It's good to see you this evening.
Before we begin the message, we'll go to God in prayer again.
I want to mention Ryle and Emma have been traveling this month,
and pray for them as they travel and seek help for their youngest. And I pray that the doctors be
gracious. God be gracious to the doctors
and give them the wisdom they need. Yes? Okay. Okay. Not McDonald's. They didn't
send it to McDonald's. Okay. I was going to say, that
doesn't sound too good, driving all that way from McDonald's. Okay. Okay. Well, the Lord bless in that.
So pray for them as they deal with this. Pray for Jill. Pray
for Rick. And Annie and Zoe, pray for them. Remember them in your prayers. I tell you, I need your prayers
tonight. I want to preach this to you, but I think I'm going
to have to wait out in some waters. And I don't like waters that
don't seem to have standing. But that's what the apostle does,
and so that's what I intend to do, is to take this and It just means what it says, how
unsearchable. And so you just keep searching, and you never
find a bottom to this. That's okay, because it is unsearchable. And we take what we're given. We take what we're given. God
gives you some things about this. Just take what the Lord gives
you with it, and give praise. with what you can grasp and recognize
God is far greater than what we can fathom. His redemption
is far deeper than we ever could possibly know. You know, when God did it, he
didn't even ask anybody about it. He didn't ask you how you
thought it should be. He purposed it. He decreed it.
I was reading something today about a real famous person started
attending church. I don't know which church, I
really don't know him very well, but he's a real famous podcaster
guy. Somebody said, well, he's been
attending church, and everybody said, oh, that's great, that's
great. One guy said, well, man, I just hope it isn't a Calvinistic
church. I said, I thought to myself,
he hopes that man doesn't hear the gospel. That's astounding. He said, that's like saying,
I hope that man doesn't hear anything about God's sovereignty. Ignorant. It's just the foolish
things that come out of religion. Spouting out things, obviously
this guy probably never, doesn't even have a clue what Calvinism
is or anything like that. He's just spouting out something
he heard from someone else, usually. It's like saying, I hope that
man never hears the gospel. Isn't that something? That's
exactly what he's saying. I hope that man never understands
salvation by grace. I do pray that God would give
me liberty to preach this to you. So pray for me as I desire
to do this. Let's go to him in prayer. Heavenly
Father, thank you for the opportunity that you've given us again to
come to you in prayer. What a wonderful thing prayer
is and how often we neglect it. Forgive us of these things. I
beg you to be gracious and draw us with the cords of love into
your presence. I plead with you to touch every
single heart in this place. I beg you to do it. I plead with
no merits here. We claim no merits of our own.
We plead for mercies. I have a desire to preach and
I can't do it without you. Don't let me stand here by myself. Please don't let these people
hear only the voice of the preacher. Don't let us go out empty. Pour in the message of Your mercies. Give us a glimpse of the greatness
of Your glory and knowledge and wisdom. Not for vanity's sake, but that we might really praise
You that we might really honor you
with all of our hearts and minds and souls and bodies. May we say at the end, having
seen the glorious wisdom of salvation by Christ, may we say that it
has been good to enter into the house of God. I know you're here because that's
what you promised. Please accompany your presence
with power in the hearts of the people. Call your elect. Save them. Use us if you please. Dear Father, we have so many
who are sick. In this small number, so many
who are struggling, so many who are in anguish and pain and grief, held captive by their own minds
and hearts, physically unable to do the basic
things. Please be merciful. Please be
gracious and heal them. If you will, you can. Forgive us our sins. Even in this hour that we desire
to worship in spirit and in truth, forgive us our sins. Bring us all at the feet of Christ
May He grab us and draw us close to Himself. These things we ask
in His name, Father, in His name and for His sake. Amen. Romans chapter 11. Romans chapter 11. My text will
be found in verse 33. Romans 11 verse 33, O the depths
of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments
and his ways past finding out. The riches of God's wisdom and
knowledge. the depths of the wisdom and
Knowledge of God now the apostle before this Last week we dealt
with verse 22, and there's a reason why I'm going to put lump these
verses together because this is his observation of these verses
and so in verse 22 we he talks about the goodness and severity
of God remember he had cast off the Jewish nation and For the
most part, not all of them, there was a remnant of them that he
would, the elect that he would save of the Jewish nation, but
for the most part, the Jews, because of unbelief, on them
fell severity. Yet to those who knew not God,
who didn't seek God, didn't want God, didn't have any clue, God
says on them fell goodness, which was salvation to the Gentiles. And in these next verses, the
Apostle's going to explain a mystery so that the Gentiles are not
consumed with vanity. Because that's the temptation,
isn't it? Them bad Jews crucify the Lord. They deserve what they
got. Look at me. God chose me because
obviously there's something good about me. The Apostle said, no,
you are a wild olive tree. They were cut out of their olive
tree. But listen to this, I'm going to show you a mystery.
Now this is a true mystery. There's going to come a time
when the Gentile nation, when all the fullness of the Gentile
nation comes in. When all of the elect of the
Gentiles are brought in. God is then going to turn to
the Jews. a majority of the Jews then are
going to be saved and the majority of the Gentiles are going to
be Back at where they were and that old olive tree that old
wild olive tree again Worshipping rats and monkeys
and all sorts of vain things Does that mean and then when
he says this so all Israel shall be saved? That does not mean
all the Jews are going to be saved at that time. That's not
what he's saying He's saying all Israel the fullness of the
Gentiles and then the fullness of the Jews who is that? That's
Israel and guess what they're all going to be saved because
God says I'm going to send a deliverer to them who is Christ and he
is going to forgive them of their sins now The apostle is standing
on the precipice of all he had said before. And now we have
gone through many things in this book. We have been now 11 chapters
in this book, building one thing upon another. And now he stands
at the precipice of all he had said concerning the salvation
of God by sovereign grace. And you know what he says? He
says, Oh the death both the riches the depth of
the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God and That's
what we're going to be looking at tonight the riches How deep
are the riches of God's wisdom and knowledge? Now he says this
just to give you a present so you understand you're not going
to find the end of this He said His ways are unsearchable and
His judgments are past finding out. So tonight I desire to wade
out a little bit in the waters. I'm going to wade out in the
waters just a little bit of God's knowledge and wisdom. And I long tonight that this
would humble every heart, because when we view the depth of God's
wisdom and riches, you're going to see how little we really know.
We know just a little of these things. The psalmist writes, Psalm 145
verse 3 says, The Lord and that's what I want
to talk about how great is the wisdom and knowledge of God how
vast how deep how broad how wide how high is the wisdom and knowledge
of God great is the Lord and Greatly to be praised and his
greatness is unsearchable So just when you think you got it
you don't When you think you've wrapped your mind around it,
you really haven't. I understand we can never reach
the bottom of this subject, but the more we meditate on it, the
more we see His greatness, it's going to have an effect. The
more we see the greatness of our God's wisdom and knowledge
concerning this matter of salvation especially. It's going to naturally
abase us. It's going to show us how small
we are. How small we are. This should always be the believer's
goal when we study the Word of God. Isn't it? To exalt God and
abase self. This is always how we should approach God's
Word. Because you know why? Because that's how God's Word
approaches itself. To see the greatness of our God is to see the smallness of our
self. To see the holiness of God is to see the sinfulness
of self. To stand in awe of God's salvation,
which is by Christ, Shows us our great need of a savior The
more the more I see how great Christ is the more I see how
much I need a great savior Now this will move our hearts to
exclaim and proclaim Exactly what the apostle did he has to
pause here? He has to find this that I have
not yet found the bottom I have spent 11 chapters declaring to
you exactly what God said to me to tell you Now he is exactly
Every word in this is inspired by the holy spirit moved upon
the apostle So that you should have the word of God and yet
even this is not yet reach the fullness You can't reach the
fullness Of all that he said, anybody got a grasp of everything
the Apostle said so far? We're scratching the surface
on each part of this, aren't we? Why? Because the depths of
God's wisdom and knowledge are too far for us to search. It's
infinite. So tonight, I want us to see
three manifestations three manifestations of the riches of God's wisdom
and knowledge. And I like this. Why did Paul
use riches? Why didn't he say, Oh, the depth
of the wisdom and knowledge of God. Why did he have to say,
Of the riches of the. He put it in there. Had to add
another preposition in there. Why? Because, listen, God's wisdom
has value. God's knowledge has value. When
He uses the word riches, He's showing you that the depth of
God's wisdom and knowledge has infinite value. Now listen, you
and I may have some wisdom, right? That we've always tried. I have
some wisdom that I want to impart to my children. They don't see
that as valuable. They don't see my wisdom as valuable. We've lived a life and we've
learned some things. You try to pass that on, and
how often does it just fall flat? No value. I've got a lot of wisdom,
but it's no value to anybody, it seems like. That's not true
with God. God's wisdom and knowledge has
value because of this. His wisdom and knowledge is not
about things. His wisdom and knowledge actually
makes things happen. He has power to make his wisdom
and knowledge valuable. We don't. I can't make you, I
can't make you, I can know something and I can try. I spent, a young
fella called me on the phone and he, I spent two hours trying
to get him to say something about the gospel. He wanted to talk
about Dead Sea Scrolls and all this other garbage. And I said,
well, just put that aside. That doesn't help anybody. To no avail. Fell flat. Why? I don't have any power.
God does. So his wisdom and knowledge are
of value. So three manifestations of this. First of all, I want
you to see the wisdom of knowledge of God in creation. Because this
is something everybody can see. Creation. The second one, not
everybody can see, but you that believe can see. I want you to
see the wisdom and knowledge of God in redemption. Oh, the depth of the wisdom and
knowledge of God in redeeming sinners. And thirdly, I want
you to see the wisdom and knowledge of God in providence. Providence. And like I said, we're going
to search these things. We're not going to find the bottom
to any of them. but it's going to make us feel
small. It is. Because we are. We are. Oh, the
depths of God's creation. Now, the psalmist in Psalm 8,
he says this, Oh, Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Your name in
all the earth, who has set Thy glory above the heavens. And
then in verse 3, he says, When I consider the heavens, God your glory is above the heavens,
but you know what you've given me to consider I can see the
heavens I can't see above that, but I know it's above it. I can't
see above it. So he looks it Looks at creation,
and this is what he says the works of the fingers I Don't know if you ever you
ever laid on I mean you laid out on the stars now if you go
farther in the country you gets really dark and you can see him
and And the city is not so much so, but you get out in the country
and you lay out there on your back and you look up and it's
clear, you can see the billions of stars, massive amounts of
stars. And the psalmist says it's as
though God flung them out with His fingers and put them exactly
in their place. the work of thy fingers, the
moon and the stars which thou hast ordained." And he said,
when I did that, this is the question popped in my head. What
is man? Listen, what is man? That thou
art mindful of him. And the son of man, not only
are you mindful, but you visit us. You sent your word. You came down and spoke to us. The vastness of space is astounding. It is. They spit out numbers,
like 100 million light years, like you know what that is. And
they don't know what it is either. I mean, they've got a number
of what they think of how many years that is. But it's more
lifetimes than any person could possibly fathom. So it's really
not an imaginary number. Because you just can't do that.
It takes us a year and a half to get to the closest planet.
That's just a one-way ticket. A year and a half just to get
there. Closest what? It would take more lifetimes
than we got to get to the edge of our own solar system. What
are you going to do? How vast is that? Can you imagine what kind of
knowledge it took to make that? And make it with a word. In the beginning, God made the
heavens and the earth. He said, and it was. He said,
and it was. Any experience in that? I say things
all the time. And nothing happens. Nothing
happens. But the wisdom of God in this
creation, and yet now, consider the smallness of man in the vastness
of this, and what is He? He's nothing. For God to take
notice of man is like you to go out to the seashore and pick
up a grain of sand and say, Oh, I'm going to take you home with
me. I'm going to take care of you. I'll be with you. Grain
of sand. We're like a grain of sand and
not only is man small, but our duration is small, isn't it?
How small is our lifespan? It's a small time. The scripture
says that our days are as the grass. Then you cut that grass. How long did that last? Did you
even count it? Was it even, you know, it's going to come up here
in another couple of weeks and then it's going to be gone. Do
you remember every blade you cut? You take notice of every
blade that's cut down? No. That's our life. Rises up
like a piece of grass. And it's gone. It's gone. Listen to what he said in Psalm
103, the wind passes over it. It's gone and the place thereof
know it no more. You want to consider the smallness
of this. We are so small. In 70 years, nobody will know
we were even here. Nobody will even remember you
that you were here. Your children, your grandchildren might say
your name. They have no clue who you are. They have no clue
of the thoughts you have, the struggles you have faced, the
difficulties you have been through. They have no idea of those anything.
Oh listen, oh yeah, I remember oh so and so, you know, oh well. And they move on. You see how insignificant we
are? But oh, the vastness of the depths
of God's wisdom. The wisdom of the Creator. Psalm
136 verse 5, To Him that by wisdom made the heavens. You cannot look at creation and
not see the wisdom of its design. You just can't do it. If you
have any honesty within yourself and look
at creation, it's not simple. It's complex. It's highly complex. That clock right there, do we
set the sun to that clock or do we set the clock to the sun?
Which is it? I can set that clock. I got a
clock in my office still broken. Suddenly it was broken. It's
still broken. Now I can move that clock anywhere
I want to. That doesn't make time. What makes time? When that
sun rises up there, God sets the time. And it runs its course. Who will stop it? Who can stop
it? Who can hinder it? The seasons
will come. Summer. Winter, fall, spring, they'll
all come in their proper order and there ain't one thing you
can do about it. Why? Because God designed it
that way. He spoke and this is how what happened. The world
came into existence in perfect timing and harmony. Now it's good for men to marvel
at God's creation, to inspect it. do their best to understand it,
but it must be done with the understanding that He is the
Creator and worthy of praise. If we're ever to inspect this
creation, it must be done in order to praise the Creator. Never praise the creature. Never
praise the creature. Many godly men have discovered
wonderful things. I thought of Sir Isaac Newton. What did he discover? Gravity,
right? So, now he didn't make it. It was there long before he ever
realized what was happening. He just figured out, hey, let's
try to measure this. He didn't create anything. He
just found it. When you got people, scientists
in labs, and they're taking this compound and they're putting
it with this compound and they put it together and they say,
aha, I've created something. No. You've taken something that's
been created and put it with something that's been created.
And if you put it together, it was always going to form that.
You just were able now to find it out. Why? So that all the praise should
go to the creator and not the creature. So by looking at these
things that are created, all men may see that God is God and
you're not. That's what creation tells you.
Creation tells you this, I'm God and you're not. And yet what do men desire to
do looking at creation? They desire to worship the creature
rather than the creator. They desire to make a God out
of the things of this world. Men today profess to be wise.
Just ask them. They'll tell you. Ask the professors
and the scholars. Are you wise? They'll slap. Of course I am. Can you tell
me where man came from? Well, yeah, there was this primordial
ooze. And you know, they should be
scoffed at. They should be mocked. They're
fools. Yet this is the highest man could
come up with. God is the creator and designer
of man. We who believe, we may look at
the heavens and then give praise to God for His works, His handiwork. Let us praise God for the earth
that we have been given. What a beautiful planet this
is. It's a spectacle of His wisdom
and understanding. It's just on display 24 hours
a day, 7 days a week. It's on display. God's wisdom. Scripture says that the word
of creation goes out This message, there's no place it hasn't been
heard. Now write, find a place that creation's message has not
been heard. Paul in the beginning of this
book tells us that they are without excuse. They've never heard of
the Word of God, never heard of this book, never heard. When
they look up and see the Son moving in His course, moving
over and coming down, they're without excuse. Why? Because
that proves the power of the Godhead. Proves it. A man to disbelieve it is a fool. Which leads to the second point,
and this is the most important. Because that knowledge, though
it is knowledge of the depths of the wisdom of God, won't save
anybody. You can't be saved by looking
at creation. You can know the power of God,
you can know the judgment of God, you can know the wrath of
God, but you can't know mercy. Not by looking at creation. And so I want us to see the depths
of the wisdom of God in redemption. There is no religion that ever
was or ever shall be that will equal the wisdom of God in redemption. That's what the religious world
tries to do. They try to answer this question
of how God redeems, and they all fall short. They all fall
short. But to see the wisdom of God
in redemption, to see the depths of his wisdom, we must see three
things. Without these three things, you can't begin to fathom the
depths of God's redemptive plan. First of all, we must understand
the depth of our depravity. Second of all, we must understand
the height of God's holiness. These two are set in opposition
to each other. Our sinfulness and God's holiness. Without the knowledge of these
things, we will never understand God's redemptive plan. And thirdly,
we must see the depth at which Christ came to redeem us. how far he must have come to
redeem man. So first of all, the depths of
sin. To understand the depths of God's wisdom and salvation,
we must first see the depths of our own depravity. How God
made man holy, God made man upright, Adam was a wise man. He was a knowledgeable man. And there was a span of time
that Adam lived in this world where he was able and desirous
to serve God. He knew God, loved God, obeyed God during
that time. He was creating the image of
God. Yet when Adam failed, that image was infinitely marred. He was created by God and responsible
to obey God, yet when he failed, he lost absolutely all ability
to obey God or know God. None. He had none left. Not only did he lose the ability,
but he also lost the desire. He had no desire to please God. When Adam sinned, what's the
first thing he did? Did he plead for mercy? Is that the first
thing Adam did? You and I that believe, you know
that's what should have done, that's what he should have done.
Now we know, after God's made us plead for mercy. Yeah, now
we understand. We didn't when we were born in
this world, The first thing we think, why didn't he plead for
mercy? He didn't want mercy. The first thing that he and his
wife did was sow fig leaves. They didn't seek God's mercy.
They sowed fig leaves to cover their sins. And when they got
done with their leaves, they looked at each other and said,
we've done it. We've done it. We've covered our nakedness.
Surely now God will be fine with us. He won't even notice the
difference. Until God what? Until God came. Then there wasn't enough leaves
in the forest to hide them. They ran to the trees, hoping
the trees of the forest would hide them. They wouldn't. How deeply was man then depraved? To think that leaves would hide
himself from God? Now how far has that fallen?
How deep is that fall? To believe that they could somehow
cover their own sin. And yet this is exactly what
men do by nature, isn't it? It's what we did. It's what I
did for years before the Lord came, is I tried to cover my
nakedness with what? Religion, works, my own goodness. That's what I did. I did just
like my father did. Gravity of man runs great. I tell you, man's gravity is
so great that they'll set up anything to be a god besides
God. I've been thinking about this
and I'm going to let you in on it because I want you to understand
what's happening. I really do. this technology theyíre coming
out with, the AI. I want you to understand theyíre making
a god. Now, we use it and say, ìMan, I need to fix my refrigerator,î
and that sure is a help. Type it in, tells you how to
fix your refrigerator, well, great. Thatís not what itís intended
for. Thatís not their purpose. Their
purpose is not to help you with your refrigerator. Google could
have helped you with your refrigerator, right? Why do you need an ever-learning
computer to help you with your refrigerator? You don't. You're
making a god, friends. And he's not meant to answer
questions about refrigerators. He's meant to answer questions
about God. But who's putting in the information? It's the same old thing as carving
a tree, a god out of a tree. They're just doing it in a fancier
way. It's man's information they're putting into this thing. What's
going to come out? Oh no, it evolves. Okay. It evolves
as long as you keep putting information into it. It's not going to find
information that ain't out there. When God challenges false gods,
that's what He said, tell me the things that's going to be.
Matter of fact, tell me the things that were. You can't even tell
me all the things that ever were. Some of those things, those,
I mean, they're still digging up pots in civilizations that
they haven't even found out yet. So can AI tell us that? Nope.
Why? Because the man that programmed
it couldn't find it either. He's finding a god. That's what
he's doing. He's making a god. Don't be deceived about this.
He is. So man is so depraved, he'll
worship anything but God. Anything but God. Why? Because he hates God. They hate
God. They say, Preacher, I don't hate
God. Listen to me. If you will not believe on His
Son, you hate God. If you will not believe on Christ
alone, if you want to add your works to His, you hate God. That's
it. It's simple language. The scriptures
are very clear about this. Our Lord said you can't serve
two masters. You love the one and despise the other, or you
cling to the one and leave the other. You cannot serve God and
mammon. You can't have God and your sin. You can't have God and your self-righteousness. You see, men don't need help.
Depravity has ruined man, and man doesn't need help. He doesn't
need a pat and a push. He doesn't need encouraging words
to help him to God. You know what he needs? Life. Man, by nature, is dead. How depraved is man? He's dead. And you can put clothes on a
corpse, you can tie strings and animate him, but one thing you
can't do is give him life. He's dead. He's dead. This is how far we have fallen. We are dead in trespasses and
sin. Can you not then see the hopelessness
and helpless state of man? He is dead. He's born dead. He can't help himself and you
can't help him. He's dead. Behold the depths of our depravity.
How simple is this? Come unto me. and be ye saved. All the ends of the earth, I'm
God, there's no one else. Come unto me. That's what God
said. Now, can you? Can a man come to Christ? Is it possible in his own nature
to come to Christ? What did Christ say? He said,
no man can come to me. I had one person say, you make
that too simple. I just read it. You make it too
complex. No man can come to me, except
what? The Father, which has sent me. Draw him. No man can come to
Him. No man has the power to come.
Why? Because we are fully, completely,
absolutely, utterly depraved in our nature. the depth of our
depravity that no man is able to merit
the favor of God or even come to Christ. Now then, I want to
keep that in mind because I want you to see something infinitely
higher than yourself, the holiness of God. The holiness of God. How holy is God? When I say God
is holy, what does that mean? Can you measure that? People
try to measure their holiness. I've had people actually tell
me they try to measure it. If you can measure your holiness,
it's not holy enough. That's just not, it's not holy.
Well, I'm this holy. That's not holy. What's the standard
of holiness, friends? What's the standard? God is. Man can only see the depths of
his depravity in light of the holiness of God. You won't ever
see how really depraved you are unless you see how holy God is.
God is so holy and without sin, the scripture says, He is pure
light, unapproachable. That's it. If any man tries to
come to God in his nature, God says this, I am unapproachable. That's what holiness is. You
can't approach unto holiness. You can't stand in the holiness
of God's presence in your nature. The Scripture said even the heavens
are unclean in His sight. The Scripture says that the angels
cover their face and cover their feet, crying, Holy, Holy, Holy,
Lord God Almighty, which was and is and is to come. And you
know what they do? They repeat it. Holy, Holy, Holy,
Lord God Almighty, which is and was and which is to come. And
then they repeat it over and over and over for eternity. You know why? It's never enough.
It's really never enough to describe His holiness. His holiness is
infinite. It's without measure. When Moses
tried to see God, he said, You cannot see my face and live. You cannot see my face and live. Seeing that God is so unapproachable,
within you take your works and try to bring them to God? A man was trying to tell me the
other day that I should, I can't know the true Christ unless I
also strive to obey His law. And I asked the man simply, okay,
which law have you obeyed? Name one. Just one. You don't
have to name all 613, just name one. One of them that you have
obeyed perfectly. And you're trying to put that
on me? When you yourself haven't obeyed it perfectly? Why? Because nobody... Paul says it's
evident that no man is justified by the law on the side of God.
If you understand God's holiness, you understand that. That you
will never be justified by the law. Can you not see that we are sinners? If we come in our own works,
we could never stand before God. See, God demands of his creatures,
be ye holy. How holy? Even as. I am holy. That's the standard. That's the standard. You can
see this is, if you think this is possible, if you think that's
possible, first of all, you've not measured your depravity right
and you surely haven't esteemed the holiness of God right, if
you think that's possible. But if God has by his grace caused
you to see this, there's a great gulf fixed between the holiness
of God and my depravity. How far is that distance? How far did man fall from his
first estate? It's an infinite distance. And
it can never be made up by our works. Oh, the depth of our depravity. Oh, the greatness of God's holiness. And so then the question comes,
if there is this gulf, how then can God be just and justify the
ungodly? That's the gulf. If you can't
reconcile that, there's no hope for us. How can God be just and
justify the ungodly? How is it that I, being guilty,
may be accepted without diminishing God's justice? Because if God
lowered his holy standard, he would be what? He wouldn't be
holy. Is there any hope? The answer
of the gospel is an affirmative yes. There is hope. There is
hope. Because God taking into account
our sin and depravity, And yet still not diminishing
his justice, he purposed and planned by his infinite knowledge
and wisdom a way. Now there's not many ways. God
devised in wisdom one way. And that way is by his Son, Jesus
Christ. There is no other way of salvation. Everything else that just opposes
that should bounce off of you. Just ignore it. It's foolish. It's ignorant. Anybody come with
anything else, ignore it. Because it doesn't meet the standard.
They're always asking you to add something to it. If you've got to add something,
it's not done. Don't tell me it's finished and
then tell me you've got to add something to it. you're telling me that Christ's
offering is not sufficient enough, and that you've got, you know,
somebody, they think it's like a ladder that reaches to heaven,
and they're just a little bit short, and you know, if you just
do this, you can make up that one rung, and then, you know
what? If you just keep on going, you
can make up another, and another, and another, and pretty soon
your ladder is higher than everybody else's ladder, and you're going
to get better rewards in heaven, because you've made more rungs
than anybody else. No, there's only one way. And
it is by the depths of the redemption of the death of Jesus Christ. It is the only way. God taking into account man's
fall and utter complete fall and inability to obey God, God
in wisdom took that into account. Isn't that astounding? That's
glorious, isn't it? Adam didn't take God by surprise.
That's always good news to me. That he didn't, oh no, what am
I going to do? Adam fell. I've got to make up
another plan now. No. No, God in eternity, in wisdom,
took into account the sins of His people. Their depravity. And in sovereign wisdom, He chose
them before the world began. And purposed. to save them. Believer, the only reason you're
saved is because God purposed to do it. Purposed to do it. Look at 2 Thessalonians 2, verse
13. One of my favorite scriptures. 2 Thessalonians 2, verse 13. Paul says, we are bound to give
thanks always to God for you. Who do we give thanks for salvation?
To God. For you brethren. Why? Because
it was God that chose you from the beginning. To what? God chose you to what? To salvation. When? From the beginning. And listen, He didn't leave the
means up to you. He didn't leave it to guess. He didn't leave
it to chance. He said through sanctification of the Spirit. See, how is a sinner made holy?
Oh, this is the experiments, the experience of it. The sanctification
of the Spirit, the Spirit of God makes us holy. He creates
in us a holy nature and belief of the truth. You have to tell a living man
to breathe. Do you? Listen to this, you do not have
to tell a born again sinner to believe. Why? Because once he's
born again, that's exactly what he does. He believes. Once he's
made holy, he believes. There's no doubt about it. It's
a work of God. Here in this verse we see the
depth of the wisdom of God in redemption. God from the beginning
chose us. If any deny election, they kick
against all hope of salvation. You understand that if there
is no election, you are telling me this, there is no salvation. It's what Paul said in Romans
9.29, isn't it? It's what Isaiah said previously,
because that's what he's quoting. He said, had God not chosen a
remnant, we would have all been likened to Sodom and Gomorrah. Doomed. Unless what? God chose. The election of grace. If any deny election, they kick
against the Word of God and they have not seen the depths of their
depravity. And our depravity is so great that if God had not
chosen us, there would have been none of Adam's race saved. But God has ordained some to
eternal life, and he has also, in wisdom, ordained the means
of their salvation, and that is, listen, the righteousness
and death of his son. In wisdom. This is how God purposed
to save sinners. Substitution. It's a beautiful
word. That's what God determined Christ
to be. A substitute. We use terms like
surety. One who guarantees. In a covenant
God made with His Son, Christ Himself guaranteed the Father
He would save them. I will be surety for them, Jesus
said. Not only that, Jesus was also
set up to be our High Priest. You realize there's no salvation
without a High Priest? You have to have someone to mediate. You
have to have someone to offer sacrifices for the sinners. That's what Christ did. He was
the sinless Son of God, and He came into the world as a man,
as a servant of God, and obeyed the law of God in absolute perfection. This is why I don't dare add
anything to it. It's why I dare don't try to
go back under the law, because Christ obeyed the law. He honored
the law. And if I put my hand to it, I
defiled it. I don't. Is the law good? You bet. Nothing
wrong with the law. I'm the problem. Christ merited our righteousness,
but more than that, he stood in our place and suffered the wrath of the
holiness of God. All the depths of the wisdom
of God provide a way to reconcile man to himself by the offering
of his son. You see, it was justice that
stood in the way of our salvation. Justice stood in the way. And the only way justice could
be moved is if justice was satisfied. Mercy, viewing its objects, could
not reach them except justice be satisfied. Brother Moose had an allegory
for that. He preached a whole message on
an allegory about justice standing in the way and mercy answering
all the questions of justice. But all the questions are answered.
I can't let him go free until his sin is paid for. Christ comes and he says, I've
paid it. Justice said, I can't let him
go until he's absolutely righteous. I've made him righteous. I've made him acceptable to God.
What can justice do but open the gate and let us out? He said, I will send a deliverer
unto Zion to pardon her sins. And that's
exactly what our Lord Jesus Christ did. He, in perfect wisdom, bore
our sins in His own body on the tree. And behold the perfect
wisdom of God to call us. Isn't it perfect? Would you have
ever come to Him? You know, in your depravity,
you know you never would have. But in grace, He appointed a
time to come to you. He came to you. He showed you your depravity. showed you his holiness and in
grace he showed you the way that these two are reconciled by Jesus
Christ we who come to him we stand amazed
stand amazed at the wisdom and knowledge of God and I'll tell
you isn't it valuable can you can you ascertain the value of
your salvation. You can't ascertain. It's too
valuable. Nothing on earth could ever assess
that value. I stand amazed in the presence
of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how He could love me. A sinner condemned unclean. Oh,
how marvelous. How wonderful. And my song shall
ever be. How marvelous, how wonderful
is my Savior's love for me. Can you plumb the depths of what
it took for Christ to save me? Do you know how much He suffered?
Can you tell me how much He suffered? Can you tell me what it cost? I can't tell you. I can't fathom
what He endured for my sins. And I tell you this, I can't
fathom the glory that is reserved for me in Heaven. Can you? What did that? was the wisdom
and knowledge of God. And lastly, I know I'm going
long, but the depths of God's wisdom in Providence. Listen
to this. We who believe on Jesus Christ,
He is all our salvation, we may rest completely in His perfect
work, but I know this, that dark times will come. For many, they're already here. The providence of God seems to
be a mystery to us. I tell you, I can't fathom the
wisdom and knowledge of God in providence, can you? When you
look at Joseph and his situation, would you have done it that way?
Would anybody have ever done it that way? When it was happening
to Joseph, he was being sold, he was being used, he was being
falsely accused, he was being put in prison, you think all
the while he's smiling and thinking, well you know what, I think God's
gonna work this all out, it's gonna be great. He had no clue. Listen, neither do we. We have
any clue. But seeing what great things
God has done for us in salvation, we may be sure of this. In wisdom,
He is using everything for our benefit. Scripture says, He spared not
His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all. How then shall
He not with Him? freely give us all things. All things that he accomplished,
all things that he has done, how then will God withhold anything
from us that is not good for us? So in the darkness, what
must you trust? You must trust the depth of the
riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God. He has the whole picture. Don't you see that? He knows
all the picture. I was thinking about this. You
know, you see a movie and some lady's running and she's going
to the door and you know the bad guy's behind the door and
you say, don't go! He's back there. You know, you have some
knowledge. You see, hey, she's going the
wrong way. You know who has more knowledge than you? The director,
the writer who wrote the thing. They know, they're not really
worried. They know in the end it's going
to be alright with the hero because that's how they wrote it. It scared us though. Fearful. We're anxious. We're troubled. But I tell you this, you can
rest in the wisdom and knowledge of God. Though you can't find it out.
Don't know what he's doing. You can sure rest in his wisdom
to know that whatever he's doing, it'll be to your benefit. Isn't even death the benefit
of the saint? Blessed is the man that dieth
in the Lord. Isn't that what the scripture
says? Our God knows exactly where we
are. He knows exactly what's happening to us, because the
one who saved us is the one who rules all providence. Oh, the depths of the riches
of both the wisdom and knowledge of God in creation, especially
in salvation, and certainly in providence. He's wise, a lot
wiser than we are. Trust Him for His grace. Has
He not been good to you? Has He not been good? In your
darkest of times, has He not been good? He's been good. God help us, sustain us, and
keep us. I pray, let's be dismissed in
prayer. Stand and be dismissed. Gracious Father, dismiss us with
your own blessings. Please, pour out your spirit.
Give us grace to rest in Christ. Settle our hearts in darkness.
Give us grace to cling to you and hold fast to Christ. Trusting your infinite wisdom
and knowledge. I pray in his name.