If you're going to hug someone,
be the last to let go. It's so good to be here. I've
been so blessed by the word that's been preached from this pulpit
this time. It's been so good. And I have
to say, it's been a pleasure to be in your pastor's home. these dear, dear folks. Good to see each one. I know of only one preacher that
ever preached a message. That first of all, that message
wasn't for that preacher. And that's Christ. Every other message ever preached
by a preacher, a gospel preacher, was for that gospel preacher
first. And most of the time, we never get it all out. I don't know how many times I've
gone over to our home after services, I miss that point. Well, next Sunday comes around
or next Wednesday. Would you join me tonight for
a very short reading in the book of Romans chapter 7. Romans chapter
7, I'd like to read the last two verses of Romans chapter
7 and then verse 1 of Romans chapter 8. Romans chapter 7,
we get to hear the Apostle Paul as he truly, no doubt, felt about
himself and yet the Holy Spirit, by inspiration, as Paul wrote
to the Romans, as this man of God wants a Pharisee, wants a
very angry, angry religious individual, one time He was a man that hated
everything that God absolutely stood for. He was very highly
religious, but he hated every gospel thought and every gospel
message and every gospel preacher, and he did his dead-level best
to get rid of everybody that had been influenced by those
gospel preachers. On the way to Damascus one time,
God stopped him. And he was not going down there
for a prayer meeting. He was going down there for much
more serious business with our brothers and sisters in Christ.
God stopped him on that way. And God revealed unto him, Jesus
Christ the Lord. And the words that came out of
his mouth is, Lord. And I love it. He was so different. God worked a work of grace. Well,
all through his life he dealt with this. Oh, wretched man that I am. I was told one time that was
talking about himself before the Lord saved him. No. This
is him. Closer towards the end of his
life. He said, this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation
that Jesus Christ came to die for sinners on whom I am chief.
Here in the book of Romans, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver
me from the body of this death? I thank God through Jesus Christ
our Lord, so then with the mind I myself serve the law of God,
but with the flesh the law of sin. Now let's just scratch out
that chapter 8 note that's right there and read the next verse. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the Spirit. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus. Now I want to say this about
that thought of being in Christ. To be in Christ means many things. But I would like to look at just
a few of them tonight in preparation for moving over to the book of
1 Corinthians. First of all, when we read that
about the Apostle Paul, or we read that about any believer,
to be in Christ Jesus means that God sent His Word to us. I cannot stress it enough that
God's Word must be brought to us in some capacity. We must
hear the Word of God and not just some pablum that the religious
world has to offer. We must hear the truth of the
Gospel. It must be brought to us by someone
who knows something about the gospel of God's free and sovereign
grace in Christ Jesus. We're not saved by a freewill
gospel and then arrive at the doctrines of grace. We're saved
by the grace of God through the preaching of the free and sovereign
grace of God, that He is a sovereign God that saves His people how
He will, where He will, when He will, and by the preaching
of the gospel. We find that God sent forth His
word to us, and He sent someone who knew something about that
word, to explain it to us. I'm reminded of that Ethiopian
eunuch that was traveling out there in the desert, and he had
the Word of God in his hands. He had the scroll of the Book
of Isaiah with him, and he is stopped there considering, what
in the world is this talking about? And Philip is sent by
the power of God through the Spirit of God down there. Join
yourself to this chariot. And he says, do you understand
what you're reading? He says, how can I know except
some man teach me? And that man, Philip, got up
in there in that chariot with him. And there they were reading
the 53rd chapter of the book of Isaiah. It tells us so clearly
that this man of God who knew something about God and knew
something about the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace
in Christ Jesus the Lord began at the same place and preached
unto him Jesus. That is necessary. That is how
God moves to put us in Christ. Now, we can say we were in Christ
before the foundation of the world, but I sure didn't know
it, did you? Somewhere along the line, God had to work a work
of grace. God had to bring the Word to
us. I've been visiting with a young
man who is a pastor of a church that is free will to the core.
I met him in a store. I believe our paths crossed just
like this. God sent me there and sent him
there and we got into a conversation and I said, I think I could drink
coffee with you. He says, I think I could drink
coffee with you. So for six months now, Wednesday mornings, we've
been drinking coffee together. And we've been talking about
the serious Word of God. And you know what his complaint
with me always is? You keep taking me back to the
Word. That's all I have. I don't have
anything else. I was in religion and I had a
lot of other stuff. But when you hear the Gospel,
and God saves you by His grace, He sends you a man, He sends
you somebody who knows something about that Word, and He saves
you by His grace, then you only have the Word of God. And that
young man is just in a dither. And I've told him what happened
to me when I heard the gospel and I told the church where I
was pastoring that I was saved, they fired me on the spot. Now,
I didn't tell him, if you ever are saved and you start preaching
the gospel of God's free grace, they're going to fire you, but
they will. I'm sure to that. I pray for this young man. I
love him. He's 38 years old and he's in a religion and he's just
going along with what he's been taught. And he just gets between
a rock and a hard place all the time. And we just keep taking
him to the Word. He told me, he said, now if you
were on a desert island, and a Bible floated up to you, and
you're on there, are you telling me that you wouldn't be saved?
I said, I would say, what's this about? But if God intended to
save me, I'd see a boat coming along with a preacher in it.
Because that's the way God does His business. Or He'd send a
boat along and take me somewhere where I could hear the Gospel.
Well, I know this. God was pleased to give us the
new birth. We were only recipients. Now that's being in Christ. You must have the new birth.
You must be born again. You must be brought to this. Very special act of an almighty
God when He gives us a birth from above. We've had the birth
from below. I've shared with this young man,
how much did you have to do with your physical birth? You know
what he has to say? Nothing. I said, thank you. You
answered the question. How much do we have to do with
our spiritual birth? Nothing. We're the recipients
of it, but we're not the participants in it. So, when we mention that
we're in Christ, God sends His Word to us in some capacity,
and then He sends somebody along that knows something about that
Word and shares with us Jesus Christ the Lord. not doctrine,
not ordinances, not church membership, not some of those things, but
He shares with us the person and work and ministry of Jesus
Christ the Lord, and that He is actually a Savior that actually
saves His people from their sins. This is the Christ, the Son of
the Living God that does that for us. Well, God does this and
we find out that we were ordained to eternal life. Everyone that
believes is ordained to eternal life. It wasn't the other way
around. We don't exercise faith and then
we are ordained, but we're ordained and Then we exercise faith. That's the fruit of the new birth. At that moment, all things become
new, spiritually speaking. I had the same wife, but I'll
tell you what, she was new. Same children. I had to go to
them and apologize. But more than all of that, everything
that I thought I knew about God, was now new. I had a God I could
manipulate. I had a God that I tried to manipulate
by prayer. Get enough people praying about
something and we can get God to move on that for us. I found
out that my God was a new God to me. It was not the same one
that I had in religion. All things became new. What had become the spiritual
matter, nothing was left undone. Now we certainly are not able
to do the new things or understand all the new things to begin with,
but we will find out everything spiritually is new. Would you turn with me to the
book of 2 Corinthians chapter 5? In 2 Corinthians chapter 5
and verse 17, we have these words that are so powerful because
it tells us in here Therefore, if any man be in Christ, 2 Corinthians
chapter 5, and there in verse 17, therefore, if any man be
in Christ, he is a new creature. Now that word creature is translated
different ways in the New Testament. It's a Greek word, and some places
it's translated creature, and other places it's translated
creation. Specifically, we find that in
the book of Mark it is translated, but from the beginning of the
creation. And then in the book of Romans
it is, for the invisible things of him from the creation of the
world. So let's put that word in this
verse of scripture where it says, he is a new creation, a new creature. Therefore, if any man be in Christ,
he is a new creation." God did something in the new birth that
is new, and he goes on to tell us in that verse of scripture,
all things are passed away. Now did you notice there that
in the next phrase, all things become new, but that word all
is not put there with all old things are passed away? You know
what I get to carry with me? I was reading Brother John's
library in there, and I found a bunch of old Puritan messages
that I started reading. And this one Puritan says, we
got a spirit carrying around a dead body. And that's the truth. We still carry the flesh. It will be with us. God didn't
save it. I'm thankful many times that
he restrains it. I remember taking my children
into a grocery store, and the first thing I had to do is restrain
them. After a while, they learned that
dad would restrain them, and they kept their hands to themselves.
We had to teach our kids that this is a pocket store. Put your
hands in your pockets. Look with your eyes. Well, I'm
thankful that God does that for us many times. But as this dear
brother brought out, we're going to be in places sometimes, and
our brothers and sisters will be in places sometimes, that
if we're not careful, we're going to make a judgment call on them
that is not right. We don't believe. We believe
in restoration. Restore such a one. That's what
the Bible teaches about it. Restore such a one. Well, here
we are. It tells us in verse 17, a new
creature. Old things are passed away. We're
going to have many old things passed away, but we're going
to still carry some of those things that we were given in
the fall. But notice next of all, behold,
all things are become new. Now that has to do with spiritual
things. That has to do with our knowledge
of the Bible. That has to do with our knowledge
of God. That has to do with our knowledge of sin. That has to
do with our knowledge of heaven, hell, and everything in between. Because God gives us His spiritual
idea and thoughts about it, and everything that we had had a
slant to it before we are born again, and after we're born again,
He gives us his view of it. Now we don't understand very
much of it. God is big. God is sovereign. God is holy. God is righteous. God has every characteristic
and attribute that's presented in the Word of God. He is far
as heaven is above the earth, is His ways above our ways. But
He gives us this knowledge that everything about Him and everything
about His Word, I'll give you the true view of it." And that's
what takes us out of that false view of salvation, that false
view of sin, that false view about ourself, false view about
heaven, false view... All that stuff and junk that
religion brings with it is taken from us and we are given a spiritual
view that God gives us. One of the things that I would
like to look at with regard to this, and there are many things,
But He gives us something new that I want to look at, and it's
found over in the Psalms. Would you join me? Let us look
at one part of what is new in salvation. And in the Psalms,
the psalmist calls it a new song. A new song. I get to sing a new song that
I didn't know the words to before. Now I may have been able to mouth
the words. but there was no significance
or meaning in it. I used to be a teacher and I
taught a lot of students and I dealt with a lot of students
that didn't know the English language. And these students,
many of them, could read English. But you'd ask them, what does
that mean? They could mouth the words. They knew how to sound
out a word, but they had no conception of what those English words meant. Now I said that to say this,
I could mouth the gospel in religion. I could mouth things about God. But if I had been asked by someone
who knew something, what does that mean? I would have simply
said, as that young preacher I've been visiting with, well,
I'm free will and I can do and manipulate God. But I found out
I'm not free will. I didn't have a free will. I
had a free will like that buzzard that Brother Clay was talking
about and those geese. I was able to do what my nature
allowed me to do and no further. Well, all things became new. And I found out my nature would
have never chosen God. My nature would have never turned
to God. My nature would have never prayed
to God. My nature would have done none
of those things. In fact, there was such an enmity that I had
towards God that I didn't even understand that I had it. But
I would not bow before the God that the Bible talks about, and
that God is a sovereign God. Well, turn with me over to the
Psalms, would you? And for a few minutes, let's
just look at a few verses here that have to do with this privilege
that God grants to the church to sing a new song. You know, you can go into a grocery
store and sing and nobody bothers you, but if you start talking
to yourself, they may report you. You can sing in your shower. Nobody bothers you. Go to church
and sing. Well, we get the privilege of
singing a new psalm. Psalm 33. Would you turn there with me?
Psalm 33. Psalm 33, verse 3. Look at this now. Sing unto Him. I wish the translators had done
one more thing for us. And when it was speaking about
God, they would have capitalized the pronouns. Amen to that. Sing unto Him. not our works,
not our righteousness, not our doings, but sing unto him a new
song, play skillfully with a loud noise, for the word of the Lord
is right. You know what we get to sing
about? The Word of the Lord is right. And He is righteous in
all His acts. He has never done anything bad. All things that God has ever
done is good. In fact, that's what the Scriptures
teach. All things that God has ever
performed. And we may look at it, that was
an accident. That was terrible. We had a slide. This year's the first year I
can remember driving down the gorge, there's flashing amber
lights that go off if there's the possibility of a slide. We've
had lots of water there in the gorge, and there's a possibility
of a landslide. Well, not too long ago, there
was a landslide came down and stopped the freeway for a short
time. You know what? They found in
that landslide, 12 feet below the top of that landslide was
a car with a lady in it. She met her end. And people said,
that's sad. Yes, it is. But God was not wrong
in doing it. Amen. I don't understand it. And I
don't have to. Because I know that my God doeth
all things well. And that's what He teaches us
in the new birth. He doesn't do wrong things. He
does all things well. Psalm 33 and verse 4, it says
there, For the word of the Lord is right,
and all his works are done in truth. He loveth righteousness
and judgment. The earth is full of the goodness
of the Lord. You know what I get to do is
sing that new song. I have a God that does all things
well. He is righteous in all His acts. He performs them according to
His eternal purpose. He carries them out according
to His own divine providence. He has done all things well.
He brought a man from Kentucky to Oregon unbeknownst to me. that would preach something that
I'd never heard in my life. And my reaction to his first
message, I hate that man. The Lord saved me. I got to sing
a new song. That man knew something about
the gospel. Turn with me, if you would, to
Psalm 40. Again, we have this new song. And this is such a
powerful statement here, a powerful passage of Scripture here, because
it gives us some insight of where we were and we didn't even know
about it. And I get to sing about being brought out of that. I
didn't climb out. What the Scripture says, He brought
me up out of. He did it. All right. I waited
patiently for the Lord. Psalm 40. And He inclined unto
me, and heard my cry, he brought me up also out of a horrible
pit, out of the miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and
established my goings, and now, notice verse three, and he hath
put a new song in my mouth. What? Even praise unto our God,
many shall see it, and fear, and shall trust in the Lord.
You know, when the Lord saved me, I realized for the first
time in my life that if I'd gone to hell, He'd have been right. If I'd have been judged at the
judgment, and He'd have said, Norm Wells, I never knew you,
I realize He would have been right and righteous in doing
it. I'm thankful by God's mercy and
grace. He spoke peace to me in the new
birth and gave me a new song about Him. But He was right if
He had of judged me to an everlasting hell. That's the first time I
could ever sing that song. You are right in all that you
do. He brought me up out of a horrible
pit. Well, some people say, I waited
patiently and He inclined into me and heard my cry. I didn't
even cry until after I was born again. You know what happens
before we're born again? We're dead. Dead in trespasses
and sin. There is no way we can cry out. There is no way we can trust.
There's no way we can believe. We're dead. One old preacher
said, graveyard dead. But when it comes to this act
of God in the new birth, and He raises us a resurrection,
He brings us to life, He breathes into our nostrils the breath
of life, and we become a living soul. We're able then to cry
out. We're able then to believe. It
is the evidence of what God has already done. And then, the report. He brought me up also out of
a horrible pit. And my religion was horrible.
The place I was was horrible. Where I was born was horrible.
Everything. Life was horrible. He brought
me up out of a horrible pit. Out of the miry clay, I grew
up on the shores of Goose Lake, and we walked down there, and
before you know it, you were up to your backside in mud, and
if you weren't careful, you're going to be stuck there the rest
of your life. It was the miriest miry clay. Then it says here,
and he set my feet upon a rock, and that rock is Christ. I was foundation upon Him. I
was fastened to Him. I had a tent peg driven down,
and I was attached to that tent peg, and that tent peg is Christ.
And established my goings. You know what? 1 Thessalonians
chapter 1 tells us, we were turned. from worshiping dumb idols, and
the worst dumb idol of all in all the world, and every religion
will agree on this, every religion believes they have a free will,
we were turned from that stupid, dumb idol to the living God. And in that, we get to sing a
new song. And yet, put a new song in my
mouth, even praise unto our God. Many shall see it in fear and
shall trust in the Lord. How can you sing in a time like
this? Because I know God. I know His great salvation. I
know His great Savior. Turn with me, if you would, to
Psalm 96. In Psalm 96, again, sing a new
song. Psalm 96, verses 1-5. Would you read there with me?
It says, O come, let us sing unto the Lord, let us make a
joyful noise to the rock of our salvation. A new song. What rock did we have before?
We had sand. We had nothing but sand. And
we didn't even have good mortar to put down. We didn't have good
concrete to put down. We didn't have any cement to
put in it. The Rock of Ourselves, let us
come before His presence with thanksgiving and make a joyful
noise unto Him with psalms. For the Lord is a great God and
the great King above all gods. In His hand are the deep places
of the earth. and the strength of the hills
is His also. And the sea is His, and He made
it, and His hands formed the dry land." We got the Creator
God, that God that created the heavens and the earth. I know
a bunch of people that believe God created the heavens and the
earth, but when it comes to salvation, they say it's up to me. We must
have that creation, the new creation. He must be the creator of our
life. Turn with me to Psalm 98 and
verses 1-3. Oh, sing unto the Lord a new
song, for He hath done marvelous things. His right hand and His
holy arm hath gotten Him the victory. No, in religion it was
always He's trying. I asked a young preacher last
year, I said, where did you hear the gospel? I like to ask that. I don't ask people where they
were saved. I ask, where did you hear the gospel? And he said,
I was sitting in a gospel church and there was a substitute preacher. And he got up there in the pulpit
and he said he just made that building reverberate because
he was very loud. And he said, God trying to do
anything? God never tried to do anything. He said, he had my attention. God never tried to do anything. He has gotten himself the victory. The Lord hath made known His
salvation. Verse 2, His righteousness hath
He openly showed in the sight of the heathen. He hath remembered
His mercy and His truth toward the house of Israel. All the
ends of the earth have seen the salvation of our God. What a
new song. We couldn't sing that by nature.
But we can sing that by grace. We can sing a new song. For He hath done marvelous things. Oh my. His salvation is marvelous. His holiness is marvelous. His
sanctification is marvelous. Because we're talking about the
marvelous Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. He is marvelous in all
of His aspects, characteristics, and attributes. He is superior
in everything. And we get to sing about it.
Preachers have preached here the song of salvation in Jesus
Christ the Lord. It's a marvelous song. It's a
new song to us. We never got to sing that before,
but we get to sing it now. And we get to sing it every day
in the night seasons. Turn with me, if you would, over
to the book of Revelation. In the last book of the Bible,
this is also brought up. They sung a new song. Revelation
chapter 5. Revelation chapter 5. Would you
turn there with me? There is therefore now no condemnation
to them that are in Christ Jesus the Lord. And then If you be in Christ, you are
a new creation, a new creature in Christ Jesus. Old things have
passed away. Behold, all things have become
new. And there's many. We got a name. We got a new name. The name that
God gives us is the Lord our righteousness. That's our name.
Here in the book of Revelation chapter 5 and verse 9, Read this
with me, it says, Revelation chapter 5 and verse 9 says, and
they sung a new song. Yes, and this is it. Thou art worthy to take the book. and to open the seals thereof,
for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood
out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation." And
you know what he does with us then? He puts us together. It's wonderful to go somewhere
and meet someone that knows the gospel of God's free grace in
Christ Jesus, strike up a conversation, and we walk away and say, I think
I've known that guy all my life. We have so much in common. It's just difficult for me. That
young man has strained me at times. That young preacher strained
me at times. I remember what the pastor who
brought me the gospel, he was so kind to me and I've had to
remember that from time to time. He just doesn't know what he's
saying. He just doesn't know what he's doing. He just doesn't
know. Because by nature we don't know. We don't know the song.
We don't know the grace. We don't know the Christ. wants
to take me back to religion, but we have to take him to the
Word of God. Alright, it says there in Revelation
chapter 5 and verse 9, it goes on to say there, redeemed us, thou hast redeemed
us to God by thy blood out of all these places. And then finally,
chapter 14 of the book of Revelation. Revelation chapter 14 and verse
3, a new song. He gives us a new song. Oh, the song of grace. Song of
mercy. Song of love. Song of righteousness. Song of the Lamb. Song of Christ. Here in the book of Revelation
chapter 14, and there in verse 3 it says, And they sung as it
were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts. That
word beasts, you know what we think of when we think of beasts,
but that's not what it's saying here. There are four living creatures. and elders, and no man could
learn that song but the 144,000 which were redeemed from the
earth." Who are those? The church. It's just another
way of saying that God has a specific number of people that He has
determined to save and that His Son laid down His life, a ransom
for that many. And no more, no less, but no
more. That's just another. And what's
it say there? It says there in verse 3 that no man could learn
that song. I can't teach it to you. You know, Philip could not teach
that lesson, that message to that Ethiopian eunuch. God had
to. And it came by the new birth. No man could learn that song
but the 144,000 which were redeemed from the earth, purchased, bought
out of slavery, saved by the grace of God. All things that passed away,
behold, all things become new. Let us sing a new song.