Speak Boldly – Part 3

In this message from David Platt from Acts 2:14–41, we’re urged to consider whether we have responded rightly to God’s Word.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Setting The Aim Of Scripture
• 2:00 The Bullseye: Character Before Conduct
• 6:30 Inside-Out Change Across Life Stages
• 10:50 Acts 2: The Word’s Piercing Effect
• 14:30 Conviction: Need And Provision
• 19:00 Seeker Sensitive Or God Sensitive
• 23:00 1 Corinthians 14: God Among Us
• 26:30 Conversion Redefined: Repent And Believe
• 31:00 Turning From Sin To Christ
• 35:00 Evidence, Deeds, And Costly Grace
• 40:00 Continuation: Spirit-Led Devotion To Scripture
• 44:30 Hunger For The Word And A Changed Life

Transcript

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You are listening to David Plott Messages, a weekly podcast with sermons and messages from pastor, author, and teacher David Plott.

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Praise the Lord. If you have a Bible, and I hope you do, let me invite you to open with me to Acts chapter 2 as we bring a conclusion to the never-ending sermon that started a few weeks ago that I thought would last us one week, and then I thought might last us two weeks, but now it will last us three weeks, but we will finish today, I promise. Acts chapter two. I want you to pull out the notes that you have for your celebration guide. We're going to pick up right where we left off last week, talking about the purpose of the word. We've talked last week about how the agenda of the Bible is to make us look more like Jesus. That all of Scripture is aimed at recreating us into the image of Christ. And that is the ultimate purpose of the Bible, which means the ultimate purpose of the Bible is not to answer every question we may have in life or provide specific direction for every situation we may face. We talked, finished up talking last week about the difference between good stuff and God's stuff. And God's stuff being the scripture that's intended to bring us into the image of Christ, good stuff being good principles that really aren't maybe specifically addressed in Scripture. And I want to clarify something. I want to clarify many, we talked about different examples like managing your money or how to lead your family, how to raise your kids, how to raise your teenagers, how to walk through the grief process. I don't want to communicate that those things are unimportant, those shouldn't be addressed when we look at the word. Certainly, these things are all important to all of us in this room. What we're focusing on, though, is that the ultimate purpose of the Bible is to bring us into the image of Christ. And when we focus on that purpose, then we will begin to play that out in our lives in the different circumstances we come into. Look at your notes there. You've got some circles there. There have been some emails that have been coming in. What are all the circles for? Some of the kids have asked what the bullseye is for on the sermon notes. Well, here it is, okay? In the very center circle there, I want you to write the character of Christ. I want you to write the character of Christ. At the core of our being, as believers who have placed our faith in Christ, Christ lives in us. It's almost like Christ, the incarnation in us. John chapter 1, verse 14 says, The word became flesh, God became flesh and dwelt among us. And that continues through each of our lives. Christ is in us, Colossians 1.27. He lives in us, he dwells in us, his presence dwelling in us. And so at the core of our being as believers is the character of Christ. Now, the second circle, outside of that, let's call the conscience. And the conscience, if you want to write some notes out by the side there, the way we think, the way we feel, the way we believe what we believe. Now, all of those things are obviously affected by the character of Christ in us. Right? When Christ comes in us, he changes the way we feel. He changes our desires. He changes what we believe. Everything now revolves around the character of Christ that's in us. That affects our conduct, our our conscience. Let's go to the third circle. That would be our conduct. That's the way we behave or act, the things we do. Now see how the progression goes here. The way we act, what we do, the way we behave is completely based on what we think and feel and believe. We always live out our faith. We may say we believe something, but if we're not living it out, we really probably don't believe it. Whatever is at the core of our values and what we believe and what we think and what we feel is going to affect the way we act. It's going to affect our conduct. And the last circle, let's call the church. And don't miss it here. We've talked already here at Brook Hills how God has designed it so that the character of Christ is reflected in the church. We want people in this community to look at the people called the Church of Brookhills and see the mercy and grace and patience and attitude of Christ. How do they see that? That comes out in our conduct with the way we act in our everyday, day in, day out lives in this community. People see our conduct, and that's how they perceive the church based on what we do. So at the core is the character of Christ, which affects the way we think and feel and believe our conscience, which affects the way we act, which is our conduct, and that affects how the church looks and how the character of Christ is reflected in the church. Now, in light of that picture right there, I want you to think about application because what we talked about last week was many times we we kind of twist scripture to make it say what we want it to say, or take some things out of context in the Bible to try to communicate practical things, to try to come up with principles for how to manage our money or principles for how to raise teenagers or children, those sorts of things. And we start focusing on what we need to do. How to raise your money, how to how to raise children, how to how to raise your money. Well, you might want to raise money too, and that would be a really good church service to focus on. But how to how to make money for the next 10 weeks, okay? How to manage your money, how to manage your kids, that might transfer over too. All of these things are aimed at which circle? The conduct, right? Things we do. And so what we what we do is we come to church, we want to put a lot of practical emphasis, practical application. We say, preacher, give me 10 steps to do this, or five principles to play out to do this. And if we focus all the time on the conduct, and you come into church week in and week out, and you get a new list of things to do, steps to take, we walk out of here, okay, let's try to do them. What we miss out on is the fact that if we're following what Scripture says and we're looking at what Scripture tells us to do, we can't do it on our own. It's impossible for any one of us in this room to live out the Christian life on our own. The beauty of the Christian life is Christ lives it in and through us. The problem comes then when we always focus on the conduct. We come in week in and week out, we get a list of things to do from the preacher, a list of tips from the preacher, then we go out during that week and we try to put those things into practice. It may last for a week or two, but then we get frustrated because we can't do it and we come back for more. You ever felt like that? What happens though when the character of Christ is fed in our hearts by his word, and he begins to transform the way we think, and the way we feel, and the way we believe, and that begins to change the way we act, and Christ begins to be reflected in his church. You see how that works from the inside out? Let me give you an example. College students. The overwhelming majority of college students who've grown up in church, once they get to college, drift away from their faith. They have this whole new horizon of different things they can do, freedoms to do this or that, all kinds of new ways to act and behave. And they begin to drift away from their faith. Why? Because there's not a foundation there for how to think Christianly, how to believe and to value what Christ values because the character of Christ hasn't been developed inside of us. How about with youth and the struggles that teenagers have with purity, with holiness in an age where they are bombarded with temptations left and right? What is the best way we can encourage teenagers to be pure and holy? By giving sermons on be pure, do this, do this, do this, do this, or to pour the word of God into their hearts so that the character of Christ is developed in them, so they begin to love and honor Christ, and they begin to think like Christ, and they begin to realize that the Holy Spirit produces in them self-control, and that begins to play out in the way they act. How about adults? How about how about with men in our culture, the epidemic we have, with men who have not led their families in a way that honors God, men who have left their families on their own. How do you address that? By calling men together and telling them now do this, do this, do this, or by feeding men with the character of Christ, so they begin to love what Christ loves. They begin to desire what Christ desires, they begin to love their wives as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, and they begin to think, how is that going to look like in my life? The word feeding the character of Christ. We've got things backwards if we're always hitting on conduct and we never feed our character our souls with the word of God. We will live defeated Christian lives that way. However, when we feed our souls with the word of God, it will begin to change the way we look, the way we act, and the way the church looks in the community. Does that make sense? We've got things backwards in our worship if we're not being transformed into the character of Christ week in and week out when we come together. That's why the word must be central in our worship. Now I want us to look. We've looked at the word's magnitude, we've looked at the word's authority, the word's relevance, and the word's purpose. One final characteristic of the word, reason why the word must be central in our worship. And it's because of the word's effect. Because of the word's effect. I want you to look with me at Acts chapter 2, verse 36. Acts chapter 2, verse 36. This is the end, kind of the climax of Peter's sermon. He says, Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this. God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. When the people heard this, they were cut to their heart. Look at their reaction. They were cut to the heart, and they said to Peter and the other apostles, Brothers, what shall we do? Peter replied, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. The promise is for you and your children, and for all who are far off, for all whom the Lord our God will call. With many other words, he warned them and he pleaded with them, save yourselves from this corrupt generation. And those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. Now let's say verse 42 together. Many of you have it in your hearts. They devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer. I want you to see the effects of the word, three different effects that come out of this. Number one, I want you to see the word awakens conviction. The word awakens conviction. As soon as Peter finishes the sermon, verse 37 says, When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart. That's quite an interesting phrase that Luke would use here to describe what happened. They were cut to the heart. We've already talked about how way back in Exodus, we saw 3,000 people who were struck down by the sword when the law came down. They had disobeyed against the law. They were cut to the heart here. We're reminded, Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12, says the word of God is living and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates to our hearts and our souls and our minds. Ephesians 6, 17 says, the word of God is the sword of the Spirit. That's kind of the picture we've got here. This is not just man's words, not just another book. This is the sword through which God and his voice penetrates our hearts and our minds. This is not just a book. There's something supernatural that goes on when the word of God is proclaimed. And here it's awakening conviction. I want you to see something very interesting. The question they asked there in verse 37, they say, brothers, what shall we do? This is the second question they asked. If you look back at verse 11 and 12, look at what happened there. After this amazing scene where all these people were speaking in different languages, tongues of fire resting on them, it says, we hear them declaring the wonders of God in our own tongues at the end of verse 11. And verse 12 says, amazed and perplexed, they asked one another, What does this mean? So two questions. What does this mean in verse 12? Over here in verse 37, what shall we do? You know, I think it's really interesting to note that when we saw these amazing things happen at the beginning of Acts chapter 2, people speaking in different languages, tongues of fire resting on people's heads, it caused curiosity. What is this about? But when the word was proclaimed, when Peter preached, they didn't say what does this mean. They said, What shall we do? It wasn't just curiosity, it was conviction. They realized something needed to change. I want you to notice, you can you can do a lot of things to amaze people and to wow them. And there's a lot of tendency, temptation today to do church to amaze and to wow and to entertain. And that will get you so far, it will get people curious, maybe, but it's proclamation of the word by the power of the Spirit that brings conviction. And that's completely different. The Holy Spirit alone can convict, can speak to our hearts. Apart from the Holy Spirit, my words fall on deaf ears this morning. However, because of the Holy Spirit and his word, the word awakens conviction in our hearts. Now, for each of these effects, I want us to look at two components or two parts of them and then ask a question that I think we really need to ask in light of contemporary worship trends. Two components here of conviction. First of all, we'll put them together and then begin to explain them. First of all, we realize the gravity of our need. This is what conviction is. We realize the gravity of our need, and second, we realize the greatness of his provision. We realize the gravity of our need, and second, we realize the greatness of his provision. That's what we mean by this word conviction. I want you to see how this unfolded here in Acts chapter 2. We've read different parts of Peter's sermon. Basically, he told him that they had crucified Jesus, the Son of God, God Himself in the flesh. Even at the very end, that climax of the sermon, God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ. And so basically he tells him, You crucified the Son of God. And he says, You have a need to stand under the judgment of God. You have crucified him. And I want you to catch the need. When he comes down in verse 38 and he says, Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for what? For the forgiveness of your sins. That's the need. That's the ultimate need that is driving the response in this passage. That's the ultimate need that they were convicted of. They had sinned against God and they stood under the judgment of God for it, and they needed to be forgiven of their sins. Now that sounds pretty basic, but we've got a temptation to miss this today. When we share the gospel, we often talk about how we have a need for success or a need for happiness or a need for fulfillment or a need for adventure, a need for an abundant life. We talk about the gospel as the answer. Jesus is the answer to all of those different needs. He's the answer to our need for success, our need for satisfaction, our need for happiness, our need for fulfillment. And certainly he is all those things. But if that's all we focus on, we bypass that which is the greatest need that all of us in this room have. And it's not a need for success, and it's not a need for fulfillment, it's not a need for satisfaction, it's not a need for loneliness. Those are all symptoms. The root need in every single one of our lives is for forgiveness. The cosmic problem of the universe for every single one of us is that we sit under the judgment and wrath of a holy God because of our sin. And unless something is done to be put right with him, then we will be separated from him forever. That's just the tourney. Oh, wait a second. Ladies and gentlemen, we will never understand. Until we have a full understanding of the wrath of God again. We don't talk about this in 21st century America, Church. We don't talk about the wrath of God. We talk about the love of God. And in the process, we create a mush to God who somewhere along the way we are convinced is obligated to save us. And he owes salvation to us. And ladies and gentlemen, it is not. It's not until we understand that we stand under the judgment of the Holy God that we realize how infinitely precious it is that He forgives us of our sin. And He sent His Son to take that wrath upon Himself instead of taking it out on us. That's the beauty of the gospel. If we do not communicate the wrath of God, we will never be able to communicate the love of God. And see how that's set up in this thing. We realize the greatness of our need, the gravity of our need, and that's when we realize the greatness of his provision. Don't miss the good news in this passage. Peter is telling these guys that even if you are a murderer of the very Son of God, God Himself stands ready to forgive you, and not just to forgive you, but to pour his spirit in you, to pour the presence of the Christ that you murdered. He's gonna pour his presence in your life by his grace and his mercy. Is that not good news? That's incredible news. Imagine Peter saying to us this morning, you all, all of us sit under the judgment of God because of our sin. And we have infinitely offended a holy God. But he stands ready this morning to forgive all who would call on him and all who would trust and the love and grace that he freely provides. That's good news. Now, we miss that. Do you see how we miss the greatness of his provision if we don't realize the gravity of our need? See the joy that comes and seeing a holistic picture of God. That's what conviction does. Now, it's at this point that I want to ask a question. The question is: which seeker are we going to be sensitive to at the church at Brookhills? All right, here's what I mean by that. Let me give you a little background. In light of a desire to communicate more about the love and the grace of God, maybe to the exclusion many times of his other attributes, we come to worship in the contemporary trend, particularly among mega churches, is to do seeker-sensitive worship. And by that is meant we're going to cater our worship to those who are seeking Christ, maybe unbelievers who have not placed their faith in Christ. We're going to cater our worship and our time in the word to seekers. And what that's resulted in is a pretty strong dilution of the word in worship. One church that I went to during the time where we were taken away from New Orleans. What's the word there? I can't remember, but we were homeless. We would visit a couple different churches. There was this one particular service where uh where it was very, very contemporary and very seeker sensitive outwardly. They had said that that's what they did. And I remember the the favorite quote Heather and I had from the preacher was he had been talking for a while, probably 15 or 20 minutes, and he said, Now let me show you a verse real quick, and then I'll get back to what I was saying. But that that that's the trend. Or maybe to use the word, but to twist it to hit some of the issues that are most prevalent to seekers. Well, I want you to think about a couple of things with this idea of should Brakills should we have seeker sensitive worship. First of all, let me say I'm all about leading as many people to Christ as possible. In fact, that's what drives me to say the things I'm about to say. First of all, the Bible says Romans chapter 3 there is no one who seeks God. Not even one. So when you take scripture for what it's teaching there, if we were to say that we are seeker sensitive and there's no one who seeks God, and you put the two together and we're actually sensitive to absolutely no one in our worship if we are secure sensitive. But maybe a step deeper and much more important what happens when we realize that worship first and foremost was designed to please the divine seeker what do you mean by that? Well John chapter 4 says the Father is seeking those who will worship him in spirit and in truth. Luke chapter 19 verse 10 says Jesus came to seek and to save those who are lost. 2 Peter chapter 3 verse 9 says God desires that all would come to repentance, that none would perish. So we've got a God that we're worshiping in this room this morning who is who is longing to see people come to know his grace and his salvation who has a zeal for people to come to know his grace and salvation that is greater than all of our zeal in this room combined. And I believe the Bible is teaching us in worship if we will exalt his character and exalt his voice that we can trust him to do the seeking after people. And if we exalt what he wants us to exalt then he knows a lot better than we do how to reach people in 21st century culture. So let's take him at his word let's exalt his greatness expose his voice and let him do the seeking and then guess what? He'll get the glory for what happens and not the secret-sensitive worship stirrers. I want to show you this in scripture let me show you this I want you to turn on the right and look in 1 Corinthians chapter 14. This is such a great passage. This is in the middle of some of the disputes that were going on with the church at Corinth about prophecy and tongues. Keep in mind prophecy we've talked about it prophecy is proclamation of the word take the word of God speak the word of God I want you to look with me at verse 22 in 1 Corinthians chapter 14. 1 Corinthians 14 look at verse 22 get a hold of this picture right here what Paul is saying. He says tongues then are a sign not for believers but for unbelievers. Prophecy however is for believers not for unbelievers. So if the whole church comes together and everyone speaks in tongues and some who do not understand it or some unbelievers come in, will they not say that you're out of your mind? Isn't that good? They're going to think you're crazy if all they hear you doing is talking in tongues. So here's what he says. But if an unbeliever or someone who does not understand comes in while everybody is prophesying, he will be convinced by all that he is a sinner and will be judged by all and the secrets of his heart will be laid bare so he will fall down and worship God exclaiming God is really among you in that a good picture when people doubtless there are some in this room this morning who have not placed your faith in Christ when people have not placed their faith in Christ come into our worship and they they hear the word of God being proclaimed and they see the greatness of God being exalted that they will fall on their faces and say God is among you God is doing things here. They will see their need and realize the greatness of his provision when we worship to please the divine seeker over everybody else this happens when the Spirit works through the word the word awakens conviction second effect of the word the word leads to conversion the word leads to conversion I want you to come back with me to Acts chapter 2 verse 37 and I want us to see another area where we are tempted to be dangerously unbiblical. Why don't you look at verse 37 when the people heard this they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles brothers what shall we do? Peter replied Ask Jesus into your heart Peter replied invite Christ into your life Peter replied everyone bow your heads close your eyes and pray a prayer to accept Jesus these phrases that you will find all across American Christianity are found nowhere in scripture and there's a great temptation today to dilute the gospel into phrases like this that in the end end up missing out on the whole point of the gospel. And I'm concerned that we've created a mindset where all you have to do is pray a prayer sign in a dotted line or walk down an aisle to experience salvation. And that is grossly unbiblical and the result is it leads people to assume that they are saved when they've never heard the gospel and responded to it biblically this is extremely important. What is conversion what does it mean to come to the point of salvation Peter replied that one word drives this whole conversion experience here in Acts chapter 2. What's the word? Repent now keep in mind this is the same message that John the Baptist preached Luke chapter 3 same message that Jesus preached Peter's first Christian sermon don't really know what else to say I'll use what Jesus used repent. Be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. What does that word mean? Literally a changing of direction in the original language of the New Testament literally a turning from one way to another way. And as we see the gospel preached here in Acts chapter 2 as well as other places this is a word that is extremely important. Now some of you are thinking well I thought it was faith that saves you. And this is not from yourselves it is a gift of God's that no one can boast. Exactly it is faith faith alone that saves you but it is a biblical understanding of faith that we've got to keep in mind here. And that biblical understanding of faith involves repentance let me show it to you in the book of Acts here. We've got it here in Acts 238 repent and be baptized that was the invitation. I want you to look in the very next chapter chapter 3 verse 19 you might underline some of these verses I want to show you the times where the Bible stresses repentance in the book of Acts. Chapter 3 verse 19 repent then and turn to God so that your sins may be wiped out the times of refreshing may come from the Lord. I want you to look over in chapter 8 look in chapter 8 look at verse 22 this is a really interesting passage. Simon the sorcerer is a guy who had made a public profession of faith so to speak but had missed out on what true conversion was about look at what Peter says to him in Acts chapter 8 verse 22. Perhaps he will forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. Acts chapter 8 verse 22 now look over at Acts chapter 17. Look at Acts chapter 17 Verse 30 this is Paul speaking in Athens giving an overview of the gospel and this is the core of the gospel that he brings out verse 30 says in the past God overlooked such ignorance but now he commands all people everywhere to what? Repent. So there's a few instances where we see just repent. Faith is not mentioned specifically that word in those different passages. Now let me show you an instance where faith or belief in Christ is the only thing mentioned is apart from repentance. Look at Acts chapter 16 one chapter before verse 31 this is the the jailer Paul's talking to it says they replied Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved you and your household so you're saved by believing in the Lord Jesus. Now I want you to look at an instance where we see both of them mentioned. Look at Acts chapter 20 verse 21 We've seen repentance we've seen faith now let's see them both together. Acts chapter 20 verse 21 says I have declared to both Jews and Greeks that they must turn to God in repentance and have faith in our Lord Jesus. They're both there. One more time Acts chapter 26 go to close to the end of the book there. Acts chapter 26 look at verse 20 Paul is talking about his mission to preach the gospel. Listen to what he says he says to those in Damascus then to those in Jerusalem and to all Judea and in all Judea and to the Gentiles also I preached that they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds hold on to that phrase we'll get back to that a little bit later. Now obviously we're seeing all throughout the book of Acts when it comes to people coming to that point where they place their faith in Christ where they are converted where they have their salvation experience it's obviously involving repentance and faith or repentance as a part of faith. So I want us to see two components of repentance that I think we see all throughout the book of Acts as well as other places in scripture two components. Number one in repentance this whole turning we turn from sin. We turn from sin when you when you enter into a relationship with Christ you do not continue to pursue sin. You turn from sin. And when you turn from sin you turn to something else you turn from sin to Christ. Now think about those two different levels right there turning from sin. This idea of repenting of sin doing an about faith Heather and I lived in New Orleans for five years you can't take a left turn anywhere in New Orleans. All you can do is U-turns everywhere you've got to go if you want to take a left you do a U-turn then come back and take a ride. That's what a repentance is it's U-turns. It's just like New Orleans and there's need for repentance in New Orleans. So you turn you do a U-turn you go the other way you turn from sin to Christ. Now think about this repentance thing think about three key words that we see all throughout scripture in our minds our hearts and our wills in our minds we change our mind about sin. We change our mind about about God, about Christ there's a mental change that goes on in repentance. But obviously we know that's not enough just to change our minds just to have mental belief right even the demons believe God and shudder if demons can do this then it's not what we need for salvation. We need to go at least a little step further. What about our hearts? 2 Corinthians chapter 7 verse 10 talks about having a godly sorrow over our sin. That's the result of repentance that we feel sorry for our sin. And then there's a change of will Luke chapter 3 verse 7 and 8 when you look back at when John the Baptist was preaching repentance he talked about how producing fruit in the way you live in keeping with the repentance that has taken place in your life in your heart mind, heart and will it's a total change of mind, a total change of heart, a total change of will that's going on in conversion. That's turning from sin and then turning to Christ two key words here. When Peter preached this sermon verse 36 God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ second word there Christ the Messiah the promised Messiah the Savior the one who would save us from our sins so you confess Christ as your Savior. Same thing in Romans chapter 10 verse 9 and 10 you confess your mouth to Jesus the Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead he died on the cross to save you and he's risen from the dead you will be saved. So you confess him as your savior and also as your Lord. God has made this Jesus whom you crucified both Lord and Christ. That word right there is so huge. I wish we had time this morning to dive into it but we'd be here another version of this sermon next week but the word Lord used over a hundred times in the book of Acts many times used to refer to God the Father but the majority of time used to refer to Jesus. Basically it means the word means God who rules or God who reigns. And so it's saying that Jesus is God, God in the flesh that he wasn't just a man but it's also saying that he is sovereign he rules and reigns over everything including our lives. And so when we are converted when we come to the point where we enter into faith true biblical faith in Christ what it is is a change of heart, mind, will about our sin, and it's a turning to Christ as the one who saves us from that sin and the one who is Lord over everything in our lives. That's biblical picture of saving faith. Now I'm not saying at this point that when you experience conversion everything is now perfect. Yes we stand justified before God we stand clean before God. And so I would not want for people to doubt their salvation today just because they can they they have sin in their lives still that they struggle with. But I do want to say this once we begin this thing called salvation at that point, it's a process that continues a continual turning from sin and a continual turning to Christ where we realize more and more every day that He is the Lord over our lives that He has saved us and continues to save us from sin and give us victory over sin. And we continue to feel sorrow over our sin. We continue to have our minds changed and our wills changed and our lives look different. And here's where we've missed out on it. We've created salvation to be this point in time we've ignored the rest of scripture what talks about salvation also being something that continues after that. And we've got a bunch of people who have prayed a prayer and walked an aisle but their lives look just like everybody else in the world and the purity of the church has been sacrificed on the altar of an easy believism that we have created when it comes to salvation the question I want to ask you this morning is have you been converted I'm concerned that in our effort to reach as many people as possible we have deluded the gospel and convinced people to believe in a salvation that is less than biblical and deceived people into thinking they're saved and they are not how do I know if I'm converted look at your life is there evidence of a continual turning from sin and a continual turning to Christ is there sorrow over sin is there changes in your life that come in on a day in and day out basis as you submit to the Lordship of Christ and surrender to him in your life is there evidence of that are you saying that my works bring salvation absolutely not please don't hear me saying that but remember that phrase from Acts chapter 26 verse 20? Let me read it to you again. What did Paul say? He said they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds that doesn't mean that you work to get to heaven. That's not what scripture's teaching at all that is a false gospel. However scripture is teaching that you are saved by faith alone yes but not by a faith that is alone. Does that make sense? Your faith shows itself day in and day out and students, adults, anybody in this room if there is not evidence of your faith on a day in and day out basis if there is not a continually turning from sin and turning to Christ then we need to look seriously at what it means to be saved. Jesus said many will say to me on that day Lord, Lord did we not prophesy in your name your name perform many miracles and drive out demons and I will tell them away from me I never knew you evildoers there will be many who will be shocked on that day to find that they were deceived into thinking they were part of the kingdom when they never were this is all important more important than anything else in life and I pray that across this road we take a serious look every one of us in our hearts Pastor not excluded and it really leads to the question if this is the gospel are we going to preach a gospel of cheap grace or of costly grace? What do you mean by that? Well let me use the words of a guy named Dietrich Bonhoeffer this guy German wrote a book called The Cost of Discipleship. Incredible book and he said this cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance it is grace without discipleship and grace without the cross true grace costs a man his life and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life the only man listen to this the only man who has the right to say that he is justified by grace alone is the man who has left all to follow Christ what do you mean? If it's grace we can't earn it exactly and that's the beauty of it because you're so captivated by grace that when you hear Jesus say anyone who will come after me he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me, you lay your nets down like those guys did and you follow him. That's costly grace. It's grace because we get to follow Jesus it's costly because it costs us everything it is our lives Maybe more importantly, have we embraced in each of our lives cheap grace or costly grace? The word leads to conversion. It awakens conviction, it leads to conversion. And finally, the word results in continuation. When you get back to Acts chapter 2, says with many other words, he warned them and he pleaded with them. And many accepted the message, were baptized, and about 3,000 were added to their number that day. Really, the only public thing we know happened there in Acts chapter 2 to cause them to say, Yeah, this is going to be real in my life, was their baptism. Doesn't say they walked down an aisle or signed a card, anything like that. Not that those things are bad. But baptism is huge. It's the way they identified with Christ, with his church. You know, one of my favorite uh evangelists from the past, a guy named George Whitfield, would stand and preach to 20,000 people without a microphone. I don't know how he did it. It's just amazing how God used this guy to lead many people to Christ. People would come up to him and ask him after they had a meeting, they said, How many people were saved in the meeting tonight or this week? His response, he would say, I don't know, we'll see in about six months. You don't hear that from a lot of evangelists today. You hear, well, we had this number, that number. Which Phil wasn't saying that over the next six months they were going to earn their salvation. What he was saying was, we're going to see who's repented by their lives. Do our lives reflect that. In a continuation, in a seeking after Christ. Two components here. We are led by the Spirit. It says, very next verse, 3,000 come to faith, and it says they devoted themselves. The word literally means continued steadfastly. They gave themselves to the apostles' teaching, the other things that we've talked about, but they gave themselves to the Word. Because they were led by the Spirit. When you repent, believe in what Christ has done, that's what we see going on here in Acts chapter 2. Peter promised, you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. It's not just a thing that they get this time, the Spirit, and then they get another day and another day. No, they have the Spirit that would dwell in them. That's the good news. For any of us, once we have truly converted, once we have placed biblical faith in Christ, the Holy Spirit comes to dwell in us, and he is a deposit that guarantees our inheritance. In other words, the spirit is evidenced as the Spirit works in our lives. That repentance is real, that Christ is real to us. He lives inside of us. He doesn't go and come. He lives inside of us, all of us who placed our faith in Christ truly. So we're led by the Spirit, and second, we long for the Word. When the Spirit's in us, and the Spirit wants to feed the character of Christ in us, then we have an innate longing, an innate hunger for the Word inside of us. We want the Word. The more we feed on the Spirit, the more we feed on the Word, the more we want it. There becomes this craving in us, this thirst that can't be quenched with anything else once we've got the Word and the Spirit. Once you get the Word, once you feast on it, and you try to worship without it, it tastes awful. And you say, I want the Word. My spirit longs for the Word. People have asked me, well, how do I have it? How do I get a deeper hunger for the Word? Here's the key. This is extra. You're not even gonna have to pay for this this morning. If you want a deeper hunger for the Word, read the Word. This is good, huh? Because the more you read it, the more you study it, the more you memorize it, the more you meditate on it, the more your spirit longs for more. I remember the first time I went over to Heather's house to eat dinner. My family grew up, never ate seafood. Dad hated seafood, so we all hated seafood. Got over to Heather's house, first meal. Seafood. Got the shrimp put in front of me. I don't like shrimp at that point. But I look around, it's Heather's family. Heather, gotta be kind. So I eat the shrimp. Mmm, this is good shrimp. Wow, that was great. Then I learned it was their pattern on all their family vacations. Seafood, shrimp, all the time. And so I so I continue to eat more. Mmm, this is good. And somewhere along the way I convinced them I liked it. So they'd offered again and again. Today, I love shrimp because I feasted on it. You see how that works? Same thing with the word. It results in a continuation. The question we need to ask is: do our lives reflect a continual evidence of a changed heart? That goes back to the fundamental question that I asked you just a second ago regarding conversion. Do our lives reflect a continual evidence of a changed heart?

SPEAKER_00: 45:36

If your life in this room does not reflect evidence of a continual change of heart, then I pray this morning you would dive seriously into whether or not the Spirit of Christ is in you.net.