Dewitt Tabernacle Teaching Series

“THE LAW OF GOD, A BLESSING AND A CURSE”

  BY C.W. WOOD                                                                                                                                                                   JUNE, 2017

   Law and Grace work together, but are entirely different!  1st John 3:23 “And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ…..”

   The Old Testament with its Ten Commandments STANDS out in the Bible, with its Impossible Standard, and some of our Church People still stagger along under the terrible weight of its demands.  Some Precious People hear it read on many Sundays, while they pray ”Lord have mercy on us for we have Failed in your Holy Law and they are a target for the Devil’s condemnation.  They have been taught and are now teaching their children that the way to Heaven is by keeping the Holy Law.  They are looking for Righteousness where it can never be found!!!

   TO TRUST IN LAW KEEPING IS TO IGNORE THESE SCRIPTURES.  Gal. 3: 21-25:

21 “Is the law then against the promises of God?  God forbid: for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law.

22  But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.

 23  But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.

24  Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.

25  But after that faith is come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster.”

      It would be good if we would make a sign to place on every church wall “By The Deeds of The Law Shall No Flesh Be Saved.”  (Rom. 3:20)

   A true Believer who has been Properly taught has learned to look away from the death-dealing Old Testament Law and look to the Sacrifice of the Lamb of God.  He understands that as many as are trusting in Keeping the Whole Law are under a Curse, because they fail in the Law.  For it is written “Cursed is everyone that Continueth not in all things which are written in the Book of the Law to do them.” (Gal 3:10)

   Therefore the Holy Ghost filled believer turns from all trust in his own ability to Keep the Whole Law all the time!  We no longer try to have Peace of Mind concerning Righteousness     by      the Keeping of the Law!!!  The Law does what it was meant to do, which is to Convince us of our Sins and cause us to turn to the cross of Christ.

   All Christians need to learn the difference between The Law and the Gospel, especially the Ministers!  The Law is our Schoolmaster, Sent to teach us how impossible it is for us to keep it all, and therefore turn us to the Gospel, which offers Jesus as our Kinsman Redeemer.  Jesus, standing in our place, and for our Sins, bore the terrible Curse of the Law (on the Cross) until Justice was Completely satisfied!!

   If I am in a Pool of Water over my Head and I am going under, about to drown because I can’t Swim----this is the Spiritual Position of the man who is trying to Keep all the Law, before he can be Saved!

   But a faithful Friend who is Standing on the Bank, he can’t Swim either, but shoves a Plank out into the water.  I grab the Plank and am saved from drowning!

   The friend on the Bank is a type of the Saved Minister, who Presents the lost Sinner with the Gospel of Salvation.

   There is a fear that Christian People are confronted with---It is that we are afraid to put all our trust in The Lord.  The devil will say to us, “You know you are not Believing the way you should!!!  And too often we agree with the devil and think that it’s Something we Can’t do!

   My Sermon is to Prove to us that we can believe God’s Promises because He Commanded us to believe them.  Are we afraid to do what The Lord Commanded us to do???  This is the Commandment that we believe on His Son Jesus Christ.  Has God Commanded us to do Something that we Can’t do??  Can’t we dare to stand and tell the devil that we are told to Believe, and therefore we are obeying by Choosing to Believe.

   Still, the devil will come and say, “Yes, but there is not  enough good in you to

Cause God to Accept your believing!!!”  And too many Christians are stopped by this thought.

   The devil has reversed the Word.  Here is the Revelation!!  The very reason we are to Believe is because there is no good in our flesh.  So for that very reason, that Satan wants us to reason with him, Saying there is no good in us,  we are told by God that we must Believe in the One which is His Son.

   Let me say that another way!  If I am to Preach Christ to those People who have no Goodness in them, those who have nothing in them that Qualifies them for mercy, then I can take that Kind of a Free Gospel Gift to the Worst Sinner  on Earth----and say with my last breath, that Jesus came to save Sinners.

   Now here is yet another way to Say this.  A person who has truly repented is already Saved!  So we don’t repent and then get saved, we get saved then repent.  Don’t we understand that we can’t  truly repent until God does a work in our hearts. 

   He has to Prick us in our heart.  Before He does that work in us, we have no heart or mind to repent.  So God saves us First, which is to Put the desire in us to Repent!

   Think about this!  We don’t repent, then get saved, we get saved then repent.  Can we see that when God saves us this way, and then we repent, we do not take any Credit for having any Qualifications for Salvation.  We can’t say, I wanted it and so God saved me.  No!  He has to Put the “want to” in us, by a Supernatural Miracle then we will repent. 

   In this way then the Scripture can say that we are saved by Grace.  Grace is the First Step and God has to take that Step.  “No man can come to Jesus until God draws him.  We say, “I found the Lord”  No!  The Lord found us.

  The Gospel, the true Bible Gospel of salvation is Preached to Sinners who have no qualifications at all for salvation.   To preach that there is anything at all that  we must do to be Saved is a False doctrine.  God’s Gospel is for lost Sinners that cannot do one thing to merit Salvation.  Grace which comes by God’s foreknowledge brings salvation.

   And so we are to tell the Worst, Meanest, Filthiest, and most low-down and lost Person----there is not one thing you have to do, except come to Christ just as you are, sins and all.  Don’t wait until you have been able to do some things to cause God to see something in you that makes you worth saving.  It’s Grace, then Repentance!

   Isa. 55:1-2 “Ho, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come buy wine and milk without money and without price.

   Wherefore do you spend money for that which is not bread? And your labor for that which satisfieth not? Hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.”

   Now, what about Acts 2:38-41 38 “Then Peter said unto them, Repent, and be baptized every one of you in the Name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost.

   39 For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.

   40 And with many other words did he testify and exhort, saying, Save yourselves from this untoward generation.

   41 Then they that gladly received his word were baptized: and the same day there were added unto them about three thousand souls.”

   These people had already been Pricked in their heart.  God had called them, they were already Saved, then they could repent.

   What kind of a Gospel would we Preach to a dying man?  There he lays in the agonies of death!     He tells me he has no good thought about dying!  And he asks me what he would have to do to be Saved?  There is but perhaps a few minutes of life left for him, another 5 or 10 minutes and this man might be on his way to Hell.  What am I going to tell him???  Am I to try to Preach to him for an hour or so, telling him some things to do to be Saved?  No!!!  I must tell him, “Turn to Jesus and ask Him to Save your Sinful Soul, and you will be saved!!!  “If any man come to me, I will in no wise cast him out.”

   Well then, if this Gospel will work for a dying man, it will also work for a living man.  The thief on the cross may have had some kind of an experience; we know he at first denounced the Lord Jesus along with the other thief. But a little later he turned his eyes to Jesus and said “Lord remember me.” How quickly the answer came from Jesus, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”  He came to Jesus just as he was, a dying Sinner on the way to Hell and was saved in the eleventh hour.

   And so today, a lost Sinner only has to come to Jesus, just as he is, not as a forgiven Sinner, but he comes as a lost Sinner, and then is forgiven.

   The Gospel that the Apostles Preached to dying men was not, “Go get ready to be Saved, but it was turn to Christ now, just as you are and be Saved.”

   God is able to save to the Uttermost those  who come to Him through Jesus.  We are not to suppose that a Sinner has any good in him before he Believes, that is impossible, the Bible says, “Without Faith it is impossible to Please God.”   Before a Sinner is Saved, he does not hate his sin.  He may hate Hell.  There  can’t be a true hatred of Sin in the heart before God changes that heart.

   Now if this is true about the Salvation of the Soul, is it not also true about Divine Healing???  What do you have to do to earn healing???  Tell me anything that God requires before He will heal us!!!!  All we have to do is come to Him Knowing He can and will heal us and forgive all our Sins at the Same time.