Good evening, let's begin our
service by standing and singing 485, revive us again, 485. We praise Thee, O God, for the
Son of Thy love, for Jesus who died and is now gone above. Alleluia, Thine the glory. Alleluia, Amen. Alleluia, Thine the glory. Revive us again. We praise thee, O God, for thy
Spirit of light, who has shown us our Savior and scattered our
night. Alleluia, thine the glory. Alleluia, amen. Alleluia, thine the glory. Revive us again. ? All glory and praise to the
Lamb that was slain ? ? Who has borne all our sins and has cleansed
every stain ? ? Hallelujah, thine the glory, hallelujah, amen ?
? Hallelujah, thine the glory, revive us again ? Revive us again. Fill each heart with thy love. May each soul be rekindled with
fire from above. Alleluia, thine the glory. Alleluia, amen. Alleluia, thine the glory. Revive us again. Thank you. I would like to read from Luke
15, Luke 15, starting at verse 11, regarding the prodigal son. And he said, a certain man had
two sons, and the younger of them said to his father, Father,
give me the portion of goods that falleth to me. And he divided
unto them his living. And not many days after, the
younger son gathered all together and took his journey into a far
country, and there wasted his substance with riotous living.
And when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in that
land, and he began to be in want. And he went and joined himself
to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields
to feed swine. And he would fain have filled
his belly with the husk that the swine did eat, and no man
gave unto him. And when he came to himself,
he said, How many hired servants of my Father's have bread enough,
and to spare, and I perish with hunger? I will arise and go to
my Father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against
heaven and before thee. "'and am no more worthy to be
called thy son. "'Make me as one of thy hired
servants.' "'And he arose and came to his father. "'But when
he was yet a great way off, "'his father saw him and had compassion,
"'and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. "'And the son
said unto him, Father, "'I have sinned against heaven and in
thy sight, "'and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the
father said to his servants, bring forth the best robe and
put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and shoes on his
feet. And bring hither the fatted calf
and kill it, and let us eat and be merry. For this my son was
dead and is alive again. He was lost and is found. And
they began to be merry. Now his elder son was in the
field, and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard music
and dancing. And he called one of his servants
and asked what these things meant. And he said unto him, Thy brother
is come, and thy father hath killed a fatted calf, because
he hath received him safe and sound. And he was angry and would
not go in. Therefore came his father out
and entreated him. And he answering, said to his
father, Lo, these many years do I serve thee, neither transgress
thy at any time thy commandment, and yet thou never gavest me
a kid that I might make merry with my friends. But as soon
as this thy son was come, which hath devoured thy living with
harlots, thou hast killed for him the fatty calf. And he said
unto him, Son, thou art ever with me, and all that I have
is thine. It was meet that we should make merry and be glad,
for this thy brother was dead, and is alive again, and was lost
and is found. Our heavenly and merciful Father,
we thank you, Father, for allowing us once again to assemble here
and to have this place, Lord, where we can hear the glorious
gospel proclaimed. Father, we thank you for your
mercy and for your grace, for calling out your sheep and for
having mercy upon sinners. Father, we thank you that we
can come to this place, albeit very small, but Lord, we thank
you that we can come together and meet together as like-minded
sinners and believers, Lord, where we can hear about the Lord
Jesus Christ, our only hope and our only way of salvation. Father,
remember Brother Eric as he stands before us this evening. Give
him, Lord, the words to speak that you would have us to hear.
Give him liberty, O Lord, and pour out your spirit upon him
and upon us as we hope to listen. Father, separate us out from
the busyness of our lives and whatever we have in our minds
and that we may receive rest for our souls. And Lord, will
you increase our faith that we may be ever looking to the Lord
Jesus Christ and away from self. Remember, O Lord, those that
assemble with us and couldn't be here. We think also of Ronnie. Lord, will you remember him where
he has has an injury? Lord, be with him and direct
the hands of the doctors and be with all those that are suffering
amongst us. Lord, you know everything perfectly.
And Lord, we also think of our loved ones, our Children and
our relatives, Lord, who are yet lost. But Father, will you
have mercy upon them and call them out of nature's darkness
into your marvelous light that they may have a hunger and a
thirst after the Lord Jesus Christ. All things are possible with
you. Father, remember us as this with this local assembly. And
will you call out your sheep in this community? You know exactly
where they are and what they stand in need of. Continue, Lord,
to give us what we stand in need of financially and to strengthen
the wisdom to go forward. For Jesus' sake alone, amen. As you remain sitting, let's
sing 332. My Jesus, I love thee. 332. My Jesus, I love Thee, I know
Thou art mine. ? For thee, O thy faulties of
sin, I resign ? My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art thou ? If ever
I loved thee, my Jesus, tis now I love thee because thou hast
first loved me, and purchased my pardon on Calvary Street. I love thee for when ? Wearing
the thorns on thy brow ? ? If ever I love thee, my Jesus, this
now ? ? I'll love thee in life, I will love thee in death ? and
praise thee as long as thou lendest me breath, and say when the death
do lies cold on my brow, if ever I love thee, my Jesus, tis now. In mansions of glory and endless
delight. I'll ever adore Thee in heaven
so bright. I'll sing with a glittering crown
on my brow. If ever I loved Thee, will Jesus
disavow? Thank you. Good evening. Turn with me to Isaiah chapter
54. I want to look at verses 6 through
10 with you this evening. This passage speaks of God's
covenant of grace with His people. This covenant is established
for us by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. He did this for
his people, that God would be just in being merciful and gracious
to his people. He's just in forgiving his people
because Christ has fulfilled all righteousness for us. He's fulfilled all righteousness
for his beloved bride, and he's done everything necessary for
our salvation. And what we see here in this
passage is that nothing is going to alter our God's purpose to
be gracious to us. He's not going to change in being
gracious and merciful to us. Rather than treating us as our
sins deserve, God will be gracious. God forgives His people, all
for the sake of Jesus Christ. He says in Malachi 3.6, For I
am the Lord, I change not. Therefore ye sons of Jacob are
not consumed. He does not change. And that's
comforting to the child of God who knows themselves to be a
sinner and who knows themselves to be insufficient for the work. We're not worthy of His calling. We're not worthy of His mercy.
And yet, God shows us great mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
there's going to be times in our experience in the beginning,
and even as we continue in the faith, there's going to be times
when we feel ourselves to be lost, and we feel ourselves to
be cut off, and we feel worthy of being cut off. and we feel
ourselves forsaken at times. But the Lord, what we see here
is that the Lord is always working for our good. Whatever he's doing,
it's going to turn for our good and for our blessing and our
comfort. So even when it's dark and even
when we're going through difficult times, the Lord has a purpose
in it. And it is for our good and for
our comfort. And so this is, it's witnessed
in the sacrifice of our Savior on the cross. You know, that
was a time that was difficult for the church, the church and
her infancy there in the light and in the presence of Jesus
Christ when he was crucified that was a difficult time for
them. That was a time of darkness for
them because they didn't know what was going on and yet we
see that God had purposed it for their salvation to accomplish
their salvation to do everything necessary that God may be gracious
and merciful to his people and be just doing it. be completely
righteous and being merciful to us. And then we see it again
in the believer's experience. When they come to a knowledge
of these things, oftentimes we're brought very low in self and
we're brought to have a a more right view of ourselves, to see
ourselves as sinners, to see ourselves as unworthy, to see
ourselves as undeserving of His grace. But it's all in the purpose
of grace. And then He brings that salvation
into the heart and into a light into our minds, our understanding.
that our God is just separating us from the flesh. He's separating
us from the things that man holds on to and trusts in. He removes
all those that we might see the glory and the obedience of our
Savior and to rejoice in Him alone and not in ourselves. I've
titled this message, For a Small Moment. for a small moment, and
that has to do with that time of darkness that we feel ourselves
to be in. It's for a small moment. The
Lord has a purpose in it, and he turns it for our good. So
for a small moment. Now let's look at our text here. Let's look at verses six through
eight. Let's just read them together before we get too much further.
Isaiah 54, verse six. For the Lord hath called thee
as a woman forsaken, and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth
when thou wast refused, saith thy God. For a small moment have
I forsaken thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. In
a little wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with
everlasting kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord
thy Redeemer. Now, historically in Israel's,
in their case, in their history, there have been times where God
appeared to hide his kind providences from them. where he removed his
protection, it would seem, or he pulled back his protective
glory from them and allowed them to be opened up to their enemies. And their enemies gave them a
difficult time, a tough time. These times were purposed to
make them to struggle in themselves, to bring us to the end of ourselves,
especially to bring us to the end of our own righteousness,
which is self-righteousness, and it's not able to save us.
It does no good for us, and we've got to be turned from that broad
way of destruction. And so an example is in Hosea.
Why don't you turn there, Hosea chapter two. So if you're in
Isaiah now, you would go through Jeremiah, Ezekiel, you'll see
Daniel, and then is Hosea. Hosea chapter two, right after
Daniel. And we'll pick up in verse eight. And the Lord says that he's going
to do this. He's going to withdraw his mercies, what he's doing
for his bride. And it says, for she did not
know that I gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied
her silver and gold, which they prepared for Baal, Baal being
their idol god. They were taking the things that
the Lord gave them and sacrificing them to their idol god, Baal. Therefore, verse 9, will I return
and take away my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in
the season thereof, and will recover my wool and my flax given
to cover her nakedness. And now will I discover her lewdness
in the sight of her lovers, and none shall deliver her out of
mine hand. And the Lord He continues describing
what he will do, but you understand the point is that the Lord is
saying, I'm going to remove my hand of goodness, which is giving
them the things that they need for their sustenance, in order
for her to know that I've been the one giving this to her. and
it's all in His hand. He's controlling it all perfectly
for her good and so our Lord does this for His people as a
wise master builder. He's preparing us for Him. He's preparing us for His light
and for His glory and the knowledge of who He is, just how great
a Savior our Lord is through His Son, Jesus Christ. And so
He brings us to know that in ourselves, we're nothing apart
from Him. And we do get proud of ourselves. We do get to thinking that we're
something until the Lord makes us to know that we're nothing.
and nothing without him and that we need him. He's faithful to
make us to know I'm the needy sinner. I need his grace, I need
his mercy. And he's faithful to do that
with all his children. That's why you believe on Christ.
That's why you're not indifferent to your Lord and to your need
of him and to hearing his gospel and being blessed by his word
because the Lord has made you a needy sinner who finds no satisfaction
but in the Lord Jesus Christ himself. He's faithful to do
that. And so, you see then, that's
for my good. It's for my good. It was painful
in the flesh, it was difficult. I cried and complained and whined
until the Lord appeared to me and made me to see, Lord, You're
good, and you're right, and you're wise, and you're so faithful. Even when I'm faithless, Lord,
thank you." And he does that for his people. So, these words
here, speaking of forsaking, and her being grieved in spirit,
and the Lord saying, I've turned from you. Notice how closely
tied they are to our Lord's sacrifice. and giving himself to die in
the place of his people. It was there in chapter 53 that
we just got through where we saw there that what our Savior
did in bearing our bruises and bearing our stripes and bearing
our punishment and being wounded for us. we just saw that and
and that's where the Lord is is saying this and so we're seeing
that through his sacrifice he's obtained all these spiritual
benefits and blessings for his people you know the church when
when Christ went to the cross when he died and they they They
took him down off that cross. They took his lifeless body down
off that cross and those wealthy men, Joseph of Arimathea and
probably Nicodemus with them, they, with the women, prepared
his body with the spices and they witnessed, they saw that
he was dead, that he gave his life. He really died. He died
in the flesh. And that young church, their
hopes were fixed in Him. And you can imagine how they
felt in that time. They didn't understand everything. They were grieved in spirit. They were troubled. And they
felt, Lord, we were sure that this was He. Who could do more
than what he did for the people? Who could be more wise and say
such beautiful, perfect, righteous truths about our Lord? He was
so faithful to the Word of God, and he was so faithful to you,
Lord. And so they were troubled, but
they didn't see that he laid down his life that God may be
just and gracious. to us who believe him, to us
who are called by his grace and mercy. You know, the Lord God,
he forsook Christ. He turned from his own darling
son. He cried out, my God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? He was forsaken by the Father.
And we were in Christ. We were in Christ. When Christ
died, His people were in Christ, and He established that covenant
of grace for us in His death. He did that for His people, that
we in Him would have life and have peace with God and be forgiven
by the Father. But that wrath of God fell on
Him. So we were in Him, but the wrath
of God fell and he took that wrath. It fell on the Lord Jesus
Christ in the same way that the wrath of God fell on the Ark
of Noah. the wrath of God fell on the
ark of Noah, well the wrath of God fell on Christ and not on
us. Just as that wrath fell on the
ark and not on Noah and his family. They were delivered safe through
the wrath of God and yet God through that then established
a covenant. At the end of the wrath, God
established a covenant with Noah and his family. Turn over to
Genesis chapter 9. You be going to Genesis chapter
9. I'm just going to read a part of a verse in Genesis chapter
8 verse 21. Noah, when he got off the ark,
he prepared a sacrifice with the clean animals for sacrificing
to the Lord. He took seven animals, right?
There were seven of the clean animals, and he made a sacrifice
to the Lord with that extra, I would imagine. And it says
that the Lord smelled a sweet savor, and the Lord said in his
heart, I will not again curse the ground anymore for man's
sake. Now look at Genesis 9 verse 11. And I will establish my covenant
with you, neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters
of a flood, neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy
the earth. God said, this is the token of
the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature
that is with you for perpetual generations. I do set my bow
in the cloud, that's the rainbow, and it shall be for a token of
a covenant between me and the earth. You can imagine when Noah and
his family were in that boat, in the ark, and the wrath of
God is under them, in the sea, in the waves, in the wind rocking
that boat, and the rain falling down upon them, they were in
the midst of the wrath of God. And it was a dark time. I'm sure it was a dark time and
a fearful time. And yet, all that time, Noah
and his sons were all safe. They were all safe. And when
it was over, Noah and his family arose from the ark and God established
that covenant with them. He established that covenant
with them. Well, in a similar way, when we're thinking of that
darkness, that's how that young church was. Those few believers
that were walking on the earth, when our Lord was on the earth
in the flesh with his people as the Lord Jesus Christ, and
their hope was fixed in Him, they trusted in Him, they believed
Him. When Christ appeared to them,
Philip found Nathanael, and he said to Nathanael, we have found
Him, of whom Moses wrote, and the prophets, Jesus of Nazareth,
the son of Joseph, They were so glad and so happy and so thankful
that they had found him of whom Moses wrote and the prophets.
And so you can imagine they were very excited. When Peter was
describing Christ and what he had done, this is after Christ
arose from the dead, he said in Acts 10 verse 38, He said,
this is how God had anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy
Ghost and with power, who went about doing good and healing
all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with him. And so we see there that these
disciples, they saw what Christ did. They knew his works. They
knew the words that he spoke. And so at that time, When Christ
was crucified and buried, dead and buried, we're told that the
number was so small that they could, as they factored in and
counted up the names of the people that believed on the Lord Jesus
Christ, we were told in the beginning of Acts that it was about 120.
120 believers, and that was it. And that's because many, when
Christ died, many fell away. All those people who said, you
know, where we read that, and they believed on him, so all
those people fell away. They didn't believe on him. It
was just a fleshly faith. It was a fleshly hope, and they
fell away. And so there's difficult times
and dark times, even there in the young church. And the point
is is, You and I, we go through difficult times, and dark times,
and troubling experiences, and troubling times, and it feels
like something's wrong. Where's the Lord in this? Why
did the Lord allow this to happen? Why did this come to pass the
way it's come to pass? Why is everything falling out
the way that it's falling out? But, the Lord hasn't left us,
and He's not left us without hope. He's not taken away His
Word. He's not removed His Son from
our hearts, who dwells in our hearts by faith. He's not pulled
Him and withdrawn Him from us. And so, be comforted and be encouraged
that there are times of difficulty, there are times of darkness,
but don't fear. You're not forsaken. You're not
cut off. The Lord has purposed it for
your good, and he will turn it out for your good. Turn over
to Luke 24. Go to Luke 24, and we'll pick up in verse 19. I'm going here because the Lord,
he shows the disciples at the end of his talking with them,
he shows them to trust the Lord. It's all in his word. He tells
us this in his word. He shows us how there's times
of darkness and there's times of being brought low, but it's
all for our good. It's all for our comfort. So
this is after Christ arose from the grave, and there's two disciples
on the road to Emmaus, and they're talking about these things, and
Christ comes up to them. And he said unto them, verse
19, what things, what things are you speaking of? And they
said unto him concerning Jesus of Nazareth, which was a prophet,
mighty in deed and word before God and all the people, and how
the chief priests and our rulers delivered him to be condemned
to death and have crucified him. But we trusted that it had been
he which should have redeemed Israel. And beside all this,
today is the third day since these things were done." And
so you see there, these men, they believed that this Jesus
of Nazareth was the Christ and their hope was fixed in him. And they're not sure what's going
on. And they're hearing now reports
that his body is missing. Yea, and certain women also of
our company made us astonished, which were early at the sepulchre.
And when they found not his body, they came, saying that they had
seen also a vision of angels, which said that he was alive.
And certain of them which were with us, they went to the sepulchre
and found it, even so as the women had said, but him they
saw not. Then Christ said unto them, O
fools, and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken.
Ought not Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into
his glory? And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded
unto them and all the scriptures the things concerning himself. All this was written, and yet
they struggled to believe it. They struggled, they didn't understand
it properly, or they had difficulty believing it. And Christ says,
why are you so slow of heart to believe all that the Lord
has said? And it's written in the prophets,
and that's where we are, right here in Isaiah chapter 54. Look at verse six again, back
in our text. For the Lord hath called thee
as a woman forsaken, and grieved in spirit, and a wife of youth,
when thou wast refused, saith thy God. And so there's that
young church with few in number, and they're as a woman forsaken,
they're grieved in spirit, they're as a wife of youth, they're there
in their infancy, and they feel refused and turned away from,
and left with no hope. And it seemed to come to an end.
But the Lord, by the prophet, tells them, before it came to
pass, verse seven and eight, for a small moment have I forsaken
thee, but with great mercies will I gather thee. In a little
wrath I hid my face from thee for a moment, but with everlasting
kindness will I have mercy on thee, saith the Lord thy Redeemer. And so for just a little time,
Christ was taken for them, leaving them to feel grieved and forsaken,
but then it all turned around for their good, for their peace,
for their comfort, for their salvation. their justification,
and not only theirs, but ours, brethren. Not only theirs, but
ours as well. And so they were gathered together
as a fold, as a flock of God, all because of the death and
sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. He went away for a short time,
but it was all for the good of his people. And so it's because
of his death that we are gathered as a church. It's because of
his death that we have hope. Because of his death, his burial,
and his resurrection, that we have any hope. And the Spirit
is the one who comes and communicates that to us, who gives us life,
who delivers us out of spiritual death, who delivers us out of
darkness and brings us to the light of Christ to behold all
that he has done for us and what he accomplished. because the
works are finished in the Lord Jesus Christ. Our Savior bore
that wrath of God for us, as it fell upon the ark, so Christ
is our ark, and we in Him are delivered, brought through that
wrath, and delivered through the wrath of God in order to
establish that covenant of peace with His people. Turn over to
Romans chapter 6 and we'll see this. Romans chapter 6. Let's look at verse 6. Knowing
this, that our old man is crucified with Christ, that the body of
sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve
sin. For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now if we be dead with
Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him. And so, our Savior as our substitute,
He died our death. But we were in Him. We were in
our Savior. When He died, we died. He died
as our substitute. And our sins were imputed to
Him. And He bore the wrath of God
for our sins. He paid that debt as our surety. and died in our place as our
substitute, and his righteousness is imputed to us. And we're clothed
with his righteousness and now have peace with God. And so, just as you see that
arc of Noah, so it is that we came through the wrath of God
in Christ our arc. and are delivered on the other
side, established in the covenant of God's grace and mercy for
us, so that we're not saved and we don't do the works to try
and save ourselves, we're saved by the Lord Jesus Christ. And
just as Noah rose up out of that ark, our Savior rose up and we
arose in Him, and we will rise when He returns as well, all
because of that covenant of grace. All right, now this brings me
to our next point here, When our Lord died, he established
that covenant of grace. And so everything's fulfilled
by him. And God may be just to forgive
us. God is just to receive us. God
is just to reveal to us his mercy and grace and kindness, his everlasting
salvation, his everlasting life for his people. And so the law
of God, does not condemn us. We're not condemned by the law
of God. We're righteous in the Lord Jesus
Christ. The wrath of God is satisfied
because Christ paid the price. The wrath of God is satisfied.
So there's nothing to be said to us. And we're forgiven and
that's never gonna change. Now look at verse nine, Isaiah
54, nine. For this is as the waters of
Noah unto me. For as I have sworn that the
waters of Noah should no more go over the earth, so have I
sworn that I would not be wroth or angry with thee, nor rebuke
thee." There's nothing for God to be angry with you for. There's no reason for Him to
pour out wrath upon you. It's been poured out upon your
Savior. It's been poured out upon him
already. There's nothing for you to bear.
Christ bore it all. Christ paid it all. The debt's
fulfilled. The debt is cancelled. You have
nothing to answer for. He answered for everything for
his people. And we're told in Romans 3 verse
21 and 22, he says, now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested,
being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness
of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon
all them that believe. And so we believe Christ because
he's accomplished that for us. The covenant's fulfilled. We
are righteous in him. We don't look to a righteousness
of our own. We don't look to the law. We
don't look to our religion. We don't look to the things that
we do. We look to the Lord Jesus Christ because he is the salvation
of his people. And by faith, which He reveals
in the hearts of His people, which He reveals in His people,
that's whereby we look to Him and we trust Him and we have
peace with God because we see by faith that it's all fulfilled,
it's all done. It says in Romans 5.1, therefore
being justified. By faith, we have peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ. We are justified by Christ. By
faith, we have peace. By faith, we're assured of these
things. That's why we have peace in Him.
And nothing's gonna change that. Nothing's gonna change that because
it's not our will that accomplished this for us. It's not our believing,
it's not our choosing, That's all the work which Christ wrought
in us, whereby we lay hold of these things and understand these
things, but it's all been done by the Lord Jesus Christ. And
so since it's not our will that decides whether or not we're
gonna be saved, but rather his will, so it is that it's not
our will that's gonna take us out of it, because he's the one
who teaches us and instructs us, who's given us life in the
new man, whereby we believe him and look to him unto salvation. Isaiah 54 10 For the mountains
shall depart, and the hills be removed, but my kindness shall
not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace
be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee. And so we
see there how that there's been times of darkness. There's been
times where the church in the wilderness has gone through times
of difficulty, endured times of wrath among the people there,
times of dark providences, but the Lord was always with them
and the Lord was always working the good of his people. We see
it most preeminently in what our Savior did for us. And so
it is, just in one final picture, let me say this, so it is that
even we, as we're going about and having no knowledge of these
things, we might be religious, we might know a lot of things
about the Bible, we might know a lot of things about doctrine,
and have spent decades in church, and not know the truth of God
revealed in the face of Jesus Christ, that he's all our salvation. But this Christ's blood was shed
for sinners, those who have been made to know that they are nothing,
those who have no righteousness. And so our Lord faithfully brings
his people, in the time of his love, he brings his people into
a time of darkness into a difficulty when we see that all my works
are dumb. All my religious works, my non-religious
works, they're all filthy rags and do nothing for my salvation. In fact, God is angry with me
for having done those things and we're brought to feel ashamed. of our foolish thinking and ashamed
of what we trusted in and what we thought was our righteousness
and how we looked to those things knowing the scriptures the way
we did or thought we did and yet still we trusted in the works
of our hands. We trusted in my faith. I trusted
in What I was doing in church and what I was confessing and
what I was turning away from, that's where my trust was until
the Lord came and said, that's not salvation. You're a self-righteous
man. And that's what he brings his
people to see, that we're nothing. And my point is to say that that's
a fearful time. We're brought to feel that we're
cut off and to know that we're lost. I'm blind. I'm deaf. I'm dumb. I can't do these things. And I'm not as wise as I thought
I was. And he brings his people to behold
that as well. But the Lord is working good
for his people because once he turns us from the broad way of
death and to see that that's where we are. and then he brings
his spirit, gives us life, and to behold the Lord Jesus Christ,
who gives us spiritual life, who leads us to the Savior, to
behold his obedient work, and the all-sufficiency of it, and
the accomplished work, is all in his blood, and that there's
nothing for me to do. and yet he works life in his
people and hope in his people and faith in his people to believe
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's an example in each child
of God personally where we're brought into darkness and it
seems like I'm lost and going to hell, but when the Lord pleased
he gives that life and peace looking to the Lord Jesus Christ
and works it wonderfully to bring us to himself and to behold Lord
you had it all this time I was worried and afraid and fearful
but it was all for my good and you didn't do it because you
hate me you did it because you love me and so that's what the
Lord brings to the heart of his people and comforting them in
the Lord Jesus Christ so I pray that's a comfort to you and and
a help to you. Amen. All right, let's close
in prayer. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your wisdom and your grace. Lord, take these words
of clay, and Lord, we pray that your spirit would bless the hearts
of your people. Turn us from self, turn us from
this flesh, and turn us, Lord, to look to the Lord Jesus Christ,
our Lord and Savior, that we would be saved by His blood,
and Lord, that we would be turned from trusting in self, that we
would be turned from dead-letter religion, and that we would be
taken up by Your grace and mercy and faithfulness, Lord. Please
have mercy upon us. please fill our hearts with joy
and hope in the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone. Lord, that we
may grow in Him and have fellowship with our God and with one another
in the blood of Christ. Lord, we pray that you would
bless your people, bless your people wherever they're meeting.
And Lord, that you would establish your work here, that you would
would establish this church and that you would bless it pour
out your spirit upon us and that you would draw your people who
are lost and afraid and fearful and don't know the truth Lord
draw them here and cause them to sit and listen and that you
would reveal faith in their hearts it's in the name of our Lord
and Savior Jesus Christ we pray amen Let's stand and sing a closing
hymn, 262, trusting Jesus, 262. Simply trusting every day, trusting
through a stormy way. Even when my faith is small,
trusting Jesus, that is all. Trusting as the moments fly,
trusting as the days go by, trusting Him whate'er befall, trusting
Jesus that is all. Brightly doth his spirit shine
Into this poor heart of mine. While he leads, I cannot fall,
Trusting Jesus, that is all. Trusting as the moments fly,
trusting as the days go by, trusting Him whate'er befall, trusting
Jesus, that is all. Singing if my way is clear, Praying
if the path be drear, If in danger for him call, Trusting Jesus,
that is all. Trusting as the moments fly,
trusting as the days go by, trusting Him whate'er befall, trusting
Jesus, that is all. Trusting Him while life shall
last, trusting Him till earth be past, till within the jasper
wall, trusting Jesus, that is all. ? Trusting as the moments
fly ? ? Trusting as the days go by ? ? Trusting Him whatever
befall ? ? Trusting Jesus, that is all ? Thank you.