Reassuring Love Triumphs Worldly Hate | 1 John 3:13-16

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1st John chapter 3 verse 13 God's Word says do not marvel brothers if the world hates you

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We know that we have passed out of death into life Because we love the brothers the one who does not love abides in death

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Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer and you know that no murderer

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Has eternal life abiding in him by this we have known love that he laid down his life for Us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers

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But whoever has the world's goods and sees his brother in need and closes his heart against him

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How does the love of God abide in him? This is God's Word Amen I want to Preface this with I probably won't get to verse 17 as It happens.

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I I find stuff and then I start Digging into it and and then it just the whole sermon comes out before I before I expect to cover everything so By way of just a brief recap we saw the last few weeks that God's Word condemns

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Cain as The very first reprobate while on the other hand

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It celebrates honors and praises the life and death of Abel The first prophet and both of these object lessons continue to speak to us today to this very day very important and Even though Abel did nothing spectacular nothing radical like many of the other prophets and apostles did

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Christ still commended him as a righteous prophet of God righteous

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Abel and Therefore Abel is a much more relevant and applicable object lesson for us all for our day -to -day example

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Abel was a righteous God -believing and God -fearing man who walked the straight path of the

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Lord in a quiet peaceable humble unspectacular way in all godliness and dignity like first Timothy 2 2 says and So should we so should all of us?

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Abel's death his blood signifies death condemnation and vengeance for sin and its consequences and It also prophetically points to the promised

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Serpent crushing seed that would redeem his chosen people

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Okay, keep this in mind because it's going to come in relevant Later on we likewise ought to live like Abel in light of our guilt

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God's grace and our gratitude guilt grace gratitude Remember that first and foremost we should and are commanded to trust

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God to repent and believe the gospel and And Then in light of our gratitude for his grace

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Everything that he has done for us and continues to do for us. We should subsequently strive to give

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God Not an afterthought not whatever's left over like Cain did But our first fruits and our best with our time our money our lives a living sacrifice like pastor

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David read earlier today and Honor him in air in our everyday lives just like Abel did so now with that said as we start diving into the next few verses here,

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I want to This is going to be a bit of a reactionary sermon so You'll see you'll see when that happens.

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It's going to be pretty obvious, but Something came up. And so I thought it would be important to address it good to address it here

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Now in verse 13 through 14. I want to reread that those

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Verses which say do not marvel then brothers if the world hates you

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We know That is we have God's assurance that we have passed out of death into life and praise

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God for that Because we love the brothers like Abel did Abel did not hate his brother

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Cain. He loved his brother But unlike Cain who hated and murdered his brother

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The one who does not love and that is does not love in general, but his brother in particular like Cain abides in death abides in death lives in death so to speak and Cannot abide in Christ and his anointing of truth.

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Those are those are a mutually exclusive diametrically opposed to each other light and darkness and we know that the world which hates us is

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The collective society of unrepentant unregenerate unbelievers and we know that The this world loves its own

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But it hates us and wants to replace us like sheep to be slaughtered those of us who trust and follow

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Christ The world hates us because it hates Christ who bears witness about the world that its deeds are evil the world is very evil

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The times are waxing late. That's an awesome hymn That's worth worth looking up but That's from John 7 7 now

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Turn with me to the gospel of John chapter 15 and we'll start in verse 18 The gospel of John chapter 15

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Starting in verse 18 We find out what

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Christ has to say about the world and our relationship to it God's Word says if the world hates you

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Know that it that it has hated me before it hated you If you were of the world if you belonged to the world the world would love its own

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It would love you to death so to speak but because you are not of the world, but listen to this who chose who

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I Chose you out of the world because of this the world hates you

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Now does that sound familiar? Sounds a little bit like Cain's jealousy, right?

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God had regard for Abel and for his offering but he had no regard for Abel and for I'm sorry

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Did I switch that God had regard for Abel and his offering and no regard for Cain and his offering

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And likewise in a similar manner this drove Cain's murderous jealous rage

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Against his brother and similarly the world hates us for a similar reason

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Verse 20 says the remember the word that I have said to you a slave is not greater than his master

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If they persecuted me They will also persecute you if they kept my word they will keep yours also

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But all these things they will do to you for my name's sake Because they do not know the one who sent me and why is that?

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Well, Jesus earlier said that because they are not of my sheep He has not chosen them to be a sheep and they are not therefore of his sheep

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John 10 26 listen carefully here

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Listen very carefully to the implications of God's sovereignty and Providence in this passage.

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Okay Verse 22 if I had not Come and spoken to them.

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They would not have sinned, but now they have no excuse for their sin he who hates me hates my father also and Consequently will hate you as well who believe

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If I had not done among them the works which no one else did they would not have sinned

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They would not have sinned But now that they have both seen and Hated me and my father as well.

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Now. They have both seen and hated me and my father as well That's a double.

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That's a double Guilt there But verse 25 listen carefully this happened

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For what reason to fulfill the word that is written in their law. They hated me without cause

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They hated the Messiah without cause God's prophets without cause notice

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Once again how Jesus declares that that evil men

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Doing evil things. This is prophesied from the Psalms Psalm 35 19 and 69 for and in other similar places

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Evil men doing evil things was purposed by God To happen that way it was purposed by God For them to hate

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Christ and the prophets without cause just like Cain did his brother In order to fulfill prophecy, which is exactly what

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Jesus said and if you remember what we read in Luke 11 How there's a similar?

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Parallel to what Jesus said there that God sent prophets so that they would be killed by the wicked the wicked generation

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Of the sprite belonging to the scribes of Pharisees so that they would be charged with their guilt that guilt and Be fattened up for the slaughter of God's judgment

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God isn't playing around amen, and so first John now that that said this now brings us to verse 14 in first John chapter 3 and this this is this is a difficult passage a difficult verse at face value mainly because There are some things that we have to Balance carefully, but we can't understand and distinguish it rightly cut it rightly and properly as 2nd

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Timothy 2 15 says by exercising the analogies of Scripture and a faith interpreting

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Scripture with Scripture with the rest of Scripture and the doctrines that the

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Scriptures teach and The other means as well as the other means that God has given the church to grow in her understanding

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These other tools to cut the word rightly law and gospel distinction and pastors and teachers

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Who bring to a sound doctrine as well? Etc Verse 14.

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I'll reread it again Says we know we know that we have passed out of death into life

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Because we love the brothers like Abel and unlike Cain the one who does not love in General, but his brother in particular like Cain abides in death and lives in death and He cannot therefore abide in the anointing of Christ in his spirit so Here's a very important question that this verse presents to us.

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It's a challenge That we have to make sense of Exactly how much love for the brothers is required of us

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In order to assure us that we have passed out of death into life like the verse says and likewise

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What exactly is the threshold for? the lack of love

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That leads to abiding in death Consequently Because we also see in verse 15

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Right. He who hates is everyone who hates his brother is a murderer and we know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him

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God is serious about sin. He hates sin and he hates the wicked unrepentant reprobates

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Whom he has reserved for judgment like Jude and Romans 9 and several other passages teach us and the

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Gospels from the words of Christ himself so We have to wrestle with this carefully and not fall into extremes or imbalances like so many today do this question of our assurance of salvation

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Which is what this is really about It's about how do we know that we're saved? How do we stay saved?

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And how do we know that we are saved? That we are assured of having received

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God's pardon this is extremely important for us who walk as Believers in the in the

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Christian life. One of the most important questions to truly have peace of mind

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And we will continue to revisit this throughout the rest of John's letter because this has been a prominent theme in the letter of 1st

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John and this is why at towards the end He says these things have I written to you in order that you may know

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That you have eternal life you can know that you have eternal life

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We can know for sure Now But I'm not gonna get a chance to dive into it fully right now

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I Would recommend reading the rest of 1st John and consulting chapter 18 of the of our

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London Baptist Confession it's a very excellent chapter on the assurance of grace and salvation and Also, I recommend that you check out the

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Lordship salvation classes that I taught a few years ago And if you would like to get a hold of those just let me know and I can send them to you because This is a very important very important things to think to understand and also because sadly many today

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Who are untaught and unstable? Teach an unbiblical view of assurance.

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There's many different perversions of the doctrine of assurance Some teach some teach that it's it's presumptuous

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It's called the sin of presumption to presume that you are saved That's actually what the

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Roman Catholic Church teaches the sin of presumption. That's a lie and it needs to be exposed and refuted

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Or there's other versions of this where some teach that you can lose your assurance Many teach that you can lose your assurance

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Including some Lutherans and Armenians and so on And others

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Similarly teach that you have to do something to keep you have to do something to maintain your state of salvation your assurance in your state of salvation and So they often twist passages just like this one in in verse 14 out of context in order to justify their destructive errors their destructive heresies that 2nd

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Peter 3 16 warns us against and about Now Here is a popular recent related example of someone who shipwrecks and train wrecks the doctrine of biblical assurance as well as other doctrines of primary importance

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By attempting to explain Hebrews 3 12 through 13 Which is a passage that could have very similar destructive consequences if it's misinterpreted just like verse 14 here

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See if you can guess who this is Brace yourselves. It's a it's about to get reactionary now.

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Okay, I told you it's gonna get obvious So here's what this man has to say

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He starts out by reading the verse take care brothers lest there be in any of you an evil

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Unbelieving heart leading you to fall away from the Living God Now does that remind you of someone?

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That sounds just like Cain doesn't it had an evil? Unbelieving heart he lacked faith first and foremost

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He continues I preach that to my people you can fall away from the

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Living God I'm gonna say that again. You can fall away from the

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Living God. No punches pulled Of course, if you're elect you won't But sitting there in this room right now professing believer you can fall away from the

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Living God John Piper can fall away from the Living God. He just gave himself away there that says it all right

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John Piper can fall away from the Living God if I John Piper that is make shit wreck of my faith.

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I'm a goner. I'm lost That's the way the

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New Testament sounds and it's right oh But it's so wrong. No that that was my comment.

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I couldn't help myself Let me let me try to finish this and then we'll we'll we'll blast this away.

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Okay, so He continues and this overplay of Justification and this overplay of security

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Gives a tone to a church that is not quite right this overplay this overemphasis on justification and Security gives a tone to the church that is not quite right

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Okay Hebrews 313 he continues exhort one another every day as long as it is called today that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin

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For we have come Listen to this. He says the tense of the verbs we have come to share in Christ if indeed

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We hold our original confidence firm to the end Perseverance is the evidence of regeneration

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So that's true of daily exhortation and it's true of weekly preaching Somebody asked me at the beginning of my ministry.

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When are you going to preach a salvation sermon and Give an invitation at the end I Said every sermon

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I preach is a salvation sermon Meaning this is what he means. Okay, listen carefully.

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I Keep people saved every Sunday. I Keep people saved every

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Sunday Okay Sure you do

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Nobody's getting to heaven without the Word of God. I am a means of getting people to heaven They get to heaven by hearing the

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Word of God and believing it week after week after week They have to be stirred up not to make shipwreck of their faith not to have an evil heart of unbelief

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Every Sunday is a salvation sermon if it's a faithful servant You have sinners you save sinners every

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Sunday by keeping them saved Okay If you can't say men

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You got to say ouch and you got to say anathema This is horrendous.

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This is absolutely horrendous and You know and Piper tried to quote

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Isaiah 50 verse 4 where it says that God granted What does it say he grants a

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A blessing or something to the tongue of the of the disciple in order to sustain the weary one with the word and He uses passages like these to make these incredibly false heretical conclusions

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Okay Now it's now it's time to really react to this. Okay.

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I have a I want to ask you this See how see how How balanced we are

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Does my preaching keep you all saved? Does the preaching of the word keep a believer?

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saved No, it does not No, it does not

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What does preaching do? biblical preaching sanctifies the believer after he has been saved and justified already past tense

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Biblical preaching sanctifies the believer Who has already been saved past tense justified already does not keep him saved

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Now preaching may very well save an unbeliever initially

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Because the gospel itself is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes right?

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Romans 1 16 the gospel preaching saves the all those who believe

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But preaching does not keep him saved or justified Preaching on the contrary is a primary means of our sanctification of our growing in the faith and in holiness

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Having been saved already Not of staying saved as If we could lose our salvation

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Lose eternal life. How do you lose eternal life? Piper is twisting

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Scripture and men. He's not the only one who teaches this But they they twist scripture by not accounting for what the whole counsel of God says the rest of Scripture says

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Okay Because God is the one who gives us the gift of faith which justifies us and saves us and Those who believe in him have eternal life

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That's that's the most popular one of the most popular verses in the entire world

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John 3 16 Those God so loved the world that though that he gave his only begotten

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Son that those believing in him May have eternal life now already the moment they believe now

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But does Piper mention that verse in that message no, he does not

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He does not This is no, this is what

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I call our initial assurance of salvation and He God is the one who keeps us to the very end

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Not us not my preaching not anybody's preaching and especially not

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Piper's preaching It's God who keeps us to the very end Don't don't don't get it twisted there

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Mr. Piper Turn with me to John chapter 10 verse 27. I want to Really?

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These are such important memory verses that we all should commit to memory in John chapter 10 verse 27 the gospel of John Out of the mouth of Christ Our Savior himself verse 27 my sheep my sheep

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My sheep hear my voice and I know them and they follow me and And who gives eternal life to them?

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I Give eternal life to them and they will consequently never perish ever ever and No one will snatch them out of my hand

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No one My father who has given them to me is greater than all greater than all and No one is able to snatch them out of the father's hand either

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That's twice the emphasis No one will snatch us out of either the son's hand nor the father's hand and to top it off Christ says

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I and the father are one one and the same

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God God the father has chosen us and given us to Christ and Christ Himself and the rest of the

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Godhead the father and the spirit But Christ in particular is the one who finishes who perfects the good work that he began in us

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Philippians 1 6 and No member of the Trinity no person of the

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Trinity does anything independently of the other They all partake in these

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Important functions in some sense Which is the primary work of the

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Holy Spirit now that has sealed us and Guaranteed us for redemption

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Guaranteed us for redemption like Ephesians 430 2nd

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Corinthians 122 and 5 5 say and countless other passages and These three are all one and the same

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God the same omnipotent God Ephesians 1 13 through 14 says in Him in Him in Christ you also after listening to the word of truth the gospel of your salvation

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So yes listening to the preaching of truth of salvation the gospel

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Having also believed you were then what? sealed in him past tense with what the

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Holy Spirit of promise of God's promise

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Who is given as a what as? a pledge as a guarantee of our inheritance of eternal life and so on Unto the redemption of God's own possession to the praise of his glory.

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Amen So These passages are so clear they are so clear

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It's not like they require special Understanding or extra careful study.

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These passages are clear and in They are as black and white as they can be and so a

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Pledge and a guarantee and a seal is something that God promises and that will never be revoked

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It's a guarantee From who from God? Who does not change?

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I am the Lord and I change not God cannot contradict himself and he cannot go against his own word

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God is the one God is the one who keeps you safe Not us and certainly not you and your salvation does not depend

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Your justification does not depend on my preaching on anybody's preaching in that sense

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That is false sloppy reckless twisting of Scripture Even when and even when the

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Bible commands us to work out our salvation To work it out

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Into spiritual maturity in Sanctification with fear and trembling using discernment and critical self

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Evaluation that's the same book letters Philippians 2 12. It is because we have been

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Justified with the reward of eternal life already Already we have that inheritance in Christ by faith already

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And We are being sanctified Why how? Because it is not your strength, but it is

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God's strength It is God who is effectively at work in you both to will and to work in you that is strengthening energizing

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Creating in you the longing and the ability to fulfill your purpose and your call for his good pleasure

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Amen That's Philippians 2 12 through 13 with some helpful commentaries from the

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Amplified Bible it nails it and To this

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I have to say utter shame and disgrace on Piper Who he does not even mention these passages in that message

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I listen to the whole thing Try to make sure I'm not taking him out of context give him benefit of the doubt none of it

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Not one of them he mentions the only one he appeals to is Romans 8 and Sadly he twists these verses so perversely

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It's to the abuse and contradiction of all the other ones that I just read to you and Romans 8

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Which is that all things work together for good among the rest of the chapter For those who love

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God and are called according to his purpose all things good bad and indifferent ugly This is an abuse of the law and a perversion of the gospel of grace of God because if you do if you do have an

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Evil unbelieving heart that falls away from the Living God like Hebrews 3 12 says and Therefore do not and cannot love truly

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Because without faith it is impossible to please him Like Hebrews 11 6 also says which he fails to mention

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Then you were never saved to begin with You never had Christ to begin with if you fell away from the

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Living God You never had him What does Jesus say in Matthew 7?

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Depart from me you wicked Do practice doers of lawlessness

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I Never knew you I never knew you But does

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Piper explain that? No, he does not look it up for yourself, I mean, it's torture

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I gotta warn you it's torture listening to that nonsense, but that's what we're dealing with here and It's a failure to account for all of Scripture the rest of Scripture this is what happens

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When you do not properly Interpret Scripture with the rest of Scripture not just in its immediate context

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But in light of the rest of the biblical conscious context in light of the rest of the passage in light of the rest of the chapter in light of the rest of the book in the

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Bible in light of the rest of the other books in the Bible and in light of The rest of the doctrines that the

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Bible teaches as a system matic whole God is not the author of confusion, but of peace, love, and sound judgment.

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Sound judgment and self -control. Because obviously now,

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I hope it's clear, Piper contradicts other clear passages in Scripture like the one

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I preached on not too long ago, on 1 John 2, verse 19. What does that say?

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They went out from us, but they were not really of us, for if they were of us, they would have remained.

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They would have stayed with us, but they went out so that it would be manifested that they all are not truly of us, with reference to Antichrist, who get into the fellowship and deceive others or try to deceive others into believing false doctrine.

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So this is absolutely an abominable destructive heresy.

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And Piper did claim, he did claim that if you are elect, then you will not fall away, if you recall.

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Well, if you're elect, then you won't fall away. But what does he claim that you have to do in order to stay elect, in order to stay chosen, in order to stay saved, in order to stay justified?

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The emphasis is on you. According to him, you are the one who is ultimately responsible for not shipwrecking your own faith, even though he may deny it because he claims to be a

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Reformed and a Calvinist and a Protestant like we hold to. But whatever happened, whatever happened to resting in God's arc of salvation?

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What about that? What about the arc of God's salvation that he built for us and sails us into heavenly eternity with?

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What about that? And he's treating it like, oh, you better watch out because you can steer your ship into wrecking itself.

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I'm sorry, Piper, but you're shipwrecking your own doctrine into utter destructive heresy.

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That's not what the Bible teaches. That is not what the Bible teaches. Those who make shipwreck of their faith never had the true faith to begin with.

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Never had it. The scriptures are very clear. You cannot lose eternal life.

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So it gets worse, of course, not surprisingly with Piper.

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It gets much worse. And this ties into Piper's other false teaching of final salvation, which is a very popular false teaching, very prominent among many popular teachers, even in our tradition, the

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Reformed Protestant tradition. And it goes, they all teach very similar things, like when a believer dies, he has to prove himself worthy of entering heaven in the courtroom of Christ by presenting his good works.

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You have to present your inherent righteousness in Piper's own words.

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He says that legally and forensically in order to justify yourself worthy of heaven.

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This is another false justification, a quote unquote final one that is required supposedly for us to enter heaven.

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Utter, utter nonsense. It is anti -Christ teaching. And this completely undermines the first and only true justification that Christ fully and finally satisfied where?

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On the cross at Calvary. That's when he declared it to be finished, done once for all time, like Hebrew says as well.

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The book that he quoted to try to spout his nonsense. So now

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I know I'm getting a little heated here, but it's necessary to rightly understand and refute this trash because that's what it is.

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It's spiritual trash and it leads people into destruction. If you want more information about this,

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I don't have time to fully draw this out. You can also check out my other work on, I've written articles on this and we've done podcasts on this from our, on our

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Thorn Crown Ministries website. I encourage you to check that out. But I want to encourage us to memorize also

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John 5 .24 in light of all of this garbage that you heard. John 5 .24,

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truly, truly, I say to you. He who hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life now, now, right now.

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And does not come into judgment, does not come into judgment, but has passed, has passed out of death into life.

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Amen. He who believes has already received eternal life from Christ and has passed out of death into life now.

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And it's funny because isn't that similar to what 1 John says in verse 14.

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John is describing another side of the same coin. He says, we know that we have passed out of death into life.

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How is that? By what Jesus taught and said, by believing in him, because we also love the brothers.

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That's another sign of the evidence of God's grace working in you. It's another side of the same coin.

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So that's what the, there's no judgment for believers. There is no judgment for believers.

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We have now been received as sons of God. Christ is no longer our judge.

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He is our advocate, our defense attorney. God is no longer our judge, but our indulgent father, like John Calvin beautifully says in his institutes, an indulgent father now who accepts, he says, come, you are my beloved son.

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There's no judgment for us, only an award ceremony for the good works that we have done.

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That's it. So public service announcement, number, probably number five at this point, but this is very important to keep in mind.

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Always unstable men like Piper repeatedly affirm themselves to be sound.

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They use the Bible. They will preach. He's been preaching for six decades. They will preach, and they'll claim to hold to what we hold to, what we believe, the same doctrines, the same confessions, the same standards, the same

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Bible. Supposedly they will affirm themselves to be sound, but this is disingenuous because their teaching undermines the doctrines of the

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Bible, the gospel of the gospel of assurance and of the perseverance of preservation of the saints, because we cannot lose eternal life.

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He who began a good work will finish it and will never. No one will ever snatch you out of your father's and the son's hand, your savior's hand.

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He keeps us to the very end and thank God for that, because if it were up to us, nobody would make it.

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That's why it had. He had to do it all for us because apart from his grace, none of us will make it.

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None of us are worthy and none of us are able. We're fallen, wretched sinners, apart from the grace, the overpowering grace of God that changes us to now love our brothers and love our enemies and be received into eternal life without judgment.

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So another very important public service announcement.

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One of the biggest problems with these men like Piper is they they very often do this.

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Piper does this all over the place. Whenever he preaches, when he writes books, it's everywhere is over applying a single verse and overextending it and therefore corrupting its true meaning.

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I like when I was talking to Pastor David about this. I like how he put he he puts this.

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He put it. He said that what what this tends to happen, what these men tend to do is that they they make an entire forest out of a single tree instead of getting the trees, recognizing the trees that make up the forest.

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So hyper focusing on a verse over applying it, overextending it to the point of now it's contradicting the rest of the forest.

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The rest of the scripture. That is a seriously destructive error to make, and you see the consequences that this leads to because you make utter nonsense and contradict basic Bible doctrines like salvation, like justification, like the gospel, like our assurance, like eternal life.

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Dangerous stuff. Dangerous stuff. One of one of Piper's fatal flaws.

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Is that he does not interpret the Bible correctly after preaching for six decades.

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Doesn't know how to interpret the Bible correctly, making basic blatant contradictions like this.

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He's 79 years old. He does not make proper use of the analogies of scripture and of faith, though he may very well claim to be claim to be doing it.

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It does not harmonize scripture into this system of sound doctrine that it teaches.

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That's the consequence of this destructive tendency. You twist, you twist one scripture, several scriptures, and then you start contradicting the rest, all the rest of them.

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You can't make sense of the Bible that way. God is the logos, the logic, the wisdom, the reason of God.

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He doesn't contradict himself. And the twisted irony of all of this is that Piper's message was about the privilege of preaching of all things.

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Sad. So do not be deceived, beloved, by these false views of salvation and assurance and of preaching and of, oh, gosh, it's just these foundations.

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These found these doctrines are so foundational that when you mess that up, you start messing up everything else.

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Because these are the doctrines, the hinge on which all religion turns. The article by which the church stands or falls are these doctrines of salvation, like Lutheran Calvin said.

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Now, I hope that's clear, beloved. I want to finish answering the question now that I first proposed to us from verse 14.

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What what exactly how much love for the brothers is required of us to assure us that we have passed out of death into life?

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And likewise, what is the threshold for the lack of love that leads to abiding in death? We've already started to answer this.

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A question. The most basic thing is to remember that you cannot interpret a passage without recognizing what the other scriptures say.

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OK, first, remember and keep abiding in this truth that much of this passage is descriptive.

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Also, it is descriptive and describing and indicating a reality.

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In addition to contrasting the fruit and the lifestyle of those who do believe in Christ, who have faith in Christ.

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Like Abel did and does, and those who do not believe and do not repent.

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They do not repent like Cain failed to do, like Esau and so on.

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They don't have repentance, beloved. That's what John is saying here.

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It's not that, well, oh, you hate somebody, you're guilty of hellfire. No, it's do you have repentance when you have hateful thoughts?

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When you even even murder physical murder, God can still forgive sin, all of that sin.

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But he gives us repentance with it, that change of mind and of conviction to recognize sin for what it is and to recognize

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Christ for who he truly is, the only savior. For all our sin.

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So it's not it's. Is repentance present and faith present?

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That's what this ultimately boils down to. I like this quote from W .R.

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Noe or Arnott. I know I think that sounds better. He says, faith in the

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Lord Jesus and love to all the saints constitute a well -understood and oft recurring sequence in the

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Bible. It is a straightening about a choking. That upper spring of faith that makes the outflowing streams of love fail in their channels.

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That's that's that's the the cause and effect relationship that he's describing, that this passage also describes, because what was the most foundational thing that Cain lacked?

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He lacked faith. By faith, Abel offered up a better sacrifice than Cain did, right?

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He lacked that upper spring of faith from which everything else flows out of the love.

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For the brothers and everything else, the repentance and everything else that flows out of that. Faith must come first.

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Everything else follows that. Of course,

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God has to regenerate us first. He has to make us alive from the dead. He gives us new life and grants us with that new life faith in his son in the gospel.

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But that's the channel through which all of these blessings flow out of.

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Ultimately, then the answer lies in the gospel promises and assurances that are beautifully summed up in verse 16 of 1st

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John, chapter three. If you turn with me there back over there in 1st

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John, chapter three, verse 16. This is an amazing gospel promise here.

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This is so important, beloved. Another powerful memory verse as well.

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By this, we have known love by this.

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We have known true love that he he

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Christ laid down his life for who? For us, for us on our behalf, willingly and saved us because of his great love for us.

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It is done. It is done. He satisfied all the demands of the law that condemn us apart from his finished work, his life and death on the cross.

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And we, therefore, ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.

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Amen. This is a this is the key to understanding the doctrines of the

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Bible. And with respect to our salvation, there's a cause and effect relationship here. And John is explaining it for us here.

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We have known love because of what Christ has done for us. He gives us faith.

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And we, therefore, ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. We live a life of gratitude and obedience to God as a result of what he did for us.

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We love him because he first loved us.

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But, oh, Mr. Piper failed to mention any of these things.

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Any of them and many men today teach these destructive, imbalanced errors that we we have to have a balance of these things properly in our understanding, because without faith, it is impossible to please him.

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For he who draws near to God must first and foremost believe, believe that he is who he says he is and that he is a rewarder of those who seek him.

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Amen. Hebrews 11, 6. Hebrews 11, 6, which I preached on these past several weeks, for in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision mean anything but faith, faith working through love.

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Faith working through love, not the other way around.

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Faith comes first, works through love by the upper spring of faith, causes the channels of outflowing love to pour down in our lives as God renews and changes our minds and renews our lives to conform us to his image and to be more and more like him.

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Live unto holiness, righteousness and obedience to his word and die more and more unto sin, unto the flesh and mortified and put it to death.

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That is what the word of God teaches us here, beloved.

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That is what we must understand. That is what we must understand. I will leave you all with this, with this final point that this is what

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Abel's prophetic death was pointing to all along to the promise serpent crushing seed that would redeem his chosen people to Jesus, the mediator of a new and better covenant and to the sprinkled blood which speaks better than the blood of Abel, better than the blood of Abel, more final than any blood of goats or animals or anything else.

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The blood of Christ fully, finally satisfied our sin debt,

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God's wrath, our pardon. And from that, we can have the full forgiveness and eternal life.

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And God's people said, amen. Let's bow our heads now with a word of prayer.

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Our precious almighty heavenly father, we thank you, Lord, for the blessing of your preached word.

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Father God, we understand that your word preached red, but especially preached has powerful means of grace that sanctify us,

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Lord, as believers who receive and believe your word. And thank you, Lord, for helping us to understand that we are not saved or maintain our salvation by our own efforts, but by what you have done for us already and continue to work out in us,

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Lord, by your spirit and by your means. Father, we know we have a role to play.

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Lord, we do have a role to play. We understand these things that we have to, we have a role to play in our sanctification, but by your grace, you have accomplished it all.

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And you have already prepared all the good works for us to do before hand.

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Like your word says in Ephesians two, father, you've prepared it for us beforehand. Everything that you've called us to do.

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And for that, we thank you, Lord, for upholding us with your righteous, omnipotent hand, you and your son who uphold us and firmly hold on to us such that no one, no one, not even us can be taken out or snatched out of your hands.

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Father, we thank you, Lord. We ask that you would bless us with these, with the understanding of these deepest, most important truths and doctrines that your word teaches us and gives us true assurance.

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Father, a true comfort and joy and assurance of knowing that we have eternal life already by your precious son and your precious gospel that saves us to the uttermost, to the, to the uttermost

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Lord, just like your word says. We thank you father God. And we ask these things in your precious, in the precious name of your almighty son.

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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.

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If you're looking for a church in the El Paso, Texas area, or for more information about our church sermons and ministries, such as Semper Reformanda Radio and Thorn Crown Network Podcast, please contact us at thorncrownministries .com.