Well, come with me then to Isaiah
chapter 48. Isaiah chapter 48. You know,
to know the one true God is a very personal thing. It really is. I cannot know God for you, nobody
else can know God for you. It's a very personal thing to
know the one true God. And knowing the one true God
is not the same as knowing about the one true God. The true faith
of God's elect is not just a matter of objective facts. Yes, the
facts of the truth of the gospel of grace are objective and true,
but it isn't objective facts alone, but it is inner experience. It's inner experience. It's an
intimate interaction in your heart. It's a heart thing. God
has a people chosen out of all humanity. God in this world,
down all ages, has a people that are his own peculiar people. I know the world thinks that
believers are peculiar people because we're odd, but we're
peculiar in the sense that were picked out and separated by the
sovereign will and grace of God. God has a people that he calls
his own peculiar people, chosen out of the whole of humanity
that has no thought for the things of God, or the truth of God,
or the righteousness of God, but he has a people. And the
Scriptures When you read in the Scriptures, we and us, especially
in the New Testament epistles, we, he has done this for us,
and we this, we... The we and us, that's from the
perspective of the peculiar people of God, of the people of God
who are the objects of God's grace. God has a people in this
world by sovereign grace. He has a people with whom, he
says, he will have a very special relationship. A relationship
that he... God is the God of the whole world.
God is the God of everybody without exception, whether they accept
it or not. And the day will come, as the
scripture tells us, when every knee shall bow and acknowledge
that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
But, Here and now, at any time in history, God has a people
of whom he says many, many, many times in Scripture, at least
ten. Look throughout Jeremiah and
Ezekiel and Zechariah. Again and again, God says this
of these people. Of these people that God has
chosen to be his own peculiar people, he says, I will be their
God. They shall be my people. That's it. That's it. You know,
heaven, where we're headed, if you're a true believer, we have
the promise of heaven and of eternal life. And the absolute
climax of Scripture is the fulfillment of the promises of God concerning
His kingdom in Revelation 21 and 22. And there we see the
whole thing perfectly and without any challenge and without any
opposition established that there is God. in intimate fellowship
with his people. In this world, constantly, the
things of this world get in the way. The things of the flesh
get in the way. We have moments of sweet communion
with the living God, and then the things of the flesh get in
the way. blur our sight and cause us not
to hear clearly and get in the way of the truth of God. But
there we have this vision of absolute perfection and uninterrupted
communion. I will be their God and they
shall be my people. Now do you know that? Do you believe that? Do you assent
to it in your mind. You say, yes, yes, I agree with
that. I agree that God has a people. A people in this world, chosen
in Christ, taken out from the rest of humanity to be the people
of God. Do you assent to that? Well,
that's good. That's good, but it's no assurance
that you are among those people. No assurance at all. You think
about it, there are people who have known that very clearly.
There are people who have preached it and yet we know that they're
not among the people of God. Think back to the time of the
children of Israel wandering in the wilderness around Numbers
21, 22, 23 and there was a false prophet called Balaam. who the king of Moab tried to
get to curse, bring down the curse of God upon this people
Israel. And Balaam in the process could
do nothing other than speak the words God had given him. His
oracle was that God has a people that is blessed above all others
and I can do nothing about it. Balaam knew that God had a people,
but Balaam was not among them. He was never among them. He died
under the curse. There was a man in the time of
David, a man called Ahithophel. You'll read about him in 2 Samuel,
about chapters 16, 17, several chapters around there. And he
was David's counselor for quite some time. And no doubt David,
the sweet psalmist of Israel who wrote such gospel truth,
who wrote so sweetly of the grace of God in salvation, no doubt
Ahithophel and David spent many, many hours in sweet discussion
of the things of the grace of God and the particular blessings
of God upon his people, and yet, Ahithophel we read, he lived
and died under God's wrath. For he went in the end, having
betrayed David, he went and hanged himself. Think of Judas Iscariot,
one of the twelve. Have I not chosen you twelve,
said Jesus, and one of you is a devil? Judas knew the doctrine
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Judas heard the preaching of
Jesus on the kingdom of God. He was sent out with the other
disciples to preach the kingdom of God. He sent them out, two
by two, preaching the kingdom of God. Go and preach what I've
taught you. And they went out. And the one
who went out with Judas, he didn't come back and say, Master, this
fellow's not teaching the right thing. Oh, Judas preached the
truth. They couldn't tell, could they?
Right up to the last supper, not one of them could tell that
Judas was not one of them in spirit and in truth. He wasn't
among them, yet he knew all the correct doctrine. You see, we
affirm, I've stated this, I think Don Forton said it a few months
ago, and I've stated it several times since, we affirm that the
only true assurance of faith is faith itself. The only thing
really that is proof to you that you are amongst God's people
is that you have faith, you believe the gospel, but there's counterfeit
faith. How do we know that our faith
is true faith, by which I mean what Titus 1 verse 1 calls the
faith of God's elect, saving faith, saving faith. How do we
know that the faith we have is that true saving faith of God's
elect? You see, the Word of God speaks
to us and the Spirit of God applies that Word within us. Listen to
some of these things. If I turn back to Isaiah chapter
41 and read verse 10, the Word of God speaks to us and the Spirit
of God applies that. Am I amongst this people which
is the people of God truly, saved from my sins and destined for
eternity? Ask yourself. in your inner being,
have you heard God say this to you? Have you heard God say this
to you, what he says in verse 10 of Isaiah 41? Fear thou not,
don't be afraid. When if you know the truth of
God, everything should tell you to be terrified. But don't be
afraid, what? For I am with you. Be not dismayed,
for I am thy God. God is your God. The one who
rules over everything is your God. I will strengthen you where
you have no strength. In your weakness my strength
will be made perfect. Yea, I will help thee. I will
uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. I need righteousness
to be right with God. God himself promises he will
uphold you with the right hand of his righteousness. Have you
heard that? Have you heard him saying that to you in your soul,
in your inner being? Has he said that to you in your
soul? Have you heard his word speak to you and his spirit apply
it and you know that the Spirit of God is telling you, you are
my child. You are the child of God. Have you heard him, as he
says in Jeremiah 31 and verse 3, when amongst all of humanity
that thinks it gets right with God, it's God by what it does.
And the true God says to you, I have loved you with an everlasting
love. What not since I thought I loved
you? No, everlastingly. God says to his true people,
I have loved you with an everlasting love. Has he said that to you?
Have you heard it? Is it something that your heart
has grasped hold of and embraced and loved the fact that the God
of the universe has said, that from before the beginning of
time, before there ever was a world and this universe and this space-time
creation, that He loved you with an everlasting love that cannot
fail. Romans 8 verse 16 tells us this,
that if we are amongst that number, which is God's people, it says
the Spirit itself, the Spirit of God, bears witness with our
spirit, convinces our spirit, teaches our spirit, speaks to
our spirit. What does it speak? That we are
the children of God. That we are the children of God.
That's what it says to us. It gives us an assurance inside
that we are the children of God. And here, in verse 17 of chapter
48, we see it again. Thus saith the Lord. Look how
personal it is. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer,
your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. I am the Lord thy God,
your God, which teaches you to profit and leads you by the way
you should go. God not only speaks to us, but
he also gives us two clear results of Him being ours and us being
His. I will be their God and they
shall be my people. And He doesn't leave us to wander
on our own. He teaches His people in the
way that they will profit and leads them in the way that they
should go. So let's look at this in the
context of this chapter. I want to underline again the
voice of God speaking. Have you heard the voice of God
speaking? Do you hear the voice? I'm not
talking about something spooky. I'm not talking about charismatic
gifts or other such nonsense. I'm talking about truly the Spirit
of God taking the Word of God and applying it to you in a very
personal, real way. Just like, you know, it says
of Moses, Moses spoke with God as a man speaks with his friend
face to face. Does God speak with you and you
with God? People all around us, they say,
I can't hear God speaking. You know, the most intellectual
of them. the great gurus of the philosophy of our day. No, I
can't hear God speaking, there's no God. It's a God myth, it's
just rubbish, no. Believe me, there's no such thing
as God. There probably isn't a God, so don't worry, go and
enjoy yourself, have a good time. I can't hear God speaking. Do
you know why they say that? The Bible tells us. It's because
they're spiritually deaf. Because their ears are blocked
up. They don't hear the sound that is plainly there. There
is a sound, plainly there. Look outside. I know I often
refer to the garden outside, but there it is in its summer
beauty and the flowers. Look outside. Is that not the
sound of God speaking, in a way, to all mankind? Listen, Romans
10 verse 18, their sound went unto all the earth. Quoting Psalm
19 and verse 4, the sound of creation, the sound that God
has made this world. It went out to all the earth.
Surely, it says in Romans, they're without excuse because what is
plainly there to see is visible to everybody. They just stick
their fingers in their ears and put their hands over their eyes
and don't want to know about it. But God speaks in creation. But when he speaks, we need spiritual
discernment to hear it. You know what 1 Corinthians 2.14
says, the natural man, the man in his natural state, with his
own natural abilities and senses, natural man does not receive
the things of the Spirit of God. The foolishness to him, neither
can he know them. Why can't he know them? Because
they are spiritually discerned, and he does not have spiritual
discernment naturally. For spiritual discernment is
the gift of God. It's the gift of God. Open my
eyes. Lord, open my eyes. Speak to
me. Give me the faith of God's elect. You see, faith is not something
that we work up in ourselves. It's not something that you can
study at college. It's not something that you can
pass an exam on. It's not something that you can
get a certificate for. It's a gift of God. By grace
are you saved. by the grace of God, by the gift
of God, by the sovereign choice of God, by the doing and dying
of the Lord Jesus Christ entirely, without any contribution from
the sinner whatsoever. By grace are you saved, but how
do you know it and perceive it? Through the gift of faith. And
where do you get the gift of faith from? Not from yourselves,
it is the gift of God. God calls to his people to listen. God summons his people to listen. Look back at verse 12 in this
chapter 48. God says, hearken unto me, O
Jacob and Israel. Look who he's speaking to. He's
not speaking to the world in general without exception. He's
speaking to Jacob and Israel. Oh, so it's not us because we're
Gentiles. No, I told you last week. Go back and listen to that
again if you need to. the Israel of God, and we can
take, we have absolute warrant to take Jacob and Israel in the
Old Testament Scriptures referring to Zion, the church of the living
God. That thing of which, you know,
the hymn says, glorious things of thee are spoken, Zion, city
of our God. Hearken unto me, my people, the
people who have God for their God. You know, He is their God,
they are His people. These people, this is Jacob and
Israel, and God says, listen to Me, My called ones. How did you get to be His people?
Well, in sovereign election before time, but how did you come to
know it? In time, you heard His call. You heard the irresistible
call of the Holy Spirit of God. Hearken unto Me, O Jacob and
Israel, My called. I am He. I am the first, I am
also the last. This is God, in the trinity of
his person, speaking to his people. The cause and the end of all
things. Listen to me. Look at verse 15. He says, this is God, again,
speaking, I, even I, who's speaking? God is speaking, listen, I, even
I have spoken. Yea, I have called him, I have
brought him, and he shall make his way prosperous. There's a
reference there to Cyrus, because it's all in the days of the Babylonian
captivity, and how's that going to be brought to an end? By Cyrus,
you have to go back to the earlier chapters, as we saw, to see about
Cyrus, but Cyrus here, Although historically this applies to
Cyrus, is it not clearly speaking of Christ who would come, who
is called to come and be the saviour of his people, to accomplish
the purposes of God? I have spoken and I have called,
and then look in the next verse. where we see the Trinity of the
Godhead speaking by His Son who is the Word to His people. Come
ye near unto Me. Who is He speaking to? He's speaking
to Jacob and to Israel, the people of God, the Church of God called
by His name. Come ye near unto Me, hear ye
this. He says, I haven't spoken in
secret from the beginning. It's not been hidden and kept
hidden. From the time that was, there
am I. Who's speaking there? Is this
not the Word? Who is the second person of the
Trinity? The Lord Jesus Christ. He is the one who was there in
the beginning. And now the Lord God, God the
Father, and His Spirit, God the Holy Spirit, has sent me. The
Son is sent by the Father and the Spirit to accomplish the
purpose of God in His triunity of persons. And He says, come
near and hear this. Christ is coming, and Christ
is speaking, and we're going to see what He says in a moment.
But He comes, and we know He comes bringing a message of peace. Why did Christ come to bring
a message of peace? He came to bring a message of
peace in a situation which demanded nothing other than wrath, for
it's a situation of sin. In Zechariah chapter 9 and verse
9, the next to the last book of the Old Testament, just let
me read this. Rejoice greatly, O daughter of Zion. Church of
God. Shout, O daughter of Jerusalem.
Behold, thy King cometh unto thee. He is just and having salvation. lowly and riding upon an ass
and upon a colt the foal of an ass of course that was literally
fulfilled the week before he was crucified when he rode into
jerusalem on an ass the foal of an ass and it says and i will
cut off the chariot from ephraim and the horse from jerusalem
and the battle bow shall be cut off why because this king who
is coming This One who is coming, this Messiah who is coming, He
shall speak peace unto the heathen. He comes, the Lord Jesus Christ,
speaking a message of peace because in what He came to do, He accomplishes
peace. He accomplishes just peace with
God for those who by nature are the heathen. He does that. What
does he say to his people? Look in the next verse. This
will be our focus for the rest of our time. Thus saith the Lord,
thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel. I am the Lord thy God. I am the Lord thy God. Do you
know many, many people have a God in this world. There are many,
many gods, are there not? There's religion everywhere in
every culture and every society. Even the religion that says there's
no God is in truth a religion. There are many, many gods. and
they're all idols except one, the one true God. The idols might
literally be statues, might be dummies, might be figures, might
be pictures, might be whatever else, but mostly they're idols
in the minds of people. And many of them are very good
lookalikes. Have you been to Madame Tussauds
on Euston Road in London? And you go around the waxworks
there, and it's as if, it's almost as if, I mean, you see people
who go up to wax dummies because they think they look so lifelike.
They go up to them and ask them, where is such and such a thing?
And then they discover, oh, it's just a wax dummy. You know, there's
wax dummies of famous people and all sorts of others around.
And there's such good likenesses of reality but you soon discover
that they're lifeless. They're wax dummies. And the
gods of the people are wax dummy gods. God's Word again and again,
especially in Isaiah, tells us about the wax dummy gods, the
idols, the carvings, the manufacturer of the fallen minds of people,
that people worship in futility because they can do nothing,
they're dead. Some of these have got such an appearance of the
true God. Especially in our day, that which
sounds so much like the true Gospel of Scripture, but when
you get down to it, it's false. Because in every case, it puts
something in the hands of the sinner to make a contribution
to his salvation. And that's a false God, because
the true God of Scripture doesn't say anything of the sort. The
one true God speaks to his people of salvation from sin. Thus saith
the Lord thy Redeemer, the one who pays the debt, the one who
pays the sin debt of his people, thy Redeemer. He teaches of God's
wisdom. and of purposeful guidance in
this life. Have you heard his voice speaking
to you? Have you heard his voice calling
you? Harken unto me, O Jacob and Israel, my called. Has he
called you? Has he taught you? How blessed
to know that the God of the universe is your God and you are his child,
the supreme ruler of the universe. You know when you work in government
circles, you know, politicians and politics is in such turmoil
at the moment. But nevertheless, I spent some
years working very closely with senior ministers in the British
government in the 1990s, very, very close to the Secretary of
State for Defence. I used to even have weekly meetings
in his office on a Friday afternoon when he'd gone back to his constituency
with the team that I had around me there. And there is a real
buzz to it because you feel you're in the corridors of power. There
was a social gathering one Christmas and I was invited along to this
and speaking to Lord such and such a person and talking to
the private secretary of John Major when he was Prime Minister. You get a real buzz that you're
in the corridors of power, that you're where things get done,
where things happen. I know that's a very, very poor
illustration, but how much more? We who are just the people of
God, if we know the living God to be our God, He is our God. He is the sovereign of the universe.
He is the supreme ruler. He's the Holy One of Israel,
and of Israel alone. And if I am numbered among Israel,
and remember, Israel is the church of God in these days, I am in
God's particular favor. I'm on his particular favor.
I'm in on his secret. He teaches me to profit. I'm
in on his secret. I'm in on the mystery of the
gospel that mankind in general doesn't know because of spiritual
blindness and deafness. I'm counted among the friends
of Christ. Do you know what Jesus said to
his disciples in John 15 and verse 15? He said to his disciples,
he said, And this is God in flesh, says to his disciples, he says,
I have called you friends. Why? Why? What's the mark of
friends? Have you, you know, we hear the expression nodding
no friends, but have you got any friends? Well, I'll tell
you, if you've got real, true friends, you share your secrets
with your friends. That's the mark of true friendship.
True friends share their secrets. How do I know that the Lord Jesus
Christ is my friend? He says, all things that I have
heard of my Father, I have made known unto you. The secrets of
the gospel of His grace, He has shared them with His friends.
Those secrets, the mystery of the gospel of grace. That He
is the Redeemer of His people. Thy Redeemer, the Holy One of
Israel, the Redeemer, what does the Redeemer do? The Redeemer
pays the price to release the object. If you go to the shop
where they lend you money against goods and you want to redeem
the goods against which you've borrowed, you have to go with
the price to pay. You are the Redeemer. You go
and redeem the item and buy it back out of that bondage in which
you voluntarily put it. He is the payer of the ransom
price for the liberty of His people, for His people are in
bondage to sin. His people think they're free
in their natural state, but they're not. They're in bondage to sin,
and they're on death row, as it were. They're condemned in
their flesh, as it were, awaiting that judgment day when the books
will be opened. But here comes the Redeemer with
the redemption price. And what is the redemption price?
It is His precious blood. For He, as the substitute of
His people, bearing the sin of His people, has paid the sin
debt to the justice of God. And the justice of God is satisfied. And the justice of God says,
no more to pay. That's it. Enough. It's finished.
The debt is cleared. There is no more to pay. The
justice of God is satisfied. And therefore, what's the result? Liberty. You know people that
have been taken captive and a ransom is paid and the exchange takes
place. The ransom is paid and the person
goes free. Liberty. What's the liberty of
the people of God that he has redeemed them for? Romans 8 verse
1, there is therefore now no condemnation for those who are
in Christ Jesus who walk not according to the flesh but according
to the Spirit. Do you know anything of this
personal love relationship with God? Because it's all on the
basis that He is His people's God, and His people are His people. In the Song of Solomon, which
is a love story, which is a picture of the love between God and his
people. In Song of Solomon, chapter 6,
verse 3, the Beloved says, I am my Beloved's, and my Beloved
is mine. Sorry, that's the wife that says
that. I am my Beloved's. I belong to him. It's not just
I know about him, I love him. I have a heart relationship with
him. I am my beloved's and my beloved is mine. If we have Christ,
if he's mine, we have everything. What more could we possibly need?
If we have Christ, all the other things are either they're just
the pluses and minuses of this life. If we have Christ, we have
everything. For doesn't it tell us in Romans
8, 32, Paul writes, he that spared not his own son, if the son of
God and his death and his shed blood was the price of the ransom
for his people, he that spared not his own son, but delivered
him up for us all, this people, this special people, this peculiar
people, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? There's nothing that God will
withhold that we might need for life and eternity. If so, then
this is your experience. God with you. And if God is with
you, and he witnesses in your heart that he is with you, look,
two things follow. The Lord thy God, I am the Lord
thy God, which teacheth thee to profit, which leadeth thee
by the way that thou shouldest go. He teaches you to profit,
and he leads you where to go. Let's think about those things. He teaches you to profit. He teaches you to profit. In
our experience of life, teaching comes from all sides, doesn't
it? Circumstances, articles that we read, entertainments that
we see and watch, teaching comes from all sides. The friends that
we associate with, the philosophy of the friends we associate with,
it's teaching us, and it comes from all sides. How are we to
discern that which is, as it says here, to our profit? The Lord thy God which teacheth
thee to profit. What is it to be taught to profit? Sometimes it's obvious, but other
times it can be subtly deceiving. You see, there is teaching which
leads exactly the wrong way. Look back in chapter 29, and
if I can turn this over, wherever it's gone. Chapter 29 and verse 13. Wherefore the Lord saith, forasmuch
as this people draw near me with their mouth and their lips to
honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, listen, and
their fear toward me, you would say that's a good thing to be
taught, isn't it? The fear of the Lord. Their fear toward me
is taught by the precept of men. Their fear is taught by the precept
of men. The fear of the Lord is the beginning
of none. Oh, isn't that good teaching? Yes, but it's taught
by the precept of men. We've got to beware of that which
is subtly deceiving. That's not for our profit, if
it's by the precept of men. And what do I mean by not for
our profit? In spiritual terms it's this.
It won't be of any help to us in death. The truth of God that
teaches us to profit is aimed at our profit in death. Look
at 1 Timothy chapter 4 and verse 8, you don't need to turn to
it but I'll read it, where Paul talks about profit. He says,
bodily exercise profiteth little. by which he means it's some good,
it's better to have some exercise than none. The society in which
we live is totally obsessed, it seems to me, with bodily exercise. They think that bodily exercise
is the answer to longevity, to freedom from health problems,
to everything in this life. Bodily exercise is good, it's
not bad, but don't think it's much more than a most basic thing.
It profits little, but godliness is profitable unto all things.
Why? Why is godliness profitable unto
all things? Because it has the promise of
the life that now is. It will bless you in this life
and of that which is to come. It will profit you when it comes
to the time to leave this life. It will profit you in death.
God's profitable teaching, how can you detect the difference? God's profitable teaching humbles
the soul. If God teaches you, it humbles
your soul, and that teaches you to profit. Why is it to your
profit to have a humble soul? because God brings down the high-mindedness
of sinfulness, false teaching, religious teaching, whatever,
it exalts and it puffs up, it makes man think better of himself.
I used to hear a philosophy that I used to hear in so-called Christian
circles, and I used to hate it because I thought it just didn't
ring true to the Word of God. People who say, before you can
love anybody else, you have to learn to love yourself. I'm sorry,
where does it say that in Scripture? Where in the scripture does it
say, love yourself? I read about love your enemies,
but I don't read about love yourself. We don't have any trouble loving
ourself. No. The teaching of God, which is
profitable for our souls for eternity, humbles the soul. It brings us down. He that is
down, says an old hymn, he that is down need fear no fall. He that is low, no pride. You
see, God's profitable teaching humbles the soul. Blessed are
the meek. Blessed are the poor in spirit.
Blessed are those things. Whereas, false teaching exalts
and puffs up. Take sin, for example. Look at
verses 1 to 8 of this chapter that we read earlier. It's all
about God's indictment of those who were His nominal people,
the people who were Israel, the nation, who had the oracles of
God, who had the sacrifices and all of those other things. And
what does He call them in verses 1 to 8? In the first two verses
He calls them, I'll summarize it, He calls them lying hypocrites. These people who carried his
name he calls them lying hypocrites. You see this is teaching of God
that is profitable because it shows you your true place as
a sinner. In verses 3 and 4 he calls them
obstinate rebels. It humbles them, it brings them
down, it shows them their true place. It's profitable teaching,
for it shows the truth. In verses 5 to 7, he shows them
as foolish idolaters, who really in their hearts love to go after
false gods. Foolish idolaters. And in verse
8, he calls them treacherous transgressors. Those who are
traitors to the truth of God. This is teaching from God which
causes us to profit. And why does it cause us to profit?
It causes us to profit, it teaches us to profit because it teaches
us about our true state in the flesh. about the sin that is
ours in the flesh, about the only answer to that sin being
the salvation that is wrought by the Lord Jesus Christ. False
teaching, on the other hand, tends to lighten the curse of
sin, tends to tell us, well, it's not that bad because everybody
else is more or less the same. God's teaching makes hearts of
flesh. Is that not what God says in
Ezekiel? I will take out of them the heart of stone. False teaching
makes hearts of stone concerning the things of God. God's teaching
teaches to profit and makes hearts of flesh, soft hearts of flesh. God's teaching makes the Lord
Jesus Christ precious. To you who believe, says Peter,
He is precious in all of His glorious attributes. False teaching
tends to turn the eyes away from Him, to self, or to other things,
or to organization, or to what you can do. But true teaching
that teaches you to profit turns your eyes upon Jesus. God's teaching
sets minds on things above where Christ is. False teaching sets
minds on the stimuli of this world. Whatever the medium through
which the teaching comes, whatever it might be, whether it be books,
whether it be entertainments, whether it be the friends that
we keep, the news that we watch, preaching that we listen to,
the hymns that we sing even. Ask this question, does it cause
spiritual profit? Does it teach us to profit? Because
it teaches us about eternity. It teaches us about the weakness
of the flesh. It teaches us about the glories
of Christ. It teaches us about the accomplishment
of salvation. Does it cause us to profit? that
it might be well with our soul when it comes to that hour of
leaving this life. Paul says to the Philippians
about these things, these different media through which teaching
comes to us, he says, whatsoever things are true. honest, just,
pure, lovely, of good report, if there be any virtue, any praise. Think on these things. This is
teaching from God. If you're among the people of
God, he speaks to you teachings of present and eternal profit. This is it. It's for our spiritual
good. And he teaches you to flee from
unprofitable falsehood. This is a question we ought to
ask ourselves. The religion that we profess, have I profited from
it? I don't mean have you been made
richer in this life. I don't mean have you got more
friends in this life. I don't mean have you had a healthier
time and health, wealth and happiness. I don't mean that. I mean have
you profited in the sense that you know your eternal destiny
is more secure. In all of the situations of life,
in its high times and in its low times, in its trials, not
just the times of ease. Has it caused you to profit in
terms of knowing the truth and the salvation of God accomplished?
He teaches you to profit and then He leads you by the way
that you should go. Again, back in Isaiah 41, let
me just refer back to this. Isaiah chapter 41, I think I
referred to it earlier, in verse 13. This is God speaking to his
people, the people of his choice. I, the Lord thy God, will hold
thy right hand. going through life. I will hold
your right hand. Fear not, I will help you. Fear
not, you worm, Jacob. Fear not, you know what you are
by nature, a sinner. You men of Israel, I will help
you, says the Lord. the one who is your Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel. God will be your help. God's
promise to hold our hand, because naturally, we don't know the
way to go, do we? As Thomas said to Jesus in John
14, Thomas said to him, Lord, we know not where you're going,
and how can we know the way? And you know what Jesus said
in reply. Jesus said to him, Tom, he said to him, I am the
way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father but
by Me. He is the way, the truth, and the life. He is the way.
Follow Him. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith. But how practically, in our experience,
does God lead His people? He leads us by teaching, through
His Word, by His Spirit, that which is for the profit of His
people. For example, you're going through
life and it comes and goes at different phases of life, younger
stages, older stages. You come to a fork in the road,
as it were, of life. Do I go that way or do I go that
way? Here we are, I don't know where
to go. I come to a fork in the road and I don't know which way
to go. But we have a promise here, he leads you by the way
that you should go. God's Word says He leads you
by the way you should go. So, what should we do? What should
we do? If any of you lack wisdom, ask
of God. Ask, is it basically right? If I go that way, is that
fundamentally, morally right? Or is it morally wrong? Is it
in accord with the word of God, and the law of God, and the teaching
of God, and the precepts of the gospel, or is it against them?
That's pretty easy, isn't it? You know, if that would take
me into sin, steer clear of it, go that way instead. But ask,
basically, is it right? Ask, is it for my spiritual profit? because we're told to grow in
grace and the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. Is it going
to be for our profit and for the profit of others? Will it
lead me into temptation and incline me to sin against God? Will it
cause grief to others? And when we lay all of these
options before the Lord in prayer, he'll show us the right way because
he promises, I will teach, I will lead you in the way that you
should go. He will cause us to follow in the footsteps of Christ,
looking unto Jesus, and He will bless us. Remember, His Word
says, 1 Samuel 2 verse 30, Them that honour Me, says God, I will
honour. I will honour those people who
honour Me. I will honour those who seemingly to their own hurt
do that which is right in the eyes of the living God. Them
that honor me I will honor. And not always as we would think
for our own good. Not always like that. Sometimes
it seems to be the wrong thing for our own, but in His grace,
it's the right thing for us and He will honour it. Often, the
way He opens up is difficult to the flesh because its purpose
and objective is actually not for the immediate benefit of
the flesh, but it is for eternal blessing. We must remember all
of these things. Well, our time is well gone.
Is your knowledge of God mere head knowledge, or is it that
which is personal, intimate, teaching for profit, and guidance
through life? If so, then you know that this
God is yours, and you are His for time and for eternity.