Got three minutes, 7-12 on here. We'll do any more. We haven't got for a while. We
might have a piece of rubber over that drain to put a bucket
on it. Maybe one. I'll have that hung
for now to help us out. We have three younger ones that
are stuck. Let's begin our evening service
by standing and singing out of your softback, number 118, Vast
Beyond Imagination, 118. Most beyond imagination is the
host of God's election. More than all the sands of oceans,
more than all the stars of heaven, Here they seem a small assembly,
weak and poor and never needy. But when all are brought to heaven,
what a mighty congregation. Mighty through the land they
conquer, Lord, let me be in that number. Fixed in your predestination,
Savior grant me your salvation. We're going to turn to number
13. Deeper than the stain has gone,
number 13. It's been a long time since we
signed this one. Worked to stain the soiled man's
nature, long the distance that he fell. Far removed from hope
and heaven Enter deep despair and hell But there was a fountain
open And the blood of God's own Son Purifies the soul and reaches
? Deep and the stain has gone ? Praise the Lord for his salvation
? God still reigns upon his throne ? And I know the blood still
reaches ? Deeper than the stain has gone ? Conscious of the deep
pollution ? ? Sinners wander in the night ? ? Though they
hear the shepherd calling ? ? They still fear to face the light
? ? This the blessed consolation ? ? That can melt the heart of
stone ? ? That sweet balm of Gilead reaches ? ? Deeper than
the stain has gone ? ? Praise the Lord for his salvation ?
? God still reigns upon his throne ? and I know the blood still
reaches deeper than the stain has gone. All unworthy we who've
wandered And our eyes are wet with tears As we think of love
that sought us Through the weary, wasted years Yet we walk the
holy highway Walking by God's grace alone Knowing Calvary's
fountain reaches deep and the stain has gone. Praise the Lord for his salvation. God still reigns upon his throne. And I know the blood still reaches
deeper than the stain has gone When with holy choirs we're standing
In the presence of the King And our souls are lost in wonder
While the white robes' choirs sing Then we'll praise the name
of Jesus ? With the millions round the throne ? Praise him
for the power that reaches ? Deeper than the stain has gone ? Praise
the Lord for his salvation ? God still reigns upon his throne
And I know the blood still reaches deeper than the stain has gone. I would like to read 1 Thessalonians
1. 1 Thessalonians 1. The first epistle of Paul the
Apostle to the Thessalonians. Paul and Salvinius and Timotheus
unto the Church of the Thessalonians, which is in God the Father and
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace be unto you and peace from
God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give thanks to God
always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers, remembering
without ceasing your work of faith and labor of love and patience
of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father. Knowing, brethren, beloved, your
election of God, for our gospel came not unto you in word only,
but also in power and in the Holy Ghost, in much assurance,
as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake.
And ye became followers of us and of the Lord, having received
the word in much affliction with the joy of the Holy Ghost, so
that ye were in samples to all that believe in Macedonia and
Achaia. For from you sounded out the
word of the Lord, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also
in every place your faith to God word is spread abroad so
that we need not to speak anything. For they themselves show of us
what manner of entering in we had unto you and how ye turned
to God from idols to serve the living and true God, and to wait
for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even
Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come. Our merciful Father, we thank
you for again giving us this opportunity to gather together.
And Father, we thank you for having provided all that was
necessary for poor sinners, for your sheep, the Lord Jesus Christ,
that great shepherd, has provided complete satisfaction and righteousness. And Father, that we may, this
evening, have an appetite to hear once again about this great
shepherd. Father, allow Brother Eric, as
he stands before us this evening, remember him, Lord. Pour out
your spirit upon him and also us as we listen. Give us, Lord,
a short time this evening that we may rest in this glorious
gospel, that we may cease from works and that we may rejoice
and receive peace in our souls once again. Father, remember
all our loved ones wherever they are. You know all things perfectly.
And especially this week, Lord, remember Brother Eric as he travels
and be with those, Lord, that hope to come this way. Protect
them and give them the strength and all that they stand in need
of. Remember us, Lord, as this local assembly. Give us wisdom
and strength, Lord, that we may continue in this location or
wherever it pleases you to put us. Father, continue to watch
over us and protect us. Work mightily, Lord, in our loved
ones, in their hearts. Nothing is impossible with you.
For Jesus' sake alone, amen. All right, brethren, we're gonna
be in Isaiah 42. Isaiah 42, and looking at verses
17 through 25. Now, I know that the scriptures,
they don't, when they were written, they didn't write in the chapters
and the verses, but this is, I think, Isaiah 42. It helps
us anyway as humans, right? It puts things in perspective.
It helps us logically group them and find them easier and speak
of the places that we're talking about in the scriptures. And
this chapter 42 has been revealing the Lord's pointing out and pointing
us to His servant, the Lord Jesus Christ. and he's described as
removing our blindness, that he is the light, the light of
God, meaning that he's shining upon, he is the revelation of
God to us all. who are fallen sinners, who don't
know our way and can't save ourselves or provide for ourselves. And this chapter here from verse
17 on to the close is as though it's the final warning before
we exit the chapter. You know, I know that it goes
on, but I mean, it's like this final reminder, this call to
us to hear, to look to this servant, this one whom God has provided
to save his people from their sins. And so, We'll begin with
this declaration in the first couple of verses, and then we
see there that our Lord, His work and what He's performed,
although men and women left to themselves, they will not hear
and they will not believe and look to the Lord. And so judgment
comes upon them in the end. All right, so I've titled this,
Do You Hear and See? Do You Hear and See? Alright,
so let's begin here with this declaration in verse 17, which
the Lord says, they shall be turned back. They shall be greatly
ashamed that trust engraven images that say to the molten images,
ye are our gods. And so the Lord is saying to
us, Well, he's speaking of these graven images and these molten
images. Well, what are they? They're
images. They're idols. And how are these
idols made? They're made with the works of
men's hands. picked up a rock or found a good
piece of wood and he had an image that he was working towards.
He was whittling it out or chiseling it away and made himself some
form of a god, what he called god. And he worked at it until
it matched or fit his imagination, right? How he perceived that
god. He got to a point and said, yeah, this will do, this works.
I'm pleased with this, and he set it up as his God. And when
you think about it in that way, that's how all of our works are. work at our religion according
to the imagination that we have of God. We imagine him to be
pleased with certain things and displeased with other things.
And so in order to align with our understanding of this God
of our imagination, we do those certain things or avoid those
other things that we think displease him and do the things that we
think please him. But our Lord tells us here that
those who worship God according to the works of their own hands,
who are trying to please God by their own works, they are
going to be ashamed. Meaning, they're going to stand
before God. We're all going to stand before
God one day. And some, those that are described
as the goats, they are the ones who will be standing in their
own works. They will bring to God and say,
this is what I've done, so to speak, this is what I've done,
these are my works, the works of my hands, receive me, receive
me on these things, this is my righteousness, didn't I do good?
And they will be ashamed of their works, they'll be, they're termed
as naked, having no clothing, whereas the sheep, They'll come
not in their own works, but righteous and pure and holy, spotless,
without blemish, acceptable unto God, because they come in the
blood and righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. They don't
come naked in their own works, they come in the righteousness
of Christ, covered in His pure white glistening robe, and they'll
be received of the Lord. Our Lord, well, the psalmist
wrote in Psalm 135 verse 15, the idols of the heathen are
silver and gold, the works of men's hands. So when you see
that, this description of idols, right, they spend this, the Lord
spends so much time on idols, and we think today, well, That
doesn't mean anything to me today. Well, yes it does. Because they
whittled away with a knife and a stick or chiseled at a rock
and laid silver and gold over it. And while we don't necessarily
do that per se, but we have our idols. We worship the god of
our own imagination. We worship riches or fame or
possessions and things of that sort. We put our heart, we set
our heart on many foolish things that will not last and they won't
stand with us. They won't cover our sins and
iniquities in that day. Whereas we hope in Christ. And
so the Lord is saying to us, he's declaring to us that you
that are trusting in your works, you're going to be ashamed, you're
going to perish in your sins, and they're not going to work
for you, it's not going to be good for you. Hear what he's
saying, right? Paul would write to the Jews
concerning their zeal, because we know the Jews, when Christ
came and declared the light of the gospel to the Jewish nation
there, they were They were rejoicing and confident in their works
in the law. And he said to them, well, he's
speaking to the Jews, but this could be said to any one of us
today. He said in Romans 10.3, for they
being ignorant of God's righteousness and going about to establish
their own righteousness have not submitted themselves unto
the righteousness of God. And so in spite of having these
scriptures, In spite of the Lord sending men and even women at
times who declared the gospel, who proclaimed the gospel, who
lived that gospel and declared it to the people so that they
heard and saw and were witness to what God had done. They didn't
see the righteousness of God. They didn't understand that God
is holy and righteous and perfect. And they thought that by their
own works, they could please God with their righteousness.
And so the Lord has provided His Son. He's provided His Son,
Jesus Christ, and men don't see it. They don't see it. And, you
know, Christ coming into the world And I've said this a few
times, but it's good to repeat it, but the very fact that God
sent his own son into the world declares to us that we are sinners. We're incompetent sinners. We
cannot save ourselves. It declares to us that none of
us is righteous and we're not going to work the works of God.
And it declares to us that God alone must save. That's what
Christ coming into the world declares to us. It makes us to
know we didn't measure up. We didn't do it. If there was
a law that could have been given whereby man could have made himself
righteous, God would have given us a law. But the fact that Christ
came declares there is no law, there is no work, there's nothing
we can do to make ourselves righteous. It required the Son of God to
come as the sacrificial lamb to do for us what we cannot do
for ourselves. And yet, though we say that,
and though we declare that week after week, and we have the scriptures
and other men preach that word, and we speak of Christ in this
manner, The people don't see it. They don't see Christ. They
don't see that. When they look at Christ, they
don't see what we see. When they hear Christ, they don't
hear what we hear. Christ is declaring to us, I'm
a sinner, unable to save myself. If not for the grace of God,
I perish. They don't see that, and they don't hear that. They
look at Christ as maybe a signpost, a helper. for us, someone that
puts us in the general vicinity that we should go, but to them,
he's not salvation, he's not the way, the truth, and the life,
he's just a component of their salvation. He's a piece that
God provided to help them on their way, but they're still
looking to their own works, right? So they don't see or hear what
the entrance of Christ in this world, coming in the flesh, what
it means. And so man continues and women
continue in their dead religious works. But we know that Christ
alone is salvation. He is our very entrance. He is,
if we are to be accepted and received of God, it's because
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so Paul said in Romans 10-11,
For the scripture saith, whosoever believeth on him shall not be
ashamed." So the Lord calls us to behold Christ. Look to my
Son. Look to Him. In Isaiah 42, verse
18, it says, Hear ye death, and look ye blind, that ye may see. He declares this word. He speaks this word for our benefit. He speaks this word for our benefit. He declares it, many hear it,
many see what the Lord says, but they don't hear it in the
spirit. And I quoted from Psalm 135 verse
15 earlier, but I'm gonna quote it again and then read down a
few other verses down to 18 with you. And so in Psalm 135 verse
15, it says, the idols of the heathen are silver and gold,
the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but they speak
not. Eyes have they, but they see
not. They have ears, but they hear not, neither is there any
breath in their mouths. They that make them are like
unto them, so is everyone that trusteth in them." So the Lord
compares us to those idols, right? We have mouths, just like we
made them to have mouths, but they don't speak. Well, that's
true of us, right, who trust in our own works. We have mouths,
and when we're speaking and telling others, if we don't know the
truth, everything coming out of our mouth is a lie. It's not
the truth, right? So, in that sense, we have mouths,
but we don't speak. We don't speak anything of value
or anything that's true or righteous or helpful to anyone in idolatry. We have eyes, but they don't
see. We have ears, but they don't
hear. And it says they've no breath in their mouth, meaning
there's no spiritual life. The breath of the Spirit of God
is our life that He gives, and we don't have that in our flesh
apart from our God having mercy upon us and saving us with His
spiritual work that He alone must do. And so, those who trust
in their dead works are nothing but idolaters, and that's all
that they have. And that's why, you know, sometimes
you know, people are happy, especially parents with their kids, you
know, well, they, you know, they, they don't sit here anymore,
but they, they go to church, you know, they started going
to church where they live, you know, so many miles away. And some
parents are happy about that. And others say, I'd rather them
not go anywhere. You know, when you know the truth,
cause you, you know, that they're hearing dead religion and they're
just being cemented up in that false dead religion. And, and, and so You know, we
don't have any comfort when our kids are just religious. We pray
that they hear the truth, not just become religious and moral,
but that they hear the truth and believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ and not be convinced that they're saved when they're not.
So, the Lord says to us in verse 18, hear ye deaf and look ye
blind that ye may see. All right, now, The Lord puts
a division between His people and the children of wrath so
that when He declares that word, when He says, hear, see what
I'm saying, the children of God, they will hear and they will
see. Others will not hear and they
won't see, but He comes with power. Causing us because the
reality is when we tell men believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and
you shall be saved We're speaking to those whom the Spirit has
come upon and given them faith and and so when the Apostle said
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ they were speaking to those who
were born again those who had the new man formed in them and
though they didn't know it. And the Lord comes with power
and he breaks them out of that prison hold and their death that
they're in. And so the Lord says these things
in the scriptures, not because man has power, but because when
it pleases him, he comes with power and delivers his people
out of their darkness and their confusion. All right, and so
we come now to verse 19, and the Lord's been speaking of his
servant. And so I have to conclude that
he's speaking of Christ here, his servant Christ here still.
Alright, when we consider the context that it's in, it's all
revealing his servant. And he says in verse 19, who
is blind but my servant, or deaf as my messenger that I sent?
Who is blind as he that is perfect, and blind as the Lord's servant? Now, we can see this in two ways,
and there's something to be gained from it in both ways. In one
sense, the Jews, right, when Christ came and he spoke the
truth of God to them, They looked at him like, this man's blind.
This man's not speaking the truth. He doesn't hear what the law's
saying. He doesn't know what he's talking about. We have the
truth. And he doesn't agree with us. So certainly he must not
be of the truth. And so they looked at him as
one who was blind and deaf and not of the Lord. But the Pharisees, their religion,
they trusted in their religion to save them, to make them perfect
and righteous before God. And so they didn't have any fellowship
with Christ in that sense, but they thought they were right,
but they didn't realize that they were the ones who were blind
and deaf and dead in their sins. And so they refused the righteousness
of God. And turn over to Matthew 13. Go to Matthew 13 and verse 13. And here Christ is speaking of
the Pharisees. He was now talking to his disciples
of the Pharisees and he said, therefore speak I to them in
parables because they seeing see not and hearing they hear
not, neither do they understand. They're the ones who are blind
and deaf in idolatry. And in them is fulfilled the
prophecy of Isaiah, which saith, By hearing ye shall hear, and
shall not understand, and seeing ye shall see, and shall not perceive. For this people's heart is waxed
gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they
have closed, lest at any time they should see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears, and should understand with their
heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them. But,
he says, blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for
they hear. So, Christ is speaking there
of that spiritual birth. When he says, blessed are your
eyes, he's declaring you've been blessed by God with a spiritual
sight, and a spiritual hearing, and a spiritual understanding
that only God can give to his people. and we rejoice in him
because he does that work. in and for his people. Our Lord, right, it says there
in Luke 24, I think around verse 44, 45, somewhere in there, where
after Christ spoke the truth of them, it says, then opened
he their understanding that they might understand the scriptures. And that's the blessing that
Christ speaks of when he says, blessed are your eyes for they
see and your ears for they hear. That that's not something for
us to take lightly. You know, we've heard the gospel
many years, and the Lord's taught us, and it's very easy to look
at these things and think lightly of them, until you find yourself
speaking to an unbeliever, someone who's confused in religion, right? And as you're speaking, they're
like, yeah, that's everything I believe. That's everything
I believe, and yet, when you really keep going at it, you
do find out that no, that isn't what they believe. They really
are trusting in their decision, and they've decided that Christ
was going to be their Lord and Savior, or they made a decision
to follow Jesus, or it's their faith that saves them. You know,
as you're speaking to them and they begin to see these things,
what you're saying, and begin to discern, wait, you are talking
differently than what I'm talking. You begin to get excited and
rejoice over these truths of what our God has done for us
in blessing us to know. our Savior, to rejoice in Him,
to love Him because He really is the one who has saved us and
put away our sins and not we ourselves. All right, now the
Lord says in the next verse in our text, Isaiah 42 20, It says, or the Lord says, seeing
many things, but thou observest not. Opening the ears, but he
heareth not. He heareth not. So again, is
he speaking of the people? Because in a sense, we know that
Christ did many wonderful works before the people. He healed
men and women of their sicknesses. He healed the blind. One, he
even, the way it's described, it sounds like he even formed
the eye and gave him sight. And he made bread and fish. Out of a few number of bread
and fish, he made enough to feed 4,000 and 5,000 men, not including
women and children. And he did many miracles, causing
the storms to cease. Well, the disciples saw that,
but the people by and large saw many things, and they heard him
speak. He opened their ear with the
truth, but they heard not. He was the one speaking truth
to them, and they had never heard it. They wondered at Christ when
he spoke. They were amazed at the authority
with which he spoke to them. And concerning that understanding,
it says in John 9, 39-41, Jesus said, For judgment I am coming
to this world, that they which see not might see, and that they
which see might be made blind. And some of the Pharisees which
were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind
also? And Jesus said unto them, if ye were blind, ye should have
no sin. But now ye say, we see, therefore
your sin remaineth." And so, you know, the Pharisees were
so confident that they were the scholars, that they were wise,
that they were teachers of the blind and that the people who
didn't study the law, they were ignorant and they were unlearned
and they were full of sin because they didn't know the law and
study the law the way they devoted themselves to studying the law. And so when Christ spoke, they
thought, wait a minute, he's not talking to me, he's talking
to these base ones, these ignorant ones and these unlearned ones.
And so they said, we see. We know the truth. And so Christ
said, well, because you say you see, in reality, you're ignorant
of these things. You're blind. You're the ones
who are lost and trapped in darkness and in prison and have no hope
or help for yourselves. And you don't see the truth. You don't know the truth. But
those who are base and unlearned and unwealthy and have nothing
to give to God, they see because I give them sight and I make
them to know the truth. And then another sense in which
we see this word here where it says, opening the ears, but he
heareth not. Again, if that's speaking of
Christ, the way that we understand that word is that that he opened
their eyes, the eyes of the people, and he opened the ears of the
people, revealing the truth of God to them. But he wasn't affected
or swayed by the people. Their evil company didn't corrupt
his good character. In other words, he wasn't swayed
or turned from the truth. He wasn't moved from the truth
of God. We actually do see the, well,
we'll see that. Well, that's why in verse 21,
it says, the Lord is well pleased for his righteousness sake. He
will magnify the law and make it honorable. so our Lord coming
to this earth, He wasn't moved from the truth, and He wasn't
moved by the people, He wasn't moved by popularity, right, those
that that refused Him and rejected Him, He didn't change His message,
He didn't change course, He didn't alter anything. To alter or change
course would have been to our detriment and our great loss. We would have been lost if He
had turned and favored the Pharisees and the rich and the wise, that
would have been bad for you and me, who have no hope, who have
been shown of God that we are sinners and that we cannot save
ourselves or we never seem to know enough if it comes to that,
right? We're never learned enough, we've
never given enough, we've never done enough when it comes to
our flesh. But, the reality is, it's of
Christ. And He's the one that's done
everything necessary. And so, He's our hope, our joy,
and our rejoicing. Alright, so, the Lord brings
us to know and to see that we're sinners, and that we need Him. He's our hope. He's our light
and life. Turn over to Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1, 17. You know, before,
well, you turn there. But I skipped over this one passage
in Matthew 5 20. He said to the Pharisees except
or he said to the people except your righteousnesses shall exceed
the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. You shall in no
case enter. the kingdom of heaven. When I
was a young child and I remember my dad reading that verse to
me and it just sticking out to me because these were people
who did many good works and they were very religious and they
were very consistent it seemed from what I could read. or when
he would read the Bible to me, or he had these children's stories
sometimes, but I remember that verse sticking out, except your
righteousness exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees,
you shall in no wise enter the kingdom of heaven. And I didn't
know what that meant. I didn't know how I was ever
going to outdo what the Pharisees did. I didn't know how I was
ever going to be more righteous than them, or how I could ever
be more consistent than them, or know the law better than them,
or just be more righteous than they were. And thankfully, by
Christ's grace and kindness and light, he reveals to us that
it's not, he's not telling us to buckle up, buckle down and
knuckle under and just work harder at the law. He's revealing to
us that we'll never be righteous enough in the law, in coming
to the Lord in the law. We must need the righteousness
of another. And that righteousness is the
Lord Jesus Christ himself. That's the one in whom we come
confidently before the Lord. He's the one in whom we are received
and brought into the fold, into the fellowship of God, and freely
have these things taught to us and revealed to our hearts, giving
us hope and confidence, not in what we know or what we've done,
but confidence that in Christ I stand, and in Christ I am received
by the Father, and have nothing to fear or worry in Him. And that's what we see wonderfully
here in Ephesians 1 verse 17. That the God of our Lord Jesus
Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the spirit
of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the eyes of
your understanding being enlightened, We that were blind, now being
able to see with the light of Christ, that ye may know, see
with new eyes what is the hope of his calling, and what the
riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints, and what is the
exceeding greatness of his power to us who believe, and that belief
is according to the working of his mighty power. That's why we believe and why
we hope, which He wrought in Christ when He raised Him from
the dead and set Him at His own right hand in the heavenly places. So that's our hope and that's
why when we speak to others of this gospel, we rejoice and we
labor in Christ because we love Him because of what He's done.
We didn't know anything. We couldn't satisfy Holy God,
we couldn't earn or work that righteousness that exceeded that
of the scribes and Pharisees by this flesh. We couldn't do
it, but Christ did and therefore he's our hope and why we love
him so and speak so highly of him and rejoice in him. We know
that the chosen remnant seed of Christ are going to be turned
from their dead works. They will glorify Christ. But there's many people who hear
but refuse to hear. Who see but they don't see. They
don't believe Christ. They don't see what you see and
believe of Christ and what he's accomplished. And so the Lord
says of these people in verse 22, This is a people robbed and
spoiled. They are all of them snared in
holes, and they are hid in prison houses. They are for a prey,
and none delivereth. For a spoil, and none sayeth,
Restore." Now history records that this was literally fulfilled
in those Jews when Rome came and destroyed Jerusalem in 70
AD. Even down to them hiding out
in holes underground. They went into holes to hide
out from their captors, and when they were found, they were either
killed or sent into captivity. And their belongings, which they
plundered from the Christians when they persecuted them, well,
the Jews were then plundered by Rome, and they took their
possessions and took from them. And regarding those holes, I
mean, just remember Saddam Hussein, if you remember where they find
him, in a hole in the desert. And so they had those holes,
and they found them hiding in those holes, the Romans did,
of the Jews. And they have no advocate, the
Lord says. No one to say, restore. No advocate
to say, return everything to them now. No one to stand for
them because they refuse to hear the only advocate, the only mediator
that God has provided for His people. Verse 23, who among you
will give ear to this? Who will hearken and hear for
the time to come? Right? Will this cause you to
hear? Will this cause you who do not
believe, will you hear and will you see? Will you listen to what
the Lord is saying in the revelation that He's given of His Son and
what pleases Him, His holiness and who is righteous and who
makes His people righteous? No, none will hear, none will
consider, except the Lord have mercy on them in His grace and
give them life by the Spirit. To believe Christ, to look to
Him, to trust His work, that His blood is sufficient to save
them to the uttermost. And so, none will hear it except
the Lord remove that veil from the heart. Now, just so we understand
the source of who it is that afflicts the people, verse 24. Who gave Jacob for a spoil and
Israel to the robbers? Did not the Lord? He against
whom we have sinned? For they would not walk in his
ways, neither were they obedient unto his law. And so, They think
that they kept the law given by Moses, but they offended God
in the law. Because even if we keep the law
perfectly in every point, but we offend in one point, on one
thing, we've broken the whole law. And so we must look to Christ
who is the righteousness of God. But they refused him who is the
way the truth and the life he's the only way to the father all
right and then verse 25 therefore he hath poured upon him the fury
of his anger and the strength of battle and it hath set him
on fire round about Yet he knew not, and it burned him, yet he
laid it not to heart." And so, there's no amount of beating,
or whipping, or stirring up the flesh that we can lay upon the
flesh of man that will cause him to trust and believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ. The only one who can work that
salvation is God Himself. He's the one that works salvation
in the hearts of His people. And He does that, He's just to
do that because of what Christ, the Lamb of God, accomplished
in the death of Himself when He came in the flesh and He took
the place of His people, bearing their sins and bearing their
punishment and wrath to put away their sin that we, who are sinners,
who have no hope outside of Christ, yet we in Christ may go free
because of what Christ has done for His people. And so, you that
believe, He says, hear and see, look, behold Christ the servant,
the Son of God, who came and accomplished your salvation.
Believe Him, trust Him, stay upon Him, and pray the Lord help
you and keep you. And all that breathing and prayer
and crying out and groaning to the Lord, It's His work. It's
the Spirit that helps us to pray that, to even care or be interested. Otherwise, we're just nothing
more than idolaters in religion, right? We're just practicing
practices and doing things for the sake of doing them. But we
come and we gather and we serve our Lord because of what He has
done for us. And so rejoice in Him and stay
upon that hope and continue, as Paul would say, continue and
the grace of God continue in him. So I pray the Lord will
bless that word and keep you ever looking to Christ. And you
that don't believe, that he lift that veil off your heart and
that you trust him and believe him and that he give you that
hope and comfort in Christ. Amen. Our gracious Lord, we thank
you, Father, for the salvation you've provided. Father, we confess
that we are by nature, idolaters, that were doubters and full of
mischief, unbelief, and sin in this flesh. But Father, our hope
is in your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray that you would
indeed deliver your people from the prison houses, from the holes,
from the darkness, Lord, and that you would shine your light
upon our hearts and that you would reveal our God to us, the
true and living God in the face of your son, Jesus Christ. Lord,
we have nothing apart from him. We pray that you would stir our
hearts in love and devotion to him, that we would be in love
with our Savior and that we would love one another in the love
that we have for our Savior, Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray that
you be with your people. We pray that you be with the
flock here, that you bless Carl and his studies. And when he
brings the message forth to your people on Sunday, Lord, we ask
that you would bless it and encourage and comfort the hearts of your
people. It's in the name of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ,
we pray. Amen. Our closing hymn will be number
119, We Have a Refuge Strong, 119. We have a refuge strong, a place
of peace and rest. Our refuge is the Lord our God,
and in Him we are blessed. There is a man above, Christ
Jesus is his name. He is our God. In him we trust. We hide ourselves
in him. Christ is our rock secure. A covert from the wind. A river in a desert, place peace
in a troubled land. A soul on wings of faith, fly
to your refuge, dear. Your foes defy your troubles,
too, and cast on Christ your care.