Turn with me to 2 Timothy chapter
2. 2 Timothy chapter 2. The last time
we were here, we looked at the first seven verses as a whole. I mentioned to you that we could
have a message from each verse individually, but we looked at,
um, that portion as a whole. And I wanted to do that again
with verses eight through 10. Uh, that was my intention. I set out to look at those three
verses, but I didn't make it past verse eight. Um, so I'm
going to split them up between the Bible study in the morning
message. But let's read all three of them,
all right? Verses eight through 10, 2 Timothy 2, verse eight.
He said, remember that Jesus Christ of the seed of David was
raised from the dead according to my gospel, wherein I suffer
trouble as an evildoer, even unto bonds. but the word of God
is not bound. Therefore, I endure all things
for the elect's sake that they may also obtain the salvation
which is in Christ Jesus with eternal glory. In those first
three verses, he mentions man's sin, He mentions the Father's election. This is what he mentioned, depravity.
And then he mentioned election. He mentioned Christ Jesus, the
Son's redemption, the Spirit's quickening call, and the eternal
glory that awaits all of God's people. He laid out the doctrine. That's what he did. He laid out
the doctrine. The doctrine of Scripture. Do you know that our doctrine
is the doctrine of Scripture? That's the reason why our doctrine
is our doctrine. It's because that's the doctrine
that the Scripture has laid out. The doctrine of Christ, it's
called. The doctrine. But this is what
he related to us in those three verses, and mainly in verse eight,
and this is what I got hung up on, all right? This is what he
related to us. This was more than a doctrine
to him. This was more than a doctrine
to him. Verse eight, he said, remember, that Jesus Christ of the seed
of David was raised from the dead according to my gospel. My gospel. Paul said, this is
not just a doctrine to me. This is not just a doctrine to
me. This is my gospel. My good news, my glad tidings. It's not just a gospel. It's not just the gospel. He said, it's my gospel. It's my gospel. Now, I have something
this morning that I am very burdened about. I have been burdened about
this for a long time, and I will be for a long time to come. And there are some things that
I really want to preach, and they are dealt with in 2 Timothy,
and I'm going to wait until we get to those verses that deal
with it. But I am so, so burdened and I wish I could convey it, but
I can't. And that's not a figure of speech.
I can't, I cannot convey it. It is going to take the spirit
of God to convey it. If it gets conveyed, God's spirit
is going to have to take the things of God and open them up
to us. But what I want to do is I want
to ask you to, in your heart, I'll give you a brief moment,
you cry out to the Lord in prayer and ask him to make this clear
to all of us. Ask the Lord to speak to us,
ask the Lord to teach us what this means. I want so badly to
cling to this and to get this across in a way that would make
all of us cling to this. If I could, if I could, oh man, I would, if I had the ability
to impart this knowledge, I would. Whatever
this means, whatever it is that I'm not able to convey, all right?
So just really ask the Lord to help you dial in with me here. Paul said, this is my gospel. This is my gospel, all right?
My means ownership. That's what it means, ownership. My means belonging to me. Associated with me. That's the definition of my. It is possessive. It is jealously possessive. My. Think about those kids in
the nursery, all right? When sin rages and, you know,
they're playing with something and another kid wants to come
take it from them, they're like, no, it's mine. All right, it's
jealously possessive. Oh, that God would make thee
gospel. to be our gospel, my gospel. Our teenagers, our
young children here, oh, that God would make their parents'
gospel to be their gospel. Does that
make sense? And all of us, young people,
teenagers, you know, young adults, middle-aged adults, elderly adults,
not just my pastor's gospel, not just my church's gospel, not just my family's gospel,
and you understand what I mean. It's kind of like, well, this
is what our family believes. Yeah, I mean, this is just, I
mean, what are y'all? Well, we're this, you know, this
is what we are, I don't know. What denomination are you? We're
sovereign greats, why? I don't know. My gospel. My gospel. I wanna encourage everyone here
to treat the gospel like it's your gospel. What does that mean? I'm not 100% sure. I don't know
exactly how to convey this. Treat it like it's your responsibility. Not someone else's responsibility. Not the pastor's responsibility. Well, that's the pastor's responsibility.
Not just the men and women in the church who kind of take care
of things and generally make the decisions about things, you
know, say, well, I'm not usually not in on that circle. That's
them. No, this is not anybody else's
gospel. This is my gospel. And I'm not willing to just leave
it in the hands of anybody else. What are you getting at, Gabe?
Isn't this God's gospel? Isn't it in His hands? Yes, it
is. The whole disposal is of the
Lord. Isn't the whole disposal of the
Lord? Yes, it is. But it has still pleased Him
to cast the lot into the lap of His people. Now, Let me see if I can try
to relate this in a way where we can really enter into it.
I thought about a lot of examples and illustrations. This was the
only one that I could think of that really honestly did convey
what I'm trying to get across. God gave me a wife. Okay. She is in God's hands. But he still gave her to me.
He gave her to me. She is not a wife. She is not
the wife. You know, some men talk about
the wife. All right. She's not a wife.
She's not the wife. She's my wife. Does this make
sense? She's my wife. And therefore,
I am not willing to just place her in the hands of another man.
She's mine. I'm not willing to neglect her
or trust her safekeeping to anybody else. Yeah, go on, honey. She's
mine. I'm looking around the room here.
I see a lot of women who are a wife. You know, you are the wife of
him. Okay? I am perfectly fine. I mean it
in my heart. I am happy to entrust you into
the hands of him, and you into the hands of him, and you into
the hands of him. Because you're his wife. But
not my wife. Not my wife. I'm jealous over her. I'm jealous over her. She's mine. I hope this is making sense.
May God teach us the difference here. May he cause the gospel to become my gospel, my gospel
to guard and protect. Well, the pastor, he'll guard
it, he'll protect it. No, this is my gospel. It's my gospel to guard and to
protect. This is my gospel to adorn and
beautify. May God give us a heart to desire
it, to need it. Can't live without it. Can't
live without it. Can't let anybody take it from
me. Are you willing to let anybody
take your wife from you? No, no, can't live without her. This is mine. This is mine. May God make the gospel to become
my gospel. All right. If he does, then,
then what is my gospel? If it's mine, what is it? What
is our gospel? Verse eight. Remember that Jesus
Christ of the seed of David was raised from the dead. He said, remember, number one,
God was manifest in the flesh of the seed of David. Jesus Christ, the Messiah, the
anointed one, he was manifest in the flesh. Jesus Christ was
made to be of the seed of David, made of a woman, made under the
law. God became a man. God became
a man. And God did that so he could
bear the sins of men. Why did God become a man? Here's
why. It was so he could bear the sins
of men. God became a man so he could
bear the sins of men. God became a man so he could
obey God's law as a man. God became a man so he could
earn a righteousness before God as a man. God became a man so he could
provide a substitute for his people, a substitute to live
for his people as a man, a substitute to die for his people as a man. My gospel is everything that
my Savior did for me. He's not just the Savior. He's
my Savior. He's mine. He's the one who lived
on this earth and satisfied God in his life. He died on this
earth and satisfied God in his death. He arose on this earth
and satisfied God in his resurrection. Living, he loved me. Dying, He
saved me. Buried, He carried my sins far
away. Rising, He justified me freely
forever. One day He's coming for me. And
I can't wait. Oh, glorious day. That's our
gospel. That is our gospel. May God give
us a heart to lay hold of it. That's what I want to convey. If any man here has a heart to
lay hold of his wife, May God give us the same heart
for the gospel as the bride of the husband. May God give us a heart to keep
it. May God give us a heart to keep
near to it, keep near to it. to desire to be with it, to gather
together around it, to stand with it, to defend it, to glorify
it, to honor it, to cherish it from this day forward, never
depart. If he does not give us this heart,
it will evidence the fact that the gospel never was my gospel. That's so. And so if he doesn't
give us this heart, that will be the evidence that the gospel
never was my gospel. That's a fearful thing to hear.
That's a fearful thing to think about, but that fear is the beginning
of wisdom. All of God's people will be scared
up next to Christ and his gospel. Go over with me to 1 John 2.
1 John 2 verse 19, it says, they went out from us, and he's
not talking about their local assembly. You know, they left
our local assembly and went to another assembly of believers
who believed the same. That's not what he's talking
about. They went out from this gospel from this declaration.
They went out from us, but they were not of us. Can a man truly
believe on Christ and then lose that faith and lose his salvation
and mess up so bad that God finally says, nevermind? Is that a possibility? No. No. Verse 19, they went out
from us, but they were not of us. For if they had been of us,
they no doubt would have continued with us. But they went out that
they might be made manifest that they were not all of us. What he's saying is they walked
away. Because the gospel never was
their gospel. It never was. And this is what
I'm so burdened about. Number one, I cannot assume that
I'm saved. I need to cry out to God for
mercy. Just put a fence up right here
and let me cry out for myself first. And then every other person here
after me. It just pains me to think about
any person here, hearing this gospel, nodding their head to
the gospel, believing in the heart, yep, I think that's right,
I think they're wrong, I think this is right, and then walk
away. and go off and do some insignificant
thing for about the next 30, 40 years, and then go meet God,
and boom, I didn't have it after all. It wasn't mine after all. The Apostle Paul said, one of
my greatest fears is after I've preached to you, I should find
myself to be a castaway. If God ever makes the gospel
to be our gospel, based on the promise of his word, we won't
walk away from it. We can't. Try. Try to walk away
from this gospel. If God has given you a heart
for it, you just can't. We won't neglect it. We won't neglect it. We just
won't. You know, I want to be with my
wife every day. You know that? I really do. I
want to be with her every day. And that's how it is when the
gospel becomes my gospel. I want to be with it every day. We won't neglect it. We won't
deny it. We won't dishonor it. And the
reason is because we're being kept by the power of God. That's
the reason why. If God ever makes the gospel
to be our gospel, we will be kept by the power of God. He
will keep us united to it. He'll keep us one with it. He'll
keep us in love with it. He'll keep our hearts crying,
this is life to me. This is air to me. He'll keep us needing it, desiring
it, not willing to part with it for anybody or anything. If God creates that true union,
it'll be forever. I pray God will make that to
be the case. I pray God will teach us what
this means. I pray God will create this true union in all of us
that falls in love with the gospel
of his dear son, the gospel. May the cross no longer just
be the cross. May God make it to be my cross.
That right there is my cross. It's appointed unto man once
to die and may that be the place where I died in him, with him. May God make the cross to be
my cross. My Lord hanging on it. My salvation. Redemption's blood shed on my
sins. I got two minutes. Go over with
me to John 20. We'll close with this. Go to
John 20. John 20 verse 19, then the same
day at evening, being the first day of the week, when the doors
were shut, where the disciples were assembled for fear of the
Jews, came Jesus and stood in the midst and said unto them,
peace be unto you. And again, this is after his
resurrection, he appeared to his disciples. Verse 20, and
when he had so said, he showed unto them his hands and his side,
then were the disciples glad when they saw the Lord. Then
said Jesus to them again, peace be unto you, as my father hath
sent me, even so send I you. And when he had said this, he
breathed on them and said unto them, receive ye the Holy Ghost. Whosoever sins you remit, they
are remitted unto them, and whosoever sins you retain, they are retained. But Thomas, one of the 12 called
Didymus, was not with them when Jesus came. How sad. How unfortunate, how sorry for
him. Verse 25, the other disciples
therefore said unto him, we have seen the Lord, but he said unto
them, except I shall see in his hands the print of the nails
and put my finger into the print of the nails and thrust my hand
into his side, I will not believe. And after eight days again, I
thought about that. That's long enough for them to
think, well, that was a one-time visit. Eight days is a long time. After eight days again, his disciples
were within and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the doors being
shut and stood in the midst and said, peace be unto you. Then
saith he to Thomas, Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands,
and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side, and be
not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said
unto him, My Lord and my God. My Lord and my God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas,
thou hast Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed. Blessed
are they that have not seen and yet have believed. And many other
signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which
are not written in this book. But these are written that you
might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that
believing you might have life through his name. My Lord and
my God, Lord, unite Christ with us. Unite the gospel of his cross
with us. For Christ's sake, make him to
be mine. I pray so, amen. Mine and yours
too, amen.