Let's take our Bibles, please,
and turn to Acts chapter 13. This is a long ways from Isaiah
6, isn't it, Curtis? He has a habit of wanting to
know what I'm going to preach on the next time I preach. He
ought to know by now. I can't give him a straight answer
because I change my mind too much. Acts chapter 13. My title this morning is Questions
of Eternal Consequence, having to do with the precious gospel
of Christ. Questions of Eternal Consequence. May we pray. Lord, we come this morning consciously seeking an audience with you that we
might lay our petitions before you, fully understanding that
we've never left your presence nor your sight. But in a conscious sense that
we approach your throne, which is a throne of grace. Lord, my problem is that it is with great difficulty that we are able to bring any good teaching or preaching
from your Word is a most difficult task. Lord, no matter what my griefs
and pains are, I know this, and I know it beyond
a shadow of a doubt, that your gospel is to be proclaimed
from human lips. It is our privilege We deserve
none of this, but you have caused us to know and understand at
least a portion of what is in our Bibles. And before we leave
this world, may we see much more made known to us. Lord, we cast ourselves at your
feet. give us whatever it is that we
need, grace and mercy, to lift up the Lord Jesus Christ, who
is the only Savior of sinners, who himself has spoken so clearly,
especially in the gospel accounts, and tells us with absolute certainty
that he came to preach the gospel to the poor, to the brokenhearted,
to sinners, to lepers, many other places and things during his
life and public life, especially in ministry. So, Lord, here we
are this morning, over 2,000 years since our Lord was on this
earth, and this world is still standing. The world's population is still
expanding at an alarming rate, but we know and we believe with
all our heart that when your last sheep is
brought into the fold, this present world has no other purpose and
it shall melt in a fervent heat. Lord, we come now to your Word,
and we pray for divine help on both ends, on the part of the
preacher and on the part of these dear hearers. Lord, if all they hear is the
voice of a man, nothing takes place. Oh, but if you speak, If you take up your own cause
in our souls, oh my, what a difference. Oh, we beg that you will. We
cast ourselves completely upon your mercy. We thank you in Christ's
name. Amen. Now, the reading passage this
morning comes from this thirteenth chapter. of the book of Acts. Now, I know you're going to say,
oh no, when I tell you where I'm going to start reading, but
it's verse 14. And there's no need for me to
tell you I ain't going to say anything, because I know I am.
I just hope it's a very limited amount. All right, we pick up
at verse 14, referring to Paul and Barnabas. who have only shortly before
this been recommended by the Church at Antioch and set aside
these two men as missionaries. And here we find them in the
synagogue in another Antioch, except this one is Antioch of
Pisidia. Just as in our own country, there
are plenty of places called Fayetteville, and there are plenty of places
called this, that, or the other. There are a blue million Bethel
Baptist churches, and on and on it goes. So this ought not
to surprise us. All right, verse 14. But when
they departed from Perga, this is Paul and Barnabas, they came
to Antioch in Pisidia. and went into the synagogue on
the Sabbath day and sat down. Now Paul and Barnabas both knew
all the rules and regulations of a Jewish synagogue, and they
complied with them. And after the reading of the
Law and the Prophets, out of the Book of Moses and out of
the Prophets every Saturday, And the rulers of the synagogue
sent unto Paul and Barnabas, saying, You men and brethren,
if you have any word of exhortation for the people, you know, speak
up. Then Paul stood up, and beckoning
with his hands said, Men of Israel, and you that fear God, give audience. The God of this people of Israel
chose our fathers and exalted the people when they dwelt as
strangers in the land of Egypt, and with an high arm brought
he them out of it. And about the time of forty years
he suffered their manners in the wilderness, and when he had
destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan, Now here again,
the New Testament spells a lot of
things differently than the Old, and I just stick with the Old
for some reason. I just think it's better. He divided their land to them
by lot according to the twelve tribes of Israel. And after that,
he gave unto them judges for about the space of four hundred
and fifty years, until Samuel the puppet. And afterward, they
desired a king, and God gave to them Saul, the son of Kish. In the Old Testament, it has
a K there. A man of the tribe of Benjamin,
and his reign lasted forty years. And when he had removed him,
when God had removed Saul, he raised up unto them David to
be their king. To whom also he gave testimony
and said, I have found David the son of Jesse, a man after
my own heart, which shall fulfill all my will. Of this man's seed
has God, according to his promise, raised unto Israel a Savior,
namely the Lord Jesus Christ, when John had first preached
before Christ's coming the baptism of repentance to all the people
of Israel. And as John fulfilled his course,
he said, Whom think you that I am? I am not he, I am not the
Messiah. But behold, there comes one after
me, whose shoes of his feet I am not worthy to loose. Men and
brethren, children of the stock of Abraham, and whosoever among
you fears God, to you is the word of this salvation sent. They that dwell at Jerusalem
and their rulers, because they knew Christ not, and did not
want to know him, by the way, nor yet the voices of the prophets
which are read every Sabbath day, they have fulfilled them,
what the prophets had prophesied concerning the death of the Lord
Jesus. You have fulfilled them. in condemning Christ. Now verse
28. And though they found no cause
of death in him, yet desired they Pilate that he should be
slain. And when they had fulfilled all
that was written of him, everything prophesied concerning Christ
and his death had to take place. They took him down from the tree
and laid him in a grave, but God raised him from the dead."
Now, you understand that probably 90% of Paul's hearers were Orthodox
Jews, and they hated the Lord Jesus with a purple passion. Where was I, verse 31? 30. But God raised him from the dead,
and he was seen many days of them which came up with him from
Galilee to Jerusalem, who are his witnesses unto the people. And we declare unto you glad
tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers
God has fulfilled the same unto us, their children, in that he
has raised up Jesus again, as it is also written in the second
psalm, You are my Son, this is the Lord God Jehovah speaking
to the Lord Jesus Christ, You are my Son, this day have I begotten
you. And as concerning that he raised
him up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption,
he said on this wise, I'll give you the sure mercies of David. Wherefore, he said also in another
psalm, you shall not suffer your Holy One to seek corruption. That is, God will not allow God
the Son in his human nature to rot. He must be raised from the
dead by the third day. And plenty of people argue this
point and so forth, but to me it's as plain as it can possibly
be. You shall not suffer your Holy
One to seek corruption. For David, after he had served
his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was
laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption. So the statement
we read there, which was also a statement of David's, that
God will not suffer your Holy One to see corruption, these
Jews would say, well, David's talking about himself. No, no,
he's not. He's talking about the Messiah.
Verse 38, Be it known unto you therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man, Christ Jesus, this
God-man, is preached unto you the full,
free forgiveness of sin. And by him, by Christ, all that
believe, not a single exception, all that believe, are justified
from all things from which you could not be justified, how? By the law of Moses. Now to these
people, to these Jews especially, Moses was everything. All their
hopes are tied to him. Beware therefore, lest that come
upon you which is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, you despisers,
and wander and perish. For I work a work in your days,
a work which you shall in no wise believe, though a man declare
it unto you. And when the Jews were gone out
of the synagogues, the Gentiles besought Paul and Barnabas that
these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now,
when the congregation was broken up, many of the Jews and religious
proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas. That is amazing. Who, speaking to them, persuaded
them to continue in the grace of God. And the next Sabbath
day came almost the whole city together to hear the word of
God. But when the Jews saw the multitudes,
they were filled with envy and spoke against those things which
were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Then Paul and
Barnabas waxed bold and said to these dissenting Jews, it
was necessary that the word of God should have been spoken to
you, but seeing you put it from you and judged yourselves unworthy
of everlasting life, lo, return to the Gentiles. Paul already
knew that he was designated the apostle to the Gentiles, just
as Peter was designated the apostle to the Jews. Verse 47, For so
has the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set you to be a light
of the Gentiles, that you should be for salvation unto the ends
of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord, and as
many as were ordained to eternal life, And that's still the rule. That's still how it is. If God chose you from old eternity,
you're coming to his Son. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believe. Now you understand that these
people who believe are no more willing in themselves to believe
than people who don't believe. But it is God who must work a
miracle of grace in our soul before we can ever come to Christ.
We must be born again before we can believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. And then verse 49, And the word
of the Lord was published throughout all the region. And it's still being published.
It's still being published. All right, let's get to these
questions. Now, I'm going to ask you to
turn, but I probably can beat you there. because I've got some
markers in my Bible, so you're welcome to turn. I want to go
to Galatians chapter 1, verses 10 through 12. And here's the question that
I want to address to us, questions of eternal consequence, of We're talking about eternity.
Of necessity, it must be questions about Christ in the gospel. Here's
the first one. Where did this gospel come from? All right, did you find Galatians
1 verse 10? For do I now persuade men, or
God? Or do I seek to please men, for
if I still pleased men? Do you catch this? Paul was admitting
that before Christ met him on the road to Damascus, he did
things in his religion to please people, and himself being one of them. I still pleased men. I should
not or could not be the servant of Christ. But I certify you,
brethren, that the gospel which was preached of me is not after
man, for I neither received it of man, neither was I taught
it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." That, my friends,
is a statement concerning God's gospel of Christ. Here are some
other ways in our Bibles that these things are related to us. This gospel could not have originated
with us, and here are several reasons why. Number one, it's
called in Revelation chapter 14 and verse 6, this gospel is
called what kind of gospel? the everlasting gospel, then
it can't be of man's providing. Without Christ, we ain't going
to last forever. Secondly, this gospel never changes. It never changes. And just like
the one whom it proclaims, our Lord has said in Hebrews 13 to
be the same yesterday, today, and forever. Another reason that this gospel
could not originate with us or anyone else, the gospel itself
is intended to kill human pride. And that ain't no small undertaking. Next, this gospel is opposed
to human merit, or works, or whatever you want to call it.
Today's religion would die on the stalk if they couldn't browbeat
people and make them work harder so God can reward them a great
deal more, and so forth and so on. If you told them the real
gospel, they'd have a revolution. I know, I've been in there and
I haven't had opportunity to say that to some folks many years
ago. This gospel makes no exceptions. It only saves sinners. It never
saves good people because there ain't no such person. It is designed, according to
1 Timothy 1.15, this is a faithful saying worthy of all acceptation,
that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom
I am chief, the chief of sinners. And so we are. Second question,
what defines this gospel? Here in verses 38 and 39 in our
passage in the book of Acts, Let me just read 38 one more
time to you. Be it known unto you therefore,
men and brethren, this is Acts 13, 38, that through this man,
referring to Christ, who is not only man, but he is the God-man,
this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. The
gospel is designed to address the subject of our sins. Since
we cannot put them away and we cannot stop sinning, this is
the only gospel that will do us any good. It is full, free forgiveness. Complete justification. The gospel is often spoken of
as having to do with three words that begin with S. And the first
one is substitution. When our Lord came to this earth, became an infant, born to the
Virgin Mary, and stayed in this world some
thirty-three years and maybe a few months, why did he do this? Why didn't
he just come as a full-grown man and go straight to the cross?
Because there's something else involved. He must be his people's
substitute. In his perfect obedience to the
law and justice of God, Christ earned for his people a perfect
righteousness. And without that righteous garment
on, we can't make it to heaven, just like the people in that
parable. about Matthew 22 or somewhere like that. All right,
third question having to do with these questions of eternal consequence. What is it to believe this gospel? Now, I'm going to the book of
John, chapter 20, which is almost the end of John's gospel. But
there's a statement here that is of great importance. It's amazing how statements like
this were in the Bible, I started to say a hundred years before
I ever believed them, but it wasn't quite that long. The last
verse in the twentieth chapter of the Gospel of John. What defines,
no, what is it to believe this gospel? Here it is. Referring
to the gospel that he John almost has two endings, and here's the
first one, verse 31. But these are written, what I've
written in the previous chapters of this book and in the previous
part of this chapter, these are written that you might believe
that Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of God, and
that believing, believing, you might have life in His name,
through His name. Saving faith has but one object,
and that object is Christ alone. The Lord Jesus is the sinner's
God. He is a man, therefore able to
die for men. I can't quote you the verse right
off, but I think it's in Hebrews chapter 2, where the statement
is made in reference to Christ. He took not on him the nature
of angels. How many angels fell? A third
of all the hosts in heaven? There was plenty of angels that
needed a Savior, but it didn't happen. But Christ The passage
goes on to read, Christ took on himself the nature of Abraham. That was a revealing day when
Christ was born an infant. And it's a little baby, but it
will be a grown man. Therefore, he's able to stand
in our room and place, and we call that, guess what? Substitution. Substitution. The second one
is satisfaction. So when our Lord lived in this
life, in this world, He met every requirement of an adult under
the Jewish law of the Old Testament. He kept the law of God perfectly. The only way He could do this
is because His humanity did not come from Adam. Everybody who
gets their nature from Adam, be it man, woman, boy or girl,
we're sinners. Christ had no sin of his own. He's our righteousness, our justifier,
our mediator, our sacrifice, our altar, our high priest. This
thing I'm standing on up here ain't no altar. The only time it's worthwhile
to be in this building is when God is meeting with His people. After that, it's just a building. Fourth question. How can we know that this gospel
is meant for us? How do we know this? That it's
meant for us? Let me try to answer that question. I appeal to Acts 13 again. If you remember this statement
by our Savior in John's Gospel, we'll not turn to that. I think
I can remember it. He said, the words that I speak
unto you, they are spirit and they are life. Therefore, he
can stand outside Lazarus' grave and tell a dead man to get up
and walk and live, and he did. All of these examples of Christ
healing the physical body are meant to be pictures to set before
us what He does for us in our soul. Verse 48, Acts 13, just the last
part of it, and as many as were ordained to eternal life, We are to preach this gospel
to everybody, making no exceptions. Today's trend is to take the
gospel to college students or to athletes or professional athletes. You can't find that in this book.
And you don't have a clue as to where God's sheep are, and
neither do I. But I know in this place there
are some. I know that for sure. The words that I speak unto you,
they are spirit and they are life. One of the first words out of
our Savior's lips as he began his public life and ministry
is this statement, repent and believe the gospel. You can find
that in Mark chapter 1 verse 15. Secondly, it is God's command
that we believe. This is found in 1 John 3, verse
23, in which we are commanded to believe on God's Son, the
Lord Jesus Christ. We are to preach the gospel without
distinction to every creature. No barrier of any kind. can hinder
this gospel. And the fourth reason that we
can know that this gospel is meant for us is if you can answer
the affirmative when I say, Are we sinners? And if you know anything at all,
you have to say, Yes, and I'm the chief of sinners. I'm sure I got these words that
I'm fixing to mention to you from Brother Mahan at some point
in time, though this is my own sorry writing
on this sheet of paper. How do we know that when we preach,
that what we preach and believe is the true gospel of God? Give us some ways to know if
this is right, and if the other man's gospel is right or wrong. Here's the first one. I can hear Brother Mahan saying
these words. Does it give God all the glory? Or is some of it put on the sinner? Making him king for the day. Just fawning and pawning over
visitors. And I tell you, that is not right. David said in Psalm 115, Not unto us, O Lord, but to your
name give glory. And that ought to be our motto.
Second reason that we know that what we preach is the true gospel
is because it enables God to be just, to be righteous, to
be holy, and still justify the ungodly. Christ died for the
ungodly, not the godly. He makes those for whom he died
in grace become godly, but they ain't godly when he finds them. Thirdly, it is the only gospel
able to save real sinners. The rest of it is just a sham,
just a sham. And the fifth reason that we
know is because it is true to the scriptures. You can find
it in all parts of this Bible, old and New Testament alike. Now I've got one more question. We've got enough time. Let's
turn to the book of Ecclesiastes. Here's the question. What are
the privileges of believing this gospel? Chapter 3 in Ecclesiastes, verse 14. I actually had that verse written
down in my notes, but I wanted you to see this in your own Bibles.
I know that whatsoever God does, it is forever. It's not temporary. It's not half-baked. It's forever. That's a long time. Nothing can be put to it, nor anything taken from it. And God does it that men should
fear before Him. Bless His holy name. This is our safety and our security. It is our rest and our peace. If God does it, It will last
forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. It's endless. It's timeless. It's glorious.