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Transcript

Light vs Dark 9.25.19 · HBCWestminster

• 0:00
  So I am going to read the verses and then we'll pray and we'll get started. This is the message for Sean one five. This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with.
• 0:29
  One another and the blood of Jesus, his son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar and his word is not in it.
• 0:57
  Let's pray. Father in heaven, God, thank you for the opportunity to be here this evening, singing praises together, fellowshipping with one another, Lord. And now opening your word, I pray that you would guide our thoughts this evening. Lord, be in the words that are spoken and may our hearts be in tune with the message you have for us this evening. In your name. Amen. You read a couple of quotes at the top.
• 1:26
  First one from Warren Worsby, you cannot read the word of God profitably while walking in the dark. And C.S. Lewis says in his book, The Great Divorce, there is, there everything, talking about heaven, is full of light, a cruel light, because it shows the ghost people as they really are. The ghost people are those who have not yet believed in that book.
• 1:56
  A recap of last week. The book of John, this first epistle of John, is writing to combat a heresy, which was sneaking into the church and was causing a disruption of the certainty in the believers. We looked at this last week. He set the stage immediately for why the readers of this letter ought to listen to him and not these false teachers. We said last week...
• 2:24
  He was basically stating that we were there, we were eyewitnesses, and these guys were not. We know, and they don't. So you listen to us. Last week, Rich actually proposed this question. The question was raised in the statement in these first four verses. It says, the word of life and what that meant.
• 2:50
  What the word of life meant. And I stated that this was a declaration of the deity of Christ. As it speaks of Christ. The word and life. Says that he is the word and that he is the life. Life we know can and does only come from God. And thus the statement shows that Christ is God. And that life comes through him. As we begin this week. Let me set the stage for this week's study as a consideration.
• 3:20
  basically of the basis of that life, that life which comes from Christ. Another quote, darkness cannot drive out light, but light can drive out darkness. John, in this section, is going to set up a very clear contrast. The title of this week is Light vs. Dark. There is clarity within these verses.
• 3:46
  And in fact, I told Carla this this week, I was going to do a literary. I don't usually do. I basically never do alliteration. I'm not smart enough to do alliteration. But this week it was it just seemed to kind of come. So we're going to start with us every time. OK, verse five. There's a fact stated, a fact stated. It says in verse five, this is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you that God is light and in him is no darkness.
• 4:16
  In the act of creation, the first thing that God did was to command light to shine out of darkness. That's seen in 2 Corinthians 4, 6. God did this by simply speaking, light be. Or as we read it, let there be light, and there was light. The indelible marks of the creator are seen here in the words spoken.
• 4:40
  by God in the creation act, which happens from those words. God, in speaking out and creating light to come forth from him, this then puts a stamp on creation, which is God, who is himself light. As we consider this topic of God is light, I want to point out a few things. This is going to sound a little, this might sound like a bunny trail for a second, but we'll tie it back together.
• 5:12
  Isaac Newton, Christian, last guy's name I can't pronounce, and Einstein, these were all famous guys who sought to understand this thing we observe called light. These great minds, in fact, Christian and Isaac Newton, were the main debaters. They wanted to figure out the nature of light.
• 5:38
  And they spent many years doing so, trying to understand if light was particles or waves or a combination of them. Man has spent endless hours and years of his life trying to discover things like the speed of light. Measure this. Its ability to dispel or display and or dispel dark. Men have been fascinated with light.
• 6:06
  Forever. It's why we have things created such as candles, as light, electricity, light switches, all of this stuff, because of these inquisitive natures of these people. And it was Einstein who finally settled on the speed of light being a constant, which is discovered in his famous equation, equals mc squared energy equals mass multiplied by speed of light squared. Now, I don't bring that all up to bore you guys, okay?
• 6:34
  But to point out that light is of importance and substance to all mankind and thus is identifiable and useful when considered as an illustration or mark of our God in heaven. When he, John, writes here that God is light, he is identifying God with the source of something that has been the source of examination.
• 7:03
  and discovery by incredibly smart men throughout history, showing that light is potent in regard to its origin. But another incredible property of light is that it's impossible to defile. So as these guys try to examine all of this stuff about what makes light, whether it's waves, particles, and it's waves and particles, and its speed and all of this stuff, they spend all of these years trying to discover this.
• 7:33
  They also have discovered things like there is zero, there is no way to defile light. Light shows the defilement of a subject or a matter or a substance or particles. Shine a light through murky water and it is not the light which is shown to be defiled, but the light is used to reveal the impurity in the water. It is the same way.
• 8:07
  And here John states that God is light and that is a fact. He gives no explanation for it. He simply states the fact that God is light. Why is this important as we consider the context of John and why it's written? Why is John written? Do you guys remember the heresy that John is trying to combat?
• 8:31
  that we talked about last week. Huh? Gnosticism, absolutely. And Gnosticism believes that all matter is evil. And so this was the basis of their understanding that Jesus was some kind of a ghost, not actually God, fully God and fully man. Here, John is establishing...
• 9:00
  That God is the source of light and that no darkness is in him right after stating that Jesus is fully God and fully man. So he is saying that Jesus comes down to earth and is not contaminated by anything. Fact stated, God is light. Next, verse 6, there's a fiction. A fiction. If we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice.
• 9:30
  The truth. Here we're confronted with John's absolutes. Light versus dark. Truth versus lies. John does not see grays, but black and white. John lives on that portion of the equator where the sun, when the sun sets, darkness appears immediately. Where John lives, there is no twilight. John simply sees day and night.
• 10:01
  And our youngest, Oren, it's funny the differences in kids and stuff and how they kind of attach themselves to different things and certain things become important and different things scare them. And with Oren, he is really obsessed with doors being locked and closed.
• 10:27
  windows being shut and all of that stuff. He hates sleeping with his window open, does not like that. With the girl, both of the girls though, we were able to at some point kind of cut out the nightlights, right? And we have tried endlessly with Oren to be able to, the bathroom light, like we live, all the three bedrooms are on the same floor, ours, the girls and then his and then the...
• 10:54
  Their bathroom is right over here, right through the hallway. And I have, much to Carla's at times chagrin, after he goes to sleep, I'll shut off the hallway light because it's using electricity and I don't want to pay for it. Well, one of two things happens when I do that. Either he wakes up after I go to bed and he goes in and he turns it back on.
• 11:21
  But usually what that means is he comes in and he wakes up mom. Because he does not, does not like it pitch dark. He cannot handle it. We have a nightlight in his room, a little dog that he turns on and everything, and it's super bright, but he cannot stand the darkness. And I think John would ask us to foster a similar disdain or dislike for darkness. John says,
• 11:51
  that no one who walks in darkness can possibly claim fellowship with the very source of light. Now, lest this portion lose its weight and reality, let's consider someone from the Old Testament, David. David is the best example, I think, of the fiction the believer is willing to live in rather than confess that we have sinned. John says, say we have fellowship.
• 12:21
  While walking in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. And I think David is a really, really good example of this. David commits sin, then rather than confessing it, tries to trick his friend into believing a lie. And when that doesn't work, David commits murder. And then when confronted with a fictional example of his sin, he gets all judgy about it and says that he's going to go kill that guy.
• 12:54
  He wants to commit the person who in this fictional story presented to him by the prophet Nathan committed the sin. He was so enveloped in this lie that he had in this darkness that he had been living in as he tries to cover up sin after sin after sin. It took him being smacked in the face and confronted by the prophet Nathan in order to wake up from the lie that he was living. Brothers and sisters, we.
• 13:23
  are all oh so willing to live in a lie in order to abstain from confessing the truth of our dark souls, are we not? We are so willing to live a lie if that means that we don't have to admit we're wrong. To us, John tells us, if we do this, we do not practice the truth and we have no fellowship with God.
• 13:49
  If we look to David, we see vividly that sin has a very deadly way of spreading through our life if we do not confess it. This could consume our thoughts and bring us to a place of hopelessness if we consider the fact that God is light and we are not, and that we're willing to live in darkness apart from him in unconfessed sin.
• 14:14
  That we are sinners willing to lie to ourselves could be something, a weight that could be too heavy to bear. Remember what Adam and Eve's response was when they were confronted with their sin. When you consider their response, when they push off onto the next person, right? They're living in the very presence of God and yet they are willing to push off. Adam says, oh, it was the woman. And the woman says, no, it was...
• 14:49
  The snake, the serpent made me do it. When we consider that, when we consider that we are so willing to live a lie rather than confess the reality of our sin, that can feel pretty weighty. Especially when we consider that it breaks our fellowship with God. Here we must consider that all important and effectual virtue, honesty.
• 15:23
  We must be honest with ourselves, with our God, and with each other. This passage describes a believer who is living a dishonest life, a life of fiction. They are a phony. They are not living a genuine life because they are insecure and they don't believe the truth of the verse that we're going to get to, 1 John 1, 9, and thus seek to hide themselves just as Adam and Eve did in the garden.
• 15:54
  An important and scary result to this life of fiction is seen at the end of verse 6. We do not practice the truth. We lose the word. We stop doing truth. That is a scary, scary warning that we must heed. We must be honest with ourselves and with our God. And again, that quote from Wiersbe, this is where it fits well.
• 16:25
  You cannot read the word of God profitably while walking in the dark. We lose the ability to read God's word in its fullness if we walk in this fictional life. And go back to verse 7 now. There's again a contrast, right? So he starts off, God is light. Then he says that if we don't walk with him,
• 16:57
  In the light, we walk in darkness and we lie and we don't practice the truth. Then he contrasts that with a but. If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have what? Fellowship with one another and the blood of Jesus. His son cleanses us from all sin. To walk.
• 17:17
  In light. To walk in the light. Is to walk in freedom. If we are walking in the light. It is only because. One of two things. And possibly both are true of us. One we have nothing to hide. Or. We are confident in the grace. And forgiveness we have. And continue to receive. In Christ Jesus.
• 17:44
  John tells us, and the recipients of this letter, that if we walk in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And another thing, he says, we have fellowship with the blood. Now many of you are familiar with, I'm sure all of us sitting here tonight are familiar with the sacrificial system of the Old Testament, right? We understand that God was prescribing animal sacrifices. These were a covering till the final and complete sacrifice of Jesus Christ's blood.
• 18:12
  the spilling of his blood for the atonement of our sins once and for all. But back then, they did these sin sacrifices, the atonement sacrifices, for the covering of sin. Now, the blood of these animals had no power to cleanse the sinner, but, as I said, would be a covering, a holding over of God's judgment until the full payment of Christ on the cross. And we see that in Romans 3.25.
• 18:42
  There was no power in the animal's blood, but there is power in Christ's blood. And this is because Christ's blood was unique. When I was studying this, one of the commentaries talked about this, and I did some reading, and it was interesting. Did you know that there is no transference of blood from mother to baby in utero? The blood that flows in the baby is not derived from the mom.
• 19:09
  It is a transference of oxygen and all the stuff that then the baby takes and makes their own blood. The baby's cells are its own. Not a single drop of blood is transferred from mom to baby. By means of the virgin birth, the Holy Spirit ensured that the Lord Jesus had a truly human body that was derived from Adam, but his blood came from quite a different source. Acts 28.
• 19:38
  20, 28, Paul, as he is writing, claims that Christ's blood is the blood of God. He obtained by his own blood. He's talking about God and the obtaining is through Christ. This is the blood which cleanses us and this is the blood by which we have fellowship. We have fellowship because it cleanses. This word which is used for cleanses in verse...
• 20:09
  Seven, as he says, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all unrighteousness. This word which is used for cleanses is a present active indicative. And you're like, so what? Great. Grammar. Well, I have no idea what I'm talking about with grammar, but I do find it really interesting with Greek and Hebrew grammar because they have tremendous meaning.
• 20:39
  These are chosen with a purpose. When I say that it is a present active indicative, I'm going to break that down. Present means ongoing, happened, happening, and will happen. It's active. It is being performed constantly. And it is indicative. It is a statement of fact. It happened. It will happen. It is happening with all.
• 21:07
  So, when we read in verse 7 that if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, cleanses us. That word cleanses means it has happened once and for all, for all eternity. As we've believed in Jesus Christ, it has happened. It is happening to us this very moment. Jesus' blood is ongoingly cleansing us from sin.
• 21:35
  And it's going to happen. It is in the ultimate perfection of the believer as we get to heaven. So, if we are walking in the light, we have fellowship with one another and with the blood because we know with all certainty that darkness has been cleansed out of us, dispelled. Though we might go back, the Lord is faithful to continue to bring us back into fellowship, right fellowship with Him. So, verse 7, we have,
• 22:08
  Fellowship, verse 8, there is a falsification. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. John again turns to the negative to emphasize this point. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves. John here is saying that there is no greater deception for the believer than to think that they are no longer a sinner.
• 22:39
  We talked about this a little bit last week. Why? Why is this such a great deception? Why is this such a dangerous thing for us to consider the fact that we might somehow not be sinners? I mean, why is legalism a danger for the believer? What does it build in us? Pride, arrogance. Absolutely. I don't think you were here last week. There you go, Bob. Nailing it. All right.
• 23:12
  Absolutely, it is. This kind of deception that we no longer are a sinner is dangerous because it breeds arrogance. Remember what these false teachers were coming for. Certainty and God-honoring Christian practice as they sought to dismantle the truth of fully God and fully man. They did this as they pushed toward what ended up becoming the Gnostic belief system that all matter is evil. And that belief
• 23:42
  And the belief that sin was simply acting in ignorance. That's what the Gnostic believes sin is, is just acting in ignorance. Or this is a quote, not knowing the spiritual truth that sets a person free. Being set free meant eventually freedom from ignorance and thus freedom from sin. John says, if we say we are without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. To this belief.
• 24:14
  John says clearly and concisely, you're wrong. The reality is to imagine ourselves without sin or as reaching a state of sinlessness on this earth is one of the ultimate deceptions. You can imagine, this is a break from the notes again here, but you can imagine if these people are telling you that you should no longer be sinning, right? If someone comes to you and says you shouldn't be sinning anymore, it should be done.
• 24:44
  Your sin should be over. You should be free from this by now. And yet I know my heart. I know the battles I have all the time with myself. I know the sin that is in my heart, that is in my actions. So somebody's telling me that over and over again. What is that going to do to me? Huh? Doubt. Exactly. It's going to cause doubt in me. It's going to cause this uncertainty, this disruption of the certainty that the believer should have and can have.
• 25:15
  What's interesting is Paul had actually had this delusion before being confronted by Christ on the road to Damascus. And so did the rich young ruler who said to Jesus, all these I have kept, all these I have kept. He was beyond saving because he was prideful and his prideful ignorance thought he did not need a savior. It took Christ confronting and blinding Paul.
• 25:43
  for him to come to grips with the fact that he was a sinner in need of a savior. The willingness to deceive ourselves is real and it is dangerous. It's dangerous because it can and will eventually change our entire being. Our very person will be redefined if we allow ourselves this guilty pleasure of justification.
• 26:10
  If we pretend as though we are not a sinner, we will eat up the energy with which we could be serving our Heavenly Father as we have to pretend that we are somehow perfect now. Instead of having the energy to serve our Heavenly Father, we are instead consumed with the need to cover that which is already laid bare before God. We become engulfed.
• 26:44
  In our sub-reality of deception and fiction. Warren Worsby says his character. This is of this person. This person who is saying they are without sin. And thus becoming a liar. His character has eroded. He is no longer a liar because he tells lies. He now tells lies because he is a liar. You get that switch? That change that happens?
• 27:12
  Brothers and sisters, if we are unwilling to admit we are sinners, if we seek to cover our sins rather than confess them as David tried, we could end up paying as David did. He lost his joy for seasons. His child, he lost his child. He lost his family. His sons rebelled against him and his kingdom. He almost lost his kingdom, but by the grace of God.
• 27:47
  If we want to have fellowship, freedom, and joy, we must be real with ourselves and with each other, and most importantly, with a God who knows. We cannot try to cover our sins. If we are not to cover our sins, what must we do with them then? Where does that leave us? Well, verse 9 follows it up beautifully, right? John is about these contrasts, and he's saying this person is basically...
• 28:22
  foolish, right? In verse 8, you're foolish. You're deceiving yourself. You're falsifying who you are. But he says next in verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Denying our sinfulness is a natural part of our unregenerate selves. We deny
• 28:51
  Because to admit is to admit an inability to right the ship on our own. Thus declaring we need help. We now understand, though, as Christians, to deny that we are still sinners is to lie and to live a fiction which will derail our freedom, fellowship, and joy. John has the answer, though. If we walk in the light, as we saw earlier, there is a two-fold benefit. There is the warmth.
• 29:25
  and the blessing of being in the light, but also just as the light exposes the debris and impurities in the water, so walking in the light of God will expose and illuminate in us the impurities of our lives and our hearts. Now you might say, that doesn't sound like a benefit. But I think John has already laid out the fact that if we don't allow light to expose ourselves,
• 29:51
  It's much worse. We're deceiving ourselves. We're living a lie. We're living a fiction. We're not living in reality. And so to allow the light to illuminate in us the impurities of our hearts and our lives is a blessing, is a gift, because as they are illuminated, we can do something about it. To this exposure, John says simply, confess as it is exposed. He contrasts again, hiding.
• 30:20
  lying about ourselves with truth and confession. He calls on us to believe the truth about ourselves, but doesn't leave us with simply confessing that we are sinners. No, he gives hope to us. Confession is one thing, right? But we confess. My kids can confess to me that they shoved the other one, punched the other one, hit the other one, stole that from that person.
• 30:51
  They can confess to me, but in that confession, they're seeking to have a writing of the relationship. Sin disrupts this fellowship, this relationship between me and Carla and our kids. It disrupts that and they're seeking to try and bring back into right relationship with us and with the one that they have wronged. Confession is one part of it.
• 31:22
  The light exposes our sin as it confronts us with the reality of our broken fellowship. If we deny what shows to be true, this is because, as we just saw, denial proves our lack of honesty and openness with God and with others. And that then caused the disruption in our fellowship with Him. However, if we confess our sins, there is a beautiful and assured promise given here. Just as assured,
• 31:50
  Just as we are assured that the light reveals and exposes sin, we can also be assured of forgiveness of them by God. And that not only will we be forgiven, but a cleansing will happen which will purify us from what? Some? Parts? All. All. It's not like Denver water, which takes out some of the impurities and then bleaches the rest.
• 32:21
  God makes the water new. Cleanses us from all unrighteousness. All the unrighteousness sin has brought on us. He is faithful. He is faithful and just. Just because he has given the payment through the blood of Christ. We just saw that in verse 7. Faithful because he said he would and thus he does.
• 32:52
  God has accepted the blood of Christ as payment for both our sinful condition, what we were born with, as well as our sinful conduct, what we continue to do day after day. God has paid the price for both our salvation and our sanctification. Brothers and sisters, God's grace, God's payment for our sins does not stop.
• 33:22
  The blessing of that does not stop upon salvation. God's grace of His love and provision continues on as we are sanctified by its power. If we confess, He is faithful. He is faithful. We come to our last contrast, and we're actually going to get through all of this, which I can't believe. We come to the last contrast, which is a flippancy. A flippancy.
• 33:59
  1.10 says, If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. Now John turns back to the negative to expose once more the reality of our condition and to charge the reader and us today, this evening, that to deny our sin is a flippant and egregious act. Why do I say that it's flippant?
• 34:22
  The implications of such an act, if considered, would most certainly cause us, the believer, to think twice and thus confess rather than deny. If we think about the natural track that that comes, if we were to deny that we are sinners in need of a Savior, that we've not sinned, it says we've made Him a liar. Who's the Him? We've made God. God a liar. That's why I think it's a flippant response.
• 34:52
  If we actually thought it through, what we're actually doing when we sit in unconfessed sin, when we try to deny, we try to cover up our sin, we're flipping, we're making God out to be a liar. Let's consider this for a minute. If I were to come and steal from one of you, if I were to come and steal Bob's wallet or his tablet tonight, which is something that God clearly says I shouldn't do, right? I shouldn't steal.
• 35:23
  But then Bob's like, you stole from me. You shouldn't have done that. And I say, well, Bob, I actually needed it because I need to study. And so I needed that. And I justify my actions, right? I justify my actions for why I stole from him. As I'm justifying my actions, which I think makes my act no longer a sin,
• 35:55
  What I am now doing is contradicting God's word, which says that stealing is a sin, and thus saying that God is actually a liar. Because he says it's a sin, but I say it's not. So one of us is lying. And my actions are telling others and my Lord that he is the liar. We say we've not sinned, we make him a liar. And his word is not in us.
• 36:26
  This could only be done, I believe, in a flippant way. And if we actually thought this through, which I believe is what John is calling us to do as he lays this out, as he lines out this argument of contrast, I don't think we could ever follow through with the fiction of this flippant response to sin.
• 36:49
  we would consider the fact that it makes our God in heaven, who sent His one and only Son to come and die for us, out to be a liar. There is in the book of Romans a much more detailed argument put forth, which is deeply connected, I believe, with these five verses in 1 John. Romans 1-3. The Holy Spirit thoroughly exposes our sinful acts, and the outline of this argument goes like this. Romans 1, 18-29.
• 37:22
  all are exposed. All are without excuse. Romans 2, 1-16, only one judge. There is only one judge. Romans 17-3, 8, no one escapes his judgment. Romans 3, 9-23, all are condemned and guilty. And then the beautiful end to that, Romans 3, 24-25,
• 37:54
  all are forgiven by his grace. That is essentially, I believe, the argument in these five verses. If we consider these three chapters and their inescapable clarity of arguments set forth, we can draw an even greater understanding and appreciation for the brevity and yet clarity with which John writes in these five succinct verses.
• 38:19
  Brothers and sisters, John writes these things not to condemn us, but to free us. Just as Romans 1-3 are written not to condemn us, but to free us, God is faithful to forgive if we are willing to confess. In these five verses, John gives us the charge and opportunity to experience the ongoing love of Christ Jesus as he continues to say, just as Romans 8-1 does, there is no condemnation for those
• 38:54
  In Christ Jesus. Because we have access. To the ongoing cleansing power. Of his blood. May we be real. Honest. And confess to God. And allow for the great grace. He offers to be experienced. In our lives. We actually cheat ourselves. Out of something. When we don't confess. We cheat ourselves out of the opportunity. To experience the unrelenting.
• 39:27
  unimaginable, inexhaustible love and grace of our Heavenly Father. One last quote from Wiersbe as we end. We must be honest with ourselves, honest with others, and honest with God. I think that is the charge set forth, and I believe that 1 John 1.9 tells us why we can. We can be honest. We don't have to deceive ourselves. We don't have to hide because we have a God.
• 39:59
  who has forgiven us. There's a book that I'm reading right now called Unoffendable. I would highly, highly recommend it. It's actually written in regards to anger and how we actually don't have a right to be angry about anything because anger is taken as there's an offense and as sinners we have no, there is no right to an offense. But,
• 40:28
  I'm just going to run to my office really quick and grab it because I want to read you guys a section of it really quick. I actually just read this today and I was like, oh my word, this is like the perfect picture of it. So the title of the chapter is Reverend of the Dumpster. Okay? Reverend of the Dumpster. And this is a true story. There once was a pastor in the days before the internet took off who availed himself of adult magazines when his wife wasn't around. He knew...
• 41:15
  What he was doing wasn't right, of course, but he did it anyway. And the story goes that he would do this as whenever she wasn't around and would hide it from her often. But one day in particularly, he feels this conviction for the sin and he actually goes and throws all of this stuff away in the dumpster, right? Well, she's gone for a long period of time. He actually gets to a point where he actually wants this again. And so it's long enough that he thinks, well, I'm just going to go down and I'm going to go get it.
• 41:45
  out of the dumpster. Reaches over, falls in the dumpster, breaks his arm, and can't get out of the dumpster. To which she then eventually finds him in the dumpster with a broken arm with these magazines around him. It was his wife who found him. He says, since hearing that true story, I think about...
• 42:11
  that guy sometime. But honestly, I don't think about what a loser he is or what a hypocrite he is. Instead, I wonder if he's still married. I wonder if his wife forgave him. I think about what it might have been like to be so obviously busted, so humiliatingly, crushingly, can't explain this one busted and then forgiven. And then forgiven. We can try and hide. God sees it all. God sees it all.
• 42:44
  He sees us in the dumpster trying to hide, thinking we're by ourselves. We have nothing to hide. The only thing that we do when we try to hide, when we try to cover our sin, is we cheat ourselves out of that opportunity to experience the full forgiveness of Christ. Let's pray.
• 43:06
  Father in heaven, God, I pray that this evening that your word would have been rightly divided. God, I pray that it would impact our lives. Lord, I thank you for the truth, God, that we do not have to deceive ourselves. In fact, deceiving ourselves is wasted. It only hurts us because you see everything. Everything is laid bare before you, Father. So, God, may we avail ourselves of...
• 43:29
  the beautiful truth of 1 John 1-9 and confess, Lord, confess to you that we might experience the cleansing power of the blood of Jesus Christ and feel and experience the freedom and fellowship that comes from that cleansing. I pray these things in your name. Amen.