Christian Wisdom from Don Fortner,
Part 2 Though God is absolutely sovereign, having mercy on whom
he will have mercy and hardening whom he will, he is strictly
just, both in bestowing his saving mercy upon his elect and in the
everlasting damnation of the reprobate. The only way to live
wisely in this world is to set your affection on things above,
not on things of the earth. to live in the constant, immediate
prospect of eternity. Soon I will meet God in eternity. The most blasphemous, God-dishonoring,
Christ-denying doctrine ever proclaimed by men who claim to
believe in God and His Word is the doctrine of universal atonement,
the doctrine that Jesus Christ died for but failed to redeem
and save the multitudes of the damned in hell. If Christ died
to redeem and justify all, and some are in hell, then one of
two things must be so. Either Christ is a failure, or
there are some in hell who are redeemed and justified. I have
searched the book of God from cover to cover repeatedly, marking
every place where God says something good about humanity with a bold
green marker. There are no green marks in my
Bible. The more vile we are in our own eyes, the more precious
the Lord Jesus is to us. There is not a record in the
Bible of a single sinner saved by the grace of God who attributes
anything to himself but sin. Though he uses the evil devices
of men to accomplish his purpose, God neither forces the wicked
to do evil nor approves of the evil they do. With regard to
the book of God, Christ is the key of knowledge. Without the
key, men can never unlock the chest and discover its riches.
They just fumble around. Slanderers are the billows which
Satan uses to stir up fires of contention. The man who is a
slave to his own passions is a slave to the worst possible
despot. Afflictions are the black dogs by which God chases the
evil out of the people whom he loves. Nothing comes to pass
in time except that which God has purposed in eternity. Every sermon ought to be prepared
and preached as if the preacher knew that all who hear him are
on the brink of eternity. We have been called unto holiness.
Let us ever seek to walk in holiness for the glory of our Holy Lord
God and the honor of the Gospel by the power and grace of His
Holy Spirit.