Good morning. We'll begin our
second service by standing and singing out of your blue hymnal
201. He is able to deliver the 201. you. Tis the grandest theme through
the ages rung, Tis the grandest theme for a mortal tongue, Tis
the grandest theme that the world e'er sung, Our God is able to
deliver thee, He is able to deliver thee, He is able to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
Him for rest. Our God is able to deliver thee. Tis the grandest theme in the
earth, o'er me. Tis the grandest theme for a
mortal's dream. Tis the grandest theme, tell
the world again. Our God is able to deliver thee. He is able to deliver thee. He is able to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
Him for rest. Our God is able to deliver thee. Grand esteem, let the tidings
roll To the guilty heart, to the sinful soul Look to God in
faith, He will make thee whole Our God is able to deliver thee
He is able to deliver thee He is able to deliver thee. Though by sin oppressed, go to
him for rest. Our God is able to deliver thee. Thank you. You may be seated. I'm going to be reading for Brother
Scott this morning. Let's go to Philippians chapter
3. Philippians 3, beginning of verse
1. Finally, my brethren, rejoice
in the Lord. To write the same things to you,
to me indeed is not grievous, but for you it is safe. Beware
of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the concision. For
we are the circumcision, which worship God in the spirit and
rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh. Though
I might also have confidence in the flesh, if any other man
thinketh that he hath whereof he might trust in the flesh,
I more. Circumcised the eighth day of
the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, and Hebrew of the
Hebrews, as touching the law, a Pharisee. Concerning zeal,
persecuting the church, touching the righteousness which was in
the law, blameless. But what things were gained to
me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I
count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge
of Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss
of all things and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ
and be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which
is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ,
the righteousness which is of God by faith, that I may know
him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings
being made conformable unto his death, if by any means, whatever
my God sees fit, I might attain unto the resurrection of the
dead. Amen. Let's pray. Our gracious
Lord, Father, we thank you for your great grace and mercy, which
you've shown to us abundantly in your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord,
we thank you for your patience, your love, your kindness, your
long-suffering with us, your forgiveness in the Lord Jesus
Christ, whom you've sent. Lord, thank you. Father, we remember
our brethren who are sick and not well who couldn't be with
us this morning. Lord, we we think of brother
scott and his healing. Lord, we asked, we're so thankful
for what you have done for him and and how you have helped him.
Lord, we ask that you would continue to heal his body to give him
strength. We pray for johnny that you would
help her as well with her pain and infection. Lord, that you
would heal her and give her health and strength and restore her
to be with us again soon. Lord, we pray for Ron and the
treatment that he has coming up. Lord, we ask that you would
sustain him, give him strength, and that you would heal his body
if it please you, and that you would bless him and help him,
Lord. Keep his eyes looking to Christ
alone through the whole thing, Lord, trusting you. We pray also
that You would heal his fingers and make them feel better with
less pain, more and more. Help him, Lord, to keep his eyes
upon you in this as well. And Lord, we pray for Alyssa
and the hurt that she feels and the suffering. And Lord, we pray
for those not with us, that you would help them and strengthen
them and bring them to be with us again soon, Lord, please.
We ask this in Christ's name. Lord, because we know that all
things are from you, and that we can do nothing of this flesh,
and we can't bring to pass that which we think should, but Lord,
we know that you do all things well, and we thank you for that,
Lord. We thank you for your grace. We pray that you would be with
us this morning, that you would help us to hear the word preached.
Lord, that you would take that word and put it into a prepared
heart, ready to receive and to hear, the glory of our Savior
and what he's accomplished for us. Lord, help me to preach the
word faithfully. Keep our eyes set upon Christ.
Bless your word, Lord. Bless this work here. And Lord,
we pray that you would call out your sheep, which are scattered
here and there, that you would draw them to hear your word,
to hear the word which you declare in Christ. Help us, Lord. It's in Christ's name we pray
and give thanks. Amen. As you remain sitting, let's
sing a second hymn, 175, Standing on the Promises, 175. Standing on the promises of Christ
my King Through eternal ages let his praises ring Glory in
the highest I will shout and sing Standing on the promises
of God Standing, standing, standing on the promises of God, my Savior. Standing, standing, I'm standing
on the promises of God. Standing on the promises that
cannot fail, When the howling storms of doubt and fear assail,
By the living Word of God I shall prevail, Standing on the promises
of God. Standing, standing, standing
on the promises of God my Savior. Standing, standing, standing
on the promises of God. Standing on the promises of Christ
the Lord, Bound to Him eternally by love's strong cord, Overcoming
daily with the spirit's sword, Standing on the promises of God. Standing, standing, standing
on the promises of God my Savior. Standing, standing, I'm standing
on the promises of God. Standing on the promises I cannot
fall, listening every moment to the Spirit's call. Resting in my Savior as my all
in all, standing on the promises of God. Standing, standing, standing
on the promises of God my Savior. Standing, standing, I'm standing
on the promises of God. Thank you. Morning, brethren. We're going to be in Judges chapter
6. Judges chapter 6. In this chapter, this is where
we first meet with Gideon. And there's many beautiful gospel
pictures given to us here in the account concerning Gideon. But before we get there, the
scriptures prepare the people of God with a view of our sin
and our weakness. to show us what we are in ourselves,
to behold the sufficiency of Christ and our need of Him. And so our Lord uses the repetition
that we see here in Judges chapter 6 to see our need of the grace
and mercy of our God, which is given to us freely in His Son,
Jesus Christ. Now there's many examples of
the scripture that teach us, or that teach us of that scripture,
which says, the scripture hath concluded all under sin. Every one of us is, are under
sin. The scriptures declare that truth
to us, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given
to them that believe. Well, this passage in Judges
6 is certainly one such passage that shows us our sin, that we
are under sin by nature, and that we need salvation, which
God has given in His Son. Now, the book of Judges, you'll
recall that the Lord is teaching us, and He's using repetition.
He keeps showing us over and over again how that we need Him
every hour. We need the Lord. We see how
every time the judge, which means Savior, every time the Savior
that God raised up for the people, every time that Savior passed
away, the people went right back into sin, right back into idolatry,
right back into sinning against the Lord. And we see, one of
the great truths we see in that is we need a living Savior. We need a Savior who does not
pass away, who does not go away. We need a Savior who lives eternally. Because left to ourselves, all
we do is sin. All we are is corruption. All
we are is unbelief in this flesh. And so the Lord uses this repetition
to show us we are sinners. No, we have not fixed ourselves.
No, we are not our own strength. No, we do not deliver ourselves.
We need the grace of God, which he gives freely in his son. And the Lord uses enemies. He'll use enemies both without
and enemies within our own heart and flesh. And He'll bring trials
of great adversity to bring us low in ourselves to see our need
of Him, to hear what He says in His Word, to hear His grace
in His Son, Christ. And so He sends Having gotten
the attention of his people, he sends the word of his grace
to declare to them again what he has done in accomplishing
our salvation, the salvation he's provided in his son. And he drives us again from self
and this flesh to the Lord Jesus Christ over and over and over
again. And so I've titled this message,
Repetition. Repetition. Let's begin now in
verse 1. Judges 6, 1. And the children of Israel did
evil in the sight of the Lord. And the Lord delivered them into
the hand of Midian seven years. Now, we're familiar with that
number seven, meaning it's complete. But what we see in that is God
has a purpose. Our God has a purpose and that
which he brings to pass. It's not just happening by chance
or bad luck. God has brought it to pass on
purpose. On purpose. We see there that
left to ourselves, we do evil in the sight of the Lord. That's
all this flesh can bring forth is death and corruption, unbelief,
doubt, going astray continually. Now, We'll find here in this
passage that the children of Israel are guilty of idol worship. They were worshiping Baal, which
was a popular false god among the people around them in that
day. And God uses an enemy here called
Midian. And Midian, that word means strife. And so God uses strife to show
the people their sin. make them see their rebellion,
and to see their need of God. And religion, oftentimes, likes
to come to these passages and say, see there? You see the people
of Israel? They knew the truth. They knew
better. But they didn't do right. They didn't do well at all. And
this is where they went wrong. This is how they went astray.
So you now know it. You go and do better. You go
and do better now. You follow the law more closely.
You do what you're supposed to do, and you do a better job than
what they just did. But our Lord tells us, he tells
us that except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness
of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no case enter into
the kingdom of heaven. It's not going to happen. We
need a righteousness that is perfect. We need a righteousness
that is of God. As our brother said the other
week, quoting, I think, Pastor Fortner, who said, how good,
how perfect does a man need to be to enter heaven? He needs
to be as perfect as God. We need to be as righteous as
God. Otherwise, we shall come short of the promise. Thanks
be to God for the righteousness which he has freely given in
his Son, Jesus Christ. We are looking at the children
of Israel and we're to understand these are the people of God.
That's how we as the Church of Christ, when we're looking at
these people, it's very easy to want to find fault with them
and dismiss them out of hand and say, well, that's them under
the covenant of works. I don't need to hear what's going
on with them. I've got Jesus and they fell
in sin. That's not me. And then just
dismiss what the Lord is teaching His people as the Church of Christ
that we're supposed to see by faith looking to Christ here
from what the Lord is teaching us. These are typical of the
people of God and that means they're typical of us. They're
typical of us. We look at these guys and we
think how can they be so hard? so ignorant, so unbelieving,
so forgetful, so quick to go back to their sin as a dog returns
to its vomit. How can that be? And then the
Lord makes us to see our own heart. And he makes me to know
what I am in myself, what I am in this flesh, and how far short
I fall, how unbelieving I am, how quick I am to doubt, how
soon I am to listen to lies and foolish things rather than believe
the word of my God and trust him. How quick I am to forsake
the Lord and to forget all that he's taught me. You know, I was
thinking as I was going through this, when I was a manager, we
used to hire workers, people that we thought were good, that
interviewed well and we thought were going to work out well.
And we'd begin to train them. And what we wanted to see is
do they learn from their mistakes? How well do they learn from their
mistakes? Because everybody in a new job,
in a new role, a new position, is going to make mistakes. We
all make mistakes. We're people, and so we do that.
And so we wanted to see how well do they learn? How well do they
learn from their mistakes? And if they learned what they
were supposed to learn, we were glad and happy. And if they didn't
work out, they usually found new opportunities elsewhere.
But when it comes to believers, And when it comes to believers,
we see how often we fail, how often we fall short of the problem,
how unbelieving we are, and how full of sin and doubts and unbeliefs
we are. I'm so thankful for those gracious
words that Peter said when he said, Lord, how often shall my
brother sin against me and I forgive him till seven times? Aren't
you thankful Peter said seven times? Boy, he's so gracious. He's so giving. Well, wait a
minute. Didn't the Lord say, no, Peter,
till 70 times seven. You're going to forgive your
brethren. He's not capping it at 490. He's saying you're going
to be forgiving your brethren always, repeatedly, just as the
Lord, your God forgives you for Christ's sake. We're not forgiven
of God because we've straightened up ourselves and perfected ourselves
and don't sin anymore. We are received of the Father
in grace through His Son, Jesus Christ. And He's long-suffering
to us. And He's patient with us. And
He teaches us in gentleness and in faithfulness by the Word of
His Spirit, turning us from self to behold. the righteousness
of God given freely in his son, Jesus Christ. And that's how
we're to love one another. And that's how we're to be patient
with one another, forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's
sake, hath forgiven you, brethren. And so we're thankful to God
for his grace and his mercy, which is very patient and long-suffering
with us and doesn't leave us to ourselves. And so oftentimes,
I've found that we've got to be brought very low, very low
and humbled greatly before we begin to see some sin which has
beset us so often. We must be brought low before
we begin to see that sin setting up in our own heart and in our
minds and see it to the point where we cry out, Lord, save
me, deliver me, Lord. I see it again. I see my own
faults. I see my wickedness. And it takes
a long time before you even get to that point. And the Lord shows
us that when we think that we've mastered it, and when we think
that we now are in a position where we can teach others and
help them to see what we've come to see, when we think that we've
arrived and put that sin to bed, it's not long before pride goeth
before destruction. And we fall in sin. We fall. A haughty spirit goes
before a fall. And so we go down the chute and
we're back to the beginning all over again to learn, to relearn,
to hear again what we have need of hearing to see our sin and
the faithfulness of God in Christ. Now we're told in Judges 6-2,
and the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. And because of
the Midianites, the children of Israel made them the dens
which are in the mountains and caves and strongholds. Now, it's the Lord who strengthened
their enemy. The Lord is the one who strengthened
Midian. There's a scripture, I don't remember if it's in Numbers
or Deuteronomy, but there's a scripture that says the children of Israel
put every male of the Midianites to death. They slew them all. That means they were brought
down very low. And yet here they are prevailing
against Israel. So the Lord strengthened this
enemy. And the Lord brought this enemy against them. And so we're
told of Israel's response. It was the children of Israel
made them the dens which are in the mountains and caves and
strongholds. Now looking at these verses objectively,
we see this was the effort of the people. They were afraid. They were made afraid. They were
fearful. And so they took it upon themselves now to provide
a hiding place for them. They were looking for a place
of sanctuary, a little rest, a little reprieve. When the enemies
would come up, they were looking for some kind of respite, some
kind of a hiding place to be delivered from their enemies. They were looking for peace.
They were looking for rest. Maybe they had a good tent. that
they had just made. They didn't want that to fall
into the hands of their enemies. Maybe they had good blankets.
They had a little wheat stored up. Maybe they had a piece of
silver, a good pot full of some meal that they were keeping,
some oil, that they didn't want to go to the Midianites. And
so they went to these caves and these strongholds and hiding
places in the mountain. Now we also read, let's go to
verse 3 through 5, Judges 6, 3 through 5, and so it was when
Israel had sown, when they had sown seed, that the Midianites
came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east,
even they came up against them. And it says, they encamped against
them and destroyed the increase of the earth till thou come unto
Gaza and left no sustenance for Israel, neither sheep, nor ox,
nor ass. For they came up with their cattle
and their tents, and they came as grasshoppers for multitude.
For both they and their camels were without number, and they
entered into the land to destroy it. So during planting time,
while it was time to till the ground, and lay the seed, and
manure the fields, there wasn't any trouble. But when harvest
was approaching, that's when there was trouble. That's when
the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the Children
of the East, even they came up against them. And so all of Israel's
enemies that were around about them came up and camped out against
Israel. Their enemies, their adversity
came and camped out against Israel. And that's true of adversity
in our own lives. Doesn't it do that? When it comes,
there's times, there's trials, there's adversities, there's
difficulties. And it comes and camps out, camps
out in our mind, trampling upon joy, trampling upon peace, taking
up our time, causing us to worry, causing us to doubt, and causing
us to fear. And so these enemies, they came
and they took all their sustenance, and they left nothing for them
to feed upon. And they harassed them and made
it very difficult in the same way that adversity and trials
come and camp against us and trample down that which were
our thoughts and minds ought to be. And it makes it very difficult
and very hard for us. It says that they came for one
purpose. They entered into the land to destroy, to ruin their
inheritance. to destroy that which God had
given to them. Now verse six, it says, and Israel
was greatly impoverished because of the Midianites. And the children
of Israel cried unto the Lord. And so the people, though they
had sown seed, though they had prepared and laid up for themselves,
found no sustenance, no nutrition, nothing good for their bodies
that they had done for themselves. But we see here what the Lord
was doing, how he was bringing them to the end of their selves.
to destroy their self-confidences and their self-righteousness,
to take away that which they had done by the strength of their
own hand, by the works of their own flesh, to bring it to nothing,
and to break them in order that they should cry out to the Lord
to save them. to see that Baal can't do anything
for them. Their false god, their idol that
they worshipped and trusted in cannot save them. All their works
came to nothing. They were trampled upon, they
were brought to ruin, and it never made it to the people,
never came to pass. And so the Lord was bringing
his people to cry out to him, to bring us to see our need of
him. Now, when you get to Gideon,
you'll see that the people sinned. They were worshiping Baal. They were worshiping a false
god. At the end of verse 25, there
in Judges 6, it says that Gideon was instructed to throw down
the altar of Baal. that thy father hath and cut
down the grove that is by him. And so what the Lord is saying
to us is he's going to have our whole heart. He's going to have
our whole heart. He's going to turn us away from
self that he would have the whole heart. And so What we find in our flesh is
that we're happy to pay lip service to God. We're happy to say all
the right things, to make an appearance, and to show like
we're trusting the Lord, so long as this heart of ours, this wicked
heart of ours, is able to wander and do the things that it wants
to do. But your God, who chose you and gave you to Christ, is
faithful to keep you, to deliver you, and to bring you to himself,
because he will have the whole heart of his people. And there
are things that he deals with each of us on. Some things don't
trouble us and don't seem to be brought out or pointed out
by the Lord, but he knows what he's going to deal with us in.
And he's going to bring us low in ourselves of certain things,
and he's going to have the whole heart. He's going to have our
whole heart. And he may not deal with you
the way he deals with me, and he may not deal with you the
way he deals with her, But the Lord's going to have our heart
and he's going to turn us and he knows right where to put that
finger. and press that mark on us and bring us to see and to
know, Lord, I've sinned. I'm to blame. Lord, I'm the one
playing the fool. Lord, I need you. Have mercy
upon me. Lord, forgive me. Deliver me
from my sin. Keep me, Lord. He does that.
He's able to do it. He knows all things. And he is
the true and living God. And so Israel here, they look
like a bunch of heathens. They look like they're getting
exactly what they deserve, but they are a type of the people
of God under the covenant of grace. By grace, they are the
elect of God. By grace, God has purposed to
save his people. And in that sense, that's how
we see them because we, too, are under that covenant of grace.
And though there are times where we look wretched and vile and
appear to be the worst heathen, the worst of the worst, the worst
of them all, the chief of sinners, yet God doesn't leave us. And
God in mercy brings us down upon our knees, down to see our need
of Him, that we cannot save ourselves and that we need Him. We need
Him. When we come forth in Adam, we're all born in darkness. We
come forth in corrupt flesh, defiled flesh, unbelieving sinners. corrupt and defiled, unable to
save ourselves. And our hearts are full of sin. And that's what Midian and the
Amalekites, that's a picture of. That's sin in this heart,
sin in this flesh. And our minds are darkened with
false religion, superstitions and silly beliefs and lies about
the true and living God. That's seen in the children of
the East, where all those false religions flow from abundantly. And that's what's in us by nature. And that's what the Lord is going
to make us to see, that in ourselves, we are dead in trespasses and
sins, and we can do nothing to save ourselves. Oh, we make our
little hideouts, we have our little safe places and our sanctuaries
and things that we think are gonna protect us and provide
for us, but God delivers us from them all that we might be delivered
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And even after we have life in
Christ, these things, these sins, still plague our hearts. And
we're still shown our need of Him repeatedly, again and again,
to behold the deliverance of God in Christ, that it's not
by our hands. That no, we didn't save ourselves.
That no, we're not walking the straight and narrow and providing
for ourselves. We're made to see that just as
in the first hour we were saved by grace, so it is in every hour
that we are saved by the grace of God, freely given in his son. We have our little dens. We have
our little hideouts in the mountains. Sometimes that's the law for
people. Sometimes that's their religion and things that they're
trusting in. We have our caves and our strongholds
that we retreat to, that we think make us feel safe. But all our
sober, sewing, and all our labors, it yields no fruit. It doesn't
bring joy and peace. It gets destroyed before it ever
matures. And we see it trampled upon.
We see it taken from us and we're never gonna be satisfied by the
works of this flesh. All we'll ever be by the things
that we do in this flesh is we'll be impoverished. We'll be poor
and desolate and brought to ruin in the flesh. That's all it'll
ever be. That's like going to a thorn
bush and thistles and brambles and looking for figs and grapes. We're expecting to see good fruit
that'll feed us, that we can live upon, but the Lord shows
us no. When you turn to the flesh, all
you're gonna get are the works of the curse, the thorns and
the thistles, and the brambles. And that's a mercy, that's hard
upon the flesh. The flesh doesn't wanna hear
it, the flesh doesn't wanna see it, but by the grace of God,
he shall bring his people, everyone, to be pricked by those thorns,
to be hurt, to see it trampled, to see what we thought was our
salvation, to see it come to ruin, to see it brought to nothing,
and to be torn down before our eyes that we would see the grace
of God in Christ, and behold His righteousness, and His glory,
and His power, and give God all the thanks for His deliverance
and mercy to us in His Son. Turn over to Romans 7, and we
see this. Romans 7, he's going to make
his people to understand this. Doesn't mean that this flesh
is going to be perfected in this time. We're not going to see
what we would see yet, but we're going to have understanding what
our God is doing in his son, and we're going to praise him
for it. So Romans 7, verse 18. For I know that in me, he knows
that by the spirit of God. We don't know that by nature,
but we know it by the grace of God. For I know that in me, that
is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present
with me. But how to perform that which
is good, I find not. I want fruit. But when I keep
following the ways of the flesh, I don't find anything. And that's
what I keep doing in my sin nature. For the good that I would, I
do not. But the evil which I would not,
that I do. Now if I do that, I would not.
It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. I find
then a law that when I would do good, evil is present with
me. For I delight in the law of God
after the inward man, but I see another law in my members, warring
against the law of my mind and bringing me into captivity to
the law of sin, which is in my members. And so the Lord shows
us that in this flesh, it's always gonna be impoverished. This flesh
is never gonna bring forth mature fruit unto the praise and glory
of God. It would be unto our glory. It's
never gonna produce that which we think it should. And our God
makes us to know that he makes us to mourn our sin, to see it,
to see our folly, to see our foolishness. He makes us to know
that we might find our all in him. To have an understanding
of that scripture which tells us Christ is all. And God makes Christ all to us. And it's a mercy, it's good when
God strips us of our righteousness, of our own self-righteousness.
It's a mercy of God to bring us low and to humble us. And
to cause us to fall on our faces when we think we've done good
and done something to earn God's favor. But he makes us to see
you're all is Christ. I've given you everything you
need. And I'm not looking to your flesh for righteousness.
I'm looking to my son whom I've sent. And He's provided abundantly
everything that you need. And you have everything in Him.
You look to Him. You stay upon Him. You trust
Him, for He is your salvation. And so all those works that we
do from our mountain cave hideouts and our seed sowing and everything
we've done isn't gonna yield that fruit, that sustenance,
that deliverance that we thought it would, because God has purposed
for you that are his chosen people to cry out unto the Lord, to
cry out unto him. And though it's painful in the
flesh, and though we weep and mourn and we're made sorry for
it, What a joy, what a blessing when he fills our hearts with
Christ. And he brings us to cry, Lord,
not as I will, but as thou wilt. And to pray that by the spirit
of his grace. Look, if you're still there in
Romans 7, let's just end with those last two verses, 24 and
25. Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the
body of this death? That which I keep seeing over
and over again, my folly, my sin, my foolishness, who's going
to deliver me from the body of this death? I thank God. through
Jesus Christ our Lord, so then with the mind, there in the new
man I myself serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law
of sin. I'm trusting the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ and his righteousness alone. Now,
having made his child to find no peace in their works and no
fruit from their labors, and bringing them to cry unto him
for salvation, He's prepared them to hear the gospel. He sends
the gospel to his sheep, his lost sheep. He prepares that
and sends that word to his wandering sheep. Look there at verse 7
in Judges 6, verse 7 and the beginning of 8. And it came to
pass when the children of Israel cried unto the Lord because of
the Midianites, that the Lord sent a prophet unto the children
of Israel which said unto them thus saith the Lord God of Israel. And that's what your God does
for you. It's a mercy when God brings you under the sound of
the gospel. It's because he will be gracious
to you and he will feed you just as he's promised to feed his
people to not leave them without a witness of his grace and mercy
in his son to turn us again from self and sin to behold the righteousness
of God, the grace of God in his son, Jesus Christ. Picking up
there in verse eight, I brought you, I brought you up from Egypt
and brought you forth out of the house of bondage. And I delivered
you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of all that
oppressed you and drave them out from before you and gave
you their land. And he's saying to us, I have
sent my son who laid aside his glory, which he had with me from
all eternity. And he took upon him the weakness
of flesh to come as the shorty of his people, of his bride given
to him by the father, to lay down his life, to be the propitiation
for our sins, to make an atonement with his own blood to cover you. and deliver you from the wrath
of God. And having accomplished that
redemption, He gives you life. By the resurrection power which
raised Him from the dead, He gives you life in Himself. And
He is our life. And He is our food. Christ said,
I have food, which you know not. Christ is our food. We feed upon
His flesh. and His blood. He is the salvation
of His people, keeping them alive, sustaining them, providing every
need that we have. It's all given freely and abundantly
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, we're looking to Him. We're looking to Him. He's our
hideout. You know, it says in Isaiah 26, verse 20. Let me just get it there. Isaiah
26, verse 20. You want a hideout? You want a place
of safety and provision? He calls you to Christ. He says,
come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers and shut thy doors
about thee. Hide thyself, as it were, for
a little moment until the indignation be overpassed. For behold, the
Lord cometh out of his place to punish the inhabitants of
the earth for their iniquity. But he's provided a safe haven
for you. He's provided a covering, an
arc of safety. In the midst of the wrath, he's
given Christ for his people. And he brings them into them.
He won't leave you. You're not a city forsaken. You
shall hear the word. You shall be drawn by the grace
of God. You shall hear that word and
rejoice in it. And God will show you your sin.
He'll show you your death. He'll show you your foolish works.
but I'll show you Christ and he'll draw you into him. And
you'll confess, Lord, this is all of your grace. It's all of
your work. Thank you, Lord. And we'll praise him for it.
He brought you up from spiritual death. He's delivered you out
of the house of bondage by his son, Jesus Christ. He's the one
who opens the prison gate. He's the one who says, sinner,
show yourself, come into the light, come into the light. And
by his power and strength, we come. We're drawn to him. Hebrews
2.15. I'll read 14 and 15. For as much
then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, yes, we are
full of sin in this flesh. Yes, we are foolish. Yes, we
are dead in trespasses and sins. But because we are partakers
of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same.
that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death,
that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death
were all their lifetime subject to bondage. To deliver us from
the folly of making dens in the mountains, going into the caves,
and providing strongholds for ourselves, which we all did out
of fear and worry, and afraid that God was gonna get us, he
provided the salvation in Christ. And our Lord says, come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give
you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn
of me. For I am meek, and lowly in heart,
and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and
my burden is light. And so our Savior, the Lord Jesus
Christ, he died. And he rose again to give life
to his people. He died for his people, shedding
his blood for them, making an atonement for them. And he rose
again for their life, that we might know the peace and promise
of our God fulfilled to us in Christ. This land here, it pictures
the promise of an eternal inheritance in Christ. And our Lord says,
I gave you this land. And those enemies, they come
to harass us and to destroy that land, to bring us to doubt the
promise of God made to us in Christ, to doubt that we shall
possess that land and have that inheritance which he's given
to us in Christ. That's why those enemies come. But it's a walk
of faith that the Lord uses. He uses those enemies wisely
at the right time to break us of sin, to deliver us from trusting
this flesh and going the way in the course of this world and
to bring us back to behold Christ again and again and again, to
find our all in him. Verse 10 says, I said unto you,
I am the Lord your God, fear not the God of the Amorites,
don't fear them, in whose land ye dwell in this flesh, but ye
have not obeyed my voice. Now, what he's saying there is
through this repetition, the Lord is teaching us over and
over again that in this flesh, we don't obey him. We haven't
done that, which we, which is right. We, we try, we, we strive
and we try to do things, but we do come up short continually,
but our salvation is in the Lord Jesus Christ. were delivered
from the dead works, were delivered from the flesh to behold the
salvation of God in Him. And there's nothing lovable in
us. It's not that we're so lovable and so good and so right that
God did this, but because of the sweet Savior of the Lord
Jesus Christ, who was sacrificed for us, who gave Himself willingly
to put away our sin, that's our covering, that's our acceptance
with the Father. Keep looking to Him. Thank God
when you're brought low. Thank God when you're humbled
in your sin. We're not looking for it, we're
not trying to do that, but our God in grace and in wisdom does
it effectually to the praise and glory of his name. Amen. All right, let's close in prayer
and then we'll take the Lord's Supper together. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your wisdom and for making Christ unto us our wisdom,
our righteousness, our sanctification, and our redemption. Lord, for
making him everything to us. We thank you, Lord, for delivering
us, for allowing the sins to harass us and camp out against
us and to trample upon the things we were so proud of and glory
to him. that we might cry unto you for
deliverance and for peace, for true rest, for salvation in your
son, Jesus Christ. We thank you, Lord, for all that
you've done in humbling us and never letting us become confident
in this flesh. It's all of your grace and mercy.
Thank you, Lord. We thank you for your son. We
thank you for life in our Lord and Savior. We thank you for
the peace and fellowship which we have with our God and him.
And Lord, we pray that you would keep our eyes ever looking to
Christ. Lord, help us to walk in love
and in faith and to be helpers of one another's joy in Christ,
to help our brethren where they have need to be kind and gentle
with one another, and to have love for one another, even as
you command. Lord, we pray that you would
be with us this week. Help us in our various infirmities,
our appointments, the things that we need to do. Lord, help
us. For it's only by your grace that
we walk in faith and walk ever looking to Christ. Lord, we We
pray this in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
Amen. All right, brethren. Now, let's
see. Okay. It's back there. Would
you be okay. I'm going to ask a brother Joe to hand out the
bread and the wine. Um, you that believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, you're, you're welcome. You're welcome to the
table. And when we come to to take of the
bread and the wine, we come remembering the grace of our God. We don't
see in ourselves what we would see, but we remember the body
of Christ. We remember what he has done
to put away our sin, and that it's him and him alone that makes
us righteous and worthy to come to the table remembering him.
I'm gonna read from Mark. Mark 14. Sometimes I sit down and we take
it together, but I'll read it and we'll take it as we go through
this passage here. I'm going to read verses 20 through
27. I like to begin with 27 because
it reminds us of what we are. And Jesus saith unto them, all
ye shall be offended because of me this night. For it is written,
I will smite the shepherd and the sheep shall be scattered.
But after that I am risen, I will go before you into Galilee. We see there that our Lord obtained
our eternal redemption all by himself. We didn't help him.
We didn't lift a finger. We didn't do anything to save
ourselves. Christ did it all for his sheep.
Verse 22, and as they did eat, Jesus took bread and blessed
and break it and gave to them and said, take eat, this is my
body. Verse 23, and he took the cup,
and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, and they
all drank of it. And he said unto them, this is
my blood of the New Testament, which is shed for many. Verily
I say unto you, I will drink no more of the fruit of the vine
until that day that I drink it new in the kingdom of God. Let's all stand and sing a closing
hymn, 292. Surely, goodness and mercy, 292. A pilgrim was I in a wandering,
in the cold night of sin I did roam. When Jesus the kind shepherd
found me, and now I am on my way home. Surely goodness and
mercy shall follow me all the days, all the days of my life. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days, all the days of my life. He restoreth my soul when I'm
weary. He giveth me strength day by
day. He leads me beside the still
waters. He guards me each step of the
way. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days, all the days of my life. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days, all the days of my life. When I walk through the dark,
lonesome valley My Savior will walk with me there And safely
His great hand will lead me To the mansions He's gone to prepare
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days, all the
days of my life. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days, all the days of my life. I shall dwell in the house of
the Lord forever, and I shall feast at the table spread for
me. Surely goodness and mercy shall
follow me all the days, all the days of my life. All the days, all the days of
my life. Thank you.