Thank you so much for that. I've
heard that song lots of times and I know you have too. It's
always a blessing. I do appreciate it. Ezekiel chapter
16 is a portion of scripture that I'm going to this morning
and trying to deal with these 14 verses. The first 14 verses
of Ezekiel chapter 16. This is, we'd call it an allegory. Here is a message, a story in
picture. And literally, it's about Ezekiel
preaching to the people of Jerusalem and Israel. And he takes them
back to their origin with Abraham when the nation was in its infancy
and then brings them up to their glory days after the captivity
of Egypt had been brought to an end. But there's a deeper
message, a deeper story involved in this, and it's a picture of
the Lord's true church. And Ezekiel sets forth our natural
condition, like an infant who's been cast out, unwanted, uncared
for, unclothed. And then he pictures this infant
growing And then our God passing by in grace, His regenerating
work, granting the new birth to these sinners. And then He
shows us our perfection in Christ Jesus. We're made kings and priests
together in Him. You notice the scripture begins
here in chapter 16, and again the word of the Lord came unto
me. Now this is Ezekiel. The word of the Lord came to
Ezekiel. His name means the strength of God. That's what his name
means. You kind of get an indication
of that because it ends in EL, which is God. And the first part
has to do with power and strength. So Ezekiel's name means the strength
of God. And Ezekiel is in captivity. This is about almost 600 years
before our Lord Jesus was born. Ezekiel was in that first wave
of captives taken away into Babylon. And maybe that'll kind of stir
your memory up, our studies in Zechariah, because that's when
the Lord brought Israel out of their Babylonian captivity. But Ezekiel was in that first
wave of captives. Daniel was taken captive into
Babylon first, and then Ezekiel was. In fact, Ezekiel actually
passed away in the city of Babylon. But though he was in captivity,
the rulers of Babylon could not hold captive that Word of God. And the Word of the Lord came
to Ezekiel in his captivity in Babylon, and he's instructed
to write this book that bears his name. And as he sets forth here in
chapter 16, now toward the end of chapter 16, actually the greater
part of chapter 16, talks about how that Israel, after they were
delivered from Egyptian captivity, how that they went a-whoring
after other gods. They reverted back to their idolatrous
days. And of course, Ezekiel, in writing
to Jerusalem, and to the nation of Israel, he rebukes them severely
for leaving the gospel of God's grace, leaving the sacrifices
that pointed to our Lord Jesus Christ. And Ezekiel really gives
them kind of a tongue lashing over their departure from the
gospel. Now, hear me. especially you who believe the
gospel of God's grace or profess to believe the gospel of God's
grace, do not forsake the truth. And I know we're kept by the
power of God, but we're also warned not to turn our backs
upon the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace to sinners
through the Lord Jesus Christ. Don't revert back to what you
were or to the religion that you were a part of before God
taught you the gospel. And this is what weighs heavily
upon the mind and the heart of Ezekiel, because he has seen
the nation that he loves. He's seen them fall away from
the sacrifices that pointed to the sacrifice of the Lamb of
God. He's seen them fall away from
the very truth of God and revert back to ways that were dishonoring
to God. May God keep us looking to Christ
only. Right? He's got to keep us. I know we're preserved by the
power of God, but the Scripture says, through faith. Lord, keep
us believing. Lord, keep us looking unto Jesus
Christ. You see, no local church has
just gone on indefinitely. The seven churches of Asia Minor,
Revelation chapters 2 and 3, where the letters are written
to the pastors of these churches. They are no more. And may God
keep this local church going, preaching the truth, and preserve
us through the faithfulness of our Lord Jesus Christ. So Ezekiel
is led to write this story about grace given to us And then our
growth in grace. And then the first 14 verses,
it's a beautiful picture of how we're brought from a state of
alienation from God to a state of being priests and kings unto
our God. So let me go through this. And
as we do, I'm gonna show you, here are three things especially
that stand out in these first 14 verses. Our circumstance by
nature. Our circumstance by nature. What
was our condition before God saved us? Secondly, we'll see
the great compassion of our God. First of all, our circumstance,
and then we'll see God's compassion, and then we'll see, finally,
our condition by the grace of God. The message this morning
is entitled, The Time of Love. And I take that from verse 8,
Ezekiel 16. God says, now when I pass by
thee, when he passed by his elect nation and looked upon thee,
he didn't see anything good, he didn't see anything beautiful,
he didn't see any merits, he didn't see any great deeds, He
said, I looked upon thee and he saw us in our shame and in
our uncleanness. And behold, thy time was the
time of love. This is the time ordained when
God showed love to his people. Let me tell you something. Of
all of us who are believers, and those of you who are not
believers, if God's going to call you by His grace, that time
when He called you was ordained and purposed before the world
began. And then somewhere along life's road, the Lord singles
us out through the preaching of the gospel of the blood of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And He opens our minds, He opens
our hearts, He opens our ears, He opens our spiritual eyes so
that we will with understanding recognize our needy condition
and we'll see the beauty and the necessity of the substitutionary
death of our Lord Jesus Christ. And He will shower us then with
His love. And that's the new birth. That's
the new birth. So the time of love, that's our
subject this morning. Now, let me show you first of
all, as we consider this, the great glory of God's grace, consider
first of all a wretched condition, a wretched condition. He says
in verse one again, again, the word of the Lord came unto me
saying, And by the way, this section begins with the word
of the Lord, and look at the last of verse 14, as was read
to us a few minutes ago. Which I put upon thee, saith
the Lord God. That which Ezekiel is sent to
write, that which he's commissioned to write, and then send back
to Jerusalem, is not his word. This is God's Word. When we talk
about our sinfulness, when we talk about the grace of God,
when we talk about God's salvation, this is not something we have
kind of come up with in our own minds. This is not Baptist doctrine. This is not Reformed doctrine. This is God's Word. It's what
God has to say. God speaks about our natural
condition. God speaks about the necessity
of His saving grace. God speaks about the necessity
that we be washed in the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ and
robed into the comeliness of God's salvation. This is God's
Word. We'd be wise to listen because
the Word of God is able to make us wise unto salvation. So may the Lord enable us to
hear. So first of all, here's our wretched
condition. He's gonna describe the awful
helplessness of the Lord's people before grace came to us. And
he says, the Lord says to Ezekiel in verse two, son of man, cause
Jerusalem to know her abominations. Do you know when it will be when
a person, a man or a woman will seek mercy from God? When God
causes you to know how bad off you are. You see, we're not going
to seek for a great physician. until, first of all, the great
physician shows us the proper diagnosis of our difficulty. And the Lord says to Ezekiel,
preach about the abomination of Jerusalem, that is, preach about
the abomination of people, the disgusting loathsomeness that
you're in, that you are. You'll never seek grace from
the Lord Jesus Christ until, first of all, God the Spirit
causes you to know that you're helpless and hopeless and defiled,
and you need a Savior. You remember our Lord after going
to a banquet to which he was invited
by Matthew. Matthew threw a banquet for the
Savior because the Lord had saved him by his grace. And there were
some Pharisees there and they were grumbling about the Savior.
And the Master said, the whole need not a physician. But those
that are sick, who seeks out a doctor? Somebody who needs
a doctor, somebody who's sick, somebody who's ill. And so the
Lord says to Ezekiel, you call, you preach on the sinfulness
of men. And that's what we try to do
faithfully. Because the Spirit of God has
to take the Word of God, the truth of the Word of God, and
expose your own corruption and show you, you need to be washed
in the blood of the Lamb. You need to be forgiven of your
sins. This is a wretched condition.
Make her to know. Make her to know her loathsomeness. Make her to know her righteousness. Unless we know our state of sinfulness
before God, we'll never be in search of a cure. And when the
cure is preached to us, we will not welcome the substitutionary
sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ on behalf of sinners unless we're
made to know the deplorable condition in which we're in. God make us
to know what our condition is. Job said in Job 13, 23, make
me to know my transgressions and my sins. That is to know
them so as to be troubled and to be moved in the heart toward
the Savior. Make me to know. If we don't
know, if we don't know what the problem is, we're not going to
search for A cure, a cure. You see, as lost sinners, he
says in verse 3, as lost sinners from my nativity, that is from
my very birth, that was our condition. And in verse 4, he says, As for
thy nativity in the day thou wast born, thy navel wasn't cut,
neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee, you weren't salted
at all, nor swaddled at all. You were like an infant cast
out into the wilderness, and no one could be more helpless
and hopeless in that condition than a little baby. Take a little
baby, put that baby out in the wilderness where there are wild
animals, a baby that cannot fend for itself, a baby who cannot
get any food, a baby that cannot fight its battles, a baby who
is prey to every animal and every reptile in the wilderness. That's
a hopeless and a helpless case. And Ezekiel says, that's your
condition by nature. This is a terrible state here. This is a wretched condition. Lost sinners cast out. And nobody
cares. That's it. Nobody cares. You know, Satan and his demonic
force, they don't care about you. They make you a lot of promises. And false religion doesn't care
about you because they're looking for more followers and more money.
Nobody cares except the Lord Jesus Christ. The hymn writer
said, no one ever cared for me. Like Jesus. There's no other
friend so kind and true. No one else could take the sin
and darkness from me. Oh, how much he cares for me.
Thank God somebody cared about us. God himself. Nobody else much cared whether we lived or died. and
certainly didn't care about our spiritual condition. But you
who are the beloved of God, who've been brought to faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ, I tell you who cared for you. God cared
for you and He cared for you from before the foundation of
the world. He cared for you so much that
He In deliberate grace and mercy, He ordained all things pertaining
to you from the beginning of your life to the end of this
physical life on into eternity. He purposed your salvation. He
purposed your redemption. He purposed your reconciliation. He purposed your regeneration,
your justification, all the way through to your glorification.
He cared for you, but nobody else did. And you know what?
Nobody else could help us anyhow. We're helpless infants. And as poor, helpless innocents,
in the end of verse 4 it says, you weren't swaddled at all.
We're naked. No clothing. You see, that's
man, that's woman in our natural unrighteousness. We're naked
before God. We need clothing. Adam and Eve, after they sinned,
they lost that glory that God gave them. gave Adam at his creation. And then Eve, when she was taken
from a rib from Adam, they lost that. And they're ashamed. They're
ashamed. We need a covering. We need a
covering. I need a robe. And so what did
they do? They made aprons out of fig leaves. I want to cover my shame. But God sees right through the
apron of fig leaves, your works. He sees you in your nakedness.
I tell you, it's a blessed day when God, the Spirit, teaches
us we're naked before Him. Got no goodness. Got no righteousness. Unclothed. You remember the story in the
book of Matthew about the king, and he prepared a feast for his
son, and he compelled people to come in, told the servants
to go out and compel them to come in from near and far, and
they all came in, and a robe was prepared, a wedding garment
was prepared for each one of them, and they all came in, all
these folks that were to attend the wedding, they came in and
everybody had the same white robes on except for one fella.
And he had a garment that he made. And he said, boy, I look
pretty good. He came in, I didn't look around
and say, you know, everybody else is dressed all alike with
the king's garments, but you know, mine's just as good. And
the king said, how dare you come in here without a kingly garment
on, a garment that I provided. Cast him out into outer darkness.
We've got to have the robe of God's salvation, the robe of
God's righteousness. To put it this way, we need to
have the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ because that's what washes
us, cleanses us, and we have the righteousness because of
the blood of Christ, because of His sacrifice. These were
unclothed, unclothed. It's a sad state. He says there, look at verse
6, when I passed by thee, I saw thee polluted. Pollution. A lot of times you see on television,
they'll have documentaries about polluted rivers and polluting
the ocean and all of that sort of thing. You want to know something
about pollution? If God give you a look in your
heart, there's the pollution right there. We're polluted,
we're defiled, we're filthy within. We're polluted and we can't do
anything about it. Oh, you need to clean up your
life. You need to start doing better. Start living by the 10
commandments. But you can't, though you can
change your outward behavior, you can't change your heart. That's the natural condition.
Polluted. Polluted. Well, that's our wretched
condition. But here's the second thing,
wonderful compassion. The Lord says, When I passed
by thee, I came to you." I tell you what, here's what we need. We need the Lord Himself to come
to us in His sovereign, saving, life-giving power. Oh God, pass my way. Fannie Crosby wrote, while on
others thou art calling, do not pass me by. God said, I passed by thee, I
saw thee in your pollution. And I said to you, live. Nobody
else has got the authority to say that and nobody else has
got the power to bring about life where once there was only
death. See, this is the new birth. This
is regeneration. This is the quickening power
of God. He comes to us and He sees us
like an infant cast out into the wilderness, absolutely helpless
and hopeless. Don't tell me what you've got
to do for God or what you've got to do with God. You can't
do anything. You're a helpless infant. You're
at the mercy and the disposal of God Almighty. And if we had
any sense at all, we'd say, Lord, if you will, you can show me
mercy, if you will. I'm a deserted infant out in
the wilderness. I can't help myself. I'm polluted. But then the Lord comes in wonderful
compassion. And he says, live. You know,
back in Genesis chapter one, in God's creation, the spirit
of the Lord brooded upon the waters. And then the Lord said,
let there be light. Guess what happened? Lights came
on. I'll tell you what's necessary.
The Lord's got to pass by us and say, let there be light.
And all of a sudden, the things of God begin to fall into place. And you live, you live. And God says in verse seven,
I cause you to multiply. And then you increased and wax
greatly. And then as the church, the church
of the Lord Jesus Christ grows in grace, she becomes a source
of nourishment. It says here, thy breasts are
fashioned. The church becomes a source of
nourishment to others who need the milk of the word of God.
And he says in verse eight, Now when I passed by thee and I looked
upon thee, O Lord, look on me. Look on me. I'm nothing to look
at, but look on me with eyes of mercy. And may it be the time of love.
Wouldn't it be wonderful right now, if this was the time of
love, And the Lord passed by somebody here in this congregation,
somebody who's watching, and it's the time of love. And I
tell you, what if it is the time of love? You'll live. You'll
see the glory of Christ Jesus. Oh, you'll continually see more
of his glory, but you'll see him as the great physician of
sinners. Oh yeah, his blood that washes
away sin. And he'll cover your nakedness.
It says here in verse eight, I spread my skirt over thee.
Oh God, spread your skirt over me. Spread your skirt over me. And enter into covenant with
me. Show me that covenant of grace. And verse nine, God says,
I washed you with water. That's the water of the Word
of God. And I anointed thee with oil.
He gives us His Spirit. I clothed thee. with broadered
work, and shod thee with badger skin. I girded thee about with
fine linen. I covered thee with silk. I decked
thee also with ornaments. I put bracelets upon your hands,
a chain upon your neck. I put a jewel in your forehead,
earrings in your ears, a beautiful crown upon your head." What is
all of this? He says, you're my child. You're
royalty. And in Christ, those of us who
by nature were like infants out in the wilderness, helpless and
hopeless, ready to die, the Lord finds us. He says, live. He says,
it's a time of love. And He clothes us. He decks us. And He says, you're my child. Oh, this is grace indeed. That's
what this is. This is royal grace. That's the kind of grace I need,
don't you? I need royal grace. This is the
grace that saves. And so, the third thing is here's
a wonderful change. We're not naked anymore. We're
clothed in the beauties of Christ. You know, when God looks at his
children, he sees his son. That's what a marvelous thing. He sees his son. We're decked
with ornaments of royalty. We're robed in the garments of
the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. We've been made comely, beautiful
by grace. Is this the same person who is
liken unto this deserted infant out here in the wilderness? It's
the same person. A sinner saved by grace. That's
what this is. And in verse 12, it says, we've
been crowned. Put a beautiful crown on our
head. Kings and priests unto God. Decked out. And verse 14 says, and thy renowned
went forth among the heathen for thy beauty. It was perfect,
watch it. It was perfect, it says, through
my comeliness, which I had put on thee. I tell you, salvation
is not of us. It's all of grace. And we're
comely before God. We're beautiful before God. Can
you imagine that? The only way we can be beautiful
before God is for God to make us beautiful in Christ Jesus. Look what grace has done. And
several of you know, you know by experience of the power of
the grace of God. Well, may the Lord pass by and
love someone right now. Let's sing the closing song,
385. 385. Take the world, but give
me Jesus. Sing the first and last stanzas.
385. Would you stand with me? Sing the first and the last stanzas. Take the world, but give me Jesus. All His stories are but a thing. But His love abideth ever, through
eternal years the same. Oh, the height and depth of mercy. Oh, the length and breadth of
love. Oh, the fullness of redemption. Pledge of endless life above. Take the world.