In the sermon 'Knowing Christ' by Mike Davenport, the speaker delves into the marks of spiritual life versus spiritual death, emphasizing the importance of personal transformation through knowing Jesus Christ. By referencing biblical passages like Matthew 15 and James 2:19, Davenport highlights the difference between merely believing in God and truly knowing Christ, which demands an active change in one's life. The sermon urges believers to examine their faith, posing reflective questions that challenge individuals to assess their personal relationship with Christ. Citing figures such as Apostle Paul and Charles Spurgeon, Davenport underscores the necessity of possessing a passionate, transformative faith that is evident through one's actions and life choices. He concludes by inviting listeners to seek satisfaction in Christ, emphasizing that true contentment and spiritual richness are found in a deep, personal relationship with Him.

Well, as we continue to consider the marks of spiritual life and spiritual death, the marks I have been tasked with being either changed or otherwise unchanged by what you know and confess to believe about Jesus Christ? What you know about Jesus Christ, has it changed you Or do you remain unchanged? In Matthew 15, 13-15, we read that when Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am? So they said, some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. He said to them, but who do you say that I am?

Who do you say that I am? You see, Christ personalized the question to His disciples, And I want you to receive that question personally as well. You sir, you young man, Who is Jesus Christ? Who is He? If you remember the narrative that follows, the Apostle Peter goes on to answer Jesus' question, and he does so most wonderfully.

And Jesus declares to him that that declaration is a revelation from His Father in heaven, not something that flesh and blood would have given him the ability to be able to answer. And I'm sure that if I sat down one-on-one with each of you and asked that question just sitting around the table after lunch or dinner, I'm sure that most all of you could give me very good answers to that question. All that Jesus is declared to be in the Bible, all that He declares Himself to be and all that the writers of Scripture declare Him to be. Yet one of The greatest fears that I have as a minister of the gospel is that you may have all the right answers and yet be unchanged by what you know and what you're able to communicate. You know, there's a fundamental difference in knowing about Christ and knowing Christ.

And James makes this abundantly clear in his epistle in 219. You believe that there is one God or literally that God is one, the fundamental doctrine of the Christian faith, you believe that? The devils also believe and tremble. You see Deuteronomy 6 lays out what it means to know God. It's followed up by knowing God and then loving God.

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. The Christian's desire is to love God and to love Him with an undivided heart and He strives to that end and everything that He puts His hand to. Truly knowing Christ it brings about real changes. It brings about real changes, changes of direction, changes of attitude, a change of purpose, a change of desires, a change of priorities. What's important to you?

The Song of Solomon 1 7 in a picture of the believer's relationship with Jesus Christ uses this revealing declaration to show what the believer thinks of Christ. O you whom I love. O you Christ whom I love. The Prince of Preachers, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, said of this address in Song of Solomon, quote, it is well to be able without any if or but to say of the Lord Jesus, oh you whom I love. Many can only say of Jesus that they hope they love Him, they trust that they love Him, but only a poor and shallow experience will be content to stay here.

No one ought to give any rest to his spirit till he feels quite sure about a matter of such vital importance. We ought not to be satisfied with a superficial hope that Jesus loves you and with a bare trust that we love Him. The old saints, he said, did not generally speak with buts and ifs and hopes and trusts, but they spoke positively and plainly. I know whom I have believed, saith Paul. I know that my Redeemer liveth, saith Job.

Get positive knowledge of your love of Jesus and be not satisfied till you can speak of your interest in Him as a reality which you have made sure by having received the witness of the Holy Spirit and His seal upon your soul by faith." So here's the question, do you know? Do you truly know Jesus Christ? It's a question you must not leave unanswered. Can I say you need to know it tonight? Do you know and do you love the Lord Jesus Christ?

Paul comes to the end of his second epistle to the church in Corinth, and there in chapter 13 verse 5 he says this to his readers, examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves that Jesus Christ is in you unless indeed you are disqualified? Young man, this is a word for you. Examine yourselves.

Test yourself. The examination and testing is not merely of what you know and what you're able to say. It's an examination of what you do, what you do. If you are truly gripped by what you know and what you testify, then your life will prove it. Your life will prove it.

We just considered what James had to say about the believing demons. They believe. They even tremble. That belief moves them to tremble as they consider God. Well, the Apostle James goes on to say, you see then that a man is justified by works and not by faith only, for as the body without the Spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead." It's dead.

So consider with me what Scripture says or what those who truly know Christ have said in Scripture. Can you in all honesty say this, that I've been crucified with Christ? I've been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me." Can you say that?

Can you say that you have died? Have you died to self? Have you died to self? Is Christ your life? Are you buried with Him?

Is it no longer you who are living, but Christ living in you? Can you truly say, for me, to live To live is Christ, and to die is game. You see, you must say something there. There are blanks there that you must fill in. For you, young man, what is it to live?

For you to live is what? You must fill in that blank. And what would it be also for you to die? For you to live is blank. For you to die would be blank.

Would it be gain? You can know that it would be gain. You can truly know that. Can you from your heart say, but what things were gained to me, these I have counted loss for Christ? Yes, indeed, I count all things lost for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish.

Why? That I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of his sufferings being conformed to his death, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead." Do you know anything of that passion, that passion of Paul? That I may gain Christ and be found in him, that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, even that I may know him and the fellowship of his sufferings. Do you have that kind of passion that Paul had? Is this your testimony?

I press on that I may lay hold of that for which Christ has laid hold of me. One thing I do, one, one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." That word, press, that Paul uses, it literally is a picture of one who runs in such a way to reach the goal, to run in that way. He says, one thing I do. Are you a distracted young man? May you have this one thing to gain Jesus Christ and to know Him.

Do you defend His name and honor? Do you love Him? Do you look for His smile? Do you desire His approval? Does that mean something for you?

Do you seek to commune with Him and have fellowship with Him? If you know Him, if you truly know Him, this will be true with you. However, if truth be told, some of you here are feeding on husks, aren't you? You're feeding on husks. You aren't eating Christ's own manna.

Like the prodigal son, you're not in the father's house. You are actually out in the world. You're no longer eating the food from your father's table. You're actually forced to take the scraps out of the mouths of the pigs of this world in order to satisfy your hunger. Have you been frequenting the well where Jesus found that Samaritan woman?

Are you coming to that well every day of your life dry, thirsty, having to come again and again and again and again. Well today Christ has come to meet you at that well and these are His words for you, Whoever drinks of this water will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give will never thirst, but the water that I shall give him will become in him a fountain of water springing up into eternal life. You won't need to go to the fountains of the world, the broken cisterns of this world, to try to find satisfaction. You will have that satisfaction welling up from within if you're drinking the water that Christ gives.

Listen to the pleas of Jesus Christ. Why do you spend money for what is not bread and your wages for what does not satisfy. Listen carefully to me and eat what is good and let your soul delight itself in abundance. Incline your ear and come to me here and your soul shall live and I will make an everlasting covenant with you the sure mercies of David. I close with these princely words of Spurgeon.

My master has riches beyond the count of arithmetic, the measurement of reason, the dream of imagination, or the eloquence of words, they are unsearchable. You may look and study and weigh, but Jesus is a greater Savior than you think Him to be when your thoughts are at the greatest. My Lord is more ready to pardon than you to sin, more able to forgive than you to transgress. My master is more willing to supply your wants than you are to confess them. Never tolerate, never tolerate low thoughts of my Lord Jesus.

When you put the crown on his head, you will only crown him with silver when he deserves gold. My master has riches of happiness to bestow upon you now. He can make you to lie down in green pastures and lead you beside still waters. There is no music like the music of His pipe when He is the shepherd and you are the sheep and you lie down at His feet. There is no love like His, neither earth nor heaven can match it.

To know Christ and to be found in Him. Oh, this is life. This is joy. This is marrow and fatness, wine on the leaves, well refined. My master does not treat his servants charlishly.

He gives to them as a king giveth to a king. He gives them two heavens, a heaven below, and serving them here, and a heaven above, and delighting in Him forever. His unsearchable riches will be best known in eternity. He will give you on the way to heaven all that you need. Your place of defense shall be the munitions of rocks.

Your bread shall be given you and your waters shall be sure. But it is there, there, where you shall hear the song of them that triumph, the shout of them that feast, and shall have a face-to-face view of the glorious and beloved one, the unsearchable riches of Christ. This is the tune for the minstrels of earth and the song for the harpers of heaven. Lord, teach us more and more of Jesus and we will tell out the good news to others." So that's my question. Men, young men, do you really know Jesus Christ?

Has that knowledge of Him changed you? Has it shaped you? If it hasn't, then you only know of Him. You don't truly know Him. But the good news is He can be known.

He's drawing near tonight, and He says, if you're thirsty, come to the waters and drink deeply. You'll be satisfied, my friend. You will be satisfied. Let's look to Him in prayer. Gracious God, we thank You for giving us Your Son, Jesus Christ.

Lord, You did not withhold Him from us, but delivered Him up for the sins of those that you intended to draw near to yourself. Father, help us. Lord, our hearts can be so deceitful and they are desperately wicked. We can't even know them, so God give us the help of your Spirit to reveal in us what Christ is to us. And Lord, help us not to be content with mere head knowledge, nor the ability to rightly be able to talk of Him, but Lord to know Him, to know Him and be found in Him, make us to be men of this one thing, that this one thing will be the thing that we do and do not leave undone.

Help us by the help of your Spirit. Amen.