Now, I want to give you a what-if this
morning. What if this Gospel that I've
been declaring to you is true? And you pass from this world
having never believed God and His Gospel. for those who don't believe,
for those who are seeking to know the Lord and seeking Him
and may have some light and are trying to seek Him. I have this
message for you. I've been thinking about this
for quite a while. What if this message that I've
been preaching to you is true? What if you went to bed last
night like you've done hundreds of times before And you woke
up around one o'clock this morning and thought you were going to
wake up and you were going to be staring at your ceiling in
your bedroom. And you woke up and you were
standing in front of holy God. And He said to you that everything
that you've heard preached to you was true. And He said to
you that you're not only accountable for what you heard, but for what
you could have heard. If what I preach is true, where
does that leave you? Your unbelief would not have
altered God's truth at all. Your unbelief wouldn't have changed
God's faithfulness or altered His faithfulness at all. And
yet you would be in outer darkness, in hell, right now, while we're
still calling around trying to comfort your loved
ones because we just got the news. What if what I'm telling you
is true? Where does that leave you? In the second hour, I have
a message that I think is going to be a great comfort for you
who believe and trust our Lord. But in this hour, I want to speak
to you who don't yet believe. I want to speak to you who who
are seeking the Lord. And I want to give you some simple,
basic things to think about. I want to give you some simple
truth about believing God, about faith, about some of the things
that hinder sinners from even truly seeking God. I want to
talk to you about obstacles of faith. Obstacles of faith. Now, what is faith? Hebrews 11
says, faith is the substance, it's the ground, it's the confidence,
the understanding, that which we stand upon. It's the foundation. Faith is
the substance of things hoped for. Faith is the evidence of
things not seen. For by it the elders obtained
a good report. All those that went before that
died in faith obtained the witness from testimony from God Almighty
that they were righteous through this thing called faith. Look at verse 6. But without
faith it is impossible to please Him. For he that cometh to God
must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of them that
diligently seek Him. Here's the first thing. Be very
afraid of being wise in your own eyes. That's good for any
of us and all of us. Be afraid, very afraid of being
wise in your own eyes. The person who reasons himself
qualified to judge and to examine the truth of God, by that imperfect
and depraved thing called our reason. The person who thinks
he can do that, he won't ever know God and he won't ever believe
God by that reason. He just won't. He just won't. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for. Faith is the evidence. Faith's
the proof. Faith is... Believing God is
where you're going to find the evidence. It's where you're going
to find the proof. It's where everything's going to make logical,
reasonable sense. God's got to make us reason according
to His reason, not our reason. And whatever knowledge a sinner
thinks that he's got, whatever he thinks he has, it doesn't
endear God to you. It doesn't endear God to us.
But whatever wisdom that we put some confidence in, whatever
knowledge we think we've acquired, whether it's in this book or
whether it's in all our studies or whatever, wisdom that we have
obtained ourselves that makes us think we're really wise and
prudent will greatly, greatly hinder us from believing God.
it'll greatly be an obstacle for us in believing God. We have
to drop all our so-called knowledge. We have to drop all of our so-called
understanding. We have to come to Christ because
in Christ are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. It please God that in Christ
Jesus all fullness should dwell and if we're going to have wisdom
and knowledge, true wisdom and true knowledge, we have to check
our wisdom and our knowledge at the door, at Christ the door. And we have to come in the wisdom
and knowledge of God. And whatever wisdom we thought
we had, if it's not the wisdom of God, we need to drop it and
bow down to God's wisdom and God's truth. If we come here
to the gospel, or we go to the scriptures, and we have a high
opinion of ourselves, and we think we can understand what
this book teaches without God the Holy Spirit teaching us what
this book teaches. This book will remain sealed
to us. We won't know a thing about what God's saying. We don't
even reason correctly till God gives us light. We just don't. If we come with a simple, come
with a simple, most elementary, most basic belief that God alone
is and that God alone is able to show you and teach you and
make Himself known in our hearts. Come, just a simple, elementary,
basic dependence upon God to teach us. Just come saying with
David, open thou mine eyes that I may behold wondrous things
out of thy law. God will teach us then. God will
teach us then. But he that cometh to God must
believe that he is. and that He is the rewarder of
them that diligently seek Him. That's how we have to come. But
as long as we approach God, expecting God to prove to us that God is,
expecting God to owe us the reward of teaching us about Him because
we've sought Him, then in either case, we haven't come believing
God and we haven't come seeking God. If we come to God expecting
God to prove to us He is, God doesn't subject His truth to
us and for us to take it and reason with it and decide if
it's true or not. God commands us to submit to
Him. He commands us to believe Him. He commands us to believe
Him. You say, well, I've asked God.
Have you really asked God? Have we really asked God? Or have we been doing God a favor
just to see, been trying to do God a favor just to see if He
wants to save someone as wise and as prudent as we are? I can
give you a guarantee. God has no interest in saving
anybody as wise and prudent as any man thinks he is. He got
no interest in it. In fact, the Lord Jesus said,
I'm thankful, Father, that you've hidden these things from the
wise and prudent and revealed them unto me. Christ is the way, and He's the
truth, and He's the life. And He said, no man comes to
the Father but by Me. And He promised this. He said,
ask and it shall be given you. He said, seek and you shall find,
knock and it shall be opened unto you. That's what Christ
Jesus said. Come unto Me, all you that labor
and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. I'll give you
rest, he said, take my yoke upon you and learn of me for I'm meek
and I'm lowly in heart. And you'll find rest unto your
souls. If we come with the idea that God's gonna have to prove
to us and convince me, you got to convince me, God. You know
what we're doing? We're seeking him way too high.
Way too high. Because he's meek and lowly,
Christ Jesus. in whom all the treasures of
wisdom and knowledge is, He's meek and lowly. We can't come
to Him in our haughtiness looking down on God. We're going to have
to get lower than He is and look up to Him. And He'll teach us. He'll teach us. You know, when
the Lord Jesus taught, He sat down and He taught. He sat down
and He taught. When Mary came and she was learning
from Him, you know where she was? She was at His feet. She
was lower than He was. And He was sitting down. We've
got to come down. We've got to come lower. Come
lower. If our seeking is because God's
already given us light, which is the only way we're going to
seek Him, if He's already given us light, then come believe in
God is. and come believing that God is
able to give, that God is able, that He's able, or else if we're
seeking Him just in the sparks that we've kindled, then we're
coming to God with a double mind. We're coming expecting for ourselves
that God is, expecting or proving for ourselves or to ourselves
that God is, and we're really expecting to learn these things
on our own and seek these things and find them out on our own.
We're not gonna find God out that way. Which it's not. Christ
said, ask and it shall be given you. He said, come to me and
you shall find rest for your souls. Listen to what James says
in James 1.5. He said, if any of you lack wisdom,
let him ask of God that giveth to all liberally and upbraideth
not. He just pours it out in abundance
and he doesn't upbraid. And it'll be given him. But let
him ask in faith. Nothing wavering, for he that
wavereth is like a wave on the sea. He's driven with the wind
and he's tossed. Let not that man think he'll
receive anything from God. A double-minded man is unstable
in all his ways." So we haven't really sought God. If we come
to God with any other reason or for any other motive or from
any other agenda, than just simply to be taught of God. To have
God teach us what He would have us to know and not us exalt ourselves
to try to teach everybody around us what we know and try to prove
something to ourselves about God. We're going to have to learn
from God. That's how we come to it. Now, I'm not speaking
right now about the necessity of the new birth, which is absolutely
a necessity. I'm not speaking right now about
the fact that no man can come except the Father drawing, which
is an absolute necessity. But I'm simply trying to meet
you right where you are, right where you are right now. That's
where I want to meet you. It's a very dangerous thing for
us to regard ourselves wise enough to figure God out by our vain
reason. If we could, God wouldn't receive
all the glory. If we could do that, it wouldn't
be God receiving the glory for revealing himself in us. He that
cometh to God must believe that he is and that he's a rewarder
of them that diligently seek him. So the first thing is it's
very dangerous to be wise in our own eyes. Second thing is
it's dangerous to come to the word of God expecting to be able
to understand or to account for everything in the word of God.
Faith is the evidence of things not seen. That's what it is. That's the very thing faith is. It's the evidence. It's the proof
of things that are not seen. Things that aren't going to be
figured out reasonably and logically and to your satisfaction necessarily. When I was a child, I remember
that when I was a child in my father's house, my earthly father
didn't tell me all his business. He didn't tell me all his business.
And yet, I ate at his table. He put clothes on my back. I
had a roof over my head. I always had everything I needed
without him telling me everything he was doing. And right now,
I'm a grown man, and he still doesn't tell me all his business.
Not all God's business is our business. Not all God's business
is our business. The secret things belong to the
Lord our God, but those things which were revealed belong unto
us and to our children forever. We read here in Hebrews 11.3,
it says, through faith we understand. That's what faith is. That's
what the word substance means. It's a word that really from
two words that means understand. By faith we understand that the
worlds were framed by the word of God so that the things which
are seen were not made of things which do appear. And I'm saying
to you now, don't expect to be able to understand and account
for everything. Somebody will hear that and they'll
ask this question, but what happened before that? What happened before
that? Well, God tells us exactly in
the first beginning verses of Genesis. He tells us exactly
all the things that He created. when he made the universe and
this earth and all things in it. You and I can't even get
into our puny little head the wisdom and the amazing thing
of that. How do we think we're going to
enter into whatever God was doing before that? He might be sparing
our puny little brain from just blowing up by not telling us
what he did before that. Our so-called intellect is so
polluted that when we can't answer a question like that, man thinks
it's more wise to just say, well, I just won't believe God then. Is that wisdom? We want God to
teach us according to his wisdom. Is that wisdom to come to a place
where we just say, well, I don't believe God? Then if I can't
figure out everything about God and make it make sense to me,
then I'm just not going to believe Him. Have you ever looked at
how God says He made the firmament? I just sat and looked at this.
Let's look over there. Genesis 1, Genesis 1-6. I want you just to look at this. God said, Genesis 1-6, God said,
let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters. Here you
have just waters is all you got. We're not talking about just
the oceans here on this earth. We're talking about whatever
there was, it was just waters. There was just waters. And he said, let there be a firmament
in the midst of the waters and let it divide the waters from
the waters. So now you've got a division
between the waters. And God made the firmament and divided the
waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above
the firmament, and it was so. So now you've got a firmament
created, an atmosphere created, a universe created. And God called
the firmament heaven. And the evening and the morning
were the second day. He just did this in a day. in
a day. And God said, let the waters
under the heaven be gathered together into one place. Now
we're talking about the earth. Let the waters under the heaven
be gathered into one place and let the dry land appear. And
it was so. You see, the land comes up out
of these waters that were under the waters that were under the
waters that are above. And God called the dry land earth.
And the gathering together of the waters called he seas. And
God saw that it was good. Look down at verse 14. And God
said, let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to
divide the day from the night. And let them be for signs and
for seasons and for days and for years. And let them be for
lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the
earth. And it was so. And I don't think that we're
fixed to talk about the sun and the moon here, but I think all
those lights are the planets and the stars and everything
else out in the heavens. And then God made two great lights,
the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light to rule
the night. He made the stars also. And God set them in the
firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth and to rule
over the day and over the night and to divide the light from
the darkness. And God saw that it was good and the evening and
the morning were the fourth day." Well, how do we know that's so?
But how can you tell me, prove to me that's so? Prove to me
that that really is how this world came into being. I'm not
going to try. I'm not even going to try. Through faith we understand that
the worlds were framed by the word of God so that the things
which are seen were not made by the things which do appear.
That's all the wisdom I need. God said it. God said it. That's how it is. I want you
to listen to the difference in a heart. between a haughty heart
who thinks himself wise and prudent and thinks himself so high that
God's got to prove everything to him, and I want you to listen
to the difference in a simple, childlike heart of someone who
just believes God. Here's the wisdom of the wise
and prudent. Look over at Romans 1. Romans 1. Paul says, Romans 1.20, Paul
says, "...the invisible things of God from the creation of the
world are clearly seen." Anybody can look and see these things.
"...being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal
power and Godhead, so that they're without excuse." They're without
excuse. There it is. We've got this whole
witness right here in this natural light that He's given right here.
We've got all this creation, what He's done. But now here's
this spirit of, we got to have everything make sense in our
mind. Here it is. When they knew God, verse 21,
they glorified Him not as God. Neither were thankful, but became
vain in their imaginations. How do you think it came about?
Well, here's what I think happened. And started talking about all
those things, what happened. And their foolish heart was darkened. It's not called wisdom. This
is God speaking it through his servant. It's not called wisdom.
It's called vanity. It's called foolishness. Professing
themselves to be wise, that's easy. That's easy. I got a little
dog about this tall. It runs out anytime a squirrel's
out there and just starts barking and barking and barking. It's
professing itself to be wise. It can take on anything out there
in that yard. There was a piece of tin foil
laying on the back patio out there and the wind blew it across. He jumped and took off running
back in the house like it scared him to death. It's easy to profess
ourselves wise. But doing so, they became fools.
and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God. He's not gonna
be corrupted. He's not being corrupted by any
of this. It's not affecting God whatsoever. They changed the glory of the
uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man,
and likened to birds, and like to four-footed beasts and creeping
things. They said, these are our gods right here. We worship
them. Wherefore God also gave them
up to uncleanness through the lust of their own hearts to dishonor
their own bodies between themselves, who changed the truth of God
into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than
the creator who's blessed forever. Now let me show you a scripture
that shows us the heart of somebody who believed God. Psalm 139. Look at Psalm 139. Now that's
the heart we just looked at of those that have to have it. God's
got to prove Himself to me. And when it comes to can't be
proven, he says, well, there is no God. And God said, he said,
the fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. Not the wise
man, the fool. And God says this about that.
You take the, there is out. That's put in by the translators.
What the fool has said in his heart is no God, no God. No. God says this is how I did
it and the fool's saying no. He's saying no. And the amazing
thing is, is amazement upon amazement and wisdom upon wisdom is in
all that first creation. God, everything He made, He made
to glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. All things were made by Him and
for Him. to show how he saves sinners
and how he creates sinners anew and how he's the light and how
he's the atmosphere. The Spirit of God is the atmosphere,
the firmament in which the light's going to shine. It's the firmament
in the atmosphere in which we're going to come in and be able
to breathe and know we really have life. because of that firmament. Everything pictures his salvation
from the beginning. We looked Friday night at that
study of the less a corn of wheat falls into the ground and is
broken, it doesn't bring forth any fruit. God didn't just look
at that and say, well, that looks like that'll be a good illustration.
He made it to illustrate that. He made it to illustrate that. Here's a contrite heart of faith.
Look at Psalm 139.6. Such knowledge is too wonderful
for me. It's high. I can't attain unto
it. Whither shall I go from thy spirit,
or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up
into heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold,
thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall
thy hand lead me, and thy right hand shall hold me. If I say,
Surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light
about me, yea, the darkness hideth not from thee. But the night
shineth as the day, and the darkness and the light are both alike
to thee. For Thou hast possessed my reins, Thou hast covered me
in my mother's womb. I'll praise Thee, for I'm fearfully
and wonderfully made. Marvelous are all Thy works,
and that my soul knoweth right well. Don't think we're going
to be able to account for everything. Sinners, hear of God's electing
a people unto salvation in Christ Jesus before the world began.
You want to know what God did before He made this world? That's
what He did. That's what he did. We're going to bow to that? That's
what he did. You want to know? That's what
he did. That's why he made this heavens and this earth. But a
sinner hears that, they start asking, well, what about all
the rest of the sinners in the world? Here's what wisdom says
to you on that subject. Here's what wisdom, God who is
wisdom, this is what he says to you, make your calling and
election sure. He says, you strive to enter
in at the straight gate. You are the one who's going to
stand before God. God will take care of His business.
We don't have to trouble ourselves about that. Or somebody will
object and they'll say, that's not fair that God did that. Not
fair that out of a mass of fallen, unholy, ungodly, God-hating rebels
that God chose to save some freely by His grace. That's not fair.
Not fair that God sent His only begotten Son to glorify His holy
name in their salvation through the blood and righteousness of
His Son? Not fair that God gives such
undeserving, hell-deserving sinners all the riches of His glorious
presence in glory forever in a new heaven and a new earth
where we'll dwell with Him forever? That's unfair? What's the real
problem? Let's get honest about it. Let's
get real honest. What's the real problem? God
knows the inner thoughts of the heart. And this is what in John
3.19, John 3.19, this is what the Lord Jesus Christ said the
real problem is. John 3.19, this is the condemnation. That light is coming to the world
and men love darkness rather than light. Why? Because their
deeds were evil. For everyone that doeth evil
hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deed should
be reproved. There's a whole lot of things
that he wants hidden under that black light, under that cloud
of incense, but the real issue is what's lurking in the depths
of the heart. That's what the real issue is.
vile affections, burning lust, unrighteousness, fornication,
wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, envy, murder, debate, deceit,
malignity, whispers, backbiters, haters of God, disobedient to
parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, knowing the
judgment of God with those that commit such things are worthy
of death, but still delighting to do them. That's what's in
the heart. There's where the problem is. Now listen to me
closely, listen to me. Whether you're young or old,
it doesn't really matter what kind of club you're in. The next
time you're in the club, you go to the restroom, and your
head's pounding, and you're wobbly on your feet. Look down the wall
beside that commode and look down deep in that dirty little
black crevice in the floor all covered in filth and take a long
hard look at your heart before God. That's the problem. Sin's the
problem. That's why the Lord Jesus said,
Verily, verily, I say unto you, accept a man. Be born again. He can't see the Kingdom of God.
He just can't see it. But as it is written, I hath
not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of
man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him.
But God hath revealed them to us by His Spirit. The Spirit
searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. Man wants
to get deep, wants to be so deep, profound. I tell you the deepest,
most profound person is the simple, Believing child of God. He's
taught some deep things of God. Deep things of God. And he believes
Him. He believes Him. And he's the
wise man. The one that this world's walking
by and stepping over and telling to get out of the way. We don't
want to have anything to do with you. That one who's sitting at
the feet of Christ and worshiping Him. He's got some deep things
revealed unto Him. God has shown them to Him by
His Spirit and taught them to Him in His heart. Things done
in eternity. Things that have been done in
the incarnation and death and resurrection of His Son. Things
that are being done now by His providence in this earth. The
work of the Spirit. Things that are future. He sees
things about the resurrection and judgment and eternal glory.
While we look not at the things that are seen, but the things
that are unseen. For the things that are seen,
they are just temporal things. The man who thinks he's so wise
and he's got all this stuff he can see and all this knowledge
he can understand and all these things he can touch and all these
things he can enter into. If you and I can enter into it
by our intellect and our wisdom, it won't fit in a peanut. It
ain't worth knowing. But what God teaches, what God
teaches, these are mysteries, mysteries. And you won't ever
reason these things out. You won't ever come to a point
where you say, well, I can understand that. God made flesh and dwelt
among us. God born of a virgin who never
knew a man. God made sin who knew no sin. Christ died, married, rose again. He came to His own and they stood
there and watched the God-man ascend out of their midst, up
into the heavens, out of sight. He's coming again. He's going
to raise our bodies out of the grave. There's going to be a
new heaven and a new earth. We're going to walk with God
and talk with God and know God and be in His presence. And there's
going to be an outer darkness. where there's gnashing of teeth
called hell. And you want to try to enter
into all these things and account and say, well, now I logically
figure all that out, know all that. God's bigger than we are. He's just bigger than we are.
Be very afraid of being wise in our own eyes. Well, I'll have
to look at this other, this other a little later. Let me just say
this. It's dangerous to come to God
trying to figure God out. Faith is the evidence of things
not seen. Keep coming to hear this gospel
consistently, and that's the key word, consistently. Keep
coming consistently. We'll be accountable not only
for what we did hear, but also for what we could have heard.
And keep reading this word of God. and keep asking the Lord
Jesus Christ to open your understanding. This is what he said, turn you
at my reproof. Behold, I'll pour out my spirit
unto you. I'll make known my words unto
you. He said, I'll pour water upon him that's thirsty and floods
upon the dry ground. You remember those leprous men,
those four leprous men? They were over there, and it
was a famine, and the king of Syria had come in and taken over
Samaria, and they were sitting there, and I mean, these men
were starving to death. They're lepers. There's a famine
in the land. And one of them said, if we say
we'll enter into the city, there's a famine in the city, he said,
we'll die there. He said, if we sit still here,
he said, we're going to die here, too. And he said, now therefore
come, let us fall into the host of the Syrians. Let's fall into
the hand of the enemy. If they save us alive, they said,
we'll live. And if they kill us, we but die. We but die. And they went, and
the Lord had turned their enemy into a friend. And when they
got into that city, you know what they found? They found all
the bread they could eat. And they found all the treasure,
more treasure than they could carry out of there. What I'm
telling you is, you're gonna die. You're dead right where
you sit. You're gonna die. Whether you come or you stay,
you're gonna die. Go to Christ, go to him who you think is your
enemy, flee to him. And it may be that you found
that God has made that one that you thought is your enemy to
be your friend and you find bread everlasting and riches eternal
and salvation forevermore. So that your heart is rejoicing
and you just delight, delight yourself. I tell you this, I've
got something up on you that don't believe. I have been an
unbeliever. And now I am a believer. And
I can tell you this, for some, they think, well, my life won't
be as enjoyable as a believer. My life's been much better as
a believer than it was as an unbeliever. Much better. Much better. I don't have anything
to worry about. Nothing to worry about. All right. Amen.