I invite you to turn with me
again to Philippians chapter 4. We'll be looking at verse 19. I want to talk to you this morning
about the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul begins
his epistle to the Philippians. with a statement concerning his
confidence toward the saints that a real and lasting work
had taken place in them. What's my confidence? As I look
around here this morning, what's my confidence that a real and
lasting work is going on in your life? What's my confidence? Well, Paul tells us in Philippians
1, 6, being confident of this very thing, that he which hath
begun a good work in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus
Christ. That's my confidence. When God
begins a work in you, what's he do? He brings his gospel and
power into your heart. He teaches you his gospel. He points you to his son. You
see His Son exalted. You see His Son sufficient. You
see His Son in all of His offices. All things given to Him for you. All the way back to Him as the
covenant surety. Cleared back before the world
was. He said, now this is my confidence.
God began a work. He's not going to begin and quit.
It's God's work. He's not going to begin this
work, Larry, and then say, well, he just ain't worth it. He wasn't
worth it when he started. That's not why he did it. And
what God begins, God finishes. Paul said, that's my confidence.
That's my confidence. In chapter 2, he tells the Philippians
how to walk a godly walk in this present evil world. which is
to have the mind of Christ. Let this mind be in you, which
was also in Christ Jesus, our Lord. Walk with the mind of Christ. He was and is God, but made himself
of no reputation. I was this, and then I become
this. No, you were nothing. and he
made you something. But let that mind be in you which
was in him. He was God. He was God. Above all, God. Think about it. Self-sufficient throughout eternity. Needing nothing. He was God,
but made himself of no reputation. He's the Lord of Glory, yet He
took upon Him the form of a servant. He ministered. That's what He
was doing before that lake of Gennesaret and out in that ship.
He was ministering. Ministering. He was a servant. He has right, the right of all
things, yet He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. Is it asking too much that we
who are but men humble ourselves? If the God of glory can humble
himself, would it be asking too much for us too? That we who have been shown such
love and mercy and grace be loving, merciful, and gracious. Is it
too much to ask that we who know him best and know his will and
purpose to be obedient to him? He was obedient in all things. Is it an unfair demand that we
who have been ministered to by God himself minister to those
who are like us? Who knows the sinner better than
another sinner? We know what it is. God has saved
us. He's called us with a holy call.
He called us out of this world. Who knows that but a man who's
been called? And then in chapter three, he
reminds them of what a great privilege it is to have this
saving knowledge of Christ. He said, what things were gained
to me, I counted loss for Christ. All those things that were gained
to me is counted at loss for Christ. His pedigree. Paul had a pedigree. He was of the tribe of Benjamin.
He was a Pharisee of the Pharisee. They were grooming him to be
the next Gamaliel. Tall. Tall of Tarsus. He counted all these things but
loss for Christ, His pedigree, His name, His reputation, His
position, His influence, and all of His relatives and friends.
Yea, doubtless, He said, and I count all things but loss for
the excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ my Lord, for
whom I've suffered the loss of all things, and do count them
but doom. that I may win Christ and be
found in him, not having my own righteousness, but his righteousness. He who is privileged with Christ
is truly privileged. Do you ever think about what
a privilege it is? I'm telling you, I've known a
lot of people over the years. And of all those that I was raised
with and known, there's only a handful that knew Christ. Only
a handful. Do I feel privileged? You better
believe it. I look around and I see thousands
upon thousands just on that broad road, just going down that broad
road like the floodwaters wash things into the sea. And I see
them, they're headed down that broad road that leads to destruction.
How come I ain't in it? How come I ain't on that rope?
The grace of God. Do I feel privileged? You bet
I do. Well, don't you miss all them
things? No, I count them things but dumb in the light of the
knowledge of Christ. What would it, our Lord said,
what would it, if you gained the whole world and lost your
soul, what would it be worth to you? You ain't gonna take
anything with you. What if you gained the whole
world? That's what every man at heart wants. I told my neighbor
one time, he was buying property like it was going out of style.
And I said, you're being a little greedy, ain't you? He said, no.
He said, I just want the land next to mine. That's what's at the heart of
every man. If he had this world, he'd want another one. If he
had two worlds, he'd want three. You can't satisfy the heart of
man until he sees Christ. Christ satisfies your hunger. He satisfies your need, your
want. All you gotta do is look around
and see the multitudes deceived, see the bulk of men and women
running after Satan, running after that spirit of Antichrist,
see your friends at school, your co-workers rejoicing in a false
hope. I went to my sister's funeral,
and I haven't seen my relatives in a long time. And I said there,
you want to know what a person really believes, go to a funeral
and just keep your mouth shut and listen. I listened to them
talking about where she was at and what she was doing and what
she was enjoying. Christ wasn't in it at all. Wasn't
in it at all. One of them asked me, she said, I'm planning on, what do they call that when you burn
the body? I'm sorry. Yeah. I'm planning
on being cremated. But if I'm cremated, she said,
Will that prevent the Lord from raising me from the dead in the
last day? And I said, nothing prevents
the Lord from the resurrection of his people. There were thousands
burned at the stake. It's not going to keep them from
raising the dead. But I said, I went back and looked
carefully in the scriptures, and I don't know of anybody in
there who's cremated, nobody. They took great care of that
body. They made plans for that body, and they put it into a
grave. Joseph gave order that his body
be taken out of Egypt. He didn't want to be left in Egypt. Just look around. See
the multitudes deceived. Deceived. And Paul thought about
that, and he said, oh, he said, that I might know him, that I
might know him, and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship
of his sufferings, that is, a partaker of his sufferings, being made
conformable unto his death, if by any means I might attain unto
the resurrection of the dead. Our citizenship, he said, is
in heaven. It's in heaven. We're fellow
citizens with the saints and of the household of God, and
our citizenship is in heaven, from whence also we look for
the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change these vile bodies
and fashion them like unto his glorious body, according to the
working whereby he's able to subdue all things unto himself. Oh, what a privilege it is to
be called of God, to be heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ. But with that calling comes a
great responsibility. We now bear his name. We're not
strangers and foreigners, we bear his name. When God took
Israel out of Egypt, they were his people. And he took them
out there. And why did he care what they
did? Because they were his people. And they had a great responsibility.
We bear his name. We stand in him and with him. And we're despised in this world.
We face a hostile crowd on every hand. And we live in a body of
sin. and lust and ungodly desires,
then you can't stop them. Age don't stop them. Geography don't stop them. Nothing
stops them. We live in a world that walks
according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit
that now worketh in the children of disobedience. We live among
them. We listen to them. We work with
them. We have to deal with them on
a daily basis. We're surrounded by it. contradicted
by. So what are you saying, preacher?
I'm saying that we're needy sinners. That's what I'm saying. We're
needy sinners. I have nothing to offer. I only
have need. The leper didn't come to Christ
and fall down on the ground. He wasn't even supposed to be
there. It was against the law for him to even be there. He
was shut up outside the camp. Nobody could even come close
to him. He had those rags and he had to tell them, stop, I'm
a leper, I'm unclean, I'm unclean. And he came and fell down at
Christ's feet. He didn't start telling Christ what he was gonna
do for him. He said, Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.
Nobody else, just you, just you. And the Lord said, I will. You mean it's that easy? It's
just that easy if you're omnipotent. If you're the all-sufficient
Savior, it's just that easy. I will be thou clean. We're needy sinners. Without
Him, we can do nothing. If left to ourselves, no matter
how strong-willed we are, we're gonna perish. We're gonna perish. Why? Because destruction and
misery is in our ways. That's why. No fear of God before
our eyes. But here's the good news. And
this is what I've been building up to. Philippians chapter four,
verse 19. But my God shall supply all your
need. Well, I'm nothing but need. I
know. But my God. shall supply all
your needs according to whatever he can find. That ain't what
that says. That says according to his riches
in glory. Oh, my soul. Is there a ceiling to that? Can
you measure his riches? John, at the end of his gospel,
said, if everything Christ did were written in a book, the world
couldn't contain the books. How rich is he? In him is eternal life. I and the Father are one, O my
soul. He can supply all your need according
to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus. Now let's look at some
of our needs that he supplies out of his riches in glory. The
first sense of the passage has to do with our physical and immediate
needs. Paul was talking about their
communicating to his needs. He went all the way back when
he was ministering in Thessalonica. And the people there, they liked
that little church I used to go to. They'd take up an offering
and had them little plastic change purses. And a guy would squeeze
that purse out, and he probably had 75 cents in there, and he'd
fish around that and get out a quarter or a nickel or something,
and he'd put it in an offering plate. That's how they gave.
And then he'd go out and get in his Buick and drive home. That's the way they worked, Thessalonica,
until they were taught better. But the Philippians sent offerings
to Paul. They understood that he had needs.
And that if he had to work, even making tents or doing whatever
he was doing, it was gonna be a hindrance to his preaching
and his study. And they sent to him once and
again. And he remembered. He didn't forget about it. He
mentions it right here in the scriptures. No church anywhere
took care of his needs, but the Philippians did. They did. And he wasn't even ministering
to them. We gotta have a place to live,
don't we? We worry about that sometimes. Gotta have a place
to live. We gotta have food. I have to
eat. Maybe not as much as I eat, but I have to eat. Gotta have
a job. You ain't gonna last long in
this world without a job. I have to have clothes to wear.
Somebody has to educate me. I wasn't born knowing all that
I need to know. I have to be taught. I got to have some means of transportation,
something to get me from here to there. Our needs are no different
from the needs of every man and woman born into this world. We
all have those same needs. The difference is that we know
who orders the providence that attends our lives, or I hope
we do. Paul said, and we know, who does? The believer. We know that all
things work together for good. Huh? For them that know him. to the called according to his
purpose. These things are all working together, like gears
and a clock. Bad things, good things, they're all working together.
He's attending everything that you need. That bread that you
ate yesterday morning, that came from him. Oh, I went down to
the store and bought that. Where'd they get it? Oh, these
people over here make it. There's a little manufacturing
company, and they make the bread. Where'd they get their stuff?
Where'd he get stuff to make that bread? Oh, it grew out in
the field. Where'd that come from, huh? Doesn't it say that God created
all those things in the beginning? Doesn't he say in his law that
all of these things were made for your benefit? That's why
there's wheat to feed you, feed his people. Yeah, but everybody
eats it, yeah. The rain falls on the just and
the unjust. It's already starting down in
New Orleans. His rain falls on the just and
the unjust. His plants feed the good and
the evil. But the difference is we know
who orders the providence of our lives, and we're thankful
for it. That's why we don't just pray
because, well, you have to pray, we'll go eat. No, we're giving
thanks. We're giving thanks to him who
provided it. The scripture says, sing unto
the Lord with thanksgiving. Sing praise upon the harp under
our God, who covereth the heaven with clouds, who prepareth rain
for the earth, who maketh grass to grow on the mountains, and
giveth the beast his food, and to the young ravens that cry,
he even feeds the ravens. I need to remember that next
time they get my fig tree. They're not a single thing that
we can eat, wear, drink, or use that's not given to us by God. My wife, bless her heart, she
told me one time, she said, you know, I can I can readily believe
that he's given us salvation, righteousness, all of those things. But she said, it's the little
things that I struggle with. Well, don't we all? Don't we
all? It's the little things, the everyday
things, things that you take for granted. What are you going
to eat tonight? I don't know. My pantry's full.
Now you got so much, you have to figure out what you're going
to eat. Huh? Listen to this. He that spared
not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him also freely give us all things? David said, I
was young, now I'm old. I've never seen God's seed forsaken. Never seen his people forsaken
or his seed begging bread. Never have. Why? Because God
feeds them. Even the old prophet down in
the cave, Feeling sorry for himself, he said, Lord, I'm the only one
left. Well, how come you're left? God
sent his raven down there, bred to feed him. Yeah. Even while he's being taken care
of by a bird down in a cave, now he thinks he's the only one.
Oh, he said, I've reserved 7,000 men. Haven't bowed the knee to
Baal. You ain't the only one. In our text here in Philippians
4.18, Paul said, but I have all and abound. I'm full, having
received a papyriditis, the things which were sin of you, an odor
of a sweet-smelling sacrifice, acceptable, well-pleasing to
God. I can't count all the times that
an unexpected bill Something breaks down. It hadn't been that long ago.
I'm telling you, my dryer quit, and then my washer quit. I got
a new dryer, and the washer quit. I got a new dryer, and the freezer
quit. And it did this for two months. But I can't count the times that
things have broken down or some unexpected bill come. Like Kathy
with her brain tumor, I had no insurance and no way to get any
insurance because she's already been diagnosed with cancer. But
lo and behold, some politician, he said, we need to have an insurance
policy for people who already have diseases. Oh, you mean you
really believe? You really believe? that God
worked in society to have that dish for your wife, you better
believe I do. You better believe. He said,
I've sacrificed nations for you. Nations are one of his elect. All our physical and immediate
needs, our God shall supply your need according to his riches
and glory. And then secondly, our God shall supply all your
spiritual needs. Long before ever the earth was
formed, our God took it upon himself to be our provider, our
provision. Nothing was left to chance, nothing
left to circumstance or any such thing. Rather in Christ, we also,
Paul said, have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according
to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the council.
of his own will. Every blessing for time and eternity
was given to us in Christ Jesus before the world began. Nothing's
going to come your way, not even in eternity, that's going to
separate us from Christ. Nothing. Things past, things
to come. Isn't that what he says there
in Romans 8 at the end of the chapter? Nothing's going to separate
you from the love of God which is in Christ. He secured us in
Christ by an eternal covenant of grace and appointed His Son
as the surety of the covenant. He said, here's my contract,
here's my covenant, here's my promise. But it's not dependent
on you. It's going to be dependent on
Him. Now you think about that. Oh, how many times? How many
times? I look at myself, I'm just a failure. I don't know
what else to say about it. My whole life speaks of it, especially
before I knew Christ. But it's not depended on me,
Walter, it's depended on Him. He's the surety. David, the last
words of David. Now this man knew God. He'd been
through some horrible things. His life was just filled with
failures and misconduct and ungodly things. It was. He planned the
murder of his best friend, committed adultery with his wife, did all
of these things. His hands were so bloody that
he couldn't be made the king of Israel. He had to be his son
Solomon. David come to die and he said,
although it be not so with my house, Yet God hath established
with me an everlasting covenant. Now listen to this, ordered in
all things and sure. And this is all my salvation,
all my desire. How could that covenant be ordered
in all things and sure? Because of the surety of Christ. He secured us in Christ by an
eternal covenant of grace and then appointed him as the surety.
But what about after creation, after the fall, after false religion
abounded in the earth? Nothing changed. Nothing changed. He said to his own, I am the
Lord, I change not. Therefore you sons of Jacob are
not consumed. Nothing changed, the Redeemer
shall come. That which was promised of God
shall come to pass. Actually, creation wasn't destroyed
by the fall because his elect have not yet been called. And who the Lord said is I shall
call and shall declare it and set it in order before me. since
I appointed the ancient people and the things that are coming
and shall come. Let them show that to you. These
people I've appointed, let them show that to you. Everything
that I said and everything I fulfilled. The creation, Paul said, was
made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who subjected
the same in hope. It was an act of God. Because
creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of
corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. What about creation? You fly
all year, Nate, in creation. Everybody's running around today,
the Earth's gonna flood, the ice caps gonna melt, the Earth's
gonna flood. The Earth ain't gonna flood.
God put a bow in the sky as a guarantee of it. I'll never again destroy
the earth with a flood. It's not gonna happen. What you gonna do with it? You're
gonna burn it up. Gonna burn it up. Oh, but what about the Redeemer?
When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth his
Son, made of a woman. made under the law, to redeem
them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption
of children. And because you're sons, God
has sent forth the spirit of his son into your heart, crying,
Abba, Abba. In Ephesians 1.5, he tells us,
having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus
Christ himself, according to the good pleasure of his will.
And so it was when that time came, he came and he brought
that adoption to pass by his own person and work. One time,
he said, in the end of the world, hath he appeared to put away
sin by the sacrifice of himself. Oh, but what about the poor sinner?
What about him? Galatians 4.6 says, because your
sons, God sent forth the spirit of his son into your heart. God has from the beginning chosen
you to salvation. And I don't care whose they are or what kind of
condition they're in, God will arrange his providence for the
crossing of their paths with his ambassadors. How should you hear without a
preacher? How he gonna preach? He don't know where to go. Phillip
was down here and he thought this was where it'd be, there
was a big revival going on down here. God said, no, you're going
out here to the desert. The desert? Going out here in
the desert. Just go. Okay. Went out there and here's a big
caravan. Now he's looking at this big caravan. God's gonna
save somebody, wonder who it is. And he looks up there and
here's this guy, old Gentile, reading a book. He said, hey,
you understand what you're reading? How can I unless some man tell
me what it says? He said, it's good old, good
old. How should they preach except
they be sent? Were ministers, Paul said, by
whom you believed even as the Lord gave to every man. And it
is the knowledge of this and the sure promise of God that
they shall hear that inspires us to preach His glorious gospel
to men. He has an elect people. I don't
know who they are. I don't know where they are.
I just know that it's so. And I know the means. I know
the means. I know His gospel. And so I preach. I preach when I see things happen,
and I preach when I don't see things happen. I preach when
the place is full, and I preach when the place is empty. I don't
know what else to do. This is his means, this is what
he's gonna bless. My sheep hear my voice and I
know them and they follow me and I give unto them eternal
life. But you say, what about this cursed nature we're born
with? A mind that's enmity against
God. A heart deceitful above all things
and desperately wicked. A nature that leaves me walking
after the course of this world. The world hateth me, Christ said. The world walks according to
the prince of the power of the air. Of the world, of the world. Any man love the world, the love
of the Father's not in him. They are of the world, John said,
therefore the world heareth them. A nature that renders all our
righteousnesses to be filthy rags, taints every good thing
that we do. No fear of God, none that understandeth,
none that seeketh after God. What about that cursed nature?
Paul said, oh, wretched man that I am. Now he'd been on his way
for a while when he said this, Russell. He didn't say this when
he was first converted. This was way on down the line.
And now he says, he cries out to God, oh, wretched man that
I am. Who shall deliver me from the
body of this death? This curse of nature. Oh, I thank God through Jesus
Christ, our Lord. And from his lofty throne and
glory, he reminds me of these words. All powers given unto
me in heaven and earth. Now you go preach. You go preach. He said, my word shall not return
unto me void, but shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall
prosper in the thing whereunto I send it. The Holy Ghost comes with the
gospel of God and enables dead sinners to live. Listen to what Paul said. He
said, I have begotten you through the gospel. Man, what a statement. What a
statement. There's no bowing, no repenting,
no believing apart from the powerful working of the Holy Ghost. I
know your election of God, Paul said. My gospel came not in word
only, but it came in the Holy Ghost. and power and with much
assurance. Turn with me to 1 Thessalonians
chapter two. I'm talking about God's irresistible
calling. We're needy sinners. We need
to be called with an irresistible calling. Anything I can talk
you into, another preacher can talk you out of. But if God convinces
you of it, nobody's gonna take it from you. I'm talking about God's irresistible
calling, whom he did predestinate, then he also called. And whom
he called, he did also glorify. He didn't lose any of them. Now
listen to this, 1 Thessalonians chapter two and verse 13. This is after he talked about
their election and his knowing their election. Now listen to
what he says. For this cause also thank we
God without ceasing, because when you receive the word of
God which you heard of us, you received it not as the word of
men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually,
ooh, what a word, which effectually worketh also in you that believe. It works. It don't go out void,
it works. It works. What didn't work in
me, well, you might not be one of his. But it works in his,
because that's where he sent it. To as many as received him,
to them gave he power to become the sons of God. Even to them that believe on
his name, born of the Spirit of God. What about the rest of my life? What about from here on out?
We've already talked about up to here, but what about from
here on out? Seeing in me and around me temptations,
trials, persecution, problems, We're his house, he said, if
we hold fast the confidence and rejoicing of the hope permanent
to the end. Reconcile, if you continue in
the faith, grounded and settled, be not moved away from the hope
of the gospel. He said in Hebrews 10, the just
shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall
have no pleasure in him. What about from here to the grave? Listen to this. We're not of
them which draw back to perdition. We're of them who believe to
the saving of the soul. We're not gonna draw back. He
ain't gonna let you. He ain't gonna let you. We've been begotten again to
a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead
to an inheritance incorruptible that fadeth not away, reserved
in heaven for you, now listen, who are kept by the power of
God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last
day. What's gonna get me from here
to the grave, Larry? What's gonna, what kind of guarantee,
what kind of assurance do I have that I can get from here to the
grave? The same power that saved me
will take me to the grave. My hope is in Christ. Before
conversion, at conversion, after conversion. I know we're filled with questions
and doubts and fears. Too many whatabouts, too many
what ifs. but my God shall supply all your
spiritual needs according to his riches and glory by Christ
Jesus. There was an old run-down orphanage
I read about sometime in the past. Old, dilapidated orphanage. Had a leaky roof, broken windows.
Right in the middle of the most dangerous neighborhood and town.
enemies and predators all around. And the old building was full
of children, children that nobody wanted. Their parents had died, some
had abused them, some were born out of whoredoms and left on
the doorstep of the orphanage. Condition was the same for all
who lived there. They all ate what was set before
them. They slept where they were told
to sleep, given whatever spiritual guidance the state recommended.
They all appeared the same, dirty faced, dressed in rags, most
of them with no shoes on their feet. And the future was bleak
at best. They were shut up altogether
to mercy. They were shut up altogether
to charity, shut up to whatever God was pleased to give them.
And then one day the heir of a rich man showed up. He announced that he was there
on the father's request. My father sent me. You see, his father owned the
orphanage. He made provision for quite a
few of the children in that place. When the time was come, he sent
his son to the orphanage to adopt some children. The names of all the children
he came to adopt, they were all written in a book. And the son
carried the book. He was given charge of it, Russell.
And he'd open that book. There's a little boy here named
Sandy. There's Sandy. You come with me. There's another little fellow
over there named Jesse. Come with me. Come with me. And they're just looking at each
other. He went to that assembly, and
he said, follow me. And they did. And all of a sudden,
they followed him. And they came out, and the biggest
limousine they'd ever seen in their life rolled up in front
of that orphanage. And a fellow got out and opened the door.
They said, come on in. Us? Come on in. Your father sent
this. for you. He sent this for you. And they climbed in that limousine. And they drove for a little while.
Eventually, they came to this huge mansion. And when they got
out, they heard this deep voice say, welcome home. Welcome home. And they all said, What shall we call him? We don't
know him. What shall we call him? He says,
Abba, Father. This is your father. This is
your father's house. I've come here and made a place
for you. My father instructed me to do that. I made a place
for you. Now come on in. Inherit that. which was prepared
for you before the foundation of the world. Abba, my God, Paul
said, shall supply all your needs according to his riches in glory.