You who were dead in your trespasses
and sins, hath he quickened together in Christ Jesus. When the Lord
Jesus Christ was raised from the dead, all those for whom
he died were raised with him. Our life is in Christ. The hymn
on the back of your bulletin says, come ye humble sinner train,
souls for whom the land was slain. Cheerful, let us raise our voice. We have reason to revoice. Amen. All right, let's stand together.
Tom, you come, please. Humbly, humble, sinner trained,
Souls for whom the Lamb was slain, Cheerful, let us raise our voice,
We have reason to rejoice. Let us sing with saints in heaven
Life restored and sin forgiven Glory and eternal love Be to
our incarnate God Now look up with faith and see Him that bled
for you and me Seated on His glorious throne Interceding for
His own What can Christians have to fear when they view the Savior
there? Hell is vanquished, heaven appeased,
God is satisfied and pleased. Snares and dangers may be said,
for we are but travelers yet. As the way indeed is hard, may
we keep a constant guard. Either lifted up with air, Nor
dejected to despair, Always keeping Christ in view, He will bring
us safely through. Please be seated. If you would, please open with
me this morning to Luke chapter four. Now, early in this chapter, the
Lord has been spending his 40 days tempted by the devil, and
he's now returning to Nazareth to preach. And he came to Nazareth
where he had been brought up, and as his custom was, he went
into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and stood up for to read.
And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Isaiah. And when he had opened the book,
he found the place where it is written in Isaiah chapter 61. The Spirit of the Lord is upon
me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the
poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted,
to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight
to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach
the acceptable year of the Lord. And he closed the book, and he
gave it again to the minister, and sat down, and the eyes of
all of them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him.
And he began to say unto them, this day is this scripture fulfilled
in your ears. If you would skip over to verse
26 now. As he's continuing preaching
to these people, he says, and many lepers were in Israel in
the time of Elijah the prophet. And none of them was cleansed,
saving Naaman the Syrian. And all they in the synagogue,
when they heard these things, were filled with wrath, and rose
up, and thrust him out of the city, and led him onto the brow
of the hill, whereon their city was built, that they might cast
him down headlong. What these verses remind me is
that it is not but for the grace of God that believers see him
and hear him in the scriptures. For these people who knew the
Lord personally and had him preaching to them did not see him and did
not hear and believe on him. So it's our hope that the Lord
be with us today and that he be pleased to show us him in
the message. Let's pray. Dear Lord, we thank
you for bringing us together this morning. We thank you for
giving us a preacher in Greg to preach unto us the good news
of your son. We pray, Lord, that you may give
him the words to preach to us this hour and give us the ears
to hear. In your most holy and perfect
name we pray. Amen. Let's stand together once again.
We'll sing hymn number 44 in your Spiral Gospel Hymns hymnal,
number 44. Precious Savior, friend of sinners,
we as such to Thee draw near. Let Thy Spirit dwell within us
with that love that casts out fear. Matchless Savior, let us
know Thee, as the Lord our righteousness. Cause our hearts to cleave unto
Thee, come and with Thy presence bless. Open now thy precious
treasure, let thy word here freely flow. Give to us a gracious measure,
tis thyself we long to know. Come and claim us as thy portion. Let us all find rest in thee. Leave us not to empty notions. We would find our hope in thee. Please be seated. Caleb is going
to come sing for us now. There is a Redeemer, Jesus Christ
God's Son, ? Precious Lamb of God, Messiah, Holy One ? ? Thank
you, O our Father, for giving us your Son ? ? And making sure
the work for sinners was completely done ? Jesus Christ, Redeemer,
name above all names. Precious Lamb of God, Messiah,
hope for sinners slain. Thank you, O our Father, for
giving us your Son. and making sure the work for
sinners was completely done. When he rose to heaven to his
throne on high, he sat down, his work was finished, chosen
ones he can't deny. Thank you, O our Father, for
giving us your Son, and making sure the work for sinners was
completely done. When we stand in glory, we will
seek his face, there we'll worship Christ forever in that holy place. Thank you, O our Father, for
giving us your Son and making sure the work for sinners was
completely done. Thank you, Caleb. Let's open
our Bibles together to Acts chapter 26. Acts chapter 26. In this
chapter, the Apostle Paul is brought by a Roman governor
by the name of Festus before a Roman king by the name of Agrippa. Now, Agrippa is the last of the
Herods. The Herodian dynasty began with
Herod the Great. He's the one who ordered all
the babies in and around Bethlehem to be slaughtered in fear that
Lord Jesus would take his throne. The Herod that had John the Baptist
taking his head off was the grandson of Herod the Great, and now this
Herod Agrippa is the great-grandson, the last of the Herods. Now these Herods, it's important
for us to know, had proselyted to Judaism. They knew the scriptures. This Herod in particular had
spent a lot of time searching the scriptures and the Apostle
Paul confronts him on that. These men were appointed by the
Roman government to keep the Jews in check in Judea. So they were Jewish, but they
were in cahoots with the Romans to keep the Jews under control. So Paul now, Festus says to Herod,
Herod comes to town, and Festus says to Herod, this man has appealed
unto Caesar, but it did not seem right for me to send him to Caesar
without a proper charge. Maybe you can interrogate him
and figure out what a proper charge would be, seeing how you
know the Jewish religion. Festus wouldn't have known anything
about the Jewish religion, but Herod would have. So Herod has
Paul come before him, and Paul recounts his testimony of conversion
and the gospel to King Herod. And here's the statement I want
us to look at this morning to King Agrippa, who was a Herod.
Verse 28, then Agrippa said unto Paul, almost thou persuadest
me to be a Christian. Now Festus had already cried
out in verse 24 saying that much learning had made thee
mad. He accused Paul of being a madman. Agrippa knew better. Paul reminds
Agrippa, you know these things that I've told you are in the
scriptures. The prophets have declared them
that a Messiah would come. and that there would be, in particular,
a resurrection from the dead. And Herod knew that what Paul
was saying was true. Matter of fact, he concludes
this whole thing by saying, you know, I don't find any charge
against him, but you know, he's appealed to Caesar, so we got
to send him anyway. And Herod said, almost thou persuadest
me to be a Christian. many sermons have been preached
from this verse of Scripture. Much commentary has been written
from this verse of Scripture. I've tried to listen and read
to some of that, that men have drawn from this verse of Scripture. And almost without exception,
the message of the sermon has to do with almost becoming a
Christian. And the sermons have been, you know, you can be under the gospel,
you can love the Bible, you can be outwardly moral, and you can
have all the outward signs of being a Christian, but not be
converted. And when I read those and listen to those, it strikes
fear in my own heart. Lord, is it I? Maybe, maybe,
maybe I'm not. Maybe that's what this is supposed
to do, to cause uncommitted Christians to doubt their salvation. Matter
of fact, you'll find on Sermon Audio a lot of sermons titled,
Almost a Christian. Now, I want you to notice in
this verse, the word almost is an adverb. And adverbs modify
verbs, not nouns. Christian is a noun. This verse
does not say, I'm almost a Christian. I'm almost there. No, the verb
is persuaded. And what Agrippa is saying to
Paul is, you've almost persuaded me, but I'm not persuaded. He's
not saying I'm almost a Christian. He's saying, you know, you came
real close to persuading me, but I'm not persuaded. I don't want to deal with this
passage of scripture by causing believers to doubt their salvation. I want you to have assurance
and peace and comfort in Christ. We could do that. We could look
at all of our lives and say, you know, I'm almost a Christian,
but I'm not sure if I'm there yet. I want us to look at what is
it that you're persuaded of? Are you almost persuaded? Or
are you fully persuaded? Because therein will be your
comfort. If we look at our lives and try
to determine whether or not we're real and we're genuine, and we've
got enough outward evidences to prove that we're really Christians,
we'll find ourselves in a slough of despair. But if we ask ourselves,
what is it that I'm fully persuaded of? I can't say with a grip You almost
persuaded me. I can say with the Apostle Paul,
I know whom I have believed and I am persuaded that he is able. I'm not able, but he is able
to keep that which I've committed unto him against that day. I've
got no place else to go. I believe that Jesus is the Christ,
the son of the living God. I believe that he alone has the
words of eternal life. And I've got no place else to
go. I'm persuaded of it. If I'm persuaded of anything,
I'm persuaded of who Christ is and what it is that he accomplished. If you try to ask yourself, am
I persuaded if I'm a Christian? Now that's a whole nother question.
You're gonna have, if you're an honest person and you ask
yourself, am I persuaded that I'm saved? Am I persuaded that
I'm a Christian or I'm just almost there? If you're an honest person,
you're gonna leave here with a lot of doubts and fears. But
if you ask yourself, am I persuaded? Paul just told Agrippa the gospel. Agrippa knew the scriptures. He knew that what Paul was saying
was true, but he would not be persuaded. Why would he not be
persuaded? Well, he had too much at stake.
He loved the praise of men more than the praise of God. He was
willing to lay the eternal salvation of his soul on the altar for
his temporal position of power. And that's why men won't believe.
That's why they're not persuaded. They've got too much to lose,
just like the Pharisees and the Sadducees. What are we going
to do about this man? If we let him continue, we will
lose both our place and our position, our power. We're going to lose
our nation. We're going to lose all these
people that are serving us and following us if we believe that.
So we can't be persuaded of that. The Lord Jesus Christ said, you
will not come to me that you might have life. Am I persuaded
that in him is life and that life, his life is the light of
men and that outside of him, I have no life. What are you
persuaded of? Believers have been taught of
God now. You know, one of the problems here is that Agrippa
looked at Paul and said, almost thou persuadest me. If you're persuaded by a man,
another man's gonna persuade you otherwise. No question about
it. Seen it happen many, many times
over the years. People here, they're convinced
by the arguments, they're convinced by the personality, they're convinced
by something other than God. And they make a confession that
it's true, but they've not been taught of God. Agrippa thought that he had to be persuaded
by Paul. No, Agrippa, you got to be persuaded
by God. Now, surely a person can be outwardly
moral and religious without being saved. A person can say the right
things. They can honor God with their
lips, though their heart be far from Him. And we see that in
outwardly religious people all the time. But those people aren't
persuaded by the gospel. And they will come, and they
will hear, and they will listen, and they will say, well, you
know, I'm almost persuaded. Yeah, what you're saying is true,
but, but they've always got a but to the gospel, don't they? They're
just like Agrippa, I'm almost persuaded. No, I'm fully persuaded,
fully persuaded that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living
God. He is the sovereign, successful
savior of sinners. I'm fully persuaded that I have
no righteousness in and of myself, that if he left me to myself,
I'd be hell deserving. fully persuaded of who he is
and what it is that he accomplished on Calvary's cross. I've heard men say, well, you
know, you can miss heaven by 18 inches. You can be, you can
have all the right information in your, in your mind, but not
have a heart for God, not have a love for God. Let me dispel
that right now, because the Bible doesn't make a distinction between
the heart and the head, okay? That organ in your chest beating
blood throughout your body doesn't think, it doesn't reason, it
doesn't know anything, it is a muscle, okay? Your heart is in your head. What
you have in your heart, you have in your mind. The disconnect is not between
a man's head and his heart. The disconnect is between his
head, his heart, and his lips. He will say one thing, but he
doesn't believe what he says. Men will say, well, I'm a sinner.
And then they'll hold on to some righteousness of their own for
the hope of their salvation, or they'll look to the evidence
of their salvation in their lives continually, and they'll boast
themselves. I've met many Calvinists over the years. They say they
believe in the sovereignty of God, and yet they hold to a progressive
sanctification. And they think that they can
somehow improve their position before God. They don't believe
there. I listened to them for just five minutes. I said, you
don't believe you're a sinner. I don't always say that to them. They
don't ask questions. I'm not gonna say that, but that's what
I'm thinking. You don't believe what you're saying. You're contradicting
yourself. By your words, you shall be justified.
And by your words, you shall be condemned. A good tree cannot
bring forth bad fruit. You're not gonna say things that
are contrary to the gospel if you're fully persuaded. if you're
fully persuaded. I've heard men say, well, you
know, he's just befuddled. He's confused. He says one thing,
but he really believes something else. No, he doesn't. Out of
the heart, the mouth speaks. What you believe is what you're
going to say. And what you hear is what you
believe. And my whole point is, what are
you persuaded of? Don't try to figure out whether
or not you love God as you ought. You don't. You don't. Hearing is love. Not that we
love God, but that he loved us and gave his son a propitiation
of our sins. That's the measure of love. We
love him because he first loved us, but you start checking your
motives in your life and you're gonna, not gonna find much comfort there.
Our motives are never pure, but we are persuaded. We do not
raise our voice with Agrippa saying, almost adverb, thou persuadest,
verb, to become a Christian. I'm not almost persuaded. I'm fully persuaded. I've got no place else to go. I believe this book is a word
of God. I'm fully persuaded of that. I'm not here to persuade
you of anything. It's like I said, if you can
be persuaded by my defense or arguments, but I'm just going
to declare the truth and hope and pray and trust that the Lord
will persuade his people. Here's what the scripture says.
They shall all, every one of them be taught of God. You want to be taught of God,
don't you? You don't want to hold something because somebody
else convinced you of it. God teaches you, nobody can unteach
you. You know it's true. I mentioned this in the first
hour when our Lord raised Lazarus from the dead and he was speaking
with Martha. and he told her that he was the
resurrection and the life. Martha, believest thou this?
Yea, Lord, I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God. I'm fully persuaded. No question
in my mind about it. No question in my heart about
it. I know that's who you are. when our Lord gave that man born
blind in John chapter nine, his sight. And the man found him
later in the temple after he had been, you remember these,
the one that the Pharisees interrogated. And he said, you know, I don't
know the answer to your questions. You've got theological questions
for me. You debate those things among yourself. All I know is
that once I was blind and now I see. Once I could not see myself
as a sinner, now I know I'm a sinner. Once I could not see that God
was absolutely sovereign, now I know He is. Once I could not
see that the Lord Jesus Christ was successful in actually redeeming
everyone He came into this world to save, now I know it's true.
I know it's true. Once I was blind, now I see.
And then the Lord finds this man. He still didn't know who
the Lord was. And the Lord said to him, dost thou believe on
the Son of God? And here's what that man said.
Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And the Lord said to him, thou
hast both seen him, and it is he that talketh with thee. And
the man who'd been given his sight said, Lord, I believe. And he worshiped him. He worshiped him. Are you fully persuaded that
Jesus Christ is the son of God? The successful prophesied Savior
of sinners. If you are persuaded, it's because God gave you that
persuasion. You know, sometimes you hear people say, well, what
is your religious persuasion? Christ is my persuasion. And
I'm fully persuaded that He is able. He's able. If he doesn't
save me, I won't be saved. I'm not persuaded of much else.
I look to my own life, I'm not persuaded of anything. But I'm persuaded of who he is.
God's taught me. Notice what Paul said in verse
29 of our text. Do you have your Bible still
open to Acts chapter 26? And Paul said, I would to God, I
wish, I pray that not only thou, but also all that hear me this
day, we're both almost and altogether such as I am. He didn't say to
Agrippa, you know, Agrippa, let's talk some more. I'll get you,
I'll bring you around. No, he said, I wish that you
were altogether, not partially, but altogether such as I am.
Now in the previous chapter, we will go back and read it.
You know, Paul's testimony, he gives it here for the third time
in scriptures. And, um, He says he was persecuting
the church. He was a blasphemer. He was going
to Damascus and got knocked down to the ground. And he saw a light
and heard a voice. And the Lord said, Saul, Saul,
why persecutest thou me? Who art thou, Lord? I am Jesus,
whom thou persecutest. When you touch my church, you
touch me. And he bowed before him. He was convinced. He was fully
persuaded. Now don't wait for an audible
voice from heaven. Ask God to speak to your heart. When God convinces you of who
Christ is and who you are and how it is that God's pleased
to save sinners, you'll be persuaded. Nothing or no one will be able
to change your mind and your heart on that, if God teaches
you. You don't need experience, you
don't need a feeling, you don't need a voice. The Spirit of God. Our Lord said,
Father, I thank thee that thou hast hid these things from the
wise and the prudent and revealed them unto babes. Lord, I'm just
a babe. I don't know anything. Lord,
you're gonna have to teach me. You're gonna have to convince
me. You're gonna have to persuade
me. Persuade me, Lord. Turn with me to Galatians chapter
one. Galatians chapter one. Now, the Apostle Paul in this
passage is defending himself as an apostle and as a penman
of Scripture. There is a difference between
inspiration and revelation. Inspiration is that which is
given by God to the writers of scripture. We talk about being
inspired, but when we're talking about revelation, when we're
talking about the truth of the gospel, there's a difference
between inspiration and revelation. Inspiration. God took holy men
and they spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. No man spoke
by private interpretation. That's what Paul's defending.
He said, God inspired me with the gospel and he taught it to
me. But the same principles of what Paul's saying here in relating
to him as a penman of scripture and as receiving the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit is also true for each of us when it relates
to revelation. That God opens the eyes of our
understanding, reveals the truth of the gospel to us. So as you
read Paul's words, Relate them to yourself in light of revelation. Look what he says in verse 10. For do I now persuade men or
God? Or do I seek to please men? For
if I yet please men, I should not be the servant of Christ.
For I certify you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached
of me is not after man. I didn't get it from a man. For
I neither received it of man, neither was I taught it, but
by the revelation of Jesus Christ. For you have heard of my conversation
in times past in the Jews' religion, how the beyond measure I persecuted
the church of God and wasted it. and profited in the Jews'
religion above my equals, in my own nation, being more exceedingly
zealous of the traditions of my fathers. But when it pleased
God, who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by
His grace to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among
the heathen, immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood, neither
went I up to Jerusalem, to them which were the apostles before
me, But I went to Arabia and returned again to Damascus. Then
after three years, I went to Jerusalem to see Peter and abode
with him 15 days. And the other apostles saw I
none, save James, the Lord's brother. Now the things which
I write unto you, behold, before God, I lie not." He's saying,
I got this straight from God. That's how you and I have to
get it. Now the Lord's gonna use the voice of a man. He didn't
do that for the inspiration that he gave to the Apostle Paul,
but he does that in Revelation. How can they call upon him in
whom they not believe and how they can believe on him in whom
they've not heard? And how can they hear without a preacher?
God used the foolishness of preaching to save them which had lucked.
But I want to make this absolutely clear. It's not my voice, not
any man's voice. It's the voice of God. God will
take the audible voice of a man, but he has to make it effectual
to the heart. That's what we pray for you. Isaiah chapter 54, verse 13,
all thy children shall be taught of the Lord and great shall be
the peace of thy children." If God persuades you, and you don't
say with a grip of, almost I'm persuaded. No, I'm fully persuaded. God's taught me. What I heard
that preacher say, I see it in the scriptures. I've searched
the scriptures. I've done like the Bereans. I've
nobly heard, and I've searched to see if these things were so,
and they're true. They're consistent with the word
of God, and God has taught me, and I'm fully persuaded, and
God's given me peace. So that if the whole world, if
that man I've been listening to turns against the gospel,
then it'll only be evident that he wasn't taught of God. That's
what it'll be evident of, that he was never taught of God. If
any man departs from the gospel, it's because he was never of
us. Had he been of us, he would have
remained with us. One who's taught of God will
never depart from the gospel. And if I've been taught of God,
if you've been taught of God, then you will understand and
say, you know what? The whole world turns against
it. God's taught me. God's taught me. Here I stand,
I can do no other. I've got no place else to go. When the Lord said he would make
a new covenant with Israel, he said, no longer will it be necessary
for a man to say to his neighbor or to his brother, you need to
know the Lord, you need to know the Lord. For they shall all
know me from the least of them even to the greatest. When God
births you into the family of God, you've been taught of God.
And you're just persuaded. I ask you again, what are you
persuaded of? I mean fully persuaded. We can't
be persuaded of anything in this world. We don't know what's going
to happen tomorrow. You don't know if the sun's going
to come up tomorrow. You don't know if you're going to be drawing breath
tomorrow. You don't know what's going to happen to the economy
or with war, if somebody's going to start pushing buttons. You
don't know. One thing I know. One thing I know. All that might
be up for grabs. The Lord Jesus Christ. He's the sovereign Son of God,
the successful Savior of sinners. And I'm hanging all the hopes
of my salvation on Him, on Him. I'm persuaded. 1 Corinthians 2, I has not seen,
nor has he or her, nor has it entered into the imagination
of man, the things that the Lord has prepared for them. But, God
hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit. By His Spirit. I've been taught of God. The
Spirit of God has persuaded me. It's convinced me. And no man know the things of
a man except the Spirit that's within a man, and so it is with
the Spirit of God. No man knows the things of God
except the Spirit of God. We've not received the spirit
of this world, but the spirit of God, that we may know what
has freely been given unto us. This gospel is a free gospel.
Can't buy it. Can't earn it. Can't pay for
it. Free. I'm persuaded of that. I'm persuaded
if God requires anything from me to be saved, I won't be saved.
I'm persuaded of that. The Lord put it like this in
1 John 2, verse 20. He says, but you have an unction
from the Holy One, and you know all things. You know these things.
You know these things are true. I love what Paul said in 1 Thessalonians
4, verse 9. He says, but as touching brotherly
love, you need not that I read unto you, for you yourselves
have been taught of God to love one another. to forgive one another, even
as Christ, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. You
know those things. You've been taught of God. Very quickly, you still have
your Bibles open to our text in Acts chapter 26. Go back with me to Acts chapter
25 and look with me at verse 19,
if you will. Now, this is Festus talking, I think, here to Felix,
and he says in verse 19, but had certain questions against
him of their own superstition and one Jesus, which was dead,
whom Paul affirmed to be alive. Now, the linchpin on this whole
chapter is the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. That was
the problem. He's saying the Jews have a problem
in that this Jesus who is dead, Paul says is alive. And they're
the ones that killed him. And for Paul to say that he's
alive is to say that he's the Christ. The resurrection of the
Lord Jesus Christ becomes the whole message here. Look at chapter
26 at verse six. And now I stand and am judged
for the hope of the promise made of God unto our fathers, unto
which promise are 12 tribes instantly serving God, day and night, hope
to come, for which hopes sake, King Agrippa, I am accused of
the Jews. Paul's saying to Agrippa now,
he said, the thing that I'm being accused of is my hope in the
resurrection. And yet I'm convinced that Christ
raised from the dead and that because of his resurrection,
I have hope in the resurrection. Look at verse 22 in that same
chapter of chapter 26 at verse 22. Having therefore obtained help
of God, I continue unto this day, witnessing both to small
and great, saying none other things than that which the prophets
and Moses did say should come, that Christ should suffer, and
that he should be the first that should raise from the dead and
shall show light unto the people and to the Gentiles. And Belish
said, he stood up and he hollered, he said, Paul, much learning
has made thee mad. Paul said, I'm not mad. I'm telling
you what the scriptures say. Nothing mad about me, nothing
crazy about me. Call me what you want. I believe
God. I believe God. Later on in the book of Acts,
Paul's gonna be on a ship that's sinking. And he says to the captain
of that ship, he said, he said, don't leave the ship. For I believe
the things that God has shown me. The Lord had told him that
they would all be saved. And I would think God's saying,
don't leave the ship. Everything that God said, here's
the evidence of faith. Faith is not believing that you're
saved. It's not believing that God's
gonna do something for you in the future. It's believing God.
It's believing all that he has said. When God speaks by his
word, you don't say with those who are like Agrippa, who are
not fully persuaded, well, yeah, but. You say, amen. Amen. That's my hope. Christ is raised from the dead.
He's the firstborn among many brethren. And because of his
resurrection, there's my hope. There's my hope. The resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ is God saying to his church, I'm satisfied
with what he did. He was successful in accomplishing
everything I sent him to do, the saving of his people. And
I'm raising him from the dead as the proof of that and the
evidence of that. You see, everybody that calls
themselves a Christian believes in the historical event of the
resurrection. You know, they all gather together
for Easter and they say to one another, he's alive and whatever
else they might do. But they're like the Israelites
who saw in the wilderness the acts of God. They saw what God
did. They couldn't avoid that. I mean,
they woke up every morning to man on the ground. They saw the
rock, the water coming out of the rock. They saw the mountain
quake. They saw the quail come. They
saw the fire, pillar of fire every night, pillar of cloud
by day, every day. They saw the acts of God. Moses knew his ways. Everybody believes in the resurrection
as an event. Nobody knows why. Nobody knows
why. Why was he raised from the dead? Because God was satisfied. I will not allow my holy one
to see corruption. I cannot leave him in the grave.
He has successfully redeemed everyone that he came to save.
And he is their life. If a man believes that there
are some for whom Christ died, that will end up in hell. And
that's most of Christian. God loves you, has a wonderful
plan for your life. Christ died for you. Won't you
let him have his way. If a man believes that Christ
died for some, and most of those people who say that also will
say that most of the people he died for end up in hell. If they
believe that, they don't believe in the resurrection. They're not fully persuaded that he accomplished what the
father sent him to do, namely the saving of his people. How
about you? Are you persuaded? The Lord Jesus
Christ was successful. Robert and I were talking during
a break and he reminded me of what the Lord said to his mother
at 12 years old. Did you not know that I must
be about my father's business? Must be about my father's business.
And then the very last thing he said, it is finished. Father into thy hands, I commend
my spirit. I'm commending my spirit unto
my father, having finished the work that he sent me to do, confident
that he's gonna fulfill his part of the covenant by raising me
from the dead and exalting me and giving me a name above every
name and sitting me on his right hand to rule and to reign over
the living and the dead. Agrippa said, I'm not persuaded. God's people say, I'm fully persuaded. Fully persuaded. Not that I'm a Christian. You know, that comes and goes,
doesn't it? Let's be honest with each other. That comes and goes. What a sweet time it is when
the Spirit of God comforts our hearts and causes us to know
and gives us assurance of our salvation and we're able to just
rest in glory in that. But even when we don't have those
times, we're still just as persuaded when we're doubting our own salvation
as we are when we're sure of it. Just as persuaded. I may not be saved. But I'm persuaded
that He's the Christ, the Son of the living God. If that's your testimony, that's the evidence. That's faith.
That's the evidence of work of grace in your heart. Almost a Christian? No. Fully
persuaded versus almost persuaded. That's the message. Our heavenly Father, thank you
for your word. Bless it to the hearts of your people for Christ's
sake. Amen. 224 on the heart, back to him
and let's stand together, 224. I know not why God's wondrous
grace to me he hath made known, nor why unworthy Christ did love,
redeem me for his own. But I know whom I have believed
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. I know not how this saving faith
to me he did impart, nor how believing in his word brought
peace within my heart. But I know whom I am believing
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. I know not how the Spirit moves,
convincing man of sin, revealing Jesus through the Word, creating
faith in Him. But I know whom I am believing,
And am persuaded that he is able To keep that which I committed
Unto him against that day. I know not what of good or ill
May be reserved for me, of weary ways or golden days before his
face I see. But I know whom I have believed
and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I've committed
unto him against that day. I know not when my Lord may come,
at night or doomsday fair, nor if I'll walk the vale with Him
or meet Him in the air. But I know whom I am believin'
And am persuaded that he is able To keep that which I've committed
Unto him against that