Selective Hearing

Thank you for listening to this message from the ministry of Morse Corner Church in Leverett, Massachusetts. Morse Corner is a non-denominational church that is committed to the preaching and teaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Our church was founded in 1896 by two students of the famous evangelist D .L. Moody. We seek to encourage and edify the body of Christ through the proclamation of God's word through the ministries of the local church.

If you'd like more information, visit our website morsecornerchurch .com. We hope you enjoy the message. The destination off in the distance is heaven. And it's the Holy Spirit who empowers us to keep walking, to continually be moving forward.

Faith Working Through Love and the Need for the Local Church

You know, sometimes it's true we trip and fall and we need to get back up. Sometimes the wind is at our back and we make great strides in our Christian walk. Other times we're walking against the wind.

And that can be a little discouraging. But those are the moments where it helps to have someone alongside walking with you. And we realize, hopefully, that we need other people. This is why we need the local church and we need fellowship.

We need someone there alongside us to encourage us when we're walking against the wind. So let's focus in on this statement in verse 6 for a moment. Paul writes, One commentator says this about verse 6.

Love tells him what that will is. And it is clear that the faith thus described by St. Paul does not stop short in a mere head notion. Let me read that last statement. You know what a head notion is. It's like, well, yeah, I believe it's up here.

But it ain't in here. And it certainly isn't coming out with what you do. So here's the problem. People read the epistles of Paul and these statements about faith and not works. And you know we've been talking about this a lot.

It's by faith, not by works. And we really stress that because Paul really stresses that. But the problem is people read that faith and not works. And they hear the preaching about God's grace. And they get the idea that all they need to do is believe a concept in their mind.

And that is somehow biblical salvation. I'm here to tell you it's not. It's not biblical salvation. Now it's tricky because obviously you do need to believe. That's true. But look at verse 6 again. Your faith is to be working through love.

And again, James 2, a dead faith does what? It doesn't save anybody. Faith without works is dead. So Paul is combating legalism. But unfortunately this causes other people to drift too far in that other direction.

And some have even fallen into the ditch of license. So we want to prevent that. Skip down to verse 13. And if you study the Bible and pay attention to the Bible, the Bible always says, you know, if you're starting to get the wrong idea, Paul is going to fix that with verse 13.

Oh, it's by grace. I just believe something in my mind and that's it. Live however I want. Wrong, verse 13. He says, for you, brethren, have been called to liberty. Only do not use liberty as an opportunity for the flesh.

But through love, serve one another. So salvation is by grace through faith alone. But again, the faith that saves is not alone. A true saving faith is accompanied by good works. Faith working through love.

How many of you know what a filter is? Not an oil filter or an air filter. I mean, you know what that is for your car. Well, some of you don't, I guess. You know what the other filter is. You might have a thought in your mind, but it doesn't necessarily come out of your mouth.

That's a really good thing that God has given us a filter. I'm sure there's a technical term for it, but we call it a filter. There are some people who say, I have no filter. You've heard these people say, admittedly, it does seem like some people don't have much of a filter.

But everybody, trust me, everybody has a filter. Here's my point. Not only do we have a filter of what goes out, we also have a filter on what comes in. What do I mean by that? People will have an idea fixed in their mind, or they think a certain way, and no matter what is said, no matter what is preached from the Bible, you can show them chapter and verse, it goes through that filter and it comes out the other side different from what was said.

You know, people, sometimes people only hear what they want to hear. Or again, something is so fixed in their mind that they just won't hear biblical truth. Let's turn to Romans chapter 3. People have this filter, right?

Everyone has the filter on what comes out. People definitely have a filter on what comes in. There's one thing I've learned as a preacher. People, they kind of hear what they want to hear. I love it when, you know, I stand out the door and somebody says, oh, I really appreciated what you said about this and this.

I'm like, I didn't even say that. I don't know what you're talking about. Here's an example, Exodus 20. Here's the thing that people have a filter about. Exodus 20 verse 11 says, For in six days the Lord created the heavens and the earth.

On the sixth day, God created Adam. Amen, and they believe that. And then you ask them, well, how old is the earth? Oh, the earth is four to six billion years old. Wait, wait, where's the disconnect here?

There's a filter. The truth of the Bible is coming in, but something happens. Another example, salvation is by faith alone in Christ. Amen, that's what the Bible says. Salvation is in Christ. Oh, but I still think there might be other paths to God.

What? Like, what's wrong here? Where's the disconnect? Look at Romans 3 verse 21. But now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe.

For there is no difference. That is Jew, Gentile, doesn't matter. There is no difference. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

So righteousness, the righteousness that comes from God is by what? Faith. Right. It's by faith. The only way a person can be declared righteous and become righteous is by faith. And a believer, he says, is justified freely.

I want you to say that word along with me. Freely. Justified. Say it. Freely. Justified freely by his grace. Now, what some people heard and what Paul's critics heard was him saying, as long as you make a profession of faith, that's all that matters.

You make a profession of faith, you can live however you want. That's how some people hear this. And that's what Paul's critics were saying that he taught. Now, usually no Christian preacher will ever say this.

Hey, just believe in Jesus and then go out and do whatever you want. Typically, I've never heard a Christian preacher say that. But in a roundabout way, oftentimes that is what is believed and preached.

Just to use a modern example, there is one famous pastor who infamously preached a sermon years ago teaching that Christians must unhitch from the Old Testament. We're talking about license here. There's legalism and now license.

He said Christians must unhitch from the Old Testament. Why would he say that? Because the Old Testament has all of this violence. The Old Testament has all of these stories like Adam and Eve in the garden, Noah's Ark and the Tower of Babel.

It has all these stories that people just find really hard to believe. Now that we have modern science, how can you believe in Noah's Ark? So his attitude was the Old Testament was a stumbling block, so we need to kind of unhitch from the Old Testament.

Never mind with all that. He said all you need to do is believe in Jesus. Okay. And if that wasn't bad enough, he said the morality and the whole worldview of the Old Testament needed to be unhitched from Christianity.

In a sermon, he actually said, thou shall not obey the Ten Commandments. Not thou shall. He said thou shall not obey the Ten Commandments. How could you say that? Because believing in Jesus and the resurrection is all you need.

That's his whole argument. As long as you believe in Jesus, that's all you need. Do you know what that is? That's license. That's what we're talking about. Now I can preach the book of Galatians and leave this in the past.

What good is that if you don't apply it in the modern day? So I think it's necessary we give modern day examples. That same pastor, and the only reason I bring this up, because he's probably one of, if not the most famous pastor in the United States of America.

Now he has taken it a step further. And now he's saying that not just the Old Testament, the Bible itself is not necessary. You don't need to believe the Bible. It's not about the Bible. All you need is Jesus, which is kind of crazy if you think about it, because the only thing you know about Jesus comes from where?

From the Bible. From the Bible. Have you heard of the term deconstruction? If you're not familiar with the term, check it out. Deconstruction. Basically what's happening is people's faith in Christ is being deconstructed.

This is what some of these pastors are doing. They're trying to deconstruct people's faith. The Judaizers were trying to deconstruct the faith of the Galatians. Paul had gone in, preached the true gospel.

They believed. They were saved. The Judaizers came in and they tried to deconstruct. So what these people are doing is they're chipping away. They keep chipping away at the foundation until there's nothing left except this empty profession.

Hey, I believe in Jesus. But now I'm free to go and do whatever I want. Do you think people…. Well, we know the Judaizers were doing this in Galatians, right? We've been reading about it for the last several months.

Do you think that still happens today? Of course. Of course it does. And yet, when you bring cases like this and show…. Here's a clear example. People are sometimes slow to believe it. I suspect the Apostle Paul was really frustrated at times when he was writing to the Corinthians and to the Galatians.

Do you think he got frustrated? He had to have been frustrated. Like, why are you listening to the Judaizers? Why are you listening to them? You remember what the Pharisees and the scribes are doing? What did Jesus say about them?

He called them blind guides. And he said, if the blind leadeth the blind, both will fall where? Into the ditch. And that's what's happening today. All right, you're in Romans 3. Flip over to Romans chapter 6.

Avoiding the Ditches of Legalism and License

So we need…. What's the point? We need to avoid the ditches. Avoid the ditch of legalism. Avoid the ditch of license. That famous pastor that I mentioned, based on the sin that he tolerates in his church, yeah, that's license.

Just as long as you say you believe in Jesus, nothing else really matters. So Paul in Romans, he's been preaching God's grace. You're saved through faith, faith alone. Now, so that nobody gets the wrong idea, look at chapter 6.

Chapter 6, starting in verse 1. What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not. How shall we who died to sin live any longer in it? Skip down to verse 12. Therefore, do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it and its lusts.

And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead and your members as instruments of righteousness to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law, but under what?

Grace. You are not under law, but under grace. Some people will filter out all of those verses, filter it out, filter it out and latch on. I'm not under law, I'm under grace. And that's the only thing they hear, not under law, under grace.

But you can't do that. Thanks for listening. I'm Pastor Michael Grant from Morris Cornick Church. If you'd like to listen to the complete message or if you'd like more information about the ministry, visit our website, MorrisCornickChurch .com.

And we'd love to have you join us some Sunday morning here in Leverett. Until next time, may the grace of God be with you.