This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Lewis
Harold, assistant pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland
County in Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Lewis as he
continues teaching through God's Word.
And those are the three things that I think about even today.
Well, I know who I believe. I believe the author of the true
Word of God. I believe what's in here.
Not some of it. All of it, all of it.
No one can tell me. Well, some of these things
aren't necessarily true because they're not for today.
No, no, no, you can't tell me that all of this is God's word.
And if it's all God's Word, then it's all truth that.
Sure is a simple way to look at the Bible.
If the Bible is the word of God, then it's all truth.
It's as simple as that. Today, Pastor Lewis shows us
that some within the church are approaching the Word of God like
it's the local Chinese buffet. I'll take a little of this and a
little of that, but I don't want any of that.
The Bible isn't meant to be approached like a buffet.
You must take the entirety of the Word of God into your very
person. It is all meant for your good.
Now here's Pastor Lewis in the Book of First Timothy, chapter
one with today's edition of Living Waters of Grace.
So we aren't saved because we do good things, say, because we
believe in him who is good. And then is the last I'm just
going to mention here is this prosperity gospel.
Prosperity gospel teaches that we are saved to be rich, you're
saved to be happy, you're saved to be healthy and whole, that if
we give our lives to Jesus, then we will live a blessed,
prosperous and happy life. But in order to do that, you got
to give, you got to plant some seeds.
You know, you got to give, you know, you have to, you have to
give to the church and then you can receive these, these things
that Jesus can offer once we give to him first.
Well, Jesus already died for us. There's really nothing we can do
for him, right? He already died for us.
It's all done. It's finished.
He said it on the cross, it's finished.
So we know that that's not a a true gospel.
So we have to be careful of some of the doctrines that can make
their way into the church. But Paul said that these
doctrines, these doctrines, these other doctrines, these
fables, which are basically just myths, they're untrue.
You know, these things along with endless genealogies.
And what he means here is that there are people who are
actually trying to achieve righteousness through their
lineage based on who they're related to.
You know, this is my lineage. And you heard the Pharisees do
it. We're of Abraham, we're
Abraham's seed. Jesus said before Abraham was I
am, so it has nothing to do with who I'm related to.
My mother could be saved. If I'm living like the devil,
I'm sorry, but I'm not going to be saved unless I repent and
trust in Jesus Christ for my salvation.
We all got to have that relationship with Him, not just
because we're related to somebody who does.
And they were trusted in some of these genealogies.
And these things weren't doing nothing but causing disputes and
speculations. But Paul said these things don't
edify. You see, they can't change our
lives. These new doctrines can't change
our lives. Or we can make you feel good for
a while because they do address your flesh.
They go right to your flesh. But it does nothing for the
spirit man. So the spirit man doesn't grow.
We don't become more mature in the Lord listening to strange
doctrines. The only thing that causes us to
grow is the word of truth, the gospel of truth.
Jesus said sanctify them by your truth, not by these other
gospels. Sanctify them by your truth.
Your word is truth. So we're sanctified by the truth
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. So then we go on to verse 5 and
it says now the purpose of the commandment is love.
So Paul says, look, that other gospel were dumped, other things
that they're teaching those false teachings.
It's not doing anything but bringing speculation, disputes,
causing us to go into more sin, causing people to go into more
sin. It's not doing anything for our
hearts. It's not changing us.
It doesn't do anything for us. But the purpose of the
commandment, that means the true doctrine is love.
The gospel is a love message. It's a love message for God.
So love the world He gave his only begotten Son.
Romans 5 and 8 says that he demonstrates his love toward us
and that why we were yet sinners.
He died for us. The gospel is a love message.
It gives us a love message. It gives us love.
Jesus say, you'll know them, you'll know them by their love
for one another, You'll know that they are my disciples by
the way that they love one another.
Now the purpose of the commandment is love, and it's
love from a pure heart, which means that a love, a heart
that's untainted, a heart that's uncorrupted by worldliness.
So it's a pure heart. And we know that it's the pure
that sees God, right? I mean, when we look at the
beatitudes, blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see
God, they shall see God, the pure in heart.
So it's love out of a pure heart.
It's also love from a good conscience.
You see, the Word of God, the gospel doesn't give, it doesn't
teach condemnation, it doesn't teach judgment and condemnation
and all those kind of things. You don't feel condemned.
Paul said There is therefore no condemnation to them who walk
not after the flesh but after the Spirit.
There is no condemnation. We don't have to feel condemned
when we read the gospel. The law makes us feel condemned
or when people make you feel like you don't measure up, that
causes condemnation. And Paul says here it's it's
it's love with a good conscience.
Our conscience is clear. If I do wrong, I repent and I'm
back in fellowship with God. I don't have to carry around
condemnation and feel like I've fallen out of love with God
because I did something wrong. God said there's nothing that
can separate us from his love. And then it says here and from a
sincere faith, the sincere faith, not a hypocritical faith,
not someone living double lives, not someone acting like they're
keeping the law and putting all this bondage on other people to
keep it and they can't do it themselves.
That's a hypocritical law. That's a hypocritical gospel.
That's not what this love is coming from.
It's a sincere gospel. We sincerely love the Lord.
We are sincere before Him, even when we repent.
Lord, I blew it. I messed up, please forgive me.
I desire to do the right thing, but sometimes I don't.
Lord, please forgive me. That's a sincere heart.
A sincere heart. And then he goes on to verse 5,
it says from which some having strayed meaning from the sincere
faith or the word of God, some having strayed, they they've
turned away from it and having turned aside to idle talk, idle
talk, vain talk, empty talk. It doesn't go anywhere.
It's circular, it's speculation. Majoring on the minors is
basically what that is. It's idle talk, verse 7 says,
designed to be teachers of the law, understanding neither what
they say nor the things which they affirm.
They don't even understand what they truly believe in.
They don't understand exactly what they're standing on.
They don't have a real good understanding of it, and it
can't. If, if it's not truth, then it's
always changing. Then it's always changing.
So you don't really know what you're standing on.
You don't really know what you're standing on.
When I was, when we were, when we were younger, when we first
got saved, our mentor used to tell us, he said, look, you need
to know three things. You need to know three things
about your salvation. First of all, you need to know
who you believe. Secondly, you need to know what
you believe. And thirdly, you need to know
why you believe it. And those are the three things
that I think about even today. Well, I know who I believe.
I believe the author of the true Word of God.
I believe what's in here. Not some of it, all of it, all
of it. No one can tell me.
Well, some of these things aren't necessarily true because
they're not for today. No, no, no, you can't tell me
that all of this is God's word. And if it's all God's Word, then
it's all truth. It's all truth.
So that's who I believe. What do I believe?
I believe that Jesus Christ is the true Son of God.
I believe he came and he died for my sins and your sins.
I believe that he was buried, and I believe that on the third
day he arose. And I believe that we have
eternal life in Him. For those who believe on him,
that's what I believe. And they say, well, why do you
believe it? Because God said it.
For me, it's very simple. I believe because God said I'll
have to give a dissertation while I believe it.
God said it. Now we hear people say God said
it, I believe it. That settles it.
I used to say that too. I don't say that no more because
it doesn't matter whether I believe it or not.
It's still true. So the word, so it should be.
God said it, and that settles it.
There's nothing in between my believing it or not, my
believing it or not believing it.
Doesn't make it any less true or any more true.
And we need to understand that as a community, as a society,
people think that because they don't believe something that
they read in the word of God, then it's not necessarily true
because it doesn't make sense to them.
Sorry. Just because it doesn't make
sense to you doesn't mean it's not true.
It's true anyway. 2 + 2 equal 4. If I have 4 beads sitting up
here, I don't care what you do with it.
If I put these two over here together with this two over here
and put them together, I'm going to have 4 beads.
Whether I believe it's true or not.
It's 4B sitting on my table. God's word is true whether we
believe it or not. So that's why I believe it,
because God said it. So then he goes on here and he
says in verse 8. So apparently what we learn is
that this problem that they had with bringing with the strange
doctrines, it had to do something with the law.
They were misinterpreting the law or misusing the law.
And we know that Judaizers were coming into different places and
that's what they were doing. They were misusing the law.
Judaizers were saying, yeah, it's Jesus Christ.
Plus, OK, you know, you have to believe in Jesus Christ, but
then you also have to get circumcised.
You can believe in Jesus Christ, but you also have to keep the
law of Moses. OK, That's Jesus Christ plus.
There is no Jesus Christ plus. It's Jesus Christ.
We're saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ
alone. That's it.
There is no Jesus plus. But they must have thought that
there was a Jesus plus, so Paul says.
But we know that the law is good if one uses it lawfully.
When the law is used the correct way for what it's intended for,
the law is good. In evangelism, people who
understand the law and are able to share the law in a way where
people understand there's that balance between law and grace.
The law is good. The law is good.
The purpose of the law, and this is what we're going into now,
the purpose of the law is to point out our sin.
That's what the law is for. It was to point out our sin.
How do I know that? Well, let's look at a couple of
verses that tells us that. How about we do that?
Let's go to Galatians first. Now let's go to Romans.
Go to Romans first. We'll do it in order.
Go to Romans first. Romans chapter 3, right around
the beginning of Romans, Romans chapter 3 verse 19 says, Now we
know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under
the law, that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may
become guilty before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the
law, no flesh will be justified in His sight.
For by the law is the knowledge of sin, for by law is the
knowledge of sin. The law simply points out our
sins. And then let's go to go to
Galatians. Let's go over to Galatians and
go to chapter 3 in Galatians, and I'm going to start right
here, verse 21. It says for if there had been a
law given which could have given life by righteousness, for if
there had been a law given which could have given life, OK, truly
righteousness would have been by the law.
But the Scripture has confirmed all under sin, that the promise
by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.
But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law,
kept for the faith which would come afterward be revealed.
Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we
might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are
no longer under the tutor. So it came to point out our sin.
It was not a remedy or a cure for our sins.
So the law is like a thermometer.
Laws like a thermometer. A thermometer can tell you
you're sick, but it can't cure you.
It tells you you're sick, but it doesn't cure you.
A laws like that tells you just how sick we are, but there's no
cure in the law itself. So let's let's go on.
We know that the law cannot empower us to change.
The law cannot be on the inside of us.
The law is on the outside. It's the new covenant where God
said, I'm going to put my law in your heart and I'm going to put
it on your minds and your sins. I will remember no more.
And that's because the law giver is now in each and every one of
you and me. The law giver is in US.
So all we do is submit to the Spirit that's in US, and that's
how we walk in obedience to the Lord when we submit to the
Spirit that's in US. So then we go on here in verse 9
where it says now knowing this, that the law is not made for a
righteous person but for the lawless.
OK, So what I'm going to do now, I'm going to mention these
violations and these first six violations that I mentioned are
all going to fall under the 1st four of the 10 commandments.
It's very interesting how Paul did this.
He says here the law is for the lawless and the insubordinate.
That means the disobedient or the rebellious is for the
ungodly and for sinners and for the unholy and profane.
OK, that's who the law. Those six, you look at those six
things and they fall under the 1st 410 commandments.
It's very interesting. Thou should have no other God
before me. Thou should have no graven
images. Thou should not take the Lord's
name in vain. Thou should remember the Sabbath
and keep it holy. All those things fall under
these, these things that Paul just mentioned.
So now we're going to go to the next 8, which are going to fall
under the next. This might be complicated, might
fall out of the next 5 of 610 commandments because he doesn't
mention covetous here, which would have been the 10th
command. We don't mention that one, but
he does mention the first, that next five of the 10 commandments
and I'll go through them. But he says here it says for
murderers of fathers, murderers of mothers, that means you know
your patricides and your matricides, people who kill
their fathers and their mothers. You know the 10 commandments
tells us that what, that we have to honor our fathers and our
mothers. And then it says for manslayers,
10 commandments said thou shalt not commit murder.
So it falls under that. And for fornication and
sodomites to commandments, they should not commit adultery.
But these fall under sexual immorality.
These fall under sexual immorality.
But I also want to point out to you that since we're on the
subject, I want to point out to you that he separated
fornicators and sodomites, or in some versions it may read
homosexuals. In some versions.
He took the time to point that out because I believe He's
letting us low. He's letting us know that being
a homosexual is no less of a sin or no more of a sin than being a
fornicator. Having sex outside of marriage
with a woman is no less of a sin than two men having sex.
It's all sinful to the Lord. It's abominable to the Lord.
OK, but I also want to point this out because somebody might
be thinking, but wait a minute. What if the two men are married?
What if the two women are married?
Is it still a sin? I have a resounding yes, it's
still a sin. God does not acknowledge
homosexual marriages, a man to man.
God does not acknowledge that marriage.
He does not acknowledge the marriage of two women.
God does not acknowledge that. How do you know Lewis?
Well, because back in Genesis when God was talking to Adam and
Eve and He was talking about their marriage, he said for this
reason, this is back in chapter 2, verse 24.
You can check it out. He said for this reason shall a
man leave his father and his mother and be joined to his
wife? Under no circumstances is a wife
ever identified as a man. A wife is a woman, and then if
you go to Matthew chapter 19, verse 5, Jesus said the exact
same thing. For this reason shall a man be
joined together with his wife. For this reason he leaves his
father and his mother, and he's joined together with his wife,
and the two shall become one flesh.
That's the institution of marriage.
And I'm sorry, but the one who created the institution has the
right to call what it is, in my opinion.
I can't go into your house and I tell you what the rules of your
house is going to be. You ain't going for that, nor
can we do it with the institution of marriage.
So let's go on. So then he says for kidnappers,
some people believe that the Bible doesn't talk about
slavery. For slavery.
The Bible was doesn't doesn't mention anything about that.
Well, here's one place that it does because it's kidnappers.
He's talking about men, Steelers, men stealers, men who
actually steal other men or women and force them into
slavery. That's what this is talking
about. And then he says for liars and
for perjurers, I mean, all liars.
And we know that all liars have their place in the lake of fire.
But what's interesting, I looked up now, you know, the penalty
for perjury is a pretty severe penalty.
I mean, it's a, it's a third degree felony here in
Pennsylvania. It's a pretty severe penalty,
and the penalty, the punishment for it is like $15,000 in fines
and up to seven years prison time.
That's pretty severe. But that is nothing compared to
what a unrepentant, unbelieving liar or perjurer is going to
have to face when they face eternity in the lake of fire.
It says for if a perjurus and if there is any other thing that is
contrary to sound doctrine, well, maybe somebody is sitting
here and thinking, well, I don't do none of those things.
Just because it doesn't list, it doesn't mean this is an
unexhausted list. OK, this is not everything, but
he said he captures it at the bottom when he says in any other
thing that is not contrary to sound doctrine.
OK, so we're all lawbreakers, We've all broken the law.
We all need the grace of Jesus Christ.
We all need the love of Jesus Christ, and we all need the
mercy of Jesus Christ. And thank God it's there.
Amen. Thank God it's there.
So to teach this, to try to teach this, if somebody tries to
teach the law and use it as a way to keep you in bondage or
use it as a way to control you or ever try to get you to think
that the law is your way to righteousness or right standing
with God, or that the law is the way to salvation, that is misuse
of the law. That is misuse of the law.
The law is there to point it out.
This is sin. God's grace and His love and
faith in Him is the way to salvation.
Believing on Him, that's the way to salvation.
It got to be balanced. Amen.
And then of course, verse 11 says, according to the glorious
gospel of the blessed God, that's the balance which was
committed to my trust. I just want to close with this.
Romans 10/4 says for Christ is the end of the law for
righteousness for everyone or to everyone who believes.
People try to use doctrine to do whatever it is that they wanted
to do. They try to use it to control
you. They try to use it to condemn.
They try to use it to try to get you to think that you have to
complete a bunch of do's and don'ts in order to be righteous
or in order to be saved. But the Lord has come.
Lord Jesus Christ has come for our salvation.
He's already paid the penalty for it.
He's already paid the penalty. And as I said before, we now
have the Spirit of God living on the inside of us that all we
have to do is yield to it, to Him.
And He is the one that empowers us to live holy.
He empowers us to change our lives.
He empowers us to understand when we have violated the law of
God and we repent and we turn from it and God is there with
his arms open, just like we are with our children when they
violate or one of our rules or they violate something in the
household. We don't kick them out forever.
We don't look at them haughty, but we invite them back when
they say, mom, dad, I'm sorry. And they come and give you that
hug around your waist. You melt.
You melt and we serve a God who loves For us to acknowledge that
we're in agreement with Him that we have sinned, but He also love
it when we come back to Him and we admit that we're wrong and we
repent and we are able to restore.
He restores. Our fellowship with Him isn't
awesome. What a plan.
Thank you for tuning in to
Living Waters of Grace with Pastor Lewis Harold.
We're currently in the books of First and Second Timothy.
Some of the things included in these New Testament letters from
Paul are that the young and newly established Pastor Timothy
was being encouraged to hold fast to what was true.
He was challenged to confront and address the false teachers
that were rising up. He was also reminded to accept
his calling to the ministry with gratefulness and to address the
happenings going on in the Ephesian church.
Paul was imparting his experience and knowledge to the
next generation. Timothy was receptive to
learning and gleaning what he could from Paul's wisdom.
This is how it should be in ministry across multiple
generations. Those who have lived a little
more life should be open to sharing their successes and also
things they've learned along the way.
That we're not a wind. The younger generations coming
up can learn and appreciate much from those ahead of them, and
perhaps avoid some of the same pitfalls that their mentors work
through mentoring. It's a beautiful relationship
when the hearts are in the right place to learn and grow.
We trust that you're in a community where this is
happening. Older ones providing advice and
wisdom, and each side learning and growing from one another.
This certainly was the case for Paul and Timothy as they were
comrades for the sake of the gospel.
For more information on where this teaching came from, go to
calvarychapelonline.com. There you can also learn about
our service times to join us in person.
This has been living waters of grace.