Well, good morning. Folks from Jackson, Missouri
send their greetings. Bruce and Jackie and the flock
there. We're going to be in Galatians
for this morning's Bible class. When Levi got a hold of me, We're
talking about what y'all had in mind and what y'all were planning
to do. I was greatly encouraged, I will say that. And, you know,
we don't know what's going to happen down the road. Don't know. But we should not, as Zachariah
says, in Zechariah 4, we should not despise that they are small
things. There's a vision. There may be a vision here. And
if there is and if there isn't, What we're doing today is important. What we're doing today is of
utmost importance. We're gathering together around
the Word, around Christ, and we're just going to worship Him.
Nothing fancy. That's okay. Let the world do what it does,
or let us just concentrate and honor and glorify Him. And he
says, an old preacher, when we were struggling, We were struggling. We hadn't
had a pastor yet. We were looking for one. We looked
for a couple. We looked for several years until the Lord revealed
to me that I was to be the pastor. I was like Jonah, just running.
Didn't want anything to do with it. But this is something that
He shared. We were outside on the porch.
And I got it noted in my Bible because I think it applies here.
Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, Always
abounding in the work of the Lord for as much as you know
that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. So, you know, I
mean, the Lord may shut this down. He may not. But right now,
this morning, we're laboring in Christ and it's not vain. It's not vain. And I'm thankful
to be a part of it. I'm thankful. I may not make
it home. Something may happen. But God
gives grace. We're going to worship Him. And I thought about when Levi
talked to me, I thought about instantly my desire was to be
here. I mean, my desire is to be with
the folks at the home church or in Jackson. But my desire
is kind of like John Bunyan's Pilgrim Progress. I don't know
if any of you read that. But as Pilgrim and Hopeful were working
their way to the Celestial City, they stopped, and there was a
place called the Delectable Mountains. And in that place, they met four
shepherds, knowledge, experience, watchful, and sincere. And these
shepherds took Pilgrim and Hopeful by the hand, and as they went
up to the Delectable Mountains, where they were at, they could
barely see, but they could see the Celestial City afar off. and they nonetheless that it
was there and they saw it and that's my desire is to just if
we can if we get a glimpse of Christ while we're here we're
still in the flesh we still struggle with the things of the flesh
it's it gets difficult the longer we're here but if we can just
get a glimpse of the celestial city. If we get a glimpse of
Christ, that's my desire. So we're going to look at Galatians
4, the last verse, just to bring it to the text I'm going to look
at. 5 verse 1. 5 verse 1. And I will say these two messages
are on purpose. They're not something that I,
oh, This will work, this will work. These two messages, and
the order in which I'm preaching them, they're on purpose. And
I hope that they will bless each and every one. Galatians chapter
4 and the 31st verse, and Galatians 5-1. So then brethren, we are
not the children of the bondwoman, but of the free. Stand fast. Therefore, in the liberty wherewith
Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the
yoke of bondage. Mr. Hawker, let me read you what
he says. He says, I admire the manner
in which Paul exhorts the church to stand firm in Christ. after
having so fully proved in what Scott read in chapter 3, after
having so fully proved in the foregoing chapters the complete
and blessed justification of the church in Christ as perfectly
detached from and unconnected with any and every law work before
God. No works involved. The liberty
Paul speaks of is the perfect and complete freedom Christ by
himself attained for his whole church and people by his obedience,
bloodshedding, and death. He hath, as the great head, surety,
and husband of his people, redeemed them from the curse of the law,
being made a curse for them. And therefore, as the apostle
says elsewhere, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus
has made every child of God free. from the law of sin and death. The law of sin and death. Basically,
what I'm going to probably be talking about is what Scott read
in Galatians 3 verse 14, that the blessings of Abraham might
come to the Gentiles through Jesus Christ. This liberty, this
liberty of freedom, that was secured for us by the worth and
work of Christ alone is all of grace, and we are to stand firm,
stand fast, not to be removed from, to hold near and dear to
this liberty, this freedom. It's secured for us by Christ,
by what He's done. If it is not secured by Christ, It's not a grace. It's not real. It's not lasting liberty or freedom.
But it's man-made, man-centered, and it's worthless. And that's
what most religion is today. Was it... No, I don't think it
was Mein Kampf. But anyway, someone said religion...
I think it said religion is the opium... Oh, Karl Marx, there
we go. Religion is the opium of the people. It's intoxicating. We came down here. I can't remember
where we came through and there was a church. Maybe Rogersville. It didn't have anything outside.
It was some bizarre name like Courage Church. What has that
got to do with anything? Let me reread this chapter 5
verse 1 in the Amplified. It expounds just a little bit. So, brethren, verse 31, we who
are born again are not children of a slave woman, the natural,
but of the free, the supernatural. In this freedom, Christ has made
us free. That's the emphasis. Christ has
made us free. There's nothing we can do to
make ourselves free. Completely liberated us. Stand
fast then. Do not be hampered and held and
snared and submit again to a yoke of slavery which you have once
Now, from what I understand, everybody here was raised in,
dare I say, suffocating religion? Stand fast. If you've heard the
gospel, if you believe the gospel, if Christ has set you free, stand fast. Stand fast in that
liberty. This liberty that Christ has
secured for us, it is all squarely and singularly
and positively set upon the shoulders of Emmanuel. If we try to do
anything to experience what this world calls, this religious world
calls, well I have freedom to Basically what they're saying
is, how much sin can I get by with and still get to heaven?
I've got freedom to go to a bar and do this and do that. There's nothing like that in
the scriptures. And we'll see this. Stand fast in the liberty
wherewith Christ, Christ, hath made us free. And be not entangled. That's what was going on in Galatians.
They thought, OK, we've heard the truth. Now we're going to
try to bring in circumcision and do this or do that. No. No.
What I want to show us this morning in this lesson is just what does
this freedom in Christ do for us? What can we expect? And what
can we hope for? What can we hope for? These are
obvious. But on the other hand, I looked
at these and I'm thinking, where have I been? The first thing,
we are free to the Bible and all that is therein. It just seems to make sense,
but follow with me. That is, we are free to enjoy
all its contents, promises, covenants, and helps are free to us to use,
and as Charles Spurgeon said, gather up and take these promises
and spend them at leisure. Spend them at leisure. There's
promises in this whole book. And we know that all promises
in Christ are yea and amen. Let's just look at a few examples.
I just pulled Isaiah 31. Turn to Isaiah 31. Charles Haddon Spurgeon has got
a little book, a little paperback book, it's called According to
Promise. I'd recommend everybody. There's so many things as believers
that we struggle with and that we starve ourselves from the
enjoyment that's in Christ. And that's what he's saying.
Stand fast in the liberty and the freedom that Christ has purchased. He purchased our liberty and
our freedom Not only to take away our sins, but so much more
than that. And it seems like we live, you
know, we don't eat right. I'm talking spiritual food. We
don't, we just don't, we don't enjoy these things. And let's
just look at Isaiah 31 in verse, I'm sorry, Isaiah 31. Isaiah 31 and verse 5, As birds
flying, so will So will the Lord of hosts defend
Jerusalem. Defending, He will also deliver
it. And passing over, He will preserve
it. Are you a citizen of Jerusalem? Are you born again? Basically,
all this book is written for believers. That's all. That's
it. I mean, a lot of people use it,
and they'll trivialize it, and they'll play games with it, and
they'll memorize it, and stuff like that. If there's not a heart
to understand it through Christ, this book is condemnation. He
defended Jerusalem. And you said it's a little rude.
Defending it, He will deliver it. Passing over, He will preserve
it. Do we not need to be delivered
daily? Do we not need to be preserved?
And I know that He will preserve us, but we doubt it so often. This verse, If you're a believer,
it's yours. Take it. It's yours. He promised
to preserve His people, His church. Isaiah 30, turn back a page.
Isaiah 30, verses 18 and 19. And therefore will the Lord wait
that He may be gracious unto you, and therefore will He be
exalted that he may have mercy upon you. For the Lord is a God
of judgment. Blessed are all they that wait
for Him. For the people shall dwell in
Zion at Jerusalem. Thou shalt weep no more. He will
be very gracious unto thee at the voice of thy cry. When he
shall hear it, he will answer it." I've got to go to work tomorrow
just like everybody else. I'll struggle. I'll fight. The fighting's within, fear,
all these different things. I struggle the same way. The voice of thy cry, when he
shall hear it, he will answer. That's a promise. It's yours. Stand fast in the liberty. The
freedom to use the scriptures. that Christ hath purchased by
his own blood. Take it, believing sinners, take
it to your heart. We, says Mr. Spurgeon, are welcome
guests at the table of his promise. This book is a treasure chest
filled to the brim, and it is freely given by Christ to all
his elect, every one of them. The scriptures, as it were, are
heaven's bank and trust. We may go frequently and borrow
against it and withdraw from it at no harm of default to our
great God. You remember that lesson, the
inopportune woman kept knocking at the door? Just aggravating,
but she just kept knocking and knocking in the open. Our God has given us exceeding
great and precious promises to be used. There's a couple of
situations in my own life, personally. A long, long time ago, before
I met Melinda, I'm not going to say exactly what it was, but
I had been threatened great harm, I mean physical harm, because
of the stand of the gospel. And this person was going to,
and he could, he could, he's bigger than me, he was going
to come down to Cape Girardeau and Whitney. That's what he said
and hung up the phone. So I said, well, sometimes, you
know, you just got to face it. So I went into the room and I
was staying with my aunt. And there's the Bible. I don't
need that Bible. I'm staying on my own. I'm pretty
young. I may be, I may, I may make it a good fight. And then
I realized I'm Without Him, I can do nothing. And I picked up and
I started reading Jeremiah because I was there in my readings. And out of nowhere, a verse,
it said, Nothing for him is going to harm you. And I looked at
that and I hadn't read Spurgeon's book. I didn't know much about
it. I was young. And I said, I'm taking that.
Five minutes later, I got a phone call. from the same person apologizing
and saying, no, I love you, I'm not going to do it again. That's
just a small example. But I could go on and on. And
what I do in my study Bibles, any time something like that
happens, I write it down. Whether I need it then or not, I'll write
it down. And then just sit there and I'll go back over it. Oh,
I remember that time. Oh, I'm going to need this tomorrow. Whatever. gather up the promises. They're for us. They're free.
And as Spurgeon said, spend them at leisure. We cannot overdraft
from His bank of mercy. However, the warning is in Galatians
5 and verse 1, because we have a tendency to do this, be not
entangled again with the yoke of bondage. That means if we
think that we can borrow from his account, from his promises
or whatever, based upon something that I have done, my puny religious
works, my vain efforts, we are said to be entangled again by
the yoke of bondage or the law or works religion. And it's so
easy to fall into that because we got the flesh. The flesh is
never going to get better, never going to get better. We're partakers
of the divine nature also. So the minute we try to merit,
favor from God, or we try to gain access to this book outside
of the covenant blessings of Christ, which is what he did
for us at Calvary, we are entangling ourselves with the yoke of bondage. It is of grace, says Romans,
it is no more worse. Otherwise, grace is no more grace.
Romans 11. Secondly, we are also free to
all covenant blessings. We need to understand them, we
need to appreciate them, and we need to be thankful for them.
This book says that we are heirs, joint heirs, with Christ. That's
yours. That's yours. The scripture says
we now have a place in glory. We have many mansions. If it
were not so, he would not have told us. That's yours. We know that the Scripture says
all things are working together for our good. All things are
working together for our good. Take it. That is yours as well. Stand fast. Your boss says this. Your wife says this. Your husband
says that. Whatever. Friends say this. Friends say that. The Scripture
says all things are working together for good to them that love God
and who are on a call according to Oh, there it is again. His
purpose. We're with Christ. That's grace.
All things. Well, what about... I remember
Tim James. 9-11. My wife and I were married
on September 11th. Oh, wasn't that Bobby? We were
married a lot longer than before that happened. But Tim James,
he wrote a message in one of his bulletins. He said, after
9-11, there was a 9-12. The sun still came up. It was
horrible. It was deceitful. It was wretched. But all things
are working together for good to them who love God and are
called according to His purpose. That's yours. That's all for
those in Christ. The Scripture says we're one
with Christ. Take that. We're one with the
Father. That's ours. The Holy Spirit
abides in us. That's what the Scripture says.
Take that. It says we're partakers of the divine nature. That is
ours. That's yours. That's yours as
well. Cling to Him, O troubled one, and all the covenant blessings
are yours. Cling to Him in times of darkness.
Declare this. Yes, I'm in trouble. I don't
know how I'm going to get out of this. But this is what your
Word says. Declare them. In a time of loss, a loved one,
a friend, a neighbor, remember them. Remember the covenant blessings. In times of distress, own it. Christ, He suffered. Forgiveness
of sins, but a whole lot more. In times of sorrow, lay hold. Lay hold of the covenant blessings. They're yours. They're yours. Thirdly, we're also free to the
throne of grace. The throne of grace. Stand fast
therefore in the liberty of freedom, wherewith Christ hath made us
free. We have been bought with a price,
We are now free to come boldly to the throne of grace to be
heard by our most dear and tender Father. We don't do that enough. We're too busy. Got things in
the morning. I try to read something in the
morning and I get up five minutes late. I don't do it. But it doesn't mean he's forsaking
you. You may be on the road and the Lord brings something up
and just like, thank you. Just thank Him. He's tender to us. I'll tell you, and I'm going
to use some language here that I'm doing on purpose, that you're
kind of stepping out a little bit. No, I'm not. I'll tell you,
God is obligated to hear and answer His children when they
ask according to His will. Isn't He? He's obligated. Isn't
that what we just read in Isaiah? Because we know the Son. Because
we have the Son's righteousness. Very righteousness. Because we
have the Son's holiness. Because we're made accepted.
Where? In the Beloved. That's why I love the book of
Ephesians. It seems like all through that. In Christ. In Christ. In the Beloved. All spiritual
blessings in heavenly places. In Christ Jesus. They're ours.
They're ours. Let me tell you a story. A story
that supposedly happened in the Civil War. Abraham Lincoln is
the president. And of course, you could approach
the White House. It wasn't so fenced off and all
the problems we've got today. There was a union officer who
was court-martialed. He felt unjustly. And back in
that day, your name meant something in reputation. So he was going
to the White House to petition Abraham Lincoln to overturn the
court-martial. Because he said he was a God-fearing
man. and charges were trumped up against
him, he felt, but no one would hear him. He got court-martialed,
no one would hear him. So he's sitting out, outside the office,
on a bench, and he tries to see that, no, he can't see. He tries,
it goes the next day, not, he can't see, he can't see, he's
got to go through certain men, he can't see, he can't see. So
like the fourth or fifth day, he's sitting there, he's got
his hands in his head, and he's basically crying. And this little
boy walks up to him, and says, Sir, what's the matter? He says,
I don't know what to do. The only person that can take
care of my situation is in that room and I can't see him. That
little boy grabs his hand, opens the door and says, Daddy, this
man needs to see you. Tad Lincoln. And he got to sit
down and his case heard. Why? Because Tad had access. The son had access to the Father. And we have access to go boldly
to the throne of grace. I have sinned, me personally,
yes, too much, too frequent, too long. Go boldly to the throne
of grace and expect pardon. Because all this hinges, you
see, now this is, boy, you're talking, that freedom, we don't
know how free we are. We don't know how free we are.
Now, if you can take this, what I'm saying, and go do something
when the brethren are gathering together and make excuses that
you don't understand, you don't understand is freedom. We're
as free as Christ is. What does it say? Christ went
about doing His Father's business. Went about doing His Father's
will. Honoring, glorifying His Father. There's the line of your freedom. Expect pardon. We get entangled again with the
yoke of bondage. I don't feel like I really meant
it when I was praying. I just don't feel like I prayed
through or whatever those terms are. I don't feel forgiven. Christ died. Yehudah is risen. Seated at the right hand of God.
Right now, Interceding? There's a covenant blessing.
Claim it. Claim it. It's yours. Claim it. Too free? Too liberal? I don't
think so. We have permission to approach,
and that at all times. Midnight, noon, or even time. Lastly, this just blows me away
here. Actually, I added to this because
I didn't even see this. We are free to everything Christ. I don't know how to say it properly. We are free to everything Christ.
Turn to 1 Corinthians 1. And verse 30. But of him are you in Christ
Jesus. Not by your puny decision, not
by your baptisms, not by any of this, but of him are you in
Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us. Wisdom? Any man like wisdom? Ask God. Isn't that what James
says? Righteousness? What are we called in the Old
Testament? We're called trees of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord. Sanctification, He has set us
apart. Redemption, you ladies know something
about redemption, when you redeem coupons. What do you do with
that coupon? You're bringing it back to the
grocery store that printed it. When He redeems His people, it's
not like, oh, I don't know who they are. He specifically knew
who they were from before the foundation of the world. They
were His. And He sent His Son to die for them. And He died
for them successfully. And then the Holy Spirit calmed
and quickened them. He brought them back. They were
His to begin with. We are made unto Him, wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification. and redemption. According as
it is written, that he that glorieth in the glory of the Lord, in
the glory of the Lord, he is not going to be entangled again
with the yoke of bondage. Now this is why I didn't see
this. I completely missed this. So I'm learning right here with
you. You think of the many names in Nath's topical Bible. It's pretty good. It's got a
lot of the names of Christ, a lot of names, and there's a lot more.
There's another book called The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge.
It has every verse in the Bible and a cross-reference. That's
all it is. It's just verses. You think of the many names of
Christ in this book, it's yours. I'll pull out some examples.
Didn't he call it the Balm of Gilead? Who among us does not
need relief, healing, or ointment? Spiritual ointment. Christ has purchased that. He's
called our elder brother. I've got an older brother. And
when I was little, I'd go to him. Somebody threatened me.
Dirk, this guy's picking on me. Take care of it. Elder brother
is the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Go to him for protection,
aid, rescue. He's yours. It's yours. Stand
fast in the liberty, the freedom wherewith Christ has made us
free. He's called Jehovah Shalom. He is our peace. He's having
made reconciliation between broke down and middle war partition.
Having made peace. He's in the Old Testament, he's
often referred to as the captain of the Lord of hosts. Who among
us does not need a champion, a sovereign, a victor in times
of spiritual warfare? That's his name. They hold on
it. On and on. Think on these things,
brethren. Meditate therein. Sweet repose
will be known, felt, and experienced. What is Christ is ours by substitution, by transfer, and in reality,
and in truth. Why? So says the record. And this
says about itself, every word of God is pure. So, this is the
record that he has. All the promises in Christ are
Yale. And amen. That's all I got. Stand fast, therefore, in the
liberty. And I mean don't let yourself,
don't let your flesh, don't let somebody else in religion, Smarter
than you? Yeah. I remember Scott Richardson
said, if the people hear the Gospel and they believe the Gospel,
THE Gospel, they'll believe it. But if you're
just telling them logic and reason and doctrine, somebody smarter
than you will come in and reason them out of it. But we're not
saved by reason. The Lord uses our mind. But I
thank God this thing is not a, it's a spirit enlightened book. And no matter how smart, or one
of my favorite passages, they take notice that they've been
ignorant and unlearned men, but they had been with Christ. Just
put that on my tombstone, that's fine.