During the Sermon, Part 1

Introduction: The Duty to Take Heed How You Hear

0:03 The following sermon was preached on Sunday morning, June 4th, 1995, at the Trinity Baptist Church of Montville, New Jersey. What a privilege to worship the one true and living God who is the mysterious one in three, and three in one. Let us now hear the word of this God as it is found in the Gospel of Luke, Luke chapter 8, and as we have done for several Lord's Day mornings, I shall read in your hearing just verse 18, the text that has formed the basis and the framework of our present studies.

0:48 The Lord Jesus in this particular chapter is recorded as having spoken and then interpreted the parable of the sower and the soils, having given that interpretation while, alone and in the immediate presence of his disciples, and speaking to them, he says in the words of verse 18, Take heed, therefore, how you hear, for whosoever has, to him shall be given, and whosoever has not, from him shall be taken away, even that which he thinks or thinks.

1:32 And here, people of God, and unconverted men and women sitting here this morning, that awesome principle will be operative in this place this morning. Those of you who have, to you more will be given, and to you who have not, that which you seem or think you possess shall be taken away. In the light of that sobering reality, let us pray and ask God for the help of his Spirit, and that we may be found among those who receive yet more from his gracious hand.

2:16 Our Father, how we thank you for the privilege that has been ours in this hour of worship to pour out our hearts in the singing of psalms and of hymns and spiritual songs. We thank you for the privilege of addressing, addressing you upon a throne of grace, in the confidence that he who died and rose now appears before your very face for us. And therefore we are bold to come again in his name, and to ask that you would look upon your Son, to whom you have given a place of supreme exaltation,

3:00 and you have crowned him with great honor and given to him the Spirit without measure, that he might pour down upon the church that Spirit, and in so doing give to your people all that they need in order to know and to do your holy will. We therefore pray that that measure of the Spirit which we need in this hour to understand and handle your word aright, O God, may that measure be given as we look to you, in faith and in expectation through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

God's Displeasure with Dull Worship and Dull Hearing

3:43 Now the scriptures of both the Old and the New Testaments clearly assert that the God of the Bible is often displeased with some of the most sacred activities engaged in by people who claim to be worshipping this God. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:09 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:09 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:10 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:10 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:10 Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen.

4:11 Amen. Amen. Amen. Chapter 1 records God's abhorrence at the abundance of sacrifices offered to him by his professing people.

4:21 That same chapter records God's disgust at multiplied solemn feasts and his rejection of a plethora of prayers offered to him. In Matthew chapter 15 we have the record of the stinging words of the Lord Jesus concerning those whose worship of God is regarded as nothing other than vanity. Now among the many sacred activities which greatly displease God, surely dull, lifeless,

4:58 insipid preaching must rank at or near the top of the list when a man presenting himself as a messenger of God. Speak forth. Speak forth. of God in a dry, sapless, lifeless monotone, exuding no real felt spiritual energy of conviction, of passion and earnestness, surely this is nothing less than inexcusable and wicked dulling

5:35 of the edge of the sword of the Spirit, while giving all necessary allowance for diversity of temperament, physical action and mannerisms, style of delivery and volume of voice, I say while giving all due allowance to those elements of divinely ordained and divinely superintended elements of diversity. Whatever preaching and demonstration of the Spirit and of power entails, it will never be justly charged as being dull.

6:18 It will not and it cannot be justly charged as dull preaching. Therefore it is right that you should pray as Pastor Jeff has prayed, that those of us who preach to you. It will be filled with the Spirit and therefore have it rightly said of us, as was said of John the Baptist, he was a burning and a shining light. There was the shining forth of truth.

6:53 There was the burning of heat and of passion. It was not merely a burning, but a shining light, not merely a shining, but a burning light. However, and here is the flip side of the issue, the most earnest, lively, vivid, passionate, Spirit-anointed preaching will do little or no good if it is delivered to an assembly of dull hearers.

7:27 And as surely as dull preaching is an abomination unto God, so is dull hearing. And it was precisely that issue which the writer to the Hebrews had to address when in the fifth chapter he indicates that he has many things he desires to say concerning Melchizedek as a type of Christ and Christ as the fulfillment of that type. But he says, I cannot do it because you have become dull or sluggish of hearing or sluggish in your ears.

8:09 One commentator has stated the case most accurately when he said, the difficulty lies not with what the Old Testament says about Melchizedek, not with the writer who knows what is said, but with the hearers and their sluggish ears. The sending station was in order, but the receiving radio set was out of order. You see the imagery. No matter how powerful it is.

8:40 Powerful and clear is the signal going out from the radio tower. If there are blown circuits or tubes in your receiver, there will be no reception of the message. And while I have begun by underscoring the fact that dull preaching can never be equated with preaching and demonstration of the spirit and of power is to be abominated, and we are to pray that none of this is to be done. It is to be done.

9:09 It is to be done. It is to be done. It is to be done. It is to be done.

9:10 It is to be done. It is to be done. It is to be done. It is to be done.

9:10 It is to be done. If none who preach to us will ever be justly charged with dull preaching, you as a people must face the fact that there is a biblical doctrine of dull hearing, which is equally abominable in the sight of God. In recalling the parable of the sower in the soils, we must never forget that in this parable the emphasis of our Lord falls upon this great principle that it was the state of the soul of the soil, that is, the condition of the hearers that determined the fate of the seed. It was not the manner in which the sower sowed the seed that determined the fate of the seed.

9:54 It was the state of the soil that determined the fate of the seed.

Recap: Prior Preparations for Hearing the Word

10:02 And it is in the light of these realities that our Lord Jesus gives the command here in Luke 8 and verse 18. Take heed, therefore, how you hear. And in our initial study in opening up this text, we established that it was the duty of every hearer of the Word of God, consciously and constantly, to pay attention to the manner in which he hears the preaching of the Word. Our Lord uses a present imperative.

10:40 Keep on constantly paying close attention to the manner in which you hear. This is a duty, a solemn duty, a constant, unrelenting duty that is incumbent upon all who are privileged to hear the saving, life-giving Word of the living God. Having established from the text our duty, I then proceeded to answer, exemplify the specific way in which we are to perform this duty, focusing in two messages

11:16 upon the category identified as this duty as it relates to our activity prior to hearing the Word of God. And I exhorted you to do four things. First, consciously to cultivate a fresh awareness that you will be confronted with the very words of the Lord. And secondly, to cultivate a fresh awareness of the living God under the preaching of the Word.

11:44 That though God is using human vessels called vessels of clay, and though if they are sane and biblical, they claim no inspiration such as was given to prophets and to apostles, nonetheless, when they open up and expound and apply the scriptures, they are instruments bringing you the Word of the living God. And you and I must consciously cultivate this fresh awareness each returning Lord's Day and every circumstance in which we anticipate going to a place where the Word is to be preached.

12:25 I will be confronting the God who spoke worlds into being out of nothing. I will be hearing the Word of Him who when He spoke, it was so. I will be hearing the Word of Him. I will be hearing the Word of Him who will speak again when at the coming of His Son He shakes all the created order.

12:47 And this realization will put us in the frame described in Isaiah 66 in verse 2, where God says, To this man will I look, even to him who is of poor and contrite spirit, and who trembles at my word. That phrase, trembles at my word, in verse 5 of the same chapter. Is synonymous with the remnant who are the true people of God in Israel. It is a distinguishing mark of the Israel within Israel.

13:22 They are called those who tremble at my word. Not those who sit in the laid back, half asleep, lazy disposition, irreverent spirit of heart with no sense of awe and wonder that the God of heaven would speak to me. Even to me, through His word. We must cultivate, consciously cultivate that fresh awareness.

13:51 Secondly, we must consciously repudiate all that would hinder the joyful reception and effective assimilation of the word that will be preached. And here we expounded the clear directions of 1 Peter 2.1 and James 1.21a.

14:10 And the structure as we saw it. On the original is clear. There can be no longing for the sincere milk of the word. There can be no receiving of the word with meekness in the language of James.

14:23 Unless there is in the language of Peter a putting off of all. And then he names specific categories of sin that must be put off by thorough biblical repentance. Putting away therefore all wickedness. And all guile, duplicity, all hypocrisy, all mask wearing, and envies, and all evil speakings as newborn babes long for.

14:56 There must be a repudiation of anything and everything that would hinder the joyful reception and effective assimilation of the word. And James' language is similar. There must for good nourishment be. Not only wholesome food, but a healthy digestive system.

15:17 And I repeat in very blunt language, you cannot come into this place with your spiritual gut of any form of wickedness, uncleanness, evil speaking, envies, guile, duplicity, and deception. A smiling face with a bitter and a rancorous heart. And prophet. From the word of God.

15:44 You can't do that. You cannot. I cannot. No amount of spirit anointed preaching will secure the kind of purging that can only be affected by personal, individual, honest, sincere repentance of our own individual, personal, harsh sins.

16:12 Thirdly. I exhorted you consciously. Cultivate a meek and an eager disposition of heart in anticipation of the preaching of the word. To cultivate a meek and eager disposition.

16:28 And there we went back to the same two passages in James 121. Receive with or literally in meekness the engrafted word. The only context in which the word can be received is a context of meekness. The fight and the strut.

16:47 And the objections are gone out of us. We come to the word not to dispute it. Not to argue with it. Not to carve at it.

16:56 Or the instrument that brings it. We come with a disposition of meekness. Readiness to be molded. To be instructed.

17:07 To be humbled. To be encouraged. To be guided. The spirit of meekness must be present if there is to be true reception of the word.

17:16 And according to 1 Peter 2, there must be a longing for that word which is, I'm sorry, that milk which is described by those two adjectives. It is that logikon milk. It is that milk which has to do either with reason or spiritual or the word. And it is without guile milk.

17:40 There's nothing in this book that is marked by guile. What God says he means. What he means. He says.

17:48 God is not tricking us with guile. And we must long for that particular distinctive milk of the word. We are to long for it. And the imagery of that passage is that of the longing of the newborn babe.

18:06 The nursing babe. The suckling babe for its mother's breast when it is hungry. And we must cultivate that longing for the scripture says to the hungry soul. Every bitter thing is sweet.

18:19 But it's the full soul that loathes and despises even the honeycomb.

18:26 And then fourthly, we are to cultivate a disposition of dependence upon the Holy Spirit and his ministry. As we anticipate the preaching of the word. 1 John 2.27 indicates that he is the anointing who teaches us.

18:44 He is Christ's other presence with us. Doing for us. That's what Christ did for his disciples. When it is recorded in Luke 24.45.

18:55 Then opened he their understanding that they might understand the scriptures. We concluded by considering Jeremiah 17.5-9. Where God pronounces a curse upon those who trust in man and make flesh their arm.

19:11 Now those were the four words of exhortation I gave to you based on these various texts. And then you. Those who are here will remember I tried to urge you. It said it may sound silly to some of you to take one minute every Lord's Day morning.

Self-Examination: Are You a Hearer or a Doer?

19:27 To pray over each one of those four things. Just four minutes in preparation. Now I want to ask you a simple question. Did you do it this morning?

19:42 Did you make some effort to prepare yourself according to the directives expounded from the word of God?

19:51 Don't answer audibly but answer as honestly in the theater of your conscience. Right now. As God will make you answer honestly in the day of judgment concerning anything he addresses. Did you do what you've heard over the last three weeks?

20:08 If not.

20:11 I want you to hear the description God gives of you.

20:17 If anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer. He is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a mirror. He beholds himself goes away and straightway forgets what manner of man he was. But he looking into the.

20:32 The perfect law and continuing not being a hearer that forgets but a doer that works. This man shall be blessed in his doing.

20:42 If you have not implemented you are what James calls a hearer and not a doer. And in that category God says you are self deluded. Be doers and not hearers only deluding your own selves. I ask you before almighty.

21:05 God have you implemented what you heard. If I were really bold. I would put you all under oath and ask you to raise your hands if you did. And if the majority of hands did not go up you know what I'd be tempted to do.

21:23 I don't have the notes with me but from memory we preach the four points. And keep preaching them in this place Sunday by Sunday. Until the majority of you could raise your hands and say. Be fortuitous or a form.

21:41 Or. Just to say thanks I believe the words of Jesus. That I must take heed how. And I've gone over those texts in first Peter and in James and Isaiah 66 and Luke 24.

21:59 And I'm convinced that those things we were exhorted to do are biblical. And by the grace of God I'm doing. That's what I probably ought to do.

22:12 But I probably lack the moral courage to do it. So I'm not going to do it. But I perhaps ought to.

22:21 Whether it's apocryphal or not I don't know. I heard of a certain preacher who preached the same sermon. One Sunday. The next Sunday.

22:30 And after about four or five times his people began to complain. And he says when I have evidence to believe you've put into practice what I'm preaching. Then I'll preach something else. Dear people nothing could be more hardening to your heart.

22:44 Than to consider this subject that we're dealing with. And to be an idle hearer. And not a doer. Because we are not gazing upon objective lofty spine tiggling breath taking doctrine in abstraction.

23:00 We're dealing with a person that Christ lays upon every hearer of his word to take heed. How you hear. Having considered that duty as it relates prior to the hearing of the word. We begin to address this morning.

Sobering Fact: Indwelling Sin and the Devil are Active During Preaching

23:19 The issue of the second category of taking heed. How we hear. And that has to do with taking heed. How we hear.

23:27 During the preaching. Of the word. So we move from prior to. To during the preaching of the word.

23:37 And as I address this category. I shall do so under two headings. We'll begin to take up the first this morning. And the first heading is a sobering fact to be faced.

23:49 While hearing the word of God. And then secondly specific directives to be implemented. While hearing the word of God. We begin with a sobering fact to be faced.

24:05 While hearing the word of God. A sobering fact to be faced while hearing the word of God. Now I say a sobering fact because facts are stubborn things. They are the immovable realities.

24:21 Of God's. World as he created it. By his sovereign power and governs it. In all of its details by his most holy wise and powerful.

24:35 Providence. Even the dictionary definition of a fact underscores this truth. A fact is defined as a thing that has actually happened or that is really true. A thing that has been or is.

24:51 The state of things. As they are actually in truth act as opposed to fancy you see facts are such stubborn things that ignoring them won't remove them denying them won't destroy them and wishful thinking won't vaporize them they stand there like the Matterhorn you can wave your hand and say abracadabra be thou gone Matterhorn and the greatest sleight of hand artist and illusionist in our day. Can't hold up a cloak and wave it and make the Matterhorn go away.

25:29 Facts are stubborn realities that are part of the world that God made and governs and I say there is a sobering fact to be faced while hearing the word of God without which we will not truly obey the mandate of our Lord to take heed how we hear and what is that fact. It is this. The insidious. Insidious and soul destructive influence of our remaining sin and of the devil himself are neither suspended nor negated while hearing the word of God.

26:13 Now that is the sobering fact to be faced the insidious and soul destructive influences of our. Remaining sin. And of the devil himself are neither suspended nor negated while hearing the word of God. And so there you go again Pastor using big words insidious what's that mean well it means that which is characterized by treachery by slyness by craftiness operating in a hidden manner.

26:51 More dangerous than it appears to be. And that's why I chose the word of God. That's why I chose the word of God. Because I didn't want to clog up the fact with all those other synonyms and explanations.

27:04 There is an insidious influence of remaining sin in the devil himself which are neither suspended or negated under the preaching of the word of God. An influence marked by treachery slyness craftiness dangerous because more hidden than meets the first sight. By suspended I mean held back. When they suspend a ball game in the seventh inning they stop it where it was if you've got men on second and third two outs and the count is three and two.

27:39 When they resume the game you've got men on second and third the two outs the count is three and two. The man at the plate you pick up right where you're left off. Well I don't think there's any Christian in this place who has any notion that prior to coming here. The activity of indwelling sin and of the devil.

27:55 Is a very real and present spiritual experience. We're very conscious of that on the Lord's Day morning. When remaining sin and the devil are peculiarly active to unstring and unhinge the soul that is seeking to prepare itself for worship. It's just at that point when you're giving the last tug on your shoestring that it breaks Sunday morning.

28:21 No other morning but Sunday morning. And you don't have a backup set of shoestrings. And then you're flustered and running around. To find an alternate pair of shoes and they don't match the suit and then you've got to change your suit and then you've got to change the tie.

28:33 All that for one stinking little shoestring. And Sunday morning is when it happens. Getting all ready and one of the kids something happens and lo and behold he barks all over his Sunday suit. All the little niggling things that come in.

28:49 There is peculiar activity of the enemy and of our own remaining sin but I fear many of us have the notion that somehow. When we step with the devil. When we step within those doors and sit in these pews. The presence and activity of indwelling sin remaining sin and of the devil are not somehow blown into another universe but they're just suspended till we walk out.

29:17 And then we pick up right where we left off at the bottom half of the seventh inning the two men on base in the count three and two. No that activity is not suspended nor is it negated. It's cancelled out of existence and this sobering fact must be one that we reckon with if we are rightly to take heed how we hear the preaching of the word of God. The fact that the insidious and soul destructive influence of our remaining sin and of the devil himself are neither suspended nor negated while hearing the word of God.

Biblical Proof 1: The Conflict of Flesh and Spirit (Galatians 5)

29:59 Now in opening up this sobering fact let me give the basic biblical proof for this fact and then in subsequent messages we'll deal with further proof and then with basic biblical directives in the light of this fact. But this morning we begin with the basic biblical proof of this sobering fact and we shall have time only to look at the proof with respect to the influence of remaining sin. On what grounds is this sobering fact? On what grounds is this sobering fact?

30:29 On what grounds do I have the temerity to sound so dogmatic and say to you that if you are to hear the word of God aright under the hearing of that word you must not forget that of the insidious and soul destructive influence of remaining sin and of the devil which are neither suspended nor negated while you are hearing the preaching of the word of God. Well the proof rests down. The proof rests down. The proof rests down squarely upon a number of passages of the word of God but we are going to look this morning at two of the most crucial in all of scripture.

31:10 Turn with me please to Galatians chapter 5. Galatians chapter 5 and in verse 16, the apostle writing to the Galatians gives a very clear positive directive. It is an imperative. It is a gospel duty.

31:33 It is an imperative. It is a gospel duty. walk by or in the spirit that's the imperative I am under a solemn obligation to walk in the spirit under the control under the guidance under the constant influence of the Holy Spirit and this will be the result you shall not fulfill the lusts the desires of the flesh now why is such an exhortation needed and why is such a promise or an encouragement appended the central exhortation is walk by or in the spirit the encouragement is

32:17 that in so doing you shall not fulfill the desires of the flesh well why should that be of such concern to me well verse 17 answers that question notice it begins with the logical connective for, for this is reality Paul says if you're tempted to take lightly the mandate to walk in the spirit and regard with indifference this encouragement in so doing you shall not fulfill the desires of the flesh let me wake you up to reality this is reality Paul says for every one of you the flesh lusts desires yearns the flesh is constantly desiring

33:00 yearning, lusting, longing in a direction that is opposite to that of the spirit for the flesh is lusting against the spirit and the spirit is continually desiring longing and in a holy sense lusting against the flesh here the apostle sets up this adversarial relationship between the spirit and the flesh and he goes on to say these are contrary these are contrary They are set in diametrical opposition to one another.

33:41 These are contrary the one to the other that you may not do the things that you would. Now that last statement, the commentators are divided as to its precise significance and I'll not go into the possible interpretations or my own present inclination of understanding. Suffice it to say that whatever it means, it is indicating that this warfare means that there's frustration in one direction or another.

34:13 That we're not yet home, where everything that we are as redeemed creatures will be in perfect, unrivaled agreement. Where a totally sanctified heart set upon loving God with all of its created entities in a perfected state will have brought to its service a mind that has no darkness, affections that have no perversity, a body that has no weariness, not a cell in the entire great humanity, but what is in perfect agreement

34:54 that God shall be loved with all the heart, mind, soul and strength and He will be thus loved. Do you want to get excited about heaven and the state of glory? Just think about that for a little bit if you're a real Christian. When I see thee as thou art, love thee with unsinning heart and we could right serve you with unwearying hands and unwearying feet.

35:22 But not here. Here we're in a constant state of conflict. The flesh longing, yearning, lusting. The dense...

35:34 The spirit. The spirit against the flesh. These are contrary the one to the other. And if he is saying that you may not do the things that you would, it is this antagonism that keeps us from fully doing what we would desire to do as renewed men and women in Christ or whether because the spirit who comes not as an equal and opposing force but as the dominant...

36:04 The dominating life force in a true Christian. For he goes on to assert that in verse 24, they that are Christ have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts thereof. It may be a statement concerning the conquest of God's grace in the midst of the conflict. But one thing is clear and there is no debate on the first two statements of the text.

36:29 The flesh is constantly lusting against the spirit. And the spirit constantly against the flesh. And there is no parenthesis that says except under the preaching of the word. You bring that conflict with you into this place every time you come.

36:49 Just as you bring it with you into your closet where you seek to pray and meditate and read the word of God and have hard dealings with God. There is no place, no set of circumstances where we can...

37:04 Suspend or negate the reality of that conflict.

Biblical Proof 2: The Warring Law in Our Members (Romans 7)

37:12 And the second passage on which I rest the case is Romans chapter 7. Romans chapter 7. Verses 21 to 23. The apostle in this marvelous epistle has clearly established that in union with Christ all true believers have died to the dominion and reign of sin.

37:41 And that all... All true believers have been released from the mastery of the lordship of sin and have become fundamentally the slaves of God and of righteousness.

37:52 That's Romans 6 in a sentence. He has demonstrated that in the clearest statements possible by using analogies and imagery and illustration from human experience and the great truth of Romans 6. In answer to the question, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? May it never...

38:12 That phrase that was opened up in our hearing last week. May it never be. God forbid. And then he opens up the glorious truth that in our union with Christ we've died to sin's dominion.

38:29 In our union with Christ we've been released from sin's mastery and we have a new master. And we have a new sphere of moral existence, righteousness and holiness. But then here in chapter 7 the apostle goes on to affirm further that in our union with Christ we have died to the condemning, galling power of the law of God. We have died to the law in its condemning and galling power.

39:03 That then raises the question, well is the law sin? Verse 7. And he says no it is not sin. And from verses 7 through verse 13 he describes, the function of the law in pulling away the scales that were over his eyes so that Paul who previously looked in the mirror and saw a creature acceptable to God on the grounds of his own self-wrought, personally woven fabric of man-made righteousness now saw himself naked and full of open, ugly, wounded, putrefying sores.

39:39 He saw himself a sinner. Dead. Unclean, vile and guilty. And the law was God's instrument to show him his true state.

39:51 But then moving on into the present tense beginning with verse 14 it is that same law which when the apostle holds his life as a Christian in the blazing light of the breadth and the depth and the magnitude of the demands of that law he is conscious that he is not yet fully, and totally conformed to it. And in the agonizing first person acknowledgement of the realities of his present struggle we come to verse 21 I find then the law that is the principle of operation that to me who would do good

40:35 evil is present. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man but I see, a different law in my members warring against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members. Now note briefly what the apostle is saying in verse 21. He speaks of a personal experiential discovery.

41:08 Notice the language I find. Jurisco. I discover. This is personal.

41:15 This is experiential. This is not theoretical. I find then the law that to me who would do good evil is present. This literally is near at hand.

41:31 When I set myself to do that which in my renewed humanity I purpose and desire and long to do that is in conformity with that holy law of God which is just and spiritual and good. Verse 12. At the point that I would do the good and do it to the perfection of its good I discover, he said. This is an experiential, personal discovery to me who would do good.

42:07 Evil is present. Evil is at hand. Evil is at hand. Evil is at hand.

42:14 Then verses 22 and 23 he amplifies the details of this discovery and its particular workings. For, see the logical connection? For, I delight in the law of God. Now notice the language.

42:30 After the inward man. In my inward man. In what I really am as a new man in Christ. I delight in the law of God.

42:44 I find. I find delight in the holiness of its standard. I find delight in the perfection of what it requires of me. That God should require that I love him with all the heart, mind, soul and strength.

43:00 I do not find that galling and saying who in the world is God that he wants everything. He says God is so glorious that for him to ask anything less and for me to give him anything less would be the height of wickedness. And when that God defines who he is. He defines what it means to love him in his worship and in the use of his name and in the keeping of his day and in human relationships and in the guarding of the heart as expressed in the Ten Commandments.

43:28 He says I delight in the law. It doesn't gall me. It doesn't chafe me. My renewed man has a perfect affinity of love and comfort and delight in the holy standards of God's holy law.

43:44 And every true child of God can say that. And you can't say that you're not a Christian. It's the carnal mind that is enmity against God. It's not subject to the law of God.

43:55 Neither indeed can it be. You see that's the mark of an unconverted man. God's law is calling to him. Though he may through saving face or saving his own skin or through the pressure of parental restraint be forced to keep certain aspects of God's law externally, internally he chases against it.

44:18 There's nothing more he'd like than if he could bust loose from the restraints of God's law. There's some of you sitting here today if you could have one wish it would be to obliterate a world in which God's law has the right to tell you what to do and not to do and then hold you accountable for all eternity for what you do with what he says you ought and ought not to do. Where your own passions and lusts and desires were the only governing principle and where there'd be no God to answer for. If that's you my friend you're as lost as the devil dead in your sins make no pretense that you're a Christian.

44:59 Paul says to me who would do good evil is present I find I have found this I delight in the law of God after the inward man but notice now I see a different law now notice he doesn't say in the inward man but in my members. He's making a distinction. Between what he is as a new man in Christ he says in the inward man I delight but I see another law another principle of action operative in my members now look what it's doing constantly warring against the law of my mind.

45:41 What's the law of his mind it is that love and delight in God's law and that disposition to obey the law. Not to chase not to regard it as a calling unreasonable harsh standard no but when he would render obedience to that law in all of its breadth and length and depth in all of the expansiveness of its standard reflecting the very character of God he says I see personal experiential I see I perceive a different law in my mind.

46:20 I see a different law in my members warring against in an adversarial relationship against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin now notice which is in my members. He's not talking about two equally powerful natures or dispositions he is certainly not saying here that he is backslidden and living like an unconverted man. No taking in its context and comparing one part of the statement with the other he says

46:58 while I am purposing to do the good in which I delight I see this contrary principle yet within and he locates it as in his members. Not that he believes that sin is somehow like some horrible virus found its way into the middle joint of his body. His finger here and his elbow there but he must make a distinction between what he is as a new man in Christ and what he finds of the remnants of remaining sin within him. And what does that lead into verse 24 a cry of personal wretchedness wretched man that

47:41 I am who should deliver me out of the body of this death who should deliver me from this state where there is an antagonism. And antagonism I didn't have when I was a Pharisee I looked at God's law and said I can check off every part of it in Philippians 3 he says I found myself blameless. I exonerated myself day after day week after week month after week he felt no antagonism he stroked himself like the Pharisee of Luke 18 thanking God daily he was not like other men. Pharisee of the Pharisees Hebrew of the Hebrews.

48:19 But now that his eyes were opened he was not like the Pharisee of Luke 18. He was not like the Pharisee of the Hebrews. He was not like the Pharisee of the Pharisees. He was not like the Pharisee of the Hebrews.

48:22 He was not like the Pharisee of the Hebrews. He was not like the Pharisee of the Hebrews. He was not like the Pharisee of the Hebrews. He was blind in God's initial dealings with him when the law was the instrument to pull away all of the rags of his own delusive self-righteousness and caused him to see his own naked putrefying state as a guilty defiled sinner.

48:39 That law now that he is in Christ with spiritually opened eyes he sees it in even greater breadth and depth and height of its spiritual demands and he says. I would do the good that is conform any action or thought or desire to the standard of the law I find this law in my members and as a result of it I cry out wretched man that I am who shall deliver me out of the body of this death who will deliver me from this state in which there is warfare and then there is the shout of triumph I thank God through Jesus

49:23 Christ notice our Lord is not an unconverted man this is not a backslidden man or someone saved but never surrendered he says I thank God I'll give the answer to my own question born out of this internal agony I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord he who has become the work I say it reverently he who has created this very condition of antagonism is going to deliver me from it but now look at the next verse puzzled me for years it's like he comes out of agony into ecstasy and back

50:05 to agony so then so then I of myself with the mind indeed serve the law of God what I am as a new man in Christ transformed by the power of the spirit united to the son of God in the virtue of his death and resurrection so that I have died to sin and risen to newness of life I myself with the mind serve the law of God but with the flesh that which is yet fleshy that which is yet of remaining sin with the flesh

50:49 the law of sin this is steady state until ultimate deliverance is brought when the Lord Jesus returns in glory and power and constitutes all of his own totally conformed to his own image now in the light of those passages do you see any indication that there's going to be any suspension or negation of these principles simply because we're sitting under the word listen carefully John Owen very perceptively remarked in his treatise on indwelling sin

Application to Hearing: Indwelling Sin's Greatest Opposition

51:31 and I know a few things that have come to me from human authors that have been more helpful than that treatise and in particular this insight John Owen said never is indwelling sin more active than when the heart of the saint is set upon that which is most spiritual and the more spiritual any activity is the more indwelling sin will oppose it why because it is those very activities which are going to wither and destroy and hold in check the power and the influence of indwelling sin indwelling sin knows its greatest enemies do you ever feel a great stirring up of

52:15 indwelling sin when you say I think I'll sit down kick my feet up and read the headlines of the newspaper no why because though that may be good it's not the highest good but how come if three minutes before you said hey I think I'll sit down and read my bible all of a sudden you thought of fifty things you ought to do your mind became dull your spirit became heavy your eyeballs felt like someone injected a couple of cc's of lead how come come this is how come when I would do good I feigned then a law that to me who would do good evil is close at hand

52:58 and the more noble the more intensified the good the more active will be remaining sin now apply that to our subject what are we talking about? take heed how you hear in this place I trust it's true we still believe it we believe the scriptures teach that this is not a theory given by someone who's trying to guard his own turf but we believe the scriptures teach that preaching is God's primary instrument for the calling out of his people to himself and for the building up of his people in their most holy faith well I ask you then

53:41 if God has given to the preaching of the word such a crucial and central place in his saving purposes where will indwelling sin be more active than in the context of the preaching of the word when you would sit down in this place to pour out your heart in worship and prayer and then give yourself to the hearing and the absorbing of the word of God If you do not face this fact, you will be defeated again and again and again because you won't recognize, as we shall see God willing in subsequent messages,

54:25 that that so-called innocent wandering thought is as effective to neutralize the word as if you sat in this place and thought blasphemous, vile, lecherous thoughts. The devil doesn't care if he fills your mind with thoughts about the roast at home or about tomorrow's activities, innocent and noble as they may be, or whether he fills your mind with lusting after a man or woman sitting in this place other than your husband or wife. Your mind is not like the mouth in the digestive system of a nursing babe yearning for its mother's breast.

55:10 He's got your mind. He's got your mind off the word of God.

55:18 And you see, you don't recognize it. And you think it's innocent.

55:26 I say we must face this sobering fact with respect to taking heed how we hear under the preaching of the word of God. And that fact is that the insidious, soul-destructive influences of our remaining sin will not touch on the devil this morning and will have to wait till next week, are not suspended nor negated. While hearing the word of God. In closing, I want to make a word of application to you who are strangers to God's grace.

Application to Unbelievers: Your Aversion to Preaching

56:01 I've already addressed you on several occasions throughout the message this morning. But I want to address you again lovingly and yet pointedly. If sin is your master, flesh is the controlling, governing principle of your life. And this explains your utter aversion and indifference.

56:22 And indifference to preaching. There are some of you here, young and old, if you were honest, you would say, I can think of a hundred places I'd rather be than right here listening to this man quote Bible verses and point his finger and holler and shout and look at me in the eye. There are a hundred places I'd rather be than under the preaching of the word of God. Well, you know why that is?

56:51 Well, say it's because of the way you shout and holler. I don't like it. Well, it may be true. You're not used to somebody.

56:57 You don't seem to mind when somebody shouts and hollers at the ball game. You don't seem to mind when someone shouts and hollers at the pool and at the beach. But let someone get excited and earnest about God! And you feel uneasy. Why?

57:09 Because you know you ought to be excited and earnest about God and you're not. And it's the light shining in upon your own spiritual deadness. That's your real problem. It's not the volume of my mouth or the pointing of my finger.

57:21 It's your love of darkness. It's your love of sin. See, that's why you have no heart for preaching. Because the scripture says, in John 3 and verse 19, this is the condemnation.

57:33 Light has come into the world and men love darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil. Neither will they come to the light. Neither will they come to the light. They don't want to come to preaching because the entrance of God's word gives light and understanding.

57:51 The preaching of the law exposes sin. The preaching of Christ exposes sin. As even the law cannot do. So odious and vile and foul a thing is sin.

58:03 Almighty God is willing to give up his only begotten son. Direct that he should take upon himself a true human soul and body. Live in this sin-cursed world. And end up on an instrument of Roman execution naked.

58:24 Scoffed, jeered. Buffeted and bruised by men. And forsaken of his father. Because even God, even God, cannot so love as to cancel out his justice in the way of forgiving sinners.

58:41 God's justice must be served if his love to rescue sinners is to find a righteous fulfillment. And my unconverted friend, that's why you have an aversion to preaching. Because you don't have any such view of sin. That's why you despise Christ.

58:59 That's why you treat the preaching of the gospel with such indifference. And what you need is nothing less than what the Bible calls a new heart. You need to have God take out your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And God says when he does the first thing he'll do once he performs that marvelous spiritual implant he says I will then put my spirit within them and write my law upon their heart.

59:26 And only then will you be able to say with Paul I delight in the law. I delight in the law of God after my inward. You'll be able to say because the spirit of Christ has come to indwell you you will say with him who said I lo, in the volume of the book it is written of me I come to do thy will. Yea, thy law is within my heart.

59:52 And you will be able to say I delight to do thy will. Thy law is within my heart. My unconverted man, woman, boy or girl, that disposition that hates preaching has an aversion to preaching. It will go on that way until you have a new heart.

Application to Believers: Encouragement and Warning

60:15 And until your sins are forgiven and blotted out in the virtue of the blood of Christ. And therefore you need to go to Christ and say Oh Lord Jesus do for me what I cannot do for myself. And to you the Lord's people in the light of what we've considered this morning just a simple word of encouragement. And a word of warning.

60:37 The word of encouragement is the fact that you experience some of your most serious conflicts sitting in this building ought not to discourage you. It ought to encourage you. You hear me? The fact that you experience some of your most serious spiritual conflicts sitting in this building ought to discourage you.

61:00 It ought to encourage you. You're in this company. You're in the company of him who said when I would do good I find then the law that to me who would do good evil is at hand. Do you find evil at hand in this place?

61:21 The Lord's died by the Lord's day until times you said how can I be a Christian? I come into the place to worship and to hear the word and there I struggle with the violence of thoughts. I struggle with the most horrible flashing, intimations of unbelief and skepticism. My friend, take comfort.

61:45 Don't be discouraged. That may be one of the most solid evidences that you're a true child of God. The flesh is lusting against the spirit. And when you come having sought if not in those words the principles that we've laid out in the previous messages.

62:04 You've sought to prepare for the preaching of the word and you come with expectancy. What's happened? Well underneath, you really expected that the influence and the actings of your indwelling sin were going to be suspended or negated. That's what you read.

62:22 You never said it but isn't that what you thought? And because it hasn't happened you said, who am I? I came this morning saying, Oh Lord, I can't wait to go to your place of special presence where your people gather and where they will lift up their hearts in intelligent, biblically framed praise and worship and adoration and intercession and where there will be the preaching of the word. Is that the real me?

62:52 I thought it was. But sitting here, I've had to fight distraction of mind, dullness of spirit. I've had to fight blasphemous thoughts, unclean thoughts, thoughts of unbelief. You're a Christian experiencing reality.

63:14 The flesh lusting against the spirit. But why haven't you given into it? Who would know if you sat here and let your first lustful thought go all the way to where you imagined yourself in total intimacy with that person who's the object of your lust? No one would know.

63:31 God would, but no one else. Why was it the moment you became aware of that lustful thought, you wrestled with it. You cried out. If somehow we could lock in to the ejaculatory prayers that go up in this place and they would be audibilized and come through that speaker above us, I wonder how many cries would come through the speaker.

63:54 Oh God, put that thought to death. Oh God, drive that thought from my mind. What was it that caused you to deal with that thought as viciously as though it were a deed to be seen by all? God's grace.

64:13 That was the spirit lusting against, coming against the flesh. But you were experiencing the antagonism. And these two are contrary. The one to the other.

64:25 And my friend, if you're not ready for a battle till you breathe your last, you're in the wrong army. This notion that somehow if God's really waterwork of grace in me, that oh occasionally I'll have a little struggle with this, struggle with that, but long enough I'll just get to the place where, no, I don't believe in sinless perfection, but I believe in the suspension. If you're not ready to battle till you breathe your last, you're in the wrong army. Because that's the way it's going to be.

64:59 It's going to be as long as we're in this earthly existence. So take courage child of God and recognize that this is normal Christian experience. And then I give a word of warning. Don't underestimate the power of what Rutherford called your house devil.

65:22 That's what Rutherford called the flesh and remaining sin. He called it every Christian's house devil. And whatever else you do when you come to sit under the preaching of the word, do not forget this sober fact. This sober fact.

65:41 This chunk of reality. And it's reality because God has ordained the scheme of His grace and the operations of that grace in human experience. And while you and I had we the choice to say how it would be done, we might have done it differently. Remember, God's done it in the way that will get the most glory to Himself.

66:05 And rather than fret that He didn't do it your way, accept the reality of His way and face that when you come to sit under the word of God, the insidious and soul destructive influences of our remaining sin, as we shall see God willing next week of the devil himself, are neither suspended nor negated while hearing the word of God. And that will mean that a right will be at one and the same time one of the most exhilarating and the most exhausting of all spiritual exercises. If God continues to give you preachers

66:50 who preach in the power of the Spirit regardless of all the circumstantial diversity of gift and temperament and volume, I don't know how many times to emphasize it, it will not be dull, it will be the communicable spiritual energy of true passion and earnestness. You will sense that God is upon his servants. But my friend, it's not enough that there be Spirit anointed biblical preaching and that we abominate dull preaching, we must equally abominate dull hearing.

Conclusion and Prayer

67:34 And if God is pleased to spare you the curse of dull preaching and spare this place of dull hearing, then true religion and saving mercy will thrive in this place until Christ comes back. May God grant it to be so for his glory. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you for your holy word.

68:10 We are so grateful that we are not left to stumble about in the confusion of your ways. But we thank you for this blessed book. We pray that the passages we've examined today may be written upon our hearts, that our wills may respond in loving compliance with them, that faith may be mingled with the word received. And Lord, for those who are strangers to your grace, who are chafing against your law, who are disloyal to your piety standards, bring it down to

68:54 a category of conduct suitable to their basest lust and passions. Lord, have mercy upon them. Show them their state. Disturb them.

69:07 Oh, God, disturb them, that even as they attempt to go home and fill their bellies and leap from their eyes, take peace from their hearts, disturb them with that holy disturbance of spirit-wrought conviction, until they fall upon their faces as we read this morning and cry out, You are of a truth among us, and seek You for mercy and pardon in the midst of this world. Oh, Lord, have mercy

69:52 upon us as we leave this place. We plead through our Lord Jesus Christ