Good evening, let's begin our
evening service by standing and singing hymn number 249, Just
As I Am, 249. you Just as I am without one plea,
but that Thy blood was shed for me, and that Thou bidst me come
to Thee, O Lamb of God, I come. I come just as I am and waiting not
to rid my soul of one dark blot. He whose blood can cleanse these
spots, O Lamb of God, I come, I come. Just as I am, though tossed about
With many a conflict, many a doubt Bindings and fears within, without
O Lamb of God, I come I come. Just as I am, poor wretched mind,
sigh, richest healing of the mind, yea, all I need In thee
to find, O land of God, I come, I come. Just as I am, thou wilt
receive, wilt welcome, pardon, cleanse, relieve. Because thy promise I believe,
O land of God, I come. I would like to read Psalm 98. O sing unto the Lord a new song,
for he hath done marvellous things, his right hand and his holy arm
hath gotten him the victory. The Lord hath made known his
salvation, his righteousness hath he openly showed in the
sight of the heathen. He hath remembered his mercy
and his truth toward the house of Israel. All the ends of the
earth have seen the salvation of our God. Make a joyful noise
unto the Lord, all the earth. Make a loud noise and rejoice
and sing praise. Sing unto the Lord with the harp
and with the voice of a psalm. with trumpets, and the sound
of a cornet, make a joyful noise before the Lord, the King. Let
the sea roar in the fullness thereof, the world and they that
dwell therein. Let the floods clap their hands,
let the hills be joyful together before the Lord, for he cometh
to judge the earth. With righteousness shall he judge
the world and the people with equity. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we thank you for allowing us, Lord, a small place and a little
time where we can rest and where we can hear the gospel declared.
Father, what a great, great blessing it is when so many thousands
and thousands, Lord, that surround us do not have this opportunity.
And yet, Lord, you have taken reasons out of yourself and you
have called us out and you have given us that great gift of faith
whereby we can rejoice in the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, remember
us this evening. Will you pour out your grace
and mercy upon us? And also those that listen online
and through various service means, Lord, will you remember them
also where they are? And Lord, remember those of us
that perhaps are struggling with health and various issues. Will
you, Lord, give healing mercies and continue to give us all strength,
Lord, that we may continue to gather together. And Lord, remember
us as a small flock, as a small assembly in this location. Father,
all things are perfectly in your hands, and you have promised
where two or three are gathered together in your midst, In your
name, there you will be in the midst of them. And Father, will
you remember us this evening? Give us a hunger and an appetite.
And remember, Lord, our loved ones wherever they are. You know
all things perfectly. And will you call them out of
darkness into your marvelous light? Lord, remember Brother
Eric as he stands before us again. Pour out your spirit upon him,
Lord, and give him what is necessary that he may declare the glorious
riches of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, we also think of Brother
Lindsey Campbell, his family, Lord, where they are grieving
with an empty place. Give them, Lord, comfort in the
Lord Jesus Christ. For Jesus' sake alone, amen.
Oh yeah, we got another hymn here.
Let's sing. Blessed Assurance, $255,000. It's in assurance, Jesus is mine. Oh, what a foretaste of glory
divine. Heir of salvation, purchase of
God. Thorn of His spirit, washed in
His blood. This is my story, this is my
song, praising my Savior all the day long. This is my story,
this is my song, praising my Savior all the day long. Perfect submission, perfect delight,
Visions of rapture now burst on my sight. Angels descending
bring from above echoes of mercy, whispers of love. This is my
story, this is my song, praising my Savior all the day long. This is my story, this is my
song. Praising my Savior all the day
long. Perfect submission, all is at
rest. I in my Savior am happy and blessed. Watching and waiting, looking
above. Filled with His goodness, lost
in His love. This is my story, this is my
song. Praising my Savior all the day
long. This is my story, this is my
song. Praising my Savior all the day
long. Thank you. Good evening. Okay, brethren, take your Bibles
and let's turn to Isaiah 52. Isaiah chapter 52, and I want
to look at the first six verses with you this evening. Now last
week, as we were closing chapter 51, we saw how that the Lord
raised up his people. He stood them up and made them
ministers of the gospel. He called us to bear witness
of the testimony of Jesus Christ as he's revealed it to us. And
we saw that in doing that, what he does for his people is he
removes the confidences of this flesh. We saw how he brings our
wisdom to nothing that we might know Christ our wisdom. And he takes away our righteousness
and our confidence in the ability to make a righteousness for ourselves,
which we try to accomplish in the law or in religion. And he
shows us. that his judgment is that Christ
is our righteousness. He provided Christ our righteousness.
And he takes away our seeking to sanctify ourselves by the
things that we do in order to draw near to the Lord. And he
shows us, no, no. Christ is the one in whom I draw
you near to myself. And he takes away that labor
in this flesh to redeem ourselves, to make right that which we've
made wrong. And he shows us, no, no, no,
no. I've provided my son. He's your
redemption. You're cleansed and claimed.
by his blood. You're washed in the blood of
my son. And he shows us that we're not
fighting our enemies. We don't have to fight them off
and defeat them because they're already defeated in the Lord
Jesus Christ. And so this evening now we see
another picture of our salvation where the Lord comes to us with
command, a command, a gracious command. a command filled with
the knowledge of His grace which comes to us in the promise that
this is what He works in us, because I don't have any ability
in this flesh to do what He commands. You don't have the ability in
your flesh to do what He commands, but He makes it known what His
will and purpose is for His people, and it comes with power. It comes
with the power of the Spirit working in us, that will and
purpose of God, and He's making us to know and to understand
and to believe Jesus Christ, our salvation. And so this chapter,
it opens with the command of God, and it comes with the power
of God to His child. And that's the only way that
we're going to hear this word is by grace. That's the only
way we can hear it. We're going to find that it's
not by our flesh. He's not looking to our flesh.
He's not commanding this flesh to do that which it cannot do,
but He provides His word of grace, He provides His salvation of
grace and mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. So, I've titled this
message, Five Commands to the Redeemed. Five commands, and
really they're five gracious commands. They're revealing the
grace of our Lord in these commands. So, we'll begin just with a quick
overview of these commands in verses one and two, and then
we're gonna see why It must be by grace. It's got to be by His
grace, because we can't hear it otherwise. And then we'll
see. We'll come back and look at these and see why I'm saying
these are gracious commands. This is revealing God's will
and purpose for us in Christ. So the passage opens with the
Lord causing his people to hear his command, his word here. And if we're honest, when we
look at these, we're going to know, I can't do this. I have
no power in this flesh to work this word of peace and joy and rejoicing with my
God. I don't have the ability to do
this. I can't affect this in my flesh. I don't have the power. All right, so let's read verses
one and two. He says, awake, awake, put on
thy strength, O Zion. Put on thy beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city. For henceforth there shall no
more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself
from the dust. Arise and sit down, O Jerusalem. Loose thyself from the bands
of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. So as I said, these
are commands given to us, but we have no power to perform them
by this flesh. And that leaves only one recourse. It must be by grace. It must be by grace. And so the Lord's revealing his
will and purpose. That's how we hear this. We hear
this is the will of God and what he wills and purposes for his
people to be, that's what he works in them. That's what he's
provided for us in his son, Jesus Christ. So, we're going to come
back to these verses in a bit, but I want to show you why it
must be by grace. And so, let's see this here. The passage we know is speaking
to Zion. It's speaking to Jerusalem, the
holy city. These are words which define
the people of God. The Lord's speaking to the people
of God. He's speaking to his children,
whom he's chosen. They don't necessarily know they're
the children of God, but when his word comes to them in power,
then they know. Then they hear his voice. Then
they know that God has been merciful to them. God has kept them all
along and brought them to hear his word of grace revealed in
his son. And so this passage here in the
Old Testament, in Isaiah, it's talking to Zion. It's talking
to Jerusalem. We read all over the place about
Israel and Judah and the people of God. And we read constantly
how these people are going into captivity. They went down into
Egypt. And before long, they were slaves
in Egypt. And when God had established
them there in the land of Canaan, we find that they became troubled
by Samaria, and they became troubled by Syria and Assyria. And the northern kingdom went
into captivity by Assyria. And the southern kingdom went
into captivity by Babylon. And these people are always going
into captivity. So what does that have to do
with me? How do I find any comfort in
reading these words about historical Israel and historical Judah?
What does that mean for me? Why is the Lord bringing this
to my attention? Well, the Lord is giving us Israel
and Judah here as a picture, as types of our need, of our
captivity, that we are in bondage. We're taken captive. We're slaves,
slaves to sin, slaves of unrighteousness and unable to deliver ourselves
out of our captivity and our slavery. And so what the Lord
is doing here is He's bringing us to see what we are in this
flesh, to shut our mouths, to cause us to cease from our boasting
and thinking that everything's all right, or thinking that we're
pleasing God. He's making us to know that we're
sinners. He's making us to know the exceeding
sinfulness of sin. and to see just how dead we are
in trespasses and sins and how corrupt this flesh is. The Lord is making us to know
this and he does that in order that we would hear. his word
of salvation, that we would hear God's judgment saying, that way
that you're going and that work that you have in your hands and
what you're attempting to do is unrighteousness, it's wickedness,
it's darkness. Come out of that, look here,
in my son, this is salvation. He is the way of salvation. He's
the life I've provided for my people. Look to him, trust him. walk in the Lord Jesus Christ. So he's bearing witness to Christ. He's showing us what we are in
the flesh and how we've nothing and we're corrupt and enmity
against God and he's showing us life and light in the sun. He's showing us the salvation
he's provided for his people and that we would know and see
and the Lord Jesus Christ is complete salvation. So That is
where we begin here in verse 3 in seeing our sin. For thus
saith the Lord, Ye have sold yourselves for naught, and ye
shall be redeemed without money. The Lord's saying here, you're
in slavery to sin. You're captive to sin. Whether
you know it or not, you're a slave to sin. You're sold in sin. You're corrupt and defiled. And
you do not know the true and living God. That righteousness
which we had when God created Adam, upright and perfect and
righteous, he had no sin in him, all that is gone. in his people. Adam fell in sin, and he became
corrupt and defiled, and all his seed in him. And we come
forth corrupted in Adam, and we come forth and commit all
kinds of various sins, and all kinds of law-breaking against
the true and living God. And so that fellowship that Adam
had with God, it's gone. It's lost. We don't have that
fellowship with him. In other words, we're dead spiritually. Naturally, as we come forth in
this world, sons and daughters of Adam, we're dead spiritually. We don't have any light in us.
There's no spark of life in us. There's nothing to appeal to.
We're dead. We're dead. Without the grace
of God giving us life, we remain dead. We shall not live except
he give us life. And so he continues in verse
four. For thus saith the Lord God, My people went down aforetime,
or before, into Egypt to sojourn there. And the Assyrian oppressed
them without cause. So like Israel, we've fallen
into sin. We've become slaves and captives
to sin. Slaves and captives to enmity
and death and the grave and hell and this world and the oppressor.
All these things. We're captives. And so what some
men do is they hear of the law and they look to the law to deliver
themselves from their captivity. And so they, trying to work a
righteousness for themselves, will put their neck under the
yoke of the law and begin to plow the field and to lay down
seed in the hope that a plant will spring up and it'll bear
fruit. And that'll be their righteousness
is that fruit there. But is that why God gave the
law? Did God give the law that we
could make a work of righteousness for ourselves, that we could
restore that which was lost? The truth is, is that no. That's
not why God gave the law. He didn't give the law For us
to make a righteousness for ourselves, God gave the law to show us that
we are sinners, to make sin more apparent to us, to show us just
how corrupt and how vile and how dead we are in our sins. Turn over to Romans chapter seven. Go to Romans chapter seven, and
we're gonna pick up in verse nine. A lot of times we'll look
at Romans 3 in verse 19 and 20 to see this, but let's look at
Romans 7 as it's saying the same thing, why the law was given. Paul writes there, for I was
alive without the law once. There was a time when I didn't
know. much about my sin. I went on
in ignorance. I was pretty carefree and didn't
concern myself with sin and with God and with judgment and things
to come. That wasn't on my mind. And so before the law, before
even religion came to me, I didn't question or I wasn't wondering
why, I wasn't troubled by my sin. And some of you came up
in the law. Some of you in religion came
up under a knowledge of the doctrine of grace. And oftentimes, associated
with the doctrine of grace is the law. But I didn't come up
under the doctrine of grace. I actually came up more in what's
called Arminianism. And their appeal to men's flesh
is based on the love of God. And they say, well, God loves
you. And he loves you so much that
he sent his son to die for all mankind. And he gave his life
and shed his blood for all men, all men to put away their sin.
And then their appeal to you, therefore, is why are you going
to spurn his love? Here's this God who loves you
and did everything for you and gave his son for you to save
you from your sin and you're just gonna despise his love and
refuse his love and won't hear him and won't believe on him.
Make a decision. Make a decision today for Jesus.
Let him be Lord of your life. And that's their appeal. That's
their false gospel. That's their lie and their appeal
to our flesh. And so religion became my yoke. And I thought everything was
fine for a time. And I began. But eventually,
just like you under the law, When you're laboring under the
law and you begin to see, I'm not keeping the law perfectly. There's problems here. I've got
gaps. I've got big gaps between what
the law says and my ability to keep that law. And in religion,
even without the law, And having that heavy dose and emphasis
on the love of God, what I found, because you read the Bible still,
you read the Bible and you see things there that are pretty
clear that this is sinful, and this is bad, this is evil, and
this is wicked. Don't do this. This is good.
And I began to see pretty quickly I'm not keeping these things
here that are written in the word of God. And so what happened
was when my actions didn't line up with my decision for Christ,
I crumbled inside. I couldn't reconcile that. And
so I was one of those people that was always, whenever the
pastor said, if you want to give your life to Jesus, raise your
hand. That was me. Or if you want to rededicate
your life to Jesus, come down the aisle. That was me. If I
was at camp, if you didn't really give your life to Jesus last
time and you want to give your life to Jesus now, raise your
hand. That was me always coming there
because my actions never aligned with my decision because my hope
was in my decision. And I questioned the sincerity
of my decision, because I was trusting in the works of my hands. And that's what everyone is doing,
whether they're looking to the law for their righteousness,
or they're looking to religion. Some set of tenets that the church
says, do this, and it means that you're a Christian. And as soon
as you see, if you're honest, as soon as you see, I'm not doing
what they're saying to do perfectly. I guess everything I've said
up to this point is a lie, and it's false. And so we crumble
and fall apart. And so that's what Paul's saying
next. But when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. Once I got religion, and once
I started trying to please the Lord, I quickly fell apart. And I realized, wait a minute.
I'm worse than when I started. I'm more sinful now than when
I first began. I didn't realize just how awful
it was. And that's where a lot of, that's
where all men are, who are trying to make a righteousness for themselves
in religion, because we find ourselves insufficient, insufficient
under these things to please God. And so the commandment,
verse 10, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the
commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore, the
law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good. We
should seek our God. We should try to, there should
be a desire to obey him, and to hear his word, and to believe
him, and to love him, and to seek him for all things, but
we don't. This flesh does him. Was then
that which is good made death unto me? God forbid, but sin
that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is
good, that sin by the commandment might become exceeding sinful. In other words, God gave the
law, and God allowed these things among men to show us just how
sinful, how wicked we are, how insufficient our righteousness
is, that we would know, I cannot save myself. Even with the best
of religion, I cannot save myself. For we know that the law is spiritual,
but I am carnal, sold under sin." And that's what we find. Yes,
we should know the Lord. We should praise Him and rejoice
in Him and give Him all the glory. But we don't. This flesh is wicked,
vile, and corrupt. And so the Lord says now back
in our text, in Isaiah 52, verse 5, Now therefore, what have I
here, saith the Lord, that my people is taken away from all?
They that rule over them make them to howl, saith the Lord,
and my name continually every day is blasphemed. So being abused
and tormented and whipped and beaten by our captors, we begin
to howl and cry out and mourn over our sin and mourn over our
captivity and wonder, Lord, I don't know how to please you. I don't
know how to be justified with you. All we know is that we're
sinners. But we don't know God's salvation. We don't hear him. We don't know
how can I be saved. All I keep seeing over and over
again is just how vile I am and how wicked I am. And we're just
ignorant, ignorant of the way of God. We tried. We tried our
best. We tried. We labored. But it
came up short. But don't miss the gracious word
that the Lord put there at the end of verse 3 when he said,
you shall be redeemed without money, without labor, without
your work. You shall be purchased. and be
made my children, you shall know your inheritance in me from the
foundation of the world. In other words, we're not gonna
be redeemed by corruptible things. Peter said it this way, 1 Peter
1, verses 18 and 19. For as much as ye know that ye
were not redeemed with corruptible things, such as silver and gold
from your vain conversation, received by tradition from your
fathers, Verse 19, But with the precious blood of Christ, as
of a lamb, without blemish and without spot. We went into slavery
being corrupted by the works of these hands. And when the
Lord was pleased to show it to us, we found that we only made
it worse with our workings and our religion and our law keeping
and trying to be good. We only made it worse and found
ourselves even buried deeper under that mountain of our sin. And so it's not gonna be by the
flesh getting you out of it. The flesh got you in there. You're
not gonna get yourself out of it. Instead, it's gonna be by
grace. It's going to be by grace in
the salvation of the Lord. He says in Isaiah 52 6, Therefore
my people shall know my name. Therefore they shall know in
that day that I am he that doth speak. Behold, it is I. So having shown us our captivity,
having shown us our deadness and vileness and wretchedness
and sinfulness, The Lord will now be gracious to us. He's going
to make us to know His grace. He's going to make us to know
His salvation and His Son. He tells us we're going to know
the name of our Redeemer. We're going to know Him who is
our very salvation. My people shall know my name. And the name is Jesus Christ. He is the Savior, the Shorty,
whom God has provided to save His people from their sins. And the Lord says, they shall
know in that day that I am He. That Christ Himself, that One
whom we come to, looking to Him, believing Him, He is our very
salvation. He's not an example. He's not
just a good man. He hasn't just made it possible
for our salvation. It's not a decision. It's not
by religious works. He is salvation. He has saved
his people from their sins. He's going to show us the works
are finished. It's already done. Everything
necessary has been accomplished in my Son, your Savior. whom I've provided as your shorty,
as your substitute, who came in the flesh and went to the
cross bearing your sins to put them away, shedding his blood,
giving up the ghost. He died in your place that you
should live and know me and have life in me and liberty And so,
our Lord's showing us that it's all accomplished already in His
Son. God's grace makes us to know
in that day that I am He. It's already done, Lord. You've
already accomplished it. There's nothing left for me to
do. You are salvation. You are the
Savior. And I believe, and I look to
You. because he brings that out of
us. He's the one who puts that faith there. It's not a decision.
The one who doesn't believe, the one who doesn't have the
spirit, you say, well, make the decision. Come on, you've got
to make a decision for Christ. And they sit there and they think,
well, gee, is it going to be profitable or work out for me
if I make this decision for Christ? That one doesn't have faith.
What are you making a decision for? You either believe, either
the Spirit reveals faith in you whereby you believe the gospel
that you're hearing, that Christ accomplished it. It's already
accomplished. Their sin's put away, and we believe it. And
others who don't have the Spirit don't believe it. They don't
hear it, and they walk away unbelieving. All right, so this is what our
Lord shows us. Now I want to come back to those
first two verses. I want to show you five blessings,
which are made up of these commands and a promise by the Lord, which
he gives to his children. But understand what the Lord
is doing here is he's making known to you in these commands.
He's making known to you. This is my will and purpose for
my people. And it comes with purpose. We
hear it as his will and purpose. believing Him, trusting Him,
and He makes it known, His will and purpose in our hearts, whereby
we look to Christ and rest in Him. We rest in Him, right? So let's read these verses together,
and then we'll break it down. Isaiah 52, one and two. Awake,
awake, put on thy strength, O Zion. Put on thy beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city. For henceforth there shall no
more come into thee, the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself
from the dust. Arise and sit down, O Jerusalem. Loose thyself from the bands
of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. So remember, these are
gracious words that come to the child of God with power and deliverance. with faith, looking to and trusting
in the Lord Jesus Christ. So the first command that he
gives, awake, awake, put on thy strength, O Zion. What is the
strength of Zion? Who is the strength of Zion?
It's the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Lord is coming and saying,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And that word comes with power. We don't believe on Christ unless
the Spirit reveals, gives it to us and reveals faith in us,
which is believing on Christ. You that hear that He is salvation,
you believe. It's not a decision that's to
be made. You believe or you don't believe. And so He comes with
power believing Christ, believing God. All who believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ shall be saved. All who believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ are saved. It's accomplished. And He shall
return and raise us up again to be with Himself. What we could
not accomplish under the law or by our religion is already
accomplished in Christ. And the Spirit makes us to know
that, and we believe Him. God isn't saying, do you see
any decision, any question in there? Awake, awake, put on thy
strength, O Zion. He's not asking, do you want
to put on strength? He's commanding, put on strength,
and that command comes with power to every child of God. His people believe him. All right,
Paul, even when he was speaking to Agrippa, said to them, believest
thou the prophets? Do you believe the prophets,
Agrippa? I know that thou believest. I
know that you believe the prophets, right? Because God is showing
in his word, he's declaring throughout. His purpose in redeeming the
people by His Son, Jesus Christ. And we that believe His Word,
and when the Spirit shows us, yeah, this Jesus of Nazareth
is the Christ, we believe. We believe Him. We that believe
His Word, hear that Christ is the Savior, and all who are God's
chosen children shall believe. And those who have the Son have
life. He that hath the Son hath also
the Father, and he that hath the Son hath life, for in him
is life, and God gives it to his people. The second command
then that comes to us is, put on thy beautiful garments, O
Jerusalem, the holy city. That beautiful garment is the
righteousness of Jesus Christ. And all who believe Jesus Christ
for righteousness are clothed with the righteous garment of
the Lord Jesus Christ. bathed in the blood of Christ.
We are washed in His blood. We are covered with the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. That's how we come to our God
and our Father. We come in the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. So that one who believes is saved,
is adorned, is adorned with that beautiful garment of righteousness. That's how the Lord words it
in Revelation 21... Revelation 21 verse 2, And I,
John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down from God
out of heaven, prepared as a bride, adorned for her husband. She's
put on that beautiful garment, the righteousness of the Lord
Jesus Christ, because the Spirit's revealed faith in her. She's
looking to Christ. And therefore, by the power of
God, by the promise of God, She's covered with that beautiful garment.
She's put it on by faith. The third thing that the Lord
says here, it's more of a promise than a command, but he says,
for henceforth there shall no more come unto thee the uncircumcised
and the unclean. What is he saying here? Because
I can't, he's not talking about physical circumcision. and physical
washing, he's talking about a spiritual circumcision and a spiritual
washing. He's talking about a circumcision
of the heart and a cleaning of the heart so that we're no longer
unclean but rather clean. Well, the Spirit of God for his
people, the promise of God is that you shall be clean. You
are cleaned. You are washed. You are circumcised
by the Lord Jesus Christ. That's how you believe, being
born again, being given life of Him. Paul says in Romans 2,
if you wanna see this, this is a good thing to see here. Romans 2, verse 28 and 29. He says, for he's not a Jew,
which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision, which is
outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew, which is one
inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit,
and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of
God." And so we keep that righteousness of the law in Christ. We're not
laboring under the law and laboring in religion to try and work a
righteousness, or try to earn favor, or try to get God to smile
on us as a sanctifying work, Christ is our sanctification.
Christ is our righteousness. Christ is our redemption. He's
everything to us, brethren. So fourth now, the fourth thing
the Lord says in the beginning of verse two, shake thyself from
the dust. Arise and sit down, O Jerusalem. He's commanding here a resurrection
from the dead. He's delivering us from the grave
of dead letter works, of dead letter religion. Shake yourselves
from that dust, he says. He's delivering, he's the one
that shakes us. He's the one that brings us from
that, right? In Hebrews 12, he talks about
a shaking. of those things which cannot
be shaken." Right? So that those things which are
made, that is made with the hands, made by man's flesh, those things
will be shaken and fall apart. But that which is born from above,
though it be shaken, will not fall, because it can't be shaken.
It's of the Lord. It's of His workmanship, it's
his righteousness, and it will not fall apart, it shall not
fail. And so he says, shake thyself
from the dust, be delivered from the grave of dead religion. And that's what he does, he makes
us to know that Christ is salvation. I'm not saved by these things.
This isn't my salvation. He makes his people to know that.
The flesh doesn't know that, but the Spirit teaches us. and
gives us that understanding and hope in the Lord Jesus Christ. So we're not looking to the law
or to religion as a measure of how well we're doing. We put
those things away. Because when we look to those
things, we put ourselves back under bondage. And we begin to
labor in fear and worry. That's bondage. That's just as
much bondage as the person ignorantly committing sins. The one who's
trying to get out of it and deliver themselves and cleanse themselves
by some religious work or law is laboring under the yoke of
the law. They're laboring in bondage and they're a slave to
sin and a slave to unrighteousness. So Christ delivers us from all
that. And he says, arise and sit down. So we are raised to newness of
life by the Spirit, being born again. and are made to sit down,
to rest from all our labors, knowing Christ, you did it all. Lord, you did it all. My Savior,
you did it all. Thank you. Thank you, Lord. And so that's what he brings
us to do, to be satisfied with the work of Christ, even as our
God is satisfied with the work of Christ. We're satisfied just
like our Lord is. And then fifth, The fifth commandment,
he says, loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive
daughter of Zion. Again, he's delivering us out
of that dusty, dead letter, empty religion that cannot save. He's
bringing us out of the grave and calling us forth like Lazarus,
when he said, Lazarus, come forth. Did Lazarus have any power in
his flesh to come forth? No, he spoke that word and it
came to Lazarus with power and glory. And Lazarus rose up, he
came forth, and what did the Lord do? He said, loosen, loosen
from those grave clothes. Take those things off of them,
which the Lord does for all you, his beloved people, in whom he's
revealed the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ in you. feed you
with the preaching of the gospel and strips those grave cloths
off so that you cease looking to those things and finding any
comfort in those things because there is no comfort. And He restores
you and gives you hope and life and comfort in the Lord Jesus
Christ. This flesh only puts us into
bondage. If this was coming to our flesh,
we'd be going deeper into bondage. This word is coming with power
by the Spirit coming to you that believe Him. and comforting you,
and giving you rest and peace and hope and joy in the Lord
Jesus Christ, to see and know the salvation of God. Now the
Lord is that Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there
is liberty. Liberty. 2 Corinthians 3.17. So these are the five commands
of our God that He effectually works in His people, by grace,
graciously working these in you, because these are all spiritual
blessings given to us in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Ephesians 1 verse 3. So these
five commands, put on thy strength. believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
which he gives you to do, to believe Christ. He's the one
who reveals that faith in you. Second, put on thy beautiful
garments. You that believe have put on
the righteousness of Christ. Christ is your righteousness.
That's the adorning garment of the bride of Christ before whom
she is brought before her Lord on that glorious marriage day. It's all by his grace. Henceforth,
he says, there shall no more come in to thee the uncircumcised
and the unclean. That one who labors in religion
and labors in the law, they're uncircumcised. They're unclean. But he circumcises the heart
and cleans this filthy heart, making us righteous in Christ.
That's why there's none uncircumcised and unclean, because there's
none in Christ who are uncircumcised and unclean. They've all been
given life. his blood, his death shall not
fail to accomplish and redeem all for whom he gave his life
for. Shake thyself forth, shake thyself from the dust, arise
and sit down, so that he raises us up to newness of life by His
Spirit, making us born again to know our Savior, to walk by
faith in Him, trusting Him, crying out, Abba, Father, save me. As
we see His promises and His Word, which reveal His will and purpose,
we now know by His understanding and knowledge in Christ that
He's not talking to my flesh to do this. But seeing how it's
not of me, but all of Him, we're made to cry out to Him, saying,
Lord, this is Your will. Lord, help me to walk in Your
will and in Your purpose by Your grace. Keep my wicked heart,
Lord. Keep my wandering heart. Keep
me ever looking to the Lord Jesus Christ. And He makes us to rest
right there, to be comforted by Christ and not to to trust
another salvation. And then fifth, loose thyself
from the bands of thy neck. Meaning he's delivered us from
that dusty old dead letter religion that binds the dead and cannot
loose them. It cannot save them. But Christ
loses us. Christ sets us free. So I pray
the Lord bless you and help you to hear that word in the spirit
being renewed by the spirit of your minds because that's how
he gives it to all his children. Amen. Let's close in prayer. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your grace. Lord, we thank you. What a frightening
thing it would be to hear these words without the Savior without
your spirit, to hear them in the flesh. Lord, we've been there,
we've labored there and only got ourselves into greater corruption
and greater sin and more unbelief and hardened and unrighteous
things. But Lord, we thank you that by
your grace, you sent your word and it came with power and delivered
us from the deadness of this flesh and the deadness of this
world and the captivity of the captors, Lord, thank you for
your grace and mercy toward us in Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray
your blessing upon all your people that you would help your people,
make your people to hear this word and to believe it, to receive
it by your grace, by your spirit, in the spirit. It's in the name
of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, we pray, amen. Let's all stand and sing a closing
hymn, 82. 82, till we meet again. And I'm singing this because
it reminds me so much of Lindsey Campbell. I remember him singing
that. That was one of the nice things
going to the conference was singing as a group there and him usually
picking this. So if we could sing this one,
God be with you till we meet again, 82. I'd be with you till we meet
again. By His counsels guide, uphold
you. With His sheep securely fold
you. God be with you till we meet
again. Till we meet, till we meet, till
we meet at Jesus' feet. Till we meet, till we meet, God
be with you till we meet again. God be with you till we meet again. Neath His wings protecting, hide
you. Deadly manna still provide you. God be with you till we meet
again Till we meet, till we meet Till we meet at Jesus' feet Till
we meet, till we meet God be with you till we meet again ?
God be with you till we meet again ? ? When Lois Perlisle
found you ? ? Put his arms unfailing round you ? ? God be with you
till we meet again ? ? Till we meet, till we meet, till we meet
again ? At Jesus' feet Till we meet, till we meet God be with
you till we meet again I'll be with you till we meet
again. Keep low spanner floating o'er
you, Smite death's threatening waves before you. God be with you till we meet
again. Till we meet. Till we meet. Till we meet at Jesus' feet. Till we meet. Till we meet. God be with you till we meet
again. Thank you.