and and and Thank you, Joy. Good morning,
everyone. Let's open this morning's service
with hymn that we're familiar with, but we don't sing it too
often, number 514. 514 in your hardback timinal. And let's all stand together.
? Come we that love the Lord ?
And let our joys be known ? Join in a song with sweet accord ?
Join in a song with sweet accord ? And thus around the throne
? And thus around the throne ? We're marching to Zion Beautiful,
beautiful Zion. We're marching upward to Zion,
the beautiful city of God. Let those refuse to sing who
never knew our God, but children of the heavenly King, but children
of the heavenly King, may speak their joys abroad, may speak
their joys abroad. We're marching to Zion, beautiful,
beautiful Zion. We're marching upward to Zion,
the beautiful city of God. The hill of Zion yields a thousand
sacred sweets before we reach the heavenly fields, before we
reach the heavenly fields. the golden streets, or walk the
golden streets. We're marching to Zion, beautiful,
beautiful Zion. We're marching upward to Zion,
the beautiful city of God. Then let our songs abound and
every tear be dry We're marching through Emmanuel's ground We're
marching through Emmanuel's ground To fairer worlds on high To fairer
worlds on high We're marching to Zion, beautiful, beautiful
Zion. We're marching upward to Zion,
the beautiful city of God. Please be seated. It is the Lord Jesus Christ himself
that's going to make that city beautiful. We long to see him as he is and
be made like him. What a glorious day that'll be.
Good morning. We're going to be in Malachi
chapter four this morning, both hours, Malachi chapter four.
And I remind you just by matter of importance that these were
the last words that God gave to the nation of Israel. The
very last words. Last words I think are significant
and all of God's words are inspired and. Infinitely holy and true
faithful. But these are his last words. 400 years the Lord doesn't speak
after this. Until the Lord Jesus Christ as
the prophet of God comes and brings himself as the Word of
God. So. There's some wonderful things
in this last chapter of Malachi that I hope will be an encouragement
to us this morning. We want to pray before we begin
and ask the Lord's blessings, but I wanted to tell you a couple
of things. First of all, we got our final bill from the city
of Apopka and we'll pay that first thing in the morning. And
our contractor is prepared to break ground on Monday, January
the 20th, which will be the day after our conference. So that's
right on schedule. We're thankful for that. I don't
know if you've been watching the fires in Australia, but to
give you a perspective, last year in the California fires,
there was a quarter of a million acres burned. In the Australian
fires, there's been 10,000 acres burned, 10 million, I'm sorry,
10 million acres burned, 40 times the size of the fires in California. And the fire was just a little
bit west of Nowra, which is where the church is located, south
of Sydney, Saturday night. And I remember their day behind
us or a day ahead of us. Their day ahead of us so. Saturday night everybody came
to Angus's house. He said the houses were just
exploding because of the heat of the fire and they could see
the fire West of them and the forecast was for a 30 to 40 mile
an hour to blow out of the West. Angus said in my entire life
living here, I've never heard of a of a forecast of wind blowing
out of the west and it didn't happen. And they're watching
the fire and waiting for the wind to shift and the wind stopped.
And he said one mile an hour wind would have brought that
fire in an hour and destroyed our whole town. He said there
was not a zephyr of wind all night long and the fire was held
west of them and moved south of them and missed the city of
Nauru altogether. What manner of man is this that
even the wind and the sea obey his voice? God spared our brethren. You're going to meet your brothers
and sisters in glory one day, and you're going to love them
like we love each other here. They're a sweet, sweet group
of folks, and just so very, very thankful. They met yesterday
morning for worship, and I can only imagine the worship service
that they had. Was in tears a Sunday morning
when I spoke to him early preparing for service so. Our God is full of mercy and
delights in showing that mercy toward his children. Let's ask the Lord's blessings
on his word. Our merciful Heavenly Father, We know that with you, all things
are possible. The miracle that you performed
for our brethren in Australia pales in comparison to the miracle
of the new birth that you perform in the hearts of your children.
When you hold off the fire of your wrath and pour out The living water of your grace
into our hearts. We pray that you would be pleased
to do that again this morning. Or do for us spiritually in our
hearts what you've done for them physically. Thank you for your
grace and for your mercy. Open your word and. Or make it
alive and. Effectual and cause us to have
your faith. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. These are the very, very last
words that the Lord speaks to his people in the Old Testament,
verses four and five of Malachi chapter four. I'm sorry, verses
five and six, we'll deal with verse four in the second hour.
Verses five and six, behold, I will send you Elijah, the prophet
before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord.
And he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and
the heart of the children to the fathers, lest I come and
smite the earth with a curse. Now, turn with me to Amos chapter
3, Amos chapter 3, verse 7. Amos chapter 3, verse 7, surely,
surely you can You can rest your immortal soul on God's surely. Surely the Lord God will do nothing,
but he revealed his secret onto his servants, the prophets. So everything the Lord has done,
he has revealed through his prophets. Here in Malachi chapter four,
he promises to send a prophet and he refers to him as Elijah
who is representative of all the Old Testament prophets who
all pointed to Christ. We know from the words of the
Lord Jesus Christ that John the Baptist was that prophet. John the Baptist did exactly
what the prophets in the Old Testament did. He pointed to
the Lord Jesus Christ and said, behold, the Lamb of God, which
taketh away the sins of the world. That's the ministry of the prophets.
Surely God hath done nothing, but he hath revealed it to us
through his prophets. Romans chapter 10 says, call
upon the name of the Lord and you shall be saved. But how can
they call upon him in whom they have not believed? And how can
they believe on him in whom they've not heard? And how can they hear
without a preacher, without a declaration, without a prophetic word? So everything that God does,
everything he does, he does through his prophets. Turn with me to
Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1. Now that's
not to exalt the prophets. That is to make us dependent
upon God speaking and revealing himself to us. No man seeketh
after God at any time. The Lord seeks us. You hear people
talk about accepting Jesus. No, he accepts us. He seeks us. I remember a religious campaign
years ago. I found it. You'd see bumper
stickers on people's car. I found it. You found what? No, he finds us. It was a campaign
that somebody had started about trying to get people interested.
in false religion, but we don't find him. He finds us. He seeks
us. And he does it through the words
of his prophets. Romans chapter 1, verse 1, Paul,
a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto
the gospel of God, which he had promised afore by his prophets
in the holy scriptures concerning concerning his son Jesus Christ
our Lord which was made of the seed of David according to the
flesh and declared to be the son of God with power. So here's
the, that's the message of all the prophets. The message of
all the prophets was concerning the Lord Jesus Christ who was
according to the flesh of the seed of David but declared to
be the son of God with power. Power to save, to save to the
uttermost them who believe. Now, Satan by profession is a counterfeiter
and the scriptures are filled with warnings of false prophets. John tells us in 1 John chapter
1, chapter 4 verse 1, brethren, believe not every spirit, but
try the spirits, whether they be of God, for many false prophets
have gone out into the world. There's a lot of false prophets. Turn to me to 2 Corinthians chapter
11. 2 Corinthians chapter 11. Verse 13, for such are false
apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into
the apostles of Christ, and no marvel, for Satan himself is
transformed into an angel of light. Therefore, it is no great
thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers
of righteousness, whose end shall be according to their works.
Now, here's the problem with the false prophets. The false
prophets declare a message of salvation that enables you to
have righteousness by something you do. by something you do,
a decision you make, a work that you perform, a religious activity
that you engage in, something you stop doing. That's the hallmark
of the false prophets. When the Lord said, try the spirits
and see whether they be of God, listen to their message and see
what they require for righteousness. They're called ministers of righteousness.
Satan's called an angel of light. They're pretending to be sent
from God, but how do we know if they're sent from God or not
sent from God? The false prophet will tell you
to look to something other than the Lord Jesus Christ for your
righteousness. That's it. It's not any more
complicated than that. Look to something other than
the Lord Jesus Christ for your righteousness. The prophets of
God All do what John the Baptist did. They point to the Lord Jesus
Christ and they say, behold, I must decrease. He must increase. I am not worthy to unlatch his
sandals. He is the Christ. If we're going
to be saved, he's going to do it all and he's going to get
all the glory. That's how we tell the difference.
So we just listen to the message. I was talking to somebody this
past weekend. And I finally told him, I said, just read Romans
chapter nine. And so he read it. And this is a very religious
person who's been sitting under false prophets all his life.
And he texted me back and he said, I read Romans chapter nine
and I have concluded that God, how do you say it? He said, God
has chosen to give man free will. That's what he got out of Romans
chapter nine. God has chosen to give man free will. And it's man's free will that
ultimately determines the outcome of his salvation. That's a false
prophet. The prophets of God will tell
you clearly, simply, look to Christ, rest all your hope on
his glorious person and on his accomplished work of redemption. Behold, I will send Elijah the
prophet before the coming, before the great and dreadful day of
the Lord. God sends his prophets and he
does nothing without revealing it to his children by his prophets. Now turn with me to Matthew chapter
11. Matthew chapter 11. The false prophets. And there's
plenty of them. And they're called ministers
of righteousness. In other words, they promote righteousness. Don't think that the devil is
just involved in the shameful things that men do in the world. The devil was getting a lot more
mileage out of religion and out of morality than he does out
of out of anything else. And so, you have your Bibles open to
Matthew chapter 11, look at verse 1, and it came to pass when Jesus
had made an end of commanding his 12 disciples, he departed
thence to teach and to preach in their cities. And when John
had heard in prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his
disciples and said unto him, Art thou he that should come,
or do we look for another? The Lord had already revealed
to John that Jesus was the Christ. But here John's in prison about
to have his head removed from his body and he's wondering,
you know, maybe I misread this. Have you ever felt that way?
You get in straights and you think, well, you know, maybe
I misunderstood. And as this doesn't seem to be
going according to schedule, it doesn't seem to be, well,
it wasn't on John's schedule, it was on the Lord's schedule.
And Jesus answered and said unto them, go and show John again. Now, child of God, you know that
Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. And yet, when
you find yourself in the prison of troubles, you find yourself
about to be decapitated, you think, well, maybe I missed something
here. What do you need to hear? Again, again. You need to hear the same story
again and again and again, don't you? We're so prone to wonder
and we're so prone to doubt and we just need to hear about who
Christ is and what he's accomplished again. Tell John again. I love it. You know, I've been,
I've been accused of just, you just preach the same thing over
and over, you know, as if that's a, as if that's a, a, a, a, you
know, some kind of an insult. It's a badge of honor. You know,
it's, yeah, we preach the same person from all the scriptures
because all the faithful prophets of God spoke of Christ and they
all reveal the same person, the same work and God's people want
to hear the same thing. And so the Lord Jesus says, tell
John again, we've told him, I've talked to him, tell him again,
those things which you do hear and see. And that's what we tell
one another. We tell each other the things
that we've heard and the things that we've seen. The hearing
ear and the seeing eye are both of the Lord. And so if God's
given us ears to hear, and eyes to see so that we don't read
Romans chapter 9 and conclude that God has chosen to give man
free will. We know who God is and we know
that if the Lord didn't make us willing in the day of his
power we would never come. We know that. So we just recite
again and again the things that we have both heard and seen. What are those things? The blind
receive their sight. I once was blind but now I see. Now I see. I see that Christ
is all. I see that there's nothing that
I can do to merit God's favor. I see that I'm completely dependent
upon him. I see that I'm but a little child,
unable to do anything for myself. Tell him that the blind receive
their sight, the lame walk. There was a time when I was like
the lame man standing by the gate called beautiful. That's
a picture of one of God's people, lame from their sin, not able
to get into heaven. This lame man was not able to
go in and worship God in the temple. He was a Jew, but he
was crippled and so he was deformed and not fit for worship. And he's begging for alms. And
what did Peter say? Silver and gold have we none,
but such as we have, we give unto thee. In the name of Jesus
of Nazareth, stand and walk." And he immediately stood and
leaped and went in with him, didn't he, to worship God. Tell
him the lame walk. Was there a time when you were
unable to enter into the presence of God, but now you can stand?
You've got a rock to stand on now. You've got a place to stand. You're not coming before the
throne of the law. You're coming before the throne
of grace. And you've heard the voice of God say, come, come,
you're welcome. The lepers are cleansed. Now,
leprosy is a clearly a picture of our sin problem. We're born
with it. And it's a disease of the blood
and it affects every part of our body. And it can only be
healed with a miracle. And that's how we all come into
the world, as lepers. And now my sin's been put away.
It's been buried, it's been hid in the depths of the sea. It's
been buried. God sewed it up in a sack and
buried it in the earth. And he separated it from me as
far as the east is from the west. And God says I remember it no
more, so what do I have to fear? What do I have to fear? Tell
John this. Tell them that the dead are raised.
We who were dead in our trespasses and sins. Now, you just go down
to the morgue or go down to the cemetery and see what you can
get a dead corpse to do. See what you can get them to
do. See if you can get them to wiggle their finger. See if you
can get them to open their eyes. See if you can get them to open
their mouth. That's not going to happen, is it? They're dead. And that's what God says about
us spiritually. We're dead in our trespasses
and sins. We can't wiggle a finger. We
can't make a decision. We can't, you know, let God have
his way. That's why the miracle of the
new birth, which is called regeneration, necessarily precedes, in order,
faith. You've got to be born again before
you can believe. And that's a sovereign act of
God's grace when he gives us our ears to hear and causes us
through the hearing of the gospel. Now, is there a time lapse between
those two things? No. No. Chronologically, they
happen at the same time. Regeneration and faith happen
at the same time. But in order of things, The Lord has to birth us into
the kingdom of God. Nicodemus, unless you're born
from above, unless you're accept, you'd be born of the spirit.
You cannot see the kingdom of God. The dead are raised up. The poor have the gospel preached
to them. Poverty stricken. What? What
is the first of the Beatitudes? Blessed are the poor in spirit.
Blessed are those who have nothing, who can do nothing, who know
nothing, who are completely bankrupt, dependent upon God for everything.
They're blessed for theirs is the kingdom of God. Being made poor is the blessing,
is the blessing. And blessed is he. whosoever
shall not be offended in me. Men by nature are offended by
the gospel of God's free grace because it robs them of their
righteousness. You remember the ministers of
righteousness which are the false prophets telling you that your
righteousness is based on something you do? And it's always the same. It's just the only difference
between one false prophet and another false prophet is what
is required for you to do in order for you to have righteousness.
And that's the reason for all the different denominations.
You see where the Methodist denomination is now splitting? And I say,
Tricia told me that, and she saw it, and I said, not surprised.
Not surprised. They'll split again if the Lord
tarries. Why? Because they disagree on what
it is that's required for man to do in order to have righteousness. God's people never disagree on
that. God's people never break fellowship
and they always are united together from church to church. Why? Because
they're not hung up on, well, this person says you gotta do
this and that one says you gotta do that. No. Oh, they all believe
the same thing. Christ has done it all. And he
gets all the glory and men are offended by that because it robs
them of their false hope. It takes away their righteousness.
But it's the only righteousness we have. And we glory in Christ
knowing that he's all our righteousness. So the Lord says blessed are
you if you're not offended by me. Most people are offended
by Christ. And the bottom line is they hate
Christ. They hate him. Don't be fooled. Oh, they'll talk about Jesus.
And they'll put on all sorts of religious airs and garments
and play religious games, but they hate the Jesus who is. They hate him. And you love him, don't you? And as they departed, Jesus began
to say unto the multitude concerning Jod, what went you out into the
wilderness to see a reed shaken in the wind? What went you out
to see? A man clothed in soft raiment?
Behold, they that wear soft clothing are in king's houses. You didn't
go out to hear a wild man just declaring all sorts of crazy
things. You believed that he was a prophet
of God. You believed that he was that
prophet which God said he would send before the coming of Christ,
like unto Elijah. And what went you out for to
see? A prophet? Yea, I say unto you, and more
than a prophet. For this is he of whom it is
written, behold, I send my messenger before my face, which shall prepare
thy way before thee. Verily I say unto you, among
them that are born of women there hath not risen a greater than
John the Baptist, notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom
of heaven is greater than he. Now who is it that's least in
the kingdom of heaven? The Lord said the last shall
be first. Who's least in the kingdom of
heaven? Though he thought it not robbery
to be equal with God, yet he made of himself no reputation. And taking on the form of a servant,
he became least in the kingdom of heaven. When John said, I must decrease
and he must increase, what John was saying, he's the one. He's the one. And the Lord Jesus
is saying here, that John, the greatest man ever born, yet there's one greater than
he. There's one greater than he. And the fact that he's a
true prophet of God is evident and that he pointed to me. And from the days of John the
Baptist until now, the kingdom of heaven suffered the violence
and the violent take it by force. A lot of violence against God. For all the prophets, all the
prophets, and the law prophesied until John, and if you will receive
it, this is Elijah, which was to come. He that hath ears to
hear, let him hear. So the Lord Jesus Christ makes
no, he tells us very clearly. Remember the one that I prophesied
400 years before my coming? My last word to you was that
I'm going to send a prophet, and that I've done nothing without
the voice of my prophets. And when he comes, you're going
to know that he's been sent of God, for he's going to point
you to me. He's going to point you to me.
That's how we know the true prophets of God, for all the prophets
of God declare the same thing. Turn with me to Deuteronomy chapter
18. Deuteronomy chapter 18. All the prophets, small p, point
without ambiguity to the prophet, capital P. That's why, well, let's read
verse 15 of Deuteronomy chapter 18. The Lord thy God will raise
up unto thee a prophet. Now the Lord's speaking to Moses
and he's promising a prophet, a messenger from God. How can
they call upon the, here's the message this morning. Lord, I
need a message. And I need you to send me a messenger.
That's the only way I'm going to hear. I can't, I can't call
upon whom I'm not believed and I can't believe in whom I'm not
heard. And I can't hear without a preacher and faith comes by
hearing and hearing comes by the word. Lord, send me a prophet.
Speak to me, call me. See the self-righteous don't
believe themselves to need a prophet. They think they can just. prance
into the presence of God and present their righteousness as
the hope of their salvation, and that God will be obligated
to hear them. But not so with the people of
God. The Lord thy God will raise up
unto thee a prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren,
like unto me, and unto him you shall hearken. So Moses speaking
to the children of Israel said, there's going to come a prophet,
he's going to be kind of like me, but he's not going to be like
me. That's why the father spoke and said, this is my beloved
son in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him hearken unto him.
He's the prophet. He's the prophet of God. Look at verse 18 in that same
passage. I will raise them up a prophet
from among their brethren like unto thee. And I will put my
words in his mouth and he shall speak unto them all that I shall
command him. And it shall come to pass that
whosoever will not hearken unto my words, which he shall speak
in my name, I will require it of him. But the prophets which shall
presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not commanded
them to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods,
even that prophet shall die." Brethren, discern the prophets,
for God speaks by his prophets, and all of his prophets point
to the prophet, and he's the one He's the one, they shall
hear my voice. So you don't hear the voice of
a prophet, whether it be a preacher, or whether it be one of your
brethren telling you about Christ, you don't hear their voice and
believe. Whatever one man can talk you
into, another man can talk you out of. And just mark it down,
that's true. That's true. If what you believe,
you believe because you were taught that of a man, then somebody
else can teach you out of it. But if God has, if God has through
the audible voice of that man spoke effectually to your heart
and said, yeah, and you've heard the voice of God, nobody can
talk you out of that. The whole world will come to
an end and everybody can turn against you and your God and
you will stand your ground. Why? Because you've been taught
of God. They shall be all taught of God. Verse six, I love verse six. The Lord quotes verse six. And
I think it's Peter, maybe it's in 1 Peter. No, Luke, Luke chapter
one. Zachariah, the father of John
the Baptist quotes this verse in relationship to John the Baptist.
And I just delight in believing on a person that does away with
all differences. As the people of God, we have
a lot of different experiences in this world, don't we? We have
different opinions about things. We just have differences with
different personalities. And the gospel doesn't take away
those differences. It supersedes them. It overrides
them. It says those differences which
would normally divide men are not important. For they have
something now in common that overrides all their differences. And they can overlook their differences
because of that one thing that they have in common. The father's heart should be
turned to the... You know, there's such a generation gap in so many
ways between fathers and children, and yet a 65-year-old man can
have sweet fellowship in the gospel around a 13-year-old girl
and believe exactly the same thing. We have no differences. He will turn the hearts of the
fathers towards their children and the children toward their
fathers and put away all the differences that they have. Supersede
those things, cause them to have unity in Christ that overrides
everything else. That's God's last word to Israel
and that's God's word to us. It's a good word, isn't it? Good
word. All right, let's take a break.