Salvation is of the Lord. That's
what Jonah learned when he was spit out of the fish's
mouth onto the shore. He learned salvation is of the
Lord. And you who believe God by His
grace know that. You know that. But you find yourself
in dark valleys and you find yourself in much tribulation.
You find yourself afraid and unsure and uncertain. And much of that has to do with
unbelief. You know, when you come in and
you hear a message that exalts the sovereignty of God and sets
forth to you how sure God keeps and directs and orders the steps
of His people, you leave out not trembling, not fearful, because
He increases your faith. You hear Him speak to your heart. And we get into the world and
we get into our routines and taken away from the Word or what
have you, and we become fearful again. It's this Word of His
grace, the Word of His grace continually spoken, continually
edifying our hearts that gives that assurance and that grounds
us from being tossed, from having that fearfulness. I want you to see this morning
just how fully salvation is of the Lord. My message is four
questions answered. And you lay hold of the answers
to these four questions. Lay hold to the answers to these
four questions and you'll find assurance. The only place assurance
is to be had. God our Father and His Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Alright, here's the first question.
Romans chapter 8. Verse 28, I'm sorry, verse 31. Here's the first question. What
shall we then say to these things? And we're going to have to find
out what these things are. So let's go back up to verse
28. And we know that all things, that's what these things are.
all things. We know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are the
called according to His purpose. Now, do you love God? Do you
trust Him? Do you believe Him? Do you yearn,
eagerly anticipate opening up His Word and reading His Word? Do you look forward to getting
in a quiet place at the end of the day or the beginning before
the day starts or whatever, where you can really just be alone,
you and your Savior, and commune with your God? Do you anticipate,
eagerly look forward to being in the worship service amongst
your brethren, amongst the Lord's people, where the Gospel is preached? Do you desire to be there? Is
your life arranged so that everything you're doing in your life has
this one goal in mind? You're wanting to further the
gospel of Christ and you're wanting to do whatever you can for the
good of your brethren. If so, these things are for you. These things are for those that
love God. Let's see how fully God works
all things together for you. Verse 29, For whom He did foreknow,
God foreordained, He foreappointed all whom He saves to salvation. He foreordained you. It's not foreseeing things that
people would do. You know, the free will man says,
well God, it's foreknowledge. God knew from the beginning. He looked down through time and
He saw I believe. And so He chose me. That's the
backward thinking of backward minds going away backwards into
sin. That's making God subservient
to man. That's making God a reactor instead
of the God who makes men react. who affects a reaction in men. God foreknew. The word is the
same word that's used in 1 Peter 1, verse 20. Let me read this
to you. Speaking of Christ Jesus, it says, Verily he was foreordained. before the foundation of the
world. That means He was appointed beforehand
to be the Savior of His people. The same word is used here. God
foreappointed. Acts 14, 48 says, as many as
were ordained, appointed to eternal life, believed. We're bound to
give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the
Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation
through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth.
God appointed all he would say. Alright, here's the second thing,
verse 29. God predestinated all whom He
saves. Verse 29. For whom He did foreknow,
He also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of His
Son that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. God left
absolutely nothing unsettled. He left absolutely nothing that
was not predetermined. Just as he has always worked
all things together for good to them that love God, to them
who are the called according to his purpose, so he works all
things together for good to bring those that he for appointed under
this salvation, under the word of his gospel, so that they are
brought into this precious union with the Lord Jesus Christ, given
the Holy Spirit of adoption. The Scripture says over in Ephesians
1.5, having predestinated us unto the adoption of children
by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will,
to the praise of the glory of his grace wherein he hath made
us accepted in the beloved." There's the first thing he fore-appointed
everyone he would save. He predestinated you unto the
adoption of children, you that love him. The third thing is,
God called all whom He saves, verse 30. Moreover, whom He did
foreknow, them He also called. In eternity, God called His sons,
His sons. He called them, He named them
by His name when He put them in Christ Jesus. He called them
in glory. In time, he calls each of those
elect whom he foreappointed, whom he predestinated to the
adoption, he calls them in time unto himself, unto his son. Paul said, when it pleased God
who separated me from my mother's womb and called me by his grace
to reveal his son in me, That's when he caught me in time. Now
God left nothing to chance in this thing. He left nothing out
of order because we saw there now, look back there now, verse
29, he did everything that His people might be conformed to
the image of His Son, that His Son might be the firstborn among
many brethren. He did this for the glory and
honor of His Son. So He left nothing in the hands
of fickle, foolish, ignorant, wishy-washy sinners. He didn't
do that. He ordered, made everything sure. Here's the fourth thing. God
justified all whom He saves. Verse 30. It says, moreover whom
he predestinated, them he also called, and whom he called, them
he also justified. Christ is the Lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. In Christ our surety, God's elect
were blessed with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
according as He chose us in Christ. All spiritual blessings. And
as the surety of His people, one of those spiritual blessings
was when Christ agreed to pay the sin debt of His people, all
the burden was taken off of the people and put on Christ. And
they were justified. justified. And because his elect
were in Christ, when Adam sinned in the garden, when he transgressed
against God in the garden and plunged his whole human race
into eternal ruin, into separation from God, when he did that, because
of Christ's surety word, in that covenant word, he upheld all
things by his word. And so the world remained and
continued. And then He came in time. And
our Lord Jesus Christ, having fulfilled all righteousness,
having fulfilled everything that's written in the Law and the Prophets,
went to the cross and was made sin for His people. And He bore
the wrath of God and satisfied the justice of God and put away
their sin. And when God calls a sinner in
time and gives us faith to believe, we receive that free, already
accomplished justification and we enter into this grace and
all we have to do is stand in it. Just stand there because
of what He's done. And then God glorified all whom
He saved. Look at verse 30. And whom He
justified, them He also glorified. God's elect were glorified when
He put them in Christ in eternity with the glory which Christ had
with the Father from the beginning. That's what he prayed in John
17. Father, glorify me with the glory I had with you from the
beginning. When he put them in Christ, he glorified them in
Christ. You know something else the Lord
said? Look over John 17. The Lord said that he glorified
those that God gave him. Verse 22, John 17, 22. And the
glory which thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be
one even as we are one. He said, I glorified them now.
I have. With the glory you gave to me.
What did He give to them? Look back up at verse 14. I have
given them thy word. Where did He give it to them?
Gave them to them in their heart. Gave them eyes to see and ears
to hear and heart to understand. And He says, and by giving it
to them, He said, the world hath hated them because they are not
of the world even as I am not of the world. And then, right
now, those that He laid down His life for are glorified in
glory. Right now. Listen to this. Ephesians 2.6, He hath raised
us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in
Christ Jesus. He's glorified. And He has raised
us up together and made us sit together in heavenly places in
Christ. Well, I don't know anything about
that. I don't see that. I can't enter into that. you
probably couldn't enter into the fact that He did it before
eternity either. Or that you're sitting there
now, or that it is yet to come, that He's going to fully, finally,
freely, forever raise us glorified into His presence, which He shall.
That's what Romans 8 says right here in verse 17, if you're children,
then you're heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ.
If so be that we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified
together with Him. That's what he prayed for in
John 17. Father, I will that they also whom Thou hast given
me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory which
Thou hast given me. For Thou lovest me before the
foundation of the world. So they had it when he put them
in Christ. Christ said, I gave it to them
when I gave them my word. I glorified them. They're glorified
right now, seated with Him at God's right hand in heavenly
places, and they shall yet be glorified with Him, together
with Him in the end. All right, now, did you see anything
in those things that we just went through? Anything at all
in these things we just went through, which God left in the
uncertainty of your hands or my hands? Did you see anything
in this that he left in my hands or your hands? It was all he
did it. He did it. He did it. He did
it. Salvation is of the Lord. This
is God. Remember the former things of
old? For I am God. There's none else. I'm God. There's
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. I'll do all my pleasure. calling a ravenous bird from
the east, a man that executeth my counsel from a far country?
Yea, I've spoken it, I'll also bring it to pass. I've purposed
it, I'll also do it. This is the God we're talking
about. Now, back down to verse 31. Now here's that question
again. What shall then we say? What
shall we then say to these things? That's the first question. Paul
answers the question with a question. If God be for us, Who can be
against us? Nobody. What do we say to these
things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? Alright, here's the second question.
Romans 8, 32. He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also
freely give us all things? We talk about these jobs and
these things, and you wonder, you know, should I do this? Should
I do that? You just want to do what's best
for the family. Listen to this. God did not spare His own son. Giving his son meant his son
would have to be made in the likeness of sinful flesh like
the children he came to redeem. God did not spare his son. He'd have to be tempted of the
devil. God did not spare his son. He'd have to endure the
slander of sinful, God-hating religious men. And God did not
spare His Son. He'd have to endure betrayal
by Judas, His close friend. But God did not spare His Son. He'd have to endure the soul
agonies in the Garden of Gethsemane. Yet God did not spare His Son. He'd have to endure being made
that horrible, wretched thing called sin. He would have to
be made His people before God. He would have to stand before
God, His people, sinners. He would have to be made sin
before God, His Father, with whom He had glory from the foundation
of the world. This One who knew no sin, who
did no sin, who thought no sin, who never had one sinful thought
would have to be made the horrible, wretched thing called sin. And God did not spare His Son. He would have to endure the death
of that cross. Have y'all seen that history
special on this Shroud of Turin? I don't know if that thing is.
One thing they said about that thing that I found hard to believe
that scientists said this. They come to this conclusion.
They don't know, they can't prove, no way they can prove if that
really was the Shroud that covered the Lord Jesus Christ. They said
this, when Mary came into the tomb, She surmised from seeing
the stone rolled back that somebody had stolen the body of Christ.
But when John and Peter came in, the scripture says, they
said, He's been resurrected. And the conclusion they drew
from this and how they came to that was, is the shroud. After
they put people in shrouds in those days, they wrapped them
with a single shroud to hold their joints in place and everything
in place, and they wrapped them. And so when John and Peter ran
in, there was this wrapped shroud laying flat on the ground. If
it would have been rolled up and thrown into a corner, you
would have said somebody stole the body. But when you walk in
and it's just laying there flat on the ground, And these scientists
said the only thing that could have made that imprint on this
shroud was light, radiation. And one scientist said, from
scriptures, all I can say is, all I can say is, is when Christ,
the spirit of Christ entered back into his body, it was a
light. And it engraved that image on
that sheet and he was gone. body and all. I don't know if
that's it or not, if that's him or not. But you see though, when
they dropped the atomic bomb and they had those pictures of
those walls where the blast was so bright that it just embedded
the imprint of a shadow of people on walls, on stones and things. When I said all that, this was
the point. Just in that, whoever this was,
it could be that somebody just took somebody that had already
died and just beat him senseless to make people come and bow to
that thing. They actually showed the Pope
bowing down to that shroud. What would they think if you
took that shroud and went in to see it and watered it up and
took it over and threw it in the fire? Oh, it was destroyed. That's exactly what Moses did
with that calf or what it was, the serpent. That's exactly what
he did because they bowed down and started worshiping the thing.
Well, the point I'm making is he was beaten. Christ was beaten
when he was scourged. Pilate thought that would satisfy
the people. They scourged him from head to toe with a big ball
with bits of bone sticking out of it and just all in his body
from head to toe. But the wrath The wrath of God's
fury, we can just look at His visible, what's the description
of the visible beating He took, and that's as close as we can
come to entering into what the wrath of God would be like. That's
just the hell of man. That's not the wrath of God.
And yet God spared not His own Son. For all those that God foreordained
to eternal life, He spared not His own Son, but delivered Him
up for us all." Now, can you imagine? Can you imagine? Can you even let enter into your
thoughts that He shall not, along with His own Son who He gave
freely, also freely give you all lesser things? All lesser things that you need. Our assurance is not in us. Our
assurance is not in our decisions. Our assurance is not in our discernment
of things. Our assurance is God who changes
not. That's our assurance. His love
is unchanging. His mercy is unchanging. His
grace is unchanging. His provisions are unchanging.
If He spared not His own Son, He will freely give us every
lesser thing. Sometimes the trial is not when
we think the trial is. Sometimes the trial comes along
after we think the trial's gone. Let this be the unwavering resolution
of your soul. Whatever I do, I'll do nothing,
nothing to interfere with me and my family worshiping my God
and benefiting His people and serving the Lord who has freely,
freely not withheld His only Son from me. Here's the third question. Romans
8.33. Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? Verse 34, same question. Who
is He that condemneth? Now, we could go into a lot of
things here about our own conscience and the sin we see in ourselves.
Let's just cut right to where it matters. Can God condemn us? I don't care if you can. I don't
care if somebody else can lay charge. All I want to know is,
can God? Can God condemn me? That's all
I want to know. Can He do it? Absolutely not. It's God that justifieth. You
see it? It's God that justified. It's
Christ that died. It's God and His Son who made
it so He can't condemn me. He's satisfied. Propitiation
has been made by His Son. He's just to forgive me of all
my sins, and He's the one who justified me. He's unjust if
He condemns me, and He's unjust if He doesn't justify me. Do
you see that? He's rewarded me double. I can't
be lost. No one can lay anything to the
charge of God's elect. This present tense, God's elect
are perfectly righteous in Christ continually. Blessed is the man
to whom God will not impute sin. He will not. Well, what about
all this sin I see in myself? is Christ that died, yea rather
that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who
also maketh intercession for us. He justified us, He laid
down His life for us, He's risen for us, and He intercedes for
us continually. This is what John, my little
children, these things I write unto you that you sin not. This
is what's going to keep us from going off into sin. Well, if
I believed that, I'd live like... This is the one message that's
going to keep a sinner from going headlong into sin. And he says,
I write these things to you that you sin not. And if any man sin,
is that a possibility they won't? Of course we will. But if any
man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ
the righteous. Here's the glorious thing. Here's
the glorious thing. The glorious thing. If you come
to me and you ask me a question about, do you think I ought to
do this or that? And I give you my answer. And
you go totally contrary to the answer I give you. And you know
what? I'm not going to lay anything
on your charge. I'm not. I'm not going to condemn you.
God justified you. Christ laid down His life for
you. Christ sent His seeds for you. He didn't leave any of this
up to anybody's whim. He's not going to leave anything
else up to our whims and foolishness. Just like Art said, if he's got
to throw us overboard to make us realize we're in the wrong
ship, that's what he'll do to bring us back in fellowship.
But he'll do it. He may have to put us at the
bottom of the ocean and make us whale vomit before it's done,
but he'll do that. I can rest right there. He is satisfaction for his elect,
whether Jew or Gentile, the world over, male or female. and they
can't be condemned. Nobody can lay a charge to them.
Look back at Romans 8 verse 1. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of
life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and
death. For what the law couldn't do, in that it was weak through
my own flesh, God sending His Son in the likeness of sinful
flesh, and for my own sin, condemned sin. He condemned the condemnation
in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.
He did it. and the gifts and calling of
God are without repentance. I think it's something I always
try to remind myself of is whenever David, who was the king, sinned
with Bathsheba and committed murder, had her husband sent
to the forefront of the battle so he would die. that Nathan
the prophet to the preacher, David's preacher, came to him
and he gave him that story of the man who had one lamb and
of the rich man that had many and came down and took his one
lamb. And David said, who is that man? And David was about
to unleash the fury. David said, he'll die, who is
he? And Nathan said, David, you're
the man. You're the one. But you know what he said as
soon as he got through saying that? God has forgiven you of your
sin, David. You want to know what made David
turn and run headlong to God Almighty and plead mercy with
a broken heart? You want to know what did it? Well, y'all not done that, David.
David, your sin's forgiven you. God has forgiven you your sin.
That breaks a sinner's heart whom God makes to know what he's
done, what he's accomplished for you. And that makes obedience. That makes obedience. Alright,
here's the fourth question. Romans chapter 8, verse 35. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress,
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? As it is written, for thy sake
we are killed all the day long. We are counted as sheep for the
slaughter. We're just helpless, defenseless
sheep. hated by the world, not of the
world, trying to wait on God in a world that don't care about
God and won't wait on God. That's telling us if you don't
look out for you, nobody else will. If you don't step on somebody
else, you're going to get stepped on. How in a world like that
is a bunch of sheep going to get along with a bunch of goats? Here's the answer, and you listen
to it, and you settle your mind upon this right here. No, verse
37, no, in all these things, He works all things together.
What shall we say to these things? In all these things, we are more
than conquerors through Him that loved us. For I'm persuaded that
neither death, I guess that's probably, I mean, that's the
ultimate thing. If he starts off with the ultimate,
if that's not going to separate us, the rest of this stuff's
not going to separate us. Death nor life, we don't think of living as something
that would separate us from them, do we? Oh boy. Living is the very thing that
separates a multitude from Him. Living. Nor angels, nor principalities,
nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nothing in
the height, nothing in the depths, not any other creature shall
be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Jesus
Christ our Lord. Look over at John chapter 10.
Why not? We've seen everything He did.
And you realize that everything our Lord did here that we've
looked at, all these things, foreknowing, forepointing, and
predestinating, and calling, and justifying, and glorifying,
Not sparing his own son. All of these things that we've
seen. You realize our Lord didn't just say these things to us.
He put it in writing. He backed it up. He wrote it
down for us. Here's the contract right here. It's written down. And He's saying,
I'll do it. I'll do it. And if He doesn't
do it, He's not God. If he doesn't do what he said,
has done, does do, and continue to do what he said he'll do,
he ceases to be God. So there's a whole lot more at
stake than you and me being saved. It's His glory, the honor of
His Son for whom He did all this. Look at John 10 verse 11. I am the good shepherd. That's what sheep need. That's
what defenseless sheep need. I'm the good shepherd. The good
shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. Look down at verse
14. I am the good shepherd and know
my sheep. He knows them by name. You sitting
right here that are his sheep. Can you get your heart around
that? The triune God Christ Jesus knows
you by name and am known of mine. You know
Him, don't you? He knows you. Look down at verse
27. My sheep hear my voice and I
know them and they follow me and I give unto them eternal
life And they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. My Father which gave them me
is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of
my Father's hand. I and my Father are one." I and
my Father are one. I want you to turn to two scriptures
with me now. And this is my application for
you. Turn over to 1 John chapter 3. 1 John chapter 3. This is the gospel, this is the
truth, and this is the word by which God separates His people
and settles our hearts and makes us willing to serve Him rather
than this world. Now, 1 John 3.1, this gospel
I've just preached to you. Now listen to what John says
about it. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed
upon us that we should be called the sons of God. Now you think about that. Sons of God. And therefore the world knoweth
us not because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God. And it doth not yet appear what
we shall be, but we know that when he shall appear, we shall
be like him." Not just like him. Somebody asked a question. If
we're going to be just like him, why are we going to worship him?
Why don't we just like him? He's God. We're still going to be
subjects. but we're going to be glorified.
We're going to be conformed to His image. You children, some
of you look like your father, but that don't make you your
father. Some of you act like your father or your mother, that
don't make you your father or your mother. He's still going
to be the father, but we're going to be like Him. For we shall
see Him as He is. Now look, what's the conclusion
of that? What's that make a man do? Every man that hath this
hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure." You're pure
already, pure in Christ, purified, washed, cleansed, sanctified,
perfect forever in Christ. What's this purify yourself mean?
Let me see if I can put it to you as easy as I know how to
do. Let's see. Let's say that you
smoked all your life, And it finally dawned on you, you know
what? I'm dying for a cigarette. I literally am dying for a cigarette. And you say, you know what? Putting
that down, I'm not messing with those anymore. You just purified
yourself from it. You washed your hands of it,
said I'm not doing that anymore. In other words, those who have this
hope of this gospel in them, by God's grace, giving them an
enlargement of their heart to behold Him, their every desire
is. I don't have anything to do with
anything that doesn't glorify Him. And as we grow in grace in the
heart, in knowledge of Him, in understanding of Him, in faith
in Him, trusting Him alone, less and less of this world, less
and less of this world, then brethren, More and more, we don't
want to have anything to do with this world. More and more, we
see our sin, we see what we are more and more, and we don't want
to have anything to do with this flesh. We see what this world is more
and more, and we don't have anything to do with it. I couldn't have
told you this when I was 20 years old. I couldn't have told you
this when I was 25 years old. But the more I hear of this gospel,
the more I see of what Christ has done for me, He's just watering
and giving the increase in the heart. I'm not becoming more
holy. I'm holy as I'll ever be in Him. But I grow more and more not
to want the things that would separate me from my Lord. I want
to be separated from those things. That's the desire. All right,
here's the second scripture I want you to turn to. 2 Thessalonians. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. And this is my prayer for you
after you've heard this word. Those of you that are suffering
right now. Now listen, you heard that this thing was eternal.
I tried to show you this thing was all accomplished in Christ
before there was anything that needed to be accomplished. Now watch this, verse 16, chapter
2, verse 16. Now the Lord of peace himself
give you peace always by all means. Now read that again. Now the Lord of peace himself
give you peace always by all means. That's my prayer for you,
and I believe He'll do it. Paul said in another place, Our
Lord Jesus Christ Himself and God, even our Father, which hath
loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through
grace, comfort your hearts, establish you in every good work, good
word and good work. That's my prayer for you. That's
what I hope he'll do by this word. All right.