if you would join me and turn
to Luke chapter 12 in the Holy Word of God. This is a parable
our Lord gives, and it is my desire for all of us that the
Lord would, what a beautiful saying, restore unto us the joy
of His salvation. There are but two religions in
this world, the religion of the works of man, and the true religion
of God's grace in Christ, and I hope you can see it in this
parable. And the Lord spoke a parable
unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought
forth plentiful. And he thought within himself,
saying, What shall I do? Because I have no room where
to bestow my fruits. This is works. And the rich man
said, This will I do. Well, there's where I went wrong
many times. I will pull down my barns and
build greater, and there will I bestow all my fruits and my
goods. And I will say to my soul, so
thou hast many goods laid up for many years, take thine ease,
eat, drink, and be merry. And that's where the Works goes. They've laid up many fruits and
they're resting on their works. I thought about this. What do
you think will happen once he builds the new barns and puts
in the fruit full? Do you think he'll rest? I'll build even more barns. Works
is like the hamster on the wheel. You never stop. You just keep
going. You keep going faster and faster
until you die. But God said unto him, thou fool. What's the fool say? No God,
I'll not be saved the way you say it. This night thou soul
shall be acquired of thee. Then who shall those things be
which thou hast provided? So is he that layeth up treasure
for himself and is not rich toward God. And he said unto his disciples,
therefore I say unto you, take no thought for your life, what
you shall eat, neither for the body, what you shall put on. The 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 you better
than the fowls of the air? How much more does God love his
people than the birds of the air? And which of you, with taking
one thought, can add to his stature one cubit? Brother Greg brought a great
point. Holiness, sanctity, they're all absolutes. If we are in Christ,
we cannot be more holy. nor more sanctified, nor more
justified than we are right now, if we are in Christ. Consider
the lilies, how they grow, they toil not, they spin not, and
yet I say unto you that Solomon the king in all his glory was
not arraigned 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. Again, I'm thankful it's not
no faith, it's little faith, isn't it? And I fall into that
category most of my times. And seek not what you shall eat
or what you shall drink, neither of you of doubtful mind. For
all these things do the nations of the world seek after. That's
what the old flesh is after. And your Father knoweth that
you have need of these things. but rather seek ye the kingdom
of God, and all these things shall be added unto you. Fear
not, little flock, for it is your father's good pleasure to
give you the kingdom. Sell that ye have, and give alms.
Provide yourself bags which wax not old, a treasure in the heavens
that faileth not. Where no fief approaches, neither
moth corrupteth. This is the one I ask myself,
and may God ask you this, verse 34. For where your treasure is,
there will your heart be also. And I ask myself, where is my
treasure? I pray that all of us can say
it's in Christ. As I ask a young man today What
did God demand of his people? Love me with what? All your heart,
your mind, your body, and your soul. It can't be somewhere else.
It has to be all in Christ. What brings us home is there's
not a person in this room that tomorrow was guaranteed. Tonight, mine or your soul may
be required of you. This gospel is an urgent thing.
that Burt brought up last week. Today is the day of salvation.
We ask his blessing upon the prayer and the preaching this
morning. Lord, would you send your spirit, send it to us poor,
undeserving sinners. For Lord, we can do nothing apart
from you. We confess, Lord, that we are
dependent upon Christ for everything. We are as the raven of the air.
We need you to provide all things for us. Lord, forgive us for our unbelief. Forgive us for our doubts. Pray that you would cause us,
oh Lord, to look to Christ this very morning and day by day ask,
oh Lord, save me from myself. We ask your blessing this morning
on your gospel preachers. that you would put your words
in their heart and their mouths, and that they would declare Christ
and His salvation. And we ask upon us poor sinners
that you would give us faith to believe it. Amen. Number 352 from the hardbacked
hymnal, Jesus, lover of my soul. so Jesus, lover of my soul, let
me to thy bosom fly. While the nearer waters roll,
while the tempest still is high, Hide me, O my Savior, hide, till
the storm of life is past. Safe into the haven guide, O
receive my soul at last. Other refuge have I none, hangs
my helpless soul on Thee. Leave me not alone, still support
and comfort me. All my trust on Thee is ? All my help from thee I bring
? ? Cover my defenseless head ? ? With the shadow of thy wing
? ? Thou, O Christ, art all I want ? ? More than all in thee I find
? Raise the fallen, cheer the faint, heal the sick and lead
the blind. Just and holy is I am all unrighteousness. False and full of sin I am. Thou art full of truth and grace. Plenteous grace with thee is
found, Grace to cover all my sin. Let the healing streams
abound, Make and keep me pure within. Thou of life, the fountain art,
Freely let me take of Thee. Spring Thou art within my heart. Rise to all eternity. Please be seated. Would you open your Bibles with
me, please, to Hosea chapter 2. Hosea chapter 2. I've titled this message, A Marriage
Made in Heaven. A Marriage Made in Heaven. One
of the glorious similitudes that the Lord gives to us in his word
as to the relationship that he has with his church is that of
a bride and a bridegroom. And in the book of Hosea, we
have a glorious picture of how faithful he is as the bridegroom
to redeem his wife. and to unite her to himself in
marriage. And the two flesh shall become
one. Now there's a lot of differences
between our Lord's relationship with his bride and the relationship
that we have in our human experiences. Most of you know that Noah Dunbar
proposed to Mary this past week. Now, I wasn't there, but I suspect
that he was down on one knee and holding out a ring at least
and begging her to accept his offer, of which thankfully for
him, she graciously did. Both of them are very excited. The similitude that the Lord
has given us of his relationship with us in the book of Hosea
is much different from that. Much different from that. The
name Hosea means salvation and Hosea clearly is a picture of
the Lord Jesus Christ. Gomer, whose name means scattered,
Gomer is a picture of his church. If you read the story, we won't
go into it in detail, the first couple of chapters, the Lord
told Hosea to go and to marry a harlot. To find a woman who was engaged
in prostitution and make her his wife, which is exactly what
he did. They bore children and she remained
unfaithful to him. She continued in her harlotry,
to which Hosea continued to persevere after her and to allure her to
himself. Now there's the picture. Noah found something very beautiful
in Mary, making him want her to be his wife. When the Lord
chose us, it wasn't because he saw any beauty in us. We, like
Gomer, have played the harlot. We have, in our hearts, exchanged
our loyalty to our husband to another man. And we do it every
day. We do it every day. Every time we try to find our
happiness, our hope, our contentment, even our salvation, even the
assurance of our salvation, in something other than the Lord
Jesus Christ, we are playing the harlot. And the Lord is faithful. He's faithful to pursue us. And
he's given to us in chapter two a picture of this marriage that
was made in heaven the union that he has with his bride. I love what Paul tells us in
Ephesians chapter 5 when he speaks of the husband loving the wife
as Christ loved the church and the wife submitting to her husband
as unto the Lord. And then he goes on to say, but
I speak to you of a great mystery. A great mystery. This is something
hidden from the natural man. He can't see it. That's what
a mystery is. It doesn't mean that it's weird
or mysterious. It means that it's hidden. It
must be revealed. The Spirit of God must open the
eyes of our understanding. He must give us faith so that
we can see it and believe it. I speak to you of a great mystery
concerning Christ and His church. So that's what I'm hoping, that
the Lord will reveal to us the glorious relationship that he
has with his bride. Four things I want you to see
in our text. The first is that this relationship
is an intimate relationship. The second thing is that it is
a loyal relationship. The third thing is that it's
a relationship, it's a marriage whereby he protects his wife. And the fourth thing is that
it is a marriage that is continuous through all eternity. The perpetuity
of there's no divorce in this relationship. Isaiah put it like this in Isaiah
chapter 54 verse 5, he said, thy maker is thy husband. The Lord of hosts is his name,
and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel, the God of the whole
earth, shall he be called. So you have your Bibles open
to Hosea chapter 2, look with me if you will at verse 16. And it shall be at that day,
saith the Lord, that thou shalt call me Ish. Ish. Now it's interesting
to me that the translators back in 1611 left the Hebrew word
here. rather than translating it into
English. And it's so precious because
it's more than what the English can possibly comprehend. It's the same word that's used
in Genesis chapter one when God speaks of Adam as the man. Here's
the man, Adam. And so what the Lord's saying
to his bride is that you're no longer going to call me Bali,
which means, which has a sense of lordship and authority to
it. You're going to call me your
man. You're going to call me your
husband. There's an intimacy to this relationship. In Genesis 2, verse 23, when Adam saw Eve, he said, this
is now bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh, and she shall be
called Isha, woman, for she came out of a man. Where did she come
from? And the two shall be one flesh. Where did God take Eve from when
he created her from his flesh? He didn't take her from a bone
in his foot to stand over her neck and to have domination and
authority over her. You show me a man who's harsh
and domineering and controlling over a woman, I'll show you a
man that's weak and insecure. That's why men do that. And there's
not a weak bone in our Lord's body, and there's not a bit of
insecurity. He doesn't have to dominate.
He said, you no longer call me Lord, Master. I'm not going to
lead you around like that. He didn't take Eve from a bone
in her foot. I heard a woman say one time,
well, yeah, my husband's the head, but I'm the neck. I'm the
neck. You know, I'm the one that controls
the head. And, you know, the Lord, where did he get the bone
from? Isn't it interesting also, you know, that the average number
of ribs that humans have is 24, but we don't all have the same
number? It could be anywhere from 21, 23 to 25, 26. Everybody's got it. Where did
that come from? Where did that come from? There's
nothing, no other part of our bodies like that except for our
ribs. We don't all have the same number.
God took a rib out of Adam's side. near to his heart. The same place, the same exact
place between the fourth and the fifth rib when that Roman
soldier took that spear and lanced it into the heart of the Lord
Jesus Christ. What intimacy there is in this
relationship that Christ has with his church. It's not controlling,
it's not fearful, it is one. The two shall become one flesh,
so that he that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are
all of one, so that he is not ashamed to call them his brethren. his brethren. You're no longer
going to call me Bali. This impersonal, omnipotent,
sovereign, which is to be feared. Now, is he Lord? Yes. Yes, he's Lord. But he's Lord
in the context of this marriage relationship, this intimacy,
this love relationship that he has with his bride. We are found in Him. Found in Him. Not having our
own righteousness, which is of the law, but that righteousness
which is by the faith of Jesus Christ. As He is, so are we. In Him. In Him is the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, and you, as His bride, by virtue of your
union with Him, are complete in Him. There's such a dear,
affectionate intimacy that the Lord Jesus Christ has with His
church. He is a friend of publicans and
sinners. The scripture says he laid down
his life for his friends. And I love it when the Lord said,
henceforth, I call you no more my servants, for a servant knoweth
not what his master does. But I call you my friends. Oh, how precious it is. when a husband and a wife are
best friends. Young people, before you get
married, you make sure that person you marry is your best friend,
your best friend, and you'll have a successful marriage. What
a precious intimacy that the Lord has with his church. I no longer call you Bali, but
I call you Ish. I'm not going to cringe in fear
of your authority over me. I'm going to say, you're my man
and I'm your woman, and the two of us are one. This is a marriage made in heaven,
isn't it? Look at verse 17, for I will
take away the names of Balaam out of her mouth, and they shall
no more be remembered by their name. I'm going to take away the names
of Balaam out of her mouth. I'm going to cause her to put
away her other gods. I'm going to cause her to curse
her fig trees and to renounce her false belief. She's going
to, when I marry her to myself, she's going to see the difference
between her new husband and her old husband. No longer is she
going to be married to that lawmonger who is beating her and demanding
obedience from her. She's going to be married to
her man and she's going to renounce. She's going to expose all of
her false hopes and even her present backsliding harlotry. And here's the difference, she's
gonna renounce those. Notice in verse 18 that it says,
in that day I will make, I mean verse 17, I will take away the
names of Balaam out of her mouth and they shall no more be remembered
by their name. I'm gonna take them out of her
mouth and they'll no longer be remembered by their name. What
was our Balaams? What was our Balaams? It doesn't
mean that there's not something still in our flesh that's idolatrous,
and it is. We commit harlotry every time
we look away from Christ. But the difference between a
believer and an unbeliever is that they know it. And no longer do they say with
their lips, I made Jesus Lord of my life. They don't speak
like that anymore. I invited Jesus to come into
my heart. They don't talk like that anymore.
I made a decision for Jesus. I came to the doctrines of grace. They don't talk like that anymore. They don't talk about their righteousness
and try to compete with one another over what they're doing for God.
Why? Because he's taken those things
out of their lips. They don't speak like that anymore.
They know the difference. They have a husband that they
love. They don't say, you know, here's his loyalty. This is a
marriage that's intimate, and it's a marriage that is loyal. I'm going to be loyal to her,
and I'm going to make her loyal to me. I'll never leave you,
nor forsake you. I will continue, I will persevere.
I love it when the scripture says that the Lord loved his
disciples to the end. I have loved them with an everlasting
love. What a commitment. I've made
this point before, I want to make it again just in case somebody
didn't hear it. When God speaks of something everlasting, it
doesn't mean that it started at a certain point and lasted
forever. When God speaks of everlasting, that means there was never a
beginning, never an end. There's never been a time when the Lord
Jesus Christ has not been committed to his bride. There's never been
a time when he's not loved her with an everlasting love. And
there never will be a time he's committed to her. I've taken
the gods of Balaam out of their mouth. and I've caused her to
be loyal to me, and I will be loyal to her. Look at verse 18. So we have in verse 16, an intimate
marriage. We have in verse 17 a loyal marriage. And in verse 18 we have a marriage
of protection. Protection. The perfect husband
who protects his wife from all harm. Look at verse 18. And in
that day will I make a covenant for them with the beast of the
field and with the fowls of heaven and with the creeping things
of the ground. And I will break the bow and the sword and the
battle out of the earth and I will make them to lie down in safety. Whatever threatens her, I'm going
to be there to defend her. And nothing is going to take
her away from me. Nothing. Whatever they perceive
as a threat toward them, I have allowed it in order to strengthen
the bond of marriage that I have with her. so that every believer
knows, you know, if you're a child of God, you know that he is working
all things together for good for them who love him and those
that are the called according to his purpose. He's committed
to protect his wife. I love it when David and his
mighty men were off in battle and his wives and his children
and all the men's wives and children were held up in Ziklag and the
Amalekites came and they took away all of his wives and all
of his children and burned the city. So when David came back
with his mighty men, they saw the smoke coming up from Ziklag
and they lamented. I mean, they thought all was
lost. And David comforted himself in the Lord, the scripture says.
His men were ready to kill him, but he comforted himself in the
Lord. And the Lord told him to go pursue
him. And the whole story ends with this statement, and David
recovered all. Not one thing was lost. And so
it is with our David, the son of David, in recovering his bride,
that whatever trials he sends our way are for our good to show
us of his protection and of his recovery. We have even a picture of that
with Adam. It's a picture of the gospel. And we're not excusing
what Adam did. Adam sinned. Adam as a man sinned. But Adam's a type of Christ.
Had Adam not gone into Eve's sin with his eyes wide open,
Eve would have been cut off with no hope of salvation all by herself. All by herself. Eve was deceived
like you and I are deceived. When the Lord Jesus Christ went
to Calvary's cross, he went to the cross with his eyes wide
open. He knew exactly what he was fixing to bear. He cried
out to the Father, Father, if there be any way this cup can
pass from me, let it be nevertheless not my will, but thy be done.
He knew he was going to be drinking from the bitter dregs of God's
wrath for the sins of his people. He knew the weight of those sins.
He knew the consequences of them. Why'd he do it? Why'd he do it? Why did he own our sins as his
own on Calvary's cross? For the same reason, well, pictured
in what Adam did for Eve. It was through his taking our
sin that he redeemed his bride. He protected her through his
death. He bore our sins and satisfied
the demands of God's holy justice in order to redeem his wife. This relationship, this marriage
that was made in heaven in eternity past between the bridegroom and
the bride, between the Lord Jesus Christ and his church, is an
intimate relationship. We don't cringe, we flee to him. He receives his children with
open arms. He loves them. He said, I know
my thoughts for you. Not thoughts of evil, thoughts
of good. I've got nothing but good for
you. Come to me. It's a relationship that is loyal. First on his part, and then he
makes sure that it is on ours. And it's a relationship where
he's always protecting his wife. And he's going to do that for
perpetuity, forever. This marriage, you know, the
marriage between... I grieve for men and women that have to
experience divorce. And if you've not been there,
you have no idea. I can't... I had somebody ask me recently,
Dave, you don't know what it's like. You don't know what it's
like. Sometimes marriages don't work, and I don't know what it's
like. But I'm here to tell you on the authority of God's Word,
this marriage that the Lord Jesus Christ has with His bride will
never, ever, ever end in divorce. Ever. He's going to keep her to Himself.
forever. Look at verse 19. And I will betroth thee unto
me forever. Yea, I will betroth thee unto
me in righteousness. I'm going to I'm going to give
you my righteousness. No weapon against you will prosper. Why? For your righteousness is mine. It's mine. Your righteousness
outside of Christ is as filthy rags. David said, I'll speak
of thy righteousness even of thine only. And we just saw in
Romans chapter 10 that the religious go about, ignorant of God's righteousness,
trying to establish their own righteousness. But Christ is
the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. I'm
going to marry you, I'm going to betroth thee unto me forever. Why? Because it's in righteousness.
And Michael, it's like you just said, righteousness is an absolute. There's no degrees of righteousness.
You're either righteous or you're not righteous. And the Lord said, I'm going
to save you in righteousness. Look what else he says. in verse
19, and in judgment. His bride rejoices that the Lord
has saved us without relaxing one Adam from his law. The Lord is just and justifier
of them that believe. He didn't sacrifice His law in
order to save His lawless bride. He didn't do it. All by Himself,
He fulfilled all that was required for the covenant. He is a just
God and a Savior. He satisfied the demands of God's
law and the father's demands were met fully. The father was
satisfied and the Lord Jesus Christ is the surety of his bride. And the sure mercies of David
are made secure by his marrying of us. Look what he says in verse
19, And I will betroth thee unto me forever, yea, I will betroth
thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness. Now lovingkindness is the Old
Testament word for grace. I'm going to save you by grace.
My loving kindness, it is the love of Christ that constraineth
us. It's the grace of God that saves
us, for by grace are you saved through faith, yet not of yourselves. It's a gift of God, not of our
works. I'm going to save you. I'm going
to redeem you to myself in loving kindness. It is the goodness
of God that leadeth to repentance. It is the grace of our husband
that melts our hearts and causes us to want to submit to him. No wife, no wife does ever wants
to submit to a husband that's harsh. But if she finds a husband
that loves her, Oh, she's happy to submit to Him. And so it is
with the church. We submit to Him willingly. Why? Because of His goodness, because
of His loving kindness, because of His grace. Turn to me in Hosea
chapter 11. Hosea chapter 11. Look at verse
4. I drew them with cords of a man,
with bands of love. I was to them as they that take
off the yoke on their jaws, and I laid meat unto them. Come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. I'll give you rest. Rest from your labors. Rest for
your soul. Put my yoke upon, my yoke is
easy. It's light. It's not a burdensome
yoke. I don't beat my children. I don't
force them into submission. I guide them, I lead them with
grace. I draw them with cords of kindness
and love and mercy. What a marriage. This is the
relationship that Christ has with his church. He's the perfect
husband. Oh, believers want to be like...
We fall so far short of it, don't we? If there's going to be any hope
for our marriages, it won't be by trying to fix our marriages,
it'll be by looking to Him and His marriage to the Church. There's marriage counselors on
every corner. You can go to marriage counselors
and find little tools and trinkets to try to tweak this problem
and that problem. Doesn't work. I'll tell you what
will work. Husband and a wife seeing the
marriage that Christ has with His church. He binds us eternally to himself
as our husband. Go back with me to our text.
In loving kindness and in mercies. In grace and in mercy. Now you
know the difference between grace and mercy is? Grace is giving
us what we don't deserve. That's eternal life. That's the gift of God. That's
the presence of his person. That's Christ in us, the hope
of glory. That's the gift of his spirit.
The grace of God and mercy is God withholding from us what
we do deserve. What did Gomer deserve? What
did Gomer deserve? She deserved, according to the
law, to be put to death is what she deserved. but he didn't do
it. Instead, he bought her off the
slave block and brought her back to himself and showed mercy toward
her. Our God delights in showing mercy
to sinners. Do you need mercy? Do you need
mercy? Do you need for God to withhold
from you what you deserve? Do you need for God to give you
what you don't deserve? It'll only happen in this union
that was made in heaven. Last point. Verse 20, I will even betroth
thee unto me in faithfulness, and thou shalt know the Lord. If we believe not, yet he abideth
faithful, for he cannot deny himself. This marriage union
that we have with Christ, another similitude that the scripture
uses besides the husband and the wife is the head and the
body. And he's saying if the members of the body are unfaithful,
he cannot deny himself. If the bride is unfaithful, he
cannot deny himself. They are one together in union
as one flesh. First Corinthians 10.13, there
hath no temptation taken you, but such as is common to all
men. Now the first point of that has
to do with Galatians chapter 6, verse 2, let every man bear
his own burden. Let every man bear his own burden.
Don't go around talking about your problems as if they're worse
than everybody else's. I'm so thankful for this fellowship
because of that. I know some of the burdens that
some of you carry, and you don't talk to them. You don't talk
about them. You don't talk about them. There hath no temptation
taken you, but such is as common to man. God is faithful. God is faithful. He will not
suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able. And
I've heard people say, well, God's not gonna put more on you
than you can bear. Don't you believe that for a minute? If
God doesn't put more on you than you can bear, you'll never need
Him. That's not what that verse is saying. The verse is saying
that He will provide a way of escape that you might be able
to bear it. He's going to put so much on
you that you're not going to be able to bear it and you're
going to find your need for a husband. You're going to find your need
for a Savior. He put your sin on you, you'll
have a burden that you cannot bear. And in His faithfulness,
you'll find Him to have put them away at Calvary's cross. Intimacy. Faithfulness? Perpetuity? It's going to continue
forever, never going to end in divorce? Oh, what a faithful
husband we have. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly
Father, we ask that you would minister grace to the hearts
of your children by causing us to reflect and
to believe what you have declared about the relationship that Christ
has with his church. For it's in his name we ask it.
Amen. You. The Church's one foundation is
Jesus Christ, her Lord. She is His new creation by water
and the Word. From heaven He came and sought
her. To be His holy bride, And with
Him blood He bought her, And for her life He died. Elect from every nation, yet
one o'er all the earth. Her charter of salvation, one
Lord, one faith, one birth. One holy name she blesses, partakes
one holy food. And to one hope she presses with
every grace endued. Mid toil and tribulation and
tumult of her war, She waits the consummation of peace forevermore. Till with the vision glorious
her longing eyes are blessed, And the great church victorious
shall be the church at rest. Yet she on earth hath union with
God the three-in-one, And mystic sweet communion with those whose
rest is one. O happy ones and holy, Lord,
give us grace that we, Like them, the meek and lowly, On high may
dwell with Thee. Thank you very much.