For in them you think you have
eternal life. But, contrary to what you thought,
but they are they that testify of me. Would to God every preacher
that is preaching would approach this book as it is intended to
preach Christ? That's it. If you go to this
book for anything else, yeah, there are wisdoms in it, worldly
wisdoms if you want to take them, financial wisdoms in there. It's
not the intent. The intent is to preach Christ. Pray that God give us grace tonight
to see Him. We'll be preaching concerning
the calling of God's people. When God calls you, you do see yourself. You see
your need. You see your sin. You see your
inability. But really the call is intended
not just for you to see who you are, but to see Christ. To believe on Christ. Why? Because Christ is all. Christ
is all. There is nothing else. Christ
is all. I pray God will make that effectual
to the hearts of men every time I preach. That's always my desire,
is that the Spirit make that call effectual. So I pray the
Lord will do that this evening. I ask your prayers for me as
I desire to preach to you. Thank you for your prayers concerning
me this past week that I was in the hospital. So thank you for your prayers.
I'm doing somewhat better, so I'm thankful for that. Just continue to pray. I ask
your prayers for me and my family. Continue to pray for Jill, if
you will. Remember her and your prayers
and her family. Angela, continue to pray for
her as she continues to suffer that grief and loss that is surely
beyond my understanding. Some of you have experienced
the loss of a spouse, so pray for her as she struggles with
this and Pray God would bring her again to be with us. I miss her greatly. Rick. Anything from Rick? Okay. You need to pray for Rick. I miss him when he's not able
to be here. Lord knows, and others who are
not able to be here on Wednesday evenings. Some are not able for
various reasons, but I tell you, I ask the Lord constantly
to remove those reasons. Why? They ain't important. Name something more important
than this. Can you find anything more important than worship?
I know the mind and the flesh are going to find things. Family is a big issue, isn't
it? Family is a big hindrance to worship, isn't that so? God gives us family, and yet we use it as an excuse
not to worship. Jobs, they're important. God gives you a job, right? If
anybody's got any income whatsoever, God gives it. And yet we use
the very thing that God gives us to say, well, it's more important. And don't think that I don't
struggle with these things as well. The things of the world
come in when I have studied. And I could find a ton of reasons
not to. And I know there are others that
are sick, that are incapable. Man, that's just a debilitating
thing and I am surely familiar with sickness. It is debilitating
and I think one of the hardest things to do is to worship when
you're sick. I just do. It is a misery and
it's a constant thing that you can't seem to get rid of. One
thing about it, God knows, And that's the important thing. And
I have confidence. And I'm not here to rebuke anybody.
God does all that by himself. And I think that's necessary
for God to teach us. You can warn people, and that's
good. You do it out of love. But how
many times have we warned people? Well, that's not for me to make
it, I'm going to use this word a lot tonight, effectual. That
just means get the job done, okay? Whatever I say is not going
to get the job done. It is something God himself must
input, and that's what I desire. I want people to come not because
they feel guilty about not coming. I would hope that the Lord put
it on their heart because they miss Him. Because they miss Him. Not me, but Him. And So pray
for these, ask God's mercy, because that's what it takes, it takes
mercy. And if you have this desire, who gave that to you? Who opened the door for you to
be here so you weren't hindered? That wasn't you, was it? It was
God doing it for you and me. And so I'm thankful to be here
with you and pray for those who are not able. Please, don't forget
them. Pray for them. Let's go to God in prayer real
quick. I've got a lot to cover, so let's just go ahead and go
to Lord in prayer. Our gracious Father, we take
these petitions that we have laid out before you tonight.
Those that are suffering, those who are in grief, those who are
in great pain in the flesh, those who are sick, those who are tried
and pressed out beyond measure. Father, please be merciful. Please
show forth your power and grace upon their hearts and minds and,
yes, their bodies, please. For those who may be healthy
in the outer but are dead on the inside, oh, Father, that
you'd be merciful. to give life, use the means that you have chosen
and call them to believe on Christ alone, that you would shed the love
of God abroad in our hearts, Father, through the preaching
of the gospel, through the effectual working of the Spirit, through
faith, I plead for forgiveness of our
sins. We could never even count our
sins that we've committed even sitting in this place. But we trust that Christ's blood
is sufficient to cover all our sins. Forgive us our sins. In Christ's name, Amen. Alright,
turn with me to Romans chapter 9. Romans chapter 9. Again, I'm reading verse 22,
but my text is really verse 24. I guess if I had a title, The Distinction Between Vessels
of Mercy and Vessels of Destruction. What's the distinction? What
is the difference, the difference between vessels of mercy and
vessels of wrath? The scripture says, what if God,
willing to show his wrath and to make known his power known,
endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to
destruction? and that he might make known
the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he afore
prepared unto glory, even us whom he hath called, not of the
Jews only, but also of the Gentiles." Now, I want to go over this again
with you. Remember, the apostle is answering
three objections. three objections of men to the
sovereignty of God. This chapter is one of the most
preeminent chapters regarding the absolute, total, complete
sovereignty of God over everything. This chapter. The Apostle begins
with a plea of mercy toward his people, the Jews, that were lost. He begs for their salvation and
he had just stated that salvation, that anyone's justified of God,
can't be separated from the love of God. Well, wait a second.
The Jews were God's chosen people. The Jews God promised to save. Yet now Paul is saying, listen,
the Jews are lost. So the question is, is the Word
of God of none effect? Verse 6, Paul says, No, the Word
of God, not as though the Word of God had taken none effect.
Why? For they are not all Israel which are of Israel. In other
words, the Israel of the Old Testament, the people, the physical
people, were only a spiritual type of the true Israel of God. So when God swore to save Israel,
His Word was valid, because He didn't mean physical Israel.
He meant spiritual Israel. So Paul answers the question,
who is Israel? Well, he uses the two illustrations
of Isaac and Ishmael. Isaac was chosen, both of them
sons of Abraham, but Isaac was the son of promise. Ishmael was
rejected. And then he gives the greater
illustration of the twins of Isaac. both being in the womb
of their mother. He said, For the children not
yet being born, neither having done good or evil, that the purpose
of God according to election might stand, not of works. You see, election by that statement
is not of works. But of him that calleth. Said
to her, The elder shall serve the younger, as it is written,
Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. So God loved Jacob
before he was able to do any good or evil. God hated Esau
before he was able to do any good or evil. God chose one and
God rejected the other. What does this prove? It proves
that salvation is not of works. That's what he's trying to tell
you. You being an Israelite, a spiritual Israelite, is not
based on works. But what? The sovereign will
of God. So the second objection comes
from the work monger. Those who desire to earn salvation. They don't like that. He says, surely God is unrighteous
to choose one and to hate the other. Is there unrighteousness
with God is the question. That's verse 14. And what does he say? God forbid.
God's not unrighteous. He told you through Moses, I
will have mercy on whom I'll have mercy. I'll have compassion
on whom I'll have compassion. So then, Listen to this, a conclusion. So then, it is not of him that
willeth. What does will have to do with
election? Nothing. It's not of him that
runneth. What does running have to do?
What does works have to do with it? It's not of him that runneth.
Well, what is this a matter of election based on? But of God
that showeth mercy. Election is based on mercy, the
will of God and the mercy of God. What about the others that
God hates? Well, he answers that question,
he says, I've raised up Pharaoh for that one purpose, to show
my power. Now you understand that man was
born, he lived, he rose to power for one purpose, so God could
kill him. That's it. God manifests His
hatred of sin in that man. So what's the conclusion of that
in verse 18? Therefore, here's the conclusion
of that. He hath mercy on whom he will, and whom he will he
hardeneth. What does this mean? It means that everything is in
the sovereign will of God. Even the wickedness of man is
determined by the sovereign will of God. This is what free will religion
is going to make an objection. Here is free will rejection. If God controls every action
of man by sovereign decree, and man doesn't have a free will,
then how can God punish them? Tell me if that's not exactly
what the apostle says, the objection. Look at verse 19. Thou wilt say unto me, why did
he yet find fault for who hath resisted his will? How can he
punish a sinner when he determined that they should do that? He starts to give you this answer.
Who in the world do you think you are? That's his first answer. Nay, O man. Who art thou to reply
against God? Shall the thing formed say unto
him that formed it, why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the
potter power of the clay of the same lump to make one vessel
unto honor and another to dishonor? And so why does God do this?
He gives this answer, this is his answer. Why does God save
one in mercy and harden another one? Listen, he hardens men for
this reason, to show his power and his hatred for sin. Why does
He save another? To show His glory and His grace. You see, men think God does things
because of them. Everything God does is because
of Himself. You understand that? Everything
God does is for His glory. Now we, as vessels of mercy,
greatly benefit. If you're a vessel of mercy,
you greatly benefit from that mercy and that glory. And so then we see this very
plainly, that according to scripture, God chose a people for himself. God loved a people determined
to save them, and yet there are others that God has determined
to reprobate. God hated them. Listen, you can kick it out all
you want to. It doesn't change the fact. You can't change this
text. You just can't. You can hate
it. And I'll tell you this, you can
be like me. I don't fully understand how
God is sovereign and man is responsible. I don't understand that. God
never demands for me to understand that. I sure believe what this book
says. I sure believe what God says about himself. And last
week, if you don't listen to that message, I gave you several
illustrations of God hardening men and deceiving men and sending
a lying spirit to men. God did that. He said, I make
no apologies for that, yet I'm not chargeable with sin. Okay. That's all I can say. Okay. I
can't fully understand that, but okay, that's right. Let God
be true and every man a liar. So God has chosen vessels of
mercy and vessels of wrath. But I want you to see that this
is not just a doctrine. Man, if we can... I really want
you to see this is God describing Himself as the Sovereign God. Men don't mind if God's sovereign
over, you know, a job or, you know, over a providence here
or a providence there, especially good providences. They don't
mind giving God credit for all the good things that happen to
them. Something bad happens, though, they seem to think that
God didn't have any control over that. No. He ordained it. He purposed it. See, God's sovereign over everything.
It's not just a theory. Election is much more than a
theory, an abstract doctrine, a part of systematic theology.
The doctrine of election is one that must be loved and embraced
by God's people. Why? Because to love and embrace
this is to love and embrace the God of election. Not just the
doctrine of election. I don't want to embrace a doctrine
of election. I want to embrace the God of election. Why? Because it's an account
of His sovereign mercy. And it humbles us. This doctrine
brings us to the dust because what do you really control? What
do you really have to control? You think you have illusions
of control. You don't have any control whatsoever. Everything is in the hand of
God. Paul is showing, Paul then having
shown that salvation from all eternity was purposed of God
for the elect. that Christ came into the world
to save the elect. He now puts flesh on this doctrine
and he says this, even us. He makes it personal now. He's
talking about these vessels of mercy which were prepared under
glory and he said, look, I'm talking about us. It's personal. It's not just a theory. Paul
said, I'm talking about me and these people I'm preaching to,
even us. Even us. So tonight, seeing that
God does have an elect people, He has people that He has loved
from eternity and people He has hated. Seeing this, that He has
vessels of honor and vessels of dishonor. He has vessels of
mercy and vessels fitted for destruction. That's just a fact. That is just plain truth. The question must be raised,
which one am I? People want to kick at that.
Why not just ask the question? Isn't it vital to know which
one I am? Instead of kicking and trying
to change that truth, bow to it and ask God which one you
are. And how would we know? That's an important question,
right? Anyone can say I'm a vessel of
mercy, right? Isn't that easy to say? So they say, I'm a vessel of
mercy, look at all I did. Is that proof? It's not proof,
is it? What is the proof? Look at this. Even us, this is the evidence,
listen to this. Even us, whom he hath How does one know their vessel
of mercy? Listen to this question. Have
you been called? Have you been called? God's purpose in election was
to save some of Adam's fallen race. If there were no election,
there would have been none saved. I want you to understand that.
Without election, none would be saved. If you believe that,
then you defy the word of God that says there is none righteous,
no not one. There's none that understand
it. Listen to this. There's none that seek it after God. You're
saying that there's somebody seeking after God. You're saying
somebody is righteous. Somebody has ability. God said
no. Jesus said no man can come to
me. So if God left it to man, there would be no one saved.
But because of mercy, God did purpose to save some. And salvation
in election, listen, is always unto salvation. What does that
mean? It means this, that everyone
God chose is going to be saved. Without question. None of them
are going to be lost. There is nothing more sure than
that. Jesus made it very plain. All
that the Father giveth me, listen to this, shall come to me. No one could speak like this.
I mean, you know, when those Pharisees heard him, they were
right. Never a man spake like this man.
Why? Nobody could be sure of really
anything. But he is. Everyone the father gave me shall
come to me and this is what I'm going to do when they come I
will in no wise cast him out What for the father? Well, I
came down from heaven not to do mine own will but the will
of him that sent me and This is the father's will which has
sent me that of all he had given me I should lose How many how
many really lose I should lose nothing? Nothing, how many of
the elect will be lost? nothing nothing Now this should
bring comfort to every believer's ears. Because I'm telling you,
there are times where you feel as though you're cast off. You
feel as though that you've been abandoned. And you assess the
situation and you feel that God would be right to abandon you.
But this is the comfort, is that He will not abandon them. He
will lose none of them. He was sent of the Father as
a federal head to obtain righteousness by His obedience. He was sent
to take all of their sins upon Himself and suffer the reproach
of the Father on Calvary's tree. He was intended to die for the
elect. He said, Psalm 69, 9, "...the
zeal of thine house hath eaten me up, And the reproaches of
them that reproach thee, listen to this, fell on me. They're
reproaching you. They reproached you. They cursed
you. They hated you. They despised
you. They sinned against you. And
I'm going to take that on myself. You see that God chose vessels
of mercy. I was reading this the other
day and it just kind of popped out to me, so it's not original
with me, but it was good. You know, mercy is something
that's not necessary. Think about this. God's justice
is necessary upon all men. Every man's sin, God must justly
deal with them. He must. But one thing about
mercy is, He doesn't have to have mercy on everybody. Mercy
can be selective. But one thing that His mercy
does, it's never at the expense of His justice. When God has
mercy, it's not at the expense of His justice, And we know this because Christ,
bearing our sins, satisfied justice. That is an act of mercy. That
He bore our sins in His own body on the tree. So if God chose some to show
mercy at the expense of His justice, then God would be unrighteous.
He couldn't do that. We do that all the time, don't
we? We show mercy, and we don't need payment. Most likely because they don't
owe us very much. If they owed us a lot, we wouldn't be kind
of difficult to let it go. But think of the debt that we
owed God. And Christ paid, paid it all. He paid it all. And so God did not choose us
and then excuse His justice. But his son agreed to pay the
debt for all that the father chose. Therefore, when Jesus
said this, if the son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. And so then those who believe,
those who are called, this is a hope that we have. There is
therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.
What about now? There is therefore now no condemnation,
no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. What about
now? There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are
in Christ Jesus. So God chose a people and Christ
died for the people. The question is, who are the
vessels of mercy? What makes the distinction? What
distinguishes between vessels of wrath and vessels of mercy? It is this, even the calling,
the calling, even us who he hath called. Now, I want to deal with this
matter of calling because there are two types of calling. There are two types. One is a
general call. This is necessary. God commands
us to go into all the world and preach the gospel to who? Who
are we to preach to? Every creature. Why? Because
you don't know who the elect are. You have no clue. Neither do I. I have any clue
whatsoever. Our responsibility as believers,
as a church, as a pastor, is to preach the word. That's it.
Declare the gospel. And listen to this one. Look
unto me and be ye saved. Listen to this. All the ends
of the earth. For I am God and there is none
else. Look to Christ. That's what Christ
is saying. Look to me. Look to me! Believe on me! So God's word cries all men to look
to Christ, to repent, and to believe the gospel. The general
call in scripture is illustrated by the seed and the sower. Remember
that in Mark chapter 4? I don't have the time to go deep
into the illustration here, but it is a valid, very easy one
to understand. A sower went forth to sow. This
guy had a bag of seed and he went out there and he just threw
it. Is that hard to understand? That's how they sowed back. We,
Joanne likes to plant. You know, she likes to dig up
and put the seed in there and dig up and put the seed in there. That's not the kind of sowing
he's talking about. They take the seed and they cast
it at a They don't know where it's going. They don't know where
it's landing. That's not their business. Their
business is simply to cast the seed. So it went forth to sow. That's what God's preachers do.
We cast the seed. We have no idea where it's going
to land. I don't know your heart. I can't tell what's going on
in you. That's not for me. We preach the gospel. The preacher
doesn't know where the seed is going to land, and it definitely
doesn't know what type of heart it's going to land on. But we are confident that God
will direct the seed and the heart. That's what I'm confident
in. I'm not confident in men. Listen,
I'm not confident you're going to hear this. I don't have any
confidence in you, just like I don't have any confidence in
myself to do this. This is just what God said to
do. This is what God commanded. And so the Holy Spirit directs
the seed into the heart, and He directs the type of heart
that the seed lands on. I told you He's sovereign in
everything. But if the heart is to receive
the seed, if you're to receive this, this gospel, this general
call, it is the Spirit of God that has to prepare the heart
to receive it. Now by nature, remember there
were those all different types of grounds. You had the hard
ground. That seed just hit the ground
and bounced off. And you have the thorny ground. And you have the stony ground.
Listen, that ground is natural to every one of us. Now, you
may have one of those three. But that's just common. That's
natural to any man. But in order to have a good ground
to receive the seed, something has to be done to the ground.
It is the work of the Holy Spirit to plow up the thorns and the
stones and the hardness of the heart. It is the work of the
Holy Spirit. He has to do that. So when this
general call goes out into the ears of the world, it goes out as a general call. But for the vessel of mercy,
in order for it to be effectual on the vessel of mercy, the power
and grace of God must change the call. He must make the call powerful. There's no, you know, there was a pastor of a church
and some people left because he wasn't powerful enough. I
kind of cocked my head and what in the world did that mean? He's
not powerful enough. Oh, you mean he's not dynamic.
He doesn't, you know, talk loud. What in the world does that have
to do with the gospel? That's not the power I'm talking
about. The power must be of the spirit. And I'm assured of this. Whatever God wants this gospel
to do, it's going to do. This gospel bounces off your
heart. Listen, that's exactly what God determined to do, and
you're responsible. And you got that? God determined
for your heart to be hard, and yet you're responsible. That seed may land in that stony
ground, and it may shoot up, and you become religious. But
there's really no life in you, no fruit in you. God determined
that, and yet you're responsible. Maybe thorny ground. But I know this. If God doesn't
prepare the heart, break the heart. If He doesn't break the
heart, this seed just don't take root. It don't take root unless
you're broken over sin. It just won't. So God, in God's hands, He either
hardens it or He breaks it up. That's not my responsibility. The question, so if God has chosen
a people, preacher, Some receive and some reject according to
God's will. Then why preach? If God's going
to save the elect no matter what, then why preach? Why make this
general call? Well, because this is the means
God chose to save vessels of mercy. And it's the same means
God chose to condemn the vessels of destruction. It is the means God chose. God didn't choose movies. He didn't choose someone pretending
and acting like somebody in the Bible. How dishonest is that? I see that's big popular now. Some story about Jesus on a series
or something. And these people are acting.
They don't even feel real remorse for sin. They're just pretending
to feel remorse. How horrible is that? They're
lying to move you emotionally. That's deceptive, isn't it? What is the means God chose to
call vessels of mercy? It is the preaching of the Gospel.
It is the general call of the Gospel. Repent and believe. That's the means that God has
chosen. Why are we preaching? Because
God said to. I don't need any other explanation. Why don't
you do something else? God didn't say do anything else.
He said preach. Well, that's foolish. You're
perishing. 1 Corinthians chapter 1 and I think
verse 20 said, To them that perish, preaching is what? Foolishness.
You think what we're doing here is foolish? I got better things
to do. That's not foolish. You know
why I say that? Because you're dying. You're
perishing. Go to 2 Thessalonians chapter
2 and look at verse 13. The apostle here is going to
bring these two things together, election and The preaching of the gospel.
2 Thessalonians 2, look at verse 13. We are bound to give thanks
always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. Listen to this. Through, here's
some means, sanctification of the spirit. Who does the sanctifying? Who does the sanctifying? The
Spirit. And, when one's sanctified of
the Spirit, what's the evidence? Belief of the truth. Faith. Faith. A new nature and faith. That
is the result of God's election. What's the means that these come?
Look at this, verse 14. He called you by our gospel. to the obtaining of the glory
of our Lord Jesus Christ. You that believe, you may testify
of this that you were called by our gospel. Isn't that how
you were called? I mean, you were lost, you didn't
believe, and now you do. He's going to get into this in
detail in chapter 10 about preaching. He said, how can you call on
somebody you've never heard of? Isn't that true? You can't call
on a Christ you've never heard of. I know a lot of people, they'll
tune in and listen to this, and they don't know anything at all
about the God I'm talking about. Well, how can you believe if
you've never heard of Him? And I'll show you here without
a preacher. How shall they preach except they be sinned our purpose
is to preach the gospel generally we preach to everyone But I know
this only the vessels of mercy will be called by our gospel.
That's it only the vessels of mercy So this seed of the gospel is
no accidental Salvation is not we cast it at a venture, but
it's really not a venture to God He knows exactly where it
needs to go. And he puts it there. I don't
plant this in people. I don't plow up your heart. I'm
not trying to get an emotional response out of you. That would be dishonest, wouldn't
it? If I tried to get an emotional response out of you, that would
be just dishonest. I'm not trying to do that. I know when the Spirit of God
touches your heart, there will be an emotional response. There'll
be guilt. There'll be shame. There'll be
sorrow. And then there'll be joy. When
you see Christ, there'll be joy. And so those who hear the Gospel,
I want you to see this, the call changes. It started as a general
call. You came in, didn't know anything
was going to happen, then all of a sudden, you believe. That changed, the call changed
in its nature. It wasn't general, was it? It's
what we call effectual. Effectual. Those that hear the
gospel and believe this is an effectual call. And the effectual
call, this means simply this, it gets the job done. When God
determines to save somebody, it gets the job done. He doesn't make salvation possible
and hope somehow you're going to receive it. Everything in your life is determined
to bring you to that place, to that time where He calls you
and you believe. You couldn't miss it. I didn't
know that before. But when it happened, I know
this, I couldn't miss it. Why? Because it was effectual.
And the effectual call involves two things. It involves the will
and power. For something to be effectual,
it must accomplish what it is sent to do. I know this, God is willing to
save some. He elected them. Christ died
for them. But I know this, that God is
also willing that they be willing. The only reason you're willing
tonight, you that believe, you are willing to believe. Matter
of fact, you recognize this, that your faith is not sufficient
to burn. You want more. You don't have enough. You know
that. You know this, if he had not
ever, if he had not exercised his power to give you faith,
you never would believe. So the general call that is not
accompanied by the power of the Holy Spirit but is rejected, that's not effectual. The general
call may change a person's outward actions, he may become more civil,
more moral, more religious, but it will not help his soul. But the effectual call is altogether
different. I'm going to give you a couple
of illustrations of what an effectual call looks like, and I'll close. Lazarus. Remember Lazarus died? And the Lord stood at the mouth
of that tomb, and he said, Lazarus, come forth. Was that an option? Was there any possibility Lazarus
would remain in the tomb? No. It was an effectual call. It was powerful and it got the
job done because Lazarus came out even though he couldn't walk.
He was wrapped up like a mummy and somehow he must have floated
out. I'll tell you this, nothing could
stop Him from coming out. Why? Because salvation is actually
a resurrection. That's what it is. We by nature
are dead in sins, but when God calls vessels of mercy, He calls
them from death to life. Just like He did Lazarus. Over there in Ezekiel 37, you
remember those dry bones, right? Some big great battle had happened,
and those bones out there, they're all dried up. And God says, you
know what? I'm going to give them life.
That's what he told them. He said, I'm going to give them
life, and this is what's going to happen. They're going to come
together. I'm going to put some flesh on them, and I'm going
to give them breath. That's what he told them before it happened. What did God say about you? He
said, I'm going to give you life while you are still a dead bone.
You're dried up, dead. And he told Ezekiel, he said,
you go out there and preach to them and tell them what I'm going
to do. You know, that's what I do. I preach to dead people. Impossible
task. And what do you say? Whatever
you want me to do. And he went out there and started preaching
to bones. You know what happened? Exactly what God said would happen.
They came together, sinew on them, flesh on them. They didn't
have any air. They didn't have any oxygen. And God said, prophesy to the
wind. I told you I'm going to give
them life and breath. Now prophesy to the wind. In other words,
this is what preachers do. We intercede. We pray. Lord,
give them life. You know what he's going to do?
He's going to give them life. Now I can pray that and be 100%
sure. Because you know why? Because
God said before he's going to give them life. I just don't
know who they are. I know he's going to give them life. So I
can pray for them. And you know what, he's going
to do that. So if you've been called, you've been called from
death to life. Another way of looking at it,
you've been called from darkness to light. You were ignorant and
now you know. You thought salvation would come
by this way. You thought it'd come by your
works. You thought it'd come by your religious deeds. You
thought it'd come by your will. You thought, like Naaman, the
leper, you thought, I thought it'd be done this way. Well, when God came to you, what
happened to your thoughts? They were foolish. My thoughts
were foolish as to how this was going to happen. I didn't know.
Until when? Until he gave me light. The scripture says that as God
commanded the light to shine out of darkness. That's how he
did you. You've been called? Well, did
the light shine out of darkness into your heart? Showing you what? The glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ. That's what I know. I know this. When God called us, He called
us from darkness to light. And the third illustration is
that of bondage. When you've been called by the
Holy Spirit, you've been called from bondage to liberty. You are in bondage to sin. You are under the power of sin. You are under the penalty of
sin. And when God called you, He freed
you from the bondage of sin. What does that mean? Well, that
means He freed me from the guilt of sin. I feel guilty for my
sin. That's not what I'm talking about.
Because that happens to believers all the time. We feel guilty.
No, I mean real guilt. Your feelings of guilt are frivolous,
aren't they? You can never feel guilty enough. I'm talking about real guilt.
Before the eyes of God, God has removed all guilt. That's what it means to be justified.
And you're free from the power of sin. What does that mean?
Sin's never going to have dominion over me like it had before. In
other words, I'm never going to be under its condemnation
again. I'm free from its power. One thing I'm not yet free from
is its presence. You that believe, you know that
we still have this old man of sin about our necks. But I'll tell you this, because
of that, I'm so glad of this, I'm also free from the law. Next chapter he's going to tell
us that. He says that Christ is the end of the law for righteousness.
In this chapter he's going to tell us the Gentiles, they didn't
even seek after righteousness, but they got it. How? Not by the law. The Jews sought
it by the law, and they don't have it. We're free from the
law. That's a glorious truth. He didn't
free us from the law to put us back under the law. No. When
you are free, you are free indeed. Free from the law of sin and
death. Not free from law, but free from
the law. In this sense, we're free from
the law of Moses. Free from the law of sin and
death. But we have a law, don't we? We're not lawless. Our law is simply this. Believe. and love. Is that not two things
that you want to do? What believer doesn't want to
believe and love? These are not grievous to us.
This is an evidence of vessels of mercy. And lastly, I want us to look at the objects
of this calling. The objects of vessels of mercy,
those who are called of God, they're no different than the
vessels of wrath. You that have been called, by nature you were no different. Who made the difference? Who made you a vessel of mercy? Only God. Only God. He made me a vessel of mercy by sovereign will. And I'll tell
you this, you can't know your election
until you've been called. You can know of election, But if you have not been called,
you cannot claim that you have been chosen of God. The only
means by which we may claim the election of God and the perfect
redemption and righteousness of Christ is what? Have you been
called? That's what Paul said. Vessels of mercy. Even us! I
like that. Even us! It's kind of like surprise.
Even me! Even me! Listen to this. Whom he hath called. Who does the calling? Who does the choosing? Who does
the saving? Who does the calling? Who does the keeping? I want you to bear me witness
tonight. Have I exalted you in any measure? Have I given you reason to boast
in yourself? You are a vessel of mercy. You
recognize you have no reason to boast except in God who chose me. I don't know, you gotta ask Him.
Why did He redeem me? You have to ask Him. Why did
He call me? You have to ask Him. It has to
be grace. It has to be grace. It can't
be anything else. It has to be mercy. Let's stand and be dismissed
in prayer. Father, please be merciful. Please
be gracious. Call your people according to
your will. I pray this in Christ's name.