As Brother Mark was reading that
passage of Scripture, this went through my mind. Isn't it sad that here, for all
that God's called out of darkness and regenerated by His grace,
isn't it sad, and I'll just speak for myself, I won't speak for
you, to realize the indescribable truth that is set forth, and
how little I am able to, A, perceive it, to enter into it, to rejoice
in it, though I can truthfully say I rejoice, but how convicting
it is to me of how blindly to see through a glass darkly to
realize how little I see. When he read back in that third
verse, I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Savior. I gave Egypt for thy ransom,
Ethiopia and Seba for thee. And I thought, God Almighty,
according to His purpose and grace, He raises up nations and
puts down nations for the sake of His people, to bring honor
to Himself. And here He is, surely, as we've
said many times in our presence. Two or three are gathered together
in His name, I'm sure. And how little we think. It just
makes me think we should be so reverent, so respectful, so thankful? And how little we think of that.
Now, is that the way it is with you? That's the way it is with
me. Well, I pray the Lord who is, oh, how longsuffering He
is. He knows that we are dust. I pray that God, in spite of
us, I'd be pleased to bless this word today. Turn to Proverbs
10. I'd like to look at verse 28.
Proverbs 10, verse 28. The hope of the righteous
shall be gladness, but the expectation of the wicked shall perish. parables, proverbs, as we're
looking at. The scriptures say that they're
dark sayings. And these dark sayings are just like a hidden treasure
in a field that a man that's unaware that those treasures
are there. He just walks right over them
and they're just not seen, not known. We read Scripture and the things
that we read I mean, even for a believer, when they just search,
they're asking, and you're looking and you're reading and you're
somewhere between desperately, desperately, I want to hear,
I want to see, I want to understand, I want to perceive. And you read
a few verses and you think, what did I just read? Let me back up and read that
again. Here again. Is it that way with you? Hidden
treasures. And we struggle. We struggle. Believers struggle with this. That's the effect of that old
nature that's still with us. Warring against the law of our
mind. Hidden treasures. And these treasures,
these marvelous, gracious treasures that the Lord Jesus Christ preached
by parables, why, Lord, He said, why do you preach like that?
The disciples said, He said, because it's given to you to
know the mystery. And there a believer will hear
that and he'll say, I know, I know that it's given me to know. But
Lord, You're going to have to show me. I'm just not able. We pray this morning that the
Spirit of God might truly... Wouldn't it be wonderful if the
Lord just, I mean, opened the windows of heaven and just, I
mean, would cause us to just enter in and just to see and
to know Understand. And to be able to rejoice. And
you think, oh, it's been good to have been in the house of
the Lord. And to have heard the Word of God and rejoiced in it. And sometimes I hear people talking
about how they've just entered in. And boy, I think to myself,
there's times every once in a while. It just seemed like just for
a moment. I thought just maybe for a moment, maybe I did hear
something, maybe. And then I just go back struggling
again, crying out, Lord, help me. Oh, I get so tired of myself. I just get so... Lord, help me. Here's a passage of Scripture.
The hope of the righteous. Gladness. Shelby is in italics. It could
be read, the hope of the righteous gladness. Now this, I know this,
this is what I know so far from that passage of scripture. Number
one, I know this, that God's people have a hope. They have
an expectation. They have a confidence. That's
what hope means. The hope of the righteous, the
expectation I know, I know that God's Word
sets forth that there's coming a time that Almighty God is going
to come back, the Lord Jesus Christ. And the trump of God
is going to sound and the dead in Christ are going to rise.
And Paul said, and we that remain, whoever's here, there's going
to be some live believers when the Lord Jesus Christ returns.
I know that. He said, we're not going to prevent
them. We're not going before those that died in faith. The dead in Christ are going
to rise first. And we which are alive on this
earth will meet them in the air, and so shall we ever be with
the Lord. I believe that. I wish I could walk every day. Nothing else mattered. Just believe
in God. Whatever came my way just didn't
affect me at all. Be like Brother Scott said, ever
since I heard the good news, I ain't heard no bad news. Wouldn't that be wonderful? I know that God's people have
a hope. The expectation of the righteous
is joyful. That's what it means. Joyful now and joyful in future
possession. I know this. I know. Though I struggle, I know. And you do too. You that know
Him, you do too. You struggle just like every
other believer does. But you do know. And you've got
a hope. You've got an expectation. You
know that for you, You that believe, this is the worst you're going
to have it. This is the worst of it right here. We've got a
glorious expectation, the hope of the righteous. It's a living
hope. And I'm telling you, our hope
is not a profession of faith. It's not my baptism. It's not my church membership. Our hope is a person. Listen to this. 1 Peter 1 verse
3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which
according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again, birthed
us again, reborn us again unto a lively, a living hope by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ. from the dead. Almighty God, the author of our
regeneration, has borne us afresh to have a
living expectation, and we find no comfort whatsoever and anything
other than Him who loved us and gave Himself
for us. It's long-suffering and gentle. All that He sends our way, He
sends in absolute mercy. Boy, I tell you, that's a good
thought. Boy, I tell you what, there are some times we go through
some things Trying to this old flesh body is hard. To realize, Lord, You've done
what You've done in mercy to me, I'm so thankful. Because I don't have sense enough
to know what to do. I don't have sense enough to
get up. But that I can be here and I
can have a hope, an expectation. Lord, I believe you. I want to
believe you. I want to look unto you. I want
to rejoice in you. Thank you. The believer in the Lord Jesus
Christ finds all of his security in Christ. Hope now and hope
then. And the life, that new life that
you possess right now, that hope That spiritual life, those eyes
that see by faith what you possess right now in regenerating grace,
that new man, that's the man that's going to be in heaven.
And I'm telling you, the Spirit of God has given you the earnest
of salvation. A down payment is not the right
word, but that's what earnest money is. But we possess something
right now. And I'm telling you, we see. We see dimly. We see through
a glass darkly, but we see. Oh, there's a glimmer. We look
and there's life in it. It's a hope. It's called hope.
Hope. That hope who is Let's listen
to this, 1 Timothy 1.1. Paul, an apostle of Jesus Christ
by the commandment of God our Savior and the Lord Jesus Christ,
which is our hope. Aren't you glad that your hope
is not your profession? We've made a profession. We acknowledge
Him who is our hope. Our acknowledgment is not our
hope. We acknowledge Him who is our
hope. He is the hope of our salvation. He is the expectation. He is
the confidence. You see, because all of our hope
and expectation is in Him who is the heir of God. And we're joint heirs with Him.
Now isn't that the greatest word you've ever heard? You think,
that's wonderful. The Lord helped me to believe
that. I believe that. I've helped my
unbelief. I struggle and I don't want to. The Lord Jesus Christ, He who
is the source of glory now and glory forever. He's always been
our source. He's always been our hope. He's
always been our hiding place. Almighty God, who eternally loved
us and chose us in Him, placed us in Christ. Placed us in the rock. and has kept us from the unpardonable
sin of unbelief, gave us faith, charged us, imputed to us His
righteousness. Oh, the one that the Father said
at His baptism and on the Mount of Transfiguration, This is my
beloved Son whom I am well pleased. He is our hope. He is our confidence. Oh, to
be found in Him in that day, that great day in which all men
will stand before God and to realize that our hope, our confidence,
our Savior is the Judge who is already eternally answered for
us. He who will judge this world
in righteousness and justice and judgment ever liveth to make intercession
for all of his people. Oh, what a day to realize that
the judge is our husband. He's always loved us and gave
Himself for us, put away our guilt, lived for us, died for
us, rose for us, ascended for us, answered for us in His blood
that pleads and pleads. Ever-living, God Almighty said,
when I see the blood, and He always sees it, He said, I'll
pass it over to you. That's hope. That's hope. What
are we going to plead in that day? We're going to plead Him. This hope. This hope was established
eternally. This didn't come about in time.
You found out about it in time. Almighty God revealed it in time.
But listen to this. Titus 1, verses 1 and 2. Paul,
a servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ, according to
the faith of God's elect and the acknowledging of the truth,
which is after godliness in hope, in expectation, in confidence
of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the
world began. This is not a new thing. This
is not a new doctrine. I'm telling you, this is the
oldest truth. This is the foundation truth
right here. Hope. A hope that is given, not
earned by you, not earned by me. Given. Grace. Mercy. Mercy. Mercy. The only ground of confidence
that we have to the acknowledging of this truth is the Word of
God. That's what you've got, God's
Word. How do you know these are sold? God said it. How do you
know you've got any confidence in it? I believe Him. I believe
Him. That's all you've got? Brothers,
God says if that's all you've got, that's enough. That's enough. Almighty God, according to His
power and will and counsel, set forth and revealed to His
people, this is how you know, this is how you know. They believe
me. That's a miracle of God's grace
that a man believes God. It's given unto you to believe.
All men have not faith. How precious is the gift to believe
God. Romans 4.13, For the promise
that he should be the heir of the world was not to Abraham
or his seed through the law, but through the righteousness
according to faith. Faith. We are bound to give thanks
to you, beloved. God has from the beginning chosen
you to salvation. through sanctification of the
spirit, setting apart by the Spirit of God and belief of the
truth. This is a glorious gospel. This is the power of God under
salvation. This is what God blesses. That's
what that means. This is what Almighty God is
pleased to bless. Not trying to convince men, not
trying to, you know, argue with men. Preach the gospel. Preach, set forth the hope. Man could never attain God's
promise if it depended upon his ability to obey God. You that believe, don't you know? Can you see that? Paul says,
you hear what the law says. You don't want to have to deal
with the law. You don't want to deal with the law for righteousness
before God. No sir. No, sir. Christ is the
end of the law for righteousness to them that believe. Faith. Faith. It's no use to hold forth
any promise of blessings if those blessings depend upon my ability
to take them and fulfill them, keep them. They are out of the
reach of every man born in Adam because he is impotent. He is
dead, dead, dead in his ability, dead in his capability to maintain. Life is given and that life is
evidenced by faith. No man, the Lord said, can come
to me except the Father which has sent me draw him. I'll raise
him up at the last day. So our hope, the hope of the
righteous, gladness. In closing, listen again. Listen
to what Peter said. Peter 1, verses 3 to 5. We've read this before. Let's read it again. Be the God
and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His
abundant mercy hath begotten us again into a lively hope by
the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance
incorruptible." It doesn't matter what men say
about losing your salvation. God said you came. It's undefiled. I can't defile
it. Leave it to me and I would. Can
you imagine thinking that your salvation depended on something
that you had to do? I like to always throw this in
to remember if your salvation. Is dependent on something that
you've done, remember now. If there's ever been any any
inconsistency to it, if you established it, you got to keep it. Remember
that. If you did something in order to establish your salvation,
you've got to keep it. Now, this thing of just thinking,
well, I can just do a little something right here, and then
that just ends it. I prayed the sinner's prayer. Well, I'm going
to tell you something. There was enough pride in that
sinner's prayer that you just prayed to send you to hell. So
if you think that you've done something to establish your salvation,
don't forget, you've got to keep it. No, this salvation's undefiled. And fadeth not away, it's reserved
in heaven for you. You know who's reserved it, don't
you? Yeah, he who ever liveth. Reserved in heaven for you who
are kept by the power of God through faith, not because of
faith, you know it by faith, who are kept by the power of
God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in that
last time. We have the hope right now, and
we know it, and we believe it, and we look to Him who is our
hope We look to Him who has eternally stood for us, stands for us now,
our surety. He who is the immovable hope. You know, the hope of the righteous
is gladness in it. I'm glad. I'm glad. I'm glad that my hope is not
based on what I've done. My hope is built, that song says,
on nothing less. That's the one we'll sing, Gary
Close, if you don't mind. Our hope is built on nothing
less than Jesus' blood and righteousness. That's my hope. My hope is Him. Paul said in Hebrews 6, 19, which
hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast,
which entereth into that within the veil. whether the forerunner,
the Lord Jesus Christ, is for us entered. Even Jesus, made
an high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. No
beginning of days, no end of days. Christ is our hope. But the expectation The expectation of the wicked.
All that has gone about to establish their own righteousness. Listen,
listen well. The expectation of the wicked.
All who will not believe God, all who look to themselves to
establish their righteousness, all that look to the works of
their own hands to establish whatever Think about it. Whatever
it is, it doesn't matter how religious it appears, the expectation of the wicked
shall perish. The hope, the expectation, the
confidence of the righteous is gladness because they find no
expectation in themselves. Isn't it a wonderful thought
to realize that I'm not keeping myself? Now, I will tell you
this. Let me tell you what the carnal
mind thinks. The carnal mind thinks, well,
if you just leave it strictly open-ended like that, I mean,
all you're going to do is just lead people into licentious rebellion. I mean, you just leave it open-ended.
You've got to straighten people out. No, you don't. They that
are led by the Spirit of God, they're the sons of God. God's
people are kept by the power of God. God's people are faithful
because God keeps them. You're not here to whip the sheep.
You just proclaim Christ who is the hope of the sheep. And
the Spirit of God blesses that and God's people rejoice in it.
That's just the way it is. May the Lord Jesus Christ be
honored, who is all of our hope and our peace, for His name,
for His honor, for His glory, and for the good and comfort
of His people. Amen.