through the chapter and look
at a few things here. There's a lot of good. The Bible says, Comfort ye my
people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem
and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity
is pardoned. For she hath received of the
Lord's hand double for all her sins. Brethren, that's exactly
what we do whenever we come together. We talk about the Lord. We went
to a funeral on Friday and got to sit around the table at lunchtime
and caught up with everybody on, hi, how are you doing? Doing
well? Getting over all your health
issues? Yeah, blah, blah, blah. It wasn't long after that, the
conversation goes to the Lord. We begin to talk about the Lord.
We begin to talk about the gospel. We begin to talk about the scriptures. And the child of grace is always
comforted by speaking of the Lord, talking about the Lord,
hearing about the Lord. That's what is our comfort. Our
comfort is, and I know I say this a lot, and we preach about
this a lot, but the comfort to the true child of grace doesn't
come in the law, because we've been given eyes to see that the
law killeth. The law condemns. The only thing
the law can do for you is to condemn you. It can't make you
righteous. It can't make you holy. It can't
make you acceptable before God. All the law can do is to condemn
you before God. And I say this all the time. All these people that are out
there preaching to people about doing the law and walking by
the law and the rule of life be by the law is doing a disservice
to all of God's sheep. God's sheep hears that, and that
is not a comforting sound. It's not a comforting sound because
whenever you tell me to go to the law, and I go to the law,
all I find is that I can't keep the law. And so, here the scripture
says, comfort ye, comfort ye my people, but what is it that
we're comforting each other with? Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem,
and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity
is pardoned. Listen, the battle for righteousness
is over for us. Christ has won the victory for
righteousness for His people. He has secured the righteousness
that is required to be accepted by God. He has accomplished that
for His people. and all of His people are imputed
with that righteousness. That means their account shows
righteousness even though they are unrighteous. And so what
do we speak to each other about? What do we comfort each other
about? The fact that Jesus Christ has accomplished our warfare. He has accomplished our pardon.
He is taking care of the iniquity of sin that each and every one
of us are guilty of. He is paid for that with His
blood. The Bible says that without the
shedding of blood there is no remission of sin and that Christ
by His death went into that Holy of Holies with His blood and
purged everything that is therein and has cleansed everything and
all of our iniquity, all of our sin has been covered, has been
taken care of, has been removed and that we are no longer under
the law of condemnation, we are no longer under the guilt of sin, because the
Bible also says there in Hebrews that whenever Christ comes and
the Holy Spirit comes and works within the heart of the believer,
one of the things that he does is he comes with the blood of
Christ to purge our conscience from the dead works of the law. What does that mean, preacher?
Well, that means whenever the Spirit of God comes in, He doesn't
come in and brings the law with Him and tells you, you need to
start keeping this law. No, He comes in with the blood
of Christ and says, all of your unrighteousness has been covered.
All of your sins have been paid for, and that you just trust
in what Christ has already done for you, because God has accepted
you, not in anything that you do, but what Christ has done
on your behalf. And so the Holy Spirit of God
comes in and purges our conscience that we are guilty before God. And although we truly are guilty
before God, the Holy Spirit teaches us that that sin has been paid
for and that we will not stand and have to give an account or
give restitution for those sins. It's already been paid for. We go on to see Verse 3 says,
the voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, prepare ye
the way of the Lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our
God. Now we know that this is a prophecy
that was talking about John the Baptist. John the Baptist was
the one who was coming to prepare that time coming from the Old
Covenant, the Old Testament, into the New Testament, into
the New Covenant. Although that new covenant is
called the new covenant, it's an everlasting covenant, it's
new in its manifestation. Meaning that the covenant of
works is what we have seen in this time that God has created
for man in this temporal existence. The covenant of works has been
what has been seen and is what has been talked about and what
has been enforced upon. But the everlasting covenant
that has always been became manifest with the preaching of John the
Baptist. The gospel was first preached by John the Baptist
in its openness and entirety. And as Jesus came, John prepared
the way for him in beginning to preach righteousness, not
in the law, but righteousness in the Lamb who was slain, who
takes away the sin of the world. See, in the Old Testament, the
sin of the world was not taken away. The sin of the world was
covered by bulls and goats. But it wasn't taken away. And
it surely didn't purge the conscience of men from their sinfulness. But the new covenant now being
made manifest through the preaching of the gospel, that we have an
advocate with the Father, we have a surety, we have a substitute
who has came and provided a righteousness for us. His blood has actually
cleansed us of sin, has covered our sin, but has removed our
sin. Completely removed our sin. We
have forgiveness with God. There is no condemnation to those
who are in Christ Jesus. So the blood of Jesus Christ
is greater than those of the bulls and goats that was in under
the old covenant. So this new testament, this new
covenant, even though it has been forever, began to be manifest
with the preparing of the way. John the Baptist came and started
preaching righteousness in Christ. Unless your righteousness exceeds
the righteousness of these Pharisees, you're done. You're done. Well,
what were the Pharisees' righteousness? The righteousness of the law.
Well, when John the Baptist came, John the Baptist came, and these
guys were seeing all this stuff going on, and they said, well,
hey, let's go down there and get baptized too. John told them, he said,
hey, show forth repentance. You know, show forth the repentance
before you come and get baptized. What was John asking? Do you
mean that they need to quit sinning before you're baptized? No. Those
men had to repent of their doctrine. Their doctrine was works salvation. Their doctrine was a covenant
of works. Moses is saving us. Sinai is
saving us. Abraham's lineage is saving us. That's what our salvation is,
our salvation is of the flesh, not in the spirit. And John said,
no, this salvation comes a different way. And you need to repent of
what you're speaking, repent of what you're worshiping, repent
of what you're doing and what you're holding out to the people
as. Whenever you repent of that,
then come to see me about baptism. So John began to speak these
things. He says, every valley shall be exalted, every mountain
and hill shall be made low. And the crooked shall be made
straight, and the rough places made plain. And the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken." So here again we see
a prophecy concerning the salvation of Jew and Gentile. All flesh
is going to see this glory. Not just the Jews, but the Gentiles
also. Whenever Christ came in His glory,
which is in in his incarnation whenever he came and brought
righteousness in and was the righteousness of him. That glory
that we see of that salvation was seen by not only the Jew
but also the Gentile. It is a worldwide salvation of
his elect. We see the scriptures back that
up, replete in many, many verses. We know that his elect has been
scattered across the face of the earth. We know that his elect
is in every corners of the world, and that he is going to gather
all them up out of every nation, tribe, kindred, and tongue. It
says, the voice said, cry, and he said, what shall I cry? All
flesh is grass, and all the goodliness thereof is as the flower of the
field. See, our goodness, our righteousness
is just like the flowers, the grass. It has a little show of
goodness, but all of a sudden it dies off. See, that's why
we can't ever be made righteous by the law. You might be able
to keep a couple of laws here and there for a little while,
But the big problem is, is to keep the law means to keep it
all, all the time. You have to keep every law, and
you have to keep it perfectly forever, and never miss a beat,
never miss a stride. You can never have a hiccup,
an oopsie, there's no oopsies, because one little oopsie, you've
broken the whole law. And this is what this is saying
here. Our righteousness, our goodliness, our trying to keep
the law is just like the flowers in the field. It's here for a
little bit and then gone. It dies off. Why? Because we
aren't righteous people. We can't provide righteousness
for ourselves. We can't do righteousness. And
so it says the grass, it will eventually wither away. The grass
withered, the flower faded. But one thing is for sure, the
word of the Lord standeth forever. The Word of the Lord shall stand
forever. Now, whenever I read that, the first thing my mind
comes to is that Lord Jesus, He will stand forever. He endures
forever. Whenever we look at that in the
Old Testament, I mean, excuse me, in the New Testament, we
see that the Word is speaking of Jesus Christ. Not only in John and the Word,
Was with God and was God, but we also see in Peter Well has slipped my mind Here it is, right here. 1 Peter chapter 1. Verse 18. For as much as ye know
that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver
and gold from your vain conversation received by the traditions of
your father, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb
without blemish and without spot, who verily was foreordained before
the foundation of the world but was manifest in these last times.
So he was foreordained before the foundation of the world to
be our Lamb without spot or blemish. He stood as the Lamb slain without
spot or blemish and I would say because he stood as such in the
mind of God as our Lamb slain and because he stood as such
as our surety that all the blessings of God are yea and amen in Him,
and Ephesians tells us that all spiritual blessings were given
to us in heavenly places before the foundation of the world,
I would say that all of salvation was accounted to His elect before
anything was ever created. So Christ, who verily was foreordained
before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these
last times for our knowing, for our understanding, for our seeing,
for our believing, He came and did these things so that we might
know and believe. Who by Him do believe in God,
that raised Him up from the dead and gave Him glory, that your
faith and hope might be in God. seeing you have purified your
souls and obeying the truth through the spirit to unfeigned love
of the brethren see that you love one another with a pure
heart fervently here we go being born again not of corruptible
seed but of incorruptible by the word of God which liveth
and abideth forever." Again, I've taught that here before,
that this is not talking about the spoken word, the preached
word, the written word. It's not talking about this.
We're not born again by reading this or hearing this. We're born
again by the Word of God, meaning Christ Jesus, and His internal
speaking of life into us. It says, For all flesh is as
grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of grass. So this
is a direct quote from where we're at, back in Isaiah. For
all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower
of grass. The grass withered, and the flower
thereof followed the way. But the word of the Lord endured
forever. And this is the word which by
the gospel is preached unto you so that right there is the context
in where I derive the fact that verse 23 is not talking about
the written or spoken or preached word beginning us but the actual
Christ himself and his Theot, his word of command within the
heart for us to come alive, because it speaks here, it says, and
this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. What is the word that is preached
unto us through the gospel? Jesus Christ. He's the word that's
preached in the gospel. We don't preach the preaching
in the preaching. Whenever I get up here to preach
the Gospel, I'm not preaching the Gospel about the Gospel.
I'm preaching the Gospel about Jesus Christ and what He has
done. He is the subject of the Gospel, and so therefore He is
the Word by which the Gospel is preached. He is the person,
the subject of whom the Gospel is preached. And so therefore
He is the One who endures forever. So whenever we go back here in
Isaiah we see that the grass withered and the flower faded.
Our righteousness, our godliness that is perceived on the outward
is going to go away because it can't stand in front of God who
is holy and righteous. Our righteousness is as filthy
rags before God. There is none righteous, no not
one. But there is one who is righteous, the Lord God, and
He will stand forever. and the children of grace have
been placed in a standing before God with the Word of God, and
being in the Word of God, we have a righteousness that will
not fade away. I heard a great example, or a
great phrase from, I'm assuming it was Brother Napier that said
it, Brother Mike Fulton is the one who was quoting it, in his
message, and he brought it up that the brother had said that,
and he's usually referring to Brother Napier who preaches before
him. He made a mention that whenever
the child of grace receives that robe of righteousness, it's never
too big and it's never too small. It always fits just right. It fits them perfectly. It's
perfectly tailored. for Him. The righteousness that
has been given to us by Christ Jesus is enough for us. It's not too much for us and
it's not less than enough for us. It is just right for us. And so it is going to stand forever. It will be all the righteousness
that we ever need. So whenever we are given the
message that righteousness comes by Jesus Christ, who endures
forever. Therefore, our righteousness
will endure forever. It will not fade away. It will
not falter. It will not faint. It will not
die off. We have a message to proclaim. See, that's the message to proclaim.
That's why whenever we look back at comfort ye, comfort ye, if
I try to comfort you by what you do or how good you are or
your accomplishments or what you need to get out there and
get busy accomplishing, then there comes no comfort in that
because that will die off. That will die off. I remember
many years ago, back whenever I was an Armenian, I would always
follow the popular trends within evangelicalism,
especially among the Southern Baptists, whatever new program
that they were coming out with that year. I would jump on that
and, you know, want to be a part of it and want to share that
in my youth group that I was over or whatever class I was
teaching or in my Sunday night preaching or whatever. And so
I hopped on all the little bandwagons of all the little programs, the
Purpose Driven Church, the Purpose Driven Life, all those things.
I just jumped on that and, you know, all those things. And guess
what? A few months down the line, forgot
all about it. Not even Barton, you know. I
got on the thing one time whenever everyone was getting on the fasting
kit, you know, 40 days of fasting. So I tried to fast for 40 days,
you know, with everybody else that was on this bandwagon, you
know, and everything. Well, quickly found out it's
hard to fast for 40 days, you know. It's hard to fast for a
couple of days, let's say it's 40, but here we are, all of us
was in this group that was trying to fast for 40 days, And man,
we were hanging on there. We were hanging on, boy. Day
one, day two, day three, it was rough. Then it started getting
a little easier, day five, six, seven. Then day eight, nine,
oh man, it was getting rough. Guess what? I failed. Tried it
again, I failed. See, if righteousness comes by
the things that we do to try to appease God, it's going to
fall, it's going to fail, it's not going to last. Because we
are of the dust, we are of the earth, we are natural people,
we are sinful men and women and we cannot produce righteousness. And so therefore we need righteousness
that will not fail. And God will not fail, Christ
will not fail. He endures forever and so does His righteousness.
And if His righteousness has been given to you, therefore
you and your righteousness are hidden in His. and it will not
fail. Now that we can comfort each
other. So the message of the gospel
is not due, but the message of the gospel is done. The message
of the gospel is done. That's what we comfort each other.
Look back again at verse 2. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem. That's the people of God. That's
the church. And cry unto her that her warfare
is accomplished. Accomplished. Not being accomplished. accomplished and that her iniquity
is pardoned. It didn't say will be pardoned.
See, if there was something that you had to do, he would say will
be pardoned. It will be pardoned when you
do this or that or the other. But no, he said it is pardoned.
The iniquity is pardoned. Why? Because we have received
something. We have received something. Something
has been given to us. We have received of the Lord's
hand double for all our sins. That means Christ's death. Everything that Christ did on
our behalf is sufficient to cover all of our sins. and is sufficient
to be our righteousness before God. There is a satisfaction
that God has with what Christ did that is enough for all of
our sin. Ain't you glad about that, brother? Because listen, whenever I start
counting up my sins and my failures, my unrighteousness, whenever
I start doing it, poor, worthless, weak is who I am. Poor and worthless
and weak like we just sang. That's who we are before God.
We have nothing to offer Him. We're poor. We have no strength
to stand. We're weak. And we have nothing
of worth that God would want to buy us or to have us for a
position because we're worthless. We're sin. But yet God in His
love has loved us with an everlasting love. And Christ, because of
that love, gave Himself to die on a cross for your sins, for
my sins if we are His. And that's the message that we
comfort each other with. And that's the message that we
see going forth here in verse 9. Look at what it says. O Zion
that bringeth good tidings, give thee up into the high mountain.
O Jerusalem that bringeth good tidings, Lift up thy voice with
strength, lift it up. Be not afraid. Say unto the cities
of Judah, behold your God. What's the message of the church?
What's the message of the people of God? What Christ has done. What Christ has done. You remember
I mentioned, I think it was last week or the week before last
that we were together, that it's been said that we preach
the same thing over and over again. We just preach the same
messages over and it's always about how bad we are and how
Christ is the only way. You preach election, you preach
predestination, you preach depravity. That's all you ever preach. Those
three things. You don't ever preach anything
else. Well, right around here, the
Bible is telling me that if I'm here to comfort you as the children
of grace, there's only one thing that's going to comfort you.
And that is what Christ has done. Now if you're not finding comfort
in these things, maybe that's because you're not Christ's child.
Maybe that's you're the child of the devil who finds their
comfort in lies, because they are the children of the devil
who is the father of lies, and they themselves love not only
to lie, but the lies that are being told to them. The child of grace loves to hear
the fact that I have nothing to prove, nothing to give, nothing
that I can do. And because of that, I have nothing
that I can show for before God as righteousness. And when I
hear that there has been a Savior that has done everything that
God commands of me for righteousness, He did it on my behalf and I
don't even have to do anything. And that's good news. Let me
give you a little example of something. Any of y'all ever
get, have ever get, and I don't see them very often anymore,
but have any of y'all ever gotten a Publishers Clearinghouse sweepstakes
thing in your mail? Y'all know what, y'all younger
people know what I'm talking about? Used to be pretty prevalent,
I don't see them much anymore, but Publishers Clearinghouse
used to send out things in the mail, you could, you know, you
could be a winner of 10 million, dollars, you know, or whatever,
you know, a million dollars. I only got no purchase necessary,
which I think was a big lie, but no purchase necessary. You'll
just do all the blah, blah, blah. And you do all this stuff. You
have a chance, you have a chance to win $10 million. Well, Brandon,
whenever that thing comes in the mail and I sit that in front
of me and I'm reading that, is that good news? Now some people
will think that's good news. Hey, that's good news. I'll have
a chance to win $10 million. But if you're like me and my
family, you turn those things in, guess what? You find out
you weren't the winner of $10 million. The next time it comes
in the mail, you look at it and say, hey, I still have a chance.
You turn that in, you don't win $10 million. Then the next time
you get it, you say, hey, I have a chance. But this time, you
know what? I think I'm actually going to buy some of them books.
Maybe I'll get a better chance. So you buy some of them books,
and guess what? You don't win the $10 million. It comes again,
and again, and again, and again, and again, and again, and you
do all that, and you never win. Now is that little card that
comes to your house good news? If you'll do this, if you'll
turn this back in, you could be a winner of $10 million. That's
not good news. That just means I'm doing all
this work and not seeing anything at the end. But if somebody sent you something
in the mail that says, you are the winner of $10 million, and
the cash has already been deposited into your account, you don't
have to do anything for it, and it's there for you. And not only that, but that $10
million that's been placed within your account, when you take a
dollar out, a dollar automatically goes in. It never is depleted. You have forever ten million
dollars in your account, never to be exhausted. Now, if that
come in my mouth, guess what, brother? That would be good news. Now let's look at that in the
spiritual aspect of it. To tell me that I have salvation
but I have to do this, do that, do the other, which I never will
be able to accomplish, and God will never accept It's not good
news. What is good news? It's already
been done for you. Your account is always full.
And guess what? You can't ever deplete that account. The righteousness is never going
to get less than the righteousness of Christ. And you doing whatever
you want to try to do is never going to add to the righteousness
of Christ. You can't add more than the righteousness
of Christ and you can't take anything less because Christ's
righteousness will not be depleted. That, my brethren, is good news. And he says here, O Zion, that
bringeth good tidings. What does good tidings mean?
Good news. I bring good tidings. Good news. Well, the good news is not get
out and do. The good news is it's already
done. Get thee up into the high mountains, O Jerusalem that bringeth
good tidings. Lift up thy voice with strength,
lift it up, be not afraid. Say unto the cities of Judah,
behold your God. It didn't say behold the church.
Church is important. God instituted and ordained the
church, the gathered assembly for the place where his people,
the elect of God, would come and would worship together and
observe the ordinances together. That's where we come together.
That's important. But brethren, that is not salvation.
That is not going to give you righteousness. And coming to
it is not going to give you righteousness. It said, Behold your God. We are to behold God in the gospel. We're to behold Christ and Him
alone in the gospel. Not ourselves. Not our works. Not our programs. Not our ministries. Not our, quote unquote, successes
when more people come. It's crazy that people think
that the health of a church is oftentimes equated with how many
people are coming to your church. Boy, look at that church over
there. They're just growing. They've grown by a thousand people in
the last two months. Boy, the Lord must really be
doing a work over there. Yeah, the Lord might be doing
a work over there. He might be reprobating people's minds over
there. He might be deceiving the heart. blinding the minds of those people
over there, the Bible clearly also says that wide is the path
that leads to destruction and many there be that be on it.
The greater number are going to be those who are deceived,
not the ones who are not deceived. The Bible says that the children
of grace are irremanent before God. They're a small group of
people. Now that's a large number of
people, but compared to everyone else, it's small. Behold your God, not your church,
not your works, but your God. Verse 10, Behold, the Lord God
will come with strong hand and his arm shall rule for him. Who's
God's arm? Anybody know? Who's God's arm? Christ. Christ Jesus is the Lord's arm.
He is his strong arm, his right arm. We see that illusion, it's
a metaphor. You know, Jesus isn't actually
standing beside a throne with an invisible cloudy spirit here
and he's standing here at the right hand of the throne. That's
not, it's a metaphor. It's an analogy of power and
strength and the person, whenever, have y'all ever said, My boss,
every now and then, whenever he'll call, somebody will call,
and he's gonna send me out to work on something, and everything,
well, they call JD, he's the owner, he's the boss. He said,
well, I'm gonna send Mike out, and oftentimes, JD will say he's
my right-hand man. Well, what does that mean? I'm the one that goes out and
does the work for him. I'm the one that goes out and accomplishes
the task for him. I'm the one that he depends on.
I'm the one that he trusts in. I'm the one that he gives assurance to all of our parties
that it will be done because this guy is the one that can
take care of it. Well, that's what we're seeing
here whenever we talk about the right arm of God. Christ, who
is the fullness of the Godhead bodily, is the person in which
God has inhabited to be his strength. to be the accomplisher of all
things that God has decreed. That's why we see in the Revelation,
we see Christ as the one who sits on the throne, the one who
has taken the book, and He's the only one that can open up
that book that contains the whole decree from the end, from the
beginning, and declare that thing, and to providentially bring it
all about. He's the right-hand man of God.
He's His right arm, His strength. He's the one who does it. This
is what this is saying. Behold, the Lord God will come
with strong hand and his arm shall rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him
and his work before him. The Bible says that Christ said
his face like a flint to go to Calvary, his work was before
him, that which the Father had given him to do. He said, all
that the Father has given me to do, I will come and I will
do it. He said, and I've lost none.
I've done everything that God has told me to do, accomplished
it all. Matter of fact, he said it was finished. The work that
was set before him, he accomplished all of it. to the point where
whenever he was put to death and was buried in that ground,
three days later, God raised him from the dead, showing that
he was satisfied with the work that Christ had done, showing
that we who were in him are also under the satisfaction of God
that all of our sins and all of our iniquities and all of
our unrighteousness has been cleared from our debt. He will come with a strong hand
and His arm shall rule for Him. Look at verse 11. He shall feed
His flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
His arm and carry them in His bosom. Isn't that a wonderful
picture, brother? Christ will come and His sheep
who are under the burden of the law, who are under the burden
of of hirelings who are workmongers, taskmasters, out there telling
you to get yourself out there and get righteous, get yourself
out there and be obedient, get yourself out there and do the
law. All these men who are trying to tell you what all you have
to do for righteousness and everything, the sheep are being overburdened,
the sheep are being beat down, they are being mistreated, they
are hearing things that are not the voice of their master, not
the voice of their shepherd, but of somebody else and they
are frightened and they are scared. But our shepherd comes along
and he scoops us up into his arms, it says right there. He
says he shall carry them in his bosom. He shall put the lamb
in his arm. Often the shepherd, whenever
he would be out tending sheep, a lot of times those young sheep
would get a little curious and try to wander off. And the shepherd
would have to go over there and scoop the little lamb up and
carry him in his arm. Sometimes the little sheep couldn't
make it on its own, or it might be vulnerable to attacks by predators
and everything. So that shepherd will scoop that
lamb up and carry him in his arm to protect the lamb. This is the picture of the Lord.
He knows our need. He knows when we need to be fed.
I may just mention, matter of fact, just a lady this week,
whenever we was at the funeral the other day, She was talking about how the
Lord had mentioned something in one of the sermons that she
had listened to. She said, boy, that came at just the right time.
I was really going through something. And it just, man, what you said
just hit me. And man, that really, really
got me through the day and everything. And that's what I told her. I
said, the Lord knows how to feed the sheep. He knows when they're
hungry. He knows when they need nourish. And he knows just the
right food to give them. He said, the shepherd, I'm not
talking about myself, I'm not a shepherd. I'm talking about
Christ. Christ knew what that lady needed
to hear, needed to know when she needed to hear it. He shall
feed his flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arms and carry them in his bosom and shall gently lead those
that are with young. It says, who hath measured. Now,
we see kind of a transition here. God is going to begin to talk
about His greatness before all the world. He says, Who hath
measured the waters in the hollow of His hand, and meted out, or
measured out, heaven with a span, and comprehended the dust of
the earth in a measure, and weighed the mountains in scales, and
the hills in a balance? Basically, this is saying, Who
hath put all this stuff in its place? Who has caused it all
to be? Who has made the mountains decide?
You know, we have the Rocky Mountains that go from Arizona, New Mexico,
and it goes all the way up through into Canada. Well, who determined
how long that mountain chain would be? God did. It says right
here that he weighed out the mountains in scales and the hills
in a balance. He measured how much all that
was going to be. How about all the waters of the world? I'm not thinking, I don't necessarily
think God literally had them all in His hand and poured them
out like that. Again, it's a metaphor or analogy
to give us an understanding that it is God who has determined
all of creation and everything how it is. That tree that's in
my yard, those trees that's across the street, the grass that's
out here and all the rocks that's underneath here that you can't
dig down in. God determined all those things. Who hath directed the Spirit
of the Lord, or being his counselor hath taught him? He said, if
I'm the one that has made all things, who is it among men that's
going to give me counsel? Who's directing me as the Lord? I mean, I'm the one that made
everything. I'm the one that created everything.
I'm the one that has all power. Who is it that is teaching me
or being my counselor? With whom took he counsel? And
who instructed him and taught him in the path of judgment and
taught him knowledge and showed him the way of understanding?
These are rhetorical questions. Nobody, nobody has taught him
anything. Why? Because he is the cause
of all things. He is the first cause of everything.
He has made everything and everything that is made and everything that
has been done has been done because of his decree and because of
his workmanship. He has done it all. It says,
behold, the nations, now listen to this, behold, the nations
are as a drop of a bucket, and they are counted as the small
dust of the balance. Behold, he taketh up the isles
as a very little thing, and Lebanon is not sufficient to burn, nor
the beasts thereof sufficient for a burnt offering. Now, the
cedars of Lebanon were Known as big trees big strong trees
and in their viewpoint that that symbolized strength and everything
and saying here Hey, if we took all the seniors of Lebanon and
all this stuff It wouldn't even be able to make a sufficient
burnt offering verse 17 all nations before him are as nothing You
think God? You think think God thinks one
nation is better than another nation or one nation holds more
prominence than another nation. We have one nation that the whole
entire world is bowing down to right now. No, it's not the United
States. It's a nation that they say,
well, if you don't back this nation, God's going to kill you. All nations before him are as
nothing, and they are counted to him less than nothing in vanity. To whom then will ye liken God? Or what likeness will ye compare
Him unto? How are you going to compare
Him to anybody? There is none comparable. He
is of His own self. He is separate from sinners,
so He's not like us. He's not like the creation, because
He's the Creator. He created it. There is no other
gods. So you can't compare Him to other
gods, because there is no other gods. It says the workman melted
the graven image and the goldsmith spreaded it over with gold and
cast a silver change. Talking about a man making an
idol here, right? It says he that is so impoverished
that he hath no oblation chooses the tree that will not rot. He says there are some people
that are so poor they can't even make an idol out of gold, make
it real fine, so they'll cut and carve one out of wood. He says, He seeketh unto him
a cunning workman to prepare a graven image that shall not
be moved. Have ye not known? Have ye not
heard? Hath it not been told to you
from the beginning? Have ye not understood from the
foundations of the earth? It is he, God, that sitteth upon
the circle of the earth, and the inhabitants thereof are as
grasshoppers that stretcheth out the heavens as a curtain
and spreadeth them out as a tent to dwell in." He's saying, listen,
these items are nothing and it's God who is over all things. Notice,
if you would, just in passing there, it's God that sits upon
the circle of the earth, not the sphere of the earth. And
notice how he stretched out the heavens as a curtain and spreadeth
them out as a tent to dwell in. The heavens are spread out over
the circle of the earth. as a tent to dwell in. It says,
that bringeth the princes to nothing, he maketh the judges
of the earth as vanity. I mean, surely, I mean, we look
at the leaders of this world and there's something. I mean,
there's a lot of leaders, people bow down and kiss their feet,
kiss their ring, kiss their hand. But what does it say here? Our
God bringeth the princes to nothing. He maketh the judges of the earth
as vanity. Yea, they shall not be planted.
Yea, they shall not be sown. They're not going to bring forth
anything. They're not going to bring forth any kind of fruit
before God. Their stalks shall not take root
in the earth, and He shall also blow upon them, and they shall
wither. They're nothing. Look at the
Roman Empire, how great the Roman Empire was at one time. God just
blew on it and it was nothing. It went to nothing. How great
the Babylonian empire was. God just blew on it and it's
nothing. Look at the great American empire.
God just blew on it and it became a heathen nation. It says, to whom then will ye
liken me or shall I be equal, saith the Holy One? Who are you
going to make equal to me? Now, remember, brethren, what
is the context that we've been talking about here starting this
whole thing? Comfort ye, comfort ye my people. Tell them what
the Lord has done. We're to declare to them what
has been done by the Lord. We're to tell them, behold your
God. See, God is now saying, He's
gone from saying, I am to be the chief of who you talk about.
I'm the center of the gospel. I'm the center of all things.
I am the maker. I am the sustainer. And guess
what? I am the finisher, ender. I am the destroyer of all things. I bring to life, I bring to death.
We sang that in that song earlier. Sovereign ruler of the skies.
Times that God gives grace, time that God doesn't. Time that God
gives help, time that God doesn't. Time that God gives wealth, time
that God doesn't. Time that God gives life, time that God gives
death. Time that God gives good, time
that God gives evil. All these things are in his hands.
And so he's going here saying, listen, I am the great almighty. I am the great God and the only
God and nobody is going to stand beside me. So whenever you comfort
your people, whenever you declare from the rooftops, whenever you
behold the Lord God before the congregation, it is not in these
idols, it is not in yourself, it is not in the things made
by man's hands or done with man's hands. He says, lift up your
eyes on high and behold who have created these things that bring
about their host by number, he calleth them all by names, by
the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power, not
one faileth. Why sayest thou, O Jacob, and
speaketh, O Israel, my way is hid from the Lord, and my judgment
is passed over from my God? Hast thou not known, hast thou
not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of
the ends of the earth, Fainteth not, neither is weary, there
is no searching of his understanding. He gives power to the faint,
and to them that have no might, he increases strength. It's amazing
to me some people think they've gone through. I just couldn't
imagine. I couldn't imagine some of the
things that people have had to go through in their lives. But
yet God has given them strength to go through that. Even the
youth shall faint, and be weary, and the young men shall utterly
fall. But here it is, verse 31. But they that wait upon the Lord
shall renew their strength, and they shall mount up with wings
as eagles. They shall run and not be weary,
and they shall walk and not faint. Now, how does that tie back into
the context of what we've been talking about? Brethren, listen.
No matter what, we're the child of grace. No matter what the
trials of this life, no matter what the sinfulness and the unrighteousness
that we feel within our own selves, no matter what of the turmoil
that we encounter, what God brings us through, whether it be the
valleys or the mountains and the valleys, whatever it is that
God brings us through, He is the Creator. He is the Sustainer. He is the One that rules over
all. He has given promise in His Son. And that promise has been given
to His children. And His, as we read there, His
strong man, His right arm, His strength has come and His promise
is with Him. And it will not fail. so we can comfort each other.
Even whenever things don't look good, whenever it's grim, whenever
our lives are in shambles, whenever it's in turmoil, whenever our
afflictions are weighing us down so much, we know that all things
work together for good to them who love the Lord, who are the
called according to His promise. That though our light and momentary
afflictions might be hard and weighty upon us, they do not
measure in comparison to the wonderful grace and mercy and
reward that we will see in the life to come. And that God will
sustain us. He will keep us. He will be there
for us. But most importantly, we know
that whenever this life is over, our iniquity, our sin will not
be held before us. We will have life eternal in
Christ. We will have a forever in His
presence. We will not be under the wrath
of God. We will not experience eternal
separation. So comfort each other with that,
brethren. I pray that's been a comfort
to you. And I pray that you will shout that from the rooftops.
O Jerusalem, that bringeth good tidings, lift up thy voice with
strength. Lift it up and be not afraid.
Say unto the cities of Jehovah, Jehovah, behold your God. We
are to not worry about what people say out there. Listen, they're
going to tell you, well, you just think that Christ did it
all and you don't have to do something? Surely you've got
to do something. Or they'll say, Oh, you just
believe you can live however you want and you're still going
to go to heaven. Well, for one, you're assuming
that going to heaven is enabled by your doing something. Second
of all, you think that that's what our heart is? No, that's
not what our heart is. That's not what we're preaching.
Matter of fact, I haven't ever heard anybody actually preach
that. It's been accused. I've been accused of preaching
that by people who call me an antinomian Oh, you just believe
you can live any way you want to live. I never said that. I'm going to live exactly however
God has decreed for me to live. I'm going to live exactly the
way that God gives me faith. Does he give me faith? Gives
me faith? Does he give me faith? I know
people are going to disagree and say, well, you mean God doesn't
keep you from having faith? Well, of course he does. By faith
in chapter 11 of Hebrews, Abraham, Moses, all these men that are
in there did all these great and wonderful things. But if
you read alongside there, they also did not have faith. See, they only had faith when
God gave them faith. He's the one who gives us the measure
of faith. But whenever He does it, we don't
have it. And guess what peeks through? The natural man. in
his own wisdom, his own carnal understanding, and his own unrighteous
works, tries to do something. But God, whenever He gives faith,
that's from Him. And so, anyway, we give all glory
to God for those things. Anybody got any questions or
comments, questions or reviews or anything that you want to
add? So, when you said it's kind of
like it fits, when you were first talking about it, it's kind of
like kind of bring me up to like cinderella and how the shoe fits
like i don't understand what you mean by fits what you were
talking about something earlier about how something just fits
the way it fits just i don't recall what i was talking about
whenever i said that I want to remind y'all to remember
Daniel. He broke his ankle and everything.
He's going to be laid up for a while. Keep him in your prayers
and everything. I know probably most people here
don't know the Buckner family, but remember the Buckner family.
Peggy Buckner, her husband passed away in the Cuyahoga Church. Anybody out there that might
know him, keep him in your prayers as well. And Lin, yes, Lin Terry. Lin Terry is now in, for those
who might know Lin, he is now been taken over to a assisted
living center in Mountain Home, Arkansas. And that's where he's
residing for the time being. And he does have lost his leg
and waiting for a prosthetic at some point will be given to
him. So remember him in your prayers, and the Phillips also.
We've been handling a lot of the leg work for Brother Lynn
and everything, and keep them in your prayer. It's not a, I'll
just say it's not an easy thing that they've been working on
and everything. I don't know, Larry doesn't want
to pat himself on the back, but him and his family have been
dealing with some pretty rough environment over there, so keep
them in your prayers along with Brother Len, Terry as well. Anybody else that I forgot? My Uncle Mike. Be in prayer for
my Uncle Mike. Mike did well. He's in Hillcrest
Hospital. He was taken in. He's been suffering
with cellulitis in his legs, and they just got swollen up
to about that big around and they finally got a lot of the
fluid off of him and hopefully gonna continue on with some antibiotics
to kind of get a lot of the infection out of him and stuff like that.
So be in prayer for him. My Aunt Judy, she also had a
fall and is dealing with that and everything and her leg is
messed up. So be in prayer for them as well. All right, let's bow and have
a word of prayer. Father, once again, we come before you humbled
at the greatness of who you are and the mercy and grace that
we find through the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you for this
day that we had together again. Lord, we do lift up Brother Daniel
to you this morning that you might be with him in the healing
of his ankle. Be with all those that are working with him, his
staff that comes and that takes care of him. Lord, that you might
give him discernment and mercy and grace. Lord, we pray for
Brother Lynn, we asked, Lord, that you would be with him during
his time of healing and the time of physical therapy of him learning
to walk with a prosthetic and the things that's going on. And
for the Phillips, they've been taking care of his estate and
the things that's going on with his house and just all of what's
happening with Brother Lynn. Lord, that you would give them
strength and that you would help them, give them wisdom and discernment,
Lord. for all things that's involved.
For my aunt and for my uncle, Lord, we lift them up as well
for their health, for their well-being and taking care of them. We also,
Lord, want to pray that you might be with us as we leave this place,
that you might keep us safe, that you might be with us as
we go throughout this week, that you might minister to us through
your word, Lord, that you might bring us back safely the next
time we meet. be your will. And again, Father,
we are so grateful for salvation, for Christ, for all that we are,
that we have been given in Him. And we thank you for the comfort
of the gospel. And Lord, I pray that it has
been a comfort to those that are here, to those that are listening
or watching. Lord, I pray that the gospel
and the finished work of Jesus Christ is a true sound. and not clanging cymbals and
banging gongs, but Lord, we just pray that it might be to them
a certain sound. Thank you again for this day,
and we ask you to bless it for it's in Christ's name that we
pray, amen.