I would ask your prayers. I desire to preach this message to you, and again, you know, I'm always coming to this place. Got all the notes. Wrote them twice. And still feel incapable. I think this is a vital message. It needs to be preached. I long for it to be a blessing to God's people, an encouragement, and may God use it for our comfort as well as calling His people to life and faith in Him, in Christ.

Pray for those churches that are without pastors. Don't forget them. Ask God to send forth men. We're going to see here in a minute that truly no man could be preacher of the gospel except there be sent. They have to be sent. Not by men, but by God. They have to be sent. We pray that God would send men. And I'm thankful to see that there have been, at least in our little sphere, some movement that God is causing some men to question And it's been good to see. It doesn't matter if I see it or not. That doesn't have anything. But he's allowed me to see some, and it sure is encouraging. It sure is encouraging. So pray that God bless that.

And you pray for Rick and others that are sick. I talked to Debbie. And Tony had failed this week. Debbie Bowling and Tony are members of this congregation. They're not capable of being here. Several years ago, Tony had a stroke, and Deborah's been somewhat confined, so they've not been able to come and worship with us, but they do worship online. They do listen to the messages, and I was very encouraged by that. But Tony fell this last week and broke one of his vertebrae. He shattered it. And so he's in great pain, great pain. And so they ask your prayers for him as they go through this. They don't know what they're going to be able to do. I think Tony is 74. So is that right, Joanne? Do you know anybody you know over there? I'm asking numbers to Joanne. That's not good. I shouldn't have done that. But I think he's in his 70s. So they don't know if they're going to do surgery, or they can't. So pray for them. They're in a very difficult place. And Tony's in a lot of pain. So pray for them. And again, pray for me as I desire to preach.

Let's go to him in prayer. Our gracious Father, we come before you thanking you for this another time. Father, every time I stand here, I confess that I have no strength in myself. I have no ability to preach thy gospel except what is given by the power of the Holy Spirit. All of the abilities and all of the things that I have are useless without the power of thy Spirit. What am I but a vessel, an empty vessel, unless you fill it? And I pray that you would do this for the glory of Christ, for the good of your people, that you would give me the unction and power I need, the strength and body and mind to preach And then in the same power, Father, we ask that you would open every heart, every mind, every spirit to cause it to drink in the Word of the living God for our comfort, for our benefit, for our instruction.

And Father, I do beg you that you would call the lost to life. that you would bring in your sheep, Father, that you would call them by name, and they should believe on the Lord Jesus Christ by the power and grace of your Spirit. Father, I plead that you forgive us our sins in Christ, through his blood, through his righteousness, that you would cover us with your love and your mercy tonight, those that are Father, this body is so frail. We're so sickly. And Father, if you would be gracious, please, be gracious in this to give health to the sick. That you would bring back and recover those who are hurting. Think of Rick and Deborah and Tony and others who have illnesses, unknown, unmentioned. You know who they are. I beg you for healing. and may it redound to the glory of Christ. I pray you forgive us our sins and lead us in Jesus' name. Amen.

Now take your bowels and turn back with me to 1 Corinthians chapter 1. 1 Corinthians chapter 1. Entitle this message, Preaching and Preachers. Preaching and Preachers. Now, in this book of Corinthians, the apostle starts out and he lays out a blueprint for the church as to the necessity of preaching. Now, if you go through this book, these people had a lot of issues. They had a lot of troubles. And you know what the remedy was for all this? Preaching. Preaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. Paul preaches throughout this whole book. I can take any portion of this book and preach it to you because Paul was preaching to them. He's preaching. The necessity of it, he lays that out first. The necessity of preaching and what a preacher is. They were confused.

At this time, if you go back to the very beginning of this chapter here, let's look in verse 11. The apostle lays out a complaint that had been made. He said, For it hath been declared unto me of you, my brethren, by them of the house of Chloe, that there be contentions among you. Now this I say, that every one of you that saith, I am of Paul, I am of Apollos, I am of Cephas, I am Christ. There was division made regarding what? Preachers. Preachers. Some said, I like Paul. He has all this doctrine, and I love that. He's a good, bold preacher. Some people said, yeah, that's right, but Apollos, he has an oratory skill. He is very talented. Now, Paul has doctrine, but he stutters. So, I like Apollos. He's very, he can elaborate really well. Good illustrations, all this. I like Apollos. Other people say, well, I like Peter. He's down to earth. He's very earthy. He's a man's man. He's a man's preacher. I like that guy. And then you got somebody over there that says, look, I'm of Christ. He tries to set himself above everybody. He says, I don't need a preacher. That's what it means. When a person says, I'm of Christ, that means that he don't need a preacher.

Well, the apostle rebukes them concerning this. And he says this, is the church divided? Did I Paul die for you? Was I the one that made you righteous, or Apollos, or Peter? He said, No. No. The church is not divided. We are all united in Christ. Every church is united in Christ. Now, this is a local assembly of believers here. But this is not it. We're not the only ones. And so you got another church somewhere else. You're not divided. We're one. Paul said we're one body. You know when I go to someone else's, another congregation, I feel just as at home as I feel here. Why? Because we're one body. We're one in Christ. And so what is he teaching here? We're not to exalt man. That's what he's teaching. Don't make divisions based on men or their abilities.

Now this is very important because this is happening even today. I know of a pastor that he came to a church and some men left because they didn't like his tone. It wasn't even his message. Now that's wrong. I don't care who you are, that's wrong. If you're coming to hear a man based on his ability to speak, listen, it won't be long until you're bored of him too, and you'll try to go find someone else. It happens, I see it all the time. I see men hopping from church to church to church to church, never staying under one. What does it matter which pastor you're under? We're not in competition. And so we're not to divide based on the ability of the speaker.

Now then, as he goes along here, and in our text, our text is going to begin in verse 17. Now I've got several questions this evening concerning this matter of preaching and preachers. Several questions that are answered here in this text, that are answered clearly in this text. I've got six. There are six questions.

First of all, who sends preachers? Now, preachers are necessary. They are vitally necessary. Listen, in Romans chapter 10, the apostle says this, Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But how are you going to call on Him in whom you have not believed, heard? And how are you going to believe on Him in whom you have not heard? And how shall you hear without what? And how shall they preach except they be sent? Preaching is necessary, friends. We'll see this more as we go along in the text.

But first of all, who sends preachers? Who makes a preacher? I'm going to give you the answers to all these so you can just write it down right off the bat. Christ. There it is. There's who sends preachers, Christ.

Now the second question is, what are preachers sent to do? Preach. Are these not simple? The apostle lays it out in that very first part, for Christ sent me, what? Not to baptize, but to preach. So we preach. Well, how and what do we preach? We preach the gospel. We preach, listen, the gospel. We preach the gospel. We preach by declaration. That's what it means to preach, to declare.

The fourth question is, what is the result of those who preach by man's wisdom? Answer? Nothing. Nothing. It comes to nothing. I don't care how big they are, what they think or how they feel, make people feel. They get millions and hundreds of millions of people to join their church. You know what happens to that? Nothing.

Fifth question is, why do we only preach the gospel? Because there's only one. That's why there's only one gospel. And six, why do believers love the gospel? Here's the reason, Christ is all. Because in the gospel, Christ is all.

So let's go through these now. First of all, who sends preachers? In our day, men go off to seminary, they're part of a local church, and then they feel an unction, they feel some kind of feeling about preaching. And then they go off to a seminary, and they go there for four, five, six, seven, eight years, they read a lot of books, and at the end, they get a little piece of paper, and they put it on the wall, and they say, now, I'm a preacher.

You know what the problem with that is? You won't find it in the book. Matter of fact, the only person I read that went to school was Paul. He went to the Jewish school and he was the top of their class and God struck him down and then went out in the desert for 18 months and taught him the scriptures. So, no.

Who makes preachers? Who sends preachers according to the Word of God? Look what your text says. For Christ sent me. And I read that in Hebrews and Romans 10. How shall they preach except they be what? Sent. Christ sends preachers. It is Christ that calls men to preach, not men.

Now I've known a lot of men over the years that had abilities and gifts and talents and I thought within myself, well surely that man will be a preacher. And you know what happened? And I see another poor old fella over here like myself. I never dreamed that I would preach. I never dreamed I would have that. I didn't have anything that I thought a preacher should have. And lo and behold, God says, I choose the base things of the world, the weak things of the world, to confound the things that are mighty and the things that are wise. And that's what he does. He chooses weak vessels and he sends them out to preach.

God sends men to preach. And when a man is sent, listen to this, he is a slave of Jesus Christ. That's it. He is a servant. And Paul says this in Romans chapter 1. He says, Paul, a slave of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated under the gospel. separated of the gospel. We're called by the grace and power of God. We're called to preach the gospel. We're not called to be kings. We're not called to be lords. We're not called to be reverends. We're not called to be doctors of theology or popes or anything like that. We are called to preach. We are servants for this one thing, to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ and nothing less and nothing more than that. That's our mission. That's our purpose. He puts it into a man's heart and he can't do anything else.

This was told me when I was desiring to be a preacher and Jack Shanks is the one who told me this. He said, Fred, if you can do something else, do it. Please, don't do this. And I thought that was dumb. I thought, what the heck are you talking about, Jack? This is the highest calling a man could ever have, to preach the gospel. I thought, whoo. I didn't know what God was gonna do. I didn't know how low God would make a man when he calls him to preach the gospel, but he does.

And if any man longed to be a pastor I know this, it is most vitally important that he learn from another faithful pastor. This is where God raises up men in the church. He raises up his people under the sound. You know Titus and Timothy, you know where they learned the gospel? Paul. Mark learned it from Barnabas and possibly Peter. But we learn under the gospel, sitting under the gospel, under faithful men who preach the gospel, and then God calls us out to preach the gospel.

So who sends preachers? God does. I didn't send myself. If any man sends their self, that won't last. If a man sends himself, it won't last. I've seen too many men send themselves. When God sends you, you become a slave to God to do this.

Now what do preachers do? We preach. This is simple. We're sent by Christ. Look what he said, For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to what? Preach the gospel. Preach the gospel. Now Paul is not diminishing baptism. Baptism is a vital part of the ministry. In Matthew chapter 28, verse 19, our Lord said, Go you into all the world, Baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Now, baptism is important. It is the only public profession of faith.

Now, the church has got a different way of doing professions of faith. They want you to come up to the front and shake everybody's hand. I don't mind you coming up and shaking people's hand, but that's not a profession of faith. A profession of faith is baptism. It's important. If a man believes, he should be baptized because baptism identifies with the death, the burial, and resurrection of Christ. When you're baptized, you're saying, I want Him. He's everything. And I'm confessing this to you. When I am immersed, I'm immersed in His death, in His burial, and His resurrection. And when He rose, I arose. My hope is in Him. That's what you're confessing.

So it's important. It's not what we're here for. I'd love to baptize people. I'd love that God would call many and that they would be baptized. That's great. But really, that's not my purpose. I've had people that I baptized, and after that I haven't seen them since. That's not my mission. My mission is to do this, to preach the gospel.

Look at chapter 2. Look what Paul says to these people. He says in verse 1 of chapter 2, Brethren, when I came to you, I came not with excellency of speech, nor of wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except this, Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I determined. It is on purpose. What we preach is on purpose. It is a determinate thing. And we have to guard against preaching anything else. Because our minds are just like your minds. Our minds will go off on tangents and things like that. We don't do that. That's not what we're here for. I am here to declare to you Jesus Christ. This whole book is concerning one man and his work. Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

So we as preachers are sent with one mission, one purpose, to preach Christ. And that's it. You know, and the only people who love that are people saved by Jesus Christ. Those who are saved by Him, those who know Him, they love it. Paul said, we love this. He said in verse 18, For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness, but unto us. See this? And to us, we know something about this gospel. This gospel has power. It has power. You know, I was dead and now I'm alive. You know what God used? He used his gospel. He sent a man to preach his gospel. It had power. We are saved, know it is the power of God. And so we're sent to preach the gospel.

I don't know if you've noticed this, but this is the center of our worship right now. Every worship service preaching is the center. I love it. I would love to have, you know, instruments. If you know, man, I'm I'm I'm big on it. I'd love you put over trombone over here if somebody knew how to play it. I say, go ahead. You know. I love music. I wish I could sing. I really wish I had a voice to sing. But I tell you, that's not our purpose, is it? That's not the main thing. And even in our songs, it's got to be gospel-oriented songs. We cannot do things just because it's beautiful. We don't play music just for the beauty of music. We preach the gospel even when we sing.

But our main goal is to preach the gospel. And what is this gospel? This gospel is very simple. Salvation is of the Lord. That's the simplicity of it, is it? Salvation is from of the Lord. From start to finish, it's all of God. That's our message. It's very simple. God in eternity chose to save a people. God the Father gave them to Christ. Anybody lost? Anybody missing that? Is that hard to grasp or understand? It's not. Men don't like it, but I don't care. I don't stick my finger in there and figure out what men want to hear. I'm here to preach THE gospel. God had a people. He loved them and He gave them to Christ. Christ came into the world and died for those people. He saved them. He redeemed them. He made a righteousness for them. He rose again and they were justified. And then the Spirit of God is going to come to every single one of those people, and they're going to hear this gospel, and they're going to believe it. They're going to trust in it by the power of the Spirit, and they are going to be saved. That's the gospel we preach. It's not a complicated gospel. Don't tell me that this theology is too complicated. No, it's rough, it's abrasive, it abases man, exalts God, I don't care what it does to man. This is what we are called to preach. And we're not going to preach anything else. Paul said, I'm not called to do anything else. I'm called to preach the gospel. That's what preachers are called to do. Preach the gospel.

And this gospel is so good, it's good news for sinners. Man, that's who God's people are. God's people are sinners. God's people are wicked. God's people are vile. God's people are ungodly. And they need to hear of Christ, and they will. When they hear of Him at the appointed time, they'll come and they'll love Him, and they'll serve Him, and they'll honor Him. That gospel comes in power, and there's nothing that can pull them away from it. I have to have Him. Oh, that men would come to Him now.

You know, I believe in whosoever will. Man, I do. I believe God died for whosoever will. Absolutely. You come to Christ, I have no problem with that. That's easy. I don't believe He died for whosoever won't. May God even now call men to Christ. That's why we preach Christ.

And thirdly, third question is, how is this gospel to be preached? What is it to preach? Preaching is not a complicated thing. It's someone who declares something. I don't have this, but in the book of Acts, the scripture says, and they all went and preached the gospel. I think they were being persecuted and they were being scattered. And the scripture says they went and preached the gospel. That word means to gossip. You know, if something happened and this church were disbanded, we had to run for our lives. And wherever you went, you would talk to your neighbor about the gospel. That's what that word preach means.

But there's a different word for what we do. It's a heralder. In that day, if some law was made by the Roman Senate, they would send the biggest, burliest guy out there with the loudest voice, and he would herald the law. He would declare it. He wasn't up there for debate. He wasn't up there to get what men thought about it. He was sent to herald. And it said, the Scripture says in Acts, that Philip went and herald the gospel. And that's what we do. We just declare it. We declare it.

And I don't mind answering questions if man's got a question. Now, this past few weeks, I've had a man ask me some serious questions he's really seeking. And I don't mind answering questions. Then I got another fellow. He kind of asks a question, but then he just keeps going. He just don't even stop talking. So I don't think he's really asking a question. I don't mind answering questions.

When I answer a question, I'm going to answer emphatically, I'm going to answer according to the word of God and I'm not going to deviate. We herald, we declare the gospel. We don't use the wisdom of man in this. The wisdom of man is like this. Well, I had a guy tell me, he said, man, you shouldn't preach. I said, what? No, you shouldn't preach to people. What you need to do is you just need to talk to them. You just need to get their opinion, get their feelings about this, and then use some analogies in their life and talk to them. I'm not called to do that. And neither is any man of God. If a man of God does that, he's not called to preach. He's just not.

Paul said, I am called to declare something to you. I'm called to preach the gospel. And we're not to do it according to the wisdom of the world. Some people do it by musicals and plays and all kinds of entertainment. They say, well, we're doing all this, and when we get them in, then we'll preach to them. You know what that is? That's worldly wisdom. That's just the wisdom of the world. That's natural. You can find that on every corner. Find that on every corner. To them, the preaching of the cross, the declaration of the cross is foolishness. It's just foolish. What we're doing here is foolishness. It don't work. We're not to preach. We're not to compromise. We're to declare the gospel in boldness.

I had one person tell me that what you're doing is old-fashioned. What you're doing is old-fashioned. She said, you need to educate people. Now listen, if salvation was by education, I'd agree. But it's not. Salvation is by revelation, not education. It's not a business. If it were a business, surely we'd have to run it differently. It's not a business. We are here to preach the gospel. In verse 18, he said, for the preaching of the cross. That's what I'm doing, preaching the cross over and over and over again. There was a man in this congregation, when I first got here, he said, all you do is preach Christ. I said, well, if you want something else, you gotta go someplace else. I ain't seen him since. Okay? But this is what we're called to do.

To them it is foolishness. To them, they're perishing. Look at what Paul said. He said, for the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness. If this is foolishness, I want you to know this, you're lost. I didn't say it, he did. Didn't he? Didn't he just say it? If this is foolishness, it's because you're perishing. You don't know the gospel. He said, but to us, this is something different. To us who are saved, it's the power of God. We know this is necessary.

See, as a preacher of God, we are sent to do one thing, to declare the gospel. Now, how? I asked that question. This is my question. How? Well, we declare it, but how do we do it? some things that were written down a long time ago by a preacher and I thought they were good. We do this simply. It is always my purpose to be as plain spoken as I possibly can. I know a lot of 50 cent words, but I don't want to use them. I don't want to confuse. One preacher said, if I preach to a 12 year old, I've got the student in Oxford. So we preach simply. We declare simply.

Secondly, we declare that this is the message of God. This is not my message. This is the message of God. I speak with authority because the authority I speak from is the Word of God. Thus saith the Lord. Nothing else matters. Nothing else counts. The Word of God is what we preach. Paul said in 2 Timothy, he told Timothy, preach the Word. When do we preach the Word? In season, out of season. When it's popular and when it's not. It doesn't matter. If we're preaching to one or a million, it is the same. We preach the Word. Why? Because it is the Word of God. No other message is necessary.

I spoke to this guy, He's very excited. He said, I heard somebody preach a message like I'd never heard before. I said, Oh, really, what was it? Yes. He said he preached from the movie Home Alone. The Lord immediately zipped my lips, I could not speak, I could not say a word. It was the most stupid thing I'd ever heard in my entire life, and I didn't even know how to say anything.

I know another man who went into a Baptist church. This was several years ago. He was traveling and he didn't get home in time to go to his church. He pulls into this church. He sits down and the preacher begins preaching on superheroes. How believers should be like superheroes.

Neither of those men are called to preach. And anybody that's just sitting in those places should run like they have their hair on fire. Why? Because they're not called to preach the gospel. We're called to preach the word of God. I don't need anything else. The word of God is what we preach. That's our authority. If you don't have that, you're not called to preach. Preach the word.

Thirdly, we declare the gospel to everyone. I'll preach this message to anybody. If the Pope asked me tomorrow to go to the Vatican and preach, I'd do it. Now, I've heard this before. Some men would say, well, you know what? You shouldn't go there because you're giving them some kind of creed. No, I'm not giving them anything. I'm preaching the gospel wherever I go. If you invite me to a Buddhist temple, I'll preach the gospel there. It's not going to change the message no matter where I go. But I preach to everyone.

I know God has an elect people. I know Christ only died for them. I know the Spirit is only going to call them. But you know what I don't know? I don't know who they are. Do you? They're making a big deal about the cartoon drawer that made a profession of faith right there at his deathbed, and people are just questioning whether he was. I don't know, do you? I'm a clue. I'm looking at you, and I love you. I've known you for years. Can I really tell? Nope. So what do I do? I keep preaching to you. I keep preaching to you. I preach to everyone.

And we preach the gospel as though it's our own because it is. This is my gospel. It's my gospel because it's personal. It's mine because he saved me. I know this. I can't tell you how many times it says, well, in the book of Acts, he says, and you are my witnesses. And the apostles kept saying that over and over to the Jews. They said we were witnesses. You know what I am? I'm a witness. I'm a witness that this is true. And every man against it's a liar. I'm a witness. We're witnesses.

And fifthly, we how do we preach this gospel? We preach this gospel and desiring everyone to believe. I want everyone to believe it. Matter of fact, I love to be duped. I mean, I do. I mean, you may you may sucker me. I'd love to be you know, I'd love to believe that everybody hears this gospel would would believe. I remember somebody. Henry was in a conference one time and he came to a man and he called him brother. He didn't know the guy, he just. Hoped, just hoped, and somebody said, well, Henry, you know that guy is not a believer. He said, well, if I didn't get him in Christ, I got him in Adam. A brother somewhere.

We desire everybody to believe this. I want my children to believe this. I want my neighbors to believe this. I want my friends to believe this. And so as we preach, we desire that men believe this. So how do we preach? We preach with boldness. We preach the word of God. We preach simply. We preach to everyone. We preach personally. and we preach desiring that everyone believe. Now the fourth question, what is the result of everyone who preaches by man's wisdom? Look back at your text. Verse 19 says, For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, I will bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent. Where's the wise? Where's the scribe? Where's the disputer of the world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God.

Now to all who are trying to keep people in churches by entertainment and amusement and all other methods besides preaching, listen, this is nothing but the wisdom of the world. Now you listen to what God said, it's written. Now when you read those words, it's written. That means this is unalterable. It's not gonna change ever. It's written. I will destroy the wisdom of the wise. I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and bring to nothing the understanding of the prudent.

This world, in its wisdom, are in total opposition to the gospel. It's our nature. It was your nature. It's my nature. We were in opposition. The scripture says we were at enmity. The natural man is at enmity against God. We were, even as others, children of disobedience, children of wrath, even as others, Paul said, in Ephesians chapter 2.

It is man's wisdom to always contradict the scripture. When we mention election, what is the first objection? That's not fair. We mentioned God chose a people based on nothing they did and rejected a people based on nothing they did. And they say what? I object. I object.

What happens to the Ministry of Free Will Works Religion? Now, if you look at it, it looks prosperous. I don't know if you ever drove by there, but there's a church in Louisville. I think they boast of 120,000 members. They got a nice coffee shop in there. I think I had to go in there and do something one day and somebody asked me to go over there for something. Anyway, so I went over there and I looked in that building. It's massive, it's huge, it's beautiful, it's grand. I imagine on Sunday it's full. But you know what they preach, the wisdom of the world. There's no value in it. And God said this, after that, in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God. So what happens to this? What comes of this? Nothing.

Go to Jeremiah. Go to Jeremiah chapter 23. Look at this. Look what God says about false prophets. Jeremiah chapter 23. Now, most of this chapter is about this, but I think this verse 32 is just the conclusion here. Jeremiah 23 and verse 32. Behold, this is God speaking, I am against them that prophesy false dreams, saith the Lord, and do tell them. It's not only that they have them, it would be better if they had them and kept them to themselves. He said, but they have them and then they tell people. And they cause my people to err by their lies, by their lightness, Yet I sent them not, nor commanded them, therefore they shall not profit this people." What are those two words? At all.

So what is the benefit of all the pomp and circumstance of false religion? What does it come to? Nothing. If men preach by the wisdom of men, and not the Word of God, it'll come to nothing. No one will ever be saved by it.

Someone once asked me, he said, you know, I think their child was going to a freewill works religion church. And he said, that's good, right? And I said, no. What? You mean you'd rather them not go to church at all? I said, yes. I'd rather them not go to church than to go there. You know what the Lord called the Pharisees? He said, you span land and sea to make a proselyte, and when you've made him, you've made him twofold more a child of hell. So yeah, I'd rather they go nowhere. Why? Because there's nothing going to come of that. They're not going to be saved under a false gospel. They're not going to be saved. God will bring it to nothing.

So this leads to my fifth question. Do we preach only the Gospel? Christ sent us to preach. Go back to your text. Christ sent us to preach, and so what do we do? We preach, we declare the Gospel with simplicity, we declare it with boldness, we declare it to everyone. We recognize that those who do not preach the Word of God come to nothing. So why do we preach the only gospel? Why do we preach THE gospel? Listen, because there's only one gospel. There's only one. There are not many gospels. You understand that? There's only one. Where do you get that? Go to Galatians chapter 1. Look at what Paul said.

Remember the church of Galatia Church of Galatia had the right doctrine. They believed that faith in Christ was necessary. They believed that salvation was by grace through Christ alone. They believed that. But then somebody came in and started saying, well, to live, you got to go back under the law. Now, once you're saved, that's one thing. But now you have to go back under the law in order to know how to live. Doesn't that sound an awful lot like religion today? And listen to what Paul said. Look at verse 6. He said, I marvel, I'm amazed that you are so soon removed from Him. Isn't that amazing? He didn't say removed from the gospel. He said Him. You know why? Because Him and the gospel are the same. You're removed from the gospel, you're removed from Him. You're removed from Him, you're removed from the gospel. And called you into His grace by Christ unto a another gospel. What? Which is not another. It is not another. It's only one. But there be some that trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we or an angel from heaven preach another gospel to you, then that which we have preached unto you, let him go to hell. That's a strong language, friends, but that's exactly what it means. There's only one gospel, and if anybody preach any other gospel than that gospel, you need to let that man alone. You need to let him go off into hell and just run as fast as you can from him. There's only one gospel, friends. And we're to preach that one gospel.

Now, why are we preaching this one gospel? And I've already described the gospel. You already preached it to you. God chose a people. Christ saved the people, the Spirit calls and keeps the people, and that's the gospel. There's only one of it. Anything different than that, it's not the gospel, leave it alone. Why else do we preach it? Look at this, look at verse 21 of your text. Go back to your text. Look at verse 21. Why do we preach only the gospel? For after that the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not God. Listen to this. It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. We preach the gospel because it is the only means God chose to save his people by.

Now why preaching? Because it is the most, to the world, it's the most foolish thing in the world. This is Like I said, if I wanted to educate you, I would not preach to you. If I wanted to educate you, I would use all sorts of illustrations and big fancy things and try to keep you, you know, keep you energetic. And I would try to do different things to make you make that knowledge stick. And I'll get you a test, an exam to see how much knowledge you've gained. I'm not here to do that. Why? Because salvation doesn't come by education. It's by revelation. God must give it to you. But the way he's going to do it is by preaching.

I think of the Ethiopian eunuch. I thought of him a lot this week. Back then, nobody had a scripture. Nobody could pick up a Bible. There was very few. Only the really wealthy had copies of the Old Testament scriptures. And this Ethiopian eunuch did. And he was reading. Very educated man. Coming from Jerusalem. He'd just seen all the sacrifices and all the things. He's coming back to Ethiopia and he's reading Isaiah. And the Lord sent Philip to run alongside of him and said, Do you not understand what you're reading? And this guy was honest. Honest man. He said, How can I? Let some man explain it to me. I can't understand it. And what did Philip do? He said, And beginning where he was, he preached Christ to him. What happened? The Lord saved that Ethiopian unit. Same thing with me. This is the only means God has chosen.

Now, listen to this. It is the only means God has chosen to save his people. I know this is offensive. This puts man, I've heard this before, a man came up to a preacher and he said, He preached from this text, the preacher did, saying that this is the only means God chose to save sinners. And the man said, well, you know, that's not my experience. He said, I was walking in the woods. And all of a sudden, I believed it, I trusted. And he said, how do you explain that? How do you justify that, preacher? He said, it's your salvation, you justify it. I don't have to. God said it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Now what else do I need? I don't need your experience. I don't care about your experience. I only care what God said. It pleased God. That's why we preach. We preach because it's the means God chose to save sinners. And we preach that there's only one gospel so that no flesh should glory.

Isn't that the reason why we preach? When we preach, nobody gets glory but God. If I declare the gospel to you as best I can, it'll come to nothing except God use it. Matter of fact, I can't preach except God give it. Look down in verse He says, Because the foolishness of God is wiser than man, the weakness of God is stronger than man. For you see your calling, brethren, not many mighty. Look around you. Tonight, look around you. Any mighty people here? Not many mighty. Not many wise. Any wise people around here? No? Noble? Any noble people? Not many of those. I'm glad Queen Elizabeth said that. She said, I'm glad it didn't say not any. She was noble. She was mighty. But there are not many. But God had chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise. God had chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things that are mighty. The base things of the world Things which are despised hath God chosen, yea, the things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are. Why? That no flesh should glory in his presence.

Why do we preach the gospel? That no flesh should glory in his presence. That's why preaching is used. I don't get no glory. You hear this tonight, I'm glad. You believe this tonight, I'm glad. What do I have to do with it? Nothing. Not a thing. What do you have to do with it? Not a thing. We get no glory. That's why we preach only the gospel.

Now, the last is why is the gospel of Christ the love of the believer's heart? Why is it that you keep coming here? You've heard this thousand times. You've heard a million times. Why do you keep wanting to hear it? Why is it the love of our life? Just like Paul said earlier, we know something about this gospel. It is power. It is power.

Every believer needs to be sustained. Isn't that right? You the believer, don't you need him to sustain your faith, to keep you in the faith? Don't you need that? Don't you need to be nurtured and fed and comforted? What does that? The gospel. The gospel of Christ does that.

And what is so glorious about this gospel? Look, look at verse 30. Here's something glorious. But of him are you in Christ Jesus. Is that not why you love to hear this? I love to hear this. You know who put me in Christ? God did. You know who can take me out of Christ? Nobody. God put me in Christ. Isn't that what he tells him in John 10? He said, no man can pluck you out of my hand. The father which gave you me is greater than all. And no man is able to pluck him out of my father's hand. Isn't that great? Here you are. In his hand. Doesn't mean somebody ain't gonna try to pluck you out. But can they? No. Why? The gospel tells me that God put me in Christ. God justified me. And notice this, this is the glory of God is made. All our salvation. Now who made Christ my Savior? Me? God did. God made Him my Savior. Before I ever knew He was my Savior, God made Him my Savior.

Listen to what He said, He's all my wisdom. The gospel deals with this one question, how can God be just and justify the ungodly? It's the only question that matters. How can God be just, holy, and righteous, and still have mercy on the guilty? Can you answer that question? Our judges do it all the time, and what do we call them? We call them unjust. You've got a guy over here, he's guilty of murder, he's guilty of rape, He's a pedophile and the judge says, oh, he's just as a bad upbringing, not guilty. What do we say about that judge? We say he's unjust. And you got a judge who's just and he condemns him to life in prison with no mercy. Yet God says, I'll have mercy. Now, how can he do it? By Jesus Christ, substitution, substitution.

He's all my wisdom as to understanding that, all my righteousness. Christ Jesus is all my righteousness. Isn't this a glorious thing about the gospel? I don't have to contribute any righteousness because I don't have any. That's good news because I don't have any. He's all my righteousness. His righteousness is perfect. Therefore, my righteousness is perfect.

He's all my sanctification. Oh, I love this one. The sanctification has two meanings, set apart and holiness, and he did both. I was set apart by him, by God, in eternity, and God declared that I should be made holy. And then Christ did what? He came and made me holy. And then in the experience of grace, that holiness was given to me in the new nature. Isn't this the glory of the gospel? Don't you love this? You are sanctified. 1 Corinthians chapter 6, verse 11, he says, and such were some of you, you vile creatures, you evil people. That's who you were, but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified. Christ is all my sanctification. I'm holy because He made me holy. Are there variations of holiness? Can you be half holy? You can't. You're either holy or unholy. You know what He made me? He made me holy.

And then He's all my redemption. You know what has redeemed us? Blood. Justice demanded blood and Christ offered the only blood justice would be pleased with. His blood. He offered himself to God for my sins. And there on that tree my Lord died in my stead. And you know what he did when he did that? He redeemed me. He didn't make my redemption possible. That's good. I mean, if think about this, what if all this was just made possible? And that means it's possible you miss it. It's possible it fails. He make it possible.

And so then, as it is written, look at this last text as it is written. This is undebatable. It's written. He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. Let him glory in the Lord. This is the purpose of preachers, that men should believe on Christ and glory in God. So who sends preachers? Christ does. What are we sent to do? Preach. Preach what? The Gospel. How are we to preach it? With the authority of God's Word, with simplicity, Without compromise, we're to preach it, declare it.

What happens to the false religion? Don't worry about them. They come to nothing. They come to nothing. Why do we preach only one gospel? Because it's only one. And it's the only means God chose to save sinners by. And we who believe the gospel love it best. We love it best. I love that there's no glory for me. I love that salvation's of the Lord. I long for others to believe this, to come, and I know this, the Spirit of God will move, and they who are chosen will believe it. That's good news, isn't it? I pray that God bless this, give us the true meaning of what it is Preaching and preachers, what God's purpose for it is. And may God help us to be faithful to attend to it, to support it. Because this is how God saves sinners. There's no other way. There's no other way.

Let's stand and be dismissed in prayer. Terrence, would you dismiss us, brother?

of crimes and all that he's accomplished. What a marvelous work he's done. And we're so thankful for his counsel. It's cured and it's sealed up. And it's accomplished. I admire the God. And Lord, would you We pray that you would increase our faith. We confess the weakness of our faith. And Lord, we so often look to ourselves for comfort. Lord, would you be gracious to us and not allow us to do this because of this. Lord, we pray that you keep this in the community, we pray for our brothers and sisters that are able to be with us, and Lord, we pray that you bless them with your spirit, and to comfort them by your word as they read it, and as they take upon you the sign of the message that they've heard.

Father, we do pray for your preachers, we pray that you break their heart, that are after your own heart, that will declare this message as our pastor has just declared it to us, faithfully, consistently, with sentiments. We pray, Lord, that you forgive us of our sins, that you keep us from sinning, and that you keep our hearts until we meet again.