Before I begin my message, let
me share this with you. I've been married to our piano
player for 52 years, last June. Thankful to my God for bringing
us together. But the first 10 years of our
marriage was without Christ in our lives. I thought I had the
world by the tail on a downhill drag. I was working in construction,
making good money. Had a boat, color television,
a home. Playing music in a nightclub
three nights a week. My social life was great. Had
two beautiful sons. But there was a void in my life
that I didn't even know about, till I came under the preaching
of God's glorious gospel. And then the Lord touched me.
It's like that song we just heard. And I haven't been the same since. I thank God that He saved my
soul. And He has given me not only
faith to believe that Jesus Christ is my Savior, but an understanding
that salvation was accomplished by Jesus Christ for me at Calvary
2,000 years ago. I just didn't know about it.
I just didn't understand what God had purposed before this
world was created for those he ordained to be recipients of
his amazing grace. Under the preaching of His glorious
gospel, our God is pleased at the appointed time of His love
for each one of His elect to deliver us from the power of
darkness and to translate us into the eternal kingdom of Jesus
Christ our Lord. And so for the last 42 years,
since last June, my wife and I have had the honor and the
joy of serving the Lord Jesus Christ together. And through
His divine providence, He has brought me to this place here
in rescue to be the pastor of this church. And so I want to
ask you to turn to Isaiah chapter 14. And it could be that some
of you here this morning have never heard the gospel. Please,
give me your undivided attention. I have nothing to gain by preaching
the truth. You have everything to lose by
not believing the truth. And so, I want to bring a message
this morning I trust the Lord might be pleased to use to speak
to the hearts of His people. for the glory of our Savior,
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, we have been going through
this book of Isaiah for several months now, and we spent several
weeks in Isaiah chapter 12, and then I brought two messages from
the 13th chapter. And from that 13th chapter of
Isaiah, we briefly considered the historical account of the
destruction of that wicked city, Babylon, and that wicked king,
Belshazzar, and all inhabitants of that land. Isaiah 13 is a
prophetic declaration by Isaiah the prophet of what God was going
to do. He had not yet destroyed Babylon,
but he gave Isaiah an understanding of the destruction of that city
and all of those inhabitants in it, exactly what he was going
to do. And he did just exactly what
he told Isaiah he was going to do. God says what he means and
he means what he says. That was the first message from
the 13th chapter. The second message we went into,
and also in the first message as well, we went into the book
of Revelation and showed the spiritual meaning of the destruction
of Babylon. In the 17th chapter, we read
about Babylon, the great, the mother of harlots, the whore
that sits on many waters. And the word waters has reference
to people. and I brought before you last
week that God's wrath is coming. He means what he says and he
tells us in his word that's coming a day when he's going to destroy
this whole world and everyone in it who do not believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ obey his gospel. That Babylon the Great, the mother
of harlots, is the spirit of Antichrist. This is the spirit
that deceives all of the false religionists in this world. Not
only those Eastern religions that blatantly deny Jesus Christ,
but the majority of professing Christians who think they're
going to glory by something they have contributed to their salvation.
And it doesn't matter what it is. If you're trusting in your
baptism, if you're trusting in meeting on a certain day, if
you're trusting in your free will or your decision for Jesus,
you are under the spirit of Antichrist. And I know those are strong words.
But they need to be preached. They need to be said. God tells
us in His Word, it is not of him that willeth nor of him that
runneth, but of God who shows mercy. I didn't write it, but
I believe it. It's not your will, it's not
your works, it's God's sovereign mercy. He said to Moses, I will
have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion
on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that
willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.
That's in the ninth chapter of Romans, but today's modern Christian
followers, they, and that's just a term, they profess to be Christians,
they would rather believe the lies of Antichrist than what
the word of God says. So they say, don't take away
my free will. I hope God takes that away from
you this morning, if that's what you're trusting in. Now it's
interesting to me, immediately following, immediately following
the prophetic statement of what God was going to do to that wicked
city, Babylon. And don't forget, all historical
accounts that we read about in the Old Testament have spiritual
meanings. And the spiritual meaning of
that wicked city that was destroyed, points to the spirit of Antichrist,
Babylon the Great, the mother of harlots. Immediately following
that 13th chapter that prophetically describes God's destruction of
Babylon, we read about God's mercy in the first couple of
verses of chapter 14. which will be our text for this
morning's message. Follow along with me as I read
these two verses. For the Lord will have mercy
on Jacob, and will yet choose Israel, and set them in their
own land, and the strangers shall be joined with them, and they
shall cleave to the house of Jacob. And the people shall take
them and bring them to their place, and the house of Israel
shall possess them in the land of the Lord for servants and
handmaids, and they shall take them captives without whose captives
they were, and they shall rule over their oppressors." Now folks,
God does not leave us in despair when he talks about that destruction
that's coming, His wrath that is coming. And last week I brought
out the words of John the Baptist to some unbelieving Jews when
he said, Who hath warned you to flee from a wrath to come?
They thought they were going to heaven because they were Israelites,
because they were descendants of Abraham. But John called them. nothing but a generation of vipers,
slithering snakes. Our Lord Jesus called them hypocrites,
whited sepulchers, men that looked good on the outside, but inwardly
they were full of dead men's bones. Now, how appropriate for
our text following that prophetic statement concerning the destruction
of Babylon. Our Lord Jesus did deliver national
Israel from their Babylonian captivity. He did restore those
Israelites to their own land. But as we have stated many times,
if all we get out of what we're reading in the Old Testament
is the historical account, we've missed the message altogether.
So I want to Read this quote by Pastor Don Fortner from this
passage of scripture that we just read in Isaiah 14. He said,
we know that the prophecy given in Isaiah 13 and 14 had an immediate
reference to the physical seed of Abraham, the nation of Israel,
and their deliverance from Babylonian captivity. But those who limit
the prophecy to these historical events have missed its message
altogether. There are some things spoken
of in this text which cannot be applied to the Jews and the
Babylonians. There never was a time in history
when the Jews carried the Babylonians into captivity. And there never
was a time when Israel ruled over Babylon. But if we understand
the prophecy spiritually as referring to the salvation of God's elect
by Christ Jesus, its interpretation is both easy and practical. The things spoken of in the passage
before us will find their perfect accomplishment in the salvation
of God's church, the Israel of God, and in every believer."
End of quote. So I've titled this message,
The House of Israel. And I want to ask you to turn
with me to Ezekiel chapter 37, a chapter that some of you are
very familiar with, but a chapter I think is very needful concerning
the mercy of God on his Jacobs. Our text in Isaiah 14 draws our
attention to God's sovereign mercy on Jacob. That salvation
cannot be referring to Esau's twin brother. God did have mercy
on that man, but Jacob had been dead for hundreds of years when
Isaiah penned these words, the Lord will have mercy on Jacob.
So Jacob has a spiritual meaning. The same holds true to these
words and will yet choose Israel. God had already chosen Israel
as a nation, but national Israel, as brother Steve brought out
this morning in his Sunday school lesson, refers to God's spiritual
Israel, his church. The house of Israel, God's spiritual
Israel, Is that body of believers our Lord Jesus purchased with
His own blood, His elect, His blood-bought church? And our
Lord Jesus said, I will build my church and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it. And it's the Lord Jesus who builds
His church under the preaching of the gospel, revealing the
truths concerning Him and what He accomplished for His people
under that preaching. Now we must see ourselves. Listen
to me. Listen to me. You're a sinner. I said that in one of our services
some time ago. And a lady jumped up, grabbed
her granddaughter and said, I am not a sinner. She stormed out
of this church and we've never seen her since. Well, God says
you are a sinner. And our Lord Jesus said he came
in the world to save sinners. And we just heard in the men's
meeting this morning a reading from the third chapter of Romans
that describes every one of us. There's none good, no not one,
none righteous, none. There's no fear of God before
the eyes of the people. We've all gone astray. In the
first place, we sinned in our daddy Adam. When he fell, we
were in him, and we all fell in him, and we come into this
world with his fallen nature, and we love it. We love the darkness
we're in. We love the lies we're under.
We don't want to be confused with any facts. We've sinned
against our Maker, every one of us, and we rightly deserve
God's wrath that's coming. But God has mercy on Jacob. We must see ourselves as nothing
but hell-deserving Jacobs, deserving of nothing but God's eternal
wrath. There's an article in today's
bulletin next to the article written by Pastor Don Fortner
on the inside back page of your bulletins, titled, The Lord Will
Have Mercy on Jacob, right across from Don Fortner's article. Listen
to this. Jacob, in the verse above, has reverence to God's
elect from every kindred and tongue and people and nation.
God said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy,
and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion.
So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth,
but of God that showeth mercy. All of God's chosen blood-bought
children were ordained by Him to be recipients of His sovereign
mercy. Those and only those who see
their need of mercy will receive God's mercy. Under the preaching
of His gospel, the Holy Spirit convicts us of what we are, sin. of what we do, sin. The Holy Spirit will make us
see that we in our unregenerate state are like Jacob was before
his name was changed to Israel. Nothing but sinful hypocrites,
deceivers, supplanters, those who take the place of others
through force or plotting, which is what the name Jacob means.
All works religionists are supplanters deceiving themselves by pretending
to be children of God. Their wicked minds plot sinful
ways to approach God, ways that are contrary to God's one and
only way, which is Jesus Christ and His perfect redeeming work
for His chosen people. When by the power of God the
Holy Spirit we see Jesus Christ as the one who obtained eternal
redemption for us, We fall before Him crying out to God to be merciful
to me, the sinner. Then, with the enlightened mind
that only God himself can give, our Lord reveals to his Jacobs,
those he is pleased to have mercy on, that we're part of his royal
family. When God delivers us from the
power of darkness and translates us into the eternal kingdom of
Jesus Christ our Lord, the Holy Spirit working in us causes us
to see that we're members of God's spiritual Israel. We're
still plagued with that old sinful nature, but by the miracle of
His grace, God has made us partakers of His divine nature. The name
Israel means Prince with God. Jesus Christ is our exalted King,
as His children were members of His holy nation, spiritual
Israel. When the Lord has mercy on a
man, he is a prince with God. When the Lord has mercy on a
woman, she is a princess with God. And all of us give our great
triune God all the glory for adopting us into His royal family. I thank God, as undeserving as
I am, that He was pleased to choose me in Christ before this
world was created. and then sent His Son to redeem
me with His own precious blood, to make me a member of spiritual
Israel, a member of that royal family. I thank God the Holy
Spirit for divine revelation, because God's the only one who
can reveal this. We have the honor, God's preachers
have the honor of preaching His gospel to you, but we can't deal
with the heart. That's God's work. And so what
I'm about to read to you out of Ezekiel chapter 37 is a picture
of every chosen member of spiritual Israel,
of their condition before God, and the power of God in giving
us life and bringing us out of that state of spiritual deadness
into a relationship with Him, giving us eternal life. And if
it could be lost, if somebody could take it away from us, it
would not be eternal, but it cannot be. He which hath begun
a good work in us We'll perfect it until the day of Jesus Christ.
So please, listen to this. This is the Word of God. Ezekiel
37 from verse 1. The hand of the Lord was upon
me and carried me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me
down in the midst of the valley which was full of dry bones.
Now please, get a picture of this in your mind. God comes
to Ezekiel. He carries him away in the Spirit.
This is a vision. Like John the Apostle on the
Isle of Patmos. He saw a vision. The Lord gave
him revelation after revelation. Ezekiel sees this vision. It's the Holy Spirit, God working
in him, that enables him to see these things. And it's the Holy
Spirit, God working in us, which enables us to see the spiritual
meaning of these things. Verse 2 says, and caused me to
pass by them. That is those dry bones, that
valley of dry bones. He caused me to pass by them
round about, and behold, There were very many in the open valley,
and lo, they were very dry. Evidently, a great battle had
taken place there. And there's dead people all over,
the bones scattered all over the place, just a vision of nothing
but very dry bones bleached in that sun for years and years
and years. And we read in verse three, Where
Ezekiel said, and he, God himself, said unto me, Son of man, can
these bones live? That's a good question. Ezekiel
didn't even know how to answer that. He knew he couldn't give
them life. So he answered, O Lord God, thou
knowest. If God is pleased to give them
life, It's possible, but that's the only way that those bleached
bones could come back to life. And that's the way it is when
we preach the gospel. We can't deal with the heart.
We can't give a man or a woman eternal life. We can't bring
them from a state of spiritual deadness. This valley of dry
bones is a picture of the whole body of believers. I know that
the whole world is dead in trespasses and sins, but this vision applies
to God's church, His chosen people. I'll show you that in just a
moment. And God's preachers know that when we are before a congregation,
this size or any size, or preaching to just one, the gospel can only
be made effectual by the power of God the Holy Spirit. We cannot
deal with the heart. That's God's business. And all
of us are dead in trespasses and sins. And we need the same
power that we'll read about here in this vision of Ezekiel, Ezekiel's
vision, the same power to bring us out of that. So, this is a
good illustration of the power of God and salvation to all who
believe. Listen to this. Again, verse
4. Again, He said unto me, Prophesy
unto those bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the
word of the Lord. Preach to them. God's telling
Ezekiel, preach to those dry bones. I don't know how Ezekiel felt. Maybe a little bit like God's
preachers today. It would be hopeless if we depended
just upon our preaching. But that's not what Ezekiel depended
upon and God is showing him that. He says, prophesy unto them,
preach unto them. Oh you dry bones, hear the word
of the Lord. So I preach unto you this morning.
Here's the word of the Lord. Don't listen to false preachers
who deceive you into thinking that you've earned your salvation
by something you have done. Don't listen to them. Come away
from them. Hear ye the word of the Lord.
Verse 5 says, Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones, Behold,
I will cause breath to enter unto you, and you shall live.
God says this. God says this to these dry bones.
I will do this. He doesn't say man will do this.
He doesn't say the preacher will do this. He doesn't say the soul
winner will do this. He says, I will cause breath
to enter into you and you shall live. Verse 6, and I will lay
sinews upon you and will bring up flesh upon you and cover you
with skin and put breath in you and ye shall live and ye shall
know that I am the Lord. This is what God does. Those
dry bones came together. We'll see that in a moment. But
here we are, dead in trespasses and sins, and we come unto the
preaching of the gospel. We think we have a righteousness
that we can offer God. How many of you? How many of
you have had this thought go through your mind? Well, I've
done a few bad things, but I'm not a murderer. I'm not a child
molester. My good is going to outweigh
my bad when I stand before the judgment seat of Christ. Well,
here is something maybe you've never heard. There's no good
in you. You don't have any good to outweigh your bad. In your
unregenerate state, in my unregenerate state, we're bad. We're sinful. We have nothing
to offer God. We need His righteousness. And
this is a picture of that. God providing everything that's
needful to bring us into a relationship with Him. He gives us all things
that pertain unto life and godliness. He covers us. When He gives us
faith to believe the gospel, He covers us with the righteousness
of Jesus Christ. Get a hold of that. When God
delivers a hell-deserving sinner from the power of darkness, He
makes us as righteous in His sight as Jesus Christ our Lord. And not one thing can be laid
to the charge of God's elect. So God says, I'm going to do
this. I'll put sin upon you. And He
goes right on down saying what He's going to do. And He says,
I'm going to put breath in you. So Ezekiel in verse 7 says, so
I prophesied as I was commanded. I preached just like what God
commanded me to do. And that's what God commands
all of his preachers to do. Preach. Preach. Preach the gospel. That's my business. That's what
God has called me to do. I want to help any way I can.
If you're having problems in any area of your life, I'd like
to be able to help you. I'm not a counselor, but I will
take you into the word of God as he is pleased to allow me
to do so and try to give you some scripture that might cover
the situation that you're going through. But my main purpose
of standing in this pulpit is to preach the gospel. That's
what God has called me to do. And so Ezekiel says, I prophesied
as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was
a noise. Listen to this. There was a noise
and behold a shaking and the bones came together. Bone to
his bone. I wonder if that's where they
got that song from. Bone connected to whatever bone. I don't know.
But anyway, they came together. God was showing his mighty hand. is sovereign power and bringing
those bones together and putting sinews upon them and covering
them with flesh. But the important thing was he
breathes the breath of life into them. And when I beheld, it says
in verse 8, when Ezekiel beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh
came up upon them and the skin covered them above, but there
was no breath in them. That's typical. of professing
Christians today who have a form of godliness but deny the power
thereof. to go about trying to establish
their own righteousness and will not submit themselves unto the
righteousness of Christ. There's no life in them. They're
still dead. But, look at verse 9, Then said
He unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and
say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God, Come from the four
winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain that they may
live. So I prophesied as He commanded
me. And what He's doing, what Ezekiel
is doing, he's praying. He's praying for God to come
in His power and give these dead bones who've now been covered
with sinews and flesh, give them the breath of life. And that's
what preachers do. We preach. And then we pray for
those we preach to. that God might be pleased to
make his word effectual, to give them life. So he said, come from
the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon them these slain,
that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded
me, he says in verse 10, and the breath came into them, and
they lived and stood up upon their feet an exceeding great
army. Now let me ask you something.
What did Ezekiel contribute to those dead bones living. He preached
to them. He prayed for them. But the results
were in the hands of a sovereign God who gave life to those dead
bones. And that's exactly what happens
when a man experiences a new birth. Like Lee and John were
saying about it earlier, He touched me. So verse 11 says, Then He
said unto me, Son of man, These bones are the whole house of
Israel. That's our message this morning,
the house of Israel. These bones are the whole house
of Israel. These bones typify God's church,
spiritual Israel. These bones are the whole house
of Israel. Behold, they say, Our bones are
dried, and our hope is lost. We are cut off for our parts.
Therefore, prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God,
Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to
come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.
And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your
graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves, and
shall put my Spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place
you in your own land, then shall you know that I am the Lord,
and have spoken it, and have performed it, saith the Lord."
And folks, that's a picture of God saving grace, and all of
those that He chose in Christ before the foundation of the
world, and all of those that Jesus Christ our Savior laid
down His life for. And God says, I've done this.
I'm the one who has done this. Now, let me take you over to
Ephesians. Chapter 2. I won't be much longer,
but we've canceled our services for this evening. So give me
a few more minutes of your time and allow me the honor of showing
you in scripture these truths concerning spiritual Israel. God and His honor that He bestows
upon His preachers that tells us, lets us know that we cannot
give life to our hearers, but we can preach to them. We cannot
change their wicked heart, but we can pray for them. God's preachers can do absolutely
nothing to make the gospel of God's sovereign grace effectual.
That's the work of the Holy Spirit. He alone can give life to a hell-deserving
sinner dead in trespasses and sins. Now, these words that I'm
going to read to you, and I'm just going to read to them in
a cursory fashion, point to something that was not revealed in the
Old Testament as it was revealed to the writers of the New Testament.
It was hinted at. There's portions of scripture
that we cannot miss in respect to the truths concerning the
Gentiles being brought into the relationship with God with the
Jews and there being one body. Those things were hinted at in
the Old Testament, but it was revealed to the New Testament
writers, to God's apostles, those who wrote his word here in the
New Testament, that what took place at Calvary tore down the
middle wall of partition between the Jew and the Greek. This religious
generation, and it's been around for several generations, are
trying to build that wall of partition back up to make a distinction
between the Jews and the Gentiles, giving them a false hope, the
Jews a false hope that they are going to inherit the kingdom
of God because they're Abraham's natural posterity. That's a false
hope. Someone asked a preacher one
time, if you had a message all prepared and a Jew came into
your congregation, would you change your message? Why would we do that? The Jews
need the same message that the Gentiles need. We need to hear
about Jesus Christ, who He is, what He has done, where He is
now, what He's doing now. We need to hear the message that
God has ordained as that instrument that delivers His people out
of darkness. Whether we're Jew or Greek, we
need that message. So follow along with me, starting
at verse 11 of Ephesians chapter 2. Wherefore, remember that ye
being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called uncircumcision
by that which is called a circumcision in the flesh made by hands, that
at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the
commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise,
having no hope, and without God in the world. But now in Christ
Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood
of Christ. So those who are far off are
referring to the Gentiles. Verse 14 says, For he is our
peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle
wall of partition between us, having abolished in his flesh
the enmity even the law of commandments contained in ordinances, for
to make in himself of two one new man, so making peace." Now
the message is here, if we'll believe it, God has his elect
from every kindred and tongue and tribe and nation out of the
nation of Israel and out of the Gentile nations as well. And
the Lord laid down His life for His chosen people from all of
those different nations. Look at verse 16. And that He
might reconcile both, that is Jew and Gentile, unto God in
one body by the cross, having slain enmity thereby. and came
and preached peace to you which were far off, that's us, the
Gentiles, and to them that were nigh, that's the Jews, for through
Him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father. Now therefore
ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens
with the saints and of the household of God." One body, one body. Ephesians 4 tells us there's
only one body, one Lord, one hope, one Father over all of
us. Read on, verse 20, And were built
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ Himself
being the chief cornerstone, in whom all the building, that
I said earlier, Our Lord Jesus said, I will build my church
and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. We're his
building. God reaches right down in that
old quarry where we were wallowing in sin. Nothing good in us, polluted
by our own sinful works. He lifts us right out of that
quarry. sets us on the solid rock. The Lord Jesus Christ,
the sure foundation, washes us in His blood, puts a new song
in our hearts. He even prays unto His name.
And He touches us with His Spirit, giving us the assurance that
Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe. Sin had left
a crimson stain, but He washed it white as snow. And so, we're
all that building that Paul is writing about here in Verse 21
of chapter 2, in whom all the building fitly framed together
groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord. Your body is a temple
of the Holy Spirit. If Christ dwells in you, Christ
in you the hope of glory, you're God's building. Christ himself
has put you into his body. Look at verse 22, in whom you
also are building together for an habitation of God through
the Spirit. Paul goes on in chapter 3 on this very same subject. He says, for this cause I, Paul,
the prisoner of Jesus Christ for you Gentiles, if you have
heard of the dispensation, the stewardship of the grace of God
which is given me to youward, how that by revelation he made
known unto me the mystery, as I wrote it for a few words. That's
in chapter two, the mystery, whereby when you read, you may
understand my knowledge in the mystery of Christ, which in other
ages was not made known unto the saints, of men, unto the
sons of men. as it is now revealed unto his
holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit that the Gentiles,
catch this, that the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of
the same body and partakers of the promise in Christ by the
gospel whereof I was made a minister according to the gift of the
grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his
power. So there's no mistaking, folks, there's no mistaking this
wonderful truth that Jesus Christ is the head of His church, His
body, and that His body is made up of sinners that He saves by
His grace through His precious blood of every kindred and tongue
and tribe and nation. Matter of fact, it says that
in the book of Revelation, the fifth chapter, that God has redeemed
us out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation. redeemed
the whole world. He didn't redeem the whole world.
He redeemed His elect out of these nations. And so the Word
of God teaches this. It's not obscure. Matter of fact,
Jesus Christ tells us in Galatians 3. You don't have to turn there.
I'm just about through. Hang on just a little bit. In
Galatians 3 verses 26 through 29 we read, For ye are all the
children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as
have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is
neither Jew nor Greek, and neither bond nor free. There is neither
male nor female. For ye are all one in Christ
Jesus. And if ye be Christ, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs
according to the promise. And then we read this In Romans
2, 28 and 29, for he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither
is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he
is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the
heart and the spirit are not in the letter, whose praise is
not of men but of God. So if the Holy Spirit is in us,
we're a spiritual Jew. We're of that holy nation, spiritual
Israel. God has brought us into this
wonderful relationship with Him and with other believers as His
holy nation, as His chosen people. And we give Him all the praise
and all the glory for His unspeakable gift, eternal life through Jesus
Christ our Lord. And I remind you of Ezekiel's
vision in that valley of dry bones and God's power in giving
life to all of those dry bones as I close with this passage
of Scripture right here in Ephesians chapter 2 starting at verse 1.
Now hang on to this. Hang on to this. This is good.
It's good if Christ dwells in you. If He doesn't dwell in you,
you won't even like this. This will be foolishness to you.
But the gospel is foolishness to them that perish. But unto
us which are saved, it is the power of God. So listen. Chapter
2 verse 1. And you. Hath He quickened? That word
means made alive. And you, hath He made alive who
were dead in trespasses and sins? Just as dead spiritually as those
bones we read about in Ezekiel's vision in chapter 37. Just as
dead spiritually as Lazarus was physically when our Lord said,
Lazarus come forth and Lazarus came forth and I'm going to tell
you he could not have come forth he could not have heard the word
of Jesus Christ if he had not come alive and it was life that
preceded him hearing the voice of Jesus Christ and that's the
way it is with those who believe the gospel. God sends the Spirit
of His Son into our hearts. We're quickened by the Holy Spirit
before we understand that it's the voice of Jesus Christ speaking
to us, before we realize or really know for sure what has happened
to us. But I know this for a fact. Every
true believer knows this. Once I was blind, but now I see. We know we were dead in trespasses
and sins, and God himself is the one who quickened us. Read
on. Wherein in time past ye walked according to the course of this
world, it says in verse 2, according to the prince of the power of
the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience,
among whom also, now Paul doesn't say you, He includes Himself
in this number, among whom also we all had our conversation,
our lifestyle in times past, in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature
the children of wrath, even as others. But the Holy Spirit doesn't
leave us there. The Holy Spirit doesn't cause
us to be in despair because we know that we served Satan, that
we were just full of lustful desires. He goes on to say in
verse 4, But God, Oh, I wish people could get a
hold of that. Not you, not your preacher, not
your church, but God who is rich in mercy for His great love wherewith
He loved us. Even when we were dead in sins,
hath quickened us together with Christ. By grace ye are saved,
and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus, that in the ages to come He might
show the exceeding riches of His grace and His kindness toward
us through Christ Jesus. For by grace are you saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast." And folks, there are message
after message after message in all of those verses. But the
point is, we're God's spiritual Israel if He has brought us out
of darkness into His marvelous light. In the first chapter of
this book God tells us we were chosen in Christ before the foundation
of the world by God the Father. He tells us we were redeemed
by the blood of Jesus Christ and that God himself appointed
us into the adoption of sons. And he tells us not only in that
first chapter but right here that it's the Holy Spirit that
makes the gospel effectual in us. The ministry of the Holy
Spirit is to take the things of Christ and reveal them to
His people. If you don't believe that, if
you don't believe salvation is of the Lord from start to finish,
that God purposed your salvation before a star ever twinkled in
the sky, let me quote a verse to you. 2 Timothy 1.9 says, God
has saved us and called us with a holy calling, not according
to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace which
was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. If you
don't believe that, if you don't believe that Jesus Christ by
himself purged your sins, if you don't believe that he obtained
eternal redemption for you, and if you don't believe that you
are out of darkness and God has deliried you from the spirit
of Satan's Antichrist, you're still dead in trespasses and
sins. And like I said last Sunday,
God's wrath is coming. And in his word he tells us he's
willing to show his wrath. Flee. Flee from the wrath to
come. flee to Christ, the only safe
hiding place from the wrath to come. I have given you the gospel
this morning. I have taken you right into God's
Word. I have shown you what the Word
of God says about the salvation of God's elect. If you are so
hard-hearted and set in your own ways that you refuse to believe
what I have preached, then the wrath of God abides on you. But,
if God has graciously brought you out of that awful state of
spiritual deadness and into a living union with Himself, you can be
joyful and thankful, not now, but for all eternity as well,
And you will sing our closing hymn with unspeakable joy and
praise to our God who redeemed us with his own precious blood.
Redeemed, how I love to proclaim it.