I must admit, I've been turned
around this whole conference, thought I was gonna speak here,
and then I looked at it, because I had got, I think I took it
off your bulletin, but it was a little bit ago, and Tim was
on there, and I like what somebody said in the back, they said,
it's Tim's fault. So I said, well, I'll take that,
I'll take that, and then I'll tell him when I see him. I do appreciate the invite, as
I said before. Jim, getting to know you a little
bit better. And Nancy, what a privilege. What a privilege. It's not a competition. Not a
competition. Lance and Robin, what a joy to
know you, know you all. And send David and Pat our love. And we'll pray for you as you
pray for us. We've been meeting there 30 something years, been
35, 36. Seems like a long time, doesn't seem like that long.
But I had more hair then. Seemed like we all get a little
older for sure. I'd like, you can turn if you
would to Deuteronomy 24. I just got one verse. I love
it when The gospel is revealed, is made plain, I think, in passages
that you've never seen them before. I get giddy like a school kid. I get excited when I see these
things. Hopefully I'm not the only one.
I'm not here for me. I'm here to Proclaim the gospel
of God's free and sovereign grace and trust that he'll do what
he does best. He'll honor his name, he'll comfort
his people, and save some sinners. But before we look at this, now
this in Deuteronomy is written by Moses. So we'll have that,
just keep that in the back of your mind. Moses was writing
this. this in Deuteronomy, and it's
a short, it's not a short book, but it was only written, I think,
in a month or two months at the most, historically, and he was
telling what was gonna, or telling the folks and blessing the folks,
and he wrote a song for them that they were to sing for their
children, the depravity of man, the sovereignty of God, the redemptive
work of Christ. All this is in Deuteronomy, and
so he's writing it. He's writing it under inspiration,
but I want us to look So you don't think I'm coming out of
nowhere, John chapter five, and I'll just read this to you in
verse 46. This is our Lord speaking. He
said, for had ye believed Moses, you would have believed me, for
he, Moses, wrote of me. He wrote of me. Now I know this
is, The last service. But I pray. That all of us here
to this morning would be like. Ruth. We wouldn't be. We would be getting handfuls
of purpose. We wouldn't give up. We wouldn't
just hear and say, OK, that's done now. You want to smell the
food? It smells good. I told somebody I'd come back
just for the food. You ladies do a wonderful job. But there's handfuls of purpose. I can't tell out all that God
has done, and Lance, wonderful, all my three wonderful messages,
but there's still more, and there's always more. We're talking about
an infinite God, and we're finite. We're talking about more. And
you remember the several miracles in the New Testament where the
Lord, you know, miraculously made bread. When they got done
eating, did they just leave? He said, no, go get the fragments.
There's grace in those fragments. Everything I do, Christ, everything
he does is full of grace and truth. And to his people, mercy. So get, let's, you know, hopefully
there's some fragments, and that's, I want to talk to you about these
fragments. In Colossians, let the word of
Christ dwell in us richly. That's my desire, is that you
think more of Christ. You would think more of your
groom when I get done with this message. Deuteronomy 30, excuse
me, 24. And these several things Moses
is talking about, different things concerning uncleanness and pledges
and different things like that. And right in the middle of chapter
24 and verse 5, he has this one verse illustration of the betrothal
or the marriage of people getting married. And this is obviously
a picture of Christ. as he selects his bride of his
choosing. Look at verse five. When a man,
when the man, hath taken a new wife, he shall not go out to
war, neither shall he be charged with any business, but he shall
be free at home one year. He shall cheer up. That word
is, to make glad his wife, his church, his bride,
his people, which he hath taken. This is it. It's just one lovely
verse. Now, as I said, this word cheer
up is to make glad, and that's what the believer in Christ,
we have trials, and we're sad often, and we're discouraged,
but in the Lord, we should have gladness. We should be full of
cheer. In Psalm 68, in verse three,
but let the righteous be glad. Let them rejoice before God,
yea, let them exceedingly rejoice. And again, in Psalms 32 and verse
11, be glad in the Lord and rejoice, ye righteous, and shout for joy,
all ye that are upright in heart. Why? due to reasons unfounded in us,
but solely in the blessed Trinity, God the Father, and God the Son,
and God the Spirit, we have been espoused. We have been betrothed. We have been married to Christ. I haven't conducted, nor have
I been to a wedding in a while, but aren't they glorious? I mean, it's something. And I
look at some of the folks here, and you've been married for quite
a while. And this is just my thought.
I wonder if this was, if this verse was truly adhered to in
this country, I wonder how the divorce rate would, it seems
like the marriage is under attack by every corner, under every
corner, legislations, law, in our own depravity. But let's
look at this together. The man, when a man had taken
a wife, who's initiating this whole thing? Who is initiating
this whole thing? It's Christ Jesus, our Lord,
as pictured in this man here. By his wondrous love, grace,
and mercy, the regenerative process starts. We can't start it. We can't pray enough, we can't
try to do our own thing enough, we can't worship enough, we can't,
no, we can't. But, when the man hath taken
a wife, it's a matter of truth. God has a people, an elect people,
throughout the whole world, scattered about, that he's gonna get. And we'll be keeping, there'll
be preacher after preacher, that'll preach this and preach this until
that last. Do you ever think about that?
Maybe the last sheep of the house of Israel, spiritual Israel,
is in Ashland, Kentucky. What are we doing? Try to find
him. Try to find him. May he be honored and glorified.
Well, this man, he woos us with his songs of eternal love. He
captivates us with strong cords of electing love and soothing
forgiveness. Who can resist his will? Who
can resist his will? Such tokens of sovereign grace
to us were. Songs of Solomon says, the church
says, I am my beloved and he is mine. And I encourage, and
I probably did a couple years ago, just read songs of Solomon
without any commentary, as good as they are, and just be enamored
with the love between the son and the church. Well, bless the
Lord, O my soul. He's fetched us, we've talked
about fetching grace. Here it is, he's fetched us out
from sin's death grip and drew us unto himself. Yes, this man,
what a man, when this man hath taken a new wife, this man, the
God man, what did they say in the scriptures? When they heard
him, they said, never a man spake like this man. Never a man lived like that man. Honorable, glorious in character,
perfect in attribute. The scripture says he was holy,
harmless, and undefiled. Never a man spake, never a man
lived, never a man died like this man. Never a man came to
put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. He covered us clean,
presented us righteous before his eternal father. And I say
lastly, never a man rose, died, buried, and rose like this man. He led captivity captive, and
so we shall rise up in newness of life like him. Our hope and
our trust is in him. Just like the husband and wife. You rely on one another. You
finish one another's sentences, if you can remember it. You know,
it seems like I forget from one day to the next. We used to be
able to finish one another's sentences, my wife and I, but
now it's like, if you don't write it down, it's gone. The love's
not. Observe again. When a man, when
the man takes a new wife, what does he mean, new wife? We, she,
the bride, we're new creations in Christ. Old things are passed
away. She, or we, has a new nature,
new principles, new cares and concerns. Her groom's ways are
now her ways. She desires to please him. His
desires have become her desires. see through family or whatever
that are unregenerate, just like, well, this is my house, this
is my, no, it's ours. It's ours together. Because my
desires are, I pray they're more like Christ's desires. Self-denial,
self, self, I think, all these writers said, self is the last
thing to die. And oh, how we have to fight
that. Because we do, it's self, Charity suffers long, thinks
no evil. And those things that our brother
spoke about last night, so clear, so precious. His wants are become the spouse's
wants, the groom's, his wants are our wants. And what was his
want? Well, you look at what was his desire, Christ's desire,
and his want, and his... In John 17, he's, Father, I've
glorified you. And that's what we desire to
do. If there's just two or three or more, we gather together,
it's not about us. We're just a mouthpiece. We're
just a sounding board. We're just retelling the truth.
And the truth is, is our groom fetched us. And now we want to
please him. All the time, if you're married,
you know that's not true. Self gets in the way, different
things. but we have the new principles
and we can go to the father and say, father, your will be done. That's another thing I've been
learning to pray. You know, all this stuff in this, this economic,
political, whatever you want to call what's going on, all
these things is like, Lord, your will be done. And it's not a,
it's not a maybe it's his will shall be done. His will shall
be done. Well, the church of the living
God has been redeemed. We are all year long, always
that would be, in this honeymoon, this closeness, this communion,
this union with our groomsmen. There's no, even though maybe
when we're praying in the clouds for him and we can't seem to
see his face, he's there. It's us that have gone astray.
But when a man, when the groom takes a bride, he goes after
her. And look at this in, if you want to turn there, in Songs
of Solomon, chapter four, this is the Lord speaking about his
church. Sometimes the confusion goes
back and forth, but this is what Christ says about his church. Yes, this is what he says about
us. This is why our comeliness is of him. That's what I'm trying
to say. Look at verse 7, a song in Solomon
4. Thou art all fair, my love, there is no spot in thee. What? Well, as he was, we are
in this world. Oh, I know, well, if you tell
people they're completely righteous in Christ, then they'll go do,
they'll, you know, they'll be more like Christ. Because that's
the word of God, and that word of God, if it begins to dwell
richly in you, you'll wanna be like in Ephesians, like our brother
preached last night. Together, these things are together, and
we're together, that union's not gonna be broken. It's not
gonna be broken. It's a proper biblical marriage,
what we have here. Well, in Isaiah 61, he says basically
the same thing, talking about his church. This is what he says
there in Isaiah 61 and verse 10. I will greatly rejoice in
the Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God. This is the church. For he hath
clothed me with the garments of salvation. He hath covered
me with the robe of righteousness as a bridegroom decks himself
with ornaments. and as a bride adorns herself
with her jewels. Our jewels, our bedeckment is
all of him. It's always all of him. And I
think about this, you know the story of Gomer and Hosea? That's us. We played the harlot. We run around. And all the while,
gifts She didn't know it was from me. When the man has taken a wife,
he takes her. He loves her. And she wants to be loved. She's
enthralled. She's enthralled with him. And
sometimes when you go to these weddings and the groom's standing
up there and when that March starts playing and the doors
open. I don't, I look at her but I usually look at, I look
at him. And he, he's all just so beautiful. So lovely. So, I want her. I want her. Well, notice there's more in
our text. When a man hath taken a new wife, he shall not go out
to war. What do you mean he shall not
go? The groomsman, because he's already gained the victory. He's
already completed the victory on the cross. He doesn't have
to go to war. Now, there's battles that we'll
fight, but he won't leave us. He'll be right there. I'm amazed
at how myself, how weak I am, and how when I hear other people
talking, the scriptures is an open book to the believer and
how we don't use it. We don't look at the promises.
We don't ask for specific promises. Spurgeon said, you get a promise
here, I got my study Bible, I got them dated. And I may not use
them then, but if I need it, something's happening, something's
going on, whatever, I may go back to that. And it says, Spurgeon
says, take them out and spend them at leisure. Take them, put
them in your pocket. You can't out, you can't bankrupt God.
But we don't, we don't go to him in prayer. We're not, we
just, we're not, we don't keep knocking, Lord, Lord, help me,
Lord, help me. We don't do these things. He doesn't have to go to war.
He's conquered. He's gained the victory. He's
our great conqueror. He's the king of kings, the lord
of lords. He's our leader, our captain, our mighty warrior.
There's no need for him to go and leave his bride and go to
war. He's not going to because he's
the lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world.
The work is done. The work is completed. His working, his accomplishments,
his pure blood has made peace between us and the Father, honoring
all things written against us. And now we enjoy peace and joy
and cheer or gladness. And he says also, we shall not
have to go to war, neither shall he be charged with any business
or That could be put, there's nothing between him and his bride.
He's not gonna let anything get in between. We sing that song,
we haven't sang it in a long time, Nothing Between My Soul
and the Savior. There's no work. You don't have
to go, when you think of business, you gotta go to work. Somebody
preached years ago, I'll never forget. He stood up there and
he's preaching the gospel and he just said, stop working. Just cease from your works and
enter into his rest. He, and I've said that I haven't
said this in a long time, but Christ is the only one that actually
worked his way into heaven. And so we don't have to work.
He did everything. So do you believe in works? Gotta
be careful. But I said, well, I said, yeah,
I do. Christ works. Yes, I do. Christ worked for
me as my substitute, that divine swap that he did. He has satisfied
our needs and has worked his way to glory on our behalf. Romans
10 says in verse four, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness
to everyone that believe, believe on Christ, trust in him and rest and rest. He has done it all. He has done
it all. There's no business for us left
to do or for him to do. He's accomplished it. Well, we
go on. He says, don't charge him with
any business. He shall be free at home for
one year. Well, we know this one year is
eternity. It's not just a set time. But what I see here is
sweet, unbroken union and communion with him. In and out, can go
in and out. Free at home, one year. Oh, you
Christians, it's gotta be a horrible religion, horrible bondage. Nope,
not if you know the gospel of the Lord Christ. Oh, you mean
if it's self-serving and self-seeking and you gotta, no, that's not
the gospel. The gospel is full of liberality
and selflessness can come in and out, can come
in and out at home. We have, through his accomplishments,
we can pray, we can have fellowship with him, we can cry unto him
in times of need and times of hardship or loss. Let's do this more often. Let's
do this more often. Because we're betrothed to Christ.
He's taken, we're new creatures in Christ by his life and his
death. There's not gonna be any separation. Finish the work. Let's just go in and out, find
pasture, in and out. I come here, I meet a bunch of
new people. And you talk to you a little
bit, and it's like, there's that bond. There's that bond. You remember Tommy Robbins? Pastor
Tommy Robbins, Sylacauga, Alabama, one of my closest pastor friends. The Lord's taken him, took him
home, cancer young. First time we had him, never
met him, knocks on the door. Whoa, what a rough looker. He
kind of looked, that was the first thing that was said. He's
kind of a rough looker. It wasn't five minutes in the
door. and our hearts were united. Why? We have the same groom. We have the same groom. He's done it all. He's done it
all for us, and in that we rejoice. I think we ought to start doing
like Mr. Spurgeon said. I wrote this down. He said in
the morning, you know, when we go to work or we get up, In the
morning, let us, before we see the face of man, let us seek
the face of God. And I've told my folks this,
having worked and just recently retired myself, I told our folks
this, one of the best things you could do is get up, you'll
get up a little early to put stuff on the table, breakfast
or whatever, get up three minutes early and read, open the book,
don't read what somebody says about the book, read the book. and take that with you to work.
Because once you get to work, it's gonna be tough. And if you
don't work, you got doctor bills, you got doctors calling, you
got the news, all this stuff telling you we're not right,
and what's right is wrong, and wrong is right, it's flipped
upside down. So let us spend time with our beloved. One year,
or rather, day after day, He shall be free at home one year.
Day after day, week after week, he loves to hear from his people.
He loves to hear from his bride. He tells us this. And oh, how
we need this. How often are we cold when we
come to worship. How often we're cold towards
our fellow brothers and sisters or sinners. We must have his
face to shine upon us daily, lest we stumble and grow weary.
There isn't a pastor that I've talked to that sometimes just, I don't know what to do. Well,
what do you do? Well, everything that we go through,
it's in the Bible. And I try to break it down into
easy, biteable chunks. I don't have the wisdom for this,
Father. Oh, what does James say? If any of you lack wisdom, let
them ask God who, gives to every man freely. That's liberality. That's our groom. Well, this is the last point,
but this is perhaps, and shall cheer up, make glad
his wife, which he has espoused. Make glad, cheer up. This he
does often, every time you gather together, You may not get anything
out of the message, you may get a phrase. You may get a phrase. There's a story, I just thought
about it, a story told about a, I don't know if Spurgeon's
ministry or what, but a woman, an older woman, and she had that
scripture quoted to memory, I know whom I have believed and have
persuaded, that he is able to keep that which I have committed
unto him against that day. And as she was on her deathbed,
he'd go visit her weekly, And he came back and it was, I know
whom I have believed. And it was shorter and shorter
and shorter. And the last word she uttered
before she passed away was him, him, him. And I thought about
this. Why, when the Lord converts us,
we're all about Christ. We can't get enough of Christ.
And then we grow up a little bit, and stuff interferes, and
then when we get ready to die, we're like a little kid again.
I'm thankful, but may he give us consistency. May he give us
consistency in this love relationship. So
this, he cheers us up, his wife, his bride, his elect, he does
this often. This he desires to do, cheerfulness,
gladness, is our privilege, our blood-purchased advantage, our
favored position. We have been adopted, married,
approved with the Son of God, who incidentally cannot fail,
he cannot falter, and he does not hesitate. Sheep lost? He's out to get that sheep. Bride
in distress, he's there. He said he came to give life
and that more abundantly, John 10, 10. And why is this so important? Why is this so important to continue
to go over our love relationship and our marriage with our Heavenly
Father? Well, we need cheering up. I
do. For sin still lingers upon us. We need cheering up or to be
made glad because we often can't do what we would. Romans 7. That which I would, I can't. We need cheering up because the
world clings far too close and far too often to us. And with
this era, this age of instant everything, it's right there. I'm going to look at the Scripture
this morning. Oh, what's that? Something's going on. Something's
going on. And don't put it on vibrate.
It's turned off. That's why we need cheering.
We need cheering up, for Satan seeks whom he may devour. He sure does. We need cheering
up, for we fear our own flesh and our own strength, we would
fear about relying on our own strength and our own insight
and put far too much confidence in it. We think we get a little
wisdom and we try to tell everybody. So I close with this. While all
these statements why we need cheering up are true, he will
always cherish his bride, the church, and his people. He will
always do so. He sent his only begotten son,
not another, just one. To him they'll reverence. No, they
just killed him. He will ever be near to us and
he has promised to never leave or forsake us. If that's the
only thing you get, lay hold on that. That's a promise. Take
it, save it, jot it down, and reuse it. And if you, well, I've
used that last week. Use it again. It doesn't, it's
like him. This word's like him. It changes
not. It changes not. Well, in closing, let's look
at Psalms 137. The church during a very difficult
time. I'd say we're here. This is the bride. This is the
bride struggling. And to be honest with you, I
think we've struggled more in these times than I've ever seen.
There's things I've seen that I didn't think I'd ever see in
this country. Here's the church struggling.
Psalms 137, verses 1 through 4. By the rivers of Babylon,
they were taken captive. There we sat down, yea, we wept
when we remembered Zion. They're being taken away, the
children of Israel. We hanged our harps upon the
willows in the midst thereof, for they that carried us away
captive required of us a song, and they that wasted us required
of us mirth, saying, sing one of the songs of Zion. The church's
answer, how shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
We can. This is a strange land. As great
as this country is, this is, to the believer, This is a strange
land, and it's the same at this world. Doesn't matter where you
go, the grass isn't, we know better. How can we sing? I had a gentleman
one time, I was able to talk to him a little bit about the
gospel, and an election came up, predestination, and then
he turned it right on me. We were unloading a truck, and
he started throwing He bails at me and he says, did God see
that? Did God predestine that? It just grieved my heart. And
I said, you know, yeah, he did. Well, David, didn't that what
David said? Shimei? Throwing rocks? Leave him alone. God told him to say that. I can't
sing. Yes, you can. Yes, you can. Let us sing. Let us be glad. Let us be cheered up by our holy,
sovereign, immaculate Redeemer. Yes, we can pull those harps
off the willows and sing the songs of free, sovereign grace. Why? Because Christ said on Calvary,
it is finished. Whether anybody understands it
or not, it's finished. Redemption's accomplished. Redemption
was applied by the Holy Spirit. And we're of all men free, all
women free, boys, girls, hear me, free in Christ, no other
place, free in Christ. Why? The man took his wife. Be glad. Thank you.