If you're opening your Bibles
with me again to Ephesians chapter one, this was not intentional
on my part. I was working on three or four
things at once trying to find the Lord's message for this morning.
Ended up being, we'll just pick up where we left off in the Bible
class this morning. Let me pass along to you the
greetings from the folks in Ashland. They all send their greetings
and love to you. especially Brother Eric Floyd. He is one of the
reasons I'm so honored to be here. His love for you and his
very high opinion of y'all makes me very honored to be in your
midst. And he promised he would preside
for the service this morning and take care of the service
as long as I promised to pass along his love and affection
to y'all. And I'm also honored to be here
in place of your pastor. I have known Kevin since he was
a boy and I can tell you he's just, he is one of the very finest
men that I know. And much more importantly, God's
gifted him. He's gifted him to be a good preacher and a good
and faithful pastor. I know God has sent him here
for your blessing and your benefit as well as God's glory. And I'm
very thankful and honored. that he would ask me to come
and fill in. I can tell you this, Kevin was
preaching this morning, but a big part of his heart is right here. He's thinking about y'all, wanting
to make sure that y'all were fed well, taken care of well. And when a man invites you to
preach at his stead and he's trusting, you to me to preach
to, that's an honor. That's a big honor and I do not
take it lightly. Very, very thankful to be here.
I've titled the message this morning, How Does God Save a
Sinner? Now, man in his fleshly dead
mind has come up with a lot of crazy ways to answer that question,
haven't they? But you know, if we want to find
out how God saves a sinner, I think it would be a good idea to find
out what God says about the subject. If anybody knows how God saves
a sinner, I believe it's God, don't you? And I think we ought
to look into God's word to find the answer to that question.
It's a very important question, a question that applies to every
one of us here this morning, from the youngest to the oldest.
And I don't want to give you just an academic answer to this
question. How does God save a sinner? This
is the good news of the gospel. It's life. And it's exciting. I mean, I'm not advocating throwing
songbooks and that kind of thing, but now this is exciting. Almighty
God has chosen to save sinners and he's told us how he does
it. And you can get a sense of that when you read Ephesians
chapter one. You can just see in your mind's eye Paul writing
this passage under inspiration of the Holy Spirit. In his heart,
he's just bursting out with praise and worship and excitement. This
is how God saves sinners. And I want us to look at this
question and the answer in such a way that we'll be thrilled
about the answer. If the Holy Spirit will be pleased
to show us Christ from it, we will be thrilled to see this
answer. How does God save sinners? In the shortest possible terms,
I can tell you this, God saves sinners by his grace. Salvation
is all of grace and none by our works. And Paul tells us exactly
here in Ephesians chapter one what kind of grace it takes to
save a sinner. I'm going to give you eight of
them and I promise I'll be brief. But number one is this, God saves
sinners by sovereign grace. Sovereign grace. Verse three,
Ephesians one, blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who has blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ. Now salvation, it all began in
eternity before the creation when God the father blessed His
people with every spiritual blessing that there is to be had. He blessed
His people with that for He created anything. And the Father just
gave, freely gave all those blessings to His people, freely, without
them ever having to do anything to receive them. That's grace. That's sovereign grace. God just
gave it to whom He would. We see that very early on in
the Bible, in Genesis chapter six, Noah found grace in the
eyes of the Lord. Nobody else did. Eight souls
were in that ark, that sovereign grace. God picked Noah. Noah
was just as sinful as everybody else, but Noah found grace in
the eyes of the Lord. That's God being gracious to
whom he will be gracious. He chose Noah. And this thing
of salvation, is all of grace. God does not bless his people
because they deserve it. God blessed his people because
Christ deserves it, because Christ earned it as a man made under
the law. Paul here tells us that the father
has blessed us in Christ, in Christ, not because of what his
elect would earn by their religious works and their morality, The
father gave his people what the Lord Jesus Christ would earn.
As their representative, as a man made under the law, he gave them
what they don't deserve. Now that's grace. And this is
sovereign grace. The father was gracious to his
people just because he decided to do it. Just because he would,
because it's his character to do it. And Paul stresses this
throughout this passage. Look at the end of verse five.
All this happened according to the good pleasure of His will. Look at the end of verse nine.
This was according to His good pleasure, which He had purposed
in Himself. And verse 11, at the end of the
verse, according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things
after the counsel of His own will. Now that is sovereign grace. This thing of grace is all God's
idea, if I can use that word, And it's all of God's doing.
God's not gracious to anybody because he owes it to him. No,
if he owes it to us, it's wages, isn't it? Not grace. And sovereign
grace, grace that God gives just because he will, is the only
kind of grace that can ever save a sinner. Because we can never
do anything to earn salvation. We can't do anything to get God
to save us. If we could do something to get
God to save us, that would make God the debtor, and that can't
be. That can't be. We don't want
God to give us what we deserve. Because what do we deserve? The
wages of sin is death. We don't want that. But God gives
his people grace just because he decided to do it. and that
grace leads to salvation of His people where His people are saved
to the uttermost. You see, sovereign grace is what
makes salvation sure because it's all God's will and His will
always comes to pass. And you might wonder, well, how
sure is salvation? How sure is this thing? Let me
tell you, so sure Paul talks about it in the past tense. He
talked about it in the past tense 2,000 years before you and I
were ever born. That's how sure salvation is. See what he says
here? Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us. That's past tense. This thing
is already done. The salvation of God's people
is so sure, it's already done. Now God's given these blessings
to his people in Christ, and what God does is forever. That
means God won't take it back. Our sin will never make him take
it back. He knew our sin before the creation
of the world better than we know it right now. He put it away
by the blood of his son, so our sin won't make him take it back.
And nobody else can overpower God and make him take it back
either. Sovereign grace. Now, that's thrilling. That's
good doctrine, but that's thrilling, isn't it? All right, here's the
second thing. God saves sinners by electing
grace. Verse four, according as he has chosen us in him before
the foundation of the world that we should be holy and without
blame before him in love. Now, people can try to deny God's
electing love and God's electing grace all they want to. But God's
election of a people is as clear as the noonday sun in scripture.
I mean, it cannot be denied. Paul says here, God chose us. I don't need anything else to
tell me. God chose a people. God elected a people. It can't
be more clear. And if he chose a people, it
had to be in electing grace. Electing grace. And God's people
Love electing grace, because that's the kind of grace I need.
Because you know who electing grace is for? Sinners. God, you know, people say, well,
God looked down through the telescope of time, and he saw who would
choose him, so he chose them. God saw who would be good, so
he chose them. Well, that's God taking credit
for what man would already do. I forget where it is in the Psalms,
but David said, God looked down. He did look down upon all the
sons of men. You know what he saw? They're all dead in Zen.
He did look down through the telescope of time and you know
what he saw? There'd be none good, no, not one. So if God's
going to save a people, he's going to have to choose them.
God chose to save sinners. He didn't choose people because
they were good and they were holy, and when they were without
blame, he chose them that they would be holy and without blame
before him in love. God chose to save dead, vile,
wretched, guilty, hell-deserving sinners. Not because they were
holy, but that he'd make them holy. that Christ would make
his people holy and without blame before him in love by his obedience
and his sacrifice for them. Now that's God's electing grace. And if a sinner would be saved,
we know this. If God has saved you, you know
this. The only way I could have been chosen, the only way I could
be saved is by God's electing grace because I know this, I
never would have chosen God unless he chose me first. Oh, I do choose
him now. I do. If I can say it this way,
I wouldn't change God's way of salvation even if I could. I
choose this. I choose to be saved by grace
rather than by my own merit. Because I see it's the only way
that salvation can be sure. I never would have, but the only
reason I do that, the only reason is God chose me first. He revealed
his son to me and in me. And you know this. If God has
saved you, you know this, he chose me first. And you know
what he said about to his people? I will never, no, never forsake
you. I'll never cast you out, never. Oh, if our character didn't make
us holy, our character can't make us unholy. Now that's exciting. That's exciting. God will never
cast away the people that he foreknew, that he chose unto
salvation. That makes it sure, doesn't it?
Thirdly, God saves his people by predestinating grace. Verse
five, having predestinated us unto the adoption of children
by Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will. Now people have a lot of misunderstanding
about this thing of predestination. And you can clear up all the
misunderstanding if you understand this. Predestination in scripture
always has to do with the person, the Lord Jesus Christ. God didn't
predestinate some people to heaven and some people to hell. No,
sir. God didn't have to predestine
anybody to hell. All he had to do was send us to hell and leave
us alone. God predestinated a people to be made just like his son. to Lord Jesus Christ. He predetermined
that he would make a sinful people to be as perfect, to be as holy,
to be as righteous as his own son, to make them the righteousness
of God in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, that's predestination. God
predetermined that's what he would do for his people. Well,
nothing can stop God's will. His will is always done. And
this is what God predetermined before he created anything, before
time began. And nothing that happens in time
can make God change his mind or make his will not happen. God predetermined to make a people
just like his son. Then he created Adam and put
Adam in the garden. Now you think about what's happened
between then and now. Adam fell. It didn't change God's
purpose, did it? Then eventually you and me came
along and our own sin, our own rebellion, our own deadness in
sin didn't change it either. You know why? Because God never
changes his mind. He never switches to plan B because
plan A is perfect and all God is doing in time is doing what
he predetermined before to be done. Tomorrow morning, I don't
guess people read newspapers anymore, but if you can imagine
back to the time when we all read newspapers, you open up
the morning newspaper and you read about stuff. You know all
that is? It's the unfolding of God's purpose
that he purposed in himself before time began. That's all it is. And everything that God is doing
in creation is all being done for this one purpose, to glorify
his son in the redemption of his people. God's working every
event of history together to bring his people to Christ, that
we would believe him and trust him and be found in him. I'm
telling you, God had to decide to do that. If God left it up
to us, to decide our destination, where would we be? We'd be in
hell. That's exactly right, because
that's the only thing that our carnal mind could do. We'd be
exactly like our father, Adam. But if the father predetermined
that he would make us just like his son, he's going to do it,
and we shall be saved. I don't know even what to call
it. in our day, if it's a softness. I don't know what it is, but
I mean, buddy, you can't cross my will. I gotta have my way
whenever I want it, and if you say anything about it, you're
evil, not me. And that's bled over into religion. God can't cross my will. This
thing's up to me. I got to make the decision. It's
up to me whether or not I'm gonna do this. You better hope it's
not. When God saves his people, brother, he crosses their will.
My dad used to say that when God saves his people, he saves
them against their will with their full consent. Because he
gives them a new want to. He gives them a new nature and
a new want to. But all that had to be predetermined
by God the Father. And that's what he's done for
his people. And his will shall be done. Now that's good doctrine. But brother, that's exciting,
isn't it? Isn't that exciting? Fourthly, God saves sinners by
adopting grace. He says in verse five, having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ according
to the good pleasure of his will. The father in his grace predestinated
to adopt his children. Now our father Adam made his
race to be a bunch of orphans. We were born dead in trespasses
and sin. Adam orphaned us, he left us
alone, and I'm telling you, he left us the worst bunch of ragamuffins
you've ever seen. We are cast out by our father
Adam into the open field to the loathing of our persons, just
like Ezekiel's baby in chapter 16. But God came down where we
were. He came to that field where we
are cast out to the loathing of our persons, and he says,
thy time is the time of love. and he chose sinners to be his
children. Now of all the people the father
could have chosen, he chose you and me, people like you and me,
to be his children. I don't know if there are orphanages
anymore, but can you imagine in the old time orphanages Small
children are in there. And a young couple comes in.
The father, the man, husband, he's tall. He's got on a nice
suit. His hair's just so, he's got
a ring on. The woman, the wife, she's in
a real pretty dress and high heels. She's got a necklace on,
pearls. And these little ragamuffin children. And they think, oh, I'd like
them to take me home. I like the I like then be my mom and
dad, take me out of this place. And they all line up. They pick
any of them. And they find the smallest one,
the dirtiest one, maybe everybody wants a small swing, they choose
the biggest one. He's been in there a while. He's
kind of hardened to the situation of the orphanage. He's kind of
acting like, I don't care if they choose me. Really, he wants
them to. But he knows there's no way they're going to choose.
They're going to choose the little one. The little ones are cute. I'm not
cute anymore. He's dirty. He's a rebellious teenager. Not
all teenagers are rebellious, but I mean, you know what I'm
saying. Teenagers are who they are. The one that's least likely for
that fine looking couple to pick is the one they pick. And they take him home and they
say, you're my son. They take those old rags off
of him. They put the finest clothes on him. They put good shoes on
his feet. They feed him good food. And
he thinks of all the little ones in that orphanage, they chose
me. That's the way a believer goes
through this life. of all the people the father could have
chose, he chose me. And he blesses all those children.
You know how he blesses them? He makes every last one of them
just like his son. He makes them all joint heirs
with Christ. All of God's children have an
inheritance, and they don't get part of the whole. When my wife
and I die, Whatever little bits left is gonna go to our two daughters.
They each get half. They each get a part of the whole. Every believer gets the whole.
Every believer gets it all. What do they get? Everything
that Christ gets. Joint heirs with Him. In verse
11, he says, in whom also, in Christ, we have obtained an inheritance,
being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh
all things after the counsel of his own will. We get everything
that Christ gives. Now, if sinners gonna be saved,
we must be saved in adopting grace. God's gotta take us from
Adam's family and adopt us into his family, and if he doesn't,
we're going to perish in our sin. If he doesn't, we're going
to receive everything that Adam's got, which is death. But if the Father adopts a people,
makes them his children, we're joint heirs with the Son of God. I'm telling you, that's good
doctrine, isn't it? But if we preach that and we
think about that in such a way that doesn't thrill our souls,
we're missing something. Here's the fifth thing. Here's
the reason God saves all of his people. It's his glorifying grace. To glorify himself. Verse six. To the praise of the glory of
his grace, wherein he hath made us accepted in the beloved. Now
God saves his people by grace. And I'm telling you, it's amazing.
It's amazing grace. When God saves sinners, he saves
the worst of sinners. Every one of them will tell you,
I'm the chief of sinners. Somebody couldn't be worse than
me. You know why God does it that
way? To make his grace even more amazing to us. God saved me? Oh, that's amazing. And God didn't save a people
so we could brag on ourselves. If we're the chief of sinners,
why are we trying to brag on ourselves? We have nothing to
brag about. God saves his people in such a way that we can only
brag on God. We can only brag on our Lord
Jesus Christ. We can only glory in him. We
can only glory in what he accomplished on the cross. We can only brag
about God's grace. We can't brag about our works
if we don't have any. Really, if truth be told, what we ought
to be doing is trying to cover up our works and not talk about
our works. The believer loves to brag on God's grace. And because we're still in the
flesh, this is a trap we're prone to fall into. But if we do, God
will bring his people out of it. The believer doesn't say,
oh, God saved him. I can't believe it. God saved him. You know what
a believer says? God saved me. That's the most amazing thing
ever was. I'm so thankful. Oh, just give me the chance to
brag on God our Savior. God gave me what I do not deserve. And God's people, they love to
talk about God's grace. And everybody's not as vocal
as others, but every believer likes to think about God's grace. Where would I be if it wasn't
for God's grace? It's hard to tell, but you can
rest assured it wouldn't be here. Oh my. And in heaven, that thing that
you like to think upon now, God's grace, and the flesh and our
sin and our deadness and the world gets in the way, But in
heaven, we'll be able to do that perfectly and eternally, and
we'll never get tired of it. We're gonna spend eternity singing
the praises of our God and his grace. And if you get tired of
hearing somebody brag on God's grace now, you're not gonna like
it in heaven either. But if you enjoy it now, you
just wait. Oh, if you think this is good.
wait or in his presence without this body and nature of sin.
All right, here's the sixth thing.
God saves sinners by redeeming grace. Verse seven, in whom we
have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sin according
to the riches of his grace. Now God saves his people by grace,
but you know, at the same time, God saves his people legally
God saves his people by grace, but he also does it in justice. This thing of justice got to
be dealt with. Our sin has put a price on our head, and God's
law demands justice, demands it. If God's gonna save us, our
sin must be paid in full. God's holy character demands
it. God's grace does not mean that
God is kind and he's gracious and he's so loving he just can't
punish us for our sins. That's not legal. That's not
legal. When my wife and I were raising
our girls, we were strict disciplinarians. I mean, we were strict, but they
didn't get, you know, discipline every single time they probably
deserved it, you know. And our youngest daughter right
now is pregnant with our first grandchild. And I can tell you
this right now. Frank the grandfather is not
going to be like Frank the father. I want to be like, well, now
he didn't mean it. He can, you know, can't you just
let that slide? You know, that that's a grandfather's
love, right? You told me there yesterday,
you get away with stuff when your mom and dad are gone, your
grandparents are you that's what. That's who I'll be. That's not
God. Don't think God's this grandfatherly
figure up there with a real long beard just looking for ways he
can overlook our sin. No, sir, he's holy. God is just. He must be holy and just in everything
that he does. And in a miracle that only God
could do, he found a way to be both gracious and just. When God forgives sin, He makes
it so it's right for Him to do it. When God forgives the sin
of His people, He makes it right for Him to forgive their sin. So that when He forgives their
sin, His graciousness, that's glorified. His holiness and His
justice are glorified at the very same time. Well, how could
God do that? Sin's got to be paid for. We
can't pay for our sin. We got nothing to offer God.
See what the Father did? He sent his son into this world
and made him a man. He made him an embryo in the
womb of the virgin. And he was born as a man, not
just with flesh and bones like we have, but with a human nature.
He was a real man, made under the law, just exactly like we
are, so that he could be our representative. Adam was our
representative, because we're just like him, we came from his
loins. Well, God can't be our representative, can he? No, he's
got a different nature. So he made himself a man, so
he could be the representative of his people. And that man did
what you and I could never do. He obeyed God's law perfectly,
in every jot, in every tittle. Indeed, where people could see
it, in thought, and in motive, too. There's a lot of pretty
mean things I've thought about doing and didn't do them. But
it was in me. That wasn't even in the nature
of our Lord Jesus Christ. He's perfect. He established
a perfect obedience before his father. That's pretty miraculous. Nobody else ever done it. He's
the only man that ever lived to do that. And then it got even
greater. He willingly was made sin for
his people. He took the sin of his people
away from them. and gave them his obedience.
And he went to the cross and he suffered and he died. He endured
all of his holy father's unmitigated wrath against sin and he suffered
until the wrath was gone. See, every other sacrifice offered
in the Old Testament, the fire burned it up and it was gone.
The fire went out because the sacrifice was gone. What fueled
the sacrifice was gone. The sacrifice of Christ is the
only sacrifice that consumed the fire. He suffered until sin
was gone. When sin was gone, sin that fueled
the fire was gone, God's wrath was gone, and he gave up the
ghost and he died. because sin demands death. He paid the price for his people. That's how he redeemed them.
He bought them with his precious blood. It's sin. That tells me sin is
not just a violation of the rules. Sin is something that's so heinous. It's so vile that the only way
a sinner could be redeemed is by the blood of God himself.
That's how vile sin is. And the Lord Jesus Christ shed
his blood in a sacrifice. He didn't just, you know, cut
his arm, let the blood come out. He was tortured. And his blood
flowed out, his lifeblood flowed out, and he gave up the ghost
to pay the price for the sin of his people. Now that sin debt
was astronomical, is eternal. We just can't imagine the size
of that debt, but he paid the price by the riches of his grace
because his blood is perfect to pay the price. Where sin did
abound, grace did much more abound and he put the price away. And
here's how I know that the blood of Christ fully redeemed all
of God's people. In verse six, that's where it is, in verse
six, wherein he hath made us accepted. Again, past tense. Christ didn't make his people
acceptable. and then they do something that
God might accept because they're acceptable, it says accepted. The father has accepted his people
because he accepted the sacrifice of Christ. Now Christ paying
a debt he did not owe, a debt he did not rack up for a people
who hated him. That's grace for guilty sinners. And that's the kind of grace
I need. Now this thing of redeeming grace, that's good doctrine.
It's the only way a sinner can be saved. Redemption in the blood.
But I'm telling you, this is a thrilling thing. The Son of
God paid my sin debt. For me on purpose, with my name
on his heart. I'm telling you, that's the most
thrilling thing I've ever heard. I can't get over it. Here's the seventh thing. I love
this one too. God saves sinners by revealing
grace. Verse eight, wherein he hath
abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known
unto us the mystery of his will, according to his good pleasure
with which he hath purposed in himself. Now salvation by grace,
through the sacrifice of Christ, that's such a great display of
grace, isn't it? But you know, it's also a great
display of wisdom. God found the ransom. that allowed
him to be just and justifier. He found a ransom, a sacrifice
that enabled him to be just while he justified the ungodly. That
can only happen through substitution. Substitution and satisfaction. There's got to be a substitute,
but that substitute also has to make satisfaction for our
sin, doesn't he? That's the sacrifice of Christ.
It's substitution and satisfaction. His sacrifice satisfied the Father. And that salvation is so wise,
ignorant dead men could never figure it out. That's why men
have made up so many wild ways for somebody to be saved. They
can never find a way to do both. In all the religions that men
have made up, they can't do these two things at the same time,
substitution and satisfaction. They try one or the other, but
never both at the same time. This is the unanswerable mystery
as far as man's mind is concerned. How can a man be just with God?
How is that possible? Well, if God slaughtered his
son for your sin, isn't that wonderful? If God did something
so wonderful for you, he's gonna let you in on it. He's gonna
tell you he did it. God's not gonna do something
so wonderful for you and keep it a secret. This thing wasn't done in a corner.
He's gonna make it known to you. And here's how God reveals this
to his people. How do I know that Christ died
for me? by the gospel. It's by the gospel
of Christ. The way we find out what God
did for sinners is by the preaching of Christ. And in that preaching,
God's gonna always reveal that to the hearts of his people.
Look back at 1 Corinthians 2. 1 Corinthians 2. or 1 Corinthians chapter 2, excuse
me, chapter 2, verse 7. But we speak the wisdom of God
in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before
the world under our glory, which none of the princes of this world
knew. For had they known it, they would not have crucified
the Lord of glory. But as it is written, I hath not seen,
nor ear heard, neither entered into the heart of man the things
which God hath prepared for them that love him. Nobody can possibly
figure out this great story of God's grace. But God hath revealed
them unto us by his spirit. For the spirit searcheth all
things, yea, the deep things of God. Now that's grace. God saves his people by his grace.
And in grace, he sends the gospel to them. How did the gospel come to San
Diego, California? And how on earth did you hear
it? How did this fella from Ashland,
Kentucky end up being your pastor? I mean, y'all have lived 15 different
places since then. How in the world did he end up
in a colisee to it? in all the places you've been
in your life. How in this world did you end up here? How in this
world did you end up here in some preacher somewhere and think,
wait a minute, that's the truth. God'll see to it. God'll see
to it. Oh, it's grace. It's grace that
God would purpose such a thing and that he would send that to
us by the preaching of his word. Now, I'm telling you, if a sinner's
gonna be saved, We must be saved by God's revealing grace. He's
got to reveal Christ to our hearts or we'll never see him. We're
so blind, we cannot see, believe, love the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's
a great indictment on the nature of man. In John chapter one somewhere
it says, let me find it and read it to you. Hang on a second. Oh, here it is. Verse five, John
chapter one. The light shineth in darkness. The son of God came in the flesh. Here he is. The sun, the light
shineth in dark, and the darkness comprehended it not. We're so
blind spiritually, we can't see the noonday sun. If we're gonna
see him, If we're going to believe him, if we're going to love him,
God's going to have to reveal him to us. Now you believe Christ? God revealed that to you. We didn't figure it out. God
revealed it. Now that's good doctrine. I'm preaching good
doctrine to you, but that's thrilling, isn't it? Oh, that's thrilling.
I see. I see. I heard the gospel. from the
time I could understand language. My parents taught me at home.
They brought me to sit and listen, you kids, this is great. I sat
in pews that were wooden seats and wooden backs. I mean, the
most uncomfortable places you could think of to make somebody
sit. I sat in for, oh. And I thought, Yeah, that's true. I mean, I see that. I see that.
That's what that's. I mean, I can see that the gospel
is not hard to understand. I was a child. I understood it.
I didn't believe it. And one day I saw. And I can't unsee. That's God's
revealing grace. Is that what God did for you?
All right, here's the last thing. God saves sinners by life giving
grace. See, there's a purpose of God,
but where there is God's purpose, there's got to be a fulfillment
of it. There's got to be an application of it. The blood must be shed,
but the blood has to be applied to the doorpost, doesn't it?
God saves a sinner. God, the Holy Spirit, powerfully
and irresistibly calls that sinner to come to Christ. And when the
Spirit calls, you come running. I try in every message I preach
to tell sinners to come to Christ. Look to Christ. And all that
means, when I was growing up and Brother Henry would say,
look to Christ, it was so frustrating. If you tell me where he is, I'll
look at him. Looking to Christ simply means this, trust him.
Trust him to be all you need. Look to Christ. A preacher can
tell you come to Christ till he's blue in the face and you
won't do it. But the moment the Spirit reveals, you know how
the Spirit calls sinners to come to Christ? He reveals Him to
you. And when you see Him, you're
gonna go to Him. Oh, the moment you see Him, you'll
go to Him. And no preacher has to bother begging you to come
to Christ. If the Spirit will reveal Christ
to you, you better get out of the way, because that sinner's
going to Christ. They are. Isn't that why you believe? You believe. You heard Christ
preach and the Spirit gave you the faith to see him and now
somebody can't keep you away. I'll tell you the only reason
I have faith is the Holy Spirit gave it and drew me irresistibly
to come to Christ. That's the application of God's
purpose. He purposed to save his people
by his grace through faith. And when the Spirit reveals Christ
to your heart, that's the fulfillment of God, application of God's
purpose. Look at verse 12. Here's why God did all of this,
that we should be to the praise of his glory who first trusted
in Christ. Now, what does that mean? Who
is it that first trusted in Christ? Well, it's God the Father. In eternity, the Father and the
Son entered into a covenant. A covenant means a promise. They
made a promise. And the covenant of grace said
the father would elect a people unto salvation and give them
to his son. And his son promised, Father, I'll redeem those people.
I'll make them righteous by my obedience and by my sacrifice
for them. And the father trusted the son
to do what he said he'd do. The father's the first one to
trust him. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ must be trustworthy if
the Father trusts him, don't you reckon? Well, if he's that
trustworthy, I want to trust him, too. I want to trust him,
too. And here's why God's done all
of this. So in the end of time, when God's elect by all of creation
sees God's elect as saved and justified in righteousness and
righteous in Christ, you know what all of creation is going
to say? God is the one to be praised for saving sinners like
that. If God saves sinners like that,
all of creation will praise him. Only God has the grace and the
power to give dead sinners life. Well, that sounds pretty mysterious,
doesn't it? How does the Holy Spirit give
life and faith to God's elect? How does he operate? It's through
the preaching of the gospel. Verse 13, in whom you also trusted,
after that you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your
salvation, in whom also, after that you believed, you were sealed
with the Holy Spirit of promise. Now, if you trust Christ, when
did that happen? When did you receive life and
faith in Christ? Well, I can tell you, it's when
you heard the gospel. Now, it may not have been the
first time. It may have been the 10,000th time, like me, but
if you believe Christ, it was after you heard the gospel. Now,
it's not just any preaching. I'm not talking about any religious
talk or religious ceremony. It's when you heard the true
gospel of Christ, and never one minute before, nobody saved. who has not heard and believed
this gospel, the gospel of Christ. How can you be saved if you don't
believe on the only Savior? How can you be saved if you've
never heard of the only Savior? Our gospel is the word of truth. And I'm not afraid to say this
by any means. Every other message is a lie. It's a lie. This word is the
word of truth. So the spirit arranges it so
that you hear the gospel. You hear it. You hear the word
of truth. And the spirit gives you faith
to believe. You believe Christ and he seals you. He seals you
kind of like a canning. My mother used to always can
tomatoes and she canned those things and that thing. I don't
know how it worked. It was magic to me. She did it
and the little thing popped and it was sealed. I mean that thing
could sit there in that jar for years and you open it up and
it's just fresh as can be. It's sealed. The Holy Spirit
seals God's people so you can't spoil. He seals you so you can't
quit believing on Christ. Well, that's God's purpose. It's
application to my heart. How do I know he's going to perfect
it? How do I know he's going to bring this thing to the end
that he promised where I get out of this life and go be with
him? How do I know that's going to happen? It's by the Holy Spirit. Verse 14, which is the earnest
of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchase possession
under the praise of his glory. Now the Holy Spirit is the earnest
money. That's the down payment. You make a down payment on something
and then later on you come by and you pay the rest. That's
just exactly what God did for his people when he redeemed them. He gave them the earnest of his
spirit. Another way to look at this earnest
is like an engagement ring. Young man gets down on one knee
and proposes. to a dear girl, and she says
yes. And he slides a ring on her finger. That's not the wedding ring. He puts some sort of a ring,
whatever he can afford on her finger, and it's an engagement
ring, we call it. She's got that engagement ring.
She goes, we've got a young couple at church, and I've been wondering,
when's he going to propose to her? When's he going to propose
to her? He finally did. Madison's her name. Madison comes
into the church the next time I see her. And first thing, let
me see the ring. Boy, she's got that ring out,
showing that ring. And you know what Madison's doing right now?
She's planning a wedding. How does she know there's going
to be a wedding? I mean, you're going to plan this big ceremony
and you're going to plan a reception and stuff. How do you know that
there's going to be a wedding and this fellow's actually going
to marry you? She's got the earnest. That ring is his promise. I'm
going to marry you and take you to be my wife. I'm going to love
you like I love my own flesh. We're going to be one. Christ, our bridegroom, has given
us the earnest. It's his spirit that dwells within
us. That's the promise. And brother, there's going to
be a wedding. Christ the bridegroom is coming,
and when he comes, he's gonna give his elect to purchase possession.
Everything he purposed for them. Everything he purchased for them,
and they're gonna have it, not by faith, but in possession. And there's gonna be a wedding
feast. Now that's good doctrine. And if you can talk about that,
and not leave clicking your heels, something's wrong. We're talking
about it wrong, aren't we? There's gonna be a wedding feast,
and we're gonna spend eternity rejoicing in and basking in the
presence of Christ our bridegroom. I can't wait. This young lady
I told you about, this young man proposed to her, and I think
she did right. She's playing a short engagement.
He proposed, I'm gonna get married. Now she's gonna have some hoops
to jump through, find a place to do it, but she said, I wanna
get married right now. I said, I'm with you. I wanna
see the bridegroom right now, don't you? He's coming, he's
coming. All right, Lord bless you.