Eric is in the hospital. Today, he was driving home with
Angela, and he had a seizure. And she asked for prayer concerning
him. And they don't right now know
what caused it. But pray for her as she deals
with this and is there with him and helping him. Pray God give
the doctors wisdom and understanding and healing is in the hands of our
God. He said, I am God and there is
none else. I am he. I kill and I make alive. I wound and I heal. It is God that does these things,
she has very much confidence in the Lord, and I know Eric
does, but it's a very scary time for them. Pray for them. Tia
was not feeling well. She had physical therapy today
and thinks she was just tired, so pray for her and Rick. Pray that God be gracious to
these that are sick. How's Rylan and Emma? I talked
to her this week and I They're still probably feeling bad. Okay, it's going through the
family. Yeah. Okay. We'll pray for them as
they suffer through that and any others that uh Terrence's
grandmother is not well. So pray for her and they're supposed
to go up there this week to see her. I think he's gonna take
Jean up there to see it's her jeans mom and uh Pray for that. Pray for the family. I do want to mention encouraging
things. I'm always asking for things
that are in deep distress, but there are encouraging things.
I've been lately just receiving emails and text messages from
believers, and certain people are asking questions. That's
always good. It's always good when God moves
people. You don't know where it's going,
but that's not my business. My business is simply to be ready
to give every man an answer of the hope that is in us. And I pray that God would use
these things and ask God to be gracious to use you where you
are. Ask God to be gracious to use
you to witness to others concerning Christ and His great salvation. And I know this, the Lord will
answer that. I tell you, there is a famine
in this land. It's not a famine of bread, plenty
of bread going around, plenty of things and money. There are not many gospel preachers
that I know I'm not saying there are not any. There are some,
and I'd like to know more of them. I'd like to know more of
them. I wish I knew more of them. If they're out there, I'd like
to know them. That's fine. I was talking to a pastor today,
yesterday. We talked about the simplicity. Paul beseeches Brethren there
at Corinth, he says that you be not moved from the simplicity
that is in Christ Jesus. The singleness. If we are not
preaching the singleness of Christ, if Christ Jesus is not the anchor
and center of our message, it's not going to do anything. It's
useless. If we move from Christ, we have
been deceived. And we should always pray that
every message should center around Christ. Should center around
Christ. And I hope that's true this evening,
that the Lord would comfort you. When you see Christ, I want you
to be comforted. That's what God intends for it.
He intends to settle you. I'm anxious. I don't know. I'm
easily made anxious. I just am. I pray that God make
me stronger, but I don't. I seem like I'm going the opposite
direction. And I know this, the only thing
that settles me is Christ. He's the center. He's the anchor
of my soul. And the only reason I know that
we're going to make it through this life is because of Him. Because of Him. And I pray that's
what the Lord teaches us tonight and comforts you. Pray that God
would send men out into the ministry. I do pray that God would send
multitudes of men out into the field. There is just an absence
of it. There's a lot of hoopla and a
lot of excitement. Just very little gospel. People
aren't interested in the gospel. It's not interesting. It's not
entertaining. And so they don't want it. Well,
I know this. It's like bread. I need it. I
need it. And God's people need it. So
pray for them. Let's go to Him in prayer. Our
gracious Father in heaven, we bow before you again before you're
thrown of grace. Father, tonight we seek mercy
and grace. And Father, we need help. Tonight
is a time of need. We that have gathered together,
we seek to hear the voice of the Son of God through the preaching
of the gospel. We seek that thy spirit would
move upon our hearts. And we should cry, Abba, Father. I pray this night that you would
comfort every elect sinner, everyone that is called by your grace
and power to believe in Christ. Father, you would show us again
the truth concerning the preservation of the saints, the perseverance
of the saints. These two are tied together in
that you keep us, you sustain us. Father, I can't preach tonight
without you. I beg you for grace. I don't
want to stand here by myself. I beg you to give me the liberty
and unction of your spirit for the glory of thy son, for the
furtherance of this gospel, for the edification of the saints,
for the salvation of the lost. Whatever you intend to use the
message for, use it for your glory and the good of your people. I beg you for these that we have
mentioned tonight who are sick, these who are suffering in the
body, languishing in the mind, I beg you for grace. Heal their minds. Heal their
hearts. Heal their bodies. And bring
them again to us. We miss them. We miss seeing
them. We miss being with them. We miss worshiping with them.
I pray that you would bring them again. And I pray that you would bless
this gospel tonight, and I ask it. the forgiveness of our sins. I ask this in the name of our
Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and for his sake. Amen. All right, take your Bibles and
turn with me to Romans 8. Romans chapter 8. Our text will be found in verses
31 and 32. Scripture says, What shall we
then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? He that spared not his own son,
but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him freely
give us all I have entitled this message, God is for us. God is for us. Now the Apostle stops again for
us to recount all of the glorious, wonderful things that he has
already mentioned. What shall we say to these things? He has mentioned a lot of things. He has mentioned that Christ
is our representative, hasn't He? He has declared to us that
our salvation, just like our sin, came from a representative. We were all in Adam when Adam
died. We all died in Adam. Here's a wonderful thing. Even
so, this is how we're going to be saved. We're going to be saved
in a representative. Jesus Christ. We're made righteous
by Him. He explains to us how that faith
is the means that God uses by which the righteousness comes
to us. And He uses Abraham as an illustration
and He says, look, all the promises God gave Abraham, if you believe,
listen, all those promises are yours. The same promises. And so we see in chapter 7, we
have a struggle. We have a struggle here. He said,
yes, we are saved by the grace of God through faith in Christ,
but yet we struggle within ourselves, don't we? We have this inner
conflict within ourselves. And Paul exclaims the truth of
every believer, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver
me from the body of this death? Here is something, one of these
things, I thank God through Jesus Christ my Lord. That's going
to be my deliverance. Then he bursts into that next
chapter, and he tells us there's no condemnation. Get that thing.
There's no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus. What
are you going to say to that? Man, that's glorious, isn't it?
That there is no condemnation when? Right now. Right now, there's
no condemnation. You do this every second of every
day, you can say that same thing. There's therefore now no condemnation. There's therefore now no condemnation
of those who are in Christ Jesus. And then He talks about giving
us His Spirit. He said not only that, but we
have the Holy Spirit given to us. Isn't that astounding? You
sitting there, you have the Holy Spirit in you, and I'm standing
up here, and I have the Holy Spirit in me. Same. The same. Isn't that awesome? That's amazing.
We're given the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit, how do you
know you have Him? He leads you. Where does He lead
you? He leads you to faith in Christ. You believe in Christ? Well, who led you there? That's
the Spirit. That's how I know. He said, as many as have the
Spirit of God. Listen, now then he gives us
something else. We're sons of God. You're the sons of... What are you going to say to
that? What can you say to that? You're a son of God. If you believe
in Christ, you're a son of God. Period. And you're an heir of
God, a joint heir with Christ. Does that mean everything's going
to be hunky-dory? Everything's going to be great?
Everything's going to be without pain or suffering? No. Paul tells
us in this chapter that we're going to suffer, even though
these things are true. Yet we suffer. We suffer. He tells us that the Spirit of
God, even the Spirit now intercedes for us because we don't even
know what to pray for. I don't know. Isn't that astounding?
We pray for things all the time. Do you know if what you're praying
for is exactly good? You don't, do you? You think
it is, you feel it is, but you really don't know if it's going
to be for the good and glory of God. So what does the Spirit
do? He intercedes for us. That's good, isn't it? If I'm
praying for something that's going to be really bad, I would
hope that His Spirit would intercede for me, and He does. And this
is all according to the will of God. Then he tells us in chapter,
verse 28, that all things in providence work together for
our good. Everything, in heaven and earth and all that happens,
it is by the hand of God working together for our good. What are you going to say to that?
We don't often feel that way, right? God says it's true. God says it is. It works together
for the good, not for everybody, but to them that love God, to
them who are the called according to His purpose. Now, from that
one statement right there, the Apostle is going to seal the
deal here with this. He's going to begin to talk about
the election of God's grace. All of those things he mentioned
before are really intended for one group of people. Those that
love God, who are they? They're the ones called according
to His purpose. What are you going to say to this thing? You
were saved on purpose. I'm glad I wasn't saved on accident.
I'm glad it just didn't by chance I walked into a church building
and heard the gospel. I'm thankful that it was all
ordained of God. Every bit of it was ordained
of God. It was purposed of God. How do we know for whom He did
for? No, He also did predestinate. ordain beforehand listen listen
to what God ordained now this if you don't we don't know much
but this we can know that these people God ordained them to be
like his son to be conformed to the image of his son that's
what God you that believe that's what God has already decreed
you should be. What are you going to say to
that? Better yet, what are you going
to say against it? What are you going to say against
it? What shall we say to these things? A better way to translate
that would be, who can oppose these things? Who in the world
is going to stand against those things that I just said? Who's
going to oppose it? Will anybody oppose it? It's
as though he's asking somebody to dispute what he said. And
there'll be a lot of murmuring and complaining, but there's
no disputing this. We don't debate the gospel. That's
one thing I don't do. I don't debate it. It is written. There it is. I don't believe
it. Okay. I'm not going to debate
with you. It's written. You can say what
you want, but you'll be proved a liar. What are we going to
say? Who's going to oppose these things?
And so then, I ask you that, is it possible for us to value
these things too highly? I preach these things all the
time. Is it possible for me to over-preach this? Is it possible
for me to preach too much Christ? Is it possible for me to go so
overboard and say, yeah, we've heard all that about Jesus, I
want to know about myself. Well, you're going to have to
go somewhere else. Because it is not possible for me to preach
too much Christ. Just not. It's not possible for us to value
these truths too highly. Why? Because this is where we
derive all our comfort. If one of these things is not
true, there's no comfort for any of us. Do you understand that? If one
of these promises fail, there's no hope for anybody in humanity. This is where we get our comfort.
This is where we get our peace. And so the scripture defies anyone
to oppose this, opposes anyone. Now, what he's going to get at
now is our perseverance or our preservation. What he's going
to talk about is, he's talked about all these wonderful truths,
but when suffering comes and affliction comes and the inner
struggle comes, what comes with it? Doubts. Fears. Am I going to finish this? Am I going to make it through
this? Will my faith endure or will I fall away? What He is
going to give you is comfort to know this, that your perseverance
and preservation are tied and dependent not on you, but on
God. You being preserved. Who preserves
you? God does. We persevere. There is no doubt
that every believer will persevere. Jesus said, He that endureth
to the end, the same shall be saved. So we know this, everyone
that endures to the end, what is it? They shall be saved. Well,
who are they? Well, they're everyone that's
kept by the power of God. These are tied together. They're
not independent of one another. God doesn't preserve you some
of the way and you persevere on your own the other part. These
are all of God. perseverance and preservation
of the saints, and anyone that doesn't believe that, anyone
believes that something in this life might interfere with God's
salvation, something comes up, and you've sinned too much, or
you've not done this, and you're in danger of losing this preservation,
anyone believes that, they're just ignorant of this text. The
Apostle is challenging anyone. What are you going to say to
these things? Listen to what he says. If God
be for us. What does all those things tell
me? All those things tell me this. God's for me. God's for
me. Now if God has done all of these
things for me, The question then comes, who is going to oppose
me? Who's going to oppose Him? Because if He's on my side, to
oppose me is really to oppose Him. He said, if God be for us. Now, I want you to get this.
Take that word, if. It's not a great translation
because it's not asking a question, if. It's not a maybe statement. It's better translated since.
So when you read this text, read it like this. What shall we say
then to these things? Here's what we're going to say.
Since God is for us, who can be against us? Since God is,
we've proven it. I've proven it to you. Since
it's already been proven, God is for us. Who then can be against
us? And so this is meant to give
comfort and security to God's people, to support us under a
sense of our weakness. Do you have a sense of your weakness? Do you have a small sense of
how weak we are? How helpless we are? When Angela was talking about
our brother's seizure, the day I thought about my son when he
was three. When Andrew was three, he had
his first seizure. And I don't believe that I really
understood what it was to be helpless until that moment. There was nothing I could do.
I could not stop it. I could not help him. I couldn't
do nothing. Listen, that's how we are all
the time. We are utter weakness. And when we get a sense of our
utter weakness, this alone will give us strength. This will supply comfort and
strength. If you were to have to rely on
your strength, there would be no security, would
there? There would be no certainty that
you could make it. If we had to rely on our own
strength for our preservation in faith, we would have great
reason to despair that we would never arrive in heaven. If I had to depend on me to make
it, I wouldn't make it. If I had to rely on anything
in me to endure in faith, I would be long gone. But here's my hope, since God
is for me. since God is for me, and all
these things are secured by His hand. He has forged the chain
that links my soul with Christ, and then He holds the chain. It's an indissolvable link that unites us to Christ. In
this there is no language then to express our wonder and gratitude
for the grace and mercy of God that sustains us. Can you be too grateful? Can
you wonder at it too much? Can you muse on it? You can't. It's great. His mercy and grace sustains
us, listen to this, no matter what happens. It don't matter what happens.
It's His mercy and His grace that sustain us. Regardless of
the trial or the trouble, no matter the suffering or the affliction
we face, since God is for us, who or what could stand against
us? There is no doubt that we as
believers have innumerable enemies. Now I'm not saying that you're
not going to experience trouble. Why? You have enemies. We have invisible enemies. Satan is a very real enemy. A real enemy. Consider his strength
that our Lord said to Peter, Satan had desire to sift you
as wheat. You know how easy it is to sift
wheat? Take a little thing, you throw it up in the air and the
chaff flies away. That's how simple it was for the Satan to
get to Peter. That's how simple. If he was
given his way, that's how simple it would be to get to any one
of us. Why could he not get to Peter? I have prayed for Listen,
not that he doesn't sit you, I pray that your faith fails
not. Did Satan get a hold of Peter?
Who let that happen? Did not our Lord know about it
before it happened? He even told Peter before he
did it. We have a real enemy and friends, he's not to be trifled
with. The whole host of hell is against
us. Listen to me, this world's against
you. Don't you know that? You have enemy this world, this
government, the false religion of this world are set in battle
array against you. And the reason they probably
don't come in here and take us away is they probably don't know
who we are. If they knew who we were, I imagine
it would be worse. Don't worry, if it's not worse
now, it will be. It will be. This world and its evil governments
are not for you. James said, friendship with the
world is enmity with God. Don't be deceived by them. This
world hates you and hates this message. This message of God's
salvation by grace is despised. It's despised. It's hated. But the worst enemy we have is
where? Where's your worst enemy? It's right here. It's self. If it wasn't for self, the world
and Satan wouldn't have any hold on us. It's self that's the problem. It's me. We're the enemy to our
own selves. And even though our enemies are
stronger than we are, listen to me, since God is for me, they
cannot be against me. And what I mean against me is
that they shall not prevail against me. They shall not prevail against
me. You know, when Gideon, remember
old Gideon, What a coward. I mean, that's just what he was.
He went out there, and he did something against the Midianites,
and he ran and he hid. Didn't want anybody to know he
did it. Thought he was doing something really valiant, and
then he ran and he hid. He was a coward. You know what? When the angel of the Lord came
to him, he said this to him, thou mighty man of valor. Now how can he say that to Gideon?
Everything pointed to Gideon's weakness. He said that because
this was also his word, the Lord is with thee. Reason you're mighty
is the Lord's on your side. In Isaiah 54 verse 17 it said,
no weapon that is formed shall prosper. Now I like that. He
didn't say that he's not going to let them form the weapon. He said in that chapter, he said,
I give life and breath to the blacksmith that made the weapon
against you. I give him strength and power
to yield the weapon against you. But you know what? It's not going
to prosper. Why? Because I'm with you. Do you
understand that? That no weapon, no weapon of
your enemy that's formed against you will prosper. It won't. It'll
all come to nothing. It'll all come to nothing. So
we are surrounded by the host of our enemies. I thought of
Elisha. Remember him? He's standing in that little
old hood out there in the middle of nowhere. And all of a sudden
that big army is all around him and his servant gets so upset
and fearful and he says, what are we going to do? What are
we going to do? They're more than we are. And
Elisha prayed and asked the Lord to open that little servant's
eyes and he said this, don't be afraid, they that are with
us are more than they that are with him. And he saw that legions
of angels surrounding him. He had no reason to fear. Why? God was with him. These people
and all their armies could do nothing without his direct decree. And so it is with you. Now, there's
two propositions then in this comforting text. First of all,
God is for us. That's the first proposition
here. For your comfort, that's the first thing you need to know.
God is for you. The second thing is because God
is for you, what's going to be the result? Always the result.
Nothing shall stand against you. If God be for us, who can be
against us? We are not promised that our
enemies will not oppose us. We're not promised that. They
will fight against us. They are often sent array against
us every day. We could not withstand them in
ourselves. But God says this, I am for you. So consider. Consider the one
who is for you. Now, I love you and I'm for you. That's okay. I'm sure that you
love me and that you are for me. If I have trouble, that you
would help me and I would help you. But we are limited, aren't
we? We are limited as to what we
can do. Consider the one that's on your
side. Is the one who created all things by His hand. listen what the creator of the
world said. Jesus our Lord told those Pharisees,
my sheep hear my voice. I know them and they follow me
and I give unto them eternal life. Listen to this statement
and no man shall pluck them out of my hand. Now is that a statement? Is there any question to that
statement? Is he leaving any room for doubt? I give them life. Well, does that mean that life
could end? Do you mean what life? No, eternal
life. He makes it very specific what
kind of life he gives us. Eternal life. And he said they
are in my hand and no man can pluck them out of my hand. I
often think of Psalm 23 when he said, He shall prepare a table
for us in the presence of our enemies. Imagine a shepherd leading
his sheep into a lion's den. And then commanding them just
to sit down. And daring one of the lions to
take one of his. That's what our Lord said. I
dare you to pluck them out of my hands. I'm for them. They're mine. And he goes even
further. And he says, my father, which
gave them me, is greater than all. And no man is able to pluck
them out of his hands. I and my father are one. We're one in will, in purpose,
in power, in deity, One. No man shall pluck them out of
my hands. It is the eternal God, the scripture
says, is thy refuge. And underneath are the everlasting
arms. I love the beautiful, very descriptive thing here. God says,
I'm your refuge, which means a covering over you. Well can't somebody tunnel under
and get to us underneath? No, underneath are the everlasting
arms. So they can't get to you from
above, they can't get to you from below. What about in front
and behind? Psalm 139 says this, All our
ways, all our paths are known to God, and He goes before us
and behind us. You got that? He's over you,
He's under you, He's before you, and He's behind you. If God be
for you, who can be against you? Who? It is though the scripture dares
anyone to try, because they will not succeed.
If God's for me, who can be against me? It is though God here is
shining a beacon of light upon the dark seas, saying, I will
bring you to my safe harbor. I will, and none can stay my
hand or say unto me, what doest thou? Somebody come along and say,
man, you should not, God, you shouldn't let that one in. Let
me tell you some stuff about this guy. Well, I tell you, Chuck,
let me tell you something about him. I ain't gonna stop him. Isn't
that astounding? If God's for you, what does it
matter what men say? What does it matter what men
think? What does it matter what you think or what you feel? If
God be for you, who can be against you? Yet we know this. You and I both understand that. All of us understand that there
are clouds of darkness. There are clouds of doubt. And so we strain at times to
see the light of this truth that Paul sets forth for us in this
text. So how do I know God's for me?
Isn't that the question? How do I know that God is for
me? How can I have such confidence? Look at verse 32. Here is the proof that God is
for you. Look at this. He that spared
not his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall
he not with him freely give us all things? Now there are two things that
move us to doubt and fear. Two things. outward afflictions
and inward sin. Those are the two things constantly
seeking to pull us away from this assurance that God is for
us. We are distressed, we are pressed
out by the world, we have common afflictions, sickness, sorrows,
pains, griefs, And then we have to deal with something the world
doesn't have to deal with, sin. We have to deal with this old
man, this wicked nature. And what does this cause? It
causes doubt. I just mentioned Gideon a second
ago. He asked this question to the angel. The angel said, the
Lord's for you, the Lord's with you. And you know what he said?
Well, if God's for me, then why are we like this? When I read that, I feel guilty.
I don't laugh at him, because that's exactly what I say. If you're for me, then why am
I hurting? Why am I feeling this pain and
suffering so? Asaph said, My foot is nigh well
gone. See, Asaph didn't distrust God. He said, I know God's good to
Israel. All those people you're talking about that God's for,
I know God's good to them. But I don't know about me. I don't know about me. And inward sin drives us to like
Paul, oh, wretched man that I am. But believer, take heart. Take
heart in these troubles and don't rest on your feelings. Is this
not a common trouble with us, to rest on how we feel? Feelings come and feelings go. Feelings are deceiving. Nothing else but the Word of
God is worth believing. Don't look at your feelings and
definitely don't look at the circumstance. You're not going
to see if God's for you based on how you feel or the circumstance. I've given you the scripture
many times. It's a vital text for us when
we have doubts. Ecclesiastes 9. And verse 1,
it says that you cannot tell the love or the hatred of God
by all that is before you. You can't. If you inherit millions of dollars
tomorrow, does that mean God's for you? Is that what you're
saying? What if God takes everything
you have tomorrow? Does that mean God's against you? How do I know God's for me? Listen
to me. He spared not His own Son, but
delivered Him up for us all. Behold the greatness of the One
who spared not His Son. God spared not His own Son. Behold the greatness of God,
being infinitely higher, being the Creator of all things, subject
to none. Yet God determined to kill His
Son for me." He spared not His own Son, so
that He might be for me." You understand that without this,
He could never be for me. God could never be with me, except
for this, that He spare not His own Son, but deliver Him up for
us all. God, in whom the Scriptures declared
that even the angels being unclean in his sight. How high is that?
And yet what he has purposed to do and what those things we've
mentioned, he has purposed, purposed that you should be with him. He said, I want that one and
that one's going to be with me. And you know what it's going
to cost me? It's going to cost me my son. Now, was God obligated to anyone
to make that decision? Was He subject to anyone? Because
He made you, do you think God owes you anything? He doesn't. The Creator of all things set
His love upon sinful, miserable creatures as we are. His love
being so infinite and great, He, knowing the cost to redeem
us, did not even spare His own Son in order for us to be restored, in order for
God to be for us, so that none can prevail against us. Listen,
sin must have been dealt with. God could not be on your side
had sin not been paid for. Your sin must be paid. If your
sin is not paid, God's not on your side. How can I tell if God's on my
side? Listen, if Christ paid my debt, how much greater a gift
could God display? How much more could God do to
display it? God, the sin price must be paid,
the law must be honored, life and faith must be applied to
us, And this was only to be accomplished one way, that God should not
spare the son of his love, but rather deliver him up. This is
what our Lord Jesus Christ told us when he came into this world.
He said this, as Moses lifted up the servant in the wilderness,
even so, listen to this word, must the son of man be lifted up. This was not an option. If God
was ever to draw you to himself, this was the only way. As Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up,
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting
life. For God so loved the world. that he gave. Now how can I tell
if God loves me? Am I going to look at my circumstances
or how I feel or am I going to look at what he gave? Was there anything greater than
his son? Could he give you anything greater? Could he make a more precious
offering and sacrifice so that you and I who are worthless could
provide nothing could be with Him. He spared not His own Son, but
delivered Him up. What does that mean, He delivered
Him up? Listen, He delivered Christ up to His own justice. He delivered Christ to His own
wrath. That's what he was delivered
up for. When Jesus Christ bore our sins in his own body on the
tree, Christ was given over to the Father's bare wrath. Do we think lightly of sin? I
know we do. If you want to view sin rightly,
You have to look at the cross. You have to. You cannot see the
heinousness of sin except you look at the cross. You can't
look at us and each other. We see evil things all the time.
We say, man, that's bad. Man, that's bad. That's horrible. We don't know how horrible. We don't know how horrible our
own sin is. But look at the cross. It was there that he suffered
the guilt for our sin. You want to see God's hatred
for sin? Look what he did to his son. When he says he spared not his
own son, do you realize that Christ was afforded no mercy
whatsoever? No compassion. No grace whatsoever. He said, my God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me? Why? So that he could be for
you. Had he not pursued Christ, he could never be for you. But he spared not his own son.
I thought about Abraham. He said, ìAbraham, take your
son, your only son, whom you love, and you take him to that
mountain, and you are going to slit his throat, and youíre going
to burn his body for me.î Now, Abraham in faith knew this, that
Christ was coming from that boy. God told him that Christ was
going to come from the seed of that boy. And he knew this, that
when he slit his throat and burned his body, that God would raise
him from the dead. He believed that. So what'd he
do? He rose up early in the morning,
took his ass, saddled it, took his boy up that mountain, raised
his knife, ready to kill his son. And what'd God say? Whoa,
wait a minute. Don't touch him. Don't kill your
boy. Why? I'm gonna kill my boy. I'm
gonna kill my son. That ram caught in the thicket
was Christ. It was a picture of Christ. He spared Abraham's son. But
listen to me, He did not spare His own son. Is there any greater
act of love you can find? He delivered Him up. Now the
Jews seized Him. They hated Him. They wanted to
do this from the time they first met Him. They wanted to kill
Him. They wanted to stone Him to death. God said, You ain't
stoning Him. Why? Because I determined that He
died a certain way at a certain time. And He did. He died on
Passover just like God ordained. He died by crucifixion just like
God ordained. And these men did exactly what
they wanted to do and they killed the Lord of Glory. What did Peter
say about it? He said, Him being delivered
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you by
wicked hands have crucified and slain the Lord of Glory. I thought
about the scene at the cross. Have you ever thought about all
of the actions that took place there? That they were, you could
not have written a script and acted out a movie in such fashion. God wrote thousands, hundreds
of years before exactly what was going to happen. Those Roman
soldiers didn't know anything at all about the scripture saying
that they should cast lots for my vesture. Had no idea. They tore the one
and left the other whole. Just like God said they would
do. He said that his feet and his
hands would be pierced. 700 years before crucifixion
was even invented. God determined to deliver his son. This was
no accident. God determined to deliver. Why?
It was the only way God could be for you. And so God, in order
to do this, and by this, He proves to us that He's for us. My life going smooth does not
prove that God's for me. What proves God's for me is He
gave His Son. That's how I know God's for me.
If He gave His Son, Paul is arguing from the greater to the lesser,
you notice that? He's saying, if God gave you the greatest,
His Son, and by His Son all your sins are forgiven, by His Son
you are justified, by His Son no condemnation is coming to
you, by His Son you are completely, absolutely saved as though you
were in heaven right now. It's just as secure. And if God gave you that, Listen
to me. How shall he not with him? Since
you're with him, and he's with you, how shall he not with him,
or by him rather, give you, freely give you, all lesser things? Take comfort that God delivered
him up so that He might restore us. Listen to what Christ said
in Psalm 69 verse 4. I restored, I restored that which
I did not take away. I restored, who? He restored us. We took ourselves
away. We sinned. God said you sold
yourself for nothing. Yet, listen, I redeemed you. I redeemed you. He did this for
you. God the Son took upon himself
unparalleled sorrows and humiliation, even death, the wrath of God,
for you. God thus delivered his Son so
that he might rescue us. Who is the us? He had delivered
him up for us all. Who is the us all? Listen to
me. Simply put, everyone that believes on the Son of God alone. Faith is the evidence. Faith
is the evidence of God's work upon the soul. And he does this
for the most vile of creatures. Isn't this astounding? He doesn't
do this for the best of men. We could understand if he did
it for the best of men. In our logic, that would have
been just right. But he didn't. He did it for the worst. I know this. You and I would
never give our son for someone on death row. Anybody? Anybody take your son down there
and exchange him for some low life? Anybody? I'm the low life. I'm the one. I'm the sinner. And he delivered up his son for
me. Therefore, we praise God that
He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." Isn't
this wonderful that we can say this? Are there any sinners? Any sinners? I know God's got to like people.
I don't know who they are. I know this about them. They're all
sinners. Every one of them. I came not to call the righteous,
but sinners to repentance. He came to call sinners. God delivered up His Son to be
the propitiation for sinners, to justify sinners, to cleanse
sinners, to forgive sinners. If God gave them the greatest
of all things, His Son, how shall He not lift His Word freely?
Do you realize heaven is a small gift compared to what He's already
given you? are not all the joys of heaven
considered small in comparison to what he's already given you? How shall he not with him freely
give us all things? How then is it that we can reason
that God gave his Son to die in our stead and yet believe that something
someone could be so strong as to remove us from his hand."
How could you say that? That would be to say that Christ
failed. That's what it is. You're saying if there's something
to bring you to ruin, Christ failed to keep you. Well, if
God gave his son for me, then I I know this. God's for me.
And since God's for me, who can be against me? And he's going
to go to this. He said, God justified me. Who is he that, can you make
an accusation against me? Can you accuse me of anything?
It's God that justified me. You see, you've got to go to
Him. Wait a second. Can you condemn me? No. Christ
died. Yea, rather is seated at the
right hand of God. And He's interceding for me.
So you've got to go to Him. If you want to condemn me, you've
got to go through Him. Why? God's for me. Who? can be against me. I'll close
with this song. I think this should be the song we sing kind
of after we hear of His great greatness and His love for us. I like that. Be still my soul. Be still my soul. The Lord is on thy side. Bear patiently the cross of grief
and pain. Leave to thy God to order and
provide. In every change he faithful will
remain. Be still, my soul, thy best,
thy heavenly friend. Through thorny ways leads to
a joyful end. Be still, my soul. Why? Why can you be still in all of
the afflictions, in all of the sorrows, surrounded by enemies? How could you endure this? How
can you make it? How are you sure you're going
to make it if God's for me? Who can be against me? How do
I know God's for me? Well, He offered His own Son. Christ is all my salvation. If
He's all my salvation, then how in the world could He not freely
give me everything else? Why am I afraid? Why do I doubt? Why do I fear? If God's for me,
who can be against me? Now what are you going to say
to these things? What can you say? What can you say against
them? Anything? Any objections? I pray that God bless this to
you. Stand and be dismissed in prayer. Stand and be dismissed
in prayer, please. Our Holy Father, we come thanking
you for this, another opportunity to gather and hear the stories,
Gospel preaching. We're thankful for this place
we have. that you bless us and that you keep us, that you continue
to tell us the gospel and proclaim it here. Lord, may this message fill home
with us, and may we consider Christ and all He's done for
His people. You are the glorious gospel and
the glorious Savior. We just ask that you continue
to tell us We ask that you may know God as the Creator and the
Savior. And we ask that you send us the
Holy Spirit to comfort you and to heal you. We are thankful
that God has done what he has done to help you and to heal
you. We thank you in the name of the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.