Let's turn to Jeremiah 27. I
want to read the first 14 verses of Jeremiah 27. Again here in verse 1, it says,
In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah,
king of Judah, came this word unto Jeremiah from the Lord,
saying, Thus saith the Lord to me, Make thee bonds and yokes,
and put them upon thy neck, and send them to the king of Edom,
and to the king of Moab, and to the king of the Ammonites,
and to the king of Tyrus, and to the king of Zion, by the hand
of the messengers which come to Jerusalem unto Zedekiah king
of Judah, and command them to say unto their masters, thus
saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, thus shall you
say unto your masters, I have made the earth, the man, and
the beasts that are upon the ground. By my great power and
by my outstretched arm have I given it unto whom it seemed meet unto
me. And now have I given all these
lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant. And the beasts of the field have
I given him also to serve him. And all nations shall serve him
and his son, and his son's son, until the very time of his land
come. And then many nations and great
kings shall serve themselves of him. And it shall come to
pass that the nation and kingdom which will not serve the same
Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, and that will not put their necks
under the yoke of the king of Babylon, that nation will I punish,
saith the Lord, with the sword, and with the famine, and with
the pestilence, until I have consumed them by his hand. but the nations that bring their
neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him, those
will I let remain still in their own land, saith the Lord, and
they shall till it and dwell therein. I speak also to Zedekiah,
king of Judah, according to all these words, saying, bring your
necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him and
his people and live. Why will you die? Why will you
die, thou and thy people, by the sword, by the famine, and
by the pestilence, as the Lord hath spoken against the nation
that will not serve the king of Babylon? Therefore hearken
not unto the words of the prophets that speak unto you, saying,
you shall not serve the king of Babylon, for they prophesy
a lie unto you. For I have not sent them, saith
the Lord, yet they prophesy a lie in my name, that I might drive
you out, and that you might perish, ye and the prophets that prophesy
unto you." I've titled this message, Why Will Ye Die? Why Will Ye Die? And that's God's
question to every sinner here this morning who has not believed
on the Lord Jesus Christ. Why will you die? Why will you
die? At the time of this text, God
had delivered all the lands, including Judah, into the hand
of that wicked king Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon. It was right
for God to do it because God did it. He said, I deliver it
to whom is meet to me to deliver it to. And he sent forth this
word to everybody in the land, telling them, submit to the King
of Babylon. He declared to everyone that
submitted to the King of Babylon, you shall live. But if you will
not submit to the King of Babylon, you shall die. You shall die. I know we're used to looking
at the king of Babylon and Babylon as falsehood and the king of
lies and what have you. But if God said this concerning
wicked king Nebuchadnezzar, you can be certain God says this
concerning his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Submit to Christ
and live. Those that will not submit to
him shall die by his hand. I want to look at this question,
why will ye die? In three ways here, three things
that God says here concerning the king. He says, first of all,
why will you die? When you know that everybody
that does not submit Two, Christ the Lord shall be judged by him
and shall die by his hand. Secondly, why will you die? Is
it because you listen to lying messengers? And thirdly, why
will you die when you know you've heard it? Everyone that submits
to Christ shall live. Everyone that submits to him
shall live. Let's look at these three questions.
Why will you die when all who refuse to submit to Christ shall
die by His hand? When you know this, why will
you die? God has given all things into the hand of His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ, like as He did King Nebuchadnezzar right
here. It says there in verse 5, I've made the earth, the man,
and the beasts that are upon the ground, by my great power
and by my outstretched arm, and I have given it unto whom it
seemed meet unto me. And now have I given all these
lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, my servant. And the beasts of the field have
I given him also to serve him. God gave all these lands to Nebuchadnezzar,
even the beasts he gave to serve Nebuchadnezzar. That was a lot. He gave a lot of land to Nebuchadnezzar. But God has given all things
into the hand of King Jesus. He's given all things into His
hand. He's the King of kings and the
Lord of lords. And Christ is salvation. Christ is salvation. If you have
Christ, if you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you have salvation. All things are in His hands.
And the reason is because He's God's servant. He's God's servant. He's the one who came forth and
served God and perfectly accomplished the will of God. What was it
that God sent His Son forth to do? The primary thing God sent
forth His Son to do was to manifest the righteousness of God. That
was first and foremost above anything else, above your salvation
and my salvation, it was to manifest that God is just and that He's
the justifier of those that believe on Christ. Our Lord Jesus Christ
manifest the righteousness of God when He was made of a woman,
made under the law, and He fulfilled the law and the prophets in every
dot and dash. He did not leave anything undone. He fulfilled all the law and
all the prophets. And then our Lord Jesus Christ
manifest the righteousness of God when the spotless Lamb of
God as the servant of God, representing His people, the spotless Lamb
of God who knew no sin, who would never sin, submitted Himself
to the Father for Him to lay all the iniquity of His people
upon Him. Why did He do that? So that it
might be just for God to pour out judgment on Him in place
of His people. Romans 5.13 says, sin is not
imputed when there is no law. Just think about that statement.
What does that mean? Sin is not imputed when there
is no law. It means God will not impute
sin unless a man has been made sin under law. It's that simple. And the Lord laid on Him the
iniquity of His people that it might be just for God to impute
sin to Him. And that's what He did. And our
Lord manifest the righteousness of God when He spared not His
only begotten Son. That's how just He is. When sin
was found on His Son, He spared not His only begotten Son. Do you and I think we're going
to escape His judgment? He spared not His only Son. And our Lord Jesus Christ manifest
the righteousness of God as He poured out His life's blood unto
death and satisfied the justice of God entirely, declaring God
just and the justifier. And then God raised Him from
the dead. showing forth His righteousness,
showing forth His faithfulness to fulfill His covenant promise.
God the Father raised Him from the dead, set Him at His own
right hand, and gave Him all things. All things. Listen to this scripture. Turn
there with me. Ephesians 2, verse 20. Ephesians
2, 20. He raised Him from the dead and
set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places. far above
all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and
every name that is named, not only in this world, but also
in that which is to come, and hath put all things under his
feet, and gave him to be the head over all things to the church,
which is his body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all."
You know what that means? since God has given him all things,
and he's reigning right now as the King of kings. That means
everybody is serving Him. Everybody is serving Him. God
said of Nebuchadnezzar, all shall serve Him. Well, it's more true
of Christ. All are serving Him right now.
Some are serving Him in rebellion, but they're serving Him. Some
are serving Him by His grace. but all are serving Him. All
are serving Him. Surely the wrath of man shall
praise thee. Whatever wrath you see come to
pass, whatever evil you see come to pass, it's praising God. And the remainder that could
come to pass, the remainder, there's a whole lot more evil
we could do, but God restrains it. God restrains it. Brethren, whatever comes to pass
in this life, for you and me who believe the gospel, we don't
have to worry about a thing. We do not have to worry about
anything. We really should never worry.
We should never worry. God's working everything for
His glory and for the good of His people. Everything. Those
that will not submit to Christ, they will perish by His hand.
The Lord said of Nebuchadnezzar here that those nations of people
that would not come under the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar, they
would perish, and they would perish by Nebuchadnezzar's hand. Well, the Lord Jesus Christ is
the one who's passed into heaven, and the Scripture says of Him,
because He pleased God, so thoroughly pleased God, the Scripture says,
At the name of Jesus, every knee shall bow and every tongue shall
confess that in heaven, in earth, under the earth, that every tongue
shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the
Father. And again, some are going to
bow and confess Him in judgment. And some are going
to bow and confess Him by His grace. Why will you die? This is inevitable. Listen, we're going to all come
before the Lord Jesus Christ. And all judgment is in His hand
to do with us as is just. Am I going to meet the just judge
of heaven and earth? rebelling against him. That wouldn't
be very wise if you went into a courtroom, into a court of
law, and you're going to stand before a judge and the night
before you went out and stood on the front lawn of that judge
and gave him a cussing. That wouldn't be very smart,
to reject him and then stand before him. That's what all men
are going to do, that meet God without Christ. Why will you
die? Why will you die? Is it because you're listening
to false messengers? Our Lord said here in verse 9,
He says here in verse 9, He says, Therefore hearken not to your
prophets, nor to your diviners, nor to your dreamers, nor to
your enchanters, nor to your sorcerers, which speak unto you,
saying, You shall not serve the king of Babylon. For they prophesy
a lie unto you, to remove you far from your land, and that
I should drive you out, and you should perish. There was all
these different kinds of messengers in that land in that day. And
we have this many liars in our day. There's more people lying
about Christ in our day than there are people telling the
truth about Him. There's prophets and diviners and dreamers and
enchanters and sorcerers. Scripture says if they speak
not according to this word, there's no light in heaven. If a man stands up and declares
to you that Christ died for all men without exception, and He's
trying to save all men, and He puts it all in the hand of the
sinner, He's telling you a lie. Our Lord Jesus Christ said, I
lay down my life for the sheep. That's who He laid down His life
for, and He accomplished the redemption of His sheep. If somebody
stands up and tells you, and this is very popular up where
we are, They stand up and they tell you that Christ justified
His people, but now if you want to be sanctified, you're going
to have to come under the law. And it's a co-effort between
you and Christ to be sanctified. He's telling you a lie. Scripture says, He hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified. Christ did that. Brother Don
read the scripture last night. It's by His will that we're sanctified. Of God is Christ made unto us
wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. And I want to speak to the young
people here. I can remember when I was a teenager and my friends
and I did this too. We all would encourage one another
to go have fun and not go hear the gospel preached. And we'd
encourage one another not to believe. the gospel. Oh, we all
had our ideas of who God is, and it pretty much boiled down
to this, if you just were a good person, and your good outweighed
your bad, you'd be alright. That's a lie. That's a lie. By God's hand, think about this
now. By God's hand, He's brought you
under the sound of the gospel this morning. Jesus brought you under the sound
of the truth this morning. Everything you heard last night,
everything you're gonna hear today, everything you're gonna
hear tomorrow is the truth according to God's own word. So why will you die by not believing
this? This is the gospel. This is the
gospel. Why will you die? when all who
believe on Christ shall live. Why will you die when all who
rest in Christ shall live? Look here in verse 12, he says,
Jeremiah 27, 12, he says, there in the second part, he says,
bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve
him and his people and live. How much more true is that of
our Lord Jesus Christ? And His yoke is a light and easy
yoke. A few chapters over, God tells
them that He put an iron yoke upon their neck under Nebuchadnezzar. Christ's yoke is light and easy. You know why? He's already fulfilled
the law for His people. He's already took the law out
of the way for His people. And He abides in His people so
that by His faithfulness we live unto God. We're robed in His righteousness
so that God receives us in whatever His believing people do. It's
acceptable to God whatever they do in the service of Christ and
the service of His people. It's acceptable to God by Jesus
Christ. I have a table at home and back
when Hurricane Sandy came, I had had surgery on my elbow and I
was laid up in a cast. I had a brand new steel chainsaw
in the garage and a big oak tree laying in my backyard and a cast
and I couldn't even use my chainsaw. So we had this tree cut up and
one of the men, one of the young fellas in the congregation, he
took the base of that tree and he decided he was going to make
his pastor a table with And so he sanded on that and he worked
on it. He made legs for it and it's
very rustic looking. But he forgot to let it dry before
he put the varnish and everything on it. And it split. And it's
got a big crack in it right to the middle of that table. You
think I threw that table away? That table's been sitting right
beside my recliner. And I don't care about that split
in it. He made it in love to his pastor because he wanted
to do something for me. And it's a beautiful table to
me. Our works are just full of warts
and full of sin and full of cracks. But that love that he's put in
the heart, that motive of just wanting to do something because
you see what Christ has done for you. God's well pleased with
it. God receives it. He receives
it. And brethren, here's what He
says, when He puts His Spirit in us, when He regenerates His
child, when He makes us willing to believe on Christ, He makes
you willing to serve Him by faith, constrained by love. He makes
you willing to serve His people. to serve his people. He said
serve him, serve the king, serve his people. He makes you willing
to serve his people. And he makes you live. Listen
to the scripture, whosoever liveth and believeth in me, Christ said
this, whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die. They shall never die. If you
and I knew how good it is, if we really knew how good it is
for a brother or sister who dies in Christ, if we knew how good
it is for them, the moment they close their eyes in death, we'd
never shed another tear at a funeral. They don't die. They go to be
with the Lord, to see Him whom they love, to see Him who lived
for them and died for them, and rose again. And they get to serve
Him. We sing here and it sounds beautiful
when you have a conference and everybody's together. But just
imagine that day when everybody's together and we don't have sin
and we can sing like an angel for all eternity. Why is it that
a man won't bring himself to submit to the Lord? Listen to
what the Lord said. He said, this is the condemnation.
Light is coming to the world, and men love darkness rather
than light. Here's why. Because their deeds
are evil. Everyone that doeth evil hates
the light, neither comes to the light, lest his deeds should
be reproved. And it's not just your sinful
deeds. It's those deeds that you think are good deeds. No sinner wants to come to God
and find out that his very best righteousnesses are filthy rags. And most sinners just believe
there's no mercy, there's nothing for me if I come to Him in my
sin. I have to clean my act up first
before I come to it. Listen to this. Turn with me
to Isaiah 55. I want you to see this. God's thoughts are not
our thoughts. He says in verse 7, let the wicked
forsake his way and the unrighteous man his thoughts. This morning
forsake your way and forsake your thoughts. And let him return
unto the Lord. Here's what he'll do. He will
have mercy upon him. He will have mercy upon him. And He will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord." We
serve a great God. We serve a just God. Every sinner
that He's made willing to come to Him, He pardons transgression. He forgives our iniquity. He
delights to show mercy to His people. So I ask you again, why? Why will you die? This is good
news. This is good news. Do you see
what insanity it would be to know this is so and yet reject
the king of kings? I pray this morning that he would
come and cause you who hear this to slip your neck under the yoke
of our Lord Jesus Christ and live. That's what I pray for
you. I tell you what you'll find out.
You'll find out blessed is the man that the Lord causes to approach
unto Him. You'll be satisfied with His
house. You'll be satisfied with Christ.
And you'll rejoice forevermore. Amen.