You're all leaving this week,
right? No? Oh, okay, you're gonna be here another Sunday. Okay,
I'm sorry. Well, good. Let's open our hymnals together
to number 229. Number 229, don't worry, I'm
not gonna lead you to sing, but I wanna read the first stanza
of this hymn because this is what we were talking about the
first hour. Tell me the old, old story. of
unseen things above, of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his
love. Tell me this story simply as
to a little child, for I am weak and weary and helpless and defiled."
Let's stand together. Tom, you come lead us, please.
? Tell me the old, old story ?
Of unseen things above ? Of Jesus and his glory ? Of Jesus and
his love Tell me the story simply As to a little child For I am
weak and weary And helpless and defiled Tell me the old, old
story. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story of
Jesus and his love. Tell me the story slowly, that
I may take it in, that wonderful redemption God's remedy for sin. Tell me the story often, for
I forget so soon. The early dew of morning has
passed away at noon. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story of
Jesus and his love. Tell me the story softly with
earnest tones and grave. Remember I'm the sinner whom
Jesus came to save. Tell me the story always If you
would really be In any time of trouble A comforter to be Tell
me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story of
Jesus and his love. Tell me the same old story when
you have cause to fear that this world's empty glory is costing
me too dear. Yes, and when that world's glory
is dawning on my soul, tell me the old, old story, Christ Jesus
makes the whole. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story. Tell me the old, old story of
Jesus and his love. Please be seated. For our call to worship, would
you please turn to Isaiah 40? Isaiah 40. This has become my most precious chapter and
verse. The Lord our God began this little
hill shortly 26 years ago how faithful he has been to provide
his word, to open his word, to bless his word, to reveal the
living word, the Lord Jesus Christ, his gospel. And as he said that he was gonna
give pastors according to his heart, that he shall feed his
people with understanding and knowledge. And he has done that. My dear brother, my friend, and
Tricia, your love for Christ, for the gospel, for the ministry,
it has to be from God's heart, because you're passing to functional
sheep like me, and without wavering, faithful to preach Christ and
the gospel. My point is, this body of Christ
will always be Isaiah 40 to me. always comfort, always peace,
always assurance, because the faithful, and it's a testimony
to God's glorious grace, being faithful to his promises and
providing for his people. That's why I wanted to read from
this chapter, because there's always comfort in this fellowship
because of what he has done. So before we begin in verse one,
Lord showed me this, verse eight, chapter 39. We don't have time.
You all read chapter 39, because the response that Hezekiah gives
Isaiah, without exception, is a response every time the gospel
is preached. When the Lord is getting ready
to come for you, He first has to strip you. Hezekiah means
Jehovah is my strength, and Isaiah means Jehovah hath saved. And so when the Lord sent Isaiah to speak the word to Hezekiah
in his weakness, Hezekiah received it, and this is his response. Verse eight, then said Hezekiah
to Isaiah, good, good is the word of the Lord which thou hast
spoken. He said, moreover, for there
shall be peace and truth in my days. That's the Lord Jesus Christ. So now may he bless what we're
about to read. This is Christ. Comfort ye my
people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem
and cry unto her that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity
is pardoned, for she hath received the Lord's hand double for all
her sins. The voice of him that crieth
in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the Lord, Make straight
in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted,
and every mountain and hill shall be made low, and the crooked
shall be made straight, and the rough places plain, and the glory
of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together,
for the mouth of the Lord has spoken it." The voice said, cry,
and he said, what shall I cry? All flesh is grass, and all the
goodliness thereof is as the flower of the field. The grass
withereth, the flower fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord
bloweth upon it. Surely the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand forever. O Zion,
that bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain,
O Jerusalem, that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with
strength, lift it up, be not afraid. Say unto the cities of
Judah, behold, your God. Behold, the Lord God will come
with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him. Behold, his
reward is with him, and his work before him. He shall feed his
flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arm and carry them in his bosom and shall gently lead those
that are with the arm. Let's pray. O Lord, our God, we come again
into thy presence in the name of thy dear Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. Thanking you, Lord, for your
precious word and the promises Thank you for giving us eyes,
Lord, and blessing to see Christ. For truly, Lord, he is all in
our all. Thank you, Lord, that you're
faithful to provide for your people wherever they gather and
meet to worship you. Thank you, Lord, that you remember
that we are made of dust, how we ask that in this hour you
would once again comfort us, remind us again that the warfare
is over. Lift up Christ that we may see
him in all his glory. And once again, bless Greg. Enable him again without wavering,
firmness, conviction. Lift up Christ that we may behold
him and it's to your glory. Amen. Let's all stand together. We'll
sing the hymn that's on the back of the bulletin. ? By God's grace I am in Jesus
? ? Who is made all things to me ? ? All I need or want is
Jesus ? ? Christ is made all things to me ? ? Christ alone
is all my wisdom ? He will guide me day by day. By His Word and by His Spirit,
Christ will guide me in His way. ? Righteousness I have in Jesus
? ? Who obeyed God's law for me ? ? His obedience is imputed
? ? Freely without works to me ? ? Christ is my sanctification
? Christ is all my holiness. He has saved me by imparting
unto me His holiness. ? Christ alone is my redemption
? His blood hides my sins from view ? And my great Redeemer's
coming ? To redeem my body too ? I will glory in my Savior who
is made all things to be. All I need or want is Jesus. Christ is made all things to
be. Please be seated. But God hath chosen the foolish
things of the world to confound the wise. God hath chosen the
weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty, the
base things of the world, and things which are despised hath
God chosen, yea, things that are not to bring to naught the
things that are. God says with barley cakes, doesn't
he, that no flesh should glory in his presence. For by him,
God the Father, are you in Christ. God has to put us in Christ.
We want to put ourselves in Christ. Who is made unto us what we just
sang? Our wisdom, our righteousness,
our sanctification, and our redemption. That according as it is written,
he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. We've come here
today to glory in him. You know, I think back in my
years in religion and most of the times we got together was
nothing more than a mutual admiration society or, you know, glorying
in what this person was doing or what that person was doing.
Let him the glory of glory in the Lord. The evidence, the evidence
of faith is worship. It's worship. to be brought prostrate
in the presence of God, to bow before him, to kiss his hand,
and to depend upon him. We see that in our text. Turn
with me to Judges chapter seven. We read this passage in the previous
hour. The Lord has given these pagan
Baal worshippers, one of them he gave a dream, another one
he gave an interpretation, and when Gideon heard it, it emboldened
him to believe God. God's giving him once again the
same message that he had given him on several other occasions,
but the Lord in his mercy, in his patience, is is giving Gideon
another confirmation. And the evidence that Gideon
heard, look at verse 15, and it was so, and it was so, and
it came to pass. Oh, what a glorious hope that
believers have that when God, everything that God does just
makes it so. Our salvation is so. It's sure. It's steadfast. It's not dependent. God is not dependent upon you
or me to do something in order to make what he did work for
us. What the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished
on Calvary's cross was so. It was just so. It's finished.
He fulfilled all the requirements of God's holy law. He satisfied
every bit of divine justice on behalf of his people. He bowed
his mighty head. And I love the fact that very
first, you know, we have seven words of Christ from the cross.
And the very first thing he said was, Father, forgive them for
they know not what they do. The Lord Jesus understood the
full horror, shame, and sorrow for sin. And God saw the travail of his soul
and God said, I'm satisfied. And when a sinner comes to believe
that he worships, worships look at and it was so when Gideon
heard the telling of the dream and the interpretation that's what we have to do we
have to hear you know I I'm not here to chastise or rebuke anybody.
I know you all work hard and sometimes things are late on
Saturday and it's hard to stay focused and stay awake sometimes
when you're here for services, especially if you have to listen
to somebody like me. But I can tell Those who wanna
hear are, there are folks that I preach to, so they have absolutely
no interest whatsoever in what's happening here. Just, it's so,
I mean, you know, when you talk to somebody, if they're interested
in what you're saying or not. God gives you an ear to hear.
Hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. What a blessing
that is when God gives you an ear to hear. Gideon heard the
dream and he heard the interpretation of the dream. And that's what
preaching is. Preaching is not just reading the Bible. I heard
someone tell me one time and said, you know, we really don't
like your preaching. Why don't you just get up there
and just read from the Bible? It'd be a lot more profitable. Well,
preaching is interpreting the Bible. That's what we're doing.
We're giving meaning to the scripture. We're comparing scripture to
scripture and we're defining the terms of the Bible. And so, you know, I'm sorry,
but you know, Gideon heard, he heard and he heard the interpretation.
He didn't just hear the word of God. He heard what it meant. And he worshiped. He worshiped. Heard a story about a man that
was walking through the woods and came upon a dog that was
caught in a trap. The dog was wounded and scared. The man tried to release the
dog, but the dog, as would it be its nature, tried to bite
the man. Didn't, you know, didn't trust
the man under his conditions. So the man went and found a stick
with a forked end on it and took that forked stick and pegged
it, pinned that dog to the ground by its neck, reached down with
his other hand and released that dog's foot from the cage and
picked up the stick. The dog skirted off. The man continues on his trip
through the woods. He hears something behind him
and he looks back And he sees this wounded dog limping, following
him, following him all the way home. Spent the rest of his life
on the front porch of that man's house, sleeping, eating the food
that the man provided for him and living his life, waiting
for that man to come out the door so they could spend the
day together. Now that's worship. And that's what God does to his
people. We're not looking to be delivered from sin. The Lord
has to take the fork stick of the gospel and pin us to the
ground and reach down with one hand and release that trap. And when he does, we become faithful
dogs. We follow him. We worship him. We look to him. We depend upon
him. Joshua and Caleb were the only two that survived the wandering
in the wilderness. And Joshua is a picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ. His name means the same thing
that Jesus means. Jehovah saves. Salvation is of
the Lord. He does all the saving and he
does it all by himself. And Caleb's name means dog or
faithful dog. And when Joshua and Caleb brought
the children of Israel across the Jordan into the promised
land, and they're dividing up the land among the tribes, and
they get to that mountain that Moses had told Caleb was his. Caleb is now 80 years old. And
Caleb says to Joshua, I've decided that it's time now for me to
take that mountain. Now, those of you that know the
story know that that is not what Caleb said to Joshua. Caleb said
to Joshua, there's the mountain. And I'm as strong now at 80 years
old as I was when I was a young man. And he's not talking about
his physical strength, he's talking about faith. And the truth is
we grow in grace and in the knowledge of Christ and our faith matures. And Caleb was stronger at 80
than he was at 40. And Caleb said to Joshua, he
reminded him of the promises of God that God had spoken through
Moses 40 years before. And he trusted Joshua to be faithful
to those promises. And he said to Joshua, give me
that mountain. Give me that mountain. That's
how we come. Faithful dogs don't say to Christ,
well, it's my right to have that. No, you've delivered me from
the bondage of sin. Lord, give me the promises of
your word. I'm hanging all my hopes on your
precious promises. I've got no other claim on you.
than what you have put on yourself to promise us your grace and
your mercy. Faithful dogs. Gideon heard the
word that was spoken and he heard the interpretation and he worshiped. He worshiped. That's always the
result of that. Matthew chapter 15. A dear woman in great travail
comes up to the Lord crying and asks for his mercy for her daughter
that was possessed with a demon. And the Lord first ignored her.
Now, she was a Gentile. She was a Syrophoenician woman.
dog was a racial slur. It was an epithet that the Jews
cast at the Gentiles to shame them. Well, there comes another
Gentile dog. So she was used to all of her
life, these Jews looking down their nose at her and trying
to shame her by calling her a dog. And when she asked for the Lord's
mercy, he ignored her. And then the disciples, she keeps
crying. And the disciples say, Lord, Lord, send her away. She's
embarrassing everybody here. She kept crying. And the Lord
said, it's not right for me to give the children's food, the
children's bread to dogs. Now the Lord calls her a dog.
And she doesn't say, well, yeah, you just another one of those
Jews that trying to shame me. Make me feel bad about who I
am? No. She said, truth, Lord. Truth,
Lord. And the dogs eat the crumbs that
fall from the master's table. Lord, would you just let a few
crumbs of the bread of life fall my way? That's all I need. That's all I need. Who worships? Dogs worship. Let me show you
that in our text. Go back with me to chapter six. When the Lord is, I'm sorry,
chapter seven, verse five. Gideon's not, he's
got 2,300 men now. And the Lord's gonna get him
down to 300. And last Sunday, we saw that
those 300 men represent the three persons in one, God, the Father,
God, the Son, and God, the Holy Spirit. But I want you to see
how the Lord proved these men, how he chose them, how he identified
the 300 that Gideon was to use to go against the Midianites.
He said, you take your men down to the river. And here it is
in verse five. So he brought down the people
onto the water, and the Lord said unto Gideon, everyone that
lappeth of the water with his tongue as a dog lappeth, him
shall thou set by himself. Likewise, everyone that bowed
down upon his knees to drink, and the number of them that lapped,
putting their hands to their mouth, were 300 men. And all
the rest of the people bowed down upon their knees and drank
the water from the river. And the Lord said to Gideon,
by the 300 men that lapped, will I save you? I'm only gonna use
the dogs. I'm only gonna use the dogs. Is your name Caleb? Has the Lord pinned you to the
ground to deliver you from the bondage of your sin? You are, you're like a faithful
dog, you'll worship him. The evidence of that is going
to be love and gratitude. You'll follow after him. David, after the death of Saul,
his kingdom is being established. And David brings his servant
Ziba. Now, David in this story is a
picture of God the Father and Ziba is a picture of the Holy
Spirit. And David says to his servant Ziba, is there anyone
left from the household of Saul that I might show them mercy
for Jonathan's sake? Now, Jonathan in this picture
is a picture of Christ in this story. So God the Father saying
to God, the Holy Spirit, is anyone left from the household of Saul? Saul was an unbeliever. Any other lost sheep out there
that I can show them mercy for Jonathan's sake, for Christ's
sake? David loved Jonathan. And Ziba said, well, You know,
there's a crippled boy. He was five years old at the
time. And the number five is the number for grace in the Bible.
He was five years old at the time when the Philistines came
in and Saul and Jonathan were killed and his maid grabbed him
up to escape the massacre, the slaughter, and she fell and he
fell and broke both of his legs. And he's been crippled the rest
of his life. And he's hanging out in Mechur,
a town called Mechur. Translated, it means sold. In the land of Lodabar, which
means no pasture or no bread. Now, Mephibosheth is me and you.
Mephibosheth is the elect of God, the sinners that Christ
came to save. That's who Mephibosheth is. Crippled
in a fall, but always under the everlasting grace of God. Hanging
out in bondage to their sin, in a place where there is no
bread, there is no sustenance for their soul, there is no truth,
there's no life, there's no hope of salvation. And David says
to Ziba, fetch him. Fetch him. Now that's God the
Father saying to God the Holy Spirit, You go get my lost child. Yeah, they're crippled. Sin has
killed him. But I'm going to show mercy for
Christ's sake, for Jonathan's sake. Bring him to me. And don't
you know, when Mephibosheth heard that Ziba was in town looking
for him, Mephibosheth thought, oh boy, my days are done. I mean,
the pattern was that if there was anyone left over from the
preceding king's family, that you kill them all in fear that
they might rise up and take over your throne. And so David would
have had the right to do that. And Mephibosheth thought, well,
this is it. I'm the last one, you're gonna
kill me. And when Ziba brought Mephibosheth
to David's house, David looked at Mephibosheth. I can see the
tears welling up in David's eyes, looking at Mephibosheth and saying,
oh, Mephibosheth, Mephibosheth, you look just like your father.
You look just like Jonathan. You remind me of Jonathan. There's
God the Father looking at his crippled children who were crippled in the fall, under his
grace, saying, oh, for my son's sake, whom I love, sit down here
at my table. You shall eat of the king's bread
the rest of your life. You know what Mephibosheth said? What would the king have to do
with such a dead dog as I? Why would you show mercy on me? And he fell at his feet in prostrate worship. That's what faith always does.
It always does that. Why would God have anything to
do with me? Faith doesn't say, you're talking about election
and predestination, and you're talking about particular redemption,
and you say that God loves some people and doesn't love others.
That's not fair. Faith doesn't talk like that.
Faith says with Mephibosheth and with the Syrophoenician woman,
what would the king have to do with such a dead dog as me? Why would you save anyone? Especially
why would you save me? Gideon heard. He heard the word,
he heard the interpretation, and he worshiped. He worshiped. That's what faith always does.
It bows before God in love and gratitude, thanksgiving, and
it worships him for having shown his mercy toward a dead dog. Now, in contrast to that, when
David later was going to battle against Goliath, that's a picture
of substitution, isn't it? You know, in religion, the story
of David and Goliath is used to try to bolster people's courage,
young men's courage. You know, you need to be brave.
You need to be like little David. No, it's a picture of Christ
winning the battle on Calvary's cross for all of Israel. We'll send out one representative
from each army, and whoever wins, wins for the entire army. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
our representative. And he went to Calvary's cross
and he laid down his life for the sheep and he got the victory
all by himself. You remember what Goliath said
to Saul? When he saw little David coming
out there with no armor and all he had was a sling and a stick? And Goliath enraged. says to Saul, what am I, a dog? That you would come against a
man like me with staves and sticks and stones? You think you're
gonna kill me? I'm not a dog. Now there's the
pride and self-righteousness of an unbeliever. What am I,
a dog? See the contrast? It's clear,
isn't it? Get in worshiped. Get in bowed. Your reason for existence is
to worship God. That's your reason for existence. That's why you were made to worship
God. And there's no higher calling
and there's no greater blessing than to be found at the feet
of the Lord Jesus Christ, like Mary was, choosing that one thing
that was needful, listening to the words that proceeded from
the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's no greater place for
you to be, no greater place for me to be. There's no higher calling. There's no sweeter soul satisfying
thing. The world has nothing to offer
like God has to offer when his people are at his feet in worship
of him. Gideon heard, he heard the word,
he heard the interpretation and he worshiped. Solomon put it like this in Ecclesiastes
chapter 9 verse 4, a living dog is better than a dead lion. Now which one do you want to
be? See men, men think they're lions,
men think they've got so much strength and power and ability
and And the clearest evidence of that is when men, you know,
the real evidence of depravity is not the bad things that men
do. The real evidence of depravity is the fact that anyone would
think that they have anything in their lives that would earn
them favor with God, that would merit them favor with God. Anything
that they think they can offer to a holy God, that's when man's
really flexing his muscle. That's when he's really grasping
his fist against God. when he thinks that God needs
him to do something in order to be saved. Dogs need their master. Lions
are pretty independent. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
lion of the tribe of Judah, and he is the only one that hath
prevailed. The rest of us are dogs at his
feet, just dead dogs. Gideon certainly saw himself
that way. Some of you might remember 1989,
they came out with a animated movie, All Dogs Go to Heaven. Only dogs go to heaven. Only dogs go to heaven. Who is it that we worship? If
the people that worship God are dogs, lapping the water. You know what that water is a
picture of? It's the word of God. And that's how we drink. We lap it up one little bit at
a time. line upon line, precept upon
precept, here a little, there a little. And the self-righteous,
they just stick their head in the river and just start sucking
up the water like, no, Lord, I'm gonna lap it like a dog. If that's the people who worship
God, then who is the person that we worship? In John chapter nine,
the Lord healed a man that was born blind. And then he left
him. He told him to go wash and the
man didn't know who he was. And then the man gets interrogated
by the Pharisees. And he gets excommunicated. He gets excommunicated, which
was being kicked out of heaven. He wasn't just kicked out of
the temple. They stripped him of his right for heaven. They
excommunicated him. And he's walking around thinking,
I can see now, but I'm not going to heaven. And the Lord sees him. And the
Lord says, dost thou believe on the Son of God? And the man said, Lord, who is
he that I might believe on him? And the Lord said, you have both
seen him, and it is he that speaketh to thee. And the next verse says, Lord,
I believe, and he worshipped him. He worshipped him. You see, when God take, we're
coming to this world spiritually blind. We have no way of seeing
God, knowing the truth. God gives you blind eyes to see. He gives you eyes to see. Oh,
I believe, Lord. I do believe. There was a time
when I couldn't see. Now I see. That's what this blind
man told the Pharisees, remember? They said, you know who? He said,
I don't know. All I know is that once I was
blind, now I see. I see now. the Lord says I'm
the one that gave you that sight to see and we do what that blind
man say Lord I believe and we worship him worship is always
directed towards God always directed towards God there
are several times where Men tried to worship one of the apostles,
then the apostles stopped them in their tracks, said, no, don't
worship me. John, the apostle John, tried to worship an angel
one time in the book of Revelation. And what the angel said, no,
I'm your fellow servant, get up, don't worship me. Worship
Christ, he's the fulfillment of all prophecy. Turn with me to Revelation chapter
five, Revelation chapter five. This spirit of worship is what's happening right now
in heaven. And the Lord said, when you pray,
pray like this, Lord, thy will be done on earth, even as it
is done in heaven. Now that's what, that's how faith
prays. Lord, let me worship. Let me
worship you. Lord, I long for that day when
I worship you in the fullness of your glory, but would you
send a glimpse of your glory my way now? Would you brush a
crumb of bread off the master's table for this dead dog? Lord,
would you? Look at chapter five of Revelation. John saw. the multitudes of heaven,
10,000s of times, 10,000s in verse 11, saying with a loud
voice, worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and
riches and wisdom and strength and honor and glory and blessing.
And every creature which is in heaven and on the earth and under
the earth and such as are in the sea and all that are in them,
heard I say in blessing and honor and glory and power, be unto
him that sitteth upon the throne and upon the Lamb. and unto the
Lamb forever and ever. And the four beasts said, amen.
And the four and 20 elders fell down and worshiped him that liveth
forever and ever." If your view of heaven is nothing more than
just an improved version of what we have here on earth, yeah, that's not what heaven
is. Heaven is a perpetual worship. I said, well, that doesn't sound
real attractive to me. If you've experienced a taste
of his grace in worship, you know that it's the best thing
you've ever had. The best thing you've ever had
are those glimpses of moments in time when God enables you
to worship him and everything else is out of the way. And the
thought of an everlasting existence of that thrills your soul to
where you would say with the Apostle John, come Lord Jesus,
even now come. There's nothing like worshiping
God. And we just get little pieces of it, don't we? Little moments
of time where the Lord enables us to worship him in spirit and
in truth. 10 lepers came to the Lord calling
for mercy, crying out for mercy, Lord have mercy on us. They had
a disease that they were not going to be recovered from. It's
going to be more painful as they went and ostracize them from
society. And it's a picture of our sin.
It's a blood disease. And they came to the Lord and
asked for mercy. And the Lord told them, you go
back to the priest and show yourself to them. And as they went, they
were healed. And one of the 10 looked and
he saw that he had been healed. And the scripture says that he
turned back. And with a loud voice, he glorified
God and he fell down at the feet of the Lord Jesus Christ. The
Lord said, were there not 10? Were there not 10? Only one. You see, the men of
this world are enjoying the hand of God's providence every moment
of their life. The rain falls on the wicked
as well as the righteous. Every breath an unbeliever draws
is by the hand of God. The health that they enjoy is
by the hand of God. The protection that they have
in this world, the peace and prosperity that they enjoy is
all by the hand of God. And they are like those nine
lepers. They don't worship the one that
gives it to them. How do I know if I have faith?
Because I'm that one leper. Turn back. Fall at his feet. And worship him. Glorifying God. What is the cause of worship?
The original cause of worship is grace. It is grace. Paul said in Philippians chapter
three, verse three, we are the circumcision. He's not talking
about physical circumcision. He's talking about the circumcision
done by the spirit of God in the heart. And just like physical
circumcision performed by the hands of men, cut away flesh. So spiritual circumcision performed
by the Holy spirit in the heart cuts us away from any hope of
our salvation depended upon our flesh. That's what spiritual
circumcision is. And that's a work of grace in
the heart. That's where God causes you to cease from man and realize
there's nothing I can do to earn favor with God in the power of
my flesh. I've got to be saved by grace.
That's why Paul said, we are the circumcision which worship
God in the spirit and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence
in the flesh. That's grace. Everybody else
is putting their confidence in their flesh. They're putting
their hope in something that they're doing. How do I know
that I'm worshiping God? I've got no confidence in the
flesh. I rejoice in Christ Jesus. All I can do is bow before God
as a dead dog and worship him for his mercy on me. A hell-deserving,
hell-deserving, unworthy sinner saved by grace. That's the original cause of
our salvation. The effectual cause of our salvation is the
Holy Spirit. This is a work of grace in the
heart. We don't say to our family members
and friends, come worship with us. Religious people do that. We might say to another brother
or sister from another place, let's go to worship. We don't
just invite people to come worship. Just because they're in this
place, here in the gospel, doesn't mean that they're worshiping
God. Worship is a work of the Spirit
of God in the heart. Come, hear the gospel. Come,
meet a man who told me everything I ever did. Is this not the Christ? Come, hear what God says and
hear the interpretation of the dream as well. Perhaps the Lord
will be pleased to open your heart and your ears and enable
you to worship. But worship is a work of grace.
It's not, we don't, we don't feign worship like religious
people do by pretending to be all caught up in the spirit and
doing foolish things. And when we gather together publicly,
this is done very privately and it's done in the heart. And it's
the, it's the work of grace that enables you to have no confidence
in the flesh, to rejoice in Christ Jesus, to worship God in the spirit. It's what the Lord told the woman
at the well in John chapter four, when she said, we know that you
Jews say that you have to worship in Jerusalem, but our fathers
say right here on the mountain of Samaria, what do you say? The hour cometh and now is. Here's what our Lord said, the
hour cometh and now is. That the true worshiper shall
worship God in spirit and in truth for such the father seeketh
after. Now that doesn't mean that God's
out there looking for people who are in the spirit. It means
that God is the one who puts his spirit in you and causes
you to worship God, which makes every child of God cry, Lord,
give me your spirit. Give me the spirit of worship. The instrumental cause of worship
is the Word of God. The original cause is God's grace,
and the effectual cause is the Spirit of God. The instrumental
cause is the Word of God. This is a means to an end. When
we read God's Word and give the interpretation thereof, we know
that this is going to lead to faith in those who have ears
to hear and eyes to see, or faith cometh by hearing. but it is
an instrument, it's not, it's the means that the Lord uses. Worship is the result and the
evidence of faith. In Genesis chapter 22, when the
Lord was going to prove Abraham, He told Abraham, he said, take
thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest. And we know who
that is. We used to talk about Isaac,
but the son of God, thine only son, the only begotten of the
father, whom thou lovest. Take him and sacrifice him unto
thee. So, and give thee up to Moriah. And Moriah is the temple mound
where Solomon's temple was built. And this is 1,500 years before. No, 2,000 years before. It's
Abraham, 2,000 years. And the Lord honors that spot,
because that's where the Lord is going to be crucified. And
just to prove, that these physical things in the Bible are not blessed
of God now? You know what's sitting on that
temple mound right now? Yeah, the Dome of the Rock, a
Muslim mosque. That gold dome in Jerusalem is
sitting right on this mountain, Moriah. God, I mean, I mean,
God, God's, there's no blessing. And they got, what's the Lord
doing? He's showing to us that it's not the mountain. It's the
picture. It's the picture. Get thee up to Moriah and sacrifice
thy son. And they find, they get to Moriah.
They see Moriah from a long way off. And, and, and Abraham says
to his servants, you stay here. The lad and I are going up to
worship and we will return unto you. Abraham didn't know how
that was going to happen. We know that Abraham put his
son on a, on a altar and raised a knife and was going to put
him to death. Whether Abraham thought he was going to raise
him from the dead or whether Abraham, but God, Abraham believed God. And he said, me and the lad are
going to go worship and we will return them to you. Faith and worship always go together. How do I know if I have saving
faith? I bow in worship to the God who saved me. I worship him. Zachariah put it like this, when
the spirit of grace and supplication is poured out upon Jerusalem, they shall mourn after him as
one who mourneth after his own begotten son. The doctrine of
substitution says that the Lord Jesus Christ bore all the sins
of all of his people of every generation in his body and put
them away by the sacrifice of himself once and for all. He
is the sinner's substitute and he successfully achieved the
salvation of his people. And that's a glorious truth and
a glorious doctrine. How do I know the spirit of truth
has been poured out in my heart? Because it's not just a cold
doctrine to me. It's personal. It's personal. It causes me to come into his
presence and worship him. I'm not hanging the hopes of
my salvation on some doctrine. I don't mean to make doctrine
sound like it's not precious. It is. It's holy. But you see
what I'm saying? The Lord makes it personal. when he pours out the spirit
of grace and supplication in your heart. Lord, save me. That's the spirit
of supplication. Lord, save me. Save me. Justice had to be satisfied.
The wrath of God had to be appeased. And only
the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished that. When our founding fathers drafted
the Constitution of the United States, they wrote in the Bill
of Rights, the Eighth Amendment, which limited government from
cruel and unusual punishment. They knew that in order for justice
to be served, the punishment had to fit the crime. Now, if
man knows that much about justice, what about God's justice? What
about God's justice? What does God's holy justice
require to satisfy the offense of your sin? Your sin? My sin? Was turning beautiful angels
into hideous devils sufficient? casting them out of heaven? Was
all the curses given to men caused by the fall sufficient? Was washing the earth clean with
a flood and killing every living man, woman, and child, save eight,
was that sufficient? Was raining fire from heaven
and consuming all the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah sufficient
to satisfy God's justice? Do all the sufferings brought
about by sin, including the eternal fires of hell, are those things
sufficient? to satisfy the justice of God? Do they express sufficiently
God's hatred for sin and His demands for divine justice? And
I answer that question, no. The cross of the Lord Jesus Christ
was the only punishment that fit the crime. Everything else
was but a slap on the hand. Only the sinless Son of God could
bear the sorrow and the shame for our sin. Only He could suffer
the full wrath of God. Only He could satisfy divine
justice. For you and I to know what sin
is, we have to look to Christ. hanging
there as our substitute, suspended between heaven and hell, bearing
our sins in his body upon that cross, because that's the only
thing that expresses the hatred of God for sin. And I will say
this, if you or me were the only person that God intended to save,
what the Lord Jesus Christ did would have been necessary in
order to satisfy God's divine justice and put away your sin,
your sin. If the only sin, the only, here's
how evil sin is. We have no concept of this. We
believe this. We know it's true because God
said so. We can't identify with it because
we've become so accustomed to sin. But if the only sin that
had to be atoned for was the very first sin committed by our
father Adam in the garden, when he simply took a piece of fruit
and took a bite out of it. If that was the only sin that
had to be atoned for, what the Lord Jesus Christ went through
on Calvary's cross would have been necessary to atone for that
sin. When the spirit of grace and
the spirit of supplication is poured out from heaven into the
hearts of God's people. They mourn after him as one mourneth
for his only son, which just simply means they worship him.
They worship him. They become like that dog caught
in a trap. They follow their master home. They eat of his food, sleep on
his porch, and wait anxiously for every glimpse of time that
they have to be by his side to worship him. Gideon heard. He heard the dream. He heard the interpretation.
He worshiped God. He believed God. Our worship is nothing like it's
gonna be one day. Nothing. But if we've tasted
of his grace, we want more of it. Amen. Our heavenly Father,
bless your word to the souls of your people in the glory of
Christ. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. 125, let's stand
together. Yeah.