That would, for our Scripture
reading this morning, if you take your Bibles, let's turn
to the 19th Psalm. The 19th Psalm for our Scripture
reading. And after that, we'll have a
word of prayer. Psalm 19. The heavens declare
the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork. Day unto
day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge.
There is no speech nor language where their voice is not heard.
Their line is gone out through all the earth, and their words
to the end of the world. In them hath he set a tabernacle
for the sun, which as a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, and
rejoiceth as a strong man to run a race. His going forth is
from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto the ends of
it, and there is nothing hid from the heat thereof. The law
of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. The testimony of the
Lord is sure, making wise the simple. The statutes of the Lord
are right, rejoicing the heart. The commandment of the Lord is
pure, enlightening the eyes. The fear of the Lord is clean,
enduring forever. The judgments of the Lord are
true and righteous altogether. More to be desired are they than
gold, yea, than much fine gold, sweeter also than honey and the
honeycomb. Moreover, by them is thy servant
warned, and in keeping of them there is great reward. who can
understand his errors. Cleanse thou me from secret faults. Keep back thy servant also from
presumptuous sins. Let them not have dominion over
me. Then shall I be upright and I shall be innocent from the
great transgression. Let the words of my mouth and
the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord,
my strength and my redeemer. Our gracious Lord and Savior,
and our Father in heaven, we bow before you this beautiful
day that you've given us to be a part of. We thank you for arranging
providence, your providence, to bring us all here in this
capacity, Lord, to, we pray, to worship you in truth and in
spirit. Be with our dear pastor as he stands before us This past
week, Lord, as he studied, we pray that what you have laid
upon his heart that he would deliver to us and that it would
be a comfort to our souls. We thank you for each and every
one that's here. And for those that can't be with us, we ask
that your blessings be upon them. Have mercy upon us, Lord, and
help us in all things to honor and glorify you. For it's in
your precious name we do pray. Amen. Early this past week, Russell
called me and told me his mother was in ICU and not expected to
live. And then just a short time later,
he called me and told me that she had passed. Thursday, I preached
her funeral, and we committed her soul to God. I've had so many since I began
to be your pastor, I think I counted 12 the other day. Amos was first, and I don't have
them all in order, but Georgia Fay, and Glenn, and Nathan, and
Kathy, and Melos, and Sue and John, and so many, so many. And each time there's a death
in this assembly, I ask myself, did I say all that I could say? Did I leave something out? Have I, as Paul said to the saints
at Ephesus, shunned not to declare unto you all the counsel of God? Have I studied and prepared and
set before you the doctrine of Christ, the person of Christ,
and his accomplished redemption? Have I done those things? Have
I been faithful to those things? Can I say to them as well as
unto you, I am free from the blood of all men, for I had not
shunned to declare unto you these things? Paul said, I preached
them publicly and from house to house. I've taught these things. Sue came here one Sunday years
ago, sat way back there in the back on the south side of the
auditorium and listened to me preach. I guess her and Russell were
contending over some doctrines and he finally talked her into
coming to here. And when I finished that day,
she said, I enjoyed your study today. I like the way you preach. You're easy to understand. Well, my friends, that's what
preaching needs to be, isn't it? I'm not up here so people
can, oh, ah, like they did Apollos. He was a genuine speaker. I mean,
he had the gift of speaking. Henry had that gift. hold people's
attention for hours on end. Well, I'm not up here for that.
I'm up here to tell you the truth as simply and as plainly as I
can make it. Listen to this. Paul said to
the saints at Corinth, he said, I, brethren, when I came to you,
came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom, declaring unto
you the testimony of God, for I determined to know nothing
among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Sue came that day and came many
times thereafter, and I'm satisfied that I set before her and you
the way God saves sinners. Did she embrace these things?
Did she lay hold of Christ? I believe she did. But the thing that matters to
me the most is that I said it before. I preached a funeral from Psalm
68, 20, and I decided to preach it again in a little more depth
to you this morning. So if you will, turn with me
to Psalm 68, verse 20. A single verse of Scripture. Now here's my text. He that is
our God. Our God. Do you have a God? Or are you looking to yourself as
your own God? Do you have a God? Do you realize
that there is a living God? A God over everything that is? An eternal being? Ruleth all things in the armies
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth? None can stay his
hand or say unto him what, eternal existence, never changing, almighty
God. Well, David said, He that is
our God, now listen to this, is the God of salvation. We're not the God of salvation,
He is. It's not our invention, it's
His counsel and purpose. He's the God of salvation. And
unto God the Lord belong all the issues from death. And this is one subject that's
relevant to all I preach to no matter where they are or how
they were raised. The issues from death. Make no
mistake about it, the Holy Scriptures plainly declare that all that
are in the graves, of which I have known many, it has been my privilege
to know many, all that are in the graves shall hear the voice
of the Son of God and shall come forth. We put them down there,
we covered them up, but God is going to raise them up out of
the dirt. And they that have done good
unto the resurrection of life. And they that have done evil
unto the resurrection of damnation. You know, the truth's a hard
pill to swallow, isn't it? Huh? Oh, it's a hard pill to
swallow. And the truth is, you and I have never done anything
good. Have we? Listen to what Paul says about
those under sin. There's none good. Now if you're
not good, nothing you say or do can be good. It's coming out
of the mouth of him who's not good. He's not good by nature. He don't have a good nature.
He don't have a good thought. Your thoughts, Christ said, are
not God's thoughts. Man at his best state, he's altogether
vanity. It's a hard pill to swallow.
You and I have never done anything good. There's none good. No,
not one, Paul said. But the truth is, also, we've
never done anything but good. At the gate, when the saint approaches
the gate of glory, he's going to hear a voice, the voice of
God. And here's what he's going to
say. Well done, my good and faithful servant. Enter thou into your
inheritance, prepared for you before the foundation of the
world. You've never done anything but good, and the reason is because
you're in Christ. You were chosen in Him. And in Him, we've never done
anything but good. That's why we stand before Him
being loved always. Well, how can that be? By looking
with the eyes of pure and righteous justice and by looking with the
mind of Christ and the mind of substitution and representation. By seeing ourselves as we are
and seeing ourselves in Christ. Beloved, you and I are sinners.
We have no hope of being justified by our works, not our thoughts,
not our hearts. The heart is deceitful above
all things and desperately wicked. I hope you're not looking in
your heart to find some reason to be saved. You ain't going
to find it. It's a black hole. By the deeds of the law, Paul
said, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight. For by
the law is the knowledge of sin. If you go before God hoping that
you've gained his favor by keeping the law, here's what you're going
to hear from the law. Sin. You're a sinner. The law
is the knowledge of sin. That's all it can say to a sinner.
You're a sinner. You're guilty. The whole world
becomes guilty before God. Read it for yourself over in
Romans 3. If we are to be saved or have
any hope to be saved, we must take our place as the sinner. See, here's the problem. Men
are not willing to take their place as the sinner. They don't
believe God. Two things we need to know here.
1 John 1 verse 8. If we say that we have no sin,
we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. We're ignorant
of the truth. That's the only reason a man
would say that. And then in 1 John 1.10, he said, if we say we have
not sinned, we make God a liar and his word is not in us. We're
sinners. We're sinners. And by the faith
of God's elect, we need to take our place as the sinner. You
remember that old publican stood in the temple. He couldn't even
look up toward heaven. He knew what he was. And he said,
Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. That's where we need to go. We
need to be the center. There's coming a resurrection
of all men, all that are laid to rest, and all that have been
laid in the graves. Some shall rise unto eternal
glory, rise to a full inheritance, rise to eternal happiness and
unspeakable joy, and some to eternal damnation. Oh, I can't
hardly stand to think about my unbelieving relatives that I
grew up with, brothers and sisters. They will arise one day unto
the resurrection of damnation. And in that day, God's saints
that have been raised to eternal glory will have such a knowledge
of Christ that they'll look on their loved ones as they're being
judged and they'll say, Amen, true and righteous are his judgments. And make no mistake about it,
he's talking about everybody in this place today. Now let
me read my text again. He that is our God is the God
of salvation, and unto God the Lord belong the issues of death. Issues from death, I'm sorry.
There are issues of death. What's that? Total depravity. That's an issue, isn't it? Boy,
if I'm totally depraved and there's no good in me, why do I keep
looking for the good? Huh? And being so sad because
I can't find it. I need to pray more. Sure you
do. Probably don't pray at all. I question myself. Have I ever
prayed? Huh? You ever really communicated
with God from your heart? The scripture said, By one man
sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed
upon all men, for that all have sinned. When Adam fell in the
garden, all his sons and daughters fell in him, were heirs of his
nature. His seed was in him, producing
more of the same. That's what God said. Paul writes
in Romans 8, 5, For they that are after the flesh, Natural
men, they that are after the flesh, mind the things of the
flesh. That's what they do. They do
what everybody else does. Well, Preacher, I just do like
everybody else. I have common goals just like
everybody else. That's your problem. They that
are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh. That's what
they do. They're just like everybody else. And they that are after
the Spirit, they mind the things of the Spirit. Four, to be carnally
minded. That is limited to a fallen mind,
a cursed nature. That's death. That's what this
death is. That's what we're talking about,
spiritual death. He has no well to draw from, no thirst for its
waters. And if he did, If he does drink
at all, he's drinking from a broken cistern that can hold no water. That's what the prophet said. Pour into him a full container of gospel water. It
just runs out. Goes in one ear and goes out
the other. In 1 Corinthians 2, Paul talks
about a revelation of God and His promises in Christ. preached
by men taught of God. But, verse 14, the natural man
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God. He's not going
to receive that. That's your opinion. That's what
he'll tell you. I disagree with you. So what? Who are you? Huh? Natural man receiveth not the
things of the Spirit of God. I don't want him to receive my
opinion. If that's all I have is my opinion, I don't have anything.
But if I have the word of God, now you're going to call God
a liar. Now you're going to spit on his gift. Give it to you and
throw it down. Oh, I love this little girl,
or thought I did. What do you call that, puppy
love? Oh, I thought I loved her. I
thought she loved me. And I'm just a young boy. And
I saved up my allowance and I went and bought her this sweatshirt
and gave it to her. And when I gave it to her, she
threw it down. And I said, you didn't like my
gift? She said, I don't like you. Huh? Ain't that what men and women
do to Christ? Here's the gift of my gospel. You didn't like it? Well, it
ain't so much that. I don't like you. That's what
you're saying. Spit on his gospel. He said,
you've done despite unto the Spirit of grace, and you've trodden
underfoot the Son of God. That's what you've done. I don't
like you. Oh, my soul. Natural man receiveth not the
things of the Spirit of God. Why? Their foolishness unto him.
Preacher Hughes keeps saying the same thing. It's foolishness. It is to you. And if it is foolishness
to you, what's that mean? Unto them that believe not, it's
foolishness. There are issues of death, ignorance,
depravity, rebellion, the carnal mind's enmity against God, its
hostility toward God. It won't take him at his word,
it won't rest in his promises, and it won't seek him for help.
None that understandeth, none that seeketh after God. All gone
astray, together become unprofitable. The issues of death are that
men and women are ruined, they're helpless, hopeless before God.
Can't do anything about it. But the man after God's own heart
is not here talking about issues of death, but issues from death. To God the Lord belong the issues
from death. And the issues, these issues from death cover
a full spectrum of salvation. What are these issues? Well,
the first issue I see here is whether or not God's willing
to save anybody. People have been telling me ever
since I was knee-high, God wants to save you. Does He? Where does
He say that? God wants to save everybody. Does He? Oh, show me that in
the Word of God. It ain't in there. He's the God of salvation. Salvation
begins and ends with God. And salvation is the purpose
behind creation. All things were made by our Redeemer. And they were created by Him,
the Scripture said, and for Him. And He's before all things, and
by Him all things have a continuance or consist. Well, how do I know that God
has purposed to save sinners? Several things. First of all,
He didn't destroy Adam when he sinned. That's the first thing. Here's the first man, God created
him and he's in. Why didn't God just burn the
whole outfit up? Destroy the earth, destroy the garden, get
rid of the whole outfit. I'll tell you why, because He
determined to save a people through His Son for the glory of His
name. That's the purpose behind creation.
They were created by Him and for Him. And salvation is the purpose
behind creation. He didn't destroy Adam. He didn't
destroy the earth. And He didn't stop them from
having children. Secondly, His Word of salvation. Genesis 3.15 tells us of a coming
Redeemer. Why would God promise a coming
Redeemer if He didn't intend to save somebody? He's the God of salvation. Salvation
is the reason behind the whole thing. The existence of the earth
a large population of people. There's no other reason for this
world to be maintained and preserved. In Romans 8, verse 19, Paul tells
us, "...for the earnest expectation of creation waiteth for the manifestation
of the sons of God." All the ice is going to melt
and the world is going to flood. I don't think so. I don't think
so. God may burn it up. He says he
will. But that's not going to be until
after the manifestation of the sons of God. All his sons and
daughters are going to be called. They're all going to be saved.
And then secondly, I know God's purpose to save sinners because
he plainly states it in his Word. Paul said to the Thessalonians,
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. Oh, that's to the way. Not necessarily. That's not what he said. He's
chosen you to salvation. All these means he put in place
to accomplish that end. But he chose a people to salvation. And then thirdly, I know God
has purposed to save sinners because he sent his son into
this world. God come into the flesh. No other
way for a virgin to have a son, is there? The Lord said to those who would
listen, I came down from heaven. Where'd you come from? Heaven. Why'd you come? Not to do my
own will, but the will of Him that sent me. And this is the
will of my Father which has sent me, that of all which He has
given me, I should lose nothing. Raise it up again the last day. And this is my Father's will,
which is sent me, that every one that seeth the Son, and believeth
on him, may have everlasting life. And I'll raise him up at
the last day. And here's another reason I know
God has purposed to save sinners, because He has and is saving
some. On the Mount of Transfiguration,
those two apostles saw two men from the Old Testament, Moses
and Elijah. Were they saved? Well, they were
on that mountain with Christ and talking to him about his
death. I'd say they were saved. When the Spirit carried John
to peer into heaven, listen to this, he saw a number that no
man could number. And everybody, all the angels
and everybody was looking at them, and they were all dressed
in white linen. Far as you could see, nothing
but a great multitude. You couldn't begin to number
them. And he said, Who are they? These are they that came up out
of great tribulation, washed their clothes in the blood of
the Lamb. Oh, my soul. These are Savior's
people standing in His presence. He said, I saw a number that
no man could number out of all nations, and kindreds, and peoples,
and tongues. And they all stood before the
Lamb, clothed in white robes, and cried with a loud voice,
Salvation to our God, who sitteth upon the throne and unto the
Lamb. And then fifthly, I know God's
purpose to save a people in Christ, because He raised up His crucified
Son. He was crucified. It's a matter
of history. He died. Even the Romans who
stood below the cross, they didn't break his bones. They said he's
already dead. There's no point to it. And they took him down and laid
him in a tomb. And on the third day, God raised him from the
dead, declaring our justification. And he sat up and took off those
linen clothes and folded them up and laid them down. He didn't
have no need of them. Somebody else can wear them.
I'm done. He laid them down. Took the napkin off his face,
that death napkin that they put on there. He took it off and
laid it in a separate place over away from the clothes. Got up
and walked out. How do I know that? Because he
appeared to more than 500 people at one time who knew him and
they all testified of him. All these men who wrote the New
Testament Scriptures, every one of them saw him and testified
of him. And Paul, as one called out at
times, saw him, saw him, heard him speak, knew who he was, preached
him. The sitting King of Glory was
sent forth. He sent forth ambassadors. Why
would he send preachers if he didn't intend to save somebody? God's purpose to save the people,
and I know how He's going to save them. Through the means
that He's ordained. It's never left up to the imagination
of His people how He's going to save sinners. He declares
it plainly in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, I think it's verse 25 or 22
or somewhere along in there. Please God through the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. That's how He's going
to do it. Will He save those I'm preaching
to? I don't know. I don't know. But all His elect
He's going to save. And He's going to do it through
preaching. And they're all going to hear. What are they going
to hear? The gospel I'm preaching to you. He's talking about God's purpose
to save and God's way of salvation. The God of salvation dictates
the terms. The second issue from death is
who does the saving? Huh? Oh, I remember the day, I remember
the place, I remember the experience. I feel so sorry for you. Paul writes to Timothy and he
says this, 2 Timothy 1.9, God has saved us. He did, yes. And then He called us. How did He do that? With a holy
calling. Nothing contrary to the character
God involved in. And it wasn't according to our
works, but according to His own purpose and grace which was given
us in Christ Jesus before the world began. And then Ephesians
1 gives us the details. The God and Father of our Lord
Jesus Christ has blessed us with all spiritual blessings and heavenly
places in Christ, according as He has chosen us in Him before
the foundation of the world, that we should be holy, without
blank, and before Him being loved. And all those who stand in Christ,
made one with Him, The love of God is secured for
them in His Son, and nothing can separate them from the love
of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Read the last few verses
in Romans chapter 8. And then he goes on in verse
6, saying, Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children
according to the good pleasure of His will, and to the praise
of the glory of His grace, wherein He made us accepted in the blood,
accepted in Christ. You see what he's saying? To
God the Lord, that's Christ. He's Lord, Lord of the dead,
Lord of the living. Nobody lives or dies but by His
Word, He's the Lord. You don't live to yourself, you
live to Him. I don't care if you're the biggest
sinner who ever lived, the biggest rebel, the biggest God-hater
that ever lived. He lives for the Lord. He's a vessel of dishonor and
God's going to show in him his power the same way he did in
Pharaoh. He'll show it in his justice
that day of damnation. To God the Lord belong the issues
from death. What issues? God's righteousness,
God's justice, God's wrath, God's love, God's mercy, God's grace,
God's will. Salvation not only of God, But
it's necessary to be in harmony with His character and name.
In Acts 4.12, He said, Neither is there salvation in any other.
There is none other name under heaven given among men whereby
we must be saved. If you're going to be saved,
it must be by this name. God requires a perfect righteousness,
unbroken obedience. Where does it say that? Galatians
3.10. Cursed is every man who continueth not in all things
written in the book of the law to do them. Not one mistake,
not one flaw, not one bad thought. And then listen to this, Romans
3.21. But now the righteousness of
God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and
the prophets, even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of,
or the faithfulness of Jesus Christ, unto all and upon all
them that believe, Jew or Gentile. There's no difference. Issues from death concerns God's
holiness and not man's ideas. Paul goes on in verse 24 and
says, being justified by His grace through the redemption
of the same Christ Jesus whom God set forth to be a propitiation
through faith That means this is the only way God can save
sinners. That's what propitiation, what
allows God to still be God and show mercy. And it's through faith in His
blood. His death is our substitute. And it's to declare His righteousness
for the remission of our sins. God has to be righteous in the
remission of our sins. You say, well, I think I'll save
this one. He goes over there and erases their sins. He has
to be righteous. Sin has to be paid for. Paul writes and says that Christ
is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believes. That
is the highest expectation of the law. It's loftiest goal. We pay the highest tribute to
God's law by receiving the righteous obedience of Christ as our righteousness. You cannot exalt the law any
higher than he did. And his death, how could his death atone for
all the sins of his people? Now, if you don't think that
price is high, then you explain to me why sinners suffer for
all eternity. It's a true suffering. It has
to be. The words of it make the hair
stand up on my neck. Eternal damnation. Oh, eternal
separation from God. Flame and flaming fire thrown
into the lake of fire. Literally, I don't know. But
even if it's just a type of it, what suffering must he be talking
about? A bottomless pit. You never hit bottom. You know,
you fall off a cliff and you start falling, but sooner or
later you're going to hit the bottom and it's over. There is
no bottom in hell. It's a bottomless pit. You fall
forever. He must satisfy God. That's what
the atonement is. A sacrifice that satisfies God
on all accounts. All accounts. Listen to this. I love this old
hymn. My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
Holy lean on Jesus' name. That's it. Now bear with me for
just a few more minutes and let's talk about the sinner and his
inability to do what God commands him to do. Listen to this. Turn with me
over to Psalm 40 and verse 2. This is a man after God's own
heart. This is a man that God saved from sin, and I don't have to have any
doubt about it. Here's what he had to say. He
brought me up, verse 2, Psalm 40. He brought me up also out
of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay. I helped build I-49
When you get down on the other side of Mansfield, there's a
strip of ground down through there that has what they call
gumbo clay. It's old black, slimy clay. And we'd have to take our boots
off about every 15 minutes, take a stick and get that stuff off,
because it'd just get bigger and bigger. Pretty soon you couldn't
walk, couldn't pick your feet up. Had to have a bucket of water
when we were digging, and you'd stick that shovel in the water
and then in the clay. And then sometimes it wouldn't
come off. That's what he's talking about here, miry clay. A clay
that just, you can't walk. It prevents a walk, you can't
walk in it. Oh, it wakes you down. And a
horrible pitch, couldn't get out of it. We're just kids playing
one time and we had this place, I really don't know if it was
a basement or what it was, but it was all walled up out of concrete
and it was a big pit. And we had one of the younger
boys with us, and we pushed him over in it and act like we was
going home. We was going to leave him up
there all night. And we just sat down over there and listened
to him. He couldn't get out. He'd run. He'd tried everything
trying to get out. He couldn't get out. That's what
David's talking about, a horrible pit. You think of the company down
in that pit, this world. Listen to how God describes it.
And he's in this pit. He calls it a horrible pit. And
he lifted me out. I couldn't get out. He raised
me out. How does a sinner get in Christ?
God puts him in Christ. Yeah, but he has to believe.
Yeah, but I'm going to tell you something about that faith. It's
not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. Huh? You believe. God don't believe
for you. But without His work in you,
you'll never believe. You'll have one of them, well,
I hope, I hope, I hope, like I hope it don't rain next Thursday.
Probably will. Hope God don't send me to hell.
He probably will, if that's all I hope you got. We're in a pit. We're in this
miry clay. And no way out of the pit. We're
helpless, hopeless before a holy God. And what's that mean? That means
we're shut up to His mercy and grace. We quit trying to invent
these ways to come to God. We're shut up to His mercy. I'll
have mercy and not sacrifice. This was a people trying to make
up some way to get to God. Trusting in their law and their
works and their traditions and all these things. And he said,
the whole need not a physician, but the sick. And you go learn
what this means. I'll have mercy and not sacrifice. I'm not come to call the righteous,
but sinners to repentance. He shuts us up to his mercy and
his grace. And boy, when he does, you'll
joy in it forever. You'll rejoice in it forever.
God shut me up to his grace. What does grace do? It opens
the fountain. It opens the treasure. Paul said a man who teaches men, he draws
from the treasure house. He takes God's treasure and shows
it to you. That's what grace does. Opens
your eyes to see the treasure. Puts in this clay pot something
worth looking at. Something worth considering.
Put this treasure, Paul said, in earthen vessels, that the
glory and the power of it may be of God and not us. Oh, that's
what it means. He raised us up out of a pit.
We couldn't get out of it. Couldn't climb out of it. Couldn't
jump out of it. Couldn't work out of it. Let me tell you something else.
He said he'd put my feet on a rock. What you do, he put you on solid
ground, he put you on Christ. On Christ a solid rock I stand. Everything else is shifting sand. Oh, but on Christ. And listen
to this, I love this word he uses here, goings. He established
my goings. We're just going about, going
about, going about, going about to establish our own righteousness,
going about to satisfy our flesh. We're just going about. But He
establishes our goings. Now I know where I'm going and
I know why. Now I'm excited about it, aren't
you? Oh, to be shut up to His grace
and mercy. May the Lord be pleased to do
it. All these issues from death, And God said, here, I'm going
to give them to my son, and he's going to take care of them. And
he did. He satisfied every issue. He's the wisdom of God. Isn't
that what it says? He's made unto us who believe
the wisdom of God. How can God save sinners? It's
all in His Son. All in His Son. May the Lord
reveal that to our hearts this morning for Christ's sake.