Be Diligent to Supplement Yo..

Welcome to Cornerstone Reformed Baptist Church. Thank you for using and sharing our resources. What you're about to hear is God's Word from one of our teaching elders. We trust that God's Word will inspire, instruct, and bless you. For further teachings or information on our ministry, please visit us on our website at cornerstonerbc.

com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. I'm going to invite you, beloved of Christ, to open up your Bibles to the second letter of the Apostle Peter. And we continue with our studies in this book, and perhaps more particularly and specifically on this topic of growing spiritually, of growth in the knowledge and in the grace of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

And as I have said before, our hope and our desire is that the Lord indeed might help us and teach us how we are supposed to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. This is the goal. This is the mission. This is the desire that we will grow in conformity to him, not only with this short series and also with the many sermons that we preach from this pulpit, but also with the series on the Bible studies that we're doing on Thursdays. that we will come together as a church in unity of understanding of what is to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ or in conformity to Christ.

So brothers, sisters and friends who are here and those of you who are online, I'm going to invite you to read together chapter one from verse one to eleven, which is a portion in which we're going to be focusing our attention as these a topic. If you want to be a desire to study together the growth in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, But today I'm going to invite you to place your attention on the third virtue or the second version if you want that is added. And there in verse six, which is knowledge. So we have spoken about many things, I suppose, from 2 Peter 1 and the whole letter. And we have said that this spiritual growth, it is something that is going to transform our faith.

And our faith is transformed by these virtues that we have there. We have spoken briefly last week about virtue and how we are to be diligent to add to our faith virtue And now I hope that the Lord might guide us as we speak and as we hear on that virtue there of knowledge, knowledge. So we are going to be speaking, beloved of Christ, and addressing this concept on this topic of knowledge. According to the apostle and according to the Spirit of God, knowledge is one of those characteristics, one of those virtues, if you want, that is needed for us to grow spiritually. We're gonna be speaking about knowledge and how the knowledge is related to virtue because you see there in the text right or six or verse five better and virtue and to virtue at knowledge.

That is that there is a relationship between virtue and knowledge. So beloved of Christ, having that in our minds, I'm going to invite you in faith and by the Spirit of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ to read together the first 11 verses of this letter as we approach the Lord and as we hope that by His grace and His Spirit, He may guide us in what we say and what we hear, that we indeed may grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. So let's read together once again those 11 verses. Let's pay attention to the context. Let's read it with faith, brothers, sisters, beloved of Christ.

And as we do, may the Lord help us not only to read carefully as people who are going to be judged by everything that they say and even the things that they put in their minds, but also with faith and hope that apart from the illumination of the spirit, we will be hopeless and we will not understand not even one word of what is in front of us. So let's read it together as a congregation, as a family, as a local church, and then we will give ourselves into the meditation of this topic. 2 Peter 1, verse 1 through 11. Simeon and Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ. May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord.

His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises. so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours, and are increasing, they keep you from being an effective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins.

Therefore, Brothers and sisters, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. And that is the word of our Lord. May he bless our meditations, our thoughts, And might He guide us with His Holy Spirit as we speak and as you hear.

Beloved of Christ, my desire and my heart is that together as a church we'll meditate together on this topic of growing in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. And there are so many reasons why we should give ourselves and we should ask the question of scripture of how we are to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. So many reasons why every soul who by grace through faith has been redeemed and inserted into the body of Christ for them, him or her to grow. that we could spend endless sermons speaking about the reasons why we should grow. But let me just call your mind your attention to a couple of them that perhaps will prepare our hearts to meditate upon this topic of knowledge.

The first one is that we are to grow spiritually. We are to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ in conformity to him for the glory of God. Because there will be no Christian who wants to and desires to glorify the father who will not bear fruits in Christ likeness. There is no genuine soul who by grace through faith has been inserted into the person of Jesus Christ. that will not desire to die to self and to be made more like the person of Jesus Christ, to bear fruits of Christ's likeness for the glory of the Father.

We are to grow, beloved brother, sister. We are to grow in Christ likeness for the glory of the one who saved us, for the glory of the one who set this plan of redemption, for the one who loved us before the foundation of the world, for the one who gave his only begotten son, eternally begotten, eternally from the father, so that we will be saved and redeemed and united to him for his glory. And that is a desire that is foreign to your flesh. Fallen flesh does not desire to glorify God. It is only by the life of Jesus Christ in us that we can desire a different extent and different measures to glorify the Lord.

So when we die to self, And Jesus Christ is enthroned in our hearts. And when the Holy Spirit guides us and leads us in everything that we say, do and think and move, when we die to self and he's enthroned in us, then glory is brought to the divine court of heaven. Not that he needs it, but that he has called us to glorify him in being more like his son, Jesus Christ. But there is a second reason why we ought to grow spiritually beloved of Christ. The ultimate glory of God is, of course, to be in our hearts and in our minds.

But there's many reasons. And the second one that I want you call your attention to is for the sake of those souls that are seated around you. Beloved of Jesus Christ. brother, sister, friend, whatever you are seated here or online. We ought to desire to grow spiritually in Christ likeness.

We ought to desire to die to self and that Jesus Christ will be enthroned in our hearts, not only for the glory of the one who loved us and gave himself for us, but also for the edification of the bride that is the object of the love of the Savior. Our brothers, our sisters, the people around you in our local church, their souls, in a sense, depend on the spiritual growth of your heart. and living in a society so individualistic, living in times in which the world is pointing you to live in your own mind, in your own heart, and to seek your own self and the benefit of who you are, then this becomes completely opposite to the desires of who we are and where we live. But if you're going to decide to glorify God, the Father, through Jesus Christ, the Son, in the power of the Holy Spirit, then at the same time, your growth, spiritual growth, is going to be for the sake of your brothers and your sisters. Because you have not been saved to have an individual relationship with the trying God you have in a sense.

But the scripture very clearly says that we have been baptized by the spirit into the body of Christ, and that body is comprised of members. And Jesus Christ is the head of that body. And then when one member suffers, the members are to suffer. And one member struggles, the members are to struggle because of the unity of those members under the headship of Jesus Christ. So if you are pursuing a spiritual growth that is focused entirely on your own, I will warn you to discern in your heart if that is a desire of the Spirit, because the Spirit desires us to be more like Him for the sake of those who are seated around us.

That requires sacrifice and debt to self and love for God and love for the others. We ought to have, beloved of Jesus Christ, the heart that the apostle Paul had. He was between this dichotomy of going and being with the Lord Jesus Christ or remaining alive. And he knew that being with the Lord Jesus Christ was the best, that there was nothing better than to be in glory with the Lord Jesus Christ. But for the sake of the brothers and sisters, he knew that he was to stay.

that his mission was not being fulfilled and completed until he would be spent, not for self, but for the church. The same apostle has the courage of calling the church to imitate him as he imitates Christ. That is, I have died to self so much that the life that is in me is the life of the Lord Jesus Christ. So you are safe and secure in imitating me. Because when you imitate me, you're imitating the Lord Jesus Christ.

What a prideful statement that would be to call another soul to imitate us, if that would be done in the flesh. But if a person was fully conscious by the spirit and by the work of the gospel that he or she is dying to self in such a way that Christ is the one that is enthroned in his her heart, his or her mind. then the same spirit will give freedom to call the brothers and the sisters to imitate us because we are imitating Christ. That is, that I have grown spiritually in such a way that as I have grown, self has died and Christ is enthroned. So imitate me as I imitate Christ.

Brothers and sisters, these are just not simple words that are written in Scripture, but this is what spiritual growth should be. That we should have the freedom then of seeing Jesus Christ in our brothers and sisters and desire to imitate each other because the shining glory of Christ is clear and visible in the life of the sister, in the life of the brother, in the life of the congregation. So then we will move from the passivity of Western Christianity, in which people come to sit in a chair to hear a man or two to speak. But rather, we will operate in the power of the spirit in which will be all of us teaching one another, admonishing one another that the abundance of the grace of God will be so richly poured into us. that just the communion and the fellowship of the saints will be means of grace given to the local church to see Jesus Christ not only preached, but lived out.

So brothers and sisters, Your spiritual growth is the instrument in the hands of God for the edification and for the growth of the others, those who are seated around you. And we are to desire to give ourselves to the hands of the Savior so that he will be the one that molds us and shapes us and changes and kills us. so that the life of Christ in us will be used by the same divine hands to edify our brothers and sisters. This cannot be done in the flesh. In the flesh, pride will take cover.

And in the flesh, men will desire to be followed, to be heard, to be approved, and to have the empty worship of people like you, just for the sake of satisfying self. That's how cults start. And that's how dead churches, even among reformed people, start. When people become followers of men, instead of being followers of Jesus Christ. When people become followers of doctrines and systems and traditions, rather than followers of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And the best way that we can guarantee and secure and protect our individual spiritual growth is when the one that is next to me, the one who lives with me, the one that comes to church with me, is also growing spiritually in Christ-likeness, is also growing in the knowledge and in the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, is also growing in practical knowledge of our faith, what we have here in 1 Peter. Knowledge. practical, biblical knowledge. If we are going to grow spiritually, beloved of Christ, if we are going to grow in Christ likeness, the apostle calls us in chapter one to grow or to add to our faith through virtue, practical knowledge. Not the divine knowledge that God has known as before the foundation of the world, but rather practical knowledge.

And we ought to be very careful. But when it comes, when it comes to knowledge, beloved of Christ, the Bible does not only cause us to add to our virtue knowledge, but the Apostle Paul also calls us to be careful of knowledge. Because knowledge paths up. Pride can easily open the doors for a fleshly knowledge to come into your heart and into your soul, not to produce any fruit of benefit for your soul or for the souls of those who are around you, but rather a knowledge that does not edify, but rather destroys. So, brothers and sisters, I have to warn you, because the Bible clearly says that knowledge paths up.

Pride is a good companion of fleshly knowledge. But at the same time, the scripture, brother, sister, calls us to grow in practical knowledge. That is what we have there in verse six. And I want you to see all of those virtues. From faith, we're adding all of those virtues.

If we desire to grow, beloved, if we desire to grow, we are to add all of those seven virtues to our faith. And in there we have knowledge. The only thing that I want to do this afternoon, The only thing that I want us to meditate together and just to grasp from here is to think carefully on the biblical definition of practical knowledge. Only that. And once we have done that, I want us just to see the relationship of biblical practical knowledge to virtue, because that's what the text says.

I want us to think carefully as a church, not as people who come just to hear, just to be a church, just to tick a box on a Sunday. So I have appeased my conscience, but rather carefully examine as a congregation and knowing that this practical knowledge of our faith is needed for our individual growth and for our collective growth to meditate upon that. together, and once we have spoken about that, I want us to take that definition of practical knowledge and then to see how it is related to virtue, because the text requires us to do so. So brothers and sisters, the knowledge that the apostle is speaking here is not other than practical knowledge. As I said, it is not the divine knowledge that he has spoken about in verse three when he said that through the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, we have been called to his grace or to his glory and his virtue.

It is not the knowledge of God that has initially saved us and the knowledge that sustains our salvation, but rather is the practical knowledge of the life of the believer. Of course, the context is very clear because Peter has already spoken about this knowledge, divine knowledge that has given to us all things that pertain to life and godliness. And now he's addressing practical virtues of the Christian life. So when he says knowledge, he's speaking about the practical knowledge that we ought to have of our faith. In other words, and in more simple words, beloved, this is what do we believe about our faith?

These are the doctrines. These are the teachings of our faith, the Christian faith, that are supposed to point us and to guide us to a more real communion and knowledge of the Savior. This knowing with our head doctrines, teachings, beliefs that we hold are meant to be means that will guide your soul to know the Lord Jesus Christ more intimately. So we're not addressing divine knowledge or this spiritual knowledge of communion with God, but rather we're addressing an aspect of it which is the practical knowledge of the church. Jude, when he was writing his letter, he said that he wanted to write about their common salvation.

Remembering Jude chapter one, only one chapter, Jude, that he wanted to write about their common salvation. But he found it necessary to write to you, exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the Saints. Jude says, I desired and I wanted to write about the glorious gospel of salvation through which you have been eternally known and have been redeemed. But because of false teachers among you, I found it necessary to write, exhorting you to contend earnestly for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints. Why?

For certain people have crept into the church unnoticed. who are affecting and going against the truth that had been given to the saints. If we are going to grow spiritually, beloved of Christ, we are to grow in the knowledge of the Savior as it is mediated through the knowledge of the scriptures and the knowledge of doctrines and beliefs, what I'm calling here the practical knowledge of our faith. How are we going to understand this? We're going to understand it from the scriptures, of course.

But once again, beloved, I don't want to get into a definition of what practical knowledge is without giving you the warning, a warning that so easily can take us in our heart. And that is a warning that even though we are called by the scriptures to growing the knowledge of matters that are written in this book, We are to be very careful that the knowledge that we decide to receive from the Scriptures will not make us idolaters of intellectualism, that will not make us idolaters of theology, that will not make us idolaters of intelligence. It's so easy for a person to give himself to the long and prolonged and elongated time of study of the Scriptures just for the sake of having a name among the Church, while his or her heart is completely empty of love and faith for the brothers and sisters. is so easy for a person to devote him or herself to extended hours of everything that I said last week. Study, reading and studying and meditation and memorization and all of these things of the scripture with a heart that is deceived and that is filled with absolute pride.

I don't know if you can hear the word in beloved of Christ. I'm telling you as one who had been taken captive by the idolatry of intelligence at times. I'm telling you as one who has spoken to you from this pulpit. Honoring and glorying the thoughts of his or the mind of men. This is something that is very deceitful to our hearts.

The Bible calls us to grow in knowledge, but we ought to be very careful that we understand so. If not, we are just going to have a nice conservative Reformed Baptist Church filled with Pharisees who will go to hell. So we are to be careful with that, beloved of Christ. Practical knowledge. How are we going to understand this practical knowledge that we must add so that we will grow spiritually?

Practical knowledge, beloved of Christ, listen to this, is the certainty in the heart off any matter off the faith because his beliefs is a certainty in your heart that is the result off hearing God's word in a scripture by faith that will move you to action. Brother, sister, dear soul, the practical knowledge that you require to grow in Christ likeness, the practical knowledge that your soul needs independently of what your name is or how long you have been walking in the Lord, the type of knowledge that is required of your soul that you will supplement to your virtue as you supplement to your faith is the knowledge that is a certainty. in the heart about any matter of the faith that is the result of hearing God's word in a scripture by faith that will move you to action. just by giving you that definition, I want us, all of us, just to pass that which we say that we believe, through that definition, and ask ourselves, is in reality, the things that we say that we hold to, and the faith that we say that we have, in reality, it's like certainty in your heart. That is the result of hearing God's word in a scripture, by your faith, not someone else's faith.

that is moving you to do, to action. From certainty to something that is lived out. Practical knowledge will never abide in your mind. Biblical practical knowledge will always connect certainty with action. And at this very point, we should be asking ourselves of the many things that we say that we believe, if we can before the Lord say that the things that we hold as belief, that we say that we have in our minds, have taken us through the process of producing in us the fruit that the scripture clearly says, that which we know Christ should produce in our lives.

Other than that, beloved of Christ, more than likely whatever we say flows into the category of hypocrisy. Practical knowledge. Certainty. No doubt. How would a person live if he or she has a doubt?

For you to have and be moved to action, you have to have certainty. There's no doubt. A person cannot claim to know when that person has doubt, but rather a person has to have full certainty and conviction. No room for questioning in your mind. The person who questions will be like the wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.

One day will do it. One another day will not do it. Because there is doubt, a certainty that is not to abide in your mind, but rather a certainty that is to abide in your heart. No, I'm not saying that your mind has to be bypassed, the beloved of Jesus Christ. Your mind is a means by which the well of your heart is supposed to be filled with knowledge of your faith.

This means that it's not an intellectual exercise, but rather it's a spiritual exercise. It is a certainty that abides in your heart, not in your mind, that is the result, brother, and sister of hearing God's word through the scriptures, not hearing my words and then believe in it just because I say it, not hearing the words of your favorite theologian and then just taking and agreeing with them, but hearing God's word through the scriptures. What I'm talking about here is what people call illumination. That is, that your heart, for you to practically know, truly knowing your mind along, not in a hypocritical, pharisaical way, the spirit of God has to illuminate to you his word. And in a sense, he's God, the one that speaks to you.

Of course, God has decreed that he will use teachers and preachers and the church to instruct the believer on how to receive the light of the wisdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, But what you need to ask yourself is that if all of those things that you say that you believe and that you hold have been truly received from the voice of God, that you have been in agreement with God, that you have been in agreement with the one who speaks through this scripture. So that means that just like the Bereans, those people that are to be taught and be instructed by men, are the ones that are going to be diligent in confirming whatever they hear with whatever is written. Because, brothers and sisters, with all your respect, if God does not speak to your own heart, you will never have a spiritual certainty that will move you to action. Again, you will be like a wave of the sea driven and toast by the wind.

And then in worst case scenario, every canning doctrine of men will take over your mind from one place to another. The Church of the Lord Jesus Christ is in urgent need to be taught, to be instructed, to be spoken by God himself and not by men. brothers and sisters, if we understand truly the importance of what I'm telling you, we will see that many of the things that many times we believe, we have just passively inherited from the system of Christianity to which we believe, many times not questioning what we heard, not questioning what we have read, not questioning what we have received, because sometimes the person that is communicating those things unto us. How is that going to be tested? Well, it's going to be tested that you are spoken from God by faith and that is going to produce action.

That is that when God truly speaks to you, when God truly teaches your soul and when God truly comes to you through the scriptures and gives you the light that is needed, he's gonna be so faithful that he was he's going to give you the certainty, not in your mind where you forget. but rather he is going to, with his holy finger, inscripturate in your tablet of flesh in your heart that which he desires to speak and to command and to instruct to you. Of course, he can do it through teachers, preachers, and the church. And that will eventually be moved into action. Brother and sister, beloved of Christ, What is the purpose of saying that we believe in the sovereignty of God?

What is the purpose of preaching and very strongly affirming the attributes and the sovereignty of God? Even when tribulation comes and when difficulty arrives, we are taken completely by anxiety and by fear. Now, I'm not saying that Christians are not to experience anxiety or fear. But if we truly believe the sovereignty of God, if we truly believe that God is in full control and that has been spoken to us by the Spirit into our hearts, then he will equip us for the time of tribulation to rest and have peace. Because that which is meant to be a certainty in your heart, will move you, brother and sister, to action.

What does it profit if a person says that they believe that the gospel is the power of God unto salvation and that hell is real, if their life is characterized for a complete lack of concern for the lost? How is that a reality in the heart of that person? How can a person affirm that indeed the gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God unto salvation, if that person is utterly non-concerned, not even moved for the lost? And I'm not even speaking about going and sharing the gospel or going to the street, but rather in prayers. How much have you prayed about those people?

How much have you wept about your father or mother or your uncle or your friend who is going to hell very soon? How can we say that we truly believe a doctrine if that doctrine does not move us to action? How can we believe that we are to reverence God, that we are to fear God, and that God is omnipotent, and that this is omniscient, that he sees all things? If when we go into the secret place when people do not see, we give ourselves to horrendous sins. Sins that we will not commit in the eyes of people because we fear them.

And we will be ashamed that people will see us committing those sins. But the God that is omniscient and that knows all things, the one that we say He's in control of everything, that one does not matter. Beloved of Jesus Christ. We can so easily just tick the box of, I believe, I believe, I believe, I believe, I believe. The Trinity, the deity of Christ, the atonement, the gospel, what the church is, that we are to love one another.

If we truly believe that the church is to be edified, if we truly believe that Christ has called us to love one another, how is that manifested in action? Brother and sister, sermons pass. We prepare these things and we come and preach to you and words are utter. Many of them are forgotten. There's absolutely no point in this exercise.

It will be futile and completely religious if not even one statement of what is said is apprehended by faith, taken in your head and put it in practice by the Holy Spirit. We ought to be tired and exhausted of religion, in which is a performance of someone speaking and then simply just doing particular things. We ought to desire to move ourselves by the power of the Holy Spirit in the truth of the scriptures, to treasure up things in heaven. Treasures in the earth, on earth will pass away, they will be destroyed, they will be broken into. But we have been called to treasure up things in heaven in eternity.

And you think that that is coins or cars or houses? No. Things in your heart. The Word of God that can free you. The Word of God that can liberate you.

The Word of God that can empower you. The Word of God that can move you from one state to a greater manifestation of His glory. That your vessel will be enlarged. Yes, we all will be glorified. But that your vessel will be enlarged in such a measure in this side of eternity that you will be enjoying forever your communion with Christ, ever growing in joy and communion with him because of who he is.

In glory, yes, but treasuring up things in heaven, beloved of Christ. This is the important thing that we ought to question ourselves. How much we have inherited from Christianity? How much we have inherited from the church and from the world? How many things we just simply take them for granted and we don't even give ourselves to confirm if we truly believe those things?

How much time we have spending confirming in our heart, if the things that are preached from this pulpit are according to what is written. How quick are we to obey men and how quick are we to receive from this book and this video online or whatever, whatever. How quick are we to do so, and to indeed desire to hear the words of God speaking to our hearts in the Scriptures through His means, so that we will have certainty in the heart, beloved of Christ, not certainty in the head. There is a very clear example of how certainty in your head beloved moves you to powerful action. Remember Exodus chapter 32 and even our brother mentioned something of it as Moses was interceding on behalf of the people of Israel when the Lord God of Israel, After he had liberated these people from the punishment and the bondage under the Egyptians, how this Lord of glory after he had shown himself to them and after he had performed all these glorious miracles and after he had even gone up to the mountain to prepare himself to enter in glorious covenant marriage with the people of Israel, how he was preparing Moses and everything for these people.

How these people rebelled and changed him as a prostitute, given themselves to false gods and to sexual immorality. And how, in the coming down off Moses, how the Lord said, I will make a great nation out of you. Let me destroy them. And then Moses intercedes on behalf of the people to hold the wrath of God so that the punishment of God will not come upon them. But when Moses goes down and he is before all of the sin that is committed in the authority and in the knowledge of the will of God, Moses said, Who is on the side of the Lord?

In front of him, before him, were sinners who had violated and broken the commandments of the Lord. Yet Moses, in the authority of the Savior and in the authority of the Lord God of Israel, says, Who is on the side of the Lord? The Levites, pierced by conviction, move on the side of Moses, on the side of the Lord. And these Levites are commanded to take the sword and to kill. their brothers and sisters.

Many of them perished. That is what certainty, beloved. That is what full assurance that what the Lord has said to me is indeed from the Lord and requires action does. Because there will be a time in which the church is to stand firm in the truth. And we are never going to stand firm in the truth if your theology abides in your head just because Mr.

This or Mr. That said so. We will never be able to stand firm in the truth, in the living truth of Jesus Christ, if we have not been spoken by God to our hearts. It's very difficult. It's very difficult to oppose the government, to oppose the world, to oppose false Christianity, when you are not led by the truth of God.

Understand this. It's easier for us to want to please one another. It's easier for us to want to please people. We love the worship of men. We love the appreciation of people.

It's very difficult to be able to take the sword and to kill your brother because the Lord says so. You will only do it when you know that is the Word of God and that is the truth. Are you willing to go against this church for the truth of God? Or are you so taken by Cornerstone Reformed Baptist Church that you will not even question what is said from the pulpit? Religion.

and the flesh abounds in you and in me. And if we don't die to self, we can pursue something that can be a condemnation for us. We are to stand firm in the truth. And for a person to stand firm in the truth, they need to have been spoken by God. Are you willing to take the sword against your son?

Are you willing to take the sword against your daughter? against your wife? Or the idolatry of family has taken you so much? Are you willing to take the sword for your elder? Are you willing to stand firm in the truth when everyone opposes that?

You are not in the flesh. We can only stand firm in the truth beloved of Jesus Christ when we have a certainty in the heart that is the result of receiving God's word that he has spoken to us by faith and that moves us to action. That's why many conservative reform Baptist churches, once you remove the preacher, then the church is scattered. Once you remove the one that leads, the church is scattered. Why?

Because followers of men. Because they are followers of system. The church is the buttress and the foundation of truth. It's not the buttress and the foundation of the ministry of so-so and so-so. is the batteries, the foundation, is the pillar of the truth of God.

And the church will never stand firm if it's not in the truth of God. And you cannot stand firm in the truth of God if God does not speak to you. You can be so articulated. You can belong to the reformed camp. You could have read all the systematic theologies.

You could have gone through authors that people do not even understand. You could have gone through all the Puritans and 17th century and 18th century literature. You could have memorized all of it. Yet when you are required to take the sword and to pierce and take those who you don't want, You will not be able to do it because you have not been spoken by the Lord. Standing on the truth or in the truth, whatever preposition you use, standing in the truth requires that God speaks to your heart.

Beloved of Christ, it's not only about standing in the truth. It is about your practical life. It's very difficult to go to your computer at night when no one sees and give yourself to pornography when you truly believe that God sees all things. It is very difficult to raise your voice in anger and wrath to your kids and to your wife when you truly believe that you are not to do so, but love your husband, your wife and your kids as Christ loved the church. The love of Christ poured into the context of the church.

is very difficult to act contrary to the things that we truly believe in our hearts. Your heart is a well, right? Your heart is a well of water. And your life comes from your heart. It does not come from your mind.

Your life comes from your heart. Everything that we do, say, think, comes from the heart. And then you are to feel, not your head, with information, you are to fill your heart with beliefs or convictions. The more convictions and beliefs that you have in your heart, the more authority and freedom of conscience that you will have when you speak, and the less that you will depend on the flesh, and the more fruit that will be in you, and the more fruit that will be in the context of the church. Just take that, beloved of Christ.

I'm not gonna say any more than that. Everything that you know, everything that you believe, is it a certainty in your heart that you have personally, not with other people, that you have personally heard from God himself through the scriptures? Yes, he could. He could have used preachers and teachers and the church that is by faith and that is moving you to action. All of us should question that beloved of Christ.

All of us should question that. Second thing that I want us to do is now to analyze the relationship between this practical knowledge and virtue, right? That's what I said. I want us just to analyze biblically Now, all of these practical knowledge of the Christian life that I have spoken about, what is the relationship to virtue? Because the text says that we are to take this knowledge and not to our virtue, this virtue that has been added to our faith.

And in a sense, the answer to that question has been already given. Because if you remember last week, I said that virtue could be summarizing good works or moral excellence or uprightness. So what is the relationship between knowledge and good works? Well, it's just simply given in the definition that I gave you. That is a certainty in the heart that will move you to action.

That is, that every single good work or righteous work that we are going to be performing has to be rooted in a genuine, faithful knowledge of what God says. In other words, that we do the will of God externally because we have received the will of God in our hearts. Or in the words of Paul, that our heart is so filled with faith that everything that comes from the heart, that comes from faith, that is a righteous work or deed because it's proceeding from a belief and righteous knowledge in the heart of God. That is the general relationship between knowledge and virtue. But I want to point your attention to something more important, I think, that pertains to us and that it will be relevant to us.

And that is the word conscience. Conscience. The way that beloved of Christ knowledge, this practical knowledge of which I have been speaking now for these minutes, the way that that knowledge, that practical knowledge relates to virtue or to good works is through your conscience. Knowledge defines your conscience and your conscience defines your good works. The sooner, the better that we understand that it will save us a lot of false conviction of sin, false repentance of sin, and it will help us to move into forgiveness more easily.

Beloved of Christ, pay attention to what I said. knowledge, the knowledge of the scriptures that you have the knowledge of the Savior, the knowledge of the faith, your knowledge of what is written in the word that is meant to be received from the mouth of God. That knowledge defines your conscience. And your conscience is the filter through which works are done. Knowledge defines your conscience, and conscience defines your works.

Come with me to Romans chapter one to make a general appreciation or consideration of what your conscience is, and then I will show you something. Romans chapter one, chapter two. This is what, generally speaking, brother or sister, brother, sister, friend, this is what your conscience is. The apostle is speaking here. about the natural righteous condemnation of the Gentiles who do not have the law of God.

And then it says in chapter two, verse 14, for when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts. Remember, these are the Gentiles who do not have the law of God. They have the work of the Lord written on their hearts while it says their conscience also bear witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them. That is, beloved brother and sister, that is that the Gentiles, that is that people who do not have the law of God, they do not need to have the law of God in order to know that which is right and that which is not right or that which is seen and that which is not seen because the work of the law is written on their hearts.

And because the work of the law is written in their hearts, their conscience testifies, accuse them or excuse them. A person does not need to be born in Israel for them to know the law of the Lord. People know that lying is against the commandments, that stealing is against the commandments. There is a God given conscience that testifies to a person of what should be done and what should not be done. Conscience defines works not only for the Christian, but for everyone.

A person that is outside of Christianity will be either accused or excused by their conscience. Conscience means with knowledge, because knowledge defines the conscience and the conscience defines the works that are done. Every person knows what is right and what is wrong. And by doing against their conscience, they are convicted of their sin. And now they know that they have broken the commandments of the one that is going to judgment eternally.

Same thing happens in the life of the Christian. Imagine how much more if a dead person in their sins and in their trespasses had God given knowledge of that which is right and that which is evil. How much more will be a genuine believer, a Christian whose conscience has been revived, whose heart has been made anew, whose soul has been restored? How much more the conscience of a Christian will not be the one that defines the works that are done? So we say your knowledge of your faith defines your conscience and your conscience defines your works.

Now come with me, please, to Romans chapter 14, because now in Romans chapter 14, the apostle will precisely address here This very important matter of the practical life of the believer, brother and sister. Very important aspect of the life of the believer. Now, I just want us to see together, beloved, how we are to connect what we know with the things that we do. How are we going to produce works that are meant to bring glory to the Lord? How are we going to be light and salt to the world and to the church?

How are we going to connect what we know with the things that we do through our conscience? Because knowledge defines conscience and conscience defines our works. Let us just read here together, beloved of Christ, the situation on the things that were taking place in the Roman church according to the apostles. So let us read the whole chapter, chapter 14, and then I will make just a couple of points there, and then we will finish. Romans chapter 14.

And for the one who is weak in faith, welcome him, but not to quarrel over opinions. One person believes he may eat anything, while the weak person eats only vegetables. Let not the one who eats despise the one who abstains, and let not the one who abstains pass judgment on the one who eats, for God has welcomed him. Who are you to pass judgment on the servant of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls, and he will be upheld for the Lord is able to make him stand.

One person esteems one day as better than other, while another esteems all days alike. Remember, we're speaking in the context of the church, different opinions, different doctrines, different knowledge, right? Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind. Verse six. The one who observes the day of service in honor of the Lord, the one who eats it in honor of the Lord, since he gives thanks to God, while the one who abstains abstains in honor of the Lord and gives thanks to God.

For no one of us lives to himself. And no one of us dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord. And if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's.

For to this end, Christ died and lived again, that he may be the Lord both of the dead and of the living. Why do you pass judgment on your brother? Or you, why do you despise your brother? For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God, for it is written, As I leave, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us will give an account of himself to God.

Now pay attention to this section of which we're gonna be paying attention to. Therefore, Let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother or sister. I know, the apostle says, knowledge, right? I know and I'm persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. But it is unclean for anyone who thinks it unclean.

For if your brother is grieved by what you eat, you are no longer walking in love. By what you eat, do not destroy the one for whom Christ died. So do not let what you regard as good to be spoken of as evil. For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking, but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever that serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men.

So then let us pursue what makes for peace and for mutual building. Pay attention to this. Do not for the sake of fruit. You could put any other doctrine or knowledge there. Do not for the sake of eschatology, food or whatever, do not for the sake of food destroy the work of God.

Everything is indeed clean, but it is wrong for anyone to make another Istanbul by what he eats. It is good not to eat meat or drink wine or do anything that causes your brother to stumble. The faith that you have keep between yourself and God. Blessed is the one who has no reason to pass judgment on himself for what he approves. But whoever has doubts is condemned if he eats, because the eating is not from faith, for whatever does not proceed from faith is sin.

Let me just point a couple of things here for you. And the first thing is that I want to back up everything that I said before now from this passage of the scriptures. I said to you, brother and sister, that the practical knowledge that you are to pursue is the one that is a certainty in the heart that is the result of hearing the Lord through his word. that by faith moves you to action. See verse 14.

The apostle, the Pharisee, the one who has kept himself from eating all despicable foods and despised food for his whole life. The one who has removed himself from anything that is not pure and not clean, that person has now been persuaded and convinced by the Lord. Verse 14, the apostle says, I know and I'm persuaded in the Lord Jesus that nothing is unclean in itself. The one who gave himself to memorize the commandments of the Old Testament, the one who spent his whole life living religion in a particular way because knowledge defines conscience and conscience works. His knowledge was wrong.

And his conscience moved him to do these observance of these particular things. But when Jesus Christ came, gave him the spiritual knowledge of that law. So the one who once had refrained himself from eating things that he considered to be unclean, now he says, nothing is unclean in itself. Nothing is unclean in itself. How offensive to the nature of a Pharisee who had spent his entire life doing that.

Brother and sister, if you are not convinced by the Lord, if you're not persuaded by the Lord in any aspect of our practical life, you will never have the courage of the Apostle Paul to give up everything for the sake of the excellency of the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. a Jew of the Jews, blameless according to the righteousness that is of the law, that he counts all of that as dung, as rubbish, for the excellency of the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Why? Because he was taught by God. His eyes were opened.

He was illuminated. He was taught by God, and therefore he was moved to action. Second thing that I want you to see there, beloved, is in the second half of that verse that he says, but it is unclean for anyone who thinks it is unclean. Why? Because knowledge defines your conscience and your conscience defines your works.

Your conscience governs what you do. For so you are supposed to feed your conscience with exceeding measures of the knowledge of the things that are written, so that your behavior will be in alignment with the will of God and with the heart of God. The apostle is never saying that people have the freedom to define their lives according to their consciences. What apostle is saying that in the exercise of our good works that are rooted in our knowledge, we are to take care and respect the one that is weaker in their faith. Not that we're going to ignore their ways that are not according to what is written, but rather that we're going to walk with them and instruct them in the way of the Lord, not accusing them and judging them based on who we are, but rather take them to a better and deeper understanding of the things that are written.

So that means, beloved of Christ, that your own conscience and your own understanding of matters is not the standard of behavior of your brothers and sisters. Your conscience, your knowledge is not the standard to which your brothers and sisters need to submit. All of us need to submit to the standard of the word of God. Even if the knowledge that you have corresponds to scripture, a person should never submit to your own preference. That is so unloving.

That is so self-righteous. That is so prideful. And we are to be careful to judge our brothers, as the apostle says, even in our hearts, because our brother or sister does not meet the expectation of what I think that should be done. That is a satanic heart. The standard to which brothers and sisters should be submitted is the standard of the word of God as God speaks to them and gives them the certainty in their heart of what they are to do.

Otherwise, you're going to have followers of you and followers of your ways and followers of your religion. And remember, you cannot save souls. We want to guide people to have an understanding of the things as they are written. And our goal is that the Lord will speak to the heart of my brother and my sister. And as the Lord speaks to the heart of my brother and my sister, I'm going to be an instrument of the words of God for my brother and my sister so that his or her conscience will be shaped to the will of the Lord.

And I'm not going to make my behavior of my standard or my conscience or my understanding the standard upon which I judge my brother or my sister, not openly, but in the heart. This will protect your heart from secret frustration. sinful frustration. This will protect you from secret self-pity, which is a sin. This will protect you in the secret place of harboring bitterness in your heart against the behavior of your brothers and your sisters.

And this will protect you from spiritual pride. Because when you don't open your mouth to the brother, but you conceive and have these things in your head, in the secret place, you're basically saying, I am so mature, and I'm so spiritual, and they are not. And this produces everything except individual spiritual growth for you and for the church. Remember what I said. We desire to grow spiritually, not only for the glory of God, but also for the edification of our brothers and our sisters.

This cannot be done in religion. This cannot be done dressing properly and coming to church and singing in a particular way. This cannot be done just following a confession of faith and having a gathering and then just all coming together and do these things at that. This can only be accomplished by the power of the Holy Spirit, who works sanctification and holiness and Christlikeness in the secret place in our hearts. And then this is brought into the context of the church.

And in the mutual edification, we grow together in the likeness of the Savior. So that when fire comes, the work that has been built, it is not with these materials that perish of 1 Corinthians chapter 3, which I cannot pronounce, but I hope that you remember those materials. So that we will be establishing gold, right? And precious stones. That and this is speaking of the fire that goes through the church.

So beloved of Jesus Christ. Your knowledge defines your conscience and your conscience defines your good works. And as we attain and as we grow in the knowledge of matters of scripture, we are to come together as a church and brother, brothers and sisters in trying to be on the only fight and united in that particular understanding. So that fruit will be the same for the congregation. So brother and sister, many of you have been Christians longer than I have been alive.

Some of you have been going to church longer than I have been alive that I've been saved or that I've been preaching. Some of you have been in church for decades. How much of that? How much of that knowledge and those practices and those things that you do and you hold are so sacred? How much of that is God speaking to you through his word, to your heart, so that you are so convinced by God himself, by faith, that is now moving you to act not based on tradition, not based on the way that you've been doing things for the last 10, 20, 30, 60, 80, 90, whatever years.

but rather that your conscience is so taken and captive by the word of the Lord that you have free done. Liberty, you know how James calls the scriptures in James chapter one, the law of liberty, or perhaps in new translations it will say freedom or something like this. the law of freedom, because Paul can call Timothy in first Timothy chapter one to have a clean conscience, a pure heart and a sincere faith. Because by the power of the Holy Spirit, all things have been given to us that pertain to life and godliness. And that which we say that we know can be lived out in free done.

Men, traditions, and church practices will never give you freedom. They will always keep you in bondage, in secret bondage in the heart of self-pride and self-exaltation, in which we condemn our brothers in our hearts because they are not as good as we are. Or just simply with a cold, indifferent Christianity that we are so okay coming to church to do these things, but in the secret place we're dead. brothers and sisters. How are we going to know that that which we know is indeed practical, biblical knowledge?

Come with me, please, to 1 Corinthians chapter 1, and let me point you to something there. Truly, brother, sister, consider these words that we are about to read. Let me just simply point you to a couple of questions. We read Romans 14. Perhaps I'm not going to get you to read the whole chapter, but let me just read this with you.

And let me just ask these questions to you, and then we will conclude. First Corinthians, I said, right? Chapter two, verse one. And this is Paul, and he says, And I, when I came to you, brothers and sisters, did not come proclaiming to you the testimony of God with folly, with lofty speech or wisdom, For I decided to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. And I was with you in weakness and in fear and much trembling.

And my speech and my message, this is the word that was preached, were not implausible words of wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and in power. He was not Paul. He was the spirit preaching through him. Verse five. What was the purpose of that?

That his teaching will be in the spirit and not in the flesh so that Your faith, which is not an intellectual faith, but a faith that is meant to be lived out so that your faith might not rest in the wisdom off men, but in the power off God. That our faith, not only when we first received it, right? But our faith that is meant to be the means by which we live our lives from faith to faith. The righteous shall live by faith. We will be given initial life and our life will be sustained and we will be preserved by faith.

That our faith may not stand in the wisdom of men. That is, that which is fleshly, but rather that our faith may rest in the power of the spirit that is the one that brings all of these glorious wisdom that was reserved and kept from the ages began, that according to the same apostle Ephesians chapter three is through the church that this eternal wisdom has been revealed, namely the incorporation of the Gentiles into the church, but that this wisdom is given to us for growing in maturity. is that which we believe established upon the power of God. Brother and sister, it's not about knowing this much. It's about knowing this way.

You can know this, the gospel is sufficient to save your soul, but that which is going to give you greater measures of communion and greater measures of the life of Christ in your soul is not that you know this much with this depth. but rather, I'm from man, but rather that you hear this from the Lord, that you hear his word through the scriptures this much. It is not about you reading three hours per day the scriptures. If you can, and if you are able, do it. But is that the Lord speaks to you this, and this profound, this depth.

It is that whatever he says does not get here, but goes into your heart. Continue, please, before I say other things. Go, please, to verse... I don't want to make you read the whole thing. So just go to verse 9.

But as it is written, what no eye has seen, no ear heard, nor the heart of many imagined, what God has prepared for those who love Him. Horrible verse taken out of context many times. It's not about physical things. It's about the wisdom of God that was eternally from before the ages. that these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit.

Pay attention to this. For the Spirit searches everything, even the depths of God. For who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person which is in him? So also no one comprehends the thoughts of God except the spirit of God. Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit of who is from God, that we may understand the things freely given us by God.

Our faith, brother and sister, is not an intellectual faith. It is a spiritual faith. Of course, it goes through your mind, but it's a spiritual faith. And we are to strive and we are to decide and we are to pray, not to know with your head, but to be taught and to be spoken by the Spirit of God. even if that causes any type of discomfort in your theology.

But every time that we come to the scriptures and every time that we seek the Lord, we are to be spoken, illuminated by the Lord. Because when he speaks this much unto our souls, he accomplishes this much of glory. When men spend a lot of time with words and things and efforts, they accomplish zero because it's a spiritual matter. Verse 13, and we impart these words And we impart these in words not taught by human wisdom, but taught by the Spirit, interpreting spiritual truths to those who are spiritual. The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.

The spiritual person judges all things, but that is himself to be judged by no one. For who has understood the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him. And this is just simply the statement that I want to point your attention to. But we, the church, not the individual, but we, the church, not will have, but we have the mind of Christ. by virtue of this glorious gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, which is the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes by virtue of the glorious condescension of God that when we were still sinners, Jesus Christ died for us by virtue of the grace of the trying God.

in choosing us before the foundation of the world in love in him to set us before him blameless and without a spot by virtue of the scriptures and the testimony of God. By virtue of this God, the life of Christ has been given to us in such a measure that the mind of Christ now is ours. And we can know the things of God as Christ knows the things of God and how the Christ know the things of God? This is the test for your beliefs. This is how you test the veracity, the verity, the power, the truth, the spiritual substance of those things that you say that you believe.

He knew what the Father gave him to do. And from what he knew and the work that the Father gave him to do, he gave himself in heart to pray, even though he knew what was going to come, that he will remove himself from the presence of his disciples and of the people to continue to pray for the will of God that he knew that was going to be accomplished by the plans and the will of God moved the one who knew all things to his knees, so that when he will left and depart from his knees, he will walk to serve and sacrifice for others. When we have the knowledge of Jesus Christ really and truly spoken to our heart, that will be evidence and clearly seen in your secret, private life of prayer, that that reality and that thought has taken you too. Because when God speaks to your heart, then your heart is going to move you in the secret place to be amazed of the things that God has, through his spirit, communicated and revealed unto you. So that when you depart from your knees, now you put into action the thing that the Lord has given you and spoken to you, just as the Lord Jesus Christ did.

Brother and sister, let us not give ourselves to accumulate this much knowledge when the substance of it is so little or absent, but let us give ourselves to seek the Lord truly in humility and meekness and recognizing how needy and weak we are so that whatever the Lord speaks to us is not this, but is rather so profound and into our hearts that indeed will move us in tears in the secret place for the state of our soul and for the state of our brothers and sisters and of the world. And importantly, that when depart from the secret place of our knees, that we will put into practice the things that we say that we believe. For what does it profit if you speak majestic things with your mouth? What does it profit if you know this and that? But then, if your soul is taken captive by sin, by secret immorality, and by awful thoughts, what is the benefit of all of it?

Only that people will treasure up wrath for the day of wrath. We have been given freedom from self, and we have been given freedom from the knowledge of the flesh, so let us come, brother, sister, young, and the adults, and whoever is within the sound of my voice, You can come before the presence of the Lord and seek Him in such a way that He will be the one that instructs you, and He is the one that teaches you, and He is the one that always sustains you and keeps you and provides for your soul everything that is needed. Men cannot do so, will never do, and will never be any benefit in that which men give. And for that, beloved of Christ, it's not only the secret place, but the context of this feeble, weak, small church. That's why we need one another.

Because God speaks to us and teaches us primarily through the secret place in our community with Him and in the context of a local church. in the context of our brothers and sisters, that we will grow in the truth, in the baptism, in the foundation of the truth, in the local church, so that we will all have the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our conscience will be brought into alignment to His, and then our works will be the result of the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ. So then when the people of God spend time and the Lord does not arrive and come 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 years, There will be one outcome and one conclusion that after 50 years of being together and those who have passed as the time has passed all of the people that have been with the Lord. But after 40, 50 years of being together, you can see a people now that love themselves so much in the Lord Jesus Christ.

and that now their knowledge and understanding is so united in the truth, as the Apostle Paul says in Ephesians chapter four, and that they are walking in that truth, not that they are the same, that we respect the differences, but the Lord is working so much that is now Jesus Christ living in our hearts. And then we can say, just as we say for our families, we are indeed a family because we are united in the one for whom all things will be united when he comes. Amen.