Our scripture reading is Psalm
61. Psalm 61. To the chief musician upon Neganah,
a psalm of David. Hear my cry, O God, attendant
to my prayer. From the end of the earth will
I cry unto thee when my heart is overwhelmed. Lead me to the
rock that is higher than I. For thou hast been a shelter
for me and a strong tower from the enemy. I will abide in thy
tabernacle forever. I will trust in the covert of
thy wings, Selah. For thou, O God, hast heard my
vows. Thou hast given me the heritage of those that fear thy
name, that will prolong the king's life and his years as many generations. He shall abide before God forever.
Oh, prepare mercy and truth which may preserve him. So will I sing
unto thy name forever, that I may daily perform my vows. Let's
pray. Heavenly and merciful Father,
we thank you for allowing us to gather together as like-minded
sinners. What a great privilege it is,
Father, what you have done for us. poor sheep. Father, you have
also given us a pastor, and will you please remember Brother Eric
as he prepares messages, especially this evening once again. Each
time is a new time. Father, will you give him the
unction of your Spirit, that he may proclaim your glorious
gospel and your glorious name, and that we as listeners may
be given an ear to hear and an understanding heart. Father,
Remember this community. Will you call out your sheep?
It is a great comfort that all things are in your hands, and
they will come according to your purpose and will. Remember all
your faithful preachers. Be with our loved ones also,
Father. Will you pour out your grace and mercy upon our children
and our loved ones wherever they may be? For Jesus' sake alone,
amen. Good evening. All right, turn
to Isaiah chapter 1. Isaiah chapter 1. Our text is going to be from
verses 21 to the end of the chapter, 31. And while you're turning
there, let me just say a few remarks that religion teaches
us How to be religious, right? This teaches us how to be religious,
but nothing that this world's religion, that man-made religion
can give to us. It can't produce any fruit in
us. It can't produce life and godliness in a person. That's
a work that God alone must do. He must produce life and godliness. One man can't give it to another
man, right? It's not according to the will
of man. And no man can give it to himself. It's not according
to the will of the flesh. This is a work that God alone
must do for a sinner. But man, that doesn't stop handmade
religion from trying to appear and mimic and look like, pose
as the true religion of God. And so this earth, this world,
the corrupt ways of fallen man, it just sneaks right in to the
religious services of people, even those who mean well and
seek to or trying to worship who they believe is the true
and living God. And it spans everything from self-righteousness
all the way to hedonism. It spans the whole thing. The
religious takes on all kinds of forms in people. And Paul
wrote to the Romans in chapter 1, verses 21, 22, and 25, and
he said, it's because that when they knew God, they glorified
him not as God, neither were thankful, but became vain in
their imaginations. and their foolish heart was darkened,
professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. And it says
that they changed the truth of God into a lie and worshipped
and served the creature, more than the Creator, who is blessed
forever. Amen. Now, we're gonna look at
this, I'll read through these verses and I'll just make a few
comments as we go initially. Basically, the Lord is declaring
in the first few verses in our text, in verse 21 through 23,
he's declaring the harlotry of the people of Judah, right? Their
spiritual adultery, where they left their husband, who is the
Lord God, the creator of heaven and earth, They forsook him to
pursue other lovers. Actually, they didn't even forsake
him. They were still pretending, still
feigning to worship the true and living God. They were still
doing practices. They were sacrificing animals,
and they were coming to the temple, and they were doing the things
that they would normally do, but their hearts or an innit, and
he says in verse 21, how is the faithful city becoming harlot?
It was full of judgment, righteousness lodged in it, but now murderers. Thy silver is become dross, thy
wine mixed with water. Thy princes are rebellious and
companions of thieves. Everyone loveth gifts and followeth
after rewards. They judge not the fatherless,
neither doth the cause of the widow come unto them. And therefore
the Lord says in verse 24, I'm going to remove my enemies from
before my face. And he says, therefore, sayeth
the Lord, the Lord of hosts, the mighty one of Israel, I will
ease me of mine adversaries and avenge me of mine enemies. And then he says in verses 25
through 27, that he himself will perform the work of salvation
for his people. Verse 25, And I will turn my
hand upon thee, and surely purge away thy troughs, and take away
all thy timb, and I will restore thy judges as at the first, and
thy counselors as at the beginning. Afterward thou shalt be called
the City of Righteousness, the Faithful City. Zion shall be
redeemed with judgment, and her converts with righteousness.
And then in the closing verses, we see that the Lord himself
separates the sheep from the goats. He has a sharp sword that
comes from his mouth, which is the gospel, and he separates
out his people. He'll separate the wheat from
the chaff. the wheat from the tares, and
he'll separate the children of light from the children of darkness,
but it's the Lord that'll do it. Through the preaching of
the gospel, he'll do it, and he'll separate out to himself
his people. Verse 28, and the destruction
of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together, and
they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed, for they shall be
ashamed of the oaks which ye have desired. And ye shall be
confounded for the gardens that ye have chosen. For ye shall
be as an oak whose leaf faded, and as a garden that hath no
water, and the strong shall be as toe and the maker of it as
a spark, and they both shall burn together, and none shall
quench them." So our title this evening is Christ Delivers from
Harlotry. Christ Delivers from Harlotry,
which is spiritual adultery. All right, and we'll have three
divisions, wickedness declared, then salvation declared, and
then we'll look at a savor of death and life. All right, so
the Lord raises this question or this statement through the
prophet, and it's a great way to make known to the people that
there is something gravely wrong. There's something very wrong
with what they're doing, the practices that they're following,
and how they're seeking the Lord. It says in verse 21, how is the
faithful city becoming harlot? It was full of judgment, righteousness
lodged in it, but now murderers. Now, if you remember, Jerusalem
or Judah remained faithful after Solomon died and ten tribes split
away and went after another king and they began to worship two
golden calves. They made two calves, one to
put in one part of the country and one to put in another part
of the country so that they wouldn't go back to Jerusalem. But Judah
and one of the other tribes remained faithful and they worshipped
at Jerusalem. And so They were once a faithful
city. They once worshipped and rejoiced
in God alone, but now he's comparing him to a harlot. A harlot, right? Rather than being faithful to
their husband, who is God Almighty, the Lord of heaven and earth,
they're now pursuing other lovers of this world. They're pursuing
other religions, if you will. And John tells us that we are
not to, it's in 1 John 2.15, he says, love not the world,
neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the
world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is
in the world, that's the things that this flesh loves, in ease
and in comfort. That's also all the religions
and the mysticism and the ideas and imaginations that are produced
in this world. All that is in the world. The
lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life
is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth
away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God
abideth forever. So at the In the corrupt heart
of man, what we are by nature, there's this love for this world. There's this love for the things
that this world praises and sets a value on, like riches and fame
and glory and recognition. and to be liked and things of
that nature, right? We want to be successful in this
world by nature, but it's not even just that. It's even religious
zealotry, right? And being self-righteous and
being very zealous for God, if you will, and just pursuing those
things. So all of it, anything that's
of the flesh is of this world, and we're not to love it and
not to seek those things. But John goes on to warn us in
verse 18, saying, Little children, it is the last time. And as ye
have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now are there many
Antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time. So there's going to continue
up until the last day, a continuance of confusion and more knowledge
and more confusion and more confusion. And you can just see it even
in our day. And we don't know when the Lord's will is to return,
but we see it in our day that there's just so much confusion
and corruption in the heart of man just before us all. You know, it was one thing when
TV came on the scene, you know, there was radio and then TV.
got a lot of things into our living rooms and exposed us to
things. But even the internet really exposes us to a lot. I mean, anything that's in some
guy's imagination, halfway around the world, can now be broadcast
around the rest of the world. And that's just another piece
to add to the whole lot of confusion. So the thing is that we see how
Judah was faithful. and they were faithful to the
Lord, but even they, you know, corruption crept in, unawares,
and the hearts of the people were led astray. And it's not
just so of Israel back then in the Old Testament. You know,
we see it very plainly there, in there, and the church, you
know, during the times that the apostles were writing their letters,
it was still relatively young and new, but even they were beginning
to say, look, there's corruption already in here. There's already
evil creeping in to the church. So it should come as no surprise
to us to realize that In today's day, the so-called Christian
church is just as corrupt and evil as Israel and Judah back
then. I mean, there's much confusion
now. We see it. We know and we understand it.
But Paul said this, confirming what John said in 2 Thessalonians
2, 3, and 4, let no man deceive you by any means. For that day
shall not come except there come a falling away first, and that
man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition." Which would indicate
that there will be a final, ultimate Antichrist. There's many Antichrists,
but there will be one, "...who opposeth and exalteth himself
above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, so that
he as God sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that
he is God." So in looking at the text that we're in this evening,
we're witnessing the corruption of the people where it's crept
in. They were once faithful, but now they're called a harlot.
They've committed adultery against their God. And so we ought never
to lean on our own understanding. and think that we've got it all
figured out and everything's fine with us and this can happen
to us in our day. Now we look to the Lord and we
trust him but that's the key is continuing to look to and
trust in the Lord Jesus Christ because the heart of man is deceitful,
it's corrupt, there's this love in the flesh in the old man that
just loves this world and loves the things of this world and
all the deceit of it. pray and constantly be looking
to the Lord to have mercy upon us and to keep our hearts and
to keep us in love with Christ and loving and serving one another
because we don't know when that day is. There's many antichrists
in there. They've been there in and about since the time of
the apostles themselves, so it continues on to this day. They
were worshiping God in falsehood. In Jeremiah, if you turn over
there to Jeremiah chapter 3, in Jeremiah 3 and verse 8, we'll see here, so Jeremiah would
have come a little later after Isaiah, because he would have
witnessed when Judah was actually taken off into captivity. He
was alive at that time and Isaiah is before him at the time that
Isaiah is prophesying. But in Jeremiah 3.8 it says,
and I saw, and I saw when for all the causes whereby backsliding
Israel committed adultery I had put her way. and given her a
bill of divorce. Yet her treacherous sister Judah
feared not, but went and played the harlot also. And it came
to pass through the likeness of her whoredom that she defiled
the land and committed adultery with stones and with stocks."
Stocks being an object that's made from wood, and the object
that's made from wood that you would then take and make an idol
out of it, maybe covering it with bronze or silver or gold.
and you would fall down and worship it, calling it your God. And
yet, verse 10, for all this her treacherous sister Judah hath
not turned unto me with her whole heart, but faintedly said the
Lord. So she was still pretending to
seek the Lord, she was still going there in the outward form,
but she was feigning her love for the Lord, she was feigning
her worship for the Lord. False religion is a harlot and
it's whoredoms and it blends a little bit of truth with a
whole lot of lies, right? It's just deceitful and it's
corrupt and it doesn't produce any good fruit. So then you can
just stay there in Jeremiah because we'll come back later. The next
phrase that Isaiah says in 22 is, thy silver is become dross. Thy silver is become dross. So the people were once precious
in the sight of the Lord. They loved the Lord, they sought
the Lord, and they were precious being compared to silver. And Jeremiah, in Jeremiah 6,
28, Again, he's prophesying to Judah, and he says, Jeremiah
628, they are all grievous revolters, walking with slanders. They are
brass and iron. They are all corrupters. Verse
30, reprobate silver shall men call them because the Lord hath
rejected them. So they were once silver, once
precious in the sight of God, but as they pursued and pretended
their religion and pursued to blend in other ideas and other
concepts into their worship, and their hearts were after other
gods, and again, bowing down to stocks, bowing down to false
idols. Their hearts weren't in the worship
of the Lord. They weren't seeking God. They
weren't truly committing everything to Him and confessing their need
of Him. And then Isaiah says, thy wine
mixed with water, right? So the wine being the teachings,
being the gospel that they were preaching and proclaiming and
being mixed with water would be a dilution of it, right? They
were watering down the truth of the Lord, which was meant
to feed and nourish and give strength and health to the children
of God, but they were watering it down. In Revelation 17, 4
and 5, it speaks of a whore, the whore of Babylon, and it
says, the woman was arrayed in purple, as though she's royalty,
and the woman was arrayed in scarlet color, and decked, which
is the color of sin, and decked with gold and precious stones
and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand, full of abominations
and filthiness, of a fornication. the wine of her lies, it's what
she was saying is the way of peace and happiness and joy and
communion with God and everything will be alright, just drink this,
just partake of what I'm saying to you is the truth. That's what
she comes and she does. And verse five says, and upon
her forehead was a name written, Mystery Babylon the Great, the
mother of harlots and abominations of the earth. So Judah's being
turned away to this. Judah's looking at all the religions
of the world around them, which interestingly seem to be trying
to make a comeback, if you will. There's this constant push towards
these old ideas and concepts and religions out there. I don't
know if it'll be like that because it seems like subtlety is the
best weapon, the most effective weapon, but it just seems like
there's this march towards just anything goes in Eastern religions
and things of that nature again. But Jeremiah goes on and points
this out, even back then, it's not just in Revelation, but Jeremiah
said, Babylon hath been a golden cup in the Lord's hand that made
all the earth drunken, the nations have drunken of her wine, therefore
the nations are mad. So it's of no surprise that,
again, we see in our day that there's just madness going on
with all kinds of corruption just breaking out again out of
the heart of man and now again with the ease of communication
and the ability of knowledge just to flow freely, which Daniel
said, knowledge shall increase. These things will just just keep
flooding out from the heart of man. And in Revelation 17 15
it says, And he said unto me, The waters which thou sawest,
where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and
nations, and tongues. So this wine being diluted is,
one, it's being diluted with just fleshly religion. The peoples representing the
flesh And that which tickles the ear of man, and that man
wants to hear what he wants to hear about what he can do to
save himself, how he can make himself right with God, and how
he can do what he needs to do and be made right with the Lord.
So they're just twisting and changing the truth of God and
putting salvation to be a work in the hands of man, so that
man can do it himself. And then Isaiah goes on to say,
So that we see exactly what they were doing there in Israel, Paul went on
to say, they're doing this even in our day. He again, to the
Philippians in Philippians 3, 18 and 19, he said it again,
for many walk of whom I told you often and now tell you even
weeping that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ, whose
end is destruction, whose God is their belly and whose glory
is in their shame, who mind earthly things. because of the subtlety
in the craft that they were introducing these other ideas and these other
religions and bowing down to stocks and bowing down to stones
and just incorporating this fleshly gospel that appealed to man because
they were doing that because they wanted to just make the
people happy and that's all they knew and all that they understood.
They were promoting this. The Lord says, the Lord of hosts,
the mighty one of Israel, I will ease me of mine adversaries and
avenge me of mine enemies. So the Lord's declared to them,
you're idolaters. You're wicked. You've gone astray.
You're not where you're supposed to be. So just remember, brethren,
We need the Lord to keep us. We need the Lord to keep our
hearts, to keep us looking to Christ always and continually
because we see that corruption throughout history in Israel,
in Judah, and in the day of the apostles, and certainly we can
look at many forms of the so-called church and just see how it corrupted
itself and has just polluted the truth of God and so changed
the truth of God that people just, you know, hate the whole
church because they say it's all just hypocrisy, it's all
vain, there's nothing to it. And that's because such a large
portion of it really is just an empty shell. It's an outward
form of religion having no spirit, no love, no light of God working
in them. So just be aware of that. The
Lord declares that he's going to provide the salvation that
his people need. He's going to deliver. Out of
that corrupt, sinful bunch, the Lord is going to deliver his
people out. Those people that he's loved
from the foundation of the world, he's going to take them out.
He's going to save them from that religion that they're all
mixed in because that's where we all are. We know and believe
that God chose us out from before the foundation of the world,
but in Adam we all fell, we all sinned, and God's going to take
us out and deliver us from that corruption. And we're reminded
in Isaiah 1.9, it says that, except the Lord of hosts had
left unto us a very small remnant, we should have been as Sodom
and we should have been like unto Gomorrah. So we're all worthy
of that, of eternal death. It's not because there's anything
good in us that God deals graciously with us. It's not because we
do good and because we're good religious people and making ourselves
acceptable to God. It's purely by the grace and
the mercy that God chose us in his Son, Jesus Christ. So, rather than entrusting salvation
to man, the Lord does the work. This man can't save himself.
We know that. That man can't save himself. He's always twisting
and corrupting him. In verse 25 he says, I will turn
my hand upon thee and purely purge away thy dross and take
away all thy tin. And our Lord did this for us
in our Savior Jesus Christ. That's where the Lord turned
his hand against us, brethren. It says in Zechariah 13, 7, when
he turned his hand upon us, it was when he turned his hand against
his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. In Zechariah 13, 7, it says,
Awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my
fellow, saith the Lord of hosts. Smite the shepherd, and the sheep
shall be scattered, and I will turn mine hand upon the little
ones. So He smote our Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ, in wrath and judgment when He took our place as our
substitute and as a sacrifice. He bore the sin of His people.
He bore us in His body there on the tree before a holy God
who poured out His wrath and His punishment and judgment against
our sins. What we are are worthy of that
punishment that was our due, the Lord Jesus Christ said, put
it on my account, I will pay the debt, I will pay it in full.
And he redeemed us, and he redeemed us by his blood, by shedding
his blood. His blood was shed so that your
blood and my blood won't be shed in that day for those sins. We are delivered from that. He's
redeemed us, He's purchased us, and we are now the purchased
possession of God Almighty. We are His people, brought into
adoption, brought into the family of Christ, brought into the inheritance
with Christ, whereby we may cry, Abba, Father, and rejoice in
Him, turning to Him for all things, that even when we fall into sin
and we see the corruption of our heart, we can turn to Him,
knowing that He is merciful and compassionate and just to forgive
us of all our sin and corruption because Christ paid the price
for us. He delivered us from our sins
and the destruction of our sins. And we hear that from the scriptures
that Christ purges us from the filthy stain of sin. It says
in Hebrews 1, 3, who being the brightness of God's glory and
the express image of his person and upholding all things by the
word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat
down on the right hand of the majesty on high. so that it's
nothing. Our works don't purge us of our
sins. We can't make up anything. We can't pay off one penny of
our debt. Christ himself purged all our
sins and put them away forever by the death of himself. And
then, you know, when we, you know, when we mingle our works
in with religion. When we mingle in our flesh and
what we can do, that's like that tin. That's that dross that we're
trying to incorporate into the silver and make it less and less
and less precious, and God will have nothing. He won't receive
any of it. But our Lord Jesus Christ, in
Hebrews 9, 14, we read that, how much more shall the blood
of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself without
spot to God, Purge your conscience from dead works to serve the
living God. So that, that tin, our God purges
us from that. So that we don't go around boasting
and talking about what we've done for the Lord anymore. That's
just tin. That's just dross. That's just
taking to ourselves some form of glory and robbing God of that. That's just idolatry. So that
we're looking to Him and trusting in Him alone. So, everything
that we bring forth to God naturally is just dead works, but the blood
of Christ removes that falsehood, removes that hypocrisy, so that
we confess, Lord, we're sinners. We need your grace and your mercy,
Lord. And you provided that in your
Son, and we're looking to Christ. We're seeking mercy at the throne
of God. in the blood of Christ, looking
to Him, entrusting in Him, resting right there in what Christ Himself
has done. And Jeremiah says, that I will
give them a new heart to know Me, I'm sorry, I will give them
a heart to know Me, that I am the Lord, and they shall be My
people, and I will be their God, for they shall return unto Me
with their whole heart. So, Christ redeemed us with His
blood, and the Spirit of Christ is given to us, gives us a new
heart, and gives us life. The Spirit of Christ regenerates
us, so that now we're alive to God. We're no longer dead in
trespasses and sins, no longer dead to the things of God, and
just happy and content with the things of this world. We're alive
unto God, and He's teaching us and growing us in Christ so that
we see and separate the precious from the vile. We see and recognize
that this world is passing away, that it's not continuing, that
this isn't our kingdom, it's not our home, it's not to be
our joy and what we love and what we pursue. But that's a
work that God does in us and he does it through the gospel.
All right, so back in our text in verses 26 and 27, Isaiah 1, says, and I will restore thy
judges as at the first, and thy counselors as at the beginning.
Afterward, thou shalt be called the city of righteousness, the
faithful city. Zion shall be redeemed with judgment,
and her converts with righteousness. And the Lord does this. What
he's saying is, I'm going to give you pastors. I'm going to
give you men who seek me and who bring forth this word and
show you that when you read this there, God's not saying be more
religious and be more zealous to be exacting and precise in
your practices and what you're doing and trusting in that. Because
that's how I read it when I was just in dead corner religion,
I thought, oh, I've got to be even better at my religion. And
that's not what he's saying. He's saying, you need the gospel,
and I'm going to give you the gospel through pastors that will
preach the gospel, that are going to exalt and lift up the Lord
Jesus Christ before your eyes, because that's how he heals us. He applies the blood through
the preaching of the gospel. He applies his work and his power,
showing us, okay, it's not what I'm to do. It's not telling me
to go and be more exacting and more precise and more self-righteous
in what I can do in my own works, but look to the Lord Jesus Christ,
because that's where I'm healed, that's where I'm fed, that's
where I'm comforted. It's in what God has done for
me, the sinner, in His Son, Jesus Christ, so that we rejoice in
Him and we're thankful for Him and we understand that He's provided
everything for us. And Jeremiah says it as well,
Jeremiah 3.15, I will give you pastors according to my heart,
which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding. So that in
Isaiah where we're called judges, he says, I'll give you judges.
And he's saying the pastors are judges because they declare Him
who is the judge of all the earth. We declare that God is holy and
just and that He is righteous and He's not going to accept
anything less than the perfect righteousness that He has provided
in His Son Jesus Christ. So we urge men, we tell men,
don't look to your works. Cease trying to make yourselves
righteous by your religious deeds. Look to Him whom God has provided,
the Lord Jesus Christ. He's redeemed His people. And
then counselors, they're called because, again, we speak of Christ,
who is our wisdom and our counselor and who instructs us and leading
us to Himself. He says, look to Me. I'm your
wisdom and your, I'm, you know, Christ says, I am everything
precious, your righteousness, everything you need to stand
before Me in that day. Before that, when I'm sitting
on the throne of God, Look to me, I am your righteousness,
trust in me, and all will be well. And Jeremiah 23.4 says,
I will set up shepherds over them, which shall feed them,
and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall
they be lacking, saith the Lord. So that looking to the Lord,
we need not fear anything against that final day of judgment. We
will not be lacking one thing necessary for life and godliness. He's providing everything for
us in his Son, Jesus Christ. Romans 8.32, he that spared not
his own son, but delivered him up for us all, How shall he not
freely give us all things?" So you can trust in the Lord. He's
not playing games. He's not tricking you. He's saying,
you look to the Lord Jesus Christ. You look to the Lamb of God that
I've provided, that I sent into this world to save you and redeem
you from your sin because you're corrupt. The whole lot of you
is sick and wounded and dead from head To toe, there's nothing
you can do. I've provided salvation perfectly
entirely in my son. I give you everything necessary
for salvation. It's in Christ. Just keep looking
to him. This world will continue to throw
everything at you. If it can't get in one way through
fame and riches, it'll come at you another way through some
other form of religion or idea or concept. It'll raise up all
kinds of ideas and ways to take your eyes and your hope and your
confidence in Christ away. Don't be surprised if it gets
even more intense and more deceitful and more odd and more weird to
just cause that falling away where people who are looking
to Him now, even hanging on, may fall away. But trust Him. Trust Him with all your heart. Just keep looking to Him. Don't
forsake the Lord, because they who forsake the Lord forsake
their own mercy. There is no hope. It's just a
black void and death apart from Christ. All right, now, in our
last point, what I want us to see is that
the Lord is the one who's going to divide his people and he's
the one that's going to separate the people, the precious
from the vile, he'll separate the sheep from the goats, he's
the one that'll do that determining and it's not for us to do, we're
just to preach the gospel. And one of the parables that
the Lord gave, if you turn over to Matthew 13, and you look there,
you see how The Lord just has us preach the gospel, to open
these doors here, to invite those, not to be judges ourselves and
to say whether or not we think someone will believe the gospel,
because you don't know. It could be the most unlikely
person that you think will hear the gospel and believe it. So
be encouraged to tell others and to invite others to come
and hear the gospel here because the Lord is the one who's going
to call out and separate his people. And in Matthew 13, 24,
the parable, he says this, He put forth another parable
unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man
which sowed good seed in his field. But while men slept, his
enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.
But when the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit, then
appeared the tares also. So the servants of the householder
came and said unto him, Sir, didst thou sow good seed in thy
field? For whence then hath it tares?
And he said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servant said
unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But
he said, Nay, lest while ye gather up the tares ye root up also
the wheat with them. Let both grow together until
the harvest, and in the time of harvest I will say to the
reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles
to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn. So we're
preaching the gospel to all who will listen and all who will
hear because many are called but few are chosen. So the Lord
knows, the Lord's going to be the one that does the separating
and he'll determine by sending the word, by sending or allowing
various afflictions and persecutions and trials and tribulations and
he'll do the separating, he'll prove his people, he'll prove
to them that indeed the faith that they have is of the Lord
Jesus Christ, that it's of Him. That it's not of their works,
it's not of their own manufacturing, but that God has given them this
faith. So, we go forth preaching this
gospel, and in Isaiah 128-31, or 128 through 30, it says, and
the destruction of the transgressors and of the sinners shall be together.
And they that forsake the Lord shall be consumed. For they shall
be ashamed of the oats which ye have desired, and ye shall
be confounded for the gardens that ye have chosen. for ye shall
be as an oak whose leaf faded and as a garden that hath no
water." So that word is going to go forth, conquering, performing
the work which God has sent it to do, right? He's going to save
his people and he's going to also prove that those who hate
him and don't love the Lord are indeed haters of God and don't
love the Lord God. So there's many that are on that
broad road that still sit under religion and they're still going
that way, the broad road that leads to destruction. But there's
a few that the Lord will take from that road and he'll turn
them down the way, put them on the highway that they would not
have ever gone, a way that they didn't know, a way that You know,
though they be blind and though they be fools, but the Lord will
put them there on the king's highway. He'll put them on his
road, his path, his way that leads to Christ and that shows
us the Lord Jesus Christ. And as he reveals himself to
us, we'll see our idolatry and we'll be ashamed. We'll be ashamed
of all the things that we thought, all the ideas that we've held,
all the foolish things that we've done and the time that we wasted
with this life so often. And we'll see those things, and
we'll be ashamed of them, but we'll be made to rejoice in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And our moisture in this flesh,
it may dry up, it may wither, this flesh will become weaker
and weaker, and we hope and pray that it does, while the new man
is strengthened and renewed in the Lord, because that's what
the Lord is doing. He's feeding us, and He's teaching
us, and growing us in Him. He does it through his word.
For the word of God is quick and powerful and sharper than
any two-edged sword, 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 the heart. So as opposed to that
remnant, though, that the Lord saves, those few that the Lord
calls out. and reveals himself to them and
shows them them, there's many that'll remain on that path of
death going that way. In verse 31 it says, and the
strong, right, that stubborn one who opposes God and refuses
to look to Christ and rest in Christ alone, that's the strong
one, they shall be his toe. And the maker of it which is
referring to the works of man, those works that he does that
he's trusting in, these works that that man trusts in, these
shall be as a spark and they both shall burn together and
none shall quench them. So the Lord's blessed us to hear
the gospel, to see that all our salvation is the Lord Jesus Christ,
that we have no other hope. If the Lord is looking to us
for righteousness, we know we're done and that we're finished
for because he's shown us what we are by nature, we're sinners. Everything that we touch, we
corrupt and we defile it and we don't make it better, we make
it worse. So we know that it's by the Lord
Jesus Christ, it's His righteousness. Our natural righteousness shall
never exceed that of the Pharisees. So we're looking to the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. And thankfully, in Lamentations
3.22, we read and understand it's of the Lord's mercies that
were not consumed, because His compassions fell on us. So, our
God struck His Son in judgment, that you and I, who hope in Him,
would go free. be set free and be delivered
from the stain and the corruption of our sins. He did that for
His people. So He's provided righteousness
for us. He's assured us that we are His
people. So trust in Him and look to Him.
And I'll just close with what Paul says in 2 Corinthians 2,
14 and 17. He says, Now thanks be unto God,
which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest
the savour of his knowledge by us in every place. For we are
unto God a sweet savour of Christ, and them that are saved, and
in them that perish. To the one we are the saver of
death unto death, and to the other the saver of life unto
life. And who is sufficient for these things? For we are not
as many which corrupt the word of God, but as of sincerity,
but as of God, in the sight of God, speak we in Christ." So
pray that the Lord would continue to pray, and I thank you for
your prayers, especially each time before I get up to preach,
but continue to pray for me and for all the Lord's pastors that
we remain faithful. We've seen how some even have
corrupted themselves and been corrupted by things that are
not profitable and not helpful to the people of God and made
that a stumbling block, a thing that we have to believe in addition
to Christ if we are to be Christians. You know, pray that we don't
look or put anything in the way of the Lord Jesus Christ, because
we trust that if there's anything that we need to know, He'll reveal
it to us. He'll make it known to us. And
the thing that we need to know is Christ. That's what we need
to know, and that's where He's going to keep us. And anything
else that comes up, He'll provide. He'll definitely provide for
His people, and we can trust in Him. So just continue to pray
that we be not like that harlot, Judah, or like those others in
the so-called, you know, in the church, the early church, that
already went astray and departed from the brethren, that went
out from them, that weren't part of them. Let's just pray that
the Lord keep us and deliver us from the evil. So I pray the Lord will bless
that to our hearts. Let's pray. Our gracious Lord,
we thank you, Lord, for your mercy your patience, your teaching
us, leading us and guiding us in the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord,
make us to look to him. Keep us trusting in him alone
for all our righteousness, for all our health, for all our perfection
and to stand before you, Lord. We pray that indeed you would
deliver us. Let us not depart in heart, let
us not depart in thoughts or in any way from the truth of
our God as revealed in Christ and in Christ alone. We pray
this in Jesus' name, our Lord and Savior. Amen.