Our scripture reading this morning,
turn with me to Colossians chapter 1. Colossians chapter 1. We'll be coming back to this
chapter in just a few minutes. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the will of God, and Timotheus our brother, to the saints and
faithful brethren in Christ, which are at Colossae. Grace be unto you, and peace
from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks
to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always
for you since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of
the love which you have to all the saints. For the hope which
is laid up for you in heaven, whereof ye heard before in the
word of the truth of the gospel, which is come unto you as it
is in all the world, and bringeth forth fruit as it doth also in
you since the day you heard of it and knew the grace of God
in truth. You also learned of Epaphras,
our dear fellow servant, who is for you a faithful minister
of Christ, who also declared unto us your love in the Spirit. For this cause we also, since
the day we heard it, do not cease to pray for you, and to desire
that you might be filled with all the knowledge of his will,
in all wisdom and spiritual understanding, that you might walk worthy of
the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work,
and increasing in the knowledge of God. strengthened with all
might according to his glorious power, unto all patience and
long-suffering with joyfulness, giving thanks unto the Father
which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints in light, who hath delivered us from the power of
darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear
Son. in whom we have redemption through
his blood, even the forgiveness of sins, who is the image of
the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature. I invite you this morning to turn
back with me to Colossians chapter 1. My text will be in Colossians
1 verse 5. This is where I found my subject,
I hope, laid up for you. That's what Paul writes to these
people. These people he acknowledged
as blessed. that have received grace and
peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. He
recognized these people as saints of God and told them that he
prayed for them concerning a hope laid up for them. It is my business, somebody, you say something sometimes
from the pulpit And they'll see me and they'll say, well, that's
none of your business. Well, my business, my calling,
and my responsibility is to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ, the
Lord. That's my business. That's my
calling. That's what I'm here to do. And the Bible is full of examples
of men with whom I share this calling The greatest of these
being the Lord himself. Our Lord was a preacher. That's
what he says in the book of Luke. The Lord hath anointed me to
preach his gospel. And no preacher, I don't care
who he is, the Bible's full of examples of men, but no preacher
has any excuse to wander off into some new way of ministering
to sinners. I don't know where they get that
from. I honestly do not know. Why they think they have the
right to change everything up and to... I know what they're
trying to do. They're trying to please men
is what they're trying to do and not please God. But there's
whole books of the Bible dedicated to the preacher's instruction
called pastoral epistles, 1st and 2nd Timothy and Titus. And any man sent to God will
be taught of God, and he's going to learn not only by example
and instruction, but by revelation and experience. In Galatians
chapter 1, Paul said, When it pleased God, who separated me
from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, now listen,
to reveal His Son in me. in order that I might preach
him among the heathen. And he said, immediately I conferred
not with flesh and blood. That is, he didn't confer this
flesh for reasons, he had all the reasons he needed. He had
a revelation from God. The ministry is about ministering
to fallen, depraved sinners. Not about fixing your problems.
If you have a problem, it's your problem. Now I can tell you who
can fix it. I can point you to the remedy.
But that's not where my calling lies. The ministry is about ministering
to depraved sinners. Sinners who don't know they're
sinners. It's hard to minister to somebody who don't know he's
a sinner because my ministry is concerning sinners. Sinners
who are lost but convinced that they have direction. The ministry is about ministering
a hope to hopeless sinners. Paul said, you remember where
God found you. Without God, without hope in
the world. Hopeless sinner. Well, you say
everybody's a sinner. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. There's none righteous, the scripture
said. None good. No fear of God before
their eyes. Everybody's a sinner. But I'm
talking about a sinner who knows he's a sinner. I can't minister
to him until God convinces him of his sin. I have nothing for
him. The whole need not a physician.
That's what the Lord said. My friend, there's a God in heaven,
the true and living God. He's almighty. He's all-knowing. He's all-seeing. He's everywhere
present. You can't escape Him. In Him we live and move and have
our best. Of one blood made he all nations
of men, for to dwell on all the faces of the earth. Appointed all the means, he appointed
all the... He even set the bounds of their
habitation. And he's holy, he's righteous,
he's just, and every transgression, he said, shall receive a due
recompense of reward. Oh, what are you saying, preacher?
I'm telling you that men and women are in trouble, and they
don't know it. They're in trouble. They act
like they're not in trouble. They don't want to talk about
trouble. I'll be all right. I don't know
how many times I've heard that. I'll be all right. No, you won't.
No, you're not going to be all right. You're in trouble. But they don't know it. If left
to themselves, they'll perish. That's what the scriptures say.
They'll perish. If allowed to continue on the
road they're on, they'll wake one day to the judgment of God. Now that's reality. That's what
this book says. One man came and visited, and
when he got home, his son, invited him and said, well, what did
you think? And he said, well, just another gloom and doom message. Been hearing that message since
I was a little child. Now, my friend, I can't overemphasize
the gloom and doom awaiting this world. I can't do it. And yet
I must, in a few words, tell you what the problem is. This
world's judged. This world is under the wrath
of God. The words used in scripture ought
to make the hair stand up on our neck. A lake of fire. Think about it. I was watching
a documentary on volcanoes the other day. And they were in Hawaii
or somewhere, and they were looking down into this pit, and they
had fire suits on, and I don't know what all. The thing that
they were holding in their hand, they put it down in that lava
to measure temperature and it turned red while it was in their
hand. Can you imagine a lake of fire? Whosoever was not found written
in the book was cast into the lake of fire. It's called a bottomless
pit, forever falling, forever. A place from which no man shall
ever be delivered. A great gulf fixed. He calls it everlasting torment,
everlasting punishment. An eternal dwelling place with
fallen men and fallen angels. Blackness and darkness, he said,
forever. And we hear those words and nothing
happens. We don't even get cold chills
on our arms. It ought to make the hair stand up on your neck.
That's what's awaiting this world, judgment. Judgment and hell. And here's the real terror. There's
nothing you can do about it. Anything you can do about it.
I'm talking about you. The closest thing I can give
you is a picture of a prison. Man's nature is a prison cell.
It holds him in bondage. He's been walled in. He can still
eat and drink and come and go in this world, but he's held
in check by nature. And by that nature, he said,
he is a child of wrath, even as others. He that believeth not the Son,
he said, shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth
on him. Am I a believer? Well, if I'm
not, if I'm not, the wrath of God abideth That's what it says. All right, so why minister at
all? Why minister at all? If death
passed, then entered by one man, and death passed upon all men,
and all men are under the curse of God, why send a minister at
all? That's what my brother told me.
If I believed what you believe, I wouldn't preach. Well, I'll
tell you why. Because God has purposed out
of fallen humanity, out of cursed humanity, to save a people for
the glory of His name. That ought to be good news. God's
going to save somebody. Who are they? I don't know. I
don't know. But I know a few things about
it. I know a few things about it. God has purposed to save
a people for the glory of his name. It's not because of anything
he sees in them, but what he's purposed to do
himself. God has purposed to manifest
his glory and the salvation of a people through the person and
work of his Son, Jesus Christ. Paul said, God revealed his Son
in me. that I might preach him among
thee. There's a redemption accomplished. Already done. Already done. There's a people justified by
the resurrection of Jesus Christ who was He came to bear their sins in
His own body on the tree. How do I know God accepted Him?
He raised Him from the dead. There's a victorious Savior,
fully accepted, seated at the right hand of God. All His work
is accepted. All that God chose in Him are
accepted. When God raised him up, he raised
us up with him, the scripture said, and seated us with him
in heavenly places. There is a king right now seated
at the right hand of God, arranging all things and governing all
things for the good of his elect and for the glory of his Father. And from the beginning of creation,
God's been saving a people. He's been saving them. He saved
Adam. If God had not purposed to save
Adam, He'd have burnt this place to smithereens when Adam sinned.
But He didn't. And He came to Adam in the cool
of the day. And He spoke to him. Ministers aren't sent get you
to do something for God, but to tell you that God has done
something for a sinner. We're sinners. Hopeless, helpless
sinners. Paul said in Romans 1.1 that
he was called to be an apostle and that he was separated unto
the gospel of God. The gospel is good news that
God has purposed to save a people. That's what the gospel is. That's
the good news. And this glory God has trusted
to his son. There's a hope for helpless and
hopeless sinners. There's a savior for lost sinners,
and there's a reconciler for wavered sinners. Paul said this is a faithful
saint. Not many are, but this is a faithful saint. It's worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came into this world
to save sinners. Sinners. Not every sinner, but
sinners who know their sin. And this salvation is ministered
to men by preachers. I know nothing more resisted,
despised, and rejected by men in this day than this gospel
truth. God ministers this salvation
through preachers. Why? Why would he do such a thing? Why wouldn't he do it some other
way? Because He's going to show you His sovereignty. That's right. And I don't know of anything
that demonstrates God's sovereignty more than that. He'll shut you
up to a preacher. Listen to what the Scripture
says. For after that in the wisdom
of God, that is God who created all things, This world was made
by him and for him. After that, in the wisdom of
God, the world by wisdom knew not God. It pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. Boy, how men want to
argue with that. But you couldn't get plenty of
words in that, David, if you hung it on. I have a thesaurus.
I looked it up. You can't find a better group
of words than this to establish this truth. It pleased
God. Well, I don't like it. Well,
we ain't trying to find what you like. We're trying to find
what He likes. Because He doeth according to His will. It ain't
according to mine. It's according to His. We're to declare the minister's
job or calling, if you will, is to minister God's gospel without
compromising his purpose or the glory of his name. Now, I have
to do that. I'm not just set free. You just
go tell the good news any way you want to. No. No, that's not
how it is. I have to present this gospel,
this good news of the death of Christ. of the resurrection of
Christ, of His seeding and glory. I have to preach this to you
and not offend God, not get sideways with God's purpose, and not compromise
the glory of His name. We're to declare God's righteousness
for the remission of sins, that He might be just and justifier
of him that believeth In Colossians 1, 5 Paul addresses
the people he believed to be saints of God, and he tells them
in verse 5 that there was a hope laid up for them. He had good
reason to believe that there was a hope laid up for them in
heaven, whereof they heard before in the word of the truth of the
gospel. Now let me give you in the first
12 verses of this epistle four things that I know concerning
this hope. And my goal in this is to show
you a real hope for real sinners. You can find, man, they pass
out hope like candy in religion. You go in there and they'll give
you every reason in the world. One man told me, he said, I just
think if you go to church and spend an hour in their listing,
you ought to come out with some kind of hope. Not necessarily. You might come out there convicted
of your sin with no hope. That'd be a blessing. That'd
be a blessing. But there's four things concerning
this hope. And my goal in this is to show
a real hope for real city. The first thing I see in these
verses is the providence of God arranging the meeting. He arranges
the meeting. We don't know that, do we? I
didn't. I didn't. I, you know, I was
still, I suppose the word would be in
the flesh. I wasn't, I didn't know anything. I was raised in religion. I was
flipping and flopping around and seeing things in the scripture.
For the first time I'd been confronted with God's absolute, total sovereignty
over all things. Nobody could resist Him. Nobody
could question Him. He's God. He ruleth in the armies of heaven
among the inhabitants. None can stay His hand or even
question what He's doing. He's God. I was trying to deal with that.
I was trying to deal with election. I'd never heard about God going
to save a people and He ain't saving everybody. He never intended
to save everybody. He intends to save a people that
He chose in Christ before the world was. Oh, I never heard
of such a thing and yet there was. And I just looked at the
simple references in my Bible and I'd go over to that one and
that's what that one said. Went over to Romans 11. But there's
a remnant according to the election of grace. And if by grace, then
it's no more works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. Elect according to the full knowledge
of God. Elect, elect, elect. It was all
over the place. I've been sitting listening to
preachers preach for 18 years and never heard the word election
mentioned one time. Oh, and then I, one of my deacons,
I was pastor of the church, lost as a goose, trying to tell people
how to be saved. And one of my deacons said, you
know, what you're asking people for answers to and what you're
saying that you've learned in scripture, there's a man on every
Sunday morning primetime on television preaching those things. And I
said, you got to be crazy. Ain't nobody on primetime TV
preaching these things. Oh, yeah. Every Sunday morning. I stayed home to listen to it. And Brother Henry Mahan was on
there, and he was preaching on election that Sunday. And I thought, boy, I'm going
up to meet him. I went up that afternoon, took
my wife, my brother-in-law, my sister with me, and we went up
there and met him and stayed for the service that evening.
When we come home, I said, this is where I'm going. But when
I looked at it, it was like a fluke. It's like I stumbled into it,
you know. It's like Ruth. Her hat was to
light on the field of Boaz. Well, it was her hat, but it
wasn't God's hat. God purposed it before the world
was. You see what I'm saying? You're
here today by the providence of God. You may not understand
it, you may not believe it, you might not even agree with it,
but that's why you're here. How do I know that? Because nothing
happens outside the providence of God. Every saint that obtains an inheritance
is predestinated according to the purpose of him, now listen,
who worketh all things. after the counsel of his own
will. What's he work? Everything. What's
that in English? Everything. It's like that word
all. It means all. Everything. Do you mean he works in the weather? He works all things after the
counsel of his own will. I see in these verses the providence
of God arranging immediately. Somebody listened to Paul preach
on this subject one time, Brother Paul Mahan, and they said, Paul,
what you're preaching makes man out to be a puppet, and God's
pulling the string. And God gave him some wisdom,
and he said, well, it's better than the alternative. God being
the puppet and man pulling the strings. Huh? Oh, my soul. The truth is that to save a man
from sin, God must interact in the lives of men. After years
in the ministry, it's obvious to me that men and women left
to themselves have no interest in God's purpose. God's person,
God's gospel, or God's judgment. They had no interest whatsoever.
If there's going to be a salvation, God must intervene. How does
he do that? He interacts with men. Christ said, nobody's going to
come to me except my Father draw him. What's that mean? He interacts
in the lives of men. That's what that means. He intervenes.
And then secondly, I see in these verses the power and ministry
of the Holy Ghost. If you read Hebrews chapter 10
carefully, those who reject the ministry of the gospel are said
to do despite unto the Spirit of grace. As Paul received the testimony
concerning their faith, he began to thank God. Why would he do
that? Why didn't he thank them? Huh? Didn't they make their decision
to be saved? Didn't they turn their life around? No, God did. And Paul knew it. He thanked God. He thanked God for this. The
work of the Spirit is a work God does What's the word I'm hunting for?
He does it in conjunction with the preaching of the gospel. Paul told the Thessalonians,
he said, I know your election of God because our gospel came
not unto you in word only. It came in word. He preached
to them. His message was full of words.
But it didn't come in word only, it came in power, now listen,
and the Holy Ghost. The result of which was much
assurance. Not confidence in their confidence,
but assurance that the Christ he was preaching was sufficient
to save their soul. The ministry of the Holy Ghost
is set before us in John 16 and 3. Things. Three things. People talk about the Spirit
in tongues and evidences and raising the dead and all these
things. Well, when our Lord talked about the Spirit, He gave three
specific areas that the Spirit would work. You can read for
yourself over in John 6. The convincing of sin. There's a difference. between
agreeing with the doctrine of sin and being convinced of sin. What's the difference? I hold
myself a world of difference, like night and day. Like night
and day. The sinner who's convinced of
sin is desperate. Desperation fills his heart. He can't do anything for himself
and he knows He's guilty before God. God has shut his mouth. He's guilty before God. He can't
plead anything. He's shut up to God's mercy and
grace. He's convinced of sin. The second
thing is that the Spirit of God convinces us of righteousness.
If He ever convinces you of sin, He'll have to convince you of
righteousness, because you have no idea that anything you ever
did or ever could do would be righteous, and you'd be right.
But there is a righteousness. And that righteousness is the
righteousness of Christ. The Spirit of God convinces a
man of that. When he does, he walks humbly
before God, and he walks in the righteousness of Christ. And
the third thing is he convinces us of judgment. Not that there
will be a judgment, your conscience tells you that. Not that God
will be the judge, your conscience tells you that. What's he talking
about? He's talking about judgment satisfied. Judgment satisfied. God's justice
has been satisfied through the work of Christ. For you, it goes out in words
every week, the word of the truth of the gospel. The convincing
of these words is the work of the Spirit. And I tell you about
the sinner, but the Spirit convinces the sinner. I tell you about
the righteousness of Christ, but He convinces sinners of the
righteousness of Christ. And I can tell you about judgment,
but judgment satisfied is something the Holy Ghost Himself has to
convince you of. The power of the Spirit overtakes
the sinner. The scripture said he's willing
in the day of God's power. Willing to what? We need to question
these things, don't we? We read them in the scripture,
my people shall be willing, that's what it says on the Psalms. But
willing to what? Willing to hear. Well, that's your opinion. You
won't say that when the Spirit of God gets a hold of you. You'll be willing to hear. That
Ethiopian eunuch went down and listened to a bunch of words
and saw a bunch of symbols and types and he was partaker of
it, no doubt offered sacrifice, did everything he was told to
do, came away ignorant. God sent him a preacher. And
let me tell you something. That man was so frustrated sitting
in there reading the Word of God and couldn't understand it.
And the preacher said, hey, do you understand what you're reading? He said, how can I except some
man lead me, guide me? Oh, now he's willing to hear. He's willing to hear now. He's
willing to reason. You can't reason with a sinner.
until the Holy Spirit overtakes him. Now he's willing to reason. He's willing to receive the testimony
of God, willing to believe on Christ and repent of his sins.
He's willing to subject himself to the power and authority of
Christ. Christ becomes his Lord. The power of the Holy Ghost is
necessary for the salvation of sinners. It translates him from
the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God's dear Son.
Makes him meet. That's what I read to you out
of Colossians 1. Makes him meet to be partakers
with enlightened saints. We plant the seed in other waters
and God gives the increase. Alright, thirdly. Every chosen
sinner receives the gift of faith. Nobody's saved who don't believe.
I don't care what he did. I don't care how much he gave. I don't care how much he dedicated
his life. Not going to make any difference.
Every chosen sinner receives the gift of faith, and without
faith it is impossible, the scripture said, to please God. Faith manifests
our election of God. Listen to this, Galatians 3.26. Ye are all the children of God
by faith in Christ Jesus. Huh? You can't become a child
of God apart from faith. There's many ways that seem right
when you hear them, especially those that speak of gaining a
righteousness by a personal obedience to the law. But hear what Paul
says to a church who was troubled with that very thing, the Galatian
church. Here's what he says, "...but the Scripture hath concluded
all under sin. Now listen to this. That the
promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe. You were shut up to faith. That's
what he said. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to who? Everyone that believe in him.
It is of faith, Paul said, that it might be by grace. If it ain't
by faith, it's not a work of grace. It has to be by faith. It's of faith that it might be
by grace. To the end, the promise might
be sure to all to see. How is it sure to all to see?
God gives them the gift of faith. That's right. Every man, woman, and child for
whom Christ died will be drawn by the Father, taught by His
means, and come to a saving knowledge of Christ. And they'll come to Him. How
will they come? Broken. Broken and guilty. They'll come needy. They'll come
weary and heavy laden, trying to carry what they're not equipped
to carry. They'll come thirsty to the waters
and hungry to the bread and desperate to the Savior. Faith ain't the cure, but faith
is the hand that lays hold of it. And God gives that faith. What is faith? Well, Hebrews
11.1 said it's the substance of things hoped for and the evidence
of things not seen. Those who believe have no tangible
evidence to support their hope. Have you got it? I don't have
it. I have no tangible evidence whatsoever. Well, what's the
basis of your hope? I believe God. That's it. That's it. Faith believes God. It takes God at His word. God
promised salvation from the beginning and a coming redeemer. When Jesus
of Nazareth was born, he was acknowledged as the Christ. God
said, This day in the city of David is born unto you a Savior,
Christ the Lord. God said that this is his Son,
in whom he was well pleased. And God said, Jesus is the Christ. God said that he died in our
room instead. He took our place before the
holy bar of God and bore our sins in his own body on the tree.
And having pleased God, satisfied God's justice, he was raised
from the dead. Raised from the dead, declaring
our justification before God. God said when he raised up his
son, he raised all his elect up with him, seated them in heavenly
places and cried. And God said that his son's coming
back. And he's going to receive to
himself all the redeemed. that they might be with Him forever.
Now here's the thing. Do you believe God? Huh? Do you believe God? Faith takes God at His Word. And true saving faith, when a
man has it, when a man's convinced of the Spirit, when a man has
faith, has that gift, has obtained it, That faith always produces
works. It's going to bear fruit. The reason God does this in this
world is to justify his gift from all these others, from all
the pretense. His faith alone will produce
these works. True faith always, without any
exceptions, always produces repentance. Always. Well, I believe, but
I just... No. No, if you believe, repentance
is yours. It's constant. True saving faith bears fruit.
In Galatians 5, 6, he tells us that faith worketh by love. By a godly perception of God's
love for us, faith reacts in love. We love Him because He
first loved us. Believers are kind and tender-hearted,
forgiving one another. Faithful men and women are humble,
they're gracious, they're generous. And my friend, the Scripture
says, faith without works is dead. Being alone. I thought and thought and thought
of something to picture that. A picture's worth a thousand
words, isn't it? A tombstone. A tombstone has
the words, but it don't move. It don't work. It don't glow. It just marks the grave of the
dead. That's what it does, and that's
what faith without works does. It marks the place of the dead. Dead faith is the marker. Faith comes to them quickened
from the dead, born again. Lazarus couldn't walk, he couldn't
talk. He couldn't serve, he couldn't
love until God called him out of that town. Is that right? He was dead. So God's providence arranges
a meeting, and upon hearing, the Holy Ghost overtakes the
sinner, works in him both to will and to do of God's good
pleasure. As the result of this powerful
inward work of grace, the sinner receives the gift of faith. He
believes God. He keeps on believing God. These
all died in faith. And then lastly, Colossians 1.9,
he's filled with the knowledge of God's will. He's not, oh,
if I could just find God's will. He's filled with it. Filled with it. The reason we can't find the
will of God in these little matters is because we can't find the
will of God as it is. He's filled with the knowledge
of God's will and all wisdom. Now listen, and spiritual understanding. The law is not just the law, that
law is spiritual. that he might walk worthy of
the Lord unto all pleasing, being fruitful in every good work,
and increasing in the knowledge of God. He grows in grace and
knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Strengthened with all might according
to His glorious power, unto all patience and longsuffering with
joyfulness, giving thanks unto the Father, Here's what the believer
does. He gives thanks unto the Father,
which hath made him meet to be partaker of the inheritance of
the saints and light. And he has a hope. And it's laid
up in the person of Jesus Christ at the right hand of God. It's
secure. Christ, and thou shalt be saved. With him there's a hope, and
that hope's laid up in heaven where moth and rust can't get
to it, incorruptible. All right, thank you.