Well, let's turn to Isaiah chapter
60. Isaiah 60. Our text is Isaiah 60, verses
15 through verse 22. I just want to read the first
verse and the last verse. Verse 15, he says, Whereas thou
hast been forsaken and hated, this is Christ speaking, And
he's speaking to his church. He's speaking to those that he
has saved by his blood. He says, Whereas thou hast been
forsaken and hated, so that no man went through thee, I will
make thee an eternal excellency. That's our subject, an eternal
excellency. I will make thee an eternal excellency,
a joy of many generations. And in the last verse he says,
a little one shall become a thousand, and a small one a strong nation. Now watch this, I the Lord will
hasten it in his time or in my time. And we will look at the
verses in between those verses now. Now, when I was on my recent
trip down to Kentucky and Tennessee, I was visiting with a lot of
brethren, some pastors and some other believers, and I like to
listen to believers older believers tell me about their family and
what's become of their family, what have you. Some of them expressed
it to me with great joy. The Lord was merciful. He called
their children. He gave them faith to believe
Christ. And when they left home, when
they went to a college, when they went to a job, when they
sought a place to begin a home and a family, They revolved their
whole life, built their whole life around the preaching of
Christ and Him crucified. In other words, they picked a
place where God had established a faithful church, where Christ
receives all the glory all the time. And that's where they went. That was first to them. It wasn't
something about the college, or something about the job, or
something about the economy. It was where can I worship Christ.
And they were so thankful for what God had done. And then I
had a few friends I spoke with who told me just the opposite
story. They told me their children sat under the gospel all the
years that they were growing up. And I thought about how long
that is, you know, that you sit there with your child under the
gospel. And they heard the truth preached.
Some professed to believe Christ. And then when they left home,
little by little, They moved away from the gospel. Some of
them became very successful in their jobs. The kinds of success
that most parents would look at and say, I'm so happy for
my child, I'm so proud of him. But I'm talking to believers
here that know they're proud of their children for what they've
accomplished. They see that the world, unless God does something
for them, the world has swallowed them up. They don't worship Christ
anywhere. They don't have any heart for
the gospel. And yet they sat there and heard
the truth preached all those years. And when I heard that
and I saw the broken heartedness of those that I was speaking
to, I began to think about my children. I have two young children. And I'm trying to teach them.
I'm trying to impress upon them how important it is to hear the
gospel preached. I'm trying to impress upon them
that when you go anywhere, you want to stay where you can hear
the gospel. When you marry someone as a believer, you want to marry
somebody, and listen to this now, you want to marry somebody
that knew the Lord before they knew you. Because folks that don't know
the Lord meet you, they'll jump through any hoop you put before
them to marry you. And then they'll go right back
to what they were doing. You want to know somebody knew the
Lord before they knew you. But I can't make my children
believe these things. We can't make our children believe
these things. We're entirely dependent upon God to do this.
But just hearing this made me think of you. It made me think
of all our young people here. And the thought that I want to
impress upon you is the same thing I said Thursday night.
Don't ever, ever take yourself out from under the preaching
of the gospel in truth. That's key, in truth. There's
a lot of places where they're preaching. But they're not preaching
the gospel. They're preaching man's works,
man's doing, man's party, man's hoop-de-doo, and they're not
preaching Christ according to this book. Find you a place where
Christ is preached and camp out there. And I'm saying this to
you whether you believe the gospel or you don't. If you don't even
believe the gospel, at least you can understand what I'm saying
with your head. And just like you would hear your parents tell
you to get you a good education and a good job, I'm telling you
first and foremost, plant yourself where the gospel is preached
because if Christ saves you, He's going to save you through
the declaration of His Word. That is so very important. God saves His people and He continues
to save His people until the end through the preaching that
glorifies Him. Now the sole purpose that He's
left His people in this world It's a two-fold purpose, but
it's just one purpose. Number one, it's for you and
I to be fed by Christ through the preaching of this Word. And
number two, it is that as He blesses us and equips us with
everything we need, it's for you and I as His church to promote
this Gospel in this world everywhere we can. Because it's through
this Gospel He's going to call out His lost sheep. Now that's
our purpose, brethren. It's not, you know, if you can
feed somebody along the way, and you can clothe somebody along
the way, and you can do something nice for somebody along the way,
that's wonderful. Do it, by all means. But our
purpose being here is preaching the gospel. Paul said, Christ
sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel. Not with wisdom
of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made an unaffected.
I'm just to declare what the book says. And that's what we're
to do. For and why? It's for our own growth, our
own spiritual benefit, and it's for the benefit of those Christies
who shall call out. Now what our text shows us here,
and the reason I've introduced this message like I did is because
our text shows us that the church of God, united with Christ, united
with His people, is the best place to be on this earth. It's the best place to be on
this earth. You won't find a better place
to be than in God's house with God's people at the feet of Christ.
You won't find a better place to be. And the reason that's
so is because in this passage, Christ declares that through
this gospel, He's going to make His church, He is going to make
His church an eternal excellency and a joy of many generations. He's going to do it through the
gospel. That's what He's going to do. Now let's look at it.
First of all, Christ makes His people what we were not. He says
in verse 15, Whereas thou hast been forsaken and hated, so that
no man went through thee, I will make thee an eternal excellency,
a joy of many generations." Now, Jerusalem at one time, and Isaiah
is preaching this to his people and his generation in Jerusalem.
And if you think about Jerusalem, you get the picture here of us.
Jerusalem started out established by God, set up by God, fed by
God, provided for by God, but they turned away from God. They
got fat and sassy and thought, we don't need God anymore, and
God took the hedge down away from them and let the enemy come
in and destroy them. so that every man everywhere
hated Jerusalem. They wouldn't go through Jerusalem
because Jerusalem was of no spiritual benefit to anybody. Well, that's
us by nature, brethren. God created us in the garden
and put us in the garden in Adam. All mankind was in Adam in the
garden. We were in Adam. This is the
Gospel 101, brethren. There's only two men in the world
God looks at, Adam and Christ. They're the two federal heads
and two federal representatives. That's what Romans 5.12 is declaring
to the end of the chapter. By one man, sin entered the world,
and death by sin. And so, death passed upon all
men, for that all have sinned. Adam sinned, and we became forsaken
and hated. But, all God's elect, He put
in Christ before that happened. So that by one man's obedience,
Christ who would come, He would save us and He would make us
in eternal excellency. He says here, just like you were
forsaken and hated, as much as you were forsaken and hated,
in the same degree that you were forsaken and hated, I'm going
to make you to the opposite extreme in eternal excellency. What did
we see this morning? You can't be saved until you
are a sinner. You can't experience the glory
of Christ's righteousness until you are just totally, thoroughly
unable to help yourself from beginning to end. And that's
what he's saying here. As much as you were forsaken
and hated, that's how much I'm going to make you an eternal
excellency. How much of a sinner are you? How much of a sinner
am I? God says, that one who sees himself
as the chief, he's going to see something in greater magnificence
of what Christ has done for him, because he's going to see what
a great depth of sin Christ has saved him from. And this is what
he's saying to his whole church. We broke God's law in Adam, we
became guilty in Adam, and then we were born of Adam. Did you
know you were born of Adam? Some people don't know they're
born of Adam. He had a child after His image. Not after God's
image, after His image. And He had a child after His
image, all the way down to you and me. So that we had His corrupt
sin nature. So now, we broke His law, that's
unrighteousness. We got His sin nature, that's
unholiness. We're unrighteous and ungodly. in Adam, by what
he did, by the sin of another. We came from a mother's womb
that way. You can't find scripture anywhere that don't declare that.
And if that's not true of you, Christ said, what did he say
this morning? I didn't come to call the righteous. I came to
call sinners. I came to call sinners. So, just like one man made us
a sinner, Christ, the last Adam, is going to make his people righteous.
Are you one of His people? Are you His church? That's who
He's speaking to here. Did you notice in that text that
Brother Art read? He talks about doing this for
some people and others it's not done for. You can't read that
text without seeing that, that there's some that this is not
done for, but for his church, this is what he's doing for his
church. Now the question is not, are you standing over there with
those people that are not his people and saying, well that's
not fair. The question is, are you such a God-hating rebel that
you can't be saved any other way than God saving you? That's
salvation. The word salvation means you
can't save yourself. That's what salvation's about.
You can't save yourself. Now, he says here, I will do
this. Christ says, I will do this.
I will make thee an eternal excellency. I will. God our Savior will. Why would anybody hate that?
Why would anybody hate that you and I cannot contribute anything
to our salvation? There's one reason they'd hate
that. They want the glory. They want to be patted on the
back. They want to be somebody to say that they're not so bad.
They're really a good person. You're not good, and I'm not
good. There's none good, no, not one. That's Romans chapter 3. That's
quoted from the Psalms. There's none good, no, not one. There's none that even seeks
after God, he said. Much less understands God. That's
us. So he says, I will do this. What
does he say? I'll make thee. I'll make thee. I will make thee. We got to be
made. We got to be made. We got to
be made a new creation. He got to make something from
nothing. And that's what God does. And
He says, and I'll make thee what? An eternal excellency. Listen
to this. Let's look at some of these scriptures.
Exodus 15, 16. Most people never hear this preach
from the Old Testament because most people, preachers, don't
have any discernment. But in Exodus 15, 16, this is... I'm sorry, Exodus 15, 6. Listen to this. Thy right hand, O Jehovah, O
Lord. Who's God's right hand? Christ
the Lord. He is the Son of God. Thy right
hand, O Lord, is become glorious in power. Thy right hand, O Lord,
has dashed in pieces the enemy. And in the greatness of Thine
excellency, Thou hast overthrown them that rose up against Thee.
Thou sentest forth Thy wrath, which consumed them as stubble. Who did He defeat? Who did Christ
defeat for His people? all our enemies. Christ came
and He redeemed us from the curse of the law. That curse that was
upon us meant we couldn't know God, we couldn't understand God,
we couldn't keep the law, we couldn't justify ourselves from
our sin, we couldn't do anything. He redeemed us from that curse,
being made a curse for His people. And it means He saved us from
our sin. He put our sin away. He destroyed
Satan and death and hell for His people. This is what Christ
did. Thou hast dashed them to pieces. You've sent forth Thy
wrath and consumed them as stubble. When He sent forth His wrath
and consumed His Son on the cross, not consumed Him, but He sent
it forth and His Son consumed that wrath, that's when He consumed
our enemies. All our enemies. If Satan doesn't
have sin against you, he got no weapon against you. And God
says, I will not remember their sins anymore. Look at Deuteronomy
33. Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy
33. Deuteronomy 33, look here. It says in verse 29. Deuteronomy 33, 29. Happy art
thou, O Israel, You may help you understand Scripture.
Don't look at Israel as being that political nation over there
wallowing around in the dirt. That's not God's Israel. Romans 9, read this on your own,
tells you clearly, Israel, they're not all Israel which are in that
political nation Israel. Israel are God's elect. Israel
are those chosen of God. Israel are those He gave to God
before the foundations of the world, that are talked about
in Ephesians 1. And He says to us, Happy art thou, O Israel,
whose like unto thee. Now here's what Israel has to
be thankful for. All people saved by the Lord. A people saved by the Lord, the
shield of thy help. That's who the Lord is, who is
the sword of thy excellency. That's who He is. Thine enemies
shall be found liars unto thee, and thou shalt tread upon their
high places. That's what God says is going
to happen to His people. Now, I want you to turn with
me over to Psalm 47. Psalm 47. What's Christ going
to do for us? What's He going to give to you
and me? Did you know that whatever comes to pass for His church,
for His people, that's an inheritance given to us by Christ? It's His
to give us. He can give us what He will.
And it's an inheritance given to us by Him. I was talking to
Brother Tom Harding this week. And he called to talk to me,
and I told him, he was asking me about the building and stuff,
and I said, my biggest concern, I said, we can't really do anything
right now until we get the down payment where it needs to be,
and then we can meet with a banker. And I said, my biggest concern
is, there's so many brethren that's gonna, that's sending
help for us, and I'm afraid that this building's gonna get sold
off from under us, you know, and here are all these brethren
that sent us help. And Brother Tom put me at ease,
and he said, Well, if that happens, it's just because the Lord's
got something better for you down the road. And whatever we come, not just
with that building, but everything, whatever Christ shuts the door
and opens another one, it's because He's given us the inheritance
He'd have us to have. And He's going to do that all
through this life until the day He brings us into our eternal
inheritance. He's going to give us that. Now
look here. Look here in Psalm 47. Oh, clap your hands, all ye people. Shout unto God with the voice
of triumph. For the Lord Most High is terrible. He's a great king over all the
earth. That's what terrible means. He's
a great king over all the earth. He shall subdue the people under
us. Boy, that's good to know. Isn't
that good to know? They're going to sue us. They're
going to sue us. They're suing businesses already
for not making cakes for them, for whatever. They're going to
sue us for not marrying them. But God says, I'm going to subdue
the people under you. I'm going to subdue the nations
under you. Look at this. He, Christ, shall
choose our inheritance for us. Because Christ is our inheritance
and Christ is the excellency. You see that? He shall choose
our inheritance for us. Who's going to choose it? The
excellency. He who is the excellency of Jacob. He's the excellency of all us
chosen elect Jacobs. Are you a supplanter? That's
what Jacob means. Are you a thieving, cunning,
no good, sorry thief? He says, I'm going to choose
your inheritance for you. That's what our Savior said.
Whom He loved. Those He loved. Psalm 68, 34. Look there. Psalm 68. I'm just
trying to show you what this eternal excellence would mean.
Psalm 68, 34. Ascribe ye strength unto God. His excellency is over Israel,
and His strength is in the clouds. O God, Thou art terrible out
of Thy holy places. The God of Israel is He that
giveth strength and power unto His people. Blessed be God. This is what He means when He
says, I will make you in eternal excellency. And so this ministry
that He's given to us, We have this ministry and we don't have
to worry because the excellency of the power is not of us, it's
of Him. That's what He said. And so what
do we do? Let me show you Philippians 3.8.
Philippians 3.8. Here's what we do, because of
Christ teaching us this, because He's shown us that we can't save
ourselves by our law keeping. He's shown us all that we thought
we had confidence in before, being born of believing parents,
or being circumcised the eighth day, being baptized when you're
an infant, or sprinkled when you're an infant, Any of these
works, sir, being a Pharisee, a Pharisee, being a Baptist,
or a Presbyterian, or a Methodist, anything like that that we put
any trust in. Paul says this, verse 8, Philippians
3, 8, "...Yea, doubtless, and I count all things but loss for..."
What? "...the excellency." He said,
I'll make you an eternal excellency, and I count everything lost for
the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for
whom I've suffered the loss of all things, and do count them
but dung. Do you count your past religious
works that you thought were something? Do you count them dung? That's
what they are. I pray God to make you count
on dung. Why? That I might win Christ. You
can't have your works in Christ's works. They can't be combined
together. Now look, and be found in Him,
not having mine own righteousness. which is of the law, which is
of my doing, but that which is through the faithfulness of Christ,
through His doing, the righteousness which is of God, given to us
by faith, that I may know Him, and the power of His resurrection,
the fellowship of His sufferings be made conformable unto His
death, that I, if by any means I might attain to the resurrection
of the dead." That's where he says, I will make you in eternal
excellency. He's our strength. He's going
to subdue our enemies. He has and He shall. He's going
to give us an eternal inheritance. It's an excellent inheritance.
The excellency of the powers of Him. And He makes us to say,
I don't want anything but the excellency of the knowledge of
Him. This is where He brings His people. Have you been brought
there? If you are, He's made you a part of our church. The
church of God. But if not, still part of that
harlot church hates God and wants to have the glory. Now brethren,
He promises to make you and I, who are His church, a joy. Look here in Isaiah 60 verse
15. This is one of the things He
means by making us in eternal excellency. And look who He is
going to make us a joy to. Isaiah 60 verse 15, He says, Thou hast been forsaken and hated,
so that no man went through thee. You were not profitable to anybody.
He says, Now I will make thee an eternal excellency, a joy
of many generations. He says, I will make you a joy
to one generation after the next. That's what he's saying. To many
generations. This year I turned 45 and I've
been thinking about my life and looking forward and back and
all that and I've been thinking about this. I grew up, unlike
so many, I grew up under the sound of the gospel. My grandfather
was James Watson, he was a preacher of the gospel and I grew up hearing
him preach the sovereign grace of God. He taught me the scriptures
set by the garden, teaching me, taught me from the pulpit. He
taught me all the time. From the time I got up old enough
to pay attention, he was always teaching me the scriptures. In
about 1985, Henry Mahan came down to our congregation, was
out in the country, a little small congregation. He came down
there and preached the gospel to us. First time I ever knew
there was anybody else in the world that believed what we believed.
None of my friends did. All my friends were free will
works religious. They all believed they were saved
by their will and their works. I didn't have anybody that believed
God saves by sovereign grace, salvation by grace, apart from
any works by His people. I didn't know that. I didn't
know anybody else that preached that. And He preached that to
us and the Lord used those men. Other men came, and the Lord
used those men eventually to reveal Himself in me. And because
Christ made Himself a joy to me, Christ made those men a joy
to me. And those churches that supported
those men that came, they were made a joy to me. I received
those tapes from 13th Street, and my grandfather listened to
them, I listened to them, and those brethren there are scattered
in so many different places. And they were a joy to me because
they supported that ministry to send that gospel to me. And
those brethren in my local church were a joy to me because they
provided that gospel for me. Now here we are. Now here we
are. The Lord has raised up a church
in New Jersey from the country backwood rural road of South
Arkansas to Princeton, New Jersey. Raised up a church. And He saved
some people here. He's called some of you young
people. And when He's made Himself a joy in your heart, you know
what He's done? He's made these brethren a joy to you for preaching
that gospel to you. He's made those men a joy to
you for preaching the gospel to you. I don't even have to
know a man. I just hear that He preaches
the gospel and hear that message and He means something to me.
He's a joy to me. And he said, I'm going to keep
doing that. I'm going to keep making you a joy from one generation
to the next, from one generation to the next. You know, when you're
young and you're looking at things you want to do in your life,
you got all these dreams and all these aspirations and all
these things that you think would be great things to make your
mark on the world. Let me tell you something. There's
no greater benefit you can do to the world, no greater legacy
you can leave, no greater profitability you can add to any person than
this. To be sitting right where you're
sitting, believe in Christ, support in His gospel, and rejoice in
Him. Nothing could be greater. This
world don't believe that. No, no. Men leave the gospel.
Men leave pulpits to get in political offices. And you know what they
do? They take a giant step down when they do it. Folks leave
the church and go to Washington D.C. to run the country. You
know what they do? Take a giant step down. Back up. Just completely
back up. No greater benefit. Now when
you're You're teaching folks and you're doing things. Wherever
you're going, whatever you're doing as a young believer, as
an older believer, whatever, we have a tendency to be looking
up to people that's taught us and helped us and encouraged,
you know, and we're always looking up to them because they're a
joy to us. Well, remember, Christ is going
to make His people a joy to that younger generation too. There's
somebody looking at you. And don't forget that there's
somebody looking at you. There is somebody that the Lord
is using you to make himself a joy unto. And so, be a witness
for Christ to them. Teach them Christ and set an
example for them of what it is to have a new character and a
new nature put in you by Christ. And show them and teach them
Christ in every way. Now, let's move on. Now, he says
here, he's going to do this work through the gospel. Verse 16.
Thou shalt also suck the milk of the Gentiles, and shalt suck
the breast of kings. And thou shalt know that I, the
Lord, am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob. Now,
the way you understand Old Testament Scriptures, you look at it like
this. Now, when he called out his Gentile people, and he said,
I've called them out, I've made them my church. He said, I'm
going to spread the gospel through them, and I'm going to start
calling out my elect from among the Jews. And in one sense, he's
speaking to them here. And he's telling them, you're
going, you think right now that you're somebody and that you,
you know, because you're the children of Abraham, you're my
people. But he's saying here to them is, I've chosen my people
from among you. And I'm going to assemble you
together. I'm going to destroy Israel. And I'm going to assemble
my people together who are my true people from among Israel.
And you're going to suck the milk of the gospel from my Gentile
church that I've saved. But brethren, this is true now
of all of us. God's elect are just scattered
throughout the world now. He says in Christ, there's neither
Jew nor Gentile. There's neither rich nor poor,
bond nor free, male nor female. He's calling His people. He's
calling out His people. And when He calls His people,
He makes you to suck the milk of the gospel from those He sent
to preach it to you. And he says here, and you're
going to do this, you're going to suck the breasts of kings.
You know what he says he makes his people? He says, I make my
people kings. I make them kings and priests.
He's saying, let me word it to you this way. You're going to
suck the milk of the gospel from my people that I've called out
already from among the Gentiles and made to be my people and
made kings and priests unto me. You're going to suck the milk
of the gospel from them and that's how you're going to be saved.
That's how I'm going to make you in eternal excellency. That's
how I'm going to make you enjoy many generations. That's what
he's saying. And that's what he does through
the Gospel. Look at 1 Peter 1.23. I want you to see that he's talking
about the Gospel. 1 Peter 1.23. For somehow we
can look into Shakespeare and we can see his similes and his
metaphors and we can, boy, we can really read into that anything
and believe anything a professor tells us. But when it comes to
the Gospel, where Shakespeare got his understanding of using
similes and metaphors, we have a problem looking at how God
speaks and saying, well, that's true, he's talking about the
gospel when he talks about milk. That's what he's talking about.
Why? Because here, look, 1 Peter 1.23, We're born again, not of
corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God. which liveth
and abideth forever. Look at verse 25. And this is
the word which by the gospel is preached unto you. Now look
at chapter 3, verse 1. Wherefore, lay aside all malice. He's saying, anything else that
you think is important, put it aside because it's not important. Put it aside. Everything that
would interfere with you or interrupt you in the gospel in verse 2.
And as newborn babies, desire the sincere milk of the word
that you may grow thereby. I'm sorry, did I say three? Two.
Chapter 2, verse 1. Lay aside all malice, verse 2
says, and as newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the Word
that you may grow thereby. That milk, that life, that growth,
that's Christ Himself. What are you going to know? Look
at verse, back at our text, verse 16. What are you going to know
through this gospel that I'm going to give you through my
church, through my kings? Look at verse 16. Thou shalt
know that I, the Lord, am thy Savior and thy Redeemer, the
Mighty One of Jacob. That's what you're going to know.
We know this is talking about the Gospel because that's what
the Gospel teaches us. This Gospel is not to teach you
how to be moral. Watch Andy Griffith if you want
to learn how to do that. This book is to teach you Christ
is righteousness. Your only righteousness. He's
salvation. He's all to His people. That's
what this book's about. He says, Thou shalt know. His
people are going to know. He's going to make His people
know. You have an option from the Holy
One, John said, and you know all things. When do we know all
things? When we know Christ is all. Till
then, we don't know a thing. Till God makes you know Christ
is all. If you got Christ, you got everything God requires.
And if you don't have Christ, you got diddly-squat. And until
you know that, you don't know nothing. Christ is all. He's
all. He says, you're going to know
this, that I the Lord am thy Savior, and thy Redeemer, and
thy Mighty One of Jacob. I'm thy, I the Lord, the Son
of God. God the Son. I'm thy Savior. God's my Savior. God is my Savior. I just get tickled saying that.
God is my Savior. I know He's my Savior. God is
my Savior. Look at this. And He says, You're
a Redeemer. What do you do when you redeem
something? You pay a price. He paid the price of His blood.
You know what He did at that cross? You know, this is how
I know Christ is my Redeemer. Christ went to that cross and
He was made me. He went to that cross. He was
made sin, Scripture says. And having been made sin, he
didn't know any sin, he did not sin, he's not a sinner, but he
was made sin. And having been made sin, made
of a woman, made under the law, made sin, he was made a curse. for his people, for us, the scripture
said. And by that, God poured out everything
justice could pour out on Christ Jesus so that it exhausted the
justice, it satisfied the justice, so that God says now, I am totally,
thoroughly satisfied toward my people. And Christ is telling
us here, I'm going to send the gospel to every one of them,
because they're lost and dead and they don't even know it.
They can't know it. And I'm going to send the gospel to them, and
by my Spirit, thou shalt know that I am the Lord your God,
your Savior, your Redeemer. I'm going to make you know it.
Has He made you know it? He's going to make His people
know it. Anybody that you have enmity in your heart at this
message, do you hate what you're hearing? Let me tell you something. If you die right now, God will
justly, thoroughly throw you in hell and punish you because
you don't know God. I can't say that emphatically enough, and
I'm your friend to teach you. Other preachers have been ripping
you off. You need Christ. That's all. That's all. Just Christ. But
preacher, don't I have to do something? You need Christ. That's
all. You're going to know it, he said.
You're going to know I'm the mighty one of Jacob. There's only one
mighty one. He's the mighty one of Jacob.
And when it says he's the mighty one of Jacob, it means he's the
son of man too. He's the God-man. Now look here. What does he give his child when
he does this? Verse 17. For brass, I will bring gold. We got everybody
here with common sense. Which one do you want, brass
or gold? For brass, he said, I'll bring gold. For iron, I'll
bring silver. For wood, I'll bring brass. And
for stones, I'll bring iron. In other words, in every way,
in every area, in everything, I'm going to make it better,
better, better. That's what it means. Listen
to the Scripture. Hebrews 8, 6, 6, Now Christ hath
obtained a more excellent ministry. What is he talking about doing
for us? Making us an eternal excellency. Now Christ hath obtained
a more excellent ministry. More excellence than what? In
all that Old Testament covenant of works. It's a more excellent
ministry by how much He also is the mediator of a better covenant
which was established upon better promises. Why is it better? Because He don't give me and
you anything to do. That's what's better about it.
That's what's better about it. That wisdom we thought was wisdom,
it was just wood. And He gives us something better. Christ our wisdom. What we thought
was righteousness, it was just tarnished brass. And He gives
you gold of His righteousness. You see what I'm saying? Better,
better, better. Instead of a haughty, arrogant, self-centered, self-righteous,
He gives us now somebody seated at Christ who sees Him as altogether
lovely. Better, better, better, better.
When you attend services, when you come here, when you go to
a conference, First and foremost, go for this reason. Go to hear
Christ. Because He's the excellency of
the message. He's the excellency. He's the
purpose. He's the one giving us everything
better, better, better, better, better. Go hear Christ. But I'm
fearful today that I hear a lot of young people talking about
going to conferences and they're treating it like it's a party.
Because they want to see their friends. It's good to see your
friends. It's good to meet, you can meet, some people met spouses
at conferences. It's better, you won't find a
better place to look for a spouse than at a church. For a belief. That's the best place to look
for one. It's a whole lot better than a honky tonk. Or the club. But listen to me. When you go
there, go to hear Christ preach. Come to church, really try to
pick up the book, and even if you don't know it, just come
here saying, alright, today I'm going to pay attention. I really
want to hear Christ. I want to hear Him. I want to
hear and look in His Word and see what He says, and come to
hear Him. I tell you, He says, when you
come like a little child to hear Me, I'll give you an understanding.
I'll make you hear Me. And of course we know if we come
like a little child, he's made us to do it. You'll see that
later as he saves you. You won't be boasting in yourself,
but all I'm saying, come hear him. He makes everything better.
Makes everything better. Lastly, He's going to make His
church a safe, peaceful place. Now look here in verse 17. These are the better things He
gives us too. In addition to Him and righteousness and holiness,
look at verse 17. I'll also make thy officers peace
and thine exactors righteousness. You know what most people hate
about church? This is, I guess, ironic. Creatures that have all
these programs and all these things that they think are going
to make people want to come to church, they're always going
around, them and their CIA and spying on people and trying to
make people come and do all these fun programs. They're exacting
on people all the time. That's what people don't like.
If the preacher would just quit being there, and they had somebody
stand up and just preach Christ, and leave it alone between God
and that sinner, God's going to draw His people, make them
come. It's the preacher with his gimmicks and his exacting
of all this stuff that people hate. But Christ said, I'm going
to make your officers peace. I'm going to make them righteousness.
He makes His people, His preachers, and His deacons, and His people
that are leading in His church, He makes them to rest in Christ,
and trust Christ, and know that Christ is working in His people
so that we don't have to go around trying to whip people into obedience. Oh, that's awful. That's misery. When you go out and you try to
cut a tree down, you have an axe. The sharper that axe is,
the less strength you've got to use to cut the tree down.
And we're all a tree that needs to be chopped down by nature.
The sharper you stand up and clearer you boldly declare Christ,
the less personal, fleshly strength has to be used. Because Christ
does all the work. Occasionally, you have to rebuke.
And you just have to because sometimes we're sinners. And
sinners don't pay attention and we get sidetracked and we start
distracting others. And you just have to turn folks
around so they go, now just listen to the Word. And that's offensive. People don't like that. They
get mad at you for a little while. But that's alright. Christ will
make them get over it. And they'll start rejoicing in the message
because they hear Christ preach. But that's the only time we have
to do that. Christ is going to work in His people and create
obedience in them through the Gospel. Christ gives us peace through
the gospel because He makes His people peaceful. He makes us
deal righteously with one another. Look at verse 18. Violence shall
no more be heard in thy land, wasting nor destruction within
thy borders, but thou shalt call thy walls salvation and thy gates
praise. You see, when you're seeking
security for yourself and you think you're your walls and you're
your gates and you're your own protection and your own salvation,
that'll make you a mercenary, cruel, panicking, frantic person. Because you gotta provide for
yourself. But when you know Christ is your walls and Christ is your
gates, that'll make you rest easy and peaceful, and you can
deal peacefully with your brethren. You know it's going to be alright,
Christ is providing. That's what He does. That's why
we don't have violence in the midst of the church. He's our
walls and our gates. And look, He's our light. Look,
verse 19, The sun shall be no more thy light by day, neither
for brightness shall the moon give light unto thee. What is
the sun and the moon? Natural light. He's saying here,
you're not going to walk by your natural wisdom and your natural
light anymore. That's not what His people walk
by. Look, but the Lord shall be unto thee an everlasting light,
and thy God thy glory. The glory of God is Christ our
light. And He's an everlasting light.
Look at verse 20. The sun shall no more go down,
neither shall thy moon withdraw itself. Now listen to me carefully. If you're trusting in your wisdom,
your works, your righteousness, your anything, are you getting
older? Are you getting weaker? And you're going to die, right?
If you're trusting in your wisdom, your righteousness, your works
in any way, the moment you draw your last breath, they're going
to draw their last breath. Everything you trust in is going
to die with you. Because it's of you. But if Christ is your
light, if God is your glory, if He's your righteousness, if
He's your salvation, He's everlasting. He don't ever die. So when you
close your eyes in death, all you'll do is put off this body
of death, and you'll wake up with Him in glory. Because it's
everlasting light. And He says, so for His people
right now, we have this. We're going to have it great
in glory. Perfectly in glory. But we have it now. And this
light won't ever be taken from us. Never taken from us. Alright,
now look. He says here, He also gives this
too. He says, the days of thy mourning,
end of verse 20, the days of thy mourning shall be ended.
One day is going to wipe away all our tears from us. I want
you to think of this and understand this. The only way we mourn right
now is in our flesh. It's our flesh that mourns. We
don't mourn in our spirit. Because we have rejoicing in
Christ. We have rejoicing. We don't have any reason to mourn
anymore in Christ. It's our flesh that mourns. We know Christ is doing everything
right, perfect, and we know that in the new man. And one day,
all we are going to be is the new man. And there will be no
more mourning. Now look at this. Christ is going
to do all this Himself. A little one shall become a thousand,
and a small one a strong nation. I, the Lord, will hasten it or
bring it to pass in His time, in my time. Isn't it good to
know we don't have to wring our hands, we don't have to resort
to gimmicks and tactics to try to get folks to come and try
to keep people here? We just preach Christ like He
said. He said, I'm going to grow you from one to as many as I'm
going to grow you to. A little one into a great many.
That's what he said I'm going to do. I'm going to do it in
my time, he said. You know, I was at Lexington last November and
I heard some great messages, wonderful messages. You know
what the best, most encouraging, comforting statement I heard
the whole time I was there? Somebody stood up and said, I
remember when I came to this church and Brother Todd was preaching
and his pulpit was a trash can turned upside down. That was
the most encouraging word I heard. Now they got, what, 300 members
down there? I don't know. House full of folks. He said, I'll do it in my time.
I'll do it in my time. Now hear this and let me close. I'm fearful for young people
in this generation. This generation, every generation
is going away from God. But every now and then you see
this world make a giant leap away from God. And here lately,
this world's made a giant leap away from God. In a bunch of
ways. All over the world. A giant leap
away from God. And they hate God's Word, and
they hate the Gospel, and they think everything they're doing
is right. It's right. Just because man makes a law
and makes it right, don't mean God says it's right. Read God's
Word and find out what He said. and believe God. But that makes
me fearful for young people in this world, the way the world
is accepting wickedness and teaching you to accept it, and condemning
you if you don't accept it. It's going to take God to teach
you this. Right here, in this place, by His grace, by His work,
Everything Christ said He'd give His people, that's what we have.
This is an oasis. This is a place nothing like
this world. This is a place that He's made
an eternal excellency. A place with no violence, just
rest. Complete walls of that Christ,
capital S, is the salvation. He's the walls, He's our salvation.
His gates, capital G, is praise. Capital P is praise. It's Him. He's our walls and He's our gates.
We have peace. And it's going to get better
and better and better and better and better. It ain't never going
to stop getting better. I pray He'll teach you that.
Oh, don't run after this world. You're running after a road kill.
Relieve Christ. Amen. Father, thank You for Your Word.
We ask You to bless it now in Christ's name. In His name we
pray. Amen.