If you'd like to turn with me in your Bibles, we're going to be in the book of Lamentations. Lamentations chapter 3 this morning. This hour, I hope to speak on a subject that is the one hope of every believer, the reason God loved Jacob and hated Esau, the reason he elected a people, and that subject is the faithfulness of Christ. The faithfulness of Christ. That's what I've titled this message.

Let's read our text together. Lamentations 3, verse 21 through 26. This I recall to my mind. This I recall to my mind. Therefore, have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul. Therefore, well, I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope and wait and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

The difference between the God's gospel and man-made works religion, the false gospel, is the truth and the lie. The lie says that you have to do something in order for what God did to be made effectual, that it's up to your choice It's up to your will. None of these things are true because man's bound to his nature. His will is a sinful nature. That's what our will will choose. No, the truth is, is it is the Lord's faithfulness. That's the only reason if we're saved that we are saved. The only reason. It's the only reason that we can have hope is because of the Lord's faithfulness, his faithfulness to his father, and his faithfulness to his people.

Someone once told me recently, they understood all that. They said, I understand what you're saying, but there has to be some kind of evidence in your life that you've been saved. There has to be something you can see. And the Lord told the Pharisees, a wicked and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign, but there'll be no sign given except that of the prophet Jonah. What did he mean by that? Three days and three nights. It's the resurrection of Jesus Christ, that's the only sign we're gonna have. It's his faithfulness that we look to as our hope. Not ourself, not our choice, not our works. We don't look at our life, our lifestyle, we look to the Lord Jesus Christ, his life. We don't look to our works, we look to his finished work. Religion's got it all backwards. We don't look to what we do, we look to what he has done. And we hope in the words, it is finished. It is finished.

My hope is that by the end of this message, we're looking to nothing but the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ, because we are so tempted. And so it's like the song says, prone to wonder, Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. That's us. That's us. So by the end of this message, my hope is that the Lord shuts us up to Christ and calls us to have no other hope but him alone, his faithfulness.

It's always been the faithfulness of Christ that's made the difference, ever since the beginning. He was faithful in creation, but after creation, in the garden, what was Adam to do after he took of the fruit and man fell? And because of that, by one man's disobedience, all were made sinners. What would Adam have done to redeem himself? Well, he tried to cover himself with fig leaves And I know that Greg had displayed this here for you all, and actually we did too up at our church. But if you ever see a fig leaf, you'll know that it's in the shape of a man's hand. It's a picture of works, what man can do of his hands to cover himself. But the Lord's going to disannul that covenant. The Lord said, no flesh shall glory in my presence. So what did the Lord do? It was his faithfulness. It was his faithfulness that slew a lamb and covered them. And it's a picture of the covering of the Lord Jesus Christ that's required for God to be pleased with you and I. It's a picture of us being in Christ.

It's all because of his faithfulness, even into Noah. You know, a lot of people talk in religion, I remember they said, you need to have more faith like Daniel, or you need to have more faith like Moses. You need to be more like this man or this man. Well, I'm gonna remind you of a man named Noah. A lot of people, I didn't see this before, but if you look in the chapter six of Genesis, you'll see that it says, Every imagination of the heart of man was evil, and that continually. He said, every imagination. That included Noah. That included Noah. So what was the difference? The faithfulness of Christ. Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. Why did he find grace? Was he looking for it? No. Grace is given freely. Grace is bestowed. And it's a gift, a gift of God. What about Abraham? Abraham was to take his son, his only son Isaac, on the Mount Moriah and slay him, sacrifice him unto the Lord. And the Lord, right before he slew him, the Lord said, he stopped him. He said, hurt not thy son, thy only son Isaac. He said, for now I know. Now I know that you believe. And what was caught in the thicket right behind where Abraham was? It was a ram, wasn't it? Caught by its horns in the thicket. Well, number one, the thicket represents sin. It's the curse. It's the curse, Genesis chapter three. But also the ram represented the Lord Jesus Christ. And so we have the ram having its horns called to its glory. Our Lord had to have a crown of thorns placed upon his head. It's the faithfulness of Christ, brethren, all throughout scripture. Everything that he reveals is that our only hope is based upon the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ, not my faith and not your faith. As a matter of fact, people say, You need to put your faith in Christ. God doesn't want my faith. My faith is tainted. My faith is sinful. I need his faith if I am to please God. I need him to cause me to believe. And you know what? He's faithful to do that. He's faithful to do that to his people.

He was faithful with King David as well, wasn't he? Man after God's own heart is what the scripture refers to him as. And on his deathbed he said, although it be not so with my house, yet the Lord hath made with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure. And this is all my hope and all my salvation, even though he makes it not to grow. And yet David was a murderer. David was an adulterer. David was a, he took things that didn't belong to him. He was a thief. So what was the difference for David? The faithfulness of Christ. How do we know that? After he had committed adultery with Bathsheba and some time had passed by, Nathan came to him and said, and I'll say this, the Lord knows how to get our attention. The Lord knows how to get his people's attention. The prophet used the example of a shepherd and sheep. And the reason he did that is because David would have been tender towards sheep. He used to be a shepherd. The Lord knows how to get our attention. To draw the confession, he will always draw out the confession of his people and he'll get all the glory for it. told David there was a man, a rich man, had many flocks and herds, and there was another man who had one ewe lamb, and he reared that lamb, treated it like his child, allowed it to eat in his house. And one day the rich man thought he was going to have a, he was going to have a feast. And at that time he went and took the ewe lamb rather than taking one of his flock. And Nathan said unto him, what should be done to the man? He said, he shall surely die. He didn't even know he was pronouncing judgment upon himself, did he? He said, he'll also pay back what he's stolen. And have you ever heard these words from the Lord? You are the man. You are the man. That's what David heard. After Nathan continued to tell him the consequence for his sin, David confessed, I have sinned against the Lord. Now what's his hope right then? In that state, what's his hope? He's heard the judgment and he's made the confession. What's his hope? The faithfulness of Christ. That's our only hope. And what did Nathan say to him? The Lord also hath put away thy sin. You shall not die. You shall not die. Why? The faithfulness of Christ. It's the only reason. It's the only reason.

There are two kinds of people in this world, and only two. You can call them many different things, the righteous and the wicked, the elect, the non-elect, those that believe the truth, that are made to believe the truth by God's grace alone, and those that believe the lie. But the ones that believe the truth are completely dependent upon God being faithful. And the ones that do not believe in that, in his faithfulness, they have to look to their own faithfulness. They have to look to how they are in comparison to others in order to justify themselves. So either I'm looking to my faithfulness and myself, or I'm looking to the Lord Jesus Christ, and there is no in between. There is no in between. I want you to turn with me to Psalm 51 and look at David's prayer of repentance after the Lord was merciful to him. And see if this is your prayer. We're not going to read the whole entire chapter, but we'll read a few verses. Now, if you look at the top, it says to the chief musician, the heading, a Psalm of David, when Nathan the prophet came into him after he had gone into Bathsheba, have mercy upon me, O God, according to thy loving kindness, according to the multitude of thy tender mercies, blot out my transgressions, wash me thoroughly from mine iniquity and cleanse me from my sin. For I acknowledge my transgression and my sin is ever before me. What is he hoping in at this point? The mercy of God, the grace of God to be bestowed. And it's only one reason it's given. It's because of the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's hoping that the Lord would be faithful to the covenant that he had given David And he did, and he was. But David's begging the Lord, have mercy upon me, the sinner. We never grow out of that as a believer. We never stop saying, Lord, save me. Somebody say, well, I've already been saved. I'll mark that down. There isn't a day that goes by that we don't say, Lord, save me. Lord, save me. Save me from myself. Save me from the world. Save me from, save me, Lord. Save me from my sin that's ever before me. Can you, are you relating to what David's saying here? Have mercy upon me. Have mercy upon me. Verse four, against thee the only have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight, that thou mightest be justified when thou speakest and be clear when thou judgest. Behold, I was shaped in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, thou desire truth in the inward parts and in the hidden part thou shalt make me to know wisdom. Purge me with hyssop and I shall be clean. wash me and I shall be made whiter than snow.

His hope, that hyssop is what they use to put the blood, to sprinkle the blood. So what he's saying is, wash me in the blood, give me the blood.

Brethren, it is the faithfulness of Christ, him becoming a man. And the scripture says, when the fullness of time was come, Christ was born. of a woman born under the law to redeem them that were under the law. He was faithful to redeem his people back to God. He was faithful in putting away the sin of his people once and for all. He's a faithful high priest. He's a faithful mediator. He was a faithful, he is a faithful substitute surety of his people. He is our only hope for salvation this morning.

You know, he lived a faithful life under the Father. You and I couldn't have done that if we wanted to. Everything that he did, everything that he said was perfect, was true, was right. And as our substitute, we have a new history. We have a new history. Because we were in Christ, because we are in Christ now, we have a new history. When the record is read, it's not going to have my works It's going to have my prayers, my anything on it. It's going to have the life of the Lord Jesus Christ, my substitute. It's going to have his perfect prayers. It's going to have his perfect words. It's going to have his perfect life before the Father. And the Lord's going to say, enter in thou good and faithful servant. Thou been good over a few things, I'll make you ruler over many. Thou been faithful over a few things, I'll make you ruler over many.

But who's faithful, me or him? He's faithful. to give us his faithfulness in the sight of God. Isn't that glorious? He's faithful to give us. He doesn't see us as failures, as sinners. He doesn't see us as broken. He doesn't see us as lepers. He sees his people as clean by the blood of Christ because of the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. He sees us as faithful. Think about that. because we're in Christ. Isn't that glorious? He doesn't see my failures. He doesn't see my sin. He sees the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. I can rest in that salvation. I can rest in this gospel. Because I know I'm not the one that did it. I didn't have anything to do with it.

Anything I talked about the canning yesterday, anything that I do, I mess up. It feels that way. Some people, somebody surely can relate to me on that one. I don't even finish projects that I start at the house. I get about 95% done every time. Don't finish them. But he's faithful. He's faithful, and 100% accomplished everything He was purposed to do.

Let's go back to Lamentations. And I'm going to read this two or three times, because as we're going through these other passages of Scripture that we're turning to, we get more and more understanding of how glorious these words are.

Verse 21, Lamentations 3, this I recall to mind, therefore, How about hope? And my hope this morning is, is the next time you're discouraged, brethren, the next time you're in darkness, and I say this to our congregation all the time, you're either in a trial, if you're a child of God, you're either in a trial, you're coming out of a trial, or you're going into a trial. That's just how it is. That's just how it is. The Lord chastens those that he loves. He teaches his children to look to him.

But my hope is that the Lord recalls to your mind the next time you're in a dark place, the next time that you're frightened, you're concerned, you're worried, You remember, he is faithful. He is faithful, that promised. He is faithful. This I recall to mind, therefore have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul. Therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him. to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

Have I been made to see that it's not my life that I live? It's not my life that I live. Paul said the life that I live in the flesh, I live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. So it's not about me living, it's about Christ living in me. It's his faithfulness in us right now. right now, in every aspect, in every way. Are we looking to our life or His? Are we looking, even if we had died, it wouldn't have done us any good, so are we looking to a work that we could do, or are we looking to His death, the finished work? This is just, it's yes or no questions, it's that simple. The gospel's simple, it's just impossible to believe it unless the Lord gives you faith to believe it. It's not complicated.

Are we looking to His resurrection as our only hope and evidence of justification? Are we looking to ourself in any way, shape or form, how faithful we have been? People in false religion pride themselves on how they live their lives. They pride themselves on what they do. They pride themselves on what they don't do. Lord's people, we're ashamed of ourself. You ever been, we're ashamed of ourself. We loathe ourself. We don't love ourself. Look in the mirror and say, that's my worst enemy right there. Paul said, oh, wretched man that I am. Not that I was. Not that I was.

I had a lady that came to service the other day. She's new. She hadn't been back. But she came up to me after service, and I was talking about how sanctification's been accomplished. We've been sanctified in Christ by His Spirit. It's already done. Everything God required, it's already been accomplished. But she came up, and she was talking about progressive sanctification, which means you're getting a little bit better, and a little bit better, and a little bit better, and a little more holy, And it's foolishness, it's absolute foolishness. It has everything to do with your works and what you're doing. And I explained to her, no, we don't preach that here. We preach that Christ is all and salvation's been accomplished, including justification, sanctification. That's why scripture says, God hath made him unto us all of our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. He's all, he's everything.

Anyways, she said, well, I see myself as getting better, which made me, you kind of, cringe, you know, when somebody says something like that, because you're like, no, you don't. You see yourself getting having a moral reformation, perhaps. But that's all that that is. She's looking to her faithfulness. Do you see what I'm saying? She's looking to what she's doing. I go to church more. I give more. I work more. And she's gratifying herself and looking for affirmation from others. And I didn't give her any affirmation. I said, well, I recommend you just come sit and listen. And I pray the Lord will open up your eyes to the truth. And she hasn't been back.

My whole point to this is, is everything God required, he provided in the person and finished work of Christ. We do not examine ourself. And we don't, we don't, we're not fruit inspectors either. It's not my responsibility to look at you and say, you need to clean up your life a little bit. You know, you need to do better. You need, I've been around people. They, they tell you what you should be doing, what you shouldn't be doing. The Lord will take care of his people. The Lord will teach his people. He don't need me for that. The Lord will teach his people. Why? because he's faithful. He's a faithful father to his children.

Oh, brethren, everything God demands, he must provide, and he provided in Christ. He's only satisfied with what he provides, and he was satisfied with the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ. I love the thought. The Lord gave us the example in the book of Exodus during the First Passover, when the death angel came through the land, was going to slay the firstborn of Egypt, the Lord said, take a lamb. Take a lamb and kill it. And put the blood upon the doorpost and upon the lintel. And when I come through, when I pass by, when I see the blood, I will pass by you. He didn't say, whenever I see you eating the bitter herbs inside, when I see your prayers inside, when I see what you're doing inside. He didn't say any of that. He said, when I see the blood. Why? because the blood points to the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. It's still the same words today. When I see the blood, I will pass by you. Not your works, not us in any way, not us in any way. When I see the blood, I will pass by you. God is still pleased with the blood, brethren.

understand something very important. And I try not to ever stand without mentioning this. Our God is absolutely sovereign, absolutely sovereign over the inhabitants of heaven and earth and in hell. He's absolutely sovereign and he demands perfection. Scripture says he will not acquit the guilty. Now that puts us in a conundrum because we're born in sin, shape and iniquity. We literally come from the womb speaking lies. Um, some of you have Children's, you know that this is true when they come out of the womb. They will immediately make it all about themselves. They'll start crying. They'll want something. My daughter, she just wanted to be picked up. She didn't need anything. Clean diaper. She was fed. I was tired. She just wanted to be picked up. Nothing wrong with her. Nothing wrong with her. But she wanted to be picked up. What is that? Well, if there's nothing wrong with her, she's lying to me. That's what that is. I didn't have to teach her that. She got it from me. I got it from my father, Adam. We all did. We come from the womb speaking lies. Our heart, I said yesterday, is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

God demands perfection and he will not acquit the guilty. So what is my hope? The faithfulness of Jesus Christ. It's my only hope. It's the only hope I got. It's a good hope. It's a good hope. It's a blessed hope. So how can a sinner, how can someone that's born a sinner, be made the very righteousness of God? Well, Romans chapter five tells us, but where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. Grace did much more abound. Great is thy faithfulness.

In 2 Timothy 2, 13, it says, if we believe not, this is good news. If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful. He cannot deny himself. You mean my unbelief can't separate me from God? Not if you're in Christ. He abides faithful. And I like the old English, the King James for this reason, the TH on the end, that's continual. He abideth faithful. And that means he's faithful right now, and he's faithful right now, and he's faithful, and it's never not right now. I love that. Absolutely love that.

Salvation, brethren, is not of man. It's not of the flesh. It's not by our blood. It's by the blood of Jesus Christ. It is of the Lord. Hebrews 1.3 tells us, when he had by himself purged our sin, he sat down. He sat down. He faithfully accomplished the salvation of his people.

Turn with me to Matthew 26. And while you're turning there, I'll just say, we are utterly, entirely, and completely dependent upon the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ because of what we are by nature. Without him, there is no hope of salvation whatsoever.

Matthew 26, this is familiar scripture, but it goes with the message. It says, after our Lord's agony in the garden, immediately following, this is his betrayal by Judas, Peter had just taken a sword and struck the servant of the high priest's ear off and the Lord put it back and rebuked Peter. And here we are at verse 55, it says, in that same hour said Jesus to the multitudes, are you come out as against a thief with swords and staves for to take me? I sat daily with you teaching in the temple and you laid no hold on me. But all this was done that the scriptures of the prophets might be fulfilled. Then all the disciples forsook him. and fled. And they that had laid a hold of Jesus led him away unto Caiaphas, the high priest, where the scribes and the elders were assembled. But Peter followed him afar off into the high priest's palace and went in and sat with the servants to see the end.

All of his disciples left. Courageous Peter, the one who said, these might leave you, but I won't leave you, Lord. He left. The one, he walked on water. Does that fascinate anybody else? He walked on water. How long did he walk on water? I don't know, but he walked on water. That's amazing. The Lord caused him to do that. Yet he forsook the Lord. Now I understand it's all by the determinant counsel of God, but he forsook the Lord. He had just took a sword out against this whole band that came to get Christ, lopped the ear off of the high priest servant, and yet he forsook the Lord. And then he denied affiliation with the Lord for fear of death to a 12-year-old, to a 12-year-old. Does that sound like you and me? Yes, absolutely, Lord, leave us to ourself. That's exactly what we would do. We would do worse, wouldn't we?

John, about the disciple John, he laid upon the breast of the Lord. You remember the Lord said, one of you is going to betray me. And everybody said, Lord, is it I? Is it I? John laying forward, got to hear the heartbeat of God. Think about that. He said, who is it, Lord? And yet he left the Lord. He forsook him. He forsook him.

What about James? Remember, James and John were brothers, sons of Zebedee. They asked him, one of my sons sit on your right and the other one sit on your left? What a question. I mean, think about the arrogance of that. And they forsook him too. All the disciples, every one of the disciples left. The one they saw walk on water, the one that they saw heal the sick, raise the dead, calls the dumb to speak, calls the deaf to hear. They saw all the miracles that he performed. He even gave them the ability to perform miracles. And yet, in the moment, they forsook him. They forsook him. They were so afraid to die, that they forsook life himself. Life himself.

Think about this, though. And this is where we find great hope. Because left to ourself, we're no different than these men are. If their election was based upon their faithfulness, then this was certain certain enough evidence that their election was turned to reprobation, but it's not based upon them. If their salvation was based upon their faithfulness, then they certainly would have been damned after this, wouldn't they? But it wasn't about their faithfulness. If their righteousness was based upon what they did in this hour in forsaking the Lord, then they would have been in trouble. They would have been condemned. but it wasn't based upon their faithfulness.

Righteousness, sanctification, justification, and glorification are all based on one thing, the faithfulness of Jesus Christ. Aren't you glad that grace is not based upon you and I? Grace is entirely based upon the merits of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was faithful in election. He's faithful in redemption. He's faithful in regeneration, and he's faithful to keep us to the end, to keep us to the end. So we're kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time. He's faithful. He's faithful in every aspect to his people.

Think about this. Peter denied the one Peter denied the very one that was his substitute surety, and yet it did not change his standing with God. It did not change his standing with God. Does that give you comfort? To know that it's not based upon you? It's not based upon me? I mentioned the canning thing yesterday, and for those of you who don't know, I touched some cans that we had canned, some jars we had canned, and I ruined it. We ate the beans. They were in the fridge for a week. I had beans every day. I don't know who all was here, who wasn't. The point I'm making is if we, what the message was, if we put our hand to it, we ruin it. You can't put your hand to this. It's his faithfulness. We can't ruin it. We can't mess it up. Salvation's of the Lord and it is finished. I can't mess that up. Does that give you comfort? The Lord won't let us mess it up, because you know as good as I know, that's exactly what we would do. We would mess it up. We would mess it up, but we can't. Why? He's faithful.

Peter did not affiliation with the Lord, yet it did not change his standing with God. After the last crow, the rooster, what happened? The Lord made eye contact with Peter. In religion, they used to say that it was a look of disappointment. It was a look of condemnation. Or it was a look of like a dad looking at a child that would be disappointed in him. That's the furthest thing from the truth. You know what that look was? Compassion. Compassion. I still love you. I still love you, Peter. Isn't that glorious? Why? Because he's faithful. Listen to what he says after the resurrection, the angel of the Lord speaking, he says, go your way, tell his disciples and Peter, make sure you tell Peter that he's risen. Tell Peter, make sure, don't miss Peter. Because Peter's miserable right now, because he denied me. I still love him. You make sure to tell him that. He didn't ruin anything. I'm faithful. He said, no doubt, same thing to Peter. He said to David, I've put away your sin. You're not going to die. I put away your sin. Great is his faithfulness.

Let's go back to it. Well, yeah, back to our text in closing. Lamentations three. Verse 21, this I recall to mind, therefore have I hope. It is of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning. Great is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith my soul. Therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that wait for him. to the soul that seeketh him. It is good that a man should wait. Both should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord. It is of the Lord's mercies that were not consumed. So the Lord's mercies were not consumed because he's greatest his faithfulness because he's faithful.

The next time we are discouraged, the next time we are in doubt, the next time we are afraid, I pray the Lord brings back to our memory. He's faithful. He is faithful, because you can rest right there. I can rest right there. There ain't a lot of places, there's nowhere in this world you can rest, but you can rest that. Rest in that. The good news about the Lord's, the good news about it being all about the Lord's faithfulness is we can't mess it up. I can rest in that. You can rest in that as well.

Tell his disciples and tell Peter. Make sure you tell Peter. It is finished. It is finished. faithfulness of Christ. Very thankful. Thank you all for having me. Those that need a break. This is a good time to do it. We're gonna sing a couple hymns and have special music before Todd comes to preach. Our first hymn is found on the back of the bulletin. There should be, if you