Alright brethren, Romans chapter
8. Romans chapter 8. Let me just say that we'll have,
Lord willing, we'll have our Bible class this Friday night. And Brother Rob Keller is going
to teach it. And he's going to bring the Bible
lesson first thing next Sunday morning. So if you don't have
children, you're welcome to come to that. It's a nice time of
fellowship. The parents watch sermon on video
in here. We have a new TV. And I teach
the kids in the back. We have ladies bring some refreshments
and things. And so it's a good time to fellowship
with one another. So you don't have to have children
to come if you just want to come. Alright, let's go to Romans chapter
8 verse 16. Romans chapter 8 verse 16. Paul here is speaking to believers,
and he says, The Spirit, God the Holy Spirit, Himself beareth
witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God. Now, when we're born again of
the Holy Spirit of God, He puts a new spirit within us. According
to God's promise, God said, I'll put a new spirit within you.
And He puts a new spirit in His people that was not there before.
And the Spirit, God the Holy Spirit, bears witness in that
new spirit. That's where He teaches us the
gospel and bears witness in that spirit. And it says here that
He bears witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. Now what does that mean? Well
Christ said over in John 16, He said, when He, the Spirit
of truth has come, Not only when He's come into the world, but
when He's come into the hearts of His people, in regeneration,
in the new birth. When He, the Spirit of truth,
is come, He will guide you into all truth. He'll guide you into
all truth. For He shall not speak of Himself. But whatsoever he shall hear,
that shall he speak, and he will show you things to come. Now
listen to this. Christ said, He shall glorify
Me. When the Spirit of truth is come,
He shall guide you into all truth. He won't speak of Himself. He
shall glorify Me, Christ said. For He shall receive of Mine
and shall show it unto you. Now that's what He does to those
that have been born of the Holy Spirit. A sinner only knows he's
a child of God. There's only one way to know
you're a child of God. A sinner only knows he's a child
of God when he agrees with the Spirit of God that our salvation
is Christ alone, by grace alone, through faith alone. That's when
you know you're a child of God. See, what I'm saying is the Spirit
doesn't come and bear witness of you or something about you
to make you know you're a child of God. The Spirit of God comes
and bears witness of Christ. He comes and bears witness in
our heart that God our Father made us His children when He
chose us by grace without any cause in us whatsoever. freely,
sovereignly, when He chose us in Christ, and blessed us with
all spiritual blessings in Christ, and predestinated us to the adoption
of children by Christ Jesus. And those that have been born
of God, cry, Amen, Father. Thank you, Father. Thank you,
Father, that you did this. If you hadn't chosen me, I'd
have never chosen you. And the Spirit of God bears witness
in our hearts that the Lord Jesus Christ came and was made of a
woman, made under the law, made sin, made a curse, and by that
He's made His people the righteousness of God in Him. And when you hear that, you say,
Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Father,
for what you've done. And Christ, the Spirit of Christ,
the Spirit of God bears witness that He did that, that you might
receive the adoption of sons. That God might mercifully, in
accordance with His justice, be able to send the Holy Spirit
and give you a new spirit and cause you to cry out, Abba, Father. And when He bears witness, how
that you've been chosen by the Father, redeemed by the Son,
and regenerated by the Holy Spirit. You know you're a child of God
when you say, Yes, Lord. Amen, Lord. It's not of me. I didn't contribute anything
to this thing. It's all of God to the glory
of His sovereign grace. That's when you know you're a
child of God. If you're butting against God and you're rebelling
against the Gospel, The Spirit's not bearing witness with you
in your heart that you're a child of God. He's just not. But how do we prove we're children?
How do we prove we're children? There's a way you and I prove
that we're children. The way we prove we're children
of God is by suffering with Christ until the end. unto the end,
that we might be glorified together with Christ. That's how a believer
is proven to be a true child of God. We suffer to the end.
We bury all things, we endure all things unto the end, that
we might be glorified together with Christ. Friday, we've been
going through Tulip, and Friday I asked Brother Rob to preach
on the pea. We're at the P now, and I ask
you to preach on the P. That's perseverance of the saints
or preservation of the saints. They're united. We don't persevere
without being preserved. And that's what we're looking
at here. That's what we're looking at right here. Now that's not
our full subject here, but we're going to touch on that here.
Our subject is heirs suffer with Christ. That's what they do. Heirs, true heirs, suffer with
Christ. First of all, if we're children
of God, then we are heirs of God. If we're children of God,
we're heirs of God. Look here at verse 17. After
he said, the Spirit bears witness with our spirit that we're children
of God, he says, and if children, then heirs. Heirs of God and
joint heirs with Christ. Now this is the hope that God
only gives to His children. He doesn't give this hope to
anybody else. He gives this hope to His children
born of His Spirit. That's who He gives this hope
to. If children, then heirs. The Holy Spirit, when He comes
and He bears witness in our hearts, He makes us to know we're children
and He makes us to know we're heirs of God. You're familiar
with Titus 3 verse 4. It says, The kindness and love
of God our Savior toward man appeared. How did it appear? How are we made to see the kindness
and love of God our Savior toward man? How do we see it? Not by
works of righteousness we have done. But according to His mercy,
He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewing of
the Holy Ghost. We were born again, a new birth
occurred. And that was done, it was shed
on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, who justified
us by His grace. So that being justified by His
grace, we should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal
life. And He makes you to know you're
an heir. And this is the hope of eternal
life. The hope of eternal life for the child of God is we're
heirs of God. We're heirs of God. Titus 1.2
says we have hope of eternal life which God, that cannot lie,
promised before the world began. How did He promise this before
the world began? He promised it when He entered
into covenant in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and entrusted
this whole work to Christ, to be the mediator, to come and
fulfill all the righteousness of the law, like we saw this
morning, to make double restitution to all His people and to God
for our offenses, and then to send the Spirit and give us life,
and then to preserve us and keep us, and bring us all to Him,
made an entirely new creation. And in that process, God has
gone from being just the Spirit of God to be manifest in human
flesh as the God-man. We saw a few weeks ago when He's
delivered up the kingdom, God then cometh to the end. And that's
when we're going to behold. All the children of God are going
to behold God who's invisible, but we're going to behold Him
in the person of Christ Jesus the Lord. When I say God in the
person of Christ, I mean the triune God. God the Father, God
the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, we're going to behold in the
face of that same Jesus Christ that walked this earth over 2,000
years ago. You see how much what God's done? He'll take His people from being
just flesh created in a garden to being a new creation. to be
in glorified human flesh, eternal, that can never fall. And God
will be not only invisible spirit, He will be manifest in human
flesh. Do you see how Christ took God
and man and made us one? He did so with God, making Him
one in human flesh, in the person of Christ, and He's going to
do so for all His people, making us partakers of the divine nature,
so that we're one with a glorified spirit, living eternally with
God. And this is the hope. This is
the hope of eternal life. were heirs according to God's
promise. That promise He made way back
there before He did anything. See, God didn't just wind this
thing up and let it go like you used to wind those little toys
up and set them down and just wherever they went, they went,
you know. God didn't do it that way. God ordained everything
that comes to pass to bring honor and glory to His name and to
save His people from our sin. And that's how He works it. He's
so sovereign, He not only ordained how He was going to work it,
He then comes forth and works it. He even tells you and me,
this is how it's all going to end up. This is what I'm going
to do along the way. This is how it's all going to
end up. And then He does what He told us He would do. And we
behold how gloriously sovereign and holy and righteous and merciful
and loving He is. Because who He loves, He does
not save. I mean, He does not lose. He
saves us. He saves us. If you be Christ,
then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.
You know what that means? That means that when Christ is
formed in us, we're born of the Spirit of God, Christ is formed
in us, there's nothing else that needs to be done for us to inherit
this inheritance. Nothing. Listen to this, Colossians
1.12 says, we give thanks unto the Father which hath, that means
past tense, he hath made us meet, that word is fit, that means
nothing else needs to be done. He's made us meet to be partakers
of the inheritance of the saints in that glorious light of heaven. All this talk about so much needing
to be done to a sinner and he's got to be made more holy and
more holy and more holy before he can enter into heaven? God
ends all that with one verse and says, giving thanks unto
the Father which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance
of the saints and light. How? He's delivered us from the
power of darkness and translated us, transferred us from the kingdom
of darkness into the kingdom of His dear Son. And you're either
out or in. There ain't no in-between. You're
either holy or not. You're either separated or not.
There's no in-between. And when He's done it, it's done.
And so we have a good hope, brethren, When He bears witness, you have
a good hope. This inheritance is yours. It's yours. And not
only that, we have a good hope because He keeps us by His power. And you know why He keeps us?
This is why we preach election, right here. People get mad about
election. They hate election. If you ever
find out you're elect, you won't. But here's the truth of it. We
preach election because Christ did not fail. What He came to
do, He came to do for a particular people and He accomplished what
He came to do. And that's why God keeps His
people. Listen to this. Blessed be the
God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His
abundant mercy has begotten us again unto a lively hope by the
resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance. that's incorruptible, undefiled,
that fadeth not away, that's reserved in heaven for you, listen,
who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation. And here's why it keeps you.
Because that salvation is ready. It's ready. It's ready to be
revealed. There's nothing else to be done.
Christ has made all things ready. ready to be revealed. And so
God, He can't lose one. His justice demands He can't
lose one for whom Christ died. He's going to bring every one
of us to have this inheritance because Christ made salvation
ready for all His people. Now if He made it ready for everybody
in this world, God's going to bring everybody in this world
to heaven. But we know that's not so because we read in this
book of a hell. where men who reject this gospel
end up. Now, speaking of worldly men,
worldly men do not have this hope. Men who live in this world
and live for this world, who go through this life trying to
just attain all the things that life has to offer. The lust of
the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. Promotions
and honors and applause of men and all of those things. Riches,
all of those things. The man goes through life and
he has hopes. I hope I get that promotion.
Oh, I hope I get that raise. Oh, I hope I win that award. Oh, I hope I get that windfall
and inherit that money from my father. Oh, I hope, I hope, I
hope. That's not our hope. Our hope is not that kind of
hope, like you hope you have a son tomorrow because you are
going fishing. No, no. Our hope is a sure hope
that God has promised us, and God can't lie. But the worldly
man doesn't have this. When he dies, all his hopes end. And everything that he has gained
along the way, all the possessions he has gained, he leaves into
somebody else. to inherit. And then what happens? Then he meets God. You're going
to have to deal with God. One day, sooner or later, everything
that you've heard me preach to you is going to come back to
you. It's either going to come back to you and you're going
to rejoice that you heard it and bowed and believed Christ,
or it's going to come back to you and you're going to say,
I should have listened. I should have listened. Everything
that was told to me was true. And I didn't even open up the
Bible, much less pay attention. Can you imagine if television,
instead of being filled with sports and entertainment, if
it was filled with the truth of the gospel preached all the
time? If that's all of us ever heard
from the time we were little all the way up, we only heard
the truth of the gospel. Can you imagine if we put as
much emphasis on studying this Bible as we do on studying algebra
and English and history and all those other things you have to
be taught at school? Can you imagine what it would be? Why
do people grow up and just think, well, I'm going to go into sports?
I'm going to go into entertainment. I'm going to go into business.
Because that's all we're taught from the time we're five, six
years old where we understand stuff. We're just brainwashed
with worldliness, worldliness, worldliness, worldliness, worldliness.
It takes God coming in power and giving you a new heart and
turning you and giving you an entire change of mind. That's what repentance is. God giving you an entire change
of mind to see life is in Christ. Riches is in Christ. That which
is forever is in Christ. The salvation of my soul that's
going to be somewhere for all eternity, that's in Christ. What is the hope of the hypocrite,
though he hath gained, when God taketh away his soul? What's
his hope? When a wicked man dieth, his
expectation shall perish, and the hope of unjust men perisheth. It's gone. So sinner, you cast
your care on Christ today, and God says He'll give you this
good hope. That's right. Cast your care on Him. He will
give you this good hope that believers have. Christ guarantees
this to all who believe on Him. That's why it's a sure hope.
Death doesn't end our hope. Death only ushers us into our
eternal inheritance. Death is the beginning for His
people, not the end. Well, what is the believer's
inheritance? What is it that we're going to inherit? Well,
if you listen to religious folks who are teaching you, they're
trying to get you to work. They're trying to get you to
obey the law they say. But let me tell you what they're
really trying to get you to do. There's only two laws they really
care that you obey. One is the Sabbath day, because
they want to keep you in the pew. And the other one is tithing,
because they want to keep your money in their pocket. That's
the only two they really care about. You can get away with
the others if you tithe enough. That's right. If you show up
enough and you tithe enough, you can get away with all the
rest of them. And so they're telling you to work, work, work,
work, work, and if you work, here's a mercenary spirit. A
mercenary will work for whoever pays him the most. He's a mercenary. And a mercenary spirit is this.
The worldly man talks about rewards in heaven that he's going to
get when he gets to heaven. And to the man that is going
to get these rewards when he gets to heaven, it's going to
be no different than this world, really, if you listen to them.
This is what they're really saying. They're really saying, I'm going
to work so much that I'm going to indebt God. Now they don't
use these words. But what they're saying is, I'm
going to do so many good works that I'm going to indebt God
to where He has to give me the finest mansion on the finest
block. And the poor believer that I
outworked, he's going to be so envious of me because he's going
to be living in the projects looking at me. Because I'm going
to be on the high side of heaven. You think that's what heaven's
going to be like? You think that's righteousness? For some to be
better than others? Do you? Christ said to be the
greatest in the kingdom of heaven is to be the least. I don't think
that's the spirit of a man who's going to be with God in heaven.
A man that thinks he's going to outwork everybody so that
people are going to just stand back and look at him and ogle
at what a fine Cadillac he's driving. That's what men do here. That's what God's got to save
us from. That's not what He's saving us to. Read verse 17 again carefully.
What's our inheritance? It says we're heirs of God. That's our inheritance. God. We're heirs of God. We're heirs
of God. Our inheritance is God Himself.
Our inheritance is Christ Himself. God says to His children what
He said to Abraham. Do you remember what He said
to Abraham? Genesis 15 verse 1, He said, Fear not, Abraham,
I am thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. God is. Christ loved us and washed us
from our sins in His own blood and He made us kings and priests
under God and our Father and all the glory and dominion is
His forever and ever. We're priests under God. Do you
remember what the priests inherited? The Lord said to the priest,
I am thy part and thy inheritance. I'm your inheritance, the Lord
said. And you know what He said to us? We are His inheritance. He said in Deuteronomy 32.9,
the Lord's portion, that means inheritance, is His people. He's our inheritance and we're
His inheritance. J.C. Philpott said, All the love
of God, the goodness of God, the holiness of God, all His
happiness, bliss, and blessedness, all His might, majesty, and glory
shining forth in the person of His dear Son in the blaze of
one eternal unclouded day. This is the saint's inheritance. You see, The truth of the matter
is, if Christ is not enough for us in matters of salvation, we
don't want to go to heaven anyway. Because our inheritance is Christ. If we don't want Christ to be
all here, we ain't going to want Him to be all there. And Christ
is all. He's all our salvation and He's
all our inheritance. to be with God. You've heard
it said, wherever God is, that's where heaven is. I had these Mormon boys come by the house
one day and I was listening to them and I said, am I going to
be saved? I told them the gospel and I
said, am I going to be saved? And they said, well you're going
to be in heaven, you're just not going to be where we are. I said, well
where are you going to be? They told me where they're going
to be and I said, well is Christ going to be where I'm at? And
they said, yeah. I said, I don't much care if y'all are there
or not. All I really care about is Christ there. I'll be fine.
It'll be fine with me. Child of God, you think about
this. Scripture says, all things are yours. All things are yours
and you're Christ's and Christ is God's. You see, everything's
going to be ours. Everything will be ours. But
when it comes to stuff, I don't know if the streets in heaven
are paved with gold or not. But if they are, I'll tell you
why they are. Because it ain't worth nothing. You going to hang some of that
asphalt around your neck? Or pierce your ears and put some
asphalt in your ears? We value gold here, but not there. We'll use it as commonly as asphalt.
What would be valuable there? The one who saved our souls. That's who. Alright, look at
this now. But the proof that we're children
and heirs of God is this, if we suffer to the end with Christ.
Romans 8, 17 says, if so be that we suffer with Him. When you
run a race, do you win the race if you stop halfway through?
No, you got to keep running it. You got to go to the end, you
got to cross the finish line. And He says, we're going to suffer
with Christ to the end. All His children do. They all
suffer with Christ for Christ. Go to Matthew 16 verse 22. I want you to see this. Whenever
the Lord talked about the suffering He was about to endure at the
cross. and how he was going to be so mistreated by men. And Peter's sitting there listening
to this, and listen to what Peter said. Peter's a believer, but
he's thinking like me and you normally think. And look what
he said in verse 22. Then Peter took him, Matthew
16, 22. Then Peter took him and he And he began to rebuke him, saying,
Be it far from thee, Lord, this shall not be unto thee. But Christ
turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan, thou art
an offense unto me. For thou savorest not the things
that be of God, but those that be of men. Then said Jesus unto
his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself
and take up his cross and follow me. For whosoever will save his
life shall lose it and whosoever will lose his life for my sake
shall find it. Now brethren, we're going to
suffer in every kind of way that you can suffer in this life because
we live in a world of sin and in a body of sin. But primarily,
What he's talking about in Romans 8 and what he's talking about
in Matthew primarily is suffering for Christ. For identifying with
Christ and identifying with His people and identifying with His
gospel. You're going to suffer. If you're
a believer, you're going to suffer. Christ said we must, through
much tribulation, enter into the Kingdom of Heaven. It's a
must. We're going to, first off, we're
going to suffer the loss of all things that we thought was something.
Everything that we had any confidence in, all our works and all the
things we thought was something, we're going to suffer the loss
of all things and count them but done. We're not going to
suffer the loss of them and go around talking about them like,
boy, we wish we had them back and how we cherished those days.
Boy, I wish I could still be in those days. No. We count them
but done. that we might win Christ and
be found in Him, not having our own righteousness, but the righteousness
which is of God through the faith of Christ. That's what we want. And we expect we're going to
suffer reproach and persecution for the sake of our Lord, possibly
even death. But we identify with Christ and
His people under His gospel because Christ suffered for us, and we
esteem Him greater than all the suffering. Hebrews 13, 12 says,
Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify the people with
His own blood, suffered without the gate. Let us go forth therefore
unto Him without the count, bearing His reproach. For here we have
no continuing city, but we seek one to come. That sounds like
He's saying, be ye separate. That's what He's saying. That's
what He's saying. It doesn't matter what people
say about you. It doesn't matter what they think of you. That's
what reproach is. He says, go to Him, leave this
world, leave what people are going after, and you go after
Christ. You go to Him. You leave this
religious world and every bunch of malarkey they're doing, and
you go where the Gospels preach and unite with His people and
sit under Christ's ministry. Go without the count to Christ.
This is not our city. All his apostles and his saints
suffered persecution. Paul told the Thessalonians,
even after we had suffered before and were shamefully entreated,
as you know at Philippi, we were bold in our God to speak unto
you the gospel of God with much contention. He said it didn't
stop us from suffering with Christ. Just because people shamefully
entreated us, we went on preaching Christ more boldly because of
it. You remember when they arrested
Peter and put him in jail, and I forget the other apostles that
was with him, and they commanded them, don't preach in this name
anymore. And they finally let him go,
and they went off rejoicing that they got to suffer for Christ's
sake, preaching the gospel everywhere they went. And after they suffered, after
the apostle suffered, he said this, You brethren, you became
followers of the churches of God which in Judea are in Christ
Jesus, for you also have suffered the like things of your own countrymen,
even as they have of the Jews, who both killed the Lord Jesus
and their own prophets, and have persecuted us. And they please
not God, or are contrary to all men, forbidding us to speak to
the Gentiles that they might be saved. to fill up their sins
always for the wrath has come upon them to the uttermost. I'll
tell you something brethren, Christ says that's how it's going
to be before He returns again in this earth. We've enjoyed
a lot of years in this country with freedom of religion, but
there's places in this world that don't have that. And Christ
has said before He comes again, It's going to be that way where
if you can find the gospel, you're going to be doing something.
And I'll tell you, we live in a day when it's just about that way.
But now, it's going to be even worse. There's going to be saints
killed for the gospel. And I'll be honest with you,
it's not a far stretch for me to see that happening with the
way this world is right now. That doesn't seem very far away
to me at all. If they could get away with it,
they'd do it in a heartbeat. But God gives more grace and
He gives more faith to His people so that you see Christ and you
see Christ as your reward. And I'll tell you what, He makes
you love Christ so that the reproach doesn't matter, the persecution
doesn't matter. It's worth it to suffer with
Christ. Scripture says of Moses, by faith,
what does faith behold? Christ. Thy faith, behold in
Christ. Moses, when he was come to years,
he refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter. Who's
the richest person in this world? They say if that, what's that,
Beto's guy, founder of whatever, if he gets a divorce from this
woman and they don't have a prenup, they said that if she gets half
his fortune, she's going to be the richest woman in the world.
I don't know who the richest man in the world is, but I'll
tell you this, That's what Moses was going to inherit. Moses was
the son of the richest man in the world, most powerful man
in the world, Pharaoh. And Scripture says this, he chose
rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy
the pleasures of sin for a season. Why on earth did he do that?
We don't do anything unless the reward is greater. Isn't that
right? You don't take the new job if
it's going to be worse than the other job. Why did he do that? He esteemed the reproach of Christ
greater riches than the treasures in Egypt because he had respect
unto the recompense of the reward. Remember this morning we looked
at restitution? Recompense is restitution. And he looked and
saw what Christ had restored his people and recompensed his
people and what he was going to receive from Christ, Christ
himself, when he entered into glory. And he said, that's far
better than any of this I could inherit from Pharaoh. And he endured, he forsook Egypt
not fearing the wrath of the king because he endured as seeing
him who is invisible. God causes us to suffer, not
only for the sake of Christ, but He causes us to suffer in
a lot of ways in this life, not only for persecution. He caused
you to suffer, and suffering in this world for a child of
God is God's hand chastening you. And what do we do about
that? We complain and murmur most of
the time. and just go on and on and on
about how bad our situation is. That's murmuring against God.
There's nothing that happened in this world that God didn't
bring into our life by His very hand. And that's chastening for
a child of God to make us suffer. And why does He do it? 1 Corinthians
4.14 says, All things for your sakes, that the abundant grace
might through the thanksgiving of many redound to the glory
of God, for which cause we faint not. For though our outward man
perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day for our light
affliction. Oh, I know some believers that
suffered heavy affliction. Yeah, but we're talking about
in comparison. And in comparison, it's light
affliction. And it's but for a moment. But
it works for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. What's it working for us? It's
teaching us that we look in not at things which are seen but
at things which are not seen for the things which are seen
are temporal but the things which are not seen are eternal. He
brings you to suffer to remind you and keep you in remembrance
brethren that this world is not our inheritance. The things of
this life is not what we're going to inherit. We have a building
of God eternal in the heavens so that when this building is
dissolved and this earth is dissolved and everything in it is dissolved,
we will be with God for eternity. And suffering forces us to quit
looking at us and look to Christ. if we're His child. If we're
not His child, we just go on murmuring and complaining about
it and never do acknowledge or understand that for that person
it's not the chastening of God. God's not doing a thing for that
person. Everybody suffers. We're all sinners. But if He
doesn't sanctify it to you and make you know what He's doing,
you're not His child. But when He sanctifies it to
His child, it makes us know this is for my good. This is to turn
me from looking at things that are seen to things that are not
seen. Because those are the eternal things. A few verses down, Paul
said, ìWeíre saved by hope, but hope that seems not hope. For
what a man seeth, why does he yet hope for it? But if we hope
for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.î
We wait for it. Brethren, Christ hates lukewarmness. He hates lukewarmness. You know
what I think? As I was preparing this, I thought,
ìBoy, I wish I knew how to I wish I could preach like those old
preachers. They say that George Whitefield's time, men would
come there to throw rocks at him and by the time they got
finished, they'd be done dropping rocks and bawling their eyes
out. God has to make you preach like
that. I wish I could preach that way. I want to call every believer
here, it's time for us to forsake everything and live for Christ
and suffer for His sake. That's right. Declare the truth
unapologetically to anybody that will listen. And not worry about
how it's going to affect you. Oh, I'm going to lose my job.
Well, shame on me for not preaching it for that very reason. It's
going to cause you some trouble in your community. Well, shame
on me if I shy away from preaching the truth for that reason. Isn't
that right? Isn't that what he's saying?
You can't be my disciple, Christ said, if you're not willing to
do that. There's some believers in this world that I guarantee
you folks don't even know they're a believer. The Lord said, Hear unto where
you call, because Christ suffered for us, that you should follow
His example. Listen to this from Philippians.
Listen to this. He says in Philippians chapter
1, He says, for unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ,
not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake.
That's right. Are we all about getting the
benefits of Christ and not willing to suffer for Christ? It takes
suffering. Christ said, people in your own
households are going to be your dire enemies before this thing
is over. Are you going to stand with them
or are you going to stand with Christ? He said, if you don't
stand with Me, you're not fit to be My disciple. That's right. That is exactly what He's telling
us about taking up our cross and following Him. But He said,
blessed are you when men revile you and persecute you and say
all manner of evil against you falsely. That's no reason to
murmur. He said, when they do it for
my sake, that don't mean go and be a horse's behind and cause
people to do it to you. But if they're doing it for His
sake, Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward
in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets which were
before you. But believers have a different, we have a different
spirit towards this suffering. It's because of this. Look at
Romans 8, 17. Because we suffer with Christ that we may be glorified
together. That's why. We have a different
attitude about suffering. We're going to suffer with Christ
to the end because we know we're going to be glorified together
with Christ. Not with His essential glory
and not with that mediatorial glory, but there's a glory the
Father gave to Him to give to us. Scripture says, There's a
glorification of the saints in Christ, there's a glorification
of the saints by Christ, and there's a glorification of the
saints with Christ. In Thessalonians, Paul said it's
a righteous thing with God to recompense trouble to them that
trouble you, and to recompense, that's restitution, to recompense
to you rest when He comes, listen to this, to be admired in you
that believe. Why? There's one reason. He said
because you believed our testimony, you believed our gospel. That's
the reason. What is this glorification with
Christ? I can't begin to tell you what
it is. Beloved, now are we the sons of God. It does not yet
appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear,
we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Well,
tell me what it's going to be like. I hath not seen nor ear
heard, neither has it even entered into the heart of man the things
which God hath prepared for them that love Him. I would fall way
short, whatever extravagant superlatives I use to try to describe it,
I'd fall short of. Believe in God. We endure suffering
because we know this, verse 18, that the sufferings of this present
time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that shall be
revealed in us. So let me end with this. Go to
1 Peter 3. 1 Peter 3. Listen to this. This is a good text to end with.
1 Peter 3.8. Finally, be all of you of one
mind. Have compassion one of another,
love as brethren. That's that love we've been seeing
on Thursday night that only God gives. Be pitiful, be courteous,
not rendering evil for evil, or railing for railing, but contrary
wise, blessing. Render blessing. knowing that
you are hitherto called that you should inherit a blessing.
For he that will love life and see good days, let him refrain
his tongue from evil and his lips that they speak no guile. Let him eschew evil and do good.
Let him seek peace and ensue it. For the eyes of the Lord
are over the righteous and his ears are open unto their prayers.
But the face of the Lord is against them that do evil. And who is
he that will harm you if you be followers of that which is
good? But, and if you suffer for righteousness' sake, happy
are you. And be not afraid of their terror,
neither be troubled. But sanctify the Lord God in
your hearts. We're either going to sanctify
man by closing our mouth and not saying what we ought to say,
or we're going to sanctify God and say what needs to be said.
According to these scriptures. One or the other. and be ready
always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason
of the hope that's in you with meekness and fear, having a good
conscience, that whereas they speak evil of you as evildoers,
they may be ashamed that falsely accuse your good conversation
in Christ, your good conduct, for it's better if the will of
God be so that you suffer for well-doing than for evildoing.
And so He says to us, brethren, He says, Gird up the loins of
your mind and hope to the end for that grace that shall be
brought unto you at the appearing of our Lord Jesus. And rejoice,
because you can suffer for His sake. When you suffer, be like
the psalmist. Thou, Father, shalt guide me
with thy counsel, and after receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven
with thee? And there is none upon earth
that I desire but thee. My flesh and my heart faileth,
but God is the strength of my heart, and He is my inheritance
forever. Say that to yourself when you suffer. And know this,
the God of all grace who's called us to His eternal glory after
that you've suffered just a little while. He'll make you perfect,
establish you, strengthen you, and settle you. That's our inheritance. Amen.