Hang On! Help Is On His Way! - [John 14:15-17]

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I think maybe the number one movie of the year this year is Dunkirk. I don't know how many of you are familiar with the history behind that.
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But at the outbreak of World War II on the Western Front, when the Germans invaded
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France, I think it was May 10, 1940, not that I looked it up or anything. The Allies, the
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English and French forces had more planes, more men, more tanks, they had more of everything, except one little thing.
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I could say a clue, but they didn't have a plan. Their plan was just to stand there and take it.
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Well, the German plan was to concentrate on a few points and break through. And they did break through. And they cut off huge portions of the
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Allied Army and drove deep into Allied territory. And eventually, we wound up with a little bubble of space out on the ocean where most of the
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Allied forces wound up, which is where the movie Dunkirk takes place. The sheer scope and scale of the evacuation is just immense, enormous, 330 ,000 men taken off the beaches there, something that had never been done.
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It was unimaginable. And you could just imagine, I mean, if you can imagine, being one of those men on the beach, having no hope at all, just thinking you're done for, being strafed, being bombed, and just waiting to either be killed or captured by the
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Germans. And then here come these British boats.
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They're not ships. These are just a little British boats that could get up close enough to the beach for the men to get on.
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And then they got on those boats, and then they went to the bigger ones. And you just think, what transformation of mindset had to take place for those guys?
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Because here they are. They have absolutely no hope whatsoever. And then here come the little boats. Here comes hope.
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Here comes rescue. And we know something about that.
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We have phrases in our terminology, in our vocabulary. We think of things like, you know, what are we waiting for the cavalry to come?
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What does that mean? We're waiting to be rescued. We're waiting for reinforcements. We're waiting for the surge of troops to come and get us because we're up against it.
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And anytime you read about a battle or something like that, and you see that the reinforcements are coming, I've been reading about Vicksburg.
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And in the prelude to it, the Union forces are getting driven back. And then all of a sudden, I won't even tell you the general's name, because I don't know if I can pronounce it correctly.
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But he gets there. And you could just feel the relief of the Union forces.
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And this is the idea as we come to John 14. The disciples, they're not apostles.
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I almost call them apostles. They're not apostles yet. But they're under great stress. And Jesus is going to tell them about reinforcements are coming.
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That's why I named it help. Hang on, help is on the way, right? A helper is on the way.
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Let's go to our text, John chapter 14. And I'm going to read verses 5 to 17.
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John chapter 14. Thomas said to him, again, verse 5.
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Thomas said to him, Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way? Jesus said to him,
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I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the father except through me.
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If you had known me, you would have known my father also. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.
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Remember, because you've seen me, seen the Lord.
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Verse 8. Philip said to him, Lord, show us the father. And it is enough for us. Jesus said, have
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I been with you so long and you still do not know me, Philip? Whoever has seen me has seen the father.
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How can you say, show us the father? Do you not believe that I am in the father and the father is in me?
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The words that I say to you, I do not speak in my own authority, but the father who dwells in me does his works.
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Believe me that I am in the father and the father is in me, or else believe on account of the works themselves.
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Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do and greater works than these will he do because I am going to the father.
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Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do that the father may be glorified in the son.
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If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it.
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If you love me, you will keep my commandments. And I will ask the father and he will give you another helper to be with you forever.
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Even the spirit of truth whom the world cannot receive because it neither sees him nor knows him.
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You know him for he dwells with you and will be in you. Now, the gospel of John is basically an elongated tract.
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Somebody wrote me this week and said they were dealing with a relative who wanted to know about a higher power.
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And I said, well, have him read the gospel of John. She said, well, I'm already doing that. I'm going, good job. Okay, this is, this is,
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I think, one of the best places you can steer unbelievers. John's purpose is to show the reader that Jesus is both fully
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God and fully man, that he is the eternal son of God who is obedient in all things to the father, even to the point of death on the cross in the place of all who would ever believe.
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He was then raised from the grave on the third day and lives to ever intercede for his own.
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And when the last hours of his earthly ministry, it's the beginning of the Passover celebration. And he,
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Jesus has gathered together his disciples for dinner, if you recall. And then in chapter 13, verse one, we read that Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the father.
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He's gathering them all together. But instead of this big celebration, it's, it's going to be kind of a,
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I guess, bad news, good news kind of thing. He's told them about Judas Iscariot.
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Well, we know that Judas Iscariot is going to betray, but only a couple of the disciples know. Jesus has told them that he's going to the father.
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And now Judas has departed. His plot is about to be hatched.
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Jesus also prophesied of Peter's denials of him. And because of all that's going on, all this turmoil, and mostly because let's just be candid, their leader is leaving.
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He's telling them he's going to die, even if they don't fully grasp it. And they are troubled. Verse one of chapter 14 tells us.
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And in order to comfort them, he gives them doctrine. He encourages them with doctrine.
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Is there anything practical about doctrine? Well, Jesus thought there was. He taught them that they, that he should be believed in just as the father was.
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Remember, he says, you believe in me, believe in, or believe in the father, believe in me also.
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And we talked about how that was a claim of equality. He wasn't saying, you know, believe in the father.
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And you know what, if you have any extra faith, you can believe in me. He puts them on the same level. He tells them that he's going to heaven to prepare a place for them.
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When Jesus, or when Thomas asked Jesus how he can know the way to where Jesus is going, because he doesn't understand that Jesus is speaking of heaven.
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He thinks that he's talking about a literal way, wants to know where Jesus is physically going. Then Jesus tells
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Thomas that he is the way. Again, as we've talked about claiming his exclusivity, there is no one like him.
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There is no other way to heaven except through him. Jesus teaches the disciples much about his nature, that his words are, his very words are miraculous.
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Why? Because this is God speaking to them directly. He teaches them, as we just read, that he is to be prayed to, that he will answer those prayers.
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And really one of the more amazing things that he says to them, he says, those who believe in him, his disciples are going to do greater works than even he did.
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We talked about that. We said that it didn't mean that they were going to do more spectacular works.
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They weren't going to be walking on the water and doing these kinds of things. What they were going to do is works that were greater in number and in scope.
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They were going to cover most of the known world then and convert people to Christ.
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And if you remember, he said that they were going to do these works. Why? Because he was going to the father.
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He's hinting at this idea of the Holy Spirit. And you know what I'm going to do today? I'm going to hint at the idea of the
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Holy Spirit. And we're going to get to the Holy Spirit fully next week. This morning, we have two truths, two truths to prepare for the coming of the
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Holy Spirit. I mean, I was thinking about it this morning and I thought, you know, I could have named this.
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Maybe I should have named it if I was really clever. You know, the cavalry after their calvary, because that's the idea, right?
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That's what he's preparing them for is this coming of the Holy Spirit, the reinforcements of the Holy Spirit.
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But this morning, I'm only going to be looking at verse 15, at verse 15, because I want us to understand,
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I mean, namely, there's this one truth that I'm going to hammer home this morning, and that's this.
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Believers, everyone here, believers receive the Holy Spirit.
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Unbelievers don't. And we'll see that in the weeks to come. Believers receive the
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Holy Spirit. This is a great promise of the Lord Jesus Christ. First truth,
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Jesus comforts those he loves. He comforts those he loves and only those he loves.
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There's no comfort for those Christ does not love. Look at verse 15, and you'll think
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I have this backwards because it should read, if I have it right, if I love you.
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But look at the text, if you love me. Now, before we go anywhere else, look at the beginning of verse 16.
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I said I wasn't going to go past verse 15, and I'm not really. But I just want you to see the beginning of verse 16 should say something like, and I.
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It's a continuation of the idea in verse 15. And what Jesus is saying is on the basis of this condition.
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Verse 15, and I will ask the father and he will give you another helper, that helper being the
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Holy Spirit. So if you love me, it seems like it's a condition.
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Well, it is a condition, but it's only met in Christ Jesus, as we will see. The promise of the
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Holy Spirit, the coming of the Holy Spirit is conditioned upon verse 15.
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So back to verse 15, the first word, if it basically presumes the condition to be true.
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If you love me, we'll think about who he's talking to. He's talking to disciples who've given up what?
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Everything to follow Jesus. This is a fulfilled condition.
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He assumes the condition. Why wouldn't a disciple of Jesus love him for a moment?
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Let's just think about this. In John 13, one, we would read that Jesus loves them.
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John 13, one says now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end, right to his very last breath.
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Jesus loved them, not emoted, but showed his love to them, sacrificially loved them, gave himself up for them, taught them, spent time with them, comforted them.
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And then also in chapter 13, talking about love, because love is so important and so central to what's going on here and the coming of the
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Holy Spirit. He has commanded, Jesus has commanded the disciples to love one another.
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Chapter 13, verse 35, by this all people will know that you are my disciples.
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How? If you have love for one another. That would be a strange relationship.
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Indeed, if those who claim to believe in Jesus, the disciples, if they did not also love him.
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In fact, scripture, I think, I think it's fair to say that scripture would equate faith or belief in Christ with love for Christ.
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Let me give you a few examples. First, Peter one, eight says, though you have not seen him talking about Jesus, you love him.
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Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory.
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Faith is love. First Corinthians two, nine. But as it is written, what no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man.
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Imagine what God has prepared for those who love him. He takes a special joy in who?
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In those who love him. If you believe in him, you love him. Again, on this theme of loving
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Christ. What did Jesus say was the greatest commandment of all?
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When he was asked, when he was tested, you know, what teacher, what's the greatest commandment? What did he say in Matthew 22, verse 37?
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You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your hearts and with all your soul and with all your mind, having declared himself
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God. It would be only right for him to ask not only for faith, but for love.
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Those two things cannot be separated. You have to ask yourself, you know, he says, if you love me, what you'll keep your, my commandments.
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And just for a moment, I'm going to get to the keeping commandments in a moment. But just imagine what kind of love would we express to Christ and then say, but I don't want to obey you.
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I don't want to follow you. That wouldn't be any kind of love at all. Again, on this theme of love, love of God for us, but also our love for him.
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I love this verse because Romans 8, 28, I love this verse. And I'll tell you why it's not just because of what it says.
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It's because of what it starts the whole golden chain of redemption. And then all these promises about how nothing will separate us from the love of God in Christ.
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Jesus in Romans 8, 28 says this. And we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good for those who are called according to his purpose.
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If we love God, we're called according to his purpose. We believe love and faith cannot be separated.
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And if you recall what Jesus had against the church at Ephesus in Revelation 2, what did he say?
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He said, I have it here coincidentally, but I have this against you.
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What? That you have abandoned the love you had at first, that desire you had to obey me, to follow me.
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You have abandoned that. What does it mean to love
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Jesus? Well, it means to put him first. In fact, he put it this way in Matthew 10, verse 37.
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Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.
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Well, what did he mean? Did he mean, many of you know this. Did he mean don't love your father?
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Don't love your mother. Don't love your son. Don't love your daughter. No. What he meant was in comparison to me, to how you love me, you won't love them.
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You know, it's going to seem like you don't love them. If you're, well, let me put it another way.
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If someone says they love Jesus, but somehow they're not interested in learning about him, or they're not interested in spending time with his people.
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What are we to make of that? How do we sort that out? Let me put it another way.
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If I ask you what your priorities are in life, and you say, well, my priorities are family, work.
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I'd say, well, those are probably good priorities for an unbeliever. They're not good priorities.
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If I said, is Jesus your first priority? And you said, yes. And then
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I said, well, now suppose I just put one of those, you know, because I've been watching these things with the police officers here lately, and they all have these body cams.
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If I was to put a body cam on you, you know, for a week, and then you had to give me that film, and I could just kind of watch it and everything.
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Would I conclude at the end of the week? Yes. That person's first priority is
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Jesus. Here's the thing though. We don't need a body camera.
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Jesus knows what your priorities are. He's with you. He knows how you spend your time, how you think, how you spend your money, everything about you.
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It's easy to fool me. It's easy to fool anybody else. It's easy to come here on Sunday to put on nice clothes.
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It's easy for a lot of us to put on nice clothes. It's easy to come here and act like a
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Christian. You know, when the kids were growing up, I used to have what I called Sunday rules. You know, like we'd get in the car to go to church, and they'd start slapping each other and acting like kids.
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Sorry, that's what they do. Arguing over who had to sit in the middle because the middle was not the comfortable seat, etc, etc, etc.
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You know what I said? I would say, you've heard me say this before. Kids, we don't treat each other like that on Sunday.
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And they would laugh because they knew, you know, they knew that was wrong. Now, I don't know what I said on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.
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But the point is, you know, there's something about Sundays that tends to bring out our best behavior.
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You ever wonder why that is? It ought not to be that way.
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And my challenge to you this morning is, if you've been a
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Sunday Christian, if you're not right with him, if you've been playing a
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Christian, please repent. If none of this means anything to you,
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I hope you'll repent and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ even today. That this will start making sense to you.
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Now, why am I addressing this? This whole idea of having a consistent life?
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Well, because it's the text. If you love me, keep my commandments. But also because there's this whole ripple through the
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Christian world. Self -identifying Christians that believe some heresy or another.
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And it is likely that at least one person here today believes that they're saved, but they love something more.
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They put something else higher on their priority list than they have Jesus. Here's an example of what many
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Christians have done today in terms of disobeying the
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Lord. And that would be in the area of fornication. The stark reality, and I took this off a survey here by a
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Barna study group, is that 65 % of altar -bound singles, and this is the general population, not necessarily
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Christian, but even many whom identify as Christians now live together before marriage.
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And they have good reasons for it. They need to save money for a house. They need to save money for a wedding. That was one of my favorites.
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And I say, go cut right on the wedding and just honor the Lord before you get married. But according to this
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Barna study, 41 % of practicing Christians, defined by Barna as those who attend a religious service at least once a month, and who say their faith is very important in their lives and self -identify as Christians.
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Self -identification is very important these days. They approved of living together before marriage.
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And the prevailing wisdom in much of the nominal church today is that Jesus is just too nice to keep anybody out of heaven who says they're a
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Christian. And you know what? He doesn't really hold us to those old standards, but that's not the truth.
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After all, it's Jesus. Let's turn to Revelation 21 for a moment. Keep your fingers in John 14, but we're going to go to Revelation 21 for a moment, starting in verse five, just all the way to the back, right before you get to the index there in the back.
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Yeah, in the book of maps, Revelation 21, verse five.
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And there's no doubt about who John is writing about when he says this. And he who was seated on the throne said, behold,
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I am making all things new. And he also, he said, write this down for these words are trustworthy and true.
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And he said to me, it is done. I am the alpha and the omega, the beginning and the end to the thirsty.
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I will give from the spring of the water of life without payments. The one who conquers will have this heritage and I will be his
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God and he will be my son. But listen, but as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, the sexually immoral sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.
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Not heaven, hell. Now where it says cowardly, that word isn't speaking of natural timidity.
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It's not talking about shyness, but the cowardice, which is the last resort that chooses self and safety before Christ.
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The word faithless are those who profess Christ, but then they sort of fade away.
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Detestable, those who adopt pagan practices.
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And then we get to sexually immoral. Well, this is a common word, pornea.
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What it means is any sexual immorality. And that would include fornication, adultery, homosexuality, all these things.
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Anything other than biblically approved sexuality.
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God's standard does not change. And he doesn't have an exclusive or an exclusion clause here for people who genuinely believe it's okay.
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Let's go back to John 14. Those who love the
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Lord Jesus will not live lives marked by the very sins, which will separate them from him for all eternity.
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Now, that does not mean that they will not sin or even that they won't sin intentionally. Christian sin.
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But to willfully live in a state of sin and convince themselves that this is fine, has no support in scripture.
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What do we do sometimes? Sometimes we talk ourselves into thinking something is okay.
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But then because of the Holy Spirit, because we talked about this in Sunday school a little bit, because of our consciences, because our consciences are informed by the word of God, we have an alarm going off in our head that says,
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I want to believe this is okay, but I know it's not okay. I know I got to stop doing this. I know I have to get right. And there's a word for those who are able to suppress those alarms and are able to, as the scripture would say, sear their consciences, right?
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Shut it off, make it go away. There's a word for that. And that word is unbeliever.
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If you can shut off the Holy Spirit, if you can shut off the word of God, if you can stop your conscience from bothering you, scripture would say, you're not a believer.
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Those who love Jesus receive a pardon from him for all their sins, and they will spend eternity with him.
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In context, we will see that those who love Jesus are indwelt by the Holy Spirit, but we won't get there today.
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Our second truth, our second truth, those whom Jesus loves obey him.
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Those whom Jesus loves obey him. Look again at verse 15. If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
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You will keep my commandments. Look, even in the immediate context, if you look ahead to verses 21 and 23, listen to what
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Jesus says there. Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he, it is who loves me.
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And he who loves me will be loved by my father. And I will love him and manifest myself to him.
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Verse 23, Jesus answered him. If anyone loves me, he will keep my word. And my father will love him.
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And we will come to him and make our home with him. Skipping ahead to chapter 15, verse 14.
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You are my friends if you do what I command you. Now, let's just think for a moment.
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If Jesus is commanding these disciples, if he's saying, okay, from now on, if you guys are perfect,
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I'm going to send the Holy Spirit. Is that a possible conclusion?
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Is Jesus teaching sinless perfection here? And the answer is no.
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How do we know that? Because he's already told Peter, guess what, Peter? It's just a few hours.
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Even though you profess love for me, even though you say you're willing to die for me, the truth is you're going to deny me three times in the next few hours.
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Before the cock crows, you're going to deny me three times. And by the way, you know what would be interesting?
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I was thinking about that this week is we don't know exactly what happened to all the disciples during this period of time.
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We know that they scattered and weren't all together. But I mean, even at the crucifixion, behold your son,
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Jesus talking to John, the apostle and Mary. We don't see an account of what all the disciples are doing.
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Well, why is that? And I think because they weren't, they didn't want to get arrested. They didn't want to go down.
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It wasn't a matter of their faithfulness that was going to condition the
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Holy Spirit. It was Christ's faithfulness and their love for him. They loved him.
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He loved them. How do we show our love for God?
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How do we show our love for God? Let's turn to 1
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John. Again, same author. And really, we're going to see just an expansion of what he's talking about here with the words of Jesus, as we've seen before.
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Peter there writes a lot of 1 Peter, and it's based on, you know, some of the upper room discourse.
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And this is very similar. 1 John, very similar. 1
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John 5, verse 3. And we're going to be in 1
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John a little bit here. How do we show that we love
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God? How do we demonstrate that? 1 John 5, verse 3. For this is the love of God, not his love for us, but our love for him, that we keep his commandments and his commandments are not burdensome.
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Remember in Matthew, where he says, my yoke is easy. They're not burdensome.
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Now there are things that specifically come to mind, like loving other
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Christians, those kind of things that are commandments that might seem burdensome sometimes.
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But scripture doesn't allow us to segregate the commands of Jesus from the commands of the triune
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God. In other words, Jesus says, if you keep my commandments, but it's not limited to the things he said there in a few chapters.
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This would be all of scripture. If we love God, we keep his commandments. And I just started because we live in this time, a very unusual time where people are protesting.
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I think it seems more than ever. And I just started thinking about, you know, the absurdity of Christians protesting against God, you know, saying we don't like, you know, the rules against this or the laws against that, the commandments against this or the commandments to do that.
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That would be patently absurd. We just think that is just folly for Christians that do that.
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And yet there are all sorts of denominations, all sorts of churches, all sorts of leaders.
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I saw somebody, you know, making a political point the other night and quoting
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Brian McLaren. And I'm just like, okay, here's somebody who denies scripture, denies
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Jesus. Other than that, he's a pretty good Christian. That kind of thing would just be bizarre.
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This idea that Christians would protest. And so why is that? It's because we understand who we are.
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We love Jesus. We're mindful of what he has done for us. And therefore, out of love for him, we obey him.
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By the way, in verse or in chapter 14, that you will keep if you love me, you will keep very clearly future indicative.
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We could understand it this way. Since you love me, you will keep my commandments. And again, this is the basis upon which
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Jesus is going to send the Holy Spirit. We're going to keep the commandments.
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Well, not exactly, but we're going to love Jesus. We're going to believe in Jesus.
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He's going to obey in our place. And then on that basis, he's going to send the Holy Spirit. This is the
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Lord's promise to comfort his disciples. Just imagine if, you know, again, this whole idea of comforting them, everything is going from their perspective wrongly.
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From Jesus perspective, everything's right on track. And I'm going to comfort, you know, he's going to comfort the disciples by doing what?
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By saying, now, if you guys will just, you know, pull yourselves up by your bootstraps and obey, then
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I'll send the Holy Spirit. No, no, that would not be any comfort at all. Now, again, in 1
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John, some examples of commands that are not optional.
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1 John 1, and I'm going to start right from the beginning. 1
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John 1, that which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life.
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The life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the father and was made manifest to us.
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Well, who's he talking about? Of course, he's talking about the Lord Jesus Christ, the word that became flesh.
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Verse 3, that which we have seen and heard, we proclaim also to you. In other words, we heard
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Jesus say these things, and now we're going to proclaim them to you. So that you may have, so that you too may have fellowship with us, so that you may be brought into the disciples, as it were.
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And indeed, our fellowship is with the father and with his son, Jesus Christ. Verse 4, and we are writing these things so that our joy may be complete.
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This is the message we have heard from him, from Jesus, and proclaim to you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all.
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This epistle is based on the apostle John listening to Jesus and then relaying that information to us.
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These are the commands, as I'm going to lay out just a few here, of Jesus. First command that I want to highlight here,
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Christians do not live lives marked by sin. First John 1 .6,
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if we say we have fellowship with him, that is to say with Christ, while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.
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Of course, the idea of a walk is the course of your life. So if you say, I'm a
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Christian, and yet your life is marked, your walk is marked by darkness or sin, then
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John has a message for you. You're a liar. You can't walk with Jesus and with what he forbids at the same time.
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I love Jesus, but I also love what he hates. That doesn't make any sense.
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That's incongruous. That just means it doesn't match up.
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Christians do sin, but they confess their sin. And John's quite clear about it right away.
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In verse 8 to 10, if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.
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If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
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If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us.
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The Holy Spirit working through the written word of God in our consciences alerts us to sin.
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Anyone who believes he is not sinning is leading himself or herself astray. That's the whole idea of deceiving yourself.
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It's like you are just completely fooling yourself. And confession, the word
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Greek word is homo legeo, to say the same as. We confess our sins. We don't come to Steve or Charlie or anybody else.
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Father Dan here in the front row. We don't call anybody father, right? We don't have to go to someone, some authority.
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We have entrance into the throne room of God. We enter before him and we say the same as.
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Well, what does that mean? It means that I'm broken over my sin. I have this. Psalm 51.
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Attitude against God and God only if I send Psalm 51. I think it's four says, you know, against the and the only if I send.
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We understand the gravity of our sin. We are distressed by it. We ideally we would see our sin exactly as God does.
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He would view it this way and we would say, I agree with you. That is horrible. That is terrible. I can't believe
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I did it. I never want to do it again. Please forgive me, God. That's the idea of confession, not please forgive me.
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I've sinned. How many Hail Marys do I have to say? And I think it's important to just for a moment.
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I'm, you know, just going after the idea of antinomianism. That is to say, being against the law, being a
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Christian who just thinks he can do whatever he wants. But we also have to say that legalism is a problem, too, to just think,
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OK, I am. More of a Christian because or I love
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Christ more because I sin less, our goal should be to sin less. But friends, if you are in Christ Jesus, nothing can separate you from the love of God in Christ.
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Nothing created. And that includes you and your sin. God does not love you any more or any less because of what you do, because your sin has been paid for.
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He loves you as he loves the Lord Jesus Christ. Let's go to 1
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John 2, 28. And we'll close here in a minute. Christians long for Christ's second coming.
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1 John 2, 28. And now little children abide in him so that when he appears, we may have confidence and not shrink from him in shame at his coming.
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Abide in him, he says. Remain in him. And you say, well, that's John. No, Jesus says the same thing.
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Abide in me. Obey him. Why? So that you won't feel shame when he returns.
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He's coming back. Christians put off sin.
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1 John 3, 6. No one who abides in him, abides in Christ, remains in Christ, keeps on sinning.
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We don't have that pattern of the same sin over and over and over again without remorse. Why? Because it says no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him.
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And I want to be clear about something else here. Our sin is not an excuse to not believe.
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In other words, if you're out here this morning and you're an unbeliever, you can't think, well, you know what? As soon as I stop sinning, then
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I'm going to come to Christ. Or you might even think, you know what? I'm not done with sin yet. When I get done sinning, then
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I'll believe. No, you won't. No, you won't. And you should be terrified this morning because there is a thrice holy
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God and judgment is coming and you don't know when. None of us knows the hour of his return nor of our own death.
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1 John 3, 16. Christians love other Christians. This is not an option. If you don't love other
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Christians, if I ask you who your Christian friends are and you say, I don't have any, there's a problem.
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You ought to love other brothers and sisters in Christ. 1 John 3, 16 says this. By this, we know love.
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That he laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers. He's already said that in John 13.
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You love other Christians. That's what the new commandment was to love one another in a special way that we might be known by our love for one another.
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Well, I'll skip some of these other ones, but there is nobody.
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I feel like I'm about to do a WB Mason commercial. Who but Jesus could promise the sending of the
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Holy Spirit? Nobody could. The second person of the Trinity promising to send the third person of the
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Trinity. And again, if it was based on the obedience of the disciples, it would be hopeless.
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It's not based on that. But Jesus says, if you love me, you will keep my commandments.
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We fail. Jesus did not fail. He lived the perfect life.
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He died on the cross. He was raised on the third day for our righteousness. He died for our sins, was raised from the third day that we might be declared righteous.
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His righteousness imputed to us. And without that righteousness, no one will see heaven. If you know the
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Lord Jesus Christ, you ought to think to yourself, how is that reflected in my life? What are my priorities?
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How can somebody say if I had that body camera on, how would they follow me around? How could they watch that video all through the day and go?
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I can tell he loves Jesus because if there's no evidence,
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I'm not saying the evidence makes you a Christian, but if there's no evidence, then you ought to be concerned.
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Let's pray. Father, we confess we all fall short of the glory of God.
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We are sinners by nature. Scripture would tell us we are sinners by desire left to our own devices.
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We are hopeless, but you didn't leave us to our own devices.
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You sent Jesus Christ, second person of the Trinity, eternally God, to take on human flesh and additional nature to become fully man, even as he is and remains and always will be fully
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God. You sent him here to live a perfect life in our place.
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And he did that. You sent him here to die the death we deserve because of our sin.
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He did that. You raised him from the dead that we might on the third day, that we might be declared righteous, that we might have that righteousness wrapped around us as it were.
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So that on judgment day, you will see the perfect righteousness of Christ and not our sin.
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Father, we praise you for the perfections, for the righteousness of Christ. For anyone here who does not believe.
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Father, today, would you convict them of their need for Christ? Would you regenerate their hearts?
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Would you cause them to believe? Father, we pray for these things in Jesus name.