What Shall We Do? - [Luke 3:7-14]

Years ago, I was speaking on the radio with a decorated war Hero and he had gotten saved after he had got out of the military and he

Was asked to pray at the National Day of Prayer And I had known about an evangelical who had been asked to speak in the

National Day of Prayer And was told ahead of time you can't say Jesus's name And so I thought saw third.

I thought certainly This decorated war vet would say Jesus name and so I said when you got up to pray

How did you end the prayer and he said I ended it in God's name. We pray. Amen.

I Thought oh Reminded me of the story of Methodist preacher Peter Cartwright, and he was to preach in front of President Andrew Jackson And he was told

Andrew Jackson is in the congregation Be careful what you say Certain things you can say certain things.

You can't say and so Peter Cartwright got up to preach. I Understand Andrew Jackson is here

I've been requested to be guarded in my remarks Andrew Jackson will go to hell if he doesn't repent

Congregation was shocked. But afterwards President Jackson approached the preacher Sir, if I had a regiment of men like you

I could whip the world And today today we talk about another

Preacher of repentance and his name is John the Baptist Please take your Bibles and open to Luke chapter 3 the herald of the

Lord Jesus the forerunner the preacher of righteousness and repentance Proclaiming repentance heralding repentance and with boldness and without compromise heralding the truth about the

Lord Super simple outline today since so many people have a false view or a wrong view of repentance.

What is repentance? Does it apply the outline is simple. I'm going to give you Several errors people make when it comes to repentance.

Maybe we could call it avoiding errors about repentance avoiding errors about repentance

What I love about the gospel Luke and by the way, if you're new here at church We just pick a book and we just start preaching through the book and this is the gospel or the good news about Jesus according to Luke and Luke writes like a physician like a historian very detailed so that you might know exactly

Who the Lord Jesus is and have certainty about what you see in the text the gospel according to Luke And he wants you to know that Jesus especially in chapter 2 is a man who's born of a woman the

Virgin Mary Conceived by the Spirit of God and he's born under a law because Jesus needs to keep the law because we're lawbreakers and Jesus need to pay for lawbreakers because that's our only hope of heaven and later in the epistles we'll learn about this

Jesus the law keeper and how he Saves us by grace and how he redeems us from slavery of sin and how because of Jesus we have peace with God Romans 5 would say through the

Lord Jesus Christ and have access to God the Father Thankfully because of the Lord Jesus that we'll learn about in the gospel of Luke Romans 5 is very applicable while we were still weak at the right time

Christ died for the ungodly For one will scarcely die for a righteous person though.

Perhaps for a good person one would even dare to die But God shows or demonstrates his love for us that and while we were sinners

Christ Died for us it is by the one man's obedience to Lord Jesus where we are

Constituted righteous and therefore there's no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus And this is the

Jesus that Luke proclaims instead of some kind of Jesus that reacts a

Jesus who is just Watered down far from being worshipped kind of an enabler

Luke will not let you think that about the Lord Jesus he wants you to think that he's truly God and truly man and Critical in the first two chapters if I had to focus in on something that I don't want you to forget in chapters 1 & 2 it's found in verse 49 of Chapter 2 as we look through the birth of Jesus and the birth of John the

Baptist and the shepherds and the angels and everything else Please don't forget dear congregation that at the verse 49 of chapter 2 is very important and He said to his parents his mother and stepfather.

Why are you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my father's? house

Of course, you could say back in those days our father you could say the father But what is Jesus saying when he says my father when

Jesus was talking to false teachers? Remember in John chapter 5 and when he called God my father, what did that signal to those teachers?

Jesus answered them saying my father is working until now and I am working This was why the

Jews were seeking all the more to kill him Not only that he was breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling

God his own father Making himself equal with God and so the writer

Luke wants you to realize Here's the God man the Lord Jesus Christ and he has an origin.

He has a background. He's truly man, but he is truly God he is The God man and in chapter 3 we have

John the Baptist preparing the way for Jesus in the old days They would have front men they would have people that would go out ahead of time to make sure that everything was set for the

King's arrival and That's exactly what happens here in John 3

Let me just read these verses again as we approach our passage today, which is in chapter 3 verse 7

But let's just catch up for last week chapter 3 verse 1 in the 15th year of the reign of Tiberius Caesar Pontius Pilate being governor of Judea and Herod being tetrarch of Galilee and his brother

Philip tetrarch of the region of Iturria and Trachonitis and Lysanias tetrarch of Abilene During the high priesthood of Annas and Caiaphas.

Here's the grammatical center of those verses. Here's the key point You think these other guys are really big shots and leaders and everything else

But here's the main issue the Word of God Came to John the son of Zechariah in the wilderness

God is speaking for the first time in 400 years through a prophet. God is speaking.

What will he say? The Messiah is certainly going to come soon What is God going to do and it's in the midst of all these crazy people sinful people vile people wicked people those that would actually chop

John's head off and Crucify Jesus John the Baptist shows up and nothing's going to stop

God and his word because God is Sovereign and he has dominion and he rules and in the midst of chaos that can't stop the

Lord Jesus from coming and what did John preach and he went into all the region around Jordan and Said you need to have your best life now

I'm gonna start calling John seeker sensitive John by the way He's so nice and he went into all the region of Jordan proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins

The Lord Jesus is going to come recognize that you're sinful and in a unique baptism.

This is not Christian baptism This was not a Jewish baptism of cleansing If you wanted to be a

Jew and you were Gentile, this is unique to John Jesus is going to show up Get baptized

Preparation baptism looking to the Lord Jesus Get ready acknowledge your sins the king is coming and What John the

Baptist does if you see in verses 4 and following is he prepares the way of the Lord?

those verses in chapter 3 verses 4 5 & 6 Literally would be let's make sure the roads are nice.

Let's make sure the roads are smooth Let's make sure when the king travels he gets there easily It's almost like let the red carpet out the red carpet treatment by the way on a side note

It was 1902 New York Central Railroad Put out plush crimson carpets to direct people to board the 20th century limited passenger train

And this was the origin of red carpet treatment put out the red carpet for Jesus.

He's coming Matter of fact Luke chapter 1 said that that was exactly going to happen

You John the Baptist will go before the Lord to prepare his ways And with great figurative language you can see in verses 4 and following this voice that cries out in the wilderness from Isaiah Prepare the way of the

Lord make his path straight, etc So now we come to our outline in our passage

Luke 3 7 to 14 avoiding common errors about repentance And by the way,

I put it this way so that you say to yourself, I don't want to fall into that error. I Want you to avoid these errors?

Error number one to ignore repentance ignore repentance. That's the first error never preach it never do it.

I read of a French preacher in 1650 Southern France preached 50 sermons in a row on two words repent ye and One of those sermons lasted four and a half hours.

I Don't think he ignored it. By the way, I always love fall ahead for Daylight savings time because that means

I get to preach for an extra hour works out. Perfect Some of you were thinking what do you do when you spring back?

You don't preach. No. No, I just ignore that one back in verse 3 again proclaiming a

Baptism for repentance and at the end of the gospel of Luke remember what Jesus said in the

Great Commission in Luke chapter 24 Thus it is written that the Christ should suffer and on the third day rise from the dead and Jesus said and that repentance

For the forgiveness of sin should be proclaimed in his name to all nations beginning from Jerusalem You need to think rightly about sin.

You need to change your mind You need to think properly when it comes to sin i .e. We sin and God is holy and there's going to be

Nuclear winter when sin and holiness come together unless that sin has been forgiven

Charles Hodge said there's no duty which is either more obvious in itself or more frequently asserted in the

Word of God than that of repentance Everywhere you look the word is repent repent repent and sometimes there are words in the

Bible that mean repent But aren't technically Repent in other words, you don't see the word but you get the idea

Circumcise your hearts a breakup follow ground Turn from your wicked way wash your heart from wickedness

And if you start looking at the Old Testament Ezekiel preaches repentance Jesus sends the twelve out in Mark 6 and they preaching repentance

Peter after the ascension of Jesus said repent and let each of you be baptized

The prodigal son I think Typifies what a repentant heart is like when

Jesus was teaching in Luke 15 about that son It says when he came to his senses when he repented

And he had felt that shame of repentance father, I've sinned against heaven and in your sight

I'm no longer worthy to be called your son And so wherever you look in the

Bible repentance is there so we want to make sure we don't ignore it Paul on top of Mars Hill, by the way, has anybody here been on top of Mars Hill Areopagus Jim McStay well good for you

Wasn't it amazing? What else could you say right now? You have to say what

I say Pastor Paul is on the top of this place where they would discuss political things and philosophical things.

And what does he tell them? Well, it should be obvious times of ignorance God overlooked Paul said but now he commands all people everywhere to Repent to think rightly about sin

And some people responded with laughter. Some people responded with snickering and some people believed

He was 1517 and Martin Luther was in Wittenberg Germany and he put up 95 statements

To try to have the reform come in the Roman Catholic Church and out of the 95 statements his first statement was

When the Lord and Master Jesus said repent he willed the entire life of believers to be one of repentance

And so even as Christians we understand what John is doing is talking about Unbelievers should repent and think rightly about sin

But even as Christians We're a repenting people and we're trying to be corrected and think rightly about our sin so that we repent and ask

God forgive us Number two second error first one is ignore repentance and I don't think anybody here really does number two turn repentance into a work the second error that happens a lot is

Turning repentance into some kind of work in other words you have to clean up your life in order to come to Christ That's where I'm going with this now

I want you to keep your thinking caps on because we're going to get a little theological here for a moment

And then we'll get back down to The hay on the lower levels, but I want to make sure you understand this if I were to say to you

What comes first? Regeneration or faith being born again or believing a mate being alive you used to be dead and now you're alive and believing

You'd probably say well. It just depends Chronologically it happens at the same time

I can't be a regenerate unbeliever, and I can't believe a believing unregenerate and so it seems to me in time

They happen at the same time. They're like Siamese twins, and you would be right But theologically and logically you can't exercise faith until you're born again until you're alive

Because dead people don't believe They're they're dead and so chronologically repentance and faith are simultaneous theologically

Being born again is first similarly here with the

Bible teaching on Repentance if I ask you repent and believe which one comes first Well, you mean to tell me that I can be a repentant unbeliever, or I can be a believing unpenitent

Chronologically faith and repentance is simultaneous. No problem there, right? It's like a coin the tails is

I'm thinking rightly about sin Repentance and the head side is I'm trusting in the

Lord Jesus So again, they're simultaneous in time, but like with regeneration and faith theologically

There's there's an order. There's a priority and that is faith comes first That's why we believe in sola fide not sola repentance, but sola fide by the way

When you think about the order theologically? John Calvin for instance says it ought to be a fact beyond controversy that repentance not only constantly follows faith

But is also born of faith For since pardon and forgiveness are offered through the preaching of the gospel in order that the sinner

Freed from the tearing of Satan the yoke of sin and the miserable bondage of vices may cross over into the kingdom of God Surely no one can embrace the grace of the gospel without betaking himself then from the errors of his past life the motivating power for repentance comes from faiths looking to the

Lord for Forgiveness and and mercy I could maybe put it something like this if you're going to grab

The Lord Jesus with the hands of faith that cling to him You're not going to grab him with hands of sin and self and everything else when you grab him all those other things

That you need to repent of fall from your hands And so without belaboring this

Too much. I just want to make sure Here's the point when you're preaching the gospel to people and you tell them in light of who

Jesus is and what he's done Let me tell you your response if you want to say believe that's fine because in the

Bible believe is Implied repentance if you want to say repent, that's fine.

Because with repentance there's faith. I say one I mean both and I tell them you must repent

I'm not saying clean up your life so that you can believe I'm not saying there's something before faith

I'm not saying you know what I can't offer you the good news of Jesus until you stop sinning as You know probably the book that changed my life

Was the God was the gospel of Luke well true and all these other books of the Bible But written by a man was the whole

Christ by Sinclair Ferguson by the way Just curious how many people read the whole Christ by Sinclair Ferguson.

I love being your pastor Good job that book changed my life and when

I met Sinclair Ferguson a while ago. I saw him again I said Sinclair that that book changed my life

The way I preach the flavor that I preach in the tincture that the attitude that book changed my life

Thank you for writing that and normally know these stage Scottish guys are like okay. Thank you. You know.

Thank you something like that And he grabbed my hands with two of his hands and said thank you

And I said I think the congregation sees it as well, too Instead of scolding people trying to encourage people in this whole idea of of who

Jesus is and how do you preach it? But in that book it has a little history to it and the history is there was an argument in Scotland in 1700s and that argument was do you tell people that are unbelievers they have to stop sinning in order to come to Christ Or do you offer them

Christ even as sinners? And it was called the Merrill controversy, and it had men involved like Thomas Boston and Robert Ralph Erskine and and Ebenezer Erskine think if I had another child

I'd probably name him Ebenezer What's the nickname for Ebenezer by the way? What Ben oh that'd be perfect.

I was thinking neither, but that wouldn't work out You have to be united to Jesus in order to forsake sin

That's why it's so Lafitte believe on the Lord Jesus, and you'll be saved when I say repent I'm not saying stop your sinning.

I am saying think rightly about your sin But I'm not telling people to stop sinning so that they might believe because Jesus justifies the ungodly

Now in the 1600s a man wrote a book called the marrow of modern divinity And he has an evangelist speaking to a legalist and they're talking back and forth legalist

I can see repentance Consists in a man humbling himself before God and turning from them all to the

Lord the evangelist Would you have a man do all this before he comes to Christ by believing?

Legalist yes, I think it is very fitting the evangelist. Well. I tell you you would have him do what's impossible

It's impossible as an unbeliever to turn from your sins, and so we preach exactly what 11

Chapter 11 verse 21 says in Acts the hand of the Lord is with them and a great number who believed turned to the

Lord Sinners don't have to stop sinning in order to come to Christ they come by faith and when they come by faith

Inevitably and always they will come by faith repenting error number three

Exchange religious activity or religious heritage for repentance this is amazing chapter 3 verse 7

John the Baptist said to the crowds that came out to be baptized by him They're coming to him out of the wilderness you brood of vipers

Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come bear fruits in keeping with repentance and do not begin to say to yourselves

We have Abraham as our father for I tell you God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham You think that you're going to?

Escape the hell of God the wrath of God the burning lake of fire by simply getting dunked in the

Jordan I Didn't tell you that don't get that from me back in verse 7 who warned you to flee from the wrath to come by simply

Getting baptized. I haven't John the Baptist said that's not the way to go It's like there's all kinds of snakes

Slithering around and then they're by the fire and they want to escape the fire to be okay

But they don't want to change from their snake nature you want to get baptized But you don't want to have any change in your life

You want to get baptized to be forgiven you crowds and you Pharisees and Sadducees and everything else

But you don't want to have any internal change because you don't want to stop sinning I'm not going to tell you that John the

Baptist said keep living the way you've always lived But say you're forgiven. I mean that kind of sounds like today when people say well.

I've been baptized I've been a church member. I serve I I go to church, and I just do that because I'm kind of just Giving God a couple you know little gifts here and there, but I'm not going to change in any of my sins

I'm going to live the way. I'm going to live Snakes in the fire they're running from the fire, but they don't want to be any less snakish

Doesn't that remind you by the way? Where's the other story about a viper in a fire in the in the

Bible remember that story? I mean, it's just so funny the fight the viper in the fire running

Paul said after the shipwreck in Malta the native people in Acts 28 showed us unusual kindness For the kindled the fire and welcomed us all because it began to rain and was cold when

Paul began to gather a bundle of sticks and put them on a the fire a Viper came out because of the heat and fastened onto his hand you can imagine just lifting the hand up And there's that thing just stuck on his hand

Uh -oh is right The native people saw the creature hanging from his hand they said to another no doubt this man is a murderer though We escaped the sea capital

J. Justice the God of justice has not allowed him to live see What goes around comes around with Karma?

He did bad things the universe is going to judge him and there's Paul with that viper However, Paul shook off the creature into the fire and suffered no harm

They were waiting for him to swell up or suddenly fall down dead But when they had waited for a long time and saw him no misfortune come to him

They changed their minds and said that he was a god. I mean can you imagine

John the Baptist here you brood of vipers in? Matthew he's saying that to the pharisees and the

Sadducees and here he's saying it to everybody They probably the crowds have probably imbibed the the teaching of the

Sadducees and the Pharisees I Just want to have my sins dealt with but I don't care about living for the

Lord I don't care about being godly. I don't care about repenting. I don't care about striving after holiness

I just want to have my sins forgiven and John Says that's a delusion you need a wake -up call for that that is

Hypocrisy that is a false profession and John the Baptist will call it out matter of fact He'll call it out so much that he'll have his head chopped off later

Essentially John the Baptist is saying this you come out here to me And you want to get baptized for the remission of sins and say you know what

I never want to change I never want to have any fruit. I never have any evidence I don't want to think rightly about sin and how it's a

Trespass against God and I don't want to think about how it defames God and attacks his holiness

I just want to live the way I'm living But I want to have the security blanket at home at night thinking if I die in my sleep

I'm going to heaven and basically he says you know what your father is Satan If you think that way you're satanic remember in John 8 44

Jesus said you were of your father the Devil because the devil's a liar the devil's a slander you think of the serpent back in Genesis chapter 3

He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in the truth because there's no truth in him

Whenever he speaks a lie he speaks from his own nature for he's a liar and the father of lies

That's your father you think father Abraham had many sons and many sons had father Abraham.

I'm one of them and so are you So let's just praise the Lord No, you have father Abraham when you're a repenter and when you're a believer, and you're trusting in the

Lord Jesus Everybody's just not a father of Abraham a son of Abraham because they're Jewish Satan lies, it's a lie to think

I'll just do a religious activity and that takes care of it It's a lie to think that God does not want us to think about our sin and trust in the

Lord only It's a lie It's a seat of the serpent

Verse 8 again we have Abraham as our father. That's not a religious duty. That's religious heritage

He says do not begin to say to yourself don't even think about it. Don't pass go don't go there

Don't lay down there. You're in your bed at night thinking. You know what my dad's a Christian my dad's a pastor

My mom's godly. I'm just in by getting in I'm in by membership. I've been by a long line of Protestants If you haven't thought rightly about your sin trusted in the

Lord Jesus bearing fruits of repentance Then you ought not to be saying to that to yourself

The real offspring of Abraham are repenters are believers And I trust that if you're here today, and if I were to ask you if you were to die tonight stand before God If God were to ask you why should

I let you into heaven I? Hope dear congregation it wouldn't be because you would say

I've been baptized Because I'm in a Christian family, and I've done these things

Because if you could get into heaven by those things why kill Jesus Why murder

Jesus it takes the death of Jesus our sin is so bad a little moral reform won't work So we need the

Lord Jesus the loving Savior to come be a shepherd and guide us and before he guides us

He saves us and so the only answer When we stand before God, it's not even our faithfulness

I was good, and I served and I I said what I was supposed to do And I and I loved other Christians, and I loved you

It's not even that our sanctification your sanctification is not a Savior Right your holy living is not a

Savior your only Savior as you stand before God And you say I deserve to go to hell, and I shouldn't be here because I'm a sinner

But I have a Savior I have an advocate that stands between you father and and me and I have a mediator who stands

There right there. I meant to say mediator between you and me advocate with me Number four misunderstand true repentance

Ignore repentance turn repentance into a work exchange religious activity for repentance and now the fourth error.

That's pretty common Misunderstand true repentance, and it's kind of connected to the last one

But we'll make it separate for our message today Misunderstand true repentance true or false

You're saved by faith alone True true or false you're saved by faith alone, but that faith won't be alone

In other words you're saved by faith alone in the courtroom of God You're justified by faith alone because you're looking to the

Savior But after God saves you and gives you the Spirit of God who dwells in you you will do things that show out of gratitude

Fruits and evidence of your Christian life you're saved by faith alone, but that faith won't be alone true or false Are you sure?

Yes good all right, that's that old thing you do when you're a pastor true or false you're saved by works true or false

True Christ works of course It's similar faith that repentance is to faith in this regard

Saved by faith alone, and that faith won't be alone And what happens is when you see real repentance?

It's going to have fruits real repentance has fruits And that's what

John says in verse 8 bear fruits in keeping with repentance have

Fruit that matches your profession that illustrate it And if you go down to verse 10, we're going to back up a little bit in a second

But in chapter 3 verse 10 you see three groups of people verses 10 and following that need to bear fruits of repentance

Essentially fruits of repentance are a loving God and loving neighbor, but there's the crowd the tax collectors and the soldiers

They know they're sinful But it's a shallow kind of thing and so he says to group one

After they ask him what every group asked him. What should we do? The crowds ask him verse 10.

What should we do he answered them whoever has two tunics? That's the thing you put underneath your cloak Kind of almost like underwear kind of thing is to share with him who has none and whoever has food is to do likewise

Not that hard somebody doesn't have what they need for clothing and you have an extra set of clothing and you can't wear two

Clothing's at the same time. How do I say that? You can't wear two under things at the same time.

I guess you could You don't need to well, then you should share you should love your neighbor

Well tax collectors verse 12. They came out to be baptized by him. What's what's fruit that bears?

What's the fruit from real repentance teacher? What shall we do and he said to them collect no more than you were authorized to do

Tax collectors sinners prostitutes. They're all in the same group. Is it wrong to work for the

IRS? Come on But it's wrong to work for the

IRS and Clam down on people that shouldn't be clammed down on it's not wrong to be a tax collector

But it's wrong to extort people It's wrong to take advantage of your Position so what

John the Baptist does not say is quit being a tax collector But what are some fruits from the tax collector?

Well, the obvious one is You know what verse 13 collect no more than you're authorized to do

Don't don't be unloving to other people There's that old phrase by Luther God doesn't need your good works.

I mean, he doesn't need anything right? He's self -sufficient He's of himself, but your neighbor does and so what does a tax collector need to do?

Well, you want to see the fruits so you can check to see what the root is if I have no fruit

Do I have any root? Well, what's the fruit be kind to people love them? Don't defraud them.

Don't extort them By the way, that's why you paid to have the franchise of tax collector so you could get extra money

But you ought not to do that because it's wrong and it's sinful be fair do your job rightly Well, there's another group that asked him

Basically, what do we do to bear fruits of repentance? What shall we do verse 14 soldiers said and he said to them

Do not extort money from anyone by threats or by false accusation and be content with your wages

Maybe Roman soldiers probably Jewish soldiers and they had the power they had the strength they had the swords and they could get money from you if they wanted to and They could probably

Justified by saying we don't get paid that much to do this kind of job and we're gonna take it from other people That we're guarding

Don't do that the root of repentance shows the fruit of repentance it says

Something here about threats. Do you see where where it says threats? Don't threaten anyone.

You know what the Greek word for a threat is Shake Ever heard this phrase before in the

Mafia shook them down Right. It's almost like they're a money tree. You just shake it until the money comes out of their pockets

Don't shake anybody down. You've got the power to do it. Don't shake them down Faith without works is dead repentance without fruit

Isn't real repentance You could probably say to yourself

All right. Am I really a Christian? This is a good exercise for everyone. Am I a

Christian am I right with God? It's the most important question you could ever ask yourself. Am I right with God and if I were to say to you

Why are you a Christian? I hope you would say Because I believe on the

Lord Jesus Christ before you said I read the Bible. I have a desire to serve I want to love

God and love his command love his people. I'm doing all these things I hope you say first and primarily

I believe what Jesus said is true. I believe he confirmed it by the resurrection I believe that he's the eternal

Son of God who took on flesh. He lived for me. He died for me He was raised for me. He ascended for me

He's interceding for me and my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness. That's why

I should go to heaven that's what you sure first should say and secondarily to emphasize the point secondarily you should say to yourself

I Wonder if the Spirit of God has any fruit in my life Is the

Spirit of God working in my life and Romans chapter 8? Here's part of the fruit of the ministry of the

Holy Spirit in your life when you're in a bad situation You cry out what? Abba father

This is the shriek of a pregnant lady who's so much in pain when you are down and out and health and money and Issues and jobs and marriages and everything else and you're thinking

I need some help God help me Did you know that's a sign of a Christian? Because you know, he can help you and there's also another thing that helps is if you look at your life and say

I Wonder if there's any spirits fruit in my life the fruit of the Spirit is

Love and joy and peace, etc. And so you say but I don't do that like I Want to but I have the desire to do it, you know, that's also the fruit of the

Spirit Who gave you the desire to obey who gave you the desire to evangelize who gave you the desire to read the

Bible? Who gave you the desire to serve one another? Satan as I like to say

CNN Newsmax that's the

Spirit of God And so if you stay if you think today, here's a good gut check for everyone standing here sitting here today

Am I really a Christian? I'm trusting in the Lord Jesus. He's my all -in -all

And I want to trust him more than I do but I Trust him. I believe it and I see in my life not as much as I want.

I want more but even that is a fruit I see in my life a desire to cry out to God when

I'm hurting and I see in my life a desire To have more love joy and peace air number four

Five, excuse me. What five we up to five? Okay, when I said for Brian Bartlett look down in his notes.

I knew I said the wrong number Number five delay repentance the fifth air delay repentance

He's talking to the unbeliever here, but of course as Christians we don't want to delay our repentance either but for the unbeliever

Got a life to live So your oats gonna travel the world gonna do other things don't get tied down now by somehow

God's law and his restrictive nature That's all wrong thinking by the way, but look at what John the

Baptist says verse 9 of Luke chapter 3 even now Better not wait.

This is risky. The axe is laid to the root of the trees judgments coming soon

You're not guaranteed tomorrow Every tree therefore that is not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire

You can't repent too soon

As Andrew Fuller said because you do not know how soon it may be too late and by the way in context fast -forward 40 years approximately and Jerusalem Falls and so if you're here today, and you're not a

Christian What are you waiting for? Why are you delaying repentance and faith in the

Lord Jesus? 2nd Corinthians behold now is the favorable time behold now is the day of salvation

Hebrews 3 today if you hear his voice do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion

Come now you who say today or tomorrow will go into such -and -such a town and spend a year there and trade and make a profit

Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring What is your life? You're a myths that appears for a little time and then vanishes

It's appointed for man once to die and after that what? judgment Isaiah 55 seek the

Lord while he may be found call upon him while he is near Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts

Let him return to the Lord that he may have compassion on him and to our God for he will abundantly pardon and number six our last one

Our last common error deny that false repentance deserves God's wrath

Ignore repentance turn repentance into a work Exchange religiosity for repentance misunderstand true repentance delay repentance and now number six

Deny that false repentance deserves God's wrath The very beginning of the

Bible the first lie that was ever told God won't judge

And we stand here as people Understanding even as Christians that God does judge and we look back to the cross and we look back to the

Lord Jesus and what? He's done for us and we say yes in fact on that cross when he said my God my

God Why have you sit forsaken me from noon to three it turned dark as God?

The Father is judging the sins of all those who'd ever believe on the cross God judges sin if you don't believe that you look to the cross

Wasn't Jesus sin either it was our sin And so we don't want to say somehow that there's no ultimate wrath if you go back to verse 7 not just the fire language in verse 9 throwing down these trees into the fire

But also remember what John the Baptist said at Baptist said after the brood of vipers who warned you to flee from the wrath to come

Where are the men and women who speak plainly and bluntly and biblically about the coming wrath

Now it's almost like a caricature if you go to a basketball game And there's somebody standing outside of TD Garden And they're saying repent for the kingdom of God is near you think he's a kook out of all the reasons to repent and believe

This should be right up there hell is real eternity is real Psalm to his wrath may soon be kindled how blessed are all those who take refuge in him

It's not just I'm afraid of hell as an unbeliever It's I'm afraid of hell and there is one who suffered essentially the torments of hell condensed into three hours on the cross

He did that for people like me The Bible says whoever believes in the

Son has eternal life Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.

I don't want you to be deceived For most of the ministry here I'm trying to encourage Christians to trust in the

Lord even though they fall short in their holy living for the week They're still safe, and that's true

The focus of the passage here today is a little bit different It's talking about people that say somehow they can be religious they can have a repentance they can have an experience

They can be slain in the spirit something that can happen to them or they're related to somebody who's godly and that's good enough

It's whoever believes on the Lord shall be saved Wasn't it John Bunyan in pilgrims progress?

That was trying to make it so vivid so that people would be urgent to repent and not delay repentance

When he said at the gates of heaven you think you're going in there's a porthole or a trapdoor to hell

Because you think you're gonna go in, but you don't have a faith in the Lord Jesus You just have a baptism or circumcision or something else

That is a diabolical strategy That Satan loves to have Proverbs 16.

There's a way that seems right to a man, but it's end is the way of what? death

You don't have demon faith. You don't want to have temporary faith Do you know in 2015 55 million people died

Every day, that's a hundred and fifty thousand every hour that's six thousand every minute. That's a hundred and every second.

That's two two four six eight ten

And all those who aren't trusting in the Lord Jesus, I think sometimes we're afraid to talk about hell in church

But if they won't hear it from the pulpit, where will they hear it from a bunch of people died tragically

And they went to Jesus in Luke 13 Do you think these Galileans were worse sinners than all the other

Galileans because they suffered in this way Jesus now I tell you the truth, but unless you repent you'll all likewise perish

Are those 18 on whom the Tower of Siloam fell and killed them? Do you think they were worse offenders than all the others who lived in Jerusalem Jesus Luke 13?

No, I tell you but unless you repent you all likewise perish. I know you've heard this from me before but it's

So impactful I reread it regularly World War two Navy group of soldiers.

They're going to have to advance soon and get off the ship Chaplain do you believe in hell?

No Well, then we want you to resign For there's no hell.

We don't need you and if there is we don't want to be led astray Kind of sounds like John the

Baptist I'm not saying our evangelism only needs to be like John the

Baptist and we're the latest Incarnation of Elijah and we're flamethrowers and this is the only part of our ministry.

I Am saying that there needs to be some law work some preparation work

Preaching what God requires and that the nature of God as a holy God Before we go offering to people

Jesus loves you and Jesus died for people like you People need to need they need to know that they need to be saved first before we offer them the

Savior. That's Romans chapter 3 verse 19 Lastly just a

PS Sometimes the Bible says repent and the response is they believe sometimes the

Bible says believe And it says they repent Because they go together and there's theological shorthand in the

Bible and if I tell you today to repent I'm telling you to think rightly about your sins and to believe on the

Lord Jesus And if you ever hear me say believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you shall be saved I'm also saying to you you need to think rightly about your sins and repent.

And so when I say one I mean the both And so today if you're trusting in the

Lord Jesus, you're safe You're secure and we are going to celebrate that at the Lord's table in a moment and if you're not trusting in the

Lord Jesus You need to be forgiven. Why why do you resist?

Why don't you just ask the Lord? I don't know if I can believe on my own, but would you give me faith?

And would you give mercy? I heard you're a merciful God. Would you grant me mercy on to saving faith? Let's pray father in heaven.

I thank you for this time hard words from John the Baptist And I thank you for the words that were used but your words and Father on behalf of this dear congregation

We thank you for bringing people into our lives Who told us the truth? They didn't sugarcoat it.

They were kind they spoke the truth in love But they told us the truth that we needed a Savior. We thank you for those people

Must have been hard for many of them to tell us even though we are family members and friends But they opened their mouth and talked about you and talked about your holiness

And talked about repentance and faith and our wonderful Savior the Lord Jesus a friend like no other the captain of our salvation

Would you help us as Christians? In a kind way, but in a real way and an honest way in a direct way

To tell people about sin so that they might look to the Savior. I pray father that if there's someone here today

Maybe it's a younger person 10 12 years old thinking they're going to heaven because their daddy and their mommy believe

Would you grant them saving faith? We realize repentance and faith is a gift And while we call them to repent and believe we know you have to do the first work the work of sovereign grace