My grandchildren have one place
here in town that most of the time when they come to visit,
they want to go see. Now it's not like it used to
be. And I'm talking about Sorosa's Park. It's not what it once was. But they love to go up there
and play. Now this last week, I took a
granddaughter up there at her request. And she wanted to play
on some of those playground stuff. And she says, Granddad, are you
going to metal detect while I'm doing that? And I says, yeah,
that's what I'm going to do. So I'm over there metal detecting,
and I found a penny. But I'm metal detecting, and
my granddaughter comes over to me and says, Granddad, there's
a couple of people over there that want to tell me a story.
And I said, well, let's put this metal detector up, and we're
going to go talk to those people. So I went over there after I
took care of my business and I said, who are you and what
do you represent? And they shared with me that
they were up there winning little children to Jesus. Worst form of child abuse ever. To give little kids the thought
the false thought that by scaring them, and that's their tactic,
this was these tactics, you don't want to go to hell, do you? Well,
I'm so thankful that as I read the gospel in the Bible, that's
not the subject. The subject is Jesus Christ and
Him crucified, and it's the goodness of God that leads us to repentance. So I didn't have much time for
them. I don't approve of that at all
and I don't think they should be up there doing it. They themselves
should be in a gospel church hearing what the gospel really
is. Well, we're going to be in the book of Acts again. I've
said that to say this. We're going to be in the book
of Acts again. In chapter 6, as we go through this wonderful
book of Acts, we find out that the gospel, the preaching of
the gospel, is what the disciples, the apostles of the Lord Jesus
Christ did. And when they made disciples,
when the people were saved as a result of hearing the gospel,
They began to preach the same thing. They did not revert back
to a works-oriented gospel. They preached the gospel of God's
free and sovereign grace. Now, that's essential. As we
look into the Bible about the gospel, we need to know the truth
of the gospel. And you know what? The Bible
has a lot to say about that, and we'd like to spend some time
on that. The preaching of the gospel means preaching the God
of the Bible honestly. We want to be honest with what
God has to say about God, and we want to be honest about what
God has to say about how God saves His people. We don't want
to give in to, and we should never give in to, the thoughts
of other people on making the gospel more palatable. You know,
it is just the way it is, and God has purposed that there is
an offense to the gospel, to our normal, everyday, born-into-this-world
nature. When God says that He saves His
people by Himself without our help, that is an offense to us,
because we really want to be involved in that, and then when
God saves us, we find out we were not involved in that. We're
the recipients of the grace of God. God, by His grace, gave
us His salvation. The gospel is a proclamation.
It's a proclamation of pardon, mercy, and peace in and through
Jesus Christ our Lord. It's a proclamation. And we find
that it is also that it's a declaration. And never do we find anywhere
that God made it a bargain or a proposition, or a trade, or
a proposal, God never did that. He never said, I propose that
if you do this, I'll do that. Now in the Old Testament, under
the Old Testament economy, which they could not keep. Hebrews
chapter 8 tells us they could not keep that old law. God made a covenant with them
in the Old Testament, and they could not keep it. Therefore,
He regarded them not. You know who He keeps the covenant
with? He's the one that initiates the new covenant in the hearts
of His people, and He will keep that covenant for us. That Old
Testament covenant was between Israel and God, national Israel
and God, and they could not keep it. Well, in the eternity past,
God knowing full well that natural man could not keep a covenant,
an agreement with God, just as He proved with national Israel,
He said, I will not have them involved in it. I will make a
covenant between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
and this covenant we will keep on their behalf. And that's the
only way he ever saves anybody, is a covenant that he has purposed
to keep on our behalf. It's not through works. It's not through bargain. It's
not through proposition. It's not through fear. It's not
through the fear of hell. Salvation is not the fear of
hell. Salvation is the declaration
that the Apostle Paul is. Before we go to the book of Acts,
just turn with me to 1 Corinthians 15. And then we'll go over there
and we see that these folks here in the book of Acts chapter 6
are preaching the gospel. And the results of preaching
the gospel is not a lot of people that don't know the first thing
about God, but it is a people that God reveals Himself to. Alright, 1 Corinthians chapter
15, we find here that the Apostle Paul says, I declare unto you
the gospel. The Bible teaches us that the
gospel is a declaration. The Bible teaches us that the
gospel is a proclamation. It is not a bargain. It's not
some thing that we deal with. It is declaring the truth about
salvation in and through the Lord Jesus Christ. And then He's
going to take that and do whatsoever pleases Him. In 1 Corinthians
chapter 15, moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel. It's a declaration. It's not
a proposition. It's not putting it down to man's
level and trying to encourage them into something that they
don't know the first thing about. It is not something that we make
a trade over. It's not something that we make
a bargain over. It's a declaration of how God
saves His people from their sins. Here he says, Moreover, brethren,
I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which
also ye have received, and wherein ye stand, by which also ye are
saved, if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you. And then
he brings in this caveat, unless ye have believed in vain. Now
the only way that we can believe in vain is to supply our own
belief. Yesterday, I had a wonderful,
wonderful visit with a young preacher, and I brought this
subject up because he keeps telling me, I was saved by my faith. And I told him yesterday, I says, the only faith that God accepts
is perfect faith. Now, have you been able to give
him perfect faith? And he says, no. We as human
beings cannot give perfect faith. We cannot give perfect repentance. We cannot give perfect sanctification. We have no, we're so full of
imperfection that we can't do it. But there is a God that does
that. He gives us perfect faith. And
I just reminded him, we're moons. And he looked like he had been
poleaxed. We're moons. We have no light of our own.
We depend upon the light of the sun. S-O-N. We have no faith
of our own. We depend upon the faith of Jesus
Christ. He's the author and finisher
of our faith. We depend upon His sanctification. It tells us in the book of 1
Corinthians 1 that He is our sanctification. He is our redemption. He is all that we are so in desperate
need of. So it's not us that are contributing. It's God that gives to us, and
we, by the grace of God, freely give it back to Him by believing
His word. By the faith he gives us all
right going on here. It says in verse In verse 3 for
I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received
Now he's declaring this. This is his ministry. He was
very quick to say I Was not I did not come to baptize. I That wasn't
his business. He wasn't his business to write
home and say, let me tell you what I've done for God today.
That was not his mission report. His mission report was, let me
tell you what God has done with us. All right, he says here,
ìHe delivered unto you first of all, for I delivered unto
you first of all that which I also received.î Now, Iíll tell you
the honest-to-gosh truth about this. You cannot give what you
donít have. You just canít do it. I tried. I spent 15 years trying to give
what I had no knowledge of. I tried to talk about salvation,
but most of the time it was how I could talk you into doing it.
Well, that's not how it happens. We're not talked into it. We
reveal the truth of the gospel. He says here, I delivered unto
you, first of all, that which I also received, how that Christ,
and that's the main subject of the Bible, and the main subject
of the gospel, and it is how Christ died for our sins according
to the scriptures. Now, if we're gonna be honest
with God, we have to take God's word about who he died for. We just cannot take our own words.
We cannot interpret for God. We have to be honest with God's
word about who he died for. Now, if it was that he died for
the whole world and then a whole bunch of them end up in that
place of fire, his blood was absolutely wasted and God did
not waste his blood. His blood is effectual blood. His blood is the everlasting
covenant. So He died for our sins according
to the scriptures. God is going to have to do some
work in us. He's going to reveal some things
to us. He was buried and He rose again the third day according
to the scriptures. So the scriptures have such a
valuable part in this whole scheme of preaching the gospel. That's
the core. That's the center. That's what
we must declare. We must declare the Scriptures.
God works only through the preaching of His Word. He doesn't create
life outside of His Word. He doesn't create life outside
of the Gospel. He creates life through the preaching
of His Word. And that is what God uses to
give us the new birth. And once He gives us the new
birth, we can see what He had to say about Himself. Now, we'll
never get to the end of it. We'll never get to the end of
what he had to say about himself, but we will say, this is about
God. It's not about me. It's about
God's work and not my work. Now, we will serve the Lord.
God's people will serve the Lord. This young man says, well, what
about the guy that is saved, God saves, and then over time,
he just loses interest, and he doesn't do anything for God,
and he forgets about God, and what about him? I says, well,
number one, you never find anybody in the Bible that did that. Everybody's got the passage of
scripture, I knew a man. I knew somebody that did this.
Well, it's not in the Bible. All of God's people will end
up with him. All right. Well, having said
that, join me in the book of Acts, chapter 6, if you would.
We have seen glorious activity of God in the preaching of the
gospel here throughout the book of Acts, up to chapter 6, chapter
1, chapter 2, chapter 3, chapter 4, chapter 5, filled with the
preaching of the gospel and the results of preaching of the gospel.
The results of the preaching of the gospel, God honored it
and saved His people from their sins. And a great host of people
were saved as a result of preaching the gospel. On the day of Pentecost,
12 gospel preachers were preaching the gospel. And as a result of
that, several thousand were saved. God granted salvation. He drew
people into the kingdom. He had given them the new birth. We can talk about all of those
things in the Old Testament, as we heard this morning in the
Bible class. It is in the Old Testament. I will give you a
new heart. You know, that's just simply
saying I will give you the new birth. We're dead in trespasses
and sin, and we're so dead that we cannot turn to God. Can you imagine John, excuse
me, Lazarus in the tomb doing anything to merit or do different
than those words that Jesus spoke could do? He's dead. and we're dead in trespasses
and sin and without hope in our deadness until God comes along
and calls us by our name. All right, Book of Acts, Chapter
6. I'd like to start there with
verse 3 again, and we'll go down through. We looked at this last
time. Wherefore, brethren, look ye
out among you seven men of honest report. Here's the requirements,
full of the Holy Ghost and wisdom, whom we may appoint over this
business. They were not restaurant matrons. Now, they're going to serve tables,
but that's not their choice. That's not their business. They're
not good business folks. I believe they were good business
folks, but that's not why they're chosen. I think they knew about
business. I think they knew about how to
take care of people. But their main business was this. They would be full of the Holy
Ghost and wisdom. And where did they get that?
They got that from God. whom ye may appoint over this
business." And the apostles said, the Twelve Apostles said, we
will give ourselves continued prayer in the ministry of the
Word. And the saying pleased the whole multitude, and then
it gives us seven men that they chose out of the host there to
be over this business. It tells us there in verse 5,
they chose Stephen, a man full of faith and the Holy Ghost.
And I don't think that the rest of those that are listed here
would have anything else but that said about them too. Full
of the Holy Ghost and power. They were saved by the grace
of God. He's calling them into a service. But He never calls
anybody into His service that He doesn't save first. Now he's
going to use pagan kings, and he's going to use lost people. He used Judas. Lost Judas. Man without any salvation whatsoever,
God used him for his glory, his honor, and his purpose. But when
it comes to his people that are serving him, he never has anybody
really, honestly serving him who don't know the grace of God
in salvation. The same pleased the whole multitude,
and they chose Stephen, a man full of the faith and the Holy
Ghost, and Philip, and Proctorus, and Nicanor, and Timon, Paramecius
and Nicholas and the proselyte of Antioch. Please forgive me
if I mispronounce those words and they're different what you
had to say. We do know that all of these people, they were not
Hebrews. These are not Hebrew names, they're
Greek names, and those are the people that were having some
difficulty mentioned in verses one and two of chapter six. So
they are the ones that are set aside for this purpose. Verse
six, whom they set before the apostles, and when they had prayed,
they laid hands on them. The apostles had no ability of
granting any specialness to this. They're men just like these are
men. All they did was recognize the
fact that God Almighty had used the congregation to select seven
men to be over this business, and they said, God's chosen them,
we're thankful for that, and they did this. They laid their
hands on them, and notice verse seven. The word of the Lord increased. Oh, what it is when God saves
His people from their sins, and He calls some into the ministry,
and they begin preaching the same gospel that God used to
save them, and here we have the results of it. The Word of God
increased. It wasn�t the Word of some authority,
some legalist, some priest, some writer You know, I'm amazed at
how many people will depend upon some commentator for their theology
and forget completely about what the Word of God has to say. These
people were not depending upon the theology of anyone else.
They were depending upon the Holy Spirit to reveal unto them
what the gospel is truly about. And the Word of God increased,
and the number of disciples multiplied in Jerusalem greatly, and a great
company of the priests were obedient to the faith. My goodness, what
was taking place here as a result of preaching the gospel? Now to me if one is saved as
a result of the preaching of the gospel There is the same
hallelujah that goes up over all of these that were saved
for preaching the gospel We don't have to wait till there's a thousand
people that are saved to say hallelujah to God for his good
work one lost sheep that he went into the mountains and found
and brought back on his shoulders and said, hallelujah, the lost
sheep has been found. The church rejoices greatly over
that. The word of the Lord increased,
was so great, multiplied, the disciples multiplied in Jerusalem. And you know, this happened without
singing one verse of Just As I Am. I don't know about you, but I've
been where they sing about 15. Now, if you look at that hymn,
it was not written for that purpose. They didn't have to have a long
protracted invitation. You know, the man who brought
me the gospel, Nearly 40 years ago now, the
man who brought me the gospel, one of the things he said in
one of his messages was this. I had been shocked that he preached
a couple of sermons, and you know what? He just closed the
service by having a prayer and said, amen. He could have said,
be free. And I said, that's not right. How are we going to get people
saved if they don't give an invitation? And I don't know whether word
got back to him or it was just in his message, but he brought
out, he says, I don't give an invitation because Christ is
the invitation. He deals with his people and
his time. And an invitation often is just
trying to get some psychological movement going on. I've seen
this in these great crusades. I was invited one time down in
Medford to go hear this guy about the Book of Daniel. Now, I love
the Book of Daniel. I didn't know the first thing
about it at that time, but after it was over with, and he's talking
about the sovereignty of God and all this, and after that
was over with, they started having an invitation. And you know what? There was plants in that congregation
that stood up and started moving down towards the altar. And they were just hoping that
they could get their neighbor or someone else to stand up and
move down there with them. What a travesty. is that kind of thing. The Apostle
Paul, we're going to read this in a moment, he came not with
the wisdom of man's wisdom. He didn't come with psychological
words. He came with the gospel. And when the gospel is preached,
God will save his people from their sins. All right, as we
think about this, turn with me, if you would, over to the book
of Galatians, chapter 2. It is a wonder that God did all
of this, as we read these in this verses, without all of the
modern tradition things that we have. We have to have an invitation. We have to have an altar call.
We have to invite people to come up here to the front. We have
all the stuff that goes on that is in religion that is not in
the Bible. There's none of that in the Bible.
It is a clear statement that we don't know anything about
how God saves His people when we try to help God get people
saved. That's not our business. Our
business is to preach the gospel and God will take care of that
part. I was told yesterday that, you
know, God can get us almost up to the new birth and by our refusal,
our rejection of him, then he will go away. And I said, you
know, I could just hear a baby that's in the process of being
born saying, nope, I'm not going out today. How foolish a statement. How unknowledgeable someone is
of God's power. That if God can't overcome our
own will, what kind of God is that? We need a God that can
overcome our will. Our will is dead. It's so off
from God. He must impose His will on us. And then we say, thank you, Lord,
for doing that, because without that, I'd have never come. Well,
I said, go to Galatians. Let's get over there to the book
of Galatians. In chapter two of the book of Galatians, We
have this, you know, here in the book of Galatians, the apostle
Paul was, he was stunned when he heard that this, these churches
of Galatia where he had preached the gospel had so soon forgotten
it. went after another gospel, and
he said clearly, which is not another gospel. The gospel of
works is not another gospel. Now, that's the gospel of man,
that's the gospel of religion, that's that gospel, but it is
not the gospel. For the gospel is that Christ
died for our sins. That's the gospel. It is a proclamation. It is a proclamation about God
who can save His people from their sins and does that. It
is a proclamation about a Redeemer that actually redeems. We have
a God that is able to act as God said God acts. And He saves
His people from their sins. Here in the book of Galatians
2, verse 5, it says, to whom we gave place to whom we gave
place by subjection, no, not for an hour, that the truth of
the gospel might continue with you. And then in that same chapter,
verse 14, we have this, but when I saw that they walked not uprightly
according to the truth of the gospel, I said unto Peter, now
Peter was a believer, But for a moment, he had this idea that
there was going to be an earthly Israeli kingdom. He brought that up to the Lord.
The disciples brought that up. And here he's saying, you know,
I'm just not sure when those Gentiles come around to me, if
this is what's going to fit into our kingdom. And the Apostle
Paul brought up the same argument that Jesus Christ did. My kingdom
is not of this world. If my kingdom was of this world,
and he said these words to Pilate, if my kingdom were of this world,
my disciples would fight. I'm not in a political stance
here. I'm not trying to overthrow Rome.
I'm not trying to overthrow Pilate. I'm not even trying to overthrow
the high priest for the year. I'm here, the preacher of the
gospel, and saving my people from their sins, and there's
great rejoicing going on over this than all of the religion
that's going on all over the world. What is the sadness? that we exercise when we're in
religion about ourselves, not alone about someone else. Oh
my goodness, I didn't do a very good job today. Or, oh my God,
guess what I did for you today? And then the next day, it's a
roller coaster ride that is not of God. His salvation is a constant,
everlasting love for His people. And Jesus, when Peter, after,
and I've brought this up a number of times, Peter denied the Lord
Jesus three times, and it's a terrible denial that Peter did with regard
to the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus had already told
him, you're gonna do this, though. And when Jesus looked at Peter
after he did that, Peter went out and wept bitterly. And you
know the first person, the first time that Jesus came to visit
that rascal rabbit Peter after he denied the Lord three times,
you know what he said to him? Peace. He did not throw that
up in his face. And aren't you glad that God
doesn't throw our mistakes up in our face, but takes us right
back to the cross. He said he paid the price. Now he doesn't give us the license
to sin, but when we do sin, He paid the price. Doesn't change
the relationship of anybody that knows Christ as their personal
Savior. Doesn't change anybody that He's
given the new birth to. Sin does not change their position
with Jesus Christ. He laid down His life a ransom. He paid the price in totality. So I'm thankful to God that I
don't have to go to sleep every night thinking, I wonder if he's
going to love me in the morning or not. When I find out he has
an everlasting love. Cannot be denied, cannot be taken
away, cannot be removed. And we just walk away saying,
how could he love me like that? This gospel, as Paul was writing
here, the truth of the gospel. Well, if there's the truth of
the gospel, then there must be the falseness of the gospel.
And he's already brought that out to the churches of Galatia.
You have fallen for a false gospel. And you know, that's just religion
to the core. fallen for a false gospel. Just
talk a bit, or listen a bit. You don't even have to talk.
They'll betray themselves. Well, you know, I asked Jesus
into my heart, and then I was baptized. Somebody came to me and said,
well, if you're not saved right now and you die right now, you're
going to a devil's hell right now. So you better do something
about it. Oh, my goodness. There is a truth
of the gospel. Jesus Christ the righteous. The gospel is about a person.
It's about Jesus Christ the righteous. It's about the whole purpose
and plan that God set into motion before the worlds began, before
man was ever created. There was a covenant agreement
in the council halls of eternity that everything is going to fall
out according to his purpose, but he's going to save his people
on purpose too. And he will and will save his
people on purpose. It's not by mistake. There is
the truth of the gospel. If you would turn with me to
the book of Ephesians, just a moment, Ephesians chapter 1. In Ephesians
chapter 1, as we think about this whole host of people being
saved that day, they're on the sixth chapter of the book of
Acts, and there wasn't any invitation, and there wasn't any hounding
them. It was the preaching of the gospel, and God saved them
by His free and sovereign grace. Here in the book of Ephesians
chapter 1 and verse 13, we read this. He says, In whom ye also
trusted, after that ye heard the word of truth, the gospel
of your salvation. Oh, how essential it is that
we hear the word of truth. The word of truth. Wouldn't it
be a travesty if a farmer Threw a whole bunch of candy corn in
his grain hoppers and planted all that candy corn out in thousands
of acres. And what kind of crop is he going
to get? Nothing. There won't be one sprout. There won't be one twig come
up from the ground. Because if you sow candy corn,
you're not going to have a harvest. You'll have to go over here to
the Dollar Tree and buy another bag. Because you're not going
to get it out there in the field. And that's just about the way
religion is. Just go over to the Dollar Tree and buy another
bag full of candy corn. Well, now if the farmer is going
to do his job, He's going to plant the best seed he can. He's going to throw it away by
the tons and tons. He's going to plant tons and
tons of this best grain he possibly can and wait on God for a harvest. All of his going out there and
digging and prying and pulling and praying and ushering and
everything else cannot make one more grain of grain in that stock. He is completely dependent upon
the God of heaven for supplying him a harvest whether he believes
it or not. And you know, when we get to
salvation, people just go off to deep end and say, well, everything
that is normal doesn't work on salvation. I can plant candy
corn and I can get a harvest. Well, it's a candy corn harvest
that's not going to get anywhere. the truth of the gospel. After
that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation,
in whom also after that you believed you were sealed with the Holy
Spirit of promise. What came first? The gospel,
the truth of the gospel. And then God, by His grace, supplies
us with that needful belief. We can't even provide that. We
don't have perfect belief. So we're dependent upon God for
everything. He must supply it. And when He
gives us the new birth, we find out that the fruit of the new
birth is repentance and faith. It's not the procurement. It
is the the results of his new birth, repentance and faith. And that's perfect repentance
and perfect faith, because it comes from God. Repentance in
the Bible, so often we find out it just is nothing more than,
I'm sorry I got caught. And the promise, I'll never do
that again. and repentance that God gives
is He gives us a change of mind about God. Whereas we had a variance
with Him. We had no love for Him. In fact,
we had enmity for Him. People say, I've loved Him all
my life. That's just too long. Can't love Him that long. Because
we're born with enmity, variance. trouble with God because He said
He must do it this way and we say, no, I want my candy corn.
Salvation. He saves His people according
to purpose. The book of Colossians. Would
you turn there with me? The book of Colossians. Colossians chapter 1. Colossians chapter 1 verse 3. We give thanks to God. Colossians
chapter 1 verse 3, we give thanks to God and the Father of our
Lord Jesus Christ praying always for you. Who is the number one
that we pray and thank? We thank God and the Father of
our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you, since we heard
of your faith in Christ Jesus and of the love which you have
for all the saints for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven,
whereof ye heard before in the word of truth of the gospel. We heard of your faith and love
which ye have for all the saints. My goodness, that just goes right
along with we love him because he first loved us. It goes right
along with him that God's people are going to love the brethren.
Because God gives us that. And it's the truth of the gospel. The truth of the gospel. You
heard the word of the truth of the gospel. If we don't hear
that, God does not act. But since he has a people, and
he will save his people from their sins, he will make sure
that they and the gospel cross paths. You remember that Ethiopian eunuch?
Man, he's been up there in Jerusalem. He's had religion clear up to
here. He's gone to Bible school for
two weeks in Jerusalem. He has his scroll. Whether he
brought it with him or bought it up there, he has his scroll.
And the scroll has the book of Isaiah in it. And he's gone home
and he has been pumped up by the high priests and everybody
else that's taught at that school while he's been down there in
Jerusalem. And you know what? He doesn't know the first thing
about Christ. That's what religion does for
us. And God said to his servant Philip, Philip, go down and get
to that chariot. And he went down there and he
saw that Ethiopian eunuch reading the scriptures. And you know,
we just ask one simple question. Do you understand what you're
reading? And the man says, no, I don't. Is this written about
himself or some other? And Philip got up next to him
and read that 53rd chapter of the book of Isaiah and began
at the same place and preached unto him Jesus. That's the truth of the gospel.
He didn't get off onto the law. He didn't get off onto Isaiah
being a writer of the book of Isaiah. He didn't get into some
historical discussion. You know, the woman at the well
wanted to get into a religious discussion with the Lord Jesus,
but he just kept hurting her back. You know, that old prophet,
Hosea, it's declared there with regard to his wayward wife that
he put a hedge about her and herded her back. I'm so thankful
that God in His great grace, the grace of His gospel, that
He will herd His people so that they will hear the truth of the
gospel and there will be great rejoicing. Just as we find there
in the book of Acts chapter 6 with regard to that great meeting,
revival meeting that was going on in Jerusalem when many were
saved and even priests were being saved. There's no restriction. God saves his people from their
sins. I have just a moment left. Would
you turn with me to the book of Acts chapter 20. Acts chapter
20. Great rejoicing going on there
in Jerusalem at the preaching of the gospel. My goodness. And
then we're going to find out that we know that they were preaching
the gospel because Stephen is marked off. He is identified. He's been preached in the Gospel,
and He's going to be arrested, and that will be part of our
next Sunday's message. But Acts 20, verse 24, would
you read that with me? Acts 20, verse 24, the truth
of the Gospel. Here it says, But none of these
things move me, neither can I my life dear unto myself, so that
I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry which I
have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the
grace of God. the unmerited favor of God. God showed His unmerited favor,
not because we were good and not because we did a good thing.
That's exactly the opposite. That's what grace means. And
the Apostle Paul, close to the end of his life, ready to be
offered up, He said this, which I have received of the Lord Jesus,
I receive this ministry of the Lord Jesus, and I receive this
as the testimony of my ministry, that is the gospel of the grace
of God. Free grace, sovereign grace,
grace, grace, grace from God. And when we know the truth of
grace, we will quickly admit, it was not of me. Because grace,
the very meaning of grace. It's interesting, you read about
religion and you find out the works of grace. That is an absolutely
contradiction of the term. Grace doesn't mean works on our
part. It means God's favor for us before
we had anything to be favored about. He talked about those
two sons, twin brothers. I have some affinity with that.
I have a twin brother. Both the same parents, just like
them. And then there was one that God
said, Jacob have I loved. And then it didn't say in the
next phrase, Esau I loved less. It says Esau I hated less. Now, the only reason that God
would hate him is his sins were not paid for. He was not justified. The sins of Jacob, God paid for,
took care of. And we say, how could he do that?
That's God's business, and I'm just going to leave it with him.
That's one thing we can be guaranteed of. It's his gospel. His gospel. All right, Brother
Mike, if you'll come.