Believe Me Not

Believe Me Not! I. Men are to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. ACT 16:31. A. There are “...lords many...” (1CO 8:5). B. There is “...another Jesus...” (2CO 11:4). C. There are “...false Christs...” (MAT 24:24). D. It is therefore necessary to qualify which lord, which Jesus, which Christ is to be the object of true faith and worship. II. The Lord Jesus Christ of the Scriptures is the One Who does the work of His Father. JOH 10:37. A. Everything He ever did was a work of His Father. JOH 5:19. B. His meat was to do the Father's will and finish His work. JOH 4:34. C. If the Lord Jesus Christ does not actually do the works of the Father, we should NOT believe on Him! III. Jesus Christ was commissioned to give (not offer) eternal life to those that the Father gave Him. JOH 17:2. A. There is a conceptual difference between giving and offering to someone. 1. give: To make another the recipient of (something that is in the possession, or at the disposal, of the subject). 2. offer: To present or tender for acceptance or refusal; to hold out (a thing) to a person to take if he will. 3. Paul received stripes that were given (2CO 11:24 c/w DEU 25:3). This was not a “take it or leave it” scenario. 4. When Paul described God as the One Who “...giveth to all life...” (ACT 17:25), he was not implying that life is offered to inanimate substance for acceptance or refusal. B. The Father's will was that Jesus should lose none that the Father gave Him to save. JOH 6:38-39. C. If the Son should fail to do that, He would not have done the works of the Father. If so, He should not be believed! D. If the Father gave all mankind without exception to the Son to save eternally, then all mankind without exception must be saved eternally, or the Son will not have done the work given Him by the Father to accomplish. 1. All mankind without exception are certainly not all eternally saved. MAT 25:41. 2. The only reasonable conclusion is that the Father did not give the Son all mankind without exception to save eternally. 3. Appeals to “contradiction” or “inscrutable” will not wash. God's words are pure and without contradiction (PRO 8:8), and His work of eternal salvation is understandable. EPH 3:3-4. IV. One work that the Father gave the Son was to put away sin. HEB 9:26. A. The Son came for that express purpose. 1JO 3:5. B. If Jesus did not actually put away sins by His sacrifice, He did not do the works of His Father and should not be believed! C. Jesus appeared for the purpose of putting away the sins of HIS people. MAT 1:21. D. Since Jesus only does what the Father does, it is clear that the Father's work was that the Son should save His people from their sins. Remember JOH 5:19. Believe Me Not! 3-4-12 Page 1 of 3E. Thus, if Christ should fail to save ONE of His people from his sins, He should not be ` believed! V. Obviously, Jesus Christ was specifically commissioned to save His people from their sins, give them eternal life, put away their sins and NEVER lose them. A. Jesus actually did put away His people's sins. HEB 1:3. 1. He DID the work of the Father. 2. It is a false Christ which never ACTUALLY put away sin by his sacrifice. B. Jesus WILL give eternal life to ALL the Father gave Him; NONE of them shall be lost! JOH 10:27-29. C. Indeed, Jesus does the works of the Father and “...shall save His people from their sins” (MAT 1:21). If He does not, He should NOT be believed! D. But if He does, then He should be believed for that. JOH 14:11. VI. If Jesus is presented as making an OFFER of eternal life as opposed to a GIFT, He should not be believed. Consider the aforementioned distinction between the two concepts. A. Scripture NEVER describes eternal life as an offer to men. It is the gift of eternal life. B. Scripture does not present Christ as offering Himself TO men, but rather offering Himself to God FOR men! EPH 5:2. VII. If Jesus is presented as one who loses some of those he was given to save, then BELIEVE HIM NOT! A. The popular Jesus is one who peers over the brink of hell and agonizes over the multitudes he came to save but who were not saved. 1. The popular Jesus is not even a savior. 2. The popular Jesus died for those who end up in heaven and hell. 3. The one who ends up in heaven is not there because of what this Jesus did, since he did the same thing for the one in hell. 4. The one who ends up in heaven is there because of what he (the sinner) did by an act of his own will. He saved himself; he is the savior. 5. The popular Jesus needs not only agonize over the ones in hell that he did not save; he also needs to agonize over the ones in heaven that he did not save. This Jesus is a complete failure. B. The Biblical Jesus “...shall not fail nor be discouraged...” (ISA 42:4). C. The Biblical Jesus “...shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied...” (ISA 53:11). VIII. If Jesus is presented to you as merely making the removal of sin a possibility, then BELIEVE HIM NOT! A. The popular Jesus never actually put away the sins of anyone by his sacrifice. B. The Biblical Jesus put away the sins of His people by His sacrifice. HEB 1:3; 9:26. C. Because He put sins away, “...there is no more offering for sin” (HEB 10:18), neither an offering of any sacrifice to God, or even an offering of Himself to sinners so their sins can be put away. IX. If Jesus is presented to you as anything less than One Who fulfilled the prophetic mandate that HE SHALL SAVE HIS PEOPLE from their sins (MAT 1:21), he should not be believed. Such a Jesus is NOT doing the works of His Father! Believe Me Not! 3-4-12 Page 2 of 3X. It should be obvious that the popular Jesus is one who does NOT do the works of the Father. A. Multitudes are told to believe on such a Jesus. B. But to do so is plainly an act of disobedience, for the real Jesus said in that case, “...believe me not” (JOH 10:37). C. Believing in such a Jesus is not Biblical faith at all, for it is a denial of the record that God gave of His Son. 1JO 5:10. XI. The only Lord Jesus Christ worthy of our faith is the One Who could triumphantly declare, “I have glorified thee on the earth: I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do” (JOH 17:4). A. He entered glory triumphantly, having completed the divine commission to secure eternal life for His people. HEB 9:12; 10:12-14. B. Through His obedience ALONE, He MADE many righteous. ROM 5:19. C. He saved us according to God's own purpose and grace, not our purpose. 2TI 1:9. D. Which Jesus do you believe in: 1. one who only tried to save those for whom he died? 2. one who shall lose eternally multitudes for whom he died? 3. one whose blood actually saved nobody? 4. one who only made eternal salvation a possibility? 5. one who left the power of eternal life in the hands of fallen sinners who could do nothing to obtain it? 6. One Who triumphantly, fully, freely won eternal life and forgiveness of sins for every single person that the Father had given Him to save without the loss of any and so DID the works of the Father, then sent out His gospel to declare it? 2TI 1:10. a. This is the only one Who merits our adoration and faith. b. Believe Him for His works' sake. JOH 14:11. Believe Me Not! 3-4-12 Page 3 of 3