Troy a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Who`s Child are you? Part 3
Well that provokes their third claim and the third reply of Christ and that's in verse 41, second part. "Then said they to Him," and here they get to the climax of their claim, "'We are not born of fornication.'" And that means illicit or illegal sexual intercourse, "We are not illegitimate. We have one Father, even God." And they're not talking about physical illegitimacy, they're talking about spiritual. If they were talking about physical, they would have said, "We are not born of fornication, we have the true father Abraham," and they would have used the physical. But since they are identifying with God, they are talking about spiritual fornication.
You say, "Well what does it mean?" It means just this, their point is very simple, they are saying this, "We are spiritually children of God, we are unmixed with idols, we are not offspring of an illicit union between God and some pagan system." In other words, "Our religion is pure, there's no false gods, there's no idols in our temple, there's no mixture with Baal, there's none of that going on here." You see. For what they're saying is, "Wait a minute, don't tell us our Father is Satan," and I'm sure they got the message by now. We are unmixed, following in the promises of God. There are no idols here. And, of course, you realize that the Jews believed that Satan was the father of the heathen, they believed that Satan was the father of the heathen spiritually. And what they're saying is, we are not the children of Satan for we are unmixed with heathen religion, we are undefiled, there's no idolatry among us, we are purely the offspring of a union between God and His people and our spiritual descent is just as pure as our physical is, not mixed with any heathen religion. And so they're saying we are so the sons of God, we've never mixed ourselves with pagans. And that to them was the only way you could ever be a son of Satan was to be involved in a pagan religion.
But this introduced to me, as I began to think about it, a tremendously tragic note and a note that can scare us, I hope, into some real thinking. They had no idolatry, now mark this, they had no false heathen religion, they had all the right religion but they were damned. Sobering thought. They were doomed right in the middle of the right religion. You say, "What happened?" Very simple, it was an institutional ritual and not a personal relationship, and so much of religion is institutional, all of it. And what God demands is a personal relationship with Him. And theirs was purely ritualistic. They went through the religious motions and even though they were sitting in the middle of the truth, they were damned by their false securities and their inability to see the personal relationship they needed with God rather than an institutional ritual.
Well then Jesus begins to give full vent to His thoughts in verse 42. "Jesus said unto them, 'If God were your Father you'd love Me.'" Oh, that's so important. "'For I proceeded forth and came from God, neither came I of Myself but He sent Me.'" He says, "If you were really the children of God, you would love Me." And that's true. That's true. Your action and your attitude belies your claims. If God was really your spiritual Father, you'd love Me, said Jesus. Well they don't love Jesus, they hate Him...they hate Him with a passion. They are so infuriated with Jesus, as I said, that they're ready to stone Him. Jesus says, "You couldn't be the children of God and hate what came from God."
John 5:1, listen to this. Here's John 5:1, 1 John 5:1, listen, "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." Did you get that? That's a true child of God, the true one believes Jesus is the Christ, Messiah, the Anointed One. Listen to this, "And everyone that loveth Him that begot, loveth Him also that is begotten of Him." See it? You can't come and say, "Well, I love God but I hate Jesus." No. Anybody who honestly loves God will recognize in Jesus Christ without a shadow of a doubt God again reproduced in Christ and will find Him as irresistible as God is. Anybody who loves Him that begot, will also love Him that is begotten of Him. And, you know, just because people around this world have some kind of a love for God, at least they call it that, if they do not love Jesus Christ, that is not so. You cannot love God and not love Christ.
I can get more specific with the words of Paul that are one of the most shattering statements ever in the Bible. First Corinthians 16:22, listen to this. This is as shattering a statement as will ever be uttered. Paul said this, 1 Corinthians 16:22, here it comes, "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema." You know what anathema means? It means accursed. God said through the Apostle Paul, "If any man does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed." Well you don't get anymore specific than that. Impossible. And again we add the recurring truth in John's gospel that nobody knows and loves God unless he knows and loves Jesus Christ. Jesus said, "No man cometh unto the Father...what?...but by Me." And God says, "Yu cannot love Me without loving My Son, Jesus Christ."
So Jesus gives the test of their claim. They flunk, incidentally. And He proceeds to a full exposure of their spiritual ancestry in verse 43. He says, "You can't be from God, you don't love Me." Then verse 43, "Why do you not understand My speech? It's obvious, because you can't hear My Word." And this is an interesting verse and the key is the difference between speech and word. "Why do you not understand My speech?" Now the speech is laleo, it's all the phrases and terms and particulars of a language. Then He says, "Because you cannot hear My Word," that's logos, that's the content, that's the inner substance.
Let me show you what He means. He's saying this, "You don't understand the language so you can't interpret the sentences, right?" If a man doesn't understand German and somebody says to him, something to him in German, he cannot understand the sentence, the particulars because he does not know the language. And that's what Jesus is saying to them. "You don't understand My illustrations, you don't understand My claims, you don't understand the things I say because you don't know God's language." It's a foreign language and they didn't understand basic, divine revelation so they couldn't understand when Christ spoke basically divine truth. He might as well have been talking to deaf people. And I know you've all had the experience of standing somewhere and hearing people talk a language you didn't know. You can't understand the words in particular because you don't understand the basic nature of the language. And so Christ says to them, "You don't understand My speech, My laleo, My lalia, My words, My phrases because you don't understand the logos, the inner substance and content. You don't have the right language." And implied here, of course, is this...the reason you don't know My language is because you speak the language of your father who's different, see. A child speaks the language of his father. And Jesus is saying here, "I speak a language that you don't know because you're not God's children, you speak the language of your father."
Then He gets real specific, verse 44. This is direct. "Ye are of your father," now He names their father, "the devil and the lusts of your father ye will do." See, they couldn't understand Christ cause they had a different father and their father spoke a different language and they couldn't figure out what Christ was saying. It was a language they didn't understand. And then Jesus gives them a direct indictment, it's dynamic. Finally He comes to the full fore and says, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do."
Physically these Jews were the children of Abraham, spiritually and morally they're the children of the devil and they follow his lusts and his passions. You say, "Well what are the devil's lusts and passions?" Well they're all over the place. But I'll give you the two key ones that Christ gives here...murder and lying...those are the two primary lusts of Satan. Here they are. "He was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there's no truth in him." And He goes on to say, "When he speaks a lie he speaks of his own." It's original. Whenever Satan lies, that's original stuff for he's a liar and the father of it.
And so He says, "What are Satan's lusts? Lying and murder, he hates men and he hates truth." Did you know that Satan hates men? Did you know that? Fantastic thought. It's amazing how many people in our world are Satan's dupes and the Bible says that he cares nothing about them, he's after God. Satan wants to destroy God and tear Christ away from the throne that He's going to have on this earth some day. Satan wants to arrest power from God. Satan could care less about men. He goes about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may...what?...devour. All he wants to do is destroy men. He wants to murder men. Who do you think is responsible for slaughter all over the world? Satan loves nothing better than to destroy men. He's a murderer. His passion is murder. He implants that passion in the hearts of men who kill. Why do you think there are wars in our world? Because Satan is a murderer and we have children of Satan in this world who want to murder with him.
And you remember in Revelation, that in the ninth chapter, you know, when all hell is open and the demons are loosed that God has to restrain the demons and prevent them from killing people and He allows them only to sting them, that is to injure them but not kill them. Why? Because it would be Satan's design to destroy them. Satan is a murderer. And you know if you've been with us on Sunday nights how many he's going to murder of the saints in the Tribulation, don't you? He's going to slaughter them. He's a murderer. He hates men. And the sad, tragic thing is many men are serving him. They're children of Satan and they're dupes, tragically to be devoured. The devil is a killer of men.
Look at the wars and the murders around our world and just tell us that Satan's not a killer of men. Just in America, six hundred and thirty-seven thousand of our own men have died in wars since 1900, eight hundred thousand we've killed with our own private guns in America. Far more we kill with our own private guns then die in wars. Satan's a murderer. And that's a direct indictment of those Jews, if you haven't figured it out. Because they're plotting to murder Him and that settles whose children they are.
Satan's not only a murderer but he's a liar. Verse 44 says, "There's no truth in him. He abode not in the truth and when he speaks a lie, that's original stuff right from him." He's the creator of falsehood and the wellspring of lies. And that's for sure. The great counterfeiter, the great liar. In fact, he made a beautiful combination with Adam and Eve. He brought about their death by lying to them, didn't he? And so the murderous hearts of these Christ-hating Jewish leaders and their inveterate opposition to truth proved that they were children of Satan, not children of God. They are acting out Satan's passion. They are lusting Satan's lusts. And this is behind their hatred of Jesus Christ. You see, Christ was the perfect man and He was truth incarnate. That combination is the most antagonizing possible combination to Satan. If he wants to kill men and destroy truth, you've got in Christ the perfect man and truth incarnate, Christ becomes Satan's greatest antagonist. No wonder he wanted to destroy Him, right?
You say, "Well is this only the Jews who are the children of Satan?" No, not at all. Let me read you something. First John 3:8, just listen, "He that committeth sin is of the devil." Did you get that? Child of God, or child of Satan is this whole passage here. "For the devil sinneth from the beginning. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin but in this are the children of the devil manifest that they commit sin," is what he goes on to say...not in exactly those words but in the same reference. Children of the devil are any people who serve him, any people who don't know God through Christ are children of Satan. And his two passions are murder and lies.
Then verse 45, He adds, of course if Satan is a liar, "Then because I tell you the truth you believe Me not." If you told people lies, they'll believe you. Isn't that interesting? You just tune in to the lies going on in our world today. I mean, a guy can get up and lie himself...just lie right to the beginning to the end...oh, terrific stuff. People believe lies. Just try to tell the truth some time and watch if you can get a reaction. People have built careers on lying. It's a pattern of living. Speak lies to the children of Satan and they enjoy it. Speak truth and you'll manifest who they are and they'll reject it. And it's so tragic and so sad that the unsaved, the children of Satan are committed to a blind, damning, obedience to the lusts of the devil. They are his dupes. They're carrying out his passions and they're doomed to occupy his hell.
Then verse 46, a question, almost pensively does Jesus say, "Why would you reject Me? Why would you remain children of Satan? Why would you not come with Me? Why would you not love Me? Why would you not receive Me? Which of you convicts Me of sin? And if I say the truth, why don't you believe Me? I mean, have I done something wrong or have I said some lies?" You notice those two rhetorical questions? Have I proven sinful and unworthy of your faith? And you better believe that if they knew of a sin they would have said something, but it's silence. Boy, if they had known anything...I know...I know one...see? Nothing. "Which of you convicts Me of sin?" And nobody can say a word. And He says, "Well if I tell you the truth, why don't you believe Me?" And nobody says anything there either. If they had anything, brother, they would have said it.
Why do men refuse Christ? I've asked that question a thousand times, a Christ who is sinless and lovely and totally truthful and never convicted of a wrong or an untruth, Christ who died for them, why would people refuse Him? Jesus gives the answer in verse 47, and closes off this discourse. Well He says, "He that is...and here's the key...of God hears God's words. Ye therefore hear them not because you are not of God." And there's the distinction. The one who is of God hears and understands. He says you're not of God.
What does it mean to be of God? Does it mean to be a believer? Not necessarily because a person must hear before he becomes a believer, right? What does it mean to be of God? It means this, the one who willingly, hopefully, genuinely puts himself under the influence of sovereign grace and puts himself in the place of openness and says, "Speak to me, Lord, I want to know what You have to say and I want to do what You want me to do." This is the willing heart, the one who wants the truth and wants to believe. He's the one of God, his heart's been prepared by God. They are the willing and eager hearts. They become God's children. So Jesus says you don't believe because you don't have that willing, open, eager heart prepared by God.
Well a lot of claims were made here and a lot of securities were shot down.
But the ultimate question is very simple ; who's child are you?
Amen
Troy
Who`s Child are you? Part 3
Well that provokes their third claim and the third reply of Christ and that's in verse 41, second part. "Then said they to Him," and here they get to the climax of their claim, "'We are not born of fornication.'" And that means illicit or illegal sexual intercourse, "We are not illegitimate. We have one Father, even God." And they're not talking about physical illegitimacy, they're talking about spiritual. If they were talking about physical, they would have said, "We are not born of fornication, we have the true father Abraham," and they would have used the physical. But since they are identifying with God, they are talking about spiritual fornication.
You say, "Well what does it mean?" It means just this, their point is very simple, they are saying this, "We are spiritually children of God, we are unmixed with idols, we are not offspring of an illicit union between God and some pagan system." In other words, "Our religion is pure, there's no false gods, there's no idols in our temple, there's no mixture with Baal, there's none of that going on here." You see. For what they're saying is, "Wait a minute, don't tell us our Father is Satan," and I'm sure they got the message by now. We are unmixed, following in the promises of God. There are no idols here. And, of course, you realize that the Jews believed that Satan was the father of the heathen, they believed that Satan was the father of the heathen spiritually. And what they're saying is, we are not the children of Satan for we are unmixed with heathen religion, we are undefiled, there's no idolatry among us, we are purely the offspring of a union between God and His people and our spiritual descent is just as pure as our physical is, not mixed with any heathen religion. And so they're saying we are so the sons of God, we've never mixed ourselves with pagans. And that to them was the only way you could ever be a son of Satan was to be involved in a pagan religion.
But this introduced to me, as I began to think about it, a tremendously tragic note and a note that can scare us, I hope, into some real thinking. They had no idolatry, now mark this, they had no false heathen religion, they had all the right religion but they were damned. Sobering thought. They were doomed right in the middle of the right religion. You say, "What happened?" Very simple, it was an institutional ritual and not a personal relationship, and so much of religion is institutional, all of it. And what God demands is a personal relationship with Him. And theirs was purely ritualistic. They went through the religious motions and even though they were sitting in the middle of the truth, they were damned by their false securities and their inability to see the personal relationship they needed with God rather than an institutional ritual.
Well then Jesus begins to give full vent to His thoughts in verse 42. "Jesus said unto them, 'If God were your Father you'd love Me.'" Oh, that's so important. "'For I proceeded forth and came from God, neither came I of Myself but He sent Me.'" He says, "If you were really the children of God, you would love Me." And that's true. That's true. Your action and your attitude belies your claims. If God was really your spiritual Father, you'd love Me, said Jesus. Well they don't love Jesus, they hate Him...they hate Him with a passion. They are so infuriated with Jesus, as I said, that they're ready to stone Him. Jesus says, "You couldn't be the children of God and hate what came from God."
John 5:1, listen to this. Here's John 5:1, 1 John 5:1, listen, "Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God." Did you get that? That's a true child of God, the true one believes Jesus is the Christ, Messiah, the Anointed One. Listen to this, "And everyone that loveth Him that begot, loveth Him also that is begotten of Him." See it? You can't come and say, "Well, I love God but I hate Jesus." No. Anybody who honestly loves God will recognize in Jesus Christ without a shadow of a doubt God again reproduced in Christ and will find Him as irresistible as God is. Anybody who loves Him that begot, will also love Him that is begotten of Him. And, you know, just because people around this world have some kind of a love for God, at least they call it that, if they do not love Jesus Christ, that is not so. You cannot love God and not love Christ.
I can get more specific with the words of Paul that are one of the most shattering statements ever in the Bible. First Corinthians 16:22, listen to this. This is as shattering a statement as will ever be uttered. Paul said this, 1 Corinthians 16:22, here it comes, "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema." You know what anathema means? It means accursed. God said through the Apostle Paul, "If any man does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be accursed." Well you don't get anymore specific than that. Impossible. And again we add the recurring truth in John's gospel that nobody knows and loves God unless he knows and loves Jesus Christ. Jesus said, "No man cometh unto the Father...what?...but by Me." And God says, "Yu cannot love Me without loving My Son, Jesus Christ."
So Jesus gives the test of their claim. They flunk, incidentally. And He proceeds to a full exposure of their spiritual ancestry in verse 43. He says, "You can't be from God, you don't love Me." Then verse 43, "Why do you not understand My speech? It's obvious, because you can't hear My Word." And this is an interesting verse and the key is the difference between speech and word. "Why do you not understand My speech?" Now the speech is laleo, it's all the phrases and terms and particulars of a language. Then He says, "Because you cannot hear My Word," that's logos, that's the content, that's the inner substance.
Let me show you what He means. He's saying this, "You don't understand the language so you can't interpret the sentences, right?" If a man doesn't understand German and somebody says to him, something to him in German, he cannot understand the sentence, the particulars because he does not know the language. And that's what Jesus is saying to them. "You don't understand My illustrations, you don't understand My claims, you don't understand the things I say because you don't know God's language." It's a foreign language and they didn't understand basic, divine revelation so they couldn't understand when Christ spoke basically divine truth. He might as well have been talking to deaf people. And I know you've all had the experience of standing somewhere and hearing people talk a language you didn't know. You can't understand the words in particular because you don't understand the basic nature of the language. And so Christ says to them, "You don't understand My speech, My laleo, My lalia, My words, My phrases because you don't understand the logos, the inner substance and content. You don't have the right language." And implied here, of course, is this...the reason you don't know My language is because you speak the language of your father who's different, see. A child speaks the language of his father. And Jesus is saying here, "I speak a language that you don't know because you're not God's children, you speak the language of your father."
Then He gets real specific, verse 44. This is direct. "Ye are of your father," now He names their father, "the devil and the lusts of your father ye will do." See, they couldn't understand Christ cause they had a different father and their father spoke a different language and they couldn't figure out what Christ was saying. It was a language they didn't understand. And then Jesus gives them a direct indictment, it's dynamic. Finally He comes to the full fore and says, "Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do."
Physically these Jews were the children of Abraham, spiritually and morally they're the children of the devil and they follow his lusts and his passions. You say, "Well what are the devil's lusts and passions?" Well they're all over the place. But I'll give you the two key ones that Christ gives here...murder and lying...those are the two primary lusts of Satan. Here they are. "He was a murderer from the beginning and abode not in the truth because there's no truth in him." And He goes on to say, "When he speaks a lie he speaks of his own." It's original. Whenever Satan lies, that's original stuff for he's a liar and the father of it.
And so He says, "What are Satan's lusts? Lying and murder, he hates men and he hates truth." Did you know that Satan hates men? Did you know that? Fantastic thought. It's amazing how many people in our world are Satan's dupes and the Bible says that he cares nothing about them, he's after God. Satan wants to destroy God and tear Christ away from the throne that He's going to have on this earth some day. Satan wants to arrest power from God. Satan could care less about men. He goes about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may...what?...devour. All he wants to do is destroy men. He wants to murder men. Who do you think is responsible for slaughter all over the world? Satan loves nothing better than to destroy men. He's a murderer. His passion is murder. He implants that passion in the hearts of men who kill. Why do you think there are wars in our world? Because Satan is a murderer and we have children of Satan in this world who want to murder with him.
And you remember in Revelation, that in the ninth chapter, you know, when all hell is open and the demons are loosed that God has to restrain the demons and prevent them from killing people and He allows them only to sting them, that is to injure them but not kill them. Why? Because it would be Satan's design to destroy them. Satan is a murderer. And you know if you've been with us on Sunday nights how many he's going to murder of the saints in the Tribulation, don't you? He's going to slaughter them. He's a murderer. He hates men. And the sad, tragic thing is many men are serving him. They're children of Satan and they're dupes, tragically to be devoured. The devil is a killer of men.
Look at the wars and the murders around our world and just tell us that Satan's not a killer of men. Just in America, six hundred and thirty-seven thousand of our own men have died in wars since 1900, eight hundred thousand we've killed with our own private guns in America. Far more we kill with our own private guns then die in wars. Satan's a murderer. And that's a direct indictment of those Jews, if you haven't figured it out. Because they're plotting to murder Him and that settles whose children they are.
Satan's not only a murderer but he's a liar. Verse 44 says, "There's no truth in him. He abode not in the truth and when he speaks a lie, that's original stuff right from him." He's the creator of falsehood and the wellspring of lies. And that's for sure. The great counterfeiter, the great liar. In fact, he made a beautiful combination with Adam and Eve. He brought about their death by lying to them, didn't he? And so the murderous hearts of these Christ-hating Jewish leaders and their inveterate opposition to truth proved that they were children of Satan, not children of God. They are acting out Satan's passion. They are lusting Satan's lusts. And this is behind their hatred of Jesus Christ. You see, Christ was the perfect man and He was truth incarnate. That combination is the most antagonizing possible combination to Satan. If he wants to kill men and destroy truth, you've got in Christ the perfect man and truth incarnate, Christ becomes Satan's greatest antagonist. No wonder he wanted to destroy Him, right?
You say, "Well is this only the Jews who are the children of Satan?" No, not at all. Let me read you something. First John 3:8, just listen, "He that committeth sin is of the devil." Did you get that? Child of God, or child of Satan is this whole passage here. "For the devil sinneth from the beginning. Whosoever is born of God does not commit sin but in this are the children of the devil manifest that they commit sin," is what he goes on to say...not in exactly those words but in the same reference. Children of the devil are any people who serve him, any people who don't know God through Christ are children of Satan. And his two passions are murder and lies.
Then verse 45, He adds, of course if Satan is a liar, "Then because I tell you the truth you believe Me not." If you told people lies, they'll believe you. Isn't that interesting? You just tune in to the lies going on in our world today. I mean, a guy can get up and lie himself...just lie right to the beginning to the end...oh, terrific stuff. People believe lies. Just try to tell the truth some time and watch if you can get a reaction. People have built careers on lying. It's a pattern of living. Speak lies to the children of Satan and they enjoy it. Speak truth and you'll manifest who they are and they'll reject it. And it's so tragic and so sad that the unsaved, the children of Satan are committed to a blind, damning, obedience to the lusts of the devil. They are his dupes. They're carrying out his passions and they're doomed to occupy his hell.
Then verse 46, a question, almost pensively does Jesus say, "Why would you reject Me? Why would you remain children of Satan? Why would you not come with Me? Why would you not love Me? Why would you not receive Me? Which of you convicts Me of sin? And if I say the truth, why don't you believe Me? I mean, have I done something wrong or have I said some lies?" You notice those two rhetorical questions? Have I proven sinful and unworthy of your faith? And you better believe that if they knew of a sin they would have said something, but it's silence. Boy, if they had known anything...I know...I know one...see? Nothing. "Which of you convicts Me of sin?" And nobody can say a word. And He says, "Well if I tell you the truth, why don't you believe Me?" And nobody says anything there either. If they had anything, brother, they would have said it.
Why do men refuse Christ? I've asked that question a thousand times, a Christ who is sinless and lovely and totally truthful and never convicted of a wrong or an untruth, Christ who died for them, why would people refuse Him? Jesus gives the answer in verse 47, and closes off this discourse. Well He says, "He that is...and here's the key...of God hears God's words. Ye therefore hear them not because you are not of God." And there's the distinction. The one who is of God hears and understands. He says you're not of God.
What does it mean to be of God? Does it mean to be a believer? Not necessarily because a person must hear before he becomes a believer, right? What does it mean to be of God? It means this, the one who willingly, hopefully, genuinely puts himself under the influence of sovereign grace and puts himself in the place of openness and says, "Speak to me, Lord, I want to know what You have to say and I want to do what You want me to do." This is the willing heart, the one who wants the truth and wants to believe. He's the one of God, his heart's been prepared by God. They are the willing and eager hearts. They become God's children. So Jesus says you don't believe because you don't have that willing, open, eager heart prepared by God.
Well a lot of claims were made here and a lot of securities were shot down.
But the ultimate question is very simple ; who's child are you?
Amen
Troy
