Let's take our Bibles and turn
with me to the book of Proverbs, chapter 19. Proverbs 19. We continue going verse by verse,
not every Sunday, but as we do through this blessed book of
Proverbs. Here we are in the 19th chapter, verse 4. Proverbs 19, verse 4, the scripture declares, wealth
maketh many friends, but the poor is separated from his neighbor. Humanly speaking, the natural
man, now this is humanly speaking, the natural man desires to be
friends with the wealth of men. Not necessarily the men themselves,
but they desire to be friends with the wealth of men. What will happen is they'll flatter,
naturally speaking, the man born in Adam, the natural man. He'll flatter the rich man as
long as he's rich. If his wealth is diminished or
if it's taken away, it's easy just to alienate yourself
from him. What does he have to offer me?
Now I'm telling you that that's just naturally speaking, that's
the natural man. I know this, we deal in a world and have a
natural man still in us, an old man in us. But there's a new
man there, created in righteousness by the grace of God. And that
new man wants to hear, not humanly speaking, he'll agree with that.
I know that. You know that. You know, James
says if a rich man comes in, there's a poor man over here,
James says, you'll say to the rich man, you come up here, you
sit up here by me, and the poor man says, well, why don't you
go, the best of you. What a believer wants to hear
is you tell me about him. Tell me about the glory of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And that's exactly what this
verse is dealing with. Now let me tell you, this verse
deals with the sovereign mercy and grace and power of Almighty
God in the regeneration and eternal salvation of God's elect, all
because of man's need Man can do nothing for himself. Man is
a spiritually dead sinner. And man must have Almighty God
to do something for him that he cannot do. God's going to
have to save him. Man can't save himself. Now I've
got three simple points. I want to be as simple as I can
possibly. I want to talk in such a way
that we understand exactly what's being said here. I've got three
points. Here's my first point. Salvation
is of the Lord. Salvation is of the Lord. Jonah 2.9 says that. If salvation,
and it is, if salvation be of God, then that declares that
Almighty God is sovereign in salvation. That God Almighty
is the author and the finisher of faith and salvation. Now, every believer believes
that. A believer believes salvation
is of the Lord. Now listen to this scripture.
We've read these scriptures. I'm not going to tell you anything
that I've not told you before. Lord willing, if you hear me
say something that you've never heard me say before, well, I
don't think you will. Romans 9.15, now listen to this. Salvations of the Lord. Romans
9.15 says, for he, that is God, Jehovah, for he saith to Moses,
I will have mercy on whom I'll have mercy, I'll have compassion
on whom I'll have compassion. So then it is not of him that
willeth. Now, I wonder how many times
I've read that scripture. How many times have you heard
that scripture? It's not of him that willeth, nor of him that
runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. I looked up that word
willeth just this morning. I wanted to know what does that
mean? It's not of him that willeth. Now you look this up. Get your
Strong's Concordance and look it up. That's what I did. I looked
it up. You know what it means? Determines. It is not of him
that determines, nor of him that runneth. That is, to have a course, or
to set it. But of God that showeth mercy,
Do you want to know the freedom to be able to proclaim the gospel? It's to not make any apology
for God's words. We don't absolutely make no apology. We rest our doctrine. We rest what we believe solely
upon the Scriptures. That's what we was talking about,
Brother Frank, a while ago. God said it. That settles it. That middle part right in there
about believing it, that's by the grace of God if you believe
it. Man is dead in trespasses and sins and God must save him.
God must do something for a man that man cannot do for himself.
It's not of him that determines, not of him that willeth, nor
of him that runneth, that is, that sets the course. but of
God. Whose will determines mercy being
shown to a sinner? Whose will determines that? Well,
I know this, it's not of him that willeth, it's not of him
that runneth, but God that showeth mercy. So I know this, if Almighty
God shows mercy to somebody, it was God that determined that.
God chose to show mercy. I could understand this very
easily. If I've got four criminals, they've all been caught, convicted,
tried, sentenced. And a judge says, I'm going to show mercy to somebody
this morning. I'm going to have compassion
on somebody. I'm going to commute a sentence
for one of you four. Now let me ask you this, who's
going to make that determination? One of the four? No, the judge. It's not of him
that willeth him that runneth, God that showeth mercy. Whose
power is executed in the salvation of God's elect. Whose power? Whose ability? Whose will? John 17-2 says this. This is the Lord in His high
priestly prayer. As thou has given him power over
all flesh that he should give eternal life to as many as thou
has given him. All power, the Lord said. Matthew
28-18. All power. It's given unto me in heaven
and earth. So the question always comes
back, who else has any if he has all
power? The Lord said in John 15, 5,
without me you can do nothing, nothing, nothing. What can a
man do without the Lord? Nothing. So we believe that unless
the Lord does something for a sinner, That sinner can't do for himself
unless the Lord does something. That sinner is going to perish.
Helpless. Man is born a helpless sinner
and rebel against God. Colossians 121 reveals the attitude
of every one of us as being born in Adam. It says, And you that
were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works,
yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through
death to present you holy and unblameable and unreprovable
in his sight. I know this, man by nature in
his mind and you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your
mind. A thing that I love about this,
Almighty God who has everlastingly loved his elect. There's a people
that God's everlastingly loved. I've loved you with an everlasting
love. Does the Lord love everybody? Well, I can tell you this, Esau,
he said he didn't. We're enemies in our mind. And
in our mind, we're not friends with God. The carnal mind is
enmity against God. So we were not born friends.
In our mind, we were born hating God, enmity against God. So I know that as my first point.
Salvation is of the Lord. God is sovereign. Salvation. Here's my second point. The scripture
declares that Almighty God, who is sovereign in salvation, has
some friends. He's got some friends. Friends,
as I just said, who at one time were enemies in their mind. Now
listen to this, James 2, 23, And the scripture was fulfilled,
which saith, Abraham believed God, And it was imputed unto
him for righteousness, and he was called the friend of God. He was called God's friend. God Almighty, this is what that
scripture said, had given and charged, had imputed to Abraham
faith. It's given unto you to believe.
All men have not faith. It's given unto you to believe.
God gave him faith, regenerated him, called him by grace, gave
him faith to believe. And Abraham evidenced that God
Almighty had given him faith, and by believing God, he evidenced
that Almighty God had justified him freely By grace! How was that faith that God had
given him, how was it evidenced? How would we know that Abraham
believed God? Well, here's what happened. God
told Abraham, He said, I want you to take your son Isaac, your
only son, and I want you to go to a place that I'm going to
show you, and I want you to sacrifice him unto me. And let me tell you what Abraham
did. He took that boy and went with some servants. They saddled
up the ass and they went and God showed him and said, this
is the place, right here. Abraham stopped, told the servants,
he said, the lad and I are going to go up there and worship. We're
going to go worship God. They're going up and Isaac said,
Father, here's the wood, fires, where's the lamb? And Abraham said, My son God
will provide himself a lamb. And you know the story. God stopped
him. But I'm telling you, that boy
in Abraham's mind was dead. That boy was dead. He was going
to believe God. He was going to sacrifice. He evidenced that God had given
him faith because he obeyed. He obeyed. Abraham loved the
God of all grace who loved him first. We love him because he
first loved us. We didn't start loving him first. He loved us first. And we trusted
Him because He gave us faith to believe. We were not the origin
of our faith. God gives faith and we believe
Him. We evidenced that God had given
us faith. We trusted Him. Isaiah 41.8, But thou Israel
art my servant, Jacob, whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham,
my friends. Abraham was God's friends. The
Lord told His disciples, He said, you are my friends. If you do
whatsoever, I command you. Obedience to His word evidences
something. God's people in obedience to
His command. Let me tell you the evidence
of a believer. The evidence of a believer. Here
it is. They believe God. They believe God. They believe
Him. Lord, did you say you chose?
You chose. The Lord Jesus Christ said, I
laid down my life for the sheep. And man says he laid down his
life for everybody to make salvation possible. A believer says, the
Lord said he laid down his life for the sheep. Who are they? I don't know. I don't know. But
I tell you what I'm going to do. I'm going to preach the gospel.
And I'm going to preach the gospel of God's sovereign and free grace,
and I'm going to trust God to bless it. He said, my sheep are
going to hear my voice. He said in John 6, 37, all that
the Father giveth me are going to come to me. Paul, under the
inspiration of God's Spirit, said in Romans 1, 16, I'm not
ashamed of the gospel of Christ. It is the power of God unto salvation. This is what God blesses. So
here's what I'm going to do. You, I need to hear it. What
does God have to say? And I'm going to trust the Lord
to call out His sheep. I pray He saves somebody today.
I pray. I know if anybody's converted
today, I can tell you where it's going to come from. God's going
to have to do it. Salvation's of the Lord. So, here's my question. How? How can anybody born in
Adam, how can anybody be truthfully called the friend of God. How? I know salvations of the
Lord. I know that the Scripture declares
that God has friends. This right here says, wealth
maketh many friends. But here's my third point. Who is the wealth? Wealth maketh many friends. Who is the wealth? Now that's
not material, like I told you at the beginning. Humanly speaking,
somebody has some money and they run out of money and all of a
sudden, if that's all you were looking at, you look for somebody
else to kind of flatter and suck up to. But I'm talking about
wealth that maketh many friends. Here's another word that we need
to understand. Wealth maketh Wealth puts. Wealth appoints. Wealth brings
and wealth calls. That's what maketh means. Wealth
maketh many friends. This third point, I could sum
it up by saying this. The Lord Jesus Christ is rich. He's rich. He's wealth. He's wealth. The Lord Jesus Himself,
the fullness, the fullness of the Godhead. He is the fullness
of the Godhead. Father, Son, and Spirit. The
fullness of the Godhead. I can say those words, but that's
so far over my ability. I can say it. I believe it. But
I can say this, Lord, who can know? Who can know? You are the
fullness of the Godhead bodily. Wealth himself, wealth himself
possesses a people who were eternally given to him by the Father. Now
I know that. I know that he who is rich unto
all that call upon him, He who is wealth himself, all power, I just read that,
John 17.2, all power is given unto me in heaven and earth,
that I should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given
me. Doesn't that just, that rings of absoluteness. All power is His. If we want
to talk about wealth, we're going to talk about Him. You know,
as I said a while ago, the earth is the Lord's, the fullness thereof. Wealth himself had before the
foundation of the world, Ephesians 1-4, the Father gave him a people,
chose a people in him. He has eternally stood as the
surety. Wealth himself, wealth himself
was given a bride. was given His church, was given
His body. The Father, the Scripture says,
chose them and gave them to the Son. And the Son, who is eternally stood as their
surety, came into this world. The Word was made flesh. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word
was made flesh. And He came into this world for
this reason, seeking to save that which was lost. He had a
people. He was going to save them. He
was going to save His people. And these people at one time
were enemies in their minds by wicked works, but because that
they've everlastingly been loved of the Father, by the Son, by
the Holy Spirit, and the fullness of that love, that power, that
fullness exhibited in the Lord Jesus Christ. And now the Lord
is not going to allow them to perish. This is the Father's
will which hath sent me, that of all that He has given me,
I should lose nothing. Nothing. There won't be one of
God's elect that will perish. They're all going to come. As
I said a while ago, who knows? Maybe there's one this morning,
Neil, that God's not called out of darkness yet. Who knows? Peradventure,
perhaps. I pray so. And the Lord of glory
has by the wealth of Himself, here He is, all power, and by
His mercy, What he did, he laid down his life for his sheep. Wealth himself. I'm going to
deal with this Lord willing in the next service out of John.
But what he did was he laid down his life. He said, no man takes
it from me. And he went to the cross, set
his face as a flint for the love of his people, for the love of
the gift of his Father. And by the shedding of His own
blood, being made sin, He laid down His life and He reconciled
them by His blood, by His broken body. He reconciled them to God. And in time, The Spirit of God, when it pleases
God, as Paul said, when it pleased God, who separated me from my
mother's womb. When does God call out one of
His elect? When does He do that? When it
pleases God. That's when He pleased God. He
may call a Samuel, a little fella. He may call a dying
thief, just before he leaves this world. Who made that determination? God did. God did, but I can tell
you this. They're all coming. They're all
coming. And in time, He calls them by
power and grace, and He reveals to them what He has done. He reveals to them through the
gospel, and He gives them a new heart. Brother Henry, someone asked
him one time, what comes first, faith or belief? And he said,
you can't separate them. When God gives man a faith, he
believes. That's just a question we just
sit there and mull over and stuff like that. I'm telling you what
happens. Psalm 110.3 says, Thy people shall be willing in the
day of thy power. They're going to come. He's going
to open their hearts. He's going to give them a new
heart. He's going to give them a heart of flesh. He's going
to remove that dethroned, that heart of stone. That old man's
still there, but he doesn't rule. What he does is this. He makes
some friends. He's always loved them. And they
were born never loving him. Let me ask you, you that believe. Do you not love the Lord? Do
you not love Him? You love His Gospel. You love
His Word. Don't you love His sovereignty?
I love that God's in control. That's not up to me. Did you
always love that? No. When it pleased God, He called
you by His grace, called you out of darkness of unbelief,
as you heard the gospel and you grow in grace and in the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And our love grows for
Him. Faith grows. Increase our faith.
Lord, increase our faith. Our belief grows. Lord, I believe.
Help mine unbelief. But think about this. Wealth
maketh many friends. But the poor is separated from
his neighbor. The poor. The destitute. The impotent. The rebellious
sinners can do one thing. All they can do is this. They
can separate. Let me read this Isaiah 59. I'll read this for
you. A couple of verses. Isaiah 59
in closing. Behold, the Lord's hand is not
shortened, that it cannot save, neither His ear heavy, that it
cannot hear, but your iniquities have separated between you and
your God. Your sins have hid His face from
you, That he will not hear. He's not going to hear. Who is
he going to hear? He's going to hear his son. The
Lord said, Father, I know you're here with me always. When we
pray, I'll tell you a comforting thing. The Lord Jesus Christ,
as we pray, and we don't know what to pray for. The Lord Jesus
Christ takes the prayers of the saints and in the incense of
His glory, of His merit, presents them to the Father. And our prayers
are accepted on His merit, not ours, not ours. All we can do,
the poor, separates, we're separated. where my neighbor is. Friendship
is going to be established between God and men. He who is truly
wealth must do it. In mercy and grace and power,
he who is rich must make us friends to him. He's shown us friendship
in the giving of his son, putting away of our guilt, The Lord reconciled
us back to God and He gives us a heart of love toward Him. This He did by the shedding of
His own blood in His life, His obedience, He established righteousness
for His people. He gives them a heart to believe.
They believe Him. They're robed in that righteousness. He did that in his life, he did
that in his death. In obedience, power laid down
his life for the sheep. And now, in absolute truth, he
can say and reveal to us, you're my friends. Wealth maketh many friends. We separate He reconciles by
grace and mercy. And I pray that the Lord bless
these words to our heart for Christ's sake.