Mark 3:20-35

Go ahead and take out your copy of God's Word and turn to the Gospel of Mark, chapter 3.

Mark 3 · chapter mention

We proceed with our study through Mark's Gospel account.

! We have come now to chapter 3, verse 20.

Mark chapter 3, I'll begin reading in verse 20.

Mark 3 · chapter mention

Then he went home, and the crowd gathered again so that they could not even eat.

And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying,

He is out of his mind.

And the scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying,

He is possessed by Beelzebul, and by the prince of demons he casts out the demons.

And he called them to him and said to them in parables,

How can Satan cast out Satan?

If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand.

And if a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.

And if Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand.

But is coming to an end.

But no one can enter a strong man's house and plunder his goods,

unless he first binds the strong man.

Then indeed he may plunder his house.

Truly I say to you, all sins will be forgiven the children of man,

and whatever blasphemies they utter.

But whoever blasphemies against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness,

but is guilty of an eternal sin.

For they were saying, He has an unclean spirit.

And his mother and his brothers came.

And standing outside, they sent to him and called him.

And a crowd was sitting around him, and they said to him,

Your mother and your brothers are outside seeking you.

And he answered them, Who are my mother and my brothers?

And looking about those who sat around him, he said,

Here are my mother and my brothers.

For whoever does the will of God, he is my brother and sister and mother.

Please pray with me.

Father God, we thank you for your word,

and the reading of it, and the preaching of it.

And pray, Father, this day, by the power of your Spirit,

for those of us who know you,

and have been given the gift of the Helper,

that you will apply these words to our heart,

that we might be transformed this day.

And I pray, Father, for anyone here who may not have placed faith in Christ,

who may not believe he is who he says he is,

and that he did, in fact, accomplish the things that we see recorded in the Scriptures,

that this will be the last day that would be true of them,

that they might believe today and be saved.

And we pray this in Christ's precious, holy, and magnified name.

Amen.

So this is a bit of a chunk of text,

particularly for us as we typically try to take a little bit smaller bites of things

and ruminate on them a bit more.

But I had a very difficult time not including verse 20 down through 35.

For most of you, as we read that,

you probably noticed that we passed by a couple of subheadings.

Please know that those are not inspired in any way whatsoever.

From the ESV that I'm reading here,

these are inserted,

and most of us have the same insertions of this.

But you'll find that as we looked at verse 28 and verse 29,

this is the text that is often talked about.

This is where the unpardonable sin is preached from.

And there's lots and lots of misunderstanding about what that is and what that means.

And I hope for us here,

those of you who are regulars with us,

this causes a little bit of grief in you

to see when he says at the end of verse 29,

but is guilty of an eternal sin.

What does that mean?

Because we preach a gospel of forgiveness.

A gospel that comes by grace alone through faith

and Christ alone forever.

We believe that our sins are expunged from us.

That they are cast as far as the east is from the west.

That they are forgotten.

That when God looks at us who have believed in Christ,

He sees the righteousness of Christ.

So we preach a gospel of forgiveness.

And here we see it taught that there's a sin that cannot be forgiven

and that should cause a little bit of conflict in you

until we arrive together, I hope,

at what this really means and how we should understand it.

There are lots and lots of entirely unacceptable understandings

of what the unpardonable sin is.

Some people believe it's just simply saying something against the Holy Spirit.

That if in some way you speak poorly of,

it's what this term blasphemy means,

is to belittle or to utter a,

some kind of a condemnation against the Spirit,

that you are therefore cursed.

That there is no way you could possibly ever have

forgiveness and acceptance in God.

I've actually seen some people make the case

that it's perfectly acceptable to cuss in God's name

and Jesus Christ's name,

but not in the Spirit's name,

which if you think cussing is cool,

that would definitely take your cool factor down

if you cuss the Holy Spirit's name.

That's not what this means.

Rather commonly,

it's believed to be that

it's the act of denying some work of the Spirit,

whether that's a real work or a supposed work.

The charismatic movement is classic for railing this against

those of us who don't believe that the Spirit works

in exactly the same way they do,

that we are committing a blasphemy of the Spirit

because we don't think that the falling out

and the speaking in tongues

and all these things that are happening

in these particular settings

are actually the work of the Spirit,

and therefore that is a blasphemy of the Spirit.

I'd say to you now,

none of these are what Jesus means at all.

There are some more acceptable understandings of it,

although I think we'll see

as we look at the context together

that they're a little bit narrow.

One being an act of resistance

which belittles the Holy Spirit so grievously

that He withdraws forever

with His convicting power.

So we're not able to repent and be forgiven.

Others say that it's simply,

as Jesus is responding to the Pharisees,

that it is to say that Jesus worked by a power

other than the power of the Holy Spirit.

And both of these things are true

in their proper sense,

but I don't think they're quite inclusive enough

of what Jesus is trying to teach here.

And so let me tell you,

not to leave you hanging too long,

quick summary,

and then I'll build the case

for why I believe

that what Jesus is saying here

is that the unpardonable sin

is denying that Jesus is the Christ

or the anointed one with finality.

Denying that Jesus is the Christ

with finality.

And I arrive at that

by looking at the context.

That's why we started in verse 20

and we're ending in verse 35.

It's incredibly important.

But before we even get to that,

we should look at the context

of the Gospel of Mark to this point.

There have been many proclamations

up to this point

that Jesus is in fact the Son of God,

the Christ,

the one who has come

to bring forgiveness to His people.

Mark states that

in chapter 1, verse 1.

He says the beginning of the Gospel

of Jesus Christ,

the Son of God.

John the Baptist makes that declaration

in chapter 1, verse 8.

He says,

I have baptized you with water,

but He will baptize you

with the Holy Spirit.

God the Spirit and God the Father

have declared that Jesus is the Christ.

When Jesus was baptized,

the Spirit of God descended on Him

like a dove,

which would have been representative

of both the indwelling power

of the Spirit in His life

and the blessing of the Spirit.

And God spoke out of heaven

and said in verse 11 of chapter 1,

You are my beloved Son.

With you I am well pleased.

This was a fulfillment

of messianic prophecy.

2 Samuel 7, 12-14.

A promise given to David

speaking of his son Solomon,

but in a greater way

speaking of the Christ.

Nathan said to David,

When your days are fulfilled

and you lie down with your fathers,

I will raise up your offspring after you

who shall come from your body

and I will establish his kingdom.

He shall build a house for my name

and I will establish the throne

of his kingdom forever.

I will be to him a father

and he shall be to me a son.

This is speaking both of Solomon

and of our Lord.

And Jesus has declared this of himself,

that he is the Christ.

When he states in chapter 2,

verses 10-11,

that he has the power to forgive sin.

And in chapter 2, verse 28,

when he says that he is the Lord

of the Sabbath.

This has been established,

this reality,

throughout the book so far.

Now as we look at our text today,

beginning in verse 20

and going through verse 35,

there emerges a common literary device

that was used in the days of Mark.

I've said to you before

that this was a rhetorical writing,

not in the sense that we use rhetoric today,

which is typically pointless argument

or unvaluable argument,

just meant to convince people of something.

But this would have been considered

valuable argument,

based in fact,

but aimed at convincing us of something.

You see here,

we're being driven towards understanding

that Jesus is in fact the Christ.

And he uses a literary form

called a chiasm.

It's not important for you to write down,

but I happen to know what it's called.

So there you have it.

It's called a chiasm.

And he follows a pattern,

beginning in verse 20

and working himself down to verse 35.

And a chiasm is reflective.

So if you can track this in your mind,

we have A, B, C, C prime, B prime, A prime.

They reflect one another.

And we see this in verse 20.

We see a crowd.

In verse 21, we see Jesus' family.

There's A and B.

C, verse 22, we see the scribes.

Then in verses 23 through 30,

he addresses the scribes.

Verse 31 through 33,

he addresses the family.

In verse 34 through 35,

he addresses the crowd.

This is significant.

It means that this was meant

to be taken together.

So as we look at verse 28 and 29,

and we really try to understand

what is it that Jesus was teaching,

we can't simply look at verse 28 and 29.

We have to look at the context.

We have to back up to this broader picture

of this situation that's happening

with the scribes and the crowd

and his family.

Very significant in this way.

So let me say to you again,

my assertion is that the unpardonable sin

is denying that Jesus is the Christ

with finality.

The same account of this story

in Matthew chapter 12.

Matthew 12 · chapter mention

Let me ask you to actually turn there.

I'm going to show you a few things

from this text.

Matthew chapter 12, verse 32.

Matthew 12:32

Jesus says,

And whoever speaks a word

against the Son of Man

will be forgiven.

But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit

will not be forgiven,

either in this age

or in the age to come.

So here, Jesus is saying,

If you speak words against me,

Jesus, the Christ,

you'll be forgiven.

But if you speak words against the Spirit,

you will not be forgiven.

So this seems to be contradictory

to the very thing I just told you,

that the unpardonable sin is denying that Jesus is the Christ with finality.

So as he's making this point to us,

we must understand why would he have chosen to say this the way that he said it.

Now note firstly, in verse 32 of chapter 12,

he uses a term he gives to himself consistently and constantly,

son of man.

He talks about his humanity in this case.

And we see many, many insults railed against him,

many blasphemies spoken against Jesus himself as he is here on earth.

So keep that in mind.

But also recognize that when Jesus was here on earth in human form,

his will and his power,

his will and his power as he was absolutely God,

his will and his power bowed to that of the Father and of the Spirit.

He set aside that part of his deity.

Jesus could have come down and done whatever he wanted to do,

but he set it aside and he bowed that will and that power

to that of the Father and of the Spirit.

John chapter 5, verse 19.

John 5:19

Jesus says,

Truly, truly, truly, I say to you,

the Son can do nothing of his own accord,

but only what he sees the Father doing.

For whatever the Father does,

the Son does likewise.

Right?

He was humble in that way.

He took direction from the Father.

John chapter 14, verses 10 and 11.

John 14:10

He says,

Do you not believe that I am in the Father

and the Father is in me?

The words that I say to you,

I do not speak on my own authority,

but the Father who dwells in me

does his work.

Here's the Spirit abiding within him.

Believe me that I am in the Father

and the Father is in me.

Or else, believe on account of the works themselves.

So both the things that he spoke

and the things that he did

were in submission to the work of the Father

and of the Spirit.

So here we have this understanding

that he's bowing now to the will of the Father

that is accomplished by the work of the Spirit.

And we have to then talk a bit about

what is it that the Spirit exists to do?

Why is it that not believing

that Jesus is the Christ with finality

would be to blaspheme the Spirit?

Would be to insult the Holy Spirit of God?

It's kind of a phrase that we've lost.

I think it's been mentioned here now

in the last couple of months

a couple of times.

But that the Spirit of God

is often referred to as the shy spirit.

The Spirit of God works in this world

not to magnify himself,

as many believe,

but to rather magnify and exalt Christ.

Listen to what Jesus says about the Spirit.

John 14, verse 26.

John 14:26

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit...

So we see this term Helper.

He defines for us what he means.

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit,

whom the Father will send in my name,

he will teach you all things

and to bring remembrance to all things

that I have said to you.

He is going to come to help you remember

all of the things,

he's speaking to the apostles,

that Jesus had taught them.

Chapter 15, verse 26.

Jesus says,

But when the Helper comes,

whom I will send to you from the Father,

the Spirit of truth,

who proceeds from the Father,

he will bear witness about me.

Chapter 16, verses 12-14.

I still have many things to say to you,

but you cannot bear them now.

When the Spirit of truth comes,

he will guide you into all the truth.

For he will not speak on his own authority,

but whatever he hears, he will speak.

And he will declare to you

the things that are to come.

He will glorify me,

for he will take what is mine

and declare it to you.

So here is the work of the Spirit.

It's to exalt Jesus as the Christ.

So denying that Jesus is the Christ

with finality

is to blaspheme the Spirit

and that his work is not taking effect.

It's not having an effectual work

in your heart.

All of this is really a matter of the heart.

Not so much about what we say,

but about what we believe.

About who we are at our very core.

And we become who we are as Christians

by the work of the Spirit.

We were once dead in trespasses and sins.

Our heart were stoned.

But God sent his Son

that by his Son,

he could send a Spirit into our hearts

to make them hearts of flesh.

That we might believe

that faith would be birthed in us

to pursue him

and be disciple-making disciples

of Jesus Christ.

So this is a matter ultimately of the heart.

I hope you're still in Matthew 12.

I didn't deceive you

and tell you I wouldn't show you

something from there

and just show you verse 32.

This is the more extended account

of this interaction with these scribes.

Now, I want to point out to you

that in verse 22,

the record in Mark

is that the scribes

who came down from Jerusalem...

Jesus at this point

has already had

many scribes and Pharisees

following him around,

railing accusations at him,

trying to discredit

the things that he was saying

to be true of himself.

Ultimately,

what he would be crucified for

would be for blaspheming God,

for saying that he himself

was God.

And here we see

now kind of a raising of the bar.

They've called in the big shots.

The scribes were the theological experts

of the day for apostate Judaism.

Right?

So they've called in the big wigs now.

The ones who reside in Jerusalem

have now come to accuse him.

So beginning in verse 30

of Matthew 12,

Jesus sets for us some position.

He says,

For whoever is not with me

is against me.

And whoever does not gather with me

scatters.

Two categories of humanity.

Those who are with Christ,

who believe he is

who he says he is,

and those who do not.

Verse 31,

Therefore I tell you,

every sin and blasphemy

will be forgiven people,

but the blasphemy against the Spirit

will not be forgiven.

It's our same thing

we found in verse 29.

And whoever speaks a word

against the Son of Man

will be forgiven,

but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit

will not be forgiven,

either in this age

or in the age to come.

Now here we go.

Here's my context.

It's so important.

Jesus goes on to say

in verse 33,

Either make the tree good

and its fruit good,

or make the tree bad

and its fruit bad.

For the tree is known

by its fruit.

You brood of vipers,

how can you speak good

when you are evil?

For out of the abundance

of the heart

the mouth speaks.

The good person

out of his good treasure

brings forth good.

And the evil person

out of his evil treasure

brings forth evil.

I tell you,

on the day of judgment

people will give an account

for every careless word

they speak.

For by your words

you will be justified

and by your words

you will be condemned.

Our words give evidence

of what we believe.

Right?

Out of the outflow of the heart

the mouth speaks.

So for you to deny

that Jesus is the Christ

with finality,

and I'll explain what I mean

by that here eventually,

to deny that

gives evidence

of where your heart is.

If you do not believe

that Jesus is the Christ,

you are not regenerate.

You do not have

the Spirit of God.

You do not have that seal

that the accomplished work

of Christ was done

on your behalf

and therefore

you are damned.

But if you do,

if you do recognize

that Jesus Christ

is who He says He is,

you believe

in His person

and His work,

you can have great confidence

in that.

this is important doctrine

for us.

It's important for us

to get this right.

As John MacArthur said,

properly understanding this

brings comfort

to the fearful

and should bring fear

to the comforted.

Those of us

who understand

the weight of sin,

understand the great offense

that it is

to our God

should be fearful

of judgment.

But this should bring us

great comfort

that we believe

that Jesus

is the Christ.

That His accomplished

work on the cross

has meaning

for my life

today.

That there is no thing

that I can do

that will not be

forgiven

by grace

in Christ.

There's a

fairly common argument

made,

was originally

penned,

I'm sure it was made

prior to this,

by C.S. Lewis.

It's often summed up

as the liar,

lunatic,

or Lord argument.

If you ever heard this,

it's an argument

against Jesus

simply being a good

and moral teacher.

I heard it said

that a lot of people

in this world

think that Jesus

was just a rather

good guy.

I've heard very few

people say

that He wasn't.

Just kind of a good guy,

but He made some

really audacious claims,

didn't He?

He claimed to be

the Son of God.

He claimed to be

the way,

the truth,

the life.

And so,

C.S. Lewis wrote

in this great quote,

essentially,

in summation,

that you have to believe

either that He's a liar,

a lunatic,

or Lord.

And I think He probably

pulled that

from this text itself.

So listen carefully

to what C.S. Lewis wrote

in a book he wrote

called Mere Christianity.

A man who was merely

a man and said

the sort of things

Jesus said

would not be

a great moral teacher.

He would either

be a lunatic

on the level

with a man

who says he is

a poached egg,

or he would be

the devil of hell.

You must take

your choice.

Either this was

and is the Son of God,

or else a madman,

or something worse.

You can shut him up

for a fool,

or you can fall

at his feet

and call him Lord

and God.

But let us not come

with any patronizing nonsense

about his being

a great human teacher.

He has not left

that open to us.

The things he said

were so audacious

that we either

have to dismiss him

completely

or worship him

as the Christ.

We see in our text here,

we see all of these

different summations

of who Jesus was.

Liar, lunatic,

or Lord.

The Pharisees

are essentially

the scribes

who are accusing him

of being a liar.

Verse 22,

they said,

and the scribes

came down from Jerusalem

and were saying,

he is possessed

by Beelzebul

and by the prince

of demons.

He casts out

the demons.

This term they gave

to him,

Beelzebul,

was a bit of a changing

of a common term

used of the devil.

We use today

Beelzebub.

It's used five times

in the Old Testament

and it's derived

from a Canaanite god,

the lord of the

Ekronites,

which was

Beelzebub,

which meant in Hebrew

lord of the high place.

But they had changed

that word a bit

and just swapped out

the B

and replaced it

with the L

and that one little letter

changed the meaning

to mean lord of the flies.

Interesting.

Right?

Which expressed

the Jewish disdain

for the god of the Canaanites.

This was their way

of really saying

that they hated Satan.

Right?

This false god.

That was a way

of really belittling him.

And this is the very accusation

that they're making

of Christ

who has said,

I am myself god.

They're calling him

the great antithesis

to who God is

and was

and will be forever.

And that is this

false god

of the Ekronites

that they contorted

the word

to mean the lord

of the flies.

They're accusing him

of being a liar.

They're calling him

something completely different.

And he responds to them

so cleverly

as Jesus always does

in our first

recorded parables

that we see

in the Gospel of Mark

and we'll see many more

in the coming months.

Verse 23 says,

And he called to them,

Hey, come over here.

And he said to them

in parables.

And he essentially

goes through

a number of true statements.

Things that would be

really hard for anybody

to deny.

How can Satan

cast out Satan?

That makes no sense.

How can someone

who is possessed

by Satan

cast out Satan?

If a kingdom

is divided against itself,

that kingdom cannot stand.

Much civil unrest.

And if a house

is divided against itself,

that house

will not be able

to stand.

Those of you

who are married

know this to be true.

Your house

will not stand

if you seek strife

in it.

And if Satan

has risen up

against himself

and is divided,

he cannot stand

but is coming to an end.

He's simply

rattling off points.

How ridiculous

is it that you're

making an accusation

that I'm casting out

evil spirits

and you're saying

I'm doing that

by an evil spirit.

That makes no sense.

And they would have been

entirely on board

with him at this point.

But then he makes

an even more

audacious statement

when he says,

No one can enter

a strong man's house

and plunder his goods

unless he first

binds the strong man

then indeed

he may plunder his house.

And he's referring here

to the world

being Satan's house

and Satan being

that strong man.

So you wanted to

break into somebody's home

and they're there.

You've got to do something

with the man of the house

or else you're not

going to be able

to take his stuff.

He's going to

overpower you

and call the police.

This is what will happen.

You come into my house

you better come armed.

You better have

more ammunition

and better aim

than I do

if you're going to

plunder my goods

in my house.

This is what you would

have to do

if you're going to

plunder somebody's house.

So it would take

a stronger man

to accomplish this.

So Jesus is again

proclaiming his deity.

Who's stronger

than Beelzebul?

God.

And that is the very thing

that he's saying

to them here.

I am working

by the power

of the Spirit.

I am working

by the power

of God

and that is how

I'm able to cast out

demons.

A very simple

and poignant

argument.

Jesus is

the Christ.

You could take

Jesus for a lunatic.

It's a possibility.

We see his family here

do that very thing.

They come to him.

He's more than likely

in Capernaum.

He's not back

in Nazareth

Nazareth

in Bethlehem

but in Capernaum

kind of his home base

for where he was operating

and there's such a crowd

that they can't even

recline at table

and eat.

They're pressed

into the house.

They're pressed in

around him

and his family comes

and they're in

probably with good motive

trying to get him

out of the situation

he's found himself in

with countless

thousands of people

pressing him in

around him

to see these miracles

because they just

think that he's crazy.

They just think

that he's absolutely

lost his mind.

I like to muse

we have no record

of it but I like to muse

about what it must have

been like to be

the brother of Jesus

and hear your mom

and dad say to you

constantly

why can't you be

more like your brother?

It cracks me up

or what it would even

be like to raise

a perfect child

I'm not sure

I have no idea

what that would

possibly look like

I can dream of that

but here they come

to him and they

have missed the point

at this station

in their life.

They do not get

who he is.

Here in the record

they're denying

that Jesus is the Christ.

Are they not?

They're calling him

a lunatic.

They think he's

absolutely out of

his gourd.

There's no way

that our brother

that my son

Mary

like Mary

she was visited

by an angel

who told him

who he was going

to be.

She gave birth

to an immaculately

conceived child.

How could she not

believe at this point?

Right?

We know

that it's her

because we see

later on

that his mother

and brothers

are outside.

Don't piecemeal

this up.

This is all happening

at the same time.

They've come.

We see the record

of them coming.

He's inside

dealing with the scribes

and the crowd reports

that his mother

and his brothers

are standing outside

to seize him.

Right?

Because they think

he's crazy.

The blessing of this

is that

Jesus must be denied

as the Christ

with finality

for that not

to be forgiven.

John 7.5

says for not

even his brothers

believed in him.

But then we have

a record

in Acts 1

that as they were

fearfully gathered

together and praying

together,

those who were

faithful to Christ,

his mother

and his brothers

were there.

That they had

accepted him

for who he is

and who he was

to them.

Right?

So it's important

for us to see

that that is the

case.

Just because

you've denied

that Jesus

is the Christ

at some point

in your life

doesn't mean

that you can't

begin to believe

by the work

of the Spirit

that he is now

the Christ.

Right?

That can happen.

So you must

reject to be

guilty of an

eternal sin.

You must

blaspheme the

Spirit by

rejecting that

Jesus is the

Christ with

finality.

So you live

your life,

you go about

your days,

and when you

pass and you're

judged,

if you have not

believed that

Jesus is the

Christ,

you don't

believe in

his person

and his

work for

the forgiveness

of your sins,

that will not

be forgiven.

And there is

your consistency

with this gospel

of forgiveness

that is taught

over and over

and over and

over again in

the Scriptures.

This entire book

speaks of Christ

and this gospel

of forgiveness.

It is all about

redemptive history.

So the final thing

that we're left with

is to believe

that he's Lord.

To believe that he's

Lord,

verse 34 and 35

in Mark chapter 3,

Mark 3 · chapter mention

he looks around

at those who sat

around and he said,

here are my mother

and my brothers.

For whoever does

the will of God,

he is my brother

and sister

and mother.

John chapter 6,

John 6 · chapter mention

beginning in verse 26,

Jesus says,

truly, truly,

I say to you,

you are seeking me

not because you saw

signs,

but because you ate

your fill of the loaves.

So there's a massive

group of people

that followed him

around everywhere

and as we've said

repeatedly,

these people were

not to understand

as disciples of Christ.

Many of them,

most of them,

were following him

because of the things

he was doing.

He was feeding them.

He was healing sicknesses.

He was giving all

this affirmation

to the gospel message

that he was preaching.

But we're not to understand

that they all

were regenerate believers

that were pursuing him

and he gives us

evidence of that

in John 6, 26.

You are seeking me

not because you saw signs,

but because you ate

your fill of the loaves.

Do not work

for the food

that perishes,

but for the food

that endures

to eternal life,

which the Son of Man

will give to you.

For on him

God the Father

has set his seal,

the Spirit.

Then they said to him,

what must we do

to be doing

the works of God?

Jesus answered,

so here's the question

they're asking,

right?

We get this,

verse 35,

whoever does the will

of God,

he is my brother

and sister and mother.

What is the will of God?

This is the question

they ask in verse 28.

Jesus answered them,

this is the work of God,

that you believe in him

whom he has sent.

Want to be in the will of God?

There's your starting point.

Believe that Jesus

is the Christ.

John 6, 40.

Later in that chapter,

Jesus says,

for this is the will

of my Father,

that everyone who looks

on the Son

and believes in him

should have eternal life,

and I will raise him up

on the last day.

And how do we do this?

How is it that we

become regenerate?

Well, it's a work

of the Spirit,

so hear that clearly.

It is a work of God

on our behalf.

He works in our hearts.

He shifts who we are

and causes us to believe.

But that has to have

some necessary outflow.

There has to be

some visible evidence

of this thing happening,

and there's a life of that.

Oh, the New Testament

is full of all the things

that should be happening

in our lives

if we do have faith

in Christ.

But the simplest

and the first thing

that starts at regeneration

and continues on,

Romans 10, 9.

If you confess with your mouth

that Jesus is Lord

and believe in your heart

that God raised him

from the dead,

you will be saved.

Back in Matthew,

this is why he's saying

that we will be judged

by the words

that come out

of our mouth.

And so we ought to believe

that Jesus is

who he says he is.

You've only got

three categories

that you can put him in.

Call him a liar,

call him a lunatic,

or bow at his feet

and call him Lord.

There's a great,

great stake

in this whole thing.

There's a meta-narrative

that hangs over this world.

And it is the reality,

no matter what people's stories are,

whatever situation they come from,

whatever country

they were born in,

socioeconomic,

ethnic,

it does not matter.

There's a commonality

between all mankind,

and that is that

we are affected by sin.

That it has changed

who we are,

and it has made us rebels.

Standing in opposition

to God.

That everything we do

is in hatred of him.

It sets us up

on our own thrones.

The sovereign of heaven,

we try to supplant him

in our own lives.

And this is a damnable offense.

God will send those

who are found in this state

to hell forever.

Rightly so.

Justly so.

Don't think that's unfair.

If you think it's unfair,

you don't understand sin.

You deserve this

if this is where you stand.

But then he sent his Son,

righteous,

perfect,

in every respect,

to be the perfect sacrifice

on our behalf.

That he might trade with us

our sin

and give to us

his righteousness.

That we would be seen in him.

So God doesn't pass over sin,

but he punished our sin

in Christ.

And if you're not found in Christ,

you have an eternal doom

waiting you.

This is the most

important question.

There's this meta-narrative,

this reality

that all of us

are headed towards death

and miserable death

forever.

How do we fix that?

That is the question

that everyone needs to answer

in their hearts.

So today,

if you have already

answered that question,

and I truly hope

everyone in this room

can say it with great confidence,

Jesus is the Christ.

I know that.

I can say that with finality.

I know forever and ever

I am redeemed in him.

Praise God for that.

But if not,

I'd ask today

that you repent

and believe.

I've said things

about the Spirit

working in your life

and you may not even

understand what that looks like.

If there's anything

going on in your mind

that ascends

to this kind of truth,

just respond to it.

That is the work

of the Spirit

in your heart.

Just respond

to the Gospel of grace

in faith.

Let's pray together.

Let's pray together.