I can't earn heaven. I can't please God. I can't merit salvation. I am what I am by God's grace, so I turn from sinful self-effort to salvation by grace through faith. I forsake any goodness in my own flesh. I rely totally on Christ, totally on the Holy Spirit. I give all the glory to God. That's a true Christian. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.
I'm your host, Phil Johnson. How can you know whether you have high blood pressure? Well, a quick test will show you. What about whether you're a diabetic? There's a test for that, too. What if you want to know your blood type?
Again, it's easy to get tested and find out. Well, you may have never realized that there are several characteristics Christians should have, and testing to see if you have them also can be relatively easy. Today, John MacArthur will run down a list of qualities that should be visible in the life of a Christian as he continues a study designed to put you on the path to faith and growth in Christ and to steer you away from the road to nowhere.
So here is John with today's lesson. Now let's take the word worship for just a moment. Going back to Philippians 3, the word worship here is the word latruo. It means to minister, to serve, to worship. It's a big encompassing word. Let me give you what I think might be the best way to define it. It means to render respectful spiritual service. Now let me help you to understand maybe some of the ingredients, just a simple little way to look at it.
It involves some components. If you want to look at your heart and say, do I worship God? Here's a little list of things to expect to find. The heart of worship, first of all, loves God and loves Christ. Let's call that affection. There will be within you a great affection for Christ, a great love for God and Christ. You will feel that.
You will express that. When songs of praise are sung, your heart will be lifted up. When you read through the Word of God, you will be so encouraged and you will feel such love for God and love for Christ.
Affection. You see, Romans 8, 7 says that the unsaved person hates God. The saved person loves God.
Love. In fact, we are to love Him with all our heart, soul, mind and strength. But there's a love for God. There's affection for Christ.
There are people who fear God, who fear Christ, but the true Christian has a healthy sense of awe, but has an overwhelming sense of love for God and Christ. There's an affection there. It may not be all it ought to be, but it's there. Secondly, secondly, there will be a delight in God and a delight in Christ. More than love, there will not only be the emotion of affection, but there will be the emotion of delight. This is joy. This is joy.
This is joy. In other words, your thoughts about God bring you joy. Your thoughts about Christ bring you delight. You love to think about Christ. You love to talk about Christ.
You love to read about Christ. There's a delight in all of that. The contemplation of who God is, who Christ is, what God has done for you, what Christ has done for you, the contemplation of all of that brings you joy. There's a delight there.
Let me give you a third word to think about. There is a confidence there. There's a confidence there.
We could even call it peace. The true Christian in worshiping is adoring with affection, is delighting with joy, and is also enjoying a confidence that brings peace. That's part of worship. In other words, there's a sense that I'm not concerned about my own prosperity.
I'm not concerned about my own things. I am so at peace in my relationship to the eternal God and the eternal Christ that my confidence is all in Him. That's such a marvelous thing. Now, where do you get love? And where do you get joy, and where do you get peace? Galatians 5, fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace. You see, it's the Holy Spirit that produces this. That's why He says we worship by the Spirit of God, or we worship in the Spirit of God either word. It is the Spirit of God that comes to take residence in us, that produces affection for us, that produces affection for Christ, delight in Christ, and peace from Christ.
And that's the character of our worship. There's a loving element. There's a rejoicing element.
There's a peaceful element. Have you ever noticed the music that we sing? Some of it is just rejoicing, isn't it?
Some of it is just almost fun, and it should be, exhilarating, thrilling. Some of it is meditative and deep and loving and adoring, and some of it is calm and gentle and peaceful. See, all of those are simply ways in which the songwriters have put these qualities of worship into musical expression. That's what the Spirit produces, love, joy, peace in Christ in God.
Flowing out of that, a couple of things come. One is devotion. Because of that, there is an unusual devotion to God and Christ.
We're talking inwardly now. In the heart, there's a total devotion to God and Christ. We could say it this way, it is a love that knows no rival. It is a delight that knows no equal. It is a peace that knows no comparison. Nothing competes.
Nothing really can compete. The love and the joy and the peace that we feel toward Christ knows no equal, knows no competition, has no rival. That's the kind of worshiping heart we're talking about. Matthew 4 10, Jesus said, You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve. That's the characteristic of a true believer. We are the true worshipers whom the Father sought to worship Him.
So how do you know you're a true Christian? Worship from the heart. Not because you do external things, but because you love God, you love Christ, you delight in them.
There's a sense of joy. You have a peace in that relationship that passes all understanding, a calm in the midst of the storm, and all of that causes you to be singularly devoted to Christ and God and you look nowhere else for what only they can provide, right? That's a worshiping heart. And believe me, only the Holy Spirit can produce that. Only the Holy Spirit can produce that. The Holy Spirit is the divine initiator at work in the depths of the human heart.
He transforms a person's life so as to promote worship, and only the Spirit can do that. So we say again that true Christians are not known because they attend church, because they perform religious rituals, because they do certain good duties. Christians are known by what's in their heart.
Now let me give you a corollary to that. Consequently, you and I can't always know who's a real Christian, right? Because we look at somebody doing stuff on the outside, we can't see the heart. Man is stuck with the outward appearance, but who sees the heart? God does.
Let me take it a step further. You're the only one who can really know your own heart. 1 Corinthians 2, no man knows the spirit of the man, but the man. That's why 2 Corinthians 13 5 says, examine yourselves. I can't examine you. You can fool me because you can do all because you can do all the outward duties. You can be an almost Christian, and I can't tell the difference. God knows it.
Don't you be deceived. You examine your heart. Do you worship God like this? Or is your worship simply something you do in a place and according to your own rules?
Or do you worship in spirit and in truth? Loving God, delighting in Him, enjoying the peace and confidence and assurance that comes because all your trust is in Him, being devoted to Him faithfully and having no rival. That's the essence of what forms true worship. And then out of that kind of relationship comes praise and adoration and service, and you live your life as an act of worship. You lived your life as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable unto God, Romans 12.
And that's the way you are to live your life. It is a living sacrifice. It is an act of worship. Second quality in Philippians that marks a Christian, and we'll just briefly look at the last two. It says, a Christian also glories in Christ Jesus.
What does this mean? Well, the word glory is a marvelous word, kau komenoi. The verb means to boast, only to boast with exultant joy, to boast in the sense that this is what I am most proud of. It is a word that Paul uses, I think, 35 times and all the other New Testament writers put together only use it twice.
Paul loved it. It could be used in a bad way. In Galatians 6, 13, he talked about those who boast in the flesh. But in the next verse, Galatians 6, 14, he talked about boasting in the cross.
What does he mean? He means my joyful boast as a believer is all in Christ Jesus. That is the character of a true believer. What are you saying by that? What I am saying by that is this, that the true Christian gives all the credit for all that he is to Christ. That's the bottom line. You know how you can tell a false Christian?
Yes. They take credit. They believe that because of their religious duties, they've earned favor with God, or if they do more good things than bad things, God will accept them. They believe that they have the ability to please God in some way and gain merit for themselves, gain approval for themselves. The true believer will always boast only in Christ Jesus. That's why 1 Corinthians 1, 31, Paul says, Let him who boasts boast in the Lord. And he says it again in 2 Corinthians 10, 17.
You see, those whose hearts have been circumcised find their only point of pride is in Christ. Paul says, I am what I am by the grace of God. Christ is the focus. Christ is the all in all.
Paul says in 1 Corinthians 2, 2, I am determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ. That's all. That's all I want to know.
That's all I want you to know. He gets all the credit. He gets all the glory. He is all my pride. He is all my boast. Paul expands it down in verses 8 and 9. He says, I count all things to be lost. What are you talking about? All the things that are true about me, all my good works, all my pedigree.
He's just given his pedigree there. He said, all of that is loss. He says, I have suffered the loss of all things and I count them but manure in gaining Christ. Christ is everything, I'm nothing. That's a true Christian. Now you may go to church and you may sing songs, but if you are feeling that you have done something to earn your salvation and you've stacked up merit with God and you should get a little of the credit and your glorying and boasting and exalting is not only in Christ, you're not a Christian. The true Christian puts all the credit where the credit must be put.
See, that means they've come and committed everything to Christ. All my pride is Christ. All my joy is Christ.
All my boast is Christ. All my life is Christ, right? People say, well, do you mean that when you become a Christian you have to acknowledge Jesus as Lord?
Yes, you literally give Him your life. He becomes all your joy and all your delight and all your boast. Oh, there are a lot of people who want Christ's grace but not His government. There are a lot of people who want Christ to be priest who pays the penalty for their sin but not prophet who tells them what they must do and certainly not king who has authority over them. A lot of people will take Christ as priest, pay penalty for their sin. A lot of people want the benefits of the cross who don't want to bow to the crown. A lot of people want heaven but not the narrow way. There are a lot of people who want the gift but won't want to take it in empty hands.
A lot of people want the pearl but won't sell all. But for the true Christian, Christ is all, Christ is all, Christ is all. He is our life, is He not? He's our Lord and Savior. He's our life. He's our pride.
He's our boast. We glory in nothing but the cross of Christ. We're determined to know nothing but the cross of Christ. All the credit is His, all the glory is His. That's the true Christian. One writer says, Christians are the circumcision precisely because they take no pride in what they might do by themselves to earn God's favor, but only in what God in His favor has already done for them in Christ Jesus," end quote.
That's right. We have the attitude of the prodigal. We come to God and say, Father, I have sinned against heaven and in Your sight and I am no more worthy to be called Your Son.
I'm not worthy of anything. All the glory is Yours. All boasting is in Christ. The true Christian is consumed with Christ. Paul says in Romans 15, 17, therefore in Christ Jesus I have found reason for boasting in Christ.
How about you? Is all your boast in Christ? All your pride in what He's done for you? All your rejoicing in Him? Is all your life in Him? Is He all in all to you? Do you live for Christ, breathe for Christ? That's a true Christian. And lastly, the third thing he says about a true Christian is they have no confidence in the flesh.
This goes along the other two, doesn't it? If all the glory goes to God and all the boast is in Christ, then you certainly can't put any confidence in the flesh. What did it earn you? What did it get you?
What did it gain you? All the flesh will do is destroy you. What do you mean flesh? Unredeemed humanness, my own ability apart from God.
And I have no confidence in the flesh. That's different than the Jews. The Jews placed all their confidence in the flesh. They were descended from Abraham physically. They had a physical surgery called circumcision. They physically performed the ceremonies and they outwardly did the duties of the Mosaic Law and the traditions. It was all the flesh.
And you know what? It got them nothing. Romans 3 19 and 20 says that no one, no one will be redeemed by the flesh. By the deeds of the flesh, nobody gets justified.
Man's unredeemed humanness has no ability. All it can do is sin, sin, sin, sin. And confidence in the flesh damns the soul.
Read Romans 3 19 to 20, that's what it says. It shuts out true salvation. It is the religion of human achievement.
It is false. It is damning. F. B. Meyer wrote, all through the epistles the flesh stands for self, the self that seeks to justify itself, that endeavors to sanctify itself, that is always fussily endeavoring to win men for God but has never learned to be submerged beneath the mighty tide and current of God's Spirit. If your religious life is one of self-effort and self-complacency, you must stand back. It is not for you to handle the priceless pearl.
Your eyes cannot detect its superlative beauty, excellence and worth. But let all humble souls who have nothing in which to glory save the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, who put no confidence in themselves, but wholly rest upon the unmerited grace of God, lift up their faces with exceeding great joy. These are the true children of Abraham."
What's the key word here? Humility, humility. True Christians are humble when they look at themselves.
They see their flesh as sinful. What we're talking about is repentance, folks. God gives grace to the humble, James 4.6, James 4.10. God gives grace to the humble. That's part of a true Christian's character.
We're humble about our own abilities. I can't earn heaven. I can't please God. I can't merit salvation. I am what I am by God's grace. So I turn from sinful self-effort to salvation by grace through faith. I forsake any goodness in my own flesh. I rely totally on Christ, totally on the Holy Spirit.
I give all the glory to God. That's a true Christian. That's repentance, which means turning from your sinful self.
Now listen to what I say as we draw this to a conclusion, very important. The almost Christian might feel a certain natural kind of conviction, might feel bad about sin, but I want you to understand the difference. There is a natural conviction that is chiefly related to scandalous sins. The unsaved person, the almost Christian, the religious but not saved person will feel bad about scandalous sin, not because he or she feels bad about the sin, but they feel bad about its consequence.
So we can say it this way. They feel bad about what their sin produces. They do not feel bad about the evil in them that produces the sin.
That's the difference. Natural conviction feels bad about the scandal. Natural conviction is repulsed by child abuse, by rape, by mutilation, by cruelty, by mass murder. That scandalizes even the natural man and he feels convicted that that is wrong, mostly because it impinges upon someone else, not because in its root it is evil. So he doesn't like the evil that sin produces, but he never recognizes the evil that produces sin. He doesn't understand the wickedness of nature. You see, natural conviction is chiefly related to the obvious sins, but true spiritual repentance touches the deep, secret, undeserved sins of hypocrisy, pride, envy, hardness of heart, rejection of Christ. That's the difference.
The ones that don't scandalize anybody because people don't even know about them. Natural conviction deals with my conduct. Spiritual repentance deals with my condition. Natural conviction deals with the symptoms. Spiritual repentance deals with the disease.
Very important. Natural conviction makes a person shy away from God because they feel fearful. Spiritual repentance makes a person run to God for forgiveness.
Very different, very different. Spiritual repentance means putting no confidence in the flesh. You know that there's nothing in you that's good, it's rotten to the core. But you see, a person with natural conviction, just feeling bad about the scandalous things their sin produces, feeling badly about what happens on the outside, feeling bad about their conduct, doesn't ever deal with the wretchedness of their condition and doesn't see in the flesh the inability to ever produce anything good. So what you have here marking a true Christian is nothing more than one who sees the filth and the wickedness of the flesh and turns in repentance from that to God. What marks a true Christian? Worship in spirit and in truth, giving all the credit to Jesus Christ who is their only pride and joy and repentance which turns totally from the wretchedness of the sinful condition to accept the salvation that only comes through God's grace.
That's the true circumcision. Certainly it's my prayer that that is you, that you truly know the salvation God sent His Son to bring. That's John MacArthur, Chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary here on Grace To You.
The title of his current study, The Road to Nowhere. Now in this study, John, you've been showing us that God rejects false worshipers, people who trust in religious activity to prove their devotion. And with that said, we need to know how to answer this question, what kind of worship does please God?
So talk about that a little. Well that's a big question and of course the kind of worship that pleases God, summing it up, is the kind that's defined in Scripture. That's the way to understand it. And you could start with the Ten Commandments, right? You could start with the fact that you are to acknowledge God and have no other God, that you are to never make a graven image and worship that as if that is God, but to worship only the one true God. You could add the summation of the great commandments and that would be, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength.
That's where worship begins. It begins with loving God. And it stretches to loving God with your whole life. Loving God solely above all others.
Loving God consummately with all your powers. And then as you move into the New Testament, obviously you meet God in human flesh. God comes to us in Christ. And what is required of us but to love Christ. In fact the Apostle Paul said if you don't love the Lord you're cursed.
On the other hand, we love the Lord Jesus Christ when we confess him as Lord and Savior. That's where worship begins. Loving God. Loving Christ. And then of course loving them in a way that is expressive in our obedience of his requirements, of his word. True worship then, loving God and loving him through obeying his word.
You can do that personally, you can do it collectively with God's people. I've written a book on that called Worship the Ultimate Priority, 200 pages reasonably priced. You need to have a copy of this book. It's a very foundational book. Again the title Worship the Ultimate Priority.
Thanks John. And friend, this book will show you how to incorporate worship into every aspect of life, from what you do on Sunday morning to how you conduct yourself at work each day. Practical insight for every follower of Christ. Order a copy of John's book titled Worship the Ultimate Priority when you contact us today. The book is available for $9.50 and shipping is free. To order, call our customer service line at 800-55-GRACE.
And our business hours are Monday through Friday at 730 a.m. to 4 p.m. Pacific Time. Or you can order the book through our website anytime. The address there is GTY.org. The title of the book again, Worship the Ultimate Priority. To get a copy, call 800-55-GRACE or visit GTY.org. And if you missed part of today's lesson, remember that you can download the complete sermon at our website. In fact, you can download all six messages from the series, The Road to Nowhere, free of charge in MP3 and transcript format, along with 3,600 other sermons from John's more than 56 years of pulpit ministry. So take advantage of the extensive sermon archive when you visit GTY.org. Now for John MacArthur and the entire Grace to You staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Thanks for starting your week with us and be back tomorrow to learn what qualifies a person for heaven, as well as the religious credentials that don't impress God, as John continues his series called The Road to Nowhere. It's another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, on Grace to You.
