Glen Bond Sunday Night May 21, 2006 Picayune MS Subject: The self-righteous sinner A sinner doesn't like to hear what I'm saying. All that I say implys condemnation. and condemnation implys - Hell. If you don't like what I am preaching, then you must be , without doubt a lost sinner. Do you think that I am telling you a bunch of baloney? Does it hurt your pride? Does it expose your self-righteousness? Do you want to run off and ignore what I am saying? Pride and self-righteousness are the two big things that keep a sinner running from Christ. Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. "...the thoughts and intents of the heart." God knows that you are self-righteous. even more than you do. His word tells us that He knows the "thoughts and intents of the heart" And look what He says about your old heart: Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? Because of your blinded state, you can't know it. You don't know how wicked your OWN HEART is. (yes you!) You carry it around and are ignorant of what it is. You (in your self-righteousness) think that you have a good heart. you think that because you do good things for people that you are a good person. You think, that because you returned that money that was given you by mistake, you think that you are a good person. Look at Psalms 14:3 They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy: there is none that doeth good, no, not one. Do you think ,"well I just don't know if I believe all that the bible says" There is a common saying around here: believe it and be saved, dis-believe it and be damned. If you won't believe what God says about you, then you are calling God a lier. You are in effect spitting in his face. Your self-righteousness won't have it, and God will never save you while you are in this state. If God did save you, you would think that you were doing God a favor by letting him save you. Oh, what poor, blinded, sinners we are. I'm not picking on you, or anyone. I'm only telling you what I have been made to see. And I have only been made to see by the grace of God. You poor self-righteous sinner! You don't know that God is able to save you, but I am telling you that He is. You don't know that He WANTS to save you, but He does. Yes, you, you old self-righteous sinner. You, that has been calling God a liar. You that has been spitting in His face. He wants to save you. Stop calling him a liar and come to him. Stop spitting in his face, and beg for forgiveness. He will save you, but you must stop what you are doing and reason with him. Isaiah 1:18 Lord, I know I have been calling you a liar, but please help my UN belief. Now don't come to the Lord and ask this if you don't see that you have been calling him a lier. That is only lieing to him. Your proud heart will not let you come to him. You will say "I'm not calling the Lord a liar!!" "I wouldn't do something like that!!" If the Lord never shows you what you are, by nature, you will never be saved. did you know that you are a natural born liar? Psalms 58:3 The wicked are estranged from the womb: they go astray as soon as they be born, speaking lies. Def. estranged 1. To withdraw; to withhold; hence, reflexively, to keep at a distance; to cease to be familiar and friendly with. We don't have to LEARN how to tell a lie. The WICKED are... Anywhere the word WICKED is used, it is talking about an un-saved person. Anywhere the word RIGHTEOUS is used, it is talking about a saved person. Now, you that are lost, you read through the Bible and see what Gods word says about you. (Psalms and Proverbs). When you read about someone that the bible calls wicked, when the Bible tells about what a person or aking did, you should consider that to be yourself. Genesis 13:13 But the men of Sodom were wicked and sinners before the LORD exceedingly. Is that you? Esther 7:6 And Esther said, The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman. Then Haman was afraid before the king and the queen. We all know the story of Esther, and the proud and wicked Haman. Could this be you? Look at all of the wicked kings that ruled in Israel. Look at all of the idol worship that they did, and all of the other wickedness that they did. Would you do that? You would do all this and more except for the grace of God. Look at David, what he did. He took his neighbor's wife, and had her husband killed. Would you do that? The Lord made me to know that there is nothing that I wouldn't do. Jeremiah 17:9 The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? The heart is deceitful, you can't know it's desires. The Lord must turn your heart toward himself or you will never come to him. You are estranged from God at birth. You have ran far from God and if he never turns you toward himself you will never return to him. You will continue in your sin, and at death you will plunge into an eternal Hell. John 5:40 And ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. You won't come of yourself. If God himself doesn't intervene in your life, If he doesn't turn you to Christ, If GOD doesn't do SOMETHING, YOU will PERISH!! My self-righteous friend, what do you think now? All of this leaves YOU in the hands of a soveriegn God, to do with as HE pleases. You can't save yourself. What are you going to do? -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Salvation is permanent, there is no such thing as back-sliding. Gods child has no worry about back-sliding. He can see that Christ did it all from beginning to end, and he had no part in it. He cannot save himself, neither can he UN-save himself. John 10:28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand. 10:29 My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. ---------------------------------------------------------- Here is a typical description of a person who is "born again". From an Internet survey company (Barna): "they believe that when they die they will go to Heaven because they had confessed their sins and had accepted Jesus Christ as their savior." This tells what a person has done, and says nothing about what Christ has done. ----------------------------------------------- Maybe we should prepare for when the Lord comes. When all of His people are gone from here. What will it be like? Only the lost will be here. They may need some help.