{"id":19117,"date":"2016-07-31T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-07-31T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sugar-land-bible-church.local\/sermon\/soteriology-026\/"},"modified":"2016-07-31T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2016-07-31T05:00:00","slug":"soteriology-026","status":"publish","type":"sermon","link":"https:\/\/slbc.org\/es\/sermon\/soteriology-026\/","title":{"rendered":"Soteriology 026"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","book":[88],"series_event":[459],"sermon_service_type":[473],"speaker":[6],"class_list":["post-19117","sermon","type-sermon","status-publish","hentry","book-john","series_event-soteriology","sermon_service_type-sunday-school","speaker-dr-andy-woods","no-post-thumbnail"],"acf":{"sermon_title":"Soteriology 026","sermon_date":"20160731","sermon_month":"7","sermon_year":"2016","sermon_notes":5067,"sermon_slides":3784,"sermon_mp3":3790,"sermon_id":"731161339454","series_or_event":459,"service_type":[473],"speaker":6,"books_of_the_bible":88,"chapter_and_verse":"15:1-6","sermon_transcript":"Andy Woods\n\nSoteriology 26, John 15:1-6\n\nJuly 31, 2016\n\nLet\u2019s go ahead and open with a word of prayer.\u00a0 Father, we\u2019re grateful for today and an opportunity to get into Your Word a little bit.\u00a0 I pray You\u2019ll be with us as we continue to look at this wonderful truth that we have, the doctrine of eternal security.\u00a0 And I pray that You\u2019ll fortify us in this truth and it would be something that would change the way we live.\u00a0 We\u2019ll be careful to give you all the praise and the glory, we ask these things in Jesus\u2019 name, and God\u2019s people said\u2026 Amen.\n\nCan you open your Bibles to the book of John.\u00a0 By the way, if you need a handout Ron has a few back there.\u00a0 The Gospel of John, chapter 15.\u00a0 Here we are, sort of working our way through eternal security; is it true that once saved always saved?\u00a0 I\u2019m giving you first of all, in the first part of this class the pro eternal security argument, which I hope we\u2019re going to finish today.\u00a0 I have 13, so by way of review because self-righteousness did not save\u00a0 us in the first place it\u2019s not a basis upon which salvation can be lost.\u00a0 Number 2, salvation is neither given or maintained by works.\u00a0 Number 3, If a believer can lose eternal life, then how can eternal life be what?\u00a0 Eternal.\u00a0 Number 4, The Bible\u2019s promises guarantee security, John 10 would probably the strongest.\u00a0 Number 5, The assurance of salvation is possible.\u00a0 You know, God wants us to know that we are saved.\u00a0 And if you could lose your salvation you could never have the assurance of salvation.\u00a0 Number 6, the believer is predestined for glory.\u00a0 Number 7, the Spirit\u2019s seal on you cannot be broken.\u00a0 Number 8, God keeps us from falling out of His hand.\u00a0 Number 9, Christ is currently interceding and advocating for us.\u00a0\u00a0 Number 10, Christ\u2019s death perfectly dealt with all sins, past, present and future.\u00a0 Number 11, a believer can\u2019t be removed from Christ\u2019s body.\u00a0 Number 12, the Bible never tells you which sins remove salvation.\u00a0 You\u2019d think the Bible would do that if you could lose salvation.\u00a0 And then number 13, this is where we are right now, believers with unfruitful lives still have salvation, although they lose rewards at the Bema Seat.\n\nSo we\u2019re focused on number 13, and you see what everybody says is they say well, if you teach security then you\u2019re not coming down hard enough on Christians who go back into sin.\u00a0 So a lot people feel you\u2019ve got to dangle hell over people every Sunday and Wednesday to get them to live right.\u00a0 You\u2019ve got to perpetually threaten them, they\u2019re going to lose salvation if they go back into sin.\u00a0 And that really isn\u2019t what we believe the Bible teaches. However, that\u2019s not to say that if\u00a0 you go back into sin you don\u2019t experience consequences because you very clearly do.\u00a0 And so what this slide and the next one really communicate is the consequences that people experience as Christians when they go back into sin.\u00a0 But the consequences, all of them enumerated are never you\u2019re going to go to hell.\u00a0 So to me when all of these consequences are articulated and the Bible never says oh by the way, you\u2019re going to go to hell if you go back into sin.\u00a0 That in and of itself is a very powerful argument for the security of the believer.\n\nSo what we\u2019re just looking at here is what do you lose as a Christian when you go back into sin?\u00a0 As we\u2019ve studied you lose power, you grieve the Spirit, you lose joy, you lose spiritual sight, you forfeit the opportunity to grow.\u00a0 We spent a lot of time last week saying you move back into carnality; in fact, we spent the whole session talking about carnality because there\u2019s a lot of people out there that say there\u2019s no such thing as a carnal Christian and I tried to show you very clearly there is.\u00a0 So carnality is a problem.\n\nSomething else you lose if you go back into sin is you forfeit fruitfulness; you can become unfruitful.\u00a0 So that\u2019s why I had you open up to John 15 which is Christ\u2019s teaching, and we have done extensive teachings on this when we were teaching the Gospel of John.\u00a0 This is Christ in the Upper Room and He begins to talk about branches that are in the vine that bear fruit, branches out of the vine that do not bear fruit.\u00a0 And people that are non-context readers of the Bible look at verses like that and they say oh, well, that\u2019s a distinction between being a believer and an unbeliever; the believer is in the vine bearing fruit, the unbeliever is out of the vine, not bearing fruit.\n\nNow one of the key things to understand when you study any book of the Bible or any passage is who is the audience?\u00a0 Who is he talking to?\u00a0 In the Upper Room He\u2019s not talking to unbelievers, is He?\u00a0 Who\u2019s He talking to?\u00a0 He\u2019s talking to believers, He\u2019s talking to the disciples.\u00a0 In fact, there was only one disciple that was an unbeliever.\u00a0 Who was that?\u00a0 Judas, and back in John 13:29-31 Judas had already left (to betray Christ) the Upper Room.\u00a0 [John 13:29-31, \u201cFor some were supposing, because Judas had the money box, that Jesus was saying to him, \u2018Buy the things we have need of for the feast\u2019; or else, that he should give something to the poor. [30] So after receiving the morsel he went out immediately; and it was night.\u00a0 [31] Therefore when he had gone out, Jesus said, \u201cNow is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in Him\u2026.\u201d]\n\nSo by the time you get to John 15 He\u2019s not talking to any unbelievers at all, He\u2019s just talking to His eleven hand-picked disciples, all of whom obviously were believers.\u00a0 Right.\u00a0 So that\u2019s the context of in the vine, out of the vine, fruitfulness, lack of fruitfulness.\u00a0 So He is not drawing a distinction here between believer and unbeliever.\u00a0 If you think He\u2019s drawing a distinction between believer and unbeliever you have to ignore who this was said to.\u00a0 He\u2019s drawing a distinction between those believers in fellowship and those believers out of fellowship.\u00a0 Are you with me?\n\nSo look at verse 5, he says there in verse 5, \u201cI am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and in in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.\u201d\u00a0 And then you go down to verse 8 and it says, \u201cMy Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit, and so prove yourselves to be My disciples.\u201d\u00a0 When He talks about a believer or a branch in the vine He\u2019s talking about a believer in fellowship with God, so that would be a believer who has confessed his sin or sins; that\u2019s a believer that\u2019s trying to live out the Christian under God\u2019s power.\u00a0 That\u2019s the believer that\u2019s walking in moment by moment fellowship with Him.\n\nAnd the promise is if you\u2019re that kind of believer and in fellowship believer, primarily, not that we\u2019re perfect but we spend the majority of our lives as Christians in fellowship with Him, then fruit\u2026 (and by the way, it goes on here and it defines fruit that will last) fruit comes spontaneously in your life.\u00a0 By contrast, if you\u2019re out, a branch out of the vine, then you really can\u2019t expect a lot of fruit any more than you can expect a branch of an orange tree, for example, that\u2019s disconnected from the nurturing sap of the tree to bear oranges.\u00a0 It\u2019s just a very simple analogy.\u00a0 So every moment I spend in sin, every moment I spend out of fellowship with God\u2026 it\u2019s not jeopardizing my position in Christ but what He\u2019s saying here is I just cannot bear the fruit that God has called me to bear because the fruit only comes when it\u2019s connected to the nurturing sap of the tree.\n\nNow you say well wait a minute here, doesn\u2019t it talk about one of these branches being cut off and being thrown into the fire?\u00a0 Isn\u2019t fire always hell?\u00a0 And the answer is fire is not always hell.\u00a0 For example, there are going to be those at the Bema Seat Judgment of Christ who are believers but they have spent the majority of their Christian lives with the right foundation but building with the wrong material.\u00a0 So they are building with wood, hay and stubble, in other words, they\u2019ve gone back into carnality and it\u2019s very clear there in 1 Corinthians 3:15, we may look at that later, that their works, not them but their works are put through a fire.\u00a0 [1 Corinthians 3:15, \u201cIf any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.\u201d]\n\nWhat does a fire do?\u00a0 It destroys that which is combustible, wood, hay and stubble.\u00a0 But that which is non-combustible, gold, silver and costly stones, which would represent the life in Christ in fellowship, the latter, gold, silver and costly stones goes through this fire but the only thing the fire can do is purify.\u00a0 So 1 Corinthians 3:15 talks about those who are in Christ that are going to heaven but they\u2019re watching at the Judgment Seat of rewards their life to a very large extent going up in smoke and fire imagery is used.\u00a0 It says, \u201cIf any man's work is burned up,\u201d see burning there, \u201che will suffer loss; but he himself will be\u201d what? \u201csaved, yet so as through fire.\u201d\n\nI\u2019m going to spend a lot of time (when we look at the arguments against eternal security) looking at that branch and the fire.\u00a0 One of the things I want you to understand is fire in the New Testament does not always mean hell; yes, fire typically does mean hell in the New Testament but there are about three examples I could give you where fire does not mean hell.\u00a0 And by the way, when you look at this branch being thrown into the fire, as you study this it never says, and I misread this for years and\u00a0 years and\u00a0 years thinking that that\u2019s what it said, but it really doesn\u2019t say this; I used to think this said God took the branch and threw it into the fire.\u00a0 But as you study this you\u2019ll see that God in this passage is not the actor in throwing the branch into the fire; what it says is they\u2019re like branches that dry up that men gathered and threw into the fire.\n\nSo let me ask\u00a0 you just a basic question: Would God ever entrust the task of throwing people into hell to mere men?\u00a0 I mean\u2026 of course not!\u00a0 So we\u2019ll spend more time on this branch being thrown into the fire and I don\u2019t believe that that\u2019s talking about hell at all.\u00a0 I think it\u2019s talking about some kind of temporal discipline, either on this earth or perhaps a loss of reward at the Bema Seat Judgment of Christ.\u00a0 Paul uses the imagery of fire to describe that.\u00a0 So I don\u2019t think it\u2019s hell but more on that later.\u00a0 But the only point I\u2019m trying to make here is if we spend our lives in Christ, not in fellowship with Him because of unconfessed sin and other things, yes, we\u2019re going to heaven but we just cannot be very fruitful for the things of God.\u00a0 So that\u2019s a little bit there on John 15, unfruitfulness.\n\nBy the way, there was a disciple that was sitting there in the Upper Room listening to all of this, and who was that disciple?\u00a0 It was a guy who wrote this book called The Gospel of John.\u00a0 John is going to take these same exact truths about in fellowship and out of fellowship and he\u2019s going to put them into his own book that would be recorded about sixty years after he heard Jesus teach these things, in the book of 1 John.\u00a0 So 1 John, to understand1 John you have to understand the Upper Room Discourse, particularly you have to understand John 15.\u00a0 John 15, as I said before, the whole point of it is not believer versus unbeliever; it\u2019s in fellowship out of fellowship.\u00a0 And remember what Jesus said in the Upper Room?\u00a0 \u201cI have many more things to tell you but you cannot bear them now, but when He, the Spirit of truth comes He will guide you into all truth.\u201d\u00a0 [John 16:13]\n\nSixty years later the Holy Spirit would bring to remembrance what John heard in the Upper Room and would strategically guide him in writing the little book of 1 John which is simply an amplification, if you will, of the branch and vine discourse.\u00a0 And I say that because 1 John is misunderstood all of the time.\u00a0 1 John is taught by people to say well, believer\/unbeliever, because it poses various tests for righteousness.\u00a0 If you don\u2019t have these tests in your life you\u2019re not saved.\u00a0 And that\u2019s what you hear 99% of the time through Christian media, Christian literature, those kind of things.\u00a0 And may I just say to you that that is not the way church history, by and large, has understood 1 John.\u00a0 And it\u2019s not at all in harmony with what John heard here in the Upper Room, so a little bit more on that later.\n\nBut what is the consequence of going back into sin as a Christian?\u00a0 Lack of fruitfulness.\u00a0 What\u2019s another consequence?\u00a0 Take a look, if you could, at Matthew 16:24-25, and as\u00a0 you\u2019re turning there I\u2019m going to go over to the book of Ecclesiastes for a minute.\u00a0 As you begin to experience a lack of purpose, even though you\u2019re going to heaven, even though you\u2019re saved, your life really doesn\u2019t produce the kind of purpose that God would have it produce.\u00a0 And if you want a whole book about a guy who clearly was saved as the third king of the United Kingdom, Solomon, but his life lacked purpose, you would read the book of Ecclesiastes because in that particular book Solomon, towards the end of his life, was led astray by his many wives (plural), so first of all he shouldn\u2019t have been possessing many wives, right?\u00a0 And a lot of these wives came from foreign countries because that\u2019s how treaties were entered into in the Solomonic time period is you were given someone to marry.\n\nSo he entered into these treaties with these other countries, something he shouldn\u2019t have been doing.\u00a0 He was offered the daughter, or the princess or something like that, of the kingdom that he entered the treaty into and he entered into all these treaties against the direct will of God and he had all of these wives.\u00a0 In fact, he had about\u00a0 700 wives and 300 concubines.\u00a0 And the Bible, and I think it\u2019s 1 Kings 11 says his many wives turned his heart away from God.\u00a0 [1 Kings 11:4, \u201cFor when Solomon was old, his wives turned his heart away after other gods; and his heart was not wholly devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been.\u201d]\n\nAnd so what was Solomon experiencing as he was in that condition?\u00a0 He was going to heaven, I believe, but he began to experience an emptiness and a purposelessness.\u00a0 And in Ecclesiastes 1:1-2 he says,\u00a0 \u201cThe words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 And then he says, [2] \u201c\u2018Vanity of vanities,\u2019 says the Preacher, \u2018Vanity of vanities! All is vanity.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Life is empty; life doesn\u2019t make any sense, life is meaningless.\u00a0 And then in verse 8 he says, \u201cAll things are wearisome; Man is not able to tell it. The eye is not satisfied with seeing, Nor is the ear filled with hearing.\u201d\u00a0 You know that song, I can\u2019t get no satisfaction, I\u2019m going to sing that for you this morning if you don\u2019t mind\u2026 NO!\u00a0 But there\u2019s a song, I don\u2019t even know who sings it but this guy just goes on and he goes I can\u2019t get no satisfaction; what he\u2019s saying is I can\u2019t find fulfillment in life, I can\u2019t find meaning, I can\u2019t find purpose.\u00a0 And unbelievers, of course, are like that because your purpose can only come in God, right?\u00a0 And out of fellowship believers are like that, Solomon being a textbook case of an out of fellowship believer and he wrote a whole book called the book of Ecclesiastes\u00a0 under that condition.\n\nSo you have to sort of be careful about using the book of Ecclesiastes to build doctrinal points.\u00a0 I find a lot of systematic theologians, they try to make a point and they quote the book of Ecclesiastes; I\u2019m always wondering, well what\u2019s the context there of Ecclesiastes?\u00a0 It\u2019s talking about a man and he calls himself throughout the book as living \u201cunder the sun.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, because he\u2019s out of fellowship with God because of all of his wives and sin and all of these things he was committing he didn\u2019t have the divine viewpoint in life.\u00a0 So he\u2019s expressing his emptiness.\u00a0 So let\u2019s be careful about quoting the book of Ecclesiastes, let\u2019s look at the specific context of everything that\u2019s quoted in the book of Ecclesiastes because a lot of the things he\u2019s saying in Ecclesiastes aren\u2019t really good.\n\nFrom the New Testament perspective, that\u2019s why I had you turn to Matthew 16, verses 24-25, Jesus begins to lay down the criteria of discipleship and it says, \u201cThen Jesus said to His disciples, \u2018If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me.\u201d\u00a0 Now look at this, verse 25, \u201cFor whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.\u201d\u00a0 And then he goes on and he says, [26]\u00a0 \u201cFor what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?\u201d\n\nBut how do you really start to find meaning in life?\u00a0 It\u2019s not by gaining your life, grabbing hold of your life; it\u2019s losing your life.\u00a0 Now again, I would ask you this simple question: when Jesus said this who was he talking to?\u00a0 What disciple was He interacting with?\u00a0 He was interacting with Peter.\u00a0\u00a0 Now Peter had been saved for probably over three years by now, this is towards the end of Christ\u2019s ministry.\u00a0 So He\u2019s not dealing with the distinction between a believer and an unbeliever; what he\u2019s saying Peter is now that you\u2019re a believer and you have received the gift of God I\u2019m calling you now into a deeper walk with me, where you\u2019re not just a believer, someone trusting in Me for your eternity, but\u00a0 you\u2019re going to actually follow Me, even to the point of death if necessary.\u00a0 And that\u2019s called discipleship.\n\nAnd in the process of unfolding the doctrine of discipleship, which is a doctrine that can only be aimed at the believer, only a believer can follow Christ as His disciple, right?\u00a0 He begins to say that\u2019s how you\u2019re going to find purpose in your life, as you lose your life you\u2019re going to discover it.\u00a0 But if you don\u2019t follow Me in this path called discipleship then you\u2019ll end up losing your own live in the process,\u00a0 you\u2019re going to be just like Solomon and you\u2019re going to spend the majority of your life \u201cin Christ\u201d living outside of finding fulfillment, meaning and purpose.\n\nSo the promises of fulfillment is not just for the believer, it\u2019s for the believer that cooperates with Christ as a follower.\u00a0 So very clearly there are people that have trusted in Christ as Savior and are on their way to heaven, I would describe the Corinthians church that way, I would describe Solomon that way.\u00a0 But then within the ranks of the believer there\u2019s a smaller group called the disciple which is actually willing to cooperate with Christ as He empowers us on daily denial to ourselves and the promise of fulfillment is only aimed at His disciple.\n\nSo guess what?\u00a0 Every moment I spend out of fellowship with Christ, every moment I spend going back into sin, is a moment I really can\u2019t experience the fulfillment and the meaning and the purpose in life that God has for me, I\u2019m just like Solomon living under the sun with a human viewpoint, so\u00a0 unfruitfulness and lack of purpose.\n\nSomething else that can happen to us when we go back into sin is a lack of stability.\u00a0 Notice, if you will, the book of Galatians, chapter 3 and verse 3.\u00a0 We just become unstable; we gravitate towards one false idea after another.\u00a0 Galatians 3:3, can a believer become unstable?\u00a0 Look at Galatians 3:3,\u00a0 \u201cAre you so foolish? Having begun by the\u201d what? \u201cSpirit,\u201d are they Christians? Absolutely they are Christians, they have \u201cbegun in the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?\u201d\u00a0 So these folks wandered back into sin, specifically they were trying to work out the middle tense of their salvation, progressive sanctification through human power.\u00a0 And Paul basically tells a bunch of Christians that they\u2019ve become foolish.\u00a0 Perhaps another way of saying it is they\u2019ve become unstable.\u00a0 A believer can become unstable.\n\nNotice 2 Timothy 2:18, it talks about false doctrine, I believe coming into the ranks of Christians.\u00a0\u00a0 It says in 2 Timothy 2:18, \u201cmen who have gone astray from the truth saying that the resurrection has already taken place, and they upset the faith of some.\u201d\u00a0 Now you can\u2019t have your faith \u201cupset\u201d unless you have what? Faith!\u00a0 I mean, if someone\u2019s upsetting my faith doesn\u2019t that presuppose that I have faith to upset?\u00a0 \u00a0So it\u2019s talking about false doctrine coming into the life of the believer and it was taking their faith and unsettling it or upsetting it or disrupting it.\n\nAnd you might recall that when we were studying 2 Timothy, particularly verse 18, one of the things I pointed out is this verb translated \u201cupset\u201d is the same verb used to describe Christ overturning the moneychanger\u2019s tables.\u00a0 Remember when Christ went into the temple and they had turned His Father\u2019s house into a place of commerce, He was very upset by that and He started to literally overturn tables.\u00a0 That\u2019s the same word used to describe that here in 2 Timothy.\u00a0 So think of a table being overturned and all the money and coinage, you know, scatters all over the floor.\n\nThat\u2019s sort of the imagery that you get of a Christian who moves into false doctrine.\u00a0 In this case they were tampering with the doctrine of resurrection, they were putting prophecy in the past, that\u2019s called today preterism; preterism comes from the Latin word past or gone by.\u00a0 There\u2019s a whole bunch of people out there today arguing that Bible prophecy has already happened, there is no future antichrist, the antichrist was Nero, these kind of arguments.\u00a0 And I know many, many people that drift into that doctrine and what happens is every moment they spend under that false doctrine their faith is literally being overturned, upset, unsettled and they\u2019re becoming unstable.\n\nOne more, if I could do that, one more verse, look at 2 Peter 3:17, Peter writing to Christians all the way through these two little letters of Peter, and at the very end of 2 Peter he says this: \u201cYou therefore, beloved,\u201d now when he says \u201cbeloved\u201d is he talking to believers or unbelievers?\u00a0 Clearly believers. \u00a0\u201cYou therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, be on your guard so that you are not carried away by the error of unprincipled men\u201d that would be false doctrine, now look at this, \u201cand fall from your own steadfastness,\u201d so you\u2019ll notice here that a Christian (they\u2019re called \u201cbeloved\u201d) can fall from their \u201cown steadfastness.\u201d\u00a0 Is this talking about loss of salvation?\u00a0 No, what it\u2019s talking about is the instability that can be introduced into a person\u2019s life when they fall out of fellowship with Christ and wander into false doctrine.\n\nSo lack of stability is a key problem with the out of fellowship Christian.\u00a0 And there are Christians that are very, very unstable; they\u2019re unstable in their ministries, they are unstable in their character, they are unstable sometimes in their marriages.\u00a0 And I don\u2019t know what it is about unstable Christians but they fall for one deception after another because they\u2019re not rooted and grounded in God\u2019s Word.\u00a0 And I\u2019ve been a Christian since 1983, I know some of you have been Christians longer but the nice thing about being a Christian over several decades is I\u2019ve seen several trends come through the body of Christ; trends that are very, very popular and everybody seems to jump on the bandwagon.\n\nOne example I\u2019ll give you is the prayer of Jabez, remember that a few years ago.\u00a0 Runaway bestselling books, The Prayer of Jabez,<\/em> study material, and everybody was saying this prayer, almost like a magical incantation of some kind.\u00a0 And today, a few years have passed, I hardly hear anything about The Prayer of Jabez<\/em>, the only thing I hear about is I go to a used book store and see a Prayer of Jabez<\/em> book and I looked at that and I said wow, this is in a used book store, that was so popular a few\u00a0 years ago.\u00a0 So it was a trend that just came through, everybody kind of jumped on it and then over time people abandoned it.\u00a0 And I\u2019ve probably seen, in the short time I\u2019ve been a Christian, probably four or five major trends like that that have come through.\u00a0 So the unstable Christian is always jumping on board, very enthusiastic until the trend wears off.\u00a0 So we have this ability, as Christians, to be very, very unstable and that\u2019s a major consequence of going back to the sin nature.\n\nI have some more here, another list to get through.\u00a0 This has to do with conviction.\u00a0 Take a look at Psalm 32:1-5, another consequence of going back to the sin nature is we come under the conviction of God.\u00a0 Why do we come under the conviction of God?\u00a0 Because God knows what is going to destroy our lives; He knows that sin will destroy our lives and He loves us too much to see us wreck our lives under sin.\u00a0 So if you go back to sin as a Christian let me tell you from personal experience, God has a tremendous ability to make you feel very uncomfortable and very bad.\u00a0 Now we look at guilt as always bad, but I would say guilt to a large extent functions as pain; if my hand is on a stove that is on and the pain shoots through my hand and prompts me to remove my hand that pain is not a bad thing; that pain is a good thing because if I keep my hand on that stove I\u2019ll destroy my hand.\u00a0 So the pain actually becomes my friend.\u00a0 So God knows what sin will do to us; we go back into sin and He will just annoy you over that sin.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because He loves you.\u00a0 We don\u2019t see what the sin will do but God does.\n\nAnd this is the condition that Lot, we made reference to Lot last week, are you a lot like Lot, remember?\u00a0 He was what I would call a carnal Christian and God bothered him because in 2 Peter 2:7-8 it says, \u201cand if<\/em> He rescued righteous Lot, oppressed by the sensual conduct of unprincipled men [8] (for by what he saw and heard that<\/em> righteous man, while living among them, felt his<\/em> righteous soul tormented day after day by their<\/em> unrighteous deeds).\u201d\u00a0 Yeah, Lot went back into sin, there\u2019s no question about it.\u00a0 But he was miserable every single moment he was back in sin.\u00a0 Why was that?\u00a0 Because he was tormented\u2026 he was tormented by it.\u00a0 I believe that the torment that he experienced, some of the older Bible translations teach this as the vexing of the soul, I believe that that discomfort that he was experiencing was none other than the convicting hand of God.\n\nSo there are many times in my Christian life where I\u2019m tempted to go back into sin and I simply say this: you know what, the last time I did that the Lord made me feel so miserable about it and I don\u2019t want to feel that bad today so I think I\u2019ll avoid the sin.\u00a0 If you want a textbook case of a man who was convicted by God it\u2019s the story of David.\u00a0 And that\u2019s why I had you turn to Psalm 32:1-5, if I have my chronology right there\u2019s about a year or so where David hid his sin.\n\nNow Psalm 51 is the blessings that he experienced when he finally confessed his sin to God. By the way, I say \u201csin,\u201d there were multiple sins in David\u2019s life when you study 2 Samuel 11.\u00a0 There was lying, there was adultery, and ultimately there was murder and was David saved?\u00a0 I think so, he was the first king of the United Kingdom.\u00a0 God said of David this man is a \u201cman after my own heart\u201d later on.\u00a0 But David did what most of us do with sin, we just kind of tuck it under the mattress and pretend like it never happened.\u00a0 You know, we hide sin from our brothers and sisters in Christ, and we try to hide sin from God.\u00a0 Is it really smart to try to hide something from God since God knows everything?\u00a0 I mean, it\u2019s like we\u2019re so self-deceived, the things we do in our sin nature.\n\nBut David hid his sin.\u00a0 Now God bothered David all that time period and David describes it in Psalm 32 1-5.\u00a0 He says, \u201cHow blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, Whose sin is covered! [2] How blessed is the man to whom the LORD does not impute iniquity, And in whose spirit there is no deceit!\u201d\u00a0 In other words he was blessed when he finally confessed his sins, plural, to God.\u00a0 Verse 3, watch this, \u201cWhen I kept silent\u201d so what was David\u2019s life like when he was hiding?\u00a0 \u201cWhen I kept silent about my sin,<\/em> my body wasted away,\u201d the second part of verse 3, \u201cThrough my groaning\u201d once in a while\u2026 NO, \u201cthrough my groaning all day long.\u00a0 Verse 4, now why was he groaning? [4] \u201cFor day and night\u201d that\u2019s around the clock, \u201cFor day and night Your hand\u201d whose hand?\u00a0 God\u2019s hand \u201cwas heavy upon me;\u201d it\u2019s this conviction that he\u2019s under.\u00a0 And when he was under that conviction he says, \u201cMy vitality was drained away as<\/em> with the fever heat of summer.\u201d\u00a0 And then finally he says in verse 5, \u201cI acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I did not hide; I said, \u2018I will confess my transgressions to the LORD\u2019; and You forgave the guilt of my sin.\u201d\n\nBut if you want to see a description of somebody and what he\u2019s like under the convicting hand of God, just like Lot when he was hiding his sin from God for about a year, you can get a great description of it there in verses 3 and 4.\n\nSo what does unconfessed sin do in the life of the believer?\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t send you to hell but God is so good at this convicting ministry that you can actually feel like\u00a0 you\u2019re in hell.\u00a0 I mean, there have been times in my life where I\u2019ve come under the convicting hand of God and it almost seems like, to me, some form of eternal judgment.\u00a0 It\u2019s not eternal judgment but it can feel that way because it\u2019s the pain shooting through my body which is not my enemy, it\u2019s my friend, it\u2019s telling me to get away from whatever it is I was doing and to get back into fellowship with God.\u00a0 I mean, would you allow your children to wander off into destructive behavior without agitating them and annoying them?\u00a0 Of course you wouldn\u2019t!\u00a0 \u00a0Why would God let you, why would He let me just wander off into sinful self-destructive behavior without bothering us about it?\n\nSomething else that happens, let\u2019s go to the book of Revelation, chapter 3, verse 19, it\u2019s sort of related, we come under the diving discipline of God.\u00a0 And as we turn there you might want to jot down Hebrews 12:5-11, it\u2019s the most in depth place I know of this doctrine in the Bible, at least in the New Testament. \u00a0It says whom the Lord loves the Lord what?\u00a0 Chastens.\n\n[Hebrews 12:5-11, \u201cand you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as sons, \u201cMY SON, DO NOT REGARD LIGHTLY THE DISCIPLINE OF THE LORD, NOR FAINT WHEN YOU ARE REPROVED BY HIM; [6]\u00a0 FOR THOSE WHOM THE LORD LOVES HE DISCIPLINES, AND HE SCOURGES EVERY SON WHOM HE RECEIVES.\u201d [7] It is for discipline that you endure; God deals with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his<\/em> father does not discipline? [8] But if you are without discipline, of which all have become partakers, then you are illegitimate children and not sons. [9] Furthermore, we had earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them; shall we not much rather be subject to the Father of spirits, and live? [10] For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He disciplines us<\/em> for our<\/em> good, so that we may share His holiness. [11] All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.\u201d]\n\nIn fact, the book of Proverbs says if you don\u2019t discipline your children you hate your children.\u00a0 [Proverbs 13:24, \u201cHe who withholds his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him diligently.\u201d]\u00a0 That\u2019s an important thing to quote to your kids because when you discipline what do they all say?\u00a0 \u201cYou hate me.\u201d\u00a0 Well, if I hated you I would just let you do whatever you wanted to do.\u00a0 The fact that I\u2019m disciplining you shows my love for you.\n\nSo what is divine discipline?\u00a0 I would describe it this way; it\u2019s momentary pain applied to somebody by God so the next time they think about doing that sin, whatever it is, they associate the momentary pain with the sin and then their hand is kept back from that sin.\u00a0 And as their hand is kept back from that sin and while it\u2019s true that no discipline at the time seems pleasant, as Hebrews 12 tells us, that process of discipline saves our lives from behavior which is sinful and by definition self-destructive.\u00a0 [\u201cNo discipline seems pleasant at the time, but painful. Later on, however, it produces a harvest of righteousness and peace for those who have been trained by it.\u201d Hebrews 12:11, NIV]\n\nThe easiest way to analogize it is if your child runs across the street without looking, which kids do, right?\u00a0 They don\u2019t have any life experience, they don\u2019t know speed limit laws and trucks and cars barreling around the corner at high speeds, they just run across the street because it looks fun.\u00a0 Well, any parent worth their salt will take that child aside and discipline them.\u00a0 There\u2019s different ways of disciplining.\u00a0 We, at our home, do use spanking but we don\u2019t use it as a first resort, we use it as a last resort but spanking, although it\u2019s (maybe I shouldn\u2019t even say this on the internet) you know, it\u2019s weird, you discipline your kids in the store and who does everybody look at?\u00a0 They look at\u00a0 you like you\u2019re some kind of bad parent when in reality when I see someone disciplining their children publically I almost want to stand up and applaud.\u00a0 As a matter of fact, one time Anne, in Dallas, did discipline Sarah at an amusement park and this guy just yelled out \u201cAll right,\u201d it\u2019s like so rare to see it he was happy because that\u2019s what keeps these kids under control.\u00a0 Didn\u2019t we have to be disciplined by our parents?\u00a0 I mean, I remember I was\u2026 well, I won\u2019t get into all that.\n\nSo you discipline a child so the next time they think about running across the street without looking they remember the discipline so when they associate the momentary pain with the discipline they won\u2019t run across the street without looking.\u00a0 And guess what just happened in the process?\u00a0 Their life was spared from the truck barreling around the corner and killing them on impact.\u00a0 Basic parenting 101, right.\u00a0 Well, if we\u2019re God\u2019s children doesn\u2019t He do the same thing to us?\u00a0 If you go off into sin God will give you a little tap on the shoulder, maybe something more than that so the next time you\u2019re thinking about doing it you remember, wow, I remember that discipline that God gave me, I\u2019ll stay away from this sin and your life is prolonged as a result.\n\nAnd look at what he says here to the church at Laodicea, in Revelation 3:19, \u201c'Those whom I love, I\u201d what? \u201creprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s kind of interesting to me that he makes this statement to the most carnal church of the seven churches in the book of Revelation because people all the time read this and they say those people weren\u2019t believers, how could they be believers?\u00a0 Look at the way they\u2019re acting.\u00a0 Of course they were believers because he says in verse 19, \u201cThose whom I love I reprove and discipline,\u201d so discipline is proof that God loves us.\u00a0 So if you go back into the sin nature then you become a candidate for divine discipline.\n\nAnd sometimes, and this takes us to the next one, that discipline can be so severe that it can result in the termination of one\u2019s life.\u00a0 Take a look at 1 Corinthians 11:30.\u00a0 [1 Corinthians 11:30, \u201cFor this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.\u201d] \u00a0\u00a0Some people God disciplines, of his children, to the point of death.\u00a0 I\u00a0 don\u2019t know how frequently God does it, I\u2019m glad He doesn\u2019t do it all the time or else church attendance would be pretty low.\u00a0 But there are four cases in the Bible where it happened.\u00a0 The first is Ananias and Sapphira, Acts 5:1-11, who were slain in the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 Now I have a lot of students coming from the charismatic background that pride themselves on being slain in the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 And I always like to take them aside and I say do you really think that\u2019s a good thing, to be slain in the Holy Spirit?\u00a0 The only people I know in the Bible that were ever slain in the Holy Spirit were Ananias and Sapphira, because they sold property and they kept back part of the proceeds for themselves and in the process they told the whole church we gave all the proceeds to the church.\n\nNow this is a very common misunderstanding, people say well God disciplined Ananias and Sapphira because they didn\u2019t give all of the proceeds of the sale to the church.\u00a0 And that is not their sin because the Bible never comes down on the ownership of private property.\u00a0 In fact, in that context, Acts 5, and you need to understand this because your kids, let me tell you something, in these schools that they are in they\u2019re being taught a Marxist doctrine constantly.\u00a0 Marxists appeal to the Bible, it\u2019s called liberation theology, where you\u2019re trying to link Marxism or the principles of communism with Scripture.\u00a0 So all of these twenty somethings are being kind of hit with this Marxist idea and there are those in the body of Christ, like Jim Wallace and many others I could talk about that are mixing Marxism with the Bible and they\u2019ll say look, the early church, they gave up all their property and they were all equal.\n\nThe great response to that is the story of Ananias and Sapphira, because Peter, who announces the discipline on Ananias and Sapphira in Acts 5:4 says, \u201cWhile it remained unsold,\u201d that\u2019s the property, \u201cdid it not remain your own? And after it was sold, was it not under your control?\u201d\u00a0 Why was God upset with Ananias and Sapphira?\u00a0 He wasn\u2019t upset with Ananias and Sapphira because they sold their property and only gave part of the proceeds to the church; that\u2019s not the issue at all. That\u2019s a complete misreading of the Scripture.\u00a0 The property was theirs, they could do whatever they wanted with it.\n\nThe sin of Ananias and Sapphira is they sold the property, they gave part of the proceeds to the church, which wasn\u2019t the problem, but they told everybody we gave it all to the church.\u00a0 So their sin was publicly lying; their sin was publicly misrepresenting their level of generosity and that\u2019s why Peter tells Ananias and Sapphira that, \u201cYou have lied,\u201d see the word \u201clied\u201d there, \u201cYou have lied\u201d to the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 That was their sin.\u00a0 And the church is very new at this time, it\u2019s only started in Acts 2 and if a new virus gets into an infant, as you know from basic biology and medicine it will destroy the life of that infant.\u00a0 So God here was keeping the church pure by bringing immediate discipline on Ananias and Sapphira, not for their sin in not giving everything to the church, that\u2019s not even the point, it\u2019s public misrepresentation and lying.\u00a0 That was the problem.\u00a0 And so they were struck dead right there on the spot.\u00a0 And people say well, they weren\u2019t Christians.\n\nLet me ask\u00a0 you a question; what were they doing in church if they weren\u2019t believers?\u00a0 And then what do you do with verse 11 \u201cAnd great fear came over the\u201d what? \u201cthe whole church, and over all who heard of these things.\u201d\u00a0 The rest of the believers got scared.\u00a0 Now would a believer be scared if an unbeliever was struck dead?\u00a0 No, that\u2019s supposed to happen.\u00a0 But one of our own was disciplined to the point of death so we\u2019d better stay away from that particular sin that they were involved in, public misrepresentation and this discipline to the point of death kept the church pure in its infant form and allowed this baby infant, this new spiritual organism to survive.\u00a0 See what God did there? He disciplined them to the point of death; discipline was very severe and in this case it took their very own lives.\u00a0 And I believe that Ananias and Sapphira, once they died, went right into the presence of the Lord.\u00a0 There\u2019s no doubt in my mind that these two were Christians or believers.\n\n1 Corinthians 11:30, which is where I had you turn, the same thing transpires.\u00a0 Now remember the Corinthian church was drunk and disorderly at the Lord\u2019s Table; in fact, if you go back to verse 27 it says, \u201cTherefore whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner, shall be guilty of the body and the blood of the Lord.\u201d\u00a0 And then you go down to verse 30 and it says, \u201cFor this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number have\u201d what? \u201cfallen asleep,\u201d which is a euphemism.\u00a0 A euphemism is a polite way of saying something.\u00a0 It\u2019s a polite way of saying death; Paul analogizes all the time the death of the believer to falling asleep because you know that you\u2019re going to be resurrected one day, you\u2019re going to use that body again so your condition is temporary, although your soul is alive and in the presence of the Lord.\u00a0 But here\u2019s another example where God disciplined folks in Corinth, some to the point of death.\u00a0 Some He caused to get sick, others died.\n\nNow verse 27 is so misread and misunderstood, this is the way it\u2019s normally taught: you can\u2019t eat and drink of the body and blood of Christ, that\u2019s the communion service, if you\u2019re unworthy.\u00a0 99% of the teaching you get on this that\u2019s what they say.\u00a0 So they say ooh-ooh, you\u2019d better not have any unconfessed sin in your life, like sin you committed six months ago or a year ago or last week, because if you come to the Lord\u2019s table with unconfessed sin in your life, pow, you can be struck dead.\u00a0 The NASB translates this not as unworthy, but \u201cunworthy manner.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0 The better translation is not unworthy, but \u201cunworthily.\u201d\n\nYou say is there a difference between \u201cunworthy\u201d and \u201cunworthily\u201d?\u00a0 It\u2019s a night and day difference.\u00a0 \u201cUnworthily\u201d is an adverb; an adverb modifies a what?\u00a0 A verb, it\u2019s like saying Joe ran quickly; the verb is ran, quickly is the adverb describing how he ran.\u00a0 Why did God bring discipline in Corinth?\u00a0 It\u2019s not because they were unworthy; it\u2019s because they were partaking of the Lord\u2019s table unworthily, which fits the whole context here of 1 Corinthians 11.\n\nWhat were they doing?\u00a0 They were excluding the poor, you have to pay to play in other words, they set it up in a way that the rich could participate at the Lord\u2019s table and the poor couldn\u2019t.\u00a0 And they were dividing the body of Christ unnecessarily.\u00a0 Beyond that they took what was sacred and turned it into a common meal.\u00a0 And that\u2019s why Paul says don\u2019t you all have homes where\u00a0 you can eat in.\u00a0 This is the Lord\u2019s Table, this is not just a common meal.\u00a0 And beyond that people were showing up inebriated, in a drunken state.\u00a0 They had total disrespect for the institution of communion that the Lord set up in the Upper Room.\u00a0 That\u2019s why God disciplined some, made some sick and disciplined others to the point of death.\u00a0 It had nothing to do with what sin they committed five\u00a0 years ago.\u00a0 It had to do with the manner, this is an adverb, the practice regarding how they were abusing the Lord\u2019s table at that specific point in time.\u00a0 See that?\u00a0 That\u2019s what God was upset about.\n\nAnd I draw that distinction because if you don\u2019t understand that you\u2019ll come to the communion table in fear, constantly, over some sin you may have committed.\u00a0 I mean, when I was first taught the doctrine you have to come to the Lord\u2019s Table in a worthy manner I\u2019m always worried, well what about some sin I committed sometime in my life that I\u2019ve forgotten about?\u00a0 Is God going to kill me because I partook of the Lord\u2019s Table in an unworthy manner.\u00a0 And you see, the laws of language and context rescue you from that fear.\u00a0 It\u2019s not \u201cunworthy,\u201d it\u2019s \u201cunworthy manner.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s not \u201cunworthy,\u201d it\u2019s \u201cunworthily.\u201d\u00a0 In other words, if\u00a0 you\u2019re coming to the Lord\u2019s Table with a reverent attitude then you\u2019re not going to be struck dead.\u00a0 So I just throw that at you because it\u2019s another example of people being disciplined to the point of death.\u00a0 God does that sometimes; He takes people home early.\n\nOne more example of it, Revelation 2:23, this is the church at Thyatira, Revelation 2 really about verse 22-23, Jesus says, \u201cBehold, I will throw her on a bed of sickness, and those who commit adultery with her into great tribulation, unless they repent of her deeds.\u201d\u00a0 So adultery of some kind, whether it\u2019s spiritual or physical, had come into the church at Thyatira and Jesus says in verse 23, \u201c\u2018And I will kill her\u201d this is in the church, do you see this?\u00a0 \u201cI will kill her children with pestilence,\u201d \u00a0why? \u201cand all the churches will know that I am He who searches the minds and hearts; and I will give to each one of you according to your deeds.\u201d\u00a0 How are we going to purify these churches?\u00a0 Jesus says well, here\u2019s how it\u2019s going to work.\u00a0 Some of these Christians in these churches that are in sin I\u2019m going to kill and that is going to have a purifying effect on all of the churches; it\u2019s exactly what\u2019s taught in Acts 5:1-11, because the death of Ananias and Sapphira sent fear throughout the saved world and they said to themselves, you know, we\u2019d better stay away from that particular sin because God apparently is pretty upset about it, as evidenced by the fact that He disciplines some believers within the church to the point of death.\n\nThe only other place I know of this doctrine, and some of you have asked me about this already, is \u00a01 John 5:16 which is the sin that leads unto death.\u00a0 \u201cIf anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he shall ask and God will for him give life to those who commit sin not leading to death.\u201d\u00a0 Look at this: \u201cThere is a sin leading to death; I do not say that he should make request for this.\u201d\u00a0 So there are some\u2026 now it doesn\u2019t say what the \u201csin leading to death\u201d is.\u00a0 So every time I teach this someone raises their hand and says what\u2019s the sin leading to death?\u00a0 I don\u2019t know?\u00a0 How would I know, it doesn\u2019t tell me.\u00a0 The only thing this opens the door to is that there are some sins of a peculiar quality that God reserves the right, not only to bring discipline into the believer\u2019s life but to actually take the believer home early.\u00a0 So this doctrine is taught not once, not twice, but four times in the New Testament:\u00a0 Acts 5:1-11, 1 Corinthians 11:30, Revelation 2:22-23, 1 John 5:16.\n\nNow in none of these cases is the issue hell.\u00a0 The issue probably would be hell if the believer could lose his salvation.\u00a0 I rehearse this because many people argue that our doctrine of eternal security makes it sound as if we don\u2019t take sin seriously.\u00a0 Let me tell you something; God takes sin very seriously.\u00a0 What do you introduce into your life when you move off into sin?\u00a0 Unfruitfulness, lack of purpose, lack of stability, conviction, divine discipline, and in some peculiar and I would say rare cases, even premature death.\n\nSo I didn\u2019t quite finish the list today, we\u2019ll finish it when we get together the next time we\u2019re together.","series_sermon_number":""},"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t