Kingsport Sovereign Grace Church,
located at 905 Yadkin Street in Kingsport, Tennessee, would
like to invite you to listen to a message of sovereign grace
by their pastor, Gabe Stoniker. And now, Pastor Gabe Stoniker. I invite you to turn with me
this morning to Revelation chapter 22. Our text is specifically
the end of verse 17, but I want us to begin by looking at the
final statements of our Lord's book, what He has chosen to be
the last words of His book. Now, Revelation 1.1 says, the
revelation of Jesus Christ. This is all about Jesus Christ. It's not about Armageddon. This
is all about Jesus Christ. And he says here in chapter 22,
verse 13, I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the
first and the last. Blessed are they that do His
commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and
may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are
dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters,
and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. I, Jesus, have sent mine
angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am
the root and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning
star. And the Spirit and the bride
say, Come. And let him that heareth say,
Come. And let him that is athirst come. and whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. For I testify unto every man
that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, if any
man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues
that are written in this book. And if any man shall take away
from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take
away his part out of the Book of Life and out of the Holy City
and from the things which are written in this Book. He which
testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with you all. Amen. In verse 13, he makes himself
very clear, doesn't he? Just in case we didn't catch
it, he says the same thing three different ways. He says, I am
Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the
last. Blessed are they that do his
commandments that they may have right to the tree of life and
may enter in through the gates into the city. Now he began his
book in Genesis with the tree of life. That's the issue. That's the issue of this book.
There were two particular trees in the garden. The tree of life,
which man had access to, and the tree of the knowledge of
good and evil, which the Lord said, don't touch, don't touch
it. And when man touched it, he lost
access to the tree of life. Our Lord began His book with
the tree of life, He ends His book with the tree of life. And
everything in between is about how man can regain access to
this tree of life. And that tree is Christ. In verse
14, He said, Blessed are they that do His commandments, that
they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through
the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers,
and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever
loveth and maketh a lie." And in verse 16, he said, I, Jesus, I, Jesus, have sent mine angel
He means the preacher. I, Jesus, have sent mine angel
to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am the root
and the offspring of David, and the bright and morning star. He said, I'm the root of David. I was way before David. I was way before anything. I'm God." That's what he's saying. I'm the root. He said, and the
offspring. I'm the son of David. I'm man. I am God. I am man. And then he said, I am the bright
star. I'm that burning high noon sun. I'm the judge of this earth.
And I am the morning star. I'm the son of righteousness
with healing in his wings, the redeemer, the life giver, the
comforter. I'm all, I'm all these things.
Verse 17, he said, And the Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say,
Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. The Spirit of God says to his
own, Come. And the bride of Christ says
to her own, Come. And let him that heareth right
now, today, say, Come. And let him that is athirst,
anybody who's thirsty, Come. And whosoever will, Let him take
the water of life freely. Verse 18 says, For I testify. Jesus Christ testifies. He says, I'm the one testifying
unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this
book. If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto
him the plagues that are written in this book. And if any man
shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy,
God shall take away his part out of the book of life and out
of the holy city and from the things which are written in this
book. He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with you all. Amen. Life and death is the issue
of this book. The words he has written in this
book are the standard. They are the line drawn in the
sand. And he says, if any man adds
anything to these words, or if any man takes anything away from
the words of this book, it's death for that man. So I want
to carefully, carefully read verse 17, our text. It says, And the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say,
Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, whosoever
will, let him take the water of life freely. And if you have your Bibles open,
notice what's after the word freely. It's a period. I don't want to add one of my
own words to that. Whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. I don't want to add one of my
own words to that. I also don't want to leave out
one of God's words concerning that either. So let's look at
what the Lord God has to say about this verse. Whosoever will,
let him take the water of life freely. Our title and our subject
this morning is Whosoever Will. Do you know what that word whosoever
means? It means our gospel doesn't exclude
anybody. There's nobody that this gospel
is not for. Nobody. Well, I thought only
God's elect would be saved. That's right. Only God's elect
will, but whosoever will. Let Him take the water of life
freely. Our Lord said, Preach this gospel
to all the world, every creature. This gospel is for male, it's
for female, old and young, red, yellow, black and white. The
rich is for the poor. It's for the wise, is for the
simple. This gospel is for kings and
it's for servants. This gospel is even for sinners,
whosoever. I can't remember what queen it
was. It was some queen somewhere sometime said, I'm so thankful
for the letter M. She said, the Lord didn't say,
not any noble are called. He said, not many. So she said,
there's hope for me. Whosoever. A man walked into
his pastor study one time and he said, pastor, did you hear
about old so-and-so? And the pastor said, no, I didn't. And the man said, the Lord saved
him. The pastor said, Really? Yep, the Lord saved him. He said,
I'll never despair of anybody now that the Lord saved him.
And the pastor said, I'll never despair of anybody since the
Lord saved me. Anybody. Whosoever. Whosoever will. Turn with me
over to Matthew chapter 21 if you have your Bibles open. Matthew
chapter 21, let's read verse 44. It says, Whosoever shall fall
on this stone shall be broken, but on whomsoever it shall fall
it will grind him to powder. The only hope I have of being
accepted into glory is if the Lord Jesus Christ, the chief
cornerstone, breaks me, breaks my hard, stony heart. I need to be broken. Well, it
says, whosoever shall fall on this stone for mercy, shall be
broken whosoever." All right, now turn with me to John chapter
3. John chapter 3 verse 14 says
this, And 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 eternal
life. For God so loved the world that
He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him
should not perish, but have everlasting life." Does that mean that everybody
is going to be saved? No. No, it doesn't. Because verse 18 right here says,
"...he that believeth on Him is not condemned, But he that
believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed
in the name of the only begotten Son of God." But here's His Word,
and I don't want to add anything to it. I don't want to take anything
from it. Whosoever believeth in Him will
not perish. and will have eternal life. That's
what he said. Now turn with me to Acts chapter
2. Acts chapter 2, let's read verse
21 together. It says, And it shall come to
pass that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall
be saved. Whosoever shall call on the name
of the Lord shall be saved." Do you think there's a chance
that our Lord didn't mean what he wrote? Let me ask you this. Have you done anything more for
salvation than just call on the name of the Lord? Have you added
any work to that? Have you done anything more than
just call on the name of the Lord? Our Lord does not write
with guile. He doesn't write with trickery.
You say, well, He preached in parables. Yes, but those parables
said exactly what He meant. He means everything He says.
Now, if I don't understand what He means, that's my problem.
But these are his words, whosoever shall call on the name of the
Lord shall be saved. All right, now let me give you
one more. 1 John chapter 4 verse 15 says this, whosoever shall confess that
Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him and he in God. That's the truth. That is the
truth. Whether I fully understand what
he means by that or not, that is the truth. Now, let's continue
with truth, okay? Our text in Revelation 22 says,
Whosoever will. Whosoever will. A person's will is the beginning
or the root of his actions. A person's will. It determines
what a person is going to do or not do. If a person is disciplined
to control himself and restrain himself, we say he has willpower. You know, I'm not going to eat
that. Well, you must have willpower. If a person is hard-headed and
stubborn as a mule and he wants everything done his way, we say
that man is strong-willed. Our will is our nature. It's who we are. Look at a sheep. He's tame. You can pet him. He'll eat grass. He'll come when
the shepherd calls him. Now look at a wolf. He will not
be petted. He will not eat grass. He hears the call, but he will
not come. Our will is our nature. Now let's look at the truth about
our will. Turn with me to John chapter
5. John chapter 5 verse 40. Our Lord says this, You will
not come to me that you might have life. You will not come to me that
you might have life. What? What? What do you mean I won't
come? It is not mental inability, mental
understanding, it's not mental inability that keeps a person
from coming to Christ. A person can study this Bible
just like they study any other book. We have some smart people
in this world. We can pray to God just as easily
as we can curse God. We can believe that Jesus Christ
died on this cross just as easily as we can believe that Columbus
discovered America. Man's inability to savingly come
to Christ is not in his body or his mind, it's in his nature. When Adam fell, I fell. My will fell. My nature fell. And now my flesh is so depraved,
it's so corrupt, I by nature love and crave everything that
is contrary to God. And he says in John 5 verse 40,
you will not come to me that you might have life. In verse
42 he said, but I know you that you have not the love of God
in you. Well, that's not true. So now
I'm calling God a liar. He said, I know you, that you
have not the love of God in you. Verse 43, he said, I am come
in my father's name and you receive me not. If another shall come
in his own name, him you will receive. Verse 44, he said, How
can you believe which receive honor one of another, and seek
not the honor that cometh from God only? You do not honor the
Son as God said to. You do not, by nature, honor
Him as God Himself. And he said, You don't believe
the Word of God. Verse 46, For had you believed Moses, you would
have believed me, for he wrote of me. But if you believe not
his writings, how shall you believe my words? These words are the
line in the sand. And the Word of God says there's
a problem with our will. Do we believe it? We know no
man can come. The nail in the coffin is, even
if he could, no man would. You will not. You know, this
message, it started out so positive, didn't it? And now it feels like
I don't have any hope. I will not. Left to myself, I
don't have any hope. But do you know what this Word
says to give us a little hope? Do you know what this Word says?
Turn with me over to Romans 9. Verse 16 says, So then it is
not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God
that showeth mercy. That is the Gospel. It is not
of him that willeth, I will not. The good news is, it's not of
him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that
showeth mercy. He said, I will, that where I
am, they may be also. Turn with me over to Philippians
chapter 2. Verse 13 says, For it is God which worketh in you,
both to will and to do of his good pleasure. It's God which
worketh in you to will. He said, Father, the work which
thou gavest me to do, I finished it. I took out their heart of
stone, and I put in a heart of flesh. I put my Spirit in them,
and I now live in them, and that has given them a brand new nature. My nature. A nature that loves
God, because I am love and I am God. A nature that loves God's
Word, every single word of it, because I am the Word. A nature
that loves God's glory, a nature that loves God's people. And
now because of this new nature, all that the Father giveth me
shall come to me. Father, because of my work, now
thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power. That's
what this word says. Nothing added to it, nothing
taken from it. Now here's the gospel truth.
Whosoever evidences His work, whosoever will, whosoever wants
Christ so badly, whosoever needs Christ and Christ alone, whosoever
will bow Whosoever acknowledges, I have no will, I have no say,
I have no ability, no right, whosoever acknowledges the fact
that salvation is of His own will, and if I receive it, I
did nothing for it, I did nothing to deserve it, it was just given
to me, our text says, freely, period. Whosoever will bow to
His Word, let him take the water of life. Whosoever will have
it to be so, has already tasted the water of life. Because if
you will, it is God who has already worked in you. I hope that I
am a whosoever, don't you? I hope that I am one of His whosoevers, whosoever He will. All of His
chosen whosoevers will. They will. They will, by His
mercy and grace and work, take the water of life freely. Until next Sunday morning, may
the Lord bless His word. You have been listening to a
message by Gabe Stoniker, pastor of Kingsport Sovereign Grace
Church in Kingsport, Tennessee. If you would like a copy of this
message or to hear other messages of Sovereign Grace, you can write
to our physical mailing address at 905 Yadkin Street, Kingsport,
Tennessee 37660 or log on to our website at kingsportsovereigngracechurch.com. If you would like to come and
worship with us, our service times are Sunday morning Bible
study at 10 o'clock a.m., worship at 10.45 a.m., and 6 o'clock
p.m. Wednesday evening at 7.30 p.m. Please tune in next Sunday morning
at 8.30 for another message of God's free and sovereign grace.