Sweet fellowship, isn't it? Psalm 69, you don't have to look
this up, the scripture says, then I restored
that which I took not away. Now that was a prophetic statement
that David was making about the Lord Jesus Christ restoring back
to his people that which he took not away. We're responsible for
what we lost in our father Adam. We're responsible for our own
sin. The Lord Jesus Christ is the restorer. Restorer of grace,
the restorer of fellowship, restorer of joy, restorer of life. Life. The passage we are going
to look at in Isaiah 58 speaks to that end so I pray the Lord
will be pleased to bless that. Bert is going to come and lead
us in the hymn on the back of your bulletin so please stand.
? Happy the man whose hope relied
? On Israel's God who made the sky ? And earth and seas with
all their train ? And none shall find his promise vain His truth
forever stands secure. He saves the lost and feeds the
poor. Why should I make a man my trust? Princes must die and turn to
dust. Vain is the health of flesh and
blood. Nor can they make their promise
good. Their breath departs, their fame
and power, and thoughts all vanish in an hour. I'll praise Him while He lends
me bread. And when my voice is lost in
debt, praise shall employ my nobler power. Thy days of praise shall ne'er
be past, while life and thought and being last, for immortality
endures. Please be seated. Good morning. Our God has. Always shown mercy
on whom he will show mercy and whom he will. He hardened if
that will never change. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
same yesterday, today, and forever. He has always saved his people
from their sin, and he always will. The Holy Spirit has always
been the comforter of God's children. He's always comforted God's children,
and he always will. One other thing that's eternal.
and will never change is the gospel. The gospel has always
been about the Lord Jesus Christ. It's about the Lord Jesus Christ
today, and it will always be about the Lord Jesus Christ.
Turn, if you will, to Job chapter 19. They say Job and Abraham were
contemporaries. They say this is the oldest account
concerning salvation. Verse 21. Have pity upon me,
have pity upon me, O ye, my friends, because the hand of God hath
touched me. Why do you persecute me as God
and are not satisfied with my flesh? Oh, that my words were
now written Oh, that they were printed in a book, that they
were graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock forever,
because I know that my Redeemer liveth, and that he shall stand
at the latter day upon the earth. And though after my skin worms
destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God, whom I
shall see for myself. And mine eyes shall behold and
not another, though my reins or my understanding be consumed
within me. But you should say, why persecute
we him, seeing that the matter is found in me? Be ye afraid
of the sword, because wrath bringeth the punishment of the sword,
that you may know there is judgment. Father, we come before you this
morning, Father, knowing that our Redeemer Ever live with to
make intercession for us. We know father that he has already
been upon this Earth. That he is through eternity past
father made arrangements for the forgiveness of our sins.
We know these things farther because the Holy Spirit is born
to again gave us eyes to see father and ears to hear. Our hope father. and our trust
are founded on these eternal things. This earth will come
and go farther. People will be born, live and
die, but the things of God will go on forever and ever. We're thankful father that you've
answered prayers about our sister Jennifer. We ask that you continue
to heal her father and and keep her here with us. We'd ask father
that Rinaldo sister would be would be brought to our knowledge
of the truth, Father, and that her body would be healed. Father,
be with those that have problems here that are almost more than
they can bear. We'd ask, Father, that you'd
be with Greg this morning, that you'd give him the grace and
the liberty, Father, to present Christ to us in all of his glory,
Father, and in all of his saving mercy. We ask these things in
Jesus' name, amen. We're going to sing to him now
number 361, the Blue Hardback Hymnal. 361, if you could please
stand. Sweet hour of prayer, number
361. ? Sweet hour of prayer ? ? Sweet
hour of prayer ? ? That calls me from a world of care ? ? And
bids me at my father's throne ? ? Make all my wants and wishes
known ? In seasons of distress and grief, My soul has often
found relief, And oft escaped the tempter's snare By thy return,
sweet hour of prayer. ? Sweet hour of prayer, sweet
hour of prayer ? Thy wings shall my petition bear ? To Him whose
truth and faithfulness ? Engage the waiting soul to blend and
since he bid me seek his faith, believe his word, and trust his
grace, I'll cast on him my every care, and wait for the sweet
hour of prayer. Sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour
of prayer, may I thy consolation share. Till from Mount Pisgah's
lofty height, I view my home and take my climb. This robe of flesh I'll drop
and rise to seize the everlasting prize. and shout while passing
through the air, farewell, farewell, sweet hour of prayer. Be seated, please. What a glorious day that'll be.
Farewell. Farewell. Oh, thank you, Burton. Joy, that was a blessing. Will
you open your Bibles with me to Isaiah chapter 58. Christ,
our Restorer. And what He restores is so much
better than what was lost. Now, Isaiah prophesies before
Israel is carried off into captivity, just before. just the generation
before. And he's prophesying of how God
is going to restore that which has been taken away by the Babylonians. And much of what he says is fulfilled
in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. Those were the two men that God
raised up in Babylon to bring the children of Israel back and
rebuild the city, rebuild the wall, fix the breaches in the
wall, hang the gates, and reinstitute the worship of Jehovah and the
practice of the Sabbaths in Israel. So that's the historical setting.
The picture, of course, is what the Lord Jesus Christ does to
restore that in our hearts which has been lost as a result of
our own sin and our own rebellion. And what a picture it is. Nehemiah
asked, he was a cupbearer for Artaxerxes who was the Persian
king who had overthrown the Babylonians and Nehemiah asked a traveler
who came from Jerusalem, what the state of the Jews left back
in Jerusalem was. And when he heard that the walls
were all crumbled down, the temple had been destroyed, the Jews
were in distress, the scripture says that Nehemiah wept bitterly. And he pleaded with the Lord
to restore the worship of God among his people. The king saw
that there was something distressing in Nehemiah and so Artaxerxes
asked Nehemiah in Nehemiah chapter 1, what's wrong with you? What's
wrong with you? And he fearfully tells the king
about the report that he had heard of the state of Jerusalem. The pagan king, under the sovereign
hand of God, sends Nehemiah back with a group of Jews to rebuild
the wall and the temple. And when they get there, there
are two men, one's called Sanballat and the other one is Tobiah. And Tobiah and Sanballat, laugh
at Nehemiah to scorn, the scripture says. The same thing is true
today. The gainsayers, the unbelievers
laugh at what they hear about the restoration of Jerusalem
and the work of Christ. And they try to thwart the work. They try to stop them. And Nehemiah's
response was, we cannot come down. We have been given a great
work. We're not going to stop what
we're doing. And so the workers, the scripture says, had a sword
in one hand and a trowel in the other hand. And so while they
were working with the trowel, they were protecting themselves
with a sword. What a picture, the sword being the word of God,
The trial being the willing work of God's people. The scripture
says that the people had a heart to work. And so they were faithful
in rebuilding the temple. It's a picture. Turn with me. You have your Bibles open to
Isaiah chapter 58. By the way, Sanballat and Tobiah
sent Nehemiah letters wanting him to come down off the wall.
And in the letters, Sanballat identified a place called the
Valley of Ono and said to Nehemiah, just come down for a little while
and meet me in the Valley of Ono and we'll discuss some terms
of peace. If you look up the word, oh no,
and that's easy enough to do, you'll see that the word translated
means common. Let's find some common ground.
Come on, we can agree to disagree on the specifics of your doctrine. Let's just all get along and
find some common ground and everything will be okay. And Nehemiah responded
by saying, we have nothing in common. We're not coming down. We're going to build this wall.
God's called us to do it. And it's the Lord's work. And
it's He that works in us, causing us to will and to do after His
good pleasure. This is the Lord's work. So the
restoring of Jerusalem, the holy city, that's the church. That's
the same Jerusalem that John saw in the book of Revelation
coming down from heaven, which had four walls and 12 foundations
and streets of gold and the glory of the Lord. That's the presence
of God among his people. Now, in short, that's what we're
interested in. I'm interested in being in the presence of God.
I'm interested in being a part of the new Jerusalem, the holy
city. I want to be a part of his church. I want to be a part
of the body of Christ. If that's going to happen, he's
going to have to restore that which I took away. And that's
exactly what Isaiah is prophesying. So this message is for us today. It has a lot of historical references
in the history of Israel, but as we all know, that History
is his story, and it's a history of redemption. It's a history
of salvation, and it's relevant. It's relevant for you and I right
now, 2017, as it was back in 660 AD when Isaiah prophesied
it. Verse 11. And the Lord shall
guide thee continually and satisfy thy soul in drought and make
fat thy bones. And thou shalt be like a watered
garden and like a spring of waters, water whose waters fail not.
Lord, that's what I need. I need to flow from my heart
the river of life, the water of life. I need to know thee."
And the Lord's promising here. He said, this is what I'm going
to do. Now notice in verse 12, and I'll say this again for the
sake of those who may not have heard it before, we use the King
James here. And one of the reasons we do
is because we believe it to be the best translation of the original
text. And one of the good things about
the King James is when the translators added words to help the reading,
they put those words in italics. And most of the time, the text
actually reads better if you just take them out. Just take
those italicized words out and the meaning is more clear. So
notice in verse 12, they that shall be are all in italics. So let's just read this verse
without that. and of thee. Who is it that does the work? Who is it that does the work? You know, I've heard it said
in the past, life is short and soon will pass and only what's
done for Christ will last. But there's a lot better way
to say that. Life is short and it soon will pass. but the truth
is only what's done by Christ will last. He's the one that
does the work. He's the one that works in us,
causing us to will and to do after his good pleasure. And
Nehemiah chapter four, verse six says, and we built the wall
and all the wall was joined together for the people had a mind to
work. Why do the people have a mind
to work? Because they had the mind of Christ. the Lord gave
them that mind. So what the Lord does, yes, He
does with and through His people, but He gets all the glory for
it. He gets all the credit. So this
verse, this verse, and of thee, there's four things. They're
going to build the old waste places. They're going to rise
up the foundations. They're going to repair the breach. and restore the paths. All of these have spiritual meaning
to the work of Christ. Nehemiah began his work in prayer
back in Babylon. He pleaded with the Lord and
the Lord heard him. When God is going to do a work,
he puts it into the hearts of his people to pray for his ability
to do that work, whatever it is, whatever it is. When Daniel
who was also in captivity in Babylon prayed, the scripture
says that he prayed for three full weeks, turned his face towards
Jerusalem and prayed to God for three full weeks. And when the
Lord answered him after the third week, The Lord said, I heard
your prayer from the first day that you set your heart towards
me. Why? Because I was the one who set
your heart towards me. You see, prayer is not to change
the mind of God. Prayer is to change us. Prayer
is to change us. And God always puts it in our
hearts to ask Him for that which He intends to give us. The Lord never saves anyone without
putting it into their hearts to ask Him for it. to ask Him
for it. Now, salvation is of the Lord. God has sovereignly chosen a
particular people according to His own will and purpose and
written their names indelibly, if you will, with iron pen in
a book with the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ as its ink.
And He's written their names in the Lamb's Book of Life. That
can never be changed. God is sovereign in salvation.
God has to call us out in salvation. God has to regenerate us. He has to take out the heart
of stone and put in a heart of flesh. He has to do all the saving. He has to do every bit of it.
Now that being said, I speak particularly to our young people
who have been sitting under the gospel all their lives. Oh, please
listen to your pastor. Listen to me. The Lord will We'll make it so
that we ask. I thought of an illustration
to this. Most of you all have been to
our home. You know where we live. Across the lake from our house
is a train track. And this has happened many, many
times. Somebody will spend the night
with us from out of town. And of course, when we get up
in the morning, we'll say, well, how did you sleep? And then inevitably
they will say, well, fine, until that train came through about
2 o'clock this morning. And it woke us up. Trisha and I have never heard
that train. We've never heard it. I mean,
maybe when we first moved in the first few nights, we've been
there 25 years. Even if you were standing in
my front yard and the train came by, you would have to call attention
to that train in order for us to even know that it came by. We're deaf to it. And if you're not careful, you'll be deaf to the gospel.
You ask most believers and they will tell you the first time
they heard the gospel, they knew it was the gospel. They were
broken by it. They bowed to it immediately. And I am here to point out that
train. Can you hear it? It's passing
by now. Blind Bartimaeus knew that the
Lord Jesus Christ was passing by then, and it was his only
chance. And he cried and said, Son of
David, have mercy upon me. Don't take for granted that the
train is going to come by tomorrow. And if you've become deaf to
it, ask God to open your ears. hear the sound of the train,
hear the voice of God. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. With the heart man believeth
unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto
salvation. When that Ethiopian eunuch asked
Paul, what must I do to be saved? Paul didn't say, oh, nothing
you can do, just go home and hope that God has mercy on your
soul. No, he said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou
shalt be saved. And when Peter preached on the
day of Pentecost and the people were broken, they were pricked
in their hearts, men of Israel, what must we do to be saved?
Peter didn't say, go home, just see if God has mercy on you.
No, he called on them to believe. You see, the means by which our
sovereign God saves sinners is the outward audible call and
the outward faith. Some of you have been listening
to that train. Well, you haven't heard the train in years. It's
been passing by, but you haven't heard it. Don't presume that train is going
to come tomorrow. The Lord Jesus Christ came, notice
in verse 8, verse 12 of our text. They shall build the old waste
places. Now, turn with me to Ezekiel
chapter 20. I want to answer this question. The question is what sin did
God's people commit that brought the judgment of God against Israel
and caused the city to fall? And it's the same sin over and
over and over again that the Israelites, the Israelites were
guilty of a lot of sins. But this is the sin whereby God
drew the line. The Lord didn't bring judgment
upon Israel because of David's sin, as grievous as it was with
Bathsheba and Uriah. He didn't bring judgment upon
Israel because of Solomon's sin. There was a lot of things that
Israel did that the Lord forgave them of, but this sin always
brought judgment. Verse 10 of Ezekiel chapter 20.
Wherefore, I caused them to go forth out of the land of Egypt
and brought them into the wilderness, and I gave them my statutes and
showed them my judgments, which if a man do, he shall even live
in them. Moreover, also I gave them my
Sabbaths to be a sign between me and them that they might know
that I am the Lord that sanctify them. It was the violation of
the Sabbath. When God's people broke the Sabbath,
it's when God brought judgment upon them. It was their unwillingness
to keep the Sabbath that caused, well that was the one sin that
God that God was about to wipe out all of Israel in the wilderness
for and Moses interceding before them, you remember? And what should have taken them
40 days to get through the wilderness took them 40 years because that
generation had to die off in order for Joshua, a picture of
Christ, to bring the children of Israel into the promised land.
Why? Because they violated the Sabbath. But the house of Israel rebelled
against me in the wilderness. They walked not in my statutes.
They despised my judgments, which if a man do shall live in them
and my Sabbaths, they greatly polluted." Look down in verse
16, because they despised my judgments and walked not in my
statutes, but polluted my Sabbaths for their heart went after their
idols. They polluted my Sabbaths. Now turn with me to Exodus chapter
31. This sin was the sin that caused the destruction
of Jerusalem. This sin is if a man dies in
it, the unpardonable sin. Violating the Sabbath. Man can be a murderer, God will
forgive him. If he violates the Sabbath, and
he dies in violating the Sabbath, there's no forgiveness. Now those
of you that have been around a while, You know I'm not talking
about going to church on Sunday. You know that. We don't manipulate people by
putting them under the law to get them to come to church on
Sunday. If they know Christ and I'm preaching
Christ, they want to be here to meet with Him. That's all
God's people want to do. They just want to know more about
Christ. We're not talking about that. And those legalists who
think they're keeping the Sabbath by what they do and don't do
on Sunday. I was talking in the hospital
Thursday and we were waiting for Jennifer's surgery and And
I was talking to John, I think I was talking to John about the
Seventh-day Adventist and how, you know, it used to be in the
Seventh-day Adventist hospitals, you couldn't buy meat. You couldn't
buy coffee. You know, they had all these
laws. And the nurse was standing over there. She said, I testify
to that. She said, I grew up Seventh-day
Adventist. If you're going to keep the Sabbath, according to
the, just join the Seventh-day Adventist. They've got all the
rules and regulations that you need. to feel like you've kept
the Sabbath. But in their attempt to keep
the Sabbath, they are in fact violating the Sabbath because
the Sabbath has nothing to do with what you eat or don't eat
or do and don't do on Sundays. But this is the sin. God made
the Sabbath a sign for the covenant. I'll show it to you. Look at
verse 13 of Exodus chapter 31. Speak thou also unto the children
of Israel, saying, Verily my sabbaths ye shall keep, for it
is a sign between me and you throughout your generation."
That's not the one and only place where the Lord refers to the
Sabbath as a sign. You don't hear of God speaking
of lying as a sign. No, that's a moral mandate. You
don't hear of God speaking of murder as a sign. That's a moral
mandate. But he refers to the Sabbath
as a sign. The keeping of the Sabbath, keep
my Sabbath day holy, is the fourth of the Ten Commandments. And
it's the sign that God's saying, you break this commandment, you've
broken them all. This commandment represents all
my commandments. Now that's what the children
of Israel did to cause them to be carried off into captivity.
They violated the Sabbaths in 600 BC when the Babylonians came
in. They violated the Sabbath in
70 A.D. when the Romans came in. All
the destructions of Jerusalem happened as a result of them
violating the Sabbath. And God said, if you work on
the Sabbath, you will die. And we know there's a story of
a man picking up sticks on the Sabbath. They brought him to
Moses. Moses went to the Lord. The Lord
said, stone him, and they killed him. because he was working on
the Sabbath. Now what does the word Sabbath
mean? It means rest. It means rest. Turn with me now,
if you will, to Hebrews chapter 4. This was the sin that the children
of Israel were guilty of that needed the old waste places to
be built up again. Matter of fact, if you go back
to the book of Nehemiah in chapter 13 verse 22, the last part of
that book, the last thing that Nehemiah does is he reinstitutes
the Sabbaths. All the laws that God gave pertaining
to the Sabbath. Now what is that Sabbath a sign
of? What does it point to? A sign points to something, doesn't
it? You're driving down the road, you see a sign, it tells you
what direction to go. And so it is with the Old Testament
Sabbath. It's a sign. Hebrews chapter
4, verse 9, there remaineth therefore
a rest, that's the word Sabbath, to the people of God. For he
that is entered into his rest, he also has ceased from his own
works as God did from his. Let us labor, therefore, to enter
into that rest, lest any man fall after the same example of
unbelief." They fell because they did not believe the Sabbath.
They didn't see what the Sabbath was about. They didn't keep the
Sabbath. And they fell as a result of
it. And God's saying to you and me, that Sabbath, that Old Testament
Sabbath was a sign. It's pointing to the one who
was going to do the work all by himself. You get in him. You find all the hope of your
salvation in his work and you cease from your own labors as
he ceased from his. It's finished. It's over. It's
done. Everything necessary for the
salvation of God's people was accomplished by the Lord Jesus
Christ. And what's religion all about today? Every form of religion,
every flavor, it's all about something you've got to do in
order to make what God wants to do work for you. That's what
religion is. And what are we here to do? We
are here to build the old waste places. We're here to reinstitute
the Sabbath. We're here to point to the noise
of the train and say, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. He's
your Sabbath. He's your rest. Labor to enter
into His rest. Stop working. Stop trying to
earn favor with God by something you do or don't do and look to
Christ. That's what it is to rebuild
the old waste places. That's what it is. to practice the Sabbath. It's a sign. Now, the New Testament
church has two signs. One of them we're going to celebrate
this morning. The other one's right behind me. That's the baptistry. Taking of the bread and wine
doesn't save, but what that sign points to does save. Being baptized
doesn't save, but what that sign points to does save. When we're
baptized, we are identifying ourselves as being buried with
Christ in baptism and being raised to walk a new life in Christ
Jesus. The Lord Jesus Christ is our salvation. We are building
the old waste places. That city was destroyed in the
Old Testament because they didn't celebrate the Sabbath. They didn't
obey God when it came to the Sabbath. What is it to obey God
now is to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. The bread and the
wine they don't save, but they picture, they point to the sinless
life and the sacrificial death of the Lord Jesus Christ for
all our righteousness and all of our justification before God.
We're building the old waste places by pointing men to Christ. Rest in Christ. Rely upon the
Lord Jesus Christ. Come to him just like you are. Don't, don't, Robert you read
from Job earlier. You know what Job's, you read
the book of Job and over and over and over here's what Job's
friends are saying to Job and this is the message of the book
of Job. This is the message of the book of Job. The message
is not about suffering, the message about salvation. Job's friends
were saying, Job, if you just clean up your life, God will
have mercy on you. Job, you've got some secret sin.
You've got to do something, Job, to get yourself right with God. And Job kept resisting their
accusations and he kept saying no. And Job was just as wrong as
they were because he thought he could present himself to God
And finally, when the Lord revealed himself, what did Job say? Oh,
I had heard about thee with a hearing in mine ear, but now mine eyes
see thee, and I repent in dust and ashes. I'm a man. Behold, I'm vile. Job had to be taught by his sufferings
to find all the hope of his salvation in Christ. And God is the same
yesterday, today, and forever. And He's doing the same thing
with men today that He did in the days of Job, all the way
back there, however long ago that was. Nothing's changed. You and I are guilty of breaking
the Sabbath every time we lift our hand to try to help God out
in saving us. And if you believe that there's
something that you've done or haven't done that adds to what
Christ did in order to secure your salvation and you die believing
that, you will die violating the Sabbath and you will be separated
from God for all eternity. That's the one sin that cannot
be forgiven. because it robs from Christ his
glory and salvation. So what are we doing? We're rebuilding
the old waste places. That place was wasted because
of their violation of the Sabbath and we're building it. Now notice
in our text, go back with me quickly, I'm sorry. Go back with
me to Isaiah chapter 58, and they that shall be of thee, and
really Christ is the one that does the work, But he gives to his people a
willing hand, doesn't he? And we, like Nehemiah, have a
sword in one hand and a trowel in the other hand. And we're
building the wall, repairing the foundation, building up the
breaches, fixing the roads. Why? To give men easy access
and protection in the holy city. It's the only place of safety. They shall build the old raised
places and they shall raise up the foundations of many generations." Now again, if you go back to
the book of Ezra, when the foundation for the new temple was laid,
Solomon's temple was destroyed. Seventy years later, Ezra and
Nehemiah come back and they rebuild the temple and they relay the
foundation. And the people who had never
seen Solomon's temple are rejoicing. They're praising God for the
foundation's been laid, the temple's going to be built now. How glorious
is this? We're going to worship God. And
the old men, the scripture says, wept because they saw that this
foundation was not near as glorious as was Solomon's. And the scripture
says that you could not tell the difference between the rejoicing
and the weeping. Some of the men were weeping
and some of them were rejoicing and they were all expressing
themselves together. That's the way every believer
feels. We rejoice that the foundation is being laid and we do. Right now the foundation is being
laid. Christ is that foundation, the
scripture makes that clear. We are built upon the foundation
of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the
chief cornerstone. For other foundations can no
man lay than is laid, which is Jesus Christ. So he's our Sabbath
that we're restoring and he's the foundation for the church.
And when we hear of Him we rejoice and at the same time we weep
because we want to see so much more of Him. We want to know
Him better. We want to see the fullness of
His glory. And so we can't tell the difference
between our rejoicing and our weeping, can we? Abraham looked for a city which
hath foundations, whose builder and maker was God. And when John
saw that holy Jerusalem come down from heaven, it had 12 foundations,
didn't it? Each of them precious stones.
Christ is that foundation. Foundation is the... He's the
one that the church is built upon. He's the one who said,
upon this rock, I will build my church and the gates of hell
shall not be able to prevail against it. What rock? Thou art
the Christ, the Son of the living God. Who the Lord Jesus Christ
is, is the rock. But foundation is also used in
the scripture to speak of the beginnings of things. When the
Bible speaks of being chosen in him from the foundation of
the world or the lamb that was slain from the foundation of
the world, that has to do with beginnings. And just like in
building a building, you start with a foundation. And the Lord
Jesus Christ said, I'm the first and I'm the last. I'm the Alpha
and I'm the Omega. I'm the beginning and I'm the
end and I'm everything in between. So when the children of Israel
came back and laid the foundation and when they rebuilt and restored
that which was broken down, they're just preaching the gospel. They're
preaching the gospel to us. They're telling us about the
Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, I've been guilty. I've
been guilty of violating the Sabbath. I've been guilty. There's
still, there's still the remnants of a Pharisee in me that has
thoughts of what can I do to fix the problem? What can I do
to earn favor with God? Notice thirdly, they were the
repairer of the breach. And when you read the book of
Nehemiah, you'll find that Nehemiah split up the people, the workers,
and put them where the breaches in the walls were. That's where
the work needed to be done. There were sections of the walls
that were still there, but the breaches needed to be repaired. There are still breaches in the
walls today in there. That's why we spend so much time.
People talk about, well, you sure, you should talk about free
will a lot. That's because that's a huge
breach in the wall. Men think that God wants to save
everybody and that Christ died for everybody and He's just waiting
for you to exercise your free will so that He can do what He
wants to do. That's a breach in the wall. We want to expose
that breach. There's a breach of good works
and there's a lot of lights on that breach. Everybody wants
to see what they're doing at the breach of free works, of
good works. And so we remind people that In me that is in
my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Woe is me, I'm undone. Lord,
if there's going to be any good works, it's going to have to
be done by faith. And that faith is a gift of God. There's a breach
of faith, isn't there? Everybody thinks, well, faith
is what I bring to the table. No, it's not. Faith is not the
cause of your salvation, it's the result of it. If you believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ, it's because he gave you faith to
do it. There's a lot of breaches in
the law. General atonement. We spend a lot of time talking
about the fact that Christ laid down his life for the sheep. Father, I pray for them which
thou hast given me. I pray not for the world. This
is not a general offer of atonement made to men. This is a special
offer limited to the God's elect. You say, why do you spend so
much time on that? Because it's a breach in the wall. They were
restore of the breach. That's what we're doing. We're
building up that which has fallen down where we're restoring the
breach. Man believes himself to be all
powerful. He set himself up on the throne of God. And we talk
a lot about the sovereignty of God and the omnipotence of God
in providence and creation and in salvation, don't we? Why? Because that's where the breaches
are in the wall. Preaching these days has given
way to entertainment and drama and music and TED Talks and motivational
speakers and people gathering teachers to scratch their itching
ears. And we emphasize the importance
of preaching. Why? Because there's a breach
in the wall there. Scriptures are replaced in our
day by creeds and confessions and catechisms and men's opinions,
and we talk a lot about all scripture being given by inspiration of
God, all scriptures profitable for reproof, for rebuke, for
correction, for instruction in righteousness that the man of
God may be thoroughly furnished. We ask one question every time
we want to know the answer of something, what sayeth the scriptures? Why? Because there's a breach
in the wall when it comes to the authority and power of God's
Word. repairer of the breach, and the
restorer of paths to dwell in. Now that's the roads that lead
to the city and into the city. And they were full of potholes.
And I'm sure there were trees laying down. It probably looked
like those around here after a hurricane. You know, there
were big rocks in the roads. And what they had to do, they
had to clear away the roads. And that's what we do. We clear
away the roads and we put up the signs clearly so that they
point to the city. But what do men do? They put
stumbling blocks in the road. They say, well, if, then you
fill in the blank. If you repent, and by that they
mean, you know, you've got to stop sinning altogether in order
to be saved. God's people hate their sin.
We don't advocate sin here. or deliver me. But you know the truth is that
you've never stopped sinning. But that's what men say. Well,
you know, if you just stop, or if you'll bring your faith,
or if you'll... and by... and by the... what they say is
your access into the city is actually a stumbling block. The Lord Jesus Christ said, am
the way, the truth, and the life. No man can come to the Father
but by me. Men put traditions. Some of you, like me, have read too many Puritans. They
will mess you up. I know they were Calvinist, but
they were legalist. And they were a lot of more prolific
riders. And they'll just put obstacles
in your way is what they'll do. What are we here to do? We're
here to clear the pathway, move all the stumbling blocks, all
the obstacles, all the things out of the way and say, there
it is. Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sins of
the world. Now, in closing, go back with me and look at verse
13. I meant to look at this earlier when we were talking about the
Sabbath, but here it is. This just proves my point, proves
God's point. Look at verse 13. Turn away thy foot from the Sabbaths,
from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the Sabbaths
of delight, the holy of the Lord honorable, and shall honor him,
not doing thy own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking
thine own words. Believe God's word. Don't do your... There is a way
that seems right unto man, but in the end, that way leads to
death. The way that seems right unto man is to offer God something
to obligate him to save you. If God saves you, He'll save
you for one reason, and that's because of what Christ did. Rest
in Him. Verse 14, and I close, Then shalt
thou delight thyself in the Lord, And I will cause thee to ride
upon the high places of the earth and feed thee with the inheritance
of Jacob, thy father, for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken
it. This is God's word, isn't it? Our heavenly father, we ask that your Holy Spirit
now would give light and life to thy word in the hearts of
thy people. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. I'm gonna ask the men if they'll
come, please, and distribute the bread and the wine. We're gonna sing number 17 in
the spiral book, number 17. Remain seated. Yeah. ? See the table spread before you
? See the feast of bread and wine ? These are symbols of our
Savior ? Tokens of his love divine ? Bread that's broken is his
body crushed beneath the wrath of God. Wine poured out is a
reminder of our Savior's precious blood. Children of our God, remember
how he bought your soul and mine. In remembrance of our Savior,
eat the bed and drink the wine. Jesus came, God incarnate. ? Fulfill God's holy love ? ?
On the cross he made atonement ? ? And retrieved us from the
fall ? Let us ne'er forget the promise Jesus made to come again. Soon he comes, our King, to call
us home to glory. Praise his name with this hope
Expectation, we rejoice to keep this peace. Celebrating our redemption
till we lean on Jesus' breath. In the New Testament, when the
Lord's giving us instructions on doing what we're doing right
now, celebrating the Lord's table, he says that the judgment of
God will be upon those who partake of this table unworthily, not
discerning the Lord's body. You see, you can't break the
Sabbath and take the Lord's table at the same time. Not discerning the Lord's body
is not discerning the fact that what He did, God satisfied with
all by Himself. This is a sign. It just points
to Him, doesn't it? We do this in remembrance of
Him. That's scarlet worm. That's a
glorious picture, isn't it? That little worm attached himself
to the tree and then dies and the babies, the larvae, live
off its blood. Life is in the blood. God said,
when I see the blood, I'll pass by you. His blood. Do this in
remembrance of me. and all God's people said, amen,
amen. Let's stand together. Brother
Don Williams, would you close us in prayer, please? Lord, our
God, we thank you for who you are. We thank you, O Lord, that you
are in control of all things. Father, we thank you for the
messages that we have heard this morning.