It's a wonderful joy to be with you this morning, being able to
be together in the first day of the week, the day that Jesus was
resurrected from the dead, the day that Jesus taught us with
his apostles to commune together, the day that we have
the opportunity to lay by in the store.
All of this is the wonderful part of our worship service to
God. And we're glad that you're here
to pay respect to God Almighty and his Son Jesus.
And we're severely thankful that we can be here together to
praise God together. A number of years ago we began a
study of the 21st St. congregation and it lasts for
about two 2 1/2 years. And there was a study on the
chronological study of the life of Jesus.
And what that essentially is, is Matthew, Mark, Luke and John,
the four gospels and putting them in chronological order.
Now, there are many really good tools or aids out there that
have done this for us. And they're just an occasional
somebody think this went before that, but that's OK.
It gives you a general idea of how things happen in what
sequence of the general practice that happened during the days of
Jesus. And this to me was one of the
most enjoyable studies that I remember having in my adult
life. It was so interesting to see
when Jesus did this miracle. It was at this time of his life
when He was maybe being treated roughly by the scribes of the
Pharisees or the political leaders of the day or whatever
the case may be. It is so interesting to see when
He gave a miracle, why He gave the miracle, What was the
environment whereby He gave that miracle.
But today in our lesson on the three crosses, I don't want to
leave the wrong impressions. I want to clarify it.
The three crosses that we are going to mainly talk about are
is Jesus and the thieves that were nailed on his left and the
thief was nailed on his right on their own individual cross.
We're going to basically address that.
However, I wanted everybody to remember this is not the only
conversation that happened during the crucifixion.
As a matter of fact, and I won't mention them all, but there's
one occasion where we know that the multitude of people, they
just railed against Jesus. So the people out the community
that were not embracing what Jesus preached and stood for,
they would rail against him and say things very, very unpleasant
to him. And Jesus took it.
And then not only that, then you have the faith on the left and
the faith on the right, and they both revived, revealed against
Jesus. They spoke evil against Jesus.
They were dying the same way he was dying the same day he was
dying. And these two thieves, one on
the left, one on the right, they themselves found themselves
doing just what the multitude of people did.
Well, that was sad and very unfortunate, but that's the way
it is now. Remember, Jesus was only on the
cross for six hours before he died.
However, as time progressed, the thief on the right spoke against
the thief on the left because the thief on the left at that
point, which is several hours later, this thief was rallying
against Jesus again. This thief spoke against the
other thief and said, what are you doing?
You know we are receiving just punishment for what we have
done, but this man, Speaking of Jesus, has done nothing amidst
He's innocent. In other words, we're guilty.
So what do you think? Why are you reviving against Him
in such a wicked and a terrible way?
This thief began to show the one on the right, and I have it on
the right intentionally because you know how the bottom puts it,
the good on the left and the bad on the left and the good on the
right. That's why we did it this way.
Now, we don't know from a biblical standpoint, nor even a
historical standpoint, whether the left guy on the left or the
left on the right or the one on the right.
But we've designed it this way just to make it easy.
But yeah, we understand that this thief right here earlier,
he reviled Jesus. He said he quit and then he
rebuked his Co person who had also been a thief.
And now this thief right here, he began to realize, man, I
better get things right. I'm getting ready to die.
It's time for me to get things right.
And that is the message we need to learn now.
We may not die today. We may not die tomorrow.
But as was mentioned in the prayer this morning, we don't
know when the Lord is going to come back, but we want to be
ready when he died. And when the Lord comes back, we
want to meet him, as the Bible said, in the clouds and in the
air. And so shall we ever be with the
Lord. That's what's going to happen if
the Lord returns during our lifetime.
He would never take it one more step on this earth.
There is no biblical evidence He will.
We'll meet him in the clouds. We'll meet him in the air.
The Bible said every tongue will confess.
Every eye will see him. What a grain and a glorious day
that will be when Jesus returns and we're able to ascend
together if we are saved. So therefore I encourage
everyone to inventory our own life, make sure that we're right
and we're ready to meet the Maker.
We're ready to go to heaven. And you said, well, I'm I'm
ready. What are you living like?
You're ready. Have you obeyed the gospel in
baptism? For the Lord can add you to the
church daily, such as should be saved.
Have you resolved conflict between one Christian and
another Christian? Have you got those resolved?
You know, the Bible says, you know, somebody's got something
against you, go talk to them and be reconciled.
Have you done that? Oh, I could give you a list of
things. Well, have we done that?
Well, this is what is important today in our Christian life, to
get us right with the Lord. Well, the Today we're going to
divide these three categories and the three main points, and
we're going to talk about the gentleman on the left, then
we'll talk about the gentleman on the right, and then we'll
talk about our roar and our Savior right in the middle.
It is such a grand event when Jesus, when he died, he died
because it was an accomplishment, accomplishing
God's will, accomplishing God's way.
And Jesus was so willing, so eager to do that.
Well, let's think about this gentleman right here, the man on
as you're looking into the board, the man on your left,
this thief right here. We don't have any record he ever
changed his attitude, his disposition, his reviling
against Jesus. We don't have any record where
He ever made all that right. If he did, it's simply not
recorded. But all of this is found in
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the four Gospels.
But what we find is in Isaiah the 5th, 9th chapter, verse 1
and 2, the Old Testament passage.
Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that he cannot save,
and neither is his ear heavy that he cannot hear.
But your sins have separated between you and your God.
Now we need to remember when we choose to sin, we choose to be
separated from God. The word of God said now is that
if not your sin separates you from God.
We need to make sure to get sin out of our life.
We don't want any part of that in our life.
Sin or keep you out of heaven. Sin is the only thing that will
keep you out of heaven. Sin is the only thing that sends
our soul to hell. Oh, we want to be free, free
from sin. We're going to make mistakes.
We're going to sin. The beauty part about it, as a
baptized believer, one who's baptized with the baptism of the
Great Commission, we can pray to God for forgiveness of our sins.
And God Forgives what pression is that can be.
Would you go with me in the book of John the 8th chapter verse
34, while we find that John 834 has another teaching about sin,
very important principle. And John 834 the word of God
said, Verily, verily, I say unto you, listen to what he said,
Whosoever committed sin is the servant of sin.
Now we don't lie to be considered a servant.
We think back at many years when people were slaves and servants
and, and that was not right, not fair, but at the day and time
they live, that's just the way it was.
And, and I'm glad that's all changed.
But let me tell you what, this is very serious, even more so
with we've become a servant of sin.
When we choose to sin, we become servants of sin.
We're yielding ourselves to Satan and evil, and we want to
break away from that. There comes a time in your life
you've got friends, family, people at work, whatever your
circumstance, that may be a hindrance to you living a
Christian life. They may be trying to get you to
go places, do things, act in such a way, talk in such a way.
Not becoming a Christian. Now, you've got to make a
choice. No, I am not going to do that.
No, I don't do that. I'm a Christian and I don't do
that. I don't go there.
I don't know it that way. No, no, no.
Oh, they may not like you for that.
They may want to just not have anything to do with you.
And guess what? That's OK Anytime somebody is
hindering you from living a Christian life or encouraging
you to live in a way that's not Christian, my dear friend, you
can turn and walk away and be thankful that you did.
Because if we don't, then we're going to find ourselves doing
some things that's not right. Well, what we can find not only
our sins separating us from God, not only if we sin, we've become
service of sin. Look at what the brother of our
Lord sin at the book of James. You know, reading the book of
James, you know James is very similar to that of Corinthians,
not in content, but in approach. James is a practical book in the
New Testament. So is the great book of First
Corinthians, First Corinthians, James of the two most practical
books in the New Testament. Now James doesn't cover the five
chapters, First Corinthian covered 16 chapters, but we can
learn problem solution, problem solution by reading these books.
And it's so enjoyable to be able to learn a lot about how we can
improve our life. Would you look with me please
that James the 1st chapter, you sit here on the board.
James one verse 15, the brother of our Lord said these words.
Look here then. When lust has conceived, it
bringeth forth sin. Sin.
When it is finished, it bringeth forth death.
This is very, very important. You're seeing the consequence of
sin. When sin is complete, it
bringeth forth death. I want everybody here to
inventory your life and to do the things that are right and
pleasing in your life, and nothing will hinder you from
going to heaven. But if today you turn loose of
your life and you just go do what you want to do, you talk
like you want to talk. You want to act like you want to
act, you don't want to do what God said.
Let me tell you what that can cause us to lose our soul
eternally, forever more everlasting punishment.
We don't want that. We don't want that.
Oh, we can give the whole lesson about what it means to die in
sin, But understand this thief, he died in sin from anything we
find biblically recorded. The thief died in sin, and he
died as a Sinner before he died as a Sinner.
We die separated from God because we were servants of sin,
and sin brought forth death. Listen, Fred, there's no picnic
there. So I want, here's what I want
from you. I want you to make a commitment
to the Lord that you will always live a life that will please
Him. You lift up his name.
You'll be more than happy to tell people in your neighborhood
and your working, the school and everywhere you go.
You'd be glad to share the good news with them about the
goodness of God. Well, this thief right here, I
don't want to have your name on this list.
I certainly don't want my name on it.
One who's dying in sin. I made you briefly the other day
in one of our lessons that one of the challenges in the preach
men of preachers is preaching the life of someone that you
really fear for their eternal soul.
You fear for it. And you, you want to say some
things to encourage the family, but you don't want to mislead
them thing. Well, this guy right here, boy,
he's got it made when he don't have it made.
Not if he's an atheist, an agnostic or an infidel or such
like. No, you know God will be the
judge and that one of the most beautiful things about First
Corinthians 5 and 13. God said I'm going to take care
of those without you. Just take care of those within.
See, we work together to take care of those within you help
me, I'll help you. We work together and that's what
the beauty part about it. You know what I've loved about
this meeting and believe me, this doesn't happen everywhere.
I have loved the fact that whenever we've assembled
together, you know, people are speaking kindly and thoughtful
and polite of one another and commended.
This brother does this, this sister does that, and they work
so very hard. That is wonderful to have.
The brothers have brothers and sisters who are working together
diligently to make the work go stronger and better for the
church. You know, it's fine for women to
work. You know, Romans 16 verse one,
the Bible says feed you with a servant of the church.
And there's a place where Bible talks about different men who
had a lot of worship in their home and their their families
were husband and wife who did that.
It's great to have camaraderie with the brothers and the
sisters working together for the common good of the congregation.
OK, now let's look at another gentleman.
This time we're looking at the gentleman on your right.
Generally, people on the right are right with God.
We want that. Now, right off the bat, the man
on the right, who we don't know his name, but this man on the
right wasn't doing what was right.
Now early on you remember we referenced the fact that he
reviled against Jesus just like the one on the left reviled
against Jesus. But let me tell you what
happened here. Now we'll be noticing every one
of these from Romans, the 6th chapter, until we get the very
last one. And it's a Hebrew passage, but
all the first several from Romans, the 6th chapter.
And this gentleman right here, unlike this gentleman, the first
things that we have a record of, he died in sin.
This gentleman right here died to sin.
How do you die to sin? You die to sin by giving up sin
out of your life. You lie.
You quit lying. You steal.
You quit stealing. You're immoral.
You quit being immoral. You do.
You quit doing all these things. You know, I've recently, two
years ago, I finished researching all of the specific
sins mentioned in the New Testament, well over 100 of
them. And then I used them in
meetings, on several meetings throughout last year of 2023.
And people really enjoyed it because some of the words,
they're not our normal English words and we don't have clues
what they even talk about. So we do one or two or three
things. We maybe go to Bible dictionary
and look up the word or even a little bit quicker than that,
you go to a modern day translation and you look up and
see how they worded that word or phrase and see how they worded
it. And you can probably learn quite
a bit from there. Or you can simply go to a a word
study encyclopedia and learn more about the word and learn
where it came from. Well, this is what happened
here. It was such a great joy to go
through that because as you read through, you know, there are
several lists in the Bible, you know, like works of the flesh
and fruit of the Spirit. One of those, the good ones bad,
of course, but there's several lists in the Bible and what me
and you need to do, we need to make sure that none of that goes
into our life. Well, this gentleman here, I
don't know what all he did. He was a thief, but we don't
know what all he did. But we do know one thing, before
he died, he died to sin and we died to sin, and I'm getting sin
out of my life. So I'm going to encourage all of
you. You've made a commitment to the
Lord. And when you make a commitment
to the Lord, you get with the program and you get rid of sin
out of your life. Husband and wife get rid of sin
out of your life. You commit yourself to each
other. You know, many weddings that
we've officiated out, you know, and we do I require before I
would do a wedding. They have pre marriage
counseling. I don't have to do it.
I don't mind doing it, but I don't have to be the one that
does. They can do it for somebody
else, but I want them to have it because pre marriage counseling
is so imperative, because you 0 right in on the strength and the
weaknesses of your relationship. Very, very important and what we
want to do as Christian people, we want to do everything in our
power and our might to be successful of the husband of the
wife, of the son, of the daughter, as the child of God,
son or daughter of God Almighty. We will do everything we can to
be right with the Lord. With this thief right here, he
started out not on too good of a term, but he ended up doing
quite well and from every indication, we learned he was
saved and I'll share that with you here in a few moments.
I want to turn with you to Romans the 6th chapter.
These are not hard. Romans 6th one through 23 the
whole chapter. I'm not going to read the whole
chapter, but this whole chapter of Romans 6 is 23 verses.
It ended up talking about the wages of sin is death.
But this is really important. We're going to read in Romans 6
and one, make a brief comment, Romans 6:00 and 2:00, and then
you put those two together and we'll read Romans 6 and 12, all
of this, and we go together and it can work out quite well.
So let's turn over to Romans 6th chapter and see what we can
learn. Romans 6 is a powerful chapter.
It's one that really helps us get our strength and our
stability things right with the Lord.
The Robinson says chapter maybe look at verse one.
What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? On Paul's error, he's asking a
question, redundant as it is. He said, are you going to
continue to live in sin? That grace may abound.
So you said what? I'm saved by grace, therefore
it's OK if I sin wrong. It's not OK if you sin.
Just because Jesus lived that perfect life and Jesus died at
Calvary doesn't mean you can go out there and say, think and do
anything you want to do because you cannot.
Oh, look at verse 2, the tithes Titan never verse one.
The Bible says God forbid. In other words, shall we
continue to sin that grace left bound, God forbid.
How should we that are dead to sin live any longer?
They're in, you know, if you're dead to sin.
What that means is I am not living in sin anymore.
I am not getting away. This is very, very important and
it's very essential that we make right decisions.
We make right decisions now. Listen, this is time you come
overnight. This is not going to be
something that that you would always be able to do I
Christian, I want you to be right and ready to meet your
Maker in order to do that. And you have sin in your life
like this gentleman had sin in his life.
He should have got right with the Lord just as quick as this
gentleman got right with the Lord.
But the difference is this gentleman owed up to his sin.
This thief on the cross. We never have any Bible record
where he owned up to it. This thief right here, you know
what he said to Jesus? He says, Lord, Remember Me when
you come back into your Kingdom. That is powerful.
This thief here, get him forgiveness of his sin.
He says, Lord, Remember Me. Number one, He recognized Jesus
as Lord. He recognized the teaching of
Jesus about paradise. Lord, Remember Me when you come
back into your Kingdom. He remember what the Lord said
about the Kingdom. It was so wonderful to see
people who are ready to die and ready to meet their Savior.
My dear friends, today, one of the greatest, grandest, most
glorious event that can ever happen in your life is that
before you die, you're right. And you're ready to meet your
Maker. Oh, you know what people say,
don't you? Oh, yeah.
Well, don't worry, Alan. I will, man.
Right before I die, I get it right with the Lord.
Well, when are you going to die? When?
I don't know exactly when I'm going to die, but before I do,
I'm going to ride with the Lord. How you going to know?
If you don't know when you're going to die, you don't know
when you're going to die. The reason today you want to
devote and dedicate your life to the Lord, let nothing, whatever
interfere, is because you don't know #1 when the Lord is going
to come back. Just mentioned in prayer this
morning, The Lord can come right back during our lifetime.
We don't know when He's going to come back, but when He comes
back, we better be right or we can lose our eternal life.
That's huge. I just want everybody to be
committed and absolutely solely committed that I'm going to stay
right with the Lord. And when I mess up, I'm going to
fess up and I'm going to make things right.
Well, that's exactly what's happened right here.
This man realized he had done wrong.
He he finally come to the point he recognized Jesus as Lord.
And look with me at Romans 6 and verse 12.
What we find right here in this passage.
It's really amazing. He says #1 this is great.
Let not sin. Let not sin therefore reign.
And your mortar body that you should have been in the lust of,
don't let sin stay in your body. Now you can play it down, you
say. You know what?
Guess what? You know Big Bill.
I know. Yeah, I lied.
But, you know, everybody lied. Yeah, I know.
You know, I dress him more. You know, everybody dresses them
more along the way, you know? Yes, I know.
I did this and I did that, and I acted this way.
I quit making excuses. When you sin, you sin and you
own up your sin. I had the baptized believer over
and over and over again. The Bible says confess your
sins, confess your fault, confess, confess and confess.
You know why? Because you've got to take
ownership of your sin and get rid of it.
You've got to get rid of your sin.
You can do this in order to go to heaven.
So therefore, if you've never been baptized, you need to see
just how quick you can get that done because you're baptized,
you're making a lifelong commitment.
You know when you stand for a preacher or someone who's
officiating your wedding and they ask you, do you take him a
hurt? But your lawful wedding, husband
or wife, whatever your situation is, if you're the man or if
you're the woman, and you know what, the more we talk about it
and do you keep yourself to him or her as long as you both shall
live. You know, we're making a
commitment. You know what we're making?
We're making a vow. And Ecclesiastes, the 3rd
chapter, it said you're better off to never make a vow than to
make one and break it. Whoa, that sounds pretty hefty.
You never, ever make a vow and break it.
You make a vow to the Almighty God.
I will keep myself to Him or her all the days of my life.
She, they will be my spouse from now on, and I will be there for
them. That is what is beautiful and
wonderful, and that's what we need to do.
That's the kind of commitment we make to the Lord and even
greater because the Lord's commitment takes us all to
eternity. Well, you know what?
There's another passage in Romans 6 I want you to look at,
and that's verses 18 through 22. Listen, sometime, whenever you
feel like, you know, maybe I don't have my grip together on
my spirituality, grab a hold of Romans the 6th chapter and read
it. It will help you get us back in
line. Verse 18, Romans the 6th
chapter. Please notice here the Bible
says being been made free from sin, you become servants of
righteousness. Wow, things are changing.
Earlier we read it becoming you're a servants of sin.
If you live in sin, you're a servant of sin.
And now here we're learning that you've become servants of
righteousness. Guess what?
You've got a choice. You've got a choice to make
right and wrong, good and evil, heaven and hell.
It's your choice. Which one are you choosing?
Are you choosing to make those right decisions and live the
right life? I pray God that you are this is
so beautiful and so wonderful. Go with me to Hebrews.
Don't one pass them really talks about is Hebrew 12 and verse one
Hebrew 12 and one should automatically set off with a
remembrance in your head because Hebrew 12/1 is right after
Hebrew 11. All of those by faith.
These men and these women did great works and they were, they
were illustrated in this way by faith, Abraham, by faith Isaac,
by faith. Sarah, my dear friend, I hope
and pray that we live that kind of life.
And then finally, when the Hebrew 11 is completed, the very
next verse, which happened to be the next chapter, Hebrew 12
verse one, it says Wherefore sin.
We also are compassed about with such a great cloud of witnesses.
You know what those witnesses are those witnesses, those
people that lived in Hebrew 11 by faith, Abraham and Isaac and
on and on and goes those who were witnesses and we're
compassed about. We're so great a cloud of
witnesses. Let me tell you how to live a
faithful Christian life. I want you to remember the fact
that they're a great cloud of witnesses pulling for you.
Just imagine yourself in a stadium witnessing a ball game
and there are thousands upon thousands of people there and
everybody rooted for this particular team to win.
Well, think about that in the way of living your Christian
life. Here you are.
You're living your Christian life out here on the field.
You're up and down the field, back and forth, back and forth,
and all these hundreds of thousands of people said, come
on, come on, you can make it. You can make it just like a
football. Somebody's running carried out
football and they've done cutting loose and they're
heading down the field. We're saying go, go, go, go.
Well, that's what people are doing for you in Hebrew 12/1.
They're so compassed about with so great of cloud of witnesses.
You got people working for you, God's working for you.
Christ is working for you. The oldest spirit is working for
you. The angels are working for you.
Your brothers and sisters in Christ working for you.
Those have already gone on before.
They're pulling for you. My dear friends, guess what?
Are you pulling for yourself? Are you really hanging on and
doing the right thing? This is what is so very
important. Oh, what we have learned
already. If we die and sin, the end
result is not good. It's not good.
If we have sinned and we all have sinned and come short, then
we have these sort of situations and we put these verses and
many, many more that we can talk about into our life.
But now here is the remainder. Here is the beauty, the man in
the middle, your Lord and your Savior, Jesus Christ.
Dear friend, I want to be very pointed, very honest with you,
but I don't want you to speak up.
But I want, I want you to think in your own mind, when is the
last time that I've told anybody about Jesus?
When I told him how great he was or how great he is?
I tell him how he's the Son of God and how we can pray every
prayer we pray, we pray in the name of the Lord Jesus.
Isn't it wonderful today to be a Christian man or woman who that
when you pray, you pray your heavenly Father in the name of
Jesus Christ? And we learned last night and
the Holy Spirit intercedes through your prayers.
Wow, the devil doesn't stand a chance.
I love him. The only thing I want to see
with the devil, I love it. I love to see his backside teeth
running away, just like he did with Jesus in Matthew 4.
The Bible says then the devil leaveth him.
He ran away. The angels came in ministering
unto Jesus. I just want you to be so ready
that whenever, whenever your life ends, you know, before I
left Dallas. And I flew out here.
They called it a three hour and 8 minute flight, so somewhere in
that ballpark I would assume. And then by the time I got out,
I turned my phone off like they asked us to.
And then I turned my phone on. When I landed, we landed.
They said you're welcome, turn your phone back on and turn it
on. And the very first message is my
first cousin had passed away. He died in the last three hours.
And then I was up in the sky flying from Dallas, TX to here.
But he died. He was the preacher of the
gospel of a southern, a regional type preacher, you know,
Tennessee and Alabama and Georgia, occasionally
Mississippi. But he's been doing that for
many, many years. And he's helped a lot of souls
be saved. He didn't baptize somebody last
Sunday. Or he was out helping.
One of the sisters who needed her yard mowed, He was out
mowing her yard. He was 78 years old and he was
out taking care of her, helping her.
My dear friend, I just want you to put a premium on your life
and a premium on your eternal soul.
You don't know when it's going to all be over.
We don't know that you're not. Paul described it in First
Corinthians 15. Paul described it this way.
I'm watching you blink your. Eyes, the Bible said, in the
twinkling of an eye. In a twinkling of an.
Eye. That's how quick.
Wow, that's pretty impressive. The main thing is it's not when
it's going to be. It's not how quick it's going to
be. Is that my ready?
That's what matters. And when you take a good hard
look here and Matthew 1 and 21, this is Speaking of Mary, the
mother of Jesus. And what we learn.
Right here is Mary, the mother of Jesus.
The Bible said that she shall bring forth the Son and I should
call his name Jesus preacher save his people from their sins.
Dear friends, I praise in the Lord worthy Jesus is going to
save us from our sin. Let me tell you what you commit
a sin, you can get forgiveness of it, but you got to be willing
to do it. You've got.
To be willing to. Say I am wrong.
You've got to be like the prodigal son of Luke 15, he
said. Here's what I'm going to do.
This is after years he lived his life for wicked.
I'm going to return home. I'm going to go to my father and
I'm going to say Father, I've sinned.
You know, that's really not. Hard to say.
I I have sinned. That's not hard to say.
Oh, it may kind of rub your grain the wrong way.
You may want to figure out a way out of.
But let me tell you what, it's a whole lot easier to say that
than to hear. Depart from me.
I know you, not depart from me. I've never known you.
I don't want to hear those words.
None of them. Looking to know how.
No surgery. I don't, and I don't want it for
you. Jesus is here to save us.
Matthew 1 and 21 and John 129. Oh this is such a beautiful
passage. The Bible said with John, He saw
Jesus come and he said, Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh
away the sin of the world. Wow, what an impressive time
that had been been. I love, that's what I loved
about studying the chronological study of the life of Christ.
And you go through it and you see these little events that are
really big events, but you've read through it so many other
times, but now you're looking at it and you're putting your feet
into their sandals and you got your ears out into the words of
Jesus and you're listening and you want to do what the Lord
said to do. You want to hold back from what
he said, to hold back from. You want to serve Him in a way,
and you want to go out and tell everybody about it.
This is the Lamb of God. He takes away the sin of the
world. Oh, look here with me.
Please. Look at Hebrew 9 and 26.
In Hebrew the 9th chapter and verse 26, here's what the word
of God says. Oh.
This is so neat. I I just really love reading in
Hebrew because this is a book that he's written to keep people
steadfast and unmovable and all week about in the work of the
Lord just like to talk about in Corinthian Hebrew 9 and 26 for
then listen here for then must be often have suffered since the
foundation of the world, but now once in the end of the world
have he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
Look at those last three words. He's sacrificed of himself,
Jesus willingly sacrifice. You know, there's a song we used
to sing in I, I don't really remember the last time we sung
this song, but he could have called for 10,000 angels to
rescue them. Oh, that is so cool, Jesus.
All he would have to do is his little finger and those angels
would have come down and they would have left the little crazy
spot where those people were the crucified, the Lord of glory.
I love that song. I remember we sung that back
when I was just a kid. But it it just, it kind of
brought a real genuine feel in my heart because Jesus could
have come off of that cross. He could have come.
Off of there and but had he did that there's no way you could
have been saved me no way I could have been.
But Jesus did that Hebrew 926 shows us Jesus did.
He stayed right there. He stayed there because he
wanted you saved. He wanted you to go to heaven.
Now the ball is going to be left in your court here in just about
5 minutes. It's going to be left in your
court because you've got to make the decision.
I'm going to be, I'm going to live the right life.
I'm sorry that I messed up, but I will live the right life.
I will prayer for me because I'm a baptized believer.
Whatever the case may be, it's very, very important that we do
this. OK, now we look at first John
one verse 7 and then first John 3 and verse 5.
You know the first John one verse 70.
This verse is so encouraging. It is just so.
Rewarding. Look at what it says.
But if we. Walk in the light as He is the
light. We have fellowship one with
another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from
all sin. Grace, I want you now, if you
don't mind those who who are so disposed, open up your Bible,
the first John 1. I want to show you something
because this is really neat. This will be a source of
strength and encouragement to you.
I promise you. One thing is a source of
encouragement to me. I love to share it with other
people in the home study. I'd love to share it with people
that have struggled and living a Christian life.
So wait a minute, hang tight, hang tight.
Let's take a look at first Sean One.
I'm going to focus the. Attention of verses 6 through
10. Just a very brief reference, but
listen, this is beautiful. Now please would you look at
verse 6. Please not word if 2 letters I
if, if all right, look at verse 7, but if second word, OK, but
if all right, look at verse 8. If first word if look at verse 9
if look at verse 10 if and what is this going to mean to me and
you? It's going to show your
forgiveness of sin given to you by God is conditional on you
doing the right thing. If you confess.
Your thoughts one to another, if you confess your sins, that's
what all this teaches. These are all conditional bases.
Now there's a couple of points I don't want you to miss, but the
fact of the matter is if we commit sin and we don't confess
our sins, we're going to die in our sins.
Now you got a choice. You don't want to do that.
But here's another very beautiful part.
And you take a good hard look here at this because the Bible
teaches. That he his he will cleanse us
from all and righteous and this cleansing is a continuous
action. You continue to confess, he will
continue to to forgive. But when you get stubborn or
absolutely. In a way for.
I am not going to make this right.
Listen, that is a bad choice. I love for shine.
One, I love verse 6 and 10 because this shows me if I do my
part, God will do his part and our part, your part and my part.
We've got to admit sin. We've got to yield his
unchanging hand. We've got to stay following Him.
And if we confess our sin, the Bible says He is faithful.
He is just to forgive us. But notice those condition
terms, It's not that you're going to have it whether you
repent or not because that's not right.
You've got to show ownership of your sins.
I have sinned. You remember the product sent a
minute ago. I have sinned.
Even David and old Odin, he did some what you may cause on big
sin. You know, he had a man killed.
He committed a daughter with the wife.
He had all kind of issues, but guess what he said?
But he made it right. He became the friend of God,
good friend today, let me assure you, one thing, you want to be
the friend of God, you want to do the right thing.
Just stay dedicated to Him. And then looking first, John
3:00 and 5:00, because in this particular passage, it drives
the nail home. Bible says.
And you know that He would manifest and take away our sins.
And in him. There's no sin, O Christians, I
ask of you. At this point of our.
Service, I want you to examine yourself, whether you be in the
faith. I want you to prove yourself.
I want you to know yourself, except you'll be able to
reprobate. That is second Corinthians 13
verse five. And then I want you to be saved.
But it's way more important than whatever Alan wants.
I want you to want to be saved. God wants you saved.
What are you going to do about it?
Now here's the situation. Bottom line, you can die in sin,
you can die to sin, but the Savior died for sin, so you can
go to heaven. So therefore, my friends, you
got to make the choice and it's your choice and you can do this,
you can do the right thing. It's just a matter are you
willing to? It concerns me when people just
hang on to it. I go to places on somewhat of a
regular basis and, and I know brothers and sisters who have
managed to get out of the Lord, but sometimes they'll come.
Maybe we're friends or I go see them and they'll end up coming,
Not every time, but sometimes. Then I know of congregation
where they've got two or three young people that have never
obeyed the gospel and some who are older men never obey the
gospel. Listen, this concerns me.
You're saying no to God. You're not saying no to me.
You're saying no to. God, God gave his only begotten
Son, but whosoever believed with him should not perish by him
every night and life. Don't you say no to God.
God is going to win this battle. Understand that we just ask you
at this time if you're right and and ready to meet your maker,
God bless you, but if you're not right, let's get right now.
Kind of.