We're in John chapter 1 here this evening, and before we get started on this chapter, let me just say a few things here.
One thing that we're going to do at Verity Baptist Church in Manila, when there's certain chapters where there's just a ton of material to cover in one chapter,
we're not just going to spend one week on that chapter.
We have 51 verses in the book of John. There's so much to cover here.
And so some chapters it's just going to be like a one-week sermon, but there's going to be other chapters we're going to be spending a few weeks.
And in John chapter 1, this is one of those chapters where there's just a ton of information.
And actually, another rule of thumb when you're preaching sermons is this.
You don't want to cover too much material in one sermon. You don't want to cover too many different types of topics.
Now this is going to be a little bit different though.
Because the first 14 verses of John literally cover every single major thing we believe, except for one.
And I'm going to explain to you why it doesn't cover that one.
And every other thing is going to be covered here. So we're going to go through like 15 points here tonight.
We're going to see all of this information packed in John chapter 1.
And honestly it makes sense because the book of John is the most important book.
It's the book written so we can believe on Jesus Christ.
It's the book written that we can understand the deep doctrines.
And so it makes sense that it covers all of the major doctrines.
And so first let's just look at John chapter 1 verse number 1.
The Bible reads in John chapter 1 verse 1.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
So the first thing we see here is that in the beginning was the Word.
Now if you look down at verse number 14 the Bible reads,
And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us.
Now who's that referring to? It's referring to Jesus Christ very clearly.
We know the Bible says God was manifest in the flesh.
That's clearly referring to God the Son. It's not referring to God the Father.
Obviously Jesus Christ was the one who was manifest in the flesh.
But the Bible is very clear here, in the beginning was the Word.
Anyone that teaches us here is that Jesus was not created.
Just right off the bat it's just very obvious that He was always here.
He's always existed.
But you know there's a lot of cults out there that they don't believe that.
You look at a glacier in Christo, they don't believe that.
You look at the Jehovah's Witnesses, they don't believe that.
They believe Jesus was created. They don't believe that He was eternally existing.
They don't believe in the Trinity like we do.
No, they don't believe that in the beginning was the Word.
But just very clearly at the beginning of John chapter 1,
the Bible reads, in the beginning was the Word.
It's really just that simple that He was here at the very beginning.
He wasn't created. He's always existed.
He's always existed as the Word.
In the beginning, now, in the future, He's been in the beginning.
It's just very clear, in the beginning was the Word.
Also in verse number 1, so the first point is here very clearly.
Jesus has been here from the beginning.
And the second point we have here is also found in verse number 1 where the Bible reads,
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
So here's what we see, that Jesus Christ is referred to as the Word.
Now, why do you think He's referred to as the Word?
Do you think it's just kind of like a cool nickname God gives Him, like He's the Word?
That wouldn't really make a lot of sense.
But what it's telling us is that the Word is synonymous with Jesus Christ.
And here's what we have to understand.
Jesus is sinless. In Him is no sin. He who knew no sin, the Bible says.
He was tempted in all points as we are, yet without sin.
So if Jesus is the Word, and Jesus is perfect, guess what else is perfect?
This is perfect. And you have to understand this.
In the beginning was the Word.
So here's the thing, before we existed, the Word already existed.
Before 1611, the Word existed.
Before 1511, in the beginning was the Word.
And guess what? God speaks all languages. All languages.
Now we know that in the English language we do have a perfect Bible.
But we have to understand that in the beginning was the Word.
The Word already existed.
Now obviously the Word is referring to Jesus Christ. We know that.
But at the same time, the Bible refers to Jesus as the Word.
Because just as Jesus is perfect, the Word is perfect as well.
And here's the thing about this.
You know, we go soul winning, we better use a perfect Word of God.
I mean, if you're going to use a corrupted Word of God, you're not going to lead people to the Lord.
The NIV is not the same thing as the King James.
The New King James is not the same thing as the King James.
This is the Word. This is perfect.
And just as Jesus Christ is perfect, His Word is perfect as well.
So the first thing we saw here is that Jesus was here at the beginning.
He wasn't created. He's always existed.
And also we see that the Word of God is perfect.
And in the English language, we know that's the King James Bible.
Now obviously as God's covering all these things in the first 14 verses,
He can't go super in depth on these first 14 verses of every topic.
But it's literally a doctrinal statement of everything we believe.
All of the key things that we believe.
Next we see here, starting in verse number 1.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God.
It's kind of funny because I've seen these verses used for years.
I mean for over a decade.
And I remember having someone explain to me that this is referring to the Trinity.
And He's with God and He is God.
And it just makes perfect sense.
And then just these last two years, it's like people are trying to change us.
And I'm like, I don't know how you could possibly interpret this the way people are.
By saying that, oh, you know, Jesus is the exact same thing as the Father.
The Word was with God. The Word was God.
We know Jesus Christ is God in the flesh.
We also know that we believe in the Trinity here.
And here's the thing, obviously here in the Philippines, most everybody believes in the Trinity.
Right.
Other than Iglesia Ni Cristo, which is the one we're going to be talking about all the time that has the weird oddball beliefs.
Look, everybody here believes in the Trinity.
The Bible is very clear from cover to cover.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.
But the Bible also says the Word was God.
And so we see here that Jesus Christ is God in the flesh.
He was perfect.
And so if you were to look at a cult that says Jesus is not God, I mean that's just heresy.
You must understand who Jesus Christ is if you're going to be saved.
But we have to understand that not only is He God, but He's also with God.
There's God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost.
We believe in the Trinity around here.
The fourth thing we see here, which I just mentioned, I kind of covered both, is that Jesus Christ is God.
But a fifth thing that I want to look at is in verse number three.
Notice what it says.
All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that was made.
And that kind of goes back to the first point where we say that He was not created, but He's here at the very beginning.
But I want you to understand all things were made by Jesus Christ, the Bible says.
See, we believe here in creation.
We don't believe in evolution.
All things were made by Him.
And if you go down to verse number 10, it also says He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not.
See, the Bible is very clear that this world was created by God.
No, it didn't come from evolution.
The earth is not billions of years old.
The Bible teaches the earth is more than 6,000 years, but less than 7,000 years old.
That's how old it is.
If you read from the beginning of Adam and Adam pages, it's between 6 and 7,000 years old.
The Bible teaches very clearly creation, not evolution.
And you know, I honestly do not understand how people could step outside and say they don't believe in God.
It doesn't make any sense whatsoever.
You know, I've never questioned the existence of God.
And you know, it's funny, I was going soul-winning one time.
And I knock on this door, and this man answers the door.
And I'm talking to him about the Bible and stuff, and he says, you know, I don't believe in God.
And his son runs up, and his son starts kind of arguing with his dad.
He's like, Dad, God's real.
He's like, I know He's real.
You know why he said that?
Because at a young age, right when you're born, you automatically believe in God.
That's the way it is.
You have to be taught that there is no God to reject God.
The only reason why people reject God is they either don't like the God of the Bible,
which is some people, and they become really wicked and evil people.
People that just don't like the God of the Bible.
Or they get taught and brainwashed by things like evolution.
But look, every single person, when they're born into this world, they believe in God.
Every single one.
And there's countries where, largely in those countries, they reject the existence of God,
and atheism is a big thing.
But the only reason why they're rejecting God's existence is because they're being taught that.
Because at a young age, you naturally believe that God is real.
It's just thrown into you.
And the only way you're going to reject that is if you choose to hate the God of the Bible,
or you're going to reject it if you're taught otherwise.
So the first thing we saw here in these first 14 verses is simply that Jesus Christ was here at the beginning.
He wasn't created, but He's always existed.
The second thing we see is that the Word of God is perfect.
We believe the King James Bible around here is perfect.
The third thing we see, we see the Trinity taught in these verses.
We also see that Jesus Christ is God taught in these verses.
And we also see that the Bible teaches creation and not evolution.
But I want you to notice also in verse number 4, we're going to look at our sixth point,
where it says in verse number 4,
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
The Bible's referring here to Jesus Christ, isn't it?
In Him was life. We know the Bible says that Jesus Christ is eternal life.
In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
But you have to ask yourself this question.
In verse number 4, what time period is He referring to when He says,
In Him was life?
Remember what the context is, in the beginning.
And He goes back to verse number 3,
All things were made by Him.
So here's what you have to understand.
In the beginning, guess who life was in?
Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ, life has always been in Him.
You know what that destroys?
It destroys this false teaching and dispensation.
Because dispensationalism will teach you,
Well, in the Old Testament, life came by your works.
That's how you got to heaven.
Well, in the beginning, according to this context,
In Him was life.
In the beginning.
So the very beginning, life was in Jesus Christ.
They didn't get saved by doing sacrifices.
No, they got saved by looking forward to the coming Messiah and believing on Him.
And salvation has always been by faith alone.
Let me tell you something.
During the end times, people are not going to be getting saved by their works.
You got these dispensationalists running around teaching that there's all these different Gospels.
Well, in the beginning, the Bible teaches very clearly,
In Him was life.
At the very beginning, in Him was life.
And you also see, in verse number 4,
That the resurrection is kind of alluded to.
Because life is in Jesus Christ at the very beginning.
So we have to understand that it would be obvious to us,
Seeing on the other side here, that Jesus would end up being resurrected.
Because throughout the Old Testament, you know what the Bible says?
That you have to believe in the Living God.
Now when Jesus Christ rose again, it was very clear who the Living God was, wasn't it?
But we wouldn't know it if we just see John chapter 1, that in Him was life.
And so throughout the Bible, you see that life is in Jesus Christ.
And so very clearly we see that dispensationalism is destroyed there in verse number 1.
And once you start going down that rabbit trail believing in things like dispensationalism,
You're going to start believing all kinds of other different heresies.
The Bible says very clear that in Him was life.
Now let's look at point number 7 in verse number 5.
And it says in point number 7, verse number 5,
And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.
See the Bible says the light shineth in darkness.
Once again we're referring to Jesus Christ, because in Him was life, and the life was the light of men.
So we see that Jesus Christ is life, and the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not.
See the darkness couldn't comprehend it.
Do you know what that shows us?
It shows us that unsaved people, they cannot understand the Gospel.
The darkness comprehended it not.
You say, why do we go soul winning so much?
Because everybody's going to go to hell unless we go soul winning.
There's no way they're going to understand because they cannot comprehend it if we don't preach the Gospel.
Turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 2.
Let's look at more verses.
We're going to be going back to John 1 for most of the sermon, so you can keep your place there.
And let me turn there myself as well.
And the Bible's very clear on this, that unsaved people can't understand the Gospel.
They can't understand the things of God.
They can't understand the Bible.
But this is what the Bible says in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, starting at verse 14.
It says, But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him.
Neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 2.14, The natural man, they do not understand the things of God.
These things are spiritually discerned.
Look, this is a spiritual book.
If we're going to understand a spiritual book, we need the Holy Spirit of God to guide us.
See, the Holy Spirit of God is going to guide us into what the truth is.
It says, But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, that he himself is judge of no man.
For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him?
But we have the mind of Christ.
We as saved people, we have the mind of Christ.
The Spirit, the Holy Spirit of God is teaching us.
And one thing that teaches us, even outside of my notes, is this.
It's very important for us to read the Word of God in our own free time.
I'm going to try my best to teach the Word of God here at this church.
But you know who's a better teacher than me?
The Holy Spirit of God.
The Holy Spirit of God is the one that's going to teach you everything.
And you've got all these churches that don't really want their members to read the Bible.
They really don't want their members to read the Bible.
They just want you to be in subjection underneath them.
I mean, you can read their materials, their publications,
or they might give you certain verses to read,
but they are scared of you just picking up this book in your free time
and figuring out what you believe.
They're afraid. Now look, I'm not afraid.
I want you to read the Bible zealously.
If you read the Bible through, you know, once every three months, praise the Lord.
Because I'm confident that the things I'm teaching are what the Bible teaches.
And you know, the Holy Spirit of God is going to teach you the same thing it teaches me.
Because the Holy Spirit of God is going to make things clear.
Now look, obviously at times we might have differences on various small different things,
but the vast majority of the Bible is just crystal clear.
But you know, the unsaved person doesn't get it.
And here's what we have to understand.
Let's say you get a Catholic Savior.
Let's say you get your cousin saved as Catholic.
I'm sure everybody in this room has Catholic relatives.
Except for me.
But my wife has Catholic relatives, right?
Everybody in this room has Catholic relatives.
And here's the truth.
If you get your Catholic relative saved, and then all of a sudden it's like a year later,
and they just don't believe anything the Bible teaches.
You show them things in the Bible and they completely reject it.
I'm not trying to hurt your feelings, I'm just trying to be honest with you.
There's a good chance that they didn't get saved.
You know, here's the thing with family, oftentimes family is going to be praying with you.
You know, they might just pray with you to try to make you happy or things like that.
But look, if you get your family member saved, and you come back a couple years later,
and they still have their rosary beads that they're always praying to,
they still worship the statue of Mary.
They still just completely embrace Catholicism.
The odds are they just didn't get saved.
Right.
And if you show someone things in the Bible, and you think somebody's saved,
and you can show them things that are crystal clear.
Because what we're seeing here, turn back to John 1.
What we're seeing here in John 1, aren't these things just crystal clear that I've explained so far?
I mean, it's just right there in the Bible. In the beginning was the Word.
He obviously wasn't created.
You know, you talk to someone, and they tell you,
I don't believe that Jesus Christ was in the beginning.
I think he was created.
I think it was just God, and then eventually it became the Trinity later on,
like Peter Ruckman teaches in his publications.
Look, I mean, they just don't understand.
They don't have the Spirit of God inside them, guiding them.
Because these things are crystal clear.
If we see people that just don't understand the Bible,
it's a good telling to us that they're just not saved.
Because they just don't understand.
They can't discern it.
So the first point we had here was that Jesus Christ was here at the very beginning.
The second thing we see is that the Word of God is perfect.
What we believe in the English language is the King James Bible.
The third thing we see is the Trinity.
The fourth thing we see here is that Jesus Christ is God.
Isn't this just all the important things that we believe?
Just covered here in the first few verses of the book of John.
The fifth thing we see is that we believe in creation, not evolution.
The sixth thing we see is that salvation was in Jesus at the very beginning,
which destroys the false teaching of dispensationalism.
The seventh thing we see here is that unsaved people can't understand the Gospel.
And there's also something kind of alluded here when it talks about the light and the darkness.
You see, the Bible says that when people go to hell, they're cast into outer darkness.
And so people that do not have the light, they're just in darkness.
When they die, they're still going to be in darkness.
So we even see hell alluded to here in verse number five.
But the eighth thing I want to show you here is that for somebody to get saved,
and I kind of just mentioned it, is that they need a soul winner.
But notice what it says in verse number six.
There was a man sent from God whose name was John.
The same came for a witness to bear witness of the light that all men through him might believe.
See, we need somebody to bear witness of the light.
And look, if it's not going to be us here in Metro Manila, who's it going to be?
Who are the soul winners out here in Metro Manila?
I mean, where are the churches in Metro Manila that are preaching the Gospel
and going out and telling people what they believe?
They don't exist.
I mean, there's very few churches that are saved.
And I'm not trying to say that to be arrogant.
I'm just being honest that outside of this church in this area, what is there?
There's literally nothing.
That's the sad reality.
And that's the sad reality it is all around the world.
You know why it is?
Because of the fact that we're not people to bear witness of the light.
That's the reason why.
I don't understand how so much of this world is unsaved.
It just shows that 99% of Christians don't care.
That's the reality.
Because in this room, you know, we all go out soul winning.
We all go out and preach the Gospel.
We've all won people to the Lord.
And it's like if everybody was doing that, then there would be a lot of great churches around.
But everybody is not doing that.
We need somebody to bear witness of the light.
And look, that's a big burden upon our shoulders.
But if it's not going to be us, who's it going to be?
I remember that, you know, I used to drive an hour and a half, an hour and 45 minutes to church for each of the services.
There was no traffic. I just lived a long distance away.
And I remember, you know, I was living with my parents at the time and they were just kind of in a small town.
And this just kind of came over me where I just thought that in this town,
literally, if I don't go soul winning, everybody's going to go to hell.
That's not saying, I mean, who's preaching the Gospel in that town?
There was no great church.
I had called a few churches because I would have liked to, every once in a while on a Wednesday night,
just go to a church that was nearby and not have to drive a crazy distance.
And I called them up and then I'm just trying to find out what they're believing.
The pastors arguing with me about repentance of sins and things like that.
And I'm just thinking there's nothing in this town.
And so who's going to preach the Gospel in this town?
And the reality is that these 13 million people in Metro Manila, outside of our church, there's not much.
Now look, we have a decent sized church.
You know, on a Sunday morning, obviously a lot of people can't make it.
Here's a long drive on a Wednesday night.
And we had a lot of soul winners on Sunday, but that's not enough to reach Metro Manila.
That's why I mentioned the first point in our vision is to get churches started.
Because look, we're not going to be able to do it alone.
And an online ministry is not going to be able to do it either.
We actually need to get real churches started to hit those communities.
I mean, 13 million people in Metro Manila, but look at how spread out those 13 million people are.
We can easily have a dozen churches amongst those 13 million.
We'd barely be scratching the surface. There's so many unsaved people out there.
Look, we need to have great churches.
And the reason why we don't have great churches in this world is because there is no one to bear witness of the light.
I believe that the reason why this church exists is because there are people bearing witness of the light in this area.
And God said, you know what, I've got to send somebody to start a church.
I need to get a church started.
But I don't think it's just one that He wants started.
I think He wants a lot of churches started.
And look, I remember it was this sort of preaching that touched my heart to decide I'm going to dedicate my time to end up being a preacher one day.
Because I was like, you know, what else matters in life?
And I'm not saying that's everybody's calling in life.
But you know, if you have that desire, God's giving you that desire, you need to put in the effort to make it happen.
Because of the fact there's just literally nothing outside of us.
And that's sad, but there's literally nothing.
Nobody's bearing witness of the light.
And there's these Baptist churches that kind of pretend like they're bearing witness of the light.
Oh, and they get so many people saved with their altar calls each week, don't they?
They're not getting anybody saved. That's the reality.
So the eighth thing we see is that we need a soul winner.
The ninth thing I want you to see, though, is found in verse number seven.
It says,
The Bible says that all men through Him might believe.
See, salvation is only found in Jesus Christ.
The Bible's very clear.
Through Him, we must believe in Him if we're going to go to heaven.
Look, you know, there's a lot of Muslims that exist out there.
And you say, where are Muslims going to go when they die?
They're going to go to hell.
You say, what if they never hear the gospel?
They're going to go to hell.
Because of the fact the Bible says that we're all guilty.
All liars shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.
It says, whosoever make it a lie.
Look, that includes me.
We're all guilty.
The Bible says, let God be true, but every man a liar.
But here's the thing, that since we're all guilty, if we do not believe in Jesus Christ, we're going to go to hell.
Because life from the beginning was in who?
It was in Jesus Christ.
And the Bible says He was a lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
Life has always been in Jesus Christ.
And so here's the thing, if people do not believe in Jesus Christ, when they die, they are going to split hell wide open.
And look, they might be very nice people.
They might be very friendly people.
They might be very religious.
They're still going to go to hell.
That's what the Bible teaches.
And you know, even outside of just these various religions like Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Atheists, things like that, just in the so-called Christian realm,
I mean the vast majority of them are going to die and go to hell.
Why?
Because they're not believing on Jesus Christ.
They're not trusting in Jesus Christ.
You look at these various different religions and they believe different things get them to heaven.
They think their works get them to heaven.
They think their baptism gets them to heaven.
Look, they're going to die and go to hell.
Why?
Because we must believe in Him.
That all men through Him might believe.
So He died for everybody.
But if we do not believe on Jesus Christ, the Bible is very clear that we're going to die and go to hell.
We must believe on Jesus Christ.
And so I want you to look there at verse number 9.
Let's look at our 10th point.
The Bible says in verse 9,
That was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
Let's read that again.
That was the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
So let me ask you a question.
Who did Jesus die for?
Was it just the elect?
Was it just some people?
Or did He die for everybody?
The Bible says that He lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
Look, this false teaching of Calvinism, we're going to fight this doctrine.
And look, we've got Catholicism to fight, but right now people are coming out of these Calvinistic churches.
And you've got these pastors that think there's something special.
And look, I get it.
They've got the money.
They've got more members.
But you know what we're going to see in 10 years?
We're going to see churches just like this getting started, preaching hard, preaching the truth.
The Bible is clear that He lighteth every man that cometh into the world.
What could be more arrogant than to sit here and say,
Well, you know what? God died for me, but not for you.
I mean, what could be more arrogant than that?
Now, they're not going to word it like that, but that's what they believe.
I remember when I first got saved, and I don't suggest you doing what I did,
but I used to listen to a lot of debates between all these various different religions.
And I remember, and I knew Calvinism was false,
but I listened to a debate between a Calvinist and an atheist.
And you know what? That atheist just smashed it.
Because the atheist said, Well, look, if I'm not chosen, then what's the point of you even talking to me?
And the Calvinist had no way to answer the question.
Because the Calvinist literally believes that, Well, you know what? Only certain people are chosen.
I mean, there's no purpose to go soul winning if you're a Calvinist.
There's literally no purpose.
What's the purpose? Because every single person that's going to be saved is going to be saved anyway.
It doesn't matter what we do.
We're a bunch of robots, and we just follow God's instructions, whatever He says.
But you know, I believe that the Bible teaches that He lighted every man that cometh in the world.
And honestly, you know, I can stand up here
that He lighted every man that cometh in the world.
And He says, The grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men.
That'd be kind of embarrassing, wouldn't it?
You say, Well, my old pastor who was a Calvinist, here's the thing.
There's people that go to a church that's a Calvinist church that might be saved,
especially it's the best church that's been in this area.
Obviously, a lot of you come out of that background and you're saved.
But look, you know, the pastor who's been teaching that for decades,
that person is not a good person. That's a bad person.
Now, you never believed in the back of your mind that God wanted some child to be molested, did you?
No.
But that's what your pastor believed.
Now, they don't want to admit that, but that's what they actually believe.
Talk about a weirdo. Talk about a sick pervert.
People wonder why I hate Calvinism. I've always hated Calvinism.
It's always been my number one doctrine that I hate.
I'm glad that's the fight that came here to start out, because I hate Calvinism.
It's such a wicked and foolish teaching.
And you talk to Calvinists, can you literally talk to someone who's more arrogant than a Calvinist?
Man, they talk down and they think there's something special.
They think they are so smart, but what they believe is the stupidest thing you could possibly believe.
Because, you know what, if that were true, then God is a monster.
Now, they could say, well, you know, that's your opinion because you're not chosen.
You just don't understand. Yeah, you have your opinion.
The God you believe in is a monster.
It's not what the Bible teaches, because the Bible says here in John 1 that he lighted every man that cometh into the world.
That's just plain and simple, that Jesus died for everybody.
And so the eleventh thing that we see here is found in verse 12.
It says in verse 12,
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God,
even to them that believe on his name, which were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
The eleventh point we see here is that salvation is by faith.
That's what the Bible teaches.
Remember the other day I told you that receiving Jesus is referring to getting saved, right?
There's a difference between joyfully receiving and gladfully receiving and just receiving.
As many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.
By believing on his name, that is how we receive Jesus Christ.
That's how we become a son of God.
That's how we become a child of God.
So we become a child of God by believing,
which means we weren't born into this world a child of God or chosen from the beginning either.
That smashes Calvinism as well.
We become a child of God when we believe on Jesus Christ.
That's what the Bible teaches.
As many as received him.
I do not see the word repent here in verse number 12.
And actually, we're going to be covering the book of John for a long time,
and guess what word you're never going to find pop up?
It's the word repent.
You're also never going to see repenting or repented because the word is not in the book of John.
Now the book of John is the book that teaches you how to believe on Jesus Christ, how to go to heaven.
That's what it says in John 20.
And the word repent is missing.
I wonder why that is that this whole book was written for us to believe on Jesus Christ,
and God made a big mistake, didn't he?
I thought the word of God was perfect.
Apparently he made a mistake because he forgot to put the word repent here in all these testimonies of salvation.
In John 3, in John 1, in John 4, throughout the book of John, you will never find the word repent.
You also never see keeping the sacraments or doing good works or keeping the commandments of God or baptism.
You see nothing like that here in verse number 12.
We see very clearly that it says,
As many as received him, to them gave you power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.
That is how we become a child of God, by believing in Jesus Christ.
Now throughout the book of John, what you're always going to see stressed is believe, believe, believe.
When we go soul winning, guess what we need to stress?
That they need to believe on Jesus Christ.
What we don't want to do is just stress, we need to pray.
We need to pray and ask Jesus to save. We need to pray and ask Jesus to save.
Now look, I covered that in the first sermon, how we're not going to negate that part of the gospel at the very end,
but throughout the conversation, what you're trying to do is get them to believe,
because that's how we become a son of God.
If they believe, then they're going to end up calling.
Look, I've got soul winning with some really bad souls,
and their conversation lasts for like two minutes.
It's ridiculous.
I remember that I went soul winning one time.
We had this church that had a big bus.
There's like 70 people that went out.
And I remember that I got paired with this guy who was kind of an older guy,
and I remember that everyone was telling me, man, you're so lucky.
This guy is the greatest.
He always gets somebody saved. He's the greatest soul winner.
And in the back of my mind, I'm thinking, oh no.
This is going to be a rough day.
And so he's preaching the gospel at the first door,
and he literally uses four verses in the book of Romans and prays with them.
It's like a couple minute conversation.
And then all of a sudden at the next door, I go through the gospel like I normally do,
and the person's not interested, so I just move on.
And then he starts telling me why what I did was wrong,
and he's basically telling me I don't know what I'm doing.
And it's like I'm in a rock and a hard place, because I just started going to the church.
I'm like, I want to be respectful.
This guy is older than me. I assume he's saved,
but it's just like he has no clue what he's doing.
And I hate shallow soul winning. It makes it a joke.
One thing I love about our numbers from Sunday,
because we have a lot of souls that we got saved here over this weekend,
there was not one person that got a crazy amount of people saved.
The numbers were great.
It was like three saved, pairings of two, like five saved, six saved, four saved, three.
In the Philippines, that's not outrageous.
You go soul winning for two and a half hours, five saved, it's very reasonable.
Nobody came away with 25 salvation.
That would have made me mad. We would have just crossed that number off if someone had a crazy amount.
And what that shows me is that people are actually spending time to explain the gospel.
When we explain the gospel, we should spend more than 10 minutes.
People, it takes them a lot of time to end up believing on Jesus.
Look, we need to make sure that we explain very thoroughly.
They cannot change their mind in a really short amount of time.
Yes, the gospel is simple, believe on Jesus Christ.
But look, people are mixed up with a lot of beliefs.
People do not believe in eternal security, do they?
I remember growing up and I thought suicide gave you a straight ticket to hell.
That's what I believe.
I think most of us in this room were probably taught the same thing.
And I remember when I was first told that suicide doesn't send you to hell, I rejected it.
The person who gave me the gospel, he had to show me over and over again. Why?
Because I had it ingrained in my head that if the last thing you ever do is commit a sin, then you can't be forgiven for it.
But obviously we know around here that once you get saved, your future sins are wiped away as well.
The Bible is very clear here that by believing, that's our point number 11, is by believing.
Not by repentance of sins, not by baptism.
But we also see point number 12, which is eternal security is taught here as well.
Let us understand the example of being a son of God.
You can look at my son over there, Zephaniah.
My son will always be my son.
Now how many times was he born into my family?
One time.
How many times did we get born into God's family?
Just one time.
My son will always be my son.
Now my son's pretty young now, but as he grows up and he becomes rebellious at times, I'm going to have to thank him sometimes.
I'm going to have to punish him.
But guess what? He's still my son.
Look, if he ends up really breaking my rules, he doesn't become brother Timothy's son.
That doesn't make any sense, does it?
He's still my son.
Nothing's ever going to change that.
And it's the same thing with God.
If we choose to break these rules, if we say, well, you know what, I'm just going to do whatever I want.
I'm going to become a drug dealer.
I'm going to cheat on my spouse. I'm just going to go out and do whatever I want.
If we choose to do that in this life, we're going to have a big punishment.
But guess what? We're still a child of God.
Once you're a child of God, you're always a child of God.
But we have to realize that, and I don't even have this in my notes, I just thought of this,
this also shows us we aren't automatically children of God when we're born.
That's what a lot of people believe.
They teach and believe that we're all children of God, whether you're saved or unsaved,
whether you're Buddhist, whether you're Muslim.
But no, you become a son of God.
So that shows us, let's make that point number 13 then,
that we're not children of God from the beginning.
Yes, we're all God's creation, but we're not all children of God.
Look, the Buddhist out there is not a child of God.
They have to believe on Jesus Christ to become a child of God.
The Hindu, the Muslim, the Galatian increased to the Catholic, the Calvinist,
they must believe on Jesus Christ to become a child of God.
They're not automatically a child of God.
So that's point number 13.
Point number 14 is this.
Also in verse number 12, it says,
As many as received, and this is referring to human beings,
to them gave me power to become the sons of God,
even in them that believe on his name.
The 14th point we see is that the sons of God are believers.
That's who the sons of God are, right?
The sons of God are not fallen angels.
That's ridiculous. You'll never find that in the entire Bible.
Do you literally believe that Satan is a child of God, is a son of God?
That's literally what some people believe, that Satan is a son of God.
That's also what the Mormons believe.
They believe that Satan and Jesus are these spirit brothers or whatever.
Look, Jesus, his plan to save the world was better than Satan,
so Satan got mad and left.
Look, Satan is not a son of God.
That's what the Bible teaches.
It's us as humans.
He's bestowed this upon us that us as believers can become a child of God.
That's not something for the angels.
It's us as believers. We become children of God,
even in them that believe on his name.
This is clearly referring to human beings.
This goes back to the dispensational teaching
because all dispensational lists will teach you
that angels in the Old Testament are the sons of God.
That is not what the Bible teaches.
Actually, let's go back to Genesis 6 real clearly.
Let's go to their big verse that they like to use.
I made a video recently, I don't know how many of you saw that,
but in the first chapter of Job, we disprove the idea
that the sons of God are fallen angels.
Very clearly, you can check that video out.
But even in the first chapter of Job,
because they love to go to the book of Job as well,
they love to go to this unclear passage,
but even in Job chapter 1, he disproves the idea
that the sons of God are fallen angels.
Now, look at what it says in Genesis chapter 6, verse 1.
And it came to pass when men began to multiply
on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them,
that the sons of God saw the daughters of men
that they were fair, and they took them wives
of all which they chose.
What do we see?
We see sons of God marry unbelievers.
That's what it's teaching.
They thought the women were attractive,
and they chose to marry them.
They saw that they were fair.
Look, it makes sense that this is referring
to believers marrying unbelievers,
because guess what a lot of guys do in today's world?
They choose to date and marry unbelievers.
Why?
Because they find them attractive.
Now, look, that's a stupid thing to do.
This caused the flood on the world.
You know, if you choose, and here's the truth,
if you choose to compromise your belief about salvation,
you will compromise everything.
I know people, I know guys that are saved people,
people that used to go soul-willing,
that married Catholics.
And guess what's going to end up happening
to their baby one day?
It's going to have a little water sprinkle on the head.
If it goes to any church, it's going to go to Catholic Church.
Because if the husband doesn't have the guts
to stand up for the thing of salvation,
he's going to do nothing to help raise that kid.
He's going to just say, well, you know what,
whatever my wife wants.
He's going to back down on that because he finds her fair,
because he finds her attractive.
What a stupid reason to marry someone.
You're going to marry someone simply
because you find them attractive?
Get ready to hate your life for the next several decades.
You marry an unsafe person because you find them attractive?
Good luck.
I hope you get them saved.
But you know what?
The reality is they're probably not going to get saved.
Because if you're willing to just marry them as unbelievers,
you probably don't even have the guts to give them the gospel.
That's the truth.
That's what I've seen in reality.
That's what you see in the Bible.
The Bible says in verse 3,
And the Lord said,
My spirit shall not always strive with man,
for that is he also is flesh.
Yet his days shall be in a hundred and twenty years.
Now remember in verse 2, before you get to verse 4,
they took them wives of all which they chose.
These are people that they married.
These are people that they lived with.
Okay?
Verse number 4,
There were giants in the earth in those days,
and also after that,
when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men,
and they bared children of them,
the same came mighty men which were of old men of renown.
Now this is something straight out of a science fiction movie.
Where people say,
Well, you know, these fallen angels,
these sons of God,
they marry these women and they have children with them.
And the children just become giants.
Just massive children.
Yeah, but here's one thing they never mention to you.
It says in verse 2 that these were their wives.
These are people that they actually lived with.
It's not just that they had a child together.
These are people that they actually lived with.
I mean, do you honestly mean to tell me
that you believe that angels,
that in this world we have now,
because if it happened back then,
it would happen today.
That, you know, there's women just,
they don't even realize it,
but their husband is a fallen angel.
I mean, that's just ridiculous.
That's stupid.
It doesn't make any sense whatsoever.
So what we believe around here is that believers are sons of God.
Now turn back to John 1.
Now as I said at the beginning of the service,
this is not your typical type of sermon.
I don't believe in covering too much material.
I believe going in-depth on certain things.
But the whole point of the first 14 verses of John
is literally to give us kind of a doctrinal statement
of everything we believe.
I mean, haven't we covered just about everything?
We've covered creation, not evolution,
that Jesus is God.
Then we covered the Trinity,
that salvation by faith alone.
Calvinism's been destroyed.
Dispensationalism's been destroyed.
I don't know of any other 14 verses in the Bible
packed together that give us that much information.
But he's really just kind of given us shotgun
just every single thing that we believe.
And let us look at point number 15.
Point number 15.
And it says in verse number 13,
actually verse number 14, it says,
And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us.
The Bible says the Word was made flesh.
What does that show us?
It shows us that Jesus Christ, when He was here,
He was not only God, but He was human as well.
Jesus Christ was fully God and fully man.
Amen.
You say, Brother Stuckey, can you explain that to me
like a math problem?
No, I can't.
Because it doesn't make logical sense to me.
Right?
But let me explain something to you.
I could not stand up here.
I've read the Bible plenty of times,
but I could not stand up here and explain to you logically
where did God come from.
You know why?
Because that goes way over my head.
Obviously we know God, we're here,
so obviously God's real.
He's always existed.
It makes sense.
But can we really explain that,
like where did God come from?
I remember when I was a kid
and I asked my parents that question.
Maybe a lot of people in this room
asked their parents that question as well.
Where did God come from?
I'm sure my son one day is going to ask me,
Dad, you're a preacher.
You love the Lord.
Obviously you're going to be able to explain this one.
No, it's not like a math problem.
I'm not going to be able to explain
where did God come from.
Obviously we believe what the Bible says,
that in the beginning was the Lord
and in the beginning was God.
God's always existed.
He's eternal.
We know that.
We know we're here.
It makes logical sense.
But realize this,
that the atheists can't explain where we came from either.
They could mock us and say,
where did God come from?
Well, where did anything that you believe come from?
Where did the rocks come from that made us?
Where did this big bang come from?
Where did the stuff come to make the big bang?
They don't have an explanation.
Now, the thing about it is,
me not having a logical math problem
type of explanation is okay.
Why?
Because of the fact if God's real
and God is obviously powerful and above me,
He wouldn't be much of a God
if I fully comprehended Him
with my own human wisdom.
He wouldn't be that powerful of a God
if I just fully got it.
Look, there's certain things about God
I will never understand
and never be able to explain.
How He was fully God and fully man,
I cannot explain that.
But you know what?
The Bible teaches that.
And I believe that because the Bible teaches that.
You know someone who doesn't believe that, though?
Eli Soriano doesn't believe that.
I still don't get it
because I've read online his explanation
and I'm like, I don't get it.
What do you mean that Jesus Christ was not a man?
It doesn't make any sense.
And he has this long explanation for it.
I mean, he's the most, what does he call him?
The most sensible preacher of our generation
or something like that.
And it's like the Bible's very clear
that Jesus Christ was a man.
What do you mean that He was only God?
That He wasn't a man?
Throughout the Bible it teaches
the Word was made flesh.
He was a man.
The Bible's very, very clear about it
that Jesus Christ was a man.
So let's recap everything we've covered here tonight.
And honestly, we've covered
just about everything we believe
because in the first 14 verses
it covers pretty much everything.
The first point we saw here
was that Jesus was here at the very beginning.
He wasn't created.
He's been here at the very beginning.
The second thing is
we see the Word of God is perfect,
which in our language
that's the King James Bible.
The third point,
the third thing we see is the Trinity.
We believe in the Trinity around here.
The fourth thing is
we believe that Jesus Christ is God.
The fifth thing we see is
that we believe in creation, not evolution.
The sixth thing is this.
We see that dispensationalism is false
because salvation has always been in Jesus Christ.
The seventh thing we see
is that unsaved people
cannot understand the Bible.
They can't understand the Gospel at all.
The eighth thing we see is this,
that we need a soul winner
in order for someone to get saved.
That kind of ties along with point seven
is they can't understand the Word of God.
They can't get saved on their own.
And look, that's a very basic point.
And it's annoying to me
how many times I've had this.
I've preached this
at Verity Baptist Church before,
and we've made small little clips before.
And I've had so many people
argue with me about that.
Look, this is our doctrinal statement.
We believe around here
that you need a soul winner to get saved.
The Bible teaches that from cover to cover.
They cannot understand the thing.
They cannot just pick up this book
and get saved on their own.
Did anybody in this room
get saved just on their own,
or did somebody priest the Gospel to you?
Someone preached the Gospel to you.
You know what, that's the story
for everybody.
Somebody preached them the Gospel.
And you know why that is?
Because if we could get saved on our own,
you know what would happen?
We'd get very arrogant.
If we could get saved on our own,
we'd get really arrogant.
The way God made our human existence
and how we're going to grow spiritually.
You know how you get saved?
Somebody gives you the Gospel.
You know how you become a soul winner?
Somebody teaches you how to be a soul winner.
You know how you end up
learning the Word of God?
Somebody teaches you the Word of God.
It forces us to be humble
and not prideful.
Because if I could get saved on my own
and learn the Bible
and baptize myself on my own
and learn the Bible on my own
and become a preacher on my own
without any help,
you know how arrogant I would be
at the end of the day?
Everybody would be arrogant.
It would get to your head.
But God forces us to humble ourselves.
That's a good thing for us
that we need a soul winner to get saved.
We need someone to teach us
the Word of God.
That's the way it is.
Like I said, obviously,
if you don't get saved,
that's the way it is.
Like I said, obviously,
you're going to learn more
in your own free time
reading the Word of God.
That's the most important thing.
But we do need people in our lives
to help guide us.
And I'm not just referring to myself.
Obviously, you guys listen
to other people online
that are great preachers.
They help guide you
in the things that you believe
and they help teach you.
And so the eighth thing we saw is this,
that we need a soul winner.
The ninth thing we see is this,
that Jesus is the way of salvation.
He is the only way for everything.
The tenth point we have is
that Calvinism is destroyed.
Jesus Christ died for everyone.
The eleventh point we had is that
salvation is by belief alone.
The twelfth thing we see is
eternal security.
Once saved, always saved.
The thirteenth thing we see is
the sons of God are believers.
I'm forgetting the one that we added.
We added one,
and we also see the fifteenth point,
the last one is that
Jesus Christ was human.
But you know what?
These things that I've taught you
so far tonight,
these are our core beliefs.
These things will never change.
I was planning to make
a doctrinal statement video
of all the main things I believe.
And I remember just looking, you know,
at John chapter one and saying,
you know, I don't even need to do that because
certain differences here and there in a passage.
All of us in this room,
we could look at a verse in the book of Job
and come to a different conclusion, right?
We're not going to agree on every single thing.
None of us know everything about the Bible.
No preacher knows everything about the Bible.
All of us are going to be wrong on certain things.
But on core things about like,
well, how do you get saved?
That's not debatable.
It's very clear what we believe.
And it's always going to be clear what we believe.
And everything is covered here.
But you know, there's one key doctrine,
one key doctrine I didn't cover at all.
That's the reprobate doctrine.
Now, one thing we believe very strongly
is the reprobate doctrine.
Now, I think most of you in this room
or maybe all of you know what that is,
but let me just quickly explain this then.
We believe that Jesus Christ,
He died for every single person
and He wants every single person to be saved.
He's not willing that any should perish,
but that all should come to repentance.
Obviously, we know when it says all should come to repentance,
it doesn't say repentance of sins.
It's changing what you believe
and believing on Jesus Christ, right?
He wants everybody to go to heaven, right?
But what the Bible teaches is that certain people
in this life can reach a point
where they can no longer be saved.
Throughout the book of John,
what you're going to see is
it's going to say they could not believe.
Not that they didn't believe,
but they could not believe.
It was impossible for them to believe.
Notice it didn't say they could not repent.
Judas repented at the very end.
They could not believe, though,
because that's what gets us saved.
They could not believe.
There's people in this world
where it is impossible for them
to believe on Jesus Christ and get saved.
But in these first 14 verses
that cover everything we believe,
it didn't cover that at all.
Now, later on in the book of John,
it's going to cover it a lot.
You know why?
Because nobody in this world,
God intends to go to hell.
At the very beginning,
at the very beginning,
God expects them and wants them to be saved.
And to become a reprobate,
they have to hear the gospel
over and over and over.
So God doesn't intend them to go to hell.
So it's not there in the first 14 verses.
But then what you see
when it talks about believe, believe, believe,
all of a sudden later on in this book,
what we're going to see here on Wednesday nights,
it starts talking about the reprobate doctrine.
Because when people hear the word of God
over and over and over again,
and they reject it,
they end up becoming a reprobate at one point.
And then they could not believe the Bible says.
Obviously people that die and go to hell,
when they're in hell,
they have no chance.
We're not Catholics in this room.
When you die unsaved,
you have no hope of going to heaven.
There is no purgatory taught in the Bible.
You either die, you go to heaven,
or you go to hell.
When you die, it's done.
But people before that point
can reach a point where they can not believe.
But obviously, you know what?
It makes sense to me
that God doesn't cover it at the very beginning.
Because God wants them to be saved,
and it's the book about getting saved,
and it talks about believe, believe, believe,
and all of a sudden you start seeing people
they could not believe.
Why?
Because if you hear it over and over and over again,
you can reach that point where you become a reprobate.
So honestly, it kind of makes sense,
because it kind of alludes to the reprobate doctrine
by not mentioning it,
because nobody's born a reprobate.
Once again, we're not Calvinists.
We're not born with no hope of going to heaven.
We have our opportunity.
We have our free will.
And if we choose to reject it,
then we can end up becoming a reprobate.
Obviously when you're saved,
you have eternal life.
You can never lose your salvation.
But unsaved people,
they choose to reject it over and over again,
can reach that point.
So these are key things that we believe.
These are the doctrines we believe.
And like I said, this is not the typical sermon.
This is kind of a shotgun sermon.
But this is the point of the first 14 verses of the book of John.
These are things we believe very strongly.
These are things we're going to teach throughout this ministry.
Let's close in a word of prayer.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for allowing us to be in your house today
and ask you to help us remember all these things that we believe.
But all these key things that we believe, God,
help us to understand why we believe these things.
Help us to be able to defend what we believe, including myself, God.
We can always learn more about these topics.
And there's always going to be heretics creeping up,
trying to bring us a verse that maybe we haven't thought of before.