When I first started having conferences
up there in Rescue, I was thanked for my introductions,
and then I was politely asked, please don't make them so long. Thank you for not making yours
so long, brother. And yes, I believe I do know
these folks here. Good to see every one of you.
Doesn't matter whether I'm standing here before you or whether I'd
be sitting there right with you in the pews, I'm worshiping with
family tonight. What a joy that brings to my
heart here. And I have to say this, I know
your pastor read the, wait a minute. Oh, that's so good. It's as good
as it looks on TV. I know your pastor read the letter
for us, for the dear saints up there in rescue. But for me, the generosity of God's people
is just so overwhelming. Thank you. Thank you from the
bottom of my heart. for your love for us and Rescue.
Thank you. I don't know who picked your
song. Actually, yes, I do. That goes right along with what
I told Kevin. I said, I've got four messages.
I have no idea what I'm going to give. That was at 2 o'clock
this afternoon. And I didn't tell him what I
was going to bring. Lord picked out this song. I
love to tell the story. That's what it's all about, isn't
it? That's what it's all about. Preaching the gospel. I wonder
at times if our loved ones who have sat under the preaching
of the true gospel one time or another, whether visiting with
us or even every Sunday. I wonder at times if they understand what it is for God to take your life, take your life from this world
and make you a servant of him. Your pastor won't say this, so
I will. God grabbed a hold of that man and made him a servant. A servant who does just this,
tells the story of Jesus Christ and his love for him. He took him out of that world
where he was a very prosperous man, took his family, and took
him to the wilderness of San Diego so that God might use him to
feed his sheep. See, we need fed, don't we? I
was talking with Cass over at his home the other day, and he
said the pastor had thanked him for being so faithful. And I
may not say it exactly how you said it, but I think they'll
get the understanding of this. He told something back to the pastor.
He goes, no, no, no, you don't understand. I come because I need. I need to feed. I need to, I'm
in the wilderness all week long. For three hours a week, I get
to come out of that wilderness and I get to hear about my Lord
who loves me, who's gonna take care of me, who's gonna provide
everything I need to be with Him for eternity. I'm not faithful,
brother. John Reeves is in that same boat.
I'm in the same ship. I'm fellers in the same ship
with you. I need to hear the gospel. I heard Larry Chris here
the other day preaching there in rescue. Oh man, I was telling
Kevin this afternoon, I could easily, easily go back to sitting
in that seat and just hearing the word of the Lord preached
to me. It's not easy being a pastor. It's a great joy and a great
honor. And you hear pastors say that, don't you? They come here
and they say, it's a great honor to be here. It is such an honor
for me to be here, for that man back there to trust me enough
to preach the gospel for you. He loves you with all his heart,
every one of you. His greatest desire is the desire
of all of God's preachers, is that God would call you out of
the darkness that you once walked in, loving that darkness, and
shine his light in your heart. The light of his love for his
people. That love that grabs a hold of
me, that grabs a hold of you, if you belong to him. I love to tell the story. It
is pleasant to repeat what seems each time I tell it more wonderfully
and sweet." He had no idea what I'm going to preach on. Remember
those words, folks. Remember those words. Turn to
the book of Hebrews, if you would, please. I hope tonight there are some
people here who have a troubled heart. I'm not hoping that you're going
through trouble of family, family, maybe troubles with work. I'm not that, that's not what
I'm talking about. I'm talking about a troubled heart from within. Larry Criss put it this way,
he said, and he was quoting another pastor, I can't remember the
pastor's name, he says, I'm looking for sinners to talk to tonight. I want to
talk tonight to those who are troubled with the sin within
their own body. If you're not troubled with your
sin, you can go to sleep if you want. This isn't a message for
you, but if you've got trouble, if you're sitting there tonight
thinking, I don't know what to do. I don't know where to turn. I can't fix this on my own. May God bring you to your knees
tonight to cry out for him. Lord, have mercy upon me. What is gospel preaching? How can one determine a gospel
preacher from someone who just talks? Well, the simplest answer to
that is a man that sent of God will preach one message and one
message only. He preaches Jesus Christ, the
Lord, and him crucified. That's gospel preaching in a
nutshell. Are you with me in Hebrews chapter
one? Look with me if you would, verses one through three. God,
who at sundry times and in diverse manners, that means at various
different times and in different ways, different manners, he spake
in times past unto the fathers, unto our fathers, by the prophets. This God, who at sundry times
spoke in those ways, hath in these days, in verse two, hath
in these last days spoken unto us by his son. whom he hath appointed heir of
all things, by whom also he made the worlds, who being the brightness
of his glory and the express image of his person, and upholding
all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself
purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the majesty
on high." How do you tell a gospel preacher? This man who wrote
these words, this man who was inspired by God Almighty through
the Spirit of God to pen these words, preached the gospel in
three verses. God made his son to sit on the
throne of all glory in heaven after he had purged the sins
of all of his people. I asked you if you were sitting
here tonight and if you were troubled with these thoughts,
I don't know what to do. Turn to the one who does. Turn
to Christ Jesus. the one who has purged his peoples,
the sins of his people. Now turn over, if you would,
to 1 John. I'm sorry, John. John chapter
one. I'm setting the table. I want
to answer to you tonight that question. How can you tell if
a man who is standing on a pulpit is a gospel preacher, a gospel
preacher of God's true word? Folks, there's a lot of people
who stand in pulpits all over the world who say they're preachers,
who say they're gospel preachers. And they'll stand up there and
they'll tell the people things that tickle their ears. They'll
have big old bands playing in the background behind them. They'll
have big old TVs for people to read their Bibles off the TV.
They'll have music going in the background when they get real
low and they talk real low to you. You know, they figured out
a long time ago that if you play the right kind of music, you
can make a man cry. Go all the way back to that movie they called
Old Yeller. Was it Old Yeller? Was that the
name of it? Yeah. They figured out then that
you could make a full grown man cry off the music, because they
played it once without the music, the dog dying, and they played
the other time with the dog dying and the music, everybody cried
when the music played. You think churches aren't smart
enough to figure that kind of stuff out, too? Whatever it takes to
get people in the pews is their motto. The more we can get here,
the more money we can generate. They think they can do more good
with it. Not everybody preaches the gospel. But God's servants
do. God's servants do. Sometimes us pastors have to
remind each other, brother, I've never heard a bad message from
him, ever. And I've listened to a lot of
his messages, not as much as you folks, but I've never heard
him preach anything outside the gospel. Here in John chapter one, we
saw back in the book of Hebrews chapter one, how Christ was exalted. Christ was portrayed. Christ
was brought out in what he was and who he was and what he had
done and where he was now. Here in John chapter one, we
read in verse one, in the beginning was the word and the word was
with God and the word was God. So we see that Jesus Christ being
lifted up here before us as the word was with God and the word
was God. Now we know we're talking about
Christ here because over in verse 14, it says, and the word was
made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory, the
glory of the only begotten full of grace and truth. Verse two,
we read back in verse two there, it says, the same was in the
beginning with God. And then it tells us exactly what it told
us there a moment ago. In Hebrews, it says, all things
were made by him, and without him was not anything made that
was made. So we see the Lord Jesus Christ as sovereign God
Almighty. Three distinct persons. God the
Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, yes. But when
you've seen Christ, you have seen God the Father. That's what
he told his disciples. When you've seen me, you have
seen my father. Verse four, and him was life,
and the life was the light of men, and the light shineth in
darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not. Oh, it throws in a little
more here now into this gospel preaching, doesn't it? The message
of the gospel, mankind in our darkness, In the days before
the light was shined in the hearts of his people, in the day before
the Lord came to us in his love, in his power, and shined his
light in our hearts, we walked in darkness. We didn't know who the Lord was,
we didn't care. Let's look at another one, if
you would. Turn over to Luke, Luke chapter 24. We're talking
about gospel preachers. We're bringing out how, how do
we tell the difference? How can we tell the difference
between one who is standing before people declaring the truth of
Christ and one who's just up there babbling? In Luke chapter
24, if you look with me at verse 27, Our Lord had been walking with
two men on the road to Emmaus. He had been talking with two
of his disciples that didn't even know him. Though they were
disciples of his, they didn't know him for he held his presence,
who he was, he withheld his presence from them. And after hearing
them complain about Christ, the death of Christ, and how we thought
he was going to be the new king to sit on his throne and save
us from the Romans, and now he's dead. What a sad thing. They couldn't see the truth of
why Christ came. The death of Christ had not been
placed upon their hearts as something of salvation yet. Many people
hear about the death of Christ. Even Muslims have heard about
the death of Christ. But until the Lord shows you
why he died, until he opened your heart to know why he died
and who he died for, it was just an event. He says, oh, in verse
25, then he said unto them, O fools and slow of heart to believe
all that the prophets have spoken. You know the word that I have
posted. Do you know the word that I spoke
in the Old Testament of the prophets too that we just read about in
Hebrews? You know those words. You're
slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken. Ought not
Christ to have suffered these things and to enter into his
glory? And then he did this. He did
this, and beginning at Moses and all the prophets, he expounded
unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. Now look over at verses 44 and
47. Gospel preachers, men who were
sent of God, those who are servants of God to preach his word, when
they are sent out and cross paths with one of God's sheep, one
of those who he has said, my sheep will hear my voice, this
is the result of that. Look with me if you would over
verse 44. And he said unto him, these are
the words which I speak unto you while I was yet with you.
Yet all things must be fulfilled which were written of the law
of Moses and in the prophets and in the Psalms concerning
me. Then opened he their understanding. I want to stop there for just
a moment. You've heard me build up your
pastor here tonight. And he knows in his heart what
I mean by that. I'm not saying something to puff
up his head. One of the hardest things to
being a pastor, to being a preacher, is knowing this, that when we
stand before you, we stand in the weakness of our flesh. I can't talk you into salvation.
What you hear from these words of this foul mouth that stands
before you can't talk you into salvation. It must be from God. He must speak to your hearts.
Well, how do I know if he's grabbing a hold of my heart? You'll know.
You will know. There will be no doubt in your
mind that something is happening. You may not understand it completely,
but you'll know something's going on. How can we tell? How can we tell
if the man standing before us is a man of God? In John 5, verse 39, we read
these words, Have you ever been to an Armenian church? I'm not trying to suggest that
you should. But if you're a child of God, it's not going to hurt
you. And if you've never heard someone just up there babbling,
you can actually tune into TV and probably hear it there and
just as well. You can tune in on the radio
somewhere. They're babblers. They're like those guys on Saturday
Night Live, Arnold Schwarzenegger and, oh, I can't remember the
smaller guy. We want to pump you up. They
want to build you up. You can do it. You can be better
if you just do this. You can be a better person if
you just do this. Or they'll, you know, we raised
so much money for our church, we were able to buy an ambulance. And they'll spend a whole hour
telling about what the kids did at the church to raise the money
so that they could go out and buy an ambulance for a poor city
down in Mexico. That's a great thing. I'm glad
they did, but that's not gospel preaching. That's not what we're
put here in this pulpit to do. That's not what God's messengers
do. We don't build up mankind. We don't want to puff you up. That's why it's so difficult
to stand here before people and talk about this, knowing that
I'm a sinner just as you are. I'm a sinner saved by grace.
I need Christ just as much as you do. I need to hear the word
of God. I need to be in the word of God
just as much as you do. I need to get away from that
valley of shadow of death that I have to walk through every
day. for the week and come somewhere where I can gather with God's
people and hear about the one who loves us and gave himself
for us and shed his own blood for us. I was asked to listen to a message and I did. is every drop of my energy to
keep from turning it off. But I told the brother that I
would listen, and I did. And the man who... I just don't understand it. I
don't understand it. But the man that some say is
a gospel preacher stood there for an hour and spoke about nothing
but, to be quite honest with you, God's love. Wait a minute,
John, isn't that what you just said the gospel was? Yes and no. You can stand here
and say God loves you and talk about what people think is God's
love for the men of this world, for people who are of this world,
but if you don't tell them what God did, if you don't tell them
who God did it for, If you don't tell them what the results of
what God did, and if you don't tell them where God is right
now, then you haven't preached the gospel. That's all there
is to it. The gospel is Christ and Him
crucified. Well, that's the love of God,
yes, but if you're just gonna sit there and talk about, well,
by God's love, He sent the Son to the cross and He died for
the whole world, He's waiting for you to come to Him. That's not, that's not the Christ
of scriptures. That's not the love of God. That's
the love of man and day making a decision for Christ. And folks,
if we're left to ourselves, our decision will be to walk on that
path to damnation. That's our nature. I read some literature and in
that, in that article, That man mentioned the word Jesus one
time in the whole article, and not once was it about him crucified.
Not once was it about his blood being shed. Not once was it about
what he had done for his people. I thought to myself, where was
the hope? Where was Christ in that message? Was this man a
true gospel preacher? We went to a service one time
for a man who died. He was a faithful brother in
Christ. He was there every Sunday, every Wednesday. He was at every
service. His wife was not. His wife went to an Armenian
church down the street. Guess where his services were
held at when he died? At the Armenian church. So the
whole church of rescue went down to that other church that one
day. And we were sitting around afterwards. We didn't even stay
to have fellowship with anybody there. We couldn't. We went down. We went to come back to the church
afterwards. And we were sitting around. And folks started saying,
well, everything that guy said was right. Everything he said
was of scripture. And Pastor Gene said to us, he
goes, did you notice he didn't say anything about Christ's death
for you? Oh. Wow. Even those who are God's
elect could have been deceived sitting under that message. What
was wrong with that message? There was nothing wrong with
it. Yes, it was. It wasn't what he said. It was what he did not
say. He did not bring out the gospel. He did not preach about
our Savior. Look over at John chapter three,
verse 14. Look over at John chapter three,
verse 14. No, not 13, three. This is the gospel message, folks.
Right here in one verse. And as Moses lifted up the serpent
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. That's as simple as it gets right
there. Is that not what you would call the gospel? Isn't that what
you would call the good news? Is that not what a poor sinner
needs to hear? Do we not need salvation? Folks,
I'm bitten. I am bitten. The poison is in
my blood. And it reaches to every point
of my body. Every drop of my soul is plagued
with my sin. I have no hope in myself. I have
no confidence in what I can do. I have no confidence in my thoughts. Because I know my thoughts are
plagued with the sin of this flesh. We can't trust our flesh,
Tim. Not one bit of it. Not even our
thoughts. I got no hope in myself. That's
not what the preachers of this world are teaching. You can do
better. You can be a better person if
you'll just give more money to the pot of the church. If you'll
just go down and feed the poor, if you'll just do this, if you'll
get into the baptismal, you'll do better. Not this sinner. I need something. I need a savior. Do you? I'm not here to figure out how good I can
be. For I know in this flesh dwelleth
no good thing. Paul knew that. He said in Romans
7, 18, for I know that in me, that is in my flesh, that is
in my flesh dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present
with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. In
this flesh, I carry the mark of the beast. 666, you know what
that is? That's the number short of perfection.
Perfection is 777. God perfected everything in seven
days. 666 is always coming up short
of perfection. That's me. I will always, no
matter how good I think I do anything, I will always come
up short of perfection. And God requires perfection from
us. Be ye holy for I am holy. I was thinking about this one
time, you know, we take the scriptures and God
gives us a lot of instructions in there, doesn't he? And I know
people who say, John, you just, you don't spend enough time on
the instructions of God. Well, that might be true. That
might be true. When I'm talking about instructions
and God's word and how he instructs his people, because he does through
his word, there's plenty there for us to instruct on. There's
one thing that comes to mind every time I read something about
the instructions of God. I can't do it. I'm not trying to, I'm not trying
to say you can't be responsible. We are responsible for our actions. I'm just saying that I have no
way to perform whatever God has instructed me to do. I have no way to perform it to
his expectation. That's why he looks to his son
instead of looking to me. His son performed everything
perfectly. Everything he did satisfied his
father. This is my beloved son in whom
I am well pleased, he said about his son. Our God requires perfection,
and a gospel preacher speaks of the only perfection that ever
walked this earth, and that is Jesus Christ, the Son of God,
the Son of the living God. He is the good news. He is the
gospel. Consider with me an example,
if you would, that we've been given over in Luke chapter four.
Turn over to Luke chapter four, if you would. Consider this example with me,
if you would, in Luke chapter four, beginning at verse 14. And Jesus returned in the power
of the Spirit into Galilee, and there he went out in fame of
him through all the region round about, and he taught in their
synagogues, being glorified of all. And he came to Nazareth,
where he had been brought up, and as his custom was, did you
catch that? And he came to Nazareth, where
he had been brought up, and as his custom was, he went into
the synagogue on the Sabbath day, and he stood up for to read. And there was a still, and there
was delivered unto him the book of the prophets, Isaiah's, and
when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was
written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed
me to preach the gospel. greatest preacher that ever walked
this earth. And what did he do? He preached the gospel to the
poor, to those who have no confidence in themselves, to those who have
come up against the wall of I can't do anything for myself. I'm destitute. I have nothing before a thrice
holy God. I have nothing to stand before
him. What can I do, Lord? Hear the gospel. be given ears
to hear the gospel, even if it's the first time. Even if it's
the first time and you've never heard it before. Are you poor
in spirit tonight? Has God made you poor? This is the importance of preaching
the gospel to men like Kevin and myself and others. This is
more important than anything else we could be doing in the
world. Folks, we're all going to go through that doormark death.
The worst thing we could do, the worst thing we have done
to the generation of, to my generation, is to try to protect our children
from what death is. I hope I didn't just scare your
kids. And I hope that you may go home
sometime here soon and teach them what death really is. Folks,
we have erred greatly in our generation. Death is coming to
all of us. None of us will live forever. I hope these young folks get
to live a long, long life. But it's not guaranteed for any
of us, is it? We need to teach our kids. We
need to teach our young. The day is coming when you're
going to meet God. Are you poor in spirit? Our Lord preached
to the poor. He sent them. He has sent me,
he says, to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the
captives and recovering of the sight to the blind and to set
at liberty them that are bruised. to preach the acceptable year
of the Lord. And then he closed the book and
gave it again to the minister. And he sat down and the eyes
of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him.
And he began to say unto them, this day, here's the gospel. Here it is. This day, he said,
This scripture is fulfilled in your ears and they knew what
he was talking about. They knew that he was talking
about himself. Now I'd like to ask you to turn
over the book of Acts chapter 7, 17, Acts chapter 17. That won't be much longer. Our Lord, the greatest preacher
to ever walk this earth, preached himself in fulfilling the words
of Moses and all the prophets. Everything in God's word points
to him and God's messengers do the same. Are you with me in
Acts chapter 17? Look at verses two and three
with me. And Paul, as his manner was. We just read our Lord, what
was he doing? He was doing what he customarily
did. That means that he was doing
the same thing he did all the time. It wasn't just one time. The Lord didn't just go into
one of the synagogues. He went into the synagogues all
the time. That's what his customary was. It was customary for him
to do that. Paul, the same thing. Kevin Thacker,
the same thing. Frank Tate, the same thing. Henry
Mahan, the same thing. God helped John Reeves to be
the same thing. That's all I want to ever say.
I want to tell the story. I want to tell the old, old story
that has been told since the beginning of time, since God
created the world. Man have sinned and deserve the
wrath of God. And because God has loved some
who he has loved with an eternal love, he sent his son to take
the wrath for us. to shed his blood so that he
wouldn't have to shed ours. When we go through that doormark
death, the death for this body will be with him in paradise
from that time on. I see smiles, because we know
the grace of what God has done for us, don't we? And Paul, as his manner was,
went and unto them, and three Sabbath days reasoned with them
out of scriptures, opening and alleging that Christ must needs. Did you notice this? Are you
catching this? What's he preaching? Same thing I said a few moments
ago in the beginning of this message, he's preaching Christ
in him crucified. Christ must needs. He must needs
have suffered and risen again from the dead. And that is that
this Jesus whom I preach unto you is Christ. Now, if you would
turn over or actually just go back to the next chapter, chapter
16, and look with me at verse 25. And at midnight, Paul and
Silas prayed. Here's the results. This is a
wonderful picture of the message of Christ and Him crucified and
what it does for His people. And at midnight, Paul and Silas
prayed and sang praises unto God, and the prisoners heard
them, and suddenly there was a great earthquake, so that the
foundations of the prison were shaken. Remember what I said at the moment,
at the beginning? Kevin didn't know what I was
gonna preach. You see how God worked that out? This is God
working something out right here, folks. And suddenly there was
a great earthquake so that the foundations of the prison were
shaken and immediately all the doors were opened and everyone's
bands were closed. And the keeper of the prison,
awaking out of his sleep and seeing the prison doors open,
he drew out his sword and would have killed himself You know,
that was their custom. He was put in charge. He knew
that if he didn't take his own life, the king probably would.
You let them go? That was the custom in those
days. You give charge to somebody, you don't give up on that charge.
It's there. He thought they had gotten out. He would have killed
himself, supposing that the prisoners had been fed. But look at here
what God's people did. They cried out with a loud voice saying,
do thyself no harm, for we are all here. Don't bring harm on
yourself. There's no need. We're right
here. We're singing praises to our
Lord. We're right where the Lord would have us to be. Did you
know you're right where the Lord would have you to be tonight?
Each and every one of us, even those who may not know the
Lord yet. Someday I pray there'll be those
who can look back and say, wow, I was hearing about the Lord
then. Paul cried with a loud voice
saying, do thyself no harm for we are all here. Then he called
for a light and sprang in and came trembling and fell down
before Paul in silence. And he brought them out and said,
sirs, what must I do to be saved? And they said, believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved and thy house. What
was it? What is it that we must believe?
My title comes from the 17th chapter of Acts, verse two, where
it says, as his manner was. The gospel is what God uses to
save his chosen people. The gospel is what the spirit
uses to reveal who Christ is. It says to believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ. He said in there in verse 31,
what must I do? He said, believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. Believe on who he is. Do you
believe that it's God in the flesh, that he was manifest in
the flesh and walked this earth? Well then thank God because you
didn't before. What made us to differ? Do you
believe that Christ walked perfectly in everything that he did? Establishing
a perfect righteousness that you and I could never establish.
The righteousness that we need to be before God Almighty. Do you believe the Lord Jesus
Christ and where He is now? Do you believe that death could
not hold Him? He's the God of death. He's the
God of hell. He's sovereign God of everything,
including our will. Aren't you thankful that in the
day of His power, He made us willing to hear Him, to make
us love Him because He first loved us? Do you believe? What must I do? Believe on the
Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved in thy house. Verse
32, and they spake unto him the word of the Lord. We recently
were doing a Bible study of John the Baptist. Actually, no, I
believe it's a message, a series of messages that I'm bringing
from the book of Luke. And we were looking at John the
Baptist. You know what John the Baptist went about preaching?
He went about preaching the way of the Lord. Not the way of man, the way of
the Lord. The way of the Lord is this.
We are saved by grace. through faith, belief in our
Savior. Not of works, lest man should
boast. And I know, I know that if you
give me one inch, I'll start boasting. That's how weak I am. And he took them the same hour
of the night, washed their stripes, and baptized, and was baptized
in he and all of his straightaway. And when he had brought them
into his house, he set meat before them and rejoiced, believing
in God with all the house." Is practical godliness important?
Absolutely. The instructions of God is just
as important as everything else. When we come together to search
God's words for instructions on Friday night, and again in
our 10 o'clock study on Sunday morning, yet practical godliness
alone is just works. It has to have grace. I'm so
thankful my pastor pounded that into me and pounded that into
me and pounded that into me. Without grace, it's just works. There's no satisfaction in what
I do in the flesh to me. Practical godliness alone is
nothing but works. Without the gospel, then it's
all man's works, and there's no satisfaction in our walk with
God. Satisfaction with God is only
in our substitute, Christ Jesus the Lord. We read in Matthew
17, five, while he yet spake, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed
them and behold a voice out of that cloud, which said, this
is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Hear ye him. A gospel preacher cannot waste
time talking about just God's love, just heaven or just hell. and not bring out who Christ
is, what he has done, and where he is right now. If you speak
of God's love and you leave out what he did in sending his son
to die for those that he loves, you have missed the good news.
You have missed the gospel. You're not a gospel preacher.
Every word that came from the greatest gospel preacher that
ever walked this earth was a gospel message of himself. Christ expounded
in all the scriptures the thing concerning himself as we read
in Luke 24, 27. You might ask, well, what about
all the instructions? Of all that our Lord has given
us in instructions, not one thing can I do in an acceptable way. The gospel in that, to me, is
this. My Lord has fulfilled it all
for me. All to him I owe. Sin had left
a crimson stain. He washed me white as snow. Brother?