All right, let's open our Bibles to the book of Amos chapter six. Amos chapter six. I've titled this message, At Peace, But Not At Ease. At Peace, But Not At Ease. Amos chapter six, beginning in verse one. Woe unto them.

I was thinking about how James was speaking of the tongue that was so unruly that no man could tame it. And he used the analogy of putting a bit in a horse's mouth so that you could direct that horse. And though we're not able to tame our own tongue, the Lord is able. And he tames us when he speaks to us and gives us ears to hear. No horse has ever stopped at its master's woe more than God's children stop at his woe. When the Lord says, woe, it is a warning of condemnation. You remember when Isaiah said, woe is me, I'm undone, my eyes have seen the king, I'm gonna die. He thought his being in the presence of God meant certain condemnation for him. Later on in Isaiah, the Lord says, woe unto them that striveth with their maker. a man who is contentious with God, that will not hear what God has to say, that will not bow and woe to him, he's in a bad place.

Look over in Amos chapter five, we saw this last Wednesday night at verse 18. Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord. Those who think the day of the Lord is gonna be a day of salvation when it's gonna be a day of judgment. There are many, many of these woes given to us in God's word. The ones to whom they ultimately apply are not interested in God's word. God speaks to his children and his word is for his children. And so When we read these woes, we take them very seriously and we become very sober about our own frailty and our own need for grace. Lord, don't let this word of condemnation be me.

Woe unto them. who are at ease in Zion. Now, Zion's the church. We're sitting in the city of Zion right now, the city of God, waiting for that new Jerusalem to come down. This is the Jerusalem of our life in this world. and we're able to come to this place where God has set his king on his holy hill. This is the place where the Lord Jesus reigns from his throne and where his people rejoice in having him reign and rejoice in having him speak. He reigns over all men, we know that. He's sovereign over the armies of heaven and all the inhabitants of the earth. But what a joy it is to be able to acknowledge his sovereign reign and rejoice in it and delight that the Lord would be pleased to bless us with his presence, with his power, and with his glory and his grace.

So we read these, woe unto them that are at ease in Zion. Now this word ease is also translated in the Bible satisfied. It's also translated secure. The Lord is speaking a word of warning to those who are in Zion who are satisfied or who are secure. Now, obviously, he's not speaking of being satisfied with Christ. We are satisfied with him. We're satisfied to have him as all of our righteousness before God. We have no righteousness outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. We would not dare add to him to try to find some other way of standing in the presence of a holy God. The Lord Jesus Christ is all and he is in all. He is the fullness of the Godhead bodily and we are complete in him. We have no righteousness of our own. All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. We don't go about trying to establish our own righteousness. We're not ignorant of God's righteousness, for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. And we are satisfied. We're secure. We are at ease. We can rest in having the Lord Jesus. as all of our righteousness and all of our standing before God. John chapter 1 verse 16 says, of his fullness have we all received from grace to grace. From grace to grace, it is by the grace of God that we're able to be secure, that we're able to be satisfied, that we're able to rest and be at ease with the Lord Jesus as our righteousness before God.

So the Lord's saying, woe to them who are at ease in Zion. That can't be what the Lord's talking about. It cannot be talking about being satisfied with the Lord Jesus as our justification before God. Not only is he all of our righteousness, But our sin has been fully and successfully put away by the sacrifice that the Lord Jesus made of himself to his father as our atonement. Our sins are covered by the blood of Christ. We would never think of not being satisfied with the Lord Jesus for all of our justification before God.

How am I going to be justified before God? What am I going to do? How am I going to atone for my sins? How am I going to make up for it and satisfy God's justice? I can't. And when the Lord gives saving faith, we are at ease. We are at rest. We are satisfied. We are secure with the Lord Jesus as our justification before God, freely, freely justified by his blood, having our sins covered by the blood of Christ. He was offered up for our offenses. He bore in his body all the sins of all of his people. And he was raised again for our justification."

Really? A better way to translate that verse is in the last verse in Romans chapter four. He was offered up for our offenses and raised again because of our justification. Because of our justification. When the Lord Jesus bowed his mighty head on Calvary's cross and said, it is finished. When he offered to his father himself and his shed blood for the atoning of our sins. We were justified before God. Sin was put away, separated from us as far as the east is from the west. God says, I remember it no more. I remember it no more. He's buried it in the depths of the sea.

Oh, how else are we going to be justified? What ease, what rest, what security, what satisfaction we have. in looking to the Lord Jesus and relying upon Christ alone for all of our acceptance before God. God is satisfied with Christ and we are satisfied with Christ. We rest in him who finished the work of redemption. We rejoice in Christ as our salvation, our substitute, our savior, our surety.

Assurity is one who pays the debt in full. Every time I think assurity, you know, Tricia used to be in real estate, and assurity was a penance, a small amount of money that you would put down as a down payment for buying a piece of property. And they called that assurity. set that property off the market and that was your promise, your promissory note to buy the property. But that's not what surety means in the Bible. When the Lord Jesus called our surety, it means that he paid the whole thing. He didn't just make a small down payment. He paid it in full. He justified us before God.

Where else are we going to go to rest? Where else are we going to go to be satisfied? Where else are we going to go to be at ease? Woe unto them who are at ease in Zion. That having been said, we agree with David when he said in Psalm 17 verse 15, as for me, I will behold thy face in righteousness. And then in that day, I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness. David was satisfied with Christ as his substitute. He was satisfied with the promised Messiah to save him, to atone for his sins, to be all of his righteousness before God, to justify him in the presence of a holy God.

What was it that David wasn't satisfied with when he said, I will be satisfied when I see thy face? and when I awake in thy likeness." Three things.

First thing is that David wasn't satisfied with himself. He was not satisfied with himself. David knew that he was shapen in iniquity. He knew that it was in sin that his mother had conceived him. David was a sinner.

What a blessing it is to sit in Zion. Many who come and hear the gospel have not been made to be a sinner. Many, the Lord said there's gonna be tares among the wheat, there'll be goats among the sheep. Some come and they hear the gospel and they're unaffected by it. They've not been stripped naked before God. They've not been caused to seek the Lord Jesus for their righteousness before God. They still believe that they have some righteousness of their own. They're satisfied. They're at ease with themselves. They're at ease with their good living and with their good life and with their works. with their religious activity, they're at ease. That's who the Lord's speaking to here.

Look what he says. Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion and trust in the mountain of Samaria, which are named chief among the nations to whom the house of Israel came.

Now Amos is speaking to the people of Judah. the southern kingdom, kingdom has been divided. And the 10 tribes of the North had already established their place of worship on Mount Gerizim, mountain of Samaria. You remember the Samaritan woman when the Lord met her in John chapter four, and she said, our fathers say that we should worship on this mountain. And you say that we should worship in Jerusalem. And of course, the Lord Jesus straightened all that out and said, salvation is of the Jews. We have the gospel. You don't. And the same thing's true in the day of Amos.

Woe unto them who are at ease in Zion, who run to the mountains of Samaria for their hope. It was a stronghold. It was a place of strength. Matter of fact, The names mentioned in verse 2, Pashyon to Kalna and Si and from thence going to Hamath, the great, these words actually translated means stronghold. These were fortified places to be protected from the enemy. And the Lord's saying, there are those who are at ease in Zion, who find their protection, they find their safety, they find the hope of their salvation, their righteousness before God and their justification before God in a false hope, in a place, a fortress that's not going to stand.

That's it, that's, where's my righteousness? Where's my justification? Where's my, I'm not, Lord, when I awaken thy likeness and I see thy face and I'm made like you, then I'm gonna be satisfied. Right now I'm satisfied with Christ. I can rest in him. I'm at ease in Christ. He's my justification, my righteousness before God.

But Lord, how oftentimes how oftentimes I am tempted to find my hope and my happiness outside of Christ. And so when the Lord says to me, woe unto them who are at ease in Zion, Lord, don't allow me, don't allow me to find my ease, my safety, my security, my comfort. outside of Christ. I'm tempted. I see it every day in my thoughts, my words, my actions. Lord, keep me, keep me from falling and present me before thy throne of grace, thoughtless, faultless, Paul said, in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. Dwelleth no good thing.

What does the world say? The world says, you need to love yourself before you can be healthy and happy. You got to begin by accepting yourself and loving yourself. Isn't that the philosophy of the world? Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion. Woe unto them who can find their comfort and their hope and their happiness and their peace in themselves.

Because when I make, when I make a man a sinner, He's going to loathe himself. He's going to loathe himself. Let me show you that. Turn with me to Ezekiel chapter 20. Ezekiel chapter 20. I cannot be at ease with myself. I am a contradiction to myself. My flesh wars against my spirit and my spirit against my flesh so that I cannot be what I would be. I'm in constant spiritual conflict with me. I am my own worst enemy.

That's not true of a lot of people. That's not true of most people. And there are those who come to Zion and they're perfectly content with what they're doing for their acceptance before God. But when a believer looks to himself, when a believer tries to find some hope and happiness in himself, oh, it's like going down in a well, isn't it? The farther you go down, the darker it gets. You know, it just doesn't work for a child of God, as often as we try.

Ezekiel chapter 20, look with me, verse 42. And you shall know that I am the Lord when I shall bring you into the land of Israel, into the country of which I lifted up my hand to give it to your fathers, and there, shall you remember your ways and all your doings wherein you have been defiled, and you shall loathe yourselves in your own sight for all your evils that you have committed. And you shall know that I am the Lord, When I have wrought with you for my name's sake, not according to your wicked ways, nor according to your corrupt doings, O ye house of Israel, sayeth the Lord God.

For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It's a gift of God. Oh, thank the Lord. I can rest there. How often I find myself looking for something good until the Lord's pleased to reveal himself. And then, what do we say? There's no ease here. No, we say with Brother Job, behold, I am Baal. We say with Brother Isaiah, Woe is me. I am undone. I live among a people of unclean lips. I'm a man of unclean lips. What am I going to do? I can't find any satisfaction in myself as often as I try to look.

We hate our sin. We hate our unbelief. We hate our self-righteousness. We hate our pride. The Lord Jesus said, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself. And let him hate not only his mother and his father and his brother and sister, but hate his own life also. For he cannot be my disciple. Many sit in Zion, and they're comforted. They're satisfied. They're at ease with who they are and with what they've done.

The child of God, though we look down that well often, we cannot find comfort there. cannot be satisfied there, cannot be at ease there. The reminder of that Esau nature in us, wrestling with Jacob, just reminds us once again that the older will serve the younger. It is the old man of the flesh, that firstborn, who drives Jacob again and again and again to be satisfied and to be at ease and to be content with Christ and only with Christ. We look at our works. We see how selfish they are. We see how inconsistent and insincere they are. We can't find any any comfort in believing that we've earned favor with God or proven our salvation. We conclude that we are but unprofitable servants. And in the day of judgment, we will stand before the Lord when he commends us for the good things that we did and we'll say even then, Lord, when did we do those things?

But I can tell you, there are those who sit in Zion who are very much at ease and very comfortable and very satisfied with what they're doing and what they've done to recommend them to God. Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion, that run to the mountains of Samaria and the fortresses who offer them peace, peace, when in fact there is no peace.

You see, brethren, this woe is to remind us where our ease is, is to remind us where we're satisfied and where we're complete and content, and it cannot be with ourselves. How many have sat under the gospel and the sound of the gospel and never seen themselves as sinners? Is this not, is this not the beginning of, you know, Paul said, as you receive Christ Jesus, the Lord, so walk ye in him. How did you receive him? How'd you receive him? You received him as a sinner. He received him as one who had no claim on God, who had no righteousness and no reason to be justified before God apart from the Lord Jesus as your surety, satisfying what God requires for you.

We're at ease in Zion, but it's not found in the mountains of Samaria. It's found in the Lord Jesus Christ.

The second thing that we're not at ease with is the religions of this world and our own past religious experiences. Trust me, as a pastor, I've had many conversations with people who have sat under the gospel, who speak fondly of their previous religious experiences in churches where the gospel was not. And if they don't speak fondly of it, they don't renounce it. They hold on to an experience that they had in a freewill works gospel And they think, well, this is maybe a little closer to the truth, but it wasn't that I didn't have the truth then. And they sit at ease in Zion, trusting past experiences, never burning their bridges.

I was listening to a very famous, he's dead now, but I was listening to a video of him from a few years ago, a very, very famous Calvinist teacher. And he was asked the question, are Armenians saved? Are Armenians saved? And he responded by saying, yes. Yes, they are saved. And then he went on to condition it by saying, unless, of course, they have considered the implications of what they believe. And if that be the case, then they're trusting in something that they have done for their own righteousness. And in that case, they would not be saved.

A man unwilling to renounce Arminianism as a soul damning heresy. A man who would say, well, yes, you can believe in free will and you can believe in man's ability to choose and God not electing a people, but you can't really understand what you believe. So you believe something that you don't believe. You see, it doesn't make sense, does it? Doesn't make sense at all. I listened to that just on the last, yesterday, I think it was. And this man was renowned in the religious community and people read his books and listened to him and traveled around the world to hear him and sit under him.

Yes, Armenians are saved. No, they're not. And we're not at ease sitting in Zion reflecting back on any of the experiences that we may have had in a false gospel, in a false religion. We readily renounce them and identify them for what they are. I've seen preachers become sentimental and tolerant of error in their old age. May the Lord spare us from that. It's a fight. It's fighting the good fight. Paul said, I've kept the faith. I'm ready to be offered up. I've been faithful to the gospel to the end. We can't give up on the fight. We can't sit at ease in Zion and in any way, in any way give any hope to anyone who is believing a gospel that robs God of his glory and robs him of his power and puts man on the throne of God and makes God dependent upon man for anything. That is a false gospel.

But there are many. There are many that are at ease in Zion. They're at ease with themselves. They're at ease with the religions of the world. They speak fondly of their family members who go to false churches. They don't grieve. Believers, when I talk to a believer about a family member or a loved one who's involved in a false gospel, they're grieved over them. And yet you speak to people who come and listen to the gospel and they talk about their family members as if they're, you know, good Christian people. They're, you know, they love God and they're, you know, we'll be together in heaven. No, we won't. No, we won't. Woe unto them that are at ease in Zion. They're at ease with themselves. and they're at ease with a false gospel. We're not at ease with a false gospel.

And thirdly, we cannot find any comfort. We cannot find any satisfaction. We cannot find any security. We cannot find any ease with anything that this world has to offer. Turn with me to Matthew chapter 16. Matthew chapter 16. Matthew chapter six, I'm sorry. Matthew chapter six. The Lord Jesus said the love of money, the love of it is the root of all evil. And how we find ourselves tempted to be at ease with the comforts and the prosperities of this world, and how we find ourselves when things are unsure financially that we become not at ease. Here's what our Lord has to say to us.

Verse 19 of Matthew chapter 6, lay not up for yourselves treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and where thieves break through and steal. But lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and where thieves do not break through nor steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.

" There are those who are at ease in Zion, not with Christ, not with the gospel, but with their possessions, with their possessions. They lay up for themselves treasures upon the earth. They don't give. They don't support the work of the gospel. They live just for whatever prosperity and pleasures the world has to offer them.

Verse 22, and this is still the same thought. The light of the body is the eye. If therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light. But if thine eye be evil, And that word evil, it's a word that means if it be doubled, if it be not single, it's a word that comes from a word that means to braid. If you try to braid together your treasure in this world with your treasures in heaven, they don't mix. They don't mix. If thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness. For no man can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon. We cannot find our ease. We cannot find our soul satisfaction. We're thankful for the prosperity and the pleasures and the comforts that the Lord gives us materially in this world. Hopefully we're generous with what we have and we're wise with what we have. And we acknowledge that everything that we have belongs to God and we're good stewards of what we have. But when it comes to the satisfaction of our souls, when it comes to being at ease with God, we cannot find our hope there. That is what's of the world.

I love what John said. James said this, he said, the friendship of the world is enmity with God. And the reverse of that is enmity with The world is friendship with God. And then John said, love not the world nor the things that are in the world, for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, that's pleasure, the lust of the eyes, that's popularity, and the pride of life, that's power. All that is in the world. or he that loves the world, he that finds those things to be able to give him comfort and ease and satisfaction and security. John goes on in 1 John 2 to say they know not God.

Woe unto them that are at ease with what this world has to offer. They're secure, they're satisfied, they're content. When Eve was in the garden, you remember the temptation Satan gave her was that she saw that the fruit was pleasing to the taste, pleasant to the eye, and able to make one wise. And that's the same thing John said when he said all that's in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.

Why is it that the love of money is the root of all evil? Is it not money that buys pleasure? Is it not money that buys popularity? Is it not money that buys power? Is that not the value of this world? How often do we hear people say, follow the money? And you see it. You see it in politics. You see it in sports. You see it in business. You see it everywhere in the world. Just follow the money. You'll find out where the problem is. Why? Because that's the world's God. And that's what the Lord Jesus is saying here. He's saying you cannot serve God and mammon.

Thank God for what we have. Be responsible with what we have. Be generous with what we have. Acknowledge that God is the owner of all that we have. But we cannot find our ease. We cannot find our satisfaction like the world does. If I just had a little more, a little more, I'd be able to, I'd be content. And so if they're not content with what they have, if they're not satisfied with what they have, the potential of having more satisfies them. In other words, I'm satisfied with the thought of having a little bit more. I read somewhere one time that someone asked JC Penney one time, how much was enough? How much was enough? And his answer was, a little bit more than what I have. And that's just the value of the world. That's the philosophy of the world. That's the way of the world.

And there are those who sit in Zion. And that's their value. Their value is their own righteousness. Their value is their own good works. Their value is their own free will. Their value is their religious experience and the religions of the world. Their value is the prosperity and pleasures that the world has to offer. And the Lord says, woe unto them. Woe unto them. that are at ease in Zion.

Is there any greater judgment than to be under the sound of the gospel? To sit under the sound of the gospel. And my dear brethren, we have people right here in our church who sit under the sound of the gospel for years. And they are in the ways that we've described them tonight, in Zion, but at ease with something other than Christ. May God deliver us. Amen.

Let's pray together. Our heavenly Father, thank you. Thank you, Lord, for your loving warnings Lord, we see the potential of all these things in ourselves. Might we be caused by your spirit to woe when we hear thy word? And might we be brought by your spirit to find our ease our satisfaction, our security, our comfort in Christ and in him alone. For we ask it in his name. Amen.

All right, we'll be dismissed.