You have your Bibles, turn to James 1. We'll be looking at verses 22 through 25. Two weeks ago, we learned who we're to listen to. Last week, we learned how to listen. This week, we're gonna look at what to do after we've listened, how to apply what we've heard. Verse 22 says, but be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, He's like a man who looks intently at his own natural face in a mirror, for he looks at himself and goes away and once forgets what he was like. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. Now the Lord's given me plenty of opportunities over the last 22 years to counsel people. And I enjoy counseling. Part of counseling is fun. The actual seeing people help and counseling is similar like going to a doctor. You got to get diagnosed. What's wrong? What's the problem? It's usually some type of emotional or behavioral issue, which is a symptom of a thinking issue. So you have to diagnose people and here's where you're thinking poorly or wrongly. Here's what the Bible says, so readjust your thinking. And then you send them off with some homework or prescription, go do these things based upon this knowledge. And I can promise you, you'll see a difference. If you do these things, your marriage will be better. And I'm not saying it might be better. I'm saying it will be better. Your life will be better. The Bible says the transgressor, the way of the transgressor is hard. It's sin that's leading to these difficulties in your life. It is sin that's causing the trouble. It's poor thinking, bad thinking. So you need to correct your thinking with the word of God. But here's the hard thing about counseling. The difficult thing about counseling is you can diagnose someone. Sometimes that can be hard, but most often it's pretty easy. Here's your problem. You're mean to your wife. You're not keeping your your covenant vows to your wife, that's gonna lead to some terrible problems. No wonder she's acting this way. No wonder she wants a divorce. No wonder. That's pretty simple. You're not behaving correctly. This is what the Bible says. This is how you conduct yourself. And you can promise them a better marriage, a better life, You promise them that they don't have to deal with anxiety the rest of their life, that anxiety can be cured through faith in the scriptures. And you can say all these things, but then there's the sending home with the little piece of paper with the homework. Here's your to-do list. And then they come back the following week. All right, first thing, how's your homework going? Well, I forgot. What do you mean you forgot? Yeah, I didn't do that. Okay, let's try again. We'll see you back in a week from now. A week goes by. Oh, how did you do? Well, I did two days good. Oh, okay. What more can you do to someone like that? What more can you, how can you help someone like that? You know, you're putting your finger on the problem. They're agreeing that this is the problem. They're not fighting the solution. They're not disagreeing with the solution. They simply are not following through. They forget or they don't make it a effort to obey God. Well, this text is telling us that just hearing is not sufficient to change your life. Just hearing. Now, we're not talking about salvation and being reborn, being born again. We're talking about, as a Christian, living a life that pleases the Lord. And it's not just hearing. It's not just coming to church. Well, I heard a good sermon on Sunday. Well, has your life been changed? Well, it was, It was a great Sunday. Well, what did you do Monday in light of what you heard on Sunday? How is that impacting the way you treat others? How is that impacting how you live your life? Well, in this text, James gives us four reasons to obey. Four reasons to obey. To take what we've heard and apply it to our lives. Four reasons. We need to take heed. We need to listen. so we can obey. First reason is found in verse 22. Be doers of the word, that's the theme. Be doers, not just hearers only. That's the main thrust of this passage. It gives us four reasons, and the first one is so that you're not delusional. You're not self-deceived. But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. Hearing and knowing the truth is not enough. We're called not just to be knowledgeable of God's word. We're called to be disciples of God's word. Now I wanna caution you real quickly because here's our tendency. Our tendency is to go, well, we don't need high theology. We don't need deep doctrine. We just need to be lovers of God, lovers of one another. We just need that application. Let's be careful here. We have to hear before we obey. We need to hear. Let's not cast out the hearing just because we're not obeying. You need sound doctrine to be able to obey God. But sound doctrine is not enough if you don't obey it. It's not sufficient just to be a theologian. We need to be careful that we don't study the word of God simply for our own intellectual gratification. Sinclair Ferguson says, there is no such thing as a genuine knowledge of God that does not show itself in obedience. The person who wants to know God but who has no heart to obey Him will never enter the sacred courts where God reveals Himself to the soul of man. God does not give divine knowledge to those who have no desire to glorify Him. Knowledge is not the end. It's a means, it's a necessary means. You can't get there without knowledge, without truth, without sound doctrine, without the word of God. We must be hearers of the word. But being hearers of the word is not the end objective. Love of God and love of your neighbor, obedience to the word, that's what God is aiming at. See, the Jews were self-deceived in thinking that the knowledge of God's law was enough. One of the things Paul had to rebuke the Israelites for in Romans 2.13 is that they thought the possession of the law, the knowledge of the law, separated them from the Gentiles. Paul says, for it's not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but doers of the law who will be justified. Well, when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness in their Conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Jesus Christ. But if you call yourself a Jew and rely on the law and boast in God and know His will and approve what is excellent because you are instructed from the law And if you are sure that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of children, having in the law the embodiment of the knowledge and truth, you then who teach others, do you not teach yourself? While you preach against stealing, do you not steal? You who say that one must not commit adultery, do you commit adultery? You who a whore idols, do you rob temples? You who a boast in the law dishonor God by breaking the law. For as written, the name of God is blaspheme among the Gentiles because of you. Now you have the law, you boast in the law, you know the law, you know what is right and wrong, but you don't do it. So don't think you're better than the Gentiles. Furthermore, they have the law not on tablets of stone. They have it in their conscience. So just knowing the law doesn't separate you or distinguish you from Gentiles. It's the keepers of the law. It's the doer of the law. It's the one who obeys the law. That's what's important. Woe to us theologians. who do not practice what we know. Dr. Moore, who teaches New Testament for us at the seminary, was relaying to me how he studied in England and picked a particular university, a seminary in England to study because of the reputation of the scholars that taught there. Only afterwards, when he's there, learned that one of the top minds of the university was having an affair with the secretary. That's when he decided to disenroll and come back to the states. Woe to the great minds, the great theological minds that can and engage in the great complex theological topics of our day. We have no desire to do the simple commands of God. We hear of pastor after pastor who live double lives. Those who preach the truth on Sunday and are committing adultery on Monday. These are modern day Pharisees thinking religion is good for personal gain. These are those who love the knowledge of God for the praise of men. They twist the knowledge of God for selfish ends. Be careful that your religion is not vain, that your knowledge is just there to puff you up. You know many great things, but you have a hard time obeying just the simple commands of God. You see, if we hear without obedience, we are self-deceived. We are delusional. Knowledge of God's word is designed to be lived out. Jeremiah 11, 6 says, hear the words of this covenant and carry them out. Do these things. We are called to be disciples, which includes hearing, but it also means following and doing what we've heard. Now, if you go to a doctor and you get a prescription, You're sick, you need some medicine. Here's your piece of paper, you can go and fill this at your local pharmacy. And you take that and you go, I agree, I need this. And you put it in the glove box to never utilize it. What good does it do you? What good does it do you to know the truth if you do not obey the truth? What good does it do you to come to church if you're not living the Christian life throughout the week? What good does it do you to not obey God's word? Jesus says in Luke 6, 46, why do you call me Lord, Lord, but do not do what I say? Matthew 12, 15. Jesus put it this way, whoever shall do the will of my father, which is in heaven, the same as my brother and sister and mother. If you want to be a theologian and you should all seek to be scholars, we're all called to be students of God's word, but we should open up our scriptures on our knees and we should open it as commands ready to be obeyed. When we go to listen to God, we should say, I hear you, oh Lord, what do you want me to do? Your command, I'm willing to follow. I'm ready to do. I wanna hear so that I can do. I want you to speak so I can act. I don't wanna just to be a hearer only, I wanna be a doer. I want the word of God to change my life. I want it to impact how I act and how I behave and how I think and how I feel. I don't want it just to be head knowledge. I don't want to be deceived in knowing but not doing. So here's the first problem with just being hearers without being doers of the word. We become deceived with the truth that is designed to illuminate. And that's the worst deception there is. I'd rather be a complete ignorant fool who've never heard the gospel on the day of judgment than one of us that doesn't make it to glory. We will be held to a greater accountability. It's amazing sometimes we can mistake knowledge with godliness. We know a lot, but we're not actually living it out. Sometimes we have to go back to the basics. I remember the years I studied Greek I'm not one of these guys that just learns languages quickly. And I remember studying and studying and get discouraged and go, man, I don't think I know anything. And then what I would do, I'd go back to lesson one and then lesson two and lesson three and start at the beginning and work my way through it again. Sometimes as Christians, we think we should be seniors or graduates when we need to go back and relearn the basics of Christianity and start with seeking to obey what we know, just to trust and obey. So that's the first thing. We are self-deceived if we don't obey what we hear. Secondly, we're forgetful. We see this in this illustration that James gives us in verse 23 through 24. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he's like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror, for he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. Now in verse 25, it talks about those who do or those who do not forget. Forgetfulness is the excuse we give ourselves. We allow our kids to come up with that one. Oh, how come you didn't clean your room? It's not because we didn't tell them. It's not because they don't know. But it's like, this is the get out of jail free card. I forgot. Oh, okay, no big deal, you forgot. You think that's gonna pass? You think God says, oh yeah, You sinners, you forgot to obey, that's okay. You forgot, no problem. Forgetfulness is one of those natural excuses that I allow for that one. I forget too, you know. Forgetfulness is no excuse. But kids use it and you and I use it. I mean, that's what I hear with counseling sessions. Did you do your homework? I forgot. No, you didn't take it seriously. You don't forget the things that are serious to you. You forget the things that don't mean anything to you. You forget the things that are of little to no importance to you. You forgot, but that was wrong to forget. You don't forget to obey God. That doesn't give any excuse. It gives this illustration of those who hear but don't do. It's like the one who goes and looks at his face intently, like you're studying your face. Have you ever got close to a mirror and just kind of examined yourself? Don't. I wouldn't advise it. You see, you know, you go look, and just imagine, imagine this happening to you. It's the middle of the day, you've already done three presentations to a large crowd, and you go look in the mirror and you see a piece of lettuce stuck in your teeth. And you go, how long has that, you think to yourself, how long has that been there? Have I been walking all morning with a piece of lettuce in my teeth? And you feel embarrassed about it. And you tell yourself, I gotta get that out. I gotta get that out. But as you're telling yourself you have to get the piece of lettuce out of your teeth, someone interrupts you and starts talking to you, and you forget all about the lettuce, and you go the rest of the day with a piece of lettuce in your teeth. Now, the first half of the day, you can go, well, I didn't know. I didn't know. But what excuse do you have going the rest of the day with a piece of lettuce in your teeth? You did know, you saw it, you looked intently. You got to examine that. You knew you needed to get it out, but you forgot. That's what happens to us in our Christian life. We often know what to do. We have no excuses to be gentle towards our wives. to be humble, to not be prideful, to think more highly than we ought to think of others, to give honor to others, to outdo one another in giving honors, to think more highly of others than we do ourselves. We know that the Bible says these things, but we forget. We know we're to forgive one another. We know we're not to hold grudges. and be bitter in our hearts. We know that. Don't be bitter. We know, the Bible says, to endeavor to keep the unity in the bond of the Spirit. We know that that's our calling and that's a duty and a responsibility. We know what we're supposed to do. We're to keep our commitments. But we forget. Somehow it's okay, we sell ourselves, we forgot. Well, we're making the mirror of no use. Why even have a mirror if it's not gonna help you comb your hair and brush your teeth and pick out the lettuce between your teeth? Why even have the Bible? Why come to church? Why listen if we don't mean to apply what we've heard? Why go to the doctor if you're not gonna fill this prescription? Why do you call Jesus Lord if you're not gonna do what he says? You see, the word of God is like a mirror. I think he's using this mirror illustration on purpose because the law is like a mirror that not only tells us who God is like and what he expects of us, it tells us our shortcomings. It reveals our inadequacies. Hebrews 4.12 says, for the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of the soul and of the spirit, of joints and marrow and discerning of the thoughts and the intentions of the heart. You start opening up the word of God. and it begins to read you, it begins to tell you where you're coming short, it starts to convict you. And that conviction needs to, it means to make application and change. Like, I gotta stop doing this, I'm sorry dear God, will you help me not do that anymore? It's meant to change your life. And as it convicts you, you're seeing yourself in a mirror and you're seeing that, hey, I got a lot of things out of alignment. I have a lot of things that need to be changed and corrected. for God to be pleased with how I'm living, and you hear the word of God, and as it's convicting you, then you go and keep on without any conformity, without any change, without doing what you've heard. You make void the word. Jesus said, you make void the word of God by your traditions. The Pharisees would make up rules, not God's laws, but they'd make man-made rules. And they would base their man-made rules off of what they thought were biblical principles. Well, for the Levites, before they could do anything within the temple, they had to clean themselves. They'd have to take ceremonial baths. They had to put their hands in this basin and clean their hands. take out all the germs and purify themselves. And the Jews begin to think, okay, if that's good for the Levites, maybe that's good for all of us. And if they're doing that, then if we really want to be holy, we need to do that before we eat meals, before we eat dinner. And maybe we should not just clean our hands, we should clean our whole bodies, and maybe even the couches that we sit on. And then when they saw Jesus and his disciples eating with unclean hands, they rebuked him. Why do you and your disciples eat? You're just eating without cleaning your hands. You're not holy like we're holy. Jesus says you nullify the commandments of God by your man-made traditions. Though they built their traditions what they thought based upon some biblical principles, they elevated their personal convictions and traditions above the word of God and ended up disobeying God in their attempt to obey their own commands. Sometimes we are prone to do that. We have our particular convictions and preferences, and we think they're good enough for us, they should be imposed upon everyone else. And those who don't live according to our particular convictions, we begin to look down upon and disassociate ourselves with and think we're holier than they are. We end up breaking God's law in order to keep our particular convictions. Be careful. One person got on to me because I didn't do what they were doing and he rebuked me sharply. I go, well, I don't see it that way. I said, how are you doing with loving your neighbor? He says, well, I'm having a hard time on that one. And it dawned on me like, okay, here's the second commandment. First one's love God, the second one's love your neighbor. You're telling me that you're not really doing good on that one. But you're upset with me because you've got this small little detail that you and your thinking has built a case for that's hard to see at best. Maybe it's good wisdom, maybe it's not, but I have to evaluate it. I don't quite see it. And you're having a hard time with me because I can't quite do this one down here. But you can't even do the second one? So be careful. But likewise, we can not obey God by elevating our own laws, our own words above it. I've seen people not go to church. They forsake the local assembling of themselves together. They excuse themselves from church attendance because they can't fellowship with anyone. They've allowed their man-made priorities, man-made traditions, to cancel out greater commands, clear commands. We gotta be careful. But another thing we do, we simply make void the word of God, the clear commands of God, by just not obeying them or forgetting to obey. And let's be clear, forgetfulness, when it comes to obedience, is no excuse, it's sin. James 4, 17 says, to him that knows to do good and does it not, to him it is sin. So don't forget. And hearing and doing, or doing what we hear, is to make sure we don't forget what we hear. Thirdly, the third reason we need to obey is because it brings freedom. Look at what verse 25 says. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty. Now, if you got a little bit of a theological mind to you, you're going, wait a minute, Jeff. Obedience does not bring liberation and freedom, faith does. Right, you've already thought that. And good, you should think that. You should be, like, we gotta be very careful how we nuance this. But why does it call the law the law of liberty? Does not the Bible call the law bondage? Is it not called in 2 Corinthians 3 a ministry of death? Does Romans 7 not say, while we were living in the flesh, our simple passions aroused by the law were at work and our members to bear fruit for death? But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive. so that we serve in the new way of the spirit and not in the old way of the written code. So here's the law, the external law says don't do this, do that, do this and live, and those who don't do it will be cursed. And that is a law that brings us into captivity, a law that brings and reveals death. How is that called the law of liberty? Well, I'm glad you asked. Well, before you were converted, you were under the law as a means of justification. You're a means of being right with God. And no flesh will be right in the sight of God by the works of the law. Because all that the law can do is like a mirror, it can show you that you're a sinner, but it cannot, the mirror cannot help you get the piece of lettuce out of your teeth. It can reveal your flaws. It can reveal your sins. It can show you condemnation. It doesn't kill you. You're already dead because of your sins. Your sin kills you. The law reveals that and it reveals that you're already under the wrath of God. It reveals that you're already inbonded. It's not the actual thing that enslaves you. It's the sin that enslaves you. And as long as you're under the law as a means of righteousness, you'll find that it can only kill you. It can only judge you as a sinner. This is why Paul said in Romans 7.10, the very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me. He thought, I can live by the law, I can do this. But the very commandment, he says, do this and live, he found out it brought death when it revealed that he was a covetor. He thought he could obey all the commandments until it says, thou shall not covet. And that one particular command, because it dealt with the heart, it didn't deal with outward actions. The Pharisees thought, well, I've kept the law from my youth up. I don't lie, I don't steal, I haven't killed anybody. But what about coveting? Ooh. This is why Jesus says, hey, you might not have committed adultery, but if you looked in your heart and lusted, you've committed, oh, okay, that's, the law goes into my thoughts. Motivations are, that's what the law deals with? Then once the law gets into your conscience and shows you that just a bad thought is sinful, then the law kills you. So why does James call it the law of liberty in this place? Well, first of all, you gotta understand, there's nothing wrong with the law of God. He calls it the perfect law. It's perfect. In fact, Romans 7, Paul talks about how the law is not bad. It may be the instrument that kills you, but it doesn't mean the law is evil. Romans 7, 7 says, what shall we say then? The law is sin? By no means. If it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. Now, the mirror is not at fault because it shows you that you're ugly. Don't blame the mirror. Don't blame God's law because it shows you that you're a sinner. Don't say, the problem's not me, it's the law. No, no. Verse 11 of chapter seven says, for sin seizing opportunity through the commandment deceived me and through it killed me. So the law is holy. and the commandment is holy and righteous and good. There's nothing about God's law that is evil. In fact, it's exposing what is evil. It is that which is holy and good and pure and righteous. This is why the psalmist says, I delight in the law. The law is something to cherish and to love and delight. Now say, well, I don't like the law. What do you not like about the law? Do you like adultery? Do you like murder? Do you like stealing? Do you like pride? Do you like selfishness? Do you like any of these things? No, those are the things that are evil and wicked. Those are the things to hate. The law is the thing to love. Verse 13. In fact, verse 12 says, so the law is holy, commandment holy, and righteous and good. And verse 13 says, did that which is good then bring death to me? By no means. It was sin producing death in me. See, the law is just pointing out that you're a sinner. You're the problem, not the law. So the law is perfect, but we gotta remember the message of Romans chapter seven is that you can't obey the law by knowing the law. The law doesn't have the ability to keep you or help you obey. It's just a mirror. That's why you have to get to Romans eight. It says the only way to please the Lord is not by the human flesh and I can do this mentality. It's walk in the spirit. and not in the flesh. You have to have supernatural power to be obedient to the word. So if you're unconverted, the law just brings death. It can't save you. It can't justify you. You need to be saved by the grace of God, through faith in Christ alone. But we gotta remember it's sin and not the law that brings bondage. And this is why the law, is not a mirror that points us towards bondage. It's the mirror that points us towards liberty. It's sin that brings us into slavery. It's sin that brings us into bondage. Jesus said in John 8, 34, whoever commits sin is a slave to sin. If you want to be free, You know, you think the world thinks if I'm going to have freedom, then no one's going to tell me what to do. I don't need any law over me. I am my own law. That's the way they view freedom, right? No authority. I do what I want to do when I want to do it. I live for myself. I obey myself. No one's going to tell me what to do. Everybody that says that can't control themselves. Everyone who has that mentality, they're a slave to their flesh. They're a slave to their impulses. They're a slave to drugs, to pride, to selfishness. They're a slave to sin. And it's not them that's controlling their life. It's Satan and the flesh and the world, and they're marching in the same beat as the rest of the world is marching in. They're a slave to it all. They think they have freedom because they don't want authority. But it's the big lie of Satan. Serve self and you'll be free. But those who serve selves are in slavery and bondage and misery. You want freedom? You have to have the law. You have to obey the law. It's antinomianism, a view within Christianity that says Christians are not bound, they're not obligated to obey, that obedience is optional, it's not required. It's foolishness. If you love your children, you say, I don't care if you obey or not, you hate your children. You let your children just do what they want to do. You hate them. I just want to sit and watch TV all day, play video games all day. I don't want to clean my room. I don't want to be responsible. I don't want to do my homework. I don't want to. You've seen kids grow up to be adults that have that same mentality. There's 30-year-olds that still live with their parents playing video games in the basement. Just no self-control. And enslaved to their passions. Enslaved to this world. We'll talk about this in a minute. And they're miserable. Always thinking the next moment will bring them happiness. But God's law brings us freedom. Now, I want you to hear this. There's no freedom without rights, and there's no rights without responsibilities. Now, police officer can pull you over and give you a ticket. Why does that police officer, if you're speeding, Why does he have the right to give you a ticket? Who does he think he is to give you a ticket? You know? Well, it's because the police officer himself is under authority. And he represents a higher authority than himself. And if you don't listen to the police officer, you're not listening to the civil authority. And they can hold you accountable. There's a lot of oomph behind the police officer's ticket. There's a whole judicial system behind it. That's some authority. Now, we as Americans, we like to think of our rights and our freedoms. And let me tell you this, God did not, I mean, our country did not give us those freedoms. God did. Now, when he gave us freedoms, it comes in the package of law. Now, that seems contrary to the natural man. That seems contrary to the selfish man. I want freedom without law. There's no such thing. Now, think of it this way. If God gives you a command, which he's given you a lot of them, love me with all your heart, love your neighbor as yourself, that gives you the right That command gives you the 100% right to obey it. And no one can say, you can't do that. Oh, yes, I can. Wherever God gives me a command, I have the freedom, no matter who says otherwise, to do it. I have freedom. I have this responsibility and no husband, wives, your husbands cannot tell you to sin. The husband cannot control your conscience. A government can't control your conscience. A church cannot control your conscience. The only one who can control your conscience is God's living written word. And that is freedom. You're free to do it. No one can restrain you. Now, especially if you're born again and you have the Holy Spirit living in you, you're free and you're free indeed. Not free to sin, not free to be selfish. You're free to obey, which doesn't lead to death, but that obedience leads to joy and goodness. And you see, it's sin that brings us into bondage. The Bible says the wages of the transgressor is hard. Legalism will enslave you, but antinomianism will enslave you. It's only the perfect law. You don't need anything more, anything less. Don't add to it, don't take away from it. It's the perfect law. Churches can't build on it. We can't take away from it. Woe to us if we teach any of you to break the least of the commandments. So obey the least and obey the greatest. But there comes true freedom. Remember how Jesus ended his sermon on the Mount? He says, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter into the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many mighty works in your name? Then I will declare to them, I never knew you. Depart from me, you workers of lawlessness, you antinomians. Depart from me. You who claim that Jesus is your Savior but did not submit to him as Lord, depart from me. You who claim that you don't need obedience. My James, the book of James is written. Don't just say you have faith, show me your faith. Prove to me that you have faith. Prove to me by your works. This is why those who are living in sin, those who are constantly lying, perpetual lying, adulterers, homosexuals, the Bible says real clearly, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Well, I forgot. No, that doesn't matter. If you're not a doer of the word, you're not a Christian. Jesus went on to say, everyone who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who builds his house on a rock. And when the rain fell and the floods come and the winds blow and beat on the house, but it did not fall because it had been founded on a rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who's built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat against the house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it. So here you have two scenarios. You have those who heard the sermon, and those who listened and applied, those who obeyed it. They're like the wise man who built their house on a rock. But the fools are those who heard and did not apply, did not obey. One, when the trial come, their marriage stood. The other, when the trial come, their marriage fell. One stood in the day of temptation, the day of trial, the day of hardship. Others fell and great was the fall of it. Do you see, brothers and sisters, how important it is to obey God? To simply trust and obey, to take Him at His word and do it? This is the hardest part of counseling, is when you start running out of things to say. You can only tell so many ways of saying the same thing. You need to do this, you need to do this, do this. Stop doing that, repent, stop it. Replace that with this. See, the problem with many is not hearing or understanding, the problem is applying and doing. Now, I know unbelievers without the Spirit, you can say, well, sometimes the problem is you're an unbeliever, you just don't know, you don't have grace, you don't have power, you're in the flesh and you need to be born again. But for us who are born again, we have the Spirit. We have all things that pertain to life and godliness. You have all the things you needed to live a holy life. You're not without knowledge. You're not without instruction. You're not without supernatural power to apply. You're just forgetting or simply not doing. Now, there is this false teaching out there of letting go and letting God just, you know, be who you are and don't put any effort into it. No, that's wrong. In the Christian life, you have to sweat. You have to be disciplined. You have to apply. Even with the power of the Holy Spirit enabling you, there's still an oomph. There's still a, I've got to go do this. Your life changes when you do it. Your marriages are conformed when you do it. Do you understand there's blessings in obedience and curses with disobedience? You wonder why your life's messed up? Well, of course it's messed up. You wonder why other families seem to have it together and they're doing well? Well, there's a reason. I'm not a mechanic. Jerry Jr. sure knows I'm not a mechanic. But I believe that if something's malfunctioned on your vehicle, it's because there is a problem. There's a reason that it has that knocking noise. And this is my philosophy, but it doesn't work. It won't go away by, ignoring it. Well, let's just keep driving it. If you've got a knock in your life, you have to pay attention to it. Look at the law, the perfect law and reveal it and say, okay, that's wrong. Maybe you need to forgive. Maybe you need to do the one another's that we've been talking about. Maybe you need to keep your covenant vows. Maybe you need to ask for forgiveness. The law does bring freedom, not for unbelievers. Only Christ can do that. But in Christ, he set us free to obey. He's given us liberty to be obedient. He hasn't saved us to remain in our sins. He's saved us to deliver us from the bondage of sin. We are free to obey. And this brings us to our last point. The reason you need to obey, we see here, is because there's blessings in obedience. Look at verse 25. But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets, but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. Now, here's the idea. It's not just listening to one sermon and applying it for one day. This has the idea of persevering in obedience. I can promise you, I can promise you that you could lose weight. I have the secret. I do. You won't like it. But it works. Eat a lot less and go to the gym every day. Okay, you will try that for a week and you'll tell me it doesn't work. Right? I tried that, Jeff. It doesn't work. Your diet doesn't work because you don't persevere. It's not rocket science. It's not really rocket science. You go to the gym, you run a mile, and you go, okay, didn't work. Of course it didn't work. You know, you hear people that try to obedience, you know, I've tried spanking my kids, it doesn't work. Of course it didn't work. You tried for a week, tried for a month, It's not instant, it's not instant, it's persevering, it's steadfastness, it's being repetitive, discipline. If you obey God, and I don't say, hey, you got a bad marriage, come back in one month, you're gonna have a blissful marriage. No, you're not. Let's be real about it. You have years of bad habits. You have that, your wife doesn't gonna trust you for the first six months. You reform for six months, she still hates me. Of course she does, she don't trust you. Six years of this, she will love you. She'll trust you. It's steadfastness, it's perseverance, and it works. You'll get in it what you put into it. Don't just be nice to your wife for one day. Don't go to church on Sunday and Easter and think, okay, that's good. Jonathan Edwards says, the commitment to total obedience does not mean a mere negative avoidance of evil practices. This also means positively obeying God's commands. We cannot say that someone is a true Christian just because he's not a thief, liar, blasphemer, drunkard, sexual, immoral, arrogant, cruel, or fierce. He also has to be possibly God-fearing, humble, respectful, gentle, peaceful, forgiving, Merciful and loving. Without these positive qualities, he is not obeying the laws of Christ. But this is talking about not just the blessings that come through obedience. You know, there's a curse that comes through disobedience and sin. If you do what God tells you, your life will be transformed. Do you believe that? Well, you have to believe. You have to know, believe, then you have to obey. It works. Are you claiming God's a liar? It works. But there's also a blessing, not just in the long-term blessings that come through obedience, there's a blessing in the act of obedience. It says there in verse 25, being no hearer who forgets, but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing. You may do good for today and die tonight. And you may not see all the benefits of your obedience. But the very act of obeying is a blessing. It brings joy, unlike sin, that brings misery. Sin is tempting, it's easy. It's easy to sin. And there's a lure to the pleasure of sin for a moment. But in the midst of sinning, there is a sour taste underneath it all. Something that brings not joy, maybe a moment of pleasure, but not real joy, not satisfaction, not blessing, but there's a curse, there's a sting in it. But John 13, 17, if you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them. You wanna be blessed? You want to have the joy of the Lord? Not just a passing moment of pleasure, but true joy and peace? A clean conscience, there's nothing like it. It's sin that leads to internal discontentment and external consequences, but it's obedience that God has established to bring joy. Jerry Bridges says, the daily experience of Christ's love is linked to our obedience to Him. It's not that his love is conditioned on our obedience, because Christ already earned that for us. Thank the Lord. That would be legalism, Jerry Bridges says. But our experience of his love is dependent upon our obedience. See, God has given us his word for us to believe. Now, if you're lost, what do you do? Obey the gospel. Repent and believe. Don't just hear it, but do it. Repent and believe the Lord Jesus Christ. If you're saved, if there's anything that this sermon, and I can't list all the sins or all the commandments that you know, but if there's a sin in your life that you know there's there, or there is a, you're neglecting something you know you should be doing, If the Spirit is whispering or telling you or yelling at you, then do it. I will do it. Let's pray. Lord, we see that your word is given to us to live out, to obey, and we don't want to be hearers only, but doers. We do pray for the Spirit and the grace to carry out what you command. We do not want to try it in the works of the flesh. We want to walk in the Spirit and not in the flesh. But we don't want to just hear and know and not be holy. We want to be holy as you are holy. We want to be godly as you are godly. We want to be humble like you are humble. We want to be righteous like you are righteous. We want to be good as you are good. We wanna be obedient as your son was obedient. This we pray in your son's name, amen.