Episode Transcript
Proverbs chapter 10 verse 16 Is what will be expounding tonight Proverbs chapter 10 verse 16 The title of message tonight is eating our fruit Eating our fruit There's an old saying you make your words sweet because you may have to eat them one day and That that's very very true.
It's the same way with the fruit our actions and I think God that salvation is By the grace of God alone and not by our works And repeat that again salvation is By the grace of God alone and not by our works That being said Our works are a very important of important part of our Christian life Our works are very important part of our faith in God.
I believe everyone would agree with that If we love God, we need to keep his commandments.
Don't we?
So here's a kingdom truth for us tonight and This will preface our exposition of verse 16 tonight We are accepted by God based on Jesus work We are rewarded in chastised by God Based upon our work repeat that again Kingdom truth We are accepted by God based upon Jesus work We are rewarded in chastised by God based upon our work if you'll Hide that in your heart if you'll remember that Then when you're reading certain scriptures or you hear somebody say something about faith or works or our duty to God or something like that And allow that kingdom truth To help keep everything in his proper place so you have the faith where it goes and the works where they go and and So where God accepts us as his child Pernally into heaven and with eternal life based upon Jesus work God chastises us and rewards us based upon our work Which is based upon our faith in Jesus work that makes sense And tonight's verse Solomon begins by talking about look now in Proverbs 10 16 the labor of the righteous the labor of the righteous Simply put a righteous person is someone who does watch right in the sight of God Now brother Richard, I thought we're justified by faith and we have the righteousness of Christ.
That's true But remember we are accepted by God based upon Jesus work We are judged or rather rewarded and and chastised by God based upon our work Just because we put our faith and trust in Christ and we're forever justified by our faith in him Doesn't mean that we can go off and live however we want to and not accept not expect God To hold us accountable While we live here on this earth.
He will then and hold us accountable Pernally as well Our eternal rewards or the lack thereof Will be based on our temporary service here on earth.
Okay?
Again, this isn't talking about us being accepted into God's kingdom is talking about Our status if you will in that kingdom Jesus spoke about those that do the commandments in those that don't and he said they will be called great in the kingdom of heaven They'll be least in the kingdom of heaven So you get into the kingdom of heaven based upon Jesus work, but you're least or great based upon your work based upon your faith in Jesus work, I Hope that makes sense but a righteous person is Someone who does what is right in the sight of God.
We're talking about practical righteousness Not imputed righteousness.
Do you know the difference and I want to make sure and cover all this When When Israel offered that sacrifice on the day of atonement and One goat Goes off in the wilderness and all the sins of Israel goes off with it The other goat sacrificed and the innocent blood gets put upon the mercy seat God Transfers the sins of those people to the goat Transfers the innocence of the goat which represented Christ to the people That's imputed righteousness That's what Paul talks about when he says bless it is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin So I'm when God sees me he sees me in the righteousness of Christ.
That's my imputed righteousness What is given credit to me based upon what Jesus has done?
But the Bible also deals with a subject of practical righteousness Is King David in heaven absolutely is in heaven Was David righteous or unrighteous?
When he had Uriah killed and slept with his wife He was unrighteous Was he right was he righteous is in the eyes of God as far as being accepted by God?
Yes That was imputed righteousness was he righteous in the eyes of God practically no He did an unrighteous thing So I want you to understand the difference there and if you don't understand that difference Then you'll read scriptures in the Bible and you'll get confused and you'll get scared You don't you won't know how to treat certain verses in the Bible As people who've been made righteous through Jesus Christ We need to be laboring for him The labor of the righteous a righteous person should be a laboring person.
Would you agree with that man?
Jesus worked for us now.
We need to be working for Jesus.
We need to have faith That works by love Not working to be saved but out of thanksgiving Praise God that we are saved we need to be laboring for him who died for us and rose again second Corinthians chapter 5 verse 14 and 15 Second Corinthians chapter 5 verse 14 and 15 says for the love of Christ's constraineth us Because we thus judge That if one died for all Then we're all dead and that he died for all that they which live Should not henceforth live unto themselves But unto him which died for them and rose again So we need to be not living for ourselves in this very very brief life that we have We need to be living for him who died for us in rose again and listen church.
There's plenty of work for every righteous person in the kingdom of God a Righteous person should be a laboring person and if you want to work for Jesus who lived and died for you There's plenty of work for you to do in the kingdom of God Here's a kingdom of truth Jesus works wherever he goes When you read about him in the Gospels And you watch him go to One city or another city or wherever you never see the Bible say and Jesus went to the Sea of Galilee and there He laid out a blanket upon the beach and chilled.
You don't see that Even when he went off and to by himself you see him praying but Jesus Occupied and redeemed every bit of time that God gave him when he was here on earth Everywhere he went he went with purpose.
He bore fruit unto God He labored in the kingdom everywhere he went A lot of people Love to post on social media This is us here and they stand in front of someplace.
Look we were here.
I Love it.
My mom and dad Yeah, I hope I hope you're not watching I don't think so I don't think any whoever said this it was anywhere remotely close to us, but it was funny my mom and dad went to The Mount Rushmore a year or two back and they had their picture taken In front of Mount Rushmore and you sell those faces carved into the rocks And someone got on Facebook and said how beautiful where are y'all?
You know, okay.
Well But but we love doing that don't we?
Here I am look at me here and look at me there In the Bible, it wasn't about where Jesus went.
It's about what Jesus did where he was Everywhere Jesus went Everywhere he still goes today because Jesus is still working in his kingdom today.
He hasn't stopped Jesus works wherever he goes.
So if you go with him, he will put you to work You get Jesus works wherever he goes and if you go with him, he will put you to work the gospel of John chapter 2 first one through eight John 2 1 through 8 and The third day There was a marriage in Cana of Galilee and the mother of Jesus was there and Both Jesus was called and his disciples to the marriage and When they wanted wine the mother of Jesus saith unto him.
They have no wine Jesus saith unto her woman.
What about to do with a Man hour is not yet come his mother saith unto the serpents serpents my goodness the servants Whatsoever he saith unto you do it.
I tell you what that's one thing that Mary said she got right Whatever he says unto you do it.
You'll never go wrong doing what Jesus said and There were sick and there were set there six water pots of stone after the manner of the purifying of the Jews containing two or three first and forkins of peace Jesus saith and of them fill the water pots with water and they filled them up to the brim And he saith unto them draw out now and bear unto the governor of the feast and they bear it Why are we?
Reading this and we're talking about us the labor of the righteous Everywhere Jesus goes he works for the kingdom of God Jesus was helping these people at this wedding feast By providing them wine to drink.
He's not intoxicating them He's giving them juice of the vine, but he's providing them wine to drink Now I want you to understand Jesus didn't need water put in those water pots To turn water into wine.
Would you agree with that?
Who made the water in the first place Jesus did?
He's the one that made the heaven the earth the great Deep with the darkness.
He's one that divided the water from the dry land and let the dry land appear He's the one that took water and put it up above the firmament and left The other collections of the seas below the firmament and it was so and God saw that it was good All of that was Jesus Jesus didn't need Water in those water pots to turn that water into wine He could have performed a miracle and filled the water pots.
He flooded the whole earth once He sure could have filled some water pots Jesus didn't need water in those water pots to put wine in the pots He could just perform a miracle and just filled it up with wine That's not what Jesus did He had people fill the water pots and Then he had them draw from the water pots And then he had them bear What they drew out?
to the governor of the feast they filled They drew they bear and here's Jesus over here You picture these water pots.
All right Let's pretend there's water pots right here.
Here's Jesus.
Here's the water pots the governor of the feast Brother will let you be the governor feast tonight.
Okay, brother.
Neil is the governor of the feast And here's Jesus.
Look at he's got his cane.
He's got a scepter there Jesus is standing here Doing nothing with the physical eyes that you can see nothing physically that he's done he's standing here Mary says do whatever he tells you He says we'll fill the water pots up who's doing the feeling him or them they are He says now dip out of the water pots Who's dipping out them or Jesus?
They are Jesus still standing here Maybe he's sitting down.
I don't know He says now now take it to the governor and and give him to drink who's doing that they're doing it all Except for what they couldn't do They couldn't turn the water into wine But everything else Jesus let those people do and that's the labor of the righteous You know what do you know what the labor of the righteous is Do you know what they were doing when they took that wine and they shared it with the governor?
They were taking what they couldn't do They were taking what Jesus did that they couldn't do and they were sharing it with somebody else That's really all that we do But he employs people in his service They were laboring in the grace of Christ sharing the grace of Christ Here's a kingdom truth Jesus did not do his work for men without employing the work of men That's a deep truth.
You'll hang on to it.
Think about this with Jesus and these people and the wine Jesus stood there They filled They dipped they bore But Jesus was the one who turned the water into wine Jesus is the one who supplied the need they were the ones who shared the need that he supplied Jesus did not do his work for men Without employing the work of men and that's what Christ does Those men couldn't turn water into wine, but they could serve the wine he made Jesus does the work we can't do and lets us serve it to our fellow men Repeat it again Jesus does the work we can't do and he lets us serve it to our fellow men We couldn't do the work Jesus did on the cross That was him alone just like we'll turn that water into wine there wasn't a person there who could do that But What Jesus couldn't do he let everybody else do it Same thing applies to us today as the body of Christ We couldn't do the work Jesus on the cross, but we can sure share it with others Anytime we share the gospel anytime we put a track out for somebody anytime you put a sticky up somewhere You know what you're doing.
You're taking the wine And you're bearing it to those who need it last week our friend Chad Chad when He was here not too long ago giving his testimony he may be watching tonight, I don't know if you are hello brother Chad sent me a text message this week and he said he was out of town for the holidays He was up in Colorado.
I believe with in-laws up there And while he was there he went to a local gym to exercise and Chad said he got out of his vehicle expecting God To give him the opportunity to share the gospel with somebody while he was in there He went in with a purpose.
I Want to exercise but I want to make this an opportunity to share the gospel with somebody while I'm here So he grabbed one of our little black Gospel booklets that he had picked up from the back while he was here Thank You for whoever sets those out By the way, that's you that sets them out Sometimes who else sets those out anybody else you do miss Sherry You know when you set those out and supply them for people You're all the same as handing them to the people that Chad handed them to There's no difference Someone picked one up the other day back there They wanted to read it to make sure they understood and could always be reminded of what the gospel was they told me But he took one of those little black gospel books of booklets back there and he took it inside the gym with him And while he was in the gym He had another man there was another man there who was there with his son and Chad got in a conversation with him about God and He told Chad he said, you know, I need to I need to be talking to my son more about God He was a Catholic man.
He said I need to be talking to my son more about God Well, there you go.
Oh Chad whips that old book out on him He says here, you know And the man took it and looked at it and he said tonight I won't go home and me and my son will read this together Isn't that wonderful Isn't that wonderful, you know what Chad was doing in that gym He was taking What only Jesus could do?
And he was sharing it with others.
He was bearing the wine that Jesus made So others could drink remember Remember the Last Supper Jesus took a cup of wine He said Drink it.
This is the blood of my new covenant of the new covenant which is shed for you Drink it Man, that's wine the wine.
That's the blood of his new covenant.
That's a work only Jesus could do We couldn't make the wine of the new covenant But we can sure share it with others to drink We're the body of Christ and that means we get to share the love of Christ with our fellow man Whether it's sharing the gospel or listen not that sharing the gospel is not the only thing that we can do Maybe it's being the body of Christ simply holding someone's hand when they're afraid Just being with them And having a word of prayer with them just putting your arm around them Having an encouraging word for them The Hebrew word translated as labor in this verse is also translated as the result of our labor that kind of makes sense, doesn't it?
Leviticus 19 13 says thou shalt not defraud thy neighbor Neither rob him the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning In other words, if someone works for you and you owe them money We'll pay them when you owe them pay them now don't say well, I'll pay you tomorrow Don't he says don't leave their wages Inside the house give them their wages that Hebrew word translated wages here is the same word translated labor in our text in Proverbs tonight So it's not just the work, but it's the result of the work that those wages were his labor It was the result of his labor The idea being that we're not supposed to keep someone from the fruit of their labor We should pay them on time what we owe them So when you think of our labor tonight We think of the labor of a righteous person think also of the fruit or reward of that righteous person's labor Solomon said the labor of the righteous look back in your text tendeth to life and That means the wages of a righteous person's labor for God is life Kind of reminds me of a text in the New Testament the wages of sin is death the wages of righteousness here is life here's a kingdom truth for us tonight If we live as God commanded us To live then we shall live as God intended us to live repeat that again if we live as God commanded us to live Then we shall live as God Intended for us to live John said I'm sorry Jesus said in John chapter 10 10 He said the thief cometh not but for to steal and to kill and to destroy I am come that they might have life And that they might have it More abundantly so you have life Then you have abundant life you have living and then you have living Jesus came to give us life He also came to give us a more abundant life.
Do you know to have you know how to have eternal life?
Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ Do you want to know how to have an abundant life?
Follow the Lord Jesus Christ on whom you believe Jesus said that God so loved the world He gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting Life if you want to have eternal life everlasting life then believe in Jesus Christ as your Savior if you want to have abundant life Then labor in the Lord Jesus Christ based on your faith in him the fruit of the righteous tends to life It will give you abundant life a Righteous life is an abundant life For the rich or do we labor for eternal life, too?
In a sense we do but we only labor That we might find rest that's it the Bible tells us to labor and enter into that rest in other words if you're gonna work Then get busy at night working you know We labor in the sense that we search for God's truth that we might find rest.
I Don't know how many of y'all have experienced it before but I know for me I Had to labor to find rest I had to search and pray and read my Bible and study different religions and say God show me the truth because I Had no rest at all.
I Wanted to know how I could be accepted by my Creator and be saved and have everlasting life and in the gospel of John chapter 6 verse 27, Jesus said labor not For the meat or the food which perishes But for that meat which endureth unto everlasting life which the Son of man shall give unto you For him hath God the Father seal so we have laboring For the bread that gives us eternal life and then we have Jesus giving in the bread So the bread is a free gift but sometimes you have to labor to get that bread do you have to search and pray and Find as God is is seeking you and drawing you Then he will reward that labor some people work so hard To try to buy the next loaf of bread That if they eat it, they're only gonna be hungry the next day Jesus is saying if there's anything that you want to work hard for Work for the bread that when you eat it, you'll never hunger again Being in the sinful flesh we may work to know the way of life, but we don't have to work to have it.
Thank God That's something that Jesus gives to us which I will give unto you For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of yourselves?
It is the gift of God Not of works.
Thus any man should boast most people in this world are simply chasing fun and earthly treasure That's all they're doing But if you really want to live then know Jesus and follow him The reward of the righteous tends to life but look back in your text the fruit of the wicked to sin the fruit of the wicked to sin again The wages of sin is death The gift of God's eternal life But the fruit of the of the righteous tends to life There's a connection between righteousness and life and sin and death The fruit of the wicked is sin when you live unrighteous Lee The only payment you have for your labor is sin Which brings death the opposite of life?
Not just eternal death When King David I'll go back to King David again King David is saved forever King David's on his way to heaven King David was given a irrevocable covenant by God that his his throne would last forever But when David sinned with Bathsheba David suddenly he gets kicked off his throne He's suddenly running He's suddenly Experiencing of the lack of the abundant life that he used to enjoy We're talking about about a man who goes from slaying giants writing Psalms getting revelations from God To now how tailing it out of his own kingdom That was the fruit of wickedness And it robbed him of the life that God intended for him to live if you live as God commanded you to Then you will live as God intended you to If you don't live as God commanded you to you won't experience life as God intended you to there will be a deprivation Of the abundant life there will be no desolation of your eternal life Because the abundant life is based upon your work for Jesus Eternal life is based upon Jesus work for you But the fruit of the righteous is very important we have to understand our part in the kingdom of God Sins deals kills and destroys the good life God created us to have notice that Solomon called the wages of the wicked the fruit of the wicked The fruit of the wicked Now what do we do with fruit I know what I do with it I Know what I did with it today You put blueberries in that shake for me didn't you Tammy?
I thought so I taste them.
They were good What do we do with fruit?
We eat it we eat fruit Here's the kingdom truth Your life will bear fruit And you will eat the fruit you bear Your life will bear fruit and You will eat the fruit you bear mark down in your margin or in your notes Isaiah chapter 3 verses 8 through 10 Isaiah chapter 3 verses 8 through 10 Said God says for Jerusalem is ruined and Judah is fallen Because their tongue and their doings are against the Lord What was that That's that's the that's wickedness.
That's unrighteousness their tongue and their doings are against the Lord to provoke the eyes of his glory verse 9 The show of their countenance death witness against them and they declare their sin as Sodom They hide it not woe unto their soul for they have rewarded evil unto themselves They've rewarded evil unto themselves say ye to the righteous That it shall be well with him For they shall eat the fruit of their doings So God said that the wicked rewarded evil to themselves.
That was the fruit of their doings So, what do we have for the wicked we have woe We have ruin We have a fall That's for the wicked That's the the fruit the reward of their doings and they have to eat it And that God goes down here to the righteous And he says it shall be well with him for they shall eat the fruit of their doings whenever you see Is the Israelites being taken captive in the Old Testament You'll see that righteous remnant and God always providing for them just like with Daniel just like with Joseph when he was sold into slavery and guess who ended up eating the fruit of their doings Joseph ate their fruit of his doings He reigned his brothers ate their fruit of their doings and they trembled and had to stand before him and and they end up Having to bow down to him But thank God if we follow Christ in this life We'll have the comfort of God saying it'll be well with you.
You'll eat the fruit of your doings Young people sometimes foolishly say well, I'm gonna sew my wild oats You'll sew them and that fruit will bear But you will eat the fruit of your doings You better choose your fruit wisely The cause before long you're going to have to eat it and with that tonight we'll close A good practical lesson tonight from God's Word To recap what we went over The labor of the righteous how do we labor We labor for reward for discipline And Jesus does his work and then we serve it to others the reward of the wicked We learned that in the end we all eat the fruit of our doing I Thank God for eternal life There's another fruit we can eat.
It's the fruit of the tree of life and That fruit is born at the cross At the cross we can eat the fruit of Jesus doing And we can live forever The fruit of our doing determines if our life in Christ will be abundant in this world Or not father.
Thank you so much for all you've done.
Thank you for teaching us your word Thank you father for dealing with our labor We talked so much about grace But Lord there is obligation that we have to you Obligation to serve you out of love for what you've done for us and there is consequence For not serving you and not laboring there's the promise of reward And there's the promise of loss of reward in discipline if we disobey you Lord I thank you that Samson is in heaven But Lord he's there by the grace of Christ But Lord he sure did not live the abundant life When he was serving outside the will of Christ in Jesus precious name we pray Amen
