Let's take our Bibles and turn
with me to the book of Proverbs, chapter 28. Proverbs 28. I'd like for us to look at the last
verse in this 28th. Chapter Romans 28. Idle this when the righteous
increase when the righteous increase. The scripture declares when the
wicked rise, men hide themselves. But when they perish, the righteous
increase. When God created man, turn with
me to Genesis chapter one. When God created man, man last of all God's creatures, was created in a marvelous way. Genesis 126 says this, and God
said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and
let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the fowl
of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over
every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. According to
these scriptures, Jehovah, in majestic unity, Father, Son,
and Holy Spirit, that's what he said, let us, one God, Let
us make man in our image and in the image of God, likeness
of God, and not in his express image, because there's only one
that has come forth in the express image of God. That's the Lord
Jesus Christ. But God was said to have made
man in his image, after his likeness. I looked those words up. That's hard to perceive when
you read that. Man was made in the image of
God, in the likeness of God. What does that mean? Well, it
means, and the word is semblance. Man had a semblance, or in the
similitude, who God is. How's that? Well, man possesses an eternal
soul. Animals don't. Man has a soul
that's going to live forever. It's going to live forever. A soul that knew and communicated
with God. Animals don't. Only man. It's like that. And man was given
a position to have, according to what we just read, to have
dominion over the lesser creatures. Fish, fowl, cattle, creeping
things. And the scripture says, according
to Ecclesiastes 7, 29, man was made upright. He was made straight. He was
made innocent. But man was made capable of falling
from that position, because he did. Yes, something happened in the
garden that had eternal consequences. A man was in an environment that,
as yet, had not been polluted by sin. God had given man a law. God spoke to him and said concerning
life or death. He said in Genesis chapter 3
verses 1 to 7, now the serpent was more subtle than any beast
of the field which God, Lord God had made. He said unto the
woman, yea, hath God said ye shall not eat of every tree of
the garden? And the woman said unto the serpent, we may eat
of the fruit of the trees of the garden, but the fruit of
the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God has said,
you shall not eat of it. Neither shall you touch it, lest
you die. And the serpent said to the woman,
you shall not surely die. For God doth know that in the
day you eat thereof, then your eyes will be open and you shall
be as gods, when good and evil. And when
the woman saw that the tree was good for food and that it was
Pleasant to the eyes a tree to be desired to make one wise she
took of the fruit thereof and did eat and gave also Unto her
husband with her and he did eat And the eyes of them both were
open and they knew that they were naked and they sewed fig
leaves together and made themselves aprons In a environment where there
was no sin, no sin. Adam did something that caused
all mankind to die, spiritually die. He disobeyed God in an environment
which had no sin. And by that one sin, Romans,
here's what happened. Here's what happened when he
did that. Sin was not there. Romans 5,
7 says this. I'm sorry, Romans 5, 12. Wherefore,
as by one man, sin entered into the world and death by sin and
so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned. In an environment that had no
sin in it, a man disobeyed God. And by that one act of disobedience,
one act, what did he do? He ate of the fruit. One act. Sin has consequences. It's got
consequences. One act. What's the consequences
of one sin? Here's the consequences. One
sin. Mankind died. And from that one act of disobedience,
Isaiah 64, 6 and 7 says this. Now this one act, you think,
One act, one taste, one bite, one fruit, one, one. Here's what scripture says concerning
the way all men, now, all men, everybody came out of Adam, everybody.
Isaiah 64, six and seven, for we are all as an unclean thing,
and all of our righteousnesses are as filthy rags, and we do
fade as a leaf, we do all fade as a leaf, and our iniquities
like the wind have taken us away, and there's none that call upon
thy name that stirreth up himself to take hold of thee, for thou
hast hid thy face from us and has consumed us because of our
iniquities. Everybody, everybody now, by
one One act of disobedience, one man's disobedience. Death
passed upon all men, ruin. And from that one act of disobedience,
there was a distinctive characteristic found within man that was not
there before. Back in Genesis three, verse
eight to 10, after their eyes were opened, They heard the voice
of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day,
and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord
God amongst the trees of the garden. And the Lord called unto
Adam and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard
thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked,
and I hid myself. Fear. But not the reverential
fear. or the respectful fear that's
rendered unto the Lord by his people who've been regenerated
by grace, but rather the fear of guilt and the exposure of
the neckiness of a man's soul because of disobedience. Men
now are born afraid, afraid. And the result, Micah 7, 2 says
the good man is perished out of the earth. and there's none
upright among men, they all lie in wait for blood, they hunt
every man, his brother with a net. Adam was afraid and he wanted
to hide from God. Truly, back in Proverbs 28, the
scripture declares when the wicked, when the criminal, When he that is guilty, when
he that is hostile toward God, when the wicked rise, when the
wicked, now that word rise means becomes powerful. And oh, the
powerful grip that sin has upon men. When the wicked rise, men
hide themselves. But man, because of sin, because
of spiritual death, because he doesn't seek God, he doesn't
know God, he knows nothing of God, all he wants to do is hide
from God. But man ignorantly thinks that
he can hide his nakedness of soul before God in a way that
is the most deceptive of all ways. by trying to make himself, reform
himself, and appease God. Now, I started thinking about
something that's always perplexed me. As a kid, I grew up in false
religion. I didn't know God until, Lord
have mercy, my late 20s. pleased to cross my path with
the truth of the gospel of God's grace. I didn't know God. I was
religious. I was a pretty good guy compared
to others. But something always used to
amaze me. I think about, I used to watch
these cowboy shows, you know, and I thought like, I thought,
I'd watch these like Indians, American Indians, out West Indians.
And I used to think, you know, they had a deity, they knew something
about it, they had worship, they had medicine men, and they had,
you know, there was kind of a religion to it. I thought, how did they...
You know, well, the missionaries got to it. Well, they did that
before these missionaries, whoever the missionaries were, before
they ever got to it, but that was a religion. In Egypt, they
had these little gods, and they had these little things, and
they had, I mean, I thought, you know, and everybody, no matter
what they were, wherever they were, there was always some worship
to them, you know? Man's born like that. Man is
born guilty. And he's got something there,
conscience, right and wrong. And he's born in that way, and
he believes, and it's always ignorant, it's always ignorant,
until a man, a woman hears the gospel of God's free grace, he
got away, he got away, and it's always a little something, you
gotta do something. You know, you gotta, you know,
take a whip and whip your back, or you gotta cut yourself, like
those ones whenever Elijah said, y'all, you know, they jumped
upon that mat, altar, and cried unto Baal. It's always something
that they had to do. He's born with a sense of guilt,
and he believes that he can resolve his guilt, his wrong, by reform,
by doing enough. He believes he can settle his
debt before God, clothe his guilt, Adam and Eve just tried it with
fig leaves. That was their way. But here's the problem. Man does
not understand the penalty. The penalty of his sin. The payment
of his sin. He don't get it. Maybe I can pay it by walking
down there. Maybe I can pay it by being baptized. Maybe I can
pay it by taking the Lord's Supper. Maybe I can do it by reading.
I'll read the Bible. I'll go out and start witnessing. I got
an unwed mother's ministry. I'll go down to the soup kitchen.
I'll do something. Without the shedding of blood. There's no remission. There's no remission. Unless
the Lord is pleased to rescue a spiritually dead sinner from
the clutches of his sin, unbelief, by the Lord Jesus Christ bearing
his sin at Calvary. unless God puts away the debt
of his sin. We'll never do it. We'll never
do it. Unless God clothes him in the
righteousness of Christ himself, man's going to perish. That woman's
going to perish. You talk about hiding, hiding from God. Turn
to, turn to Revelation six. Yeah, men, men are going to,
They're trying to, ignorantly, they're trying to hide from God
now by doing, by doing something, and appeasing their conscience
is what they're trying to do, Pat. Just appease their conscience.
Make them feel a little better. Come to church, I feel a little
better. You know, I feel a little bit better. You know, I'm feeling
pretty good. Revelation chapter 6. It says
it's coming today. Revelation 6, 14, 17. And the
heaven departed as a scroll. when it's rolled together and
every mountain and island were moved out of their places and
the kings of the earth and the great men and the rich men, the
chief captains and the mighty men, every bondman, every free
man hid themselves in the dens and the rocks of the mountains
and said to the mountains and rocks, fall on us and hide us
from the face of him that sitteth on the throne and from the wrath
of the lamb. Now, now men are honest. When they stand before
God, Fred, now they're gonna be honest. They want to hide
themselves. They want to hide themselves.
When the wicked rise, men hide themselves. Oh, but bless the
Lord when the Spirit of God comes in power and mercy. And when men and women are brought
under the sound of the truth, of the gospel of God's grace,
and by the grace of God, they're made to realize, I can't hide
myself. I cannot hide myself from God. When the Lord in mercy comes
and teaches a man or a woman something of their inability,
oh, what a blessing. What a blessing. They will then
from a new heart, set forth and cry that which is now honorable
unto him and for his own good. Listen to Psalm 27, verse 5. For in the time of trouble, he
shall hide me in his pavilion. In the secret of his tabernacle
shall he hide me. He shall set me upon a rock.
Doesn't that just have a sound of, Lord, thank you. Thank you for not leaving me
to myself to go through the rest of my life and leave this world
thinking that I had done something that could could clothe me before
God's eyes, clothe my guilt where God could be hidden from seeing
me as I am, knowing, knowing He knows. The books are going
to be open. He knows. And every man, apart
from Christ, is going to be judged out of his own works. Yes. When the wicked rise, men
hide themselves. But those who know God in grace
and truth, those who do know by the grace of God, there's
no place to hide. No place to hide. They're going
to find all of their safety. And the glorious truth of God's
grace. Oh, the mercy of that word. Grace
for by grace. Grace are you saved through faith. They're going to realize that
the Lord has hidden them in his pavilion. In the city of his
refuge. in the cleft of the rock himself,
the haven of rest, put in Christ, hidden in Christ,
according to God's mercy, and they're secure in Him. But Scripture says in closing,
when the wicked rise, men hide themselves, but when they perish,
they who? Well, I can tell you this, it's
the wicked for the people of God are never going to perish.
I give them eternal life and they shall never perish. Somebody
going to perish though. Who is it? The wicked, the wicked,
the wicked. And it doesn't say, but if they
perish, but it says, but when they perish, when they perish,
And there's coming a day when all men, as I said, are gonna
stand before God, the goats on the left hand of the Lord, sheep
on his right hand, he's gonna judge all men according to righteousness,
justice. And for all for whom Christ has
not borne their guilt, he said, I lay down my life for the sheep. In that day, when they perish, spiritually dead, judged out
of the books, Revelation 20, 12. Sheep shall be justified
by the grace of God. Those whose names have been written
in the Lamb's Book of Life, slain from the foundation of the world,
Revelation 13, 8. And when they perish, and there is coming a
day, all the accounts are going to be settled. Here's what I
just rejoiced in. the righteous increase, they're
going to be fruitful. That's what it means. They're
going to multiply. When they perish, the righteous
increase, they're going to inherit the kingdom prepared for them
from the foundation of the world. There's going to be no more bondage. to this body of death, but rather
when the Lord shall appear. The scripture says they shall
see him as he is, and they're gonna be like him. They're gonna
increase. They shall no more behold him
by faith, but rather by sight. I think about recently those
that have been graciously called unto our Lord. I was thinking about Brother
D. I think what an increase. When the wicked perish, and even
the very presence of that wickedness, I know I know the guilt of our
sin for the believers gone. I know the guilt of it's gone.
I know the debts been paid by the blood of Christ, but the
presence of it still there. But when that bondage that body
of death. Separated from that believer
when he leaves this world. He going to increase. And he'll
be with the Lord. He'll forever be with the Lord.
What an increase. I pray the Lord bless this to
our hearts for Christ's sake. Amen. All right, let's take a
break.