Today
is the second Sunday of Advent. As I reminded us of last week, Advent is the
season leading to the celebration of our Savior’s birth 2000 years ago in that
little town of Bethlehem. Advent gives us yet another opportunity to prepare
our hearts for that celebration.
Certainly, most Christians try to prepare themselves for service to the Lord
365 days out of the year by daily pleasing Him and obeying His commandments. But
also to many Christians, the season of Advent is an occasion to help us focus a
bit more pointedly on celebrations that are important in our lives.
And yet we each need to be careful during the Christmas season that we not get caught
up in the pretty lights and the sounds and parties and family get-togethers. We
need to be careful that we are not distracted from the REAL REASON for the
season. We need to be diligently careful that we do not forget what Christmas
eventually cost our Almighty Father in heaven three decades later on Calvary’s
cross.
My primary text this
afternoon is a short passage from Zachariah’s prophecy about his newborn son,
John the Baptizer. The occasion is the circumcision and naming of their son.
Zachariah, filled with the Holy Spirit said: (Luke 1:76-78a) “And you,
child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will go
on before the Lord to prepare His ways; To give to His
people the knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their
sins, because of the tender mercy of our God.”
I want to focus our
attention today on verse 77 as the Holy Spirit draws a critical link between salvation
and the forgiveness of the sins. We know, of course, that there can be
no forgiveness of sins without repentance. Indeed, the first recorded words of
Jesus after His baptism by John in that Jordan River and his subsequent 40-day
testing in the wilderness were: (Matthew 4:17) “Repent, for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand.”
If we are serious about
preparing ourselves for the upcoming celebration of the Lord’s birth, then
repentance must be at the very core of our preparations. Why is that? Because faithful
Christians recognize in the deepest recesses of our souls that repentance is
not secondary to the gospel message. It is at the very heart of the gospel
message. That’s likely one reason the Lord Jesus said: “I have not come to
call the righteous but sinners to repentance.” (Luke 5:32)
As I prepared this message, I thought of the thieves crucified on either side
of the Lord Jesus. The one thief clearly had no idea of – nor a concern for –
his need for repentance. Luke tells us what happened: (Luke 23:39-43) “One
of the criminals who were hanged there was hurling abuse at Him,
saying, “Are You not the Christ? Save Yourself and us!”
The man was clearly
concerned only for his release from the cross. Sorrow and repentance for his
crimes had no place in his heart. But the so-called good thief – Oh! Look at
how his heart had changed. Again, Luke tells us: “But the other answered,
and rebuking him said, “Do you not even fear God, since you are under the same
sentence of condemnation? And we indeed are suffering justly,
for we are receiving what we deserve for our deeds; but this man has done
nothing wrong.” And he was saying, “Jesus, remember me when You
come in Your kingdom!”
The man was not only
sorrowful for his crimes but was contrite before Jesus. He was repentant before
Jesus. And you know what happened next. The Lord told him “Truly I say to
you, today you shall be with Me in Paradise.”
Listen: We know God
never jokes; And when the Holy Spirit moved Peter to proclaim to the religious clergy
on the Day of Pentecost: ‘Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be
saved’ -- God was very serious about that promise.
And when He moved Paul
to tell those at Rome: “He who believes in [Christ] will not be
disappointed.” (Romans 9:33), God was equally serious.
And God remains serious
about His love and tender mercy toward anyone today who repents before the
Lord.
As I reflected further on the link between repentance and salvation, I thought
back to King David. We find in the Scriptures that God called David a man after
his own heart (1 Samuel 13:14). Now, those who know of David’s sins might
wonder why God would say such a thing about the man. After all, in rapid
succession, David broke three of the 10 Commandments. He lusted after another
man’s wife, he then committed adultery with her, and a short time later he had Bathsheba’s
husband murdered on the battlefield.
It’s important to this point to understand that, according to the Law of Moses,
God would not accept any sacrifice as atonement for any of those sins. But God
called David a man after his own heart. So, why was that?
I think the key is found in two of David’s psalms: 51 and 32. Bible scholars
tell us, David wrote those psalms after his encounter with Nathan the prophet
who rebuked the king for his adultery and subsequent murder of her husband to
cover up his sin.
Before I read the 51st
psalm, listen first to what Nathan told the king: (2 Samuel 12): “There were
two men in one city, the one rich and the other poor. “The
rich man had a great many flocks and herds. “But the poor man had nothing
except one little ewe lamb which he bought and nourished; And it grew up
together with him and his children. It would eat of his bread and drink of
his cup and lie in his bosom and was like a daughter to him.
“Now a traveler came to
the rich man, and he was unwilling to take from his own flock or his own
herd, to prepare for the wayfarer who had come to him; Rather he took the poor
man’s ewe lamb and prepared it for the man who had come to him.”
Then David’s anger
burned greatly against the man, and he said to Nathan, “As
the Lord lives, surely the man who has done this deserves to
die. He must make restitution for the lamb fourfold, because he did
this thing and had no compassion.” Nathan then said to David, “You are the man!”
You can read the more
complete account in 2 Samuel 12, but my point is, David knew God was very angry
at him. He also knew God's indictment of him was completely justified. And without
hesitation, the king confessed: “I have sinned against the Lord.”
Back now to Psalm 51,
which is a long look into David’s heart after Nathan’s rebuke: “Be gracious
to me, O God, according to Your lovingkindness; According to the greatness
of Your compassion blot out my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly
from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my
transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against You, You only, I have
sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You are
justified when You speak and blameless when You judge . . . Hide Your face from my sins and blot out
all my iniquities. Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a
steadfast spirit within me . . . For You do not delight in sacrifice,
otherwise I would give it; You are not pleased with burnt offering. The
sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O
God, You will not despise.”
Listen now to the 32nd
psalm which David also wrote in the aftermath of the Bathsheba incident. Here
is a portion of that Psalm: “How blessed is he whose transgression is
forgiven, whose sin is covered! How blessed is the man to whom
the Lord does not impute iniquity . . .When I kept
silent about my sin, my body wasted away through
my groaning all day long. For day and night Your hand was heavy upon
me; My vitality was drained away as with the fever heat of
summer. I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I did not
hide; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord”; And
You forgave the guilt of my sin.”
So, having
just now shared with you David’s words of contrition and repentance, WHY do you
think God called him a man after His own heart? I believe it was because of David’s
humility, his willingness to confess his sins to God and beg God's mercy.
Which now begs an
important question of all of us: Why do people not repent of their sins? Why do
people who know that they have broken God’s law not repent? I’m sure there are
many reasons, but mostly, I think, it’s because people choose to believe
that what they’ve done is NOT wrong – like the woman written about in Proverbs
30:20: “This is the way of an adulterous woman: She eats and wipes her
mouth, and says, “I have done no wrong.”
Other reasons for
refusing to repent surely include pride – the kind of arrogance Frank Sinatra
trumpeted in his signature song, “I did it MY way,” and the smugness of Sammy
Davis Jr. who sang, “I Gotta be Me.”
But beyond pride and
the dangerously false notion that their sins are not really sins in God's eyes,
I think other reasons people don’t repent is because part of our human nature
tries to avoid thinking about things for which we are ashamed and embarrassed.
Which, if you think
about it, is a pretty silly idea, trying to avoid dealing with our sins because
we are embarrassed by them. I mean, He knows all about what we’ve done, anyway,
so why not just tell Him we’re ashamed and embarrassed. Why not just tell him we’re
sorry and stop trying to avoid facing what we did? Why not just repent? Why not
just soften our heart before God and, thereby be a man or woman after God's own
heart?
Otherwise – and this is
important – if we refuse to soften our hearts before the God who sees all and
knows all – then beware: Refusing to make our hearts soft will inescapably lead
to a hardened heart. It is simply a truism of Scripture: The more often we
refuse to repent the harder our hearts become.
Listen to this warning
of Scripture: “Take care, brethren, that there not be in any one of you an
evil, unbelieving heart that falls away from the living God. 13 But encourage
one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so
that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin . . . [and
so] Today if you hear His voice, do not harden your hearts.” (Hebrews
3:12-13, 15a)
What happens to people who harden their
hearts? Listen to Proverbs 29:1 “A man who hardens his neck
after much reproof will suddenly be broken beyond remedy.”
And listen also to the Chronicler: “The Lord,
the God of their fathers, sent word to them again and again by
His messengers, because He had compassion on His people and on His dwelling
place; but they continually mocked the
messengers of God, despised His words and scoffed at His
prophets, until the wrath of the Lord arose against His people,
until there was no remedy.” (2 Chronicles 36:15-16)
Truly – as again Scripture warns us – “It
is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” (Hebrews
10:31)
Oh, yes. It IS a fearful thing to harden
our heart. Let me give you some examples of men and women in history who hardened
their hearts beyond remedy, of those who refused to bow their knee in
repentance before the One who created them:
On his deathbed, Voltaire, the French philosopher and
well-known atheist uttered these last words: "I have swallowed nothing
but smoke. I have intoxicated myself with the incense that turned my head. I am
abandoned by God and man.”
Sir Francis Newport, former Head of the English Atheist
club, said to those gathered around his deathbed: "You need not tell me
there is no God, for I know there is one, and that I am in his presence! You
need not tell me there is no hell. I feel myself already slipping. Wretches,
cease your idle talk about there being hope for me! I know I am lost forever!
Oh, that fire! Oh, the insufferable pangs of hell . . . Oh, eternity, eternity forever and forever!
Oh, the insufferable pangs of Hell!”
Finally, for our point, is Anton Levey, the author of the
Satanic Bible and so-called ‘high priest’ of Satan. His dying words were these:
"Oh my, oh my, what have I done? There is something very wrong. There
is something very wrong.”
Such a destiny of eternal terror awaits EVERY man and woman
who refuses to bow their knee in repentance before God in this life while they
still had the chance. Without repentance there can be no salvation.
But what of those who DO repent and live a life of ongoing
repentance for their ongoing sins? Well, let’s for a moment return to King
David. Because he was a man after God's own heart, we can be sure he LIVED a
life of repentance. And because of that unbreakable link between repentance and
salvation, it should come as no surprise that he would write: “Yea, though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou
art with me.” (Psalm 23:4)
Many of you know the old hymn, “Rock of Ages.” Its author, Augustus
Toplady, called out these last words on his deathbed: “Oh, what delights!
Who can fathom the joy of the third heaven? The sky is clear, there is no
cloud; come Lord Jesus, come quickly!"
Joseph Everett, another child of God, exulted on his deathbed for a full 25
minutes, again and again, until he entered the gates of heaven: "GLORY!
GLORY! GLORY!"
St Elizabeth of the
Trinity softly uttered these last words before passing into eternity: ‘I am
going to the light, to love, to life!’”
And finally to this
point, the apostle Paul wrote these last words in a letter to Timothy (2
Timothy 4:7-8): “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the
course, I have kept the faith; in the future there is laid up
for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge,
will award to me on that day; and not only to me, but also to all who
have loved His appearing.”
I close this message by
briefly returning to Zachariah’s prophesy over his son, John the Baptizer: “And
you, child, will be called the prophet of the Most High; For you will
go on before the Lord to prepare His ways; To give to His people the
knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins, because of the
tender mercy of our God.”
How will you prepare
the way of the Lord into your life, your hearts, your soul, your spirits this
Advent season and throughout the coming year? How will I do the same?
This question is not a superfluous
question with which to close this message of repentance and salvation. It is a
most pressing question that ought to cut to the very core of our relationship
with our most holy, holy, holy God. May the Holy Spirit make us each diligently
careful to not let our hearts grow hard to His whispers into our souls, His
gentle call to ongoing and daily repentance of our daily sins. As the Psalmist
prayed, so we also pray:
“Teach me, O Lord,
the way of Your statutes, and I shall observe it to the end. Give me
understanding, that I may observe Your law and keep it with all my heart. Make me walk in the path of Your commandments, for I delight in it . . . Establish Your word to Your servant, as
that which produces reverence for You . . . Revive me through Your
righteousness.
(Psalm 119:33-40)
For Christ’s glory and
in His name we pray. Amen.
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