Romans 15:16 - How We Are Made Believer-Priests, Pt. 3 (11/13/2022)

Amen wow that was marvelous I was thinking about I know just enough music to be dangerous with it but I know enough to know that that's amazing that the two of you put that together and just beautiful thank you beautiful and I agree with you we should like have that all organized where something like that happens every

Sunday and we do have an unusual amount of musical talent in a congregation this small

I mean it's such a blessing even have a couple named the musics and so that I mean think about that it doesn't get better than that it's all orchestrated isn't it it's so so marvelous all right well thank you so much that was a blessing and and when you think you know

I sit there and think well I can't do that but I will be able to do that in heaven because I've already asked part of my prayer life is

I've asked the Lord to let me be able to sing when I get to heaven so hopefully I'll be able to even by then but and I've also

I pray for Ron the same prayer too and I'm messing with you

I appreciate you more than anybody because because you will you will do it and uh no you're a blessing

Ron I'm serious about that to to lead us in singing and that was a great choice today so we've had a great start today so good to see each and every one of you and uh you're right it is a great crowd today but we had a huge Sunday school class today uh

I think uh Ben and Dave must be out you know soliciting during the week come we pay you money you know whatever

I don't know what you guys are doing but it's working it's great so all right uh well we best get started because we never have enough time

I noticed Dave said he ran out of time this morning I think that's just part of how it is when you're teaching there's so much you know you literally could go all day on just about any topic so uh we're in Roman chapter 15 verse 16 where it says that the

Gentiles can even offer up acceptable sacrifices so we kind of stopped right there and started talking about that a lot and we've been talking about how when you get saved

God makes you to be a believer priest and what does that have to do with and we've talked about uh quite a few aspects of this but really what's funny is years ago

I did a study on the believer priest and everything that we've talked about for how many Sundays now six or seven

Sundays all of that's just Roman numeral one and we haven't finished it yet we'll finish maybe what we started last

Sunday morning all that's just like the very first part of this amazing concept that really comes to fore when you go into the

Old Testament and you look at what the priests did and what their role was and realize that is just a picture it's like a a model of the real thing that's what we're supposed to be doing now the spiritual side of it that was a physical picture of the spiritual thing that we're supposed to be involved in right now on this planet in time and space uh while we see what seems to be the whole world falling uh apart oh hey by the way let's see

Matt could you bring me my phone I can't preach without a phone just like you your bibles are on the phone uh

I don't even know where I put it it's up there somewhere do you see it I gotta read

I gotta read something something uh to you here because to show you the environment that we live in in case you don't know did

I get the camera in about the right place Ben or can you tell that was just luck okay um so we just you do know we just had an election correct uh if you want to if you want to call it that um let's see

I was just looking up something let me see if I can find this right quick Joseph Biden oh it didn't it's not showing at all that's too bad oh there it is okay

I'm looking at a particular precinct in Nevada and Biden during the presidential election only won 53 percent of this particular precinct it's called

Clark County remember that number barely over half right barely over half okay so here's what happened um after the after election day on Tuesday the entire week they're still counting votes in that particular state for whatever reason

I mean like Texas was done by midnight Florida was done by midnight we have millions more people than they have there so they just take they stretch the thing out and they just leisurely in the dark corners late at night count these things that the press called called batches of votes that just come in from somewhere so here's here's what happened there now by the way this has to do with the control of the senate all right so on election day in that particular uh state in Nevada uh there were two people running

Cortez Mastos was uh the incumbent senator and she was running against a guy named

Adam Laxalt and the AP concluded that Mastos lead would carry now this was after a whole week went by after election day this is like Saturday following election day on Tuesday they concluded that she will win even if Republican Adam Laxalt made gains in rural

Nevada counties that are still counting votes so they're not even done yet as of yesterday they still weren't done counting all of the votes in the out you know where the farmers and ranchers live and guess what they are you think they're

Republican or Democrat they're Republican so you wonder okay why are they taking so long counting those votes and why do they wait to count them after they count all the rest of these batches that come in in between election day and Friday they wait till Saturday to finish off the outlying

Republican votes um so here's what happened her victory allows the

Democrats to retain control of the Senate with at least 50 seats and Vice President Kamala Harris is the tiebreaker now this is true even if um

Hershel Walker wins in Georgia so even if he wins we still we still lose the

Senate because of what happened here in this county the Associated Press called the Nevada Senate race for Democrat Senator Masto they called it in her favor on Saturday I mean a whole practically a week after the election day after a batch of votes from the

Las Vegas area a pristine part of our country by the way Matt and I spent the night there once after a trip in some beautiful mountainous areas but we had to fly home from there we were freaked out all night in that hotel and could not wait to get on that plane we literally thought we were going to blow away in a sandstorm and that the devil had taken over while we were there that the devil chose that one day to destroy the place while we were there but we finally flew out the next morning praise

God anyway so this is where we are in this particular decided the entire

Senate of the United States of America the most powerful nation in the world was decided right there in Nevada and the gambling mecca of the

United States of America and you know as Baptists we don't gamble you know that right because they they a lot of reasons but anyway

I'm kind of saying that tongue -in -cheek but I don't I don't gamble so I don't know if y 'all do or not but I hope you have better things to do with your money like like give it to the school you know what

I mean it's a way better gamble because you get treasures in heaven all right so so all right so they called this and gave it to Masto on Saturday after a batch of votes from the

Las Vegas area gave her a 5 ,000 vote lead that the AP determined she would not relinquish they hadn't counted the

Republican votes from the outlying areas yet but they already called it in her favor Masto benefited in mail ballot counting since election day so these were all mail -in votes where's

Dave Dave tell everybody what they need to watch what's it called 2 ,000 mules jot that down google it and the interesting thing is you won't find it because they removed it from everything but you can get it from Dave Huber so we'll give out his email address and his home address or you can drive there and get a copy of this but you need to watch it because it shows how

Donald Trump lost the election that he actually won and it and it's verifiable it'll blow your mind all right but but not that that would have happened here in Nevada but I'm just reading this because I found it interesting this is stuff

I like to read uh most of you think I read Theological Works did that when

I was 20 no okay so Cortez Masto benefited in mail ballot counting since election day you might as well say after election was over basically winning in Clark County now that's the county where Biden only won by what percent because I asked you to remember it barely 50 52 points no

I think it's a little over 53 that's like barely half right okay same this is the same county now um

Laxalt listen to this Laxalt saw his lead of some 19 ,000 votes at midnight on election day he went to bed a winner and guess what by Saturday he woke up a loser 19 ,000 votes ahead after election night that lead had now dwindled to about 900 on Saturday he was still ahead by 900 on Saturday yesterday basically before the latest counted votes were added to the tally so now let me run this down I'm going to go back to Thursday this won't take long

I know you want to hear the Bible but this won't take long because like you're salt and light in this environment it should make you somewhat serious about what your job is as a believer priest because probably some of you need to volunteer to be missionaries

Nevada after I hear this but Clark County okay about 12 ,000 this is

Thursday 12 ,000 more votes appeared and were tallied

Thursday breaking roughly bringing roughly 62 percent to only 35 percent for the

Democrat 35 for the Republican now it was 50 50 for Biden but no this person gets 62 percent and Laxalt's overall statewide lead at this point dwindled from 19 ,000 to only 8 ,000

Friday still Clark County the county tallies 27 ,000 more votes well

I mean how do they have all these bags of votes in this one county in this one

Laxalt only got 33 percent of those supposedly by Friday Laxalt's lead shrunk to only 800 votes ahead he's still ahead after all of these batches of votes come from nowhere right so Saturday officials late

Saturday you know in the dark corners of nowhere in the middle of the night in Las Vegas the most honest place in the world officials late

Saturday released tallies from another batch of some 23 ,000 more votes and Laxalt only got 36 percent of those so now he's behind by 5 ,000 votes and they don't think the votes from the ranchers and so forth can catch that so he so they called it a lot of dead people voted that night there you have it so now the

Democrats maintain control of the Senate now you know we're gonna win at least the majority in the house but we're probably for the same reason in the same places

Georgia Nevada and one other place where they're still counting votes we need

I think it's 218 wins and not wins but a total to to be able to overdo a presidential veto which would give us control of the house and we're only seven votes from that but do you think we will get them since they're still counting votes since last

Tuesday we you know so there you have it so that's the environment that we're living in some of us that are my age or older remember a place called the former

Soviet Union it's where Russia is now but included much bigger territory and communism and atheism took over there during Lenin Stalin and Lenin and and we we thought they were going to take over the whole world and then

Ronald Reagan got elected by a miracle of God anytime a Republican gets elected it's a miracle of God like the parting of the

Red Sea because even with the cheating we win sometimes and did you know by the way that John F.

Kennedy beat Nixon by a batch of votes suddenly appearing after midnight or sometime around midnight in Chicago and he won by those few votes

John F. Kennedy would not have been president ever it would have been Nixon who was a Republican Nixon was ahead and then he suddenly lost because a batch of votes showed up in Chicago under I believe

John Daly was his name and he was known for cheating on on the election so it's been going on for a long time well anyway so so now we have it where they will control the senate because Kamala Harris becomes the tie breaking vote because it's 50 to 50 and in the house we will probably not quite get to the 218 which means we cannot overcome a veto which means the

Republicans have zero control of anything except the Supreme Court which has pretty much ended federally funded abortion hallelujah isn't that great and President Trump made that happen so hallelujah we got some young ones that are coming up going to be

Republicans I can tell so I'm not a pastor sitting here telling you whether to be Republican or Democrat I don't care what you are

I just want you to vote for the person who's who is most nearly aligned with scripture as far as the actions that they will do in the government

I don't really care about how they live their life because you're not voting for a pastor all right you're voting for a president or whatever you just need to look and see how they're going to lead the government and the ones that more closely fit the scripture such as no killing babies that's a big one

I really don't think you need to look much beyond that one the others don't even matter compared to that one so just look at that one and vote for the person that won't kill the babies there you have it so it could be a

Democrat could be a Republican I don't care so that's the end of the

I decided to start this sermon with a rabbit trail rather than inserting them all in the middle like I usually do so let's pray and ask the

Lord to remove the junk from our minds that I just inserted but it is real it is

David's Sunday school lesson was fantastic today it was on how David was running for his life with Saul trying to kill him when

God had already anointed David as king well God's already anointed us as king priests right we're already we already are kings and priests and we will be running this world as the king part of us for a thousand years it's already done and yet here we sit running from the enemy like David was

David right we're running from the enemy all over the place and sometimes we lose our

I don't know our joy because we focus on that enemy and the fact that they're trying to kill us every day and destroy us and destroy our testimonies and our influence in this world every day but guess who wins in the end king

David won in the end which is a picture of Jesus sitting on that throne for a thousand years and somebody in this room some unlucky person probably

Ron is going to get to run Corsicana and Navarra County for a thousand years you're tired already amen all right let's pray

Lord thank you so much for your word and we ask your Holy Spirit to teach us today so that we might be useful in your hands as you bring these thoughts to our minds when we need them as we talk to our friends and our family and maybe even a few

Democrats around us in Jesus name amen and I say that lovingly of course so we've been talking about this concept of believer priests and we came down to this idea of how do we even become believer priests well

God makes us to be one it's not something we get because we're good it's not something we get to do because we are great at other stuff it's like he just names us one he anoints us to be believer priests now we're kings too but that part won't be happening until the thousand year millennial kingdom

I'll promise you you're not going to get to run Corsicana probably until that happens Ron so don't even try you might get gunned down but at that point if they try to gun you down it'll be fruitless because you'll be in your glorified body you'll be immortal and so anyway we talked about that now we were in first Peter chapter one starting at verse three in case you missed that you might want to jot that down to go back and read some of this but the first thing that we noticed was that we become believer priest according to his abundant mercy it's about mercy it's not about us doing good works and earning it it's all about God's mercy and Titus 3 5 through 7 we talked about that it's according to his mercy by the washing regeneration and renewing of the holy spirit we get saved we get born again and along with that one of the things that he does there's over 33 things he does in an instant when he saves us one of them is he makes us believer priests but it's according to his abundant mercy and it talked about we're born again and all that I don't want to rehash everything we talked about last time so you can go back and listen to to it out there on our website so first Peter chapter 1 verses 3 through 9 we covered last

Sunday now let's do this let's drop down to verse 18 so turn with me to first Peter chapter 1 verse 18

I want to pick it up right there I would love to get through this part and get into what's actually

Roman numeral 2 on this study of believer priests and get into the Old Testament a little bit with you just give you a taste of that this morning because it's really quite amazing all right verse 18 first Peter 1 chapter 1 and verse 18 for as much then as you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things such as silver and gold from your vain lifestyle received by tradition from your fathers boy could you ever stop there and talk a little bit you know

I would start with the Roman Catholics they had the biggest batch of tradition from their fathers that they put on the same level as this book or even higher than it in many places that's really bad but then

I've got to write down to the Bapto -Catholics and the Pento -Catholics and the

Church of Christo -Catholics and the Methodo -Catholics and they're all doing it every great denomination goes through a cycle from God being sovereign and in control of all things to man has to get a little more and a little more until there ends up in Arminianism where man is controlling really important stuff in the church including changing the gospel from is not even the gospel of the

Bible anymore but no one recognizes that because they don't remember what the gospel is that has already happened in America it's not even the same gospel and I don't have time to talk about it would be a rabbit trail for this particular sermon but I sure do love that rabbit trail but I'm not going to talk about it today unless someone pulled my arm and I would have to talk about it a little bit but anyway let's just put it this way here's the true gospel blood of Jesus plus nothing

I'll leave it at that for this morning you can't add anything to it you didn't do it it's something

God did to you thanks for pulling that arm run and it's called the operation of God you're the patient and it's heart surgery and you can't do your own heart surgery ever figured that out yet you can't do that someone has to do it to you someone way more skilled has to do it to you and it's heart surgery and the

Bible says God is the surgeon and he and it's called the operation of God it has nothing to do with you or your works or anything that you do nothing nothing whatsoever the cause of your salvation has nothing to do with you it's the parents that birth the babies and Jesus said it's like being born again and the baby has nothing to do with his own birth he just enjoys it that's the same way salvation works right so there's your rabbit trail but but that's that's what the

Bible teaches the gospel is nowadays the gospel is really different even in the baptist churches now you got to do two things not it's not enough for the

Holy Spirit it's not enough for this why we're reacting our sins have he quickened us that mean brought us to life boom it's done that's the cause of salvation oh but after that there's a lot of things that happen they're called effects things that you do because you are now saved and the churches want to grab two or three of those things and put them in front say well you got to do that to get saved that's not the gospel and that's what

I meant by saying the gospel is not the same anymore oh what do I got to do to get saved there's nothing you can do but every church tells you you got to do something anybody ever been to one that didn't can you name it for me any church that didn't tell you here's what you got to do to get saved well if you got to do it you didn't get saved that way now

I got to be quick yeah is that what you're trying to remind me oh yeah thanks that's true this church does not say that but I got to be quick to say this because I messed up once and the first time

I ever thought of this and preached oh it cost me some heartache and one of our members who thought they weren't saved anymore but uh if you went down to the aisle and the preacher said here's what you got to do to get saved you hear the gatta see that's a work we're not saved by works of righteousness uh which we have done but by his mercy he saved us that's titus 3 -5 right but he says you gotta pray this little prayer dear

Jesus come to heart and save me amen and you got to repent from your sins and you got to believe in Jesus shake my hand you're now saved that is not the gospel well

I said I taught that one sunday and one of our members quit coming and I asked him why and he said well that's what

I did so I guess I'm not saved and I said wait a minute I messed that up or said okay you are saved

I proclaim you saved you're saved because I knew the man he man was saved no doubt in my mind he was saved but I had talked him out of it for about a week no about two three days

I guess and so here's the deal I said I apologize to you for saying it that way here's what I will always say in the future if you come down the aisle and the preacher tells you stuff you got to do to get saved and you do the stuff it doesn't save you but neither does it unsave you because by the time you left that pew to come down to talk to the preacher you were already saved because the bible says whosoever desires to call upon the name of the lord shall be saved once your heart desire changed out there you were already saved because the holy spirit did that to you it's not something you can even do you were lost five seconds before that and the whole week before that you didn't want to be a christian you're out there god of your own life and all of a sudden something happens you might have been in the pew

I was in my car driving to work when it happened to me who knows where you are and all of a sudden you just something happens and you look up and you say wow

I think you could run my life better than me here's my life and you don't even know why you did it well that's called being called right you're called by the holy spirit and that's how salvation works while we were yet in our sin had he called us that's the cause of salvation then all this other stuff is stuff that happens because we are saved and churches want to move that in front and say but you've got to do that to get saved you see how it's not the gospel okay rest my case on that so uh it's not the gospel anymore because you're putting effects in front of the cause and saying you got to do it now you're no better than the roman catholic church you have got tradition the church tradition of what your church says you got to do whatever it is your pentecostal grew up they had even more like you had to have short hair women had to wear dresses men could wear shorts though women had to have really long hair and their dress had to be up to here like this

I'm getting older I need to wear clothes like this because this thing yeah my grandbabies like to grab this and play with it so loose now so I'm going to start lifting weights and build these muscles out like this you watch

Matt where's Matt you're going to help me right and Ben when you get moved out there we're going to we're going to do a little operation of God on this right here or I could just get it clipped and do this see but you know what you know what the problem you know the problem with that is because when you do that right it takes your mouth and does this so then you got a really wide mouth

I don't know it rapture Lord Jesus come quickly I don't like getting old baby boomers don't like getting old we don't get old do we just don't get old we just look old oh well whatever all right

I was playing with Parker the other day on the floor where's Parker he'll remember we were down there playing the little

G .I. Joes and I was telling him about the good ones you know any of you guys know about the good ones that were this big when they came out and he looked at me and said

Papa I can see part of your head through your hair and I said

I said well Parker you know when you get over your hair gets a little thinner and he says Papa I can see your whole head through your head

I swear and I said Parker you can play by yourself and I'm there went and found me

Gemma or somebody after that who has never mentioned my hair Maddie's never

Abby's never Sam never you see that's how you figure out who gets the inheritance sorry

Ben all right so look at this 1st

Peter 1 18 I knew there was some Bible in the sermon somewhere for for as much as you know that you were not redeemed bought by paying a price what is it that bought you something plus nothing what was it the blood of Jesus plus nothing you were redeemed with not redeemed by corruptible things such as silver and gold and stuff from the

Bain traditions of whatever church group you grew up in and they all have them none of that saved you none of that was the cause of your salvation doesn't the

Bible say that look at verse 19 but that that means okay so how do you get saved but with thee not you know the word thee means like this is the only thee this precious blood of Christ as a lamb of God without blemish and without spot that is the only thing that can save us now that blood was shed but it had to be applied to us individually the

Passover in the Old Testament's a great example that they had to take the hyssop weed and dip it in the blood of the sacrificial lamb which pictured

Jesus coming in the future and they had to shake it on the doorpost and the death angel passed them by and they it saved their children and their family but they had to apply that blood and that hyssop weed is a picture of faith but it's also a picture of the

Holy Ghost because it is the Holy Spirit when he calls you while we were yet in our sins hath he quickened us that means brought us to life what he did was he became the hyssop weed in a sense because he applied that blood to you individually and every one of us got saved at a different moment in time in a different place and in a different way with regard to what we were thinking was saving us which is the prayer that we prayed we thought that's what saved us and yet that very prayer was a response it was an effect of the fact that the

Holy Spirit had already saved us and made us want to be that way because two seconds before that we didn't want to be that way well anyway it's miraculous isn't it and so he calls us he he he places this blood and sprinkles it on our soul at a moment in time which we call our spiritual birthday and at that moment we are born again because of the work that the

Holy Spirit did on us and did over 33 things he gave us the faith of Jesus not our faith

Jesus's faith was given to us as a gift he gave us his himself he placed himself the

Holy Spirit in us and sealed us in there until the day of redemption he gave us the very righteousness and purity and perfection of Jesus and imputed that to us if it were as if it were ours and gave our sins to him while he was on the cross because God Father can transcend time and he and he died with our sins on him and we live with his righteousness in us all of this was done and I don't know about what 28 other things and that's the work of God in our life and part of it was he made us to be a believer priest while this was happening so we were saved not by the tradition of the church but with the precious blood of Jesus as a lamb without blemish and without spot who barely truly was foreordained brother

David you believe in foreordination yeah kind of because it's in the bible hundreds of times Jesus was foreordained before the foundation of the world so Jesus was slain in the father's mind before he created anything yes amen can't get the adults to do it but them babies will do it yeah

I got it yeah I'm gonna sick him brother preacher who really who barely was foreordained before the foundation of the world but was manifest in these last times for you don't you think it's pretty cool that Paul and the apostle

Peter both called their lifetime to be part of the end times so if they're part of the end times how much closer are we to the second coming yeah because there's a lot of stuff that's happened that hadn't happened yet when they said that such as Israel was destroyed after they said that and then put back together again in 19 whatever it was 40 when was it night no 19 uh when was it 1943 or something like that no it was after world war ii so 48 48 thanks yeah so wow now that had happened yet and uh you'd you'd never seen uh president

Biden offer a pig I'm sorry it's probably not him or I could say something really funny but I am not going to say that I'm not going to mention who the pig could be but anyway that he offers on the altar which is going to be a sign it hasn't happened yet but it could happen soon um

I am being bad today who barely was foreordained before the foundation of the world but was manifested in these last times for you

Jesus was the greek word for manifest is interesting because it means it comes before our senses so like it's a spiritual thing that you can't see smell taste or feel that is made to be physical where you can see smell taste and feel it and Jesus was manifested the bible says that Jesus was all of the fullness of the godhead in a body so physical so we could see the bible says he was

God with us because we can't that you can't even fathom what the father is you say well he's a spirit a lot of people picture him as an old man on the throne the father is not shaped like a man and he's not on a throne he's a pure spirit being which is indivisible if you could picture we don't know what spirit is but if you could picture it as particles lots of particles of something each particle would be fully

God now think about that he's because he's indivisible so you you've never seen the father you never will see the father the only one who has ever seen the father is

Jesus so he's the only one who can tell us about the father and I got upset about that one time and told brother

Otis it bothers me I'll never see the father he said brother David you'll see the father someday through the eyes of Jesus think about that that's profound because I'm in Christ right

Jesus can see him so I can see him anyway that's the

Sunday school teacher Dave and Ben that you guys have to follow along with brother Bill the physics professor but you can do it and you are doing it very well

I might say because you guys had a teacher they didn't have me and Kate and Ashton right in Charlotte but anyway so who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world but was manifest in these last times for you who who is the you you always have to ask that who is the you is it every person that ever lived in the world because the because the modern gospel says

Jesus died for everybody the bible doesn't say that it he died for the elect which means he died for the sheep not the goats now we don't know who the sheep and the goats are sometimes sometimes we do know seemingly but sometimes we don't know but he always knows and he said of those sheep

I will lose nothing now Maddie normally agrees with my sermons but today she she disagrees

I'll go visit her this week she'll probably come back like a year ago that would have freaked her out if I said that but now she's grown who okay catch this look at verse 21 there's so many little subtle things in this passage that the church at large today knows nothing about and I listen

Charlotte I were talking about this on the way we're not the only true believers in the world seems like it sometimes like when you look at churches that we know of in this town teach that God's got little pockets of people that believe right all around the world

I run into them from time to time always surprises me does it you like when you run into somebody that actually gets it but there are thousands and hundreds of thousands of them probably around somewhere in the world different places could be a whole batch of small groups like this one see they have batches of boats that come in after election day we have hidden batches of Christians that are born again soldiers believer priests all over the place but sometimes it feels like you're on that hill by yourself and there's no reinforcements but boy when those reinforcements show up as in that how many angels are around us right now that we can't see

I wonder but look at this who barely was foreordained before the foundation of the world but was manifest in these last times for you who now who's talking about the one that was manifest who's that Jesus that's

God with us right he was manifest for us who by him do believe in God now what does that mean now the modern gospel says you come down to this aisle and that preacher or someone in the church is going to teach you a prayer formula to pray and you're going to pray it and that's going to make you be a

Christian how come people like that who can answer that question why do people like that well go ahead you want to have control over who gets saved and who doesn't right especially moms think about it you got some of you more than one kid don't you want to control that they all get saved be honest with me okay so here's what you would have to do it if you could you would have to be perfect and you know what they might look at your hair someday and say you know what

I can see your head through that hair and they're gonna know you're not perfect and so if it was up to you they might not all get saved might not none of them get saved right bad grammar good preaching

I have to say that because we got teachers in the room front row so so anyway wouldn't it be better if a loving all -knowing pure love spirit being was in control of saving your kids who will never let them down who will always be there for them who will hear every prayer they preach even be a prayer they preach that's not like a preacher every prayer they pray even before they get saved you know that salvation moment even before that he hears every prayer that they pray wouldn't that be better let's see that's how it really is and humans don't like it because of what you said because humans want to be in control of everything including god but we're not so it's by him that we believe you can't believe on your own the world tells you that part of the formula for getting saved is you've got to believe what do

I got to do to get saved you got to believe even the baptists say that do they not and some of them add repent don't they how many of you went to a baptist church says you got to believe and repent raise your hand

I did yeah so there's two things you have to do so those are works that you have to do to get saved and so now if that's true you could lose your salvation because you might stop repenting you might go back to some of that stuff you you gave up right am

I right or not like you live in a body of flesh you think you might could like do one of them again no don't get ahead of me on this sermon

Dave you know stuff you're not supposed to know I'm saying if you did it and you didn't know that stuff and you had you thought you got saved by believing you're terrible he's like he's the choir right so all you're supposed to do is say amen okay all right so so like you didn't know that stuff and you were he ruined this whole thing all right so hey don't laugh

Dave when we're on the back row he does that to y 'all while you're teaching too and so do I by the way anyway so like you don't know that stuff so I told

I'm the preacher so I told you got to believe and repent to get saved and you did it you came down dear lord I am so sorry for all that smoking and drinking that I used to do as Dave Huber and I'm sorry and womanizing

I talk to her sometimes I know about that no I'm totally making this up totally making this up and he and he comes down and he prays that prayer and I go shake my hand you're a

Christian right isn't that how it works so what happens if not on some of that stuff but like you pick up the smoking again you never smoked all right good example then

I wouldn't hate to pick someone that that's a problem for but so like he picks that up again isn't it true that if that's what saved him that he just lost it well that's why so many of your friends tell you that they you can't have eternal security because their salvation was was based on stuff they did

I don't care if it's just two little things believe and repent so what if you didn't what if our church didn't have the repent part you just got to believe which first baptism hey where I grew up that's all they had was that one okay so all of a sudden some loved one in your family gets really ill like we've had some really serious prayer requests this year haven't we still do today and someone gets deathly ill that you love so much with all of your heart

I lost my mom this year okay and you prayed Lord raise them up I believe you'll save them and raise them up and give us more years together and then three weeks later they go to heaven and all of a sudden your faith was here where is it now

God didn't answer it because you think only a yes is an answer and your faith is way down here well it can get so low that you'd lose your salvation if you had to believe to be saved think about it

I'm telling the truth I know I'm preaching too but some of it's the truth right isn't that the truth so isn't it nice that your salvation it doesn't work that way look at verse 21 again who by him you believe in God so apparently it was the

Holy Spirit who opened your eyes one day wherever you were when it happened opened your ears where you could hear the gospel message you could see

Jesus is the Messiah he is the shepherd and I'm a sheep and I'm hungry you've heard me say a million times that he's got the food and he became irresistible to you and and yes you were saved and after you were saved then you believed you know why because part of what he gave you as a gift was

Jesus's faith and it doesn't depend on that prayer being answered yes or no because I happen to remember one

Jesus prayed that God answered no Lord would you take this cup for me so I don't have to die on the cross for them if you could if you could save them without me doing that would you and what did the father say no and what did

Jesus say nevertheless thy will be done right he had a faith that could not be crushed ladies and gentlemen and you have that faith in you and that's what saves you so when your faith dwindles bring it back up to that tuning fork of Jesus's and set it right next to it and it'll begin to resonate at the same frequency again and you'll be fine but you don't lose your salvation because it's not based on your human belief it's based on perfect faith and so God by him you believed in the first place and by him you keep believing every day till you meet him isn't that wonderful to know by him do believe in God that raised him up from the dead and gave him glory that your faith and hope might be in God see first thing you got his faith and by him you then believe because you had his faith do you see this you see it right it's right here

I hope you look at the Bible when I'm talking so you know it's not me making this stuff up because it sounds like I am because it sounds too good to be true but it's not

Dave it's true you and it sounds too good to be true so here's his faith it saves you and then look down here at the end of verse 21 now your faith is in God it's like resonates at the same frequency but it's not the faith that saved you it's just the faith that you now have but you here's another cool thing once he gives you

Jesus's faith wouldn't you agree that if someone gives you a gift that once you take the gift and have it it's now yours so that faith is yours too so now you've got you've got salvation the

Bible way that your faith and hope might be in God now watch this look at verse 22 seeing you have purified your souls in obeying the truth now the root word for the word obey in English in the

Greek it's pistis which means believe it doesn't mean obey it means to believe and it's translated obey in English because it means you believe it means you obey the gospel well how can you obey the gospel which is all a gift of faith which is not about doing it's about believing how do you obey the gospel the way you obey the gospel is you lay aside the catholic traditions you lay aside the bapto -catholic traditions you lay aside the pento -baphthalic catholic i can't even say it and the method of that's easy methodo -catholics and you got my point you lay all the traditions the vain traditions of your father aside and you say okay none of that stuff saves me lord if you've shown me

Jesus I'm just so happy because you placed a desire in my heart for him whosoever desires call upon the name of the lord is saved shall be saved and is saved and so now

I'm saved and now my faith and hope kicks in gear I can do some good works now

I can repent now I can believe now I can do good works I can get baptized in water

I can do all these things and they're all effects of the fact that I'm already saved now so that your faith and hope might be in God seeing that you purified your souls by obeying the gospel so what does that mean it means you lay aside what the world says saves you all the works and systems and the religiosity you lay that aside and you just sit at the feet of Jesus and thank him that's faith you just look at the lamb of God who is perfect and gave his blood to totally pay your sin debt in full which means

God the father now sees you as if you've never sinned and never will sin and there is no sin on you whatsoever has been removed as far as the east from the west the bible says where does the east and west ever meet again never it's gone so think about that so your soul is purified because of that so obeying the truth is the same thing as just having the faith of Christ now think about this though in the context of verse 22 what it's literally saying when it says that you obeyed the truth the word truth is a reference to the physical written word of God this is the truth you obeyed it when you got saved because when the holy spirit called you he showed you that Jesus paid your sin debt and he died for you and he rose again and he's just called you to himself and you said yes because you're the bride and he finally wooed you the place where you said yes and the marriage takes place your soul is saved you become one with Christ he is the groom you're the bride and all of that's pictured in the bible now so here obeying the truth is a reference to the gospel that's found in this book and the interesting thing about this book is that God is the author of it but men are the penman and God even though he could have he didn't choose to just give the bible written by his own hand he actually worked together with his children to bring this to be in the world and he said it's perfect and he said he preserves it to the last generation so it's physical and we have it and you can't get saved without it it's impossible for a human to be saved without the word of God all right so this is referenced as the truth here so that's the word of God seeing that you have purified your souls and obeying the bible the word of God but look how you do it what does the next phrase say through the spirit who is that that's the holy spirit the one who called you and said you remember that stuff your grandma told you from the book called the bible about Jesus died for your sin it's true so you have the bible which is sometimes called the truth sometimes it's called the water because in Ephesians it calls it the water of the word and then you have the spirit it takes those two ingredients for anybody to be saved and the only human part of it is that God used humans to get the written word to you and he chooses to use that and sometimes has to send human missionaries where you don't have this book to tell it to you or a radio show or tv or a podcast nowadays so you hear the gospel the truth and then the holy spirit uses that information and brings it into your mind and opens your eyes enlightens it so that you believe it and he does that at the moment that he saves you so you have those two ingredients again and again

Jesus Christ mentioned them it's again and again seeing that you have purified your souls and obeying the truth the word of God through the spirit unto unfamed love of the brethren there's an effect that takes place one of the first things that happens and one of the greatest symptoms that a person's been saved is all of a sudden he loves other