chapter 1. We'll be looking at the first
three verses in this chapter, and the title of the message
is, A Servant of God and the Faith of God's Elect. A servant
of God and the faith of God's elect. Now this book of Titus was written
by the Apostle Paul as he sends this young preacher, Titus, to
Crete. You see his mission that the
Apostle gives him. He says in verse 5, "...for this
cause have I left thee in Crete, that thou shouldest set in order
the things that are wanting and ordain elders in every city as
I had appointed thee." These churches in Crete were missing
something. They were lacking in one very
important thing. Pastors. They had groups of believers
gathering together, but they were lacking, they were wanting
for one thing, true preachers. True preachers. And so he sent
these to ordain preachers of the gospel. There in these churches,
they were not just meek and lowly believers gathered together,
but these were unruly men. Some men had taken the preeminence
in the church and raised themselves up to be pastors. And so then,
in verse 5 through verse 9, he gives him qualifications for
pastors so that he knows who to ordain. He said, "...these
should be blameless in conduct, husbands of one wife. They must
be of good steward of the gospel, not self-willed, not soon angry,
not fighters or drunkards. They are to be lovers of the
souls of men, and especially holding forth the faithful word,
the faithful word of the gospel." You see, it was by these men
that God sent these faithful preachers of the gospel, that
he sent to call out his elect, and by these preachers he would
shut up those false preachers. He would shut their mouths. And
how would he do this? How would Titus go about this? Look in chapter 2 and verse 1,
he says, "...but speak thou the things that become sound doctrine."
He would do this teaching these men, this church, by one means,
and that is preaching sound doctrine. Preaching those things that become
sound doctrine. Preaching Christ, the gospel
of God's grace, And by this we are taught to
deny sin and ungodliness and live soberly, righteously in
this world. Look at verse 11. It says, For
the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all
men, teaching us That denying ungodliness and worldly lusts,
we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world,
looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of
our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. You see, what does the
grace of God teach us? It teaches us how to live soberly,
righteously, godly in this present world. And this is what He was
to do. What a mission. What a mission this man was sent
on. This preacher of the gospel. And so then, in order to encourage
him in this, he gives this salutation, and I want you to see four things
of encouragement in this salutation. Four things about the Apostle
Paul himself that encourages Titus as well as it should encourage
us in our labor in the Gospel. In our work for the gospel and the cause
of Christ. Four things here. First of all,
look what Paul says here at the very beginning. He calls himself
a servant of God. Paul, a servant of God. and an apostle of Jesus Christ. Now how then did Paul become
a servant of God and an apostle? Here it is, according to the
faith of God's elect and the acknowledging of the truth which
is after godliness. And what was his confidence?
He says, in hope of eternal life. which God that cannot lie promised
before the world began, and how then is this faith and hope manifest? He hath in due time manifest
his word through preaching, which is committed to me according
to the commandment of God our Savior." So let's see these four
things here in this salutation. First of all, Paul says he's
a servant of God. Servant of God. Now Paul was
given also an office, he says, and an apostle. And I'm going
to deal with this because this is very clear. None of us are apostles. So that
right there is not necessarily going to be applicable to us. He was an apostle of Jesus Christ. And so this office was his alone. And so, yet some men are given other
offices in the church, such as pastors and evangelists. Let's go to Ephesians and see
this, how God gives these gifts. Ephesians chapter 4 and verse
11. He says He gave some apostles,
some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers for
what? For the perfecting of the saints,
for the working of the ministry, for the edifying of the body
of Christ till We all come in the unity of faith and of the
knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect man, unto the measure
of the statue of the fullness of Christ. You see, God puts
these offices in the church for the edification of the body. Now, not all men are going to
be called to be pastors. Not all men are called to these
offices. But listen, Every one of us is
called to this office. You know what it is? A servant
of God. Every one of us can identify
with this place. We all who are believers in Christ
are servants of God. Now then we know this, that it
was not by nature. We were not servants of God by
nature. We know this that in the fall,
when Adam fell, when he sinned against God, you know the justice
of God swiftly fell, and the divine sentence was carried out.
In the day thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. He died spiritually. so as to
cause him to cease from all holiness and righteousness. It was there
that he was overcome by darkness and was free from righteousness
and became a servant, not of God, but of sin. When Adam died, he became a servant
of sin. Of sin. He sold himself. Do you realize that he did this
deliberately? Now we all were born into it.
Adam did this deliberately. He became a bond slave to sin
so that he could never break free from it. Wherefore, as by
one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, so death
passed upon all men, for all have sinned. In Adam he sinned,
and became a servant of sin. Therefore every one of us born
of Adam have become servants of sin." We were born dead in
sin, and by nature are slaves to it. Slaves to sin. You see, you can see this very
clearly by your inability to obey the law. Paul says in Roman 8, "...for
the carnal mind is enmity against God." Well, how do you know? Paul, I don't hate God. How do
you know I hate God? For it is not subject to the
law of God, neither indeed, listen, can be. Why? It is enslaved. The natural mind is enslaved
to sin, and it cannot obey the law of God. Neither does it have
any desire to do so. Now, if a man would be honest,
if he would be... Consider that if everybody were
capable of obeying the law of God, how rich this world would
be, how great this world would be, wouldn't it? It would just...
If everyone loved their neighbors themselves, just that portion,
just that one portion... No. No. You can't. The law is good. Everything about the law is good. And yet men still openly rebel
against it. Even because it's what our Lord
Jesus Christ told us, whosoever committed sin is a servant of
sin. Slave to sin. By nature we are
born enslaved to sin. I like this. Man by nature cannot
not sin. All we do, all we think, all
we feel is nothing but sin. What did God say about us in
Genesis? Genesis chapter 6, just before
the flood. He said that every imagination
of the thought, before it actually became a thought, whatever it
was, before it became a thought, the imagination of the thoughts,
of the heart, is only evil continually. Continually. See how some men try to break
free. Don't you see that? Some men
try. They begin to feel the twinge of guilt, and God sees something
of God's holy nature. And what do they do? They begin
to be afraid. I've seen this. I've seen this
many times. People go to a near-death experience.
They begin to be afraid. They're scrambling around, trying
to find something that would please God. And they grab ahold
of the law, and they begin to try. They grab ahold of religion,
and they try. And they're sincere with all
their soul. They're sincere to try to break
their chains. of sin. But what happens? You remember that man who had
that evil spirit? And the evil spirit went out
of him. What happened when he came back?
The man was worse. You found that true? You found
people come into religion, they're bad, then they come into religion
and they go out again worse than they came in. You know why? Chains. Sin. They're chained to their sin,
and they cannot break free. I mean this is outwardly, if
you want to see an outward visual of it, you know, drug addicts
are a big outward visual representation of it. But that's true of every
man by nature, it's not just them. Man is addicted to sin,
and he can't break free. no matter how hard he tries.
You see a man, he chooses, he grabs the law of God, and you
know what he does? He starts chopping it up. Why? Because
he realizes he can't obey it. He begins to piece it together
and try to, he modifies it so as to justify his obedience or
lack of it by traditions or church creeds or bylaws, whatever it
is. But what saith the Word of God
concerning such vain efforts to free oneself from the chains
of sin, to make ourselves acceptable before God? What does the Word
of God say about that? He says this, that there is none
righteous, no not one. There is none that understandeth.
There is none that seeketh after God. They are altogether become
unprofitable. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. Therefore, by the deeds of the
law shall no flesh be justified in his sight. For by the law
is only the knowledge of sin. The law cannot save you. The
law cannot break your chains. The law only strengthens your
chains. Isn't that what the Apostle said,
that the strength of sin is the law? The law can only condemn you,
and the more you try to obey it, the more it only condemns
you. And so, no matter how moral a man tries to be, how outwardly
he reforms his life, how religious he becomes, he will never, ever
be able to free himself from the chains of his sin. Ever! Never! Let him spend a million
years trying and he will only strengthen the chains. Isn't
that right? The longer we live, what is it?
The more sin we commit. the stronger the chains, the
thicker the chains become. Therefore, what then is the hope? How can we who are servants of
sin ever become the servants of God? There is only one way, by Jesus Christ. The only way servants of sin
shall ever become the servants of God is by the work of Jesus
Christ. Jesus in John 8, He told those
Jews, He said, The servant abideth not in the house forever, only
the Son abideth forever. Therefore, if the Son shall set
you free, you shall be free indeed. You shall be completely, absolutely
free. Now then, are you a servant of
sin? Are you a slave to your sins? You know, Jesus said, if the
Son shall set you free, you should be free indeed. You know what
they said? We're not in bondage. You see, freedom is only given
to those in bondage. Isn't that good? It's good if
you're in bondage. It's good if you have need to
be free from your sins. Jesus said, if the Son does it,
you will be free indeed. free completely, absolutely,
from your chains of sin. Are you a sinner indeed? Are
you sold under sin? Are you a servant of sin, desiring
to become a servant of God? Only the Son of God abideth forever,
and only the Son of God can set you free. He is the only one
that can do this. The only one. And so then you
should look to Him. Don't look here. I was a prisoner
just like you. I have no ability to break my
own chains, much less anyone else's. Only Christ can set you free.
Only Christ can set me free. That's it. He's the only one,
so look to Christ, the Son, who abideth forever, and if He will
set you free, if He breaks these chains, they will be broken.
They won't ever bind you again. You'll be absolutely, completely
free of these chains. Now this is pictured in the Old
Testament, isn't it? By the kinsman-redeemer. Isn't
that how it's pictured? Leviticus chapter 25, verse 25.
It says if a man becomes impoverished, if a man sells himself and his
inheritance, what a picture of us. We sold our inheritance. We sold ourselves to sin. We became indebted to the justice
of God because of our sins and we could never pay the debt.
Therefore God in his law made a provision, picturing only Christ,
that if there was a near kinsman He would be able to redeem you.
He would be able to purchase your inheritance and restore
it to you again. And that's pictured the best
in the book of Ruth, isn't it? Those two women, Ruth and Naomi. Naomi had lost everything. Ruth
had lost everything. They were two widowed women in
Jerusalem, having no inheritance, no possibility of her having
a son to restore their inheritance. And all of a sudden, by the grace
of God, there was one there, Boaz. He was a near kinsman redeemer. But Boaz said there was a nearer
kinsman. I had to deal with him first.
And you remember that nearer kinsman could not redeem Ruth
and Naomi. Else he would defile his own
inheritance. What a picture of the law. The
law was a nearer kinsman, but it could never save us. It can
never redeem us unless it defile itself. So Boaz being a picture
of Christ says, I'll redeem it. And so he deals with the law
and then he goes to Ruth. Isn't that what he did with us?
He dealt with the law and then he comes to us and he says, I'm
your Redeemer. You get that? He redeemed us
before we found out he was our Redeemer. Ruth was in there waiting. She
didn't know how the thing would fall. He had already done it.
She didn't know until He came to her and said, I am thy Redeemer. And He redeemed her. And I'll tell you this, when
we know this, and know of Christ's redemption, we then, like Ruth,
become a servant. of her husband. She became a
servant of her husband. She was his wife. So we are the bride of Christ
by his redemption price. And thus we are his servants. Is that not the most pleasant
thing? I am a servant of God. servant of God. Paul says of himself, it is true
of everyone redeemed by Christ, for he has come in the flesh
and he has redeemed us in the flesh, satisfying our debt before
God, therefore we are no more slaves to sin.
But Christ by grace has set us free from sin. How are we free
from sin? We're the servants of God and
no longer servants of sin. How are we free? How has He set
us free? He set you free from the penalty of your sin. The
penalty of your sin was eternal damnation. And He set you free
from that. You'll never have that if you're
in Christ. God will never demand payment
from you, seeing He was satisfied with Christ's payment. You're
free from the penalty. Listen, you're free from the
power of sin. You're free from the power of sin. Sin shall not
have dominion over you. Now does this mean you'll be
free from the presence of sin? Not yet. One day we'll be free
from the presence of sin, just not yet. Why? We still have this
old man to contend with. We still have this old nature
that is with us. We're free from the law, free
from the strength of sin. We are under the grace of God How then can we, being servants
of God, free from sin, live any longer in sin? One who claims the grace of God
but still continually, perpetually lives in sin, willfully his life is bent in
sin. That man is not free. That man
is not free. One who says, who does not love
Christ, who does not love his word or his brethren, that man
is like Simon Magnus. You remember, that man Simon
Magnus, he heard the gospel, he professed to believe the gospel.
But what did Paul said? He said, I perceive that you're
in the bondage of sin, bondage of iniquity. See, he was just
a pretender. But we who are free from sin,
free from the law, we recognize this. We are not our own. Do you know that? We do not belong
to ourselves. We belong to another. We are servants of God. And if
we are servants of God, listen, we are servants of righteousness.
Isn't that what Paul said in Romans 6? He said, you are no
longer servants of sin, you are servants of righteousness. Righteousness. Paul said, I am
a servant of God. Now then, how then is one, this
is the second thing, how then is one to become a servant of
God? Look at what Paul says here.
He says, I am a servant of God, Apostle of Jesus Christ, according
to the faith of God's elect. Jesus said, If the Son shall
set you free, you shall be free indeed. And so then you should
look now and see that Jesus is the only Savior, the only Kinsman,
Redeemer, the only Righteousness, and by His blood alone can set
you free. And so what do we say to that?
As preachers of the gospel, what am I to say to you who are under
the bondage now that desire to be the servant of God? I say
this, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved. Come to Christ. If He's the one
that can set you free, you should come to Christ. You should believe
on Him and He will set you free. Isn't that what he said in his
first public message? He said, the Spirit of the Lord
is upon me to preach the gospel, to set at liberty the captives. Set at liberty the captives.
He came to be the Redeemer. So then, what should you do?
You should believe. You should believe. on the Son
of God. If you will be the servant of
God, then you should come and forsake your religion, forsake
your sin, forsake your righteousness. Isn't that something? If you
want to come and be a servant of God, you've got to forsake
your righteousness, because you don't got any. You have to forsake
it. You have to forsake everything
and come to Christ. Flee to Him. Isn't that what
the church is to Christ? The Spirit and the bride say,
come and let Him that heareth say what? Come and let Him, that
is a thirst, come. And whosoever will, let him come
and drink of the water of life." How? Freely. Freely drink. And you remember he gives those
next two things. He says, don't take anything from this book
and don't add anything to this book. You come to Christ, you
can't take anything from Him and you can't add anything to
Him. You come and take Him as He is, as the Savior and Redeemer
and believe on Him. And you know what you've got?
You've got the faith of God's elect. That's what it is. The faith of God's elect. All
who come to Christ, you listen, they are the servants of God.
Now notice that the faith of God's elect, this faith of coming
to Christ is described, like Paul says it, according to the
faith of God's elect. Now the faith of all who believe
on Christ alone, I want you to see, it is one faith. One faith. In other words, your
faith is no different from my faith. Why? Now we have different measures,
right, of faith. God deals out measures of faith
as he does all the graces. So then, you may have more faith,
but you don't have any different faith than I do. And that's because all the faith
of God's elect has one common source, God. That's why your
faith is no different than mine, because God is its author. God
is its author. The faith of Abel, the faith
of Moses, the faith of Abraham, the faith of Enoch, the faith
of David, Paul, the thief on the cross, you and me, it's all
one common faith. Isn't that what he said in Ephesians
4? He says, one Lord, one faith,
one baptism. The Apostle Jude, he said this
in his letter, he said, I gave all diligence to write unto you
of the common salvation. You realize that? Our salvation
is all common to us. In other words, there's no difference
in your salvation and mine. It's the common salvation. He
says that this common salvation, and Jude mentions three things
about this common salvation. See if I can't read it to you. He says this, if I can find the
right one, there we go. Jude says, "...to them that are
sanctified by God the Father." Well, there's our common election.
We have this common faith because we were commonly chosen of God
by sovereign grace. We were sanctified by God the
Father. We were commonly preserved in
Christ. Every one of the elect were given
to Christ, preserved in Christ, and when Christ came, He came
as our representative. So that when He lived in a righteous
life, we lived a righteous life. When He died for sin, in Him
we died for sin. We died according to the law
and commandment of God. And when He rose again, we rose
in Him. We all have this in common. And
listen, we were all commonly called, called of the Holy Spirit. You servant of God, you who believe
on Christ, does this not move you to love? Isn't this great? That you and I have the same
salvation. Why? Because we have the same
God and the same Savior, the same Lord and the same Christ.
It's a common salvation to all of who? All God chose. all Christ
redeemed, and all the Spirit calls. Those are the ones who
have the faith of God's elect. You see, God purposed for you
to have this. Isn't that something? You just
didn't slip up on this. You didn't become a servant of God based
on anything you've done, or earned, or merited. You became a servant
of God because God predestinated you to be a servant of God. Isn't
that great? He purposed that you should be
holy and without blame before Him, in love, having predestinated
us unto the adoption of children. How? By Jesus Christ to Himself. And therefore the Son of God,
who was promised to come, has come, and has magnified the law,
made it honorable, and He has redeemed us through
His blood, and we have the forgiveness of sins. You see this, that our
salvation, though it was common, it was all done outside of us.
This is the most marvelous thing, is that it was never done because
of us, or merited by us. It was done outside of us, by
God, all by himself, so that nothing would taint it. Nothing
could defile it. Then in grace, he comes to the
sinner and works that salvation in us. Works that salvation in
us. while none of this was known
to us we by nature were born not born free but yet by grace
we were made free this uh... past week A man was
talking to me and trying to convince me again that man has a free
will. So I began to use people that
I know and take them out of, you know, their messages and
take them out of context. But he gave me this passage that
says, Spurgeon said this, he said, we should preach both responsibility
and sovereignty. And I wrote him back and I said,
that's exactly right. We do preach both sovereignty
and responsibility. Utterly incapable and so weak.
Until when? Until God imputed that righteous
nature and created that nature in us by which we now have the
faith. Yet be by nature... This is all
the work of God. He was the sovereignty of God
that wrought this in us by the Holy Spirit. So we praise the
God of all grace for making us His servants. We were the servants
of sin, but praise God now we are the servants of God according,
how do you know? How do you know? According to
the faith of God's elect. Do you have the faith of God's
elect? Well, that's how you know you're his servant. You have
the faith of God's elect. Faith is the evidence. The evidence
of our position. Now, the third thing is the result
of such faith. What is the result of such faith?
Look at him in verse 1 again. It says, "...and the acknowledging
of the truth." Acknowledging the truth. Isn't that what faith
is? Faith acknowledges the truth of the gospel. And that truth,
that's what he's talking about, is the gospel. The gospel truth. You know what I acknowledge?
I acknowledge that this is the Word of God, from cover to cover,
without error. It is the infallible, God-breathed
Word. As God moved His men, they wrote
according to the Holy Spirit, and this whole book is nothing
but one gospel concerning Jesus Christ. That's all it is. This
whole book is all about the salvation of Jesus Christ. Christ is the
subject, the object, and the theme of this book, and I acknowledge
that there is only one gospel. Isn't that what Paul said? Galatians
chapter 1, he said, I marvel you are so soon moved from Him.
to another gospel which is not another." There is only one gospel. We
acknowledge this. And this acknowledgment is not
some mere acknowledgment of facts. I know that this is how false
religion puts it. They said, do you believe in
Jesus? Do you believe Jesus died for your sins? Okay, you're safe.
You just acknowledge that. You just check it, and you're
okay. No. That's not what it means. This gospel to us is more than
just acknowledgment of facts. It is an experience. It's an
experience. When I speak of total depravity,
you who know Christ have experienced your own total depravity. And when I preach Christ, I'm
not preaching some mere historical person. I am preaching someone
you know. Paul said, I know whom I have
believed. Do you know whom you have believed?
Yes. I know Him. How do you know Him?
I know Him as He is revealed in His Word. I know Him because
He resides in me, in my heart. So I know me and I know Him.
You see, I acknowledge the truth about myself. I acknowledge the
truth that Jesus Christ is the only way to God. I acknowledge
His blood alone can remove my sin. I acknowledge His righteousness
alone can clothe me before God. I acknowledge that God is Savior
and Christ is all. That's what I acknowledge, the
truth. And what is this acknowledgement of the truth, this experience
of grace? What does this yield? He said, acknowledging of the
truth which is after what? Godliness. Now listen, when a
man believes on Christ, he changes. There's a change. There's a change. Not in his flesh. The old man is still the old
man. But there is a new man. Therefore, one who acknowledges
the truth is at constant warfare with himself. Do you have any experience in
this? And yet, what is our aim? It is godliness. hope, our desire is to live what
he says in verse 12, look at, of chapter 2, he says, the grace
of God teaches us denying ungodliness and worldly lusts. Which believer
doesn't want that? I don't want ungodliness and
worldly lusts. I want to deny it with everything
in me. To live soberly, righteously,
and godly in this present world. Now how are we to do this? By
self-determination. David tried that in Psalm 39.
You can read it later. He tried. He said, I'm not going
to talk evil anymore. And he said he tried to shut
his mouth and it was like a fire burning inside that just burst
open. You can't contain that. You can't
stop that. That's not by mere determination.
How do we live soberly, righteously, and godly? Looking for that blessed
hope and the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior.
Looking to Christ. Looking to Christ. That's how
we live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present world. Now if we do this, what is going
to happen? Friends, you will be hated. You will be hated. If we preach this gospel that
we hold true, that we acknowledge as the truth, that it's the only
gospel, and there's only one Christ, you will be hated by
this world. If we will not compromise with
false religion and the whore of free will works religion,
we will be hated of all men. But what must we do? We must
stand. We must stand, not looking at
either the hatred of men or the praise of men. We should not
cease to preach the gospel of Jesus Christ. We are His servants. We are to live godly, looking
to Christ. Look at this in verse 2, "...in
hope of eternal life." in hope of eternal life, confidence of
eternal life. Do you have confidence of that? I tell you, sometimes my confidence
is very low. Sometimes we feel so faint, we
doubt and we fear that we shall fail of the grace of God. We
are so prone to sin, doubts, and fears, and unbelief, so often
we feel God should justly leave us. But we see that we all were
chosen of the Father, redeemed of the Son, called and quickened
of the Spirit. We believe on Christ have this. We have hope of eternal life.
Why? Because God that cannot lie promised
it. God promised. Our Lord says, All that the Father
giveth me shall come to me. This is the will of Him that
cometh to me. This is the will of the Father
that sent me, that of all He had given me, I should lose nothing. Not one of you servants of God
shall ever fail to reach Canaan's shore. I do not care what happens in
this life. You will not fail. Why? God promised. God swore that you would not fail. Who
is he that condemneth, as Christ hath died? Who shall separate
us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus? So, tribulation,
or famine, or peril, nakedness of sort, devils, sin? Oh, look at that. In 2 Timothy,
he said this. Let's see if I can find it. It says in 2 Timothy 2 and verse
13, if we believe not, yet he abideth faithful. He cannot deny
himself. Is that not comforting to you?
This was giving Titus encouragement and strength to fulfill his task.
He was a servant of God, like the Apostle Paul. He had the
faith of God's elect. He acknowledged the truth of
the gospel of Christ, and in hope of eternal life he had,
because God promised. When did God promise it? Before
the world began, He promised it. He promised it before we
were ever there. So it's not based on our merit. It's based solely on His promise. On His promise. Now surely if He has promised
it based on works, our gospel would be yea and nay. Maybe. Wouldn't that be the gospel if
it was based on you? Maybe. That's the gospel of false religion,
isn't it? Maybe. You might, maybe, if you're
just good enough. No, that's not our gospel. What
is our gospel? Our gospel is yea and amen in
Christ. Our Savior, our salvation is
not flexible because it is not based on anything we've done
but solely on the promise of God. And the last thing is this.
Did this hope and faith and love to Christ come to us? Verse three. But hath in due
time manifest his word, how? Through preaching. So how does
this a man who is born a servant of sin become a servant of God? Only through faith in Jesus Christ.
through the acknowledging of the gospel, but yet how should
a man believe a gospel and acknowledge the truth of it if he doesn't
hear it? This is what he's telling Titus. He says, this is why I'm
sending you, because preaching is the means God has chosen by
which to give his elect this faith, this hope, this confidence,
only through preaching the gospel. This is the manifest means that
God has chosen. This is the purpose of Titus.
This is the purpose of everyone's sin of God. I'm glad God didn't leave this
up to us to figure out how to do this. Church, false church thinks He
left it up to them. I'm not kidding when I say this,
and I want you to take this into consideration. The Southern Baptist
Church According to their academic and their curriculum writing
people, this is a quote from one of them, rough quote, but
it's the same quote nonetheless, is that there is no more need
for the preaching of the gospel, because everyone already knows
and has a Bible, they can learn it themselves. God's Word says this, Paul said, God sent me not to
baptize, but to preach the gospel. Not with wisdom of words, lest
the cross of Christ be made of none effect, for the preaching
of the cross to them that perish is foolishness. But unto us which
are saved it is the power of God, unto salvation to everyone
that believes. This one, I'll close with this.
I read this bulletin article. It was a question. It said, why
go to church? Why go to church? This man, he
was writing a newspaper article and he was complaining. And he said, why should I have
to go to church every Sunday? Been going to church for 30 years,
heard over 3,000 sermons. But he could not remember one
of them. He said, it's a waste of time
for me to go and a waste of time for the preacher to prepare it.
So he started a real argument there in that newspaper and sent
it back and forth, until one man wrote in, he says, I've been
married for 30 years. I've had 32,000 meals my wife
has cooked for me, but I cannot recall the entire menu of one
single meal. But I know this, that they all
nourished me. They all gave me strength to
do my work. without them i would be physically dead so to it is
if i had not gone to church to hear the gospel i would be dead
and have no strength to continue in the faith why go to church why hear the
gospel preach because this is the way Christ is manifest to
his people. This is the way God uses, the
means God uses to save his people. This is why we support it. This
is why we attend it. This is why it's necessary. It's
not optional for me. Now this has nothing to do with
my salvation. I already told you that. It's already done. But this is my heart. Where your treasure is. Where
will your heart be? Where's your treasure? Where's
your treasure? Who's your master? Christ. How do you know? I have the faith of God's elect.
I acknowledge the truth of the gospel and hope for eternal life
that God promised and cannot lie. Therefore, I preach the
gospel. And so should you. You should
witness this gospel to others. Pray God give you grace to do
it. Let's stand and be dismissed in prayer.