Pastors Panel Podcast- 11

All right, welcome to the pastor's panel podcast tonight. This is the Ministry of Truth and Love Network.

We've got Robert Kniep with us. We've got Dan. We've got Pastor John. My name is spelled with a small letter.

I don't matter, but Jesus is everything. So tonight, what we are gonna be talking about, basically, we're gonna be looking at two passages of scripture.

We're gonna be looking at Matthew 5, 19 and John 3, 6 in context of the whole of those chapters, but we're gonna be looking at the apparent, seeming contradiction between Matthew 5 and John 3, and we're gonna be diving into the scripture, going deep, trying to do some theology tonight, but our hope and our goal and the aim of it all is this tonight, that you will hear the word of Jesus Christ and that hearing the word of Jesus Christ and understanding the truth of the gospel message, recognizing that you, our sinner, are separated from God.

There's none good, there's none righteous, there's none holy, there's none that seek after God, but the scripture tells us this, that despite our sin,

Christ came and he died for our sins, that he was buried and that he rose again on the third day.

So when it's all said and done tonight, the hope is this, that you repent and you believe the gospel of Jesus Christ tonight.

So guys, how are y 'all doing? Doing good, doing good. Thank you for hosting.

And you forgot to mention, you forgot to mention Here I Stand Theology podcast. Are you familiar with that one? Yeah, not important, not important.

That guy's a joker. So Dan, what's the weather like up in New York?

Well, it's about 30 degrees right now. We've got about three inches of snow on the ground and we're getting ready for Saturday morning.

It's supposed to be 10 below with a high of two. What? And then we're supposed to get about a foot of snow next week, so about business as usual.

So how about y 'all in North Carolina? We're ready, or I am. Yeah, we're getting ready for snowmageddon.

That's what they say here, you know. That's supposed to be for North Carolina, another biggest snowstorm we've had since 2018 is what brother

Brad Panovich said. And Brad's usually pretty accurate, but you know, they're calling anywhere from six to eight inches up to a foot for us, which for down here, that's a pretty good size snow.

So we're excited. Wow, and didn't Robert, didn't you tell me last week that usually by the time it gets to you all, that it usually gets knocked off.

But man, if y 'all get that much, I'm scared to see, I haven't even listened to the weather to see what it's supposed to do.

I just get up like a kid, hope it snowed. Well, we have to see where it's coming from here in North Carolina.

If the system is coming from the North, it's nothing. We get nothing. If the system comes from, you know, coming from either direction,

North or South, we're diverting the mountains and we miss what you're talking about there. But if it's coming from the

South, that's when our eyes get big. Oh man. That's right, from the Gulf Stream, that's right.

Well, let's preach all the gospel we can in case the internet gets knocked out. So, so again, guys, we're going to be looking at John 3,

Matthew 5, and the seeming contradiction there. Robert, would you like to just kind of give us what's been going on in your mind and tell us why we're looking at this tonight and what we're going to try to, have resolved?

Yeah, like I was sharing with you guys earlier, as I was working my way through Matthew, I come upon Matthew chapter five and Jesus begins, well, he's, he mentions the kingdom and it's not something that he pulls out of the air and it's not something new.

He's been preaching about the kingdom, been talking about the kingdom all through Matthew. And what do we want to know?

We want to know how to enter the kingdom. And I'm sure that was the interest of those folks, his original audience as well.

And so his comments there in Matthew, tell us that we, if you keep the commandments, if you keep the law, you'll be greatest.

I'm misquoting. Let me go back to it. I lost my place. If you're keeping his commandments, you'll be greatest.

If you don't, you'll be least. But then you get to verse 20 and he says, speaking of your righteousness, whoever annuls one of the least of these verse 19 commandments, and so teaches others shall be called least in the kingdom.

Then whoever keeps them and teaches them, you should be called great. So there's a level, a scale system that we see there.

What is he talking about there? And then verse 20, for I say to you, and let your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.

And then from verse 21 on and on and on, Jesus begins to explain the law.

You've heard it said, I mean, he gives a true explanation, a true teaching of how they should have understood the law.

But he is preaching about the law right after he tells them your righteousness must surpass that of the

Pharisees and Sadducees, or you won't enter the kingdom. And so like we had discussed that earlier too, that it's important for us to kind of understand, realize, recognize, and to know here that Jesus is speaking here about the

Pharisees and what the Pharisees have said, right? And in John three, he's speaking directly to Nicodemus, a

Pharisee. Yeah, well, and when I read that, I was thinking, you know, nobody, no

Orthodox Christian, nobody that we attend church with, none of our friends that we fellowship with would ever agree that we're saved by works.

We go to John, John chapter three, that we must be born again, that we must be born of water and the spirit.

If we want to see the kingdom, if we want to enter the kingdom, we go to the verse that says, we're saved by grace through faith.

It's not of works, less than any man should boast. So we all agree that we're saved by grace through faith.

It's a work of God in us, something that he does. And then you go back to Matthew.

Right, but so here, when we come into that, and I'll try to quit after this guys, but it's important for us to understand how to rightly divide the word, how to rightly interpret the scripture and the major confessions throughout church history guide us, kind of give us guardrails on this.

The chief rule for interpreting scripture is this, that scripture always interprets scripture.

When there's a passage that seems vague and ambiguous, and it's hard to understand, it is likely that in the larger context of the scripture itself, that's going to be clarified, but we don't need to wander off on an ambiguous passage and make our own kind of interpretations and decisions on such a thing.

And what Robert said is true, the larger context of scripture teaches the doctrine of justification by faith alone and through Christ alone, so.

Yeah, so I wanted to throw that out at you guys, cause I wanted to hear from you, my friends that I fellowship with, that I want to hear what you've learned, what

God's taught you about this verse, how you would explain this to someone that we know what the scripture is saying.

And so how do we understand what Jesus is doing here? And so, yeah, we can start there because as we were discussing earlier, it's going to be fun how we begin in one place.

We began with one order, Matthew to John, or actually

John to Matthew. We start with what we know, we start with what's clear, and then we get to Matthew and it seems confusing to us, but what really happens, where we're going to conclude is actually flip flop.

Yeah, it brings everything all together. So John, Dan, so the question would be this, let's say that somebody for the first time is going to pick up the gospel of Matthew, right?

And they're going to start reading. So in Matthew, they'll find that up to the fourth chapter where Jesus goes into the wilderness temptation, right?

And then he comes out and the scripture says, he's preaching repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

And so his first public speech is, you know, the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew's account.

That's Jesus' first public speech, right? So what would you guys say, Dan, John, Robert, if somebody came up to you first time reading that and they say, see, this

Jesus is saying that I need to be righteous like the Pharisees if I want to get into heaven. That's how

I'm going to pitch that to y 'all. And I would say, I would probably start out telling them they're absolutely right.

That you, it's impossible for you to get to heaven unless the law has been 100 % fulfilled in your life.

And you're all, all that have broken the law and all that you don't have the law filled in life are bound for eternal hell.

And that's, and so I would be very plain and unapologetic. Now that seems stark coming from an evangelical, but that's exactly the truth.

And that's why then I would take them back to the word that I continue to use is fulfill. Because I love in the context of what we've read here,

Jesus said, I didn't come to do away with the law. A lot of New Testament people have really botched teaching when it comes to New Covenant versus Old Covenant and New Testament versus Old Testament that they have said, well,

Jesus came and just did away with all that stuff. Oh no, he didn't. He didn't do away with any of it because if he did away with it, then it would be very unjust for God to bring judgment.

So he didn't do away with any of it. It's still today, not a letter of that law has ever more ever will pass away.

And so what we could not do for ourselves, Jesus did. And so I've already broken the law.

I'm a lawbreaker. I am condemned under the law. And Jesus is actually preaching the gospel here.

I mean, that's what he's saying is he's saying, I didn't do away with it, guys. What you could not do for yourself,

I did it. So that's my interpretation of it, that's how I view it. So he fulfilled it. And he's telling them what he's actually done to fulfill it.

He's demonstrating to them his actual actions of what a person of the kingdom or a person filled with him or transformed by him.

There is a, not the letter of the law, but the spirit of the law that's on all of our lives that we're continuing to live those things out from a transformed heart and life from Christ.

So that's how I view it. Dan, what do you think? Man, I was about to say the same thing like word for word. Yeah. I was starting to say, yeah,

I'd absolutely, I'd tell them, you know, you're absolutely right. Like your righteousness does need to exceed that of the Pharisees and Sadducees.

But that's great because we know somebody who has righteousness to give. And that is

Christ. So it points us to the righteous standard of who

God is to his law and then points us to the one who has, who has made right for us, who did not keep that standard.

That's right. And I don't like verse 18. I mean, I'm reading the

ESV version. It's what's in front of me. I like the, I like the detail of that translation.

It says, for truly, I say to you until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot.

So not even, so I think he's even saying not even the semicolons or the periods in those original texts, not one iota, not a dot of this law will pass away, you know, until all is accomplished, until it's all accomplished.

You know, and so, so I think that tells us how serious God takes the law.

I mean, it's, it's, it's very crucial. Right, and here too, I so appreciate what you said and how you brought to light the importance of the fact that Jesus said,

I didn't come to destroy the law, but to fulfill the law. And that's what, basically in any gospel presentation, a biblical gospel presentation will contain both law and gospel.

I said, we can't know our sin without the law, right? And unless we know our sin, we can't be saved.

We don't see our need of a savior. And in Matthew here, Robert, Christ is establishing the law.

He's setting the law up as the standard when he tells the people this in the Sermon on the

Mount. He's setting the law up as the standard of righteousness. Right?

Whoever relaxes one of these least commandments, they know what he's talking about. He's not, it's not something new to them, the commandments in the law.

And he said, but whoever does them and teaches them will be great in the kingdom of heaven unless your righteousness exceeds the

Pharisee's righteousness. Boom. See, he sets the bar way up here.

And that standard is perfection. Yes. Perfect fulfillment, yeah.

Yeah, yeah. And particularly in moral perfection.

See, that's the issue because, I mean, folks can be morally good to a point and to a degree.

There are some great moral people in the world, but morality will take, you'll go to hell on the morality train just as quick as you'll go on the adultery train.

You'll go to hell on the drunk train just as quick as you'll go on the morality train. Morality is not what saves us.

What saves us is the sacrificial death of Christ on the cross who propitiated

God's wrath on our behalf. So that standard is being set up there.

So why do you think that Jesus was speaking like, I know why he's speaking in general to the general

Bible reader, but to his specific audience there, why do you think that he was speaking to them in this way?

And John? Well, they were Jews. I mean, that's the other aspect of it too.

Just don't forget, he's speaking to a Jewish audience that is very familiar with the law and very familiar with self -righteousness and self -fulfillment and the boasting and the arrogance and God's chosen people and all the things that comes along with that.

So it seems odd for us, but there's actually some things in here too. He's reminded them even earlier in that passage of the

Beatitudes and he's actually taken what they've always considered as law and he's actually up in the ante all the way throughout scripture.

That you've heard thou shalt not commit adultery, but I tell you, if you've lusted in your heart, you've committed adultery.

So he's taken the law and he's like, he's making sure every single one of them that are sitting there in the religious self -righteous know that you're all deeply in trouble.

You're all really in trouble. And he's really telling them all, all of you that are under the sound of my voice, because as he's preaching this, can you imagine him upping the ante where they've thought they've been pretty good and pretty, and I'll be honest with you, when

I get to go preach revivals, this is a main text that I use because you've got people sitting in congregations that are extremely good rule followers.

And we've created our own moral law, moral code, which I believe that Christians do have a moral law, moral code that we live by, but not for the sake of righteousness.

And they've been keeping this code, this moral law, this even written law for the sake of their righteousness.

And Jesus is destroying their faith in a lot of ways, to a degree.

He is demolishing their security in their works. So it's quite the opposite.

He's not telling them to get worse because people that will be hearing this would be like, we're in trouble.

So he's not telling them to work harder. He's actually convincing them, you're actually in really bad trouble because none of you have kept the law, even to the degree of the

Pharisees and scribes, none of you have kept that letter of the law. And I'm telling you, if you don't have even more of that, you're not gonna get into this kingdom.

And so now they're looking around saying, then what hope do we have? And we find

Jesus teaching really hard concepts to these people, even later he's, if you wanna enter in to follow me, drink my blood and eat my flesh.

He's not making them feel good about themselves. This is very powerful prophetic preaching that is demolishing their faith system so that they realize we have to come to the end of ourselves and put our faith in the one that can save us.

So if I can, guys, I share with you before we got started, I'll do it shortly. And the reason

I'm passionate about this is, for those of you that are listening, this is the passage that God used to save me, to bring me to an authentic faith.

And that's because I was raised in very conservative church with the letter of the law of good morals, of purity before marriage and no alcohol and no drugs and no tobacco.

And I had all this list of stuff and I could literally go down and make check marks, check, check, check, check, check.

I had all that covered. And so it created a pride and an arrogance and a self -sufficiency in my life.

And of course, I was told as long as you keep these rules and you pray the sinner's prayer, then you're in heaven, you're good.

And so I made sure sinner's prayer, check, get baptized, check, join the church, check.

So I had my checklist and it created a pride and an arrogance in my life that was very much a works -based salvation and I didn't even realize it.

And so when I was 19 years old and laying in my bed at NC State University and read my

Bible as a good little moral Christian does, just because I knew my mama that night was gonna ask me, did

I read my Bible that day? So I wanna make sure to be able to tell her yes. And it's not that I'm my parents, I'm thankful for that moral code that they gave me.

But I did just a lot in order to appease my parents and those around me.

But I was reading this passage of scripture and the Holy Spirit just broke me.

I mean, I don't know how else to say it other than He, especially the passage that says, unless your righteousness surpassed that of the

Pharisees. And I interpreted that unless your rule keeping surpasses that of the Pharisees. And I thought, man,

I read the rules, but I was never as serious as those guys were about keeping the law. And I'm like, God, what do you really mean by this?

And that's where my whole world turned upside down to realize that it's not my works. And there was a pride in me that I didn't realize that I had even greater sin than the guy that was the drunk or the prostitute on the street or the drug addict.

My sin was my own pride and self -sufficiency apart from the gospel. And so God used this passage to make me realize that all the rule keeping in the world,

I've broken them already, even though I've said, hey, I'm sorry, I won't do it again. I had already broken all of them and now

I'm already guilty. And in the midst of that, I had to have someone to intervene in my life that would fulfill what

I could not do. And that's where there was an authentic faith and my life came to trust in Jesus as savior.

Not only the one who died and rose again, but the one who had fulfilled the law in the death and resurrection and the power of obedience unto all the law and then paid the penalty for something that he didn't commit, for to book that law, he paid the penalty.

And so that's where belief came into my life, guys. And so if you're listening tonight, I hope that your faith is not in works of something that you've done.

We've already covered that to a degree, but it's not in the works of church attendance or something that you've done because all of that's gonna fall short.

It really is in the fulfilled, finished, absolutely finished work of Christ.

And that's why we put our faithfully in him. So I just wanna insert that in the middle of this, guys. And for those of you listening,

I got to share that with these guys before we opened up. That is such a crucial passage.

So he's speaking to the Jews, going back full circle, and the

Jews know exactly what he's talking about when he starts talking about the law. Western, we a lot of times miss that, but his congregation that he's speaking to and his crowd that he's speaking to knew exactly what he's talking about.

And he's not exhorting them to actually keep the law. He's demonstrating to them, you guys are bad.

Yeah, when earlier, just a few minutes ago, it popped into my head for some reason, as Christ is, he is pointing out the fact that it's impossible to keep the law.

And I think it's ironic when we think about what you said, the importance of understanding his audience.

Y 'all remember, I Love Lucy, the TV show. Is everybody, everybody's old enough for that, right?

Well, what was it when her husband would come home, Lucy, you got some explaining to do, right? These guys, these jokers here, the

Pharisees and the scribes, they were so righteous that they started writing their own moral code.

That's what the tradition of the elders, when you read that in the gospel, when you see that specifically mentioned by Christ, this was the oral

Torah. They held the, they made the mistake of holding the written word, the law of God on the same level as they held the oral law of the mission and all that and so on and so forth.

So, which we see that today and in our time, with Roman Catholics, right?

You can't hold the scripture and tradition on the same level because they're not. The scripture trumps everything and they failed to see that.

So great comfort. Years ago, he's got some pretty good stuff, but he makes a statement, the law doesn't help us.

It just leaves us helpless. And when you were saying what you were saying there, John, I thought, yes, that's exactly where every single person has to be.

We have to be crushed under the weight of our sin. With the understanding that it is absolutely impossible for a man, a woman, boy or a girl to attain the righteousness that the

Pharisees thought they had, but they didn't have. Which leads us, Robert, Dan, John, into the miracle of the new birth.

John three. Can I ask Jonathan, I wanna ask Jonathan and Dan two separate questions real quick.

Jonathan, you brought out something in what you were talking about that, if I ask the question this way,

I think you'll answer several questions that I had. And then Dan, I've got a question for you. So based on what you were talking about,

Jonathan, God used Matthew chapter five to help you see the law, to help you see yourself.

So now that you're on the other side, how do you view Matthew chapter five, six and seven and this beautiful sermon?

Man, I love it. And like I said, I love preaching it. And it's a very powerful sermon.

The Sermon on the Mount is a very precious text to me personally. And so viewing it,

I think it gives a great evangelical methodology for the law is our schoolmaster, the law.

And I think one of the problems in modern religion or modern church, the law of God has not been preached plainly enough for people to see the absolute necessity for Christ to be the only way to salvation.

And so therefore we have to be careful that it's not legalism or that it's not misinterpreted as where preaching works, but the law is definitely the mirror, the schoolmaster that we should hold people up and say, now, if you can tell me that you fulfill this a hundred percent of the time on a hundred percent of your life and never broken one, then

I have nothing else to say to you. So speaking of Ray Comfort, a lot of times he starts there with the 10 commandments.

You ever told a lie? Have you ever stolen anything? You ever looked at a woman with lust and now you're telling me you're a lying, thieving adulterer?

Yeah. But it's true. So I see it very precious. And about every time that I can get to my bridges and think that I'm doing really good and that, hey,

I'm kicking sin's butt or whatever, I mean, God brings me back to this and say, look young man, don't you forget, you're not the one that fulfilled it.

And that's why we still give our praise and glory to Christ. And so it also humbles me to dust. I mean, it humbles me, but yet it empowers us too.

So that's how I view it today. Does that answer your question? Yeah, yeah. And I think that the question

I'm going to ask Dan will help us answer that question too, because I want us to understand how we should view the law now as a

Christian. And Dan, I think this will be right up your alley, how

I'm going to ask this question. And so you're a covenants guy, an overarching covenant of grace.

And then you have smaller different kinds of covenants throughout the scriptures, throughout the

Old Testament. So how do we view the law? Jesus teaching here on the law in relationship to the overarching ultimate covenant of grace?

How do we view the law in relationship to, its relationship to the covenant of grace plus its relationship to its, just throwing out examples,

Abrahamic covenant, Noahic covenant, Davidic covenant, the Edimic covenant.

You know, what's the relationship with the law and the covenants as a covenant of grace, all those things?

So you just want me to fit a whole nother podcast in this next question? There is a lot to that.

Try to keep it tight. The law, basically you want to think of the law as a reflection of the moral character or the perfect righteous standard of who

God is. His standard of righteousness, his standard of goodness, his character, who he is, who he exists as is reflected to us in the law.

So when you look at the covenants throughout scripture, you see God's, trying not to say something heretical.

There's a bunch of people who love to poke holes in folks. We've got you, if there's a hole poke, we'll slap some duct tape on it.

You come on with it, brother. Give me that stop leak and just. Billy Mays.

You see parts of God's character revealed through his covenants. You see his mercy and his justice put forward in the

Adamic covenant where you see that whole thing where Satan is cursed.

This is a curse laid upon a man and woman for our sin as humans. But you also see directly after that, you see a promise of a, right there at the same time, you see a promise of a seed coming through the woman who's going to crush the head of the serpent.

There was a plan made. And then you see the killing of the animal and the clothing with the skins, where they see that it's going to take the death of something to cover their nakedness, cover their sin.

You move along to Noah. Noah is a wonderful, beautiful picture of Christ saving his people.

Christ, the Ark being a picture or a type of Christ. It's even interesting that the word for rainbow in Genesis is the word for bow.

Like you would shoot a bow and arrow bow. And when you look at the bow, it's always pointed.

If you're going to shoot an arrow, I asked my kids this the other day, if you're going to shoot an arrow from a rainbow, where's it going to go? So who's going to take the wrath of God for our sin?

God is. Amen. In his son, Jesus Christ. Then he calls out

Abraham, says, I'm going to make a nation out of you. I'm going to bless all the nations of the earth.

All the families of the earth will be blessed through you. And so he marks them off, says, you're going to live as I tell you.

And then he goes on for a while, pulls them out of Egypt. Fast forwarding a lot here.

He pulls them out of Egypt, baptizes them in the sea. That's first Corinthians 10, not just me.

Baptize them in the sea as he came through, brought them together, said, this is my law, live like this.

But he also, when he's giving them the law in the end of Deuteronomy, we see that he says, today,

I lay before you life and righteousness or death and cursing.

And he says, he promises to him. He says, at some point, you guys are going to fail at keeping this law.

And when you fail at keeping this law, a prophet will come and the prophet will come and you'll be saved from your sins.

So when the law is given, he even says, you're going to fail. You're doing terrible.

You're not going to do well. And that's pretty much what Jesus is saying here in Matthew five.

Hey, you've got this standard, y 'all are going along acting as Israel and you're supposed to be here, not there.

But here comes the prophet. Here's the one that was foretold way back in Deuteronomy. The one that was promised back in the garden of Eden.

That one's coming and he's going to take the law, uphold it. He's going to obtain life and blessing for you.

When he takes it upon, takes your sin upon himself, he goes down into the grave.

He comes up victorious. He ascends to the right hand of the father in heaven, ruling and reigning over his kingdom, presenting eternal life to those who believe.

And that is how the law mixes with the covenant that God's promise of a future salvation for people who live on this earth comes through what works, but not ours.

Who'd send us to hell, but the works of the law perfected by Christ, fulfilled by Christ brings us eternal life.

Amen. Did that answer your question, Robert?

Oh yeah. That was good. Yeah, that was beautiful. Absolutely.

Yeah. I think it's important for us to have a grasp and continue to study how we should view the law on the other side of salvation.

We talk so much about how it's a standard, how it is something that must be fulfilled, but what else is it to us?

How does it relate to the covenants? What else is it to us as a Christian? How do

I view the law after Christ? Now that it's been accomplished, it's been fulfilled, someone did meet that standard.

How do I view it now, post salvation? What's my relationship?

And I think a good conversation for maybe a later podcast is the difference between the

Judeo law and the moral law, because there is a prescription in New Testament of what the fulfillment of that law is versus us keeping the feast and food rituals and those kind of stuff.

There's nothing wrong if someone says, hey, I'm not gonna eat shellfish. I wanna eat according to the, like we did the

Daniel plan one time, and sort of the plan for health reasons, but it wasn't a law matter.

And so, but there is groups of Christians that are just like, they're pulling back to do the feast and Sabbath on Saturday.

And I mean, a lot of things like that. So there's some people that are pulling into that, but so I think it's a worthwhile conversation in viewing of the law, what's been fulfilled, and then the law that is written on our heart that is

Christian behavior. There is such a thing as Christian behavior and husbands love your wives and wives submit to your husbands and fathers don't provoke your children to wrath.

And what does it mean to be a Christian father? And that's still rooted back in the codes of the law, the code of the

Old Testament law, it's still rooted in that. But again, it's a praxis, not for the sake of righteousness as much as it is what we do because you're made righteous.

That's exactly right. Honor Christ. So we're not earning our righteousness in this, but it's that we want to manifest what's being given imputed into us.

We want that manifest in our lives. And then Jesus has given a description of, this is how you do that. So that's also where in Matthew it's not a teaching of, when you get on past the part of being fulfilled,

Jesus is still saying, now here's some things that in me, in my kingdom, this is how those that follow me as King, I'm giving you direction of this is how

I want you to live, you know, in purity and in righteousness. And so it's how we live to honor him, not earning his favor, but because you've been given favor, you've been given grace, the most reasonable thing that I can do then is say, sure,

I'll follow you. And then I had this conversation today. And even that it's not designed for our oppression, but it's actually the law is designed for our flourishing.

And that's a good thing. Cause being a good father and a good savior, what he gives us is to cause us to flourish.

And so it's a good thing for it to be in the design of marriage, one man and one woman for one lifetime, to abstain from sexual impurity and the things that are diminishing away.

God gave us that for our flourishing, not for our oppression. It's a good thing. And that culture speaks of that, you know, and so on and so forth.

So again, too, even though in our righteousness field, I think it's important that we have a good relationship with what

I would call maybe the moral law of the Bible. And that's the whole Bible, the moral law of the

Bible, because that's how God has said, this is how I want my kids to live. This is, and because as a good father, this is what causes you to flourish.

If you'll follow this, there's blessing. There is blessing and there's fruitfulness by the following of law.

So anyways, I know that law, it sounds again like legalism, and that's not what we're talking about, but I hope that makes sense.

And for our future podcast, what you're talking about there, probably we're discussing the three divisions of the law, moral, ceremonial, and civil.

That's right, absolutely. But you're right, that's a whole nother podcast. Let's stay on track here.

That will be fun though. That is awesome. That is great stuff right there. So now let's go to John three.

I'll bring that up here. Hit the share button, the brand button, the hide button.

And so let's read three, one through six, right? Actually one through seven for good context.

There was a man of the Pharisees named Nicodemus, a ruler of the Jews. This man came to Jesus by night and said to him,

Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher sent from God, for no one can do these things that you do unless God is with him.

Jesus answered him, truly, truly I say unto you, unless you are born again, when he's born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus said to him, how can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother's womb and be born?

Jesus answered, truly, truly I say unto you, unless one is born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

That which is born of the flesh is flesh and that which is born of the spirit is spirit. Do not marvel that I said unto you, you must be born again.

So in the Matthew passage, we see the law said is the standard, as John and Dan both said, they're impossible to attain on your own by John's own testimony there, that's what brought him to saving knowledge of Christ there.

So we see the impossibility of works -based righteousness.

And John and Dan both, I think, touched on the idea of the fact that kind of, well, they did touch on the fact that we don't do good works to be saved, but because we are saved,

Christ produces good works in us. The spirit produces good works in us. So Robert, take us off on this.

Yeah, yeah, I think this is a clear passage. And, excuse me, and this is where, you know, the conversation that you and I were having previously made it such a beautiful story because, you know,

I was going in one direction where I was starting with the clear, you know, we understand, we believe in salvation by grace through faith, not by works.

And so we pulled from John, we believe that we must be born again, we believe that it's a work of God.

And then we go back to Matthew and there's that seeming contradiction that you were talking about.

But if we flip -flop it, the story becomes beautiful. We see the progression of the gospel.

We see the progression of the gospel presentation and the progression that we all had to take.

The confrontation with the law in front of our face, on our heart, and how that brings us before a holy

God. And then after we're confronted with the law, then we come to the scenario with Jesus and Nicodemus to one whom the

Holy Spirit has worked in such a way they are ready for this work.

Right, and two, you all know where I'm at,

I'm Reformed, so, you know, salvation is of the Lord. All, 100,

I don't think the scriptures, we can find anywhere in the scriptures that salvation is 99 .9

% God and 110th or 100th percent of man, that it's of the

Lord. That's the impossible, we have the impossibility of keeping

God's law in Matthew. And here we have the impossibility of salvation outside of the regenerating work of the

Holy Spirit in the heart of man. And like you said, it kind of, when we look at it and take it, we approach it from a

God down perspective rather from a man up perspective. We see, you know, everything,

Dan, you went through the covenants there and to kind of compact those covenants.

I mean, we have the three big covenants, covenant of works, covenant of grace, covenant of redemption.

Covenant of redemption was accomplished before time and all eternity. God, the Father, God, the Son, and God, the

Holy Spirit have always agreed in one upon the redeeming work that was going to take place, right?

The covenant of works is what God gave Adam, Adam and Eve in the garden. He said, if you do this, then you will live.

If you do this, then you will die. They truly, we've been going through the

London Baptist Confession on Sunday nights at church. We actually just started back. We missed a bunch of last year on Sunday nights on that, but the idea of Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve, and, you know,

I know this is one of those things that may be a challenge for our listeners that, you know, and I don't want to turn people off of you,

Robert, but you trust me to say what I'm about to say here? No, that's why we're here because, and I mentioned this in the chat that we had before, so I don't want you to lose your train of thought, so I apologize.

But I think that so much rich, rich theology is missing from our community today.

And it was missing, you know, with me, and I want us to bring that rich theology to the table for people to chew on and think about.

And I know it's going to be offensive to some people, but we want to lay it on the table for people to feast on.

So concerning Adam and Eve, concerning Adam and Eve, there's a lot of talk, and everybody talks about it, and we can always talk about it.

I'm not marking anybody off the list, but when it comes down just to understanding the creation of Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve were created unlike anybody that has ever lived.

They were truly born with a capacity to sin or not to sin. They truly, as Pelagius taught heretical teaching in the early centuries, they were truly the only people ever created that were able to choose to sin or to choose not to sin, and they chose to sin.

And because of that decision that was made there in the garden, the scriptures teach us that death is passed upon all men now.

So we didn't have an option, right? We, when we were born, we came out kicking and screaming, right?

Buddy Baucom talks about babies. You know, he says some, he says they're vipers and diapers, right?

He says, why did God make, why do you, he said, why do you think God made babies so small? He said, because if they were a grown adult size and they pitched a fit like they pitch, they would kill you when they pitched that fit, right?

So, but again, just that's the covenant of works, covenant of works, God gave to Adam and Eve.

They chose to sin. Death was passed upon all men. God gave him the covenant of grace.

There right after in Genesis 3, 15, right when he said that the serpent would bruise his heel, right, and he provided skins for him as Daniel went through very eloquently there.

So that we have the, the law was given at first, then grace was given to them, right?

They didn't have to make a decision to accept that grace. Grace overwhelmed them.

And that's the beautiful thing about us as sinners is that for me,

I got saved in March, 1987. And my testimony is the same no matter where I'm at.

I was a little bitty, punk, foul mouth, little hellion kid.

I got invited to go to a youth conference in Nashville, Tennessee with my friend. I went,

I did not expect anything out of that conference, but to make girlfriends. But I want to tell you what way up high in that balcony, the spirit of God found me.

I realized and I recognized that I was a sinner and that I was undone and helpless and hopeless.

And I got born again that day. Not because of a decision that I made, by the way, it was made impossible for me.

I was on a youth trip in Nashville, Tennessee with thousands of kids with a youth leader in a group that did not know me and I did not know them.

And when the preacher gave the altar call, I wasn't able to get down there to the altar. But I thank

God that the spirit of God was right there. He birthed me into the kingdom in a balcony way up high in Nashville, Tennessee.

And it wasn't anything that I did. It wasn't anything that I accomplished. The grace of God overwhelmed my sin.

He overcame my sin. And it is that same grace here that Jesus is talking to Nicodemus about, the new birth.

That is the work of the spirit. I'm sorry, guys. Go ahead, take off, Dan. Take off,

Dan, say something. You gotta fill in, I gotta, why am I? Fair enough, we'll start with something.

It's interesting, I think, the context between the two passages that we've been looking at, Matthew and John.

In Matthew, you have a people who have been called, their whole existence, they've been called the people of God.

There are special people called out, given the law of God, having stuff come to them, oracles and prophets and miracles.

And they've seen all sorts of stuff. And then he's saying, even though you have been called the people of God, you're missing something because you don't actually trust and believe in the

God that you have. So I'm coming to tell you that you need to have righteousness better than the people who think that they're doing it right.

You need to find that righteousness in someone else. He goes on to say, pray like this, our father who's in heaven, he says, build your house on the solid ground.

Don't do your righteousness out there for other people to see, because it's not about other people seeing it, it's about your true heart condition between yourself and God.

And only Christ can make that right. Now you come over here into John 3, and John 3 says, just a chapter, about a chapter and a half after Jesus, since John the

Baptist is baptized, he says, sees the dove coming down on him. And he says, behold, the lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.

He says, you must, verse five, unless one is born of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.

And people may disagree with me on this. I think he's there talking about water baptism, not because of what water baptism does, but because of what it symbolizes.

Water baptism, from my understanding, symbolizes a destructive power of judgment that the

Christian is brought through safely. We see that when we go to 1 Corinthians 10, you see a people who were brought through, they were brought through the

Red Sea, they were preserved, but then the Egyptians that came behind them went through the same waters, but they were destroyed.

You look at 1 Peter 3 that talks about the ark, those who were in the ark, baptism corresponding to the destruction that came upon the world through water.

So when you look at baptism, what I see is that Jesus is calling them to come and be a part of a new type of people.

He's saying, hey, I was baptized. I was turning, or I was showing the repentance of sins, showing an identity with the people of God.

And yet you have to be born not only of water. You don't just have to identify outwardly.

You have to identify with, not just identify, but be born of the spirit of God.

There has to be an actual real change by the spirit of God. And down there in verse nine, he says, this is verse nine, eight, the wind blows where it wishes and you hear it sound, but you don't know where it's coming from or where it's going.

So it is with everyone who was born of the spirit. The spirit of God is one who works regeneration in the heart.

So it's not enough to just be a Pharisee or to be called a

Christian. We must actually know the God of our salvation. We must actually trust in Jesus Christ and believe in him to be our perfect savior.

If I could add something in right there. I think when it's talking about water too,

I don't totally disagree in a New Testament context of baptism. I think

Jesus, again, is speaking to Nicodemus and he's speaking to a Jew. And I think

Jesus is quoting from Ezekiel to a Jew. Bingo.

And so, oh, would you pull it up? So, oh, I didn't even see it pop up there. So, I will sprinkle clean water on you.

It is pretty easy. You know, I'm gonna... So, we'll talk about that teaser later.

But you know, I'll sprinkle clean water on you and you shall be clean from all your uncleanliness and from all your idols.

I will cleanse you and then I will give you a new heart. And so, you know,

I think it is talking about this spiritual work, this sovereign work. So I think that's probably the best definition is speaking of a sovereign work of God.

He's quoting to Nicodemus about this work of God, that God has to do the cleansing,

God has to do the washing and God has to be the one that creates a new heart that does this work of generation that regenerates a heart of stone.

But the other thing, the other place though too, that I think is not way out of context that I've heard translated to or an interpretation of that is of water and of spirit.

Jesus, Nicodemus is still thinking about how can I re -enter into my mother's womb and be reborn? And so, the other place that how

Nicodemus is thinking, Jesus is saying, well, you do have to be born of water where when a mother gives birth, there's water there, the breaking of the water.

So there is a physical birth and then he's speaking of a spiritual birth. So Jesus is saying something that's not been birthed from a human birth cannot be born again.

So therefore there has to be a human birth and a spiritual birth. I think that's the lesser of it.

So I think the two best interpretation, I agree with Dan and in the Testament is speaking of baptism. But I think in my opinion, the best translation is he's quoting

Ezekiel to Nicodemus because Nicodemus would be familiar with the Old Testament teaching.

I agree there, I agree. And that's using the analogy of faith, scripture interprets scripture.

When we look at that there, we always got to understand the context of what's being said. I agree 100%.

That's where we were earlier talking about this and it's the work.

In one place, in one of the epistles, I think it was Peter or maybe it was

Paul, I think, but he uses the term through faith of the operation of God.

The work of heart regeneration is only something that God is capable of doing, that we are not capable in and of ourselves of doing such a thing.

And in the Jewish faith, historically, the idea of being born again was not anything new to the

Jewish, to the rabbis. There were actually several ways in the

Jewish faith that a man was considered to be born again. At his, is it called a bar mitzvah when you get to be 13, right?

You're considered born again. When a man reaches the age of 30, right?

Because Christ entered, again, keeping the law, the age of 30, man enters the priesthood, right?

That was another rite of passage that they considered where a man was born again. It was like when a man gets married, he's considered to be born again, right?

So it's like Nicodemus is thinking to himself here, what else can

I possibly do? I mean, according to the law, I've done everything that is necessary to be done.

And let's bring this to a close because we've been an hour and five minutes. Are you okay if we bring it to a close, Robert?

Absolutely, yeah. Okay, so let's go to Philippians chapter three to bring this to a close here.

Claude, while you turn there, this text that you have pulled up there in Ezekiel, it really summarizes everything we've talked about tonight because it talks about the sovereign work of God.

It talks about the rebirth. And then when you get into 27 and 28, I will put my spirit in you and then

I'll cause you to walk in my statutes. And I'll cause you to be careful to obey my rules.

So it is talking about the sovereign work of God and in the manifestation of that work.

So everything we've talked about tonight is really summarized right there in Ezekiel of what God's gonna do to bring us salvation.

So I just wanna point out the whole context of that. I didn't know if he was gonna go there or not. So before you took it off the screen, I just wanted to mention it.

Yeah, and I'm sure Robert would have done that when he closes here in a minute too. But yeah, that's exactly what the whole point of this was, was to bring us to that text right there because it does, it perfectly summarizes it.

So Philippians 4 or Philippians 3.

So if we go down to Paul's testimony to the Philippian church, right?

If we go down to verse 12, or actually,

I'm sorry, verse seven. Paul's listing, he begins to list out here reasons that he should be considered righteous before God.

And he says, we are the circumcision who worship God by the spirit and glory in Christ Jesus, put no confidence in the flesh.

And then chapter four or verse four there, though I myself, Paul says I have reason for confidence in the flesh also.

Anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more. That was a big statement he made right there.

Circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel of the tribe of Benjamin, a

Hebrew of Hebrews, right? He's saying as to the law, I was a Pharisee, meaning

I was keeping that high level of the law.

And then he said, as to zeal, I persecuted the church. As to righteousness,

I was under the law, blameless. What a statement. I mean, and he didn't crack, because I don't believe he cracked a smile when he said that, he wasn't joking.

He said, I've kept the law, I was blameless according to the law. But whatever gain I had,

I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. And indeed, I count everything as a loss because of the surpassing worth of Jesus Christ, my

Lord. For his sake, I've suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish in order that I may gain

Christ and that I may be found in him. Not having righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness of God that depends on faith, that I may know him and that I may know the power of his resurrection.

I mean, it's beautiful and it's amazing. And folks, don't need to feel like, when the

Holy Spirit convicts us of our sin, I don't know how we can feel any lower or any less than at that moment when we realize the weight of our sin and the fact that we are underneath the wrath of almighty

God. But then there ain't nowhere else to go when you can't even look to the side of you.

You're laid flat on your back. The only place that you can look is up and there's the grace of God.

And the grace of God. The scripture of Paul, I believe it was in Titus, the grace of God hath appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldliness, that we should live soberly and righteously in this present world, the most beautiful thing in the world.

I say it carefully because it's one of those things that'll get poked a hole in, but one of the most beautiful and precious things that we should recognize in our life is our lowest point, when we realized our sinful state before a holy

God. And we don't relish and we don't glory in our sin, but we relish and we glory in the fact that despite our sin, that even while we were yet sinners, that Christ died for us.

And that he who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

It's a beautiful thing. Absolutely beautiful. Absolutely. And I'm quite convinced that the goal that you set out for us to have for this podcast at the very beginning,

I'm very convinced that we met that goal. And it's not because of who we are and how we present it, but it's because the message is perfect.

Amen. And it's because the person of whom that message about is perfect and he's holy.

And so you've heard the gospel, those who are listening, we've heard the gospel.

And if these guys are anything like me, it convicts me every time and it challenges me every time that I hear it.

And so we would, if you have joined us and if you've stuck with us this long, we would love nothing more than for you to have seen the law and realize that it wasn't just for the

Jewish nation, but it's for all people, that God has a standard and we cannot meet that standard.

Amen. And we should become crushed as Claude was talking about underneath that law.

This law is holy because it represents a holy God. It represents him and he's righteous and he's just.

And we need a savior. And he has been proclaimed and he has been lifted up and his name is

Jesus. He lived, he fulfilled that law where we couldn't.

And he took our place where we needed to be punished. He took that place for us so that we could be saved.

And we would plead with you that as you're being crushed by the law, you look up as Claude told us and see the savior, see his grace and how beautiful and wonderful it is.

And that grace is an arm reaching down for your hand. Come to him in repentance and faith today.

And thank you guys. I appreciate it. Thank you for hosting Claude. And this was amazing.

Just the opportunity to look at the law and look at the gospel and to glorify God. So Dan, would you mind to close us in prayer?

Sure. Dear heavenly father, thank you for the time we had to come together and talk about your word, talk about your kingdom, salvation, forgiveness of sins is all wonderful.

I pray that you would keep us all safe, that you would help us to grow deeper into your word, closer to you and to our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.

Pray for anyone who does not know you that they will, that you would change their heart and show them exactly what we've been talking about tonight.

We love you in Jesus name we pray. Amen. And before Claude hits the end broadcast.

Let me hit the stop button and then we'll. I will just say to you who are watching, remember that Jesus is king.

Go live in the authority of Christ, go speak with the authority of Christ and continue to go out there with us and share the gospel of Christ.