You Can'T Spit in God's Face and Get by

There is a passage in Galatians which goes against the grain of our society. Turn, if you will, friends, to Paul's epistle to the Galatians in chapter 6. We will be in verses 7 through 8. And may we have ears to hear as God speaks to us from this important passage. Be not deceived.

God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption.

But he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. We live in a day, friends, where the very spirit of Antichrist is in the land. God-haters multiply all around us.

And perversion spills out across our country like an open sewer, contaminating all that comes in its path. We as a nation have legislated God right out of this country. And I am surprised that we still have on our currency in God we trust.

Because this nation no longer trusts in God. It doesn't even believe in God. But rather, it hates God and all things holy.

It's as if our entire society, from our government to our educational system, through our corporate sector and through our judicial system, they've all lined up like dominoes to take a stand against the law of God and God himself. It's as if the whole of society shakes her angry fist at God in mockery and sends all they want to on their way to hell and dares him to do anything about it. But listen to me, friends, and listen to me closely.

You can't spit in God's face and get by. And as I tell in my message tonight, you can't spit in God's face and get by. God is not mocked.

There is a coming day of reckoning where he will settle his accounts. There used to be a time in this country and in Great Britain where the Sabbath was observed as a holy day, a day of rest from labor. And there's a story about a certain farmer who mocked God and thought he got away with it.

This man was an infidel farmer, and he made it a point to do all his planting and harvesting on Sundays. And after he filled his barns with his rich harvest, he sat down and wrote a letter to the local paper. And in his letter to the editor, he bragged on how he defiantly made Sunday his day to work, and his crop this October was better and bigger than all his Christian neighbors.

And the editor of the paper printed the farmer's letter, but he added a footnote at the bottom with the following comment, I cannot argue with you about what you say about your recent harvest for this October, but God doesn't settle his accounts in October. And then the Christian editor put a verse from Galatians 6-7 at the end of his footnote. And it's true friends, God has a settling day coming, whereby he will judge the world in righteousness.

God is not mocked, even though this present world system, and predominantly pagan society, thinks it can spit in God's face and get by. It cannot. The nation that forgets God will be turned into hell.

Look at ancient Rome. They ruled the world with an iron fist. Where are they now? Look at ancient Greece with all its culture and philosophers gone into ruin and rubble.

Mighty England, who with her royal scepter ruled the seas. Look at America, once great in the eyes of the world, now a promoter of evil as she's gone down in the eyes of the world. God is not mocked.

You can't spit in God's face and get by. I want to go ahead and read us a passage, a scripture at this time, from the Gospel of Mark. And the soldiers led him away into the hall, praetorium, and they called together the whole band.

And they clothed him with purple and planted a crown of thorns and put it about his head and began to salute him. Hail, King of the Jews! And they smote him on the head with a reed and did spit upon him and, bowing their knees, worshipped him. We'll stop there, friends.

I want us to visualize this horrible scene before us. Here is the Lord of Glory in his humility and public shame. The cross was a scandal.

His persecutors ignorant dupes of the devil. They mocked him, ridiculed him. They beat him.

But note the most disgusting act they did to Jesus. They spit in his face. Have you ever been spit in the face? I have.

When I was a boy, a schoolmate of mine got mad at me and spit right in my face. I reeked. I was embarrassed.

It was humiliating. The ultimate insult is to have your face spit upon. Maybe some of you know how that feels.

Now visualize these Roman soldiers. Our text from Mark states that they called together a whole band, often a band of Roman soldiers numbered about a hundred men. Here are these brutes lined up in rows waiting to mock the Lamb of God.

They put a purple robe on him, a mock crown on his head, for they think he is a mock king. And they make fun of him. And then they spit in his face.

Each one of those barbarians spit in his holy face. Can you imagine the stench of that smell from their foul mouths? Jesus went to the cross with their spittle on his face. Now I want to make a statement.

And I want you to write this down in the margin of your Bible. And here is that statement now, friends. Sin is spitting in the face of God.

A nation that sins against God spits in his face. A religious denomination that sins against God spits in the face of God. I've never seen a time in my life where so many religious denominations have fallen into apostasy and evil as they welcome the world in perversion and spit in the face of God.

I've never seen so many nations of this world stand in defiance against God and his law and spit in the face of God through flagrant sin. And I've never seen a time in my life where so many churches preach a sin in religion. Holiness has been thrown right out the window in most churches in our land.

Many churches say, come to Jesus and take him as your savior and sin all you want to and still go to heaven. But God is not mocked, friends. You cannot spit in the face of God and get by.

Listen to me, dear friend. If you are truly saved, that means you were bought with a price and that price was his blood. If you are a believer and if you sin presumptuously, I have this to say to you.

You are spitting in the face of Jesus with your sins. Every time you sin, you spit in his face. Every time you gratify that lust, every time you willfully sin and rebellion to God, you spit in the face of God.

You can't spit in the face of God and get by. Sin is going our way when we know it isn't God's way. I remember reading a story about John Song, the famous Chinese evangelist, a Methodist missionary in China.

He had invited John Song to come and preach to his church in a certain province in inland China. And during one of his sermons, John Song made the following remark to his hearers. He said, Well, you know I sin every day.

Well, this Methodist missionary waited for John Song to finish preaching and then he came up to him and rebuked him. He said, Well, John Song never made that statement again. But in our church today, in this country, we have somehow convinced ourselves that we can sin all we want to and still go to heaven.

And it's all right with God because He's all right with sin. But God is not mocked. God is holy and He hates sin.

And there is a common day of judgment. God will and must punish sin. God is a God who must punish sin.

Now that concept goes against the grain of our modern pulpit today. But listen to me, dear friend. God is not gonna tolerate a sin loving people.

And if you're presently out of step with your God through sin, and if you're out of fellowship with God through sin, then fall on your face and beg God for the grace repentance to restore you back to a close walk with Him. I want you to know Jesus loves you with an everlasting love and His desire for you is to obey His commands. He said, if you love me, obey my commands.

God's word declares in Hebrews, holiness without, no one shall see the Lord. I repeat, if you have fallen into a ditch because of sin, and you are currently sinning all you want to, I want you to know that each time you sin, you are spitting into the face of God's dear Son. You are trampling His blood.

You are robbing God of His glory. God hates sin. He hates sin so much, friend.

He sent His only beloved Son into this world to die on a bloody cross for sin. Listen to me, friend. You can't spit in God's face and get by.

If you continue to harden your heart against God and remain in rebellion against Him by sinning against Him, you won't get by Him. He will deal with you. He will deal with you as a loving Father and chastise and correct you.

And if you remain in an unrepentant state and willful sin and harden your heart against Him, He could very well remove you. God kills people. Will He have to kill you? You can't spit in His face and get by.

And they smote Him on the head with a reed and did spit upon Him. In Matthew's gospel, it says they spit in His face. Look at verse 20.

And when they had mocked Him, they took off the purple from Him and put His own clothes on Him and led Him out to crucify Him. Listen to me, friends, and hear what I have to say. The religious crowd of Jesus' day gathered together against the Son of God and cried out, We will not have this man reign over us.

And there's a religious crowd today in many of our churches who cry out in unison, We will not have this man reign over us because they hate the doctrine of the Lordship of Jesus Christ. But if He's not your Lord, friend, He's not your Savior. And that's true even if you're the chairman of the deacons.

Being saved means this, friend. A self is dethroned and another is enthroned there. The Lord Jesus Christ, He must be a complete master.

All sin must go out the window for the light of your life to shine. Jesus is looking for clear channels where His rivers of living water can flow through without obstruction. Picture in your mind a flowing mountain stream.

At the top of the stream, all the water is pure. But as you travel lower down that mountain, that water becomes a little tainted. Perhaps some campers left some litter in the riverbed or debris obstructs the flow near the bottom.

The water below is more contaminated than at the top. The debris must be removed for that water to flow without obstruction. When we sin, we obstruct God's activity in our life.

We hinder Him. I believe a church can do this corporately. I believe an individual can hinder God in his life or her life through willful sin.

Jesus is looking for clear channels to flow through as a means of blessing to others. Do you want to be that clear channel, friend? Then turn from sin and turn to God and repentance toward Him. You can't spit in God's face and get by.

I really believe, friends, that Jesus is coming soon. I can almost hear the faint echoes of that midnight cry. Soon He will return for His bride.

Let me ask you a question. Will He come for a dirty sinning bride? No. The apostle John writes in his first epistle, chapter 2, verses 28 and 29, And now, little children, abide in Him, that when He shall appear, we may have confidence and not be ashamed before Him at His coming.

If you know that He is righteous, you know that everyone that doeth righteousness is born of Him. I believe that God is calling His bride to a time of purification. He's cleaning up His bride, friends.

He's turning people's lives around. The Holy Spirit's convicting people of sin in their life, bringing them to a place of forsaking it. God is preparing His bride.

God is going to send back His Son for that bride. The bridegroom is coming, friends. He's almost on the way.

Let's take this time now to get serious with God. And if you, friend, have been convicted of sin by God's Spirit during this time, then go to Him who bled for you, who bought you out from the marketplace of sin by redeeming you with His precious blood. We have this promise from Him.

If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Let us go now to God in prayer.