Lightly edited for readability while preserving the speaker’s meaning and substantive statements.
This morning, we're welcome you this morning to Fire and Grace Church. We welcome those listening by Blogtalkradio. You okay back there, Kev? Hallelujah. Everybody turn to 1 John the epistle of 1 John chapter 3, where we'll start this morning. Believe. You know I'm just going to be honest. Isn't that good? Preachers ought to be honest. I'm going to be honest this morning. I've had a I've had a bad week. A rough week. You know, we got back from vacation last weekend or last Well, really last Thursday. Friday, our water main main line from the road to the house busted. Uh floor Plus, we already had a leak under the house. Just constant problems. And then, you know, the the silver lining is that Kevin can do everything just about, so Kevin and I went rented a trencher bought all the materials and got ready to redo the plumbing in the whole house and under the house and from the road and so So, we used the trencher for about 4 hours. And uh some of you know this, some of you don't, but in the process, I woke up on Sunday morning and a lot of pain in my neck and my middle of my shoulder blades and my back. Not just thought, well, maybe it's just a crick in my neck or something like that, you know, just I'm working. Anyway, so I spent a few days this week uh at the doctor, chiropractor. And for the first time, it's only the second time I ever went to a chiropractor, so they took some x-rays. Come to find out the problem is is that I have a very bad disc in my neck. So, all week long I have been dealing with pain all week long. Even to this day. So, I have not had a good week. And it hurt to hiccup, it hurt to cough, it hurt to sneeze, it hurt to even laugh. If I If I laughed, you know, I But, in all of that, of course, when you go in through things like that, you know, you usually you go through stuff a lot of times either right before God does something good or right after. You know, the devil likes to always create situations and scenarios so that um he can try to either hinder something good that's going to happen or pay you
back for something good that happened. You know, the old saying, no good deed goes unpunished type thing. That's what the devil He doesn't like us to be able to uh you know, to rejoice long in what God is doing. But, you know, this week even though I had a very tough week physically and even spiritually, emotionally, and you know, when you're a pastor and you just had a wonderful Sunday morning where you know, people are baptized in the Holy Spirit with the evidence of speaking in other tongues and you're the pastor of a church that believes in healing and divine healing and that Jesus still heals and we've seen people healed and delivered of demons. So, as a pastor, sometimes when you're dealing with physical problems that just seem to continue it can be very discouraging and very you know, you're just like, "Lord, you know, I pray for somebody else and they get healed, but then there's things that I'm dealing with uh that it seems like I pray and ask the Lord about and they just don't they don't go away. And I don't know, it's a mystery. You know, the Apostle Paul, a lot of people and I've talked about this before about the Apostle Paul's thorn in the flesh and how he, you know, the Apostle Paul prayed for people who were crippled and they walked raised people from the dead and and yet we know he said that he had a thorn in the flesh that he besought the Lord three times that it would depart and it God said, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness." And I don't know why there's ever been any theological debate about the issue because in Galatians 4 the Galatians, the church there, wanted to pluck out their eyes and give them to Paul. So, Paul obviously had a problem with his eyesight or his vision probably after the road to Damascus incident. Which made Paul, I guess, and he said it was so that pride would not overtake him. So, maybe it's that, I don't know. But sometimes, just like everybody else, I mean, I just I just want you to know, just cuz you're a pastor or a minister and, you know, people think that you're sometimes they think that you're Superman or oblivious or somehow on some kind of special level. No. Uh we're all people and we all struggle with the same stuff. And so, sometimes I get discouraged and get down about stuff. I tell my wife, sometimes I feel like now at 47 years old, I feel like that someone has beaten me with aluminum bat a lot of times. Just due to all the physical problems I had. And some of it's my own doing. Some of it was my living in sin and disobedience and living wild and you know, playing football and martial arts and fighting and everything else that I used to do. I'm probably paying I'm probably reaping in my body some of
what I sowed there. Um But I want to say this. In all of this, I'm going somewhere with this this morning. Is that one day this week in the midst of having a really really bad day. Really bad day. Um My wife probably thinks you've had probably thinks well, man, I didn't know it was that bad cuz you've had worse seems like you've had worse weeks than this week. But it was more on the inside. It was more just me, you know, dealing with all these thoughts and trying to deal with the pain and you know, all the other problems and issues that are out there. And so sometimes you feel a little bit overwhelmed, but I remember and well, it was during the week through later in the week and then yesterday. And I think sometimes the Lord lets me as a as a pastor go through these things so I will share them with that it's not always going to be easy. You know, I woke up last Sunday morning could hardly get up. But yet I came on the church and preached anyway and prayed for people and people were baptized in the Holy Spirit. And we had a one of the most powerful services we ever had, but I was having problems with turning my head. What I'm getting at is you press on. You press on whether you're feeling down, whether you're feeling discouraged, whether you're feeling like the devil's beating you up or you're having physical problems or whatever. God wants us to not give up. To not draw back. To not you know, get angry or get offended or get bitter or whatever. But he just wants us to press on. And sometimes if you just keep pressing on, When stay with him and you pressing on, you either find out something you need to find out or you see a miracle. All right? And yesterday when I got up to pray and study and prepare for the day, the Lord just I guess he just knew. He's like, "I know he's had a tough week." But I remember the it was it was just special because the Lord reminded me. He's like, "Son, I love you." Well, I'm having a bad week. I'm kind of frustrated. I'm kind of tired of it. And he just reminded me, "I love you and I'm here." You know what? That's enough. And I think sometimes we just need to be reminded of the simple things. Cuz see, I know I preach real hard here
about sin and living for God and not being lukewarm in this society and not compromising. But I do know this, that we all have bad days and we all have bad weeks and we all get uh sometimes we get offended, even upset with God because things are not going good. And sometimes we get upset with people and we get And then sometimes we get rebellious. We got rebellion in our heart and we we we sin and we, you know, we pitch little temper tantrums like children do sometimes when we don't get our way or when we get frustrated or when we get, you know, you know how your kids sometimes you you have the best kids in the world they going to have a bad day every now and then. Right? Uh they get tired, frustrated, have a bad day, sometimes they get a little rebellious and do things they shouldn't do. Just they're acting out their their frustration. They're acting out their pain or their issues. And I just want to remind you this morning is that, you know, even though there's the side of of ministering where you have to preach, this is what is sin and this is how it will destroy you or lead you to eternal damnation and this is what you need to be careful of, we always need to be reminded that God is not waiting, you know, watching over us with a stick to beat us and destroy us the moment we fall or struggle or stumble. That's not who he is and that's not his heart. And I just want to remind you of that this morning. He is a loving father who wants you to make it. Who knows that you're going to fall down and struggle. He just doesn't ever want you to get so rebellious or so angry or so offended or believe a lie that you can just go do whatever you want and live in habitual rebellion. But he knows the difference and this is what I love. I look at the stories of people like David and Saul or Peter and Judas. These are perfect illustrations of what I'm talking about. Was David a perfect man? Was David a sinless man? Yet God said of him, "He is a man after my heart. Now, why is that? Everybody remembers David, they think about David who committed adultery, about David who tried to hide his sin, about David who sent the woman he committed adultery with, sent her husband to the front lines and told people to pull back from I mean, you want to talk about a time of of falling into sin and giving into sin and rebellion and being evil, you want to talk about that,
you got it with David, right? Yet, this is the same man that God said, the man after my own heart. Why? Because that was not David's desire. It wasn't the pattern of his life. He wasn't going, let me see how much I can get away with and still be right with God. David loved God, David worshipped God, David pursued God. And when he had his few bad moments, he didn't stay there. See, David confessed his sin and David was forgiven and David got up and David, you know what a lot of people don't realize is he didn't do those things again. Right? But Saul on the other hand, his entire heart motive was wrong. King Saul started out right, but pride came in and wanting to be seen by men and all the other things came in. And remember when Samuel was telling him, do this, do this, and Saul was just disobedient. He said, you know, he wanted the people, Paul Saul was always afraid he was going to lose the people. He was going to lose the people liking him or loving him. And so Saul's motive was completely wrong. So, you see Saul blow it and you see David blow it, but yet you see one man cut off for his transgression and you see another man forgiven. This is something that ought to keep us humble and seeking after God. You will not be perfect in this Christian life. You should strive for it. You should want to be sinless. You should hate sin. You should hate anything that's going to harm you or harm others or harm your relationship with God. If you have a real relationship with Jesus, then you should hate anything that would get in the way of that or block that or hinder that. This is what I'm saying, it's really not complicated. True born-again believers should hate sin and love righteousness. We should want to do righteousness and practice righteousness more than anything because we know that pleases our Father and because we know that if we if we can just stay away from the destructive stuff, we won't be destroyed. But, we got too many people thinking, "Well, see, there's two sides to the ditch. We got people thinking, "Well, because God loves me and God's merciful and God's forgiving, then I can do whatever I want and God will just forgive me." That attitude right there will damn you to hell. It will deceive you and it will damn
you. But, then there's the other attitude. I know some people around here that wrestle with this. You little perfectionists out there. And you think, "Well, if I don't pray just enough or if I don't read just enough or if I don't do this just God won't be pleased with me. God won't love me." Both sides of the ditch. You understand? Both sides of the ditch. My wife brings me this is my wife. My wife I have to tell her all the time she's like, "I don't pray enough. I don't read enough." And you know what I have to tell her all the time? She's the most godly woman that I know. Her heart desire is to do what God wants her to do, to be in the will of God, to be walking according to what God's word says, but she beats herself up sometimes a little too much. And you need to be reminded that God loves you. He's not waiting for us to think because you didn't pray. You prayed for 30 minutes, but you were should have prayed for 35. Are y'all hearing what I'm saying? Let me read this. I told you to turn to 1 John chapter 3. Verse 1. We'll start right here. And if you think all of that was just Pastor Dean's opinion, let me show you this is what God says about exactly what exactly he just says it uh here in verse after verse, but let's read it. 1 John chapter 3 verse 1. Notice how he starts this. He says, "Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God." Now folks, I'm going to stop right there just for a second because this is the part that I want us to be reminded of is that what I mean what manner of love God has bestowed upon us that we can be called the sons and daughters of God through faith in Jesus Christ, through faith in his cross, through faith in his blood, through faith in his resurrection, that we can be the most wicked sinners, we can be the most vile, rebellious, depraved, you know, sexually immoral, drug addicted, alcohol addicted, we can be the worst of human beings. And that we can come to God and we can say, "Lord, forgive me for my sins. Be my Lord and Savior. Forgive me for what
I've been doing. Wash it away. Cleanse me." And he says, "I will not only cleanse you, I will not only wash your sins away, but I'm going to make you my sons and my daughters." What manner of love? You can't even I mean, look at the Apostle John walked with Jesus every day of his earthly ministry. He says, "I still can't comprehend this great love that God says, 'If you will just believe in what my son did on the cross, that his blood was shed for your sin, that he rose from the dead on the third day, and if you're just willing to turn from your sin and do your best to follow me, believe me and follow me, you are my sons and my daughters, and I love you, and I'm for you, and I want you to make it.'" Let me just say, GOD WANTS YOU to make it to heaven. He wants you to be there. Amen? Some people I think sometimes think that he doesn't want anything. And he's Christian. He doesn't want us there. No, he does. Amen. What manner of love behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. Now, I'm thinking about the verse and you can look it up, but in the Gospel of John chapter 1 verse 12 when he says that as many as received him, he gave power to become sons of God. Say this with me. I am. If you're a man, say it with me. I am a son of God. If you're a woman, say I am a daughter of God. If you've been born again and you love God you're a son or his daughter. Now, if you're a son or his daughter he wants you to act right. I promise you that. Don't we want our children to act right? Do they always act right? Do we love them? Let's read this. Let's keep reading so I you can see what he says here about this. Starting verse 1 again, behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. Therefore, the world knoweth us not because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God and it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. Every man that has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure.
Whosoever committed sin transgresses also the law for the sin is the transgression of the law. And you know that he, Jesus, was manifested to take away our sins and in him is no sin. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not. Whosoever sinneth hath not seen him neither known him. Little children, let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous even as he is righteous. He that committed sin is of the devil for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the son of God was manifested that he might destroy the works of the devil. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin for his seed remaineth in him and he cannot sin because he is born of God. In this children In this the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. Whosoever doeth righteousness doeth not righteousness rather is not of God neither he that loveth not his brother. Now, I know a a lot of that. I read through that quickly. But I want to break it down here. We are the sons and daughters of God because we have believed. We have believed in the message of the gospel. We believed in Jesus as the savior. We have believed in his death on the cross as the sacrifice for our sins. We have believed that he is was sinless. He was the perfect spotless lamb of God that came to take away the sins of the world. We have believed the truth. And we have chosen to walk in righteousness. Now, let me break down these words. It's very important because a lot of people take these out of their context. You have to understand the Greek verb tenses to understand this passage cuz it's not going to make sense. Look at verse four. Whosoever committed sin transgresses also the law for sin is the transgression of the law. Then he says "Whosoever abideth in him that is whosoever abides in Jesus sinneth not." Now, wait a minute. Is that saying that Christians, if you're born again and you're abiding in Jesus Christ, does that mean you will never ever sin or you will ever you will never fall short or do anything? We know that's not true. Well, then well, what is it saying here? Well, let's break this down a little bit because this is important that we get a hold of this. There's three primary Greek verb tenses in the New Testament Greek language. Okay? You probably don't have this, but I'll give them to you. You can write them down. There's the aorist tense. There's the perfect tense. And there's the present tense. Now, there's variations of those verbs, but they're still the basic concept. And I'm just going to I'm not going to go through them all today, but let's just get present tense Greek verb down. You want a definition of a
present tense Greek verb? I'm going to give it to you because much of what you need to understand in the Bible depends on it. There are verses that will not make sense to you unless you understand this one principle. And it's not hard. But the definition of a present tense Greek verb means ongoing continuous action that's taking place in the present. Everybody say that with me out loud. Say, "Present tense Greek verb ongoing continuous action that is taking place in the present." Now, that's straight from the Parsing Guide to New Testament Greek Verbs. So, now we know that definition, let's look at these verbs here real quick. Three chapter three verse four when he says, "Whosoever committed sin." This is a present tense Greek verb. So, what he's saying is whoever continuously You hear what I'm going in a habitual manner and is presently practicing sin is transgressing the law. See, there's a difference between sinning and living in sin. You get what I'm saying? There are people who have committed adultery, but there are people who keep committing adultery. See the difference? There are people who have who have committed the sin of fornication or premarital sex or or sexual immorality, and then there are people who continue to commit it. A Christian a born-again Christian, a true born-again Christian that loves Jesus and has been changed on the inside, may commit a sin, but they will not and cannot, if they love God and know God loves them, they cannot or will not continue to practice it. You see what I'm saying? And if so, either they were never saved, they were never truly born again, or they have become a full-on backslidden saint. And can I say this? If you've never been born again, or you're a full backslidden saint, you're going to the same hell. There's no such thing as unconditional eternal security. Conditional. Now, let's keep going. God says,
keep reading this. So, y'all okay with this? I love verse five, and you know that he, Jesus, was manifested to take away our sins, and in him is no sin. Whosoever abideth in him Now, the word abideth here is a verb, and guess what it is? Present tense Greek verb. Whosoever is continually ongoing, presently abiding in Jesus Christ will not continually and ongoing and presently practice sin. Somebody say amen. Good preaching. I say I have to say, "No, it came first from from John. He's the one that preached it first, right?" Look at verse six. Whosoever abideth in him sinneth not. Whosoever sinneth hath not seen him neither known him. Again, all of these are present tense Greek verbs. Let's read the next one. Verse seven. Then he says this, "Little children, let no man deceive you." That means no preacher, no Sunday school teacher, no TV evangelist, not Joel Osteen or Rick Warren, Moody Bible Institute. Don't let anyone deceive you. He that doeth habitually righteousness is righteous. Oh, wait a minute now, Pastor Dean. You you you you I thought if we tried to be righteous, if we tried to do what was right, that was living under the law. What does this New Testament The sign that you are walking in the righteousness of Jesus Christ is that you doeth righteous or you practice habitually present tense Greek word doeth here means to practice habitually ongoing continuous doing righteous. So, you can you can always examine yourself and know where you are. But here's here's the message is what I want to tell you. Today, if you're listening to me in here or you're listening by internet radio this morning. Here's the good news. Even if you are practicing unrighteousness. You want to know what the good news is? There is forgiveness. Go back to 1 John chapter 1. We're going to come back to chapter 3. Say, "Pastor Dean, this is this is basic 101 Christianity." Yes, it is. Sometimes we need to be reminded
of the fundamental. Everybody say this with me. There is There is forgiveness forgiveness with God. with God. Let me ask y'all something. Let Let's see if you if anybody in here who knows the definition the true biblical definition of grace and how it's different from mercy. So, let's see the bibl- Anybody know the biblical definition of grace? Anybody know the biblical definition of mercy? Cuz we got a bunch of preachers out here don't even know it. So, don't be ashamed if you don't know it. Probably cuz you've been taught wrong. Cuz most preachers don't know it. Even though they have the same dictionaries that I do. And I can look it up. So, give me grace. Somebody give me grace if you know it. No. Partially. I'm looking for something else. See, that's what most people think it is. It's not. That's what we've heard, though. You've been taught that. I know you've been taught that. Unmerited favor. No, but do you know what that is, though? There is unmerited favor. But that's really the definition of mercy. Mercy is undeserved favor or kindness. That's the definition. We usually get those two mixed up. But I'm going to show you what what what grace is. Mercy is un- merited favor or kindness from God. Grace is something different, though. Grace is the power from God to actually do what he expects you to do. Grace, in fact, the Greek definition of grace is this. It means the divine influence of God upon your heart and its reflection in your life, meaning God influences toward righteousness. And you when you practice it, the righteousness, or you do what God wants you to do, you are allowing grace to work. And I'm just telling you, preachers will lie to you. You know why? Cuz a lot of them were taught wrong even in their seminary. They were taught wrong. So, grace is God's power from on high in your heart and then you giving you the ability to do what he wants you to do, okay? Mercy though and this is really the title of this message is what I'm talking about the mercy of God. The mercy of God is his kindness his favor even though me and you, all of us, we don't deserve it. See, that's the Romans 8 or 5:8. I'm sorry. That God commended his love toward us
and that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us, right? What is that? We did nothing even before we were born. Jesus took Mike's sin, Dean's sin, Mandy's sin, Sandra's sin, Josiah's sin. Jesus took the sins of people who had not even been born yet. In his body on the cross. We had done I mean most of us all of us before we had you know everybody had been born in this room. That means that God in his mercy, mercy means he did something for us that we did not deserve, we didn't earn, we didn't do anything right, it was done for us a long time ago. That's the mercy of God. The grace of God is when God comes upon you by his Holy Spirit and influences you to receive Jesus and to repent and to live righteous and to want to do what is right. That is grace. That's why it says in in Titus chapter 2 and you can look it up. Look up Titus 2:11. It says this that the grace of God that bringeth salvation has appeared to all men. Teaching us. Everybody say this say this one. Grace Grace teaches us to deny ungodliness worldly lust to live soberly righteously godly in this present world. That's grace. How do most preachers and churches preach on grace? Unmerited favor. And they even preach it so in in in a way where basically says, "Well, you know what? It doesn't matter what you're doing in there, Pablo. Doesn't matter what you're doing. Grace covers it." No. And then and then what happens is that teaching people take that if great God's grace covers it and I I pretty much no matter what I do, I'm still going to be saved, I'm still going to be okay with God. It doesn't matter how I live or what I do. So people take that to their other extreme and still do whatever they want. See, now you understand
In the light of your word and let not scandalize my walk with God says walk after me. And the blood of Jesus will cleanse you from all sin. See, it's not going to be Help me. Jesus. I'm out of practice with these chords. You're not going to be perfect. But what are you pursuing? Amen. If you want to be in his righteousness, and you want to do the right thing, and you're going after him. If you stumble and you fall, just get up. And let's keep reading. What does he say? This is one of my favorite chapters in the whole Bible right here. Verse seven, he said, "But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." So, no one can walk around saying, "I have no sin." If Don't you love this? If we confess our sins, he, Jesus, is faithful and just to forgive us of our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us." Folks, do you know there's a guy named Joseph Prince? How many of you heard of Joseph Prince? He goes around saying that Christians should never confess sin. That if you're a Christian, you cannot
sin, you don't sin. That your sins are forgiven past, present, future, and there's nothing else you have to do except when you All you had to do was when you believed and you were born again, you were saved. That's it. It's dealt with there once and forever. That's what he said. I've I'm This is not from an internet article that I read. I listened to the man. He's a false teacher. He's a deceiver. No, God loves you. There is forgiveness for sin, but And I love how he wrote this because he wrote this not talking to the unsaved. He said, "If we Now, I don't know about y'all, but if I say we, I'm talking about what? Me and you, right? And the Apostle John said, "If we confess our sin, he is faithful and just to forgive us." So, what does that say? No confession, no forgiveness. Do you hear what I'm saying? See, what I'm getting at today today is the good news. Jesus paid for your sins on the cross. All right? You can never be good enough to go to heaven in your own works or in your own righteousness. Right? But if you don't confess your sins, they will not be forgiven. You must confess your sins, and I like the way Proverbs puts it, "For sake them to the best of your ability, and you will have mercy." Now, folks, you think Some of you in here are saying, "Now, Pastor Dean, this is elementary message this morning." Yes, it is. It ought to be. But I don't hear this preached anymore. I hear, "God loves you. You're forgiven." Notice how it's just a slight We We just slightly leave something out. Yes, God loves you. Yes, there is forgiveness for you. Yes, Jesus died for your sins. You know, we got people now like Rob Bell. Rob Bell and there's a lot of preachers Actually, there's a lot of what I call closet universalists within the church world right now. And what that means is they believe because Jesus died for the sins of all mankind that everyone's forgiven, even the ones who don't know it, and that ultimately in the end, whether a person confesses Jesus or not, and believes in Jesus or
not, that they're going to go to heaven when they die. They literally believe that everyone's going to heaven because Jesus died for the sins of everyone, and that it's kind of like automatically applied to people, whether they accept it or not. I'm just here to tell you today that there's a very simple truth. Yes, God loves you. Yes, he proved it through dying on the cross for your sins. Yes, because he is God and sinless, he rose from the dead the third day. But, if you don't do something WITH IT, YOU DON'T get it. Amen? If you want the love of God to be real in your life, then you have to love God. AMEN? IF YOU WANT the forgiveness of your sins, then you have to confess your sins and ask him to forgive you. It is a relationship that must be ongoing, but the good news is is if you will pursue that relationship and walk in the light of his word, you are his sons and his daughters, and he loves you, and he is going to give you the grace and the mercy to make it if YOU JUST KEEP WALKING. So many people Listen, I have had people call me. I've had, over the years, phone calls and letters and emails and people People think that they they some sometimes they think that, you know, Christians I'm talking about they have fallen deep into sin away from God. And they they they they've believed a lie. Well, I he just he you know, he won't forgive me. And really what it comes down to is now they they won't forgive themselves. Because all they got to do with him is say, "God, you know what? I blew it. I have sinned. I hurt all these people. I did this wrong. I did that wrong. I confess that I am a sinner. I can't wash away my sin or my guilt on my own. Jesus, forgive me and wash it away. And I'm going to do my best from this point on to not be like that anymore." Can somebody say amen to that? The mercy of God and the grace of God and the forgiveness of God is there for you. But it's if you believe. It's if you confess. It's if you repent. It's if you pursue. See, the problem, like I stated earlier, the thing with David is David pursued God. He loved God. He hated sin. And when he fell into it, HE HATED IT. SAUL NEVER UNDERSTOOD THAT. SAUL was not pursuing God. Saul was pursuing his own
agenda. It was the same with Peter. Peter loved God, BUT PETER DENIED Jesus in that moment of trial. He fell. He blew it. But the difference was is that Peter really loved Jesus and he was really wanted to do the will of Jesus. He just messed it up. But Judas had an agenda the entire time. His own agenda. His own plan. And I got news for you. Churches, especially big ones, are full of people with their own agenda. I see it all the time. That's why it's so subtle sometimes. Don't ever let that little serpent if I want people to see me and I want people to I want you know, I want to be somebody. Once that little serpent creeps into you in church realm, it can get you off bad off. Do you all hear what I'm saying today? That's what God had to remind me of. Son, I know you had a bad week. I know you're frustrated. I know you're discouraged. Struggling. Just I know it. But you know what? Just confess it. Just ask me to forgive you. Just know I love you. And I'm not going to destroy you because you had a bad week. You hear what I'm saying? You really ought to meditate in 1 John. And study these words. Let's keep reading. I'm going to back up again though. I'm going to go read in the chapter 2 a little bit. This is what he says here. Verse 7, but if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another. And the blood of Jesus Christ his son cleanses us from all sin. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in us. And here it is, folks. My little children, these things write I unto you that you sin not. So, God says, "Look, I don't want you to sin. I don't want you living in sin. I don't want you compromise I don't want you doing things that are wrong, evil, wicked against the the word of God. My little children, I write these things that you sin not. If any man sin, now this is interesting. This is the aorist tense Greek verb. You know what that means? Real simple. The opposite of the present tense Greek verb. Meaning you committed a sin, but you're
not practicing it habitually, ongoing, continuous. He says, "My little children, these things write I unto you that you sin not. But if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And he is the propitiation or the sacrifice for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world. And hereby or this is how we do know that we know him if we keep his commandments. He that saith, "I know him and keepeth not his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But whoso keepeth his word in him, verily is the love of God perfected. Hereby know we that we are in him. See, this is what's beautiful. If you'll keep your sin list short with God. You know what I'm saying? Keep the sin list short. And I love this. He says, "If you'll do that, if you'll keep the sin list short, confess your sin. If you keep that short and walk after righteousness, and walk after his commandments, listen to this. He says, "The love of God will be perfected in you. How many of you want that one? You know what that means? You will never doubt or wonder if God loves you or if he's upset with you or if he's You will know where you stand. And it also means that because you understand that relationship you will also find it a whole lot easier to love other people around you. Cuz the love of God has two sides, doesn't it? The love he has for us and the love we're supposed to give to others from him, right? I want the love of God perfected in my life. It's not. I can tell you. My wife could tell you. I'm Mr. Grumpy Pants sometimes. You know what you call me? A few other names. I am. I I got a long way to go, you guys. But here's the here's the difference. I can tell you this much.
I fall down. I get frustrated and discouraged and disappointed. Angry sometimes. I say things I shouldn't say. Do things I shouldn't do. But I can promise you this. I don't want to do them. And I will not practice them. And that's the difference. And if I do them, I go to God and I say, "Lord, forgive me. I did this. I sinned." I I'm going to I can I be honest this morning? I'm not near as kind and sweet to my wife as I should be. I'm not. I got a long way to go. It bothers me that sometimes I get snappy. Or as Pablo used to say, "Mooey snappy." Yes, I get snappy sometimes. I know none of you can look around here and say that you don't get mooey snappy sometimes. You do, too. We all do it, though. This This is not a This one's not a hard one to put the peg on. You get what I'm saying? Now, let me say this to husbands and wives, and even parents for children. You know, sometimes you just need to say, "You know what? You need to confess your sins to your spouse or to your children in in in in in this way. You say, "You know what? I've I've I've apologized to Faith. I'm like, "I'm sorry, baby. I Daddy has been very impatient and very grumpy and snappy and please forgive me." You know, because you're not going to be perfect to your spouse. You're not going to be perfect to your kids. But they will always remember if you were humble enough to admit it. Some people can never admit they're wrong. And you know what? That doesn't help any relationship. One of the things that that Nancy and I advise married couples all the time say, "If you want to have a good marriage, you want a key to a good marriage, or one that survives this war that we live in, be quick to forgive each other. Cuz you know what? You're going to hurt the other one's feelings. You're going to say things you shouldn't say. You're going to do things you shouldn't do. You need to be quick to say, "I'm sorry." And uh and and we got to be quick to truly forgive and not hold on to it. Kids, now there's a lot of kids out there now that are now teenagers. You guys, well, you're a teenager now. You're getting close. There's a lot of teenagers that are angry and bitter at their parents cuz their parents made some mistakes.
Guess what? It's time to forgive your parents, teenagers, all right? Some kids is now they're into their adult years and they're still angry at their parents over mistakes they made. And here's the thing about forgiveness. We all want forgiveness, right? Right? We all want God to forgive us. And he says he will. But he's got one where he says he won't. What is that? If you won't forgive. If you do not forgive your brother and sisters, your spouse, your parents, where they screwed up, if you won't forgive others, guess what? You can you can pray and soak the altar with your tears, confessing your sin, and not one sin is going to go anywhere until you forgive somebody else. That's why forgiveness is so important. You say, "Well, you don't know what they did." I don't care what they did. I mean there's women that are going to have to forgive people that raped them. Children are going to have to forgive adults that abused them. People are going to have to forgive people. You know, there's a lot of parents that walked out and left their kids. That brings a lot of pain, a lot of hurt. Those kids still are going to have to find a way to forgive. And if you don't forgive, you will not be forgiven. You don't hear that one talked about much, either. Oh, we all hear we hear about forgiveness, but we don't hear about the consequences of it. I'm not going to keep on today. I'm not going to preach long today. Probably long enough. Let me see. Oh, yeah. I'm usually good for about an hour and 15 to an hour and 30, but we're kind of a little short today. God loves you. He wants to forgive you. He's for you. That's why we have the scripture in 2 Peter. We've quoted often lately. God's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repent. You know what I love about Acts 13? Acts 13 says when Paul's preaching there in the synagogue, he says these words. He said that Jesus came, listen to this. You guys, this is good. I've I saw it I was reading it last night. But he said Jesus came to give repentance and remission of sins to Israel and to the world. Wait a minute. I think well, I said, "Lord, wait a minute now." I was reading that last I was like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait a minute." I thought repentance I'm supposed to do.
And he was like, "Look up the word." And he says, "To give repentance to Israel." Well, if you look up the word repentance in the Greek, metanoia, one of the first thing it means is to feel the guilt for your sin. The conviction of the Holy Spirit. So, what he's saying is Jesus came to give us the guilt, to convict us, to convince us that we need to repent. The first part of repentance is feeling it. You got to feel guilty. Every The world thinks feeling guilty is bad. No, feeling guilty is good if you're guilty. Because if you don't feel guilty, then you won't do something about your sin or what you're guilty of. But, if you feel the guilt, the conviction of sin, that's what the word, if you look it up in the Strong's Greek Dictionary, it says compunction, to feel the guilt for your sin. But, then he said, "Repentance means to feel it, own it, and then to reform or change your life." Meaning, guess what? I feel guilty for all the things I used to do. When I used to smoke dope and drink and party and get drunk and all those terrible things. I feel guilty. I felt guilt about that. But, what happened was I was willing to take that God was giving me repentance. He was making me feel it so I would leave it. Amen. And so, I confessed it. So, when he when he says Jesus came to give repentance, Let me Let me just tell you something. Feeling guilt for your sin, conviction, that is grace. Grace is that divine influence upon you. Guess what? If you wake up in the morning on Sunday morning and then you got the devil whispering in this ear, "Don't go to church." And all of a sudden you feel, no, I need to go. I'm going. That's grace. That's God um pushing you to do the right thing. You get what I'm saying? Grace is the giving you repentance and the remission of sin. Y'all checking me? Y'all reading it in Acts 13? Just read the whole sermon he preached. I never really seen it that way before. Jesus came to give us repentance and remission of sin. But we have to do something with it, right? See, that's the good news. And folks, listen to me before we close this morning. This is the gospel of Jesus. These are the working parts. These are what you have to give to people. You have to give people these answers. They'll say out there, the unsaved people will say, well, God loves me. Yes, I know God loves me. Do you know why he loves you? Do you know what he did for you? Do you understand that? But
then do you understand what do you have to do? What do you have to do to love God? What do you have to do to receive forgiveness? What do you have to do to walk in the light? What do you have to believe? What do you HAVE TO DO? ALL these things are important and we got preachers out there telling people all kind of different crap. That's not true. I mean, we got them come up here, say this prayer, make sure you give your tithes, and say this little prayer and you're good for all eternity. No. How about if when we got married, babe, we're up at the altar, when we said our vows, and I said, okay, see you. Then it's been a good day. I'm going to do what I want. I'm going I'm going to Vegas. I'm going to hang out at the strip clubs. I'll be back in a couple of years. That's how That's what happens in the Baptist church. You know that? Oh, let me get Let me get real for a second. You know what I'm talking about. Not just the Baptist church, but I'm talking about Come up here. Let's sing song five courses. Just as I am without Let's sing that. Come up here. Pray this prayer with the preacher. Get your name on the church roll. You're good. You're eternally secure. You're once saved, always saved. You're good. Hey, that's Southern Christianity right there. Isn't that something? Isn't it? Even down to the just as I am. I know this. I guess all the Baptist churches back in the day tried to copy Billy Graham's services. Cuz he used to always end with that. Now, don't get me wrong. Praying that prayer is a good thing if you mean it. Praying that prayer is a good thing if you understand that it's a continuous walk with Jesus. Praying that prayer is a great beginning if you understand it's an ongoing relationship and you have to walk in the light. And you have to repent. And you have to confess your sins. And you have to keep short accounts with God. And you have to forgive others. And if you know all the ifs I'd like to do a sermon just entitled ifs. And go through all the ifs in the New Testament. If we confess our sins All right? You are saved and will have eternal salvation if you continue in the faith. Colossians chapter 1. You are partakers of Christ if you continue. Hebrews 3. There's a lot of ifs in there. Right? Can I just say this before we close?
Pay attention to the ifs. For a lot of people the ifs are going to be the difference between heaven and hell. Let no one deceive you. If you practice righteousness and walk in the light of Jesus and confess your sins you will be saved. If you want to practice iniquity and think grace and mercy of God will cover it no matter what you do, you will be lost. That simple. This pastor will not turn the grace of God into lasciviousness. Man, but I'm not going to sit here and tell you God doesn't love you and doesn't want to forgive you. He wants to. Everybody say this with me. God is a good father. He loves us. He wants us to make it. But it's up to us. But to us. God's mercy is there for anybody who wants it. God's love is there for anybody who wants it. The forgiveness through the blood of Jesus Christ shed on the cross is there for anybody who really wants it. That's the good news. If you really really want it and you really love the Lord and you appreciate it you'll do it. So, before we leave this morning, I want us to stand. That last song we did, I want us to worship again. Just for a minute, since I'm not going to preach as long as normal. We're not going to take up the tithes and offerings right now. There's a basket in the back. If you have a tithe or an offering you want to give, you put it in that basket on your way out. It's a beautiful song. We're going to worship with this song, and then we will I'll get somebody to pray and dismiss us. Let's Let's worship the Lord for a minute.