Home  Contemporary John MacArthur Fundamental Christian Attitudes: Obedience
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Fundamental Christian Attitudes: Obedience |
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Written by John MacArthur Jr.
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We are studying the anatomy of the church. And we're going to continue that study this
morning. We've taken a little break from our look through 2 Corinthians and are having a
wonderful time in this particular study. In spite of the identity crisis in the church the
Bible is very clear about what a church should be. The Scripture lays out a definitive way
in which life in the church is to be conducted. There really aren't any mysteries in terms
of how the church is to conduct itself and what the nature of its ministries are to be. In
fact, God has outlined definitely a right way to do work in the church. It very...it's
very, very direct and easy to see.
Cultures change, styles change from time to time and place to place, but the character
of the church doesn't change. And God's design for how the church functions is clearly
revealed in Scripture. The sad reality is that when the church deviates from the plan
there is chaos and that's the kind of thing the church is experiencing in the world today.
Speaking of the right way to do things...in a recent issue of a magazine I never read
called "Meat and Poultry," the editors quoted from another magazine I never
read, "Feathers," that is the publication of the California Poultry Industry.
But the following story was irresistible. It seems the U.S. Federal Aviation
Administration has a unique way of testing the strength of windshields on airplanes. The
device is a gun that launches a dead chicken right at the plane's windshield at
approximately the speed the plane flies. The theory is that if the windshield doesn't
crack from the carcass impact, it will survive a real collision with a bird during flight.
Well it seems the British were very interested in this and wanted to test a windshield
on a brand new high-powered locomotive they're developing. They borrowed the FAA's chicken
launcher, loaded the chicken and fired. The ballistic chicken shattered the windshield,
went right through the heart of the engineer's chair, smashed the instrument panel behind
him and imbedded itself in the back wall of the engine cab. The British were stunned and
asked the FAA to recheck the test to see if everything was done correctly.
The FAA reviewed the test thoroughly and had only one recommendation..."Thaw the
chicken."
Now I'm trying to make that into a parable for this sermon, you understand. So you have
to come back from that hilarious scene. There's a right way to do things. And if you do
things the wrong way, the result is chaotic.
There's a right way to do things in the church and the Word of God has laid out the
formulas for that. Jesus said, "I will build My church," and He has established
the plans and He has revealed them to those who are employed in the building. Those of us
who lead in the church, who serve in the church have the plan in hand in having the New
Testament. As I said, styles may vary from time to time and culture to culture, but the
basics for the life of the church are non-negotiable, they are not interchangeable, they
are fixed. And we're reviewing them in this series around the metaphor of the church as
the body of Christ. There are a number of ways in which the church is described
meta
phorically in the Bible as a flock and as a family and as a household and as a temple
and so forth, even as a vine and branches. But the most rich metaphor for the church is
the body idea, that we are like a physical body attached to the head, the head being
Christ and His life and direction and guidance flowing out through the body. And so we've
borrowed this metaphor and extended it a little bit in our series on the anatomy of the
church.
It allows us, this metaphor does, to consider all the salient elements for life in the
church and we started out letting you know that there would be four categories we would
look at if in a very simple way we divide the body into four parts, the skeleton, the
internal systems, the muscles and the flesh. We can take a look at those areas and get
pretty good insight into what the church is to be.
We started out with the skeleton and we said there are some things that are fixed, that
are rigid, that are non-negotiable that give the church its form and those things are
skeletal in the life of the church. And we said they were the honor of God, the exaltation
of Jesus Christ, the presence of holiness, the proclamation of truth and submission to
spiritual authority. That's framework.
But like a living body the framework itself doesn't have the life. You've gone to the
doctor's office or into the lab in high school or college and you've seen a skeleton
suspended on a hook, on a metal frame and you know that it isn't alive, it has the
structure but it doesn't have the life. You have to hang on that skeleton that internal
systems that cause the fluids to flow and maintain the life. And so we move then from
discussing the skeleton into the internal systems, and we're talking about what it is that
has to happen on the inside of the lives of believers for the church to be what God wants
the church to be...spiritual attitudes, spiritual motives, spiritual convictions...that's
what we're talking about.
Spiritual ministry in the church applies the truth of God and the means of grace to the
soul. The work is the work on the inner man. That's what we do. Legalism is content to
work on the outside. It's content to conform people externally. That's what legalism does.
It manipulates people, it intimidates people, it somehow promises them rewards or it
brings them under fear and it gets them to conform externally to certain behaviors. But
that doesn't accomplish the work of God. That's legalism and legalism is rejected by the
Word of God, as you know. We're not interested in controlling people, we're interested in
seeing the heart transformed. It's the same thing in parenting, it's a good analogy. It's
not difficult to control your children, you're bigger, you're smarter, you're more
powerful, you have a better way with words, you have all the money, you control the car,
you've got the keys to everything. It's not difficult to control your children. But it's a
whole other thing to see their heart transformed, that's a completely different mission.
And that's what the church must recognize. Controlling can be done a lot of ways but
change can only be done one way and that's by heart work, working on the heart and then
that takes care of the outside. Spiritual attitudes are the internal life of the church
and those attitudes have to do with motives and convictions, building those into people.
The issues of the heart are where the church has to spend its time and those are the
internal systems. That's where the life flows and apart from that the church is really
dead. To sort of set this thing in motion, I want you to look at Ephesians chapter 3 and
as I've noted for you, we'
re going to go through a lot of different passages as we sort of
reach back and pull together a summary of all of these salient matters with regard to life
in the church, something we really need to do because our church is growing and we have so
many new folks and we want all of you to understand why we do what we do and what the
emphasis really is. And one of those very important passages is Ephesians chapter 3, it
takes us into the heart of one of the noble pastors, of course, of all time--the Apostle
Paul. We get an idea of what he was really after in his ministry and it was the heart.
There are a number of notable passages in which he makes that clear, but this one is
perhaps as clear as any of them. And we find that his desire for heart work is manifest in
how he prayed for his people. Look at verse 14. "For this reason I bow my knees
before the Father from whom every family in heaven and on earth derives its name."
For this reason...a reason he is about to tell you...he prays. And he prays to the
Father because the Father is the creator of every family in heaven and on earth. In other
words, God is the creator of every family and every kind of family, whether you're talking
about the human family in general or whether you're talking about what is called the
nuclear or individual family in particular, or whether you're talking about the spiritual
family of the church, the body of Christ...God is the Father of all of that, God is the
one from whom everything derives its life and not only in the human world but everywhere
else in creation as well. So he is saying I go back to the source, I go back to the one
who is the creator. And in regard to the family that is spiritual, I pray this...this is
the reason I pray...here's the reason...verse 16, "That He would grant you according
to the riches of His glory to be strengthened with power through His Spirit...here's the
key...in the inner man."
The issue is the heart. We know that. This is a very good emphasis, however. The issue
is not what someone is conformed to doing on the outside, the issue is what is the heart
condition...doing the will of God from the heart, Paul says in Ephesians 6:6 at the end of
that verse...doing the will of God from the heart. Paul says, "What I'm concerned
about is the inner man. I'm concerned about the inside because it is out of the heart that
everything proceeds." It's not that which goes into a man that defiles him, Jesus
said, it's that which comes out of him. And since the defilement is on the inside, that's
where the work has to be done.
Moving back into a sort of a medical metaphor for a moment, men need heart surgery.
They have sick hearts, diseased hearts. And the work has to be done internally. You've got
to cut through and get to the inside to do the work. And that's what Paul prayed. When he
bowed his knee to the One who is the creator and the source of every family in earth,
including the spiritual family, he asked Him to work on the inside. In fact he prayed that
according to the riches of His glory and there are no limits to those riches, according to
the vastness of God's spiritual riches that He would grant through the Spirit,
strengthening with power in the inner man. In other words, Paul prayed for strong inner
men...that there would be a strong spiritual heart, a strong inner man. That's where the
work had to be done.
Then notice in verse 17 he even moves beyond that. He wanted that inner man
strengthened with the power of the Holy Spirit, "In order that, or so that, in order
that," it's a hina purpose clause, "Christ may settle down," katoikeo,
to se
ttle down in your hearts.
Now let me stop there in a moment...for a moment. Christ, if you're a believer, is
already in your heart but He may not be settled down, He may be up all the time fixing
things. You remember that wonderful little book, "My Heart Christ's Home." I
read it as a young man and it had a marvelous effect upon me, it's a picture of a house,
like the heart and Christ comes in and He goes into the living room which is the realm of
fellowship and He goes into the dining room which is the realm of appetites and He goes
into the library which is the realm of thought. And there's work to do in all those places
and all those places received His purging. And then, all of a sudden, when all of that is
done there's a terrible stench coming out of somewhere and Christ finds a closet and opens
it up and there are all the hidden iniquities. And Christ can't settle down and be at home
until all that work is done. And that's what the Apostle Paul is praying. He's praying
that the Spirit of God would strengthen your inner man so that sin would be dealt with and
the response to the cleansing of Christ would be a complete response and Christ could
settle down at be at rest because sin is being dealt with. That's what Paul's praying for.
He's praying for the Spirit to come, bring His strength to the inner man, do a cleansing
work so that Christ is comfortable in your life. Very opposite would be 1 Corinthians 6
where you go to a harlot and join Christ to that harlot. I can't imagine anything more
disconcerting to the one who is joined with the believer than being so joined to a harlot.
Such an embarrassment and a shame to Christ that would be. The opposite is to have Christ
settled down and be at rest in your life because holiness is there, sin is being dealt
with.
And when Christ settles down, something else happens. You become rooted and grounded in
His love, you're able to understand with all the saints the breadth and length and height
and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge. The Holy Spirit comes
in, gives you strength in the inner man, sin is dealt with, Christ is at home and He
exudes His love into every part of your life and out to those around you. And you
literally are a walking advertisement, a walking testimony, a walking witness to the
transforming love of Christ.
And that's not all, the end of verse 9, another sequence, another purpose clause,
"That you may be filled up with all the fullness of God." The progression is
amazing. The Spirit comes first and brings you the power to control that inner man, to
bring that inner man into harmony with God's truth. Christ cleanses your life, settles
down, is at home. And then you're flooded with the fullness of God, the whole trinity is
there.
As a result of that, verse 20, you become able to do exceeding, abundantly above all
that we ask or think according to the power that works within us. And as a result of that,
"To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and
ever. Amen." The ultimate purpose of a life that glorifies God is produced. That was
Paul's prayer. I mean, it is a massive reduction of all the work of sanctification into
this one prayer, that the Spirit would come in and do His work and not be quenched or
grieved, that Christ would be free to cleanse every area of your life so that He is at
rest and at peace and comfortable in your life. Then the fullness of God comes in and you
begin to exhibit all the attributes of God because Christ is being fully formed in you and
then you become useful to do beyond what you could even ask or think. And in the en
d all
the glory in the church goes to the Lord of the church, the head of the church, Jesus
Christ. And all of that is an inside work, all of that is an inside operation.
This is the long haul, folks. This is doing it the hard way but it's the only right
way...building into people convictions and motives and attitudes that cause them to do the
work of God from the heart.
Let me expand on that just a bit. Go back to Romans chapter 2, and this is still kind
of just introducing this need for heart attitudes. But in Romans chapter 2 and verse 5,
here is an indictment in this chapter of Israel and in verse 5 of Romans chapter 2 that
indictment against Israel is an indictment of their heart condition. "Because of your
stubbornness and unrepentant heart..." I mean, here were the Jews who had all the law
of God and the covenants and the promises and the Messiah had come to them and they had
all of this and they had all the external religion, they went through all the ceremonies,
carried off all the sacrifices, gave all the offerings, went through all the external
codes, did it all but were stubborn and unrepentant in heart. And because of that instead
of storing up merit with God, verse 5 says they were storing up wrath. They were just
accumulating more fuel for the fire in which they themselves would burn. And the problem
down in verse 29 is further defined at the end of the chapter in these words, "He is
a Jew who is one inwardly." And the circumcision that God's concerned about is the
circumcision of the heart. Always it has been internal.
The Jews, of course, had totally ignored that and they had created an external
religion. They had a form of godliness without any power. They had an external kind of
religion. You remember that they had substituted the commandments of God with traditions.
Their religion was completely on the outside and consequently they were storing up nothing
but wrath. God's work is the work of the heart.
Over in Hebrews chapter 4 it tells us what is most efficient in doing that work. Verse
12 of chapter 4, "For the Word of God is alive, or living, and active and sharper
than any two-edged sword." If you're going to do heart work you don't want to use a
butter knife. You're better off with a fairly sharp scalpel. And if you're going to do
heart work spiritually, there's only one really efficient knife to use and that's the Word
of God because it pierces all the way in to the division of soul and spirit. It is
efficient all the way to the very place you need to go, all the way through the joints and
the marrow and it gets all he way down and dissects the thoughts and intentions of the
heart.
If there's any question why we do what we do with the Word of God, that's the answer to
it. If we're going to do heart work we've got to use the one knife that can penetrate that
deeply. We have to use the one efficient tool and that's the Word of God. The Word of God
is what cuts all the way down to the heart. It produces conviction. It tears up the
thoughts and intentions and unmasks the reality of the condition. It cuts open and reveals
the true state.
In chapter 10 of Hebrews and verse 22 it says if we're going to draw near God we have
to come with a sincere heart, a true heart, an honest heart without hypocrisy. And then
following it says, "Having our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience."
You go in there, the Word of God slices open, takes you down to the heart, removes what is
diseased, cleans the heart and then you can draw near to God.
Now what is the...that's the metaphorical picture...what is the actual manifestation of
a
pure heart? Go back to Deuteronomy 13. When the surgery is done and the patient has had
the disease removed, the bypasses have been inserted, or whatever was done was done,
they'll be a new kind of condition in that heart and it's described for us in Deuteronomy
13. Deuteronomy 13:3, "For the Lord your God is testing you to find out if you love
the Lord your God with all your...what?...your heart and with all your soul. You shall
follow the Lord your God and fear Him, you shall keep His commandments, listen to His
voice, serve Him and cling to Him." Everything really that needs to be said about the
whole of the Christian life is said in those two verses...it is a glorious summation. Love
the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, follow Him, fear Him, obey Him,
listen to His voice, serve Him and cling to Him. That's it and that all starts when you
love Him with all your heart. The heart is the place. It has to come from inside.
Over in Deuteronomy chapter 30 and verse 6, "Moreover the Lord your God will
circumcise your heart and the heart of your descendants." He wants to go in and cut
your heart, He wants to cut the disease out of your heart, He wants to cleanse and purify
and purge your heart. Why? "To love the Lord your God with all your heart and with
all your soul in order that you may live." That foundational reality of loving the
Lord your God with all your heart is repeated in Matthew 22:37, in Mark 12:30, and 33, in
Luke 10:27, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, the New
Testament says. It all starts with the heart and so the internal systems give the church
its life and it starts on the inside and flows out.
That's why we're not into legalism. We're not interested in just herding you around in
external conformity. But we want to see the Lord do heart work.
Now what are the essential heart attitudes? What are the essential heart motives and
convictions? Last Sunday night I gave you the first one...faith...faith. And if you didn't
get to be here last Sunday night, you need to get that tape because that is absolutely
foundational to your understanding of this whole matter. In Habakkuk 2:4, repeated in
Romans 1:17; Galatians 3:11; Hebrews 10:38, the Lord has repeated it all through
Scripture, it says this, "The just shall live by faith." At the heart of
everything is believing God. He that comes to Him must believe that He is and that He is a
rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. And Paul in Galatians 2 says, "I live by
the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me." We live by faith.
That is the compelling heart attitude. We walk not by sight but by faith. And we trust God
and we believe God. We believe in Him, we believe Him to be the God revealed in Scripture.
We believe He's a God who faithfully keeps all of His promises and covenants. We believe
He's the God who knows best and never lies and tells us the truth. Sin is what we do when
we believe the flesh or the world or the devil, not when we believe God.
So faith then becomes the shield that thwarts every temptation. God says do right and
you'll be blessed, do right and you'll prosper, do right and you'll enjoy peace. And when
you believe God you resist temptation. Faith is the important foundational attitude.
Right alongside that, and we'll talk about this one this morning, is obedience. The
perfect companion to faith is obedience. In fact, the hymn says, "trust and
obey...trust and obey." It really sums up the two foundational attitudes. Obedience
simply means to submit to what the Lord says, do what He tells you. And what He tells y
ou
is revealed in Scripture.
How foundational is it? Go back to the great commission, the last verse of Matthew,
Matthew 28 verse 20. Jesus is commissioning His disciples to go out and make disciples of
all nations, to baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
That's the salvation part. You go out there, you preach the gospel. They believe. They
become disciples. You take them and baptize them, public confession of their faith. And
then verse 20, once they're saved here's what you do. "Teaching them to observe all
that I commanded you." That's what we do. We teach people to obey God's Word, to obey
God's commands, to submit to Him. That is the foundation of Christian living, of
sanctification, faith and obedience. And where you say there's faith and there's no
obedience, we will question your faith. John 8:31, Jesus said, "Whoever continues in
My Word is My real disciple." Jesus said, "The one who keeps My commandments is
the one who loves Me." First John...John repeats this same emphasis in 1 John chapter
2, "By this we know we have come to know Him if we keep His commandments. The one who
says I have come to know Him does not keep His commandments is a liar and the truth is not
in him. But whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has been truly perfected."
In other words, you say you love God, you say you believe in God, you say you belong to
Him, then it will show up in your obedience. We're talking about heart obedience here,
from the heart, obedience without equivocation, obedience without resistance, obedience
without compromise. This is part and parcel of the original commitment we made.
Turn to 1 Peter and I want to show you a very important part of this first chapter in 1
Peter. First Peter 1:22 describes salvation as an act of obedience. It says, "You
have in obedience to the truth purified your souls." He describes the same reality in
verse 23 as having been born again through the Word of God. When you were born again
through the Word of God that also could be described as obeying the truth that purified
your souls. What truth was that? The gospel. What was the gospel? Repent and believe in
the Lord Jesus Christ, right? And that's a command so you either obey it or you don't. God
said, "This is My Son, hear Him." Jesus said, "Repent, repent,
repent." The apostles remember on the day of Pentecost, Peter says, "Repent, be
baptized for the remission of sins," and so forth. Always they preached the
gospel...believe, believe, that's a command. It's always in a command mode and it calls
for obedience. So Peter says you obeyed the truth and you were purified, you were saved,
you were born again because you obeyed the truth...the truth contained in the Word of God.
The Word of God was preached, you heard it, you believed it, you obeyed it. It said
"believe," you believed. It said "repent," you repented. It said
"cast yourself on Christ," you cast yourself on Christ.
So, the point is that at the moment of salvation you engaged in an act of obedience.
But you did more than that. You pledged yourself that that obedience was only the
beginning, not some isolated event. In other words, at the time when you committed
yourself to obey the gospel you also affirmed Christ as Lord, right? You came and you
recognized that He was your Savior and there was no other way to be saved from your sins
and you were on your way to hell and the burden of your sin was overwhelming. And so you
said I can't save myself, I can't deliver myself from sin, and only You can, You alone are
the Sav
ior and please forgive my sin, I cast myself on Your mercy, I cast myself on Your
grace. Please forgive my sin based upon the fact that You died in my place. And you
recognized Jesus as Savior. But at the same time you also acknowledged that He was lord
and master and you said, "I'll follow You...I'll follow You." I don't...I'm
confident that no Christian at the time of salvation has a grasp on the full implications
of what that commitment meant. You don't know what that means at that point but the
commitment is there. Why? Because the Holy Spirit has produced it. The Holy Spirit has
produced the sense that you are now becoming a servant of God and you are now becoming a
servant of Jesus Christ your master and acknowledging Him as your Lord. And you have
stepped in to a place of obedience. That's part of the covenant of salvation. God's
part--I save you, I forgive your sins, I give you eternal life through the work of Jesus
Christ. Your part--you repent and you submit to follow Me. That's salvation. When you came
to salvation that's what you did...that's what you did, you committed to obedience, though
you didn't fully understand all the implications involved in that.
But go back to 1 Peter again, moving back from verses 22 to 23 to verse 1 and 2, this
is a very, very important portion of Scripture. As Peter starts writing, the end of verse
1 he starts to talk about this matter of salvation. He starts with election. He talks to
the aliens, the scattered believers who are chosen. So he's starting to talk about
salvation here and he starts with election. Back in eternity past God chose who would be
saved and He did it, verse 2 says, according to His foreknowledge. Foreknowledge doesn't
mean that everybody acts independently and God way back looked ahead and saw what they
were going to do and said, "Oh, so that's what they're going to do, if that's what
they're going to do this is what I'll do." Foreknowledge is a
predetermination...predetermined relationship. "Fore" means before we were ever
born, before we ever had a choice, before we ever did or didn't do anything God
predetermined to know us. In the same way that He says, "Israel only have I
known." It doesn't mean that they're the only people on the planet that He knows, it
means they're the only ones with whom He has personal relationship. It's the same knowing
as Cain knew his wife, it's the same knowing as Mary's pregnant and Joseph has never known
her. It's the same knowing as in John 10 where "My sheep hear My voice and I know
them." It is the knowing of intimacy. And God in His plan chose based upon a
predetermined relationship. He predetermined to have an intimate relationship with certain
ones before the foundation of the world. That's the past part of salvation.
The present part moves in in the phrase "by the sanctifying work of the
Spirit." That which was in the decree of God in eternity past moved into time through
the work of the Spirit. In what sense? We were sanctified by the work of the Spirit. To
put it another way, we were begotten of the Spirit. To borrow John 3, "Born of the
Spirit," that's our salvation there. That's the initiation of the sanctifying work.
Sanctify means to separate, when the Spirit separated us from sin, separated us from
death, separated us from hell, separated us from Satan in the sense that we were saved.
So first eternity past, we are chosen based upon God's predetermination to have a
relationship with us. We are saved as the Spirit of God moved in and separated us unto
God. That's the sanctifying work of the Spirit. It started at our salvation. And th
en
notice this, next statement, "In order that..." we were chosen and saved,
"In order that you may...do what?, what's the next word?...obey Jesus Christ."
We were saved unto good works, Ephesians 2:10. We were saved unto obedience. That's the
point. So the past, chosen on the basis of the foreknowledge of God. The present, saved by
the separating work of the Spirit of God. The future, a life of...what?...obedience. I
mean, that's the redeeming purpose, a life of obedience.
And then this most interesting little statement there. "And be sprinkled with His
blood." That's strange. What a strange thing to say. "And be sprinkled with His
blood." What does it mean to be sprinkled with His blood? Isn't that more of a
salvation issue? It's referred to in Hebrews 12:24, "the sprinkled blood." What
is that?
There is an answer to that and it's in Exodus 24 and that's what Peter's alluding to.
Go to Exodus 24, it is a very important text and a very interesting one. In Exodus 24, and
we're going to find out what that sprinkling of the blood is, in Exodus 24 Moses has been
up on the mountain and received the law of God. God has given man His law, it includes the
ten commandments and all the rest of the law that God gave. And in that law God has
revealed His will in very specific terms. Obviously prior to the Mosaic law God had
revealed His ways and His will in many different manners, but now it's all going to be
written down in absolute specifics in the law of Moses. So Moses went up the mountain, you
remember Mount Sinai and was given the law of God. Then Moses came down.
Let's pick it up in chapter 24 verse 3. Moses came and all of this law, it's this
massive law, all of the law that came through Moses, ceremonial law and moral law and all
the laws of social life, the whole thing, Moses came, recounted to the people all the
words of the Lord and all the ordinances and all the people answered with one voice and
said, "All the words which the Lord has spoken we will do." Now this is a very
important moment. Moses comes down and I guess by the work of the Holy Spirit was able to
remember everything and he recounts the whole thing...all the law of God to the people.
And unilaterally with one voice they say, "We will do all of that." And they
make a public vow. They make a pledge, they make a promise and it is a promise of
obedience, it is a promise of obedience.
There's a covenant being made here, God's part of it is: I will send you My moral law,
I will provide in that moral law My standards, I will provide in that moral law for when
you violate those standards because in the moral law...I mean in the Mosaic law, and it
certainly has moral implications, spiritual implications, but in the Mosaic law there was
the sacrificial system and they were instructed as to how to deal with their sin as well.
So God even revealed His grace and His mercy through that law. So God says My part of the
covenant is I'll show you My will and I'll show you what I want you to do and I'll give
you a path of righteousness and I'll give you a means of grace and mercy. And He gave all
of that. And the people said, "And our part is we will obey."
You have a parallel right there to salvation. At the point of salvation God says to the
sinner...Here is My law, here is My means of grace, I will bless you, I will care for you.
And the believer says...And I will...what?...follow You, I'll obey You. So it's a very
similar scene.
Follow along then in verse 4. Moses after having recited all this again, no doubt,
under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit wrote do
wn all the words of the Lord. And then he
arose early in the morning. The implication is that it was a full night of writing. And he
built an altar at the foot of the mountain with twelve pillars for the twelve tribes of
Israel. Now he's going to get ready to publicly symbolize the covenant that has been made
between God and the people. God revealed His part, the people declared their part...God
spoke, they spoke and now he's going to demonstrate a sealing symbol. So he builds this
altar out of stones, no doubt, and puts twelve stacks of stones representing the twelve
tribes as a symbol of everybody's participation. He sent young men of the sons of Israel
and they offered burnt offerings and sacrificed young bulls as peace offerings to the
Lord. The sacrifices being an indication of the people's pledge in response to God's law.
And then he did a most interesting thing in verse 6, he took half the blood...and
believe me, burnt offerings, sacrificing young bulls, there was blood everywhere...it was
a real blood bath as they were bleeding all of these animals, cutting the jugular, in most
cases, and capturing all the blood. Moses took half the blood, put it in basins,
collecting it all in these big basins. And the other half of the blood he splattered
across the altar...the altar represented God. And so the covenant was going to be ratified
in this sort of demonstrable way and he splattered some of the blood across the altar.
Then he took the book of the covenant, that is what he had written down all night, and he
read it in the hearing of the people. He read it all over again, this would be the fact
that they had heard it once and now they hear it again. And all the people responded the
same way, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do and we will
be...what?...obedient." That's the covenant made between the people and God. So
Moses, verse 8, took the blood and splattered it on the people.
Some of the blood on the altar, symbolizing God's part in the covenant. The rest of the
blood on the people, symbolizing their part. "Behold the blood of the covenant which
the Lord has made with you in accordance with all these words." He said His part, you
said your part, the blood is the physical demonstration that you both made that
commitment.
Now with that in mind go back to 1 Peter. And in 1 Peter 1 you read this, "That
you may obey Jesus Christ and be sprinkled with His blood." Peter is borrowing from
that graphic, graphic ceremony of Exodus 24. And Peter is saying when you came to Christ,
when you put your trust in Jesus Christ, you accepted His part of the covenant, I will
write My law in your heart, new covenant, I will write My statutes in your heart. I will
forgive all your trespasses and all your iniquities, I will grant you mercy and I will
grant you grace. And at that part, at that point when you were receiving all of that from
Him, you were responding by saying, "Yes, Lord, and I will follow You." And that
was the covenant of salvation. I confess you as Lord, and Lord means the one in charge,
and that's what you confessed. And at that point in God's eyes the blood that had been
splattered on Christ, the sacrifice, was then splattered on you because of your part in
the covenant. It's a beautiful picture.
So when you came to salvation, my friend, you made a simple covenant of obedience. The
sad story of Israel is that they did...what?...they violated it. And so do we...and so do
we. If there's anything that has to be the companion of faith, it must be obedience
because those two were the companions when we were saved, right? Faith in the Savior is
the only one to save us, comm
itment to obey the Lord as our King. Obedience...that from
the heart is what we desire in the church. Give me a church full of people whose hearts
are devoted to obedience and I'll show you a church with power and joy.
Look at Romans 6:17, I'm going to give you a few more and we'll be done. Romans 6:17 on
this issue of obedience...but look at verse 16, first of all, "Do you not know that
when you present yourselves to someone as slaves for obedience you are the slaves of the
one whom you obey." That's pretty obvious. If you become somebody's slave, the main
word is obedience. When you present yourselves as a slave to somebody, the issue is you do
what they tell you. And then he makes that simple illustration, a spiritual doctrine in
verse 17, "Thanks be to God that though you were slaves of sin you became obedient
from the heart," I love that phrase, you ought to underline it, "obedient from
the heart" because it's your desire, because you love to be obedient, because it's
from the inside. You became obedient from the heart to that form of teaching to which you
were committed. In fact, verse 18, you became a slave of righteousness.
When you came to Christ you entered into a new obedience. You had been obedient before
to the flesh, the world, the devil. You had been obedient to sin. And now you're obedient
to Him. You're obedient to righteousness.
It's not just a question of hearing the Word, it's a question of obeying it. In Matthew
7 there were people who hear...who heard the Word and didn't obey it, and they were
building their house on sand. And when the judgment came it would collapse. Obedience
means hearing and putting it to practice.
One last scripture, very important, James 1. We'll close with this one, James 1:22,
"Prove yourselves doers of the Word and not merely hearers who delude
themselves." You know what happens if you hear the Word and don't apply it? You're
living in a delusion, you are deceived about your true spiritual condition. If you're not
applying the Word of God in your life you are deceived about your spiritual condition. And
then he gives an illustration of such deception...a very interesting one, verse 23,
"If anyone is a hearer of the Word and not a doer, he's like a man who looks at his
natural face in a mirror," literally the word "looks" is glances. You go in
there in the morning and you've decided you're going to shave off your mustache and you
get half of it shaved off, you've got half your hair combed and half your teeth brushed
and the phone rings and you go out of there and you've just barely gotten started maybe
and you go out of there and you get on the phone and you forget what you look like and you
go off to the office to the hilarity of everybody who greets you because you forgot what
you look like. So it is with an individual who merely glances at the Word of God, who
doesn't apply it. He really doesn't understand the condition he's in. He thinks everything
is fine but everything is not fine, he is deceived about his true condition. And when he
goes away he forgets because he doesn't apply.
This certainly applies to a non-believer, a non-Christian who hears the gospel, hears
the gospel and never puts it into practice, never really looks very deeply at it, just
water off a duck's back and is deceived about his true condition. This can be true about a
person who comes to the church, makes a profession of Christ, might even in his own mind
think he's a Christian, think he's a Christian...listen,s never applies anything, never
applies anything...he's in a state of delusion about his spiritual condition.
It can also be true of a Christian who hears teaching about a certain area and he will
not deal with that, he will not apply that in an area of his life. He becomes totally
deceived about his true spiritual condition.
So the point is this, you better take more than a passing glance if you want to know
your true condition. And verse 25 says it, "The one who looks intently," that's
a Greek verb that means you look very closely and for a prolonged period to rightly assess
your condition. You look in that mirror which is the perfect law, the law of liberty.
What's that? The Word of God, it's the perfect law, it's the law that sets you free from
sin and delusion and you abide by it. You are not a forgetful hearer but an effectual
doer, this man shall be blessed. It's obedience that brings the blessing. And people who
don't obey are self-deluded. Maybe they're not even Christians, maybe they're Christians
who mistakenly think all is well when all is not well.
So, we want to deal with attitudes from the heart. And that means faith and that means
obedience. Tonight we're going to talk about the third one. I'll tell you what it is, I
shouldn't tell you but I'm going to tell you...humility. And all of you who aren't here we
know will be avoiding humility. This is a very important study tonight and we'll only deal
with it once. You be with us and we'll have the Lord's table, as well. Let's bow in
prayer.
Father, we thank You for again the reminder of the foundation of our Christian life
being obedience. There is a plan. There's a right way to do things in your church and that
involves spiritual attitudes from the inside out. And, Lord, we ask that You would grant
us great faith and the strength to be obedient and the longing to confess our disobedience
and make it right. Work that work of conviction in our hearts that makes us hate our
disobedience and long to submit. Produce in us those attitudes which will cause us to live
in ways that bring You glory, for Christ's sake. Amen.
© 1997 Grace to You
GC 90-115
All Rights Reserved
(A copy of this message on cassette tape may be obtained by calling 1-800-55-GRACE)
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