Let's open tonight's service
with hymn number 62 and your hardbacked hymnal, number 62.
Let's all stand together. ? Crown Him with many crowns ?
? The Lamb upon His throne ? ? Hark how the heavenly anthem drowns
? ? All music but its own ? ? Awake, my soul, and sing ? of Him who
died for thee, and hail Him as thy matchless King through all
eternity. ? Crown him the Lord of love ?
? Behold his hands and side ? ? Rich wounds yet visible above ? ?
In beauty glorified ? ? No angel in the sky ? Can fully bear that
sight But downward bends his wandering eye At mysteries so
bright ? Crown him the Lord of life ? ? Who triumphed o'er the
grave ? ? Who rose victorious to the strife ? ? For those he
came to save ? ? His glories now we sing ? ? Who died and
rose anew ? I who died eternal life to bring and lives that
death may die. Crown him the Lord of heaven,
one with the Father known, one with the Spirit through him given
from yonder glorious throne. ? To thee be endless praise ?
For thou for us hast died ? Be thou, O Lord, through endless
days ? Adored and magnified Please be seated. Good evening. We're gonna be
reading from Colossians chapter one. If you'd like to open your
Bibles with me to that part of scripture. Colossians chapter one. Where'd Pam and Brad go? There
they are. Welcome. Good to have y'all with us today,
tonight. Caleb is going back up to Pennsylvania
this weekend to preach for the brethren up there. So I want
to pray for him and safe travels and the Lord will bless his gospel
there among the brethren. Happy birthday, Caleb. All right,
you have your Bibles open in Colossians chapter one. We'll
begin reading at verse 12, giving thanks unto the Father, which
hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints
in light. He qualified us. That's what
that word meet means. He qualified us. By putting us
in Christ, we have the right to stand in the presence of God,
who have delivered us from the power of darkness and have translated
us into the kingdom of his dear son, in whom we have redemption
through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of
the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. For by him
were all things created, that are in heaven, that are in earth,
visible, invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions or principalities
or powers or things that were created, all things were created
by him and for him. And he is before all things.
And by him, all things consist. And he is the head of the body,
the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead,
that in all things he might have the preeminence. For it pleased
the Father that in him should all fullness dwell. And having
made peace through the blood of his cross by him to reconcile
all things unto himself, by him I say whether there be things
in the earth or things in heaven. And you that were sometime alienated
and enemies in your mind by wicked words, yet now hath he reconciled
in the body of his flesh through death to present you holy, unblameable,
and unreprovable in his sight, if you continue in the faith,
grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope
of the gospel, which you have heard, and which was preached
to every creature which is under heaven. Wherefore, whereof I,
Paul, am a minister." Let's pray together. our glorious and merciful Heavenly
Father. We are thankful that you have
stooped so low to give us a revelation of yourself in the person of
thy dear Son. Lord, we thank you for your word.
We thank you for your Holy Spirit. We pray that you would enable
us to to speak and that you would cause us to hear. And that Christ
this evening would have the preeminence in our hearts, that we truly
would, as we just sang, crown him Lord of all. Lord, we know
that he is crowned and that you have made him to be Lord over
the living and over the dead. Lord, might we rejoice in spirit
that Christ reigns as Lord over all. We pray for Caleb, and we ask,
Lord, that you would continue to speak to his heart as he prepares
to preach to your people in Pennsylvania, and pray for the brethren there,
Lord, that you would prepare their hearts to hear your word
and that you would be glorified and honored in it all. For we
ask it in Christ's name, amen. Let's stand together once again.
We'll sing hymn number eight from your Spiral Gospel Hymns
handbook. Number eight. ? O Lord, our hearts and souls
aspire ? To lift up from this earthly mire ? O may we think
of heavenly things ? And know the joy thy presence brings ?
Lord, let us see the Savior's face ? ? And let us taste of
thy sweet grace ? ? May open ears thy glories hear ? ? And
may we smell thy fragrance near ? ? Be pleased to open heaven's
door ? And on our heads thy blessings pour ? All wretched, poor, and
needy wee ? Where can we go if not to thee ? O may this day
be blessed the most ? ? That Jesus Christ becomes the host
? ? To feed our souls with living bread ? ? And with our souls
in joy to wed ? Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles together
to Acts chapter 20. Acts chapter 20. I've titled this message, The
Church's Testimony. The Church's Testimony. And we'll
begin reading at verse 17. And from Miletus, he sent to
Ephesus and called the elders of the church. Now, Paul had
already been run out of Ephesus and To avoid any more conflict
there, he went to a city called Miletus, which is about 35 miles
south of Ephesus, and called the elders to come from the various
churches that were between Miletus and Ephesus to come meet with
him. And the rest of this chapter is Paul meeting with those elders
of these various churches. And when they were come to him,
he said unto them, you know, from the first day that I came
into Asia, after what manner I have been with you at all seasons,
serving the Lord with all humility of mind and with many tears and
temptations which befell me by the lying in wait of the Jews,
and how I kept back nothing that was profitable unto you, but
have showed you and have taught you publicly and from house to
house. Testifying. Here's the testimony of the church.
Testified both to the Jews and also to the Greeks. Here it is. Repentance towards God and faith
towards our Lord Jesus Christ. That's the church's testimony.
We are testifying. We are declaring what the scriptures
say about repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus
Christ. And now behold, I go bound in
spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the things that shall befall
me there, save that the Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city,
saying that bonds and afflictions abide me." So the Lord's been
showing him. He's not avoiding personal persecution
by not going to Ephesus. He's just letting the people,
the believers there have some peace without him. And the gospel
has had free course in Ephesus because he knows now he's going
to Jerusalem and he's going to be arrested. And, uh, and that
great trials and afflictions wait him there. Verse 24, but
none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear
unto myself so that I might finish my course with joy and the ministry
which I have received of the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel
of the grace of God. Here's his testimony. Testify
where the testimony of the church is repentance towards God and
faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ. And it is the testimony
of the gospel of the grace of God. And now behold, I know that you
all among whom I have gone preaching the king, I have gone preaching
the kingdom of God shall see my face no more. This must have
been a very sad departure. for the apostle and for these
believers. Wherefore, I take you to record
this day that I am pure from the blood of all men, for I have
not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. The church's testimony. This
past Sunday, I made reference to Matthew chapter five, beginning
of the Sermon on the Mount, where the Lord said that you are the
light of the world. And a city is to be put on a
hill that all men might see, and a candle is not to be put
under a bushel, it's to be set up on a candlestick. And the
Lord said, let your light so shine before men that they may
see your good works and glorify your Father which is in heaven. Now, I want to be an example
of the gospel. I don't want to be a reproach
to the gospel. Every believer could agree with
that. Every believer would say, you know, I want to be zealous
for good works. I want to be kind and loving
and forgiving. Truth is that there's a lot of
people in this world that are that way that aren't believers.
A lot of kind people that are sacrificial. caring, that do
lots of good things and other people appreciate it and recognize
them for it? Is that the testimony of the
church that we go out into the world and that we live our lives
in such a way that other people see Christ in us and have an
interest in the gospel as a result of that? They didn't see Christ
in Christ. And chances are they're not going
to see him in you either. Yeah, don't be a reproach to
the gospel. Live your life in such a way
as to be a good example to your children and people around you. Unless a person comes and hears
the gospel preached, they're not going to believe the gospel
because of the way you live your life. Well, the Lord said, let
your light so shine among men that they might see your good
works and glorify your father, which is in heaven. Who is it
that's going to glorify God based on the light that shines from
your life? Only believers are going to glorify God. This light
that we shine is among, we saw that in the upper room of the
third floor Sunday when Eutychus fell and the Bible said the room
was filled with lights. There they are, the children
of God with their little light shining among men, and we're
encouraged when we fellowship and testify and preach and worship
with one another. This is our testimony right now,
and we are encouraging one another in that regard. But the testimony
of the church is the message of the gospel. I can remember
in religion where men, we would use testimony time in order to
get attention to ourselves is really what we're doing. And
we would veil it with a little piety, act as if it was all about
God, but really it was an opportunity to talk about yourself and what
you had done and where you had been and how you were living
your life now and what you were doing and not doing anymore.
And that was called the testimony. Testimony was all focused on
the lives of individuals and how much better off they were
now than they were before. That's not what this passage
is telling us the testimony of the church is. We would tell people about how we'd
accepted Jesus and made him Lord of our life. And that was our
testimony and how much better our lives were now and how much
better we live now than we did before. Here's the testimony,
the testimony of the church. And this word testimony is the
same word from which we get our word martyr. In the original
language, it's the word, it's the word marteo. It means to
lay your life down for this message. You know, the truth is that many
of those people that were giving testimonies back in religion
don't have those testimonies anymore. They've gone back to
those things which they missed. They've reverted back. This is a testimony of the gospel. This is what every church, every
gospel church lays its life down for. repentance toward God, and
faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what we're testifying
to. And we've put everything on the line for it. And there's
no witness protection program in the gospel, is there? You
stand as a faithful witness and you're not going to have someone
to hide you out so that you suffer no consequences for that. If
you testify faithfully, if a church testifies faithfully, or a believer
or a pastor testifies faithfully, repentance towards God and faith
toward the Lord Jesus Christ. And the gospel of God is all
of grace. That was the testimony. There's
going to be consequences for that. And yet we do it because
the Lord has burdened our hearts with that message. Ezekiel said,
I was going to, I wasn't going to say anything, but it was like
a fire in my bones. I had to speak. I had to speak. And if it costs me my life, it's
okay, because this is the truth. This is the testimony of the
church. This is the message of the gospel
that all men must hear. Think about that word toward,
repentance toward God and faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ.
Think about that word toward as an arrow. And it's a sign, it's God's signpost
pointing us to heaven. Repentance toward God and faith
toward the Lord Jesus Christ. And the gospel of God is all
of grace. And it's the only way that he
and you will get there. Paul was a faithful witness. He, remember he, the Lord told
Ananias, he said, you go ahead and go to Paul, go to Saul of
Tarsus, for I'm gonna show him what great things he must suffer
for my name's sake. And so here we go back to the
word martyr, where if we're faithful to this testimony, to this witness,
it's gonna cost you your life. Everything's on the line for
this. Nothing will be given or will be compromised or changed
in this testimony for a faithful church and for a believer. Somebody from Canada actually
wrote me a letter recently about the parable of the talents. You remember the one servant
was given 10 talents, and the other one five, and the other
one one. And he said, what does this mean? It sounds like a works
gospel. It sounds like this was an unfaithful
Christian who didn't pay his dues. And I reminded him in that
story, I said, it didn't invest his talents and his time in the
gospel. He hid them out to himself. Uh,
and, and I pointed out in that parable, no, the one with the
one talent that was taken away from him. And the Lord said,
given to them, that them that have will receive more and them
that, that, that, that, uh, that have not even what they have
would be taken away from them. Uh, the one with the one talent
that Lord told that the master told the servants, he said, you
take him and throw him into utter darkness where there is, where
there is weeping and gnashing of teeth. Now that's eternal
damnation. That man that, that had the one
talent who hit it in the earth was not an unfaithful Christian
who wasn't applying himself as he should have, wasn't being
a faithful witness and a testimony for the, he was a, he was, well,
the most often quoted passage in the new Testament is from
Isaiah chapter six. They will have ears, but they
will not hear eyes. They will have, but they will not see,
which describes the majority of people who call themselves
Christians in the world. They have some truths, but they
don't have the truth. And so what they do have eventually
will be taken away from them and they will be thrown into
utter darkness where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing
of teeth. That parable wasn't given in order to motivate Christians
to be more faithful with their talents. The talents there are
not... Yes, we have time, and we have
talents, and we have treasure, and those things are all invested
in the gospel when the Lord convinces you of the testimony of the grace
of God. But the talents there spoken
of is the message of the gospel. It's the grace that's put in
the heart and that we grow in grace into the knowledge of Christ
and to whom is given more will be given unto him. And so this
idea of being a faithful witness and being a good testimony of
the gospel. Yeah, we don't want to be a reproach
to Christ, but Our lives are really not going to have that
much difference or influence on other people's lives. They're
really not. The only real influence, eternal
influence, is the effects that the testimony of the gospel has
on the hearts of God's elect when empowered by the Spirit
of God and they're given the faith to believe it. There's
the, you know, where the Lord told Isaiah in
Isaiah chapter six, he said, he said that passage I just quoted
there, you go, you go preach Lord. You ever said, Lord, Lord
said, who shall we send? And Isaiah said, send me Lord.
And so he said, okay, but they're not going to hear you. You're
gonna be brokenhearted. You're gonna see their rebellion
and their unbelief. And everything you say is just
gonna fall on deaf ears. And what did Isaiah say? Oh Lord,
I didn't know that's what I was getting into. How long do I have
to do that? And what'd the Lord say? Until
the cities be without inhabitants and the land be utterly desolate.
Until there's no one else to hear the testimony. You just
keep preaching the testimony. It's not gonna have much effect
on anybody. It's going to be more of a hardening than it will
be of a softening, but you're going to preach it anyway. And
here's the testimony of the church repentance towards God and faith
towards the Lord Jesus Christ. And we really do believe that's
testimony. God has taught us and what God
teaches you, no man can unteach you. And whether or not anybody
else believes it, we believe it and we preach it. I remember hearing a story about
someone, Benjamin Franklin went and listened to George Whitefield
preach the gospel. And someone asked Benjamin Franklin
afterwards, he said, well, Benjamin Franklin said, I heard you went
and listened to George Whitefield. He was a passionate preacher
of the gospel. And he said, Mr. Franklin, surely you don't believe
that, do you? And Benjamin Franklin said, no,
but he does. He believes it, I'm sure of that. And that's the way most people
are gonna say to us. No, I don't believe it, but they
do, they do. What is the testimony? Well,
the first point is that it's repentance toward God. The Bible says that the carnal
mind is enmity against God. It doesn't say the carnal mind
is at enmity against God. It says the carnal mind, that's
the unregenerate mind, that's the fleshly mind, that's who
we are by nature, is enmity against God. For it cannot be subject
to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then, they that are
in the flesh, they that do not have the Spirit of God, cannot
please God. The natural man cannot receive
the things of the Spirit, neither can he know them. So there's
the, this word repentance means to have a changed mind. The Lord
has to change our mind. He has to give us a new mind.
He has to give us the mind of Christ in order for us to have
repentance toward God. Everything that we think about
God until we've been given repentance is wrong. We didn't really believe that
God was holy and just. We didn't believe that, that
he, that his justice could be We
believed that his justice could be satisfied by something that
we did is what we believed. We thought, well, I can, you
know, I can, I can appease God. And when the Lord gives you repentance,
you know, God's holiness and God's justice is unapproachable.
And if the Lord Jesus Christ doesn't become my peace with
God, if he doesn't, if he doesn't justify me with God, if he doesn't,
he doesn't become my propitiation and put away the wrath of God
as my surety before God, I'll have no salvation. We still don't
understand what holiness and justice means, but we believe
it. And we know now that we have repentance, that it's that it's
not only foolish, but it is eternally deadly to our souls to try to
satisfy the justice of God with something that we do, some prayer
that we pray or some, you know, some testimony that we give to
the world of our changed life. There was a time when we thought,
well, God, must love everybody because
love is of God and everybody that loves know the God. And
if I was a better person, I would love everybody like I ought to.
And surely God's all together as of myself. And so we fashioned
God into the likeness of ourselves. And we thought, well, God loves
everybody and he's compassionate towards everybody. And then God
gives us repentance and he changes our mind and he causes us to
realize that God loves righteousness and he hates iniquity. And that
the, and that the reprobate, the wicked is, is standing in
the judgment of God every day, every day. Jacob I loved, Esau
I hated. And, and we don't understand
what all that means because, you know, for us, love and hatred
is an emotion mostly. But for God, it's his holy character.
And we know now that when God hates, he hates in a holy way. And when he loves, he loves in
a holy way. God's not like I thought he was.
You know, I was, I was worshiping a figment of my own imagination.
I was an idolater. I was worshiping a God that didn't
exist. And now God has given me repentance.
When we preach the gospel, we're calling on men to change their
minds about who they think God is, knowing that they can't change
their minds, but the preaching of what, that's the whole point
of verse 24, look, to testify the gospel of the grace of God. This repentance and faith is
a work of grace in the heart. And yet we call on men to repent,
change your mind. Everything you've ever thought
about God, naturally speaking, the carnal mind is enmity against
God. It is enmity, it's everything
it thinks. It's thoughts about God, it's
feelings towards God, it's actions toward God are all, all wrong. was a time when we believed that
God laid down his sovereignty on the altar of man's free will.
We would have said, oh yes, God's sovereign, but when he created
man, he gave him a free will and he sort of abdicated his
throne of sovereignty and gave man the final choice and the
the final power over his own destiny. And now God's given
us repentance. We know that that's foolish.
That's evil. It's wicked. It's setting ourselves
up on the throne of God. It's making us ourselves to be
God. And it's blasphemy to say that
man has a free will and that God somehow is subject to that
will. We know that's not true. We know
that it's not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth. It is
of God that showeth mercy and that our wills are bound to our
rebellion and sin against God. And if God doesn't give us a
new will and a new nature and a new mind and a new heart, we'll
not bow. We'll not bow. This is repentance. All the things that, repentance
toward God. We're thinking differently about
who God is. We used to think that God's hands
were tied. There's nothing he can do unless
we let him. How wicked is that? Aren't you thankful for repentance?
Aren't you thankful to have a right mind to be in your, you know,
you think about that demoniac that was possessed with demons.
That's what we were. And when the Lord cast the demons
out of them and put them into the swine, the scripture says,
and now he was in his right mind. He was in his right mind. We
were just in the wrong. I mean, everything we thought
was wrong. Now the Lord has shined the light
of the gospel in his word and in the face of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And we have some understanding and some, well, we have little
understanding and a lot of faith in who God is. God is God. We used to think that God was
mutable, you know, that God be this way one day and another
way another day and that you know that he had different plans
depending on how things worked out with man's free will you
know we had a we had a a greek mythological view of god where
the where the gods and the heavens were were fighting with the men
on earth to see who was going to be supreme and and in the
end man always won and now we know that our God changes not. He's never learned anything.
He's never changed. He's never changed his purpose. He's never asked anyone a question.
I am the Lord, the scripture says, and I change not. And therefore
you sons of Jacob are not consumed. And aren't you thankful that
we have an immutable God? A God who is the same yesterday,
today, and forever. And all the changes that go on
in us and in this world in which we live, our God is sure and
steadfast, unchangeable on his throne. Here's the message. Here's the testimony of the church.
Repentance towards God. If you're not thinking about
God the way God is, and if you've got an upside down view of God,
then you need repentance. Isn't that what we're saying
to men? That's our testimony. You need a changed mind because
you're wrong. Men don't like to be told they're
wrong, do they? You don't like to be told you're wrong. You
know, we ought to be diplomatic in trying to help one another
come to some better understanding of things, but that's what we're
declaring repentance toward God. Everything you have thought about
God from the time you were born is just the opposite of who he
is. We're not talking about just tweaking your understanding about
God or improving your understanding about God. We're saying you have
to have repentance towards God. Don't you love what Paul said
about the Thessalonians when he said that God had given them
repentance and they turned to God from their idols to serve
the living and true God. There's repentance, turning to
God from our idols to serve the living and true God. A lot of
gods in this world, aren't there? Little G's. There's only one
living and true God. If the Lord doesn't give us repentance
toward God, we'll not be saved. We'll not be saved. That's the
signpost. That's the message. That's the
testimony of the church. That's what we've laid down everything
for. Not going to compromise that.
Someone puts a gun to our head, said, well, you know, maybe,
maybe God's this way or that way. And we know that it's a
lie about God. I'm sorry. God will give you
the grace to stand in that hour. That's something I can't compromise. Repentance towards God. God's
changed my heart. He's changed my mind. And by
the way, the heart and the mind are, you know, the heart's not
really in this muscle in your chest. You know that. Your affections
and your will and your thoughts and your beliefs, those are here. They're not here. We talk about
them being in your heart and we make a separation between
heart and mind. But when we talk about the heart,
we're talking about the things that the mind really believes.
We have lots of passing thoughts through the mind, don't we? And
we have speculations about this and that. But when we speak of
the heart, we say, I love you with all my heart. This is my mind. This is my affections. This is my will. These are my
thoughts that are true and unbending, uncompromising. The prodigal is an example of
repentance toward God, isn't he? Can you just see this young
man? I mean, we've all been there.
He's, you know, just turned 18. I'm an adult now, dad. Give him
my inheritance. Too many rules and regulations
in this house. You know, just, I don't want to be under anybody's
authority anymore. I want to get out and see the
world. And you're just kind of an old fogey and you don't really
know what's going on out there. And I do, and I'm going to indulge
myself in the pleasures of this world. It wasn't long before
he wasted his inheritance, ended up in a pig pen, feeding swine
with the husk that the pigs do eat. You know what that's a picture
of? He became a Sunday school teacher
in a freewill Baptist church, and he was feeding them husk
of the corn and eating it himself. And he came to himself. He was
given repentance. He came to himself. His mind
was changed. He said, what am I doing? My
servants at home have a better, oh, my father was right all along.
Let me go home to my father. God gave him repentance. There's
every believer's experience. And when he gave, he said, he's
rehearsing his thoughts. When he goes home, I'm just gonna
ask my father if I can have a stack of hay back in the barn and I'll
just be a servant. And the father saw him a long
way off and ran to him and kissed him and put a ring on his finger
and shoes on his feet, God giving him repentance. And these were
the fruits of that. He had to have his mind changed.
Saul of Tarsus thought, he said, I thought one time that those
things which were gained to me, I was a, Israelite, tribe of
Benjamin, circumcised the eighth day, concerning the law, I was
blameless, no one could charge. There's an example of a man who
had an outward testament, who can say, no one I know can charge
me for ever violating any of God's laws outwardly in my behavior. What sort of influence did he
have on the world in that state? Concerning the law, I was blameless.
Oh, I was living my life in a way that just impressed everybody.
Nobody learned the gospel from that. And those things I thought
were gain to me. You see, I've had my mind changed
now. Now I know that they weren't gain to me. They weren't neutral
to me. They were my damnation. They
were to my loss, and I count them now but dung that I might
know Christ. He's the one that I have to have.
This is repentance toward God. I know some will define repentance. God's people hate their sin. They would never sin again if
they could. They don't feel like that grace gives them a license
to sin. Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? God forbid. Child of God, you
hate your sin, don't you? And if you could, you would never
sin again. But if repentance means never sinning again, you've
not repented. If repentance means stopping
any sin. I was talking to somebody about
this recently and they said, well, someone was saying, well,
they've gotten victory over this sin. And I said, well, all they
did was replace an outwardly shameful sin with now a worse
sin pride and self-righteousness. That's all they've done. You
don't get victory over sin. You just make sin worse if you
think you've gotten victory over something. That's not repentance. We grieve over our sin and we see ourselves for what we are,
sinners that Christ died for. And we know that Apart from His
righteousness, we have none. That by nature we are lepers
without a square inch of clean flesh anywhere on our body, lest
the Lord make us so. That clean flesh is His flesh,
for our carnal mind is enmity against God. And so we have repentance
toward God. We have repentance toward our
view of ourselves in relationship to God. There was a time when
we were thinking that we were doing pretty good because we
looked at our lives and whether we as things I'm not doing, I
used to do, and I'm getting a little better here, a little better
there. We always find some way to think that you're better than
you were. And everybody measures themselves at least above average
with other folks. And so, you know, we compared
ourselves to ourselves and compared ourselves to one another. And
all of a sudden God gives you repentance and you find yourself
standing in the presence of a holy God. you cry Lord save me save me
truly in me that is in my flesh dwelleth no good thing God gives
you repentance he causes you to be a sinner I made that statement
for a long time and and you know we have people in our church
that English is not their first language and one of them finally
came to me and said Are you saying that God's responsible for our
sin? Because you said God makes us a sinner. I had the opportunity
to explain that to her. No, God doesn't cause us to sin. He's not responsible for our
sin. He makes us to see our sin, at least in part. He makes us
to see that all we are is sin before Him. That's repentance,
brethren. That is repentance. and repentance towards God is
having a changed mind about how God forgives sin and remits sin
and puts sin away. There was a time when we thought,
well, we could help God out. And all we were doing was lying
with Hagar and producing Ishmael and just creating more conflict. Abraham thought, well, I'll help,
we'll help God out, Sarah. and they just produced flesh.
Now we know the Lord Jesus Christ all by himself on Calvary's cross,
laid down his life for his sheep. He didn't make an offer of salvation.
He made himself an offering to the father. And the father saw
the travail of his soul and the father was satisfied. And he
actually accomplished the salvation of God's people. actually accomplish
them. And when he ascended back into
glory, the word of God did not return void. He went with the
names of those for whom he lived and died and is seated at the
right hand of the majesty on high. And we in him are righteous
on the side of God. We'd have anything to do with
that. God's given us repentance. He's changed our minds about
what it is that God requires for the remission of sin. It
is the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ only, only. We can't add to it. We can't
take away from it. Repentance. We think differently
about who God is, about who we are, about how it is that God's
pleased to save sinners. And in repentance, this thing
of repentance and faith, they never exist separately. They're always together. Two
sides of the same coin. You can't divide them. Because
when God gives you repentance, when he changes your mind, about
everything you thought was true. And now, you know, it was a lie.
He gives you faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, you run
to him. You flee to him. You cast all
your care on him. You believe on him. You just
believe. You believe that he is the successful
sovereign savior of sinners. You believe that he's all your
surety before God, that everything that God requires of you has
got to be found in him. You believe that he's the son
of God. He's the omnipotent, immutable son of God. that he's not capable of failure. He's not trying to do something.
He doesn't have a plan of salvation. He's God. He reigns sovereign
over all the armies of heaven and over all the inhabitants
of the earth. And no man can say unto him,
what doest thou? You believe that? You really
do believe that? God gives you repentance. Repentance
towards God and faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ. You believe
he's Lord. There was a time when you thought
you could make him Lord. Now you know that God made him
Lord over the living and the dead. There was a time when you
thought Jesus meant, well, you know, he's the savior of the
whole world. Now, you know, you shall call
his name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sins. That's
why his name is Jesus. It was a time when you thought,
well, I know he's the Christ. But Christ now means something
completely different to you. You know that Christ is not capable
of failure. That's the very essence of the
definition of that title. He's the Messiah. He's sent in
the full power of the Spirit of God to accomplish the purpose
of God. And therein lies your faith.
Therein lies your faith. Faith towards the Lord Jesus
Christ. Your faith terminates. You remember the arrow? Faith
with an arrow towards you. And your faith terminates in
the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Doesn't go any further. Doesn't fall short. And it can't
go beyond. All your hope is in Christ Jesus,
the Lord, for all your salvation. And if anyone has a different
testimony and points you in any other way, You flee from it. You run from it. You can't have
it. It robs you of your hope. Preacher,
don't make me look to myself for the hope of my salvation.
Testify to me the truth. Witness, lay down your life as
a witness for the truth of the gospel, which is all by the grace
of God. because there's my only place
of hope, my only place. Someone might ask, well, how
do I know if I had been given faith and repentance? Faith and repentance is like
breathing. Okay, just as natural as breathing. You breathe in, life giving oxygen,
you exhale poisonous gases, and then you breathe again, and
again, and again. When did you start breathing? The moment you came out of your
mother's womb. And that doctor did what Fred's done hundreds
of times, clapped you on the butt, and you started breathing.
And you breathed because you were alive. You didn't become
alive after you started breathing. You breathed because you were
alive. Faith and repentance, brethren, is a daily experience
of breathing. Every time you have a wrong thought,
the Spirit of God changes your mind. Every time you have unbelief,
the Spirit of God points you to Christ. It's a daily experience. Faith towards God, repentance
towards God, and faith towards the Lord Jesus Christ is the
believer's life. And it is the gospel of the grace of
God. These things are by grace. Oh,
election was by grace. Predestination was by grace.
Redemption was by grace. Regeneration is by grace. Sanctification
is by grace. Glorification is by, it's all
a free gift. You can't earn it, you can't
do anything to, for by grace are you saved through faith.
And that not of yourselves, it's a gift of God. Not of works,
lest any man should boast. Amen. Our heavenly father, thank you
for the gospel of your grace and the testimony that you have
given to your church, Lord. Please, please keep us faithful
to this testimony without compromise, without change, but we ask it
in Christ's name, amen. 268, let's stand together, 268. you ? How firm a foundation, ye saints
of the Lord ? ? Is laid for your faith in his excellent word ?
? What more can he say than to you he hath said ? ? To you who
for refuge to Jesus have fled ? Fear not, I am with thee, O
be not dismayed, For I am thy God, I will still give thee aid. I'll strengthen thee, help thee,
and cause thee to stand, Upheld by my gracious, omnipotent hand. When through the deep waters
I call thee to go, The rivers of woe shall not thee overflow,
For I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless, And sanctify
to thee thy deepest distress. When through fiery trials thy
pathway shall lie, my grace all-sufficient shall be thy supply. The flame shall not hurt thee,
I only design thy draughts to consume. and thy gold to refine. The soul that on Jesus hath leaned
for repose, I will not, I will not desert to his foes. That soul, though all hell should
endeavor to shake, I'll never, no never, no never forsake.