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[0:00] Matthew 18, and we'll be reading from verse 21 to the end of the chapter. Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me?

[0:15] Up to seven times? And Jesus answered, I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. Therefore, the kingdom of heaven is like a king who wanted to settle accounts with his servants.

[0:30] As he began the settlement, a man who owed him ten thousand talents was brought to him. Since he was not able to pay, the master ordered that he and his wife and his children and all that he had be sold to repay the debt.

[0:46] The servant fell on his knees before him. Be patient with me, he begged, and I will pay back everything. The servant's master took pity on him, canceled the debt and let him go.

[0:59] But when that servant went out, he found one of his fellow servants who owed him a hundred denarii. He grabbed him and began to choke him. Pay back what you owe me, he demanded.

[1:12] His fellow servant fell to his knees and begged him, be patient with me and I will pay you back. But he refused. Instead, he went off and had the man thrown into prison until he could pay the debt.

[1:26] When the other servants saw what had happened, they were greatly distressed and went and told their master everything that had happened. Then the master called the servant in.

[1:38] You wicked servant, he said. I canceled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?

[1:50] In anger, his master turned him over to the jailers to be tortured until he should pay back all that he owed. This is how my heavenly father will treat each of you unless you forgive your brother from your heart.

[2:06] For the past two weeks, we have been looking at the substitutionary life and death of Jesus. The fact that he came and lived the life of perfect obedience that we owed to God and then died the death under God's wrath that we owed to God for our disobedience.

[2:30] That's why the eternal son of God came to earth. Our life to live and our death to die. And then he rose again on the third day.

[2:44] And that's the gospel. Not what I have done, but what God has done for me in his son, Jesus Christ. Now, as you know, the word gospel means good news.

[2:59] And it's not just good news the first time that we believed it. It remains the good news throughout our whole lives. In fact, every day you wake up, this is the best news of the day.

[3:14] That Christ lived for me. Christ died for me. He was raised again for me. And he lives for me today. And that gospel is to have a dominant impact on the way I live today.

[3:29] Indeed, every day. That's what Paul says. The life I live. He's talking about the life he lived. The life I live. I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

[3:43] You see, that's gospel living. Living with our eye of faith on Jesus and the gospel of his loving and giving himself for me.

[3:54] And so that's why when you open up Paul's letters to the Christian churches, you find them so full of the gospel. In fact, some of his letters like Romans and Ephesians and Colossians, you find huge chunks devoted to what God has done for us in Christ first.

[4:14] And only then toward the back of the book do you find the commands to us and the applications of what the gospel means for us in life.

[4:26] How it changes the way we live. The difference it makes in our marriages, in our family relations, our workplace, our nation, our neighbors, and so on.

[4:41] Other letters from Paul have the gospel and its applications just intermixed all the way through. But one thing is sure, if you're reading the Apostle Paul's letters, you can't get far without bumping into the gospel.

[4:54] The gospel, it's there. Everywhere. Even as it is in the other epistles of our New Testament. Why is that? Why do we find the gospel so profuse in these books?

[5:09] It's because that's precisely what we need and need continually. The gospel is not something to be learned once at the beginning of the Christian life and then set aside to go on to bigger and better things.

[5:24] No, the gospel itself is the bigger, the better thing. And we're meant to feed on it all of our lives. And so we've been studying the basics, getting back to basics.

[5:36] And we need to be careful that we don't think, okay, we've got the basic now of Christ's life and death down. Let's move on to other things. No, let's go on feeding on this. Every day.

[5:47] All our days. The whole Christian life is meant to flow out of a God-saturated heart. You know, God designed it that way on purpose.

[5:57] It was His intention that our life should flow from the gospel. We don't live well without the gospel in view. So each day we need to remind ourselves in one way or another of the gospel, of my lostness, what I deserve, and what God in Christ has done for me.

[6:21] Preach it to yourself. Sing it to yourself. Read it to yourself. Listen to it. But keep the gospel daily before you.

[6:33] So what would a gospel-saturated life look like? How can I know? What are the marks of a life that's just saturated with the gospel?

[6:44] What we've just been looking at the last two weeks. Well, let's begin by saying in the first place, a gospel-saturated life is a life of willing, careful obedience to God's commands.

[6:59] Willing and careful obedience. Houses don't last long without foundations. And neither does willing, careful obedience last long without the foundation of the gospel holding it up.

[7:14] Now, some have reasoned this way, looking at what we saw last week about Jesus' perfect obedience. They would say, if Christ has perfectly obeyed God's commands in my place, well, then I don't need to.

[7:30] If He has already obeyed enough to make me right with God forever, then why do I need to be careful to obey God? Well, Christ did it for me. That's logical, isn't it?

[7:42] But it's the devil's logic. It's sad to say, this kind of logic is alive and well in the church today. Since all my righteousness is in Jesus, then don't bother me, John, with sermons about my duty to obey God's law.

[8:00] Just tell me what Christ did for me. And it can sound so spiritual, but it's devilish. It's devilish. Turn to Ezekiel chapter 36 and verses 26 and 27.

[8:14] Ezekiel 36. You see, Christ's substitutionary life and death not only won a perfect righteousness for His people, that work of Christ also purchased a new heart and the indwelling Holy Spirit for His people.

[8:38] And we have it for us here in the promises of the new covenant. Ezekiel 36, 26 and 27. God says to His people, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you.

[8:55] I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and to be careful to keep my loss.

[9:11] Christ, by His perfect life and death, have won for us a new heart and the Spirit of God living in us. And what that new heart craves and what the Holy Spirit works in me is a carefulness to obey God's laws.

[9:29] To keep His commands. This new heart hungers and thirsts for righteousness. Right living. And that's exactly what the Holy Spirit produces in us.

[9:43] He moves us. That's supernatural. He moves us to be careful to keep His laws. So you see the logic of the new heart?

[9:54] It's exactly opposite of the devil's logic. The logic of the new heart is this. Did Jesus Christ so love me that He became a man and was born under the law and obeyed every commandment perfectly and then lay down His life as an atoning sacrifice for sin that took God's wrath away from me?

[10:19] Oh, then I want to love Him in return. I want to please Him. Did He love me that much? I want to do what pleases Him. I want to love Him. And Jesus says, well, if you love me, you will keep my commandments.

[10:34] Oh, so the new heart says, these commandments from God are ways I show my love to Him. They're ways that I please Him because of all that He's done for me in Christ.

[10:47] And so the Ten Commandments that we recited are a summary of how to love Jesus. You see, God's law has lost its condemning power in my life.

[11:03] Because I'm righteous in Jesus. I'm not under its condemnation, but I am under its authority. After all, it's God's law that we're talking about.

[11:14] Not an equal. God's law. And so, I still owe obedience to my Heavenly Father whose law it is. But now, because of the Gospel, I want to obey the One I love.

[11:27] I want to obey the One who loved me first. The Gospel generates loving, glad obedience in all who believe.

[11:40] How do you know? It will be in all who believe because God will put His Spirit in them who will move them to be careful to obey. That's how we know. So the law of God sends me as a sinner running to Jesus.

[11:55] I can't do that. I haven't done that. I need a Savior. And I run to the Lord Jesus and trust in all that He has done in keeping that law and dying under its condemnation.

[12:06] And then, He freely forgives me. And listen, He sends me, as a son of God, back to that law. Because that law is a transcript on God's holiness and how I please Him, how I love Him.

[12:25] So how do the Ten Commandments start, children? Well, let's see. You shall love the Lord. Or no, you shall have no other gods besides me.

[12:36] No. Before the first command, there is an introduction to the Ten Commandments. And this is the way it starts.

[12:47] I am the Lord, your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. Now, you shall have no other gods besides me.

[12:57] And so on. But you see, before He tells them what they are to do, He first tells them what He has done for them.

[13:08] I've made you my people. You're mine. I'm your God. I've redeemed you out of bondage in Egypt. Now, don't have any other gods but me.

[13:21] You see it? The order is all important. It's gospel before law. It's privilege before duty. These commands from God are not to be obeyed in order to earn God's forgiveness or to earn His salvation.

[13:42] No, they're to be obeyed because He has already freely forgiven me in Jesus Christ. And the very giving of the law reflects that order. they are already His redeemed people.

[13:55] They already have been received grace. And all of that is to influence their glad obedience. So it's the gospel rehearsed before giving the commandments.

[14:09] Now that's Pauline. That's what we find in Paul. That's what we find in the New Testament. What God has done for us comes before what we are to do to Him in response, in obedience.

[14:21] Now, Israel's redemption from Egypt was an Old Testament type of New Testament realities. grace. It symbolized what happens to the believer.

[14:34] So the New Covenant would read this way. I am the Lord your God who sent my Son to live a perfect life for you and to die under my wrath for you to set you free from condemnation and to win for you my eternal favor.

[14:50] Now, have no other gods besides me. Gospel before law. So honor your father and mother and so on.

[15:02] Or, the New Covenant order would read like Romans chapter 12 and verse 1. Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice holy and pleasing to God.

[15:19] This is your spiritual act of worship and so don't be conformed to the pattern of this world any longer. In the New Covenant, we are to, just as in the Old Covenant, we are to receive the commandments of God always with God's mercies in view as coming from the one who crushed his son in our place who redeemed us from the hand of the enemy.

[15:46] We're never to receive the commandments of God without viewing the mercies that this lawgiver has done for us. It won't work right.

[15:57] It wasn't meant to work right. Always view the mercies of this God. In the New Covenant, it is a nail-pierced hand that holds out the law of God to us, isn't it?

[16:13] It's a nail-pierced hand that gives us his law and we cannot rightly receive his law without viewing his mercies to us in Christ. That the influence of those mercies might influence our glad behavior in response.

[16:33] His love and mercy in the gospel is what constrains us to no longer live for ourselves but for him who died for us and was raised again. So if these commandments come from a nail-pierced hand that was pierced for me, well then I can trust that God's commands are truly good for me.

[16:53] That is one of the suspicions that we have about the commands of God. We see it in Eve in her perfect state being tempted by the devil. Eve, he's holding out in you and that's why he doesn't want you to eat from this tree.

[17:09] And every time we sin, we show that we are suspicious that there's a better way than God's way. His law really isn't good for us. In this instance, to fudge it a bit, this would be better.

[17:22] That's what our sin is saying. But as we receive that law from a nail-pierced hand, what can we conclude but that the giver of these laws loves us dearly, loves us unto death, even the death of the cross.

[17:38] And so, we know that these commands that he hands us are devised not only with perfect wisdom but with supreme love for us.

[17:50] I'll never be the loser for obeying the commands of him who died for me. So the believer's obedience is a gospel produced obedience.

[18:01] It rests on the foundation of grace, not of works. I am careful to obey God's commands not for pardon, but from pardon. I obey not in order to be saved, but because Jesus' righteousness alone has covered me and saved me.

[18:20] That's why Paul in Ephesians 2, 8, and 9 emphasizes that we're saved by grace through faith, not of ourselves, not by works. But then what does he tell us?

[18:31] We are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God has prepared in advance for us to do. We're not saved by our works, but we're saved to do good works.

[18:44] We've got to get our works on the right side of conversion. We don't work to be saved, we are saved in order to work. It's always gospel foundation on which the obedience of the believer is to be built.

[19:01] And those good works are simply obedience to God's commands, because God's commands define for us what good works are. What is a good work? It's not what my neighbor wants me to do, it's what God wants me to do.

[19:14] And that's how I come to the commands, to be taught what good works are that should be done out of love for him. Titus 2.14 says, the reason Jesus Christ gave himself for us was to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own eager to do what is good.

[19:35] So you look at Calvary and you meditate on Calvary for three minutes and then you say, he did all of that to make me zealous for good works. To have me eager beaver to be about obeying and doing good as he's commanded.

[19:52] He did that to ensure my eager obedience. That's gospel logic. And if the perfect obedience of Jesus that we heard about last week, if it does anything to relax your carefulness to obey those commands of God, then you could be twisting the truth to your own destruction.

[20:16] Taking something as pure and sweet and wonderful as the righteousness of Jesus, perfect obedience, and so twisting that to mean that I can therefore relax in my attitude toward what God commands me to do.

[20:30] Be careful. That's the devil's logic. And he's taken multitudes to hell with it. Yes, the gospel is the end of works righteousness, obeying in order to be saved.

[20:43] It's the end of that. But it is the beginning of a new order of obedience, glad obedience of the believer for the Savior's perfect work on our behalf, let alone saves us.

[21:01] You see, without gospel saturated hearts, our obedience suffers and can easily sink back into some legalistic way of doing things, and I'm doing this because I'm wanting God's favor.

[21:13] Or it can cause us to lose our heart and motivation to obey. And we start cutting corners and compromising and caving into the pattern of this world.

[21:24] Are you running out of the will to obey any of God's commands? Are any of them starting to look, oh man, I've got to do that. Oh, let that be a flashing light on the dashboard of your life, my friend.

[21:41] Something's wrong. I need to get back to the gospel. I need to get back to the cross. The gospel is where I find new strength, new heart, new will to obey him who loved me first.

[22:01] So daily make use of the grace of God in the gospel to motivate loving obedience to God's commands. That's a gospel saturated life. But secondly, it's a life of radical mortification of sin.

[22:14] Haven't you found that the gospel makes you hate sin more? Not less. Peter writes, he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness.

[22:33] By his wounds we have been healed. He bore our sins in his body on the tree so that we might die to sins. And never does sin appear more hateful than when we see it being born by him on the tree and then him being crushed, pierced for our transgressions and crushed for our iniquities.

[22:58] And then we say, did my sin open up those wounds in the Son of God? Did my sins cause him to cry, Father, my God, my God, why have you abandoned me?

[23:09] Is that what it costs to forgive me for my sins? Then let every day be an all out battle against sin. Every day, all my days.

[23:22] sin. A gospel saturated life is a life of radical mortification of sin. But now listen, someone says, but if Jesus died to pay for all of my sins, past, present, and future, then why should I be concerned about putting my sins to death?

[23:46] He's taken care of my sin problem. Once again, that's logical. But it's the devil's logic. And Paul had to face it in his day.

[23:57] And he writes against it in Romans chapter 6. Let us go on sinning because we're not under the law but under grace. Oh no, the logic of the gospel says God forbid.

[24:13] God forbid. Let it never be so. We died to sin. How can we live it in any longer? And he writes to Titus in Titus 2, 11, and 12. It's the grace of God in the gospel that teaches you to say no to ungodliness and worldly passions and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present age.

[24:37] Now, since temptation is strong, it's powerful, it says, take me, take me, take me. What is strong enough to make you say no to sin?

[24:48] sin, every time it comes offering, it's forbidden fruit. What's strong enough? Paul says, the grace of God in the gospel.

[25:00] The gospel. How can I do such a thing and sin against my loving Savior if he gave himself to redeem me from all wickedness? If he has done that for me, there can be no truce with sin.

[25:16] with wickedness in any form, it must die. And so, through the Spirit, we put to death the misdeeds of the body. And as the Savior says, we take out the knife and we cut off anything that causes us to sin in our lives.

[25:32] Anything. No matter if it's as dear as our right hand, our right foot, our right eye. What will cause a man, a woman, a boy, or a girl to deal that way with sin?

[25:42] A heart saturated with the Gospel. Oh, but don't attempt to fight sin without the Gospel, because the Gospel is the power of God.

[25:54] Don't fight without this power. Sin's power is broken by Christ's death to sin. It's in the Gospel that I learn that sin shall no longer have the reign in my life.

[26:05] It's in the Gospel I see that sin's power is broken and I live on the basis of that truth. It's the Gospel that makes it harder to sin against our curse-bearing substitute.

[26:18] And so John Owen in his treatise on the mortification of sin says, take your sins to Calvary for the killing of them. It's the cross.

[26:32] It's the Gospel. It is the power of God to put sin to death. It's through the cross that our love affair with the world is broken. There's a wonder-working power in the blood of Calvary.

[26:47] The blood of God's own Son cleanses from all sin. And if sin is what I do when I am not satisfied with Jesus, then I need to keep myself feeding on Christ in the Gospel.

[27:01] A Gospel saturated life is then a life of radical mortification of sin. Is that you? Is that me? sin. But then thirdly, it's a life of quick confession after sinning.

[27:15] A quick confession after sinning. How long is it between your sins and your confession of sin? How wide is that gap? How long do you go on after a fall before you recover?

[27:29] do you wait to get to Jesus with your sin? Well, your flesh is always telling you to fall back on some legalistic method.

[27:40] To go through some penance. Bearing some grief and sadness for so many hours and days. Some suffering to pay for your sin.

[27:51] Or to clean yourself up first. Try to make yourself fit for His presence. And then to come and confess. There's ever some temptation to stay away until you're better.

[28:04] fears that God may reject you if you just came right now. Now, that's what your flesh is telling you all the time. Do you know what the gospel is telling you?

[28:15] Come right now. Come right now. Come now. Just as you are. With your sin to me. The gospel removes all the reasons for staying away from Christ for another moment.

[28:30] Jesus has already obeyed enough. He's already suffered enough to pay for all my sins. So come now. His obedient life and death are finished works and they've won eternal acceptance for me with the Father.

[28:47] So come now. My sin does not unjustify me. My sin does not place me back again under condemnation.

[28:58] There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ and there never is and will be condemnation. My acceptance in heaven is not based upon my performance any day of my life but always on Christ's perfect performance.

[29:12] And so the gospel says all is done and it bids my fears depart. The gospel says we have a savior for our sins. It says come now and let us reason together.

[29:26] Though your sins be like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. The gospel says if you confess your sins, he is faithful and just to forgive you your sins and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness.

[29:39] And so I just keep coming over and over again. I just keep coming. I believe the gospel over and over again that Jesus is full of grace and more full of grace than I am of sin.

[29:54] So I come in my sin and I say Jesus, wash me, forgive me. I look again to him. You know John in his epistle, 1 John chapter 2 verses 1 and 2, he says, I write this to you so that you do not sin.

[30:12] I'm writing you this letter that you do not sin. That's its purpose. But, if any of us does sin, if anybody does sin, we have one who speaks to the Father in our defense, Jesus Christ, the righteous one, he is the atoning sacrifice, the propitiation for our sins.

[30:37] So when we come confessing our sins, 1 John 1, 9, we are to come with faith looking again to Christ, even as we did the first time, and we are to see him as the righteous one who has perfectly kept the law of God and worked out a righteousness for us.

[30:57] And we are to see him as the atoning sacrifice who has pacified the wrath of God by bearing it himself. And so, we're not even to confess our sins without looking again to what we've been looking at for the last two weeks.

[31:14] Christ's perfect life for me, Christ's perfect death for me. And that's the way we are to confess our sins. trusting afresh in his righteous life, live for us, and his wrath satisfying death, died for us.

[31:31] So, when Satan tempts me to despair and tells me of the guilt within, upward I look. That's it. Upward I look and I see him there, the righteous one, my propitiating sacrifice.

[31:49] I look again and I confess God the just is satisfied to look on him and pardon me. And that's the only way that this man can walk in fellowship with he who is in the life.

[32:02] It's as the blood of Jesus is constantly cleansing me of my sin. As I constantly keep looking back to that fountain open for sin and uncleanness, that righteous life, at every point where I break that law, I look to his perfect obedience and say, there's my righteousness.

[32:18] wash me, cleanse me of all unrighteousness. A gospel saturated life is a life of quick confession after sinning.

[32:30] So if we're delaying, it's a signal to us that we need to get back to thinking upon the cross and upon the gospel, what God has done for us. Then fourthly, this gospel saturated life is a life of mercy and grace towards others.

[32:46] mercy and grace towards others. If you ever stop being amazed at grace, well, then you will stop showing grace.

[32:57] It works that way. If I stop being amazed at God's grace to me, well, I'll stop showing grace to you. That will follow. So we are in the Old Testament and God commanded His prophet Jonah to go and preach in Nineveh.

[33:15] call them to repentance. Nineveh, the enemies of Israel. And he rebelled and ran away and God's rod of discipline followed him wherever he went and then he ends up in a terrible storm at sea and finally thrown overboard into the storm he sees and he's good as dead.

[33:32] He's going down for the last time and God's grace, that big fish came and swallowed him up and kept him alive for three days in that belly and then came and vomited him out on the earth.

[33:43] That was pure grace. He didn't deserve that. He deserved to die for his sin. He rebelled against his maker but he received pure grace.

[33:56] He didn't deserve a second chance but he got it. And then God said, go and preach to Nineveh. And that time he obeyed, didn't he?

[34:06] He went and he preached forty days and Nineveh will be destroyed. That was his message and then he set up camp outside of Nineveh to watch the fireworks that God would send in judgment.

[34:25] The wonder of wonders, Nineveh, godless pagans, repented and God withheld his hand of judgment and the forty first day came and went without any judgment at all.

[34:42] It was pure grace to guilty Ninevites. They deserved to be destroyed for their sins. And so Jonah rejoiced to see the Ninevites spared just as he had been spared.

[34:56] Or not so. Not so. Jonah wanted justice to fall. Jonah wanted them destroyed. And he's actually angry at God when instead of judgment they get mercy.

[35:13] Now that's the story. And Jonah teaches us that if you ever stop being amazed at God's grace to you, you'll stop showing grace to others. No longer amazed at how gracious God was to him, Jonah has nothing in his heart of grace to be shown to the Ninevites.

[35:36] And we are dangerous then. We're dangerous to each other when our hearts are not saturated by gospel grace. We'll treat others with no mercy. We'll cut them no slack.

[35:46] We'll demand on justice being paid now and in this way. And Jonah's struggle is our struggle. That's why it's there. These things were written to teach us.

[36:00] And it's a fight to stay amazed at the grace of God. And that's not saying anything injurious to the grace of God. There's enough in the grace of God to keep all the saints forever amazed through all eternity.

[36:14] But here on this earth, I find it's a fight, it's a battle to keep my soul amazed at the grace of God to me in Christ.

[36:25] My flesh is programmed to tell me that I deserve grace. that I deserve good from God.

[36:37] And so I must linger long at Calvary. I must go there often with my own sins and see Christ dying in my place, receiving what I had coming and know that's exactly what I deserve.

[36:48] John, that's what you would have had forever, God's wrath. But look what He did for you. now. It's the fire of Calvary's love that lights our love for others.

[37:05] And so that parable that Pastor Jason read for us from Matthew 18 about that unmerciful servant, what was wrong with that servant that he would not forgive his other servant? Well, he just forgot something, didn't he?

[37:17] He forgot something. He forgot just how merciful his master had been to him. He forgot the greater debt that his master had forgiven him, the far greater debt.

[37:29] And so the gospel prepares us to show mercy by reminding us how much we have been forgiven. It doesn't work automatically.

[37:41] This business of the heart offering grace to those who sin against us. By nature, we want vengeance. We want justice. It doesn't work automatically.

[37:51] No, we must. Meditate on the cross. We must be daily confessing our sins and soaking in the gospel so that when someone wrongs us, we're ready to forgive.

[38:03] We're in a posture to forgive. I've just come fresh from that fountain myself. And he's forgiven me the whole mountain of my sin. Now, whatever you've done, I can do nothing but forgive you.

[38:19] Jeff Thomas tells of an incident in a furniture store in a small town in Mississippi. A white Christian owner was talking with a black Christian customer.

[38:33] And as they were fellowshipping together, upstrutted this obnoxious racist. And he said some of the most disgusting words to this black Christian.

[38:45] And the owner said to him, you shouldn't speak to him in that way. You should apologize to him for what you've said. And he said, you'll never hear me apologizing to this blankety-blank black man.

[39:03] And off he went. And this black Christian was so hurt by what he said in public about him. He said, Oh, if I could just get revenge on him.

[39:21] This would be my revenge. I'd be driving home late one night and I'd see his car off on the side of the road. And he'd have a flat tire and he'd be without a jack.

[39:36] And I'd stop and get my jack out and jack up his car and change his tire. That'd be the revenge I get.

[39:49] Overcoming evil with good. When we're cursed, we bless. And I ask you, where do you find that kind of mercy towards others? When you have been cut to the bone, shamed, dissed in public, where do you find that kind of mercy to bless?

[40:11] To do good to your enemies? I'll tell you where. It's at the cross. It's in the gospel. It's in what God has done for us, hell-deserving sinners, in Christ.

[40:27] A heart saturated with the gospel is where mercy triumphs over judgment. It's a heart that's keenly aware that my sins against Jesus Christ are disgusting.

[40:41] Do you know that all those years that we lived without repenting and believing on Jesus, we were dissing Him in public.

[40:53] We were saying by living for ourselves, He's not worthy of my life. I don't need you.

[41:03] I don't want you. I don't trust you. Leave me alone. That's what our self-centered living said to Him. And rather than damning us in hell forever for what we deserved, He goes to the cross and He receives the hell that we deserved in our place.

[41:21] And He forgives us all of our sins. So whatever anyone does against me, I have found mercy.

[41:35] Come and enjoy the mercy of God and Christ. You know, in the Lord's Prayer we pray, Father, forgive me like I forgive others.

[41:49] Did you know that's what you're saying when you pray the Lord's Prayer? Forgive us our debts as we forgive those who trespass against us. So how do you forgive others when they sin against you?

[42:04] Freely? Fully? From the heart? Or do you hold grudges against them? And you just mark it down and hold it against them and get cold towards them.

[42:16] And that's how your Father in heaven will forgive you. Or rather will not forgive you. You find it all over the gospel as if we need to be told that and reminded of that.

[42:28] Blessed are the merciful for they shall receive mercy. three years ago a reformed Baptist pastor Arif Khan and his wife Kathy were shot to death in their home in Islamabad, Pakistan.

[42:46] And after numerous delays the Pakistani court has finally rendered a verdict of not guilty for the three murderers. The letter came to us last week in the mail saying that the family is suffering from fresh grief but knows that the Lord will do what is right and that justice will be meted out either in the day of judgment or in Christ's cross for those who repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.

[43:14] And then these final words. Please pray that God's mercy would apprehend all three murderers even as it did Saul of Tarsus. Praying for mercy.

[43:29] because mercy triumphs over judgment. And only those saturated in gospel mercy toward them for their own sins will be able to pray for mercy for those who murdered their parents.

[43:53] A gospel saturated life is a life of mercy and grace towards others. sinners. And fifthly and briefly a life of humble joyful worship. It's a life of humble joyful worship.

[44:07] John 4 Jesus tells the woman at the well that his father is seeking true worshipers who will worship him in spirit and in truth. And I ask you how does God seek and make those kind of worshipers? He seeks them and he makes them worshipers through the gospel.

[44:23] Through the gospel of what Christ has done for sinners. There's nothing that makes a man worship like the gospel.

[44:35] And the more we focus on what God has done for us in Christ, the more we will want to worship him. And so the book of Revelation takes us right into the worshiping throng in heaven.

[44:45] And it teaches us that even the worship in heaven is fueled by the gospel. Their everlasting song is worthy is the lamb that was slain and who by his blood has purchased men for God.

[45:02] Worthy is the lamb. And it is as the hearts of worshipers are saturated with the gospel that they're gripped with a sense of wonder, a sense of love and a sense of praise.

[45:17] It's the gospel that strikes this note of wonder and awe without which there is no worship. love. What makes you catch your breath in worship?

[45:31] What makes you say, can it be? And can it really be that I should gain an interest in my Savior's blood? Amazing love! How can it be that thou my God should die for me?

[45:46] I stand amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene and I wonder how He could love me, a sinner condemned unclean.

[45:57] Oh, how marvelous! Oh, how wonderful! And my song shall ever be! Oh, how marvelous! Oh, how wonderful! It's my Savior's love for me! It's the gospel that sets the heart to singing.

[46:10] There's so much in the gospel to make the saints sing. And so when in the Protestant Reformation the gospel was recovered so was congregational singing in worship.

[46:25] Isn't that interesting? Because when people are feeding on the gospel it makes their hearts want to sing and want to worship.

[46:37] And so with the gospel burning in our hearts we worship by the Spirit and we glory in Jesus Christ and we put no confidence none in the flesh. And lastly sixly a life of a heart saturated with the gospel is a life of enthusiastic gospel witness.

[47:01] Andrew was there that day when John the Baptist pointed to Jesus and said behold the Lamb of God and Andrew followed him home and was with him all day long just soaking up the gospel. And the first thing he did was to find his brother Peter and told him we have found the Messiah that is the Christ and he brought him to Jesus.

[47:21] The more we drink deeply from the wells of salvation the more we will say this is too good to be kept to myself. This forgiveness of sins this peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ this Savior others must hear of him others must know him and drink and live as well.

[47:44] We could go on and I'm sure that we could come up with another six or seven or ten things that will describe a life saturated with the gospel. But I trust this is enough to show us just how important it is that we be filled with the gospel of what God's done for us.

[48:03] It's meant to leave deep marks upon our hearts and lives. But again, it doesn't do it automatically. We must rehearse the gospel. We must think upon it until our hearts are burning within us and our lives are saturated and controlled by it.

[48:21] So I'm asking you, will you wake up every day this week with the gospel? Any way you'd like, but with the gospel.

[48:32] Maybe it'll be a verse on a card with a gospel verse on it and it meets you in the mirror each morning in your car or wherever you start your day. There it is. And you start memorizing and you start meditating and you take the gospel with you throughout the day and then it becomes your pillow at night.

[48:50] You wake up the next day. Maybe it's the words of a gospel hymn. And you wake up singing of what God has done for you in Christ.

[49:03] Through the day as you're driving, walking, you're working, you're singing this hymn. You're memorizing its words. You're feeding on the gospel. And you're thinking about all Jesus has done for you.

[49:15] In some way, in some way, saturate your heart and life. And may the Lord Himself draw near as you think on Him. And give you that holy heartburn of fellowship with Himself.

[49:31] It's a God saturated life that is most glorious and brings most glory to Him. let's sing the gospel together in number 403.

[49:42] Not what my hands have done can save this guilty soul. Not what my life has performed and what I have suffered, but what the Lord Jesus has done for me.

[49:56] Let's stand and bring Him our worship gladly this morning. 403. Oh, Father, hear those words and oh, that you would work by your spirit more heart into them.

[50:11] That we would learn what it is to live upon Christ and to ever be looking unto Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith. Bring someone to look for the first time.

[50:23] Bring us to look again and again this day into glory in Jesus Christ. It's not right that our lives are no more influenced by the gospel.

[50:35] So come and heal us. Come and correct us. Thank you for your patience with us. Do us good, Father, for Jesus sake. Send us the Holy Spirit in power.

[50:47]  We'll praise you in Jesus name. Amen.