So welcome back to session number two. Basic Bible truth training. It's good to see people show up a second time. It's kind of like folks visiting church and they come back a second time. It's just always wonderful to see them come back. That's how it is with you guys tonight. We're going to go into lesson two. I want to just give you a few little hints. At least for the first 15-20 years that you teach this, it's probably good to skim the lesson each time before you go to teach. Just to sit down in a quiet place and just refresh yourself with it. There's not any Oh, what's the word I'm looking for? There's nothing really negative about laying the book down on the table and teaching from the book. Everybody, just about, teaches from a book. Do we not teach from a book? I'm holding up the King James Bible, by the way, just so that folks listen. We always teach from a book, and so there's nothing embarrassing or there's no shortcoming in having your lesson plan laid out there with you as you teach with it on the table. There'll come a day that you won't just because you had too much trouble, you don't need to. But that's fine. That they may or may not come doesn't matter one way or the other. What matters is that we get the Gospel across in a clear and concise way so that people can understand it. The systematic approach to reaching people for Christ and seeing them grounded in the Word, which basic Bible truth is basically 50% soul winning and 50% getting you in church where you can grow. That's the two main objectives that are in this course. Lesson two that we're going to start here shortly, it begins with a review of lesson one. Who can tell me why it's so important that you review lesson one before you start lesson two? Linda? Because they've slept since last time we've been together. They've slept since the last time? several times actually Brian That's right, and you want to go back and make sure that was for real Sometimes sometimes people like to tell you what you they think you want to hear because they don't want to be confronted and And of course, the beautiful thing about basic Bible truths is that it is a non-confrontational system. There's really no confrontation to it, especially when you choose your candidates by teaching people who really want to go through the course, who really want to learn these things. They're not looking to set a trap for you. They're not looking to trip you up. You know, you may find someone like that once in a blue moon, but by and large, that's not going to be the case. I've taught, in 30 years, I've probably taught one or two like that. So you're really not going to be bothered too much by that. Questions about lesson one, now that you've had time to sleep on it and go over what you heard on Tuesday night? Anybody have a question regarding lesson one? Do you get it that the construction of the Bible demonstrates clearly with real evidence that this could not be the work of men? Does that make sense to you? If it doesn't, it's not going to make sense to them. You have to own this first before you're going to articulate it to someone else. Make sure that you understand what you're teaching. Make sure that you have a very clear, concise understanding of each principle of each illustration. And if you're not sure about one or you're a little foggy on one of them or something, what's the best thing to do? Yeah, call me. I'm not BG. I'm available. I can be reached on cell phone. You can call me and I will explain to you whatever you need to know about these lessons. And we'll get you clear on it, just to make sure. And that goes for all of the principles and all of the illustrations in all of the lessons. So we are your resource for that. I guess it's called human resources, right? So no questions on lesson one. What are you going to do to get ready for lesson number two? You're going to review Lesson 1, but that's going to happen after you start Lesson 2. But what are you going to do to get ready to go teach your class? Pray. What kind of prayer? Okay, that's one thing you should pray, but there's another thing that you need to be praying for before you go teach your class. What is it? Make sure you confess your sins. That's right. 1 John 1, 9. You need to get clean. You need to examine yourself. You need to make sure that you're right with the Lord so that God has... I don't want God to have to work at it to use me. Okay? I mean, I don't want Him to have to overlook and tolerate. I want to be clean when I sit down in front of these girls. The eternal destiny of these two girls may well ride right here on our job. Now I understand from a point of eternity that the Lord's already seen it and he knows who's going to trust him and everything about that. But we're not in eternity. We're here on this timeline and we don't get off of it. And from our perspective and from the job that we're told to do, our job is to get the message across to these students clearly in a way that they can see it, understand it, and come to see and know Jesus Christ. That's our job, and we want to do it the very best we can. Amen? So, all right. No other questions? All right, yeah, you had one. Go ahead. They'll be on sermonaudio.com. You can just go download it. If it's a really close friend, I don't have a problem communicating with them. But like somebody who's an acquaintance or something like that, how would you approach them about possibly presenting this to them? Okay. That's a very good question. That's all about how to set up the classrooms. I don't want to offend them. I don't want to be pushy. Do you understand what I'm saying? Yeah. I will give you what the Lord has given me to use, and I've been using this for probably at least 30 years. I have a question. I used to knock doors before the Lord gave us this property on the freeway, and people are coming through Freshlands every week into the door. I used to go out in the neighborhoods and knock doors. I knocked probably 15,000 doors here in this area before we moved to the freeway here, and I talked to lots and lots of people. I have a standard question that I ask when I don't even know who they are. And that question is, has the Lord been working in your life in such a way that you really need some answers right now? It's a yes or a no. Has the Lord been working in your life in such a way that you could really use some answers right now? Now just think about the content of that question. It's a very simple question. Think about before you trusted Christ. What was going on? Was the Lord doing things in your life that caused you to need some answers? That's how He works. Now, just to give you the results of those questions, I would knock on about 80 doors on average before someone said, you know, we really do need some answers right now. Only it would go like this. Hi, my name is Charles Deal with Lighthouse Baptist Church, and I just came by today to see if the Lord's been working in your life in such a way that you could use some answers right now. And he would say, or she would say, well, we're Catholic. We go to da-da-da-da-da. I said, great, have a nice day. Next door. Takes about 30 seconds, door to door. About a minute, minute and a half to each house, depending on how far apart. About 80 doors, about every 80 doors. Hi, I'm Charles Deals, Lighthouse Baptist Church. I just came by today to see if the Lord has been working in your life in such a way that you could use some real answers right now in your life. Well, you know, honey, come here. There's a preacher here from Lighthouse. You know, we were just talking about that last night. We were thinking about we need to go to church, but we don't have any idea where to go or how to start. I said, well, obviously I'm not here by an accident. The Lord has given us a wonderful set of five Bible lessons. One hour a week for five weeks. in which you're going to get to see without any confrontation or nobody telling you what you've got to do, you're going to get to see how the Bible really speaks, that it really is God's Word, and you're going to get to see not just how it fits into your life, but you're going to get to see how you fit in to God's plan. Does it sound interesting? Well, yeah, it kind of does. Why don't you two talk it over, and if you'd like to, give me your phone number, and I'll call you in a couple of days, and we'll set up a time. And they give me the number, and I call them back, and two-thirds of them will set up the class. And I got to see a lot of people saved doing that. You can make a living doing that, by the way. Just imagine the value of somebody that did that 40 hours a week. Just think about that for a minute. Just entice an offering from a business standpoint of those that get saved and get in church and serve the Lord. This is a career opportunity. So you might want to talk to the Lord about how that might work for your life. We'll see how good you get at this. Any other questions? It really is as simple as just reading the book word for word. Have you ever sat down with someone and done it? No. Well, that's your homework assignment. is sit down between now and tomorrow night and just take lesson two and just read it to mom, just go through it. If you don't have anybody, go get your teddy bear and set him up on a chair and read him the lesson, teach him the lesson, practice it. These illustrations are stories. They're made up. I did not get a ticket into Webster School Zone. I did get a ticket in another school zone that I really gotta go deal with, but that's a different subject. They don't go away. They do not go away. But these illustrations have come about over a lot of years, and they're a little bit goofy, they're humorous, and you need to have fun with them. You really need to enjoy doing this. Don't just sweat bullets trying to get this said. Just enjoy yourself. Be who you are. Let your personality, except maybe in the case of John there, let your personality shine through. But God's going to send the people that will relate to John's personality. Yeah, I know. I'm just picking on you. I did that this morning. I just kind of whipped through it like there was an invisible person there. The first time I went through it, I had to look at the book constantly. And by the second time, I was just glancing, and then I was off the book. And so you start to kind of find your keynotes and just... And again, it really doesn't matter. You're stumbling around, you're looking at the book. People, they're there because they want to know what you have to say. And they're going to listen. And they don't... Just put yourself in their place. Are you going to sit there and judge them on how professional they do this? No. You're listening to what they have to say. It's that simple. And it's wonderful because that means you can do this. You don't have to be a memorized-it-all, stand-up-and-preach-it-without-a-breath preacher to do it. You can do this. Keith? Terry told me last night she didn't realize I was reading it to him. It's true. I was surprised he was even here. I knew he was reading the book, but I thought he was just getting little notes and bits and pieces and following the Scriptures and stuff. I didn't have a clue. You never had a clue. I did not. Don't give them the book ahead of time. This is for you to teach them. And faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. And how shall they hear? About somebody tell them it's called a preacher, but not in the ordained pastoral sense necessarily and how should they preach except they'd be sent and We are sent folks. We are all right. You ready to you ready to get into the lesson number two Cariana oh Yes, I need to hand out the sheets how about some help Do you want a seat for Laramie? Here you go. Take that and move it to that side. Take these and get them over there on that side. Kind of pass them around. Make sure everybody gets one. No, it takes too much time to write down two of them. And we have a copy machine. So we can just go make a copy. Number three is going to have number one and number two on it and number three added to it. Number four's got number one two and three on it and number four added to it. Last one has everything. Because I really don't know what all people do with their note sheets during the week. I know that often times they will go back and look at the Scriptures and look some of them up. What did you do with yours? Did you go back and look at it at all? No. Anybody? Lisa looked back at hers. Maybe you looked at his. Yeah, so it's there. You'll have it. You know, one of the things it does, it adds a legitimacy to what you're doing because you're not hiding anything. Everything you talk about is right here on the paper for them to check out, look up, review, whatever the case. Kariana and Laramie have both been through Lesson 1 with me. Kariana, we started her classes and got interrupted a while back, so we're picking it up tonight with Lesson 2. And Laramie heard lesson one Tuesday night. So these girls are right on schedule. And they have not been through the classes previously. So this is the real thing here. We're not role playing or acting. This is the real thing. And these girls are very gracious to do this in front of y'all. And Laramie, made the comment Tuesday that she actually kind of forgot you were back there for a while. Is that true? That's pretty good, isn't it? OK, let's get started. Well, girls, I am thrilled that you're back for lesson number two tonight. And one of the things we want to do before we get into lesson number two and talk about it is that I want to remind you of kind of where we ended up in our last lesson. We learned that through the construction of the Bible, we learned that there's just no way man could have put this together. We learned that through the prophecies of the Bible, that hundreds of prophecies, sometimes hundreds of years in advance, accurate to the letter, who but God, who's not limited to time, could possibly be able to do that. No one ever has, and there's no other place that prophecies like this exist except in God's Word. We've learned that through the claims of the Bible, we actually get to see how God accomplished what He did. He spoke to men, holy men of God, they're called in the Scriptures, that He chose. And they were writing it down, sometimes on parchments and on sheepskins and various different things and got it recorded and We have it today preserved down through the ages The Word of God now you both made a statement at the end of lesson number one That you were convinced by the evidence that this really is God's Word. It really is true and you both said that you were willing to accept what you could see for yourself that the Bible really does say that as coming from God and not from men. Is that still good? You haven't changed your mind about that? Well, I knew you wouldn't. So we're going to get right into it. Lesson number two, we're actually going to start with a little bit of a review from lesson one. And I have three scriptures up here at the top of the page. Romans 14, 11 and 12 tells us that everyone should give account of himself to God. Romans 2, verse 2 tells us that the judgment of God is according to truth. And then Jesus, in John 17, 17, tells us what the truth really is. And it is very clear. Thy word, this is it, is truth. So we're not just talking about God's word here, we're talking about real truth, the real thing, aren't we? Okay, today we're gonna look at how God actually sees and relates to us. Now God sees us as being in one of Only two categories. And those categories are that we either have or we do not have a relationship with God. Everyone you know fits into those categories. We see many categories when we look at ourselves. We see religious groups and social groups and economic groups and racial groups. But God only sees two. People that either have a relationship with God, people that do not have a relationship with God. Now the word relationship, it's from a root word, relative. You all have relatives. Relatives are part of a family. And that's what we're talking about when we're talking about relationship. We're going to look today at many scriptures in which God states this principle again and again so that you can see for yourself what a basic fact of scripture this really is. So let's get started. First of all, we're going to start out with Luke 19 and verse number 10. And I'm going to go fast, and I'm going to look each one of these up for you. And you don't have to be worried about whether you can be fast or slow as you're looking at Scripture. It makes it kind of easy. But I'm going to set that over just a little bit, because I'm going to knock it over showing you this Bible here. Luke 19.10, Jesus is talking to a little short guy named Zacchaeus who had climbed into a tree to get a glimpse of Jesus as he's passing by. And in speaking to him, Jesus said, here in verse 10, that the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. Now, this term lost is a Bible term. You've probably heard it used in church. It's used to refer to people who do not have a relationship with Jesus. Now, in contrast to that, we're going to go next to the book of Ephesians, chapter 2, and in verse number 8, And over here in Ephesians 2, verse number 8, the Bible says to these people who used to be lost, he says to them, for by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of words, lest any man should boast. So God says there are people who are lost people, there are other people who he calls saved people. Does that make sense? Okay, now saved is another Bible term commonly used in church to refer to those who do have a relationship. Now next we're going to go to what is probably the most well-known chapter in the whole Bible, John chapter 3. We're going to look closely at verse number 18 when we get there. Now mostly verse 16 is the one everybody looks at first, and there's nothing wrong with doing that, but we're going to go to verse 18 for a reason. Now this is the chapter that tells us about the Pharisee lawyer named Nicodemus who slipped away at night to come to see Jesus to secretly talk to him. Now this is the chapter where Jesus tells him that except a man be born again, he cannot see or enter the kingdom of God. This is also where we find the most famous verse, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that, I bet you can quote it. Could not perish but have everlasting life. Absolutely. Now Nicodemus being a lawyer, Jesus is speaking to him in legal terminology. And that's what you're reading when you read verse number 18. Jesus says to him, He that believeth on him is not condemned, but he that believes not is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. Now that word condemned is a legal term. Now, you hear it a lot today. Do you know what it means when you hear that term condemned? What's your thought of what that means? Means what, Governor? Sentenced. Actually, that's exactly what it means. You've been studying somewhere. If I break the law, what legal term applies to me for breaking the law? Didn't spell if I did, yeah. Well, I'd be guilty of breaking the law, right? So it's just a simple thing. No trick question here. I go before the judge, and the judge finds me guilty. And then he passed a sentence on me, and so then I am now what? Condemned. Condemned. That's the word. Now most people have the idea that we all live our lives, and when we get to the end of it, we go before God to be judged, and then we find out if we made it or not. You ever thought about it that way? Never happened? Most people have. That's usually the way people view this thing. But this verse says that that's not how it is. This verse says that God has already witnessed our sin. He has already found us guilty, and he's already passed judgment. Romans 623 says that for the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God, as we just read, is eternal life through Jesus Christ. This is why the scripture says that we are condemned already as it does. We'd say we're not waiting to get to the end and find out. God says that we are already condemned because we've sinned. Now let's have some fun. We're going to, I'm going to tell you about the famous school zone over here in Webster, Texas. Webster, Texas has the most famous school zone probably in the whole country. Right there on NASA Road 1, it is probably the most well-guarded school zone in the whole universe. You know, it just is. There was often a policeman at the beginning. There's another one in the middle with, there's a kind of a guard shack there where he watches and checks everybody. And two on the end, one to get you and another one to chase you if the first one doesn't get you. So no one gets through that speed zone going over the speed limit without getting caught. So that's a kind of a famous thing. Probably everybody that in our class here tonight has been through that school zone very carefully many times. Let's say that I'm driving my truck through that 20 mile an hour school zone at 30 miles per hour. What am I legally? What's the word that applies to me? Speeding, guilty of breaking the law, violating ordinance numbers, whatever it is. We got a couple of cops in the room, they can probably come up with something. Okay, the officer, I'll call him an officer now, After all, he writes the tickets, right? So we need some respect here. The officer stops me and he writes the ticket. And he takes me to the judge. The judge hears the officer's report and then says to me, $300 or 30 days in jail. It got quiet in here. What am I now? Sentenced or condemned. That's the Bible word. That's what it means. Now I'm in trouble. I don't have $300. But it just so happens that my good friend John, who used to be a cop, is down at the courthouse. He was probably paying a fine of his own, but we're going to say he was down there like taking out a building permit or something, okay? taking care of some business at City Hall, and he sees me in the courtroom as he is walking by. Are you getting a picture of all this? Got a little movie playing in your mind here? Okay, good. My good friend John sees that I obviously need help. So he comes in, and out of the goodness of his heart, he lays three $100 bills just like that down on the clerk's desk, the judge's desk there on my behalf. He's a pretty nice guy, right? You're thinking, I don't know John. Now, he's a pretty nice guy. OK, now, will the judge keep me or will he let me go? What will he do? What do you think? He's going to let me go. Do you think he's going to let me go? OK. So why will he let me go? Will he let me go because I'm not guilty now? I'm still guilty, though, right? You think I'm going to jail? Well, the fine is $300. It's not a bribe. It's an actual levy fine from the judge. This is the penalty. It is a fine of $300. Now if the judge said 30 days in jail and I tried to pay him $300 to let me off, that would get me probably 90 days in jail. So no, this is legitimate. It's a real fine, okay? All right. Okay, so I'm still guilty, but I get to go free. We just learned something extremely valuable. We've just learned a major truth that our being guilty has no bearing whatsoever on whether we pay or do not pay for our sin or our crime. What matters is that the penalty gets paid. That's the only thing that matters when it comes to whether I'm going to pay that debt or not. This is, of course, why Jesus, who had no sin and who owed no penalty, died on the cross. It was for us. that we might get to go free. That's what all of that's about, and we're going to learn a lot more about that as we go. Now let's learn some more, okay? Let's say that I, like all of us to some degree, have my pride. You have a little pride thing going on somewhere, a little bit sometimes? Yeah, we've all got that disease, by the way. There's nobody exempt from this. Instead of being thankful and gladly accepting the $300 gift from my friend, I, because of my pride, I just don't want to accept it. I'm thinking, man, and I tell John, look, John, I'm sorry, but I just can't accept your money. I just put your money back in your pocket and I'm just going to have to work this out for myself. So John puts his money back in his pocket and looks at me like I'm crazy, which I would be if I acted like that and goes on out the door. He's probably saying, Lord, I tried to help him, but he just wouldn't let me. So while I'm gone, I've come up with this incredible, ingenious plan. You're going to be impressed. While I'm gone, I make three special trips back through that famous school zone down on National Road 1 with a witness in my car, in my truck. So I'm back in court now. I have to go back. The judge postponed my, because I didn't have the $300 after asking for a postponement. So I'm going back to court, and I still don't have $300. And judge asked me, what's it going to be? Is it going to be $300, or are you going to go to jail? I said, Your Honor, if you will please hear me out, I have another solution for this that I believe you will find acceptable. Are you following my story? You're not going to go to sleep on me yet, are you? Okay, good. The judge says, well, what is it? I said, Your Honor, since I have been gone, I have driven back through that same school zone three times now. Guess how fast? Exactly 15 miles an hour. Now, I have here a witness and a sworn testimony that I've actually accomplished this. Now, I went over the speed limit by 10 miles an hour, right? I went 30 in a 20, right? Now, three times now, I have gone under the speed limit by five miles an hour. I have accumulated five miles an hour to the good three times against the 10 miles an hour that I went over the speed limit. This means, Your Honor, that my good now outweighs my bad by five miles an hour. And on that basis, I respectfully ask that you dismiss my case and let me go. You're impressed, right? What do you think? Will he let me go? No. You didn't say that like there was any question to it. You said that like, dummy, there's no way he's going to let you go. Is that kind of the way that I'm reading this? Okay, yeah. Here's what we just learned. Another major truth. The most widely accepted religious idea in the whole world And that is, without question, if my good outweighs my bad, you ever heard that before? The most widely accepted religious idea in the whole world is pure garbage. It's absolutely ridiculous. It would not even be acceptable to a human judge, least of all God himself. Can you see God buying that kind of an argument? No, not going to happen, is it? Well, the idea that if somehow you could manage to do more good than you do bad, God is somehow obligated to just forget all your sin and just accept you into heaven is a truly ridiculous idea. No amount of doing good ever changes the fact that we've sinned. And the only thing that ever matters is whether or not that penalty gets paid. That making sense? All right. Now, let's say that I had not been so foolish and had just thankfully accepted the $300 gift from my friend. No, I'd have walked out free and clear. What's the legal term for that? And there is one, by the way. No idea. Any idea? Well, I'm going to read it to you from the Bible. This legal term is By the way, all of these legal terms are still used in our court system today. Don't tell the lawyers, it'll break their little heart. They find out all this comes from the Bible. Here it is in one place. This is one of those terms that you don't notice it too much until it's brought to your attention and then you start seeing it everywhere. Here it is in Romans chapter five verse one. Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. The word that fits legally if my penalty was paid and I get to walk free is justified. The $300 justified me and now I'm out the door a free man. Pretty good deal, huh? Especially since it was John's $300. Well, now, Jesus paid for our sin in order to justify us so that we didn't end up in a place called hell. What did Jesus pay for our sin with? What? His death. Now get more specific, you're right. Get more specific. His blood. Alright, look. Read verse 9. Look. Much more than being now justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him. Pretty awesome, isn't it? Jesus shed His blood, not for us, not for Himself. He had no sin. He had no fine to pay. He had no guilt for anything. But He did it so that He could step before the judge and pay for you and for me. And we're going to learn how that works here in a little bit. Now, the Apostle Paul is preaching here to a group of Jews who They've got this idea that somehow they're going to, by keeping the law, work their way into some kind of favor with God and maybe do more good than they did bad and think God's going to be okay with that somehow. This is Acts chapter 13, verse 38 and 39. And we're going to see that these people are in a condition of unforgiveness. The Bible says that they are unforgiven. Here in Acts 13, 38 and 39, Paul is talking to them about this thing we've been talking about right here. He says here, Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. And by him all that believe are, what's that word? Justified. There's our word again. From all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses. Just like Just like going under the speed limit does not justify us from having broken it, obeying God's commandments doesn't justify us having broken them already. It's just the same kind of system. The Apostle Paul is trying to teach these groups, these Jews, that they're not going to be able to work their way back into favor with God. They need justification by having their debt paid. So we see that there are people, Paul says, that are lost, they're condemned, They're unforgiving. Now, over in Ephesians chapter 1, verse number 7, we find that these people who have received the payment of Jesus Christ for their sin, His death, here's what it says about them. It says, in whom, speaking of Jesus Christ, right here in verse number 5, in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace. Forgiveness is truly a wonderful thing, isn't it? So we find that there are those who are unforgiven, and we find that there are those who are forgiven. Now, we're going to read next a very blunt passage of scripture. This passage is 1 Corinthians chapter 6, verses 9 through 11. 1 Corinthians 6, 9. You ready? Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived. Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminates, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God. The Bible says that no one who is unrighteous is going to go to heaven. He says, and such were some of you, but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified. There's that word again. Pops up all the time, doesn't it? In the name of the Lord Jesus and by the Spirit of our God. This scripture poses the most important question that you're ever going to find the answer to. How is it that someone who is unrighteous can become righteous? That's a pretty good question, isn't it? We've already learned that it's not through doing righteous things. Now, sometimes, class, you may want to use an illustration that if you took a survey to the mall and you asked people at the mall, how does someone who's unrighteous become righteous, they're probably going to tell you that you need to do righteous things to do that. But we've already seen that that does not work. Next, we're going to go to Romans chapter 3, verse 10. And this is just one of the many, many places that you're going to find in the Bible that tells us who, indeed, is unrighteous. Look at verse 10. Romans chapter 3, verse number 10. As it is written, there is none righteous No, not one. So where does that leave us? Nobody righteous. God gives us a picture of our righteousness here in this chapter in Romans, and it's not a pretty picture. We're going to read verses 10 through 20. Class, I use this, and I want to take a little break from the lesson, girls, for just a second. Class, I use this opportunity in Basic Bible Truths to establish an issue that comes up all the time when we try to minister in churches, and that is the racial question. And Clarionna and And Laramie are two different colors, so I'm going to take advantage of this opportunity. The Jews in the Bible here were prejudiced. Matter of fact, this whole book of Romans is written because of that thing, because they were prejudiced. The Jews were looking down on the Gentiles because they were the chosen ones and they were the people the word of God was given to. And then when the Lord Jesus sent the gospel to the Gentiles, the Gentiles started getting saved like by the gazillion. I mean, almost, it was just everybody that the gospel was sent to trusted Christ, it seemed like. Well, the Bible says that we're to teach the gospel to everybody, every creature. Doesn't matter who, doesn't matter what color, doesn't matter. And when they trust Jesus, we're to baptize them. And when we baptize them, what happens? They become a member of our church. So there is no racial bias in God's house, ever. Just want you to get that down. That does not exist in God's economy. Everybody is the same. You cut us, we all bleed red, and we're all the same. But the Jews were looking down on the Gentiles because for the first time in history, they had been in the same congregation now, and it never was the case before. And they're just acting like they're better than everybody else. And Paul is telling them, if you'll read this verse right here with me, you'll see the subject of what he's proving to these Jews. He says, what then, verse 9, are we better than they? And he's writing this to the Jews in the church of Rome. He says, no, in no wise. That means not in any way. For we have before proved both Jews and Gentiles that they're all under sin. And then he takes all these Old Testament scriptures, and proves to us that we're all sinners. You know what the worst thing in the world is? A sinner. Do you know of anything worse than a sinner? No? And we all are one. So there's nobody to look down on. That pretty much handles the prejudice issue, doesn't it? Here's what God says. There is none righteous, not one. There's none that understandeth. There's none that seeketh after God. They're all gone out of the way, they're together become unprofitable. There is none that do it good, not one. Their throat is an open sepulcher, that's a grave. With their tongues they have used deceit, the poison of asps, which is a snake, is under their lips. Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift to shed blood. Destruction and misery are in their ways. You ever been miserable? It's our ways that do this. The way of peace they have not known, there is no fear of God before their eyes. Paul says this is the way everybody is, so there's nobody gets to look down on anybody else. And you'll see that question being addressed all through the book of Romans. Now, God gives us a picture here of our righteousness. It's a pretty sad looking picture, isn't it? It is not a pretty picture. Verse 21 goes on to say, Look at this, verse 21, right here, down at the bottom. But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested. Now the law is the old Ten Commandments and more than ten, but that's the beginning of it. The Bible says God's righteousness is manifested to us. Do you know what that means? Manifested. It means it's shown to us. Real simple. Big word, simple meaning. It's witnessed by the law and the prophets. In other words, the Bible, the Old Testament, talked about it a lot. Even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ. Now, I want to talk about this righteousness thing here for just a minute. We just saw what our righteousness looks like. It is not pretty. But what's God's righteousness like? If you had to describe God's righteousness in one word, what would that word be? Has God ever done anything wrong? Anything bad? Has God ever sinned? So His righteousness is pretty amazing, isn't it? What's the best word for it? Good? How about perfect? That's the word, perfect righteousness. When you hear about God's righteousness in the Bible, you need to understand that that means perfect righteousness. Now look what it says. Even the righteousness of God, perfect righteousness, is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe. For there is no difference for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. God's righteousness has been made available unto whom? What did it just say? What's it say right there, Remy? Unto all. God's made His righteousness available to everybody, but does everybody have it? No. Which ones have it? It's all, that's right, them that believe. It's upon all them that believe. Now, verse 23 through verse 25 tells us about a very unusual word And we have a kind of a little lesson within the lesson here about this very special word. Look what it says. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified. That word's in the Bible a lot, isn't it? Freely, by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth to be a what? Can you pronounce that word? Propitiation is, yeah, almost, believe me, I took a long time to get it. That's a word that I bet you've never heard it used outside the Bible. You've heard that word before except in the Bible? I never have. I've never heard that word used outside of the scriptures. What does it mean? I am so glad you asked that question. It means an expiatory sacrifice. Now you're looking at me, what on earth is that? A synonym for the word propitiation, the best synonym that I can come up with is the word atonement. It is an atonement. For example, if my friend John had offered the judge just $200 to let me go, which, you know, it's worth a try I guess, right? Okay? The $200 would not have been an atonement. It took the full $300 to make atonement for what I did, speeding through that speed zone. Does that make sense? So when it says that Christ was set forth to be a propitiation for us, it means that He was put here to be our full and complete payment. What Christ did for you is not a down payment and you have to do the rest. It is the whole deal. Jesus paid. Have you ever heard the song, Jesus paid it all? Well, it means just what it says. So this is what this word propitiation is about. Now let's say that I've noticed that one of my boys, I'll pick on Nathan here. You know Nathan, he's been around here a few times. Let's say that I have noticed that my son Nathan has sinned. Actually, I have noticed that my son may have noticed it. We all notice those things. And I understand that his only hope is somehow his penalty gets paid. And the penalty of sin is what? Death. We've learned that already. So I, out of my love for my son, go to God and I offer myself to die in my son's place. You know what God would tell me if I did that? He would say, sorry, you have your own sin to deal with, you're bankrupt, you can't pay for somebody else's sin. And he'd be absolutely right, because I am a sinner too. Now, this is the part where I always instruct my students to not laugh. So do not laugh when I tell you this. Now let's say that I am perfect, just like Jesus. You're smiling. Now you're laughing, okay. All right. Never sin. I understand that obviously no one is perfect, but this is just for an illustration, nothing else, okay? Now being perfect, now I go to God and I offer myself in the place of my son. Again, no one is and no one could be, but this is just theory, okay? This is just for conversation. If God chose to do so, he would be justified in allowing me to take my son's place because I don't have any sin against me. Does that make sense to you? Well, that's pretty awesome for Nathan, isn't it? Yeah. But what about my other sons? I'm all used up here. They're just out of luck because Nathan's used me up and I'm gone. In 1 John 2, verse 2, the Bible tells us something that many people have wondered about, but most of them are afraid to ask a question about it. And they just kind of go on wondering. But here, in this verse, John tells us something amazing and wonderful about Jesus. Look what it says. Now here's that word again, that you now know what it means, though. He says, and he, Jesus Christ, is the propitiation Propitiation, I've mispronounced it, is the propitiation for our sins. Now look what it says. And not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole. That's amazing, isn't it? How is it, how is it that Jesus can with his single death pay for everybody's sins? That's a pretty amazing question. Haven't you ever wondered about that? How can this one man pay for everybody? It's kind of bad math, isn't it? Well, Jesus is not just a perfect, sinless man. Now there are people that are knocking on doors all over the city telling you that Jesus is an angel, that He's a good man, that He's a perfect man, that He's God's Son, but He's not God. He's just a perfect man. And class, I did not write this into the book, but this is where I like to use the scale. You know that scale that everybody wants to weigh their good and bad on? Well, there is one productive use for that scale. That scale is still a good scale. So here's what we're going to do with that scale. Over here on the one side of the scales, I'm going to put all the people in the whole world who've ever lived or who ever will live. Now that's a lot of value, isn't it? That's a lot of value. That's a lot of life. But on the other side of the scale, I'm going to put God. Which one's worth the most? God. Now you understand how that Jesus, with His single death, not just because He's perfect, but because of who he is. You know, the Bible says, except we know and understand that Jesus is God, we'll die in our sins. This is why it's so important that you understand this. God is worth more than the whole world combined or it would be. And so when Jesus, because of who he is, when he paid our debt, the scriptures can declare with absolute accuracy He's not just for our sins, but also for the sins of the whole world. Girls, that means that God did not leave you out. That means that when he paid the debt, he paid it for you. Just like you'd been the only one, he still paid it and it's paid in full. That's pretty wonderful to know, isn't it? Okay, now, verse number 26. We're going to go back to Romans, and we're still going to answer that question that we were addressing about how does that unrighteous person become righteous. God says that He put Jesus here, verse 25, to be a propitiation of complete atonement through faith in His blood. That's what He paid for our sins with, right? To declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past through the forbearance of God. To declare, I say, at this time, now see that term, at this time? That's talking about the time we put faith in His blood in the previous verse. Make sense? To declare, I say, at this time, His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Now, the Bible says that that at the time we place our faith in the blood of Jesus Christ as a payment for our sins, that God says that he declares us righteous as we place our trust in Jesus. When Jesus, in the Old Testament, back in the beginning of creation, and class, this is just an illustration, it's not your book, but you can add to your notes. When Jesus, and it was him, not the Father, the Bible says, said, let there be light. What happened? There was light. Let's say that Jesus came into the room right now. And He turned to Kariana here. And He said to Kariana, Kariana, I declare you righteous. What would she be? Righteous. Now you understand. The only way there is that an unrighteous man or woman or boy and girl can become righteous. God declares us righteous when we place our faith, our trust in the blood of Jesus that he shed for our sins. Now, this might explain why the Bible says that there's a rejoicing in heaven when a sinner comes to Christ. God's on his throne. He declares this person righteous that just put their trust in Jesus. And I would just, I could just imagine what heaven would be like when that declaration, does God's voice get heard all through heaven? I expect it does. I don't know for sure. But it just could explain why there's all that rejoicing going on up there every time a sinner comes to know the Lord. Next we're gonna see in Ephesians chapter two and verse number one, the condition of a little bit more detail about of those who have no relationship with God. We get over here to Ephesians 2 and verse number 1. We're going to see here the condition that he talks about. And he says, and you hath he quickened, now the word quickened means made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins. Now these are the people who over here in verse number 8, for by grace are you saved, they used to be dead in sins. Now they were not physically dead, they were walking around, so we understand that their spirit was dead in sin. In John 5, verse 24, we see what happens when we believe. John 5, verse 24. Here we go, right here. Jesus said, Verily, verily, which means truly, truly, I say unto you, he that hears my word and believeth. How many times have we seen that word believe so far? It's a bunch, huh? I didn't count them, but we've seen it a lot. And believeth on him that sent me hath what? Everlasting life. And shall not come into condemnation. Look here. Never goes back over here. but is passed from death, being dead in trespasses and sins, unto life. That's pretty wonderful. God says that that life that we're passed to is eternal life. And just in case we didn't get it, God points out that we do not ever go back into condemnation, never be sentenced. That sentence is removed, never to be upon us again. That means when people get saved, they stay safe. And it's Jesus who keeps us that way. Amen. Next is a is another very blunt verse of scripture. And I'm sure you've heard people say that, well, we're all God's children. You've heard that probably on TV or something. Well, there is a sense and class you may want to bring this out. To people there is a there is a sense in which we are God's all God's children by virtue of creation. Paul said because of creation we are the offspring of God. But spiritually that is not the case. This is what the Bible says in John chapter 8 and verse 44 when Jesus is talking to the Pharisees who did not believe and thus did not have a relationship with God. He said to them, you are of your father the devil and the lust of your father you will do. God says that there are two kinds of people. this too, there are people who are the children of God, and people who are the children of the devil. I want to take you to first john chapter three, and you'll get to see both of these terms right there in one verse of scripture. First john three, and verse number 10. He says in this, And we'll talk a little bit more later about what this is. In this, the children of God are manifest and the children of the devil. Two kinds of people. Children of God, children of the devil. Everybody at this table is either a child of God or a child of the devil. Everybody you know is either a child of God or a child of the devil. So, the Bible says here that there are just two places where men end up. One of them, Is eternity in the lake of fire for those that have no relationship? That's where we all start, isn't it? It's kind of obvious where everybody starts out, isn't it? It gets really obvious really fast. You don't even have to point it out. As a matter of fact, it's just easy to see. So we're going to go read about that over here in the latest book of the Bible, Revelation chapter 20. Sometimes while you're turning you might want to point out some interesting things for your student and that is that For one of them might be that revelation happens to be written in a little bit different way than some of the other books because John was on the isle of Patmos and he was exiled out there because he's preaching the gospel And Jesus comes to him there on that island And the Bible says that Jesus takes him up in the Spirit and I could not possibly explain what that means except that it is. And literally takes John ahead in time. I bet you didn't know that time travel was real, did you? It is. He takes John ahead in time and shows him what is going to happen and tells John to write what he sees. John, unlike the other writers of the Bible, are writing what he was told John is writing from that point on, all the paragraphs in Revelation start with, and I saw this, and I saw that, and I saw the great white throne, and I saw heaven come down, and I saw the elders, and all these things. So, that's kind of an interesting concept, isn't it? I can't get my head quite around it, but it's amazing. So, Revelation 20 starts out, and John says, I saw an angel, whoops, never mind, go down to verse number 11, and I saw a great white throne, And him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away, and there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God." Now, when most people read, I saw the dead stand before God, they're thinking that everybody who's died. But that's not what it means. It means everybody who's dead in trespasses and sins. Because if you back up about six verses, you find that those who were not dead in sins were already resurrected a thousand years earlier. And if they are here, they're spectators not being judged. Because, you see, I've been judged according to what Jesus did, and I will never have to be judged according to what I've done. And that is the most wonderful condition to be in there ever was. Right there. And so here's what we read. It says, Blessed and holy, verse 6, is he that hath part in the first resurrection, on such the second death hath no power. Now let's go on down here and read the rest of this. I saw the dead small and great stand before God, and the books were opened, and another book was opened, which is the book of life. Now again, class, I want to give you something extra that you may want to share with your student. It says here that there are books, plural, that are going to be opened, and then a singular book that's going to be opened. Do you know what those books are? the Bible actually tells us what those books are. Now people, preachers come up with all kinds of crazy ideas about what the books are. But Jesus told us what the books are. He said, He said, you're going to be judged according to truth. And then what did he say truth was, thy word. is true. It's these 66 books that everybody wanted to scoff at and lay on a shelf and not look at and disregard. These books are going to be open and they will be judged according to their words based on what's written in these 66 books. If I were judged according to my words based on what's written in these 66 books, how do you think I'd do? You're right. I would not do well at all. I would not. Well, Here's what happens to them. Verse 13. And the sea gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them, and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. Now remember verse 6, those that knew Christ, the second death has no power over them. And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire. So there are people who are headed to eternity in the lake of fire. There really are. There are others, however, who are headed to heaven. That's that good part we'd like to talk about more. You think that preachers ought to talk about more about going to heaven or about going to hell? What do you think? It's kind of a varied opinion on that. I think we probably better cover them both just to make sure, don't you? Alright, so back over here in John chapter 14. Now this is an interesting time, John 14. This is just a few hours before Jesus is going to be crucified. The disciples are being hunted down. They're scared to death. Jesus is going to give Himself over to be killed, literally, and they're really freaking out, okay? And here's what Jesus says to them. He says, let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in Me. In My Father's house are many mansions. If it were not so, I would have told you, I go to prepare a place for you. Where was He going? He was going to the cross. That's where he prepared our place, you see. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am there you may be also. Well, Jesus went to the cross and he died there the most horrible death we could ever imagine. And they put him in a borrowed tomb and roll the massive stone to the door. And the Roman soldiers sealed that stone with an iron pin. It's still in the rock, by the way, today. You can go there and see it for yourself. And three days and three nights later, Jesus came out of that tomb alive without opening the door or rolling back the stone. And the next morning, the angel of the Lord rolled back the stone to show the women that came that he was not there. He had risen from the dead. For the next 40 days, a month and 10 days, that's a pretty long time, isn't it? For the next 40 days, Jesus taught and walked with and spent time with His church in 500 at once over here and two over here and a different group over here. A month and 10 days He spent with His church teaching them how to take the Gospel all the way to the end of the world. And that's what's going on right now. We're still doing it. And after that 40 days was complete, in Acts chapter 1, The Lord Jesus went back to that mountain, and let's just read what happened. In Acts chapter 1, verse number 9, it says, And when He had spoken these things, and while they beheld, He was taken up, and a cloud received Him out of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel, which also said, You men of Galilee, why stand you gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come again in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven. It's like he labors the point that Jesus went to heaven and Jesus said, where I am, that's where you're going to be also. When I check out of this body, I'm going to where Jesus is and that is in heaven itself. And that's a pretty amazing place. Now, you can clearly see, girls, the two groups. Now, there's so many other Scriptures that we didn't go to and that we didn't write down, but I wanted to cover enough so that you could see that this is a continual theme through the Scriptures. God says there are those who are lost, they're condemned, they're unforgiven, they're unrighteous, they're dead in sins, they're children of the devil, and they're headed to an eternity in the lake of fire. Now, the sad thing is that there's not a single blessed thing we can do about it. Even if I even if I were to say, well, I'm just going to turn over a new leaf and I just did what no one's ever been able to do. I attained 100% perfect conduct. You ever imagine anybody being 100% perfect? Never gonna happen. But if I did, I'd love everybody, I'd get baptized, I'd join the church, I'd worship, I'd serve, give, do all that stuff that you've heard about. Even if I did it all, the Bible says in Ephesians 2 verse 8 and 9 that salvation is not of works lest any man should boast. In Titus 3 and 5 it says it's not by works of righteousness which we have done, but it's according to His mercy He saves us. And Isaiah tells us why. All of our righteousnesses are as filthy rags before God. So there's just not anything that we can do. Here we are, we're lost, we're headed to eternity in the lake of fire, and there's not one single thing we can do about it. So if, if anyone ever gets to this second column, it's not going to be because of what they did. It's going to be because of what Jesus does. And he is the only one that can do anything about it. Now, No matter what I do, it's not going to help me. Next week, we're going to see exactly what Jesus did in order to move you from column number one to column number two. Do you have any questions? That's the lesson for tonight. Did you enjoy tonight's lesson? You did? Good. What are you really going to like next week if you like this one? Tomorrow night. Tomorrow night. It is tomorrow night. Usually it's next week, but it's tomorrow night. So what will you, class, what will you be tempted to do when you finish lesson number two? Go to sleep. What would be your temptation when you finish teaching lesson number two? One to go on. One to go on. One to go on. Always. Always the temptation. I taught, there was one class I had, must have been 20 years ago or so, that would not let me go, would not let me leave. demanded that you cannot go until you tell me. And so I did. Even though it's not policy or recommended, I did. And it must have stuck because her name is Lisa Dill. She is the only one that I ever went on and taught the third lesson because she would not let me leave without it. Is this before or after y'all were dating? I don't want to get into that. It was a long time ago. Listen, to those of you who have been studying your Bible for years, this is It's basic, it's easy, it's fun, but to someone who's not been here before, this is a lot to handle. There's a lot to digest here, and you need to let them go sleep on it. Now, there's a question that always seems to come up. What if something happens to them? What if they get run over? What if they get in a car accident? I know you thought about it, right? Nobody thought about that? You did? What's the answer? God's in control. Who determines when the appointment of death takes place? Who set that appointment? That's right. God does. I have determined through my just looking at reality here that probably the safest time that exists in the life of any person that they're protected from death is while they're taking basic Bible truths. Between lesson one and lesson three. I would dare say that they're probably protected there more than any other time that anybody ever has been. I've taught it for 37 years now, and I've never had anybody die between lesson two and three. Okay, so it's, you know, if you girls get to die this week, you know, you'll be the first one. All right, questions? You gotta have a question or two with all that. It took you one hour. But the time we turn to all those scriptures and everything, I just have a feeling it would take us longer. It doesn't. It really won't. You're going to have your Bible marked. You're going to have a ribbon over here in Ephesians. You'll be able to flip back and forth. The first two or three, maybe. But so what? I mean, tell them it's going to be about an hour. So you don't lie, OK? If you can use the phone application, it's instant. I mean, you can let her use something in her phone, and it pulls right out. You want something big enough that they can see it, too. Now, Kariana followed along on her phone, which is kind of unusual, but she did. She was right on target. She was checking out every verse I turned to. Is that OK? Does that have the same effect? I'm sorry? Is that OK? Does it have the same effect? I recommend using a large print Bible. It's God's Word that has the effect. The power is not in the pages, it's in what's on the pages. It's the Word made flesh and dwelt among us. Do you realize that the Bible is a post Bethlehem appearance of Christ? He's the Word made flesh. This is who Jesus is. This is Him. Again, it's not the pages in the ink, it's what it says. And when people see you turning, everybody knows what this book is. Everybody understands it. There's a respect to the Bible. The phone thing, listen, I don't care how you teach it, just teach it, okay? But this probably is a better way to go, at least in the beginning until you get, you need a bigger screen with bigger print so that you can turn it and they can see the whole thing. Yeah, that would be fine You know you don't want You know you don't want any additional distractions I don't even care. I don't even encourage my students to look up the scriptures I'm going to look them up for them. We're going to read them together. I don't want them embarrassed because they can't remember which one's in the Old or New Testament. That's not part of this program. The terminology can confuse them too when you're saying chapter and verse and they don't know what you're saying. Yeah, just turn to it and let them read it. Because they just promised you last week that they were willing to accept whatever they could see for themselves in the Bible as coming from God and not from men. And they're gonna receive it that way. Again, when you get that commitment of 1 Thessalonians at the end of Lesson 1, and I will often reaffirm the commitment of Lesson 1 two, three more times as we go. I'll remind them in review. Now in Lesson 1, you said you were willing to accept what you could see in the Bible for yourself as coming from God. That's still good, right? Oh yeah, absolutely. That's the answer. Yeah, see? And you'll get to see that. Now, tomorrow night, we have an extra hour. We may not need it. It depends. Some said there are a lot of questions I really want to ask you about salvation. And that's coming tomorrow. If you girls are not saved, you're going to be saved before the day's over. Hallelujah. So you just get ready and do not be surprised either way. 98, 95 out of 100 that I asked, based on what you've seen for yourself in the Bible, and this is going to be coming tomorrow night, are you saved? How many of you said yes? And most were not. By the time we finished, Randy Ruckey is probably the textbook example. Randy's a member of our Lighthouse Bible class. He talks about this all the time. Randy had been coming to Lighthouse for a year and a half, about, before he finally decided, okay, I'm going to take the classes. Got to Lesson 3. By the time we finished the first two-thirds of Lesson 3, Randy saw that he was lost. He thought he was saved right up until the minute that he saw it. And he was convinced that he was saved. And he almost went into shock, realizing that he was not saved. And it was just, it was like, well, you just ask him sometime about it. He'll tell you. He was just in a, he didn't know what to say. He was speechless. But within two minutes, five minutes from that time at least, He put his trust in Jesus Christ. And he's never had a doubt since that day. We had another woman in the church that was here. They went to church for like 40 something years. And she just knew she was too. Yeah. Yeah. I've done. I've taken people through this in a Sunday school class from time to time. And we've seen it's the power of God's word. Understanding how God sees you. Everybody in this room either has or does not have a relationship with God. And not one person in here started out with one. Nobody in here started out with a relationship with God. We started out lost, condemned, unforgiven, dead in our sins, worthless folks, headed to the lake of fire and deserving to be there. Every one of us, no good people, none of us. But thanks to Jesus, he changed all that. He did it with his blood. Don't ever be shy about talking about his blood. It's the best thing that ever happened to you. Amen? Amen. All right, any other questions? We're fixing to get out of here on time. Early, actually. I forgot to stop and have cake. Yes, you're going to have to have it as we finish. All right, you are dismissed. Does that mean we get to start 25 minutes late tomorrow? No.