Today were talking about ethical world views, and were examining each one every week. Heres this family who says, Were going to pretend like the school system doesnt exist, and there are no rules, no hygiene rules. Brush your teeth if you want to; dont brush your teeth. Its up to you. Put on deodorant if you want to; take a shower-its all up to you. Pick up your mess; dont pick up your mess. Go to bed when you want to; eat what you want to, when you want to. Man, it sounds good! The problem is the end result is it produces self-centered, undisciplined, uneducated people. Its not going to work if everybody in society adopted that mindset. What kind of problems would we be having right now, right? This is called antinomianism. Thats what were studying today. Its a big word, ant-in-om-ian-ism. It comes from two Greek words: anti, meaning against; and nomas, which means the law. This is against the law or to live as though the law did not exist. In your New Testament, this word will be translated lawless. Its the same thing, so when you see lawless, it means somebody who the law does not pertain to them or they believe the law does not pertain to them. There are several problems with this. One of the things we talked about is the chaos that this would provide, this would bring up. If everybody in society adopted this philosophy, we could not function as a society. The second thing is its a self-defeating argument. It really is because when you make a statement like they make and you say there are no moral absolutes, youve just made an absolute statement. There are no absolutes, and youre absolutely sure of that? There are no moral values, but you just expressed a moral value? So its a self-defeating argument. Thirdly, whether you acknowledge the laws or rules or not, you are still subject to them. You can say, Well, I dont believe gravity exists. What would happen if you climbed up on the church and jumped off the roof? What would happen? For me, I do a triple gainer with a half twist and land on my feet. I dont know about you, but all of us would actually come down to the ground and land-probably not too pleasantly because if you choose to ignore the law of gravity, it still exists. Youre still subject to it. You can say, Well, I dont believe in the speed limit. Im going to treat the interstate like its the autobahn, and some do. What happens? Eventually you are either going to crash and burn or you are going to get a ticket. If you do it long enough and often enough, youre going to get caught. Or you say, Well, I need to get some food, so Im going to go over here to Woodmans, and Im just going to take what I need, and Im not going to pay for it because my rule is that all food belongs to me and its free. If Im hungry, I should be able to eat. I shouldnt have to pay you money for it. So you get a handful of groceries, and you walk out the door. Whats going to happen to you? Theyre going to stop you, Ah, you didnt pay for that. Oh, I dont believe that paying for food is right. All food is mine. Will they just say, Oh, okay. Come back again. Enjoy the meal! Youre going to get arrested because whether you acknowledge that rule or not, it still exists. If you say, Well, the law of sowing or reaping doesnt apply to me. Gods universal laws dont apply to me. I can just go out and do whatever I want to do with no consequences. Guess what? Its not going to happen because Gods moral laws still exist whether you acknowledge them or not. A lot of people who would hold this point of view would be atheists or agnostics. That doesnt mean that people who are atheists or agnostics dont have morals. What Im saying is many in that camp are antinomians. They believe there are no universal laws because there is no law giver. Everybody makes up their own laws. Everybody determines their own rules. Its as old as the Garden. What did Satan say? Rules, shumles. Did God really say… Thats not what He meant! This isnt going to happen! He is basically saying, Do what you want to do, and its okay. Its interesting to note one of the most prominent in the field of black magic in the occult was a man by the name of Aleister Crowley. His famous saying is this: Do what thou wilt will be the whole of the law. Do what you want to do. Anton LaVey, high priest in a church of Satan, wrote the Satanic bible, and he says, We dont worship the devil. We worship pleasure. We celebrate greed and lust. We engage in what we want to do. This epicurean philosophy, this hedonism which says, If it feels good, do it. If it looks good, get it because you make the laws. You are the center of the universe. You are your own god. Israel bought in to this philosophy for a time, and it did not go well. We had strong leadership with Moses and Joshua, and eventually Israel would have strong leadership with David and Solomon, but in between there were several hundred years where Israel was ruled by what were called the Judges. That has nothing to do with a court or a gavel. A judge was a deliverer. Israel would fall in to sin, would repent, cry out to God, and God would send a deliverer to deliver them, and then everything would be fine. They would again forget God and fall back in to the cycle, and this cycle happened over and over again. In Judges, it is summed up by the last verse of the last chapter. It says in those days, Israel had no king. Everyone did as he saw fit. They just did what they wanted to do. Thats antinomianism in a nutshell-do what you want to do, when you want to do it. It doesnt matter because youre in control. You might think, Well, thats just for the Godless. Certainly those who name Christ would not adhere to this ethical world view. Certainly those who name Christ dont follow this premise. Guess what? Much of the New Testament is written to address this very thing. In fact, there was a rumor floating around, and Paul addresses it in Romans, that people would teach that Paul was an antinomian. Thats what they taught. They said, The Apostle Paul teaches that you can do anything you want to do, and its going to be fine-anything you want to do, and there are no consequences. Paul says, Listen, thats not what I teach at all. Thats not what I believe at all! Turn to Romans 6:1 (page 1116 of pew Bibles). In Romans 6:1, he is going to address that philosophy directly. He says, What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? In other words, the more I sin, the more God has to forgive, and it demonstrates how great His grace is. What kind of crazy philosophy is that? Paul says, By no means! We died to sin; how can we live in it any longer? Paul says, Gods universal laws no longer cease to exist. The call to live a righteous, holy life does not cease because of grace. We should not seek to abuse Gods grace and favor. He says, Thats not even a question a believer should consider or ask. Some of you grew up in homes where your mom or dad was really neat, and if there was a mess, you were expected to clean it up. Did any of you have a parent-maybe you were expected to clean it up, but if you didnt clean it up, they would clean it up for you. It would just kind of get done. Did anybody have a parent that did that? Its not your fault if you did. A few of us did-had moms or dads that cleaned up. Anybody have a spouse that does that? Cleans up after your messes. My brother (shouting out in the congregation)! Just kidding. No, sometimes she does. Sometimes she does. You leave your socks here. You leave the toothpaste in the sink or whatever it is, and your spouse goes, I just cant take this anymore! I cant walk past this mess anymore! Then they clean it up, so when you go to bed at night, magically the bed is made. When you wake up in the morning, the dishes are back in the cupboard. Its magic! So you go, Hey, I have this great idea. Since it seems like the bed is always made, the caps always put back on the toothpaste, the dishes are always magically back in the dishwasher in the cupboard, Im just gonna make as much of a mess as I want to. Im going to see how much I can mess up this house, knowing that this parent or this spouse is going to clean it. Is that an attitude you should have? I mean, really. Because you might like having maid service, that doesnt mean they like it. That doesnt mean they like to clean up after your messes. That doesnt mean they want to put away your toys, kids. It doesnt mean they want to put away your dirty socks, Dad. It doesnt mean all that stuff. Youre putting an unnecessary burden on them, but the attitude is this-the attitude is just growing to say: How much of a mess can I create? Paul says, Neither does a Christian say, How much can I sin? so God can just show His grace. Thats not a question a Christian asks, so Paul and other Epistles address this whole problem of antinomianism. Janet did a great job talking about Jude and how he was addressing lawlessness. Peter addressed lawlessness, and John addressed lawlessness. It was a problem then; its a problem now, and those who name the name of Christ often times-I put the word Christians in quotes here-practice antinomianism, live as if there are no universal laws. You might think, Well, Paul dealt with it. Peter dealt with it, but were beyond that now. I mean there arent people who name the name of Christ who are living as antinomianism here and now, right? I mean thats days gone by. Well, then you arent reading your papers right now. Do you know whats going on in Janesville this morning and this afternoon? There is a church-I think its called the Red Door Church, and they meet in a bar. You might have read about this congregation in the newspaper. There is a homosexual minister that is going to speak there this morning, and hes going to speak on the subject of universalism. Hes going to get up and say, Everybody goes to Heaven, everybody. It doesnt matter what you do-if you receive Christ or not… You might hate God. You might not even believe in God. You might curse the name of Christ, but youre going to go to Heaven. You could be Hitler-youre in. You could be a terrorist blowing up innocent people-youre in. You could be a serial rapist or killer-youre going to Heaven. Christs atonement paid for all sin, which I agree with, but they said therefore, That means everybody is going to end up saved. I went on their website. I thought, Well, this is interesting. Im a pastor. Im concerned about the spiritual needs of our community, so I went to the website of the pastor, and its called, God Revolution. Its very interesting, and there he is right there (on screen in service). If you just scroll down on that page, heres the T-shirt (congregation is viewing the projector as Pastor points the details out). Thats the T-shirt logo. What is that? Thats the 10 Commandments. It has a big slash through it, right? You dont need law! He says in the website, God doesnt care about sin! He doesnt care about your lifestyle! Were all going to the same place. Thats coming to our town today! That service is in process right now! So dont tell me antinomianism is dead and buried, this heresy is something of the past. Theyre saying all the churches like ours in this city, and there are many who are preaching the Gospel of repentance and living a righteous life in Christ, are teaching a false doctrine. That little bar is going to be packed today with this message. So this stuff Im talking about is very relevant. Its not just people who dont believe in God, and its not just people who name the name of Christ back in the day; but this philosophy is prevalent today. Now you might be thinking youre off the hook because you say, Well, I certainly believe in God, and I certainly believe his moral law applies today, so while I agree with you, Pastor, that it does apply today, it certainly doesnt apply to me because I am not an antinomianism. I believe in the law of God. Well, Ive got some very sobering Scripture to read to you. I dont question that you do, but Id like you to look back just a couple chapters to Chapter 3 of Romans. Paul is quoting from Psalms 53, and he says these words, As it is written: There is no one righteous, not even one; there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one. Pretty sobering, isnt it? Paul is saying any righteousness thats in you is from God. Paul is saying its not natural for you to want to seek God. If you are seeking God, it is because the Spirit of God is working in your life. That is not your natural tendency; that is not your natural inclination. In fact we are very self-centered. Were self-centered from the word go. You will never see a parent teaching little Junior how to say the word mine. You might teach them how to say, MaMa, Daddy, please, thank you, but youre never going to see a parent saying, Okay, Junior, say, Mine. No, no, no, Mine. No, Mine. Say, Mine. Youll get it one day. No. We dont teach them that word. They just learn it on their own. They learn it really early, and they can say it very proficiently at a very young age, MINE! We say it all the way through life. In 30, 40 years from now, some of us are going to be in a nursing home with a cane, whipping some nursing aide over the head saying, Thats mine! Its just us. The needle points to self, and thats what Paul says. We dont seek God unless the Spirit of God is working in us. We are self-centered people. Thats why antinomianism is such a popular philosophy. Sometimes it exists in the form of hedonism or pleasure-seeking, like the Epicureans in the time of the Apostle Paul. It takes different forms, but in the end, its about you. Its about you. Heres the thing, friends. Lets talk about what the word sin means. Some people, I dont want to use the word sin. The S word-dont use that word. Its bad. Its harsh. Well, what does it mean? Romans 3:22, This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God... That is sin. It comes from the word hamartia-which is an archery term, which means to miss the mark. You shoot at a target, and you miss it; so sin is just simply saying we miss the mark. We fall short. We dont hit the target all the time. Paul also talks about a defiant spirit, a rebellion spirit thats within us, that there are times we deliberately aim for a different target. God has said, Heres the target, and we go, Yeah, I understand its the target, but Im shooting over here. Heres what I think is the good life. Heres what I think right now. God says, You need to forgive one another for your faults. Yeah, I know, but Im gonna shoot over here. Im gonna shoot for this holding on to a grudge target. God says, Be truthful. Speak the truth. Thats the target. Some of you go, Yeah, I know, but really its in my best interest to fudge on the truth a little bit, you know, point at you guys too. I mean thats what we do. Sometimes because of our sin nature, we deliberately go against the Will of God. Friends, in that moment, if its just a moment or just a short time, in that moment, you are living as an antinomian. You are living as though Gods law didnt exist. You are living as though the consequences of your sin didnt apply to you. Youre living as though you were your own boss. You see-it does apply to us. Its very much something that applies to us. Sometimes we act as if Gods law is not there and our way is a better way. We go the way of the Garden; we go the way of the Judges, and we do what is right in our own eyes. In that moment, in that time, even though it goes against our ethical world view, we are living as if thats what we were instead of followers of Christ. Thats the sin nature thats within us, so what does God do? How does God reconcile us to Himself when we have this sin nature? We know that sin must be punished. We know theres a moral law in the universe, and God is just and righteous; and sin must be punished. It must be paid for; it must be atoned for. How do we do that? Thats where the cross comes in. Paul talks about that in the next verse, Verse 24, …and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonemen… That is that which removes rath-atonement. …through faith in His blood. He did this to demonstrate His justice, because in His forbearance He had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished… There was a moral law that said sin must be punished. …he did it to demonstrate His justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus. He atoned for the sin of all, but He justifies those who have faith in Jesus, so at the cross, Gods justice and Gods mercy are on display. Sin is punished, and then His love and mercy are shown in the pardon of sin. I illustrate that with a story. Now Ive shared this story before, and I dont like to keep using stories over and over again, so I have like a five to seven year rule kind of thing. If I havent done it in like five, seven years, then I pull it out of the achieves. Then its fair game because there will be enough people around who havent heard it; but if youve heard this before, hopefully youll get something new from it, but listen you have to pull these out from time to time because there are other folks who need to hear them. It just means youre an old timer. Youve been around for a while. I like to tell this story about a little boy named Dannie who loved to play ball. I remember when I was a kid, I used to play a game where Id throw the ball against the wall of my house and catch it. Occasionally, I would miss the wall, hit the window and break the window. This could probably be loosely based on my life cause that part of it I did. Thats whats going to happen. There was this professor, and he lived next to the boy. They had a good relationship; there was a friendship. He looked up to the professor. The professor was a mentor; he was a model to the little boy. They talked together; they occasionally played ball together. They enjoyed one anothers company. He talked about his job; they talked about life; and it was a good relationship-good mentor/mentee relationship. However, he did have some rules. One of those rules was dont throw the ball against the wall of the house because you might miss, and you might break a window. With that in mind, one day the boy couldnt find anybody to play ball with. He was by himself, so he decided-even though he knew the law-he was going to do it anyway because the professor was at work. He was going to be careful because it was about the time he came home, so he was watching down the sidewalk. He was throwing the ball against the house, and he got caught up in the game in his mind. He forgot to look down the street, and here comes the professor just as the little boy throws an ideal throw through the window. The glass broke, and sure enough the boy turned around to see if anybody saw his crime. Did anybody see his sin, that he had missed the mark, broke a law and he broke a window? He saw the professor. The look on the professors face was one of shock, anger and disappointment. The look on the little boys face was one of fear and one of shame. Rather than running to the professor, apologizing, and saying, What can I do? Can I mow your grass? How can I make up for this? the little boy ran away and he hid. He stayed at home, and he waited for rath to come. Every phone call, This is it. Every doorbell, This is it. Every time his parents used his middle name, Daniel Allen! This is it. Why did you not put your dishes back? Oh, sorry, Mom. Phew, that wasnt the big one, but its coming; so he learned to live in fear. Days went by, and weeks went by, and the judgment never came. He would see the doctor, but their relationship had been broken. Now when he seen the doctor, he ran the other way. The doctor at times would try to call his name and maybe try to catch him, but he was way too slow to catch a little boy. Life went on like this for periods of weeks. Every time the boy would see the doctor, he would run away. The boy saw the window was fixed, and he knew there was going to be a price to pay. One day the doctor snuck up on the boy when he wasnt looking and grabbed him by the arm. He tried to get away. He said, Let me go! Let me go! He said, No, no, no. I wont let you go! You need to listen to me, Daniel! Ive paid for the window. You are more important to me than the window. I wasnt happy that you broke my window. I dont want you to break my window again. I want you to respect my laws, but I want you to know I love you, and I value my relationship with you more than the window. I have paid for the window. I knew you couldnt afford to pay for the window, but I simply want you and me to be friends again. What do you say? Can we be friends? He relaxed his grip, and he extended his hand. How about this, a new start for us? Okay, said the boy. He reached up, and he took the mans hand, and they started the friendship anew. Friends, thats the Gospel. In the Garden, man rebelled against God, but rather than go to God-man talked to God-man runs, man hides, and man makes up excuses. Man covers up his sin, but God pursues man, and God finds man, doesnt He? He questions man, Where are you? What did you do? Thats the Gospel. The Gospel-religion is man reaching to God and saying, How can I get right with God? But the Gospel is God reaching down to man. Its God reaching down to man. God is the initiator. Christ came. Christ is the One who sought us out. His Holy Spirit is still the one who seeks us out to reconcile. The message of the Gospel is God saying, I know you broke my laws. Im not happy you broke my laws, but I have decided to pay for that. I decided to pay for that with My own blood because My love for you and My fellowship with you is more important to Me. Im offering you today forgiveness, pardon, and a new start. All you have to do is take My hand, believe what Ive done, believe My words, and receive Me. Ill belong to you, and youll belong to Me. Our relationship can be restored. Thats the Gospel-its not complicated, and its not hard. Its beautiful, and its loving. If we understand thats the Gospel, will that little boy then go say, You know what I think Im just gonna go and break some more windows, so I can get some more love and grace. I think Im just gonna see how many windows I can smash! Maybe Ill smash three windows this time! Maybe Ill paint the side of his house! Maybe Ill put graffiti on it. Then he can really demonstrate his love and grace! Wow! Paul says, Thats crazy talk. God has shown His love to you, His grace to you. Your natural response is to show love and grace back and to say, I want to obey your laws! I want to do whats right! Religion says, Do all these Ten Commandments all the time, and youll go to Heaven, and youll be right with God. The Gospel says you cannot obey all the Commandments, all the time. Youre going to break them, so what youll need is grace. Once youve received grace, you are called to live a life of righteousness and holiness, and He will give you His Spirit and empower you to do that; but the universal laws are not obsolete. Theres no slash through His Ten Commandments. We are still expected to live them out, but we live them out because we belong to Him-not in order to belong to Him. I hope today you can see that this topic is very much about where we live. What better topic to have on a Sunday than one where we receive communion than this one? Lets bow for prayer. Father, we thank You today for the message of the Gospel. Maybe some are hearing that and understanding it for the first time. They thought religion was just about hoops we jumped through and these unattainable goals that Youve called us to, but its about a person. Its about a relationship that they can know You. Youve made a way for us to know You. Father, as we come to this communion table today, we thank You for the gift of salvation through Jesus Christ, that God became a man; and He lived a perfect and sinless life and offered that life upon the cross as a gift. He offered in exchange His righteousness for our unrighteousness, His pureness and holiness for our sin and guilt. Lord, by faith, we receive that and affirm that covenant through receiving of Your table today, of Your body and Your blood. Help us now to examine ourselves and receive together of what You have provided for us. In Jesus name, Amen.