Good morning. Tom, we're going to open with
number 62 in the hardback temple, number 62. Let's stand together. Crown Him with many crowns, the
Lamb upon His throne. Hark how the heavenly anthem
drowns all music but its own. Awake, my soul, and sing of Him
who died for thee. and hail Him as thy matchless
King through all eternity. ? Crown him the Lord of love ?
Behold his hands and side ? Rich wounds yet visible above ? In
beauty glorified ? No angel in the sky ? Can fully bear that
sight But downward bends his wandering eye, That mystery so
bright. Crown Him the Lord of life, Who
triumphed o'er the grave, Who rose victorious to the strife,
For those He came to save. His glories now we sing, Who
died and rose on high, Who died eternal life to bring, And lives
that death may die. Crown Him the Lord of Heaven,
One with the Father known, One with the Spirit through Him given,
From yonder glorious throne. ? To thee be endless praise ?
For thou for us hast died ? Be thou, O Lord, through endless
days ? Adored and magnified Please be seated. Good morning. And good morning to those of
you that are watching from home. Hopefully soon we'll be able
to gather back together here. That's our, that's our prayer.
We're going to be in Acts chapter two this morning, Acts chapter
two. I've titled this message, a prayer
for our church, a prayer for our church. Want to go before the Lord and
ask his blessings on his word and ask his blessings also on
Christian Emily Murray. They were united in holy matrimony
yesterday up in West Virginia and can't wait for them to get
back down here as a married couple. So we're very excited for them
and rejoice in their union. All right, let's ask the Lord
to bless our time together. Our merciful, gracious, and glorious
Heavenly Father, what great hope we have in knowing that when
we come into Thy presence pleading the name, the blood, and the
righteousness of Thy dear Son, that we have full acceptance
before Thee. We have an advocate. a sin bearer. We have a Savior. In whom we have all righteousness. What great hope we have in knowing
that as he is. So are we. Or that's beyond our. Our understanding and yet you've
given us faith to believe what you've declared in your word
and so Lord we come based on the promise of thy word. Believing
that you are Always faithful. Lord, we thank you for this time.
We pray your blessings on your word. We pray that you would
open what no man can shut open our hearts, open the windows
of heaven, open your word, open our understanding. And Lord,
give us the grace to set our affections on by dear son and
rest our hope in his glorious person and in his finished work.
Father, we thank you for Christian and Emily and we pray your blessings
on their on their marriage and on their home. Pray that you'd
be honored and glorified in their union. We ask it in Christ name. Amen. You have your Bibles open
to acts chapter 2. I can say to you as your pastor
that I've. Never thought about. Or prayed
for what we're doing as a church more than I have recently. I don't know if it's because
of the absence that we're experiencing and all the trials that were
going through being separated from one another. Or perhaps
it has something to do with the with the new building going up
right here next to us, My heart is heavy to know what are we
doing? What are we all about? Why are
we here? And I don't know a passage of
scripture that's more clear and more comprehensive as to what
the church is really all about than these last verses of Acts
chapter 2. When the Holy Spirit came down,
And the church, the New Testament church, was birthed. 3,000 souls were saved. And they continued steadfastly
in the apostles' doctrine and in fellowship and in the breaking
of bread and in prayer. This is a summary. of what God's
church is to look like. And my heart's desire is that
this is what our church will look like. Now, these things
that are identified in Acts chapter two cannot be manufactured in
the flesh. That's why I titled this message
a prayer for our church. Don't be under the misconception
that, well, I can do these things. No, you can't. And I can't. And we can't make our church
to be like this. But we can see that this is the
pattern that the Lord has given for his New Testament church.
And we can ask him to create in our hearts this spirit, this
desire, And if he does, then we'll have good hope in knowing
that all that we're doing is according to his word, it's for
his glory, and it's for the salvation of his people. That's my desire
for our fellowship and for our church. Acts chapter two. Beginning at verse 39, this has,
this is God's testimony of his people's response to the first
preaching of the gospel after Pentecost. And as I've said, this is a pattern,
if the spirit of God is blessing the word of God and calling out
of darkness into his marvelous light, his people and banding
them together in the fellowship of the church, then this is what
it'll look like. This is what it looked like.
There's a lot of warnings and in scripture, I think about the
passages over there in revelation where, uh, the seven churches
of Asia minor. are rebuked for some of the things
going on in their churches, but there's no rebuke here. This
is a fresh working of God's spirit and how we hope that the working
of God's spirit will be fresh for us every time we gather together
and that the Lord will cause us to have this spirit among
our people, among this fellowship. This is my prayer for our church. And my hope this morning is that
it will become your prayer for yourself and for this assembly. Otherwise, everything we're doing
is just in vain. Well, it's worse than vain if
it's done in the flesh. It's worse than empty. It is,
well, it's sinful, isn't it? May God put in our hearts this
desire to call out to him to give us this spirit. Verse 39, for the promise is
unto you and to your children and to all that are afar off. They heard the gospel as a fulfillment
of a promise that God made to his people. David said, although
my house be not so with God, yet he has made with me an everlasting
covenant. That everlasting covenant, the
word covenant is promise. That everlasting covenant is
ordered in all things and it's sure. The first thing that Peter
says after preaching Christ to them is that this is the fulfillment
of all the promises that God has ever made to save his people. The hope of our salvation is
based on a promise, not our promise to God. That's man-made works
religion, isn't it? Lord, I'll do this and you'll
be obligated to do that. And the Lord says, no, this is
the fulfillment of my promise. And I will, and you shall. I will save you and you shall
believe. I will forgive you of your sins
and you shall repent. I will love you and call you
out and you shall worship me and serve me willingly with all
of your heart. The gospel is based on God's
promise to us. And that's how they heard it.
How much preaching today is an attempt to inspire people and
motivate people by getting them to make promises to God. And
what Peter says clearly, this is the promise. And this promise
is for you and for your children. How I hope and pray that the
Lord will make this promise true to us and to our children. Our. That God would be merciful
toward Our children, they heard the gospel as the fulfillment
of an everlasting covenant promise of grace that God made that's
now being fulfilled. Now I want you to notice the
rest of this verse. Even as many as the Lord our
God shall call. They understood and believed
themselves to be dependent upon the inward call of grace in order
for them to be a part of this promise. And if the Lord teaches
us that, causes us to believe that, Each and every one of us
will say, Lord, turn me, and I shall be turned. Lord, save
me, and I shall be saved. Lord, open the eyes of my understanding,
and I shall see. Lord, take out my heart of stone
and put in a heart of flesh, and I shall believe and love
you. Lord, I'm dependent upon you to call me. Now, I want you to notice that
promise and call are in the same verse. Promise without a call makes
God to be a liar. If God made a promise and never
called anybody, then God would be a liar. And we know that our
God cannot lie. And a call without a promise
would make God mutable. If God was just calling people
because he decided all of a sudden that he was going to save somebody
and it wasn't based on an everlasting covenant promise that he made
in eternity past that's never been changed, now the God who
changes not is a God who is mutable. He's always changing. He's always
trying to figure out a way. No, you see, promise and call
are two sides. to the same coin, aren't they?
A promise without a call would make us disinterested. The only time we become interested
in the promises of God is after God's called us. So if God doesn't
call us, we have no interest in the promises of God. And the
call of God without the promise would give us no place to put
our hope. If God just called men without
giving them a promise to establish their hope in, then we would
have no place to rest. You see, the promise of God and
the call of God are necessary to maintain the integrity and
the glory of God and they're necessary for our salvation.
And that's what the New Testament church believed. They believed
that their salvation was based on a promise and necessitated
on a call. May the Lord give us that spirit
to rest our hope in a promise and to keep pleading with him
to call us unto himself. Notice in verse 40, and with
many other words did he testify and exhort, with many other words. The gospel cannot be condensed
to a soundbite. The gospel cannot be condensed
to a slogan. It cannot even be condensed to
a creed or to a confession. What, where did Peter spoke a
lot more to this crowd of people on the day of Pentecost than
what we have recorded in the scriptures. That's clear. As
the Lord Jesus Christ did, John makes it clear in John chapter
20, he said, if all the things that the Lord had said and done
were recorded, the world would not be able to hold the books
that could be written. So we have those things necessary
for our understanding and for our salvation revealed to us. But Peter now goes on to speak
to them many, many more words than what we have recorded here.
Where did he get those words from? He got it from the scripture,
didn't he? The word of God is our authority.
No other place. Creeds are not our authority.
Confessions are not our authority. We don't have those. We can't reduce the gospel down
to those things. The gospel is the full canon
of scripture. That's why we have to preach
the full counsel of God's word, don't we? Turn to me to Acts. You're there in the book of Acts.
Turn over to Acts chapter 20. Acts chapter 20, Paul is meeting with the elders
in Ephesus and he's admonishing them, he's encouraging them about
how to lead their local assemblies after his departure. And he says
to them in verse 27, for I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God. From the first verse in Genesis
to the last verse in Revelation, this book is about Christ. It's
about the nature of God. It's about how it is that the
Lord's pleased to save us. And we can't limit the gospel
to a verse or to a slogan or to a logo or to a creed or confession. We must be faithful. This is
my prayer for our church, that God would keep us faithful to
preach the whole counsel of God. Verse 28, Paul says, take heed
therefore to yourselves and to the flock over which the Holy
Ghost hath made you overseer to feed the church of God, which
he hath purchased with his own blood. See, if we're going to
have a well-balanced diet, and I've said to people over the
years, I've said, what a difference a steady diet of the gospel has
on men. You know, you watch someone come
in and they sit and they've got questions and objections and
over a period of time, a steady diet of the gospel just has a
strengthening, spiritual strengthening effect on the hearts of men.
And, and that's what Paul's saying, feed the church of God, all the
counsel of God. Look at, look over, look over
in second Timothy chapter four. You're familiar with this passage,
2nd Corinthians chapter, 2nd Timothy, I'm sorry, chapter 4,
beginning at verse 1. I charge ye therefore before
God and the judge and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall judge
the quick and the dead at the appearing of his kingdom. Preach
the word. The whole council of God. It's
all about Christ. It's all going to lead us. If
a passage of scripture doesn't lead us to the Lord, Jesus Christ,
then we've, we've misunderstood that passage of scripture. And
what Paul is saying to Timothy. Now you I'm charging you by the
authority of God. This is my prayer for our church,
that the Lord would humble us to be faithful to the whole council
of God, preach the word. Be instant, in season and out
of season. When it's convenient and when
it's not convenient, when men listen and when they don't listen,
just keep preaching the whole counsel of God's word. Now that's
what the first church heard. With many other words, he exhorted
them about the gospel. For the time will come, I'm sorry,
out of season, rebuke, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long-suffering
in doctrine. For the time will come when men
will not endure sound doctrine. After their own lust, they will
heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. They just want
to hear, they want to have their ears tickled. They want to hear
something entertaining. They want to hear something that's
going to make them feel good. God's people and God's church
want to hear what God says. That's just the bottom line.
Just tell me what the Lord says. That's all I'm concerned about.
I don't care about opinions. I don't care about creeds. I
don't care about confessions. I don't care about denominations.
I want to know what saith the scriptures. And that's what Peter
did. He stood up and he exhorted these,
this first, this early first New Testament church with the
scriptures. Go back with me to our text in
Acts chapter two. They heard the gospel as a covenant
promise. Secondly, They understood their
dependence upon God to call them. They knew that coming to Christ
wasn't a decision. Coming to Christ could not be
done by their free will. Coming to Christ had to be made
irresistible. He had to draw them. He had to
call them. And so Peter says, this is the
fulfillment of the promise that God has made to you and to your
children To everyone that's a far off, and he's not talking about
just those that are far off physically in another land, because in fact,
until God calls us, we're all a far off. Spiritually, there's no such thing as being
close to the kingdom of God. You're either in it or you're
out of it. And if we're outside of Christ, we are spiritually
a far off. That's who the promise is for.
It's for those that are far off. Those who think, well, you know,
I'm pretty close. I'm right there. You know, I've
got something to offer when I do come. No, that's not who the
promise is for. The promise is for those who
are far off and for those who acknowledge their need to be
called. And with many other words, verse
40, the gospel cannot be condensed to anything less than the whole
of God's word, all of scripture. That's why this is the revelation
that we have of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what did he testify and exhort
them to do? Save yourselves. This New Testament church, and
we will be patterned after this church if the Lord puts on our
hearts that our greatest need is to be saved. That's our greatest
need. Nothing else really matters.
God's people understand that at the end of the day, forget
the end of the day, at the end of life, Nothing else is going
to be of any consequence other than the salvation of our soul.
Lord, I need to be saved. I need for you to be merciful
to me. I need for you to take my sins
away. I need for you to give me Christ
as my righteousness before God. Lord, if you don't do that, nothing
else matters. And that's what Peter is saying.
Save yourself from this untoward generation. Now you know that
a lot of words in the English language and probably in the
Spanish language too come from the Greek. And usually it's a
part of a Greek word that we change. But I want you to see
this word untoward. You see it in your scriptures?
It is the word scoliosis. We use that word in our language,
don't we? What is a person who had, my
mother had scoliosis. And she had a crooked spine.
That's what scoliosis means. It means crooked. It means perverse. It means it's not straight. And
my mother suffered with that all of her life. And when she
was 80 years old, she had back surgery. I mean, major reconstructive
surgery, and she never recovered from it. And the next 10 years
of her life, she lived in agony with an attempt to correct scoliosis. And she died in agony from that. And I thought, you know, as I,
what a picture of man-made religion. Men who've got scoliosis. and
they're trying to correct their problem, and they're living in
pain and in agony, and they go to this doctor and that doctor,
and they try to get it patched up and fixed, and it never is. And the older they get and the
longer they live, the worse it becomes, the worse it becomes. And the Lord, I'm thankful. He has mercy on people of all
ages, but how often do we see of a person who's older being
called? Not often, do we? What am I saying
to you? Come to Christ the first time
you hear the gospel. The first time you hear the gospel.
Come, don't wait. Your scoliosis is just going
to get worse. You're going to become more and
more crooked. You're going to become, everything's going to become
more and more painful. The only hope you have of getting
a straight spine is to be saved from this untoward generation. The whole generation that we
live in has scoliosis. They can't stand up straight. And they're all in agony and
they're looking here and looking there to try to get some relief
from their pain. And they're going to this quack
and that quack to try to have, you know, some, and nothing works,
nothing works. You see, it's not until the Lord
saves us from this untoward generation. It's not until he takes away
our sin and gives us Christ that we have any hope. Any hope in
this life or in the life to come. The urgency of the gospel is
being declared now by Peter. He's saying, save yourself. Hey, you know, that he's not
saying do something to make yourself right with God. He's saying,
calm, calm. Yeah, what the Lord, what the
Lord requires, he must provide. And we know that through all
of scripture. And so when the Lord, when he says, save yourself,
he's saying the Lord's calling you come out from among them
and be separate. Sayeth the Lord, you've got a
crooked spine. I'm the only one that can make
it straight. And the whole generation that you live in has got the
same problem you've got. They just don't know it. Oh,
might the Lord give us this spirit in our church. Notice verse 41. Then they that gladly received all Lord. Make us willing in
the day of thy power. Give us a spirit of rejoicing
in Christ. I'm not interested in somebody
reluctantly confessing Christ or reluctantly joining the church
or, or, or just some sort of flash in the pan sort of experience,
you know, where they're, where they're pulled emotionally into.
Abraham is called the father of the faithful. And Abraham
in so many ways is a pattern of faith. Abraham believed God
and it was counted unto him for righteousness. And when the Lord
Jesus Christ told those Pharisees before Abraham, as I am, and
he went on to say, your father, Abraham, your fleshly father,
Abraham rejoiced to see my day. He rejoiced to see my day and
he saw it and was glad. He gladly received the word of
God. What? That the Lord would cause
our hearts to swell with thanksgiving and rejoicing over the precious
promises of him, of his word and of Christ. That we would,
that we would gladly receive the word of God. That we'd be
more, that we'd be more, um, glad over God's word than anything
else. Anything else? What makes you,
what makes you happy? What makes you glad? What makes
you rejoice? The father, the faithful saw
his day and was glad and he rejoiced. And they that were gladly received
the word. Look, look at verse 41. This
is my prayer for our church. Mike, the Lord make this each
of our prayers for our church. I've been hoping that the Lord
would put on somebody's heart, praying that the Lord would put
on somebody's heart, a desire to confess him in public baptism. And what a rejoicing day it would
be for our first day all back together to be able to witness
a baptism. When God causes someone to be
glad over the gospel, he causes them to want to confess him.
And that's all baptism is. Baptism is a public declaration
of the new believer saying that my hope of salvation, And the
only hope of salvation that I have is that when the Lord Jesus Christ
died on Calvary's cross, I was in him. I died in him. That when he was buried, I was
buried in him. When he was risen from the dead,
I was risen in him. You see, baptism is just a picture
of one person confessing to others that the hope of their salvation
is union with Christ. My salvation can't be depended
upon anything else other than what the Lord Jesus Christ has
done. I know whom I have believed and I am persuaded that he is
able to keep that which I've committed unto him. against that
day. The death, burial, resurrection,
and ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ. His perfect life of righteousness
and his ascension back into glory to be seated at the right hand
of the majesty on high. Christ is my hope of salvation. That's all baptism is. And that's
what Peter, Peter exhorted them with many other words just as
we're doing right now. And And the Lord put on the hearts
of 3000 souls to want to confess their hope in Christ through
baptism. Wouldn't that be something? Verse 41, then they that gladly
received the word were baptized in the same day they were added
unto them about 3,000 souls. This church grew in one day from
120 members to 3,120 members. And they didn't have a building
program. But they believed what they heard
and they confessed Christ and they became part of the body
of Christ. And verse 42, they continued steadfastly. I know that if the Lord does
a work of grace in our hearts, that he will. cause us to persevere. I'm not interested in anybody
doing anything that's not done by the Lord because I know it
won't last. It won't last. But if God does it, if God does
it, we will continue steadfastly. It won't be, it won't be because,
you know, somebody, somebody pulled my heartstrings or some
preacher got up and, you know, and, and, and convinced me and,
and, It wasn't a flash in the pan. No, it was a work of grace
in the heart, and that lasts forever. That's my prayer. Lord, do a work of grace in our
hearts. Their hearts weren't just moved. Their hearts were changed. That's
my prayer. Lord, don't just move our emotions. Change our hearts. Give us a
new heart. And what did they continue steadfastly? You see, the only true final
evidence of salvation is believing on Christ to our dying breath.
Faith is the evidence of things hoped for. You see, if faith
ever stops, it wasn't real faith, was it? And so the only true
evidence that we have that the Lord has saved us is that we
can't quit believing. We continue steadfastly. in the Apostle's Doctrine. What
was the Apostle's Doctrine? Well, we've already dealt with
that. It's the full canon of scripture, isn't it? It's the
gospel of God's free grace in the finished work of Christ revealed
in the word of God. That's the Apostle's Doctrine.
They didn't have anything else to teach from other than the
scriptures. And they continue steadfastly
in the Apostle's Doctrine and in fellowship. I heard a brother
say one time, fellowship is a bunch of fellows in the same ship.
And, you know, the church is likened to a boat in the scriptures.
And, you know, you get people on the same boat together. They
got to work together, don't they? They've got to cooperate together.
They're kind of, you know, they're kind of confined there to a very
limited space. And, you know, they've all got
to cooperate. You can't have chaos on a boat. Oh might the Lord cause us to
have that kind of, the word here is koinonia, it's the word common. May the Lord cause us to have
that kind of common spirit towards Christ and towards his gospel
and love for one another and a love for his word and you see
these are the things that God has to put in our hearts and
my prayer is that This absence that we're experiencing right
now will only cause our hearts to grow fonder of one another. They continued steadfastly in
the apostles doctrine and in fellowship and in the breaking
of bread. Now that's a reference to the
Lord's table. And in fact, though we do it
physically here once a month, Every time we open the scriptures,
we're breaking bread, aren't we? You remember when the Lord
revealed himself to those disciples in Luke chapter 24, walking back
to Emmaus, and the disciples didn't know they were walking
with the Lord until what happened? They asked him to come in until
it was getting dark, it's dinnertime, won't you stay with us and enjoy
a meal with us? And he sat down with them and
in the breaking of bread, their eyes were opened and they saw
him. That's when God opens our eyes,
when the bread of life is broken open, whether it be at the Lord's
table or whether it be at the preaching of the gospel. May
we continue steadfastly in the breaking of bread, in fellowship,
in the apostles doctrine and in prayer and in prayer. You know, one of the evidence
that the Lord grows you in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord
Jesus Christ is that you become more You know, you become more needful
for prayer. You remember when Saul of Tarsus
was knocked off his high horse in Acts chapter Nine, and the
Lord sent him to Damascus, to Justice's house at the street
called Straight. And then the Lord appeared to
Ananias and said to Ananias, there's one at the street called
Straight and Justice's house. His name is Saul of Tarsus. You
go. And you preach the gospel to
him. And Ananias objected. Ananias said, we've heard of
this man. He's been arresting people in Jerusalem. He's come
here to arrest us. And the Lord said, you go, for
he is my servant. And behold, he prayeth. What was Saul doing? What was
he doing those three days between the time that the Lord arrested
him on the road to Damascus and the time that Ananias came and
preached the gospel to him and his eyes were open and immediately
Saul of Tarsus, scripture says, got up and went into the temple
right there in Damascus and preached Christ to them. What was he doing? He was praying and behold, take
notice of him. He prayeth. He prayeth. Might the Lord give us a spirit
of prayer in this fellowship. Cause us to say, Lord, would
you, would you acknowledge my prayers? Would you, would
you put in my heart to pray, to say, and behold, look, there's
may have one man in all of Damascus. He's praying. You know how rare
it is for someone to actually pray. I mean, people, you know, as
long as there's, someone says, as long as there's tests in school,
there's going to be prayer, you know, in school. And I guess
that's probably true. But that's not prayer. As long as there's bullets flying
at you in the battlefield, there's going to be, you know, there's
going to be a lot of foxhole religion too, isn't there? But I'm talking
about prayer. Lord, save me. Lord, give me more grace. Give me wisdom. We're not talking
about praying for temporal things. We're talking about praying for
those spiritual things. When you pray for temporal things,
you can't be sure that that's God's will for you to have that.
But brethren, you pray for spiritual things and you can be absolutely
certain by the promises of God's word that it is His will for
you to have them. Pray for them. Pray for love,
pray for understanding, pray for grace, pray for wisdom. These
new believers continued steadfastly in the apostles doctrine and
fellowship in the breaking of bread and in prayer. That's my hope for our church. May God make it our prayer. That he would cause it to be.
We're going to take a 10 minute break and then we'll be back,
OK?