"And Jesus entered and passed through Jericho. And, behold, there was a man named Zaccheus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was rich. And he sought to see Jesus who he was; and could not for the press, because he was little of stature. And he ran before, and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him; for he was to pass that way.

"And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up, and saw him, and said unto him, Zaccheus, make haste, and come down; for today I must abide at thy house.

"And he made haste, and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it, they all murmured, saying, That he was gone to be guest with a man that is a sinner.

"And Zaccheus stood, and said unto the Lord; Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold.

"And Jesus said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, forasmuch, as he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost."—Luke 19:1-10.

I am going to speak to you on the subject, "A Devilish, Depraved and Determined Man."

Someone said to me one time, "Why do you speak on this subject dealing with man’s depravity?" Well, it is a known fact that unless men come face to face with their own natures and are made to see that they are sinners in God’s sight, that they are wholly incapable and incompetent to save themselves, then they will look away from Him who is the Saviour. As long as a man entertains the vaguest idea or hope that there is something good in him, then, just that long, he won’t be SAVED, because he will not trust his all to the only One who is able to save—Jesus.

People talk about repentance, but the average man knows nothing about repentance; for repentance, like faith, is a gift from God, and it is given to men through the hearing of the Gospel by the Spirit of God. But the direction of repentance— if there be such a thing as direction—is from dead works. In Hebrews 6:1, the Apostle Paul points out that in order for a man to be saved, he must repent from dead works.

Now the only kind of a man who has DEAD works is a DEAD MAN. A living man cannot produce dead works. He may not produce any kind of works at all, but he cannot produce DEAD works. That is a Biblical fact that cannot be successfully denied. A spiritually dead man cannot please God; he cannot do anything to help himself, for he produces dead works. As long as a man entertains in his heart the slightest hope that he can pull himself up by his own boot straps and make himself acceptable in the Beloved, he will NEVER be saved. It is Christ who makes us acceptable in the Beloved, and not we ourselves: "To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved" (Eph 1:6).

You might call the message by another name if you desire. You may call it an "Old Fashioned Biblical Conversion," but I prefer to call it "A Devilish, Depraved and Determined Man." Zaccheus was a publican, and a publican was a man who sold out his country. He was a tax collector; he collected for the Romans, who had subjugated Palestine. He was a collaborator with the Romans against his country. He was a man who desired to "get somewhere." The poverty, sorrow and misery to which his people had been subjected was of no concern to Zaccheus; he was determined to get rich, and his was a profession that would make a man rich in a hurry.

Now he didn’t rob and steal from his people in order to BECOME a devilish, depraved man. Men do not have to DO ANYTHING to be devilish and depraved. The only thing you or I have to do in order to be both is to be BORN into the world. We are both by NATURE. He was acting like a devil because inwardly he WAS a devil; not THE devil, but he was acting like a devil because he was one of the devil’s children. Men do not commit the gross sins they do in order to BECOME sinners, but they do those things as the MANIFESTATION of their NATURES. They are sinners by nature; they do what they DO because of WHAT they ARE.

I say without fear of contradiction, although people don’t like to hear it, for it is an obnoxious doctrine to the carnal mind, but I tell you that every person outside of the Lord Jesus Christ is a DEVILISH and DEPRAVED man. Everyone outside of Jesus is LOST—not GOING to be lost, but he is ALREADY lost. This fact is presented in John 3:18, and also in 2 Corinthians 4:3: "If our gospel be hid, it is hid to them which ARE lost."

Jesus said in John 3:18, "He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned ALREADY, because he hath not BELIEVED in the name of the only begotten Son of God."

Jesus said that the unbeliever is ALREADY lost and condemned—not going to be, but is already lost. We, therefore, are drawn to the specific conclusion that people outside of Jesus ARE lost and are the children of the devil.

Perhaps one of the doctrines that has caused more confusion than any other doctrine advanced in the last fifty years is the doctrine of "Fatherhood of God" and the "Brotherhood of Man." The proponents of this hellish doctrine say that all people are the children of God.

Now, beloved, that isn’t so. There isn’t a word of truth in the first word of that statement. All men are the HANDIWORK of God, to be sure, and we are all the CREATION of God; but He is NOT the spiritual Father of those who are lost, He is only the Father of those who have experienced the birth of the Spirit which is from above—the New Birth. We are by birth and adoption transferred FROM the family of the devil INTO the family of God.

"You mean to say, Brother Cox, that because I am not a Christian I am a child of the devil?"

That is exactly what I mean. I say again that EVERYONE outside of the Lord Jesus Christ is LOST, and he is the child of the devil. If you are lost, you are a child of the devil.

You wonder why men go to Hell. They go there because they want to go there. Their spiritual father is there, along with all their spiritual brothers and sisters. I mean by that, those who are unsaved have no desire for heavenly, immortal glory, for their affection cannot be set upon .things above when they, themselves, are from beneath.

I say this in all kindness and not in order to offend—although I am not an apologetic preacher and I never make apologies for the Word of God, but I say this in order that you might realize your position in the sight of God. If you are without Christ you are lost ALREADY, and you are a child of the devil.

In John 8:34 and also in John 8:44, Jesus said to that great religious group, the religious Pharisees, "Ye are of YOUR father the DEVIL, and the lusts of your father ye will do."

Jesus said they were of their father, the devil. They were very religious, but religion will not get you to Heaven. It is like a baby with a ten-pound weight hung around its neck, cast into the river and told to swim out. It is that which CONDEMNS men’s souls. The ONLY religion—if you can call it that—which will save is the religion of the Lord Jesus Christ—though I don’t like to associate the word "religion" with Christ.

Romans 9:8 tells us that "They which are the children of the flesh, these are NOT the children of God; but the children of the promise are counted for the seed."

Now the Holy Spirit points out that these Pharisees were NOT the children of God. Then, if not the children of God, they must be the children of somebody, and that someone is the DEVIL. I say this without fear of contradiction, every lost person in this building, nay, in the world, is a child of the DEVIL.

In Matthew 13:38, when Jesus spake the parable of the tares and the wheat—and I might just pause here long enough to point out that the word "tares" comes from the word ZIZANIA (zizania), and it means that which looks just exactly like the wheat; in fact, unless you are well acquainted with wheat there can be no distinguishing between the two—but notice in the parable, the angels of God know the difference; for Jesus said in explanation that the TARES are the children of the evil one, and that all the WHEAT are the children of the kingdom. Thus, the lost are the children of the devil, and second, they are depraved.

I heard a man say one time that this was one of the two blackest doctrines this side of Hell, the doctrine of total and inherent depravity. I heard him say this and cold chills ran over my body. He was lost. A man who will say that doesn’t know the Word of God; moreover, he doesn’t know the AUTHOR of this Book. The doctrine that he despised is a doctrine that destroys his own theology, but nevertheless, the Bible teaches that doctrine of DEPRAVITY.

I want you to get this now: men are depraved by NATURE. We do not mean by the words "total depravity" that men are as BAD as they can get. We mean that the total MAN is depraved; every faculty of man is depraved. I have seen many lost people whose outward lives were as clean as that of Christians, but they have a depraved heart. We do not mean that man is just as MEAN as he can BECOME, the Bible doesn’t teach that. In fact, it teaches that evil men shall wax worse and worse for it says in 2 Timothy 3:13, "But evil men shall wax worse and worse, deceiving, and being deceived."

The Bible teaches, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that men are DEPRAVED in the sight of God, that is, in their natural state. Not only their hearts, but from the top of their HEADS to the SOLE of their FEET. Isaiah 1:5, 6: "Why should ye be stricken anymore? ye will revolt more and more: the whole HEAD is sick, and the whole heart is faint; From the sole of the FOOT even unto the HEAD there is no soundness in it; but wounds, and bruises and putrefying sores: they have not been closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment."

This covers the WHOLE man; for He said, "From the top of your HEADS to the sole of your FEET there is no SOUNDNESS in it." He said that it is rotten; it is rotten to the core; the WHOLE man has no soundness in him. There is nothing but putrefying sores: they have not been closed up, neither bound or mollified with ointment. The balm of Gilead has not been applied.

Jesus said in Matthew 23:25, "Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but WITHIN they are full of extortion and excess.

Jesus said that they make the outside of the cup clean, but on the inside they are filthy. He said, "You appear beautiful in the sight of MEN, but on the inside you are full of dead men’s bones."

A lost man is like that. He is depraved and needs something besides his own strength—indeed, he has no STRENGTH with which to save himself! David knew the Lord in the free pardon and forgiveness of sins, but he also knew something else: he knew that he was DEPRAVED, for he said in Psalm 51:5, "Behold, I was shapen in INIQUITY; and in sin did my mother conceive me." Now this was no reflection upon the character of his mother, but only the recognition of his own condition: he was depraved by NATURE.

Adam stood as the federal head of the human race and when he fell the whole human race fell with him, or rather fell IN him. Romans 3:23 says that "All have sinned and come short of the glory of God." And the tense of that verb "sinned" means sinned in the indefinite past. And in the first part of Romans 5:12 we locate the TIME. It was in ADAM. When Adam transgressed against God, He immediately imputed that sin to ALL Adam’s posterity, that is, the whole human race. We sinned in ADAM, and we are all born into the world with this imputed sin. We are born with a deceitful heart. There is nothing in the world as fickle as the human heart. In Jeremiah 17:9 the wailing and lamenting prophet of God had this to say: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?" The heart is deceitful and wicked, and who can know it? GOD knows it.

Not only is the HEART wicked, but the MIND is against God. "Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God" (Romans 8:7, 8).

Beloved, the carnal or lost man is at enmity with God. He is an enemy of God. Never talk to me about a lost man, a man who is depraved as I have pointed out, never talk to me about such a one assisting God in any WAY in saving himself.

Jeremiah 13:23, "Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? then may ye also do good, that are accustomed to do evil."

I tell you, beloved, it is just as easy for a Negro to change the color of his skin, and a leopard his spots as it is for a man to do good, who is accustomed to do evil. It just CAN’T be done. A man can no more SAVE himself or HELP save himself than a Negro can change his skin, or a leopard his spots.

Before us is a passage that teaches that Zaccheus was a depraved and devilish man. Not only that, he was a DETERMINED man. He wanted to see Jesus, who He was, with no desire for SALVATION, that being the farthermost thing from his mind. He closed his office and went down into the street; for he heard that Jesus was to pass that way. He was a DETERMINED man, and regardless of the cost, he was going to see WHO He was.

The crowd was so great he could not see, but he was a very ingenious fellow so he climbed a tree. . . "for Jesus was to pass that way" (Luke 19:4). He looked down the road. He was not looking for salvation for the thing that happened to him was just as big a surprise to him as it was to the bystanders. He wanted to see this miracle Man of the ages—"who He was . . ." (Luke 19:3).

When Jesus got to where Zaccheus was "He looked up." Brother, Jesus came to where Zaccheus was and looked up, and if you are ever to be saved, Jesus will come to where YOU are and call YOU. The Scriptures say that Jesus "looked up" and said, "Zaccheus, make haste, and come down; for today I must abide at thy house" (Luke 19:5).

Then we see that Zaccheus made haste and came down and "received Him joyfully." I tell you there is JOY in coming into an intimate relationship with the Master. There is JOY in coming to know Christ as personal Saviour. Zaccheus passed from death unto life, for he came down and "received Him JOYFULLY." And what did he say? He called Him "Lord." He was SAVED for "no man can call Jesus Lord, but by the Holy Spirit" (1 Cor. 12:3). And no man has the Holy Spirit except he be saved.

Then notice something else. There was a CHANGE in Zaccheus from what he was when he climbed the tree. What did he say? "Half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have taken anything from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold" (Luke 19:8). That was according to LAW—Deut. 22. But before he climbed the tree he was a devilish and depraved man, and he would have taken money from his own mother or anyone else; but now there is a change: he had come into the knowledge of Christ; Christ had saved him and he wants to make everything right. He is no longer a devilish and depraved man; he wants to make things right. I tell you, God’s people always want to make things right.

And Jesus said—bless His holy name—"This day is salvation come to this house." I tell you, beloved, Jesus SAVES; for He said, "I came to SEEK and to SAVE that which was lost."

Jesus came, He SOUGHT and SAVED Zaccheus, and not only that, He saved his whole FAMILY. He said, "This day is salvation come to thy house." I believe in household salvation; it is demonstrated through the New Testament. Cornelius and his whole household were saved. We see this throughout the New Testament.

When the Lord saves us we ought to desire to see our families saved. You know, I could never understand why a Christian can be unconcerned about the spiritual condition of his family. When I was saved I wanted to see everybody saved, especially those of my own family, and I witnessed to them of Christ and His saving grace and power.

Do you know Christ? Has He come to where you are? Have you come down and received Him joyfully even as did Zaccheus? Has He spoken to your heart? If so, may you receive Him right now as your personal Saviour. Amen.