I wonder how many of you have
been saved out of religion. I mean, by that, you were a good
Catholic, Baptist, Presbyterian, Methodist, Episcopal, or whatever,
and then God caught up with you and converted you to faith in
Jesus Christ. How many of you? That's awesome. Awesome. I'd say about 40 of
you. That's good. No, that's good. I mean, you
were in a double darkness, the darkness of your depravity and
the darkness of religion, and how awesome it is when God goes
to a church, ecclesiastical building, and there converts someone who's
into that particular religion. It's an awesome thing. So you
have a testimony. Old Brother Barnard used to say,
we're more religious every morning in America, nearer hell every
night. So you have a testimony and there is a need for your
testimony. I was in the Baptist church and
had no faith really in Jesus Christ alone. I was trusting
in my will, my works, my baptism, my Baptist lineage. I'm not saying
that that's not my personal testimony, in a way it is, but I'm projecting
that you might say that and how awesome it is for God to have
come and got you and called you to himself. Somebody ought to
say hallelujah. You may have to help me preach
this message a little bit. I have a little bit of the bug
going on. Well, let me ask you this. How many of you were addicts
to drugs, heroin, cocaine, whatever? How many of you? You know we're
having a hundred people die every day. from the heroin epidemic. And you have a testimony, an
important testimony. Think about how long it's been
since you used, that the power greater in you, sinners saved by the grace of
God. Some of you had to go to the crack house to find you.
Amen. You're converted now. You know
Christ. Probably if I was going to really
emphasize a person, the need of personal testimony, it's to
all of you who were addicts. You have a real testimony. You
know, the United States of America does not know how to purge this
heroin epidemic, but you have the answer. It takes a mighty
God to come to a sinner and regenerate them, convert them in the power
of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and they become new creatures. Well, you heard the scriptures
that Dr. Christopher read today, 1 Timothy
1, Philippians 3, and Galatians 1. The apostle Paul felt his
testimony to be so important that he was repetitive. You just find him giving his
testimony over and over again. I believe that's what we ought
to be doing. You know, you might just bump
into a person out there who's a heroin addict. Who's lost all
hope. But you have hope and you have
a good hope. Don't keep it to yourself. Share it. Something happened to the Apostle
Paul subjectively on the inside. Has something happened to you?
On the inside. You've come to love what you
once hated and hate what you once loved. Something subjective
happened to you. On the Damascus road, something
happened to Paul that he never got over. And that's the kind
of conversion and the kind of testimony that we need today. Something happened to me that
I've never got over. Some of you got over it too quick. I am a believer in the Lord Jesus
Christ. He saved me. I was there when
it happened. Something happened on the inside
of me, subjectively. Now, I know that salvation is
objective and subjective. And objective, I mean that God
loved us before the foundation of the world. Christ died for
us in our stead, and when he had Finished the work. He said it's finished. It's it's
accomplished but in time we came into the world and the hound
of heaven got on our trail and sought us out of our lody bar
and quickened us Regenerated us did something on the inside
of us To faith in Jesus Christ. Is that what happened to you?
Well, that's good I have heard preachers over my
50-some years of ministering say that Paul's conversion was
uncommon. It was an exception to the rule.
It was a wonder altogether by itself. But I'm telling you,
my friend, I'm of a different opinion. I think any man who
comes to know Christ is a wonder of wonders and ought to be shocked
and amazed in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene. And it's
only in that state of wonder that we really praise. Amen. And give him glory. The old Puritan
writer said, oh, what a wonder that Jesus found me. Do you feel
that way? Then you ought to clap a little. I feel that way. That's me. Out
in the darkness, no light could I see. Oh, I was blind as a bat. He put His great arm under, and
wonder of wonders, I love this part, He saved even me. Sometimes it's hard to believe
that you're actually saved, isn't it? Me, that He loved me. Why would He love me? Wonders
of the grace of God. marveling at that. And that's
what you ought to tell. And you ought to be saying things
like this. If He saved me, He can save you. You know, one of the great arguments
of heaven is going to, when I get with the Apostle Paul, I want
to tell him he has no right to claim that he was the chief of
sinners. That would be me. I'm kidding with you a little
bit. How do you see yourself? Do you see yourself as a wonder
of the grace of God? Then, I hope you will begin to
tell it out. Boy, what a need there is for
this congregation to tell out their testimonies. Don't you
know we're living in a hopeless situation here as far as this
drug use, heroin epidemic? that we really need people like
yourself who've been converted to tell what happened to you.
I was out there stooped and lost. And when I could not and would
not come to him, he came to me. What a wonder. You ought to be
excited about it. Amen. Well, actually all conversions
The Apostle Paul's conversions was, I believe, a pattern. In
other words, like, you know, I used to see my mother make
dresses and she would have a pattern. I know most of you are too young
to remember those days, but she'd have a pattern, a paper pattern
laid out on the floor. Well, the Apostle Paul, I believe,
is kind of an example or a pattern of how God converts sinners. And the first thing I want you
to note is this. If God has saved you, converted
you, brought you to a knowledge of himself, He has others for
you to bring to a knowledge of Himself. When He saved you, He
didn't have you just in mind alone. He had others. Might be your mom, might be your
dad, maybe your children. Think about this. If God saved
you and you have three kids, Oh, you have your own congregation
and ministry to witness to them and begin to tell them early
of the miracle of God's grace in converting power and in sovereign
grace. So, the Lord has not saved you,
nor will He save anyone else for themselves alone, but with
a view to others. Amen. How many relatives do you
have Do not know Christ. And why isn't this big building
filled to capacity? Why aren't we excited about what
God's done for us enough to do our best to get other folks in
here to hear the gospel, or to tell them yourself the gospel,
to witness to Christ? You see, every elect is saved
to become a chosen vessel, to bear the name of Jesus Christ
to others. That's why you're saved. To the
praise of the glory of his grace. My dad was a great bird hunter
and he loved bird dogs. And I remember him so many times
talking to other hunters and he'd say, he'd reach for his
wallet and he'd go, I got a picture of my bird dog here. You want
to see her? You know, you and I ought to
be talking not about our bird dog, but about our Savior to
other people. I've got a wonderful Savior who
is sovereign and Lord. Here's what the Apostle said.
The elect bear a marked connection to the race. He said, therefore
I endure all things for the elect's sake that they may also obtain
the salvation which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. You know, God may have saved
you to bring thousands to Christ. Amen? So we need to get busy about
this thing of witnessing to His saving grace. His special eye
was on you to bless you, to save you, to bring you to faith in
Christ, and then for you to go out and tell everybody what God
has done for you and what He will do for them in His Son,
Jesus Christ. So Paul's conversion had an immediate
relation to the conversion of many others. Think about all
the Pharisees. that, you know, the Apostle Paul,
Saul of Tarsus, he was like, if you're a major Baptist, he
would have been a major Pharisee. You know what I mean? I mean,
if you were settled into the denominational thing and you
made your boast, well, Saul of Tarsus even the more. You ever
thought about what a wonder it was when he got converted? You
know, There are wonders sitting in here this morning. Absolute
wonders. I love to hear your story of
how God brought you to faith in Christ. You were a long way
off! And God said, fetch her out of
Lodibar to the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit went to sniffing
around, and you were the biggest sinner He could find at that
time. I went hunting this week, pheasant
hunting. We got 50 birds. That's a lot
of birds, about 50 pheasants. Well, they were set, you know,
they were set out there. But anyway, someone took me hunting,
and we had an excellent dog. And when we would shoot those
pheasants, that trainer would say to that dog, fetch! And that
dog would go, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh, shh,
shh, until it found that bird. and brought it back. The Holy
Spirit one day, in conversion encounter with you, sought you
out of Lodibar and brought you back to Jesus Christ and to faith
in Christ. How awesome is that? I don't know, maybe you're just
a, you know, you're a common working man, Let others of those
that you work with, you ever talk about the Lord on the job
or in conversation with your fellow workers about how God
brought you? You know, many times people say
this to me, well, you know, I'm not a preacher. Oh, if you've
been saved by the grace of God, you are. You've been called to
tell. And the best preaching in the
world for you is to tell what God's done for you. Tell it to
mom, tell it to dad, tell it to your children. I know, I don't
know why we're this way, but we are to a great degree. Well,
I don't want to tell my kids about, you know, I don't want
my kids to know. Well, your kids came out of you,
so that means they're not little angels, they're depraved sinners
who need the same Savior you do. And plus, when you tell them,
God brought me up from a long way off, and mommy was, and daddy
was a drug addict. Or we were in church, and we
were so churchy and self-righteous, But God turned us inside out
one day and let us look at ourselves, and we found out we were sinners.
And that church entity was not the answer, but Christ alone
was the answer. When you come, become familiar
with somebody, share the gospel. And by the way, you know, While
I was hunting, I'm telling you this story. While I was hunting,
two or three pheasants would come up at the same time. I wouldn't just shoot amongst
them. I'd pick one out. Do you have any targets? Or are
you just shooting amongst them? You know, if your baby is 10
years old, 8 years old, Sixteen years old and doesn't
know Jesus Christ. Boy, what a target. Amen, what
a target. What about some of you, your
mom and dad don't know the Lord. And look what God has done for
you, brought you out of that darkness. You got a story to
tell mom and dad. I got one amen out of that. Wouldn't
it be something if your mom and dad came to know Christ? Through
your ministry? Wouldn't that be something? You
know God's able to do that. He didn't save you to sit or
be a sponge in church and just get information. He didn't save
you simply to be a theologian either. He saves you to be a
missionary. Go into all the world and preach
the gospel to every creature. Say, well, pastor, you know,
we believe in election here. Yeah, but the elect don't have
an X on their forehead. So what I do is just preach to
everybody in the Spirit of God. And I try to make it sweet too.
So many of you in here have heard this old story about me feeding
the chickens when I was a little boy. I would go down to my grandma's
house, and she had a whole lot of chickens. And every afternoon,
she would shuck the corn and then shell it in a bucket, and
we would go out. I'd go with her as a little boy
and feed the chickens. And she began to call them like
this. Here, chick, chick, chick, chick,
chick, chick. Here, chick, chick. And those
old hens would begin to go, quack, quack, quack. They'd get real
comfortable. And the next thing you know,
they were eating right at her feet. Well, I was just a young
kid. She said, you want to try it,
kiddie boy? I said, yeah. I reached in there. I threw that
corn at those chickens. They went everywhere. And what
I'm doing this morning is to some of you who are here without
Christ, is here, chick, chick, chick, chick. I'm dropping the
corn of the gospel at my feet and hoping that the Spirit of
God will make it effectual in your heart and life and that
you'll come to know Jesus Christ. Some of you have been saved in
your eleventh hour. laid in life. You know, there's
a lot of old people out there that don't know Christ. I mean,
if God saved you in the 11th hour, there's some old folks
out there for you to tell out the gospel of how God saved you
in the 11th hour of life. Isn't that something? That God
would wait till you was 75 to convert you. But He did it on purpose, for
a purpose. And every one of you in here
that have come to know Christ, over three or four hundred of
you, have been brought to Jesus Christ. Boy, we ought to double
the number that's here hearing the Gospel and that are coming
to know Christ. The Lord promised this. Take
the Gospel. It's not yours to save anybody.
That's God's work. But you can tell it out sweetly.
The gospel message that Christ came to die for sinners. I know
sitting way back there in the back, some of you, you know,
I always say, if you want to get warm, get closest to the
stove. That's what my tutty used to
say. We had wood stoves back then, and if you want to get
warm, get closest to the stove. I know some of you sitting way
back there, you're sitting back there on purpose. because you
just have never come to know Christ and you're hiding out
back there. May the Spirit of God find you and bring you to
Jesus Christ. You know, another thing is the
Apostle Paul was not ashamed to tell the gospel. He said,
I was a blasphemer. I said, well, You know, I can't
be that bold because I was a streetwalker. I was on the streets, male and
female. Yes. Yes. That's where you were. But you
think you were the only streetwalker? There might be a few more here
in Pontiac. I think I spotted a few more
down on Saginaw Street. Why are you laughing? It's true,
is it not? And if you were out there and
Christ has brought you to faith in Jesus Christ, what an awesome
story to tell. I hope that this morning you'll
just begin to calculate the possibilities. God save me. Just about everybody
in here has been in jail at one time or another, not to make
any of our visitors uncomfortable, But this is a church of sinners
that have been saved by the grace of God, and we're excited about
it. Paul, who had been the foremost
in sin, became the foremost in service. He said, I was a blasphemer.
I was a persecutor. I was a murderer. I was a Christ-hater. I held the coats while they stoned
Stephen to death. I was injurious, killing Christian
people, hunting them down. Think of it this way. If the
bridge of grace will carry the elephant, it will certainly carry
the mouse. Mr. Spurgeon said, and I think
that is a good saying. If you're the chief of sinners,
you know some folks out there without Christ, I hope you'll
get the message to them, the good news, the glad tidings.
And by the way, it's the best news a sinner ever heard. When
a man or woman can hear the good news. I mean, you've been going
for maybe six, seven, eight years with no hope. You're just hopeless.
Ah, the good news is that He's able to save to the uttermost
those that come unto Him. If you have gone far in sin,
when God saves you, think how far you can go in blessing and
being useful. Oh, Pastor, I don't think God's
gonna use me. I'm telling you, I was the worst
of the worst. Oh, you are God's servant and
he's about to use you. I hope you come to know that.
So, think about this too. You ever thought about this,
how long-suffering God was with you? I'm trying to get you to
think about You remember when you were first converted, how
excited you were about it? Literally, how excited. I'm trying
to shake you a little bit. Or you'll be thinking about that.
Christ came and swept away all your sin. You thought it impossible.
You are without blemish. You're without spot. You have
a perfect righteousness. You stand before God without
sin. Blessed is the man to whom the
Lord will not impute sin. Satan is an accuser. He remembers
what you did with him. He accuses you. Still in your
mind, even the little believer often is accused by Satan. Look at him. Look at her. You
remember her, don't you? We were together and you know
what we were doing. And you began to kind of fade
a little bit. Get excited about this. They're
gone! All my sins are gone. Buried
in the deepest sea, that's good enough for me. There's no condemnation
to those that are in Christ Jesus. I'm His and He is mine. Wonder of wonders. That one could
have been as cursed as I. And then Jesus became a curse
for me. Became sin for me. He who knew
no sin. Think about this too. You say,
well, Pastor, I know all the things you've already said. I
already know that. Think about this one. This is one you know.
There was nothing in Paul to contribute to his salvation.
And there was nothing in you either. That's what makes it
even a greater miracle. I remember years ago I was speaking
on WMUZ and I was talking about the inherent depravity and that
there are no little angels born, only innate sinners. And some
lady called me up after I went off the air and said, I'll have
you know, my baby is a little angel. I said, well, that can't
be, she came out of you. That's in my younger days when
I was a smart aleck, but that's a true story. You didn't give
birth to a little angel. When you talk about giving birth
to a little angel, you're acting like you were. No, sinners only make sinners. But Christ Jesus came into the
world to save sinners and to change people immediately. How about this? Is your transformation
apparent? You know, somebody ought to see
that somebody made a difference in you. That you're not the same
person. I don't mean you go to heaven by your works, but you're
actually sweet and polite and nice and smiling and you have
a joy in your heart. You're not the same person. It's
apparent. Can the Ethiopian be turned white
and no one hear of it? Your language, your actions,
your whole conduct. Because Christ has made you a
new creature. This is what conversion is. Oh,
the longsuffering of our Lord. Have you dived into all kinds
of sins so shameful that you dare not even think of them?
Think of this. The precious blood of Jesus Christ,
which removes every stain. Do you sometimes feel you've
been damned already? There's probably a few people
here who feel like there's no hope for them. You're sitting
right here and you're listening to me. No hope for me, pastor. You have no idea what I've done. Well, you're wrong there. Think about what we've all done
in thought, word, or deed. Have you been a thief? Streetwalker, do you know God
can make something wonderful out of you? I always ask the Lord when I
was a young preacher, put me in a big fishing hole with big
sinners. And oh, he's done it, and I'm
so grateful. And I, along with you, You know
where the jewels of Emmanuel's crown come from? They come from
the dunghill. That's where the Lord finds us.
On the dunghill. I don't need to make that any
plainer, right? God saves you a worthless piece
of dung. You had no merit. I mean, I could
make that plainer if you need it made plainer, but I won't
from the pulpit. A worthless piece of dung. A tumble bug. You were playing
in the manure pile when God found you. Searching for peace and
happiness. You were a real tumble bug. And God picked two tumble bugs
up. Think about this. This will blow you away. He looked
at both of them. He put one back down and said,
I'm going to save this one. I said, what did you say, Pastor? He put one tumble bug down and
said, I'm going to save this one. Why would he do that? Because
he wanted to. He didn't have to save you. He
didn't have to save me. But he did, and I'm happy about
it. And I'm rejoicing in it. You know, we sang today, it was
God's grace, right? Over and over we sang it. I wonder
if you were thinking about the tumble bugs and how God saved
you. Some of you have brothers and
sisters who have no interest in the gospel. And here you sit
in an inner city church, saved by the grace of God, rejoicing
in the gospel. You ought to be caught up in
the wonder of that. We must be. And as my dad showed
off old Tilly, his bird dog, my great desire is to show you
off Jesus Christ and point to Him and say there is salvation
in Him. And how do you come to Him? By
faith. You know without faith it's impossible
to please God. Did you know that? Just impossible
to please God. Think about this. Here's the world's greatest question
and God's only answer. What must I do to be saved? Here's
God's only answer. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
and thou shalt be saved. I wonder today, if you're here,
and you came in here lost and without Christ, and today, you've
sat under the preaching of the gospel, The Spirit of God has
done something on your inside. You're so conscious of your sinnership. Now, those of you who aren't
sinners, I really have no message for you. But if I can find a
real, genuine sinner, I've got some good news for you. Christ
Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Well, what must
I do? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Can you just lay the shotgun
down today? Your self-righteousness, see
it as a filthy rag. Can you today just, you know,
hoist the white flag and surrender? I am what you say I am. I am
a sinner without hope within myself, but I'm trusting in you,
your Son, Jesus Christ, and that alone to take me from here to
your heaven. I wonder if you could do that
today. If you are enabled by the Spirit of God, you'll do
that. Not only will you do that, but you will want to confess
Him. I'm in the Lord's army. Some of you hiding out there,
I'm a silent Christian, no such thing. Just no such thing. You're gonna have to upchuck
it sooner or later. You're going to have to say,
I was lost and He saved me. I was lost and He found me. I
was unregenerate and He regenerated me. Will you today confess Him? And
then, those of you who are here, let's begin to turn this city
upside down with the good news. Let's invite people to come and
see. We shouldn't have this many empty seats. I was reading this
week through some of my old notes. I have boxes and boxes and boxes,
54 years of boxes of notes. And it was just before we were
going to move down here. And I said, I wonder what God's
going to do now that we have an auditorium that'll seat 600
people. Well, how about filling it? You
know, there's enough people here around this church, we could
have two or three services. Amen! Wouldn't it be an awesome thing
to fill this place three times on a Sunday morning? I mean,
you'd have to get somebody else to preach a couple of those services,
but that would be all right. I'd be for that. What an awesome
thing to see men and women coming to know Christ. America's in
trouble. We need to be telling out the
gospel.