Tests That Every Christian Pass (part 2) - [1 John]

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Tests That Every Christian Pass (part 3) - [1 John]

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By the way, you're my favorite church to preach to. It's one thing to go across the world and preach, but I don't really know the people that well.
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I don't know their struggles. I don't know how they think through issues. I don't know their backgrounds. But you,
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I know. And the Lord has allowed us to be here for 12 years, and you know me, and I know you. And so it's good to teach a message like this today, because I want every one of you to have assurance.
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If you're saved, I want you to have assurance of your salvation. Wouldn't you like to be able to stand on your, well,
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I was going to say stand on your deathbed, lay on your deathbed, and have the confidence like Stephen did when he was being killed, that you know you're going to heaven.
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Stephen wasn't wavering. I don't know. I had good devotions this morning, and therefore I think I might, and I hope
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I can, I wish I can. Stephen knew that when he stood up for the Lord Jesus Christ, I think the first time in all the
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Bible, Jesus on the throne stands for him. Wouldn't you like to know that I, when you die, you'll say,
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I know God will stand up and accept me into heaven. And contrary to the largest religion in New England, which says, if you think you can have eternal life and have assurance of it, you are damned.
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We're going to find out from the Bible today in 1 John that God wants you to know that you have assurance.
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Let's turn our Bibles there. The first letter of John. Not the Gospel of John, but toward the back of your Bible, the
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Epistle of John. This is part two in a series talking about five tests that all
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Christians pass. In other words, I want you to know that you have your assurance. I guess the knife could cut the other way as well.
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If you're not a Christian, I hope this text roots you out and that you bow your knee and submit to the
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Lord Jesus Christ alone for your salvation. That you would believe and trust in his sacrificial atonement on your behalf.
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That you would trust that God the Father confirmed him by raising him from the dead.
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But John writes this letter and he wants you to know that you can have assurance of your eternal home with God.
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By the way, if you're a Christian, true or false, your security is sure. The objective counsels of God, you are declared righteous by the work of another, correct?
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God credits you the perfect work of Christ, confirms it by the resurrection, and there's nothing you could do to unsave yourself since God saved you.
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And there's nothing you can do to lose that security, even though you might not feel that you have that security.
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So security of salvation is done, it's objective, it's something that God has done for us. But the way we perceive that, the way we relate to that, the way we feel that, if you will, can change.
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Sometimes we say to ourselves, I don't really feel like a Christian. Sometimes maybe you don't feel married, maybe you don't feel like you're a member of the local church.
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But these perceptions come and go and so John, you can tell this beloved disciple, writes as a pastor, he wants his people to know, he wants his people to have the joy that's made complete by knowing that you know that you're going to heaven.
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Now John could have said, I want to fix before your eyes the cross. Look to the cross and assurance will come.
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He could have done that. He could have also said, now when times are tough in Romans chapter 8, especially during times of persecution and martyrdom, there's an internal mechanism, and that mechanism is a person, he has called the
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Holy Spirit, that bears witness to our spirit that we're a Christian. True? That we feel that there's something inside of us, and again that something is a someone.
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The Spirit of God is bearing witness to our souls, you're a Christian. It's another way
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John could have gone about it. But John here says, let's give you a list of things that Christians do, and then when you say, oh
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I do those too, maybe not perfectly, maybe not totally, but that is my desire, that is my goal, it is my purpose to do these things, then you say, well if that's what
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Christians do, I do that, therefore I must be a Christian. It's going to be very important today that we don't somehow say to ourselves, if I do these things,
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God will then save me. I'll become savable, I'll become in a good situation where God will say, now
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I can take my scepter and say, welcome. That would be somehow works righteousness, and all our works are tainted by our hands because they're connected to our sinful hearts.
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But no, what John is going to say is, if you are a Christian, you'll do these things. Since God has saved you, this is how it will make itself incarnate in your life.
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Now if you turn to 1 John 5 .13, before we look at these tests that all
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Christians pass, John in his multi -purposed letter, his multi -faceted letter, says this, 1
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John 5 .13, these things I have written to you. Chapter 1, chapter 2, chapter 3, chapter 4, chapter 5, these things, written to you who believe in the name of the
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Son of God and all his attributes, his holiness, his omniscience, his omnipotence, his sovereignty, his mercy, his compassion, in order that you may know that you have eternal life.
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If I had my finger out, I would point that this sermon is for you. Sometimes I don't know about you, but I almost sit and listen to sermons thinking,
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I know this is a good sermon for you -know -who. You know, and it's the spouse, you think, ah, man, or you think to yourself,
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I wish that person would have come to the church today because it would have been a great sermon for them. But this is for you today, not your spouse, not your kids, not anybody else, but this is for you.
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John wants you to know. John writing inspired of the Spirit of God wants you to know. It's as if,
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John says, you can have a UL spiritual approval stamp put on you.
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You know what the UL approval stamp is? Well, they have them in Omaha, but I guess they don't have them here. This is a stamp of approval that you are genuine, that you are true, that you pass the test that God says, these are the tests of a
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Christian, that you may know.
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There's another verse in 1 John, I'll just read it to you, I won't tell you where because you might turn to it. But whoever keeps his word in him, the love of God has truly been perfected.
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By this we know that we are in him. The next chapter, we shall know by this that we are of the truth.
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Later in the same chapter, and we know by this that he abides in us. And then one chapter later, by this we know that we abide in him and he in us.
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God wants you to know, if you're a Christian, that you should have assurance.
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Five tests that all Christians pass. The first two are reminders from two weeks ago, and then we'll get into the next three.
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You can already tell that it's going to be a three -part series, and so that's all right. We're just working our way through this. Here's my strategy, by the way.
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For about five weeks, I hammered you with the words of Jesus in Matthew 7, yes? They were hammering words.
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You can just feel that jackhammer go. Enter the narrow gate. Beware the false teachers.
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Examine to see if you're really a Christian. You got to build your house on the rock, and you think, who could ever be a
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Christian? This is the converse side. This is after we worked on your profession to make sure it's a possession.
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Now we want to make sure you can really feel saved. The first two tests are doctrinal tests, and they both begin with confess.
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Number one, the first test that every Christian passes is, and I'll put them in the form of questions, do you regularly confess your sins?
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Is it your habit? Is it your purpose? Is it your desire to confess your sins on a regular basis? First John 1 .8,
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please. And again, just a little review, but we want to make sure we catch people up here, even in the summertime when some were not here two weeks ago.
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First John 1 .8, if we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
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If we confess our sins, he, God, is faithful, and he, God, is righteous.
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By the way, he's always faithful and he's always righteous. That's the verb tense there. And he's faithful and righteous to do what?
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Forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. It's best as a
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Christian, Christians do this, I am a sinner. I don't have to run into the dark. I don't have to give all kinds of excuses.
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My justification is found by the work of another, and I am who I am, God. You're going to call a spade a spade, and I agree with you that I am a sinner.
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We say to God, all of us like sheep have gone astray. Each of us have turned to his own way, but the
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Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on him. We don't have to run around. God knows everything. So why try to hide?
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Why try to cloak? Why try to somehow cloak and dagger it? The good news is the text says he's faithful and just or righteous to forgive us.
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The text does not say, and he is faithful to scold us, to chide us, to make fun of us, to damn us.
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When we do say, God, I'm a sinner, and I'm a sinner saved by grace, and all my best that I offer you is like filthy rags,
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God doesn't say, how could you? I'm going to disown you. God says, cleansed.
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I already cleansed you based on the work of Christ, and now as a dad would welcome a wayward child back after repentance,
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God says, oh, please. Excellent. There's a blasphemous, blatant, stiff -armed attitude that we want to stay away from, which is the opposite, verse 10.
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We claim that we have not sinned. I mean, can you believe this is in the Bible? We make him out to be a liar, and his word has no place in our lives.
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It's as if John says, you don't know anything about anything theologically, if somehow you say you're not a sinner, because everywhere you go, you see sin in the
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Bible. So I ask you the question, is there something in you that even if you go for a day or a few days, something that gnaws at you and you say,
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I know I'm not cleansed, and I'd like to feel cleansed? I'd like to run into the figurative arms of God, having him say, you're my son, and I love you no matter what you've done.
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If you like that, if you want that, if that's your desire, that's a sign of you being a Christian, because I'll tell you, when you weren't a
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Christian, you'll do the opposite. Everything about it, I don't sin, I'm not like the other people,
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I compare myself against the worst people, thank God for Hitler, Stalin, and Osama bin Laden, because I'm not like them.
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But no, we as Christians, we realize that we stand before God and God alone, there's no bell curve, there's no comparison to somebody else, compared to the holy
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God, we know we're undone, and God says, just recognize that. Do you confess your sins?
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Test number two, it also has the word confess in it, it's also a doctrinal question, do you regularly confess all the truths about Jesus Christ?
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Everything found in the Bible that speaks of Christ, you say, oh, I believe that, even if there's something new that you don't believe before, because you didn't know it, now that you're presented with the evidence, you say,
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I believe that. Take a look at 1 John 5, verse 1, they say, well, they're kind of skipping around some, and going here and there.
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This book is more layered than it is deductive, this verse is more kind of circular, he keeps repeating the same things over and over and over, and so we'll just see those kind of woven throughout the text.
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1 John 5, one, whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ, Messiah, is born of God, and whoever loves the
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Father, loves the children born of him. Remember last time I talked about belief in Christ is not necessarily what you did in the past, but your assurance today should be based on what you're doing right now, remember?
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When I told the story about Christian, and I thought her name was Sally, but I remember when I walked out, her name was
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Mary. Christian, you speak German, you speak some
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English, do you like Mary? I am liking Mary, right now, present tense, that's the language of assurance.
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It's not back in the old days I did this, I used to go to a lot of Bible conferences, I used to wake up every day and read my
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Bible, I accepted Jesus in my heart at VBS. The best way to work with your assurance is, are you confessing
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Jesus as Lord now? And it means you're not confessing Buddha as Lord, Muhammad as Lord, yourself as Lord, you say,
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Jesus is a Messiah and I stake my claim believing in him alone for salvation.
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I believe who he is, he's virgin born, he's fully God, he's fully man, every prophecy about him was either fulfilled in the first coming or will be in the second coming.
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I say with Peter, thou art the Christ, the son of the living God. If you go back to chapter 4, this theme just bubbles up again, it's almost like you get some kind of bubbling water and pour some kind of, this is going to be a bad illustration, but we'll just see what we can do, just pour in some kind of peas and carrots and sometimes the peas come up, bubbling to the top and sometimes the carrots come up.
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I tried. Jesus spoke in parables to the common man.
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I don't know when the last time I had peas and carrots would be in my life, but kind of bubbling up to the top throughout the chapters, you'll see 1
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John 4 too, this idea of confessing or agreeing with, saying the same words that God does about his son.
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It'd be pretty bad if you said, God, you say this about your son and I say something different.
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By this 1 John 4 too, you know the spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God.
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Every cult says Jesus hasn't come in the flesh and he hasn't come to die on the behalf of sinners, he hasn't been raised literally from the dead.
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Every cult messes with Christ. They have a Christological problem. And here the
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Bible says, if you want to make sure you know that you know that you're a Christian, is you say, I affirm everything about Jesus, who he is and what he has done.
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On a side note, I'll get into this more next week. When somebody knocks at your door, hi,
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I have some spiritual strychnine here in form of this little pamphlet from the Watchtower Society and I'd like to damn your soul and your kids too.
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You ought to think to yourself, they have a Christological problem. Oh, they have a sin problem as well.
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But the only way you can have your sin covered and paid for is if you have the right Jesus.
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So my friends, when they come to the door, my advice is to preach the real Jesus. To preach who
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Jesus is, they don't know. And if they do know, they try to deny it. Preach Christ.
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It's like Paul in 1 Corinthians 2, I determined, I was resolved, I made it a resolution before I walked out that door that when my mouth opens,
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I'm going to preach Jesus Christ, even that crucified Messiah. Look down at verse 15.
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Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him and he in God.
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When you say with Paul, I delivered you as the first importance that Christ died for our sins according to Scripture and he was buried, he was raised on the third day according to Scriptures.
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You are talking like a Christian talks. If you deny these things, the
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Bible says, you're a liar. Reminds me of Jesus' words in Matthew 10, whoever acknowledges me before man,
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I will also acknowledge him before my Father. But whoever disowns me before man, I will disown him before my
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Father in heaven. So I'd have some sub -questions to ask you.
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Do you accept Bible truth when you learn it? You say, this is so crazy, I couldn't believe it unless it was in the
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Bible, but since it's in there about Jesus, I believe it. That's a sign of a Christian. Chrysostom said, the source of all our troubles is in not knowing the
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Scriptures. I could ask you this question about confessing
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Jesus. Do you think there's any other way for a sinner to go into heaven? Because if you think there's another way, then you're really not confessing
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Jesus as the Christ. Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go?
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You have the words of eternal life. And we have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God.
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That is a lot different than Bill Maher saying, you can't be a rational person six days of the week and go on one day of the week, go on one day of the week to a building, and think you're drinking the blood of a 2 ,000 -year -old space god.
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That makes you a schizophrenic. You can't say you're a
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Christian and say things like John Caputo does, who says, we've got to get past this old god who forgives us only if the divine sense of honor or justice offended by sin, satisfied by the violence of the crucifixion, is made.
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In other words, we don't want some kind of angry god who punishes his son. That's like child abuse.
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And he wouldn't know that what the Bible teaches about Jesus is that the Father sent the
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Son. The Son gladly went. And it was all in the economy of the Trinity. It wasn't the
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Father angry against the Son. The Father, in the counsels of eternity, sent the
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Son. And the Son was glad to stand in the wrath, in the place of the wrath of God for us.
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I like it better instead that Bazo said to Anselm, nothing more reasonable, delightful, desirable could the world hear than about Jesus died for sinners.
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Therefore, I hence conceive so great confidence that I can hardly express the greatness of my heart's exultant joy.
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I don't know what any of that old language means, but it just means I think he's happy. Jesus died in my place.
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The text says it. I believe it. Now let's move to test number three.
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The first test is, do you confess sins? Do you confess Christ as God?
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We move now to morality tests. They all have the word love in them. As the first two had confess, confess sins, confess
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Christ, these all have love. Test number three, do you love God? Is it your desire to love
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God? Over and over and over. Sometimes, just read 1 John, you'll see how many times the word love is there.
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It's not some kind of emotional love. It's not some kind of sensual love. It's what kind of love?
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If you had to give me the Greek word, you would say agape. That's exactly right. 1 John 5 .2.
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Is it your desire to follow these words? By this 1 John 5 .2,
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we know that we love the children of God. When we, excuse me, we know that we love the children of God.
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When we love God and observe his commandments. God has orders.
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God has mandates. God has commandments. And you say, I'd like to fulfill those. I'd like to carry them out like a soldier would.
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Sometimes I fail. Sometimes I do the wrong thing. But when the push comes to shove, I say to myself,
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I'd like to do that. I'd like to follow God. This has nothing to do with warm fuzzies.
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I have a feeling, some kind of emotional love. This is I will submit myself willingly to the lordship of Christ.
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Of course we sin. 1 John 1 says, if you say you don't sin, you're a liar.
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But this is the purpose. This is the intent. This is a purpose -driven heart, if you will.
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See, I knew I could wake you up. Verse 3. For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments.
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And his commandments are not burdensome. Show me somebody who's not a Christian, and I'll show you someone who says, all those rules, a bunch like a ball and chain to me.
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I'm tired of all these rules. I want to be free. I'm my own man. I'm my own woman.
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And I just want to get rid of this yoke that's around me. I rule myself. Does that sound like a
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Christian talking? A Christian says this. Like a son would say to a father, Dad, I know you have your rules.
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But you've told me this is how far I can go playing in the backyard, and I can do anything I want. As long as I don't go past that fence, and I have freedom in those rules.
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Because I know you love me. I know you care for me. You have my best intentions at heart.
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Same thing here. The scribes and Pharisees added hundreds of man -made rules to God's law.
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And Christians don't think his commandments are burdensome. Christ has a wonderful lightning effect when it comes to his commandments.
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Augustine said this. Love God and do what you please. Love God and do what you please.
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Look at verse 3 of chapter 2. I'm going to just quickly go through chapter 2 and chapter 3.
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And show you basically a litany of this same kind of thing. That if you're a Christian, you will love
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God. I love God. Verse John 2, 3.
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And by this we know that we have come to know him. If we what? Keep his commandments. Good.
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Verse 5. But whoever keeps his word in him, the love of God has truly been perfected.
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By this we know that we are in him. The one who says he abides in him ought himself to walk in the same manner as he walked.
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Verse 17 of 1 John 2. And the world is passing away, and also its lust. But the one who does the will of the
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Father abides forever. 1 John 3, 7. You see these themes just kind of bubbling up again.
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Little children, let no one deceive you. The one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as he is righteous.
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He's not talking about works salvation. He's talking about assurance. You do what God says in his word, or you have a desire to do it.
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And when you fail to do it, you confess it. That's a sign of a Christian. Unbelievers don't act that way. Verse 24, the same chapter.
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Chapter 3. And the one who keeps his commandments abides in him. Amen. I'm with you.
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What's the name for someone who says one thing but does another? Look at 1
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John 3, 6. Now no one who abides in him sins.
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No one who sins has seen him or knows him. Verse 8. The one who practices sin is of the devil.
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For the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God has appeared for this purpose, that he might destroy the works of the devil.
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No one who is born of God practices habitually, as a lifestyle, like they used to, sin.
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Because his seed abides in him. And he cannot go on sinning, is the tense, because he is born of God.
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And one of the verses that struck me when I was a brand new Christian. People run around and say, oh, I live with my girlfriend and I'm still a
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Christian. And I've got all these kind of, you know, I'm an idolater and I'm still a Christian. And I'm a Hindu and I'm a
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Christian too. You go, it's pretty obvious to me what the story is. And then someone would retort back, well, you don't want to be a fruit inspector now.
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That's for God to decide. Look at verse 10. By this the children of God and the children of the devil are what?
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What's the word? Manifest, or what's the N -A -S -A? Obvious.
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It is obvious the difference between a child of God and a child of Satan. And here's the recognition.
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Anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God. There are two categories.
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No middle ground. You're either a saint or you're an ain't. I thought
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I knew this congregation and that was like 10 years old. 1
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John 2 .4, go there. He addresses this. Back up a chapter. The one who says, oh, I've come to know him.
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First name basis, big guy upstairs. Talk to him when I'm on the golf course.
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I know him. And does not keep his commandments is a what? Something you're not supposed to say when you're a kid.
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You're not supposed to say stupid. You're not supposed to say liar. He's a liar and the truth is not in him.
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Turn with me, if you would, to Ephesians chapter 4. I want to digress for a moment from 1 John, but not digress from the topic at hand.
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You say, well, I don't live like I used to, but I don't live like I want to.
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That's a good sign of a Christian. The unbeliever says, well,
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I sure wish I could live like I used to, but now I've got to put on this show. Ephesians chapter 4 pretty much demolishes the idea that you can say
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Jesus is your Savior and not have him as your Lord. Some kind of bifurcated Savior, some kind of fracture in God's attributes and in his name.
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And here, in a way that is not in many books talking about lordship salvation,
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Ephesians 4 .20, Paul says, But you did not learn
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Christ in this way. If indeed you have heard him and have been taught in him, just as truth is in Jesus.
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John says, if you're a Christian, you'll confess your sins. You'll confess Jesus as Lord and everything else.
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And then John says, if you're a Christian, you'll love God. And you'll love him by keeping his commandments.
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And by the way, when you first were a Christian, if you're a Christian, you were taught that very thing, weren't you?
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Let me put it this other way. New Christian, you've come down the aisle and you've accepted
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Jesus. And here's what I want you to do. You go on and sin as much as you want.
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It's all covered. You can be as impure and as vile and as filthy and as licentious and as greedy and as covetous and as blasphemous as you want.
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Because you're a Christian now. You're good to go. Were you taught Christianity that way? I hope not.
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I hope it wasn't taught you here that way. What were you taught? God has so loved you that he sent his son to die in your place.
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He has so cared for you before eternity passed, God chose you personally, and he adopted you as a son.
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He's rescued you out of the slave pit of sin, and he's put his redeeming love on you.
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And now I want you to go out and live with conduct befitting an officer.
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Live out who you are by the grace of the Spirit of God who dwells in you. You want to make your father happy.
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You want to make your father's face shine. You know there's different looks on people's faces, don't you?
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Did we talk about these looks the other day? I've been traveling enough, I don't know all my different looks. There's different looks.
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Here's look number one. It's a closed face. Scowl. That's an appropriate look sometimes, and you scrunch up your face.
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By the way, you're all scrunching your face. You should see your faces. You ever watch somebody do something, you're doing the same thing.
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Scowl, scrunched down, angry, bothered, perturbed.
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There's another face that you have, and it's the face you'll have when I bury you. That's the face of the dead. It's expressionless.
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It's nothing. But then there's the open face. And the open face is the open face.
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You should see all your eyebrows. I'm not kidding. You're all doing it. It's an open face.
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It's a happy face. It's the face that you use when you go over and you see your six -month -old baby there laying in the crib, and the baby wants to get up, and you go over and you go,
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Okay, baby. No. Hi. How are you?
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And your face is open. And by the way, your face is shining. When Aaron talks about God, would you so bless us that your face would shine when you see us?
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When you first become a Christian, you're told, because of what God has done for you at great expense, at great cost, would you live in such a way that when
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God looks at you, he'll say, That's my son. That's my child.
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Don't you get taught that way when you're a Christian? So Paul says in Ephesians chapter 4, he said,
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The way you weren't taught is get saved and then go living like the devil.
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You didn't learn Jesus in this way. In what way? Back up in verses 17, 18, 19, and 20.
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In this filthy, putrid, corrupt way like the Gentiles and the pagans live.
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You didn't learn it that way. You learned Jesus this way. It's great language. It's emphasis by understatement.
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It's the opposite of hyperbole. It's a figure of speech called elitist. It means to say something in such a way to give emphasis for the opposite.
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Let me give you some illustrations. That's no small problem.
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That's elitist. Maybe you'll like this one better. It's straight from the scripture. Jesus said,
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I will in no wise cast out. What does it mean? I'm going to receive. It's the opposite.
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How about Revelation chapter 3 verse 5? I will not erase his name from the book. What's the focus?
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The focus is, I'm going to keep it in there. It's saying the opposite with emphasis in an understated way.
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So you will say to yourself, boy, I didn't learn Christ in that way. I learned him another way.
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I learned him that when God saved me, my response is not to save myself but obey because of what he's done.
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I now learn about Christ. I learn about his word. And I say, God, I want to love you by keeping your commandments.
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And I don't act the way I used to act. Paul is basically saying this in Ephesians chapter 4.
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Maybe you learned Diana, that wild, temple, prostitute, sex god cult.
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And maybe you learned her that way. But you didn't learn
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Jesus that way. You associate with Jesus, you'll be changed.
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Look at what the pagans did back up earlier in the verses in 17 and following. In the futility of their mind.
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They live for nothing. They live for meaninglessness. They live for worthlessness. They live for emptiness.
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They couldn't produce anything eternally. Verse 18, being darkened in their understanding.
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Show me someone who sins and I'll show you the result of their sin. And that is what? More sin.
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Excluded from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them. Because of the hardness of their hearts.
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Impervious to spiritual things. Baptized themselves into sin and gross immorality.
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It was their job description, basically. What do you do for a living? I sin with reckless abandon.
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Paul says, you aren't some greedy, grueling, covetous sinner.
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You've learned Christ a different way. And that different way is, if you love me you'll keep my commandments.
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The other way was, if you love me you'll do what you want and you're still my kid. I could ask you this question.
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Ask yourself the question. Am I a happy person? Maybe not fair.
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Let me ask you it a different way. Am I a joyful person? You say, what does this have to do with anything?
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It would be my belief that you are never more happy and joyful than when you are purposely obeying the word of God.
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Just let that sink in for a second. You are never more happy and joyful than when you are consciously, purposely, with intent and will, saying,
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God, I have desires and I want to please me, but I will say no to them and I will please you.
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And the response of the fruit of the Spirit is what? Happiness.
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So you say, well, am I a Christian? Well, the Bible says, you confess your sins, you confess
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Jesus as Lord, and then you love God. How do you love God? You love Him by keeping His commandments.
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And you say, oh, yes, I want to do that. And I want to be more happy. I want to be more joyful. That's my desire.
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I want to be washed again by the word today and say, today is the day I'm living for the Lord. It's a sign that you're a
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Christian. Test number four, back to 1 John 2. Test number four. There are two confessions tests.
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There are three love tests. Confess sins. Confess Christ. Do you love God? And here's the big one.
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Do you love other Christians? Do you love other Christians? You know the little poem, the little ode.
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To dwell in love with the saints above, oh, that will be glory.
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To dwell below with saints we know, ah, that's another story.
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Christians love other Christians. 1 John 2 .10.
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The one who loves his brother abides in the light and there is no cause for stumbling in him.
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Show me someone who doesn't love other Christians and I'll show you a corpse. A walking corpse.
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And again, to use my old pastor's terminology, this isn't the perfection of your life. This is the direction.
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Every one of these things we have to look ultimately to Jesus Christ. Well, number one, he never sinned.
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He was perfect. But he was always confessing the Father's greatness. He always loved the
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Father by obedience. He loved other people. We say positionally I have to be in Christ because I can't make it on my own.
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That's true. But then we flesh out who we are by saying I should love other Christians because God loves other
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Christians. 1 John 3 .15.
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And again, this is just kind of this theme that just shows itself in 1 John. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer.
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Who do you think he was thinking of right here? Who's the first murderer who hated his brother and killed him? Cain. And you know, he says, verse 15, that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
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The ultimate murderer, Satan, had an offspring, as it were, figuratively. And his name was
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Cain, who acted just like his father and murdered. Calvin said, if we wish an evil to happen to our brother from someone else, we are murderers.
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What's the opposite of murder that takes? It's love that gives. Look at verse 16. I had a guy that I went to school with, and he did all these kind of weird things.
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John 3 .16. 1 John 3 .16. Romans 8 .28. John 8 .28.
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All these kind of weird things. Don't do that, because the numbers weren't here, and you're going to get yourself in some kind of weird numerology
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Jerry Lucas thing or something. I don't know. Stay away from that. Who knows Jerry Lucas? He was a
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New York knickerbocker, but then he got into some kind of number stuff. The college crowd was a lot younger in Omaha last week.
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They wouldn't have got the Jerry Lucas thing. There's the killer, the selfish robber of life, and then there's the lover, the giver of life.
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1 John 3 .16. We know love by this, that he laid down his life for us.
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You say, oh, that's wonderful. I love that truth. Eternal verities are good for me, but truth has consequences, and here's the consequence.
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And we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. True or false?
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Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
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True. John 15 .13. People say, well, Jesus just died on the cross, and it was something that was done to him, kind of actively not involved.
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He just let it all happen to him. Friends, that's not Jesus of the Bible. Jesus with purpose and with intent and with aim said,
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I am setting my face towards Jerusalem, and I will lay down my life. Nobody killed Jesus. He gave up his life with purpose, with passionate intention.
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And so with the same passionate intention and purpose, John says, if you're a Christian, you're going to love other
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Christians. It's not this lay back and let God kind of thing, not some kind of, well,
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Jesus died like a lamb, and they hogtied the lamb down and slid its throat, and it just has to allow it.
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No, Jesus is active in his obedience. He's actively dying on the cross for sinners. And so then the deduction is we ought to be the same way.
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Francis Havergale has a little hymn, and this is Jesus. She has
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Jesus speaking in the hymn. I gave my life for thee, my precious blood I shed, that thou might's ransom be, and quicken from the dead.
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I gave, I gave my life for thee. What hast thou given for me?
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And with a moral obligation, do you see that word ought in verse 16? This is what we ought to do.
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He laid down his life for us. We ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
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It's interesting when I hear people say, well, I'm going to do home church. We're going to do kind of home church.
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We're going to kind of do our own thing. We're going to do golf church. We're going to do TV church. We're just going to listen to the iPod for church.
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Friends, I know some of those people are Christians. But if I use John's pastoral language,
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I would say this. How can you call yourself a Christian when you're not around other unlovely people to love?
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Now, I'll be the chief of everyone here. But, I mean, this is a pretty motley group that I represent. As I look around at you,
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I see many people certainly that have loved my family and loved me, of course. But just to make a point, we are sinners.
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And we have been scraped from the bottom of the barrel. And to use the language of Paul in 2
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Corinthians, you have some pots that you serve food on. You go, oh, those are good. Those are set apart for Thanksgiving.
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Those are china. Those are holy. Those are sanctified. Those are special. And you have other pots that they would make back in those days that weren't so special.
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And you would put garbage in there and other unmentionables. And Paul says when it comes to his life, his life of sin, his life before Christ, in one of those pots that you would place unmentionables, you can get some kind of little chart and you get down there and scrape off the stuff that just sticks to the side.
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And it's hard to get out. And Paul says, that's who I was. God still loved me. And so we are called to love other
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Christians even though, frankly, sometimes we're not very lovable. And this is the body of Christ here.
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And that's why body life is important. That's why it's important to have ministries where you say, you know, it's not all about me.
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I have problems and I have issues, but I'm here to actively love other people. We all go through troughs and valleys and say to ourselves and peaks, well,
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I'm on the end now where I need a little more reception of love than actually giving love. I understand that.
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But there is a moral obligation found in 1 John 3 .16. You ought to memorize that verse and know it as well as John 3 .16.
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There is the revelation of God. Jesus laid down his life. John 10 .11, laid down his life.
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John 10 .15, laid down his life. John 10 .17, laid down his life. John 10 .18, laid down his life.
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And if Jesus lays down his life, then you ought to what? I don't even have to tell you.
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It's like the kid, you know, who disobeys. You know, Daddy loves you. Daddy provides for you. Daddy prays for you.
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Daddy's given you everything you have. What ought you to do? Well, then the kid says exactly what they're supposed to do.
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If God has loved you and he's laid his life down for you, then your response is, I'm selling everything and going to the moon.
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You know what I think I'll do? I'm going to become Amish is what I'm going to do. I'm sick of all these people.
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I want to have people that have the, you know, long skirts and the hats and the bread and all these kind of things.
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Friend, it is a lie to somehow think you're more sanctified because you're going to run away from people and have a false set of rules.
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But I'm digressing. It's one of my major pet peeves in life. Oh, I think I'm going to become Amish. So you're going to abandon sanctification according to the
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Bible. You're going to abandon the truths found in the Scripture, and you're just going to have your own rules and live out in wear.
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And then say, you know, I can plug in the electricity every once in a while, and I still think I'm kind of copacetic.
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The standard of love from Jesus to us is here. Your standard of loving other Christians should be, we know the answer.
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You say, I fall so short, but I want to. I have a desire to.
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I have a longing to help other Christians. It makes me happy when I can serve other Christians and be there for them.
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That's a good sign that you're a Christian. Verse 17 of verse John 3, whoever has the world's good and beholds his brother in need and closes his heart against him, be warm, be filled.
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How does the love of God abide in him? It's not even really a question theologically.
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It's an exclamation point. There's no love in that person. Somebody's hurting. You don't help.
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And you can almost hear a James -like kind of love has feet. In verse 18 of verse
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John, little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but in deed and truth. I'll speak for myself.
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I know I could use this, and I'll speak for you because I know you could use it. I wonder how many marriages would survive divorce court if this was the theme of their marriage, either ever taking or always giving.
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Verse 19, we shall know by this that we are of the truth and shall assure our heart before him.
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How would you like to have your heart have some balm on it?
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I'm not talking about embalming. I'm talking about balm. I don't know about you, but if I'm out all day at a different place, and I'm running around some conference or doing something,
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I think, my lips are chapped, and I'm looking around every little pocket, and it's not where it's supposed to be, and I've got one in my car, and I've got one at home, and I'm out of town.
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I go, I can't wait to get back to the hotel and just, oh. You're doing that? It just feels so good.
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I mean, what'd they do back in the old days? Some kind of alligator oil or something?
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I don't know, but it's like, oh. When you put it on, you just go, I want to say something out loud.
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It's just soothing, tranquil, oh. How would you like to have that same feeling of balm and tranquility and spiritual lubrication, not on your lips, but in your soul, to say,
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I know I'm a Christian. Deep down, I'm assured. I know
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I'm going. That's what this text talks about. And we shall assure our heart before Him, and whatever our heart condemns us, for God is greater than our heart and knows all things.
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In the context of loving other Christians, as you love them, you go, how am I, I don't know if I'm a
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Christian. Friends, if you struggle with assurance of salvation, then your number one duty ought to be track down one of these elders and say,
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I need a ministry. Give me the hardest. Give me the most difficult. Give me the one that nobody ever knows about.
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And as I serve these other Christians, I will receive that spiritual chapstick and say, oh, I've never served these people, except God has saved me.
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We need that soothing tranquility that God affirms in our hearts we're a
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Christian by our actions. Verse 7, we're almost done. Beloved, let us, 1
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John 4, 7, excuse me. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and everyone who loves is born of God and knows
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God. Flip side, the one who does not love does not know
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God, for God is love by nature. And by this, the love of God was manifested in us, that Christ has sent
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His only begotten Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, verse 10, chapter 4.
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Not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation of our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, and you don't even have to look at your verse.
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You don't even have to look at your Bible. What do you think He'd say? If God so loved you, what's your response without even looking at the
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Bible? I ought to love other people. And again, this is not, you get at home and you turn the
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TV on, and you go, oh, I'm just really loving people in my heart. In my heart, there rings a melody for loving other people.
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This is action. We love because He first loved us.
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We're going to learn more about this next week. Are you a Christian? You say, well,
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I believe in the cross alone, the resurrection confirming that. I believe that I'm a sinner and I confess my sins.
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I believe that Jesus is virgin born. He's coming back one day, fully God. He's never sinned.
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He's not just the priest, but He's also the sacrifice. I believe it all. And my belief has action to it.
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And that belief says, God, I'm going to respond with obedience. My desire is to serve you, God. And my desire is to serve your people.
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And the Bible says you should have a good assurance that you're a Christian. Isn't it good for God to tell us?
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Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for our day. Thank you for these dear saints who want to learn and listen.
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Father, I rejoice that for maybe ten years, maybe eight years,
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I don't know the time, that I haven't heard the words, a pastor, you preach too long.
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And, Father, that is a sign of a growing congregation that wants to serve you. Father, it's an amazing thing.
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We can read our Bible on our own and it's good and you work, but somehow in a special way, unknown to us, you change people through the preached word.
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And, Lord, I pray that today would be a revolutionary change in our lives at Bethlehem Bible Church for serving, for loving, for doing to one another's.
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Father, I pray you take this word and make it run swiftly in the hearts of these dear people. And then as they serve,
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I pray that you would increase their assurance of salvation and give them that wonderful balm that you have promised.