The Bible says that those who
worship Him, worship Him in spirit and in truth. We think that we have to have
worship teams. the purpose of a worship team
or a worship leader is to lead us into worship. But the Bible
makes the distinction that it's the Holy Spirit who is the leader
of worship. He's the one who leads us in worship. We don't
worship out of rote. We don't worship out of necessity. We worship because it's been
put into our hearts to lift up exaltation and glory honor and
love and praise to God. And that comes from the heart,
from the spirit moving within the people whenever they gather
together. Whenever we gather together, it isn't to keep some
scheduled meeting. That's not why we've come here,
just so we can say, well, we've kept our scheduled meeting. That's
not the reason. I hope that's not the reason
that you're here. It's not the reason that I'm
here. I don't get up here and preach
because it's my duty to get up here every week to have something
prepared to say to you guys. That's not the purpose of that. We gather together because we
love the Lord Jesus Christ. We find great comfort and great spiritual blessing
from hearing the preaching of the Word of God. It is food to
our soul, and I am thankful that the Lord has given us a church
that gathers together, and a people that gathers together that desires
to hear that. But if we're just coming here
out of rote, out of a schedule, out of necessity, so that we
might look good in our community, or look good amongst other Christians
even, You know, we went to our meeting and everything. Then
we've completely missed the whole entire reason that we're here
today. And then as far as worship is concerned, you know, men can't
lead you into worship. I mean, I can't lead you into
worship. A band, if we got up here with
the best musicians in the world, with the best songs in the world,
no matter how doctrinally correct they are or not doctrinally correct
they are, emotionally driven they are, They can't lead you
into worship. They can lead you into an emotional
state, but they can't lead you into worship. All these things
you see on TV and radio and you see these people that are up
there and they're playing and everybody's just getting into
that stuff. I'm not saying that sometimes that people's hearts
may not be truly moved in worshiping the Lord because of what they're
hearing and what they're singing and things like that. But music,
people up leading you and telling you all these things and saying
all these things and singing to you, does not lead you into
worship. The Spirit of God is the only
thing that leads us into worship. And He's going to lead us into
truth. He's not going to lead us into
falsity. He's going to lead us into truth.
If there's anything that comes from this pulpit here, or podium,
or stand, or whatever you want to call it, that's false. That's definitely me. That's
all me. If it's coming from any of you,
that's false. It's definitely you. But if there's
any truth that comes from any of this, It's surely of the Lord,
because He's truth. It's surely of the Lord because
the Holy Spirit is here to guide us into all truth. It's to teach
us truth. And if He's to lead us into worship,
it's going to be by the Spirit, not by the flesh. It's going
to be by the Spirit, and it's going to be according to and
in accordance with the truth. And so, you know, whenever we
meet together, it's not some liturgical thing, like I was
saying a minute ago, that we put down a, we have to do this,
this, this, or this, and follow up this little outline, or anything
like that. No, we gather together, and as the Spirit moves upon
the brethren, as the Spirit moves upon the pastors, as the Spirit
moves upon, you know, the congregation, however, that's where we want
to, we want to do what the Spirit leads us to do. brother is given
to speak, or any of the other brothers are given to speak,
they need to speak. Let them speak. If it's to pray,
let them pray. If it's to sing, let them sing. These are the things that the
Spirit does as it leads us into that worship and that freedom
that we have to come and not be so bound to some sort of organizational
outline. All we do is bind. the freedom that we have in our
worship. And I'm not here saying that
everything should just be willy-nilly, you know, or anything like that.
The Bible is clear that everything should be done decent. We need
to follow the New Testament pattern on what is scriptural worship,
what is scriptural preaching, what is scriptural
ordinances, things like that. The Lord does give us guidance
on that. And in those things, yes, we
want to adhere to those and we want to be faithful to those
as the Lord helps us to be faithful in those things. But we surely
don't have to be tethered to some ritual or some organizational
scheme and follow that, as many have seen before, you know, and
especially those who watch, faithfully watch on YouTube or Facebook
or whatever. There are some times the Spirit
leads us to discuss things here that we might not want to go
on on the thing. Sometimes I've not even preached.
We've just discussed things. And so we do that. The Spirit
leads us in that. And that's just as important and just as
much a part of worship as me standing here coming from this
podium delivering some sort of a message and everything. So
I just hope everybody understands that and realizes that That's
at least my understanding of it, and that's where my heart
is in it. I want to hear as much from you, because you have just
as much of an experience with the Lord as I do. And the Lord has not only gifted
me, but he's gifted other men. Brother Larry definitely has
been given to speak on the Lord and on the gospel and everything.
Anybody that the Lord has called or given something to say on
those things, I definitely don't have a problem with that as we
gather together. I was thinking this morning on
the fifth chapter of Matthew, especially these first 12 verses. We know these as the Beatitudes. I'm going to show some of my
ignorance here. They're called the Beatitudes,
and to be honest, you may have to enlighten me on this, brother,
because I don't think I've ever even looked it up. I don't even
know what Beatitudes is. I don't know what the word Beatitude
means, why they're called the Beatitudes. Now, I know that
there's preachers in the past that I have listen to that says
because they look at these verses here as things that we have to
do so that we get blessed therefore they are called the BBE attitudes
these are the attitudes you should be doing you know that may have
been Warren Wiersbe or somebody like that I can't remember so
one of those old commentators of old had all the B series you
know be this be that be this be that whatever I may even have
that wrong too. So forgive me. But I don't know
what Beatitudes means. Maybe I need to go look that
up because everybody calls this the Beatitudes. It's even headlined
up here in my Bible at the top of the page. It says the Beatitudes. So forgive me for not knowing
that. My academics is lacking. But
we are going to look at this sermon that the Lord Jesus gave
But let me read the first 12 verses here, and then let's see
what the Spirit has to say to us this morning about these things.
It says, And seeing the multitudes, he went up into a mountain, and
when he was set, his disciples came unto him, and he opened
his mouth and taught them, saying, Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are they that
mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they
shall inherit the earth. Blessed are they which do hunger
and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled. Blessed
are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy. Blessed are the
pure in heart, for they shall see God. Blessed are the peacemakers,
for they shall be called the children of God. Blessed are
they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs
is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are ye when men shall
revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil
against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice and be exceeding glad,
for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets
which were before you." I'm just going to end right there. I want
to just deal with those things that the Lord had spoken on and
get to whatever we get to. The first thing that I would
like to point your eyes to is the first two verses here. Because
we know that before this took place, Jesus had been talking
to a multitude of people. And it says here, And seeing
the multitudes, He went up into a mountain, and when He was set,
His disciples came unto Him. So Jesus removed Himself from
the multitudes And he went up into the mountain and his disciples
followed after him. And it says, and he opened his
mouth and taught them. Same. If you notice here, this Beatitudes,
this great sermon that everybody talks about that Jesus does in
all this teaching, that even pagans refer to. You know, this great sermon of
Jesus. Many people think that Jesus
delivered this sermon to the masses and was telling all the
masses this is how you ought to be and if you do all these
things, if you are poor in spirit, then you're going to inherit
the kingdom of heaven. If you are mournful, then you will be
comforted. If you are meat, you will inherit
the earth. If you hunger and thirst after
righteousness, then you will be filled. And it's looked upon
as an activity or a conditional thing that you must do. And if
you are like this, then this is what you're going to receive.
And I've heard that preached a lot my whole entire life. From
many, many a preacher preached that way. But Jesus was not preaching
to the multitude. He was preaching to His disciples. He went away into a mountain,
withdrew Himself from the multitudes, and the only ones that He had
around Him at this point is His disciples. Those who have been
given to know and to understand spiritual things. Those who had
come by God's grace, had been given faith, born of God, given
faith, given a trust in Christ Jesus, given a spiritual understanding,
they had followed after Christ. That's what disciple means. It's
a follower of Jesus Christ or a learner of Jesus Christ. Someone
who is learning from Jesus Christ. These men were coming as disciples
once taught of God. Those were the ones that Jesus
was addressing in this sermon. He's not addressing the multitude.
So first and foremost we see, and if this is not true, I can't
find anywhere else in scripture where the Word of God and the
things of God and the spiritual teaching of this Bible is directed
to anybody except those who are the disciples of Jesus Christ.
To those who are the people of God. This is who these messages,
this is who Everything that is in here, this revelation of Jesus
Christ, and this is what this is, this is a revelation of Jesus
Christ. It's not a rule book by which
you have to live by so that you might be accepted by God. This
is a revelation of the One who did live righteously and has
made you accepted in the Beloved, made you accepted before God.
It's a revelation of Him. And therefore, all preaching,
all teaching, All information, as it's to be known, about that
one man, Jesus Christ, is revealed in this Scripture, and this Scripture
is only revealed to those who are His. Therefore, the message
of this Bible is not made for the masses, not made for the
multitudes, but it is made for the people of God. Now some are
surely going to say, So you don't believe in preaching to everybody.
The Bible says that we are to preach to all. We're to go out
and we're to preach this and the word they always use, the
theological phrase they always use is we are to preach the gospel
indiscriminately. We're to go out and we're not
to pick and choose who we preach the gospel to. Well, brethren,
I'm not necessarily saying that that's a wrong saying. We should
preach wherever God leads us to preach. We don't know who
the elect of God are. We don't know that. But see,
a lot of people have that mentality because they believe the preaching
of the gospel is what gets people saved. They believe that the
preaching of the gospel is what gets people saved. We don't know
who are out there that needs to be saved, so we need to preach
to all people, everywhere, because we don't know who are the elect
and who are the not the elect. That's how the Calvinists look
at it at least. The free willers, they think that we ought to be
preaching of the gospel. That's how everybody's going
to get saved is through the preaching of the gospel. The Calvinists
believe that we've got to get out there and preach the gospel
because that's how men are born again. But they are regenerated
by the preaching of the gospel. Therefore, we have to preach
the gospel to get them saved. No difference between the Arminian
and the Calvinists, right? We've talked about that many
times. However, the preaching of the gospel indiscriminately,
as we say, or some say, The preaching of the gospel indiscriminately
is like right now. I don't know who are God's elect
among those who are gathered here. The Bible tells us that
we have wheat among tares. Tares among wheat. We have sheep
and goats all together. There is a mixed multitude. When
they came out of Egypt, there was a mixed multitude. We live among a mixed multitude. We live among those who are professors,
but not possessors of the blessings of God. We live among those who
say they are Christian, but yet not are. We live among those,
if you allow me the timely phrase, who say they are Jews, but they
are not. We are the true Jews. We are
the true circumcision. We are the true wheat. We are
the true sheep. We are the true people of God.
And the people of God worship God in spirit and in truth, right? And Jesus, whenever He came aside
from the multitude and came to His people, He was telling them
something about who they were. And that's what this sermon is
all about. This is what all these blessed
are about. Now somehow we try to make this
more dignified and instead of saying blessed, we say blessed. Now, I may be wrong about this,
but to me, I don't know, when I read that in English, it says
blessed. But for some reason, I don't
know if it's just to put an emphasis on the fact that if you have the
dignity to be this type of person, the reward is yours, in the latter
part of the verse, and therefore it makes it sound more regal.
It makes it sound more lavish. It makes it sound more important. Blessed are those. Now, I might
be wrong about that, completely wrong about that. But whenever
I look at this, I see blessed are the poor, meaning that the
people that is in in view here are people that something has
happened to. They are passive in this. Blessed
are they makes me think, and again, this may be just my ignorance
of language, ignorance of grammar or whatever. When someone uses
blessed, it is saying that this person is such
because they are such. But brethren, blessed are the
poor Those who are poor are blessed to be poor. There's a difference. I can actively be poor and that
doesn't mean God is going to bless me because I actively became
poor. Now, granted, the word poor here
is not talking about monetary wealth. How much money you got
in your wallet. Okay? It's not talking about
that. I'll try to move to that here
in a minute. These blessed verses here are
not a be this and you will get this. It's not a conditional
thing. This is a statement of fact that Jesus is making to
these brethren. Those who are the disciples,
those who are the children of God, those who are the ones born
from above, They have been blessed with these kind of attitudes. Blessed with these kind of demeanors. Blessed with this kind of mindset. It's a blessing from God. In
Ephesians chapter 1, the Bible says, in Ephesians
1-2, it says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ. Brethren, I believe that these
are some of the spiritual blessings that God has blessed us with. He has blessed us with being
poor in spirit. He has blessed us with being
mournful. He has blessed us with being
meek with being hungry and thirsty for righteousness. He has blessed
us with being merciful, blessed us with being pure at heart,
blessed us with being peacemakers, blessed us by being persecuted
for Christ's sake. Some people say, well, I don't
think that's a blessing. Well, brother, neither is being poor
to some people. Neither is being a mourner. Nobody
likes to be a mourner. Although there are those people
out there that you hate talking to, because every time you talk
to them, it's gloom, despair, and agony on me. You know, the
old hee-haw tune. You know? You surely don't want
to ask Sister So-and-so, well, how was your day today? And you're
going to hear it. She's going to let you know. See what happens, we look at
all these things that we are blessed with to the natural eye,
those are not lovely things to be blessed with. But to the child
of grace, those are things that are wonderful. Psalms 51, yeah, verse 17. The Bible says the sacrifices
of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, thou
wilt not despise. See, he says above that, he says,
for thou desires not sacrifice, else would I give it. Thou delightest
not in burnt offerings. But it says the sacrifices of
God, those sacrifices that God is well pleased with, those sacrifices
that are a sweet savor in God's nostrils, is a broken spirit,
a broken and contrite heart. And is that not the very gist
of who all these are that are in you here in Matthew 5? Those who are poor in spirit,
those who are mournful, those who are meek, Those who hunger
and thirst after righteousness. If you hunger and thirst after
righteousness, that means you realize that there's none in
you, right? You hunger and thirst for righteousness
that you know you don't have. And why don't you know you have
that? Because you're a meek person. You are not a proud person, you're
a meek person. And you're a meek person because
you are mourning over the fact that you are poor in spirit. You see how all these are interconnected? I hunger and thirst for righteousness
because God has given me the eyes to see, the understanding
to know that I am poor in spirit. There is nothing in me that is
worthy of anything. I don't have anything for me
to give to God. I don't have anything to present
to God that could merit a relationship with Him, to merit any kind of
favor from Him. I'm poor in spirit. My spirit
is empty and void of any righteousness or holiness. It's empty and void
of anything of any worth. People say, well God, we must
have been very worthy, worth a lot because God loved us and
died for us, and so obviously our worth is a lot in God's eyes. Listen, the Bible says that God
looked down upon the inhabitants of the earth and saw that the
intent of their heart was evil continually. The Bible says that
he accounted us as nothing, as grasshoppers. Nothing. That's who we are in nature,
in Adam. Praise God, the child of grace has been loved with
an everlasting love before the foundation of the world. So we
have been made to differ than everybody else in the fact that
our relationship to God doesn't depend on our relationship to
him and how we are. No, our relationship was set
apart from the foundation of the world. We were set apart
as his loved ones. We were set apart as his beloved. We were set apart as his blessed. We were set apart in Christ Jesus.
See, our relationship with God doesn't have anything to do with
our activity on earth. And it surely doesn't have anything
to do with us letting God have control of our life. It doesn't
have anything to do with us yielding ourselves. That isn't how our
relationship is formed. And it isn't how our relationship
is maintained. Our relationship with God is
based completely and totally, fully upon the fact that we were
set apart from the foundation of the world and given to Christ
in union with Him in Christ Jesus, blessed with all spiritual blessings. That's what Ephesians is telling
us. Blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
according as He had chosen us in Him. This blessing, this being
blessed, these spiritual blessings all come because we have been
united with Christ and that was before the foundation of the
world. It has nothing to do with anything that we do in this lifetime.
Nothing to do. You being in the beloved has
nothing to do with your activity on this earth by making yourself
poor or mourning or being meek or being hungry and thirsty for
spiritual or religious things. It has nothing to do with that.
You are not blessed because you did those things. No, Jesus is
saying, listen, if this is your spirit, you have been made a
sacrifice unto me. You have been made a sacrifice
unto me. You've been made that way. He
says there in that psalm, he says, he doesn't desire other
sacrifices, but a broken and contrite spirit. A broken spirit, a broken and
contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise. All of our other
efforts, all of our other so-called achievements, the Lord despises. A broken and contrite heart.
What is a broken and contrite heart? And I think this is why
the Lord put this at the very beginning of this teaching is
so that we might get and understand this, that, listen, without God
giving us a broken and contrite heart and a contrite spirit,
we cannot worship Him. We cannot be a sweet-smelling
savor unto Him. We cannot be pleasing unto Him. He is only pleased in His Son. Therefore, when we come into
worship, when we come into our how we view ourselves before
God, and who we are before God, and what He has made us to be,
is that we are nothing, that we
have nothing, and could ever be anything, but that it is all in His Son.
Blessed are the poor in spirit. Those who are poor in spirit
are the ones who know that they are spiritually bankrupt. Those
who have nothing. Look at the fourth one, it says,
fourth verse, blessed are they that mourn. Whenever I am poor
in spirit and I have been brought to understand that I have nothing
that I can give to God, that I have nothing that I can do
for God, that I have nothing that I can do on God's behalf, then what happens? I begin to
mourn within myself. Paul, seeing his poor spirit,
said, O wretched man that I am. That sinner that was praying
next to the publican said, Have mercy upon me. I'm nothing. I don't have anything. And his
heart mourned because he had nothing to give to God. He had
nothing that he could present to God. He had nothing that he
could do for God. And his heart mourned for that,
over that. And then look at verse 5, blessed
are the meek. What is the meek? Well, the meek is the one who
is not the proud boastful person. The publican was the proud guy
out there saying, I am thankful that you're not, that you haven't
made me like this guy here. Look at him over here, groveling
in the dirt. You know, I'm glad you haven't
made me like this publican. See, that's not meek. Meek, those
who are meek, doesn't necessarily mean weak, by the way, but meek
means that they realize their position. They realize that they
know and they are quiet. They know their place. A servant
that is meek is one who knows who their master is and that
their place is at His feet. We are the footstools of God. We are the ones who are at His
feet serving the Master and we do so in meekness. We do so knowing
that we have nothing to give to God and so any service that
we might do as His servants is as He does and bids. At the end
of the day, we are unprofitable servants in and of ourselves.
It is God who works in us to will and to do of His good pleasure. And we are meek. We know our
place. We aren't striving to raise our
status. We're not trying to raise our
position. We realize that we are poor.
And our hearts mourn over that. And we are content in the place
that we are. Look at verse 6. Blessed are
they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness. While we
know that we are poor in spirit, while our hearts mourn for the
fact that we are like we are, and we are content to know that
we can never change our position or know our place or improve
our status in God's sight, we are given a hunger and a thirst
for righteousness. We desire a righteousness. Not a righteousness of our own,
though. Those who are blessed to hunger and thirst for righteousness
are not hungering and thirsty after providing their own righteousness. They are hungry and thirsty for
an outside righteousness because they know that they are poor
in spirit. They know that they have nothing
to offer God and could ever offer God. Therefore, they hunger and
thirst for righteousness that is not their own. Because only
a righteousness that is perfect will ever be accepted by God.
Therefore, they hunger and thirst for that righteousness, and the
only righteousness that is there is the righteousness of Christ.
Therefore, they hunger and thirst for Christ's righteousness. Now,
do we also hunger and thirst for that to be evident in our
lives? Yeah, I hate my sin. I hate when I sin. I hate that
my flesh did not do anything for God. I hate that. But brethren,
that is not my motive to be accepted with God. Let me change that.
Let me get up and rise up from my status of being weak-willed
and put forth my effort in doing religious things to be pleasing
to God. No. I desire for God to make
within my heart, create in me a clean heart, oh God. Make me
not want to do those things. Make me not want to follow after
the lust of my flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride
of life. Make me like that. Make me where I restrain my sin. Keep me from these things. Yes,
I desire those things. I know that within myself that
even the things that I do in the flesh that are good are not
pleasing to God. He's not pleased with those sacrifices. But He is pleased with a broken
and contrite heart that says, I can do nothing. I could never be anything. And so therefore I look for a
righteousness That is not my own. Is that not what Abraham
did? Abraham looked and he seen the righteousness of Christ from
afar off. And Abraham said, that's my righteousness. Right there is my righteousness.
He accounted it, Christ's righteousness. He accounted it for his righteousness. That's my righteousness right
there. And he hungered and thirsted. He longed to see Christ's day. He longed to see that righteousness. And he did see. He is experiencing
that righteousness even now. And so will we, brethren. It
says in verse 8, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall
see God. Brethren, the pure in heart are
those who the Lord has taken out the heart of stone and put
in a heart of flesh. We have that new man that is
in us. That new creation, born from
above, that is created in righteousness and holiness. See, that thing
is perfect. He cannot sin. That's that spirit
man, that inner man that is in us. That is pure. See, our hearts
are not pure. is pure at heart. Blessed are
the peacemakers. What does that mean? If you can
get two people to quit fighting and that's who you are? No. Blessed
are the peacemakers. We are blessed by God if we are
able... What does the Bible say? The
Bible says that we are to live at peace with all men if possible,
right? as much that we can in us is
to live at peace with all men. We are to seek after peace. We
are not to be disputable all the time. We are
not to be argumentative all the time. We are to try to live at
peace with all men. That doesn't mean compromise
the gospel. It doesn't mean compromise the
faith. Right? It doesn't mean that. But it
means that in all things that we do, we try to seek after peace.
Listen, if I have a person that disagrees with me, I try to live
at peace with them as much as possible without compromising
the gospel. I don't just jump all over them
and just say, I hate everything that you are teaching, therefore
I hate you, therefore I will not have anything to do with
you. I had a guy just recently who disagrees with some of the
viewpoints that I have on some doctrine. Number one, God being
the author of sin. He disagrees with what I think
about that. And this is his exact words. He says, you know, I've discussed
this with you in the past. I didn't even know who he was.
He's going under a different name on Facebook now than he
used to. So I didn't know who he was. I was engaging in a conversation.
with him, and he told me, he said, I don't want to have anything
to do, and I will never have anything to do with you, because
you hold to this, and you knew me by, we've had conversations,
but you knew me under a different name. He never did tell me who
that name was, so he's keeping himself hidden from who he was,
but you know, he told me, I give you all this stuff to read, and
you didn't read it, obviously, because you still were holding
to the blah, blah, blah, all this stuff, and so, It was just
vitriol. There was no reasoning and sitting
down and discussing it. There was no, you know, none
of that stuff. It was just, I've written you
off and you're done. You know, I will have nothing
to do with you. And of course he's going all
over Facebook, warning everybody that shares anything of mine.
He'll go underneath and say, I hope you know, Michael Smith
believes blah, blah, blah, you know, and everything is preaching
heresy and all this kind of stuff. Listen, We're trying to live
at peace with all... Listen, there's a lot of these
guys out here that I disagree with a lot of their stuff. But
I try to live at peace with them. I go to Bible conferences and
there's guys there that preach things that I don't see it the
same way. But I try to live at peace with
them. Am I going to compromise what I believe? Absolutely not.
I mean, there's been times that I've had a conference, there's
a guy been preaching something that I disagree with and I've
got brought up and something that I've preached totally contradicts
what he preached. I don't have a problem with it
and I don't have a problem with the guy doing that with me. Getting
up and preaching something and saying, I don't see it that way,
and preaching something different. I want to be at peace with the
brother and I'll just sit there and discuss it and we can discuss
it all day long and go to the scriptures and at the end of
the day we may still not agree. But I want to live at peace with
that brother because if he is a child of grace, if he is for
us, he's not against us. If he does believe the gospel,
the Lord has us at different understandings. Am I going to
force that on him? I can't because I can't teach
him. I can't teach nobody the truth. Only the Spirit teaches
the truth. So all of us are at different
levels of teaching. That's the problem. I'm getting
off on a high horse here I think. That's the problem with most
of what is called Christianity today, especially among the sovereign
grace people. is that they believe that just
because you're born again, you should be able to understand
everything in this book, and everybody should have the exact
same level of understanding. If I pointed out to you, you've
been warned, now you need to believe it. Listen, brethren,
there's been men that have said things to me for years and years
and years, and I thought, that is not what that is saying. And
then all of a sudden, one day, I'm reading this thing, and all
of a sudden, the Holy Spirit just says, They were right all
along. And I was like, I was wrong. And vice versa. Guys that I've
been sharing things with over and over and over again, I was
able to see it, not because I was studious, not because I'm any
smarter, not because I went to a seminary or anything like that.
The Lord was pleased to allow me to see that. And then all
of a sudden, now they see it. Now do I think, ha ha ha, I told
y'all, I was right all along. No. I rejoice in the fact that,
hey, whenever I open up a book or something like that, some
of the old school Baptist or whatever, and I start reading
through, and things that I've seen in the scriptures, but yet
I can't find that in all these creeds and confessions and Calvinist
books and all that stuff out there, and all of a sudden I'm
reading through, and a guy says something, I'm like, that's what
I've thought about that all along, but I've not ever heard anybody
saying that. It rejoices my soul to hear that. And so, whenever the Holy Spirit
teaches somebody something, and then He brings one person up
to the level of understanding as He did somebody else, we don't
boast about it because we had to be brought up to that level
ourselves. We didn't know that until the Spirit taught us. And
so, we live as peacemakers. We don't have all knowledge.
God hasn't downloaded the whole file, okay? He hasn't downloaded
everything into us. He does that in little bits.
And listen, as much as people hate to hear this, God has also
ordained, predestinated that heresies come. There is heresies
to come in the Lord's churches so that those who are the people
of God might be approved. Those things are going to come
up. And if it's true, they'll stand. If it's not, it won't. So, someone continues to hold
and becomes divisive over things like that. See, that's the thing.
The word heresy, and I don't mean to get too far down this
rabbit trail, the word heresy means a divider. One who is a
heretic is one who is a divisive person, a divider. And the Bible
tells us that the Lord hates those who make division among
the brethren, right? That's one of the things that
He hates. A heretic is a person not necessarily that is just
preaching false doctrine, or false doctrine is a heretical
doctrine. It divides in the fact that truth
and error is not going to coexist as the same thing. In the church
of Jesus Christ, who is the pillar and the ground of truth, when
error comes in, it's going to cause a division because the
people of God are going to recognize it as error. Therefore, those
who are heretics, who continue to press that, press that, press
that, after two or three admonitions, you need to have nothing to do
with them. Right? There is discipline that needs
to take place in the congregation whenever that takes place. So,
there is importance in this. But brethren, listen, just because
there has to be, we've had to do that here. When we discipline
something over divisive things, or whenever somebody is, We do
not fellowship with any more. That doesn't mean that we hate
them or we dislike them or we're never going to have anything
to do with them ever again. Because the whole reasoning for
that is for restitution. The whole issue of that is so
that we might come back together into fellowship. And so for a
brother to say, well, I wrote you off. I'm not ever going to
have anything to do with you ever again because that's what
you believe. That's what you teach. If they still believe the gospel,
I can go a long way. It's still on some level. Can
we congregate together? Maybe not. Maybe not. But I still can love that brother.
I can still care for that brother. I can still pray for him that
the Lord will show him his error and vice versa. He can do that
for me if he thinks I'm an error. and live at peace. And if he
seeks to have restitution, let's try it. Let's do that. That's
the whole point of it. Be peacemakers. That doesn't
come naturally though, right? Because my nature is just like
the guy that I was telling you about. Okay, well, that's how
you feel about me. Get all out of here. Don't talk
to me ever again. Don't want to see you. Matter
of fact, you're dead to me. That's how most guys are. That's
how our flesh are. How many sane people like to
be gathered around people that don't like them and don't want
to listen to them and don't agree with anything that they do? Nobody
likes that. I want to find people that agree
with me. I want to find people that like me. I want to find
people that say, hey, you know what? You're right. I like that. But guess what? It's not hard
to make peace with people that agree with you, but it's people
that disagree with you. And the Bible says here that
the children of God are blessed as peacemakers. I see guys running around all
over the place on the internet that their main mission, their
main goal is to dig out and to dig up and to portray everybody
who's wrong. and their whole entire life is
consumed with exposing everybody's errors. Hey, why don't you just
preach the gospel? If you preach the word of God,
it's going to expose error itself. You don't have to... That doesn't
mean that we shouldn't mark them out, those who are wrong, Joel
Osteen, those guys, you know, men among the Calvinists that
are preaching heretical things. Yeah, point that out. Point that
error out, and then let's pray for the brethren. Let's move
on down the road and lift up Christ. Our whole ministry shouldn't
be pointing out the errors of others. Let's preach the gospel,
not compromise, not accept the error, but let's deal with it,
move on, be peacemakers. That right there can only happen
by grace, I can tell you. Blessed are they which are persecuted
for righteousness' sake." See, this is where the thing takes
the big turn. See, all these other things,
you know, I can fool myself and act like I'm poor in spirit.
Have you ever met that person who tries to act humble? And inevitably, if you listen
to them just a little bit long enough, their pride definitely
shines through. Their humility is definitely
a costume that they have put on. Those who are poor in spirit,
those who are mournful, those who are meek, those who are hungry
and thirsty after righteousness, those who are merciful, those
who are pure in heart, those who are peacemakers, those generally
are the ones who are going to be persecuted for the sake of
Christ. They're going to be persecuted
for righteousness sake. As a matter of fact, in verse
11 it said, Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you. Say all manner
of evil against you falsely for my sake. Listen, brethren, and
again, among those who call themselves Christians, there are a lot of
people who are reviled against because of their the doctrines
of grace. Listen, the free willers out
there in the world, they hate our gospel, and they hate those
who are preaching it, for the most part. They don't like it.
They don't want to hear this gospel. They hated Christ, they
hated His gospel, and those who are His children, who hold to
the same gospel, and hold to the same teachings, they're going
to be hated too. And Jesus here is saying that
count it a joy, count it as a blessing that you are being persecuted
on account of this because the fact remains that I too was persecuted,
reviled, hated, misaligned, all these things for this sake. And if you are being reviled,
persecuted, now there are people out there that claim that they're
being persecuted for their Christianity, their quasi-Christianity, their
free will, religious Christianity. They're saying they're being
persecuted by that. But brethren, we're not talking about, I go
to church. Oh, you go to church? I don't
like you. Okay? We're not talking about, oh,
you believe in Jesus? Well, I'm a Muslim. I don't like
you. We're not talking about that.
We're talking about those who look to Christ's righteousness
alone as their righteousness. Those who look to their depravity
and look to Christ's righteousness. Those who look to the sovereign
salvation of God. Those who believe in Christ alone
and know that they can't do anything on their own. Those who are poor
in spirit, those who mourn, those who are Those who are hungry
and thirsty after someone else's righteousness on their behalf.
Those who are peacemakers. These people who have these characteristics
are going to be scorned by those of this world. They're going
to be scorned. But Jesus says, Rejoice and be
exceedingly glad For great is your reward in heaven, for so
persecuted they the prophets which were before you. Rejoice and be glad, for you
are counted among those who have been blessed with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. Rejoice and be glad, because
Christ is your salvation. Be glad, because Christ is your
great reward. And this isn't a condition that
you have to keep in order to get all these things. This is
a fact of who you are. If you've been made to be this
type of person, you have been blessed because you are counted
as one of His. So what is it that is ours? Because He said right here in
verse 12, Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward
in heaven. Now ultimately, Christ is our
reward. But what else is our reward if
this is who we are made to be? Not who we become. Not who we
try to be. Not who we work after. Not who
we yield ourselves so that we can be. Not who we let God make
us be. but if we have been transformed
by that new creation that has come from God into a person with
the demeanor of being poor in spirit knowing we have nothing
to give to God and to present to God, to being those who mourn
after our own inability and mourn over our own sin and have been
given to be meek in our demeanor knowing that everything that
we have, we have received of God and hungering and thirsting
after His righteousness. If we have been made to be these
kind of people, what is our reward? Well, it says, verse 3, if we're
this kind of people, then ours is the Kingdom of Heaven. If
we are these people, the blessed, we are going to be comforted.
If we are these people, if we are part of this group of people,
the called according to His purpose, the elect of God, the sheep of
God, the wheat, the beloved. If we are these
people, our reward is that we shall inherit the earth. We shall
be filled. We shall obtain mercy. We shall
see God. We are called the children of
God. Ours is the kingdom of heaven. See, these things are our great
reward. Those who are not part of the
blessed cannot claim that, will not receive that, will not experience
that. See, Jesus here is telling these
disciples that has gathered themselves to Him out of the multitude Jesus has gathered His men together,
His people together. And He said, Rejoice, for this
is who you are. See, Paul, and I keep going back
to this, and I keep going back to this because it's a great
example of our experience. If you're a child of God, you
know this experience. If you're a child of God, you
know this to be true, that your spirit has been made poor. You
know that you mourn over your sin. You know that you cannot
do anything. and that God has brought you
to such a low level that you know that everything that I have,
what makes me to differ? It's only God that makes me to
differ. What is it that makes me have anything? It's only by
grace. Everything is by grace. I don't
have anything to claim. You know? Nothing in my hands
I bring. I go to Paul in that Romans 7
passage because Paul here is rejoicing to know that despite
the fact that everything that is me is worthless, is vile,
is wretched, is not any good and cannot do good, even though
I have been given to know that this is who I am, there is therefore
now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. I know
that those who are His, those who are the redeemed, those who
are His children, that everything that God has promised is theirs. Everything is yea and amen in
Christ Jesus. And therefore, if I be His, if
I be His child, if I be the blessed, if I be the beloved, if I have
that, then all these things are mine. And it gives me comfort. It causes me to rejoice. That's
why we come. That's why we worship here today.
We are gathered to rejoice. We are gathered here to worship.
We are gathered here to exalt and to honor and to give praise
and glory to God because He has made us the blessed. He has blessed
us with all spiritual blessings. He has put us into the beloved. He has caused us to be a people
separated and sanctified from the world, set apart from all
that the world is. He has caused us to be a people
who have been given to know our emptiness, our lack, our inability,
but has given us a hope in Christ Jesus. We are blessed because
of that. And the Bible says that all good
and perfect gifts comes down from the Father of Lights. Notice it didn't say from the
Father of Light. It said Lights. Plural. From the Father of Lights. Look at verse 14. Ye are the
light of the world. The city set on a hill cannot
be hid. Every good and perfect gift comes
down from the Father of lights. And if this light, and I would
say that this light that it's talking about here comes from
the light, Jesus said, I am the light. And now he's telling his
disciples, ye are the light. Well, how are they the light?
And Jesus is the light. Well, they are the light because Jesus
is the light. They are his children. The children
of the light are going to display the characteristics of the light.
We were just talking about it a while ago. My great-uncle Ted
came in, seeing my son. As soon as he looked at him,
he said, that belongs to that guy. Whenever people see my children,
they look at them and say, man, you got your mom's eyes. Oh,
you got your dad's nose. You got your, you know, we have
the features. We show forth that which is of
our We are blessed to be poor in
spirit. We are blessed to be mournful,
blessed to be meek, blessed to be hungry and thirsty, blessed
to be merciful, blessed to be pure in heart, blessed to be
peacemakers, blessed to be persecuted for righteousness sake, because
we are our Father. Our Father too, the Bible says,
was poor in spirit. Not that he was lacking anything
like we are, but he was made to be poor in spirit on our behalf. He was made to be sin, even though
he knew no sin. He was made to mourn. He was
made and was meek. And brother, he was true righteousness.
And He hungered and thirsted to do nothing but His Father's
will. Brethren, we are the light of
the world. A city that is set on a hill
cannot be hidden. The characteristics that come
in the child of grace that are not ones that we work to accomplish
or work to do or muster up inside of ourselves. No, these are blessings
that come from above. supernatural, they are eternal,
they are divine gifts of God to the child of grace in the
new birth, and it's not something that we can manufacture. It's
something that is produced in us by God as God lives in us. And these are inward works. These
are inward works. Just like love, joy, peace, long-suffering,
gentleness, goodness, meekness, temperance, faith, all those
gifts are spiritual gifts and they are all spiritual gifts
that are worked on the inside of us. Therefore, we are the light of
the world because men cannot manufacture these things. Men cannot manufacture a hope
on Christ alone. It only comes from the divine
gift of God. And therefore, we're blessed
if we have these things. Whenever we have these things,
we become salt. We become light. Not that even of ourselves we're
restraining anything. Listen, if God removed everybody
that are His from among this world, which one of these days
He's going to separate, the sheep from the goats, the wheat from
the tare. You're going to separate them.
All that's left is putridness. All that's left is rot and filth. All that's going to be left is
evil. See, as the child of grace, with God in us, displaying the
things of God that's worked in us, that's the only good this
world actually really sees. That's the only good this world
sees. And any time that we push for godly principles, godly things
and things like that, that's the only good that is in this
world, so to speak. But if that be removed, if the
salt is removed, if the light is removed, there's nothing left
but and there's nothing left but darkness. Brethren, don't ever think that
we in and of ourselves are that salt and that light. Matter of
fact, Christ is the salt. Christ is the light. There's
actually some things we could probably look at here. If you
remember in the sacrifices, whenever the sacrifice was to be made,
whenever that meat offering was to be made, the Bible says that
you are not to bring that without salt. It is to be salted. Meaning that just any old meat
wasn't going to do. It had to be one that had salt
on it. Christ is that salt. Christ is the sacrifice, is the
only acceptable sacrifice. So therefore, if we are sacrifices,
as we've seen in Psalm 51, the sacrifice of the broken and tried
heart, that is because we have Christ in us. If we have anything
to show in this world, it's only because of Christ. in us. So, anyway, that's how my look
on the Beatitudes, that's what they're really called, has changed
over the years. These are not be-attitudes, but because-attitudes. Because we are children of grace
and blessed of God, these are the attitudes that He has given
us. That's why I have a hard time with people whenever they
come and I visit with them about their salvation experience. It's
about, I did this, I did that, I did this, I did that. Or I
talk to them about their Christian walk. Well, I'm doing this, I'm
doing this, I'm doing this, I'm doing this. Or you talk to a
pastor of a church, you know, how's the church doing and everything
like that. Oh, we've got this program, this program, this program,
this program, this many people, this much money. You see, it's
all about, what we're producing, but not what's being produced.
See, it's all about what we are accomplishing and not what has
been accomplished. See, the child of grace has been
given to know that we are completely defunct and that everything has
been done for us. And therefore, we rejoice in
the news about that because there's no good news about us. I can't
boast about our church. Any success, Right now, we know churches where
they are getting rid of their pastors because their pastors
aren't producing enough fruit in their church, making them
grow. Isn't that ridiculous? That is utterly ridiculous. For
any person who is a child of grace, especially one who believes
in sovereign grace, to think that it's the preacher's responsibility
to cause the church to grow. That's crazy. Or that it growing
is what God wants us to do. The Bible says that he will add
to his church That's easy spit. The Bible doesn't ever, ever
put the success of a church on the amount of people that are
in it. It's crazy. But, that's another rabbit trail
to go down. Anybody got anything you'd like
to mention or add to? by sometimes the simplicity.
Matter of fact, even Paul said, you know, that we can be moved
away from the simplicity which is in Christ. The simplicity
is, we can't do nothing and Christ has done it all. Can't get much
simpler than that. You do nothing, Christ did it
all. That's what we preach. I pray
that's what we continue to preach. All right, well, brother, we
won't be here next week. Family's gonna be going and taking
a trip to St. Louis and spending the weekend
up there and everything. So we will not be here next weekend. So Lord willing, though, we will
see you back the week after that, which will be on the calendar
right here. The 12th. The 12th of November. Boy, the years went by quick.
So on the 12th of November, we'll be back see everybody. Lord willing, lest the world comes to an end
before then. Anyway, all right, let's have
a little prayer. Father, we thank you once again
for all that you are. Father, we thank you for the
blessings that you've given us in Christ Jesus, through Christ
Jesus, and the things that we will experience and receive because
of Christ Jesus. Father, we are grateful for your
love and mercy. We're thankful for salvation. Lord, we know that in and of
ourselves, we can do nothing for you. On your behalf, we know
that Christ has been given to us and that he is our great reward. Father, I pray that you might
be with these brethren as they leave. We thank you, Father,
for their safe trip that you've given us here, despite the cold
and the rain. Lord, I pray that you'll be with
them on their way home, that you'll be with them this week.
And Father, we just continue to ask that if there be any of
your children here in our area, Lord, that is without a place
of fellowship, that you might lead them our way, that you might
bring our paths to cross, that we might fellowship one with
another, and that they might find a place to come to hear
the Word of God and to experience the fellowship of the brethren,
Lord, and I pray that you would just guide and direct them wherever
you'd have them to go. We know that you are the great
shepherd of the sheep, and that you herd your sheep where you
desire them to be at, and so Lord, we do not ever think that
we could ever be a shepherd to your sheep. We know that all
things that are done for them and with them are at your discretion,
and Lord, we just pray that you would let us ever be mindful
of that. We know that you will do what
is best for your people. And so, Father Lord, again, we
just pray that you might guide us and direct us in all things
that we do, that it might be in accordance to your word, and
that we might be ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Again,
I thank you for these brethren. May you be with them today as
they go. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.