On Dogs and Joy #2

Dogs are associated with this gross immorality of deception, of fornication, of murder, of sorcery and demonic worship. That's the association of a dog in scripture. Don brings us the second half of a message called On Dogs and Joy, with a powerful look at how human effort and merit have absolutely no part in our salvation. Let's join our teacher now in the Truth Pulpit.

You must understand this, my friends. You must understand that the true gospel and true salvation, true regeneration in the human heart, produces a changed life. It doesn't produce a perfect life, but a redirected and a reoriented life, one that is oriented toward holiness and away from sin. In 1 John 2, verse 3, it says, By this we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments. The one who says, I've come to know him and does not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not within him. And so, as you look at your own life, my friends, in part as you consider whether you are a true Christian or not, you need to ask yourself, what is the orientation of your heart? Is it toward righteousness and godly living? Or are you still one who loves sin, loves profanity, loves corruption, loves immorality?

You drink it in without, you know, and it goes down easy and smooth for you, because there's not a reflex action against it by the motions of the Spirit of God in your heart. A false gospel produces immoral men. In these days in which we live, beloved, it is just especially important for us to emphasize this and for you to embrace it and take it to heart, because there are all kinds of men who live sinful lives and continue to claim to preach, continue to claim to preach a gospel. Well, you can't trust what they say when their life is a living contradiction of what the message of the true gospel is.

You can't trust a teacher like that. They're dogs. They're immoral. They're not to be believed.

You go somewhere else and you look somewhere else for it. And one of the great deceptions that people within the, broadly speaking, Church of Christ are so happy to drink in is a man disqualifies himself, and then after a brief period of so-called restoration, he's back to doing the same thing. He's back to preaching again. And the cover that is given to that is, well, I can speak to people who have sinned because I've sinned myself in like way. In all their adultery and fornication and gambling and other matters of corruption, they don't disown the sin. They say, this helps qualify me to preach to you that I have been such a corrupt person, and without repentance of that, I come and I tell you, this is what the gospel is and how you are to live. And inevitably, inevitably, they are minimizing the demands of God for holiness and telling people that your sin is not that important and everything's covered by grace. And it's a message that is devoid of any concept of calling people to repentance, to turning from sin rather than accepting it. And inevitably, that is what you find. And so a false gospel produces men like that, and they are not to be believed. They are to be avoided. When it comes to your attention that a man is like that, you just turn and walk away.

You don't have to sort anything out. You beware of that. You turn away from it because it's a threat to your joy. It is a threat to your spiritual well-being. That's what a false gospel does. And so Paul here, by warning, saying beware of the dogs, he's saying beware of immoral men who are pretending to be in ministry and turn away from them.

You don't have to figure it out. You should not speculate. Are they real Christians or not? None of that matters to you. You just turn your back on that kind of ministry because a false gospel produces immoral men and it becomes one of the ways by which you can identify them. And those with a works-based salvation like the Philippians were facing and dealing with, they're bankrupt, immoral dogs.

Paul says watch out for them. Now secondly, there's another aspect of it. A false gospel relies on human works.

It relies on human works. There are many ways to go astray in the presentation of the gospel. But one of the ways, one of the key ways is a false gospel relies on human works. Paul goes on and he describes them as evil workers.

Look at verse two with me again. Beware of the dogs. Beware of the evil workers.

Beware of the false circumcision. These evil workers, why were they evil? They were evil in this way. Christ was not enough for them. Christ was not enough in their message.

They wanted to add something of human merit to it. They trusted their fleshly works for righteousness before God. And so this Jewish ceremonial law became the means by which they justified their claim to be right with God.

And their fleshly works for righteousness, their religion became their message and what they trusted in and what they called others to trust in as well. Now, in our postmodern time where everybody's, you know, truth is relative and everybody's, your truth is as good as my truth and as good as Tom's truth and blah blah blah. Because we in our age have been so conditioned by that thinking, you may be tempted to view other religions with sympathy. And to say, well, at least they're religious or at least they're proclaiming some kind of morality in the midst of in the midst of this decadent age in which we live.

And at least they're at least they're saying something about morality. Friends, what you need to understand is that that is an entirely wrong way to think. We should not view false religion with sympathy.

We should not view it as though they are co-laborers for us, that we can work together with them to achieve other agendas. No, this is false religion. And in the eyes of God, it is damnable and corrupt and subject to eternal damnation.

We are not at a cafeteria where we can pick out of whatever tray of religion we want and everything comes out okay. There is one way of salvation and it is by faith alone in Christ alone. And to reject that, beloved, what I want you to see here is this. To reject that message, that the exclusivity of that message in exchange for human righteousness is to reject the gospel altogether.

You cannot mix the two together. In fact, even if it's done unawares, even if it's done in ignorance, it is still a spiritual rebellion to reject the righteousness of Christ in an effort to establish your own. In Romans chapter 10, Paul is praying for these Jewish, for his Jewish brethren as he writes to the Christians in Rome. And he says in chapter 10 verse 1, he says, Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.

For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God. You see, in order for you to be saved, you must, you must subject yourself, submit yourself to Christ and to Christ alone. To submit yourself to the gospel message and to what Christ said about himself. I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. There is no other way of salvation. In order to have joy and in order to be rightly related to God, you must come to Christ humbly and submit yourself to him forsaking any claim to self-righteousness whatsoever. Paul in Romans says that his Jewish friends were not doing that.

Therefore, they were unsaved and they were trying to establish their own kind of righteousness as the currency with which they would buy heaven for themselves from God. And Paul says it's false. That is false work.

You cannot do that. You cannot proclaim that and be true to the gospel. It is sharp. It is clear.

It is distinct. Salvation. The five solas of the Reformation. Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, based on the testimony of scripture alone, to the glory of God alone. You know, and it's not enough simply to talk in vague terms about Jesus. It's not enough to talk in vague terms about the cross.

The question that you have to answer is what is your hope? What are you relying on for your salvation? Is it Christ alone? Is it his righteousness? Is it his shed blood on the cross? Is that what you're trusting and alone? Or is there some mixture of pride and self-works that are mixed in there?

It's distinct. It's Christ alone. And we're not to rely on our false works for any aspect of our reconciliation with a holy God. Now thirdly, thirdly, a false gospel relies on religious ritual.

You can recognize a false gospel by the fact that it relies on religious ritual. You've got to do this every week. You have to show up every week.

You know, you've got to take the wafer and do all of this stuff. Well, no. Look at chapter 3, verse 2 with me. He says, beware of the false circumcision. And what he means by that phrase false circumcision is that these Judaizing teachers took circumcision to be a mark of spiritual salvation. The act in the flesh was necessary and integral to a saving reality. But what Paul is saying here is that if you have circumcision without true faith, without true repentance, without a complete and utter reliance on Christ and Christ alone, all you've done is mutilated your flesh.

You've just cut yourself up. It has done nothing for you in the presence of God. Circumcision without true faith is simply mutilation. And so they were trusting in their work of circumcision rather than trusting Christ alone for salvation. And Scripture makes it abundantly clear that when you mix works with faith, you have come under the condemnation of a false gospel. Galatians chapter 1, verses 8 and 9 says, if I or an angel from heaven comes and preaches any other gospel to you than what you heard from me, he is to be accursed. He is to be damned. And so a false gospel is not a lesser form of good religion.

It's poison. And when believers come under the influence of this false teaching of trusting in works and a sense of self-righteousness, it's going to drive joy out of their life. And that's why Paul warns against it so much.

It's because your joy is premised on a complete and utter total reliance on Christ and finding your utter sufficiency in him and in him alone. That is essential to understand. And that reliance on him alone causes us to reject everything else that rises up in competition against him. Now, quickly, all too quickly, let's take a contrasting look at three marks of the true gospel. Three marks of the true gospel.

And our second main point, and then we're going to have three sub-points here. Paul, by contrast, sets forth the faith which the apostles preached. Verse three, he says, for we are the true circumcision. In other words, he's saying we go beyond a fleshly symbol, and what we preach is that which inwardly cleanses and renews a man, as we're going to see in just a moment. Chapter three, verse three, we are the true circumcision who, number one, worship in the Spirit of God, number two, glory in Christ Jesus, and number three, put no confidence in the flesh. So what can we glean about the true gospel from those three statements that Paul makes in that one verse?

There's a lot packed into there. Well, first of all, you need to understand that the gospel, the true gospel, is spiritual in nature. It is spiritual in nature. It comes from within the heart. It's a matter of the heart, not that of outward performance. Paul immediately refutes the outward view of the false teachers with what he says there in verse three.

Look at it with me. He says, for we are the true circumcision who worship in the Spirit of God. Understand this, beloved, is one of the clearly defining and separating marks, the distinguishing marks of the true gospel, is that there is a focus on the inner man. You know, false religion will tell you if you just go through the rituals, you'll be okay, and what's going on inside isn't that important. That's why you could be a mobster in Chicago and be in good standing with the Catholic Church as long as you were going to Mass. Well, that's not true.

That's false. We render spiritual service to God in our inner man. First Samuel 16, verse seven says, God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.

And so, my friends, what's in your heart? Is it reliance on self, or is it reliance on Christ? This is fundamental to understanding what the true gospel is. Look over at Psalm 51, verses 16 and 17. Psalm 51, verses 16 and 17. And you see this clear renunciation of external ritual as that which God requires from sinners.

What is the inner response? Psalm 51, verse 16. For you do not delight in sacrifice, otherwise I would give it. I'd give you the ritual if that's what you wanted, God.

You're not pleased with burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart, O God, you will not despise. True salvation is recognized in the heart of a believer by a brokenness over sin, a repentant mournful attitude over sin. It does not mean that you are sinless. It does not mean that you achieve perfection in this life. Rather, true salvation can be recognized by that inward attitude that renders spiritual worship to God, humble repentance wedded together with a faith in Christ alone.

It's a spiritual act. The gospel produces spiritual people like that, rather than, watch this, rather than a boasting in a sense that I am good enough. I'm not perfect.

Oh, I hate hearing that. Sure, I'm not perfect, but I'm pretty, you know, I've done what, you know, I've pretty much done what God requires. That is the mark of someone who is not saved. The mark of salvation is someone who says, I have sinned against God, I have fallen short of His glory, and my only hope is in Christ alone. That's what Paul is saying there. We worship in the Spirit of God. And secondly, the gospel comes through Christ alone.

This is what we've been saying throughout. The gospel comes through Christ alone. Paul emphasizes the only source of our salvation, and notice how plainly he states it. He says, we worship in the Spirit of God, and we glory in Christ Jesus. Our hope and our confidence is in Christ alone.

It is outside of us. I don't trust in what I have done to go to heaven. I don't trust in anything about me to make me right with God. My glory, my hope, my joy is in Christ outside of me. Christ in His righteousness, Christ in His shed blood, in His resurrection, in His ascension.

I'm hoping in Him to be faithful to His promise to save me. And when a man has that, when a woman has that clear in her mind that that's where my hope is, then joy is going to come because that is the way that men are truly reconciled to God. And so true salvation comes when you trust Christ for His righteousness, and joy comes when you forsake any reliance on self, and you are ever reminding yourself that my hope is in Christ and in Christ alone. For as it says in Ephesians 2, verses 8 and 9, we are saved by grace through faith and that not of ourselves. It is a gift of God, not as a result of works, lest anyone should boast.

And so I ask you, my friends, what are you hoping in? Do you realize and acknowledge that you are a sinner who has broken the law of God and you are irredeemably lost apart from Christ? Have you forsaken all sense of self-righteousness and looked to Christ alone to be that which can save you and the one who can reconcile you to God? Because the gospel comes through Christ alone. We glory in Christ Jesus and not in ourselves. Thirdly, finally, on the flip side of that coin, the gospel denies all human merit. The gospel denies all human merit. Look at it there at the end of verse 3.

We've been talking about this all along, so I'll just quickly state this. Chapter 3, verse 3, we are the true circumcision. Our message is the true gospel. We are true teachers of the gospel, Paul says. We worship in the Spirit of God, we glory in Christ Jesus, and here's the negative side of it, we put no confidence in the flesh. Paul says we don't trust any works of our own. Paul says when we proclaim the gospel to you, we do not teach you to rely on something that you do for your salvation. We don't tell you to be circumcised and then you can be saved. We tell you to go directly straight to Christ and trust Him alone for the forgiveness of your sins. And so when he says we do not put any confidence in the flesh, he says we do not look to self for righteousness. You look to Christ and Christ alone, His life, His death, and you trust Him exclusively for your reconciliation with God. And you ever make it clearer and clearer in your mind that my hope is in Christ and not in myself. It is all of Christ and not of me. Galatians chapter 2, verse 16, Nevertheless, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Christ Jesus. Even we have believed in Christ Jesus so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, since by the works of the law, no flesh will be justified. And so, my friends, to preserve and protect your joy, perhaps to enter into salvation for the first time, this passage calls you to examine your heart and the basis of your hope.

Threefold question. Is your life marked by unbroken patterns of sin? An unrepentant spirit toward iniquity?

Do you think you are good based on what you have done? Do you think obeying religion can take you to heaven? My friends, that is the mark of a false gospel. You need the true gospel, because the true gospel brings interchange to a man through the new birth. We glory in the Spirit of God. The gospel rests on the person and work of Christ alone.

I trust what he did, not what I do. And the gospel teaches us to deny all self-righteousness. And so, my friends, I ask you, what is your hope? What are you hoping in to bring you forgiveness of sin, righteousness with God, and to enter safely into heaven? And in the spirit of this passage, my friends, all I can say is this.

Don't let the dogs steal your joy. You know, there isn't a single thing we can do or say to earn or merit our salvation. It is through Christ alone we are saved.

And that's really good news. Well, friend, we're so thankful you've spent this time with us in God's Word. And we'd love to have you join us again next time on The Truth Pulpit with Don Green. Meanwhile, you can find out more about this ministry by going to thetruthpulpit.com. While you're there, you'll find this series along with all of Don's podcasts so that you can listen again or share with a friend. Again, that's at thetruthpulpit.com. I'm Bill Wright inviting you back next time when Don Green presents more from The Truth Pulpit.