I want to also thank the church
for the invitation to come here and fellowship with you and preach the gospel of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Thank you for such fine meals. I don't know who fixed the salad
the first day, but that was the best salad I think I've ever
ate in my life. Everything was good yesterday,
just a wonderful meal. And thank you, Clay. Thank you,
dear pastor. I esteem you very highly. Love
you. And pray the Lord this morning
will bless us once again and instruct us. The word of God
not only is good for exhortation to encourage us and help us,
but it's good for instructions. And that's my first point tonight. This morning, I want you to turn
your Bibles to Genesis chapter 13. And I want you to hold that
chapter 13 for just a minute and let me talk to you just before
I read that text. And my text this morning and
my title of my message is Choices That We Make. You and I make
choices all the time, don't we? Choices as believers, choices
as Christians. And I want us to look at that
this morning. I want us to look first of all
at a bad choice, a sad choice. And that's found here in Genesis
chapter 13. But let me say this first and
foremost. that there are some things in
our life that we have absolutely no choice in. No choice whatsoever. We had no choice in who our father
and our mother was. You and I come into this world
born of a woman. We didn't have any choice if
we were a male or a female. who our dad was, who our mom
was, where we were healthy, where we were sick. All that was made
for us. Had no choice in that. God did that. To everything there
is a season and a time and purpose for all things under heaven. A time to be born and a time
to die. And who's in control of those
times? Who's in control of those seasons? God has determined the
times before appointed. God set that time. You should
be born, who your mother and dad was, where you would be born,
when you would be born, all of that was God's choice. You had
absolutely nothing to do with that. King David was in great
trials, his heart was grieved, and he prayed this prayer, Lord,
have mercy on me for I am in trouble. My eye is consumed with
grief, but Lord, I trust you. You're my God. My times are in
your hands. The trials that you go through,
you don't pray for them? You don't set yourself up for
them? You don't know when they're coming, you don't know how long
they're going to last, and you don't know when they're going
to end, but those times are in your Lord's hands. He chooses
that. None here this morning who are
believers in the Lord Jesus Christ had a choice whether or not your
names were written in the Lamb's Book of Life. You had absolutely
nothing to do with that. Nothing. God did not consider
your person, your works, your merit, anything about you. That
was God's choice, whose names were put in the Lamb's Book of
Life. He hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. You and I are here this morning,
and if we've come to the Lord Jesus Christ, we've been saved
by Him. by His grace, by His mercy, by
His sacrifice, by His intercession, you had no choice as to when
you came to Jesus Christ. That was not your choice. When
did you come to Christ? When it pleased God. That's when you came. You set
in darkness, in despair, until He came to you and called you
out of darkness into His marvelous light. There's something else that you
have no choice in the day that you die. You have no choice in the day
that you die. I was talking with a man who
fell off of a five-story building, landed on his back, and got up
and walked away. We may think we have a choice
as to when we die. It's God's choice. It's appointed
to every man who wants to die. And who does that appointment?
You say, but this man did that to himself, or this woman did
that to himself. I saw a man with half of his
skull literally blown off. A shotgun took one quarter of
his skull, and he's still alive today, the last time I saw him. A man will die when God has appointed
his death. Not until then, and not before
then. That's God's choice, is it not?
I rejoice in this and you rejoice in this. And having said that, you and
I know also there are choices you and I make every day. There
are choices unbelievers make every day. There are choices
God's children make every day. Some are good and some are bad. Some increase our happiness and
some increase our misery. If you're very old this morning
and very experienced, you know that you've made some choices.
That if God had not overruled the choice you made, it would
have been detrimental to you. You look back when you were young,
in your teenage years, and you say, oh, God, thank you that
you kept me from making that choice. There are other choices
that you've made. You actually made them. And if
God hadn't delivered you from the consequences of that choice,
it would have been detrimental to you. But he was pleased to
deliver you. There have been other choices
that you've made and you've lived to thank God that he secretly
influenced you to make that choice. And there have been other choices
that we made and God did not keep us from them and neither
has he delivered us from them. And we'll probably not escape
the burden of them until we're finally with the Lord. If someone tells us this morning
that a true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ is safe and that
he's safe forever and that he will never perish, I say with
a wholeheartedly amen. That is true. A man who is in
Jesus Christ today is in Christ forever. He will never perish. And let me give you just two
or three reasons or so, while I'm thinking about that, why
that is true. Because God has purposed to save
that man. And what God has purposed, He
will bring it to pass. I have purposed it, I will also
do it, saith the Lord. All things work together for
good to them who are the called according to God's purpose. And
then he tells us in the next two verses what that purpose
is. To glorify them at last. That purpose can never be thwarted.
If you're saved, you're saved on purpose. And you will be saved. And secondly, The death of Jesus
Christ secures the salvation of all his elect people. God
saw the travail of his soul and was satisfied by his knowledge
shall my righteous servant justify many. The death of Christ will
deliver many. And that's for certain. and the calling of God. When
He calls you and gives you the gift of eternal life, that is
without repentance. God will never take it back.
The gifts and calling of God without repentance. The intercession
of Jesus Christ secures the believer. He ever liveth to make intercessions
for them and therefore they are saved to the uttermost. And the promise of Jesus Christ
to every believer will secure his eternal salvation. This is
the promise that he has promised us, even life eternal. So if somebody tells me this
morning, Bruce, a believer will never perish. Those who are in
Christ will never perish. I'll say amen to that. Thank
God for it. But if somebody tells me that
it doesn't really matter whether a believer is careful in his
life, or curious in his life, he's really not concerned with
how he lives his life, and it doesn't matter the choices he
makes in this life, it just doesn't matter, then I would have to
tell that man, you better go read your Bible. You better go
read your Bible. Because it does matter, doesn't
it? It does matter. The choices you and I make as
children of God should be made diligently, prayerfully, and
made by faith. Look at my text now in Genesis
chapter 13 and look in verse 10. This is where Abraham and Lot
had just separated themselves. Abraham, the great prophet, and
Lot, his nephew. Both of them were very rich,
had all these cattle, and the grass couldn't support them,
and not enough water in this location, and their servants
began to bicker with one another, and fuss with one another. And
Abraham said to Lot, let us separate. Let's separate one from another.
If you go to the right hand, I'll go to the left. If you go
to the left hand, I'll go to the right. So this is what happened
in verse 10. And Lot lifted up his eyes and
beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere
before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, even as the garden
of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, as thou comest into Zor.
Then Lot chose for himself all the plain of Jordan, and Lot
journeyed east, and they separated themselves one from the other. Abraham dwelt in the land of
Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the plain, and pitched his tent toward
Sodom. But the men of Sodom were wicked
sinners before the Lord exceedingly. What a sad, sad choice. And most of us know, if we've read
our Bibles, how this story developed and ended. Remember what happened? The Lord come to Abraham and
said, I'm going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah and all the cities
of the plain. I'm going to burn them. Judgment's
coming. They're wicked before me. He
goes down and delivers Lot. The angels almost have to drag
him out of the city. The Lord destroys Sodom and Gomorrah. destroys Lot's sons-in-laws, destroys
his wife, destroys all his possessions. And Lot is in a cave up on the
mountain. He commits incest with his daughters. Each of them have a son by his
father. And as far as we know, the poor
man died in shame, and we read nothing else about him in all
the scriptures. And as we realize the end of
this story, we can't help but see the correlation between the
end of that story and the choice that Lot made. He chose for himself. And one of the consequences of
his choice was devastating. His choice was to live among
wicked men without being composed to. He did it willingly. Boy, if you're born of God this
morning, you cannot take the ungodly the
open and profane people to be your bosom buddies. The Bible
says that Lot was a righteous man, he was a just man, and he
was grieved with a filthy conversation of the wicked every day. I know
and you know that every man outside of Jesus Christ is condemned
He's guilty before God. But we also know this, brothers
and sisters, that there are some people so open and so profane
that they beg the justice of God to destroy them every day. These were sinners before the
Lord exceedingly. We used to tell people sometimes,
I hope we don't tell people like this, we've implied it to lost
people. If you're not in Christ, nothing
else matters. Well, in that sense, it doesn't.
But there are men that can sin against God and never blush. Bless in God and go to bed and
sleep very well. mock God, mock His people, mock
His word. Those people call for the judgment
of God to destroy them. That's the kind of people Lot
chose to live among. He pitched his tent towards Sodom,
and what's the next thing we read about him? He sat in the
gate of Sodom. When we make a choice to do something
and It's a sad choice. Doesn't it seem to go downhill
from there on if the Lord doesn't deliver us from it? He pitched his tent in the gate
of Sodom. Can you believe that if Lot had
earnestly sought the Lord that he would have led him to make
a choice like that. It's obvious that he didn't prayerfully
seek when he made this choice. It's obvious that he made it
by the sight of his eyes. He lifted up his eyes and he
saw the well-watered plains. And without making a choice prayerfully
and by faith, he said, that's what I want. I want to secure
an easy lifestyle for myself and my family. Could a believer
do that? Man alive, a believer can do
anything. He can do anything. I knew a preacher one time. I don't know if he's converted
or not. Church asked him to come and pastor. And he said, well,
if I do that, I won't have any means of support. I want to make
some money first. So we chose not to pastor. He chose to make some money,
and man did he ever make some money. He took a few years off
and made a bundle of money, had a big bank account. And then
when he finally thought he'd made enough money, no church
wanted him. And he died, as far as I know,
without being a prophet to any of the children of God. Could
a man make a choice like that? Yes, he could. Yes, he could. Lott made a sad, sad choice. And boy, the alarm. Can you imagine
the alarm? He had no rest every day he was
grieved living in the city. Had an opportunity to get out
when Abraham came through there and delivered him and brought
him back and he stayed there at Sodom again. We get in these
situations, we can't get out of them, don't we? And then his mind was so filled
with grief. Then the angels came down and
said, get out of this place. The Lord's going to destroy this
place. All the alarm sounded in his ear. Get out of here.
Get out of here. Now, get out of here. Boy, the
older I get, there's two things, brothers and sisters, I want. I think I've obtained them by
the grace of God. I want to live in a neighborhood,
a physical neighborhood where it's quiet. I've had neighbors shoot their
guns all during the night, race their engines and cuss and quarrel
and fight, and you can't sleep. I live in a neighborhood now
that is so quiet we've got two or three cars that goes by our
house every day, and that's it. And the older I get, the more
I want peace in my mind. I want quietness in my conscience. Lot didn't have any of these.
He lost it all. And you can trace it right back
to when he lifted up his eyes and made this wretched, sad choice. Could a believer do that? Brothers
and sisters, All of us make choices in our life, and I'm just saying
this, as children of God, be prayerful of your choices. I
had a friend of mine, and he said, we're getting a dog for
our family, and we've been praying about it. And I sort of sniggered
under my breath until I got a little bit older, and I thought how
wise that man was. Should we pray about getting
a dog? Prime out everything. Cast in all your care upon Him
because He cares for you. When Ashland Oil shut down there
in Ashland, Kentucky, several people at 13th Street worked
there. I don't know how many of those folks called me and
said, how far are you from here? And what determined where they
lived at and had to move to was where the gospel was preached.
And I don't know how many of them told me, if the gospel isn't
preached where I'm going, then I'm not going. What a choice. What a choice. I don't want to
make a choice now that I have to live my old age in grief and
regret. All righty, that's my first one.
Turn with me to the book of Joshua, if you will, Joshua chapter 24. And look here in verse 14, verse
15, look in verse 15. Most of you probably memorized
this verse. This is where Joshua was ready
to die and he gathered the elders of Israel together. And this
is what he said to them in verse 15 of Joshua 24. If it seemed
evil unto you to serve the Lord, choose you this day whom you
will serve. Whether the gods which your fathers
served that were on the other side of the flood, that was Jordan. Remember how it flooded out when
they crossed it? They called it the flood. are
the gods of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell. But as for me
and my house, we will serve the Lord. Boy, how often this verse of scripture
is misinterpreted. And it's interpreted in a way
that's not only dangerous, but really blasphemous. How many
times have you heard some preacher interpret this verse like this?
Here's your little gods that you've been worshiping, you've
been idolaters. And here's the eternal God, the
almighty God. And you need to choose if you're
going to serve your little gods or if you're going to serve God.
That's not what he said. Can you imagine if Glenda come
to you and she had this fellow on her arm? And she said, Marvin,
I'm trying to decide if I want you or him. What would you say? Let me help you out, sweetie.
Get out of my face. And apply this that way to God? I want you to choose now these
idols that you've been worshiping or choose God. Go to God with
an attitude like that. No, that's not what that means.
What he's saying, your fathers, before they came across the Jordan,
they had their gods. They had the gods they brought
out of Egypt that they worshipped. And now you've come into the
land of Canaan and there's these gods around you of the Amorites
that you're dwelling among. Choose which one of those gods
you're going to worship. the gods your fathers worshipped
or the gods the Amorites worshipped. Choose which idol you're going
to worship. And he says it like this, if
it seems evil unto you to serve the Lord according to
the rule of his word, then choose which God you're
going to serve. Choose one of those idols. If God does not give you a will
to own your wretchedness, that you're unable to save yourself,
and you're not willing to cast yourself upon the Lord Jesus
Christ to be saved by Him, then deny Christianity altogether. Pick you another God and worship
that God. You know the world needs to hear
from the church today, and this is what they need to hear. If
you hate God's sovereignty, if you hate the sovereignty of God
the Bible reveals, if it seems evil in your sight to be saved
by free grace alone, then pick you another God to serve. There's all kinds of gods out
there. If it seems evil to you to bow
down and be saved by mercy, then find you another God. Go join the Mormon God. Worship
Him as a big convention of Jehovah Witness here in town this week.
Go worship that God. Better yet, go join yourself
to that lustful God of Catholicism and live like you want to and
get a priest to absolve you of your sin. That's a good little
God to worship. Go worship that violent God Allah. But be a man about it. Tell us which God you're going
to worship. And then, whichever God you choose, be content with it, die with
it, and go to hell with it. Ain't that what he's telling
them? And this world, this world thinks
that they've got their little idols over here, then they've
got the great and eternal God, and they're just trying to make
this choice. when all the world is doing is just choosing between
their little gods. They don't choose God at all.
No, they just choose between their little gods. Somebody would
just tell me, maybe it's you, Marvin. Somebody would tell me
some fellow just got out of the service and couldn't remember
what religion he was. He thought he may have been a
Baptist, then he thought he was Presbyterian, and come to find out he's a Mormon.
He just chooses between these little gods. He said down here in verse 19,
Joshua said unto the people, You cannot serve the Lord, for He is an unholy God and a
jealous God, and He will not forgive your transgressions and
your sins. You can't serve God until you're
born of God. And God will not forgive your
sins but by one way, and that's through the blood of his dear
son. You know, we're living in a generation,
of course I guess it's always been this way, but we're living
in a generation that has a Jesus that's just so accepting. And
he's so tender and he's so meek. And they make him almost to be
a sissy. He's got nothing to say negative
about anybody. And all you gotta do is just
accept him. And everything is fine. You can accept somebody you think
is Jesus. But all you're doing is choosing
another Jesus. and another God, and another
God. And a man will continue to do that until he's born of
God, until God takes hold of him and washes him from all his
idols and sets upon the throne of that man's conscience. And
all he'll do before then is just choose between these little gods.
He'll lay one god down and it's like that little whack-a-mole.
That one down, he'll grab another one over here. Whack that, he'll
grab another one over here. Look in Luke chapter 10. This
is a good choice. Luke chapter 10. And look in verse 38. A sad choice? Here's a good choice. Luke chapter
10 and verse 38, And it came to pass, as they went, that he
entered into a certain village. And a certain woman named Martha
received him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary,
which also sat at Jesus' feet and heard his word. But Martha
was cumbered, distracted, busy about much serving, and came
to him and said, Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath
left me to serve alone? Bid her therefore that she help
me. And Jesus answered and said unto
her, Martha, Martha, Thou art careful and troubled about many
things, but one thing is needful, and Mary has chosen that good
part which shall not be taken away from her." Oh, here's a
good choice, isn't it? A good choice. Mary chose to
sit at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ and hear his word. Can you imagine sitting in your
living room and the incarnate God talking with you? Looking at you, making eye contact
with you. Can you imagine the power that
He spake and the comfort that came through His word? Him speaking
personally. And we don't know for sure, but
I earnestly believe that there's hints in the Bible given as to
what he was saying to her. First of all, I really believe
that he was revealing to her his love for her. I say that
for this reason. You remember what the Bible said
about Christ's love for them? He loved Martha, and he loved
Mary, and Her brother Lazarus. If Jesus Christ loves you with
His redeeming love, His everlasting love, He's going to make you
know it. He's going to reveal that love
to you. He's going to open your heart
and you're going to know something to your utter amazement that
Jesus, the Son of God, loves you. We have known and believe
the love that God has to us. I think he was looking at her
right in the eyes and said, Mary, I love you. Can you imagine that? There's a verse of scripture
that I think that hints at this and it's found in Deuteronomy
33 and three. And listen to this, Deuteronomy
33 and three. Yea, the Lord loved his people. All his saints are in his hand,
and they sat at his feet, and every one of them receives his
word." Don't that describe Herb to the T? He loves his people. They sat at his feet and hear
his word. And what do they hear? His love
for them. His love for them. Secondly,
I think the scripture hints also that he was speaking to her of
his death. You remember in the twelfth chapter
of John, right before the Lord was betrayed and crucified, the
Lord came back to Bethany where they lived and they had a big
dinner for them. And Mary brought this expensive
alabaster box of oil, and she anointed his feet, remember that?
And wiped his feet with the hairs of her head. And Judas got disturbed
and said, why did she waste this? This should have been sold and
given to the poor. And the Lord said, let her alone. Against
the day of my burying has she did that. She knows I'm going
to die. and they're going to bury me.
How did she know that? The apostles didn't even know
it. He told Peter about it. Peter rebuked him and said, don't
talk that way. He revealed something to this
woman that the apostles did not fully understand. That he was
going to die. Can you imagine sitting and having
the Son of God look you right in the eye and say, Clay, this
is my body which was broken for you. Can you imagine hearing
that? Christoph, this is my blood that
was shed for the remission of your sins. Can you imagine hearing such
a thing? the Son of Man came to give His life a ransom for
who? You, Mary. Can you imagine? He says it in His
Word, but He says it to us for His people He laid down His life. Imagine Him sealing you out and
telling you that he's made peace on your behalf by the blood of
his cross, that he hath reconciled you to God by his death. I can imagine what she felt like
sitting there. And it got so in her heart and
so full of assurance that she brings this precious ointment
and pours it on his feet and wipes his head and her heart's
bubbling over, saying, Lord, I know what you're ready to do
for me. I know what you're ready to do for me. Thirdly, there's something in
this word. Mary has chosen the good part. That good part means portion.
It's the same word that Asap talked about in Psalm 73 when
he said this, my flesh and my heart fails. But God is the strength
of my heart and my portion. God is my portion. And when the Holy Spirit said,
Mary has chosen that good part, she's chosen Christ who is her
portion. It wasn't just what he was saying,
it was himself. He said, Mary, I'm your portion. I'm your everything. And the Lord said, these things
ain't going to be taken away from her. I've given her some things that
ain't going to be taken away from her. Brothers and sisters,
if he was telling her of his love for her, that'll never be
taken away. If Christ loves you right now,
He loved you yesterday. And if He loved you yesterday,
He loves you tomorrow. And He'll never cease to love
you. His love will never be taken away from you. He'll never cease
to love you. And if His death If his death
was on your behalf, then all the benefits of his dying is
yours. And they'll never be taken away
from you. And if he's your portion now, he'll be your portion forever. Ever. Could you imagine then
sitting there at his feet and hearing these things? No wonder
she wouldn't go help her sister serve the meal. I wouldn't either,
would you? Well, I guess the reason this
is so important, Mary sat there thinking, what a wretch I am.
What an ungodly sinner I am. You say, Bruce, how in the world
could you know that? Nobody ever said it to the feet
of Jesus Christ. Nobody ever heard his word and
coming away feeling good about themselves. When you got into His presence,
the presence of the Majestic, you felt yourself to be the most
unworthy sinner in the world. Do you know that? The Lord appeared
to Abraham. Abraham was standing talking
to the Lord. And he said, Lord, I am just
dust and ashes. Isaiah was in His presence. and
saw Him on His throne high lifted up, and His glory filled the
temple. And what did He say about Himself? I'm undone. I'm a wretch. I'm a sinner. Peter
got down at his feet and said, Lord, depart from me. I'm a sinful
man. And when the Lord shows us what
we are in the light of his glorious presence, we'll see we're the
most unworthy wretches in this world. And then to have him turn
around and say, I love you. I give my life to redeem you. And I'm your portion forever. Oh, amazing. Ain't that amazing?
Oh, how amazing. And he turns to Martha and he
said, Martha, dear Martha, oh, my precious child, you ought
to be more like your sister. Choose the good part. I'm just
saying, brothers and sisters, we have these choices. When you're in pressed in your
mind, when the Holy Spirit secretly almost impresses upon your mind
to go pray, go pray. Lift up your voice to the Lord.
When it's a choice by working some overtime or coming to the
public worship, make a good choice. I wouldn't care if you ladies,
if it kept you, if it hindered you from coming out here and
setting and you're in the gospel. I wouldn't care if we eat a bologna
sandwich and we had to go back and fix it ourselves. I doubt seriously if Martha come
down to die and she said, man, I wish I'd have spent more time
fixing that meal better than I did. Boy, I wish I'd have swept. I wish I'd have mopped that.
I wish I'd have got the house cleaner. I bet she didn't say
that. I wonder what Mary thought when
she came down to die. Fade, fade, each earthly joy. Jesus is mine. All that my soul
has tried, all of these necessary things that we have to give some
attention to, left but a dismal void, Jesus has satisfied. Jesus is mine. God bless His
Word to your heart. Thank you, Pastor.