The Great Deception of our Day

Let us open up God's holy word to the first letter to the Corinthians chapter six. We'll read the verses nine to 11, which is quoted as you will notice later in the Heidelberg Catechism of today. First Corinthians chapter six, the verses nine to 11. Paul in the context here, he is urging the believers to love one another and to walk honestly and wholly before God. And so he says in verse nine, or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you, but you are washed, you are sanctified, you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God. Let us pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we pray that you would open to us your word, especially these truths that we have just read, that we might understand the great power of the Spirit and the great hope for living the Christian life. Father, we pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Let us turn to the Heidelberg Catechism. We're in Lord's Day 32. Read questions 86 and 87. And I must say the more that we dive into the catechism, even though it's not on par with scripture or close to being on par with scripture, these men that wrote these questions understood the scriptures very well. So read these questions and answers as you hear them from me. We have been delivered from our misery by God's grace alone through Christ and not because we have earned it. Why then must we still do good? To be sure, Christ has redeemed us by his blood. But we do good because Christ by his Spirit is also renewing us to be like himself. You see who the agent is? The Spirit is renewing us to be like himself. So that in all our living we may show that we are thankful to God for all he has done for us and so that he may be praised through us. We do good so that we may be assured of our faith by its fruits and so that by our godly living, our neighbors may be won over to Christ. Question 87, can those be saved who do not turn to God from their ungrateful and impenitent ways? By no means. Scripture tells us that no unchaste person, no idolater, adulterer, thief, no covetous person, no drunkard, slanderer, robbers or the like is going to inherit the kingdom of God. Dearly beloved, for every doctrine, every truth that God teaches us, Satan counters it with a deceptive doctrine, a twisting of the truth. Our catechism this evening unmasks a key deceptive doctrine of Satan and it goes something like this. Because Jesus died for all your sins and you will never suffer any punishment for it, you can do whatever you like for it doesn't matter how you live. After all, Jesus already paid the price of your past, your present and your future sins. Some Christians, sure, will live very righteously and religiously and carefully watch their lives while others walk in sin, but in the end, as long as they believe in Jesus Christ, whether they live righteously or unrighteously, God's grace covers them all and brings them in to the kingdom of heaven. As long as they believe that Jesus died for their sins, it doesn't matter how they live the rest of their lives. You see how that is close to a biblical doctrine and yet it's twisted to Satan's truth. And so the church may be filled with people who are virtually identical to people in the world, but the great difference is that they believe in Jesus and so they go to heaven while the people in the world go to hell. You see, the people outside the church perceive Satan's doctrine to be error, but if we're inside the church, we have a tendency to overlook it. If you go into the world and you ask them, why are you not a Christian? Why don't you wanna belong to the Christian people? They say, well, they're hypocrites. And they say they love God and follow God and believe in Jesus Christ, but then they live just like us. Why would I have to be inside that group and not just be outside here? I don't wanna be a hypocrite and live and pretend to be something that I'm not. And so Satan's doctrine is deceiving the church, but even those who are outside of the church can see its falsity. And for this reason, our catechism asked a question and I'm rephrasing a little bit, but this is what it comes down to. Can people be saved who do not repent from their ungrateful ways and their sins? Will people go to heaven who do not make a radical break with their sinful lives? Can you have your cake and eat it too? Can you have on the one hand heaven and on the other hand your sin on earth? Can a person believe in Jesus while walking in his sin? The biblical answer and the catechism answer to us is absolutely not, that's impossible. Such people are lost and without salvation. In other words, it's impossible to believe in Jesus and to live without repentance. And if you think about it, that makes perfect sense, right? If your sin and the things of this world are on this side and Jesus Christ is on that side, you cannot split your head so that you watch on both sides and live both ways. You have people that walk after their sins and then you have people that walk after Christ. And so tonight we have a few points. The first, what I wanna lay out is, I'll quote the passage that you see in the catechism, but I wanna show you how extensively this is repeated in the New Testament. So we'll just look through some passages in the New Testament and this is the point that I will make, unrepentant people will not inherit the kingdom of God. The second point is that true believers do not live in sin. And thirdly, the Holy Spirit's work and true believers, in other words, why are they different? Let's begin with unrepentant people will not inherit the kingdom of God. The New Testament is very clear that people who do not turn from their sins will not enter into heaven. Follow with me on the screen behind me or look it up in your own Bibles if you can. That's the one. First Corinthians six, verse nine and 10. And see if as we are going through these verses, you can catch a theme. This is our text. So do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Who are the unrighteous? Well, he explains. Do not be deceived. In other words, do not think that you're in this path while you're actually in another path. That's the idea of deception here. Neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality. Practice is actually entered in. This says no homosexuals, in other words, no those who have homosexual desires and follow after them. Nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor the drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. And the idea is this. People who say they believe in Jesus Christ, say they are followers in Jesus Christ and are identified by these things are not going to inherit the kingdom of God. Now let me say something obvious and blunt here. If a pastor lives a sexually immoral life, he is a lost man. If a pastor is a homosexual, lives a homosexual lifestyle, he is a lost man and he cannot be entering the kingdom of God unless he repents and believes. If a person is greedy, that is, he's not satisfied with what he has, but in his mind he is constantly thinking about what other people have and to have that, if that's how his mind works and functions, he will not inherit the kingdom of God. Let's go to Galatians 5, verse 19 to 20. Now the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. They will not enter into heaven. They are still under judgment. If you are a drunkard, a person who gets drunk in public or in private, a drunken lifestyle, you will not inherit the kingdom of God. And did you notice that little phrase? Things like these, things like these, this is not a complete list. In other words, if your lifestyle is marked by sins like these, you are not on your way to heaven. I also want you to note one more thing here. Paul says, I warned you as I warned you before. This is not new. This is not something that they thought, well, we never knew this, Paul. You're away, you write a letter, and suddenly you tell us? This is something they remembered. Paul had warned them before of these things. Let's go to Ephesians five, verse five. For you may be sure of this, that everyone who is sexually immoral or impure or who is covetous, that is an idolater, has no inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God. In other words, same types of sin, you are not written in the Lamb's book of life. When the books are opened, it will not, your name will not be found in the Lamb's book of life. You are not registered in the kingdom of God. Revelation 21, eight. But as for the cowardly, the faithless, the detestable, as for murderers, and that would include their people who have hate in their hearts, because that's how Jesus defines a murderer, the sexually immoral, sorcerers, idolaters, and all liars. Their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death. So now we see the location that they go. New Testament says, not the kingdom of God, location is the lake that burns with sulfur. Finally, Revelation 22, verse 15. This is how they will be identified. Outside are the dogs. That's, I know that in our day, we love dogs and we treat dogs like pets. In the New Testament understanding, dogs is about as bad as you can be. That's the outcast, the unwanted ones. Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. Do you notice that? Who loves, who has a heart that desires, and because there is a desire, he or she acts in that way. They will be outside and not inside the kingdom of God. I think I have shown you enough verses to see that this is not a singular theme in Corinthians or just an idea that Paul picks up on the way. This is a dominant theme in the New Testament. This is a common knowledge in the New Testament that everyone who is immoral or sexually immoral is not on his way to heaven, but on his way to hell. If you watch pornography or sex in movies, or if you cheat, you are in great danger for you are on your way to hell. If you get drunk with alcohol, and that is what you love and desire, in other words, that is present in your life, you're on your way to hell. If other people around you in your house would say, my dad is a drunkard, he is one who gets drunk. This is who I know who he is, unless you repent, you're on your way to hell. If you are greedy, if your mindset is motivated constantly by desiring more and more and more stuff for yourself, that's a greedy person. You have a dark heart and you are on your way to hell. If you are a liar, one who knows that he or she doesn't speak the truth, if that is how you are marked by God, in other words, if he looks at your life and you say, this is a pattern of lying, of deception, of telling untruths to other people for whatever reason, that's evidence that you haven't repented of your sins. You see the pattern? If it'd be one verse, we could say maybe we take it out of context, right, maybe we're just overstating it. Maybe Paul is just laying out something in a very extreme sense, but this is everywhere. And I could take you through the Gospels, that's the same. I could take you in the Old Testament. Oh, the prophets, they laid this out in terms that I would be blushing to lay this out before you. What the Bible says is very plain. If you haven't repented from your sins, in other words, if you haven't stopped running the direction that your fleshly heart desires, you are still running the way to hell. God will not be deceived. You see, sometimes we think, and in this world, it's so easy to deceive one another, isn't it? I can deceive you very easily. I could go home and sit behind my computer and watch pornography the whole week, and on Sunday, come up, nicely dressed, give some motivational speech, and all of you would look at me and say, what a wonderful pastor we have. Or I could go around and tell lies everywhere, as long as I don't ring it into your ears. You would say, well, look at that man. You could do the same to me. You can live bitter, angry lives the rest of the week, as long as you show up to me and you show a nice, upright face. I believe you. I'm not gonna look behind all of your lies and look into your heart and say, oh, I know your heart, no, I don't. I can't read it off your face. I can't see it in your eyes whether you're lying. I'm no human lie detector. I can't see what you do with your fingers or your eyes when I don't see you. The Spirit can. That's why Paul warns. That's why the Apostle Paul and the Apostle John are constantly warning, saying, we warn you. Otherwise, he doesn't have to warn, right? If he can see it, he can just say, you are obviously walking in sin and you're lost. But he can't see it, so he warns. He says, if in your private life, you live a life contrary to the gospel of God, you need to know that you're not going to inherit the kingdom of God. So, bringing us to our second point, true believers do not live in sin. This is what Paul wrote. 1 Corinthians 6:11, our very own text. It says, and such were some of you. What does that imply? Such were some of you. If you tell me I used to be a football player in college, what does that imply? You're not doing it today. That's something in the past. It is done. It is no longer there. There has been a definite break between what you used to do and what you do now. Such were some of you. In heaven, there are many people who had lived in sexual immorality. I think there are many people who had homosexual desires in heaven. I think there will be people who were married or however you call that, that had a homosexual partner in this world. But before they died, they could say, I used to be that. Until I came to know the Lord Jesus Christ, definite break, now I live a different life. Such were some of you. But you were just, you were washed. You were washed. And not the way that a seven-year-old washes himself with a little splash here and a little splash there and say, mommy, I'm clean. But a real washing, a cleansing, a thorough washing from the old to the new. You were sanctified. You were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God. What is Paul saying? When you became a Christian, something changed because you repented. As a matter of fact, the Holy Spirit repented you. He turned you around. He made you a different kind of person. You might be a brute, a selfish man who was rude to your wife and beat her up if you had the chance. But when you came to know Christ, something changed. You changed. Can't do what you lived before. Now where you hated, you love. The things you used to love that were sinful, you now hate. What he's saying is when the Holy Spirit entered your life, you became a different man, a different woman. There was a great change in your heart. And depending on how you used to live externally, there was a great change externally. If you were a person who watched pornography and loved watching it, no more. If you were a person who lied and gossiped and used the name of God in vain, no more. A definite change. The supernatural power of God made you a new person and separated you from your sinful self. It is no longer who you are. It is no longer how you walk. It is no longer the course of your life you are now new because you turn around. You're repentant of what was in the past and before God, the past is gone. Hey, there is that person that was sexually immoral. God says that is not the person who's sexually immoral. That's the saint of the living God. See that? That's repentance. When a person turns around by the power of the Holy Spirit in him and lives a different life. What the New Testament teaches is truly magnificent. It doesn't say a Christian, once he starts to follow Jesus Christ, from now on, he's gonna put a big wrinkles on his forehead and squeeze really hard with his, with however you do that, with your face. And from now on, you're gonna do it and try hard and work hard and I'm not gonna sin anymore. That's not what the New Testament teach. That's what worldly religion teaches. If you have religion without the Holy Spirit, you do that. You know what? You are such a sinful man. You need to live on a mountain somewhere, sit there and make the sun, see the sun rise up and the night you go back, see the sun rise down and all day you're trying to keep the evil in. That's human religion. We can do that in the form of Christianity too. From now on, you need to try to be a better man. If you wanna follow Jesus Christ, try to be a better man. Look in the mirror every morning and say, today you're gonna be a better man. Throughout the day, you look at yourself and you say, I'm gonna be a better man, I'm gonna be a better man. That's not Christianity. Christianity is this. And such were some of you, but you were washed. You were sanctified. Not you washed yourself that day, you sanctified yourself that day, no, no, no. You were washed, you were sanctified. It's impossible for a sinner to sin like he or she used to because God has done a powerful work in every single believer. This is why Paul can speak so boldly. And he says, anyone who is an unrighteous person, either sexually immoral, nor adulterous, nor adulterous, nor a man who practices homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God. You know why? Because none of them will. Because Paul knows that every one of those have not been washed and sanctified. But all those who have changed and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and have the power through the gospel to have turned from that have great hope. Because they couldn't do it themselves, because God did it in their hearts. The proof, they prove by their actions, whether they are alive or dead. Now, is there still temptation in the Christian life? Absolutely. Paul writes in a few verses later in 1 Corinthians 6, verse 18, flee from sexual immorality. In other words, don't put yourself around sinful situations because you can be tempted. You can't walk in it. If you walk in it, you're dead. But you can't be tempted by it. So run away from it. They still have to strive for holiness and purity. And Paul knows that when he calls to a group of people and whether they're believers or unbelievers, he can say the same thing. He can say, flee from sexual immorality. And the true believers say, amen, praise the Lord, free from sexual immorality. And the people who are dead and lost in their sins will say, why? And keep going. See that? Different receptors, different heart. Paul is saying is this. If there is a habit of sin in your life, a pattern of homosexuality or lying or drunkenness or covetousness, then you have not been washed. You are not a saint. But a sinner. You belong not to the kingdom of God, but to the kingdom of the devil. If there is any pattern of consistent sin that you love and walk in, you are dead in your sins. We might all think that you live wonderful, but you know it in your heart. Doesn't matter whether you are a pastor, the pope or deacon or an elder. You will not inherit the kingdom of God, but if you're alive in God, you're on your way to heaven. Let me read to you some verses that help to solidify this. I don't have this on the screen, so you can follow it or write it down and study them later. I'll try to read them clearly. First John three, verse nine. Says, no one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God's seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning, because he has been born of God. First John five, 18. We know that everyone who has been born of God does not keep on sinning, but he who was born of God protects him, and the evil one does not touch him. Romans six, 17 to 18. But thanks be to God that you were once slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and having been set free from sin, you have become slaves of righteousness. No longer slaves to sin, but now slaves to righteousness. Lastly, Romans eight, verse two. For the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. If you live in sin, you are not set free from the law of sin. Would you agree? If you are stuck to sin, and that's your life, and that's who you are, you are still bound in sin. The word of God cannot be broken. But if you have been set free from sin, you have been made a slave to righteousness. You cannot get loose from righteousness. Even if you take a step back, you're drawn back because you are a slave to righteousness, and there's nothing you can do about it. Praise the Lord, for God has done a work. It is two people, you see that? It's not, we divide the world into groups that God doesn't care about. We divide the groups into Democrats and Republicans. We divide the world into black people and white people. We divide the world into rich people and poor people. We divide the people up into criminals and not criminals. God cares about this. There's one division. There's people who are dead, because they're in the law and to sin, and there's who are alive because they're enslaved to righteousness. That's what matters. All these other things doesn't make you go to heaven or to hell, but makes you go to heaven is the power of God in your life. What makes you go to hell is the power of Satan in your life. You can vote Democrat, you can vote Republican, you can go to hell either way. Does it make you a Christian? I'm not gonna tell you how you should vote. That's not my domain. My domain is this, your soul. I care about your soul. Are you bound to sin or are you bound to righteousness? A true Christian cannot live in a pattern of anger, of bitterness, of lust, or impurity, or covetousness, of lying. And this is the testimony of the New Testament. This is the testimony of God. By the way, we elevate men in this country of birth and death above what we're supposed to elevate them. You look at politicians, how would they pass this bar? Are they bound to righteousness or are they bound to sin? Let me bring you to the last point. The Holy Spirit's work in true believers. What does the Holy Spirit do? Why can Christians not live in sin? What if I'm a Christian and from now on, I'm just gonna go live in sin. How about that? I can do it if I want to. No, you cannot. Here's why, three things. First of all, you are washed. The washing here refers to the cleansing from the dominion of sin and unrighteousness. Believers are washed free from the infection of sin that they were born with. The center of this washing is, of course, the heart. We receive a cleansed heart, a new heart. The Holy Spirit washes the heart of a sinner so that its desire for sin is gone and its pleasure for sin is gone. Before, if a person, before he's born again, he speaks something that's false, he will make an excuse. It's just a wide lie. Once he is born again, repented, filled with the Spirit of God, he's about to say something and suddenly he's cut to the heart. How can that filth come out of my mouth? The Holy Spirit washes the believer from the moment he is saved. This doesn't follow 10 years after. We have this idea sometimes that, you know, I'm saved here at 16, 17 years old, but hey, I just gotta enjoy my youth before I get older. And so a person lives for 10 years like the devil. And then he recommits himself to Christianity and begins to live like a Christian. That's not what the Bible teaches. That person was as lost as the devil while he walked like the devil. You see, before a person is born again, he is under the control of his desires. He or she was under the law of sin and death, fast bound in sin's quicksand. It drags him down and he can't get up. The more he moves, the more he goes down. When the Holy Spirit comes, he does a mighty work. He takes away the desire for sin and the pleasure in sin. It's like eating sand. Before it was like candy. You delighted in it, even though it killed your teeth. Once you become a believer, it's like sand. You put it in your mouth, it looks beautiful. Somebody made a beautiful candy shape. You touch it with your lips and it's disgusting. Becomes vile to your heart. The unbeliever loves sin, is addicted to sin, different kinds of sin. But it's a love for sin, it's a love for anger, a love for jealousy, a love for sexual immorality, a love for stealing or covetousness. When a person turns to Christ, he or she is washed and his bondage is broken because his desire is different. You see that? The desire drives your actions. What you desire and what you find pleasure in is what you fill your life with. That's why Paul can say this. If your life is filled with sexual immorality, I guarantee you, your heart loves sexual immorality, which means it's still the heart of Satan and darkness and so you're still lost. When your heart loves the things of God, praying and reading his word and having fellowship with his people, it is evidence that your heart's desires have become new and so you love the things of God. Secondly, you were sanctified. Many would take this as kind of the same meaning as washing, but I think that it's something other. I think it's the positive towards the negative. Washing washes away the dirt. It's the negative, so to speak. It's not negative, but it removes. It takes it away. It's the minus. It takes away sinful desires. Sanctification imparts the good. God doesn't just take away the desire for sin. He places in us holy desires. The Holy Spirit does not merely empty believers of sin and unrighteousness. He fills them with a love for the things of God. Holy desires lead to holy thinking, leads to holy walking. And through the sanctification by the Spirit, we're enabled to enter into the presence of God and see his glory because our hearts are positively drawn to holiness. We seek God's face and we're able to fall in love with the love of God and we fall in love with his glorious presence and with his wisdom and his knowledge and his power. And we're drawn after the things of God. And the more we're drawn after him and move after him, the more the world seems colorless and stale and unworthy. Lastly, you were justified. Finally, through the Holy Spirit, we are justified. He believes, he justifies believers. He declares them holy and separate from sin. He's perfectly presents us before God. He gives us the new label, holy, perfectly holy. Knowing that, believing that, which is the Christian faith, the desire of sin falls apart. For the love of God compels us to follow him and to love him. See that? I think I've given this illustration many times before, but if you have a bride that is dressed in old rags, she doesn't care whether somebody spills something on her, whether somebody throws something that is dirty on her because she wears rags and who cares? They place that same woman, wash her, place her in a perfectly beautiful, sparkling white dress and she will stay away from everything that could defile her because she's clean and she loves to be clean. Oh, my beloved people, I'm jealous for the gospel of God. It's being trampled on, sold cheap, watered down, hidden in our world today. We have people that live in open sin, elevated as Christian leaders. That's not the gospel of God and God will judge it one day and I fear for their souls. But in the Bible, the gospel is clear, it's clean, it's beautiful, it's bright, it's life-giving and powerful. It actually saves you out of the grip of sin. You see that? These are not, well, if you become a Christian, you gotta be really diligent so you're no longer in this. No, when a person turns to Christ, he is set free. The chains that at his hand, bound to sin, set free. The eyes that were covered with sin, broken free. The ears that were filled with the filth of the world, taken now and I can hear again. The legs that make me run off in sinful places, chained, broken free and I can run after the glory of God. Do you see the powerful gospel of the Bible? Don't settle for anything less. Don't run after ideas that say it's somehow more loving to say that people that can walk in open sin are actually people of the living God. That's blasphemy. You know why? Do you know why? Because the glory of God sets a man free from the bondage of sin. And if you're saying that that sin is more stronger than the power of God, you have just blasphemed the name of the living God. You see that? Don't come to me with some gospel that leaves you on in your sin and call the grace as something that loves sin. God hates sin. He hates sin. And he knows the destructive power of sin and he loves his people so much that he will cleanse them from their sins, break the bond so they can walk in the ways of God. Who of you would let a scorpion stinging your children just sit there and say, because I love you, I won't touch you. Who of you would say, because I love you, keep on drinking poison. Keep on swimming in the sewer. That is you. You're worse than the devil. That's a gospel from the pit of hell. Because the gospel of the living God describes and reveals a gospel for the God so loving that he gave his only begotten son to die for sinners so that they might be free from sin. See that? If he sent his son to die for sin, do you think that he will let you live on in sin? Beloved, if you are saved and you're broken, free from the power of sin, and there's an urge and a longing to be closer to be God, to be more holy than God, you have one biggest fan and it's God himself. He loves to make you more holy and more righteous and more pure and more loving. You are his special care. Oh, the glory when you see the gospel. The gospel of God is pure. I'm afraid that sometimes instead of being jealous, we're just pointing fingers. We're pointing to other churches and say, well, look at that. They got a pastor that is a homosexual. Look at that. It should break our hearts. Not because of that single man, but because of that whole group is misunderstanding the biblical gospel or at least accepting a destruction of the biblical gospel. It is not love to let people walk in their sin. It is love to speak the word of God in love. And God hates sin because he is a good, good God. And if any of you walk in secret sin and are bound to secret sin, I'm not your enemy and nor is God. He calls you to come and be saved from your sin because he sent his son for people like you to wash you, to sanctify you, to justify you, to make you spotless, pure, and separate you forever from that vile place of sin. He can do it. And he will, if you believe in the biblical gospel. Let us pray. The heavenly father, you're holy and beautiful and glorious. God, I pray that you would show the power of your gospel. I pray this in Jesus' name, amen.