Once again, we welcome you and
I encourage you to turn with me to Isaiah chapter 11. We're
going through the book of Isaiah in a verse-by-verse study, and
we're in the 11th chapter. And while you're turning there,
I want to read an article that's in this morning's bulletin, also
written by Pastor Don Fortner. It's on the inside back cover. Taking his thoughts from Isaiah
9, 6, unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Pastor
Fortner said, someone once said, God could not suffer and man
could not satisfy. But the God-man both suffered
and satisfied. That points out the necessity
of our Lord's incarnation. Our Savior, the one who redeemed
us from sin and death and hell, had to be both God and man in
one glorious person. He must be a man capable of suffering
and death, yet he must also be God of infinite merit and value. Here the prophet Isaiah, by divine
inspiration, describes the real humanity and perfect deity of
the Lord Jesus Christ hundreds of years before he came into
this world. Unto us a child is born. Hard as it is for us to
imagine, the Son of God, our Savior, became a real man. He did not simply assume a human
form. He assumed our nature. He assumed a real human body,
mind, and soul. He is as much man as though he
were not God. It is true he had no sin. He
was born the son of the Virgin without an earthly father, the
woman seed by the immaculate conception of the Holy Spirit.
But he was a man touched with the feeling of our affirmatives,
subject to all the sinless passions, emotions, pains, and feelings
of humanity. He was tempted in all points
as a man. And though He had no sin of His
own, He was even made to be sin for us. Because the Son of God
came to redeem us, He took not on Him the nature of angels,
but took on Him the seed of Abraham. He assumed the nature of His
elect, that He might die in our place to satisfy the justice
of God for us. Unto us a child is born. Unto
us a son is given. Mary is not the mother of God. The Son of God was not born of
the virgin. He was given through the virgin's
womb. But even when he was in Mary's
womb, he was Mary's God. Though our Lord became one of
us, He never ceased to be God. He is as much God as though He
were not man. He is the Son of God given, the
gift of the Father's love to redeem and save His people. God the Father gave His Son in
the covenant of grace before the world began to be our surety. He gave His Son in the incarnation. God gave His Son into the hands
of justice to die as our substitute upon the cursed tree. He gives
His Son in regeneration to every believer. And God will give His
Son in heaven's glory to be the everlasting portion and joy of
His elect. That was worded so well, I just
wanted to read that. in your hearing as an introduction
to this morning's message. Now God has sent the Spirit of
the Son into our hearts. The Spirit of Christ dwells in
the heart of every believer. This is the miracle of the new
birth. This is something that God performs. Man has no part in that. He has
no part, no more of a part in our spiritual birth than we had
in our physical birth. This is God moving as He pleases,
upon whom He pleases, when He pleases, to enlighten the minds
of His elect to the things concerning Christ, to give us eternal life,
to bring us into that living union with Christ our Savior,
that He will receive all the praise and all the glory. And
that's why we're here, to worship Him, to give Him the praise and
glory for who He is, and for what He has done. Jesus Christ,
who is the sovereign Lord over this whole universe, has everything
in His sovereign hands. Everything that happens, happens
because of His eternal purpose, and by His eternal decrees, by
His power. bringing to pass that which he
purposed before a star ever twinkled in the sky. Folks, listen, nothing
happens apart from the permissive will of Jesus Christ, our Savior.
He works all things after the counsel of his own will. And this man who suffered and
bled and died there at Calvary 2,000 years ago, the God-man,
is our blessed Redeemer who dwells in the hearts of his people,
giving us this understanding. So as we walk through this life
filled with heartaches and sorrows, a life that has many painful
trials, the Lamb of God who sacrificed His life for us is with us every
step of the way. That old sinful nature that plagues
every believer and will continue to do so until we're delivered
from the body of this death. That old nature can rear its
ugly head in a moment's notice. But we have been made partakers
of the divine nature. This is part of the miracle of
the new birth. This is Christ in us. God has
sent the Spirit of the Son into our hearts. We are partakers
of His nature. We are in living union with the
true and living God. And this is what God uses, His
Spirit dwelling in us. We can do all things through
Christ who strengthens us. His Spirit enables us to suppress
the old nature. It'll never get any better. But
at least by God's grace and His Spirit working in us, we can
keep it down. We're to put on the new man daily.
We're to put down the old man. Put it off. Put him off. Put
him out of our mind. Help. God, help us. We need help.
Do you need help? I need help. I need His grace
because I'm aware of my weaknesses in the flesh. And so our subject
this morning goes along with what we looked at last Sunday.
We titled last Sunday's message, Be Not Afraid. And we covered
some verses here in Isaiah 11. I want to repeat some of them,
starting at verse 6 of Isaiah 11. And we covered down through
verse 9, except for the last part of verse 9, but I want to
read down through verse 10. We read, the wolf also shall
dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the
kid. And the calf and the young lion
and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them.
And the cow and the bear shall feed. Their young ones shall
lie down together. And the lion shall eat straw
like the ox. And the sucking child shall play
on the hole of the asp. And the weaned child shall put
his hand on the cucarachis' den. They shall not hurt nor destroy
in all my holy mountain, for the earth shall be full of the
knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. And in
that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for
an instant of the people. To it shall a Gentile seek, and
his rest shall be glorious. Now, I am not going to repeat
what we looked at last week, but I do encourage you, if you
didn't hear that message, get a copy of it. Ask our tape director,
Brother Bill Silva, and he'll get you a copy. We have a high-speed
copier. We'll make you a copy right away.
But I do want to make mention of the fact that all of those
scriptures that we just read that have to do with the lion
and the kid lying down together, the wolf and the bear and all.
That has to do, the wolf and the bear and the old roaring
lion that goes about like, the old devil that goes about like
a roaring lion, he's still around. But that old nature is what's
described in these symbols and the new nature, living together.
This is us walking through this life, aware of our sinful imperfections,
aware of the fact that we sin daily, but also aware of the
fact that we're not to be afraid. Our Lord Jesus Christ is not
only with us every step of the way, He dwells in our hearts. So I've titled this message this
morning, The Knowledge of the Lord. The last part of verse
nine says, For the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the
Lord as the waters of the sea. Now some believe the last part
of verse nine has reference to a future day when there will
be more sovereign grace churches where the truth is being preached
than false churches where lies are being told. I hope so. I would like to believe that,
but it doesn't seem like that's what our text is teaching. If
we keep in context with the first part of verse 9, I believe the
knowledge of the Lord has reference to God's elect from every kindred
and tongue and people and nation who were redeemed by the blood
of Jesus Christ our Savior. When our Lord Jesus died for
His chosen people at Calvary 2,000 years ago, He tore down
that middle wall of partition between the Jews and the Greek,
making one new man, so making peace. That enmity, that animosity,
that hatred that was in the hearts of the Jews for the Gentiles,
and the Gentiles for the Jews, and both in their unregenerate
state with enmity in their hearts toward God. He has taken care
of that. He has given us a new heart filled
with love for the Lord Jesus Christ and His gospel. He's given
us a love for each other. It does not matter what the color
of our skin might be. It does not matter what position
we hold in life, whether it's prominent or whether it isn't.
Does it matter if we're well-educated or if we're illiterate? Doesn't
matter. What matters is that we're in
Christ. And what matters is what He has
done for us, is doing for us, and will yet do for us. And this
wonderful relationship with God enables us not only to lie down
in peace when we go to bed at night, even though we're aware
that we still have that old sinful nature, We can lie down in peace
because the Spirit of Christ dwells within us, and we can
be at peace with each other because of the Spirit of Christ that
dwells within us. And as much as possible, we can
be at peace with those in the world who do not know Christ
because of the Spirit of Christ that dwells in us. So, the Gospel
of Jesus Christ and Him crucified was first preached to the Jews
at Jerusalem, and then went out to the Gentile nations, the apostle
Paul being the apostle to the Gentiles, and the other apostles
as well. And from that time, the word
had just gone out to every one of God's elect in different parts
of the world. The whole world is full of the knowledge of Jesus
Christ. That is a remnant in different parts of the world,
every corner of the world. God has his people who are meeting
on a regular basis, worshiping God, singing praises to the Lord
Jesus, who delight in the gospel of his glorious grace and his
sovereign mercy. So when we experience the miracle
of the new birth, the Holy Spirit reveals to us that Jesus Christ
is the God-man, the article that we just read by Pastor Don Fortner. And the root of Jesse that we
read about in verse 10, the root of Jesse is Jesus Christ. Jesse was David's earthly father,
and Jesus Christ was of the tribe of David. Scripture says in Galatians,
actually in Romans chapter 1 first of all, says that Jesus Christ
was made of the seed of David, Jesse's son, according to the
flesh and declared to be the son of God with power. Then in
Galatians 4 verses 4 and 5 we read, in that day When the fullness
of the time was come, in that day is our text for this morning,
but Galatians 4, 4 and 5 says, When the fullness of the time
was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under
the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might
receive the adoption of sons. And because ye are sons, God
hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying,
Abba, Father. That just confirms what we're
talking about here in our text in Isaiah chapter 11. He, the
Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man, shall stand for an instant to
the people. To that instant, to Christ, shall
the Gentiles seek, and His rest shall be glorious. So Lord willing,
we'll take a closer look at verse 10 next Sunday, and along with
some other scriptures as well. There's just too much Too much of God's glorious truth
is contained in these verses to cover in a lifetime of sermons,
let alone in one sermon this morning. So I want to ask you
to turn, if you will, over to John chapter 12. Our subject
this morning is the knowledge of the Lord. I had a conversation
with a brother, Brad Ward, following last Sunday's morning worship
service, and we talked about how many hyper-Calvinists are
afraid to invite people to come to Christ. That's just wrong. Years ago, almost 30 years ago,
we were not even in our new building here yet. We were still meeting
over in the other building. I had a visit from a preacher
in the Primitive Baptist religion, and they do hold to the gospel
of God's sovereign electing grace. But he told me, that man told
me, he said, even if you're not one of God's, no, he didn't work
that. He said, if you are one of God's
elect, you could wake up in glory not ever hearing the gospel,
not ever believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. I said, I don't
believe a word of that. He said, you keep studying God's
Word and you'll see that's what the scriptures teach. Well, it's
been, like I said, almost 30 years ago and I've been studying
God's Word all along and I don't see that in the scriptures yet.
I know there's a lot I don't know. I said this just last Friday
night. The more I study, the more I realize how much I don't
know. But this one thing I do know, our Lord Jesus said, He
said in John 3.36, actually it wasn't him speaking, but it's
recorded in God's Word by the Apostle John. He that believeth
on the Son hath everlasting life, and he that believeth not the
Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.
So we're doing a grave injustice to our hearers if we give them
any kind of a reason to believe that they can wake up in glory
without believing on the Lord Jesus Christ. This is the gospel,
and we encourage people to come to Christ, to believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ, but we do not use these sinful, fleshly
tactics of men who call themselves preachers, who are encouraging
people to make a decision for Jesus, to come to the front of
the of the church to shake the preacher's hand, repeat some
words after the preacher, and give them some kind of confidence
that they're saved because of something they have done. Listen,
Jesus Christ is our altar. And right where you are, as the
gospel is being preached, you can call out to the Lord Jesus
Christ for mercy. He will never turn a deaf ear
to the sincere cry of a sinner who sees their need of Christ
and cries out for mercy. But it's by faith. It's not by
doing something. It's by believing something.
And faith is not blind faith. It's based upon what the Word
of God says. Matter of fact, I draw your attention
to the Scripture that's on the front of this morning's bulletin. Taken from Romans chapter 10.
Verses 10-15, we read, For with the heart man believeth unto
righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
For the scripture saith, Whosoever believeth on him shall not be
ashamed. For there is no difference between
the Jew and the Greek. For the same Lord over all is
rich unto all that call upon him. For whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. How then shall they
call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they
believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they
hear without a preacher? And how shall they preach except
they be sent as it is written? How beautiful are the feet of
them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings
of good things. Now folks, the gospel must be
preached. We must tell people who Jesus Christ is. He's God
Almighty. He's Jehovah. He has always been
God Almighty. There are three divine persons
that make up one glorious God. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Jesus Christ, the second person of the Trinity, is as much God
as the Father or the Holy Spirit. But He has not always been a
man. He became a man. Our Creator became a man to redeem
us with His precious blood. And so we must hear who He is. We must hear what He has done. He didn't try to save anybody. Thou shalt call His name Jesus,
it says in the first chapter of Matthew, for He shall save
His people from their sins. He saved His people 2,000 years
ago when He laid down His life for us. Second Timothy 1.9 says
that Jesus Christ 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. We just didn't know anything
about this until the Holy Spirit came and enlightened us. That's
the miracle of the new birth. Like I said, faith is not blind
faith. It's based upon what the Word
of God says. And like Abraham, all of God's
enlightened children believe God. We don't. There's no way
that we can understand all of that which is contained in God's
Word. But I'll guarantee you, all of God's children who are
enlightened by the Holy Spirit believe every word of Holy Scripture.
We read this, you don't have to turn there. I want to show
you something in John chapter 12, but let me quote this scripture.
Revelation 22 verses 16 and 17 says, I, Jesus, have sent my
angel to testify unto you these things in the churches. I am
the root and the offspring of David, which we just read in
Isaiah chapter 11. 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 is a thirst
come. And whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. Now folks, I believe in whosoever
will. But I also believe these words from our Lord Jesus, no
man can come to me except the Father which has sent me. Draw
him, and I will raise him up at the last day. It is written
in the prophets, and they shall be all taught of God. Every man,
therefore, that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh
unto me. So our divine teacher, the Lord
Jesus Christ, who enlightens our minds by the power of the
Holy Spirit under the preaching of his gospel, teaches us these
truths, and as He teaches us these truths, our hearts just
swell with praise to Him for His sovereign grace and His sovereign
mercy. This is the difference between
those who are enlightened by the Holy Spirit and those who
are just plain church. Those who are plain church, those who are religious unregenerate
people, have to have something that they have done to recommend
them to God, to gain favor with God. Not by works of righteousness
which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us by the
washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Ghost. So
God's people, we put that down. We are the circumcision which
worship God in spirit and in truth and have no confidence
in the flesh. We rejoice in Christ Jesus. We
abhor any doctrine that puts man in a driver's seat, that
puts man as doing something to earn favor with God. We say by
grace are we saved through faith and that not of ourselves. It
is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. So
true saving faith comes from God. That's God's gift to his
people. And God's preachers do encourage
our hearers to come to Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. But we do not encourage anyone
to come to Christ at the expense of the gospel of God's grace,
at the expense of the honor that belongs to our wonderful God.
The Apostle Paul wrote these words inspired by the Holy Spirit.
In 2 Corinthians 5, 18-21, he said, And all things are of God,
who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given
to us the ministry of reconciliation. To wit, that God was in Christ
reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses
unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.
Now then, we are ambassadors for Christ, As though God did
beseech you by us, we pray you in Christ's stead, be ye reconciled
to God. For He hath made Him, God the
Father, hath made His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, to be sin
for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him." So Paul, as an ambassador, as one who represented
God himself, and all of God's preachers do, encouraged people
to be reconciled to God, but in the same sentence where he
encouraged them to be reconciled to God, he laid down some glorious
gospel truths. They have to go together. The
gospel is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes
in Jesus Christ as the power of God. this world while he was walking
amongst sinners, our great majestic God, the Lord Jesus Christ in
a human body, told some unbelieving Jews, I and my Father are one,
making himself equal with God. And they didn't misunderstand
what he said. They took up stones to stone
him, and he said, which good work do you stone me for? I've
done many good works, which good work do you stone me for? And
they said, not for good works, but because thou being a man
makest thyself equal with God. And the same problem is amongst
religious people today, most professing Christians. They will
utter the words that Jesus Christ is God, but when it comes to
him being the absolute sovereign God over all of His creation. When it comes to Him being the
very sovereign God who must reveal Himself to us, they balk. Oh,
we believe He's God, but that's going too far. How can you take
that subject too far? Now, what our Lord did while
He was here on this earth, every miracle He performed that pertain
to physical healing points to the miracle that he performs
in the lives of his elect when he heals us spiritually. Now
we know, we know the story of Lazarus, how our Lord Jesus stood
at his grave and commanded him to come forth. Lazarus come forth. Lazarus was dead. He had nothing
to do with that life that was restored to him by the power
of Jesus Christ. And he's a picture, Lazarus is
a picture of all who are raised from the state of spiritual deadness.
Here in the 12th chapter of John, in verses 9 through 11, we read
some things that are interesting. Much people of the Jews therefore
knew that He, that is our Lord Jesus, was there, and they came
not for Jesus' sake only, but that they might see Lazarus also,
whom He had raised from the dead. But the chief priests consulted
that they might put Lazarus also to death. They wanted to kill
the Christ of God. They wanted to kill Jesus. But
they also consulted together that they might put Lazarus also
to death. Why is that? Look at verse 11. Because that by reason of him,
many of the Jews went away and believed on Jesus. By reason
of his testimony. Now I ask you this. Do you believe
Lazarus when he was giving his testimony? of our Lord Jesus
raising Him from that state of physical deadness was talking
about His decision for Jesus, or His free will, or what He
contributed? No. He knew he was dead. And every enlightened child of
God, when we're brought from a state of spiritual deadness
into eternal life with Christ our Savior, we know that we were
dead. Spiritually, we know that. Because
we have passed from death unto life. That life wasn't there
before. Now go back to John chapter 4. I just have a few of these
I want to share with you. And please bear with me. This is
so very important. And let me share a testimony
that I experienced early in my walk with the Lord. The Lord
had saved me under the preaching of his gospel. And that's, he
saves everybody under the preaching of his gospel that are saved.
But I have a brother by the name of Corky who had a religious
experience under Armenian free will doctrine. And oh, how he
tried to convince me that what I believed was wrong. My wife
and his wife would just shudder when we got together. because
it wasn't very pretty. And my brother and a friend of
his that was also in that church that he was going to was talking
to their pastor about what I was being taught. And the pastor
assured them that what my pastor was teaching was false. And so
they said, my brother and this man who was with him, They said,
well, we'll just go over and straighten that preacher out. And their pastor said, oh, I
wouldn't do that. If I were you, he'll just tie you up with scripture. That's interesting. If I'm going to be tied up, that's
how I want to be tied up. Well, there's a bright side to
that testimony. The Lord enlightened my brother.
He now believes the true gospel of God's amazing grace. The other
man is still in a free will church, and that's between him and the
Lord. Just a few weeks ago, three I think, I was at my first pastor's
wife's funeral, and he preached that funeral. My brother Corky
was aiming gospel. It just thrills me. He loves
that truth. All of God's people love the
truths of God. And our testimony should harmonize
with the testimonies of these people that I'm sharing with
you from Holy Scripture. We know the story of the woman
at the well. How our Lord came to her. She
never would have come to Him. And this is true of all of us.
In our unregenerate state, we don't want Christ. We don't want
anything to do with Christ. We love what we're in, even if
it's darkness. We love that darkness. We won't
come to the light. So Christ comes to us in the
person of the Holy Spirit. But he came to this woman at
the well, revealed to her that she was a sinner. I mean, told
her everything that she had done. And boy, she just perceived that
he was a prophet. Well, I guess he is more than
a prophet. He's that prophet that Moses
spoke of. But what I want to draw your
attention to is in verses 39 through 42, of John chapter four,
it says, and many of the Samaritans, that woman was a Samaritan, that's
half Jew and half Gentile, and the Jews hated him, and they
hated the Jews, but many of the Samaritans of that city believed
on him, on Christ, for the saying of the woman which testified,
he told me all that ever I did. Yeah, I take it. When the Lord saved me, I just
knew my wife had met with a preacher and told him things about me
that he didn't need to know, because he was preaching right
here. But this is God, the Holy Spirit, revealing to me that
He knew everything about me and everything I'd ever done as sinful,
every sin that I committed. I didn't remember all that, but
it revealed to me that God knows every sin I ever committed, past,
present, and future. The joy of it is that Our Lord
has forgiven us for all of our sins, past, present, and future. This should be our testimony
before others. Verse 40 says, So when the Samaritans
were come unto Him, that is, when they came unto the Lord
Jesus Christ, they besought Him that He would tarry with them,
and He abode there two days. And many more believed because
of His own word, and said unto the woman, Now we believe, not
because of thy saying, For we have heard Him ourselves and
know that this is indeed the Christ, the Savior of the world.
And so, this is what we do as God's enlightened children. We
testify of God's absolute sovereign power in knowing all things.
And how He revealed this to us, and how He brought us out of
darkness into His marvelous light. But folks, listen. It's not going
to do those we talk to any good unless they hear the voice of
Jesus Christ speaking personally to their hearts. And our Lord
Jesus said, My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they
follow Me, and I give unto them eternal life. They shall never
perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of My hand. My
Father which gave them Me is greater than all, and no man
is able to pluck them out of My Father's hand. I and my Father
are one. And so, we have to hear His voice. He didn't say, I hope my sheep
will hear my voice. Or, if they will just do something
to give me permission they'll hear my voice. No. He said, my
sheep hear my voice. And He speaks personally to everyone
for whom He suffered and bled and died. Can I take you over
to Matthew chapter 8 now please? One more example. of the knowledge
of the Lord, I'll bring this to a close. I could share many
of the testimonies of Holy Scripture. I think of the blind man that
was born blind that our Lord healed, and the proud religious
leaders of that day examined him. They knew that he was born
blind. But they didn't want Jesus Christ
to receive the praise, so they were telling him, well, give
God the glory. This man is a sinner. And he said, whether he's a sinner
or not, I don't know. But I know this one thing. Once I was blind,
but now I see. Later, the Lord came to him and
revealed himself as the true and living God, his sovereign
Lord. But he was desynagogued. That's probably not a word. But
he was kicked out of the church. because he wouldn't back down
to those religious hypocrites. He told them, this man, Jesus
healed me, gave me sight. And this is our testimony. This
is our testimony of what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for
us. He opened our spiritually blind
eyes that we might see God's glory by faith in the face of
the one who loved us and gave himself for us. Now remember
last week's message? Be not afraid. We have no reason
to be afraid. No reason to be afraid of anything. Our God is with us every step
of the way, and He is able to save to the uttermost those that
come unto God by Jesus Christ, seeing He ever lives to make
intercession for us. So we're not to be afraid, and
our rest in Christ is glorious. And I want to read this scripture
in Matthew chapter 8, starting at verse 23. down through verse 27. And when he was entered into
a ship, our Lord Jesus entered into a ship, his disciples followed
him. And behold, there arose a great
tempest in the sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with
the waves, but he, our Lord Jesus, was asleep. And his disciples
came to him and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us, we perish. And he saith unto them, why are
ye fearful, O ye of little faith? Then he arose and rebuked the
winds and the sea, and there was a great calm. But the men
marveled, saying, what manner of man is this, that even the
winds and the sea obey him? Now folks, many of the Lord's
disciples were in the same boat together. They all experienced
the same raging storm. But the Lord Jesus was in the
boat with them. And all of God's enlightened
children are in the same boat, so to speak. All of us go through
many painful trials. There is no temptation that is
taking you such as is common to man. But such as is common to man.
In other words, this, what we're experiencing is not unique. All
of the Old Testament saints who died in faith went through trials
and testings. I think of Job. He really went
through a painful testing. And you know, the interesting
thing is that God allowed Satan to do that. He allowed Satan
to take away all of his possessions, kill his children. Allowed Satan
to cover Job with boils. I don't think we give enough
thought to that. His whole body covered with boils and no way
that he could get comfortable without excruciating pain going
through his whole body. Yet, even though Satan is the
one that God used as an instrument to do that to Job, Job said,
the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name
of the Lord. He acknowledged God's hand in
what had taken place. I don't know if you're aware
of this, and I hope you are, but if you're not, let me tell
you. Grab a hold of it. This is good. The devil is God's
devil. He's in the hands of Jesus Christ.
He cannot do anything but what Jesus Christ allows him to do.
The devil had to get permission from God to afflict Job. And
they had to get those evil spirits that were in that demoniac man
that we read about in Mark 5, had to get permission from Jesus
Christ to go into a herd of pigs. He's in control. Jesus Christ
is in control. So we're all in this boat together.
We're going through this life with trials and testings and
painful things that we experience. Sorrow grips our heart. We have
fearful doubts and misgivings. This little old vessel of clay is weak, frail. We bounce around on the storms
of life It caused us to get our eye off of Jesus Christ and look
to the storm rather than the one who brought the storm. When
those men in that boat that we just read about were involved
in that storm that was raging, it was Jesus Christ Himself who
purposed that. And when He stood up in the boat
after rebuking them, saying, O ye of little faith, He proved
beyond a shadow of doubt that He has control over everything.
when he said, peace be still. And even the winds and the sea
obeyed his voice. So I encourage you. We still
have the old nature. We still are involved in dealing
with others who have the old nature. And religious people
are the meanest people in the world. They don't have the divine
nature. They have never experienced the
miracle of the new birth, and they just believe they're right,
and they'll persecute God's enlightened children just like... My mind, it's there. It'll come
out here in just a minute. Ishmael persecuted Isaac, I told
you there. And we just go through some terrible
time, but folks, the Lord's in this little frail vessel. He's
with us. And He will allow the storm to
rage as long as He is pleased to do so. And at His time, His
appointed time, He will speak peace, be still, and He'll calm
that storm. But while we're going through
this storm, God helped us to have a true testimony of His
sovereign power in our lives. Those men in the boat with our
Lord Jesus were God's ordained apostles. They were going to
be lodged out to preach the gospel of God's amazing grace. They
learned a valuable lesson. They learned that Jesus Christ
is in control of everything. That's why Paul and Silas could
sing while they were thrown into the deepest part of that prison
there at Philippi, with blood still oozing from their backs.
Praises to God at midnight. They knew they were right where
God had ordained them to be, going through just exactly what
God had purposed for them to go through. And through that,
God had his elect that heard the gospel from Paul and Silas
who were thrown into that prison. They were gloriously saved, that
Philippian jailer and members of his household. So we need
to keep this in mind. Our Lord is on his sovereign
throne of power. He rules over this whole universe
and everything in it. He's too wise to make a mistake. And he loves us too much to allow
anything to happen to us except that which He has predetermined,
that which is for His glory and for our good. Romans 8.28 holds
true in every situation, and we know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are called
according to His purpose. So, brethren, our sovereign Redeemer
dwells in every vessel of clay he has enlightened with the knowledge
of himself as our Lord and our Savior. The knowledge of the
Lord is the title of this message. As babes in Christ, we know some
things, like the blind man, We know that once we were blind,
and now we see. Like Lazarus, we know that we
were dead, but now we have life. Like the woman at the well, we
know that we're sinners, that God has saved us, redeemed us,
and has forgiven us for all of our sins. But as we mature in
the faith, as we mature in the faith, growing in grace and in
the knowledge of our Savior, this wonderful truth concerning
God's absolute sovereignty in the person of the God-man should
thrill our hearts, to where we will trust Him. Lean back into
the arms of the Lord Jesus Christ in every situation and give a
testimony that will glorify Him. It's easy to say praise the Lord
when there's no waves, when there's no bumps in the road, when we
have a little account in the bank and our health is good and
we're at peace with different people. But when a trial comes
and we lose some of the things of this world that we possess,
our job, or even if we lose a loved one, or if a loved one is right
on the threshold of death, If our mother or our father or
our children or our siblings who are in Christ live next door
to us or thousands of miles away from us, the knowledge of the
Lord is in their hearts as well as in ours. Trust the Lord. Bow down to Him saying, Father,
I know. This is according to your purpose.
Through Christ Jesus, my Lord, give me grace to endure this
for your glory, to be a testimony that others around me will see
that my love for the Lord Jesus Christ does not cause me to be
in despair when things are going wrong, but that I'll be a testimony
for the glory of the one who loved me and gave himself for
me who's in control of the whole situation. God help us to realize
that one of these days we will see our Savior face to face. And what we don't know in this
life, we'll know then because we'll know as we're known.