Good evening. All right, let's
go back to our text, Isaiah 27. Isaiah 27, verses one through
six. Now, there's two key things provided
for us that we see in this chapter. One is the Lord's care for his
church, and the other is the destruction of his church's enemies. He destroys her enemies. Now,
tonight we're going to just look at the first six verses, and
what you'll notice here is that the enemy of the church, which
is pictured in the serpent, that serpent, that the Lord has no
mercy on the serpent. He utterly destroys the serpent. But for the church, unlike that
serpent, the Lord is very caring, very tender, and he provides
and keeps her he shall teach her, he shall correct her, and
do for her that which is for her good. And so to this end,
he turns her to Christ. As our brother was reading in
Proverbs 18 verse 11, it said, the rich man's wealth is his
strong city. Well, the believers' wealth,
their strong city is Christ. That's their strong city. That's
our riches. And the Lord turns his church
to her refuge. He flees to Christ for her protection
and for her good. Because in Christ is how we make
peace with God. Those that don't make peace with
God shall be destroyed like the Leviathan. They'll be destroyed
just like him. But those that have made peace
with God do so in the Lord Jesus Christ and that's why God provided
him. He's provided him for our protection. So our title tonight is How to
Make Peace with God. How to Make Peace with God. So
first we'll look at these enemies destroyed and then we'll see
that the Lord teaches his people, or that the Lord directs his
people to Christ. All right, so our text begins
here with three familiar words in verse one. In that day, in
that day. And whenever we see these verses,
such as captured here in the Gospel of Isaiah, we see that
they're speaking to the purpose of God's salvation for his people. And historically, it signaled
Israel's deliverance. When Israel, in history, as picturing
the church, we see the trouble that they went into, and their
captivities, and the enemies that came up against them, and
it would picture the day of their deliverance. It also sometimes
pictures the Lord's return, his second coming, when he'll raise
us all up in glory. It also broadly evokes the gospel
day for us, what Christ accomplished in the gospel day, when he died
and rose again for our justification. And then it also specifically
for us pictures the day of our salvation, the day that the Lord
brings salvation to us, to our understanding and makes us to
know what he's done for us. All right, so what this pictures
though, what this is all coming down to is Christ's sacrifice
when he accomplished salvation for his people. And that would
have happened about 700 years after Isaiah wrote these words,
that's about when Christ was crucified, 700 years later. And
so the reason is that what we see here is that in Christ's
sacrifice, it's the very means of how our enemies were destroyed. That's when our enemies were
destroyed, when Christ did his faithful work, when he sacrificed
himself to the Father to put away the sins of the people,
the works of the enemy, were destroyed and he accomplished,
he obtained our eternal redemption. All right, so let's look at,
without a mind, let's look at verse one and read that in its
entirety. In that day, the Lord with his
sore and great and strong sword shall punish Leviathan, the piercing
serpent, even Leviathan, that crooked serpent, and he shall
slay the dragon that is in the sea. Now, Christ is that strong
sword. Christ is the strong sword of
our God, and he utterly destroyed the works of Satan. For that
purpose, he was manifested. God manifested Christ, sent Christ
to this earth to destroy the works of the devil. And he was
sent to destroy him that had the power of death, that is,
the devil, so that we who labor and feared to die, laboring under
the law, laboring to bring forth good works, to try and appease
a holy God, we were afraid. And we labored under a false
doctrine, under a false gospel, a gospel that was no gospel at
all. But Christ delivered us from
that. He slew the works of the devil. And so this destruction, it regards
the promise that was made in Genesis 3.15, where the Lord
said, I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy head, and
thou shalt bruise his heel. So Christ, being the word of
God, was sent of God to split and to divide, to destroy that
union that we had with the body of Antichrist. and the children of wrath, and
there is no difference but God. But God provided salvation in
his son. And we read in Hebrews 4 12 which
says, for the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper
than any two-edged sword, right, he's that, he's that great sword
of the Lord, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul
and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner
of the thoughts and intents of of the heart, and so Christ,
he does that for his people. As we hear his word preached,
the gospel, as the Lord is pleased, he attends that word, making
it effectual to us, and he's the one that divides the thoughts
and intents of our heart. He's the one, when we have questions,
and thoughts, and wonder, Lord, what does this mean? Lord, what
are you doing here? Lord, why am I like this? The
Lord's the one that reveals these things to us in the preaching
of the Gospel. And so He does that, and it's
the Lord who does it, it's His power, it's His Spirit that does
that, that pierces our hearts and delivers us out from the
clutches of the devil, out of the kingdom of darkness, into
the kingdom of His Son, and He continues to be the one that
that destroys that confusion and lifts that darkness and that
veil of confusion and shines a light into the hearts of his
people so that we know him and we begin to learn of him and
understand what he's doing among his people. So Christ did this,
he worked this salvation for us when he died on the cross.
When he went to the cross and there on the cross stained it
with his blood, shed for the remission of the sins of his
people. He delivered us out of that slavery
of death and fear under the law and he entered into the strongman's
house and he spoiled him of his goods. His goods being the people
of God, the chosen people of God whom God loved in eternity
and gave to his son Jesus Christ. Put them in Christ for their
safe keeping. That's the precious goods. Those
are the goods that he delivered from the strongman's house, the
devil. He took us out from there so
that we are now delivered, redeemed, delivered out of that into the
kingdom of our God. Alright, now all outside of Christ,
they're going to perish with that Leviathan, with that serpent.
Those who have no covering for their sin, those who are still
trusting their works, or those who have no love for Christ and
don't desire Him, and don't seek Him, and are content with their
works and what they're doing in the flesh, all those outside
of Christ, they'll perish. They'll perish, they have no
inheritance in the kingdom and therefore they will perish with
Leviathan. Alright, so they'll die in judgment
not having any covering for their sin. So the question is, for
those who do not know the Savior, for those who have no faith in
the Savior, for those who are wondering, well, everything that
I do, all I hear is that it's wrong and it's sinful and I can't
please God with these things that I do. How then can I make
peace with God? How is it that I can make peace
with God? How is that? Because the Lord
answers that question, and he's the author of the answer of that
question of how to make peace with God, and he reveals it in
his gospel word. That is, the Lord is the one
who teaches his people. He's the one who reveals to us
his peace. He reveals to us his righteousness,
that it is in his Son, Jesus Christ. And he's the one that
reveals faith to your hearts, whereby you hear the word and
believe it. You receive that word and you
believe, yes Lord, my righteousnesses aren't going to cut it, my works
aren't going to do it, but you've provided your righteousness. You provided everything for me
and your son and he creates that love in us and that desire in
us so that there is also a desire to bear fruit to the Lord but
it's by the power of his spirit and we understand and know Lord
you're the one that brings forth these fruits of your people as
it pleases you. All right so let's see this gospel
that's preached to us. It says In verse two, Isaiah
27, verse two. In that day, sing ye unto her
a vineyard of red wine. Now, we don't know it at first. When we begin to hear what Christ
has done, what we are under the law, what we are in our sinful
nature, as the Lord reveals it, we don't realize it, but as the
Lord is stirring our heart, and causing us to hear what's being
preached, that this is his work. He's doing the work. We don't
know that it's his work yet, but he's the one singing this
gospel. He's the one singing this gospel
to her, to his church, his beloved church, whom he loves, who is
a vineyard of red wine. So the Lord purposes, he's purposed
to save a people, and he's going to bring that knowledge of her
salvation to her in time. The scriptures call it the time
of her love, and the time of your love, when God is purposed
to show you and to spread his love upon you, to reveal his
love to you. And so he sends that gospel,
he'll send a minister, someone with the gospel, someone who
serves the gospel, that's what a minister is, someone who serves,
and so he'll send someone to to labor and to preach that word,
and he'll bring you there, and he'll cause you to hear what's
being said. And it's a sweet, sweet song,
and we'll hear the sweet melody of the gospel word, what God
has provided for us richly and freely. In that day, sing ye
unto her a vineyard of red wine. So the one hearing that gospel,
not just hearing it audibly, many hear it audibly, but the
ones that hear, this is good news, that God has done all the
work, that all my labors are for nothing, that I couldn't
save myself, but this is good news. He's provided salvation
full and free. He's established peace with me
and I with him, all in his grace, all in his mercy. This is the
church and she's a purchased possession of the Lord by His
blood, right? By His blood He purged us of
our sins and He made payment to redeem us with His own blood. And so that there is the red
wine. That's the red wine that saves us. Christ's blood shed
for the remission of our sins is the red wine. That's what
He shed there on the cross when He died in the place of His people
to put away their sins. Now she's called a vineyard of
red wine, and that's because the church is often likened to
a vineyard. Sometimes they use the language
of a garden, but here they're speaking of a vineyard, a vineyard,
all right, of red wine. And Matthew 20 verse 1 says,
for the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is in householder,
which went out early into the morning to hire laborers into
his vineyard. So a vineyard, as you understand
it, bears fruit. A vineyard is planted to bring
forth fruit. And specifically, a vineyard,
they grow grapes. So grapes are to come forth of
that vineyard. And in the Lord, in that gospel
song, we hear our fruits, the fruit that we bring forth to
the Lord of this flesh, of our affections, our lusts, the things
that we think God is pleased with, God doesn't receive that. That's not the grapes that the
Lord is harvesting from his people. That's not what he's accepting
and saying, good, that's good, you keep doing your best there
and that and just bring forth whatever you got, I'll take it. That's not gonna happen, that's
not gonna continue to happen. So our fruit that we bear, the
grapes that we bear, that fruit is of his seed. It's of his son's
seed and he creates that new man in us and he waters that
seed with the red wine of his blood. It's all his work that
he's bringing forth. Alright, so as the red wine vineyard
of the Lord's planting, she's bringing forth good fruit, pleasant
fruit that is accepted of the Lord and pleasing to Him, and
it's by His power. It's by the power of the Lord,
not our power, not our strength, but His power and His strength. And he says, verse 3, I the Lord
do keep it. I will water it every moment
lest any hurt it. I will keep it night and day. So our Lord is going to ensure
that none will spoil this vineyard, none are going to destroy this
vineyard, but that He's going to keep it, He's going to water
it, and provide for it night and day. And so, what that means
is that the Lord isn't turning us over to ourselves, but the
Lord is going, He teaches us at the first, He sings us that
gospel at the first, we hear His voice, And he continues to
be our teacher, and continues to sing that gospel to us, and
we continue to hear it. He's always drawing us and keeping
us. He's always refreshing us and
turning us back to himself, right? And so he's gonna teach us what
Christ has accomplished for us, and he teaches us what Christ
is accomplishing in us, right? What he's working, what he's
pleased to do in his vineyard. Now Christ, as I said, was sent
of God to put away the enmity. Naturally, when we come forth
of Adam, we're enemies of God. We are enmity against God. That means we hate him, we don't
care for him, his Christ, his gospel, his people, his word. There's no love there for the
Lord. There's love for false idols.
There's love for worshiping ourselves and satisfying ourselves and
what we think, but there's no love for the true and living
God. He's the one that creates that in us. He's the one that
bears that fruit in us. But when Christ came, he was
sent of God for the purpose of establishing peace. And it says,
well, and Luke, when the angels were saying to the people, they
sang glory to God in the highest and on earth, peace, goodwill
toward men, showing that God had sent the Messiah who was
sent to establish peace in the earth for his people, right? That's why Christ came. And so
he put away that enmity between God and men. And so now when
we come to verse four, now we begin to understand what he's
saying when he says fury, is not in me." Fury's not in the
Lord toward his people. That fury is put away. The anger and the wrath of the
Lord that we saw executed upon that crooked serpent Leviathan
is not for you that love him, for you that are his people.
There's no fury in him for that. Now, one of the beauties of the
Lord that we hear in the Gospels that our God looks to the sinner,
that's you and me, he looks to the sinner for his people that
believe him and hope in him, he looks to us for nothing, for
no part of our salvation, but he looks to his son Jesus Christ
for all of it, every part of salvation. And he looks to his
son to provide everything necessary for you. That's from the beginning
all the way to the end, and everything in between. And so she's taught
this. He's revealing this to her through
the gospel. She's being convinced of this,
that yes, that he is my righteousness and we continue to see and learn
how that is so for us as he grows us in grace and in faith and
in love to him. And so she believes the word
of God and her faith lays hold of the righteousness God has
provided us in Christ. maybe weakly, maybe with strength,
usually very weak, but the Lord, he shows us and reveals to us
so that we see he's our righteousness and that his righteousness is
the righteousness I have fulfilled by faith in him. And God accepts
me now in the person of his son, Jesus Christ. And as he's comforting
us, we cease trying to appease him by our works, under a legal
fear, under thinking that God requires these things of me,
else I'm going to be cut off. That's that legal fear and that
legal bondage. That's what the Judaizers were
doing when they said, except you be circumcised, you cannot
be saved. You're fine if you want to call
on Jesus' name, but except you be circumcised and keep the law,
you cannot be saved. And so the Lord's showing us,
no, no, we don't operate. We're not bearing fruit under
a legal bondage. He delivers us from that. And
that's what he's saying here in verse 4. Fury is not in me.
So he asks, well, who would set the briars and thorns against
me in battle? You that hear, that know what
I did to Leviathan. Why are you going to set briars
and thorns before me in battle? Don't you know I would just go
right through them? I would burn them together. The briars, the
thorns, and you with them. The whole thing will be burned
up. Why are you going to set those things in front of me?
And so we hear this, that it's not through legal fear that we
bring forth fruit to God. And so we cease trying to lay
before Him, to slow Him down, to appease God with briars and
thorns. And I use that term briars and
thorns, not just because they're there in the scriptures, but
isn't that what God did when he cursed Adam? He said, he said,
now when you labor and toil in the earth, the fruit of your
labors, it's gonna produce thorns and thistles, briars and ragweed
for you. It's just gonna bring forth rotten
things. So God doesn't accept those.
That's the work of our flesh, right? That's the work of our
flesh. to a thorn bush to try and produce figs. You don't turn
to briars to produce grapes, Christ said. It's of a good tree. So don't set those works of legal
fear and concern before me because I'll just burn them up. They
won't last. And so that's what'll happen. Anyone that tries to come to
God in their legal works shall meet an angry and a fierce God
that shall destroy him, them, just like he destroyed Leviathan. And so that's what the good works
of man are. They're just crooked, perverse works. They're just
browers and thorns that God will destroy. There are good works
that the Lord brings forth. He's bringing them forth in Christ,
in love. There's a desire. We desire to
grow in Him. We desire to see that growth
in trusting Him, in serving one another, in being there for one
another, in showing patience toward one another. Because we
see in the flesh The flesh meets that and resists that. It resists
the spirit. The flesh does not cooperate
with the spirit. And so there is that battle and
that struggle that goes on. But in the new man, we continue
to say, Lord, you've saved me for this purpose. I'm your vineyard.
You've saved me to bear fruit. But we do it in thankfulness,
not out of a legal fear, not out of trying to earn or change
God's mind toward us. It's in thankfulness, and he
produces that in his people, alright? So, instead of foolishly
trying to please God or slow God down with briars and thorns
of our works, he turns us instead to the strength that he's provided.
He's provided. He's provided the peace. We don't
have to try and slow him down with thorns and thistles. We
don't have to. He's provided the salvation.
Look at verse 5. or let him take hold of my strength
that he may make peace with me and he shall make peace with
me. So hey, instead of producing your own works of righteousness
by the law, how about you flee to the one I've provided, my
strength, and you'll make peace with me. You shall make peace
with me in my strength, Jesus Christ. So you that want to know
how do I make peace with God, It's in Christ our Savior. He's
the one who has made peace for all his people. When he fulfilled
righteousness, when he went to the cross willingly, bearing
the sins of his people, perfect and holy and righteous in himself,
bearing the sin before the father of his people, bearing his people
in him, and the father poured out wrath upon him. The father
poured out the judgment that you saw poured out on Leviathan,
he poured out on his son. but his son being holy and righteous,
fulfilled and satisfied the holy, just wrath of God for his people,
so that the stain of sin and the guilt and the shame of sin
is removed. And we stand faultless before
the throne of our God, because he is our high priest, offered
up himself this sacrifice upon the altar of himself, which sanctifies
the sacrifice. He did everything. for us to
the Father. He provided. He's the propitiation,
the means of our forgiveness. So therefore, in Christ our strength,
God cares for us. He cares for his people. He's
not angry with us anymore. He's caring for us and keeping
us and providing for us and providing for that vineyard. Zephaniah
says, 317, the Lord thy God in the midst of thee is mighty. He will save. He will rejoice
over thee with joy. He will rest in his love. He will joy over thee with singing. And so there in that midst of
thee, we're reminded, yeah, the Lord regenerates his people.
He dwells with his people. By his Holy Spirit, he lives
in us so that he causes us to hear his voice singing over us,
tenderly caring for us, and the strength that he provided. which
is His Son, Jesus Christ. And so, by His Spirit, He's turning
us from self and sin and the love of sin. We cease trying
to satisfy God with legal bondage and legal works and legal fear. And instead, being filled with
His Spirit, there's a a yielding of ourselves to the Lord. We
learn to submit to Him just as our Savior submitted to the Father.
We learn to hear His voice. We want to hear His voice and
we submit to Him and we seek Him and desire, Lord, help me.
Help me to be patient with my brethren. Help me to consider
them and think of them and pray for them. And help me to serve
them and love them in the way that you love your people. And
so there's that desire that he creates in us, a fruitful desire. Again, out of thankfulness, not
out of legal fear and bondage and turning back to the law of
Moses to do that. He teaches us by his spirit,
all right? Now there's a couple things I
want us to see here in verse five. When it says, or let him
take hold of my strength, that he may make peace with me and
he shall make peace with me. That's speaking of the Lord's
strength there is Jesus Christ. It's Jesus Christ. And it's Christ
a defense for us in two ways. So first, we see that he's our
cleansing from all sin. And we know sin provokes the
wrath of God. For this cause sake the wrath
of God cometh upon the wicked. The Lord's coming to judge the
earth. We see him judging Leviathan who's wicked. And so sin provokes
that of God. And so we flee from the wrath
of God to his strength. We're turned to his strength.
That's how we're gonna flee the wrath of God. That's the only
way we're gonna flee the wrath of God is being turned and fleeing
to the strength, that stronghold, right? It means, strength there
means a defense. It's a fortified city, right? It's a fortified city. It's a
strong city of those that have nothing. and are fleeing from
the wrath of God. He's provided his son. All right,
like you hear sanctuary cities today? Well, you flee to Christ. He's our sanctuary. He's our
protection. No legal arm can touch us in
Christ. We are delivered from the wrath
of God in Christ, all right? So he's our strong defense, provided
by God as our savior. And then the second blessing
we have is when the Lord chastens us, When we're chasing, when
the Lord shows us our sin, and he's teaching us, and he's stripping
us of the lusts of this flesh. Well, the lusts of the flesh
are always there. That's why Peter said to us, the brethren
abstain from the lusts of the flesh. The flesh isn't changed. The flesh isn't improved. It
can only be subdued by the Spirit, by us walking in the Spirit and
the new man, and that the flesh is put in a corner because the
flesh always meets it with resistance. The flesh doesn't ever produce
anything beautiful or acceptable or lasting or eternal to the
Father. It's only in the Spirit that
we produce fruit. So, right, when the Lord chastens
us, when he's teaching us through chastening, there's a temptation,
right, the flesh says, well, I know how to fix this. I know
how to get, you know, ease up this this heat that's on me here.
And there's that temptation to try and do something out of a
legal fear. Those thorns and briars that
we try to put up. And the Lord's showing us, don't
be turned to the legal fear. You run to my Savior, to the
Savior I've provided. You run to Christ, the strength
I've provided for you. He doesn't want us turning back
to the flesh to try and correct it, but be turned to the Lord.
That's why He's doing it. That's why the chastening, when
it's of the Lord, and you're the Lord's people, you're drawn
to Christ. You're turned away from the love
of this world. You're turned away from all the
distractions and the lights and the shiny things in this world
and those things which would draw us down and weaken the knees
and bring the arms hanging down. He's turning us from that to
his son. He's bringing us back. So that's
where we're to go. Go back to him. Don't be turned to the law. Christ were refreshed. All right
now turn over to Isaiah 5. This is similar language here
in Isaiah 5 and we'll look at just the first four verses. It
goes on but we'll see what we need to see here in these first
four verses of Isaiah 5. Here the Lord is speaking of
a vineyard. And in that vineyard, he's provided a stronghold. This
is a different word, but it means a tower, a watchtower in the
vineyard. And he's provided a wine press
in the vineyard. But look at this. It says, now,
Isaiah 5.1, now will I sing to my well-beloved a song of my
beloved touching his vineyard. My well-beloved had the vineyard
in a very fruitful hill, and he fenced it and gathered out
the stones thereof. planted it with the choicest
vine." That's Christ, brethren. He's the vine, where the branch
is connected to him. So he's planted it with the choicest
vine, and built a tower in the midst of it, and also made a
winepress therein, and he looked that it should bring forth grapes,
and it brought forth wild grapes. And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem,
and men of Judah, judge, I pray you, between me and my vineyards,
What could have been done more to my vineyard that I have not
done in it? Wherefore, when I looked that
it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes. Why did it bring forth its own
works when I planted the choicest vine in it? You that are connected
to Christ, you're going to bear the fruit of Christ. You that
see the strength of our God, He has provided His Son. We are
to be turned to Him, looking to Him and trusting Him for everything. up the heart and causes us to
seek him and to desire him and to grow in him, to bring forth
grapes that are acceptable to him because it's a spiritual
fruit of the Son. But so many, this is what happened
to Israel, who had the law and were operating under a legal
works and a legal covenant, he's saying, I gave you everything
I could picture that testified of Christ, that testified of
my strength, and yet when I looked for that spiritual grape, that
spiritual fruit, they were bringing forth fruits of their flesh.
Wild grapes. Why would they do that? Why do
they do that? Why do they... I gave them everything. That's
what he's saying. I gave them everything necessary and they're still producing
wild grapes. And they could have been producing
good grapes that I meant for them to bring forth. So, you
know, he's showing us that don't you and I be turned back to the
world Don't be turned from Christ, even though the world persecutes
Christ and says you're foolish. Your own flesh says you're foolish.
You're really going to believe that that's your righteousness?
Right? We know that there's times when
we think of legal, we get concerned too. You can see why, because
you know that, well, we should be producing fruit. And so there's
a natural tendency to think, well, maybe I can stir it up
here with some natural works. And all it's going to do is produce
natural because we know it's His work
that stirred us up and did it in us. So flee to Christ. Flee to the stronghold. Flee
to the tower that God has put there in the vineyard, in the
midst of His garden. You keep turning to Him. Trust
Him. Pray to Him. Seek Him, not these
wild grapes. this will be, it's the will of
our God for us. In Isaiah 26, we saw a couple
weeks back, it says, thou, or it says, Lord, thou wilt ordain
peace for us, for thou also hast wrought all our works in us. So everything, every good grape
that we bring forth, some 30, some 60, some 100 fold, all those
fruits of grapes, those that God accepts, it's spiritual fruit,
born in his son, connected to the choicest vine. That's how
we bring forth good fruit, all right? So, except you, you that
don't know him. except you run, or you that even
confess that you know Him, except you flee to the stronghold, you
will not be saved from the wrath of God. You will perish in your
sins. If you're trying to work up some righteousness still for
yourself to please God, they're just thorns and briars and He's
going to burn them right up and pierce you through just like
He pierces serpent. So get to Christ. You that are
outside of Christ, get to Christ. That's why he's provided them
to deliver his people. So it's the mercy and the grace
that our God has provided us for him. Press into it. He said, for since
the days of John the Baptist, the kingdom of heaven suffereth
violence, and the violent take it by force. Press into it, press
into it because why? It's your salvation that God
has provided for you. Don't be careless with it. Like
Jerusalem back there, Israel who had everything, who had the
testimony and the word and did nothing with it. So those that
do come to the defensive stronghold that God's provided, which is
Christ, they shall find peace. That's how we make peace with
God, in his son. Now look at verse six. He shall
cause them that come of Jacob to take root. Israel shall blossom
and bud and fill the face of the world with fruit." That's
the purpose of our God. He's ordained this peace for
us. He's ordained these works that
we should walk in them. We're Christ's workmanship. So
we're connected to Christ, the choice vine, and we seek Him. We seek Him to bear fruit. in
us and not to be indifferent. Because the flesh is indifferent.
The flesh doesn't care. The flesh is fine. The flesh
is more than happy for you to do nothing and to just be indifferent
to the things of God. And, you know, we know very well
that it's not, you know, our works aren't done in legal fear.
And that, you know, can create in us sometimes where we're like,
well then what do I do? Like, am I supposed to do nothing
here? Because I don't want to do anything, you know, that I shouldn't be
doing, you know, legally. And so, you know, then we do
nothing. But the Lord isn't saying do nothing. He's saying, trust
me, flee to Christ. Get you in Christ the stronghold.
He's a choice vine. He's the choice vine, and he
shall produce fruit in his people. And it's for each one for themselves,
not for you to look at others, but to look at yourself and say,
Lord, help me. I want to be a servant to your
people. I want to be a peacemaker as
Christ is. He's the only one that makes
peace with us, but we don't want to be indifferent to that, and
we don't want to be troublemakers or not patient with one another. The Lord's revealing that to
us. He shows us just how dull ignorant and misunderstanding
we are of him. And so he teaches, he shows us,
and so that we are kind to one another and patient with one
another. All right, so he's our peace, and that's how we make
peace with God. It's in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so you that do come by the power and grace of God, he says
in Colossians 2, 6 and 7, I'll close with this, as ye have therefore
received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk ye in him. rooted and
built up in him, established in the faith, as ye have been
taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving." And so, I just encourage you to lead to
Christ, our stronghold. He's been given to us by the
Lord for this purpose. We're his vineyard and he's gonna
He establishes peace for us, and He's going to bear fruit
in His people by showing us what He's done for us, and we'll keep...
You know, when you have a cold heart and it's hard to pray,
a good place to start is just thanking Him. Just thanking Him.
And oftentimes, He'll stir up our hearts and bring forth a
more honest prayer. But the Lord does it. He does
it. Alright, so let's pray. Our gracious Lord, thank You,
Father, for the salvation you've provided in your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord, we thank you for the strength
of your Son, Jesus Christ, that has established peace for us.
And Lord, as your vineyard, help us, Lord, to just to learn what
that means, and that we would be turned to Christ, not continue
in our works of the flesh, not continue in dead works, not trying
to do anything of the flesh. But Lord, make us to rest in
Christ and to be connected to Him, established and rooted in
Him. For Lord, being rooted in the
vine, and that choice vine surely, Lord, good grapes, good fruit,
spiritual fruit will come forth of your people, will bud and
blossom and fill the the earth around us with food, with good
fruit. Lord, we pray and trust that
you'll do this because it's your work that ordains it. Your word
and your purpose that ordains it. It's in Christ's name we
pray and give thanks. Amen.