Let's open tonight's service
with hymn number 38 from your Spiral hymn book, number 38,
The Debt of Love. Let's all stand together. Come, every sinner saved by grace,
you who by faith God's Son embraced. Tell all who hear your voice
below the debt of love to Christ you owe. ? Dear Lord, I lift
my praise to Thee ? All that I am or hope to be ? I owe alone,
O Christ, to Thee ? He left His Father's throne above ? And came
to earth on wings of love For us He lived, the perfect man,
And so fulfilled the lost demand. Dear Lord, I lift my praise to
Thee, All that I am or hope to be I owe alone, O Christ, to
Thee. Thus endured his father's ire,
And died at the appointed hour. What he endured, no tongue can
tell, To save our souls from death and hell. ? Dear Lord,
I lift my praise to Thee ? All that I am or hope to be ? I owe
alone, O Christ, to Thee From death's dark grave our King arose,
And triumphed over all our foes. Up through the skies the victor
rose, And reigns on high our Savior God. ? Dear Lord, I lift
my praise to Thee ? All that I am or hope to be ? I owe alone,
O Christ, to Thee Come, heaven, Christ will quickly come, And
bring His ransomed people home. There we shall see His lovely
face, And chant the praises of His grace. ? Dear Lord, I lift
my praise to Thee ? All that I am or hope to be ? I owe alone,
O Christ, to Thee Please be seated. That is a debt that we'll never
ever be able to pay, isn't it? We're going to be reading in
Daniel chapter 4 if you'd like to turn with me there in your
Bibles. That hymn reminds me of an article
we put in the bulletin for this coming Sunday. A woman who was talking about how
thankful she was that the Lord had saved her and that if she
found herself in heaven that he would never hear the end of
it. That's a good way to put it,
he'd never hear the end of it. Daniel chapter 4 beginning in
verse 34, and at the end of the days I Nebuchadnezzar lifted
up my eyes unto heaven and mine understanding returned unto me,
and I blessed the Most High, and I praised and honored him
that liveth forever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and
his kingdom is from generation to generation. And all the inhabitants
of the earth are reputed as nothing, and he doeth according to his
will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the
earth, and none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest
thou? At the same time, my reason returned
unto me, and for the glory of my kingdom, mine honor and brightness
returned unto me, and my counselors and my Lord sought unto me, and
I was established in my kingdom, and excellent majesty was added
unto me. Now I, Nebuchadnezzar, praise
and extol and honor the King of heaven, all whose works are
truth and his ways judgment, and those who walk in pride he
is able to abase. Let's pray. Our merciful Heavenly Father, we thank you for the humbling of our pride
and our self-righteousness. We thank you, Lord, for your
power and ability to do for us what you did for Nebuchadnezzar,
put us in our place, cause us to look up, have our reason return
unto us, and to lift our hearts and voices in praise, adoration,
glory. Lord, we ask, Lord, that you
would enable us tonight to worship, that we might be given by your
spirit the grace to look outside of ourselves and to find in the
Lord Jesus Christ all the hope of our salvation, that we would
ascribe to Him all honor and all praise and all glory for
the successful, accomplished work of redemption that He performed. Lord, give us a good understanding
from thy word. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Let's stand together again. We'll
sing him number 2 26. This is another him. If your book hasn't been changed
and the top line third verse where it says man, just make
that A and E. It should say men, not man. Sinful men. Number 226. I am not skilled to understand
what God hath willed, what God hath planned. I only know at
His right hand is one who is my Savior. I take him at his
word indeed. Christ died for sinners, this
I read. For in my heart I find the need
of him to be my Savior. That He should leave His place
on high And come for sinful men to die You counted strange, so
once did I Before I knew my Savior And oh, that he fulfilled, may
see, the travail of his soul in me, and with his word contented
be, as I with my dear. Please be seated. Let's open our Bibles to Mark. chapter 5. We looked at this
miracle last Wednesday night and saw our condition naturally left
ourselves in the behavior of this demoniac living among the
tombs dominated by a legion of evil spirits, unable to be tamed
by the chains of the law, unable to atone for our own sins. This man was cutting himself
and making personal sacrifices in order to try to salve his
conscience and satisfy God's justice. This is what all men
do by nature when left to themselves. And we saw the sovereign mercy
of the Lord in that he crossed over to the other side and met
this man and delivered him from these demons and... and brought him to faith in Christ.
We saw the power of Christ over these evil spirits and how they
begged the Lord to not torment them before their appointed time. That was very, very powerful
to me to think about how these demons were pleading with the
Lord not to send them to hell. that they were hoping to have
a little bit more time here in this world before they were cast
into the lake of fire and chained for all eternity in that place
of torment. And the demons were begging our
Lord. And you remember how he cast
them into the swine and a picture of the Lord fulfilling the requirements
of the law and putting our sin into the depths of the sea. Tonight
I want us to pick up this story in verse 15 and I've titled this
message, From a Demoniac to a Disciple. And we see in these next few
verses a contrast in this man's condition And we also see the
command of his commission, what the Lord commissioned him to
do. And what a beautiful picture of salvation it is here. The Lord setting us free from
the rigors of the law. And yet, as we just sang, binding
our hearts in love and faith to Christ, to want to follow
him. Notice with me in verse 15, and
they came to Jesus and see him that was possessed
with the devil and had the legion sitting and
clothed and in his right mind and they were afraid." What a contrast in this man's
life of what he was before the Lord met him and what he is now. Now he's sitting, he's no longer
tossed about by every wind of doctrine. now he knows that all
truth and all doctrine is the doctrine of Christ and he's no
more in need of being tossed about as the natural man is left
to himself. He's no longer running to and
fro as the natural man would do looking for something. He can now say With what Philip
said to Nathanael, we have found him. We have found him. The one that Moses and the prophets
spoke of, the Christ, Jesus of Nazareth. Obviously it was the
Lord that found him, but we no longer are looking for anything
else. We're like the woman at the well
when the Lord said to her, if any man drink of, of the water
of this well, he'll never thirst again. He'll never have to go
anywhere else other than this well to gratify and satisfy his
thirst. And there we see a picture of
ourselves in this man sitting. He's no longer running, he's
no longer tossed about He's no longer laboring to keep
the law. They had chained him and the
chains could not restrain him and the law was not effectual
in restraining his sin. and he couldn't satisfy the demands
of the law. Now he has the Lord Jesus Christ
who himself is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone
that believeth. No longer is he under the rigors
and the curse and the commands of the law for his salvation. He's been freed from that. He's no longer fighting his sin
and Satan in the power of his flesh. He now sitting and the
weapons of his warfare are now not carnal as they once were. Now the weapons of his warfare
are spiritual and powerful to the bringing into captivity every
thought and obedience to the obedience of Christ. This is
what happens when the Lord crossed over from heaven to earth and
found us in this spiritual state. And what a contrast between where
he puts us and where we were. This man is no longer seeking
to build a tower to heaven. He's not making bricks with his
hands and putting them together with slime and trying to achieve
access into the presence of God by his works. Now God has come down and God
has come to him and the Lord Jesus has revealed himself. As he told Nathanael in John
chapter one, he said, you're gonna see the angels ascending
and descending on the son of God. And that's a reference back
to Jacob's ladder. You remember when Jacob met the
Lord at Bethel and Jacob saw a ladder. Well, the latter is
Christ. So, and the angels ascending
and descending on the Lord Jesus, who himself is our way and access
and entrance into glory. So, we're no longer laboring
at the sweat of our brow, trying to make bricks with without straw
and building a tower in Babel, place of confusion. This is the
condition that this man was in. And now we see him sitting, sitting. He's no longer working his way
to heaven. He's no longer running to and
fro. He's no longer looking for something. He's now resting. resting in Christ, knowing that
the Lord Jesus himself is seated at the right hand of the majesty
on high and that he has been successful in accomplishing the
salvation of his people. And so just as his work was done,
so our work is done. And now the Sabbath is our Savior
and we rest, we rest, not just on one day of the week, we rest
every day in Him and in His finished work. We saw Him running wild, trying to find something and now notice
He's sitting In the previous verses we looked at last Wednesday,
this man was naked. He was fully exposed in all of
his shame to God and the world. And now he's clothed. There was
no shame with Adam and Eve until the fall. They were naked in
the garden. that they were innocent and there
was no shame in their nakedness. And now after the fall, they
sought to clothe themselves by sewing together fig leaves. The
Lord had to slay a lamb, had to shed blood in order that they
might have coats of skin, as the Bible says, to cover their
nakedness. We know what that is. When John
saw the church in heaven in the book of Revelation, and they
were robed in white. He asked the question, who are
these in the white robes? And the Lord answers this question
and tells them these are those that have been washed in the
blood of the Lamb. These are those who have the
righteousness of Christ given to them, no longer Are we trying
to hide the shame of our sin by the works of our hands? No
longer are we attempting to cover up and to hide from God. Now we have a perfect, seamless
coat of righteousness. When the soldiers were dividing
up our Lord's possessions at the cross, it's not insignificant
that when they came to his robe they saw that it was without
seam. It had been knit together as one piece unlike
much of the clothing which would have been sewed together in parts
and they could just break the parts and share the fabric. But
this robe was knit all together as one piece without any seams.
And what did one of the soldiers say? Let us not rend this robe,
let us cast lots for it. And the robe went to one of the
soldiers to whom the lots fell to. And scripture tells us that
the casting of the lot is of man, but the The fullness of
it thereof is of the Lord. How that lot turns out is of
God's choosing. And so here we have a picture
of the righteousness of Christ which cannot be rent, it cannot
be torn, it cannot be separated. It must be possessed in whole. And the Lord in His sovereign
mercy and grace determines who will receive that robe of the
righteousness of Christ, just as he did for this demoniac. He was no longer trying to cover
up things. He went from from being dressed
to being naked, from being chained to being broken loose from the
chains. So he kept going back and forth from one extreme to
the other. Is this not what we do in our self-righteous religious
attempts to atone for ourselves? And the Lord comes. Turn with
me to Isaiah chapter 30, Isaiah chapter 30. I just want to read one verse
here, verse 1. Verse 1 of Isaiah 30. Woe to
the rebellious children, saith the Lord, that take counsel,
but not of me. They take the wisdom of man,
the counsel of man-made religion, and it doesn't come from God.
The Lord said, these false prophets, I didn't send them. I didn't
give them the message that they're preaching, but the rebellious
and the unbeliever, we listened to them. And that cover with a covering,
but not of my spirit, that they may add sin to sin. And what
the Lord is telling us here is that is that left to ourselves,
we will attempt to cover up for our sins, to atone for our sins,
to make up for our sins, and our very attempts to atone for
our own sins only adds to our sin. It only adds to our guilt. What man covers, God will uncover. And what man uncovers, God will
cover. As long as we're trying to cover
it up, there will come a day when God will uncover it and
everything will be exposed. But if by God's grace we're brought
into his presence naked, Lord, I have nothing. I have no righteousness. I have no claim on thee. I have
no hope of salvation outside of you clothing me and sitting
me down and causing me to rest. I will do what this man did. Thirdly, we find that this man
is in his right mind. I was interested to look up this
word Right. And it's most often translated
sober. You remember when Paul was brought
before Festus and he began to tell Festus the truth of who
Christ is and what he had done and Festus stopped him and he
said, he said, Paul, much learning has made thee mad. You're out
of your mind. You're insane. And the Apostle
Paul said, oh no, Festus. He said, I'm not mad. He said,
I'm speaking to you the truth in soberness. This is the truth
of the gospel that I'm revealing to you. If anyone's mad, now
Paul didn't say this, But I know he believed it and he knew it
to be true as long as Festus wasn't believing the gospel.
He's the one that was mad. He's the one that was not in
his right mind. And that's where we are, left
to ourselves. We're not in our right mind.
We can't We can't discern the truth for what it is. We can't
discern ourselves for what we are. We'll never be able to believe
ourselves to be a sinner. We'll never be able to believe
that all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags until God
puts us in a sober mind. We'll never be able to believe
that God is just and holy and must punish sin and that there's
no hope for the atonement of our sins or for any righteousness
or any salvation outside of the Lord Jesus Christ. We'll never
be able to believe any of that. Why? Because we're not sober. We're not in our right mind.
We've been, as Isaiah just revealed, intoxicated, if you will, with
the false prophets and with the lies. And we've We've added sin to sin in our
attempt to cover up and now we're in a sober mind, think clearly. We have some understanding. We just read of that with Nebuchadnezzar,
didn't we? He came to himself. The prodigal,
he found himself having wasted his inheritance and riotous living
and found himself now in a pig pen, literally feeding pigs,
feeding swine and the scripture says that he came to himself. He became sober-minded. This
is what repentance actually means. It means to have a changed mind.
And when God gives repentance, he changes our minds and he gives
us a sober mind so that we're able to think clearly about who
we are, about who God is. and about how it is that God
is pleased to save sinners through the shed blood of Christ. Anything
else is insanity. Anything else is an intoxicated
mind. It's not a right mind. It's not
a sober mind. We will live our lives in this
world as if this world was all we had. Turn with me to 1 Thessalonians
chapter 5. 1 Thessalonians chapter 5. Look with me at verse 6. Therefore, We were talking about
this before the service, how many therefores there are in
the Bible. And when God says, therefore, we know that it's
there for a reason. It's there because in light of
what's been said previous about what God has done, therefore,
let us not sleep as do others. You see, a person that's not
in their right mind is slumbering and sleeping. They're in the
dark. They're dreaming. I had a brother
tell me one time he was working with a man and every day he said
he'd ask the man how he's doing and his answer was always the
same. I'd have quit asking him how
he's doing. But his answer was always the same, living the dream.
Living the dream. And I'm talking to this brother
I was talking to and I agreed that yeah, he was living a dream.
He was living a fantasy life. He was not sober-minded. He was living as if the dream,
the American dream or whatever dream he was talking about was
was the end of all things. And that's what we'll do and
that's what this man was doing. He was not in his right mind.
And here the Lord said, let us not sleep as do others, but let
us watch and be sober. Be sober. I think believers probably We have a different concept of
time than unbelievers do because we're always judging time in
comparison to eternity. And for us, you know, the unbeliever
talks about time as if, oh, you know, 50 years ago was a long time ago.
For the believer, it was yesterday. It was just yesterday. And the
unbeliever thinks about the future. Well, we've got 20 years from
now, it's gonna be a long time. 20 years to you, child of God,
what's 20 years? It's a flash in the pan. What
is your life? It is a vapor. Why would we think
differently and soberly about time when the unbeliever doesn't? Why do we watch and pray soberly? Because we have a different standard
to judge time by. We're judging time by eternity. And this time is nothing, isn't
it? It's just nothing. The days slip
by, vanity of vanities. It's all going away. It's not
going to last much longer. And believe me, that's not a... You talk to an unbeliever like
this, and they'll walk away from you. I think I shared this with
you all one time. I was at the end of our driveway
collecting the garbage cans, and the neighbor was complaining
about something that another neighbor was doing. And I said,
ah, don't worry about it. We're not going to be here much
longer. They said, oh, you moving? I said, no. I said, none of us
are going to be in this world much longer. There's no need
to get upset about that. Man, they turned on their heels
and got away from me as quick as they could. Quick as they
could. Well, we'll talk about that.
Believers love to talk about it. Talking about the brevity
of time and life is not a morose subject to the child of God.
It's their joy. Why? Because they're watching
and praying in a sober mind, waiting for that day of their
redemption, knowing that it's drawing nigh. God giving you
a sober mind, that's a sober mind. Don't be like, don't be in darkness
like the rest of the world. You're children of light. You
see that in verse 5 of this passage? But you brethren, verse four,
are not in darkness that the day should overtake you as a
thief, but you are all the children of light and the children of
the day. We're not of the night nor of darkness. Therefore, therefore,
let us not sleep. Let us not be slumber as do others,
but let us watch and be sober for they sleep. They that sleep,
sleep in the night. They're always asleep. And they
that be drunken are drunken in the night. He's not talking about
just literal sleep and literal drunkenness. He's talking about
spiritual things here. And a person who's wide awake
and completely absent of any intoxicating substances in their
body can be intoxicated and not be sober and be sleeping. But let us who are of the day
and here's the word again. This is the word that's used
in our text, right mind. It's sober. Sober. A person will say things and do
things when they're intoxicated that they won't do when they're
sober. Why? Because they've lost touch
with the reality. being intoxicated and so it is
with spiritual intoxication. Lots to touch with reality but
when you're sober you're mindful of the things as they really
are. Putting on the breastplate of
faith and love and for a helmet the hope of salvation for God
has not appointed us to wrath but to obtain salvation by our
Lord Jesus Christ. What a change from this, I think everybody
here was here Wednesday night, most everybody last Wednesday
night when I go back and rehash the condition this man was in
but you remember, he's a wild man. Naked, breaking chains,
cutting himself with stones. Demons calling out from him and
now he's sitting, resting trusting Christ, clothed, has the righteousness
of Christ, his nakedness before God is covered, and he's in a
sober mind. He sees things as they really
are. Turn with me just a few more
pages over to 1 Peter chapter 4. we find this word sober again,
1 Peter 4. Verse six, for for this cause
was the gospel preached also to them that are dead, that they
might be judged according to men in the flesh, but live according
to God in the spirit. But the end of all things is
at hand. Be ye therefore sober and watch
unto prayer. And above all things have fervent
charity among yourselves, for charity shall cover the multitude
of sins. The end of all things is at hand. It's at hand. And it's at hand
for me and you, isn't it? It really is. And it's gonna
be here sooner than we think. And as far as the world is concerned,
if it was at hand 2,000 years ago when Peter, under the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit, wrote these words, how much closer at hand
is it now? Look over just one chapter to
chapter five. Peter uses this word again in
verse six. Humble yourselves, therefore,
unto the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due
time, casting all your care upon him, for he careth for you. Be sober, be clear-minded, be vigilant, because your adversary,
the devil, has a roaring lion walk about, seeking whom he may
devour. Whom resist steadfastly, In the
faith, in the faith. What is it to resist the devil
in the faith? It's when he hurls those fiery darts, the shield
of faith to quench the fiery darts of the devil. What is faith? Faith's looking to Christ. Resting
in Christ and believing on Christ. It's trusting Christ, it's resting
in Christ, it's having the righteousness of Christ. That's faith. Faith is, I've heard people say,
my mother used to say this a lot, God helps those who help themselves.
You heard that? No, it's not true. God helps those who can't help
themselves, and that's faith. Casting all your care upon him,
for he careth for you. Lord, I'm no match for the devil,
but he's no match for you. He's no match for you. Look at the rest of verse 9,
knowing that the same afflictions are accomplished in your brethren
that are in the world. All believers have to go through
this affliction but this affliction accomplishes something. What
does it accomplish? The peaceable fruit of righteousness. It accomplishes our salvation,
it accomplishes our peace and rest and trust in Christ. The Lord is bringing good out
of these things. What is the good that he's bringing?
Himself. Himself and everything required in order for us to come
to him. He knows how to humble. What did Nebuchadnezzar say?
He is able to humble the pride, the proud. And we are. We can be so proud and so self-sufficient. We can be just like Peter. Lord,
I'll not forsake you. They might, but not me. What's
the Lord do? He allows Satan to come and sift
us. He allows those fiery darts to come. until we fall flat on
our face. And then we cry with Peter. Lord save me. What a contrast. Can you see that? Can you see
that contrast in your own life? The contrast of the, demoniac
being turned into a disciple. Contrast of one who could not
be tamed by the chains and could not atone for his own sins now
seated, clothed and in his right mind. That's a work of grace. Go back with me to our text. In verse 16. They that saw it
told them how it befell to him that was possessed with the devil
and also concerning the swine. So now the people come from the
town, I assume they're the owners of these pigs, and the ones that
were taking care, helping to, you know, to take care of the
swine, There were 2,000 of them, so there were probably several
men there that were helping to provide for them. They tell the
people that come from town everything that happened, how the demons
were cast into the swine, how they ran off the cliff into the
sea, and how this man who everybody knew was a wild man out of his
mind was now seeded, clothed, and in his right mind. I tell
them everything. In verse 17, and they began to
pray him to depart out of their coast. Well, there's a big difference,
isn't there? This man who has now been seated, clothed, and in his right
mind, pleads with the Lord to let him go with him. Lord, don't
leave me, I don't wanna be away from you. And these men are doing
just the opposite. Get out of here. We don't want
anything to do with you. You're costing us too much. There's
the difference between the child of God and the unbeliever. The
unbelievers, no interest. No interest. What you're saying
is true. This is way too high a thing
for me. I'm not prepared for that. You
know, I'll take, I'll take a little bit of God, but you know, to
be, to cost me everything, no. You're just, just please leave. And verse 18, and when he had
come into the ship, he that had been possessed with the devil
prayed him that he might be with him. Lord, let me go with you. What a difference. He just wanted
to be with the Lord. Lord, don't leave me, let me
go with you. Howbeit Jesus suffered him not,
he did not allow him to do that, but saith unto him, go home to
thy friends and tell them how great things the Lord hath done
for thee and hath had compassion on thee. When you listen to the testimony
of the religious, they don't, the Lord tells us
in this one verse how to be a witness for Christ. He tells them, tell them what
great things the Lord hath done for thee. When you listen to the testimony
of the religious, Though they don't say it like
this, if you listen to what's being said, this essentially
is what is being said. The first thing they'll tell
you about is what they did for God when they allowed Him to
save them. And then they'll begin to tell
you what they're doing now for God and allowing Him to use them. And they'll tell you all about
what God's doing and what they're doing for God. I wonder if you interviewed Joseph
when he was in that prison in Egypt and ask him what he was
doing for God, what he would have said. You know, my brothers, were going
to kill me, they were going to murder me, but Reuben stepped
up and rather than killing me, they sold me to some slave traders
and brought me down here to Egypt. And then I ended up getting a
pretty good job with Potiphar, but his wife told lies about
me and now here I am in prison. And there was a butler, here in the prison with me, along
with a baker, and they had dreams and I interpreted their dreams
and they promised to help me once they got out. I hadn't heard
a thing from them. What am I doing for God? What's God doing for
me? I don't know. I don't know. I'm kind of in
a difficult place right now. If you had asked Jacob, not soon after that when his
sons came back from Egypt. What's God doing for you? No,
he's not doing anything. All these things are against
me. Everything's against me. What is my point? My point is
that you can't always tell by your circumstances what God's
doing. You know what I mean? A couple of pastors I talk to
on a pretty regular basis and we've all agreed that we don't
know what's going on in our churches. We don't know who God's blessing,
who he's not blessing. As soon as we think that something's
happening good for someone, they end up leaving. As soon as we
think that someone's got no interest whatsoever, they end up showing
great hope. You can't, I've heard preachers
say, well, you know, so many people got saved. How do you
know? How do you know that? Because
you baptized them? We don't know. We don't know
what God's doing. We don't know what God's doing
in our lives. We're thankful for times when the Lord makes
things easy and we're prayerful when things are hard, but we
don't know what God's doing. He's got a grand purpose that's
mostly hid from us. Solomon wrote about it in Ecclesiastes.
He said, we don't know the beginning to the end. We just have this
little slice of time and we don't know how it all fits together. But this we know. We know what
he has done. The Lord didn't say to this man,
go tell your friends what God's doing in your life. No, he said,
go tell your friends what God has done. If you had asked Peter
after that night when he denied knowing Christ with cursings
and he later said, he said, I'm done, I'm going back to fishing,
no way God's gonna be able to do anything in my life again.
If you would have stopped him, down there at the shoreline while
he was cleaning his nets and ask him, Peter, what's God doing
in your life? Nothing. I've blown it. There's
nothing. I've got no hope. But Peter, what did God do? Oh, Peter would
have gladly rehearsed all the things that he had seen the Lord
Jesus Christ do. and all the things that he had
heard him say. He could not discern the Lord
doing anything for him or in him or with him in his current
circumstances, but he was crystal clear on what God had done. What is the point? When the Lord
sends us back into the world, and he does, we're his witnesses
in this world. What is our witness? Our witness
is not to have a Facebook testimony. I'm not on Facebook, never have
been. I've glanced at it once or twice when somebody's shown
it to me. But I've heard people talk about it enough to know
that when you put things on Facebook, you don't talk about the bad
stuff. You don't talk about all your fears and doubts and horrors
that you're going through and the embarrassing things. You
put out the good stuff, don't you? You know, and that's what
most religious testimonies are about, most religious testimonies. It's just religious people lying,
you know, look at me book. You see, it's just, you know,
it's just people telling all and making up all these good
stuff that's going on and you read it and you think, man, I
wish my life was like that. And that's what they're wanting
to present. They're wanting to present themselves as if, you
know, if you just follow me, your life could be like my life.
When the truth is that their lives are just as much a mess
as yours. What's the difference between a believer and unbeliever?
We go through some of the same trials, afflictions, we just
read about it in 1 Peter, that the world goes through. We have
the same doubts and fears and troubles and heartaches. We know
what God hath done. Past tense. And that's the testimony. That's our witness. What has
he done? He has foreknown us in Christ,
in the covenant of grace before the foundation of the world.
He has predestinated us. He called us. If you ask Peter,
Peter, What's God doing for you? Well, I can tell you, I was standing
right here on this same beach three years ago when the Lord
Jesus Christ came and said, I'm gonna make you a fisher of men. And he called me and I left my
nets and I followed him. We know what God's done. We know
what he accomplished on Calvary's cross. when the Lord Jesus shed
his precious blood as a covering for the sins of his people. We
know what he accomplished. He accomplished full salvation.
We know that he ascended back into glory and he's seated at
the right hand of God. We know that he ever lives to
make intercession for us. We know that he's all our righteousness. We can't... Make up some bed
of roses life as if, you know, well, you know, God's made me
healthy, wealthy, and wise. And I'm so happy all the time.
And I'm just, everything's just going my way now that I've, now
that I believed on Jesus. That's the hypocrite's testimony. You go back and you tell your
friends what the Lord hath done. done for thee. That's our testimony. That's
the commandment of our commission. The contrast of our life and
the commandment of our commission. This is such a beautiful picture
of salvation. I hope that each one of us, by
God's grace, will be able to see ourselves in it and believe
it. Tom? 225. Let's stand together. I heard the voice of Jesus say,
Come unto me and rest. Lay down, thou weary one, lay
down thy head upon my breast. I came to Jesus as I was weary
and worn and sad. I found in Him a resting place
and He has made me glad. I heard the voice of Jesus say,
Behold, I freely give the living water. Thirsty one, stoop down
and drink and live. I came to Jesus and I drank of
that life-giving stream. My thirst was quenched, my soul
revived, and now I live in Him. I heard the voice of Jesus say,
I am this dark world's light. Look unto me, thy morn shall
rise, and all thy day thee bright. I looked to Jesus, and I found
in him my star, my sun. And in that light of life I'll
walk till traveling days are done.