Brethren, let's turn to 1 Thessalonians 5. In chapter 4, Paul had written
and was comforting the saints concerning Christ's return, declaring
that those that are awake when Christ returns, those that are
alive, and those that have died, which he said those that are
asleep, he'll take with him. And he ended that chapter and
he said, wherefore comfort one another with these words. And
then he begins in verse 1 of chapter 5 and he says, but of
the times and the seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write
unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the
Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. There's a time fixed
when our Lord Jesus shall return. He promised his people that he
went to prepare a place for us and he shall return again for
us. But we do not know the time. We don't know when he's returning.
The Lord Jesus said, of that day and hour knoweth no man,
know not the angels of heaven, but my Father only. He told them,
it's not for you to know the times or the seasons which the
Father has put in his power. One reason the Lord's not told
us when he's returning, the exact time that he's returning, is
so that we live every day by faith, watching for his return,
expecting his return at any time. Folks, read Matthew 24, and they
try to match the things that Christ described there when he
said the things that would happen before his return. And they try
to match those things to events that are coming to pass. And
throughout history, folks have done that. And one reason the
Lord was vague in that is because when we see events that seem
to match what he said, it makes you watch. As a believer, it
makes you watch. It makes you hopeful. I don't
watch the news hardly at all, and the other day when that smoke
from those fires came in, I didn't know what was going on. And,
you know, I saw the smoke, I saw the sun dimmed, the blood was
red, the moon was red like blood at night. And immediately I thought
of Acts 2.19. He said, I'll show wonders in
heaven above, signs in the earth beneath, blood and fire and vapor
of smoke. The sun shall be turned into
darkness and the moon into blood before that great and notable
day of the Lord. And it made me watch. It made
me hope. It made me think, maybe the Lord's
coming. God's children don't need to
know the time. He's given us faith and he's
given us a hope in the Lord and an eagerness to see him return.
And so when you see anything that resembles something he said
in the scriptures, it makes you hopeful, keeps you watchful.
If he told us the exact time, if we knew the exact hour and
day, we wouldn't be watchful till that time came. This keeps
us watchful. Now first of all, he contrasts
here believers with the unregenerate world. He said, you know perfectly
well the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night. For
when they shall say, peace and safety, then sudden destruction
cometh upon them as travail upon a woman with child, and they
shall not escape. Those whose hearts and minds
are set on things of this world are not watching for Christ's
return. They're not watching for his return. The worldly folks,
unregenerate folks, they think they have many more years to
live. They have house, they have money in the bank, they have
clothes, they have food, they have plans for tomorrow, and
each day passes like the one before it, and they say, peace
and safety. But the Lord said, as the days
of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be. For as in the days that were
before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying, giving
in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and
knew not until the flood came and took them all away, so shall
also the coming of the Son of Man be. Christ will come like
a thief in the night. It will be unexpected. It'll
be a surprise to unbelievers, just like a woman when she goes
into travail, when she goes into labor. You know, the Lord said,
if the good man of the house, if the house owner had known
in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched,
and he would not have suffered his house to be broken up. You
know, the night divided into watches. The Jews divided it
into three, the Romans divided it into four, four watches of
the night. Well, if you knew which watch
of the night the thief was coming, you'd sleep in those other watches,
but you'd wake up for that watch and know, I don't know the hour,
but sometime in this watch he's coming. Well, brethren, scripture
says, When Christ came, when he came the first time, it says,
God hath in these last days spoken to us by his Son. These are the
last days. We've been in the last days since
Christ came. So this is the last watch. This
is not the watch before Noah's day. This is not the watch between
Noah's day and Christ coming. Christ has come. We're in the
last watch. We know he's coming in this watch. We don't know
the hour. We don't know the time, but we
know he's coming at any time. So we're to watch. You know,
the thief comes to rob. Christ comes to give believers
our inheritance. The thief comes to rob. Christ
is coming to give believers our inheritance. What good reason
to be awake and watchful and anticipating, looking for his
return? You know how we watch things
important to us in this earth? Think about how you watch. You
watch your bank account. If you make a deposit, you check
and make sure it was recorded correctly or you do a business
transaction, you watch and you look because you don't want to
be defrauded and you're trying to make sure it was done right.
Those are important things and you watch for things that are
important to you. Well, this world though sleeps concerning
things of God. sleeps concerning their eternal
well-being, and isn't acceptance with God, isn't our eternal well-being
more important than anything else in this world? Our Lord
said, therefore be you also ready, for in such an hour as you think
not, the Son of Man cometh. It could be today, could be this
hour. If there's anybody here that's
indifferent, I pray God, if he wakes you, if he regenerates
you, he's gonna do it through the preaching of the gospel.
And I pray that's what he does, and he make you wake and watch.
believe on Christ, cast all on Christ. The only place of safety,
Noah preached 120 years, Christ our righteousness, that was his
message. We know that because scripture says he was a preacher
of righteousness. There's only one, that's Christ.
And he preached Christ for 120 years, and the only place of
safety was to be in that ark. And the only place of safety
for you and me is to be in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the
only place to be in safety. Come hear the gospel. And don't
just come and hear the gospel. Take the things you've heard
and look into the word of God and see that these things are
so. And be diligent and be watchful. And the spiritual matters are
far more important than earthly matters. And we ought to be given
more diligence to spiritual things than earthly things. These are
the words of eternal life. Seek the Lord while I may be
found. This is the day of grace. But then he speaks of God's saints
here and he says in verse four, but you brethren are not in darkness
that the day should overtake you as a thief. You're all the
children of light and the children of the day. We're not of the
night nor of darkness. This is owing only to the grace
of our God. Christ has sent you the light
of the gospel. Christ the light has shined into
your heart to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God. We saw not long ago what Paul said in 2 Corinthians 4.
God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined
in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. The day star arose in your heart.
The sun of righteousness shined into your heart. We seek Christ
as light. And beholding Christ crucified
by this light, we beheld the righteousness of God. We beheld
what our own curse and condemnation deserved. And the Lord Jesus
gave us faith to trust Christ to be our only righteousness.
He keeps showing us more and more. And we see light more and
more. We see our own helplessness.
We see our own inability. We're not growing more self-sustaining
and self-reliable and stronger. That's not growing stronger,
that's growing weaker. You're growing stronger spiritually
when you're growing more dependent upon Christ. And that's what
he's teaching us more and more. It's through the tender mercy
of God, the dayspring from on high hath visited us to give
us light that set in darkness and in the shadow of death, and
He guided our feet into the way of peace, into Christ our peace
by faith, and He keeps doing so. He keeps doing so. He's translated us out of darkness
into the kingdom of His dear Son, and in Christ we have forgiveness
of sins. From that day, he'd been shining
that light more and more. He'd been teaching us more and
more, making us to know the Lord Jesus Christ more, making us
know what we are in ourselves more, so that we're more and
more dependent on the Lord Jesus. And he's promised he's going
to come again. He's promised And by this grace and this light,
He's going to keep His child watching. We may try to sleep
and slumber, and we do, but He's going to wake you. He'll wake
you up. He'll use this gospel, He'll use this providence, and
He'll wake His child. And He's teaching us to be awake.
He's teaching us to be serious-minded about these things. watching
for Christ's return at any time. He gives us an illustration in
verse six. He says, therefore, let us not
sleep as do others, as does the world, but let us watch and be
sober, serious minded. For they that sleep, sleep in
the night, and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. He's
given you an illustration of what it is to not be awake and
have our minds set on Christ alone. Men and women taken up
with the things of this life are asleep like somebody sleeping
in the night. They're drunken like a man intoxicated,
living for things of time and sense and materialism, ambitious
and prideful and covetous for the things of this world, living
for the pleasures of sin for a season. These are things that
lull us into sleep. And don't forget the Lord's word
concerning the moral, self-righteous Pharisees. Don't forget that
word either. They were in the synagogue every
day. They were, you know, zealous for the law, but the Lord said,
they're drunken, but not with wine. They snack stagger, but
not with strong drinks. The Pharisees were drunk with
the vain ideas of their own wisdom. God's going to have to make us
ignorant that we might be wise. He has to make us fools, see
ourselves as the fool, and as knowing nothing that we might
be wise, trusting Christ only. Vain glory they had in their
own strength and their own ability. They didn't need Christ. They
could do it on their own. They were intoxicated with their
self-importance, with their self-righteousness, with their self-attained holiness,
and so they weren't awake when Christ came and seeing how they
needed Christ. We must be awake, we must be
watching, lest we sleep, and lest we be taken up with the
things of this world. Now thirdly, he declares what
our armor is, what our armor is. He said in verse eight, but
let us who are of the day be sober, putting on the breastplate
of faith and love, and for a helmet, the hope of salvation. Now why
do believers need to have this word spoken to us? Why do we
need to have this word spoken to us? You remember the parable
our Lord gave of the 10 virgins? Five were wise, five were foolish.
The wise represent those born of the spirit. The foolish represent
those who just had a profession of faith. But you know what the
scripture says? They all slumbered and slept.
Every one of them slumbered and slept. The Lord has taught us
by that what Paul's teaching right here. At no point, at no
point should we put confidence in our flesh. At no point should
we look to ourselves. At any point, at any point, even
the believers out to sleep. Have you slept since God called
you? I mean this spiritual sleep.
Have you fallen asleep and slumbered since the Lord called you by
His grace? Have you been taken up with the
things of this world since God called you? Have you found yourself
at any time to be feeble-minded? Have you ever been weak since
God called you? Have you sinned since God called
you? That's what I'm saying. We must be awake and must be
dependent on Christ and not be asleep, not trusting our ability,
not trusting our strength. He said, watch and pray that
you enter not into temptation. Watch and pray. Why are you praying
that you enter not into temptation? Because he's the only one that
can save you. He's the one we need. The spirit indeed is willing,
he said, but the flesh is weak. And what did the apostles do?
They fell asleep. They fell asleep. There's one
thing needful. That's our Lord Jesus Christ.
One thing needful. And there's only one who makes
the difference. That's God by His grace. And
it's by the Holy Spirit continuing to pour in all of His grace,
waking you up. How does He do it? Just what
Paul was doing right here, he's using this word, preaching this
gospel, and through it the Spirit wakes his people up. Wakes his
people up. Our Lord's going to use this
gospel. I titled this, The Word That Awakens. He's going to use
the gospel. It's the power of God unto salvation. That doesn't mean just the first
hour He calls you. That means He pleads God to save
through the foolishness of preaching from the very first moment He
calls you to your last breath. It's only through the preaching
of this gospel. Now, the spirit, when you hear
the gospel, and you might be like our Lord, we saw that prayer
of our Lord in Psalm 119. And he was in the Garden of Gethsemane
and he was praying to the Father to quicken him, strengthen him. And David prayed that, quicken
me Lord, strengthen me. And you'll be in a place where
you're sleepy and you're slumbering and you need strength and you
need your faith strengthened. You need your love increased,
you need hope increased. Well, he's given us this armor,
and the Spirit of God is going to make his child put this armor
on by the preaching of the gospel. It's the breastplate of faith
and love over the breast for the heart, protecting the heart,
and it's the helmet of the hope of salvation to protect our minds. In Ephesians 6, the Apostle Paul
called this breastplate the breastplate of righteousness. Here he calls
it the breastplate of faith and love. It's the same breastplate
protecting the same thing. It's Christ's righteousness.
It's Christ himself, but it's his righteousness. And it's imputed
to us through faith. Him giving you faith in Him.
And Him turning you from this world and yourself and everything
else and setting your heart on Him. That's how He protects that
new heart He's given you. To see He's your righteousness.
He's perfected His people forever and it's His righteousness imputed
to us. That's what protects our new
heart. That's the breastplate protecting our new heart. When
we behold His love for us and laying down His life for His
people, that's how your love for Him is increased, and that
protects love in the heart. Joseph Hart wrote this, Righteousness
within thee rooted may appear to take thy part, but let righteousness
imputed be the breastplate of thine heart. See, it's Christ, it's His righteousness,
it's the Lord our righteousness that is the life of our new heart
and is the protection of our new heart and it's through faith.
Why does Paul call it the breastplate of faith and love? Well, that's
what he's protecting. You know, we're going to see
here, we get faint hearted, faint hearted. That's where you don't
have heart, you don't have courage, you're about to wilt and fall
away. What's going to protect that
heart? It's through faith. It's the Lord Jesus strengthening
you through faith by hearing of what he has done for his people
that's going to protect that heart. And it's fastened on by
the love of Christ for you. When you see his love, that's
what fastened your heart to him and protects your heart. So this
illustration is of a soldier. That's what this armor is about.
It's about being a soldier. Now our great captain, He's the
captain of our warfare. He's accomplished the warfare.
It's accomplished for his people. But doing so, he provided armor
to protect us. He made the armor. It's his righteousness. It's his love. He's the hope. He is the righteousness by which
we're saved. He's the hope our hope lays hold
of. He's the one our faith lays hold of. And through the gospel,
by the Spirit, by the power of His grace, He makes you put on
the armor. That's not like you just put
on a suit of armor. What is that? It's Christ speaking
into your heart through the... You ever come in here and you're
just so weak and your mind's a thousand different places and
your mind's distracted and you can't hear? And then Christ speak
through the word to you personally, and you just focused on him.
And your faith is set on him, and your hope is in him. Who
did that? Only the Lord Jesus Christ did.
You ever been in a place where you could not do that? I'm here
to tell you, you cannot do that by yourself. What's Paul doing
right here? He's preaching the good news
to them. And saying, now put it on. That's
how it's gonna be put on you. It's not a costume. It's a vital
living union with Christ that He's going to make you willing
to trust Him only in the whole situation. When it appears there's
no way you ought to trust Him alone, that you ought to do something,
He's going to make you just trust Him and hope in Him and know
by His love for you, He'll take care of you. We're talking about
something that's real here. We're standing on the wall watching
like watchmen. We're to be awake and alert,
serious-minded. Christ's righteousness and love
for us is what's going to protect us. It's in the heart that we
live. It's in the new man that we live,
that we believe, that we love. It's in the new heart where we
experience his goodness and his mercy. And this love of Christ
is in the heart. It's a real living, feeling,
new heart he's given you. But it's got to be protected.
So you're on the wall. You're watching. Satan shoots
his fiery arrows to condemn you. He can use a thousand different
things to do it. But he'll shoot his fiery arrows
to condemn you. And his mission is to divide
and to destroy. And he's aiming for your heart. He's aiming for that new man.
He's aiming to make you fainthearted. He's aiming to make you convinced
that you're not righteous, that everything that you thought was
a good hope is just a vain hope, that you really don't have Christ
as your all in all, that your profession's just vanity. That's
his aim, and he's aiming for the heart. But the Spirit's gonna
keep you knowing through faith God's provided our righteousness.
The Lord Jesus is our righteousness. He loved us, and He died for
us, and He made us the righteousness of God in Him, and so through
faith, He's gonna make you know in your heart that His righteousness
is yours. It's imputed to you, and that's
gonna protect your heart just like if you had on a suit of
armor, a breastplate protecting you, vital organs. But if the
arch enemy can't hit us in the heart, he's gonna hit you in
your mind. He's gonna aim for your mind.
He's gonna bring in reason. He's gonna bring in things to
make you say, well, this just isn't reasonable. He's gonna
try to make you feeble-minded. Feeble-minded, feeble in your
mind. What's gonna protect and comfort
you from being feeble-minded and weak? We have the hope of
salvation for a helmet. What's that? What's the hope
of salvation? Christ. Christ is our hope. He's our salvation. He's our
hope of salvation. He's the one that's going to
strengthen and comfort you and save you from being feeble-minded.
He's going to set your mind and your affection on Christ alone.
And He's going to purge your conscience so that your hope
enters into the veil where Christ your hope sits, and you're going
to know. That's how he's going to protect
your mind, the helmet. Well, what's he going to use
to do this? How's he going to do this? He's
going to use the power of God. The power of God. Paul said,
I'm not ashamed of the gospel. It's the power of God and the
salvation. And this is the gospel that he's going to use. The Spirit's
going to awaken you with this. He's going to make you put on
this armor this way. Christ your captain's going to
speak, and he's going to say in verse 9, For God hath not
appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord
Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we wake or sleep,
we should live together with him. The true and living God,
God our Father, has appointed everything that He brings to
pass in this world. And Christ is going to keep His
children knowing that God the Father, by His electing grace,
and His predestinating grace, and His redeeming grace, He's
appointed His children, not to wrath, but to obtain salvation. He's appointed it. You think
if God appointed something, you're going to receive it? You think
if He appointed it, you're going to obtain it? Christ said, I appoint unto you
a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me. This is the
word he's going to speak in our heart to make that breastplate
of faith and love cover your heart and protect you. This is
the message he's going to speak to make that helmet of hope of
salvation protect your mind. How do we know we'll not receive
wrath but that we shall obtain salvation. How do we know that
we won't come under the wrath of God, but we'll obtain salvation?
This is what faith believes. This is what, when you put on
faith, this is what you're believing right here. This is what you're
doing right here. You're believing that the only reason you shall
obtain this salvation, right there it says it, by our Lord
Jesus Christ, who died for us, that whether we awake when he
comes or we're dead when he comes, we shall live together with him. That's what he's going to strengthen
faith with, because that's what faith believes. Faith believes
Christ. Faith believes that our Lord
Jesus Christ came and bore the wrath of God for his people.
Faith personally believes he bore it for me. It's appointed
unto men once to die, and after this judgment, Christ was once
offered to bear the sins of many. He settled the judgment for his
people, and unto them who look for him shall he appear the second
time without sin unto salvation. And when Christ returns, whether
we're awake, alive when he comes back, or we're in a grave when
he comes back, we're going to live with him. It's this gospel. This is the gospel. Paul said
comfort one another, strengthen one another with this word. He
didn't say whip one another with it, condemn one another with
it. He said comfort and strengthen one another with it. That's the
difference between Phariseeism and grace. You're comforting
your brethren with it. You're not trying to condemn
them. That's the way that our Lord strengthens faith and love
and hope and quenches the fiery darts of the wicked. So he makes
you comfort one another and edify one another like when he's edified
you. And He's comforted you through
this gospel. He's made you put all this breastplate
of faith and hope. He's just increased faith, love,
and hope in you. That's what He's done for you
through the message. And He did it through the gospel.
That's the only time that you will use this gospel and speak
of Christ and His works when your brother need it. When they
need to be edified and comforted, you'll speak of Christ. You won't
speak of you. You won't speak of them. You're
going to turn them to Christ. Turn them to Christ. Let's see
a few examples. Paul gives in this exhortation
below. When Christ has spoken to you through the gospel, and
he's made you be increased in faith and love and hope, seeing
that it's by Christ's faithfulness, it's by his love for you that
has saved you, and he set your faith on him, he set your love
on Christ, he set your hope on Christ. When he's done that through
the gospel, he's gonna make you know the minister that he gave
you. You quit going back listening
to dead preachers. You quit going back trying to
put flowers on dead preacher's grave. You'll submit to the preacher
he's put over you. Watch this. We beseech you brethren,
know them which labor among you and are over you in the Lord
and admonish you. That word admonish, you could
say exhort, teach, but I tell you one of the best words there,
the word is establish. Establish. We only establish
one place, that's on Christ the solid rock, on the one foundation. See, by working this through
the gospel, he knits your heart with your pastor. He knits our
heart with our pastor. That's what he did for me with
my pastor. When I went to Franklin in 1994, I had a pastor. Loved
him dearly. Been sat under him a long time.
And not only that, he was biologically family to me. He was my grandfather. And when I got to Nashville,
and he would give me some advice, Marvin would give me some advice.
It didn't take very long when the Lord knit my heart together
with Marvin, and I had to tell my former pastor, I'm not listening
to you. Biological family or not, this is my pastor. I'm listening
to him. I'm following him. And that's
what the Lord of work. And by Christ blessing this word,
you recognize the labor of the one who's preached the gospel
to you. And so when the stormy wind of false doctrine comes,
or when Satan sows his seeds of discord and tries to create
division, Verse 13, it will make you esteem them verily, highly,
and love for their work's sake, and it'll make you be at peace
among yourselves. That's having on this breastplate
and this helmet. That's what God does through
the preaching of the word. That's why he saves this way
through the preaching of the gospel. There'll be brethren
who sleep. There's gonna be brethren who
are unruly at times. You have been. You have been. not peaceful, unwilling to submit,
insistent, but it's the armor of faith, hope, and love that's
going to make you know how to warn the unruly in love the very
same way Paul's doing it right here, by declaring the good news
of this gospel. We speak this gospel to wake
each other up, that God has not appointed us to wrath, but to
obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ who died for us.
And you say, now brother, wake up. And this is the message he's
going to bless. It's the only message he's going
to bless, because he gives his son all the glory. There'll be
some that are feeble-minded. There'll be weak brethren. But
you've been there. and having experienced this grace
of God through the preaching of the Word, where He turned
you and settled you and made you know for sure Christ has
saved you, He has redeemed you, He's your righteousness, and
He set your faith on Him, and He constrained you in your heart
by His love for you, and He gave you hope in Him. By knowing He
did this through the Gospel, He'll make you comfort the feeble-minded. We only have one helmet He is
right there at God's right hand. Stop hoping in yourself. Stop
hoping in somebody else or anything in this earth. Look right there.
That's how you comfort the feeble-minded. Or if they're weak, you speak
the gospel. And you do so as you preach the
gospel, being patient toward all. That means you can't affect
anything in another person's heart. You just have to wait
on the Lord to do it. And it'll make you see that none render
evil for evil to any, but ever follow that which is good both
among yourselves and to all. Without the Lord settling us
in faith and love and hope on Christ alone, without him putting
this armor on us through this gospel, things come down the
pike and they'll just toss you to and fro. They'll toss you
to and fro, and you'll be feeble-minded and you'll be weak. You won't
be at peace amongst yourself. When you see others who are unruly
or they're feeble-minded or they're weak, it'll make you unruly and
feeble-minded and weak. That's exactly what it'll do.
While you're thinking, you're doing what's right and glorifying
God and keeping the law. about as unruly and feeble and
weak-minded as you can be. That's the fiery darts of the
devil. But Christ will come again through
this gospel, and He just makes us see that we have no reason
to have any confidence in ourselves. He makes us to see we're weak. He makes us to see our flesh
is grass, and He turns you again to Him. And He strengthens your
faith in Him. He strengthens your love for
Him. He strengthens your hope in Him. He comforts your feeble
mind. He comforts you in your weakness.
He makes you see what He made Paul see. My grace is sufficient. It's made perfect by your weakness.
You see it because you're so weak you couldn't help yourself.
God helps those that help themselves. No, He doesn't. No, He doesn't. He brings you to see you can't
help yourself. That's who He helps. That's who
he helps. It's all of him. So what do we
comfort one another with? Verse 9. God has not appointed
us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who
died for us, that whether we wake or sleep, we shall live
together with him. Just like he said at the end
of verse four, we're for comfort one another with these words.
He said it again. Verse 11, we're for comfort yourselves
together and edify one another, even as you also do. That's the
word that awakens. That's the word that saves. Amen. Father, we thank you for this
word. Thank you, Lord, that you have sent your son and saved
your people. Thankful you sent us the gospel.
Thankful that you made us experience this power through your word.
That you gave us faith and put your love in our hearts and gave
us a good hope and a confident expectation in our Lord Jesus.
Lord, we're not only looking for your return at the end, we're
waiting right now for you to come and work in us and increase
us in patience and experience and love and hope through every
trial. Lord, if one of us were to die
today, We rejoice and are thankful because you came. You came for
that woman. And as we go through these things
and assemble together to hear your gospel, we're watching,
Lord, waiting for you to return. Father, we need the Spirit. We
need Christ to awaken us. We need Christ to keep us serious
minded, keep our hearts and our minds set on Christ. Hedge us
about, Lord, be the armor all upon us, quench the fiery darts
that are shot at us continually. Keep us knowing you're ruling
and reigning, and that you'll keep your people to the end.
Help us, Lord, to comfort one another with these words, to
edify one another with this good news of Christ our Redeemer.
It's in his name we ask it, amen.