Alright, brethren, let's go back
to Exodus 19. Our gospel is really very simple. Salvation is of the Lord. And
we mean it. We mean that. Salvation is of
the Lord. The purpose of God in salvation
is to make His people behold His glory. and to praise Him
for all His wonderful works, to give Him all the glory. And
God said, I won't share that glory. He will not share His
glory with any sinner. He said, behold, even everyone
that I've created, everyone that I've formed, everyone that I've
created, I created Him for my glory. That's why He has saved
His people. for His glory. He said, I will
not give my glory to another. What is it that Christ prayed
in His high priestly prayer? Father, I will at those whom
Thou has given me be with me where I am that they may behold
my glory. And that's the whole point of
salvation, is to behold His glory. And we only behold His glory
if salvation is entirely of the Lord. So the scriptures tell us, He
that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. And this is how
believers discern between a truth and a lie. Do they preach according
to this word, giving God all the glory and sinners none? That's
the difference between the true gospel and every false gospel. There's only two messages in
the world, works and grace. Cain and Abel, Esau and Jacob,
Ishmael and Isaac. There are only two gospels. Works
and grace are two messages. The other is not a gospel. And the good news is that we
gather to hear is of God's works. That's what we gather to hear
is God's works. in saving us. The psalmist said
in Psalm 145, 4, One generation shall praise thy works to another
and shall declare thy mighty acts. I will speak of the glorious
honor of thy majesty and of thy wondrous works. All thy works
shall praise thee, O Lord, and thy saints shall bless thee. All the saints of God shall glory
in the Lord. That's what the scripture says. He that putteth his trust in
me shall possess the land. So, even when the apostles are
teaching us, teaching believers to maintain good works, even
when the Lord is teaching us that, they always preach the
gospel of Christ to us. telling us what He's done for
us so that our motive, our constraint for doing what God, the good
works God ordained for us to do is not from a legal motive
but from the motive of grace. He even declares the gospel and
not law, the gospel. That's how we're constrained.
So this whole book and everything in it is the message of God's
glory, the message of His works in saving us. And if a man doesn't
like this gospel and he's against this gospel, there's one reason. He wants glory. He wants glory. He wants his works to be noticed
rather than God having all the glory for his works. So in this
passage now that we're going to look at today, Exodus 19 verse
1 through 6, we see God doing what we talked about
in the first hour. He's continually reminding His
people of what He's done for us and He's given us a sure promise
of what He shall do for us. This is our gospel. It's reminding
us what He's done for us. This is what the trial is for,
to remind us what He's done for us and to remind us of what He
shall do for us. I've told this, you have seen.
Let's look here. when he sent Moses up into the
mountain, verse 3. The Lord called unto him out
of the mountain, saying, Thus shalt thou say to the house of
Jacob, and tell the children of Israel, Ye have seen. That's my subject. You have seen.
You that believe, you have seen. You've seen with the eye of faith.
You've seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bear you
on eagles' wings. and brought you unto Myself.
Now therefore, if you will obey My voice indeed and keep My covenant,
then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me above all people.
For all the earth is Mine, and you shall be unto Me a kingdom
of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which I also
speak unto the children of Israel." So Moses came down, spoke those
words to the children of Israel. Now first, here's what we see.
Christ Jesus is the mediator between God and His people. That's
what we see in Moses. Moses went up unto God and the
Lord God called unto him. And He gave him what to speak
and then Moses came down and spoke to the people. That's a
mediator. Moses goes up for the children
of Israel and comes down to the children of Israel for God. And
that's what Christ does. He's the daysman between us who
can lay His hands on us both. He can come to God for His people
and He can come to His people for God. And He can bring us
together. That's what Christ does. There's
one God and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. There's a couple of things to
notice about that verse. He's not one Mediator between
God and man. That would make it to be all
man. All men. He's the mediator between
God and men. Between God and some men. He's chosen. And also notice,
there's only one. That man wearing the funny hat
over in Rome is not a vicar. He's not a mediator. There's
only one. No preacher is a mediator. There's only one. And that's
Christ. Now Moses was a mediator under
the covenant of works and that covenant required the sinner
to fulfill man's side of the covenant. That's why they could
never do it. But Christ is the mediator of
a better covenant, the covenant of grace. Now hath he obtained
a more excellent ministry by how much also he is the mediator
of a better covenant which was established on better promises.
It's a better covenant with better promises because Christ fulfilled
all of man's side of it as well as God's side of it. So that
all the promises of God in Christ are yes and in Christ amen to
the praise of the glory of God's grace. We don't contribute anything
to this covenant. And that's what He did as a mediator
for this cause. He's the mediator of the New
Testament by means of death. For the redemption of the transgressions
under the first testament, they which are called might receive
the promise of eternal inheritance. When you have a last will and
testament, it only goes into effect after the testator dies. Well, the gospel we preach is
the will and testament of God, how He's going to give an inheritance
to His people. But in order for that inheritance
to come to His people, Christ had to come forth and die in
the place of His people and by that He justified us, satisfied
the law for us, fulfilling our end of the covenant. We couldn't
fulfill it because to fulfill our end of the covenant, we had
to keep the law in perfection and we had to die under the law
because we had broken it. So we couldn't keep the law.
We couldn't keep the law. It's not enough. Men talk about
being able to keep the law. It's not enough to keep the law.
Because we've sinned, we've got to die under the law. That's
how you fulfill the law. And He did that for His people
as the substitute of His people. So there's just one mediator
between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Now secondly, God
continually reminds His saints what we are. just like we saw
in the first hour. He continually reminds us what
we are. Look here in verse 3. Moses went up unto God, and the
Lord God called unto him out of the mountain, saying, Thus
shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell Israel, the children
of Israel, He addressed the same people as the house of Jacob
and He addressed them as the children of Israel. Why? Well, not everybody that's in
Israel, that was in Israel were God's elect. You know that. Not everybody there were God's
elect. But there were some there that were God's elect. But God
also has Gentiles who are His elect. And all God's elect were chosen
by God from eternity by free grace not based on anything in
us. You could go read Romans 9 and you can see that. They
are not all Israel which are of Israel. They are not all Israel
which are all of Israel, neither because they are the seed of
Abraham are they all children. But in Isaac thy seed shall be
called. That is, they which are the children
of flesh. Remember Abraham had a son Ishmael
who was a child of the flesh, born by his works. He wasn't
the elect of God. But the children of the promise
are counted for the seed. Isaac was a child of promise.
who God gave life and brought forth. And so are all his elect. He used Jacob and Esau as the
example. Before they were ever born, it
was not according to anything in them. It was not according
to any works they had done. They had done nothing. And yet,
before they were ever born, his twins in the same womb of the
same father. Before they were ever born, God
said, Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated. And it's not unrighteous
for God to do that. Now that's what I thought when
I was dead in sins. I said that's not fair. But after
God brings you to believe Him, you say, God forbid. That's not
unfair. For He said to Moses, I'll have
mercy on whom I'll have mercy. I have compassion on whom I'll
have compassion. He said, I raised Pharaoh up
for that same purpose. That I might show my power and
my name might be declared throughout all the earth. That's why he
elects his people. So that his power and his name
might be declared throughout all the earth. And what are we
going to reply? Shall the thing formed say unto
him that formed it, why have you made me thus? Are we going
to argue with God? The potter has power over the
clay. He makes one vessel under honor and one under dishonor.
Can God not do with us the same thing? And by this, He endures the vessels
of wrath that are made up for destruction so that He might
show you who He's chosen, what great mercy He's had on you.
in that He prepared you before the world was made in Christ.
And then He brought all these blessings to you. But He makes
sure we remember what we were and what we are. We must be born again. And when
we are born again of God the Holy Spirit, there is a new man
created in us. He is not a Jew which is one
outwardly, neither is that circumcision outward in the flesh, but He
is a Jew which is one inwardly. One inwardly. Circumcision is
of the heart, in the spirit, whose praise is not of men, but
of God. We praise Him for this work.
And so those born of God have two natures. We have two natures. Two natures. We have a sinful
nature that we got from Adam's corrupt seed, and we have a new
holy nature that we got from Christ's incorruptible seed,
the word whereby the gospel is preached unto you. Thus shalt
thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel.
In our sinful nature, we're Jacob. We're the supplanter. We're the
trickster. We're the sinner. And in our
holy nature, we're Israel. as a prince that has power with
God and has prevailed. You go through the scriptures
and you'll see God addressed the children of Israel as Jacob
sometimes and He talks to them as Israel sometimes. We're Jacob
and we're Israel. Paul said, I know that in me,
that is in my flesh, in that part of me which is of Adam dwells
no good thing. For the will is present with
me, but how to perform it I find not. The good that I would, I
don't do. The evil I don't want to do,
that's what I do. And so, if I do it, it's no more
I that do it, but sin that dwells in me. Sin that's in my flesh. And so, when I would do good,
evil is always present with me. Sin is mixed with everything
I do. So there's two laws working here. In my mind, I serve the
law of God. I delight in the law of God and
I would keep the law of God perfectly. But in my flesh, I serve the
law of sin. Now that's a miserable, wretched
person, isn't it? Everybody is born of God. That's
what we are. Oh, wretched man that I am. And who's going to save us from
this body of death? are from the body of this dead,
Christ alone. I thank God through Christ Jesus
our Lord. So as long as we live in this
flesh, God's going to remind us, you're Jacob and you're Israel. One is what we are. because of
our own sin and rebellion in Adam. Two, the second is what
God's made us by His grace. So we rejoice in what He's done.
But that's what we are. And He's going to keep you remembering
that. So we always depend on Him to
save us. You know, any work you do, Scripture
says the plowing of the wicked is abomination before God. It's
just sin. Even something like plowing,
we were sinning doing that when we were just dead in sin. But
now, all our works are accepted of God. Everything you do, just
mundane work like plowing is now righteous before God. Why? It's not of us that it's righteous
because sin still makes for what we do. It's of Christ that it's
righteous. It comes up to God in the blood
of Christ, washed and perfect so God accepts it. Everything. Everything. So as long as we
live, we're going to be in this flesh. Sinful Jacob in our flesh,
Israel in our inward man. Now thirdly, God our Father is
going to continually keep us remembering what He has done
for us already. What He has done for us already.
Verse 3, again he says, Thou shalt say to the house of Jacob,
and tell the children of Israel, You've seen what I did unto the
Egyptians, and how I bear you on eagles' wings, and I brought
you to myself. Now, you who are sanctified,
you who have been called by God, born of God, and you hear the
gospel, when you hear this gospel, You're constantly reminded of
what God's done for you. Constantly reminded of that.
And we see what God's done for us in delivering us from bondage,
destroying all our enemies. That's what the Egyptians stand
for. God didn't do this for everybody in the world. He did it for Israel. And God doesn't save everybody
in the world. Christ died for God's Israel,
the elect of God. That's who He died for. And when
He did that, He put down our enemies. He delivered us out
of bondage. Chapter 14 told us the waters
returned and covered the chariots and the horsemen and all the
host of Pharaoh that came into the sea after them. And there
remained not so much as one of them. The Egyptians. There remained not so much as
one of them. And concerning our sins, brethren,
By Christ's blood, there remains before God, before His judgment
seat, there remains not one. Not one. He said, they'll be
searched for, but they won't be found. They won't be found. He's put away our sin completely
before God. God doesn't pretend He has. He's
not treating us as if He has. God has. He has. He's done it. And concerning
the rest of our enemies, the devil, death, hell, now that
we're robed in Christ's righteousness, brethren, all those enemies are
defeated. They're all destroyed. They can't
harm us, can't do anything for us, because there's therefore
now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. to them
who walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. It's because
the law of the Spirit of life in Christ has made us free from
the law of sin and death. He's come now and He's created
life in you and when He gives you life, life and righteousness
are equal. You have life, you have righteousness. You have righteousness, you have
life. They're equal. Romans 8 tells you that. The
Spirit in you is life because of righteousness. They're equal.
And when He gives you that, that means you have eternal life.
In that new man, when you die, when you drop this body of flesh,
there will not be anything that needs to be done to our spirit. You don't find anything in the
Scripture done to our spirit for us to enter in immediately
into God's presence. And that tells you we have a
new spirit. We have a righteous and holy
spirit that God has put in us. So that now we can commune with
God in that new man and when we die it will go be with God
immediately. Nothing needs to be altered or
changed or made better about it. We have that holiness we
need to go into God's presence. And this is what He's done for
us. Due to our being dead in sins though, He had to come and
give us that life and teach us what He's done for us. We couldn't
even enter into it. He said there, you see how I
bear you on eagle's wings and brought you to myself? You have
seen this. And haven't you seen this believer?
When I was dead in my sins, that boy right there reminds me of
me so much it scares me to death. And I can tell you when I was
in my sins, running wild as a buck, it's just God's keeping hand
bearing me on eagle's wings that I didn't die. But He wasn't going
to let me die. He was going to bring me to hear
this gospel and be born again. He wasn't going to let me die.
I was with a boy one time driving in a truck And when there was
a busy highway we lived on, I mean it was busy. There was constantly
gravel trucks going down that highway and chicken trucks always. My neighbor up the road called
it the cock and rock because it was chicken trucks and gravel
trucks and all that went up down that road. And one day I was
riding with a boy and we come up to a T where it went across
the road, you know. And he didn't even stop on purpose. He just kept going. He just went
right over that busy highway, right through that stop sign.
Scared me to death. Why didn't a gravel truck hit
us, T-bone us and kill us both? God was going to make sure I
heard the gospel. And that's the same. When we
didn't know Him, He was bearing us on eagles' wings. He was bringing
us to Himself. And He did that. He brought us.
He brought us. He said, no man can come to Me
except the Father which has sent Me. Draw him. Just like you draw
a sword out. And He drew us to Him. Brought
us unto the Gospel and made us hear of the great works of God
done for us. Gave us life. And why do we continue
to come to Him? How come Israel had come all
that way, and in spite of all their murmuring and complaining
and sin, and yet here they stand, right where God... Remember when
Christ appeared in the burning bush and He told Moses, I'm going
to show you that I'm with you. And the sign of it is, the proof
of it's going to be, you're going to stand right here in this mountain,
in Horeb, Mount Sinai, and you're going to stand here with the
children of Israel. And Moses is right back where he started.
He's right back there where that burning bush was, standing at
Mount Sinai with the children of Israel. How come they were
brought that far? The Lord bear them on eagles'
wings. That stands for strength and
security and swiftness, and the power of God to bring His people,
just like a strong eagle's wings. The Lord's portion is His people. Jacob is the lot of His inheritance. He found Him in a desert land,
in a waste, howling wilderness, and He led him, and He instructed
him, and He kept him as the apple of His eye. And as an eagle stirreth
up her nest, and fluttereth over her young, and spreadeth abroad
her wings, and taketh them, and beareth them on her wings, so
the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no strange God
with him. He made him to ride on the high places of the earth,
that he might eat the increase of the fields, and he made him
to suck honey out of the rock, and oil out of the flimsy rock.
That's Jacob. That's what God did for Jacob.
That's how come they were carried that whole way and their shoes
never wore out in forty years of traveling through the wilderness.
And God, He's bringing us, He's leading us, He's carrying us,
He's providing for us. We're kept by the power of God
through faith unto salvation that's ready to be revealed.
And it's for that reason that He's going to continue carrying
His people You know what I pray God will do today? I pray today
He'll draw some lost sheep to Him, bring you to Him. When He does that, you're coming.
It's not a matter of, well, let me mull it over and decide if
I want to come. No, if He draws you, you're coming. You're coming. And here's the
last thing, brethren. When God has drawn His child,
God makes an everlasting covenant promise with us. and everlasting
covenant promise. Look at verse 5. Now therefore,
if you will obey my voice indeed and keep my covenant, then you
shall be a peculiar treasure. Mark that. You'll be a peculiar
treasure unto me above all people, for all the earth is mine. And
you shall be unto me a kingdom of priests. Mark that. You'll
be a king priest and a holy nation. These are the words which thou
shalt speak unto the children of Israel. And Moses came, and
he called for the elders of the people, and he laid before their
faces all these words which the Lord commanded him. And all the
people answered together and said, All that the Lord hath
spoken we will do. And Moses returned the words
of the people to the Lord. Now for the children of Israel,
this was a covenant of words. If then, If then, that's a covenant
of works. And their answer was pride and
arrogance. They answered what they thought
was true. All the Lord has spoken, we will do it. And they thought
they could. They thought they could keep
this law God was about to give them. Next time we're going to
see, Lord told them, wash themselves. And so they washed themselves.
That's a picture of a sinner trying to sanctify himself. They
washed themselves, they got good and clean, put on their best
garments, and they came to that mountain. And when they got to
that mountain, I want you to look over at verse 18. Chapter
20, verse 18. All the people saw the thunderings,
and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountains
smoking. And when the people saw it, they removed and stood
afar off. And they said unto Moses, Speak
thou with us, and we'll hear. But let not God speak with us,
lest we die. That's what's going to happen.
God comes in grace. He's going to come and He's going
to and show you what the law says unto you, and going to reveal
His requirements in the law, and you're going to see lightning
flashing, you're going to hear thunder and crashing, and by
that I mean you're going to see that you're a sinner, and you
can't keep God's law. And it's going to make you run
back away from that law, and you're going to ask for a mediator. to represent you to God. You're
going to call on Christ to have mercy on you, to be your mediator,
to represent you to God. That's where He brings you. That's
where He brings you. Now when He brings you there,
for God's elect, you read the ifs in these passages when you
go through the Old Testament. Read the ifs as promises that
God makes to you. Every if you come to, read it
as a promise that God's making to you, His children. Because
anything God requires of His people, God provides it for His
people. You can hear that being said
to Christ. If then, if you keep my covenant, you fulfill my law
perfectly, then you'll be all this to me. And Christ did it
all. And so when He brings it to you, it's not a covenant of
works, it's a covenant of grace. Saying, He's done it. He's done
it. So it's a promise to you. It's
a promise, because he obeyed perfectly. God said to him, He
said, Then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me, above all people. And you shall be unto Me a kingdom
of priests, and you'll be a holy nation. Go over with me to 1
Peter. And I'll show you this is a promise.
It's all fulfilled by Christ, and it's what He makes His people.
First Peter. Look at verse 2. Chapter 2 and look down at verse
9. First off, go back up. Let me
show you here in verse 4. To whom coming as unto a living
stone, disallowed indeed of men, but chosen of God and precious,
ye also as living stones are built up a spiritual house, a
holy priesthood to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God
by Jesus Christ. That's where you've come to.
You've come to Christ. And now look what He's made you.
Look over here at verse 9. You're a chosen generation. You're
a royal priesthood. That means you're a kingdom of
priests. He's made you kings and priests. What He said to them over there,
because it was a covenant of works and they couldn't fulfill
the law, they never were kings and priests. They never were.
But Christ makes you kings and priests. That means we can offer
up spiritual sacrifices to Him as a priest, the fruit of our
lips, the calves of our lips, thanking God. And through our
high priest, it comes up to God acceptable. And as kings, we
reign with Him. We reign with the King of kings.
Because He's our King. He's made us kings and priests.
We're a kingdom of priests. And look here, and a holy nation. That's what He said. You're going
to be a holy nation. A nation separated out from all
other nations on this earth and blessed of God. That's what His
people are. That's what God's Israel is.
And then He said, you're going to be a peculiar treasure to
Me. You're a peculiar people. That doesn't mean you're an odd
bunch. That means, well, that might be true. But it means we're
a peculiar treasure. And we're a treasure unto God.
That's what it means. A precious treasure. that you
should show forth the praises of Him who has called you out
of darkness into His marvelous light. Isn't that what I began
with? I said this is the whole purpose of salvation. It's to
bring us to praise God and give Him all the glory for all the
works. That's why I did it. In time past you were not a people,
but now you're the people of God. You had not obtained mercy,
but now you have obtained mercy. That's what He does for us and
He never stops. Never stops. Amen. Alright, Brother
R.