1 John 3. I did not plan these two messages. I did not think ahead and plan them to bring them together, but they're so much alike. This morning's Bible study and the second message are very, very much alike. I believe the Lord, I know He did. He brought these things up in His Word at the exact same time. Look at verse 10 of 1 John 3. I'm not going to go as far as I wrote in the bulletin. He said, In this the children of God are manifest. It's apparent. The children of the devil. Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. He says the children of God are revealed, and the children of the devil. I know religion talks a lot about the devil and Satan, and he has really become a laughing matter to this generation because ignorant Religious people speak, Scripture says, evil of dignity, things they don't know about, and they speak about him. I saw a man come in to Walmart yesterday, and he had on his shirt, Not Today, Satan. That tells me he's under his dominion, that he doesn't have any fear. Ask Adam and Eve about Satan. Ask David. Ask all of God's people. Ask Michael, the archangel, who would not contend with them. The archangel. The children of God are revealed. The children of the devil. Scripture very plainly tells us that all human beings are not God's children. God is not the Father. He's the Creator, but not the Father of all mankind. God said that in the garden. He began saying that in the garden. He spoke to Satan. He said, I'll put enmity between her seed and your seed. The seed, the offspring of the dead, Satan. Our Lord Jesus Christ said this. He turned to some and said, If God were your father, you would do the works of your father. Right? That's what John is talking about. He said, if you're of your father, the devil and his works, that's what you do. So this is what John is talking about. Can we know whether or not we're the sons of God or of the God of this world, Satan? Can we? Yes. This whole book, 1 John, I'm so thankful for it. Hereby we may know. that we've passed from death unto life. By this we may know that we're born of God, begotten of God. And there's several ways, but two principal ways we want to look at this morning. So scripture plainly tells us that the true children of God are manifest, are revealed, It's not completely apparent and obvious to everyone, but 1 Corinthians 2 talks about those who are spiritual, that is, mature in their understanding. They have discernment. Their eye is single. Their whole body is full of light. And they have some discernment. They can discern between the true and the false. Not infallibly, mind you, because some of these works are easily imitated outwardly. in speech and works and so forth. God's not mocked. He sure knows. He looks on the heart. On the heart, that's where the issue is. Love. We're going to talk about that. We may know, and here's what Paul told us in 2 Corinthians 13 and 5, examine yourselves whether you be of the faith. Know ye not your own self? Whether Christ be in you, except you be reprobate. So, do you want to know if you're a child of God? Do you want to know? That's a good sign. The people of the world don't know and they don't care. They're not asking that question. They're not asking. So it's a good sign. Give diligence. They give diligence to make their calling and election sure. Paul said this, one thing I want. I want one thing. And I'm pressing. I want to be found in Christ. I want to win Christ. I want to know Him. I am not there yet, he said. I haven't arrived yet. I haven't attained yet. But this one thing I do. Didn't David say that? So do all of God's people. All of them without exception. That's one way you know. They're not playing games here. This is life or death. They want to be found in Christ. They've been warned like Noah, and they move with fear, and they get in Christ's ark, and they don't want to get out. Two principle ways that John deals with here. Verse 10. In this, the children of God are manifest, the children of the devil. Now, you go to John chapter 6. Now, he just said, little children, let no man deceive you. He that doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous. He that committeth sins of the devil, never sinneth from it again. Let no man deceive you. Why would he say that? Let no man deceive you. Because, sad to say, some men completely explain that away. to mean that it doesn't matter how you live at all. It has nothing to do with salvation. Rather, it's not the means of your salvation, but salvation is unto good works. Salvation is to take an unrighteous people and make them righteous, make them like Christ. Not in principle, not in theory, not just spiritually, but in thought, word, and deed like Jesus Christ. Let no man deceive you. Let no man explain this away. And Paul said it in the other epistle. Paul said it. He said, let no man deceive you. Because of these things cometh the wrath of God on the children of disobedience. Adultery, fornication, all of these things. Drunkenness and so forth. And such were some of you. But you're washed. You justify. You sanctify. You change. You're a new creature in Christ. If there's no new creature there, God didn't save that person. They're not of God. Is that right? That's why he said, don't let anybody deceive you. And it's obvious, you look at a person out there that has no interest in God, that they're sitting on the bar stool at 10 a.m. at Applebee's. That's their life. It's obvious that person doesn't know God, is there? Right? Clearly, the works of the devil are manifest. Galatians 5 says that works of the flesh are made manifest. But the fruit of the Spirit is also manifest. Children of God are manifest. It's obvious. For this purpose, Christ came to destroy the works of the devil. To suppress that old man in you, create a new man in you for his glory. That's what salvation is all about. It's unto good work, not because of them, but unto them, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. Let no man deceive you. Let no man teach you otherwise. I'm so thankful I had a pastor that preached the Word as it is, what it said. Barnard used to say, it doesn't say what you think it means, it says what it says. Why would anybody explain this away? I love what John Newton said. I love it. We all love this. I am not what I ought to be. You know, that's why the scriptures keep exhorting us, exhorting us, exhorting us. Jesus, that's what the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, leads us and guides us in holiness and godliness and Christ-likeness. Be holy, I'm not. I'm not what I ought to be. I'm not what I'm going to be. It does not yet appear, John said, what we shall be. I'm not what I'm going to be. I'm not what I want to be. Like David said, I'll be satisfied only when I wake with His likeness. Like Paul said, O wretched man that I am, I just want this old man gone. But thank God, John Newton said, I'm not what I used to be. Is that self-righteousness? No, it's acknowledging what God has done. Brethren, I wouldn't be in this building if God hadn't done something for me. It's the furthest thing from my mind and heart years ago. But God. To God be the glory. Great things He hath done. It's obvious when He does it. It's obvious when God does something. When God does something to somebody like Moses, they come out from the Word of God, born again, and their face is shy. Their countenance is shy. They're a new creature in Christ. Now, what I said before, it's not perfectly obvious or manifest or infallibly known, but it is known. Where are we? John 6. Now he talks about doing righteousness. Doing righteousness. Here, John chapter 6. The two ways we're going to look at this morning. The children of God are known to manifest, and the children of the devil. The children of God do righteousness, and they love. They love. Really. It's unfamed love. It's not fake. They're not putting it on. And we're going to see who and what they love supremely. John chapter 6, doing righteousness. In verse 28, some said to our Lord, John 6, 28, they said unto him, What shall we do that we might work the works of God? Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent. Number one, doing righteousness. Doing righteousness is dealing first and foremost with faith. That's what it's talking about. Alright? Believing, trusting Christ. Look at Romans 4. Romans 4. You see, remember Titus 3 says, it's not by works of righteousness which we have done according to His mercy. See, even this faith is not of yourselves. It's the gift of God. I believe God, but I didn't just decide to. It wasn't my free will. It wasn't my choice of Him. It was His choice of me. It was His will. Okay? If I believe on the Lord, He did it. He did it. But I do believe. I do believe. Yet not I. You understand what I'm saying? If you don't believe on the Lord, you're not saved. You won't be saved. If you don't call on the Lord, you won't be saved. You're not saved. Well, who calls? Those the Lord calls. Who believes? Those the Lord gave faith, but they believe. Romans 4 verse 1. What shall we say then that Abraham, our father, as pertaining to the flesh, hath found? If Abraham were justified by works, he hath whereof something to glory in, not before God. What sayeth the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted. It was reckoned. It was charged. It was imputed unto him for righteousness. He believed God. That's a work of righteousness, as God said, justified from all things. For what? Believing. Where did he get this faith? Abraham was 75 years old and an idolater. He didn't know God. He wasn't looking for God. But God came looking for him. And God found him. And God revealed himself to him. And God gave him this faith, see, of God are all these things. Verse 5, verse 4, Now to him that worketh is a reward not reckoned of grace, but of death. You see, by grace we're saved, not work. This doing righteousness, and you know these things. Am I saying something new to you? I know. It's new to those who've never heard it before. Not God speaking. You know these things. that we keep stressing them, though. Why? It's God's glory. Now, verse 5, But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. This is doing righteousness. Number one principle, doing righteousness. Galatians 3, we don't have time to turn there. I'm going to turn for you. In Galatians chapter 3, over and over, it says, now listen to it, Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Again, he's saying the same thing. Don't you know that they which are of faith the same are the children of Abraham? And verse 26 says you're all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. I tell you, the children of God are manifest. by this work of faith in them. They do righteousness, but it's not them. They believe, but it's not them. He gave them this faith. This faith is a result of salvation. It's not the cause. Okay? And this gives me hope. This really gives me hope that I'm a child of God. I really do believe. Who do you say that I am? Simon Peter said, we believe, no, we're sure, that thou art the Christ, the Son of God. They knew Him. They believed Him. They walked with Him. They listened to Him. They strove to do what He told them to do. They loved Him. They depended upon Him. He was their life. Brethren, I can say the same thing. If you'd ask any of them, you'd say, what's your hope of heaven? Simon Peter says, him. It's him. But Peter, you're a new man. That's not my hope. If I'm a new man, he did it. I didn't do it. He did it. He was a new man, wasn't he? Peter went from a longshoreman to a Christlike man. John Newton. Read his story sometime. Well, faith, faith, faith. Now faith worketh. Galatians 5 says this faith that God does, it's His Word. But this faith He puts in them worketh. How? By love. Which brings me to the next thing. The next thing is work of righteousness, work it by love. Go back to our text, 1 John chapter 3. It says in verse 10, Whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God, neither he that loveth not his brother. This is the message, verse 11, that you heard from the beginning. That we should love one another. He says we should love one another. We should. Our children should love. Our children should do what we say. Well, they do. But we tell them they need more. They need to grow in this thing. They do. If they don't, they're not. If we don't love, we're not God's people. And we do. But oh, how little is our love. How small is our love. These things need to be perfected, or matured, or grown, that we might grow into the measure of the stature, Ephesians 4 says, of the fullness of Christ, a perfect man. We're created in Christ Jesus unto good work, for we grow in grace and the knowledge of Him. And this is, as we noted last week, it's not something washing. Remember washing? You don't wash yourself. The soap washes you. The water washes you. This means that the Lord says to use the Word. And He says, so desire the sincere milk of the Word that you may grow thereby. Do you make yourself grow? No. The Word does. You grow in faith. You grow like crack. There's a passage in 1 Corinthians that says, we all behold as in a glass the glory of the Lord, and we're changed into the same image. Beholding the glory of the Lord. We really don't know it, don't realize it, but we are being changed in His image. The more you look at Him, the more you look to Him, the more you look at Him, the more you become like Him. The child grows up. grows up, is it pretty evident that that John Cheesley back there is the son of just John Cheesley? If you came in here and nobody knew these two men, and I asked, who's that man's son up there? It's manifest. Well, what about the work of God? Sure it is. Sure it is. All right. Now, let me just say this before we go on to love. Scripture speaks much of good works, doesn't it? Many things. And some of those things can be imitated. As we said last week, Janice and Jamboree, the magicians of Pharaoh, they had their tricks and they threw their rod down and became serpents and tricks. Fooled a lot of people. Fooled the Egyptians. They thought they were white tricks, schemes, sorcery. It appears to the naked eye, but it's not. It's not. So a lot of good works. And here's why the Scripture says, listen to this, the plowing of the wicked is evil in the sight of the Lord. Now farming is a good, honest vocation. Aren't you thankful to the farmer? But he said the plowing of the wicked, that man who doesn't know God, who doesn't give thanks to God, who doesn't worship God, who does not give God the glory for everything that he has, him out there plowing his field and not glorifying God for that field is wicked, evil in the sight of the Lord. Whatsoever is not of faith is what? Sin. Sin. God's not getting the glory for it. All of it. There's nowhere it's more subtly deceptive than in religion. Because it's in the name of God, and they use Jesus' name and all that, and that's why it says, many will say unto him in that day, look what we've done. And our Lord said, it doesn't matter, it's evil in my sight. You call it good works? The Lord said, I say it's evil because it wasn't done for my glory. Right? All right? So this brings me to the next thing. It's manifest. And rather than you, those who have clear eye can discern the difference. You can smell it. You can smell man's glory. You can smell You can smell the exaltation of man. And you can feel it and you can hear it when God's being abased in man's immediate. And it makes you ill, not sick. There's signs. David said, the transgression of the wicked saith within my heart clearly tells me, clearly manifests to me that there's no fear of God before their eyes. And this is the clearest sign of all to me in religion today. No fear. They talk about God, but it's not in fear, not in reference. Well, I've got to go on, because there's a group that are so close that if it were possible, they'd receive the very leg. And this is the thing that I know in them. No fear. They're clever, they're cute, they're even comical. And they've got the doctrine. But there's no fear of God when you're trying to be clever, cute, and comical, and you don't have a burden for the Word. If you're not serious about this, God didn't send you. And I'm listening to these fellows, and I'm thinking, our Lord didn't preach like that. The apostles didn't preach like that. It's too serious. I've been reading the burdens of the Word of the Lord in Isaiah, seven or eight burdens. Read it. No laughing matter. It's good news, all right, but there was a lot of woe before he got to chapter 40, and Isaiah did. Comfort ye, comfort ye, my people. My people. All right, love. 1 John 3. This is manifest. He that loveth not his brother. This is the message. Now, is love to the brethren the first thing? Our Lord said all the law is fulfilled in one word, love. The first four tables of the law, the moral law, is to God, toward God. The last six are toward man. In this, the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. God's people really do love God as God. All things work together for good to them that love God as God. Let such as love thy salvation, thy glory, thy name. David said, Unite my heart to fear thy name, to never use thy name in any way but in fear and reverence. Why? Because they love His glory. They love His name. They love His truth. They love His truth. They don't just believe it. They love it. They've received the gift, the grace of God. They've received a love for the truth. They don't just say, Oh, I believe man is to pray. They know it. They don't just believe God elected people. They know it and they love it. They know that if He had elected me, I wouldn't have chosen Him. They know and they believe that Christ died for His people and the blood of Jesus Christ. They believe in particular, effectual, eternal redemption of Christ. They believe and they love it. It's a hope. They believe in irresistible grace. Oh, they love it. Because they resisted, they resisted, they resisted. But then when God said, no more. Here are the two shall you come. No further. They love it. They love that. And perseverance of the same. Perseverance, as Brother Crabtree called it. Perseverance. They don't just know it. They love it. If I get the glory, brother, it's because Christ got me there. One hundred percent. Ask the people on the ark, how did you get to this promised land? The ark! We didn't swim afoot. We were found in the ark. These aren't just doctrines in the head of God's people. They're the joy and rejoice of their heart. We speak of Him who loved us and chose us and called us and washed us and preserved us. They love Him and they love His people. They love His people. They love His kingdom. They love His king. Here's the thing. Here's the true children of God are manifest. Faith in Christ, I mean they really do trust, believe Christ 100%. Cut into the heart of a believer and what you'll find is Christ. They're not looking to anything, anyone but Jesus Christ. There are no exceptions. No exceptions. Faith in Christ, love for God as God. Buddy, when you start preaching and exalting God, the sovereign God, to His people, His children, they rejoice to high heaven. They're so glad. Rejoice the Lord is King. They love God as God. They love His truth. It endureth forever. They love it. They love the things of God. They love the kingdom of God. Their mind, their heart is set on it. They want it. They desire it. They're looking for it. They want to be in it. They love the worship of God. These are the things of God what we're doing right now. This is what are we doing? We're preaching Christ. We're preaching. We're not doing anything. I'm not entertaining you. There's no programs for you. It's one thing. Is this one thing needful for you? Is this the one joy and rejoicing of your heart? Is this the one thing that you must have that is the joy and rejoicing of your heart? Is it not it? Him. The children of God are manifest. The children of the devil. Our Lord said of Satan, Thou shapers not the things that be of God, but the things of man. So that's what you have to use to appeal to the people of the world. What's that? Music, entertainment, programs, food. President, this is our food in it. Fun. I wouldn't call, I don't, again, I don't use likeness or cleverness. This is not fun, per se, as in a game we're playing, but this really is the enjoyment of God's people. You can't fake it. And you will for a while. You can for a while. But not forever. Until finally somebody, Christ, the love of Christ is not in them, the things of God is not in them, what they'll say is, I'm looking for something else. And they leave. And they find all those things, programs and this and that and the other. What do you want for your children? What do you want for your children? One thing. And that's what we do here. You know what my wife is teaching your children downstairs right now? Isaiah 53. Isaiah 53. This is how the children of God are manifest. And love for one another. Now, he's going to deal with this more in depth, and so will I, with more time. But love for the brethren. It's not fake. It's unfeigned love for the brethren. You go in these places, and some of you have been in it, and I love you, brother, and they're stabbing you in the back. They don't say it all the time, but you know it. How? Because they'll prefer you over their blood kin. And I'll deal with that a little more in the next message. And that's a God. That kind of love is a God.