Welcome to the InTouch Podcast with Charles Stanley for Tuesday, May 20th. The choice to receive or refuse God's offer to forgive you may seem simple, but the ramifications are eternal. This series continues to help you see how forgiveness is really a matter of life and death. My friend, how would you describe your relationship to Jesus Christ?
Could it be described in one of these two fashions? First of all, your daily walk is one of walking in the assurance and the joy of God's continuing uninterrupted forgiveness for your sins. Or would your relationship to Him be described maybe in this fashion, and that is walking under the dark cloud of God's displeasure about your life.
Somewhere along the way, you may not have done quite the right thing or you didn't do enough or you didn't quite do it in the right fashion, but somehow you just can't seem to quite get to the point of being able to enjoy Almighty God and your relationship to Him. Could it be that your sense of guilt is a false sense of guilt or is it true guilt because you're living in sin against Him? The Bible says in Romans chapter 6 verse 23, the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God, that is the eternal gift of God, the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.
Now think about this. If the wages of sin is death and the gift of God, the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ, and the free gift of God, which is eternal life through Jesus Christ, comes through the forgiveness of our sins, that makes forgiveness a matter of life and death. And that is the title of this message, Forgiveness, a Matter of Life and Death. Now let's think about this matter of forgiveness in the light of what is naturally involved in forgiveness, and that is the question of guilt. You see, forgiveness presupposes the idea of guilt. Guilt presupposes the idea of knowledge of my guilt. Knowledge presupposes the idea of moral consciousness, of right and wrong, I've done wrong. And moral consciousness presupposes the idea of accountability or responsibility.
Now I want you to listen carefully to this. When you and I in our motivations or our intentions or our words or our deeds disobey our Heavenly Father, when we do that and we acknowledge that, we accept our actions as our own. That is, we consent to them. We identify ourselves with acts of sin. Therefore, you see the person who says, well, I grew up in a bad home situation. But somewhere along the way, you identified yourself with sin. You chose to be disobedient to God. All of us could work up, at least most of us could probably work up a pretty good case to bring before God of why he should not hold us accountable for many things in life because of our opportunities, our background, our training, our misfortune, the way we were treated, our rejection and all the rest. But when I consent to doing what I know is wrong, when I am willing to identify myself with an evil thought, when I'm willing to agree with myself that I'm going to do something that I know is wrong, I assume responsibility and I am accountable before Almighty God for my wrong, no matter what it may be. Now, sin is a destroyer by nature.
It is always a destroyer by nature. God does not give us laws in order to keep us from having fun. He gives us laws. Every single law is for our protection. Do you know who God is trying to protect us from primarily?
From ourselves. He's trying to protect us from making mistakes, from sinning against Him, from committing wrongs that He knows will ultimately destroy us unless we face the truth of it. Now, all of us, when we talk about forgiveness, more than likely have come to God many times to speak to Him about forgiveness. Now, what we have to ask is, what is it that makes us guilty? And so when a person says, well, you know, look at the good things I've done versus the evil. What they don't understand is the basis of their guilt.
Here's what I want you to see. The reason we are guilty is not because we have performed all of these guilty deeds. The Bible says that you and I came into this world. That is, we came into this world born of Adam.
Adam is the first man. Sinned against God poisoned the whole stream of the human race. Why did Cain and Abel sin against God?
They grew up in the first family. They sinned against God because their parents sinned against God and the evil nature of their parents. That is, Adam was transmitted to them and they came into the world with a bent away from God. Cain and Abel did not have to learn to sin.
Well, where did that come from? The Bible says that in Adam, all of us came into this world with a sinful nature. We, listen, we know how to sin. Amen?
Now, I'm not condoning it. I'm just saying we know how to do it, right? We know how to sin without training. We have to learn to be obedient.
You don't have to struggle to learn how to be disobedient. But we struggle oftentimes to learn to obey God and to do the things that God has called us to do. Now, we are guilty.
Listen carefully. We are guilty because of what we are. Creatures with a sinful nature before we are transformed by the grace of Almighty God. Now, if I should say to you, what is sin?
All of you more than likely could give me a definition. Sin is disobedience to God. Sin is rebellion toward God. Sin is transgressing the law of God. Sin is falling short of the glory of God and all of these things. But I want to give you a verse of scripture that is probably one of the most picturesque verses in the Bible to describe what happens every time you and I sin. It's in the book of Jeremiah.
So if you'll turn there for a moment. Jeremiah chapter two and verse 13, just one verse. I want you to mark this in your Bible and just remember that every time you and I sin, here's what's happening to us. Now listen. For my people have committed two evils.
What are they? First of all, they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters. In order to do what? To hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. Now, what does he mean by hewing a cistern? Simply this, that in those days in which he was written, they would dig out of a rock, out of stone, what would appear to be like a bowl, sometimes very, very large, a cistern, a container, a reservoir in which to catch water to drink or to use for other purposes.
And so a cistern is what they dug out in order to catch and preserve the water. Listen to what Jesus says, and this is so perfectly described sin. He says you've committed two evils. Number one, he says you have forsaken me. Listen, not a cistern which you dug out. You have forsaken me, a fountain of living waters. Now, when the Bible speaks of living waters, it means that waters that are incessantly continuously flowing. He says you have chosen to walk away from an ever flowing fountain. Listen to what he said, my people have committed two evils, they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water. Jesus says I am the fountain of water.
I am the water of life. Have forsaken the Lord Jesus Christ in order to dig a cistern. Now, what does he mean by digging a cistern?
Simply this, that when you refuse the Lord Jesus Christ in your life, you choose a lifestyle, you choose to regulate and to live your life in opposition to God's plan. You're going to dig your own. You're going to do it your way.
Oh, I know the fountains there, but I'm going to dig it out myself. You see, what is this? This is man's pride.
I'm going to do it. This is man's energy. This is man's strength. No man can back off and say, see my cistern? See how deep it is? See how wide it is? See how many gallons of water it'll hold? I dug that with my own strength.
That's what I did. Sin, in essence, is this. It is attempting to meet my needs any way other than God's way. When you and I turn from the ever flowing fountain of life, who is Jesus Christ, to go about life our own way and to formulate our own lifestyle and to do our own thing in rebellion or forsaking His way, what we're doing is we are sinning against God. And sin, the bottom line of sin is this. I'll get my needs met my way.
No, thank you, God. Now, notice what he says in the last part of this phrase. He says, they have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, to hew for themselves cisterns. But he says what? They are broken cisterns that can hold no water. You know what he's saying? All of this attempt on our part to do it our way and to have our will, he says, is not going to work. He says, because what we do is we dig out broken cisterns.
Now, a broken cistern would hold no water. So I want to ask you a question. How many of you are spending your life, spending your time trying to dig out your cistern? You're carving out a lifestyle that you think is going to bring you satisfaction and peace and joy. You've sort of neglected God in your life. It's not that you've done so many things against Him.
What you have done is you have totally or attempted to ignore God in your life. Oh, no one can accuse you of stealing. No one can accuse you of lying. No one can accuse you of committing a crime. No one can accuse you of adultery. No one can accuse you of cheating on your income tax.
No one can accuse you of being a critic or a gossiper. But what are you doing? You're just hewing out your lifestyle. And God says what you're attempting to do is to meet your life's needs, your way to the neglect of God who created you for the primary purpose of glorifying Him. Now, when the Lord Jesus Christ comes into your life, through the forgiveness of your sins, what happens? You receive a new nature. You receive a new attitude. You receive a whole new perspective on life. Suddenly you think, my goodness, what in the world have I been trying to hew it out, dig it out when it all comes as a gift, that life is a gift of God?
You see, my friend, if you're one of those persons who's trying to do good to get God's acceptance, you will ever live under this awesome cloud of divine displeasure. You'll never be able to dig it deep enough. You'll never be able to dig it broad enough. You'll always be wondering, how much deeper do I have to go? How much broader must it be?
How much must it hold? You see, the truth is there's no answer to that because what God wants you to have is a gift, the gift of eternal life through the forgiveness of your sin. And the question is, how does that come about? It doesn't come about by man's effort of pleasing God.
It comes about through a free gift. What did that verse say? The wages of sin.
And we're talking about just doing your own thing your own way. He says the wages of that is death. You see, you dig your cistern, it may rain, it all goes out the bottom and you thirst to death. No way.
It cannot hold it. The wages of sin is death. The gift of God, the free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. God doesn't throw people in hell.
He lays down his life in front of them and they have to trample over him to get there. The next time somebody says to you, I don't believe in a God who throws folks in hell, you agree with them. They have to choose to go there, deliberately, willfully choose to rebel, to choose to deny themselves the drink of eternal life that comes from the fountain of life. So when the Bible says that the wages of sin is death, it is true. The gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. How do I receive the gift of eternal life? Through the forgiveness of my sins that makes forgiveness a matter of life and death.
Let me ask you a question. Has there ever been a time in your life when you humbled yourself before Almighty God and you acknowledged yourself as a sinner before a holy God? That you recognize that your motivations in life, that your lifestyle, the things you thought, the things you're thinking, the things that you're doing are in disobedience to the law of God?
Have you ever humbled yourself before him, knelt before Almighty God, bringing him no list of your good virtues in life, no list of the good things you've done, but acknowledged that you by nature are rebellious toward God, that you in your nature want to do it your way, that you in your nature are going to be disobedient to God, acknowledging that before him, asking him to forgive you of your sins. Listen, not based on the fact that you're going to be better, not based on the fact that you're going to do better, not based on the fact of any promises that you make God, but asking him to forgive you on the basis that his son paid the penalty on the cross for all of your sin and therefore the moment you receive him as your personal savior, your guilt is canceled. Forgiveness means the cancellation of guilt, the cancellation of debt. You and I are forgiven because our what?
Our sin has been canceled. It was paid for by God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, on the cross so that all of us who are his children are walking in the forgiveness of God. Forgiveness is a matter of life and death. If I refuse the forgiveness of God, I rest under the condemnation of guilt. He says those who believe in him shall not be condemned, but those who believe not are already condemned because they have not placed their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as their savior. There's only one sin that'll keep you separated from God forever and ever and ever, and that is the sin of unbelief. That is not believing in what God says about himself and about yourself. Forgiveness is a matter of life and death.
You mark this down. When someone dies who has never received the forgiveness of their sin through the atoning death of Jesus Christ, when they die, they die not only physically, but their death is eternal and forever and uninterruptedly. When you and I receive the forgiveness of our sins, we never die.
What did Jesus say to Mary and Martha? Even though he be dead, yet shall he live, he shall never die. When the gift of eternal life becomes your possession, that possession is not there temporarily or based on your conduct. It is there eternally. To receive forgiveness is to receive life now that never knows an end.
It is an unending life. Say, what about death? Here's what happens in death. When the heart stops beating and God calls us, we simply step out of this life into another life, but we have never lost the life that we had nor have we exchanged life at all. The only thing we exchange is the physical body, the real you, the spirit that is within you that has been transformed by the grace of Almighty God. The life that became yours the moment you exchanged death for life.
In the forgiveness of sins, the moment Christ Jesus became your life, that is exactly what you possess. His life forever and ever and ever. You can never, never, never die once your sins are forgiven by the grace of Almighty God. Your life is set forever and ever and ever. Your life never cease because, my friend, once you receive Him, you kiss death goodbye forever. Amen? You kiss it goodbye forever.
You know why? Because you have been forgiven. That means that God stamped across your sin account canceled. Forgiven, freed, liberated.
You know what the cross did for you? The moment you receive the Lord Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, here's what God placed on your account. Sin list canceled, and at the bottom of His divine page, paid in full by the blood of my Son. Now, which had you rather hear Jesus say?
Depart from me, I never knew you at any time as one of my own. Or, your account says, paid in full, debt canceled, enter therefore into the joy of the Lord. Now, my friend, you may never have heard the gospel before.
You are totally accountable to God for your thoughts, your actions, and your presence before Him in the judgment. And it is my plea to you to fall on your knees. You may not even be able to close your eyes where you are, but to tell Him, Father, I've sinned against You. I've been hewing out my cistern.
It's not working. I'm asking You to forgive me on the basis of the death of Your Son. I yield myself to You by faith.
You know what happens the moment you do that? Canceled, paid in full, and for the rest of your life, you can live life, the life of Jesus Christ, which is yours for the asking. Thank you for listening to A Matter of Life and Death. If you'd like to know more about Charles Stanley or In Touch Ministries, stop by intouch.org. This podcast is a presentation of In Touch Ministries, Atlanta, Georgia.
