Alright, let's go back now to
Psalm 35. We have a lot of enemies as we
go through life as believers. And we're really helpless against
these enemies. Especially when it comes to Folks
who do not like the gospel we preach and bring reproach upon
us because of the gospel and try to turn others against us
because of the gospel. This is what I mean when I talk
about an enemy. I'm talking about one that is
an enemy because of Christ, because of our stand with Christ. And
so it's good to know that Christ ever lives to make intercession
for His people. The same One who redeemed His
people and went into the tomb and carried our sins away into
a land not inhabited is now arisen to the right hand of God. And He's reigning and He's ruling.
And He makes intercession for His people. And God will hear,
God our Father will hear His Son. And because of that we can
be assured that our enemies will never triumph over us or any
of God's people or His church. I've titled this message, Who
is like unto thee? Now Psalm 35, the whole Psalm,
is Christ praying to God the Father. That's why I said Christ
is our intercessor. Here we have a whole Psalm with
Christ interceding. He's praying to the Father. He's
interceding. right here. He's interceding
for himself and for all his people in him. This is when he was suffering
at the hands of men in this earth, when he walked this earth. Look
down at verse 7. He says, for without cause have
they hid for me their net in a pit. He says in verse 11, false
witnesses did rise up and laid to my charge things that I knew
not or things that I did not. That can be said of Christ. That's
what happened with our Redeemer. So here we're looking at Christ,
our head and our surety, the surety of all God's elect. Now
all the indignity and reproach and shame that you and I merited, Christ bore it when He walked
this earth to redeem His people. to take our place. He bore all
of that from men the whole time He walked this earth and then
went to the cross while their utter hatred was spewed out on
Him. And now as we hear Christ pray
to the Father in this psalm, we are going to see just how
dangerous it is for a sinner to be against Christ. And we're going to see how secure
it is for a believer who's cast all his care into Christ's hand. We'll see how dangerous it is.
If you don't believe on Christ, you're somebody that doesn't
trust Christ, and you hate Christ, you don't want anything to do
with Christ, you see how dangerous it is to oppose Christ. And if
you believe Him, You're going to see how safe it is and how
secure we are trusting Him. Alright, first of all, those
who persecute Christ or His people, whoever persecute Christ or His
people shall be persecuted by our Lord. Those who persecute
Him or His people shall be persecuted by our Lord. Listen here, Christ
praised the Father in verse 4 and He says, Let them be confounded
and put to shame that seek after My soul. Let them be turned back
and brought to confusion that devise My hurt. Let them be as
chaff before the wind, and let the angel of the Lord chase them. Let their way be dark and slippery,
and let the angel of the Lord persecute them. Christ prays
that His enemies be brought to confusion and shame. He prays
that they lose their footing in slippery paths. That's His
prayer against those who wickedly and rebelliously turn against Him and hate Him
and reject Him. And John 18, go there with me.
We see this take place in John 18. He prayed that they would
be brought to confusion and shame and they would go backwards and
their foot would slip. Look at John 18.4. This was when
that band of men came to arrest Christ after He came out of the
Garden of Gethsemane. It says verse 4, Jesus, therefore,
knowing all things that should come upon him, went forth, and
he said unto them, Whom seek ye? They answered him, Jesus
of Nazareth. And Jesus saith unto him, I am. That's the Almighty Name. I am, the great I am, I am. And Judas also, which betrayed
him, stood with them. And as soon then as he had said
unto them, I am, they went backward and fell to the ground. They
were brought to confusion. They were confounded. They lost
their footing in slippery paths. They went back. as Christ prayed. And all who oppose Christ, that's
just a small example, but all who oppose Christ one day are
going to meet Him in judgment. And that confounding and that
being turned backwards is nothing compared to how they'll be confused
and brought to shame and cast out in that great day of judgment. But that won't be so for those
who are resting in Christ. That won't be so. Of His enemies,
He says there, let them be confounded and put to shame that seek after
my soul. That's Christ's just prayer for
those who are the reprobate, who's against Him. But go to
Psalm 69. Psalm 69. And look at verse 6. And here
is his intercession for those for whom he died. Listen to this.
Psalm 69 verse 6. He says, ìLet not them that wait
on thee, O Lord God of hosts, be ashamed for my sake. Let not
those that seek thee be confounded for my sake, O God of Israel.î
He prays for His enemies to be confounded and to be ashamed,
but not for His people. He prays for them to not be confounded
and not be ashamed. Of His enemies, He said, let
them be as chaff before the wind. But of His people, they're called
His wheat. And the scripture says, His fan
is in His hand, and He'll throughly purge His floor, and He'll gather
His wheat into the garner. But the chaff, He'll burn up
the chaff with unquenchable fire. See the difference in the way
He treats His people and the way He's going to treat the enemy?
He prays concerning His enemies in verse 6. In Psalm 35, 6 He
says, Let their way be dark and slippery. Look at Psalm 40. This is what every believer can
sing right here. Is our way dark and slippery?
Is our path dark and slippery? Psalm 40 verse 2, He brought
me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, and
set my feet upon a rock and established my goings. We just sang the solid
rock. Christ is that solid rock. He brought us up and He set our
feet on that sheer foundation and He establishes the goings
of His people. We're not on slippery paths.
That's His treatment of His people. So now, when we read this, the
first point here is to get this. Anybody here who doesn't believe
on Christ, it's going to do no good to fight against Him. It's
going to do no good to go through life opposing the Gospel and
opposing Christ and opposing His people. It will do no good
whatsoever. You depart from this world in
that condition and meet Christ. And Christ Himself will call for your confusion
and your shame and your going away backwards and your being
cast out. But for those who cast their
care on Him, those for whom that God gave to Him, those that He
redeemed and those that He's called out by His gospel that
you cast your care on Him, You're secure. Because His prayer is
just the opposite for you as it is for the enemy. Now let's
go to this second point here. And when our Lord destroys the
enemy, it will be just. The destruction of the enemy,
the destruction of those that are the enemy of Christ and the
enemy of His people, their destruction will be just. Look here now in
Psalm 35 7. It begins with the word for.
When you read that, you know that means because. Because. He just prayed that prayer and
prayed and called for the confounding and the shame and the slippery
paths be upon those that hate Him and they be as chaff and
be just blown away. And now He is going to tell us
why He prayed that. Because. without cause have they hid for
me their net in a pit, which without cause they have digged
for my soul. Let destruction come upon him
at unawares, that is, when he least expect it. And let his
net that he hath hid catch himself, and into that very destruction
let him fall. Now there was no cause for the
enemies of Christ to seek his destruction. There was no cause
whatsoever. Go over to John 15. And listen
to what Christ said. John 15, 24. He said, If I had not done among
them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin. See, he came and did works that
no man had ever seen anybody do the works he did. And the
works he did revealed that their works were just a sham. It revealed
their works were sin. Remember how he said, except
your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes
and the Pharisees? He is that righteousness that
exceeds the scribes and the Pharisees. And so he said, if I had not
come and done the work I did, they would not have sinned. But
now have they both seen, and they hated both me and my father.
But this cometh to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that
is written in their law, that is in their scriptures, in their
word. They hated me without a cause. See it there? He said this had
to be fulfilled. They hated me without a cause.
And he's talking about our psalm. It's written two times right
here in Psalm 35 7 and then it's written again later in the psalm.
For without cause have they hid their net in a pit, and without
cause they've digged for my soul. No one ever had cause for rejecting
God in human flesh. Just think about that. Holy God,
righteous God, perfect God, our Creator, came down in human flesh
and He did nothing to earn any man rejecting Him or trying to
kill Him. He did nothing whatsoever. He's
the holy, harmless Lord Jesus, the Son of God. That's what made
them angry. That's what He meant there. If
I had not done the work that no man did, we had never seen
a holy man before. You know how jealous we are?
You think you've got everybody looking to you, and you've got
everybody following you, and you're really setting the bar
high that people are trying to strive to get to, and you're
so much better than they are, and here comes somebody along
that makes you look like a harlot over there in the bordello. They've never seen a holy man
before. He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.
He never opened his mouth and said anything but truth. Everything
he spoke was needful. Everything he spoke was right.
Everything he spoke was good for sinners. And everything he
did was good for sinners. They had never seen a man come.
They had been trying to take up money for the poor and do
all they could do for the poor and all these different benevolent
things they were doing for the poor. And here he comes along
and he just heals. the lame, and the poor, and the
blind, and the leper. And they'd never done anything
like that. And you would think a lame man who's been sitting
by a pool all this time, they would want to see him walking
and see him be able to contribute to society now and not have to
be on the welfare of the people and get up and be able to go
to work and help out and help somebody else that's poor. And
this man had never ever walked a day in his life. But they said,
you did it on a Sabbath day. And they hated him. They wanted
to kill him for it. Why? He showed them up. That's
why. He showed them up. They couldn't
do what he did. And besides that, he is the Sabbath. He is the Sabbath. His grace,
He did only good then and He does only good now too. All the
things I'm saying about then is true of Him now. He's alive
now. He is as alive now as He was
when He walked this earth. That's so. Those angels, when
He went up, those angels looked at the disciples and they said,
Why are you standing here gazing up in heaven? He's going to come
back the same way He went. His grace is free, His righteousness
is free, His salvation is free. If it was anything else that
was free, men would latch on to it. But righteousness and
salvation, they won't latch on to it. Christ has never caused
one sinner to reject Him. Do you know that? Christ has
never ever done anything to one sinner to make them reject Him. Never. Never. Sinners reject
Him on their own. He don't have to do anything
to a sinner to make them reject Him. Sinners do it on their own. Men want to say, I don't think
it's fair that God won't give all men a chance. If God just
left it all up to chance, and I guess what men mean by chance
is, just leave it up to me. That's a long shot. It's not
a chance. But it's on purpose. It's not
by chance. But if He did just leave it up
to me, and say He left it up to all of us, brethren, There's
not a one of us would ever call on Christ. The one men are calling
on of their own will is not this Christ. And we would not have
called upon Him if we were left to our own devices. We never would have. But He's
never caused one sinner to reject Him. He didn't have to do anything
to make us reject Him. We just rejected Him. And that's
what we would have kept on doing. And men do that without a cause. They do it without a cause. There's
no reason to reject Christ. No reason to reject His gospel.
It's right here. Men want to act like that's your
interpretation. No, if I read you any other story,
you wouldn't say that. If I read a book to somebody
and they looked at the words on the page and they read it,
they wouldn't go, well that's just your interpretation of Snow
White and the Seven Dwarfs. No, that's what it said. This right here, is the Word
of God. This is real. This is not a fairy
tale. This is real. And the words are
so clear on the page, and you'll read it to a man, and he'll say,
well, that's your interpretation. No, that's God's Word. Plain
and simple. Clear. You can see it. It's God's
Word. So whenever Christ... They do this without a cause.
Can't blame His Word, can't blame Christ, can't blame God the Father,
God the Holy Spirit, can't blame anybody. We're talking about
God leaving you to yourself now and just, ok, you want to be
on your own, you're on your own, let's see what you got. And look
to the cross and you see what we got. Rejected, spit in his
face, railed upon him, dug a pit for him. laid a net for Him,
wanted to trap Him and tail Him in His words. That is us, brethren. That's me, that's you, that's
every other sinner that's fallen in Adam. That's us all by nature. So, when He calls for justice
upon those that meet Him in judgment, when this One calls for justice,
it's going to be just. Because men rejected Him. Our Lord Jesus and God our Father
is the righteous judge. And so when a sinner perishes
under condemnation, this is why. Verse 7, it's because without
cause they have hid for me their net in a pit, and without cause
they've digged for my soul. That's why. That's why. The condemnation is not only
just a condemnation, it's sure, because God our Father is going
to always hear Christ Jesus, His righteous Son. and He's going
to do what He calls for to be done. Those that are plotting
against Christ are plotting against themselves. They're going to
fall in their own net and they're going to fall in their own pit.
I'll give you an example of it. What was the net that the Jews
used to finally get Christ on the cross? What was the net The
pit that the Pharisees and the scribes and the Sanhedrin...
What was the pit? The high priests, what was the
pit and the net that they used to finally get Christ on the
cross? It was the Romans. They said, He's speaking blasphemous
things, treasonous things against Caesar. And when they brought
him out and said, Behold your king, what did they say? We don't
have any other king but Caesar. And so, they turned Him over
to their will and they were able to put Him on the cross. And
then unawares, Christ said, let destruction come on them unawares
and let them fall in their own, be tangled in their own net and
fall in their own pit. In 70 AD, without any notice,
here comes Rome. And goes in and fights in Jerusalem
and totally destroys them. You see they fell in their own
net and were destroyed by their own pit that they had used to
put Christ on the cross. Christ said, go to Matthew 12,
Christ said a man's own mouth is going to condemn him. Men are so mad at the gospel.
And men are listening to the gospel the wrong way. We all
do by nature when we hear it. Men are listening to the gospel
and think, well, that sounds like that's against me. If God
only saves those He chooses and Christ only died for those God
elected, that's against me. No, no. That's not what's against
you. What's against you is you. That's what's against us by nature.
Us. Not the gospel. The gospel saves,
but we're going to have to be brought to bow to it. Now look
here, Matthew 12, 34. O generation of vipers, Christ
speaking, O generation of vipers, how can ye, being evil, speak
good things? For out of the abundance of the
heart the mouth speaketh. A good man out of the good treasure
of a regenerated heart brings forth good things. And an evil
man out of the evil treasure, and he's talking here about an
unregenerate heart, he brings forth evil things. But now watch
what he said. But I say unto you that every
idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof
in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be
justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. The man that
the Holy Spirit has entered and he's created a new heart out
of the abundance of his heart, he speaks good things. He comes
confessing he's a sinner, unable to save himself in order to make
himself righteous in need of mercy, and he confesses Christ
by his own mouth. Christ justifies him. This man
right here is a man that believes. And the sinner who is left to
himself out of that wicked, evil heart rejects Christ and rails
against the gospel. And Christ said, by your own
mouth you are going to be condemned. By your own mouth. Well, I believe
that a man has a will to come to God, by your own mouth you're
going to be condemned. So then when you stand before
God in judgment, and you meet God, meet the real God, and God
says to a man like that, why didn't you ever come to Me? You
said by your will you could, why didn't you? You came to that God of your
imagination, but you didn't come to Me, God will say. I never
knew you, depart from Me ye that work iniquity. What did Christ say? Go to John
chapter 3. Look here. John 3.14 Listen to the grace of God right
here. John 3.14 He said, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the
wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that
whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have eternal
life. For God so loved the world after
this manner as how He loved the world, that He gave His only
begotten Son, that whosoever Whosoever, isn't that wide open? Can't you just picture Christ
standing there with His arms stretched from one side to the
other going, Whosoever believeth on Him shall not perish, but
have everlasting life. Because God sent not His Son
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through
Him might be saved. He's standing there saying, there's
nothing stopping anybody from coming to me as far as myself
stopping them or God stopping them. He sent me to lay down
my life so that whosoever they are, it doesn't matter if they're
a Jew or they're a Gentile. That's what he's telling Nicodemus.
He's saying, Nicodemus, you don't have this market corner just
because you're a natural son of Abraham. This is to a people
all over this world. Whosoever believes on him shall
not perish, but have everlasting life. But watch this. He says,
He, verse 18, he that believeth on him is not condemned. But
he that believeth not is condemned already. Why? Why is he condemned? Because
he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
You see? He was condemned already. And
the only way to not be condemned is to believe on Christ. So He
just didn't believe on Him. And because He just didn't believe
on Him, He just stayed in His condemnation. Right where He
was. Mark 16, verse 6, Christ said,
He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved. He that believeth
not shall be damned. He that believeth on the Son,
John 3, look there at verse 36. He that believeth on the Son
hath everlasting life. He that believeth not the Son
shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. Turn over
to 2 Thessalonians 2. I'm trying to show you this is
just, see, man's not going to be able to blame God for his
condemnation. God didn't... God's not the one
who brought sin into the world. Man is. Man is. 2 Thessalonians 2, it didn't
surprise God because it was in God's purpose. But man's the
sinner and we're the one that are the condemned ones and so
if God doesn't come and just save us and give us an all new,
everything new, we'll never... You will just be left in our
condemnation and we'll perish in it. So we can't get mad at
God and His gospel. We need to be getting mad at
ourselves and come bow to God. Look here, 2 Thessalonians 2.10. One more place I want to show
you. This is a great contrast right here to help us see this.
Verse 10. Look at the second part of verse
10 after the colon. It says, because they received
not the love of the truth that they might be saved. He's talking
about here, Satan's coming, he's going to deceive them in all
unrighteousness and they're going to perish. Because they received
not the love of the truth that they might be saved. You see
the reason? Because they received not the love of the truth that
they might be saved. Look at this, verse 11. And for
this cause, God shall send them strong delusion that they should
believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed
not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. Now that's
the cause for man's condemnation. What's going to be the cause
for his salvation? Verse 13, But we're bound to
give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the
Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you. to salvation,
through sanctification of the Spirit, belief of the truth,
whereunto He called you by our gospel to the obtaining of the
glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. So if a man perishes, see this
is my point to you, it's just, it's just, and here's why Christ
is saying it, He calls out in Psalm 35 and He says, He says, let them be confounded,
let them be ashamed. He said, let their ways be dark
and slippery. Let them be as chaff. Let the
angel of the Lord chase them away. Let the angel of the Lord
persecute them. Why? Because, because without
cause they've rejected me. Without cause they've rejected
me. So if a man perishes in condemnation, in final judgment, it's going
to be because he earned it. God's righteous. And a wage is
something that you earn, and a man who is a righteous man
will pay you what you have earned. And the wages of sin is death. And God's going to pay a man
what he earned. But you see, who makes the difference between
men like that? And that would have been all
our case if God had just, as men say, left it up to chance.
But God chose some to salvation. And because He did so, He sent
forth His Son and redeemed us and He sends forth His Spirit
and His Gospel and He calls us to Him and He makes us willing
to come to Him by His power and His grace. And you know that
there is a reason also why He is going to save His believing
people. There is a reason why He is going to save them too.
But the reason is not in them. The reason is in Christ. God
always just, He always damns or He justifies for the same
reason. A work has to be done. The cause
for damnation is the work of a man that is unjust. and sinful
and rejecting Christ. And the work by which a man is
justified is the work of Christ, by which He has justified him
and made him righteous. There is a cause to it. That
is why Christ had to come. Because righteousness had to
be established. Now thirdly, let's see this.
In the day of judgment, Christ and each of His people, because
this is so, because God is just and He is doing everything in
righteousness. In the day of judgment, Christ
and each of his people are going to rejoice at the righteous,
just salvation of God who saved us from all our enemies. We're
going to rejoice in God's righteousness. That's what we're going to rejoice
in. Psalm 35 9. Christ, let me remind you of
the context. Now He said, let their way be
slippery, let them be ashamed, let them be confounded, let them
go away as chaff. Why? Because it's just. They've
rejected Me, they've hit a net for Me. They've done that without
cause. And He says, and when you've
done this, Father, He says, My soul shall be joyful in the Lord,
and it shall rejoice in His salvation. And all my bones shall say, Lord,
who is like unto thee? Which delivereth the poor from
him that is too strong for him. Yea, the poor and the needy from
him that spoileth him. This is Christ our head. He says,
I'm going to rejoice from my very soul. I'm going to rejoice
in your salvation. And then he speaks about his
church. And he says, and all my bones,
all my body, all my members, just like the head is going to
rejoice in you, all my bones, all my members are going to rejoice
too. And he is going to bring all
his elect to rejoice just like he rejoices. And this is our
rejoicing. Who, Lord, who is like unto thee? There is no other God ever like
unto the Lord. None whatsoever. There's none
that does things like this right here that we're looking at in
righteousness. What does He do? He delivers
the poor from Him that is too strong for Him. And the poor
and the needy from Him that spoileth Him. That word spoileth means
that ruins Him and takes everything He's got from Him. Spoils Him. The poor and the needy. You know
who that is? as true sinners. The poor and the needy are ruined
by the fall. They are condemned. They are
unrighteous. By the first birth they are unholy. They can't do
one thing. They can't deliver. We couldn't
deliver ourselves. We couldn't make ourselves righteous.
We couldn't make ourselves holy. We couldn't even make ourselves
come to Christ. Why? Because there was somebody
too strong for us. That spoiled us and ruined us
and we couldn't do anything about it. Who is that? Who is Him that
is too strong for us? Who was it the Lord delivered
us from? First of all, it was our own sinful flesh. Our own
sinful flesh was too strong for us. If God had left us alone,
we would have just kept right on blaming God for sin rather
than blaming ourselves for it. But He sent forth the Holy Spirit
and He created in us a new spirit, a new heart, and He taught us
the Gospel. And He made us Christ, the Lord
said to Christ, the day of thy power, your people shall be willing
in the day of your power. And that's what He did. Made
us willing. Listen to this. Ephesians 1.22. I want you to
read this because I know I read it to you all the time. I want
you to see it again. I want you to see the last two verses and
the first verse. Listen to this. This is Christ. He's put all things under His
feet and gave Him to be the head over all things to the church
which is His body, the fullness of Him. And it's Him that filleth
all in all, and you hath He quickened. We were dead in trespasses and
in sin. Christ made us new. He delivered
us from our flesh by quickening us. Who else was the strong one
too strong for us? The curse of the law. The condemnation
that we earned, that's the curse of the law. And Christ came and
He put Himself in our stead. He gave the law perfect obedience
and He gave the law perfect death so that the law cannot ask for
anything else from Christ and therefore it can't ask anything
else for His people. The law canít ask anything else
from us ever. Just think about it. If you lived
in this town right here and somebody had fulfilled the law for you
in this town forever, and answered for all the speed limits you'll
ever break and for all the everything, you know, whatever else you ever
do that's against the law of ewing and so that you could not
ever break the law of ewing. All you ever can be looked at
by the powers that be in ewing is that you're a lawful man. That's all that can ever be said
of you. Is that going to make you What's
that going to make you do? I mean, is that, there's nothing,
you can't do anything that's going to change that. Wherever
you go, whatever you do, it's going to be that way. It's not
going to be able, you're not going to change it. You wouldn't
go around worried all the time and like looking over your shoulder
and every time you come around a bend seeing if there's a police
officer there. You're not going to be, the law can't say nothing
to you anymore. And when you see Christ has done
that for you, and bled for you, and suffered for you, and laid
down His life for you, it doesn't make you want to kick up your
heels and sin. That makes you want to, I want
to honor Him. I want to serve Him. I want to
send this gospel forth and see other sinners brought to Him.
He came forth and He laid down His life and He redeemed us from
the curse of the law by being made a curse for us. So that
the promise of God might come upon us and we might receive
the Spirit of God. And so now there's no condemnation.
No condemnation. The devil, he was too big for
us. He crushed his head on the cross
and he binds the strong man when he enters in. And one day he's
going to crush him for good and throw him out. This present evil
world and all our enemies in it. We got a lot of enemies in
this world. But every time anybody opposes
one of Christ's people, they oppose Christ. I want you to
go home tonight, and I want you to read this psalm, and I want
you to read it a different way than what I've been preaching
it to you right here. You remember Christ said Him and His people
are so one. He said that what you've done
to them, you've done to Me. And so you go home tonight and
read this psalm again, and you hear it like this, anytime somebody
comes seeking after me, or you who believe him, and they're
like persecuting you, we're so one with Christ that when He
intercedes for us, Christ can intercede like this, let them
be confounded and put to shame that seek after my soul. You get what I'm saying? He can
pray that in the first person because we're that one. Even
though it's you that's being persecuted, it's Him that's being
persecuted too. So He can say, they're persecuting
my soul. And because He's praying like
that, none of His saints have anything to worry about in this
world, brethren. We're of far more value to God the Father,
and He'll never let us go because our value is in His Son. being
connected and vitally united to his son. I read a story that
will illustrate this and I'm going to let you go. There was
an American tourist that went to Paris, Paris, France, and
he found this little old amber colored necklace, a little locket
on it, and in a trinket place, a little shop, like a little
rummage sale, cheap things, you know, and he paid a little money
for this necklace. And he started home, back to
the United States, and when he started through customs, they
took this necklace and began to look at it. And they made
him pay a large sum of money for the duty to get through customs
for this necklace. And he couldn't figure that out.
And he thought, what on earth? This is a cheap little trinket
I bought at a rum and sale. Why on earth did they charge
me so much money to get through customs with this little thing.
And so he took it to a jeweler and the jeweler looked at it
and he checked it out with his magnifying glass and the jeweler
turned to him and said I'll give you $25,000 for it. And the guy took it and he said,
I better get a second opinion on this. I don't know if that
guy is ripping me off. Maybe it's worth more than that.
He goes to another guy. He shows it to him. He takes
his magnifying glass. He looks at it. That guy said,
I'll give you $50,000 for it. He said, what in the world is
making this little cheap necklace cost so much? And the jeweler
said, come here. And he looked in there and it
said, from Napoleon Bonaparte to Josephine. It was because
it was connected to a famous person. And it made it of extreme
value. And all God's people in this
earth right now are vitally united to the most famous person ever. And that's our value. That's
why God the Father won't allow. Christ will intercede for us
and God the Father won't allow one of us to perish because we're
united to Christ. And there's our value. His glory
demands, His justice demands, His whole eternal purpose demands
that not one for whom He died ever perish. And so the last
enemy, brethren, that's going to be destroyed is going to be
death. Who is a God like unto thee?
He delivers from the poor. He delivers us from those that
are too strong for us. That's not so of other men's
gods. Think about that. You're utterly helpless. And the one you need to be delivered
from is everybody we need to be delivered from is too strong
for us. We can't deliver ourselves. That's
not so of any other God you hear men talk about. They can partially
deliver themselves by something they do. Whatever. Who's a God like unto thee? There's
not another one. Just ask men. They'll tell you.
My God's not like your God. I got things I'm responsible
to do for my God. Not mine. Mine does it all. How about you? I pray God, bring us to see that
in Christ, trust in Him, you're eternally secure. He's going
to protect you. But outside of Him, He's going
to be against you. And that's not a place you want
to be. Come and cast your care on Christ. He redeemed His people. He saves His people. He won't
lose one of His people. Amen.