with hymn number six from the
gospel hymns, the spiral hymn book number six, Who Is a God
Like Unto Thee? And let's all stand together,
number six. Who is a God like unto Thee,
that pardoneth iniquity? Jehovah God, the Great I Am,
forgives our sins through Christ the Lamb. Who is a God like unto Thee that
pardoneth iniquity? His anger He retains no more,
His grace and mercy shall endure. The God of truth must punish
sin, but in His love He formed a plan. To satisfy the law's
demands, For sinners numerous as the sands, Who is a God like
unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity? His anger He retains no more,
His grace and mercy Behold his love and compassion
in the death of Christ his son. The precious sin atoning blood
reveals the love and truth of God. Who is a God like unto thee
that pardoneth iniquity? Here he retains no more his grace
and mercy. endure. He passes by the transgressions
of all his loved and chosen ones. In mercy God delights we see,
He cast our sins into the sea. Who is a God like unto thee,
that pardoneth iniquity? His anger he retains no more,
His grace and mercy shall endure. None can with our great God compare. He gives his son sinners to spare. His anger he retains no more. Christ died. requires no more. Who is a God like unto Thee,
that pardoneth His anger he retains no more. His grace and mercy he shall
endure. Please be seated. Good morning. I love that line. Christ died
and he requires no more. No more God satisfied. We're going to be in the last
few verses of Zechariah chapter 10. I've titled this message in the
world. Yet not of the world. God's people are not of this
world. Doesn't mean that we don't get
attracted by the things of this world. Doesn't mean that we don't
hate how much we love this world. Many of the things of this world,
I should say. But we're not of this world. Let's ask the Lord's blessings. Our merciful Heavenly Father,
there is no God like unto thee that pardoneth iniquity and passeth
by the transgression. Lord, you've sent your Son to
satisfy all the demands of thy holy law. You've fulfilled all
righteousness and justice has been served. Know how hopeful
we are, Father, that you would send your spirit in power now.
Enable us through thy word to set our affections on things
above where Christ is seated at thy right hand. Lord, we find
ourselves setting our affections on the things of the world far
too often. We pray that once again you would
wean us from this world And cause us Lord to find our hope and
our strength. And I dear son. The hope of our
salvation accomplished in him. Well, we ask it in his name.
Amen. We saw. Last Sunday from verse
8. where the Lord says I will hiss
for them or call them and they like faithful dogs will come
for I have redeemed them. I have purchased them with the
precious blood of my dear son. They've been bought with a price.
They are not their own. They belong to me. I'm going
to have my way with them, and they're going to rejoice. They're
going to rejoice. You know, I heard someone say,
well, you know, when we we quote that passage from James where. Well, from John, where the Lord
said, except the father draw him, it will not come. And James says that uses that
same word draw to talk about being dragged before a judge
in a court of law. But that's really not the way
the Lord draws us. All the Lord has to do to get
his children to come willingly is reveal himself. That's all
he has to do. He just makes himself known and
God's people instantly fall in love with him. and they come
willingly. He makes them willing in the
day of his power. God doesn't drag his children
kicking and screaming into the kingdom of God. Now, they may
be kicking and screaming a lot before the Lord's pleased to
make himself known to them, but once he makes himself known,
oh, they just, they fall, they bow, they come willingly. No place else to go. glad to
know him and to see him for his beauty. That's what Isaiah was
talking about in Isaiah 53 when he said, who has believed our
report? Who has believed our report? The world hasn't believed
the gospel. To whom has the arm of the Lord
been revealed? That's who believes. And when
the arm of the Lord, the strong right arm of God, who is the
Lord Jesus Christ, is revealed By grace, through the Spirit
of God and the Word of God to the hearts of God's people, they
bow, they come willingly. And so he says, I'm gonna call
for them, they're gonna come, I have redeemed them and they
shall increase. And look at verse nine, and I
will sow them among the people. I'm going to scatter them out
into the world. They're going to be in the world. I did not save them and call them into some sort of commune
where they can wall themselves up from the world and be separated
from the world. They're going to be in the world. I'm going to scatter them among
the people. Turn to me to John chapter 17. You know, anyone that thinks
that they can isolate themselves from
sin by joining a commune or walling themselves up against the world
doesn't have any understanding as to what sin is. You could
lock yourself in a closet. All you're going to do is take
sin with you. And so the Lord says, I'm going
to redeem them, I'm going to call them, and I'm going to scatter
them out among the people. They're going to live in the
world, but they're not going to be of the world. Look what
the Lord said in John chapter 17 in his high priestly prayer
in verse 14, I have given them thy word and the world hath hated
them because they are not of the world even as I am not of
the world. Now that can't be any more clear. And the more you increase, the
more you grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus
Christ, the more a stranger you become to this world. The more
out of place you realize you are in this world, the more you
long to see him in the fullness of his glory and be made like
him. Father, they're not of this world, even as I am not of this
world. I pray not that thou shouldest
take them out of the world, but that thou shouldest keep them
from the evil. Brothers and sisters, God has
scattered us among the people. He's scattered us among the people.
He's redeemed us. He's made us different. We're
not of this world. And the Lord Jesus is praying,
Father, don't take them out of the world, but keep them while
they're in the world. And isn't that the way the Lord
does? The, it doesn't matter how far we wander into this world. It doesn't matter how he's going
to make them. We're going to see that in our
passage in Zachariah, he's going to keep them coming. They are not verse 16. They are
not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them
through thy truth. Thy word is truth. That's why
we open God's word. That's why we come here. That's
why you look to God's word daily, Lord, but your word is truth.
I need you to sanctify me, Lord. I'm living in this world. I'm
getting stained by the things of this world. There's a part of me that hates
this world, and there's another part of me that's drawn to this
world. And Lord, I need you to keep me while I live among these
people. As thou hast sent me into the
world, even so have I also sent them into the world. God has each and every one of
us where we need to be in this world. And he's prayed that we
be kept from the world. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians
5. In the world, but not of the
world, I will hiss for them, they will come willingly, When
they see me for who I am, they'll fall at my feet and rejoice in
worship. And I've redeemed them. And I'm
going to scatter them back out into the world. Now in the church
at Corinth, the church was tolerating things in the church and condemning
things out in the world. Isn't that typical of self-righteousness? We see it in religion. Preachers
and religious people pointing to the world and pointing out
all the sins of the world and separating themselves from the
world and yet tolerating the same things in the church. 1 Corinthians chapter 5. At verse 9, I wrote unto you
in an epistle not to company with fornicators, yet not altogether
with the fornicators of this world, or with the covetous,
or extortioners, or with idolaters, for then must ye needs come out
of the world. These words describe every person
out there in the world. If I meant for you to separate
yourself from them, you'd have to come out of the world. You'd
have to build yourselves a little commune and separate yourself
completely from the world. That's not what I meant. But
now I've written unto you not to keep company if any man that
is called a brother be a fornicator or covetous or idolater or railer
or drunkard or extortioner with such a one do not eat. Shame
him by separating yourself from him. For what have I to do to
judge them that are without? It's not our place to stand in
judgment of the world and to point out the sins of the world.
What's the Lord saying here? He's telling us that judgment
begins in the house of God. We need to be concerned about
our own sins, not other people's sins. Do you judge them that are within?
But them that are without, God judgeth. Don't worry about the
world. God will take care of the world.
He's going to judge them for their unbelief. Therefore put
away from among you that wicked person. You know what the issue
there was. There was a man in the church
that was living with his stepmother and the church in their pride
was just ignoring it and acting like everything was fine and
taking his father's wife as his own wife. And the Lord's rebuking
them for that. And at the same time, they're
standing in judgment of those things going out in the world.
And so the Lord's saying, go back to with me to our text. Father, I pray not that you take
them out of the world. I've redeemed them. They are
increasing in faith and in knowledge and in truth, and they're going
to live in the world. And the world has always been
the world. I hear religious people talking
about how much more evil the world is today than it's ever
been before. Morality in the world is cyclical. It kind of goes up and down,
and people become so horribly immoral that society falls apart,
and then they change their ways, and things get a little better,
and then it goes bad again. So maybe we're in a low point
as far as social morality goes. I don't know. I've done some
reading of history when things were a lot worse in times past
than they are now. That's for God to take care of. Go back and look at verse 9 in Zechariah chapter
10. I will sow them among the people and they shall remember
me in a far country. Now, you can go to a far country
without ever leaving home. Um, it, you know, David was in
a far country for almost a better part of a year after what he
had done with Bathsheba before, before, um, um, um, Nathan pointed
out his sin. David was right there in Jerusalem,
going to the temple every day, making sacrifices. And yet he
lived in a far country. Didn't he? Peter, when he said, I go fishing,
was right there in Nazareth. But he had gone to a far country. He thought that all was lost. And what the Lord's saying here
to his people is, I'm going to scatter them out among the people.
And sometimes they're going to find themselves in a far country.
But in that far country, I'm going to make sure that they
remember who they are. And I'm going to bring them back
to myself from a far country. They shall remember me. It does
not matter how adverse our circumstances are to the true nature and union
that we have in Christ. It does not matter how bad our
temptations are or how deep our sins are or how often we fall
or how far we fall. It does not matter how dry the
desert is or how pagan the land is. God says they will remember
me. That's good. And that's my experience.
Is that your experience? At the Lord, the Lord's got you
a, you know, we, we talked last week about the church being dogs
and the God Lord's got you on leash. And sometimes he lets
you run to the end of that leash. And sometimes he puts a shock
collar on that leash and sometimes he puts a choker on that leash,
but he's only going to allow you to go so far. And he's going
to say, remember me, remember me. I'm going to scatter them among
the people. And they're going to be in a
far country. But Job was in a far country justifying
himself rather than justifying God, wasn't he? Until Elihu came
and preached the gospel to him. And then he remembered. He remembered. I'm so thankful that the Lord's
long-suffering His longsuffering is our salvation, and the way
He longsuffers is that He causes us to remember. We take our eyes off of Christ,
and what does He say? Remember me? Remember me? The prodigal was in a far country,
wasting his inheritance. But after he wasted his inheritance
and rised to his living, where did he find himself? Where did
he find himself? I'll tell you where he found
himself, teaching a Sunday school class in a free will church.
And he had never been in such a far country as he was there,
eating the husk that the swine did eat. He was worse off in
that Sunday school class than he was when he was involved in
riotous living. He was in a far country. And
he remembered. Scripture says he remembered
that in his father's house the servants had it better than he
did. He remembered. Who caused him to remember? Who
caused him to return? Well, we know the answer to that
question, don't we? Who is a God like unto thee that pardoneth
iniquity? This is what the Lord's saying.
You're going to live in the world. And in living in the world, you're
going to get caught up in some of the things of this world.
but I'm gonna make sure that you remember me. And you're gonna
keep coming back. You're gonna keep coming back.
I'm not gonna let you go. You're mine. I'm gonna be just
as successful in keeping you as I was in redeeming you. You
will not fall away. I will not lose one of my sheep. that's exactly what the Lord
saying here I'm gonna hiss for them I would gather them I've
redeemed them I'm going to increase them and then I will send them
out among the people and in the world they're going to remember
they're going to remember me in a far country and they shall
live with their children and turn again all we have we have
parents here raising children I cannot tell you how how quickly your children are
going to be out from under your authority. A few short days,
that's all you've got. It seems like, I know it doesn't
seem that way now, but that's the way it's going to be. Just
a few short days. Have them under the gospel. Raise
them in the way in which they should go. And here's the glory
of the gospel. The same message, you know, in
religion, they package the message for teenagers and for young people
and for senior adults and for singles and for... The same exact
message of Christ relates to eight-year-olds and 80-year-olds
the same way. I will cause the fathers and
the children to come together. We don't have to change the message
to appeal to a certain segment of society. It's the same message. Christ died for sinners. He died
for sinners. He satisfied the demands of God's
justice. He loves his people. He causes
them to come unto him and he keeps them from falling and he
will be faithful to present them faultless. And the world's the
same. It's the same world. Temptations may change as we
change from one stage of life to another, but it's the same. It's the same world. Same godless
society that every generation of believers have lived in. A
dry and thirsty land with no hope. No hope for centers, just
people doing what comes natural to them. And God says to his
people, you're going to remember me. And you and your children
are going to bow in worship of me. I will bring them again. Look
at verse 10. I will bring them again also out of the land of
Egypt and gather them out of Assyria." Now, Egypt, you know,
represents the law. Those past masters of Egypt that
used the scepter of the law to beat the slaves and put them
under subjection, the Lord says, I'm going to bring you out of
that. I'm gonna bring you out from under the law and I'm gonna
set you free. And if the son make you free,
Tom, you read this this morning, you shall be free indeed, free
indeed. And don't go back to the bondage
of the law. I've delivered you from that.
I've satisfied. How did he deliver us from the
bondage of the law? He satisfied its demands. Now,
it's not that we love God's law. We're not looking to the law
to save us, and we're not looking to our law keeping for any hope
of our righteousness before God. Christ is our righteousness before
God. He's the only one that was able
to satisfy the demands of God's law. He says, I'm going to bring
you out of Egypt, and I'm going to bring you out of Assyria.
Now, Assyria represents the law in a little bit different sense.
The word Assyria translated means steps. Steps. And that's what man-made religion
is all about. You take this step, and then
you take this step, and then you take this step, and you earn
your way to heaven by steps. And they build altars that have
steps upon them. And God says, if you walk up
an altar that has steps on it, the Lord said, when you, told
the Old Testament Israelites, he said, when you make an altar,
don't put steps on it. Don't put steps on it. You know, those
pyramids that you see down in Mexico, they have steps on them
and they make their sacrifices up on the top. And the Lord said,
if you make steps on your altar, all you're going to do is expose
your own nakedness. And that's what those priests
would have walked up those steps. You'd expose their nakedness.
And that's the way religion is. The Lord said, I'm going to deliver
you out of Egypt. I'm going to deliver you out of Assyria. You're not
going to earn favor with God by taking steps. You're not going
to expose your, your, your nakedness is going to be exposed by God's
grace. And you're going to be clothed
in the righteousness of God and the righteousness of Christ with
the, with the robe of righteousness. I'm going to, I'm going to cover
that nakedness. So he says, I'm gonna take you out of works religion,
whether it be Egyptian or Syrian, that's where I'm gonna get you
from. And all men have a works mentality when it comes to salvation. Doesn't matter if they're religious
or irreligious. Everybody has a works mentality. And I will bring them halfway
through verse 10, and I will bring them into the land of Gilead
and Lebanon and place shall not be found for them until there's
no room for them. I'm going to fill my house. And
Gilead and Lebanon were mountains in Israel. And they both are
spoken of in the song of Solomon as representing the Lord Jesus
Christ. And so what he's saying is I'm
going to bring them to Christ until my house is full. And when
my house is full, the door will be shut. There's there's what
the Lord promised to do. I'm going to bring them to myself. I'm going to bring them to Christ. Verse 11. And he shall pass through
the sea with affliction, and shall smite the waves in the
sea, and all the deeps of the river shall dry up, and the pride
of Assyria shall be brought down." The pride of Assyria. Lord, no
steps that I've made save me. It's the steps of Christ that
saved me as he walked Calvary's mountain and took his place on
Calvary's tree. That's the steps that saved me. And the pride of my self-righteousness
has been taken down and he shall be brought down and the scepter
of Egypt shall depart away. And here's what the Lord's saying,
brethren, listen to this. If Assyria and all that it represents
is humbled in your life and my life, in other words, we give
up on thinking that any steps that we've taken are going to
earn us favor or merit us favor with God, if that's taken away. And if Egypt is departed, And
Christ is all. Then the waves in the sea of
affliction are taken away. We're going to have affliction
in this world. The Lord said you're going to
have tribulation in this world, but be of good cheer. I've overcome
the world. There's going to be affliction.
We live in the world. and the Lord said, Father, I
pray not that you take them out of the world. They're going to
suffer afflictions in the world. But look at the first part of
verse 11. And he shall pass through the sea with affliction, and
shall smite the waves in the sea, and all the deeps of the
river shall dry up. What's the Lord saying? I'm going
to take the fear and the hopelessness out of their afflictions. The waves that would otherwise
overwhelm them, the deeps of the waters that would drown them.
I'm going to walk through those waters with them. The way of
the Lord is through the seas. There's going to be afflictions.
But the Lord's promising that even though you're going to be
in the world, you're not going to be of the world for I am with
you. You're not going to have to fear
these afflictions. I've ordained them for your good. There's no,
there's no coming out of the world until we come out of the
world. And that day has been appointed
by God. It is appointed unto man once to die, and after that
the judgment. There's going to come a day, sooner than we think,
when the Lord's going to take us out of this world. But as
long as we're in the world, what's the Lord saying? What's He saying? They're going to end up in a
far country. I'm going to bring them back with their children.
They're going to remember me. And in their afflictions, I'm
going to calm the waves. And He's not saying I'm going
to take away the afflictions. He's not saying I'm going to remove
all their trials and troubles and tribulations. What he's saying
is if Assyria has been done away with
and Egypt has been done away with, they'll be able to handle
the afflictions because they'll be looking to Christ alone for
all the hope of their salvation. When God enables us through faith
to rest our hope in Christ, What else matters? What else matters? The afflictions of this world
cannot be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.
And that the, and that the believer's heart. Or it's, it's okay. I know this is, this is, this
is what you've ordained. This is your purpose for me.
I'm in this world, but I'm not of this world. Not going to be
overwhelmed by God's not going to let his people be overwhelmed
by their circumstances. Like the world is overwhelmed
by their circumstances. The scepter of Egypt shall depart
away the strength of the law, the beating of the taskmasters.
You know, if I, if, if I'm free in Christ, I'm free indeed. And. Some of the most choice of God's
people have suffered the greatest afflictions in this world. And yet their hope was not in
that. Peace for the people of God is
not the absence of conflict. It's fellowship with Christ.
That's it. I'm your peace. My peace I give
you, not as the world. The world sees peace as the absence
of conflict, don't they? Well, I'm going to just be in
the world. I'm going to accumulate enough resources. I'm going to
create an environment. I'm going to be in control of
my circumstances, and I'm going to develop a little piece of
the pie that's going to give me peace. That's the world. God says you're not of the world.
That's not where you're going to find your peace. Yeah, I'm
going to calm the seas. And I'm going to leave you. I'm
going to enable you to walk through the river. With dry on dry land,
but it's not by removing the conflict. It's by being with
you. Taking the scepter of Egypt and
the pride of Assyria away from you and causing you to find all
your hope in Christ. Now look at verse 12, and we'll
finish. And I will strengthen them in the Lord, and they shall
walk up and down in his name. Sometimes this walk of faith
is a downhill slide. Rarely, but sometimes the Lord
just lets us, you know, right now, I hope we're on a downhill
slide right now, and we walk out of here, and we may be on
an uphill climb. But the Lord says, whether they're
walking up or down, whether on the mountaintop or in the valley,
whether in the troubles of this world, or whether they're at
rest in this world, they're going to look to me. They're going
to look to me. And they're going to rejoice
in my name. For I've saved them. And I promise
never to leave them nor forsake them. And not one of them is
going to be left in a far country. And when my house is full. When
my house is full, the doors will be shut. That's that's good news to the
center. That's good news. Alright, let's
take a break.