Let's turn in our Bibles again
to Isaiah chapter 43. Now you know most people you know
claim to be saved. Many of us tonight claim that,
don't we? We're here, we claim to be saved, we claim to know
the Lord. But you know, Scripture tells us, very plainly, most
sons of Adam are lost. That there's only a remnant at
any given time on earth has actually been saved by our Lord Jesus
Christ. So that being the case, here's
my question. How can I tell if God's truly saved me? How can
I tell if the salvation that I claim is God's salvation or
is it just me claiming religion? I hope this evening from our
text to answer that question so all of us You can leave here
tonight knowing this. Has God saved me or am I just
plain religion? Let's look at this and see if
we might, God might teach us something. Now I know this about
salvation. The salvation of a sinner must
be done in such a way that God is glorified. The salvation of
a sinner has to be done in such a way that all the attributes
of God are glorified at once, never one at the expense of another.
And any salvation that does not glorify every attribute of God
all at the same time is not true salvation. Now the prophet here,
this is God speaking through the prophet, verse 21 of Isaiah
43, this people have I formed for myself. They shall show forth
my praise. And that's what he's saying.
This people, their salvation is going to show my praise. God
has a people that he chose to save. He says, I have a chosen
people. I formed them for myself. That's God's elect. A true salvation,
first of all, has to begin at the right source, doesn't it?
It has to begin with God, with his electing love. Any true salvation
of a sinner is going to glorify God's electing love. And throughout
the scripture, God gives us a picture of his choice of his people.
In the Old Testament, that nation Israel is a picture of God's
elect. Everyone who was a Jew, everyone
who was part of that nation Israel, they weren't part of spiritual
Israel. They weren't all believers. They're a picture of spiritual
Israel. God chose that nation. Of all
the nations of the earth, He chose them to be His people.
And He showed the world, this is my people. Only Israel had
the prophets. Only Israel had the priesthood.
Only Israel had the tabernacle. Only Israel had the sacrifices.
God chose those people. But now you don't have to read
very much scripture to know Israel was a stiff-necked, rebellious
nation. You remember back at the end
of chapter 39, God told him, because of your sin, because
of your rebellion, you're going to be carried away captive into
Babylon after King Hezekiah dies. And that's a picture of God's
elect. That is a picture of spiritual Israel. God chose a people before
the foundation of the world. He set his love and affection
on those people. but they're lost in Adam. When
they were born into this world, they were born in sin. They were
born with the nature. You and I can't look down our
noses at Israel saying, what a stiff neck rebellious people.
We've got the same nature. So rebellious, so stiff neck. And we've been carried away captive.
We've been carried away captive by sin. We're under the dominion
of sin under the curse of the law. But now God has elect people. Those people cannot stay in that
condition because God chose them unto salvation. So they're going
to be saved in a way that shows forth God's praise. He says here
at the end of verse 21, they shall show forth my praise. Now,
without a doubt, God's people show forth the praise of our
savior. We talk about him and we sing about him in the way
that we live our life. We show forth his praise. But
what our text really means is this, that God's gonna save his
people in a way that's gonna show forth the praises of the
one who did the saving. He's gonna save his people so
everybody knows God gets the glory in this matter of the salvation
of sinners. So here's how God gets the glory
in saving his people. First, God gets glory in saving
his people through man's inability. Man can't do anything to get
saved. That phrase, get saved, scrapes
on my soul like fingernails on a chalkboard. Man can't do anything
to get himself saved. Look at verse 22. God says, but
thou hast not called upon me, O Jacob, but thou hast been weary
of me, O Israel. Now scripture plainly tells us
this. Three times scripture says, Whosoever,
whoever you are, whatever your background, whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Scripture says that
three times. And you know why we can't get
saved? Because we can't even call on the name of the Lord.
We refuse to call upon him. Look at Psalm 14, and that makes
us wicked. We cannot and we will not call
upon the name of the Lord. And that makes us wicked. Psalm
14 verse four. Have all the workers of iniquity,
no knowledge who eat up my people as they bread and call not upon
the Lord. It's the workers of iniquity
who call not upon the Lord. You're the only person that will
ever call upon the name of the Lord is the person who's been
born again. When God says there, he, that
this people I formed for myself, Those people who are formed,
they've been formed in the new birth. That person will call
upon the name of the Lord, but left our human nature, we never
will. We will not call upon the name
of the Lord. So we can't do anything to get
saved because salvation is only of the Lord. It's of him, by
him, in him, it's all of him. And when he, when he moves in
power and forms this people for himself, when they're born again,
you know, they'll call on the Lord. Look over a couple of pages
of Psalm 18. Psalm 18 verse three. Listen
to David here. I will call upon the Lord who's
worthy to be praised. So shall I be saved from mine
enemies. Well, why would David call upon the Lord who's worthy
to be praised? Because he's been born again.
He's been given a heart that calls out to God. But until God
moves in power like that, we'll never call upon him. And I tell
you how wicked, how sinful our nature really is. God says, you've
been weary of me. You've been weary of me. Now
you have to admit that's our nature. You have to admit that's
so. We get exhausted so quickly when we begin to hear a preacher
talk about the Lord. Oh, we get so sleepy. If you've
got insomnia, all you gotta do is click your sermon audio button,
start listening to message, you'll fall asleep real quick. Get your
Bible, sit in bed, you fall, I mean, won't you? That's the
sin nature. It ought not be that way. That's
the way it is. Now we don't get weary of our
own way, do we? We don't get weary of our sin
and the things that appeal to this flesh, but we get weary
of the Lord so quickly. So we will not come unto him
that we might have life. You know, I tell you this often,
if we go to hell, it's our own fault because we wouldn't come,
because we wouldn't call. It's our own fault that we don't
come to Christ. So we can't do anything to get
saved, can we? We will not come to Christ and
we refuse to worship God in the way he said we're supposed to
worship him. Now we love our religious ceremonies
and our religious traditions. You know, the things that we've
always done or religious ceremonies that makes us feel so good. We
love that stuff, but we hate the worship of God, the way God
said he's to be worshiped. Look at verse 23 in our text. Thou hast not brought me the
small cattle of Thy burnt offerings, neither hast Thou honored me
with Thy sacrifices. I have not caused Thee to serve
with an offering, nor wearied Thee with incense. Thou hast
brought me no sweet cane with money, neither hast Thou filled
me with the fat of Thy sacrifices, but Thou hast made me to serve
with Thy sins. Thou hast wearied me with Thine
iniquities. Now God required lambs for the
burnt offering, for the sacrifices. That's how God's to be worshiped.
When he talks here in verse 23, the small cattle, that's what
he means the lambs. You haven't brought me the lambs
that are required by the law and the law required those lambs
that they be brought, that their blood be shed, that their bodies
be roast with fire because God must be worshiped through the
blood of the lamb. God can only be worshiped through
the blood of the sacrifice. Yet the people refused to bring
the lambs. God said, bring a lamb, kill
it, you worship me with its blood before the altar. They wouldn't
do it. They said, well, we can't afford that, we're too poor.
Or worse yet, they did bring lambs. They did have offerings,
they did have sacrifices, but they brought them to idols, not
to the Lord. See, they didn't do what was
required, bring the lamb. And they didn't bring their free
will offerings either. Now, there were offerings that
were required by the law. The lamb, all the different sacrifices
that were required by the law. And then there were other offerings
you could give if you wanted to. It's up to you. That's what
the Lord refers to here. He says, I've not caused thee
to serve with an offering. I've not wearied you with incense.
God doesn't require anything that's a hardship on you. God
doesn't require anything that'll weary you. You think about the
land God gave Israel. When they came out of Egypt,
where did they say they were going? To a good land, a land
flowing with milk and honey. And they got there, and God gave
it to them. Bob, they never fired a shot.
Gave it to them. Now, free will offering. If you're
thankful, you want to show your thanks, this land flowing milk
and honey, you can bring some of that milk, some of that honey,
some of the spices of the land to be used in the incense and
different things. But they didn't do it. It wasn't
because they didn't have it, the land's flowing with it. They
kept it for themselves. God said he's to be worshiped
with the blood of the sacrifice and they're stingy with the sacrifice
too. The Lord had been so good to
Israel, how he delivered him and protected him, his presence
with him. Nobody else on earth had to worship
of the Lord. Oh my goodness, how thankful
that they should have been. God said, bring a lamb. I think
most men operate that. Women might be smarter than this,
but men operate this way. You know, I, I think, If one's
good, more is better, right? When I first began running, you
remember this, Isaac, I ran a mile. Well, if one mile's good, five's
better, you know, and then I overdo it and get injured. This is the
way men think, but God said, bring a lamb. Well, out of thanksgiving,
you'd think somebody would say, well, one's good, more is better,
I'm gonna bring more. But they didn't fill up the altar
with the sacrifices. They brought just enough to get
by. They brought the littlest lamb
or the sickest lamb or the lamb they couldn't sell. They didn't
fill up the altar and overfill it. They did just enough to scrape
by to salve their conscience so they thought I did enough
to satisfy the law. Aren't you glad God doesn't give
to his people that way? Oh, he gives abundantly, but
we don't. And that's our nature. This is
why false religion has to teach tithing. They have to tell you
what you have to bring, because if you don't have to bring it,
you won't. That's our nature. False religion
can't survive on offerings, on freewill offerings, because the
flesh isn't willing to give to God. But when God saves a person,
He forms them for His praise, He gives them a new nature, a
generous nature. You're partakers of the divine
nature. Now you've got a nature that has a desire to give like
God gives to you. God gives you a nature. You say,
everything I have, God gave me. He's given me plenty. He gave
me enough to give. I want to give like David said,
because the Lord's worthy. He's done so much for me. But
that'll never be our attitude till God saves us. Well, now
we're at a real impasse, aren't we? Left to our own nature now,
man's weary of God, and God's weary of men trying to worship
Him in sin rather than holiness. See that? End of verse 22, but
thou hast been weary of me, O Israel. We're weary of God. And at the
end of verse 24, thou hast wearied me with thine iniquities. Well,
we're weary of one another. Man doesn't have the strength
nor the desire to deliver himself. Man doesn't have the desire to
do what it takes. They don't have the desire to
do what God says. So if anybody's, man's completely
unable to do it, aren't we? So if anyone's gonna be saved,
God's gonna have to do the saving. And He's going to have to do
it against our will. He's going to have to do it against
the will of this flesh. If God waits until we suddenly
come up with that will on our own, we're going to hell. God's
going to have to save us against our will with our full consent.
With the full consent to the new nature He gives. All we've
done is sin. That's all we've done. We've
made God weary with our sin. And the very one that we've sinned
against is the only one who can save us because man's unable. Well, here's the second way God
gets the glory. God alone has both the power to save and the
character to save. Now look back up at verse 15.
I am the Lord, your Holy One, the creator of Israel, your King. Now God's name is the Lord. And
you know that word when Lord was spelled in all capital letters
means Jehovah. God, my Savior, this is the Lord
Jesus Christ speaking. I'm your God, your Savior. And
he says, my name is your Holy one. Not just the Holy one, your
Holy one. God or the Lord Jesus Christ
is our holiness. He says, I'm your Holy one. That's
such good news. I don't have any righteousness.
He's my righteousness. He's my holiness. I'm your holy
one. I'm holy and righteous in Christ. And he says here, I'm the creator
of Israel. I'm the one who formed you. I'm
the one who gave you life in the new birth. That's the Holy
Spirit, the one who gives spiritual life to his people. See, when
God says this is a work of God, the whole Godhead, Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit, And when He saves His people like that, what
do we do? We bow to Him as King. He gets all the glory. We bow
to Him. He's our King. And we give thanks. God is not only able to save,
He not only has the power to save, He has the character to
save. He has the willingness to save
His people who've done nothing but sin against Him. And he gave
us a picture of that and how he delivered Israel from bondage
in Egypt. Look at verse 16. Thus saith
the Lord, which maketh a way in the sea and a path in the
mighty waters, but bringeth forth the chariot and horse, the army
and the power. They shall lie down together.
They shall not rise. They're extinct. They should
be quenched his toe. Now God's so powerful. When he
delivered Israel from Egypt, he brought him out of Egypt,
he brought him to the Red Sea, and it says here in verse 17,
God's the one that brought out Pharaoh. Pharaoh didn't just
suddenly decide, you know, I made a mistake, I'm gonna go out there
and get him. No, God brought him forth, didn't he? I brought
forth a chariot and a horse, and I brought them forth in all
their power, and I'm the one that caused my people to be trapped
at the Red Sea. God did that so he could show
his great power. God didn't deliver Israel from
Egypt by letting them go around the sea. God didn't deliver Israel
by letting them build a bridge, a pontoon bridge across the Red
Sea. God divided the water. God made a path for his people
right in the middle of that sea. So his people would just cross
on dry ground between those gigantic walls of water. God's so powerful,
he just held that water up. And people walked through on
dry ground. And then Pharaoh's army tried to come through and
God just took his hand and let the water come through and they
were never seen from again. That's God's power. And then
Israel went away from the Red Sea and they went out into the
wilderness. They didn't have any supplies. How are they going
to live out there? Well, God didn't give them huge
trucks of water to pull around, did he? So they'd have water
to drink out there in the wilderness. God made rivers of water to flow
to his people right in the middle of the desert. Now that's power. God had a rock. That rock was
Christ and they got water from that rock. Look at the end of
verse 19. This is what he says here. I will even make a way
in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Rivers of water
flowed from that smitten rock in the desert to give his people
drink. Now I'm telling you, That's power. But now remember this. All this is is a picture. I mean,
that's power. No question about it. But that's
nothing to the power that it takes to put away the sin of
God's people. God has that kind of power and
he uses it for his people. You know everything God does.
Absolutely everything he does for his glory. and he does for
the good of his people. And he does it for only the good
of his people. God's not out there blessing
the heathen for them. No, he's doing this for the good
of his people. As far as physical blessings
are concerned, the heathen get no benefits, none, except when
God blesses his people. Look at verse 20. The beast of
the field shall honor me. the dragons and the owls because
I give waters in the wilderness and rivers in the desert. Why
did he do that? To give drink to my people, my
chosen. God made those rivers of water
flow from that smitten rock so his people would have enough
to drink. And you know what happened? The beasts of the field, the
animals that live out there in the desert, they got benefit
too. They drank the overflow, that
river of water that the children of Israel didn't drink, that
ran out there and all those animals got a blessing because God was
giving his people spiritual or giving them drink. And God does
the same thing today. God blesses his people with the
necessity of this life. Now, the heathen benefit from
it too, but God's doing it so his people have what they need. That refinery out there. You
know why that thing's out there? From what I read in the newspaper,
oil companies are making money hand over fist. You know why
they're doing that? So Wayne Kennel and Gene Patterson
have a job. That's exactly why. They got
all the necessities of this life for their family. Now the heathen
are getting some of it along the way, but that place exists
for God's children to get a blessing. to get what they need. That's
what's going on. Everything God does, he does
for his people. This is his goodness. Well, we
wonder sometimes, don't we? This is the doubt and weakness
of the flesh. Well, I know what God's done
in the past, but does he have the power to save me now in this
present age? Well, if we wonder that, all
we gotta do is look back to the past, don't we? You know, I've lost a lot of
strength, a lot of agility, a lot of things I used to, I used to
be able to jump up and almost dunk a basketball. I don't think
I could jump up and touch the bottom of the net now. If it
was a long net, I'm sure I couldn't. I lost a lot of strength compared
to what I used to have. What I used to be able to do
is absolutely no indication of what I can do right now. But
that's not God. If you wanna know what God can
do today, all you gotta do is look what he's done in the past.
He's the same yesterday, today, and forever. Look at verse 18.
He says, remember ye not the former things, neither consider
the things of old. Now God has done some miraculous
things in the past in his dealings with Israel, but this is the
trap Israel fell into. Don't look at those things, all
those miracles, all those mighty things he did and think, That's
all there is. Think, well, God's going to bless
me that way or I'll have no blessing. That's what they were looking
for, an earthly kingdom. Don't think, when you look at
those things in the past, don't think that's all there is. Those
things God did to show us what he's going to do for spiritual
Israel. And God says, now you hang on. I'm gonna do something
so much greater than you've ever seen before. If you think walling
up the Red Sea so my people can pass through something, you just
wait and see what I'm gonna do for my people spiritually. He
says in verse 19, behold, I'll do a new thing. Now it shall
spring forth. So you not know it? I'm gonna
do a new thing. And this new thing is the salvation
of the souls of his people, not just physical deliverance, spiritual
deliverance from sin and hell and condemnation. God's going
to send a savior, his own son. And look back in Isaiah chapter
11. Isaiah says the savior is going to spring forth from dry,
barren ground. Well, that's Christ. He's the
root out of dry ground. In Isaiah 11 verse 1, And there
shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch
shall grow out of his roots. And the Spirit of the Lord shall
rest upon him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding, the
Spirit of counsel and might, the Spirit of knowledge and of
the fear of the Lord, and shall make him of quick understanding
in the fear of the Lord. And he shall not judge after
the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of
his ears, But with righteousness shall he judge the poor and reprove
with equity for the meek of the earth and shall smite the earth
with the rod of his mouth. That's the word of his mouth
and the breath of his lips. Shall he slay the wicked? This
one who's going to grow up out of the, out of the earth is the
Lord Jesus Christ. And this new thing God's going
to do. It's so wonderful. It's so much more marvelous than
all these physical miracles he's done in the past. We just can't
believe it unless God gives us the gift of faith. God's going
to send his son to become a man. God Almighty is going to become
a man so he can be the representative of all these sinful people that
he's chosen to save. God's going to send his son to
be a man so that he can be the sacrifice. You know, we expect
him to come and set up an earthly kingdom. That's not the way God
works. God's going to do something so marvelous. He's going to send
his son to be the sacrifice for the sin of all these people that
God's chosen to save. God's going to send his son so
that as a man, he can suffer and die as a substitute for his
people so they can live. And God's going to give this
great priceless salvation. He's going to give it freely
to His people. Now that's so great, you won't believe it unless
God gives you faith. Not only do you not have to do
anything to earn it, you can't do anything to earn it. It's
free in the Lord Jesus Christ. He did all the work of salvation
by Himself and He gives it as a free gift to His people. You
see how that exalts His power? and His character. He's able
and He gives it freely. Now that is love and grace untold. Now we saw our character, didn't
we? And we saw God's character. Where sin abounded, grace did
much more abound. That brings me to the third thing.
Here's why God would do something that's so wonderful. He does
it for His glory. Look at verse 25. He says, I,
even I am he that blotteth out thy transgression for mine own
sake and will not remember thy sin. Now we need to understand
this. God does not save anyone for
their sake. He doesn't save them because
what they've done or what they haven't done. He doesn't save them because
who their parents and grandparents are. God saves sinners for his
own sake. God saves sinners for the sake
of His own name, for the glory of His reputation. God saves
sinners who are unable so everybody knows the only way they can be
saved is God did it for them. God saves sinners who don't deserve
it so that His grace and mercy will be glorified. Now the first
reason for salvation is always found in the character of God.
We see God's glory in His character, mercy, and grace. I told you
at the beginning of the message, when God saves sinners, true
salvation, all the attributes of God are glorified at the same
time. Never is one attribute glorified
at the expense of another. When God saves sinners, it's
done in both mercy and justice. Now we tend to think Because
if we know ourselves at all, this is what we tend to think,
don't give me justice, give me mercy. Isn't that right? That's
what we think. But you know what? You cannot
have mercy from God without justice. Can't be done. Because that would
be glorifying one attribute of God at the expense of another.
When God shows mercy to his people, it's done in justice. He shows
mercy to his people because Christ, our substitute, suffered justice
for us. See, in that way, all the attributes
of God, both God's justice and His mercy are glorified in saving
His people. When God saves a sinner, it's
done in both righteousness and grace. God gives grace to His
people. He does not punish them for their
sin, but He doesn't do it in an unrighteous way. He doesn't
do it by ignoring their sin. No, God makes His people righteous. If God Almighty has made you
righteous, you can't be punished. There's no charge to bring against
you if you're righteous. You can't be punished. And God
did in fact make his people righteous because he made Christ to be
sin for them. And he made them the righteousness of God in him.
Christ suffered. When he was made sin, he suffered
injustice and truth. All the punishment, the sin of
God's people deserve. That salvation glorifies both
God's righteousness and his grace, doesn't it? When God saves a
sinner, all his attributes are exalted and glorified at the
same time. God exalts both his justice and
his love. Now you parents understand this.
We love our children so much, we never want to see them suffer.
I'd never want to see Holly Louisa, ever, ever, ever. And there are
things that she learned from it, going to school, kids were
bad at them and, you know, they're five and however old I was, I
couldn't go cut their head off. You know, they just don't work
that way. I didn't want her to suffer.
But, you know, a lot of times it was for the best. She learned
something. She needed to learn, you know, to be able to function
in this world. And when she did something wrong, I didn't want
her to suffer. I sure didn't want school to
punish her, and I didn't really want to, and I had to, but I
didn't want to. Well, that's a human love, isn't it? That
kind of love, it does kind of glorify a parent's love, doesn't
it? But it puts our character in pretty good light. Our love
would come at the expense of justice, wouldn't it? That's
not how God saves sinners. God set his eternal. unsearchable
love upon His people. And He did it in justice. The
Holy God showers His unchangeable love upon His people because
Christ suffered justice for us as our substitute. See, salvation
accomplished like that glorifies both God's love and His justice.
God magnifies all of his attributes in saving his people through
a substitute. See, it's the substitute that
glorifies both the power of God, the wisdom of God, the grace
of God, the mercy of God, and the justice of God. Salvation
is the reason for it, it's found in the character of God, all
of his attributes. The second work of salvation,
it's a work that God does by himself. And He does it by Himself
without any help from us, so He gets all the glory. God the
Father purposed the salvation of His people. He chose a people
unto salvation, put them in His Son. God the Son came as a man
in the fullness of time, and He purchased that salvation with
His own blood by the sacrifice of Himself. And God the Holy
Spirit comes We're rebels, we're running as far away from God
as we can, we're dead in sins, we're wearing God with our sins,
and the Holy Spirit comes and says, halt right there. And he
applies the blood of the sacrifice to our hearts, gives us a new
heart. Where do we enter into that equation? Not one place,
except that we provided the sin that needed a savior. The blood
of Christ, he shed his blood to fully pay the sin debt of
his people. Our scripture says, God says,
I blotted out your transgression. I blotted out the debt. Now the
illusion that's given here is to a debtor, someone that's,
they've gone down to the bank, they've borrowed money from the
bank, and they've got a debt. And you know bankers, they start
keeping a ledger, don't they? They keep the ledger of the debt.
They keep a ledger of the interest. They keep a ledger of the payments.
Of course, in our case, all there is is debt and no payments. And
the illusion here is to this, that the mighty rich man of all
wealth came in and paid the debt. And the banker blotted out the
debt so that the amount of the debt cannot be seen anymore. Now, that's wonderful. I grant
you. But salvation of a soul is far more wonderful than that.
You see, when we try to describe this new thing that God's gonna
do, this great, glorious thing that's gonna glorify God, the
only examples that we can come up with is human examples. And
they're never as good as the real thing. The word blotted
out, it means to utterly destroy. So it's not there anymore. It
means to utterly wipe out so that it does not exist anymore.
If Christ died for you, your page in God's book, that page
that will be open in the day of judgment is a blank page. I have an earthly example, human,
try to illustrate what I'm saying. Here's Eric Floyd. God's got
a book. He's got a page in there for
Eric. Eric's sins are blotted out, blotted out under the blood
of Christ. When God Almighty opens that
page, he sees his name, Eric Floyd. This is not what he sees. I should have done this in red.
I just did this at the last minute. But this is not what God sees.
There were sins there that are blotted out. And I could look
at that and say, well, I don't know what what the numbers were.
There are a lot of numbers there. There's a lot of debt there.
That's not what this blotted out means. It means wiped out
so that it doesn't exist anymore. The holy son of God one day went
to the garden and he prayed, Father, if it be possible, let
this cut pass for me. Nevertheless, not my will, but
thy will be done. And it was God's will he go to
the cross. And he went to the cross and he shed his blood in. Agony we cannot understand. For
Eric Floyd, so his sins would be blotted out. So when God opens
the book and he finds Eric's page. There's nothing there. Blotted out. If Christ blotted
out your debt, your sin is utterly destroyed. There's no record
of it anymore. That's why God says, and I will
not remember your sins because even God cannot remember what's
not there. They're gone. Look in Isaiah
51, I'm sorry, Psalm 51, Psalm 51. This is David's cry and this
is the cry of every sinner. that God saves. Psalm 51 verse one. Have mercy upon me, O God, according
to thy loving kindness, according unto the multitude of thy tender
mercies, blot out my transgression. Make them so they don't exist
anymore. Wash me throughly from my iniquity
and cleanse me from my sin. And that's exactly what God does
for his people. He cleanses them. He blots out
the sin so it no longer exists. Now that salvation glorifies
God alone, doesn't it? Because Christ paid the debt
alone. Jesus paid it all. All the debt
I owe. Sin left a crimson stain. He washed it white as snow. He
blotted it out. I want to show you one more thing
here, verse 26. That's God's salvation. And God gives us instruction
how to plead for it. Would you plead for mercy? God
tells you how to do it. Look at verse 26. Put me in remembrance. Let us plead together. Declare
thou that thou mayest be justified. Now, do you have anything of
your own that you can offer before God to justify? Well, of course
you don't. But now if you do, if you think
you do, God says, all right, bring it before the judge. Let's
see if it'll justify. And if we're honest, we look
for something in ourselves that would recommend us to God that
we could bring before him. There's nothing in us that's
worthy. We just come up empty. We look in ourselves, don't we?
So what should we plead? We can't plead anything about
us. What should we plead? We should plead God's own word.
we should plead the promises and character of God. Lord, you
said you would forgive sin for Christ's sake. Would you forgive
my sin? Lord, you said you'd blot out,
you'd wipe out the transgressions of the sin of your people into
the blood of your son. Would you blot out my transgressions?
If you would plead with God, plead God's own word. God says,
put me in remembrance. Put God in remembrance of his
promises. Put God in remembrance of his
word and plead his own word. That's how you beg for mercy.
Not based on just some silly feeling, but based on God's word.
You said you'd be merciful to sinners. God be merciful to me,
the sinner. That's putting God in remembrance
of his word. Now, is that your salvation?
Like I said, most everybody here claims to be saved. Well, is
that your salvation? Does God get all the glory in
your election? Does He get the glory because
He chose you and you wouldn't choose Him? Does He get the glory
when He chose you and nobody else would have chosen you because
of your sin? You're too sinful, too rebellious, but He chose
you anyway. That glorifies His electing love, doesn't it? Is
that your salvation? Does God get all the glory in doing everything
it required for your salvation. I mean, you didn't pay a penny,
you didn't contribute anything. Did He do it all? That salvation
glorifies God. Does Christ get all of the glory
in blotting out your sin with the blood of His sacrifice. You
get no credit for it. You're not righteous because
you quit sinning or you quit doing this or you quit doing
that. You're righteous because Christ blotted out your sin with
His own blood. He gets all the credit for it.
You don't get any. Is that your salvation? Did God the Holy Spirit,
did He form you into a new man and a new birth? Is your confession
I'm not saved because I made a decision for Jesus. I'm not
saved because I got saved one day because I decided to quit
doing this and start doing this. No, I'm saved because God the
Holy Spirit came and caused me to be born again by His grace.
He revealed His Son to me and in me. Is that your salvation?
If it is, God saved your soul and we'll give Him the glory
for all of it, won't we? And listen to me. If that's not
your salvation, you know if it is or if it isn't, if that's
not your salvation. I wouldn't let the day pass.
Without putting God in remembrance of his word. And begging him
to save me. for His glory, not because I
deserve it, not because I'm in the right place at the right
time, not because I have the right doctrinal belief, but for
His glory. If God can get glory in saving
your soul, He will. Then plead for it. All right,
let's bow in prayer. Our Father, how we thank You
for this precious portion of Your Word How we thank You for
this marvelous, wonderful, new thing that You do for Your people.
That You'd send Your Son to be a man. That through the blood
of His sacrifice, You'd blot out our transgressions and not
remember them anymore. Oh, how we pray for the faith
that would believe this Savior. How we pray for the faith that
would look to Christ and Christ alone. How we pray for the faith
that would cause us to look to Christ and rest in Him. And Father, we pray for Your
mercy. We pray for Your grace for those that do not know You.
Father, for Your glory, would You reveal Yourself, would You
reveal Your Son to them and in them through the preaching of
Your Word. We'll give you all the praise,
all the thanks and all the glory for it because all praise and
all glory and all honor is thine. We're thankful. Help us to sing
your praises. It's in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ and for his glory we pray. Amen.