We're going to sing to him in
the back of the bulletin. And we're going to sing it to
the tune of Majestic Sweetness. And if you could all please stand,
the back of the bulletin. Lift up to God. No. Lift up to God a voice of
praise. That one. Majestic Sweetness. Lift up to God a voice of praise,
whom one in three we know. By all the heav'nly host adored,
And by His church below, And by His church below. Lift up to God a voice of praise,
with triumph we proclaim. The universe is full of Thee,
and speaks Thy glorious name, and speaks Thy glorious name. Lift up to God the voice of praise,
His holy Son adored. And Thee, O Holy Ghost, we bless
and worship evermore, and worship evermore. Lift up to God the
voice of praise on every hand we sing. Oh, may the blessing
of this hour lead all our thoughts to Thee. Lead all our thoughts
to Thee. Be seated, please. Good morning, brothers and sisters.
Our Bible scripture reading this morning is on Luke chapter 12,
verse 22 starts. Luke 12, 22. And he said to his disciples,
Therefore, I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what
you should eat, neither for the body, or what you should put
on. Life is more than meat, and the
body is more than raiment. Consider the ravens, for they
neither sow nor reap, which neither have storehouse nor barn. and
God feedeth them, how much more are ye better than the fowls? And which of you, by taking thought,
can add to his torture one cubit? If ye then be not able to do
that thing which is least, why take ye thought for the rest? Consider the lilies, how they
grow. They toy not, they spin not,
and yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed
like one of these. If then God so clothed the grass,
which is today in the field and tomorrow is cast into the oven,
how much more will he clothe you, O ye of little faith? And seek not ye what ye shall
eat, nor what ye shall drink, neither be doubtful of a doubtful
mind. For all these things do nations
of the world seek after. and your father knoweth that
ye have need of these things. But rather, seek ye the kingdom
of God, and all the things shall be added unto him. Fear not,
little flock, for it is your father's good
pleasure to give you the kingdom. If God gives us the kingdom,
which is in the Lord Jesus Christ, will he not supply everything
else? Sell that ye have, and give alms. Provide yourselves bags, which
wax not old, a treasure in heaven, that faileth not. where no thief
approacheth, neither mouth corrupteth. For where your treasure is, there
will your heart also be. Let's go to the Father. Father
God, we come before you. We come in the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ by his righteousness and by his sacrifice. We come
before you, first of all, to thank you. Thank you for Christ. He's everything to us, Father.
Thank you for him. Thank you that you give us this
church here that we can come to and listen to the gospel,
Father. Thank you for the brothers and sisters here. Thank you for
the preachers that you have sent to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. We now, we pray for ourselves
as well as the other churches that preach Christ. We ask for
your Holy Spirit. We need him. We need him to see
Christ. We need him to help and fill
the message, the preachers, that they may absolve Christ and Christ
alone. We need to see him and we realize
we know that we need you, your Holy Spirit, to be able to do
that for us, that we may be drawn to the Lord Jesus Christ. In
Jesus' name we pray this. Amen. There's a blue handout in front.
We're going to sing to him number 11. Thou must have loved me first. You can remain seated. Thou hast
loved me first. "'Tis not that I did choose thee,
poor Lord, that could not be. This heart would still refuse
thee, hast thou not chosen me? Thou from the sin that stained
me, hast cleansed and set me free. Of old thou hast ordained
me, that I should live to thee. Your love had no beginning, no
cause in me was found, that you should choose to save me, a sinner
strongly bound. What grace not earned or sought
for was purpose for my soul. For me salvation wrought, for
Christ paid that dreadful toll. was sovereign mercy called me
and taught my opening mind. The world that else enthralled
me to heavenly glories blind. My heart owns none before thee,
for thy rich grace I thirst. You'd like to turn with me in
your Bibles again to Hosea chapter 14. Hosea chapter 14. I had already prepared this message
from Hosea 14 and entitled it the effectual call. The effectual call. When I received
in my mail yesterday a brochure from a very well-known
and popular reformed Calvinistic organization. And I noticed in
it that they were promoting a new book. And here's their promotion for
the new book. The author has done a splendid
job of explaining what's at stake in the debate over free will. and presenting a compelling biblical
case for the compatibilist view of human freedom and God's sovereignty. Now I had to practice on being
able to pronounce that word. The compatibilist view of man's
freedom and God's sovereignty. There's nothing compatible about
man's free will and God's sovereign grace. I noticed that the title
of this publication is academic. That's the title of it. So I
looked up that word. I thought that I remembered something
about it. And sure enough, the word academic is a Latin word
that literally translated means theoretical, not practical, not
leading to a decision. And that, my friend, is the reason
why professors and their students in our higher educations sit
around and massage one another's egos by pooling their ignorance
and never being able to come to a decision about anything.
Everything is relative. Everything's relative. I talked to a Hindu man a couple
of weeks ago. and he confessed to me that he
had a PhD in philosophy. He's 72 years old now. He got his PhD when he was a
young man. And he said to me, I'm still asking the same questions
that I asked back then. And I have no answers. That's the world. That's the
world. We're not here to say, you know,
it seems to me. We're not here to say, won't
you please consider. We are here to say the one thing
that only we can say. Thus saith the Lord. Put down your pen. Quit taking
notes. Quit trying to intellectualize
the gospel. And listen, faith comes by hearing,
and hearing comes by the Word of God. It is an effectual call. Our God's not trying to save
anybody. When He's ready, here's what
He says. Here's what He says. I will make
you willing in the day of my power. I'm going to take out your heart
of stone and put in a heart of flesh, and I'm going to give
you a desire for me. And until I do that, you will
have no will for me whatsoever." Now, how do you make that compatible? How do you make the clear declaration
of God's Word compatible? I love it when they sent those
soldiers out to arrest the Lord and they came back and they said,
where is he? Never a man spake like this man, for he spoke as
one having authority. Now that's what I need. I don't
need to have a bunch of opinions when it comes to the salvation
of my soul. I need to know what God says.
I need to know. This is not a college debate
session. This is not academic. This is, thus saith the Lord.
And what hope and peace we have for our souls. And how humbling
is that? You don't have anything to bring
to the table. There's nothing for you to discuss. There's nothing
for you to debate. There's no contribution for you
to make. This is what God says. And if God gives you the faith
to believe it, your response will be simply, Amen. Oh, I'm so thankful that there's
something that's not relative. There's something that is absolute
that I can rest the eternal salvation of my immortal soul on. I don't have to worry about it
being this way or that way. What does God say about it? Here's
what God says, no man can come unto me unless the Father which
sent me draw him. Now how do you come up with a
compatibilist view of man's free will and God's sovereignty when
that's what God says. You can't come. You don't have
a will. Your will is contrary to the
things of God. That's the truth about it. This is not a matter of opinion.
This is what God says. It is not of him that willeth,
nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. For I will have mercy upon whom
I will have mercy, and whom I will I'll hardeneth. And faith, God-given
faith, bows to him. It just bows to Him. It says,
truth, Lord, truth. There's no compatibilist view
here. There's no contradiction here. We come into this world dead
in our trespasses and sins until God breathes life into us and
we are as passive in that experience as was Adam's body made of the
dust of the earth when God breathed breath into his nostrils. We're
passive. That's why, listen to me carefully
now, that's why faith comes by hearing. It doesn't come by study. It doesn't come by trying to
figure it out. It comes by hearing. Why? Because
hearing is completely passive. You're not doing anything when
you're listening. You're just, you're just receiving. That's
it. That's it. Oh, that God would shut our mouths,
put our hands down and enable us to hear, to hear what he says. My sheep hear my voice and they
do follow after me. And our Lord said in John chapter
10 verse 16, other sheep I have that are not of this flock, them
also I must bring. I must bring them. I will bring
them. I must needs go through some
area. Why? Because I've got a lost sheep
there and I'm purposed to save her. I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna
do it. and they shall hear my voice,
and they shall be onefold and have one shepherd." There's no
need for a compatibilist view. There's no need for us to try
to reconcile. I've heard people say, well,
you know, I was converted under freewill Arminianism and then
I came to understand the doctrines of grace. The gospel you were
converted under is your gospel, plain and simple. Plain and simple. It's your gospel. That's your
gospel. The gospel you were converted under. If it was strong enough
to convert you, then it's your gospel. God's never used a man-made
freewill gospel to save a dead sinner. If he has, then let's
just cast our lot in with everybody else that's involved in preaching
their gospel. We might as well. An effectual call. Here's a God
who's sovereign in salvation. Here's a God who has a particular
people that he chose in the covenant of grace according to his own
will and purpose before time ever began. He calls them Israel. And he says, O Israel, return
unto the Lord, the covenant-keeping God, the one who is willing to
save because he purposed to save, and the one who is able to save
because he's God. He's able to save. The world
says, well, you know, God wants to save you. He wants to save
you. Won't you let him have his way?
He's willing, but he's not able. That's not our gospel. That's
not what we're here preaching. We're preaching a God who is
both willing according to his covenant of grace, according
to his purpose in salvation, and a God who is able. And when he purposes to save
one of his sheep, He's going to fetch them. He's going to
bring them to Himself. And they're going to believe
the gospel. They're just going to believe. He's going to open
the eyes of their understanding and unstop their ears, change
their hearts and give them faith and they're going to come. They're
going to come. Willing sheep, they're going
to come. But He has to do a work of grace. Hosea closes his prophecy with
this glorious declaration of God's particular redemption,
God's irresistible grace, God's effectual, effectual call. Return unto the Lord thy God,
for thou hast fallen by thine iniquity. Your sins have separated
you from your God. And only if the Lord reveals
that to you, and I'm not talking about individual infractions
to God's law, because the truth is you've never been able to
keep one God's law one time. I'm talking about the sin that
doth so easily beset us. And it's the same sin for every
one of us. It's the sin of unbelief. When the Spirit of God comes,
he will convict the world of sin because they believe not
on me. Oh, Lord, help thou mine unbelief.
Help thou mine unbelief. Lord, I can't believe unless
you call me, unless you draw me to yourself, unless you give
me the miracle of faith. I can't believe. I won't believe. Turn me, Lord, and I shall be
turned. That's what the prophet said.
Call me out, draw me to thyself. If he's gonna do it, he's gonna
do it by his word. That's why we're doing, that's
what we're doing right now. We're preaching the gospel in
hopes and in faith that God's gonna use his word. He said it
will not return unto me void, it will accomplish the purpose
for which I send it. It will harden some men's hearts,
and others it will draw to me for life. I love verse two. It's how do
I come? How do I come, Lord? You've called
me to come. You've given me a desire to come.
How do I come? Come with words. What do I say? You've been around somebody that
you just didn't know what to say around them. You were intimidated.
You felt uncomfortable. You didn't know what to say or
how to speak. Well, if that's true with men,
how much more is that true with God? You're calling me to come
into the presence of God. What am I going to say? What
words can I bring? And so He gives us. He gives us words to speak. And
here's how you know that you've been called. Here's how you know
that it's been made effectual to you. Because God has put these
words in your heart. Prayer is a work of grace. It's
a work of grace. People ask me all the time to
pray for them, and I want to, and I tell them, you know, the
Lord enables me, I will. Lord enables me, but it's not
just, well, okay, I'm gonna check that off, I prayed for that person.
True prayer, coming into the presence of God and interceding
for yourself and for others is a work of grace. God has to enable
you to do that. You don't just check that off
as a religious practice or a habit. That's something, Lord, put these
words in my heart. Give me the grace so that I'll
know that you've called me. What does he say to say? Come
take with you words and turn to the Lord. Turn to the Lord. Now, you know this word iniquity
that we find in verse one, which has separated us from our God. is not a word that's used in
the Bible to describe the shameful things that we don't want other
people to know about. In fact, it's used to describe
the things that we're proud of. And what God calls, this is your
righteousness, this is the good stuff. And what we call righteousness,
what man calls, that's a righteous deed. God says it is iniquitous. It doesn't measure up. It falls
short of my glory. The truth is that it's not the
shameful deeds that keep men from Christ. It really isn't. People get caught up in things
and they want to change, they want to get rid of that. You
know, it's causing them too much pain, too much problems in their
life. What keeps men from Christ is
not their sin, it's their righteousness. It's their righteousness. And if you've been called effectually,
then you know that all your righteousnesses are as filthy rags before God. They are iniquitous. And if you
look to them, What did Paul say? Those things which I thought
were gain were in fact to my loss. And now I consider all
things loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus
my Lord, that I might be found in him, not having my own righteousness
which is of the law, but that righteousness which is by the
faith of Jesus Christ. Now that's the evidence of the
effectual call. Bring with you words. Bring with
you words, confess your righteousness for what it is, it's iniquity. Look to the Lord Jesus Christ
in faith for all your righteousness, all your justification, all your
wisdom, all your sanctification, all your life. He didn't come
to patch up an old garment. Don't put new wine in an old
wineskin. He came to give us a robe of
righteousness. When the soldiers at the cross
were casting lots for the possessions of the Lord Jesus Christ, they
noticed that His robe was without seam. It was without seam. I actually used to work in a
textile manufacturing plant and I know how to make fabric without
a seam. But that was a very unusual thing back 2,000 years ago. When
you put together a garment, you had different pieces that you
seam together. But this garment was without
seam and the soldier said, let us not rent it lest we destroy
it. That robes the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's without seam. Don't rent
it. Don't tear it up. Don't try to
change it. Don't try to add to it. Don't
try to fix it. It comes in one piece. One piece. The Lord's gonna do all the saving
or he won't save us at all. It's just that simple. He's gonna
get all the glory. We'll be lost in our sins. Simply because you did it. God calls it iniquity. Whatever you put your hand to,
whatever I put my hand to, falls short of the glory of God. The
only one that measured up to God's glory, the only one that
God Almighty is pleased with is his dear son. And the only
hope I have is to be found in him. How do I know that he's
called me effectually? Because I've brought words before
the Lord. I've turned to the Lord. I've said unto him, take away
all iniquity. Take it all away. If the Lord should mark iniquity,
who shall stand? If the Lord reckons to your account
and to my account, here's what that verse means. If the Lord
should mark iniquity, who shall stand? That means that when we
stand before God, if he takes the very best thing you've ever
done in your whole life, the best thing you've ever done,
and he charges that to your account, you're going to hell. The most sincere prayer you've
ever prayed, The most good deed you've ever performed. The most
selfless act. If he charges that to your account,
you're going to hell. If the Lord should mark iniquity,
who shall stand? Is that so clear? Where does
that leave us? It leaves us with nothing but
Christ. Or I've got to have the Lord
Jesus Christ. Or I've got no life. He's the
only one that's righteous before God. Take with you words, and
here's where these words start. Lord, take away all my iniquity,
not unto us, O Lord, not unto us, but into thy name be glory. For thy mercy and for thy truth's
sake. Who's getting all the glory?
Take with you words. How do I know that He's effectually
called me? Because He's caused me to believe
that all my righteousness is iniquitous before God and I can't
be found with any of it. I've got to have Christ. I've
got to have Him. I've got to have His work. I've
got to have His person. I've got to have Him interceding
on my behalf. I've got to have Him presenting
Himself as my righteousness before God. I've got to have Him keeping
me from falling. I've got to have Him to present
me faultless before the throne of God. That's the only hope
I have. He is my hope. Take with you
words. Ask Him. Take away all my iniquity. Don't hold on to the best thing
you've ever done. Don't hold on to the best religious
experience you've ever had. Don't hold on to it. Hold on to Christ. And receive us graciously. Lord, I have no claim on your
favor. That's what that means. Here's
what you're saying. Now, I want to know that I've
been called effectually. Go turn to the Lord and take
with you words and ask him to take away all your iniquity and
to receive you graciously. That means that, Lord, I've got
no claim on you receiving me. I've got nothing to bring to
you. I can't bring anything in my hand. unmerited favor, nothing in my
hand I bring, only to thy cross I cling. Lord, receive me based
on your grace, on your good favor, on your loving kindness, based
on the accomplished work of your Son is the only claim I have,
the only hope I have, bring with you words. God's given us words
to bring. How gracious is he to do that?
He doesn't just say, come and try out a few things and see
if I'm pleased with them. He gives us exact words to speak. I'm so thankful for that. Take
away all my iniquity. Receive me graciously. So will
we render the calves of our lips Now in the Old Testament calves
were sacrifices. And the scripture says that the
sacrifice of praise is what's pleasing to God. So that with
our words we shall be justified and with our words we shall be
condemned. With the heart man believeth
unto righteousness and with the mouth confession is made unto
salvation. Offer to him the calves of your
lips in other words Give to him all the praise and all the glory
for doing all the saving That's what that means Can you do that? Can you do that? The natural
man can't he's gonna hang on to something the natural man
can't say with Jonah Salvation is of the Lord Turn to me to
Ephesians chapter 1 Verse 5 We got to start in verse
4 don't we according as he has chosen us in him He chose us
in Christ before the foundation of the world that we should be
holy and without blame before Him in love. That's the only
way we're going to be holy. That's the only way we're going
to be without blame. Now some people say, well, God chose us
so that we could live a holy life and be blameless in our
behavior. No. I want you to be blameless. I
want to be blameless. I hate my sin. But that's not
what this is saying. If we're going to be blameless
and holy in the sight of God, we're going to have to be found
in Christ. Having predestinated us unto
the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according
to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of the glory of
his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. Who does the saving? Who predestinated
us? Who reckoned us holy and blameless
in his sight? How'd he do it? He placed us
in Christ. Oh, who gets all the praise?
Bring to him the calves of your lips. Don't try to make a deal
with God. Don't try to make promises with
God that you can't keep. Bring to him the calves of your
lips. Let that be your sacrifice, the sacrifice of praise. Look at verse 14. We won't read
the rest. You read the rest of Ephesians
1 at some time, but look at verse 14, which is the earnest of our
inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession unto
the praise of his glory. It's all to the praise of his
glory. You wanna know what God's purpose is for your life? You
wanna know what God's doing? I can tell you. I can tell you
what God's doing in your life, in my life, in the lives of nations,
in the world, every event in history, the big, the small.
I can tell you what God's purpose is. It is to the praise of the
glory of his grace. He is bringing glory to himself. And everything he does is ultimately
to that end. It's not about you. It's not
about me. Not unto us, O Lord, not unto
us, but into thy name be glory and praise forever for thy mercy
and for thy truth's sake. It's not about you. It's not
about me. It's all about him. And what
the Lord Jesus Christ was doing on Calvary's cross resulted in
the salvation of his people. But first and foremost, he wasn't
doing it for us. He was doing business with God.
It was about his relationship with the father as the head of
the bride, as the husband of the bride, as the head of the
church. He was doing business with God to put away their sin.
and to satisfy divine justice, that's what he was doing. Look at verse three. So there's
the words that we bring. How do I know that I've been
effectually called? God has caused me to come into
his presence with words, and these are my words. Take away
all my iniquity. Receive me graciously. Lord,
I don't know what to do, but praise you. Give you all the
honor and all the praise and all the glory for my salvation. And Lord, I've come to realize
that Asher cannot save me. Now, Asher is another name in
the Old Testament for Assyria. Translated, it means steps. Steps. God told the children
of Israel, when you build an altar, don't put steps on it. Because when you ascend that
altar, along those steps, all you're going to do is expose
your own nakedness. Now what's the spiritual? You
see the spiritual application of that. Men love steps. They love steps. You know, if
the 12-step program has helped you to stop being an alcoholic,
great. But it's never saved anybody.
Never saved anybody. Men love steps. They love to
put steps in place. If I can just follow these steps,
and they do it in every area of the world. And they do it
in religion. programs and accountability partners
and things that we need to do in order to give me. Most of preaching today is the
preacher giving men steps. If you'll do one, two, three,
four, then your life will be better. It's all about your current
circumstances anyway. That's all men are interested
in. What does that one who's been effectually called say?
Asher shall not save me. Lord, there's no steps that I
can take. There's no progress that I can
make. The world is touch not, taste
not, handle not. You know, that's the religious
world. If you'll not do these things and do the other things,
or you have the religious world of hocus pocus of ceremony and
superstition. Some of us came out of that.
Smoke and mirrors, that's all it is. There's nothing to it. But it's steps. You know, you'll
light this candle and put this money in that receptacle and,
you know, and kneel here and kiss that ring and, you know,
and bow to that idol. Then those steps are, Asher shall
not save us. Lord, there's no steps that we
can go through. There's nothing we can do to
earn favor with you. You're gonna have to do it for
us. It's the steps of the Lord Jesus
Christ that walked up to Mount Calvary and offered himself to
God on behalf of his people, shedding his precious blood to
put away our sins. That's the only steps God's looking
to. Asher shall not save us. We will not ride horses. Those were instruments of warfare. The army's on horses. Government's
not going to save me. The military's not going to save
me. The economy's not going to save me. Your problem and my
problem is not a bad economy. It doesn't have anything to do
with your bank account. If I could just get this amount
of money set aside, then I'd be set. I'd be okay. No, you
won't. Have you been able to say to
God, horses will not save me? No amount of warfare on my part. We're in a spiritual warfare.
But that warfare is to the obedience of the Lord Jesus Christ. We
bring down the, we walk not after the, turn with me. We're gonna look at this again.
Second Corinthians. Chapter 10, 2 Corinthians chapter
10. Here's steps. Men want steps. They want Asher to save them.
So look, for though we walk in the flesh, we do not war after
the flesh. Don't try to conquer this sin
problem with flesh. It's not gonna work. It's just
gonna aggravate it. For the weapons of our warfare
are not carnal, they're not fleshly, but they are mighty through God
to the pulling down of strongholds, casting down imaginations, and
every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge
of God. God's not pleased with sacrifices.
He's pleased with the knowledge of God, or that we might know
Him, the power of His resurrection, the fellowship of His suffering.
What is the knowledge of God? Bringing every thought to the
obedience of Christ. Not your obedience in Christ,
but to the obedience of Christ. There's the steps. Here's the
steps. Are you trusting the obedience
of the Lord Jesus Christ for all your salvation? Have you
bought those words before God? Lord, take away all my iniquity.
Take away all my iniquity. Receive me graciously. Render
the calves of your lips. Asher will not save us. We will
not ride upon horses. It's not the strength of my warfare.
I'm engaged in a spiritual warfare, but I'm not fighting it with
horses. The only instrument of battle that I have is faith,
faith in Christ, looking to the Lord Jesus Christ, relying upon
the Lord Jesus Christ. Neither will we say any more
to the works of our hands, you are our gods and in thee, the
fatherless find his mercy. We won't take the time to look
this passage up, but in Luke chapter 17, the Lord speaking,
and he says, how many of you having a servant who comes in
from the field would say to that servant, I know you're tired,
you've worked hard all day, sit down and let me feed you. And
the Lord says, I think not. You're not going to treat your
slave that way. But rather, you're going to say
to your slave, who's been working all day in the field, when he
comes in, you serve me. And when you're finished serving
me, then you can go eat for yourself. Have you done that servant a
favor? No. That servant has proven himself
to be just exactly what he is, an unprofitable servant. That's
all he is. The Lord said, are you gonna
thank him for his service? Are you gonna bow to him and
reward him and praise him because of what he's done? No, he's a
slave. He's an unprofitable servant. And the Lord was likening that
to us and our relationship with God. Expect God to reward you? Expect
God to thank you? Expect God to bow down to you
and say, oh, you've been so good and you've done such good things
for me? We'll no longer say to the works of our hands, you are
our God. We're not trusting in what we've
done. When we've done everything we're supposed to do, we're but
unprofitable servants. That's all we are. God didn't
know us anything. He doesn't know it's a thing.
We're completely dependent upon Him for everything. Everything. I will heal their backsliding. Are you a backslider? Now I know
in religion, backsliding was something that a person did when
they made a profession of faith, got baptized, and then they spent
five years out of church. And you know, at some point they'd
have troubles and they'd come back and rededicate their lives,
and we called them backsliders. I've come to realize that backsliding's
a whole lot worse than that. Jeremiah calls Israel a perpetual
backslider. How many times have you backslid
in the past 45 minutes? And then there's a passage in
Hosea that speaks of the backsliding heifer. And I've never worked
with cows and and big animals like that before, but I've read
a little bit about them, and I understand that when a cow
gets in a muddy, slippery area, that their feet, they'll lose
traction, but they'll never drop their head. Their head will be
up, and they'll be looking in the direction. They're doing
everything they can to get out of that muck and mire, but they never
drop their head. Oh, what a backsliding heifer
we are. Perpetual backsliders. Always looking away from the
Lord. Always trying to find our hope, our satisfaction, our joy,
and our happiness somewhere other than the Lord Jesus Christ. And
what's the Lord say? Oh Israel, oh Israel, return
unto the Lord thy God. Return unto him, for thou hast
fallen by thine iniquity. Take with you words And turn
to the Lord and say unto him, take away our iniquity and receive
us graciously. And so will we offer to you the
calves of our lips. Asher shall not save us. It's
not a matter of steps. And we will not ride upon horses.
It's not our effort. It's not our battle. It's the
Lord's. Neither will we say anymore that
the works of our hands, you are our God, for we are the fatherless,
depended upon you for your mercy. And you, Lord, are going to have
to heal my backsliding ways. And if you do it, you're going
to have to love me freely. You see that? You're gonna have
to love me freely. If you look for something in
me that's lovely, you're not gonna find it. Not in the eyes
of God. Not unless he's looking upon
Christ. Daniel said, my comeliness, my
beauty, my strength, when I saw him was turned into corruption. For mine anger, Look at that
last phrase in verse 4, for mine anger is turned away from him. There's no anger. God's not angry. He's angry with the wicked every
day. Don't lose sight of that. The reprobate, they're gonna
know something about God's anger for all eternity, but towards
God's people, toward his church, towards those that the Lord Jesus
Christ saved, he's not angry. He loves them. His anger has
been turned away. His anger was spent on Calvary's
cross. He receives us graciously. Oh, what a great God we serve.
And come, return, in your heart, in your heart, come to Christ. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we're thankful for your word. What a glorious hope we have
in knowing, Lord, that thus saith the Lord is an absolute truth. that we're able to rest in, that
we're able to trust the salvation of our very souls on. We ask,
Lord, that you would speak these words effectually to our hearts,
for we ask it in Christ's name. Amen. Brother Byrd? Number 290. Before we do that, I forgot to
say this at the beginning of the service. Many of you, hopefully
all of you, will be greatly encouraged to hear this. But 19 years ago
today, Grace Gospel Church had its very first meeting in Petals,
there in Longwood, Michael. 19 years ago today, this is our
19th anniversary, the second Sunday of November. And I'm so
thankful for you and I'm thankful for our God's grace has kept
us in Christ for these 19 years. Let's stand together. Brother
Burt, what's the number? 290 in the hardback tent. Be still, my soul, the Lord is
on thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief
or pain. Leave to thy God to order and
provide. In every change, ye faithful
will remain. Be still, my soul, thy best aheadly
friend. Through thorny ways, leads to
a joyful end. Be still, my soul, thy God doth
undertake, To guide the future as he passed the past. Thy hope, thy confidence, let
nothing shake. All now misty, yet shall be bright
at last. Be still, my soul, the waves
and winds still know His voice who ruled them while He dwelt
below. Be still, my soul, the hour is
hastening on, when we shall be forever with the Lord. When disappointment, grief, and
fear are gone, Sorrow for God, love's purest
joy restored. Be still, my soul, when change
and tears are past. All safe and blessed, we shall
meet at last. So, I'll add this scene.