Good morning. For the call of
worship, let's look at Matthew 14, starting in verse 22. In straightway, Jesus constrained
his disciples to get into the ship. Constrained his disciples
to get in the ship. and to go before him unto the
other side while he sent the multitude away. And when he had
sent the multitude away, he went up into the mountain apart to
pray. And when the evening was come, he was there alone. But
the ship was now in the midst of the sea, tossed with waves,
for the wind was contrary. And in the fourth watch of the
night, Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea. And when
the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled,
saying, It is a spirit and they cried out for fear, but straightway
Jesus spake unto them saying, be of good cheer, it is I, be
not afraid. And Peter answered him and said,
Lord, if it be thou bid me come unto thee on the water. And he
said, come. And when Peter was come down
out of the ship, he walked on the water to go to Jesus. But
when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid and beginning to
sink. He cried, saying, Lord, save me. And immediately Jesus
stretched forth his hand and caught him and said unto him,
O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt? And when they
were coming to the ship, the wind ceased. Then they that were
in the ship came and worshiped him, saying, of a truth, thou
art the Son of God. If you would, by contrast, look
over at chapter 15, verse 8. Let's pray. Heavenly Father,
you and you alone are worthy to be praised. We ask, Lord,
that you would give us faith. to believe in the sacrifice that
was sufficient to meet all of our needs, that we can then worship. We ask, Lord, that you be with
the men that stand up before all your people that are in your
ship. Give them grace and strength
and peace and comfort that they might speak those same things
to our hearts. For these things we ask in Christ's
name, amen. Let's stand together again. We'll
sing hymn number two in your spiral hymn book, number two. Lord, we come before thee now. At thy feet we humbly bow. O do not our suit disdain. Shall we seek thee, Lord, in
vain? Lord, on Thee our souls depend,
In compassion now descend. Fill our hearts with Thy rich
praise, Tune our lips to sing Thy praise. In thine own appointed way, now
we seek thee here. Lord, we know not how to go till
a blessing Thou bestow. Send the message from Thy Word
that may joy and peace afford. Let thy spirit now impart Christ's
salvation to each heart. Please be seated. Caleb and Adam are gonna bring
special music. Complete in thee No work of mine
Could take, dear Lord the place of thine thy blood hath hardened
bought for me and i shall stand complete in thee yea justified
oh blessed and sanctified, salvation wrought. Thy blood hath pardon bought
for me and glorified. My God shall be complete in thee. ? No more shall sin be all I
do ? ? And am within thy grace hath set this prisoner free ?
? And I shall stand complete in thee ? ? Yea, justified ?
? Oh, blessed thought ? ? And sanctified ? ? Salvation wrought
? ? Thy blood hath pardoned ? ? Bought for me ? ? And glorified ? My
God shall be complete in thee, each need supplied and no good
thing to me denied. Since thou my portion, Lord,
wilt I need none else complete in
thee. Yea, justified, O blessed thought,
and sanctified, salvation wrought. Thy blood hath pardoned, bought
for me, And glorified my God shall be. Dear Savior, when before
Thy bar All tribes and tongues Assembled are Among thy chosen
Will I be At thy right hand Complete in thee Yea, justified O blessed
thought and sanctified. Salvation, Lord, thy blood hath
pardoned but for me, and glorified my God shall be. Colossians 2.9 says, For in him, the Lord Jesus Christ
dwelleth, the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and you are complete
in him. Thank you, Adam. Thank you, Caleb.
To be found complete. God will settle for nothing less.
He requires nothing more than what the Lord Jesus has provided.
Let's open our Bibles together again to Judges chapter seven.
Judges chapter seven. Salvation truly is of the Lord. As Job said, every aspect of
our salvation is of him. He of his own will and purpose,
before the foundation of the world, chose a particular people
in Christ. The Lord Jesus Christ came and
successfully redeemed those whom the Father had chosen. The Holy
Spirit now is taking the word of God, the message of Christ,
the gospel, and he's making it effectual to the hearts of God's
people. He's calling them out of darkness into his marvelous
light. Our hope this morning is that he'll do that again for
us. We saw in the first hour that this story, this historical
narrative that were given by the Holy Spirit in Judges chapter
seven, is a parable. As are many of the battles that
the children of Israel engaged in, they picture the battle of
all battles, that battle that the Lord Jesus Christ fought
for God's elect, in securing their salvation on Calvary's
cross. And we see that in David and
Goliath, don't we? When David, as the representative
of Israel, stood against that great giant of sin and defeated
him for the victory of God's people. We see it when Moses
was in Joshua, we're fighting against the Amalekites. And Aaron
and Ur, you remember, were lifting up the arms of the law. As long
as the law was upheld, Joshua got the victory. But when the
law started to become weak and become the focus and the victory,
the tide changed. These are all gospel pictures.
These stories are not given to us. We're not here to study these
narratives just for the historical value of information. That would
be of no profit to our souls. There'd be no profit to our souls
unless these things point us to Christ. We find him to be
our all in all. We find him to be the reason
behind these stories. Gideon is going against the Amalekites,
the Midianites, and he's the commander. And God has assured
him that he cannot fail. And he represents in this story
the success of the Lord Jesus Christ, whom God has made to
be our commander and whom we follow. The strategy was very
simple. The men were to stand still.
They weren't to do anything. God was going to get the victory
and he was going to get the glory. And so it is in the salvation
of our souls and the forgiveness of our sin, we stand still and
God gets the victory and he gets all the glory. The battle's not
yours. It's the Lord is not by might or by power, but by my
spirit, saith the Lord. The weapons that are being used
is the heralding the call, the effectual call of the gospel
to the hearts of God's people seemed in that trumpet. That
trumpet was a symbol that was used to call the children of
Israel together for worship. It was to be used for the beginning
of the warfare and each sound of the trumpet had a particular
meaning and so the children of Israel understood what those
meanings were and what they were to do. The trumpet was blown
particularly on the the Day of Atonement, and it was to symbolize
the sacrifice of Christ in atoning for the sins of his people. And
it was blown on the year of Jubilee, saying to all of God's people,
your debt's been paid. All those who are slaves to sin
have been set free. And that which was lost by our
father Adam in the garden has now been restored. What a glorious
year that was, the year of Jubilee. And it is the year that the Lord
came. And he came in order to fulfill
everything that was symbolic. In that Old Testament picture
of the year of Jubilee, he came to set the prisoner free, came
to establish that which our father Adam lost in terms of his relationship
with God. And he came to pay our debt,
which we're not able to pay. The other weapon that was used
was that light that was inside the clay pot. Those of you that
weren't here the first hour, let's read this together. Judges
chapter seven, we'll begin reading at verse 17. And he said unto
them, look on me and do likewise. And behold, when I come to the
outside of the camp, it shall be that as I do, so shall you
do. That's what we're doing right
now. As the Lord did, we're trying
to herald a certain sound from the trumpet of the gospel. And
we're holding forth the light. When I blow the trumpet, I and
all that are with me, then blow you the trumpet also on every
side of all the camp and say the sword of the Lord and of
Gideon. So Gideon and the hundred men that were with him came unto
the outside of the camp in the beginning of the middle watch.
And they had newly set the watch and they blew the trumpet and
break the pitchers that were in their hands. And the three
companies blew their trumpets and break the pitchers and held
the lamps that were in their left hand and the trumpet in
their right hand to blow with all. And they cried the sword
of the Lord and of Gideon. And they stood every man in his
place round about the camp. And all the hosts ran and cried
and fled. And the enemy was defeated by
this strategy that God had employed for the purpose of teaching me
and you what the Lord does now to defeat our enemy, the enemy
of our sin, Satan, death, and hell. Those are our real enemies. The enemy of our own flesh and
our own unbelief. Those are our real enemies. This
is the battle of all battles. This is what has to be fought
and won. And if it is to be, the Lord's
going to use a strategy that will require us to stand still
and give him the glory and the praise for having gotten the
victory by himself. Turn with me to Psalm 31. Psalm
31. the clay pot. We'll begin reading at verse
nine. If my heart, um, I'm sorry, I'm in the wrong book. I thought that's not what I wanted
to read. Forgive me. Psalm 31. We'll begin reading
at verse 9. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for
I am in trouble. My eye is consumed with grief. Yea, my soul and my belly, for
my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing. My
strength faileth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed. I was reproached among all mine
enemies, but especially among my neighbors, and a fear to mine
acquaintances. They that did see me without
fled from me. I am forgotten as a dead man
out of mind. I am like a broken vessel." These Psalms, first and foremost,
are the words of the Lord Jesus Christ. They're spoken prophetically
of what the Lord would suffer when he came into this world
and bore the sins of his people, suffered the wrath of God. He
said, I'm broken. Look at verse 13, like a broken
vessel. For I have heard the slander
of many. Fear was on every side while
they took counsel together against me. They devised to take away
my life, but I trusted in thee, O Lord. I said, thou art my God. My times are in thine hand. Deliver
me from the hand of my enemies and from them that persecute
me." When our Lord celebrated the Last Supper before he went
to the cross, he said of the bread, that unleavened bread,
he said, this is my body, which is broken for you. As often as
you do this, do it in remembrance of me. That's what happened on
Calvary's cross. The scripture says that God,
Christ bore in his body our sins upon that tree. And it was broken
by the justice and judgment and wrath of God. He suffered and
he died. His body was frail. It was dependent. It was weak. It amazes me that
his own half-siblings did not know that God was living in their
home. Can you imagine? You wake up
with your elder brother being the son of God and you don't
know it? Nothing's really changed. Nothing's really changed. People
say, well, I want people to see Jesus in me. They didn't see
Jesus in Jesus. They did not. His own siblings
didn't know who he was. And you and I will not know who
he is unless he reveals himself. Now that's just, that's just
how depraved we are. That's how blind we are. That's
how spiritually dead we are. That's how spiritually dead his
brothers and sisters were. They didn't know. The perfect Lamb of God, God
incarnate, the Word made flesh, was living right there, and they
didn't know it. No, His body was broken. That's
what this clay pot's a symbol of. The light of the gospel could
not shine until His body was sacrificed on Calvary's cross,
and it suffered all the pain and all the suffering in His
physical body. But the real suffering that he
suffered was the cup of sin that he drank from. That was the real
agony. And you and I, we've all experienced
some level of pain, and we can only imagine what pain crucifixion
would be, but we can't even begin to imagine. what the Lord Jesus suffered
when he said, Father, if there be any way this cup can pass
from me, nevertheless, let it not my will, but thine be done.
When he cried, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? We
don't even begin to understand what that means. The separation
that Jesus Christ suffered from his father, because when God
saw him, he saw sin. The sky was... When did this
battle take place? At the beginning of the middle
watch. That's midnight. It happened
in the middle of the night. And that's what happened when
the Lord Jesus Christ fought for God's elect and put away
their sins. The sky was blackened. Even the
Roman soldier said, surely this is the son of God. The earth
shook. God forsook his only son. For
three hours from noon until three o'clock, the time of the evening
sacrifice, three o'clock in the afternoon, when the priest would
have been making the evening sacrifice, the Lord Jesus Christ
bowed his mighty head and said, it is finished. All that God
requires for sinners to stand complete in the presence of God
was accomplished by Christ on Calvary's cross. It happened
at night. It still happens at night. Nicodemus,
the scripture says, came to the Lord Jesus Christ at night. He was a master of Israel. I
was telling some men recently, I met a man in seminary. He was
a Jewish man. He had the entire Old Testament
committed to memory in Hebrew. And he didn't know Christ. Nicodemus
would have been like that. Much, if not all of the Old Testament
would have been committed to memory by Nicodemus in Hebrew. And he didn't know that he was
standing in the presence of God. And the Lord had to say to him,
Nicodemus, except you be born of the spirit, except you be
born again, you cannot see the kingdom of God. It came to him
at night. And that's how you and I come.
We come like blind Bartimaeus. And the Lord says, what would
you have me to do for you? And what did Bartimaeus say?
Oh Lord, that I might see. The darkness of my sin and my
unbelief has hid me, has hid God from me. And not only has
it taken away, as I said in the previous hour, not only does
darkness hide the truth, but darkness also creates a lot of
things that aren't there. In the imagination of man, he
will create things about God that aren't true. Lord, deliver
me from the kingdom of darkness and translate me into the kingdom
of thy light. That's when this battle took
place. And it still takes place at night. Still takes place at
night. Do you remember the story of
the 10 virgins? Five of them had oil in their
lamp and five of them did not. And they were waiting for the
bridegroom. And when did he come? The beginning of the middle watch
is midnight. And in Matthew chapter 24, I
think it's 24, the scripture says that the bridegroom came
at midnight. When men say, peace and safety,
then the end shall come. See, the Lord's gonna come when
men least expect it. That's why he said, be sober
Be ready. Walk in the light as he is in
the light. We have fellowship one with the
other. And the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ shall cleanse us
of all of our sin. Light and darkness have to do
with truth and error. It has to do with salvation and
being lost. Men get lost in the dark. The
sun comes up. Oh, now we see our way, don't
we? Now we see. Lord, shine the light of the
gospel in the face of the Lord Jesus Christ in my heart. This
battle takes place at night. And those of us that have been
given some light realize by experience how dim
that light can be. How that wick That flax wick
that Isaiah talks about. He said he will not snuff it
out, but how the wick of the candle can become just an ember,
just a little tiny light. And we're in need of the Lord
to give more light and to blow the wind of his spirit on that
wick and to fill the lamp with oil and to bring the light back. Lord, if you don't give me light,
I'll lose the light that I have. You feel that way, child of God?
You feel that way? I know you do. You feel like
you're in danger of losing the light that you have. And so you're
always crying, Lord, you've got to win this battle in the night.
Lord, I'll be left in the night if you don't give me light. If
you don't cause me to see like you did for blind Bartimaeus, Those Pharisees, what do they
say to the Lord? Are you saying that we're blind?
We know the Bible. The Lord said, if you were blind,
then you could see. But because you say that you
can see, therefore your sins remain. A child of God, you're
always on the verge of being blind, aren't you? Always in
need, that's why you're here. You're here in hopes that the
light will shine a little brighter, that the Lord will blow on that
wick and put some more oil on the lamp. That's just what we
are by nature. We're forever dependent upon
Him. He continues to win this battle. This battle, yes, was fought
2,000 years ago, and it's fought right now, right now for the
child of God. Clay pot. has to be broken. And not only is that the breaking
of the Lord's body on Calvary's cross, but it's the breaking
of our self-righteousness. It's the breaking of our independence. We have this treasure in an earthen
vessel that the glory might be of God and not of us. The gospel
God pours into a clay pot, and unless that clay pot is broken,
A broken spirit and a contrite heart. Thou will not despise. Isn't that what David said in
Psalm 51? He said, Lord, if sacrifices
is what you wanted, I would make them. David had the ability to
make as many or more sacrifices than anyone. But the sacrifices
of God are a broken spirit and contrite heart. That he will
not despise. Why will he not despise it? Because
it's he that does it. It's him that breaks our hearts
and causes us to be broken over our sin and to be, Lord, I'm
just an earthen vessel, just an earthen vessel. The glory
is of God, not of us. We have no ability, we have no
strength, we have no faith. We depend upon him for all of
it. Luke chapter 20, here's what
the Lord said. Whosoever shall fall upon this
rock shall be broken. Now that rock is the Lord Jesus
Christ. You fall on him and you'll be broken of yourself. And then
the Lord went on to say, however, whosoever this rock shall fall
on shall be crushed to powder. That's what he said. You see,
all men are gonna find themselves falling on Christ or Christ falling
on them. And then they cried. That's what
we're doing. We're blowing the trumpet and
we're crying. The sword of the Lord and of
Gideon. Now you know what the sword is.
The sword of the spirit is the word of God. We're just comparing
scripture to scripture, the spiritual to the spiritual to uphold Christ. We're giving the meaning of the
Bible. Someone said, well, that's your
interpretation. Yes, it is. Yes, it is. But I believe it's
consistent with all the interpretation of the Bible. I would say to you, don't take
my word for it. You search the scriptures and you see if the
things that we say is not true. Everybody's got an interpretation. It's going to be man's interpretation
or it's going to be God's interpretation. But that's what we're doing.
We're giving the meaning of the Bible. Is this what God says?
Is this what he says? then we're crying the sword of
the spirit. What does God say? That's what
Paul said that in the book of Romans. When there was controversy
over works and grace, he said, what sayeth the scriptures? Settles all controversy. For
the child of God, it's the only thing that matters. We don't
use reason. We don't use logic. We don't use confessions or the
opinions of men. We go straight to the source
of God's word. We say the sword of the Lord
and of Gideon, the servant of God, who's wielding that sword.
But they didn't have a sword. All they have was a trumpet,
a clay pot, and a torch. They didn't have any swords.
The Midianites, the 100,000 Midianites, all of them had swords. 300 men
of Gideon, no swords. They had the sword. I love that
story when David is running from Saul and David says to Ahithophel,
the priest, he said, we had to leave in haste and we didn't
bring our weapons with us. He lied to him. He said, you
got any swords or spears here? And Ithbel said, well, got one. You remember that giant that
you slew in the Valley of Elah? He said, I've got his sword.
It's wrapped in a cloth, hid behind the ephod. And David said,
give it to me. There's none like that. There's
none like that sword. You see the sword of the spirit,
which is the word of God is hidden to the natural man. It's covered
in a cloth and it's hid behind the ephod. The ephod is what
the priest wore. It's a picture of the Lord Jesus
Christ as our high priest interceding on our behalf. And we can't understand
the word of God until the Lord shows us who he is and what he's
done. And then all of scripture fits
together in revealing his glory. Give it to me. There's none like
that. There's none like that. Can you say that with me this
morning? Oh, give me that sword. Lord, reveal the scriptures to
me. Show me who Christ is and what
he has done. This sword of the Spirit, it
is the word of God. Those disciples, three days after
the crucifixion, who were going home to Emmaus, They had been
with the Lord Jesus on many, many occasions. And they're walking
along thinking that all is lost. And the Lord himself, after the
resurrection, comes along beside them and starts walking with
them. And the scripture says, their eyes were holden. They
did not see him for who he was. We don't understand the word
of God until we see Christ. And, And he asked him, what's
wrong with you guys? Why are you so depressed? He
said, have you not heard? They said, have you not heard?
Jesus of Nazareth, who we thought was the prophet of God. We thought
that he was the Messiah. He's been crucified. He's dead. And beginning with Moses and
the Psalms and the prophets, he expounded unto them those
things concerning himself. And he said to them, these things
must take place. Did the scriptures not say it?
He shows them from the very word of God, how it was necessary
for Christ to die. And they get to Emmaus, they
still don't know who he is. And they beg him to stay with
them. There's a work of grace. Lord, come to my home. Stay with
me. Lord, break bread with me. And
the scripture says, he went in and in the breaking of bread,
their eyes were opened and they saw him for who he was. That's
what we're doing in the breaking of the bread of life. We're praying
that our eyes will be opened and we'll see Christ for who
he is and what he's done in defeating the enemy in a battle that was
fought at night with clay pots, a trumpet, and
a cry. Sword of the Lord and of Gideon. The Lord Jesus Christ, every
time the scripture says that his His lips were pure, perfect. Every time he opened his mouth,
he could do nothing but speak the word of God, because he is
the word of God. And when the Pharisees sent the
police to go arrest him, they came back and they said, where
is it? Well, the police, the official
police said to the Pharisees, never a man speak like that man.
We had no power over him. And when those Roman soldiers
came to arrest him at the garden of Gethsemane, and he asked him,
he said, who do you seek? Jesus of Nazareth, I am. And those stalwart Roman soldiers
fell over backwards at the word of God. And that's exactly what
happens today. Those who walk in their own strength
and in their own power become broken vessels. The light shines
forth. We see Christ for who he is.
This is the battle that's still being fought for the souls of
God's elect. James put it like this, of his
own will, begat he us with the word of truth. There's no salvation
apart from the preaching of the gospel. And there's no preaching
of the gospel apart from the word of God. Peter put it like
this. And this is, this is the word of God, which by the gospel
is preached unto you. If Christ is not being preached,
the word of God is not being preached. Now there are plenty
of fundamentalists, conservative religious fundamentalists that
will stand and die. This being the word of God, and
they're not preaching Christ. Preaching the Bible is a history
book or book of theology or rules and regulations and how to make
your life happier and better. And we're preaching Christ because
we know that this is a matter of life and death. My real need
doesn't have anything to do with my temporal needs. My real need
is spiritual. My real need is to know God and
to have my sins forgiven. I've got to have this commander engage the strategy of me standing
still and giving me ears to hear the trumpet and the cry and the
eyes to see the light. He's got to break this broken,
this vessel of clay. This is my need. This is your
need. Let men play church, let them
be religious, let them try to reform their lives. We need to
be saved. And faith comes by hearing and
hearing comes by the word of God. We have no other book, but
this book. Someone wrote me a question recently
and they're probably listening. They live in another part of
the country and they asked me for some extra biblical literature
that might help them on a particular subject. And this person knows
me and they listen and they know our church. And as soon as she
asked me the question, she said, I know you're probably just going
to say we've got the Bible. And I said, well, yeah, that's
pretty much what I was going to say. You know, it's amazing
to me that people who say they believe the Bible is the word
of God, they'll even declare sola scriptura, only the Bible. And then they'll write a confession
in creeds and they'll test the Bible by their confessions and
creeds. Let's just test the Bible by
the Bible. The Bible interprets itself.
It interprets itself. You say, well, there's a lot
of obscure things in the Bible. Yes, there are. And the things
that are clear define the things that are not. The Bible is a double edged sword.
It kills, it makes alive, it wounds, it heals, it convicts
and it converts. causes us to mourn and rejoice
at the same time. It causes us to lose everything
and gain all. It's a paradox, isn't it? We're
not talking about the Bible, we're talking about the gospel.
This is God's word. Makes us poor and rich at the
same time. We have nothing and we have everything
at the same time. were vile sinners and were sanctified
saints at the same time, the same time. This is what the natural
man cannot understand. This is the battle that our Lord
is telling us about in this passage in Judges chapter
seven. I want you to notice a couple
more things from our text. If you'll turn back with me to
Judges 7. Notice in verse 17, and he said
unto them, look on me and do likewise and behold, when I come
to the outside of the camp. Notice in verse 19, so Gideon
and the hundred men that were with him came unto the outside
of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch at midnight. This battle took place outside
the camp. In Leviticus chapter 16, when
God's given to the children of Israel, the detailed instructions
on the day of atonement. This is when all the sins of
God's people are atoned for by a blood sacrifice. The high priest
is to take that blood and go into the holies of holies and
put it on the mercy seat. And the Lord is very clear. He
said, you take the skin and the flesh and the dung of that animal
and you take it outside the camp and you burn it. Why did God give them that instruction? Well, it's interpreted in Hebrews
chapter 13. Turn with me there. Turn with
me there. Hebrews chapter 13. Brethren, this battle takes place
outside the camp. Hebrews chapter 13. beginning of verse 9, be not
carried away with divers and strange doctrines. For it is
a good thing that the heart be established with grace and not
with meats which have not profited them that have been occupied
therein. Now meat, it's a picture of works. It's the sacrifices
that men make. It was the, those sacrifices
that the priest in the Old Testament made, those blood sacrifices
never put away sin. They pointed to the Lamb of God,
the sacrifice that would be successful in putting away sin. And so when
they made those sacrifices, they made them in faith, looking ahead
to what they, to what they pictured and what they represented. And
so the Lord's telling us here in Hebrews chapter 13, He's saying, those meats that were sacrificed
never profited them. We have an altar. We don't manufacture
an altar. We don't have a kneeling bench
where people come forward and pray to a priest. We don't make
a sacrifice in an altar. We have an altar. And speaking
of Christ, he is our altar. He's the one on which the sacrifice
was made and he is the sacrifice. Look at what he says. We have
an altar where they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle. Those that are looking to the
sacrifices that they're making have no right to this altar. This altar can only be approached
in faith. For the bodies of those beasts
whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest
for sin are burned without the camp. That's what I was telling
about Leviticus 16. So now the Lord's interpreting
Leviticus 16 for us. Wherefore Jesus also that he
might sanctify the people with his own blood suffered without
the gate. While the priest was making his
sacrifice in the evening sacrifice exactly at three o'clock on Passover,
the Lord Jesus Christ outside the tabernacle on Calvary's Hill,
suspended between heaven and earth, made himself a sacrifice
for sin outside the camp. Verse 13, let us therefore go
forth unto him without the camp bearing his reproach. If we're gonna follow Christ,
we have to forsake all the works religions of this world. All
the works religions of our own imagination. of our own unbelief,
we have to forsake it all. Let us therefore come outside
the camp. Well, I can't, I can't forsake
my religious past. Well, the sacrifices that you're
making will be of no profit to you. All worship all over the
world, is centered around sacrifice. I mentioned Wednesday night.
We've been down to Mexico a few times to visit our friends and
missionaries and preach in the churches down there, and they
have these old ancient ruins where they have temples, and
they showed us these wells. Forgot what you call them now.
Cenote. And they found out that these
Mayan Indians would take their children and cast them into the
cenotes as a sacrifice to their God, or carry them up to the
top of the temple and offer them up as a blood sacrifice to their
God. And that's exactly what the Lord
told Abraham to do in Genesis chapter 22. All worship involves
a sacrifice. What is the ultimate sacrifice
that a man can make? A man can make the sacrifice
of his child. Those pagan, ancient Mayan Indians
had a better understanding of God than modern day Americans
have. Modern day Americans think they
can appease the wrath of God with their prayers or with their
works. Those Mayan Indians understood
that if God's going to be appeased, he's going to require the ultimate
sacrifice. But they erred in thinking that
it was their child that was going to satisfy God's justice. Yes, the ultimate sacrifice is
the sacrifice of a child. And it is the son of God that
he sacrificed for the sins of God's people. This battle was fought outside
the camp Outside the camp of religion, God will bring you to forsake
all of your works religions. He brings you to Christ. And
Christ will be all, gonna be in all. And you'll have hope
and liberty and freedom knowing that God is pleased with Christ
and pleased with you. The Lord said, come ye out from
among them and be ye separate, saith the Lord. Now in works
religion, we used to think that meant, you know, don't go to
the bars and don't do this and don't do that and don't do the
things that worldly people do. Come out from among them and
be separate. No, he's talking about coming out outside the
camp. He's talking about forsaking
that temple worship. of sacrificing meats and works,
come outside the camp. That's what that, let us go forth
therefore unto him without the camp bearing his reproach. Men will not bear the reproach
of Christ. They love the praise of men more than the praise of
God. And they will, they will forsake Well, here's what Joe
put it like this. He said, they that observe lying
vanities forsake their own mercy. They forsake their own mercy.
Men will forsake their own mercy and the salvation of their own
souls. And they will spend eternity in a devil's hell rather than
come outside the camp. I've watched people do it. I've watched people lying on
their deathbed, holding on to their idols and refusing to believe
on Christ, insisting that these things will be sufficient to
save them. It happened at midnight and it
happened outside the camp. You know, the battle fought and
won for the souls of God's elect was really fought in the middle
of the night when our Lord went to Gethsemane
and fell before his father. That's when his passion began. It culminated when he bowed his
mighty head and said, it is finished. Father into thy hands, I commend
my spirit. But it was settled in Gethsemane.
When he sweat drops of blood and he cried out to his father,
father, if there be any way this cup can pass from me, let it
be nevertheless not my will, but thine be done. He prayed that three times. He
came back to his disciples and said, sleep on, sleep on, my
time has come. It's settled. It's settled. The battle was fought at night. Torches and cries and trumpets,
men standing still. And it happened outside the camp. And so it is for the salvation
of our souls. And the person who fulfilled
that parable, that type, that picture, that foreshadowing,
the salvation of God's people. What a Savior. What a hope. Our merciful Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We
pray that it would be a certain sound that would call us from
our sin to Christ, Lord, that you would unwrap that sword,
take it from behind the ephod, that you would pierce our hearts,
break these clay vessels, reveal to us the glory of thy dear son.
For it's in his name we pray, amen. Number 30 in the spiral hymnal,
let's stand together. so