00:00
00:00
00:01
Transcript
1/0
John chapter 5 and verse 31. If I bear witness of myself,
my witness is not true. There is another that beareth
witness of me, and I know that the witness which he witnesseth
of me is true. "'You sent unto John, and he
bear witness unto the truth. "'But I receive not testimony
from man, "'but these things I say, that you might be saved. "'He was a burning and a shining
light, "'and you were willing for a season to rejoice in his
light. "'But I have greater witness
than that of John, For the works that the Father hath given me
to finish, the same works that I do bear witness of me that
the Father hath sent me. And the Father himself which
hath sent me hath borne witness of me. You have neither heard
his voice at any time, nor seen his shape. And you have not his
word abiding in you, for whom he has sent him, you believe
not. He said, you don't have the word
of God abiding in you, because the one that the father sent,
you don't believe in him. Search the scriptures, for in
them, you think you have eternal life. and they are they which
testify of me." Our Lord was using this verse as a challenge. In fact, this controversy that
he tries to settle with the religious leaders still boiled on all the
way to chapter number eight. And he said, I challenge you
to search the scriptures because in those scriptures, He said,
you are confiding in that you have eternal life. In those same
scriptures, they are the ones that testify of me. And you will
not come to me that you might have life. I receive not honor
from men, but I know you that you have not the love of God
in you. I'm come in my father's name
and you receive me not. If another shall come in his
own name, him ye will receive. How can you believe which receive
honor one of another? And seek not the honor that cometh
from God only. Do not think that I will accuse
you to the Father. There's one that accuseth you,
even Moses, in whom you trust. For had you believed Moses, you
would have believed me, for he wrote of me. But if you believe
not his writings, how shall you believe my words? You may be
seated. Look down at your Bible. You'll
find our text here in John chapter five and verse number 40. I couldn't get away from it.
I preached this text before. This is not the message I preached
before. It is the same text. John chapter
five and verse 40. And you will not come to me that
you might have life. Let's pray together. Father,
as we bow our heads and hearts, we want to say thank you for
this opportunity to come and to preach the wonderful word
of God. I pray you touch the minds and
hearts of those who come this way. Lord, convey clearly the
truth of the scriptures in this hour. There may be one who has
long been lost, that needs to be saved in this audience today.
There may be one Lord that's nearest hell. Lord, their appointment
with death may be sooner than what we realize. I pray that
you'd captivate their attention and Lord that you'd convict their
heart and draw them by the power of Christ. to make the greatest
decision that any man or woman will ever make. That is, the
one to turn from their sins and take Christ as their Savior.
Allow the Holy Spirit to have freedom and liberty to work in
this audience. And we'll thank you for what
you do now, for we ask it in Jesus' name, amen and amen. Many years ago, a man had an
appointment to meet with a lawyer over some legal business that
he had to conduct. And this man was a Christian,
a born-again Christian, and a very avid witness for Christ. After
having the consultation with the lawyer, he looked at that
man whom he had some acquaintance with, and he said, I was wondering
why that you've never been saved. Why have you never become a Christian? And the man ashamedly bowed his
head. He said, I know enough about
what the Bible says to know that no drunkard shall inherit the
kingdom of God. And he said, well, you can be
forgiven of your sins. You can come to Christ and you
can take him as your Lord and Savior. After a time of conversation,
that man, Cyrus Scofield, C.I. Scofield took Christ in his own
lawyer's office and later became a preacher of the gospel. I want
to ask the same question that man posed that day. Why are you
still lost? Why are you still lost? Why have you not taken Christ
as your dearest friend and only Savior and the only one that
can take you to heaven? What really is it that's hindering
you from coming to Jesus in salvation? FORGIVENESS THROUGH THE BLOOD
OF CHRIST. WHY WOULDN'T ANYONE WANT TO TAKE
THE GREATEST PEACE THAT'S EVER BEEN IMPARTED TO MANKIND? AND THE BIBLE TALKS ABOUT so
great salvation. That is, salvation is the greatest
truth that has ever been proclaimed. How that God sent his son from
heaven above to this world to live and to die on an old rugged
cross so that men might be born of God. Not only is it the greatest
truth, but it imparts the greatest gift that has ever been given.
I'm thankful this morning that God sent his son and that through
his death at cow rate, that you can be born of God and your life
can be transformed. And salvation brings about the
greatest transformation. It's a change not from the outside
in, but from the inside out. I'm thankful that Christ can
come to live in your heart and he can change your desires. My
quandary and my battle before I got saved, for about 30 days
I tried to figure out how how I could live the Christian life.
I tried to quit every known vile vice that I had in my life at
that time. Many times I would start out
in the day and I would say, I'm going to quit cussing today.
In the South, we don't curse, we cuss. And I said, I'm going
to quit cursing today. And before the noon hour, usually
before the first or second hour of the workday finished, I had
already cursed up a blue string. I said, I'm going to quit this
and quit that. And there were some of those
vile habits that just would not leave. I found out what I really
needed was not to try to be a Christian, but to first take Christ as my
Savior and to trust Him. to save my soul and to change
my life. Though these in this chapter
were speaking directly to the very one who was the answer to
their life, they refused to come to Him as their Lord and Savior. Jesus looked at them directly
and said, you will not come to me that you might have life.
Sometimes people say, well, they won't get saved because they
got hurt in a church or got offended or they got their feelings hurt
and they won't ever go back to church again. Well, I'd rather
go to heaven and know Jesus and find a church that I could go
to than go to hell with all the hypocrites in the world. And
I want to say our Lord in this passage is directly speaking
to them. He's the greatest preacher that
ever lived. They did not reject Christ because they didn't have
a clear witness of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, our Lord begins
to tell them all the witnesses that he had sent to them to show
them that they needed to be saved. He sent a man named John the
Baptist. In verse 33, he said, you're
sending a John and he bear witness unto the truth. That is John
had told them who he was. John made the first announcement
about Christ. He looked up from the Jordan
River and saw him coming down the river banks and said, behold,
the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. He
announced him in the same chapter as the Son of God. And so this
morning, Christ is the only way you can have your sins taken
away. You see, it'd be all fine if
you knew how You could get rid of your sins, but the only way
you can have your sins forgiven is by the blood of an old rugged
cross. That is how sins are forgiven. The only way you can have a relationship
with God is through the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, I sent
John to you. And it seems like he didn't want
that witness that John the Baptist gave. In fact, one of the kings
actually had his head cut off because John preached against
sin. And he preached about the Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ. The second witness that he sent
was the witness of the Father. In verse 37, as the Father himself
which hath sent me hath borne witness in me. You have neither
heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shade. And you have
not his word abiding in you. For whom he has sent him, you
believe not. They really did not have, though
the word of God abiding in them. And they did not believe that
the Father had sent him. Had they only known the prophecies
that God had sent to them, they would know that Jesus was sent
from God. And then in verse 36, he said,
but I have greater witness than that of John. For the works which
the Father hath given me to finish, the same works that I do bear
witness to me that the Father hath sent me. And so now the
witness that he sends is the witness of his mighty works that
he sent to John and said to his disciples, tell John the blind
receive their sight. and the lame walk, and the lepers
are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the
poor have the gospel preached to them. He said, you tell John,
just like Isaiah said, it would happen when the Messiah arrives,
the blind receive their sight. Said, tell John down in prison
that a man named Bartimaeus in the city of Jericho received
his sight and followed me in the way. Tell John that in the
ninth chapter of this same book, there's a blind man and Jesus
passed by his way and that blind man got his sight restored by
the power of Christ. I would say if he were living
in this day, tell him that there's a bunch down at Unity Baptist
Church. Thank God they had their spiritual
eyes opened up by the power of Christ. They said, tell John
that the blind receive their sight. The mighty works of a
Savior are being done now by the Lord Jesus Christ. Tell him
that the lame walk. Amen. In the early part of this
chapter, there's a man by the pool of Bethesda. And that man
is laid there for many days. The Bible said in verse 5, he
had that infirmity for 38 years. And yet there came one by that
way that was able to give him a command through the power of
Christ. He was able to rise up and walk. I'm telling you about a mighty
Savior. Not only do the blind see, and
the lame walk, and those that are crippled are raised up, and
the lepers are cleansed. Thank God they're those that
were the hopeless ones. They came crying out. Jesus,
Master, have mercy on us. Thank God he did what nobody
else could do. That horrible disease called
leprosy, he caused it to flee from them. And some even came
back and fell down at his feet and gave glory to Christ. Thank
God the lepers are cleansed. The deaf here, as in Mark chapter
seven, verse 32 through 37. And then he said, the dead are
raised up, amen. That is, here he is at a place
called Nain. And the Bible said there's a
funeral procession coming down the road outside the city of
Nain. And thank God the old song said, and coming down the road
is Jesus. Right on time. Amen. And he touched
that little place where the dead body lay. And thank God that
boy sat up on that stretcher. He gave him back to his mother
and broke up a funeral procession and sent the family home. Wipe
their tears by the power of his blessed hope. Thank God our Savior
has given a witness of his mighty power. Not only that, at the
city of Bethany in a graveyard, Mary and Martha are already weeping. And Jesus came down there where
they were, and He walked out to the grave with them and held
their hands. And the Bible said Jesus wept. He stood there by
the graveside, held their hands, and He wept along with them.
Bless His holy name. And then he said, let's rest,
come forth. And out of that grave where he
had already been dead four days, thank God, came a man that was
woken. I say hallelujah. The witness
of his mighty works are testimony of who he was. I say not only
that, but there is the witness of the scriptures. Our Lord had
challenged them concerning the very thing that they knew so
well. He said, search the scriptures.
If you don't recognize me, you need to search the scriptures.
He said, you need to read Isaiah's writings. If you don't know who
I am, You need to read Zechariah's writings. If you don't know who
I am, you need to go back to Deuteronomy and find the prophecy
that said a prophet shall arise like unto Moses. That said you
need to read the writings of the Old Testament because in
them you think you have eternal life. And this is a verse that
reminds us that the religious leaders were not saved. They
were sadly deceived. And yet Jesus said, if you search
those scriptures, you'll find my identity. you'll find the
prophecies that talk about me coming and me dying and rising
again so people can be saved. But they would not search the
scriptures. They turned their back on all
these witnesses. And sadly, there could have been
a great deal of them that still went to hell. But I'm asking
you the question, why are you still lost? Why have you still
rejected Christ? Why have you kept him outside
of your heart all these years? Why have you not asked him to
forgive you and to save you? Why have you not begun the greatest
relationship that any person can ever have? Why is it this
morning that you, as an individual, have not taken the greatest gift
that's ever been given? Sadly, there are some people
that will never get saved. You say preacher that sounds
awfully hopeless. Not because I'm trying to offer
no hope this morning, but because there are some people that will
never get saved. Not because Christ cannot save
them. I remember sitting in a break
room years ago and I was pastoring the first church that I pastored
and I was working a job and I was sitting around the table with
some guys and they were talking about a certain individual that
this person had gone down the wrong road like a lot of us have.
They had gotten wound up in drugs and alcohol and one person at
the table to my right knew this person very well. I was just
listening and just minding my own business for a minute and
they were telling all these things. One of the men said, yeah, I
saw this person up on the hill in a certain city that was known
for drug activity. Another person spoke up and said,
yeah, I know that person's best friend. She's known to be a drug
user and known to be strung out and all of these things, all
the bad things that they said. And one of them all of a sudden
spoke up and said, well, there's no hope for them. And I said,
hold on a minute, and I raised my hand up. I said, now you've
talked about what you know about. I said, I want to tell you what
I know about. I said, you talked about what you can observe and
what you can understand. I want to tell you what God says. I want to tell you that that
dear person is not hopeless because Jesus Christ is the hope for
the entire world. My life was much like theirs
until I came to Jesus and took him as my Lord and Savior. And
I want to say that it's not that they're lost because Christ cannot
save them. wherefore he is able also to
save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing
that he ever liveth to make intercession for them. There's no one that's
too bad to save. Amen. They are not lost because
Christ did not die for them. In some denominations, and you'd
be surprised, I could name them all. Even the Southern Baptists
are riddled with this doctrinal ideology today that Jesus Christ
only died for a select few and that unless you are one of the
elect, that you have no hope of being saved. I've got news
for you. The very same one that put this
book together, the very same one that came from heaven to
die for us, the very same one that inspired this book and inspired
the payment of Scripture said, for whosoever shall call upon
the name of the Lord shall be saved. The very one that said,
whosoever will, let him come and take of the water of life
freely. They're not lost because Christ
did not die for them. He absolutely did die for them. You are not lost because your
lives are too hopeless to save because Christ can save anyone. In a street one day they brought
to him a woman that was caught in the very act of a wicked deed.
And I personally believe as I see the way this account is arranged
that those men had likely set her up. They had likely arranged
this whole ordeal. They did it so they could challenge
Christ to see if he would inflict the very penalty of the law.
And Jesus saw their wicked hearts. He said to them, he said, those
of you that are without sin, not just any sin, but this very
sin that you have arranged right here to take place so it can
challenge me about my moral authority. He said, you go ahead and cast
the first stone. And when he stooped down twice
and wrote on the ground, He looked at the woman after her accusers
had vanished and said, woman, where are thine accusers? And
she didn't see any one of them. And she said, no man nor, nobody's
here left to accuse me. He said, neither do I. He said,
go and see them no more. He wasn't condoning what she
did, but he gave her mercy and he gave her hope, hallelujah.
That's the savior that I'm preaching about this morning. But there
are some people that God cannot save. Now I want you to hear
me carefully. God cannot save a self-righteous
person who will not admit that they're a sinner. You see, God
sent his son to seek and to save that which was lost. God sent
his son not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. Mark
2 and verse 17. For the Son of Man has come to
seek and to save that which was lost. Christ came to die for
our sins and the only way we can be saved is to admit that
we're sinners and admit that we're in need of a Savior and
to cry out to Him for the mercy of God. God cannot save a person
who thinks they're too good to be saved. I have met people down
through the years. I remember myself and a visitation
partner of mine were knocking doors not very far from this
church one day. And we were on the loop road
there where it winds around and climbs the hill where the old
maintenance garage of the mill was at the top of the hill. At
the bottom of that hill, there's a road that goes off to the right.
And we were over in there, and my partner was doing a masterful
job of showing this man why he needed Christ. The reason we
need Christ is because we're sinners in God's sight. The reason
we need Christ is because we broke the law of God. The reason
we need Christ is because we're gonna have to pay the wages of
sin if we don't take Jesus as our Savior. And he's telling
this man all along, and he did it very graciously. He went around
the room, and he said, now, he said, Christ came to die because
Tommy's a sinner, and I'm a sinner, and you're a sinner. And that
man's facial expression changed. And he said, wait a minute, I
ain't no sinner. What are you saying? I ain't
no sinner. I've never killed anybody. He said, sir, you don't have
to kill anybody to be a sinner. You're a sinner by nature, and
then you're a sinner by choice. But you don't have to be a murderer
to be a sinner. All of us are sinners in God's
sight in need of a Savior. Every one of us are lost. And
the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.
And Christ cannot save a person who does not see their need of
Him as a sinner. Amen. You know why Jesus went
to the down-and-outers? You want to know why they said
of him, he's a friend of sinners? You want to know why that he
sat down in a publicans house and sat down with a man that
he had saved named Matthew and all of his friends? It's because
these men knew how How wicked they were. They didn't profess
to be anything. They were not pretending to be
something righteous. They just knew they were sinners
and Christ sat down to them and he fed them the bread of life.
He gave them the water of life. I'm telling you, hallelujah,
if you're a sinner, he came, he died for you, and he'll save
you, amen. God cannot save a person who
is self-righteous and doesn't see themself as a sinner in need
of a savior. Secondly, God cannot save a person
who will not repent of their sins and take Christ as their
Savior. Now, a lot of denominations have
their doctrines and they are man-made oftentimes because they
tell men, the man that led me to Christ the day I got saved
was lost for many years. He lived in an area of this town
called Frog Holler. His family lived in that part
of town. He told me one time when we were
out knocking doors, he said, he said, Brother Tommy, he said,
if you were in Frog Holler when the sun went down and you didn't
belong over there, you got out of Frog Holler. But I'll tell
you what happened to him. He's a middle-aged man and he
was a drunkard. And he said a denominational
preacher came by one day and said to him, said, Charlie, all
you need to do is straighten up and do right and join the
church and you'll be fine. And he said, I started trying
to do it. He said, I started trying to quit. Everything I
knew was wrong. And he said, I was trying to
do it. And the harder I tried, the worse it got. He said, there
was revival going on in one of the churches over there in Frog
Holler. And said, the power of God was at work. And said, the
pastor and the evangelist come by one day and they knocked on
the door and said, ask if they could come in. They came in and
they started telling me about Christ and telling me how I could
be saved. He said, finally, he said, the
man looked at me and he said, sir, he said, would you like
to be saved? He said, I can't get saved. He
said, what are you talking about? He said, I've already made up
my mind. I'm going to hell. I can't get saved. and said he
reached in his pocket and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and
he slammed them on the coffee table. He said, I can't even
quit these. He said, how can I get saved?
He said, the evangelist slid up on his chair. He said, sir,
it's occurred to me that you're trying to be a Christian without
becoming a Christian. You've got the cart before the
horse. He said, you've got to come to Jesus and get saved and
God can clean up your life after you get saved. He said, you mean
to tell me if I got down on my knees right now that he'd save
me? He said, he sure will. He said, if I got down by this
coffee table and ask him to save me, that he'd save me. He said,
I'll tell you on the authority of the Bible that Jesus Christ
will save you. He said, we got on our knees
and I cried out to God, made that coffee table and altar and
asked Jesus Christ to come into my heart and save me. He turned
from his sins and took Christ as his savior, but God cannot
save anyone that won't turn from their sins. Jesus said, I tell
you, nay, but except you repent, you shall all likewise perish.
Paul said, testifying to the Jews and also the Greeks, repentance
toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. Let me say thirdly,
God cannot save a person who comes to God any other way than
through Christ. God cannot save you. You see,
that'd be like saying, I'd like to go to Lexington. Would you
please help me to go to Lexington? And you told me, well, if you
just go out here to the stop sign and make a right, and then
at the first turn up there, at the first break in the highway,
just make a U-turn and go that direction. You know what? I may
have believed you. I may have believed that you
were sincere. I may have believed that if I took your directions,
that I was gonna go to Lexington. But no matter how hard I drove,
no matter how sincere I was, if I'm going south, I'm not gonna
wind up in Lexington. You know why? Because Lexington
is not south of here, it's north of here. And you can't go to
heaven unless you go through Christ. Jesus said, I am the
way, the truth, and the life. There's not any other way. I
am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the
Father but by me. That is, Jesus said, I am the
door. By me, if any man enter in, he
shall be saved and go in and out and find pasture. Jesus said
he's the only door to heaven. He said he's the only way to
heaven. He's the truth about God and the life from God. If
you come any way other than Christ, you cannot be saved. God cannot
save anyone who tries to come another way other than Christ. Number four, and maybe most important
as we progress through the message, number four, God cannot save
anyone after they die. God saves no one after death. All of your choices for Jesus
are made while you're alive. Jesus said to that crowd in Mark
chapter two that brought the crippled man to him, before he
caused him to rise up and take up his bed and walk away from
that house that day, he said, but that ye may know that the
son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins. When you leave
this world, your destiny is sealed. When you breathe your last breath,
when your heart stops and the doctor can never resuscitate
you, I'll tell you this, your choices for Christ are over.
Nobody's gonna pray you out of any place. Nobody's gonna get
you anywhere from where you made your final choice for Jesus Christ. That's why I say to everyone
here that the time to take Christ is today. The time to make the
decision is now. That is because after death,
no one is gonna be able to be saved. That's why the Bible said
now is the accepted time and today is the day of salvation. You see, God many times sends
witness after witness after witness. I was trying to win a man to
Christ several years back and I remember walking up to the
place where he lived and we started a conversation and I started
talking to him about Christ and about eternity. This man looked
at me and he said, Tommy, I usually tell people I don't want to hear
it. I said, I know, and I answered by giving his name. I responded
to him that day, and I said, I know that. I said, but all
men still need to be saved. You're gonna need to be saved
if you're gonna go to heaven. He was very gracious and kind
with me that day. That man had a massive heart
attack in his home. He died, as far as we know, without
Christ, unless something else happened that we don't know about.
I remember going to the viewing that day for the funeral. I took
his son by the hand and I said, sir, I said, I want to apologize
to you. I said, I tried, I tried to talk
to this man about Christ. He said, preacher, it's not your
fault. He said, I've witnessed to him many, many times. He told
me about several instances where he had clearly gave his father
the gospel of Christ. After the funeral, I had occasion
to meet another man. And I said, you know, it was
sad that this man, it seemed to be a picture of health, but
died of an extreme cardiac event there in his own home. He said,
preacher, he said, I tried many, many times to give that man the
gospel. I said, you witnessed to him
too? He said, yes, not just me. He said, in the church where
I met, this man had a cousin that got saved that was a drunkard.
He said many Sunday nights his cousin was in the altar praying
and asking God to save his cousin. Said, I know that man went to
his home a number of times and tried to plead with him to get
saved by the grace of God. And I wanna tell you that I found
out that the Lord had sent witness after witness, after witness,
after witness. But you see, God cannot save
a person that won't come to Christ. Jesus looked right at these men
and said, you will not come to me that you might have life.
You see, sometimes I know we're beating ourself up over the fact
that our family member maybe hasn't turned to Christ yet.
We're thinking maybe in some ways our mind's a little twisted
that it's all up to us. But I'm gonna tell you, friend,
it's not all up to us. Jesus said they have a will and
a choice in this matter. They have a will and a choice.
Charles Spurgeon said this about preaching Christ. He said, we
preach Christ to those who want him and to those who don't want
him. And we continue to preach Christ. We preach Christ to those who
want him and those who don't want him until one day they decide
they cannot live another minute without him. Then we preach Christ
to them again and watch them come to Jesus. But it's my desire,
and I believe it's the desire of Unity Baptist Church, if you're
here today and you're still lost, and I ask you the question again,
why are you still lost? It's not because you have questions
unsettled or problems unseen, but it's simply because you haven't
decided to turn to Him yet, and that today might be that day
that you decide to come to Him. You see, one day it's gonna be
too late to turn to Him. I say to you this morning, I
feel like in this stage of my ministry, I'm preaching some
of the last messages I'll ever preach. This has really gripped
my heart. I've had this verse in my heart.
I go and look because I say to myself, Lord, have I preached
that before? But I have. Not like this, but
I have. And see, I couldn't get away
from it. So today, don't be like those in Jesus' day. Some of
these very men that he addressed in this chapter could be burning
in hell right now because the greatest preacher that ever lived
told them time and time again, I've sent witnesses to you. I've
sent people to you. There's another man I tried in
this town to reach time and time and time again. I've been to
his home a number of times. I sat with him and we tried to
plead with him. On the day of this man's funeral,
I learned that God not only sent, he not only sent one witness,
he sent multiple witnesses. No, God loves you so much that
he sent somebody to bring you the gospel and tell you about
Christ. You see, you don't have to remain
lost. You can take Christ as your savior. Let's stand with
our heads bowed. The musicians are coming. With
our heads bowed, I'd ask you the question, why are you still
lost?
Why Are You Still Lost?
| Sermon ID | 121251430362998 |
| Duration | 34:53 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday - AM |
| Bible Text | John 5:40 |
| Language | English |
© Copyright
2026 SermonAudio.