All right, let's turn to Isaiah
chapter 46. I was planning to give you this as an introduction
for our message, and I just thought I would just go ahead and give
this as our Bible lesson. And then at 11 o'clock hour,
we'll look at this same verse in Isaiah 46 for our message.
Now, you and I do innumerable things, day in and day out, where
we purpose and we plan what we will do before we do it. We predetermine what it is we're
going to do. And then we go about and we do
all the things necessary to bring that to pass. We do that every
day. God saves His children the same
way. He predetermined how He would
do it and predestinated His children and works all things to bring
it to pass. Now we can't really compare ourselves
to God because God is infinitely more able to do things than we
can even think about. Everything we do, we have to
say if it's the Lord's will because when we start to do something,
it may not be God's will for it to be done. We're not comparing
ourselves to God, but what I did think to do is to show you something
as an example. Let's read our text first, Isaiah
46 verse 9. This is the Lord speaking through
Isaiah. Isaiah was very clear throughout
his preaching to say what God gave him to say. And he just
set forth what God told him to say. And that's really all we're
sent to do, is set forth what God has said. Say what God has
said. This is what God said, Remember
the former things of old. For I am God, and there is none
else. I am God, and there is none like
me. Declaring the end from the beginning. And from ancient times, the things
that are not yet done, saying, my counsel shall stand, and I
will do all my pleasure. calling a ravenous bird from
the east, a man that executeth my counsel from a far country."
This is an example of what the context is particularly. This
was several hundred years beforehand and he was calling Cyrus to come
in and deliver his children out of Babylonian captivity. We've
seen that. We've looked at that. That's
who the ravenous bird is that he called to execute his counsel.
Cyrus, you know, is a picture of Christ. Christ came from a
far country and he accomplished God's counsel. He truly is the
counsel of God. Look at the next thing. He says,
Yea, I've spoken it. I will also bring it to pass.
I have purposed it. I will also do it. Whatever we
purpose, like I said, it changes, but not God. Not God. He says when he purposes to do
it, he said, my counsel shall stand. I will do all my pleasure. I've spoken it. I will also do
it, he said. Now I want to use an example
to show you that we ought never be offended at God's predestinating
of His children and His working all things together according
to His purpose and Him bringing to pass His will. We should never
be offended at those things because we do the same thing every day.
And we would do it just as surely and as absolutely as God does
it if we could. You and I know we would do that.
But God can. Now let's look at this example.
The past few weeks The sun came out and it's beautiful springtime
weather, you know, and so I decided I wanted to plant some new shrub
beds in front of my house. Well, what I did was, the first
thing is, I purposed and I planned how I would do it. That's the
first thing I did. I got it settled how I was going
to do the thing. That's what God does. Look at
verse 10. Declaring the end from the beginning
and from ancient times the things that are not yet done saying
my counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure. My pallet
that I was working with, my canvas that I was working with is a
little strip of ground right in front of my windows in front
of my house. It's what I was working with.
And I determined what I'd do with that little piece of ground
right there. God determined his palette would be the heavens
and the earth, when as yet they were not made. And so he made
them to bring forth what he purposed from the beginning to do. See
how infinitely greater God is in what he does. Well, from the
very beginning I chose, I knew from the very beginning the exact
shrubs I was going to put in that garden. I knew from the
very beginning the plants that I would put in my Shrub bed. Look at 2 Thessalonians 2. 2
Thessalonians 2. Verse 13. We are bound to give thanks always to God
for you, brethren." This is who he's writing to, brethren. They've
been called of the Lord. And this is why he says, we're
bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren. They were
beloved of the Lord. Because God hath from the beginning,
he said, I declare the end from the beginning." And here he says,
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification
of the Spirit and belief of the truth. And that's belief of the
truth. Do you see that? Swear unto he
called you by our gospel, by the good news of the truth of
God, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.
He chose from the beginning what plants he'd put in his garden.
God did. And he chose each one that he
was going to save. And that's exactly what the apostle
tells us right here. He did that from the beginning.
We do this every day. We do this every day in everything
we do. You know, the next thing I did
was, I want you to look at Acts 20, Acts chapter 20. The next
thing I did was I went down to the nursery where those shrubs
were and I bought them. I bought them. I bought those
shrubs that I wanted and a few flowers and things. Matthew 20
and verse 28 tells us this. Christ Jesus came into this earth
and He gave His life a ransom for many. You know what a ransom
is? It's the purchase price. Christ
came here and He bought those children that God said, I'm going
to put in my garden. He bought them. He came to this
place and bought them. Look at Acts 20 verse 28. What
did he buy them with? Paul says here in verse 28, look
there towards the end, he says, it's the church of God which
he hath purchased with his own blood. He bought those that he
chose to save. He bought them. Look over to
Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1 and look at verse
14. It says there in verse 14, it
says that God gives His children the earnest of the inheritance,
the Spirit of God, until the redemption of what? Of the purchased
possession. Until that which God has purchased,
He redeems to be with Himself. That is, until He comes again
and brings them home to be with Him. That's each of these children
He's bought. Look at one more place, 1 Corinthians
6.20, just to your left there, 1 Corinthians 6.20. This is what is so of every one
of those children whom God's called and made to rejoice in
Him. This is what's so of us, brethren.
Look, verse 20, ye are bought, you're bought with a price. There was a price that justice
demanded. God's holy justice. It was His price. And it demanded
a life for a life. It demanded death for those that
had sinned. And His Son came and paid the
price. He came and paid His life. You're bought with a price. Therefore
glorify God in your body and in your spirit, which are God's.
He owns them. He owns us. He bought us. He
owns us. Well, look over at Isaiah 60
now. What did you do next? Next thing I did after I bought
those plants is I brought them home. They're
mine. Nobody, not a single person in
that nursery stopped me. I paid the price. I bought them.
I put them in the truck. I brought them home. They're
mine. I brought them home and I planted them. I planted them
just like I determined beforehand that I'd do. I brought them home
and I planted them. Look at Isaiah 60 in verse 21. Somebody say,
this is so much different now. We're talking about people. We're
talking about human beings here. We're talking about living, breathing
people. And you're talking about plants.
You're talking about shrubs. Surely you can't compare the
two. Well, let's see. Here's God speaking, Isaiah 60
verse 21, Thy people also shall be all righteous. They shall
inherit the land forever, the branch of my planting, the work
of my hands, that I may be glorified. You know, I probably will laugh
if Friday night we gather together over at the house, if Art comes
in over at my house and he says, he says, well, I sure am glad
that I allowed Clay to plant those plants and that I consented
to it and I allowed him to do that and allowed his purpose
to come to pass and everything. I would probably laugh at that
because he didn't have anything to do with it. Well, God will
laugh at us if we say something so foolish. I let God do this
by my will. I consented to what He determined
for the world to do and to bring it to pass. We will consent to
it. We'll consent to it with our whole heart, but it'll be
a heart that He's made entirely new by His Spirit and His grace.
Because we won't consent to it until then. We just won't. Look
at Isaiah 61, verse 3. Christ said, I came to proclaim
the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our
God. He came and He says, verse 3, to appoint unto them that
mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of
joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the Spirit of heaviness,
that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord, that He might be glorified. that God might get
all the glory. You see, I went and did all this
work myself, but really the way God did it was it would be the
same as if I said, Will, I'm going to plant that bed out there
and here's the plants I'm putting in it. I want you to go and go
down to that nursery and you buy those plants. You buy them
and you bring them back and you plant them. And make sure they're
all planted, each in their each spot right there. And I turned
the whole work over to him and I said, now do this so that when
people pass by and they see what I have done, they will glorify
me. And so then he goes and he does
everything I put into his hands to do. And he does it all so
that His Father will be glorified. That's what Christ did. Christ
came and the whole work was put into His hand before the world
began. And Christ came to accomplish everything the Father gave to
Him. He's the King. That means everything in his
kingdom is at his disposal. What king is there who cannot
send his own princes at his bidding to accomplish what he's given
them to do? Would you tell me one king that can't do that?
If he does, he's not a king. Christ calls his ambassadors,
his servants, his messengers, and he sends them out into his
kingdom to do his bidding. He is the prophet, though. omniscient,
omnipresent, everywhere at once, the prophet. And it's Him that
He's given the words to speak, right here. And He says to His
princes, go forth and rule in judgment. Preach My Word. This is the Word of My Father.
And they go forth and they preach His Word, exactly as He said
them to do. But it's the prophet who through
their Word is making that Word effectual in the hearts of His
people. And He's doing it that He might appoint those that mourn
in Zion over their sin and their rebellion against God, that He
might give them the oil of joy. The Spirit comes into them and
makes them to behold what God has done for them in His Son,
Christ Jesus. That they might be trees of righteousness,
the planting of the Lord that He has planted, that the Father
might get all the glory for this thing. God didn't leave this in the
hands of somebody that wasn't capable of accomplishing it.
He put it in the hands of God the Son, and God the Son is the
prophet, and He's the king, and He's the priest who wrote all
this about. He's the one who came about,
who is able to make reconciliation to God for the sins of His people.
to offer up Himself as the Lamb of God to His people, and accomplish
this for His people, and then bring this Word to His people
and speak peace into their hearts through this Gospel. Do you really
believe God is God? Do you really believe God's able
to do what He says He's able to do? Let God be true in every man
a liar. Well, this man says he thinks,
liar, this is how God said it. Yeah, but this man told me, liar,
this is how God said it. This is how God did it. He hasn't
left one thing to chance from the beginning. He hasn't, man,
there's not been one second passed in this world that hasn't been
exactly according to how he determined for it to come to pass. Everything. from the least little non thing
that you can't even see to the greatest thing you can see. Everything. Everything. Everything. All right. What am I going to
do? And this is something I came
home. You know what? I came home and there were some
plants there in the garden. And I didn't want those plants
there. I didn't plant them. I didn't want them there. And
there was a bunch of weeds there. I didn't want them in my garden.
You know what I did with them? I dug them up. I took them somewhere
else. Some of them I took back to the
back, put in the back. Some of them I took out to the
road and threw them in a ditch. Because I didn't want them. They
were useless. They didn't glorify. what I was
purposing to do. I didn't keep them. This is what
the Lord said. He said, every plant which my
heavenly Father hath not planted shall be rooted up. They were
arguing and carrying on and saying that, you know, all these religious
leaders leading a host in His day, and the heir of the whole
world had gone after them in His day. And He said, leave them
alone. Just leave them alone. They're
blind and they're leading the blind. This is a problem. Pray about this. This is a serious
problem in our day. When you talk about worshiping
God in the letter and not in the Spirit, it's worse today
than it's ever been. If a church just holds to the
right creed from 200, 300 years ago, if they just say they believe
the right points of doctrine, Men are content to support it
and sit and listen to trash. to absolute garbage. They're
content to sit and listen for man exalted and Christ brought
down. They're content to listen to
man's will exalted and God's will made out to be subservient
to man's will. And they cannot discern the difference. Got a letter knowledge of what
the doctrine is. Got a head, dead letter knowledge
of what the doctrine is. Can dot the I's and cross the
T's on it. but can't discern the difference
when they hear it preached. Can't do it. When God said, when
He walked this earth and He said, there'll come a day when if it
were possible they shall deceive the very elect, He wasn't talking
about the Pope. That's obvious. He wasn't talking
about the Pentecostal. That's obvious. He wasn't talking
about the Muslim and the Buddhist. That's obvious. He wasn't talking
about the freewill Armenian that's just out and out saying God loves
everybody, won't save everybody, and he's just bowing down, cowing
down, waiting for you to carry him around and do what you can
with him. That's obvious. It's the man who's got his doctrine
down right, but he stands up and he won't preach it because
he's afraid of men rather than God. Those are the ones who are
deceiving. That's what we do. That's the
famine of bread in this day. It's here more than it was where
I came from. But it's going, it's everywhere.
It's everywhere. And men can't discern the difference.
Can't discern the difference. Leave them alone, he said. Every
plant which my Heavenly Father has not planted should be rooted
up. Well, I brought them home, Lord willing. Look at Psalm 92.
If the Lord wills, I'm going to keep feeding those plants
and they're going to grow. They're going to grow and they'll
bloom. God gives the increase. That's what Paul said. God gives
the increase. Look at Psalm 92.12. The righteous,
those made righteous in Christ Jesus the righteous, they shall
flourish like the palm tree." Every individual plant that God's
planted, they're going to flourish like a palm tree. He shall grow
like a cedar in Lebanon. Those that be planted in the
house of the Lord shall flourish in the courts of our God. They're
going to come into the courts of God. They're going to be in
His house and in His courts. They're going to beautify His
courts. They shall still bring forth
fruit in old age. They shall be fat and flourishing."
It doesn't just mean that in this life, it means for all eternity. It means they're going to be
flourishing. They're eternally alive with
God forevermore. That's what it means. Why will
that happen? To show that the Lord is upright. To show that
He really does not speak in vain. He doesn't say, I sure wish you'd
let me do this. He just does it. He just does. To show the Lord is upright.
He is my rock and there is no unrighteousness in Him. Look
at Jeremiah 17, 5. If you contend for the truth,
you're going to be called contentious. Contend for it. Jeremiah 17,
5. Thus saith the Lord, Cursed be the man that trusteth in man. Jeremiah 17.5 Cursed be the man
that trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm, and whose heart
departeth from the Lord. For he shall be like the heath
in the desert, That's a plan in the desert. Shall not see
when good cometh, but shall inhabit the parched places in the wilderness
in a salt land and not inhabit it. It won't look like that to
him. It's going to look like he's in a well water plain. It's
going to look like he's in a fat and flourishing place. It's going
to look like he's got everything. And he might in this life. He
might in this life. But it's a parched land. There's
no water there. No eternal water there. No everlasting
well of water. No Christ in Him crucified. No
righteousness of God. I told you this again and again.
I'm going to keep saying this. Wherever God is said to have
died for all men, without exception, there's no righteousness in that.
Absolutely no righteousness. The righteousness of God is not
revealed in that message. How come, Clay? Because it declares
double jeopardy and there's no righteousness in that. Listen! This is so! Wake up! Oh sleeper, hear this word! This
is so! God saves righteously. We're
talking about the glory of God. Who cares about what you think
and I think? We're talking about the glory
of the sovereign God of heaven and earth. We're going to stand
before Him. You're going to stand before
Him and I'm going to stand before Him. I'm not saying this because
I care one way or the other what you think about my doctrine.
I'm saying this to you because you're going to stand before
Him. You have an eternal soul. You're going to stand before
Him. I'm pleading for you to listen
to what God says and quit listening to what men say. Quit listening
to what your deceitful, conniving, cunning, dead heart is telling
you and listen to what God says. Is that contentious to want to
see you saved? Is that contentious to want to
see you turn from error? Is it contentious to see you
want to turn from that God-hating rebel that wants to kill you? You ever had anybody tell you
the truth? You ever had anybody tell you, you're perishing and
you're going to hell? You ever had anybody tell you
that? Listen to God, He saves in righteousness everything from
the beginning He's done in righteousness. He saves in righteousness the
message that declares God came and justified His people Himself. That's the message of righteousness.
The message that declares that God can be merciful to his people
because he's put away their sin himself, reconciled them to himself
himself. That's the message that declares
righteousness. God says, I speak that which
is right. He sends forth messages that'll
feed you in knowledge and understanding. There's no knowledge and understanding
in that false gospel. Either God's true and He really
does send them or He's lying and He's not righteous at all.
And we can throw the whole thing away and go to where we want
to go and kick back, kick our feet up in the sunshine and just
eat, drink, be merry. We're going to all die anyway.
We'll just be like dogs. Huh? Is God true or is man true? He said he'll be like a... But
look at verse 7. Blessed is the man that trusteth
in the Lord. Do you see that? Whose hope's
in the Lord. Whose hope the Lord is. For he
shall be as a tree planted by the waters. And that he spreadeth
out her roots by the river, and shall not see when heat cometh,
but her leaves shall be green, and shall not be careful in the
year of drought, neither shall cease from yielding fruit." God's
going to provide for you, brethren. He's going to keep giving you
this water. He's going to keep giving you this bread. And he's
going to have it for everlasting. That's what Paul said when he
said, he that hath begun a good work in you, he will perform
it until the day of Jesus Christ. We said this the other day, I
put it in the bulletin. The Lord said, the man that won't
confess me, he's ashamed of me and my words. That's plain and
simple. If you're going to believe God
and continue in the truth, they killed your Savior. They're going
to kill you if they can. They killed every prophet from
Abel all the way to the end. They're going to kill everybody
that speaks the truth. Man hates God. That's just how
it is. And the man that would rather
say, I don't want to, I want to ease myself of that. I want
to ease myself of that. I believe, I believe God does
this according to his sovereign will. I believe his counsel will
stand. I believe he predestinates his people. I believe he saves,
he's a just God and a savior. I believe he came and saved his
elect by his own blood. I believe he purchased them.
I believe he's going to send forth his spirit, call them out.
I believe he's going to preserve them to the day that he brings
them home. But then he's content to go and
sit down and support a message that tells lies against that
God? That's being ashamed of God and
His Word. Because if I really confess Him,
Christ said, you're going to suffer persecution. You're going
to be called contentious. People will hear this and they'll
say, oh, that man's just being contentious. That's all he is.
They're going to say that about you. I don't care what men say.
If men say that, all they reveal is they hate the God I love in
their own heart. That's all they're saying. Because
God is true. And that's all I'm telling you.
Teddy, this is how he saves. Don't you rejoice that it's not
left up to us. It's God that's working this
all together. All right. He's begun this good
work. He's going to finish it to the
day of Jesus Christ. Now, that's what I want you to
see. You see, there's examples like this every day where we
do things from the beginning. We determine before, we purpose
how we're going to do it, and we carry it to pass. And if somebody
gets in our way, you know what we do? It makes us upset. It
makes us upset because they thwart our will and what we want to
happen. God's going to get in our way. Where He is, He's going
to get in our way. And He's going to stop that dash
to hell. That's for certain. Because He just ain't going to
lose one. He's not going to lose one. He's able to do whatever
He purposed and carry out all things necessary to do it. That's how He saves. Infinitely
more than we. Let's read it one more time.
Back in our text. Hold your place there because
this is where we're going to be the second hour. Isaiah 46, 9. Remember the former
things of old, for I'm God and there is none else. I'm God and
there's none like me, declaring the end from the beginning. And
from ancient times, the things are not yet done, saying my counsel
shall stand. I will do all my pleasure. Look at the last part of verse
11. I have spoken it. I will also bring it to pass.
I have purposed it. I will also do it. That's God. Ain't another God like Him. Amen.