I'm glad to see each and every
one of you. I've been kind of struggling
with a handicap more than my normal
handicaps, and that's kind of a bronchial sinus thing this
last two weeks. But I want you to turn this morning,
first of all, in John chapter 11. John chapter 11. I want to read
just one verse of scripture here that is a statement by our Lord
Jesus Christ on the occasion of Lazarus's death and his standing before the tomb of Lazarus. And that is the 43rd verse. And when he had thus spoken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus,
come forth. Now, I don't know of a better
verse of scripture a better situation whereby we can see this condition,
this state and condition that grace meets, that the gospel meets. Because Lazarus here is commanded
to do what he cannot do. The reason he cannot do it of
his self is because he is dead. And in the gospel, men and women
are commanded to do what they cannot do. That is to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. And the reason that they cannot
do that is because they are dead spiritually. That's the state
that the Bible describes all in Adam to be in. But to show further this spiritual
deadness, men logically say that God would not command us to do
something that we cannot do. That's just another evidence
of that spiritual deadness. And it is the very logic that
forms the basis for such foolish notions as free will, provides
the basis of all of modern decisionalism, I call it. But that is the very thing, if
you stop and think about it, that is taking place all the
way back in the book of Exodus, when Moses is up on Mount Sinai,
and God is giving him the law. While at the same time, at the
bottom of that mountain, those Israelites are disobeying that
very law. So to say that God would not
command us to do or require of us that which we cannot do is
not to answer this situation and it is not the biblical view
of how God in grace and mercy has dealt with this situation. And so there goes on this debate
whereby set against each other on the one hand is God's sovereignty
and on the other hand man's responsibility. But we have to be careful when
we talk about man's responsibility lest we forget that there really
is no ability in man's responsibility. Just because he is responsible
to God and responsible to obey and responsible to do these things,
that does not mean automatically that he has this necessary ability. And that is why salvation has
to be all of grace. That's why salvation has to be
all of the Lord. That's why it has to be all by
God's saving power. Because if you look back in John
chapter 6, our Lord made two statements, unmistakable statements
that show the absolute deadness and inability of any sinner to
do anything positive toward God. In John 6 verse 44, He states
this matter of inability. No man can, and I'm not a star
English pupil from way back, but I do remember the teacher
talking about the difference between may and can, may having
to do with permission and can having to do with ability. No man can come to me except
the Father which has sent me draw him, and I will raise him
up at the last day. And after he says that, some
immediately demonstrate just the very thing that he has stated. So he goes on just a little bit
later and he restates that in John 6, 65. And he said, therefore said I
unto you that no man can come unto me except it were given
unto him of my father. And you would think that these
two statements, as well as some others, were not even in the
Bibles that modern religion carries so religiously. He simply said,
no man can of himself, by himself, come unto me, believe on me. So why does God command men and
women to do what they cannot do? Well, there are a number
of reasons, I believe. The first one is to show us our
helplessness. our inability, our weakness,
our inability to do the least thing in saving ourselves. And then he does it also, I think,
to show us his power. He does those things which bring
glory to him and him alone. And he does it, I do believe,
as scripture says, to magnify and glorify his free grace. To show us that salvation must
be all of God's free grace. And he does it to show us that
he and what he does is the difference. Men say God loves everybody. They follow that with Christ
died for everybody. Then they follow that with the
Holy Spirit trying to save everybody. So the difference in salvation,
if God has done all he can do, that would leave the difference
in salvation in your hands or my hands or the hands of other
rebel sinners such as we are. But he makes these statements
and he says these things to show our helplessness and to show
that it is what he does in salvation that makes the difference. Paul said to those believers
in one place, and he says it to us, who makes you to differ? And what do you have that you
did not receive? And if you received it, why are
you glorying in it? If you don't have anything except
what God alone gave you, if you cannot attribute your salvation
to anybody but God in Christ alone, That means that you and
I can only make our boast in the Lord. We do not believe that God purposed to save every
person. And while it is obvious that
the gospel has not gone out to all men without exception, we
do believe, as the scripture commands us and as God has directed
us, that as far as we are enabled, we are to preach the gospel to
every creature. We do that because God commands
it. We do it because God gives glory
in the preaching of His Son. And we do not believe that any
are born again without and apart from the gospel. And that's because
the object of that faith that God gives in the new birth The
object of that faith is revealed in the gospel, the Lord Jesus
Christ. But we do not believe in gospel
regeneration. That is, we do not believe that
simply because the gospel is preached. that men and women
will by it be born of God and believe, we know that it must
be attended by divine power. The gospel goes out as it is
proclaimed in this world, and I'm talking about the true gospel. I'm talking about that gospel
wherein the righteousness of God is revealed, declared, made
manifest. as truly preached as it might
be, and I do pray it be more clearly preached, but that gospel
falls on the ears and in the minds and hearts of all who are
of themselves still spiritually dead. We are preaching to the dead. We are commanding things from
God that they are unable even to hear spiritually, lest believe. We do these things at God's command,
and we know like that old hymn writer wrote in his hymn, when
he said, all is vain. unless the spirit of the Holy
One come down. And that is my prayer for these
days in which we live. I know that there is not a lot
of true gospel preaching that goes on in this day. But while I know that there is
not a lot comparatively, I am thankful, I am truly thankful
for the amount of true gospel preaching that is going on in
our day. God has not left himself without
a witness. And one thing that always encourages
me about this group and the reason you have a kind of a special
place in my heart is because that God has laid that burden
for the going forth of the gospel on your hearts and you make great
efforts to send forth and proclaim the true gospel, that gospel
that gives all the glory to God to everyone that you have opportunity
to. But as we send it forth, as we
proclaim it, I am impressed, and I pray that it be joined
and attended by the power of God's Spirit, especially in this
technical age in which we live, where I do not or have not met
the one who will hear. And it may not even be possible
in this lifetime for me to meet them or see them or any of these
things. They may simply in a foreign
land by virtue of the internet hear the gospel. But where I
cannot go and wouldn't do any good if I could go, that does
not limit the Spirit of God. My prayer is that he would attend
what I'm afraid is my often poor preaching of this gospel, because
the success of the gospel does not depend on my ability or your
ability. It depends on the ability of
God the Spirit to wake these dead sinners. and to reveal Christ
in their hearts. You see, God gives the enablement
to his people in the hour appointed, and they do what they do, and
they cannot otherwise do. Now, how many a sinner has said
when they first heard the true I'll never believe that. And right at the head of that
list is this sinner that had notes written in my Bible how
that supposedly this verse or that verse proved just the opposite
of what is clearly stated in the gospel. But a funny thing happened to
me on the way to hell. And that was that God not only
caused this message to fall on my ears, but brought it to my
mind and sealed it to my heart. And what I once said I'd never
believe, I could not do anything but believe it. The reason is because God gives
his people this ability, this enabling by His Spirit to believe
and to have an understanding of what they could not do otherwise
at that hour He appoints. He not only appoints that they
will come in contact with this gospel, they'll come in contact
with this living Christ, but He'll cause them to hear and
to live and to believe. Lazarus was dead, and he could
not do what he was commanded to do, but he did. Our Lord spoke to this man who
had been dead so long that even his sister said, well, by now
he sure stinks. And how it must have seemed foolish
to them for Christ to stand before his very tomb, this man dead
and rotting, and say to him, Lazarus, come forth. You see, when God speaks to his
people, it's a very personal and effectual call. He said Lazarus. Somebody said, well, why did
he just say Lazarus? Well, because if he hadn't called
him particularly and individually and distinctively by name, every
dead soul in the whole earth would have come to life. When God speaks to a sinner through
this gospel, By that all-knowing, all-wise and almighty Holy Spirit,
when He speaks to us, there is no mistake about who He's talking
to. We cannot in any activity, we
cannot in any working or doing or whatever it is, nothing can
drown out the sound of the Spirit of God speaking to our hearts
and calling our names. We may run, but we can't hide. So he speaks effectually. And
Lazarus could not do what he was commanded to do, but he did
because the command was attended by divine power and enablement. You look back in verse 26. And listen to what our Lord says
to Martha. He says, and whosoever liveth
and believeth in me shall never die. Do you believe this? You look at that verse and you
tell me what the order is. Religion says, if you'll believe,
you'll live. But that'd be like saying to
a dead person, left to themselves, if you believe or if you move
your hand up or wave your finger or something, you'll be made
alive. No. Whosoever lives. This life, if we defined it or
dissected it down to its very finest points, we would know,
though it is simultaneous, we would know that life must precede
faith. Faith is the evidence of life. When a baby is born, we don't
expect that baby to cry in order to have life. We rejoice when
it cries because by that cry, we know it has life. And that's
the way it is with faith. When a person is brought to forsake
all other hopes, and to cease from their own works
of righteousness and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. When
we find him believing and trusting in the blood and righteousness
of Christ alone, we rejoice. We know that's a sign of life. Because the Spirit of God has
attended the gospel. O Lazarus came forth, O he had
the rags of the grave clothes on him. And I can tell you this,
when the Lord brought me forth from death to life, I had a whole
lot of the rags of the grave clothes on me, and he told those
standing by to loose him and let him go, and he had to command
others in my day who were around me and who he brought in contact
with me to help me get some of those old grave clothes off me.
But I was alive. did something that there was
no way I could do. And that was to look outside
of myself to the one who I'd never seen and fall in love with
him and rejoice in him and trust my whole of salvation and eternity
in him, this one I had not ever seen. How could I do that? Like one man said one time, ain't
nobody but a fool or a Christian do that. Because the Spirit of God not
only commands us, but enables us in that command to do what
we otherwise could not do. Turn over to Matthew chapter
9. Matthew chapter 9. And this is another occasion
of one of the miracles of Christ, and this is a miracle that constantly
repeats. Matthew 9, verse 5, he says to
those standing around this paralyzed man, this man sick of the palsy,
he says, For whether it is easier to say, Thy sins be forgiven
thee, or to say, Arise and walk. but that you may know that the
Son of Man hath power on the earth to forgive sins. Thus he said to him, the sick
of the palsy, arise, take up thy bed, and go to thy house. And he arose and departed to
his house." Now, he couldn't do that. Be like me and you walking by
someone in the hospital, laying there paralyzed from their neck
down and say, you get up, get out of your bed, take that bed
and you go home to your house. Well, he couldn't do that. But
when Christ commanded him and joined that command with that
power, like as was demonstrated what the old theologians used
to call the divine fiat. That's when our God said, let
there be light and there was light. Or as it actually says,
light be and light was. He was commanded to do what he
was unable to do. But he did it. Why? Because of
who commanded him. Turn over to Luke's Gospel, Chapter
7. Luke's Gospel, Chapter 7, and
this is an occasion when a funeral procession was
passed in our Lord. Verse 12 says, Now when he came
nigh to the gate of the city, behold, there was a dead man
carried out, the only son of his mother, and
she was a widow. And much people of the city was
with her. And when the Lord saw her, he
had compassion on her, and said unto her, Weep not. And he came
and touched the bier, and they that bare him stood still, and
he said, Young man, I say unto thee, Arise. A lot of people are Because they
have only the eyes of the flesh, they're impressed by the miraculous
things that Christ did while he was here on this earth. They
say, well, he raised people from the dead. Well, he sure did. But let me tell you something. That is nothing to compare with
the power and the glory of that event when he raises a dead sinner
to spiritual life. And he that was dead sat up and
began to speak. Now that's, that can't be Kenneth. He was
commanded to do what he, like Lazarus, was unable to do, but
he did it. And his inability did not alter
or diminish Christ's ability. Can we remember that? As we preach the gospel, we call
upon people to do what they cannot do themselves, what they will
not do. because they have a natural enmity
in their hearts toward everything about God and his truth. As those
Pharisees were told by life himself, you will not come to me that
you might have life. That is, that verse alone shows
the foolishness of free will, so called. He said, you will
not will to come to me that you might have life. This is a fact. All people are
of themselves spiritually dead. As a matter of fact, all the
miracles that Christ performed in the gospel accounts, they
were all in those that they were done to, given as examples to
show the spiritual condition of a sinner. spiritually dead, spiritually
deaf, spiritually blind, spiritually paralyzed, spiritually putrefied. But we preach. We preach as commanded, and we
preach what is commanded, knowing that we have no power
of ourselves, knowing that the most talented preacher, the most
learned preacher, the most gifted preacher as far as the ability
to define and explain It'll be in vain if the power
is ours alone, if the ability is in those we preach to or bear
witness to, because it is all of our God. God will attend his gospel with
power to every one of his sheep. Because he said, my sheep hear
my voice, and they follow me. Well, if they're in this awful
condition, if they're by nature unwilling, if they're unable
of themselves to do any of these things, even what men say is
the most simple thing, which is to believe on Christ. Because he long, long told his
king, that he set on his holy hill,
the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, he calls him his king,
and what is a king unless he has a kingdom? And what is a
kingdom unless he has subjects in that kingdom? He said to his king, thy people
shall be willing in the day of thy Somebody had a program once,
I'm not sure who it was, I don't remember, but I remember it was
called Day of Decision. I got news for you the Day of
Decision was long before the world ever began. And it wasn't
sinners deciding, it was God Almighty Himself. But God's people,
their hope lies in the day of His power. And He comes to them
with this message of truth that gives Him all the glory, that
gives the only hope there is for a real sinner, and says to
them, rise up, rise up. And you know, not only did Christ
do this Himself, but He sent forth those apostles, a whole
week, a bunch of powerless fishermen and leftover tax collectors and
stuff like that. He enabled them to do miracles. To go to these dead people and
raise them to life. That actually happens in Acts
chapter 3. That's only the minor miracle.
Because as they went forth preaching the gospel. I don't imagine it
was such an eloquent message either. Somebody like Peter,
who had more fervor than he had brains, yet in the hands of these weak
sinners, just like today, they preached Christ and him
crucified. to the dead, and God brought
them to life. Because in that same place there
in John 6, where Christ said, no man can come to me, there was an except. Except the Father which hath
sent me, draw him. You ought to go home and do a
little word study on that word draw there. Because in religion,
you're made to think that that means something like that invites
you or exerts a certain little influence on you or woos you
or something like that. That is the same word that is
used when Peter drew out his sword and cut off the high priest's
serpent's ear. It is the same word that is used
when they drew the nets in that were overfilled with fishes. They had to be taken. Peter's
sword did not just leap out of its own so-called free will and
find itself in his hand. Peter had to draw it out. except
the Father which hath sent me draw him." But even before he said that,
he stood there in the face of those Pharisees who totally rejected
him. And he said, all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me And him that comes to me I will in
no wise cast out. Let me show you one more passage.
You're familiar with it, I'm sure. It's found in Ezekiel 37. Because here's another picture
long before Christ came. Same situation with the prophet
Ezekiel. Ezekiel says in chapter 37 in
verse 1, the hand of the Lord was upon me and carried me out
in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the midst of the
valley which was full of dry bones. Every gospel preacher
that has ever stood to preach the true gospel has stood just
like old Ezekiel was to a congregation that was nothing but spiritually
a valley of dry bones. And he calls me to pass by them
round about, and behold, they were very many in the open valley,
and lo, they were very dry. They'd been dead a long time. And he said unto me, Son of man,
can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou
knowest. I've always interpreted that
as his ego saying, Lord, if it depends on me, they can't. Again, he said unto me, prophesy
upon these bones, preach, declare my message upon these bones,
and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. They
can't hear, they've been dead a long time. Preaching to the graveyard, Ezekiel.
Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones, Behold, I will cause
breath to enter into you, and ye shall live. And I will lay
sinews upon you, and I bring up flesh upon you, and cover
you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live. And what's going to be the evidence
that he made them alive? And ye shall know that I am the
Lord. So I prophesied as was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was
a noise, and behold, a shaking, and the bones came together,
bone to his bone. And when I beheld, lo, the sinews
and the flesh came upon them, and the skin covered them above,
but there was no breath in them. Then said he unto me, Prophesy
unto the wind. Prophesy, O son of man, and say
to the wind, thus saith the Lord God, come from the four winds,
O breath, and breathe upon these slain that they may live. What's the wind symbolic of in
the scriptures? The Holy Spirit. So I prophesied as commanded
and the breath came into them and they lived and stood upon
their feet an exceeding great army." They did what they couldn't do.
They did what Ezekiel could not do for them. He issued the command God gave
him, declared the message God put in his heart and mind, the
Word of the Lord. He preached it to a bunch of
dead folks and the Spirit of God made them live and acknowledge
Christ as the Lord. These things ought to encourage
us, those of us who preach. Those who, to friends and co-workers
and such, bear witness of the gospel concerning our families. Decided that the Lord shows us
our greatest weakness and inability to help a sinner,
most in our own families and our children. If I were to look at my own son, Strangely, at 40, I love him
more now than when he was a kid. But if I was to look at him for
any sign of hope or spiritual life, I'd be sorely, sorely grieved. He is dead, spiritually. But God is alive. He's the life
giver. And he can come to the deadest
of dead. Religiously dead like Saul of
Tarshish. Morally dead like the woman at
the well. He can speak life. He can enable the sinner to do what he couldn't
do otherwise, which is to believe on Christ.