Romans chapter 10. Friday morning, our dear brother
Henry Mahan passed from this life and entered glory. And this was something that his
friends and his family prayed for at his request. This was something he requested
his family and his friends to pray for. To die is not something
that most people desire, let alone request their family to
pray for. But not Brother Henry. He was not like most people. A great many come to their last
days and they're fearful of meeting the true and living God. They
come to their last days regretting that they didn't take the time
they had to seek the Lord while He may be found. Brother Henry
faced his final days with eager anticipation of meeting his Redeemer. His hope of doing so was not
because he was a pastor, a faithful pastor for 54 years. His hope
of doing so was because he believed on the Lord Jesus Christ. Now
I want that hope for each of you sitting here. I want you
to face those last days with a good hope. And the only way
to do that is by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse
11, For the Scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall
not be ashamed. For there is no difference between
the Jew and the Greek. For the same Lord over all is
rich unto all that call upon Him. For whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Why should I believe
this word? Why should I believe this word?
Because verse 11 begins, The scripture saith, This is the
word of God. That's why I should believe this
word. This is the word of God. There's no other word worth believing
but this word. None other. In Isaiah 28, 16, Thus saith
the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone,
a tried stone, a precious cornerstone, a sure foundation, And he that
believeth shall not make haste, he shall not be ashamed. The
Lord laid this foundation. That's why I should believe.
The Lord laid this foundation. This foundation is His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's a tried stone, tried by
God. And what's He proven to be? A precious cornerstone. Most
valuable. Most valuable, most rare. Rare
because He's the only one, He's the only one who ever obeyed
God. From the womb to the tomb. He's the only one. He's most
valuable because He satisfied God for His people. He made complete
satisfaction of God for his people. And God's well pleased with him.
And he's most valuable to the believer because the moment you
believe on Christ, God makes you to know that his righteousness
is freely given to you. And that's the righteousness
we have to have to come into God's presence. It's only through
believing on Christ. We should believe on Him because
this is the Word of God. He laid this foundation. He said,
therefore, He said, whosoever believes on Him, he'll not be
ashamed. He will not make haste. He won't
make haste to look for any other foundation. He won't make haste
to look for any other salvation. When the enemy comes, he won't
make haste to run away. He's in the refuge. And as Paul
said, he will not be ashamed. He will not be ashamed to confess
Christ before God and men. And he'll never be put to shame
for trusting Christ. Ever. This is a sure foundation. Our Lord Jesus Christ said, Whosoever
heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, he said, I'll
liken him to a wise man, who built his house upon a rock.
And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew,
and beat upon that house, and it fell not, for it was founded
upon a rock. Christ is that foundation. He's
that rock. But he said, everyone that hears
these sayings of mine and does them not, you won't come to Christ,
you won't believe on Christ. He said, I liken him to a foolish
man that built his house on sand. And when the rains came and the
floods came, that house fell. Christ is the only rock. That's
why I should believe this word. He's the one God has said in
His Word is the sure foundation and the Word of God is the only
thing worth believing. Martin Luther said, feelings
come and feelings go and feelings are deceiving. My warrant is
the Word of God. Nothing else is worth believing.
Take God at His Word. His Word is sure. And His foundation
is sure. Well, look at this next word. Romans 10 and 11 says, It says, for the scripture saith,
whosoever, whosoever. Now we preach the doctrine of
election because it's the word of God, it's the truth. God chose
a people before the world began and our Lord Jesus Christ came
to this earth on a mission to redeem those elect and those
elect only. That's who He came to redeem.
But when God sends us to issue this command, calling, this general
call goes forth. He says, whosoever. He swings the door wide open.
He says, whosoever. Whosoever. To Christ give all the prophets
witnessed it through His name. Whosoever believeth in Him shall
receive remission of sins. The Spirit and the bride say,
Come. Let him that heareth say, Come. Let him that's athirst
come, and whosoever will. Let him take of the water of
life freely. Why then does not every sinner
come to Christ and believe on Christ? The door is wide open
and God says, Whosoever will. Why then are not all sinners
coming to Christ and believing on Him? Because Christ said,
You will not. come unto me, that ye might have
life. Scripture says the natural man
receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, they're foolishness
to him. Neither can he know them because
they're spiritually discerned. That means God's got to give
you spiritual understanding. But, but men will say, well I
don't, no point in me calling on him because election shuts
me out. No. No, if you don't come to Christ,
you can't blame God. You can't blame election. God
says, whosoever. Whosoever. You know, if I said,
if you were bankrupt, you're bankrupt. You have no ability.
Now you have a responsibility to believe on Christ. But responsibility
does not mean you have the ability to believe on Christ. Now let's
say you're bankrupt. You got no money whatsoever.
And I come along and I say, whosoever pay off their house, I'll give
them a new house. I'll give them another house
in addition to that house. And let's say I had a bunch of
money and I come along and I had actually given, I paid off somebody's
house and I had given some houses away. You can't blame me because
you don't have the ability to pay off your house. You're responsible, and you're
going to be called on one day by the bank if you don't pay
it, but you can't blame me that you can't pay it. You get what
I'm saying? You can't blame God. He says,
whosoever. Whosoever. Come to Christ now. But by God's grace, there are
some whosoevers. By His grace, there are some
whosoevers that find themselves able to believe. and able to
call. Are you one of those whosoevers? You find yourself believing on
Christ? That's what it's like. You just find yourself believing
on Christ. You find yourself looking into
this Word and seeing everything they're telling me is so. And
you believe God. Well, what does God require of
me? If I hear this word, what does
God require of me? Look here in verse 11. Whosoever
believeth on Him. Whosoever believeth on Christ. God requires that you stop doing
any work for salvation. He requires you cease from any
work for salvation. He does not require you to bring
any of your works. But He does require you to stop
working for salvation. The only ones Christ came to
save are sinners. A sinner is somebody who can't
do a thing. He can't contribute one thing to his salvation. That's
who Christ came to save. We must not come before God with
anything of ourselves. He said to Isaiah 55, 1, Ho,
everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters. He that hath
no money, he that's totally bankrupt, come ye buy and eat. Yea, come buy wine and milk without
money, without price. That means it's free. God won't
take your payment. He won't take any payment from
us. This salvation is free. A man will do anything you tell
him to do. If I gave works, you remember
that, was it Naaman the leper? And he come down there to the
prophet and he said go dip in Jordan seven times. That Jordan
is a picture of Christ and he despised that Jordan River. He
just despised it. Men despised Christ. And he said,
I thought he'd come out, he'd give me such and such things
to do and he'd call on his God and whatever. And his servant
said, if he'd have given you some great thing to do, wouldn't
you have done it? Why not just believe on Christ? See, the one
thing sinners can't do is stop trying to do the work themselves
and believe on Christ. That's what God calls His people
to do. Christ alone magnified and honored the law, and God's
satisfied with Christ only. He's not satisfied with you and
me. He's satisfied with Christ only. And so He requires that
we believe on His Son from the heart, for with the heart man
believeth unto righteousness. You know what Paul said? Paul
had all these works. He had all these different things
that he had his confidence in. And then when the Lord revealed
Himself to him, He said, I count all those things done, that I
might win Christ and be found in Him, not having a righteousness
that's of my hand, not having a righteousness that's of my
works under the law, but the righteousness which is by the
faith of Christ. I want His righteousness. And
you only receive that by believing on Christ. Casting all your care
on Him. Now, somebody might say, well
preacher, I have nothing to bring to God. I don't have anything
I can bring. That's good. You come empty,
He'll fill you. You come thirsty, He'll quench
your thirst. You come naked, He'll clothe
you. It's good that you don't have anything to bring to Christ.
In my hand no price I bring, simply to thy cross I cling.
You come with nothing. And listen to me believer, you
sitting here today, we don't stop coming to Christ. You never
stop coming to Christ. We come into Christ confessing
our sins daily. We cast our care on Him daily. We're being saved by Him daily.
You don't ever stop coming to Christ and believing on Him.
And once we believe in the heart, God-given faith is going to produce
a confession of Christ. That's right. It's going to produce
a confession of the mouth. Believing on Him with the heart
under righteousness and with the mouth confession is made
unto salvation. It's going to produce a confession.
What's this confession include? Well, first let me tell you what
it does not include. It's not walking in an aisle
and giving your hand to a preacher and repeating whatever the preacher
tells you to say and just doing that one time and then thinking,
okay, I believe on Christ now and then you go out into the
world and live like hell and never darken the church door
again. That's not it. That's not it. That's huge where
I come from. That's all churches are doing
is trying to get folks to walk an aisle and the preacher brings
you down there and he says, now repeat after me. I'm a sinner. I'm a sinner. You want to be
saved? I want to be saved. You believe
on Christ? I believe on Christ. Can you
imagine if a man was drowning and somebody did that? Can you
imagine a man in a swimming pool drowning? You're going to walk
up to him and say, now repeat after me, I'm drowning. He's
going to say, throw me a life preserver. A man that's drowning don't have
to be talked into confessing Christ. You don't have to give
him the words to say. He'll come just like that publican
and bow down and saying, Lord have mercy on me the sinner.
That's all He said. Lord have mercy on me the sinner.
Christ said He went down to His house justified. Let me give you six things included
in a confession. I thought about just skipping
this and preaching this to you because these things are needful.
But let me just give them to you briefly. Confessing Christ
is confessing to God. your total need of Christ. It's
not confessing to a priest, it's not confessing to a preacher,
it's not even confessing to your brethren. It's confessing to
God. Your sins and your need of Christ.
Number two, it's confessing Christ. Confessing Christ is identifying
with Christ even when it means division from your dearest loved
ones. The Lord said, he that loves
father, mother, son or daughter more than me is not worthy of
me. This confessing Christ is doing so even if it means you're
going to be rejected by your dearest loved ones. Confessing
Christ, number three, is to confess Him before men in believer's
baptism. Those that believe on Him want
to confess Him in believer's baptism. This is a command from
Christ. Christ said all the people that
heard John the Baptist and the publicans justified God. How did they justify God? Being
baptized with the baptism of John? But the Pharisees and the
lawyers, these whitewashed moralists, they rejected the counsel of
God against themselves. How so? Not being baptized of
Him. See, we come and confess by being
baptized. Our Lord said they were baptized
of Him in Jordan, confessing their sins. That's how they confessed
them. They were being baptized. That's
what you're doing when you're baptized. You're confessing you're
a sinner. And Christ is all your salvation. Do you believe on
Christ? Anybody here, you believe on
Christ and you've yet to be baptized? Paul told that jailer, why tarryest
thou? What are you waiting on? Arise,
be baptized. Lord willing, finally, next week,
we're going to get a heater in for our baptistry. And we're
going to baptize Brother Greg and Brother Jeff. Who else are we baptizing? Baptizing
somebody else. I can't remember who else was
baptized. I'm sorry. There's a thousand
miles from here to here. Well, four, confessing Christ
is to identify with Christ's people in commitment to the preaching
of the gospel as a member of a local church. In other words,
when you believe on Him and you confess Him in believer's baptism,
you want to become a member of His church. Commit to the gospel. Identify with brethren. We're
born of one Spirit. We have received the common faith
from Christ. We believe on the same Lord.
We have the same Father. We're in fellowship one with
another. You want to be in fellowship when you're born of Him. These
are your brothers and sisters. This is not just something I
do two days a week. This is my life. Our Lord said,
whoever does the will of God, these are my brothers and my
sisters. Number five, confessing Christ
is the whole of a person's life. It's living every day as unto
the Lord, to honor and glorify Him every day in our life to
the end. And then number six, confessing
Christ is to stand for Christ. This is important. It's to stand
for Christ and lead in the way of Christ wherever my sphere
of influence is. If it's in the home, if I'm the
husband, I'm the head of the home. If I'm a mother, I'm the
head of my children. But I'm leading my sphere of
influence, I'm leading those under me to Christ. If I'm a
business owner, if I'm a manager or whatever, whatever my sphere
of influence, confessing Christ is to lead those in word and
example that's under you. And this confessing Christ is
required. Our Lord Jesus said, whoever
confesses me before men, him will I confess before my Father,
and whoever will not confess me before men, whoever is ashamed
of me, I'll be ashamed of him before my Father. This thing's
necessary. Our Lord's not going to have
us believing in a closet. He's going to have us come forth
publicly, confessing we believe Him. Well, why is faith in Christ
the only way? Look at verse 12. For there's
no difference between the Jew and the Greek. We're all sinners,
totally ruined in sin. That's why faith in Christ is
the only way. Listen, the righteousness of
God, Romans 3.22 says the righteousness of God is by Christ's own faithfulness. And it's unto all and upon all
them that believe. Why? For there is no difference. For all have sinned and come
short of the glory of God. We like to put all these distinctions
between people. North and south, and east and
west, and race, and rich and poor, and male and female, and
educated and uneducated, and all these different distinctions.
Before God, He says there is no difference. You're all just
a bunch of worms. That's it. No distinction. And if you think you're somehow
making yourself to be exalted above others and God's going
to be pleased with you above others because of something you
do, you're going to be sadly mistaken to hear Christ say there's
no difference between you and Hitler. No difference. Depravity is not just a doctrine
to those that are born of God. Depravity is what we are. God's made us to experience it
and you come to God knowing this is what I am. I'm depraved. That's just it. But catch this
good news in verse 12. The second part says, and this
is what the text means, There's no difference for the same Lord
over all is rich unto all that call upon Him for whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. No sinner ever
called on the Lord and went home empty. Nobody. Nobody ever called
on the Lord and He sent them away empty. Not ever. Somebody
might say, well I called on the Lord and He sent me away empty.
No, you didn't call on Him. This book says you call on the
Lord He's not going to send you away empty. That's what the Word
says. Somebody here might say, but
preacher, I've been too much of an enemy to call on the Lord. I've been just too great a sinner.
I've been too much of an enemy. He said, let the wicked forsake
his way. The wicked. Let the unrighteous
man turn from his thoughts. Let him return to the Lord and
he will have mercy on him. Come to God, for He will abundantly
pardon. God said, for my thoughts are
not your thoughts. My ways are not your ways. Us
sinners, we have somebody that has treated us as wickedly as
we've treated God, and we wouldn't receive them if they came to
us. Not God. God said, my thoughts aren't
your thoughts. You come to Him, no matter how wicked you are,
begging mercy, and God will have mercy on you. and he will abundantly
pardon you. The question is not, have you
been too much of a sinner before God? The question is, are you
enough of a sinner to come to him? That's the question. Most
people are too righteous to come to him. Are you enough of a sinner
to come to him? Who's a God like unto thee that
pardoneth iniquity and passeth by the transgression of the remnant
of his heritage? He retaineth not his anger forever
because he delighteth in mercy. God delights in mercy. You just think about this now.
You got a God here that's rich unto all that call upon him.
You got a God who says, Whosoever shall call upon me, call upon
the name of the Lord shall be saved. You'd have to be insane
to not call on him. You'd have to be utterly insane
not to call on him. You have to know your sinner.
That's the only ones that's going to call on him. The only ones
that are drowning are going to call for that life preserver.
The only ones that are sick and dying are going to call for the
physician. Only those that see themselves totally ruined in
sin are going to call for Christ. Have you ever called upon the
name of the Lord? When you call upon the name of
the Lord, that's calling upon Him, believing Him to be all
you need. You need wisdom. He's wisdom. You need righteousness. He's
righteousness. You need holiness? He's holiness. You need redemption? He's redemption. He's calling
on Him and believing He's all. He's all. Have you ever called
on Him? Call on Him. He says, He says,
Seek ye the Lord while He may be found. Call ye upon Him while
He's near. And here's God's promise. For
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. I pray God give you grace today
to call on Him. Really call on Him. You will
be saved. Believe on Him with your heart
and confess Him. And you'll be saved. Let's stand
together. Our great God and Father, we
thank You for the simplicity of Your Word. We thank You for
the simplicity of Christ, the singleness of Christ. Lord, shut us up to Him. Make
the way narrow, as narrow as Christ. And draw us to Him. We pray now for these that don't
know You, that You would today be pleased to draw them by Your
grace. Cause them to call on Your name
and come bow down asking mercy. We pray, Lord, You won't ever
let us cease coming to You. Keep Your people believing and
coming to Christ every day. Don't let us ever think there's
something else. Make Christ all to us all the
time. Forgive us our sins, Lord. We
ask it in Christ's name. Amen.