Let's take our Bibles and turn
with me to the book of Proverbs, chapter 22. Proverbs 22. I'd like to look at verse 12. A passage of scripture that we're
all very thankful for. Proverbs 22 12, the eyes of the
Lord preserve knowledge and he overthroweth the words of the
transgressor. The scripture reveals that there
is a grand guardian that protects the knowledge that the Lord has
given concerning Himself. Here's the grand protector of
God's knowledge. The knowledge that the Lord gives
and the knowledge that we have of Him. Here's what protects
it. The eyes of the Lord. Now when we speak of the eyes
of the Lord, we're speaking not only of His knowledge, We know
that He knows. But we're also speaking of His
will and His purpose and His good pleasure. Here's what we
know. God knows. God sees. God perceives. His eyes of omniscience
sees, first of all, the wickedness of man. The scripture declares,
Genesis 6, 5, God saw. It wasn't that He saw and just
saw the effects. The scripture says He saw that
the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination
of the thoughts of His heart was only evil continually. 14, 2 and 3, the Lord looked down from
heaven upon the children of men to see if there were any that
did understand and seek God. They are all gone aside, they
are all together become filthy, there's none that doeth good,
no, not one. Now men may deny, maybe not outwardly,
but they do in their heart. that God's knowledge of man's
wickedness is keen. They may deny that. But Job,
under the inspiration of God's Spirit, said in Job 11, 11, For
he knoweth, he always knows, always has known, vain, worthless,
empty men. He seeth wickedness also. Will he not then consider it?
Is God not going to deal with it? Jeremiah chapter 2 verse
22, For though thou wash thee with niter, and take thee much
soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord God. God knows. And every believer
admits it. Lord, You know my frame. Lord, You know. Lord, have mercy
upon me. The Lord sees the wickedness
of man. But there's another truth set
forth concerning the Lord's eyes. The eyes of His mercy and compassion. First time the word grace ever
mentioned in the Bible. Genesis 6, 8. But Noah found
grace. in the eyes of the Lord according to His will, according
to His purpose. The Lord was pleased to be propitious,
that means He was pleased to show favor to a needy, helpless
sinner named Noah and all like him that Almighty God looked
upon everlastingly in mercy, not because there was anything
good with them. Noah fell in that first group. God saw that
the wickedness of man was great in the earth and that every imagination
of the thoughts of men was only evil. That's Noah, right there. But there was this truth set
forth, but, but, Noah found grace. And this precious truth of His
mercy and His compassion, the knowledge of who He is, it must
be preserved. It must be preserved. God's got
a people. The Lord's going to save His
people. Almighty God has purposed before the foundation of the
world that all He placed in His blessed precious Son were going
to be brought to Him. And they're going to be brought
to Him this way, through the preaching of the Gospel. And
that truth must be preserved. The knowledge of God must be
kept. And here's the truth of that
word and knowledge being kept. Psalm 138 verse 2, I will worship
toward thy holy temple and praise thy name for thy loving kindness
and for thy truth because for thou hast magnified thy word
above all thy name. I read that verse of scripture
and I think There is nothing concerning the Lord that He Himself
has magnified above His Word. The Word of God. He has given
His Word of promise to His elect in the person of His blessed
Son. He has promised them, I'll never
leave you, I'll never forsake you, and His Word is the highest
and clearest manifestation of Himself, His being, His perfection,
His purpose to show mercy to an undeserving people of His
affection. His Word reflects His glory. It must be preserved. And for
His glory in bringing about His people, their comfort, their
peace, their salvation. That Word must be preserved. Now think, we're here tonight
with the blessed privilege of taking some scriptures that Almighty
God has preserved. The Word of God written down
in a book and here we are listening to the same Word that has been
preached to men since the creation. God has kept it. Now, Satan and
all of his lying followers would have God's Word erased from the
ears of all men. Have it erased from the ears
of all. God's true Word. Not His distorted. I'm going
to talk about that in just a second. But He would have the Word of
the Lord. The truth. of the gospel erased
from the ears of all men because Satan knows that God has a people. And he knows that this is how
the Lord is going to call them out. He knows that. Paul said,
I'm not ashamed of the gospel. The gospel of Christ. Man, if anybody would ever just
read the Scriptures and understand, you know, I've said before, I
ask this question, is it absolutely, without a shadow of a doubt,
is it absolutely necessary? Does God save men apart from,
let me say it like that, the preaching of the Gospel? No.
No one has ever been converted without the hearing of the gospel.
Paul said, I'm not ashamed of this. It is the power of God
unto salvation. It pleased God through the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe. God called you, 2 Thessalonians
2, by our gospel. Gospel. Is it necessary that
this word be preserved? Absolutely. Absolutely. And the eyes of the Lord, the
will, the purpose, the power, the seeing, the omniscience of
God Almighty preserves that Word. I've told you this many times,
but we need to hear this over and over and over. This world
is so permeated with false religion. It's everywhere. And the thing that is so subtle,
so, so damning subtle, is that there's so much truth in it.
I've said many times though, it's not what men say. I have listened to some stand
and preach, and Pat, I'd say probably 99% of what they said,
I'd go along with it. They may say salvation is of
the Lord, I'll go along with that. The Lord Jesus Christ died on
the cross. I'll go along with that. But
it's what they don't say. Nine times out of ten, it's what
they don't say. Satan will attempt, as he has
attempted and shall attempt till the Lord returns, to hide the
gospel from God's elect by sending a false gospel. This is the way
he tries it. That passage we looked at so
many times in Revelation chapter 12, and the serpent cast out
of his mouth water as a flood after the woman. Why? That he
might cause her to be carried away by the flood. I say without
apology, every place, every pulpit, every pulpit, where the gospel
of God's grace is not being preached. It is Satan's attempt to carry
away the woman by a false gospel. That's all he's trying to do.
That's the purpose of it. They'll tell you we love everybody.
No they don't. No they don't. You only love
those you're truthful with. All these false gospels, they're
sent. But the scripture says in Proverbs
22 verse 12, And He overthroweth the words of the transgressor.
God is going to preserve knowledge by His eyes of omniscience and
power. But He's going to overthrow the
words of the transgressor. What happened to the flood, the
waters, when Satan cast them out of His mouth after the woman?
Well, the next verse in Revelation 12 says, And the earth helped
the woman. And the earth opened her mouth
and swallowed up the flood which the dragon cast out of his mouth. Who's the earth here? Well, it's
all those that will not receive the love of the truth. That refuse
to hear. They actually help the bride
of Christ by swallowing up, drinking in that flood that Satan cast
out of his mouth. False religion. God will give
a man exactly, but for his grace, what he wants. And then we'll
send him to hell. While the devil is attempting
to sweep away God's people with his false gospel, God preserves
his own by taking that cesspool of lies and allows men to drink
it and believe it. And then when men hear the gospel
that the Lord is preserving, Preserving. Preserving it in
His people. Keeping them by the power of
God. He preserves it in people by
giving them faith to believe. He keeps it in His people by
teaching them and causing them to hear it. And as they hear
it, granting them faith, faith, faith to believe. And He doesn't
leave them. He doesn't forsake them. And
He grows them in grace. and He perfects them in the hearing
of the truth. But those that will not hear
the truth, this is the condemnation that light is coming to the world
and men love darkness rather than light. The deception of
Satan meant for the bride is that strong delusion that Almighty
God is said to send to all who will not receive the truth. This was the first The thing
that Satan did when God told Adam, you can eat of all the
trees, but one. First thing Satan did, first
thing he did, he spoke to Eve and tried to do nothing but deceive
her. Hath God said, you shall not
eat of every tree of the garden? She said, we may eat of the fruit. of the trees of the garden, but
of 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 what does Satan tell her?
You're not going to die. You're not going to die. You
tell men, you tell women, except God Almighty puts you under the
sound of the gospel of God's grace. and grant you faith to
believe this gospel, this message that exalts the Lord Jesus Christ
only and abases men, that man doesn't have a free will, that
man doesn't have the ability to reconcile himself back to
God. God must save him according to
his purpose and will. Unless God teaches you this,
you're going to die in what a Satan preacher says. You're not going to die. You're
not going to die. No, no, no, no. This is the truth.
This is the truth. They say, you shall not die for
God knows in the day that you eat thereof then your eyes will
be opened and you'll be as God's, knowing good and evil. This is
the truth. If any man loved not the Lord
Jesus Christ, what did I just say? any man that does not believe
the Gospel concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, the Servant of
Jehovah, He in whom all of the elect were chosen, that they
should be holy and without blame before God in love, the Establisher
of the righteousness of God's elect, He who laid down His life
for these sheep, the ascended great high priest who ever liveth. If any man love not the Lord
Jesus Christ, hear what the Apostle Paul said in 2 Corinthians 16,
22. Let him be anathema. Let him be accursed or devoted
to destruction. Maranatha. What does that mean? The Lord's coming back. That's
what it means. If any man love not the Lord Jesus, let him be
accursed and devoted to destruction, the Lord's coming back. All but concerning this precious
knowledge of God's revelation to His people. God keeps it. It doesn't deviate. Because the
Lord never deviates. That knowledge from the mouth
of the true and living God is going to endure until the heavens
and the earth pass away, and then it will still endure. It's
going to endure. It's going to be preserved. Heaven
and earth, he said, is going to pass away. But not my Word. My Word will not return unto
me void. It's preserved by Him that changes
not. We rest our soul on this truth. We rest our very soul on the
Word of God. And we believe God doesn't change. Oh, that glorious revelation
of His everlasting love to a people of His choosing, that's never
changed. His promise to bring to Himself a bride by His Son,
holy, without blame, that's never changed. And He has preserved
His Word that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding
riches of His grace and His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. The knowledge of the Lord Himself. having written in the book of
life all the names of His adopted children in Christ, all before
the foundation of the world, that He everlastingly trusted
in the Son to finish the work of redemption and salvation for
His people, and having trusted His Son, He justified us. I told you before, I'll tell
you again. What does justified mean? No charge. No record! You know, that's even
better. Yeah, somebody said, well that's
ok, there's no charge, we'll just wipe it off, just forget
about it. I mean, we'll just kind of mark it through. No,
no record. No record. We as His people, we truly rest
our souls upon His Word, His revealed knowledge of Himself.
And we believe that this Word is not the Word of man, This
is the Word of God. Listen to this in closing. For
the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but
holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. This is what we believe this
evening. We believe that the Lord has sent His Word to us
through His prophet, Old times spake by the prophets, hath in
these last days spoken unto us by His Son. That word from the mouth of His
Son through His preachers is preserved in Christ Jesus. In His hand, kept by the power
of God through faith, He sends it and preserves His Word by
preserving the preachers that He calls. That's how He's going
to call His people. He keeps that Word in them. Remember when Jeremiah said,
I love this. When Jeremiah said, I'm not going
to preach anymore. People had just lambasted him and they talked
about him behind his back. They backstabbed him and everything.
He said, I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. I quit. He said, but his word
was in me like fire in my bones, and I couldn't refrain. God preserves
his knowledge. He's going to deal with all false
preachers and professors, but for those of us here that the
Lord has called out of darkness, may we say amen. to his preserving
grace. Lord, thank you that you kept
your word. You preserved it and allowed
me to hear it. Thank you, Lord, that you didn't allow that word
to perish and become void and return unto you with no profit.
And you taught me by it. I pray that God teach us tonight. Pray that the Lord keep us by
his power and grace, which he's promised to do for Christ's sake
and for our good.