I think that that is my plea,
and I'm sure it's most of yours, that all that thrills my soul
is Jesus. He's more than life to me. That's
a good song. Good morning. This morning, I'm
bringing a message, and the text of the message is Romans 10,
13, calling on the name of the Lord. And I'm not going to actually
get into the text until a little later. I'm going to have a little
bit of preliminaries, The first thing I thought I would just
talk about, the last time I was up here was about a year ago,
and Georgia had beaten Florida, and now they, of course, had
a bad day yesterday. And, you know, I guess it brings,
you know, the things that are really important is Jesus, and
that's it, and what he did, and the fact that he gave it all.
and that our hope is built on nothing less than Jesus' blood
and righteousness. And that's our hope. And that's
a blessed hope, because we, there's nothing in us that deserves merits,
salvation in any way, shape, form, or fashion. And we are
rotten sinners, and if God would mark iniquity, I wouldn't stand. Who would stand? None of us would.
And so why are we here today? Is it to worship God? You know,
we're commanded, you know, don't forsake the assentment of ourselves
together. Here we are in a little small church in Albany, Georgia.
There are probably 100, 125 churches in Albany. And why are
we here in this church? Surely God in some form is preached
in these churches. And Mark preached last week,
and I remember him saying, that there were about 2,500 different
denominations all over the world. You know, why don't we sit in
a big, nice Catholic church or a big Baptist church or Pentecostal
church or Methodist church? Why are we here? And, you know, I heard a little story about
some lady was talking, and I think you may have heard this before,
but she had a a daughter that was going to college, she was
going to some church, and it was some kind of a way out church,
and they had some crazy gospel, but of course, obviously, we
believe if it's not the true gospel, you know, they're not
in, you know, they're in bad shape, but anyway, this was some
kind of a church that preached some kind of a cult openly, and
the mother says, well, you know, at least she's going to church
somewhere. Well, that's a sad commentary to, you need to know
that the church you're going to what it preaches, and you
need to know the gospel it preaches, and you better know that whether
or not it preaches the true gospel of Christ and Him crucified based
on the imputed righteousness of Christ alone. And, of course,
if you just listen to this message for the first time, I'm going
to talk about that a little bit more and get a little bit more
detailed. And, again, why are we here again? What are we here
this morning for? It's Labor Day weekend. Why aren't
we out barbecuing on the lake? What are we here for? And, you
know, is it pursuit of truth? That's certainly it, to some
extent. What is truth? Is truth sincerity? You know, how about Steve Jobs? You know, he sincerely believed
in that holistic treatment. You know, he was the head of
Apple Computer, you know. He believed in that holistic
treatment instead of getting the the contemporary treatment
of radiation and chemotherapy for his cancer. And he was sincerely
thought it was going, he believed in it. And he died. And then there are other people
that, you know, if you're out, I'm a lawyer and I handle cases,
several, numerous cases from time to time where someone is
at a crossing or something, they sincerely believe that the coast
is clear. They just don't look, they're
negligent, they're careless, and they just pull out into the
intersection. Well, they were sincere about it, but they were
sincerely wrong. Or someone hurriedly, a nurse hurriedly grabs the antidote
for a particular malady where someone is very sick and she
rushes to the, they're on the deathbed and brings the medicine.
It's the wrong medicine and they die. She was sincerely thought
she had the right one, but she was sincerely wrong. We need to know what the truth
is. And is truth reformation of our character and conduct?
Well, you know, we certainly, the Bible commands us that we
should live right, we should be honorable, although it doesn't
have anything to do with our salvation. But truth, you know,
the Bible says, by the deeds of the law shall no flesh be
justified. And that Romans 320, we've heard
that many a time. But deeds of the law, that means
trying to get into heaven by your character and conduct, by
refraining from doing bad things and trying to do good things.
That's deeds of the law. And how about if a person owes
$50,000 and he goes to his creditors and say, listen, I owe you $50,000
in the future. I'm going to pay you 100%, but
I'm just going to let that pass. The Bible says God requires that
which is passed. You know, we have to be perfect
from the cradle to the grave. You can't just say, well, I'm
going to repent of everything I've done. I'm sorry about that. No, God requires we've got to
be perfectly righteous from the cradle to the grave. So what
is the truth again? The Bible says, seek and you
shall find. And John 8, 32 says, you shall know the truth and
the truth will make you free. Well, what is truth again? Jesus
says, I am the way, the truth and the life. No man comes to
the father, but by me, John 14, six, what things are certain
in life? We know, we've heard the expression,
well, death and taxation, that's for certain. We know we're going
to be getting taxed now. You know, I thought I'd had a
pretty good year, and then all of a sudden I found that I made
less than I did a couple years or five years ago because of
this taxation here. Another thing that's sure and
certain is the love of a mother. There's nothing like a mother's
love. That's sure and certain. That's
something that you can count on. How about the loyalty of
a dog? You know, some of you might have
had a dog that's been loyal. I hadn't had any lately, but
I would do when I was younger. And, uh, but you know, one thing
is sure and certain, though, we get right down to it and that's
death. You know, it's appointed upon man wants to die. And after
that, the judgment and I've, you know, it's going to come
to all of us and I'm, I'm, I'm probably one of the, I'm the
next to the oldest man in the church here, I believe, right
now, Winston. So, you know, the older we get,
you know, when you're young, you kind of, you worry, you don't
want your grandmother and granddaddy to die. You love your grandmom
and your granddaddy, and you worry about that, and then all
of a sudden, they leave, and then, oh, you worry about your
mother and daddy, and then they leave, and then you worry about
brothers and sisters and older brothers and sisters. All of
a sudden, like I had, I had a younger brother leave, And, you know,
death is very real. And we're going to have to, you
know, face, we're going to have to go to eternity and we're going
to have to face the Lord. Now, the problem is, and I think,
and with most people, and I'll give you this illustration, is
that if a person came and gave his favorite girlfriend a $25,000
diamond ring, And they put that diamond ring
in a pretty little blue velvet box and gave it to her. And she
sees him the next day and gives him a hug and a kiss. Oh, thank
you so much for that blue velvet box. I'm going to take care of
that. I'm going to put her in a place where it'll never be
destroyed. Thank you so much. She didn't
mention the diamond ring. That's kind of what we do, unfortunately. We're more concerned about our
physical bodies than our spiritual bodies. I mean, now, listen,
I almost died three years ago. So I said, I want to live. We
all want to live. And I walk, try to walk about an hour, about
four days a week. But there are a lot of people
that are, man, they get in boot camp. All they do, they go in
the morning, they go in the afternoon. They've got these, you know,
Six abs and they just got a great body. That's all they work on
constantly. And I guess I'm talking about
more people between 20 and 40 than I am my age. But people,
you want to put off thinking about your death until a more
convenient time. We just don't want to think about
that. And because we associate that with times that are depressing,
We just want to just, well, everything's going to be all right. Well,
we better face up to it right now, because it's a point upon
man wants to die, and after that, the judgment. We're going to
be standing in the judgment either, you know, as a forgiven sinner
or as one who's condemned. And that's pretty, that's mighty
critical, because That's what we're talking about internally.
You know, there's a lot of things, again, while we're here, while
we're here again today, there's a lot of things happening in
our world right now. I mean, I've never seen it, and you haven't
either. We kind of, the news media is everywhere now, but
there are fires like we've never seen before. It's even in Yosemite
National Park. You know, we got those giant
sequoias, those great redwoods. You know, they're endangered
right now. And there are fires everywhere. And our economy is
horrible. It's in a horrible shape. What are we here for? What are
we here for today? Well, we're here to find out
what the truth is, and we're here to be to be fed. And that's what I want. Now I'm
going to talk to you, you know, there with my brother dying.
It's really, you know, kind of made me think a lot more about
my efforts to share the gospel and the most important thing,
I guess, in all of our lives, the most important thing. And
this is when I first came to hear about Christ and him crucified,
about the gospel based on the imputed righteousness of Christ
alone. Most important thing is family. And of course, on holidays
like Labor Day, like today, this weekend, you know, we gather
together with family and friends, and we, you know, we share things. We want to be together. We love
our family. That's important. And that's
what life's about, is our family. And we even try to share the
gospel. And unfortunately, this narrow way, it's the offense
of the cross keeps coming up. And of course, Randy, you're
very fortunate. You have two of your brothers,
your two, only two brothers who have come to know this gospel.
And my brother's dad, I hope he knew the gospel. And I've
got another couple of brothers and a sister, and you know, I
hope that they'll one day come to know the gospel. You know,
one of them may know it, I don't know, but we have a duty Especially
if we love our family, you say, well, I really hate, I don't
want to be offensive. You know, I really don't want
to cause any problem. You know, I'm just going to live.
Well, listen, if you don't, you know, you, you need to be ready,
always be ready to give an answer for the hope that's within you
to anyone that asks you if any one of your family members ask
you, you better be ready to tell them and tell them the truth
about, about who Christ is and what he did and about a just
God and a savior. Well, As far as, we're here today
to just get reassurance about our entrance to heaven. And what's
it based on? It's based on one thing. What
do we have to have? The one thing we have to have.
is righteousness, a complete, perfect righteousness. That's
what we gotta have. But we have some problems. Man
has two or three problems. The first problem is we have
a sin problem. We're all sinners. I'm not gonna
read all these scriptures about that, but all, you know, sin,
it comes short of the glory of God, and then as a result of
that, the wages of sin are death. So therefore, because of our
sin, we have a death warrant on us. And we deserve to die. We have that problem and we have
to overcome that problem. Another problem we have is, uh,
and, and we, we, we need to be saved from seeing that's, that's
our problem. We need to be saved from our sin. Another problem
is that, that God requires righteousness and there's an unrighteous. No,
not one. And it says, the Bible says,
Matthew six 33, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.
What is righteousness? Well, that's perfect satisfaction
in his law and justice. Well, what does that mean? Well, you know, God requires,
he requires every sinner to be perfect, and because the sinner
has, because we have, through Adam, Adam's sin, and we inherited
the sin nature through Adam, and he requires that the sin
be paid for. He requires the death, the soul
that sinneth shall surely die, He requires death. Whose death? Our death. Thank goodness that
we have a suitable substitute Christ who died for us in our
place instead, who imputed our sins to him, and then who died,
shed his blood, and rose again, established a righteousness,
and had that righteousness. So there's none righteous. That's
the first one. The third problem, is we lack
knowledge of the truth. And that's what, when we talk
today about who shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be
saved, that's the main problem. People don't have a knowledge
of the truth. They have a zeal of God, but not according to
knowledge, for they've been ignorant of God's righteousness. They
go about to establish their own righteousness. They have not
submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. Romans 2, 3, 10, 2, and
3. And then, but the natural man,
1 Corinthians 2, 14, if you want to turn to it, But the natural
man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they
are foolishness unto him. Neither can he know them, because
they are spiritually discerned. So, I have a, there's a handout that
I gave out today. And, you know, one of the things
that we're to do today in seeking the truth, we are to seek the
truth. And there is a dichotomy of sorts.
It's a kind of a two-fold, two-edged sword, so to speak, and that
is that the truth of the mystery of Christ is revealed in the
heart and mind of a sinner once God enlightens him to the truth. Matthew 11, 25, then I'm going
to let you look at this little handout. Jesus answered and said,
I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because
thou hast hid these things from the wise and the prudent, and
thou hast revealed them unto babes. Most people, we don't,
before we come to know the gospel, we don't understand what the
scripture is. We don't understand which way we need to go. We don't
understand what we need to do. Well, here's some things that
we are, need to be proactive into doing, and I'm going to
try to clarify it. So if you'll look at this handout
that I've got you, we are commanded in the scripture to do I think
seven basic things. There may be a few others, but
these are the basic ones. We're commanded to seek the Lord.
We're commanded to call on the Lord. We're commanded to choose
the Lord, to believe on the Lord, come to the Lord, receive the
Lord, and look to Christ. Those are the things we're commanded
to do. And, of course, a lot of people, you know, well, natural
man will say, well, listen, you know, Christ has done his part,
but now we have to do our part. And they don't understand that
if you add something to Christ's finished work, that you're affecting
God's glory and you're destroying the gospel of Christ. So looking
at the first one, Matthew 6, 33, it says, seek ye first, no,
seek and ye shall find. Then it says, seek ye first the
kingdom of God and his righteousness. So we're commanded to seek and
ye shall find. But then, There appears to be
a conflict with scripture. It says, I've got a little verses,
Romans 3.11, there's none that understand, there's none that
seeketh after God. Then Isaiah 65.1, I am sought
of them that ask not for me, I'm found of them that sought
me not. and then thy people shall be willing in the day of thy
power." There's sure some more. So is that an irreconcilable
paradox? I've mentioned that before. Is
the scripture at odds? No, the scripture are not at
odds. What that is showing whether we're seeking, choosing, or what,
is that God is the first cause of our salvation. We are commanded
to seek. And when we seek, it's because
he first sought us and drew us because he drew us. And in each
one of these commands of God, the calling, the next one is
number two, whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall
be saved, Romans 10, 13. shall come to pass, whoever shall
call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered. For in the
Mount of Zion and in Jerusalem shall be deliverance, as the
Lord has said, and in the remnant whom the Lord shall call. And
then I'll skip down. The Lord has nine of them that
call on him. So there is a reference right here that shows whosoever
shall call. Well, there it is. We have to
call. We have to do something. Well, we do. But we see in the
corollary, says, not many wise men after the flesh, not many
mighty, not many noble are called first Corinthians 26. And then
thus say at the Lord, fear not for I have redeemed thee. I have
called thee by thy name, thou art mine. I, the Lord have called
thee in righteousness. So we're to call on him, but
he first calls us. He is the first cause of all
this. And I'm not going to read every
single verse and then choosing. Choose this day, that's the old
famous scripture from Joshua. Choose this day who you will
serve. As for me and my house, we will
serve the Lord. And then a good name is rather
to be chosen than great riches, silver and gold. Well, look at
the corollary. We're to choose Christ. There
it is. We are to be proactive. We're to choose Christ. He says,
thou art my servant. I have chosen thee and not cast
thee away. The first shall be last, and
the last shall be first. The first shall be last, for
many are called, but few are chosen. For many are called,
but few are chosen. Well, we're to choose him, but
he first chose us. And that shouldn't, I guess,
discourage us in any way in looking at that. And then believing,
whosoever believeth in him shall not perish, but shall have eternal
life. He that believeth on the Son shall have everlasting life. He that believeth not shall not
have life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. And then the
corollary, in whom the God of the world has blinded the minds
of them that believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel
of Christ, whose image should shine upon them. And then the
next one is coming. He says, coming to me, all you
that labor now and heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. And he
says, anyone thirst, let him come to me and drink. Incline
your ear, come to me here and your soul shall live. We are,
we're to come to it. We're to choose him. And then
receiving him. As many as received him, to them
gave he the power to become the sons of God, even them to believe
on his name, which were born out of blood, nor of the will
of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the word
was made flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld his glory.
and the glory of his only begotten Son, full of grace and truth.
And then it says, natural man receiveth not the things of the
Spirit of God. We are to receive him, but it
must be his first doing it. He's the first cause. Then we're
to look to Jesus. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up.
Well, Christ is the first cause, and what I'm just trying to say
in all this, and try to bring it to a quick head, is that,
yeah, we are to be proactive. We're to do all these things.
We're to seek Him. We're to look to Christ. We're
to call Him. We're to choose Him. We're to come to Him. But
we know that He is the first cause, and that when we do come
to see Him, and we come to see Him as a just God and a Savior,
and we come to see that He is all our salvation, that He is
everything. that when we come to see Him,
we realize that He's the first cause. Now, a lot of people think,
well, you know, since we were elected in the everlasting covenant
of grace before the world began, God has elected His peoples,
we're just going to sit back and do nothing. That's just,
we're just going to say, hey, you know, if we're going to be
saved, we're going to be saved. No, God uses means, He commands
every man everywhere to come and seek And it's fatalism if
we just sit back and just say, well, I'm just going to do whatever.
If I'm one of the saved, that's still a command. The gospel is
a command. And man, even though God is sovereign and God is the
first cause, man is still responsible. So we can't get away with that
excuse. We can't say, well, I wasn't
elect. That's not going to cut it. responsibility
to seek, choose, receive, look to Christ, and come to Christ.
So now, there's a scripture before I get to the text. I'm just going
to touch on it. It's very closely analogous to
the scripture, the text. And it is in Proverbs 22.1. And
you might want to turn to it. And it says, a good name is rather
to be chosen than great riches. And then that's Proverbs 22.1. And loving favor rather than
silver and gold. And then Ecclesiastes 7.1, it's
a close corollary to that. A good name is better than precious
ointment. And the day of one's death is
better than the day of one's life. Well, let me just say this
about this. A good name is to be chosen. And that's obviously what is
a good name. That's the message. And the main message is the name
of God, which we're going to touch on in a second. Here's
a poem that I got. And you know, we're all, especially
your mothers, the mothers of young boys, They push their sons
to be good boys and they want them to be good. Everybody wants
their children to be good and not get in trouble. And here's
just a little poem I was going to read it. You got it from your
father. It was all he had to give. It's for yours to use and cherish
for as long as you may live. And if you lost the watch he
gave you, he can always be replaced, but a black mark on your name
can never be erased. It was clean the day you took
it and a worthy name to bear when he got it from his father,
there was no dishonor there. Make sure you guard it wisely
after all is said and done. You'll be glad the name is spotless
when you give it to your son. Now that, you know, that's, that's
kind of a pretty good little poem. And that, and you can apply
it to that first, but that's not what this verse is about.
A good name. The Bible said there's none good
but God. A good name. What is a good name? Too many funerals lately. I'm
just going to pick out an arbitrary name. But at a funeral I heard
recently, it says, you know, old Joe, boy, he was a good boy.
He's not saved nobody. He's one of the best guys I know.
Well, you know, unfortunately, that's not the criteria. You
know, it's do you have a perfect righteousness? It's not whether
you're good. And there's none good, Romans 3, 12, there's none
that doeth good, no, not one. You know, what is a good name?
Well, a good name means a godly name. And a good name really
is God himself, God with us, the imputed righteousness of
Christ. That's what a good name is. Do you have a good name?
A good name is if you believe in the Lord our righteousness.
Jehovah Sid Canoe, the Lord our righteous. Emmanuel, God with
us. Well, there is none. There is none good, and our heart
is deceitful and desperately wicked. And if the Lord were
to mark iniquities, obviously no one would stand. By nature,
none of us have a good name, you know. We deny the glory of
God. We deny the person and work for
Christ. We think that Until we've been enlightened, we think it's
part God and part man. We think that God's done most
of the part. He's done his part, now we have to do ours. We say,
oh no, but our coming to him and our part, oh, that's not
really a work. He's done it all, but we need
to do something in addition to what he's done. We need to add
something to it. But you know, if you have a good
name, the day of one's death is better than the day of one's
birth. That's Ecclesiastes 7.1. Now, we know that in Matthew
25, he talks about separating the sheep from the goats. And
if you're a goat, you're going to go in the lake of fire. I'm
not going to take time to read that. I mean, that's clear as
it can be. But if you are one of the sheep,
if you believe the truth, of Christ and His right. If you
have a good name, and your name's written in the Lamb's Book of
Life, well, that's nothing better than
to have a good name, and where you'll be confessed by the Father
and all the angels. Romans 3, Romans 10, 13, and
I would, everybody, most of you maybe know this by heart, but
if you don't, here's what it says. for whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. That's pretty simple. And people all over the world
who are somewhat familiar with the Bible, they can use this
one, you know, or they can use the one that with the Philippians,
he asked Paul and Silas, you know, sirs, what must I do to
be saved? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, thou shalt be saved
in our house. But I'm focusing on this particular
verse today because I think this is where the water hits the wheel
on salvation and it gets right to the crux of the matter. I looked up in preparing for
this message, I got a concordance on my computer and I pulled up,
I guess, I don't know, I didn't count them, but it was about
125 different times where the name of the Lord was mentioned.
And certainly I'm not gonna read all those verses, but I'm gonna
read just four or five just parts of verses so you can just get
some kind of gist. And the first time was obviously,
was in Genesis when Abraham built an altar. He built, he got some
rocks and he just piled them up and he built an altar and
he worshiped in the name of the Lord. And the end of the message,
I'm going to talk about that, about that, that calling on the
name of the Lord is about worship, it's about sacrifice. But let
me, let me just call up, let me just mention a few verses.
And this is here about Abraham 26, 25, and he built in an altar
there and he called upon the name of the Lord, pitched his
tent and there Isaac serviced, digged a well. And. Then there's another reference
here in Deuteronomy 18. The Lord had chosen him out of
the tribes to stand minister in the name of the Lord. And
then there's another reference here in 1 Samuel 17. It was about
David facing the Philistine. And here's what he said to him.
He said, thou comest to me with a sword and with a spear and
with a shield, but I come to thee in the name of the Lord
of hosts. And the Queen of Sheba, 1 Kings 10, 1, heard of the fainting
of Solomon concerning the name of the Lord. And she came to
prove him with hard questions. And then Job, naked I came out
of my mother's womb, naked I shall return. The Lord gave, the Lord
has taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
So we hear the name of the Lord is blessed. And then in Psalms, David says,
Lord, I call upon the name of the Lord, I beseech thee, deliver
my soul. So it's a source of deliverance.
And then it's a source of help. Psalm again, David 124, our help
is in the name of the Lord who made heaven and earth. Then Proverbs,
King Solomon. He says the name of the Lord
is a strong tower, the righteous run into it, and it's safe. It's
a place of safety. And it's another place that's
mentioned in Acts 8, 16. It says, only they were baptized
in the name of the Lord. They were baptized. That's got
some significance. And then Paul He answers, what do you mean
to weep and break my heart? For I am ready not to be bound
only, but to die at Jerusalem for the name of the Lord. He
was ready to die for the name of the Lord. So we see that it's
got some tremendous power and significance. And then there's
another scripture. First Corinthians, you were justified
in the name of the Lord. And then whatsoever you do in
word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord. Colossians 3, 7.
Anybody sick among you, let him call the elders. pray over him,
and know him with all in the name of the Lord. And then there's
praise. There's a praise of King David.
He said, praise ye the name of the Lord. So evidently, the name
of the Lord has got some significance. So what is it to call upon the
name of the Lord? Well, in short, to know that
answer, you've got to know the righteousness of God and what
that entails. If you don't know that, if you've
never heard, if you're a person, you say, well, Have you ever
heard of how God can be just and justify an ungodly sinner,
which is spoken of in Isaiah 45, 21 and 22. Do you know what
that means, sir? Well, no, I never heard of that.
Well, have you ever heard about the imputed righteousness of
Christ where it talks about God won't impute sin to his sheep
and spoken of about six or seven times in the fourth chapter of
Romans. Have you heard that, sir? Do
you know about that in Peter? Well, no. Well, you have to have
knowledge. You're not going to understand
what does it mean to call on the name of the Lord. Does it
mean? We know what it means, but Jesus,
Jesus, and I'm sincere as I can in my heart, I honestly believe
you are the son of God, that you died for your that you died
on the cross to save your people from their sins, and I honestly
believe that in my heart. I believe that. And just saying
that, is that going to do it? That little magic touch, is that
just saying that? Is that enough? Is it simply
just saying the sinner's prayer, Lord, save me? Come into my heart.
I invite you to come into my heart. I receive you. Is that
going to save you? Well, You know, I could be sarcastic,
but I won't because I was there. I was there and I didn't understand
the truth at one point. Before someone becomes enlightened,
he's got to be shown the truth. He's got to be shown knowledge.
You know, where does it come from? Faith and knowledge go
together. And faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word
of God. You've got to have a God-appointed preacher who's going to tell
you about satisfaction, substitution, and imputation. That God had
to satisfy our sins. He had to die on the cross and
satisfy justice. That justice had to be satisfied.
And that he's our substitute. You know, God, he was God and
man. We had to know who he was, what
he did, and why he did it, and where he is now. They're going to be a lot of
people, obviously, you know, that are disappointed, especially
these religious people. And I, and, you know, when they
say, Jesus, Jesus saved me, I mean it. And I'm trying to live rightfully.
I love you. I believe you died on the cross.
Let me read it from Matthew 7, 21, 23. Let's see what God said. So not everyone that saith unto
me, Lord, Lord shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he
that doeth the will of my father, which is in heaven, many will
say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied
in their name? And they have people are prophesying in the
name of the Lord. They're seeing Jesus and they're prophesying.
And in that name have cast out devils. People today, even today
are casting out David using the name of Jesus, but they didn't
know him as a just God and a savior. And in thy name cast out devils,
and in thy name done many wonderful works. And though I was a professor
to them, I never knew ye. Depart from me, ye that work
iniquity." There's going to be a lot of sad people that think
they know the truth, but they don't because they haven't had
time. You know, and the gospel is a mystery. You know, the Bible
says the gospel is a mystery. You know, the gospel It's not
for the wise and the prudent. It's for the babes. He hides
it. There must be a revelation. And
you're not going to understand the truth until he reveals it.
And he reveals it through the preaching of his word. Now, the
preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness. That's what Bill said in our
last lesson. He was quoting from the Bible. That's a quote from
scripture. But people who refuse to see,
you know, You know, past the nose on the face there. They're
just they're sincere. They're sincere. I really don't
see it. And they don't. But they're sincerely wrong,
like we talked about. And it requires prayerful study. Proverbs 14, 12 says there is
a way which seems right in a man. But then there are the ways of
death. Enter ye at the straight gate, for wide is the gate, broad
is the way that leadeth to destruction, many that go in thereat, but
straight is the gate, narrow is the way which leadeth unto
life, and few there be that find it." The name of the Lord, it's
His character, it entails who He is, what He's done, it entails
His person, who He is, His attributes, He's the God-man mediator, His
work, what He accomplished on His death, He gave himself a
ransom for many. He didn't die for all. He died
for the sheep. And the fact is, he's finished the work. He didn't
make men savable. He made it sure. He's a successful
savior. He's already saved his people.
And if somebody believes that people that are in hell for whom
he died, then they don't know the truth. That's not the true
Jesus. You know, when somebody's growing up, you say, well, This
guy, he's known, he's a pretty good worker. He's known as a
pretty good worker. That's his name, he's known by.
Oh, this guy likes to fish, hunt, and drink beer. Well, that's
what he's known by. This guy's money hungry. He just
works all the time. Oh, this guy, another name, he's
got a name for being a freeloader. Man, he's a freeloader. Man,
he's not going to pay anybody. He's a chinch. And then his name,
somebody's a womanizer. And that characterizes exactly
what the people are, really. That just, in a couple words,
an acronym if we want to call it, a word or two that describes
somebody. But to call on the name of the
Lord is to call on Him in truth as exactly how He is, the one
mediator between God and man, a just God and a Savior, who
was our substitute representative in surety, who established the
righteousness and who imputed it to our account. Now, if that's
the one you call, that's the name of the Lord we have to call
on to be saved.