I did choose thee. Todd's Road Grace Church would
like to invite you to listen to a sermon by our pastor, Todd
Niver. We are located at 4137 Todd's
Road, two miles outside of Manowar Boulevard. Sunday services are
at 1030 a.m. and 6 p.m. Bible study is at
945 a.m. Wednesday services are at 7 p.m. Nursery is provided for all services.
For more information, visit our website at toddsroadgracechurch.com.
Now here's our pastor, Todd Niver. In Luke chapter 13, verse 34,
we read these words from the Savior. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
which killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto
thee, how often Would I have gathered thy children together
as a hen doth gather her brood under her wings? And you would
not." Now here the Lord says, I would. I would. And you would not. I would. I would have gathered
you together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings when
the hawk is in the air coming at one of her chickens, chicks.
I would have put you under my protection. I would, and you
would not. You would have none of me. I've
entitled this message, I would, and you would not. Now, someone
might think if you've Even heard the message that I brought last
week on God's absolute sovereignty and salvation. How he chose the
people to be saved, they will be saved. Christ died for them
and for them only. God is absolutely sovereign in
salvation. Someone may think, well, how
can you reconcile this, Christ saying I would and you would
not, with the glorious truths of election and Christ's effectual
redemption for the elect? Regeneration being a work of
God. How can you reconcile this Christ saying I would and you
would not? How can you reconcile this statement
with those things? Well, they don't need to be reconciled
because they're not at odds. You see, Christ is willing to
save all who are willing to be saved. Are you willing to be
saved by the grace of God? Christ is willing to save you. Now, if you and I are not saved,
it's our fault. It's because we were not willing
to be saved. Christ says, I would, and you
would not. He's speaking to Jerusalem. He
knew this is where he was going to be crucified. and the very
people that he knows will crucify him, he says, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem,
how often would I have gathered you together? I've sent you prophets,
you've stoned them. I've sent you the gospel with
messengers telling you of who I am and who you are and you've
put them to death. You had no love for the gospel. You despise the message of the
gospel so much that you killed the people that came with the
message to you. This speaks of the total depravity
of man. Never been a city with greater
blessing and yet more responsibility for wickedness than Jerusalem.
Oh, the things that the Lord had done for that city. Oh, Jerusalem,
Jerusalem. These are the ones who would
end up murdering Christ. How often would I? How often
did I desire to be just like that hen gathering her brood
under her wings when the hawk was coming? How often would I
have done this for you and you would not? Now, do you desire
deliverance? Do you desire to be one of those
little chicks Getting under the wing of the mother hen for protection
and safety from the hawk. Do you desire deliverance? He's willing. He's willing. He's willing to save you. He's
willing to have mercy on you. He's willing to do something
for you. He is willing. If you're in danger
and want safety under the shadow of His wings, He desires to give
you safety under the shadow of His wings. He's willing to receive
everybody and anybody who needs His salvation, who needs shelter
under His wings. Are you in danger? Are you a
sinner? He says, come to me. He is willing
to save you. He said, how oft would I have
gathered thy children together as a hen gathers her brood under
her wings. And here's the sad commentary
on you and I. He says, and you would not. Now the teaching of our Lord
is that He is willing to save all who are willing to be saved. I think of what He said to that
man in John chapter 5, Will thou be made whole? Are you willing
to be made whole? If we're not saved, it's because
we're unwilling. Not because Christ was unwilling
to save us. If we're not saved, it's because we would not come
to Him for salvation. In John 5, verse 39, Christ said,
you will not come to me that you might have life. Now, we're
willing to not go to hell. We're willing to not be punished
for our sins. But as far as being willing to
be saved on God's terms, no man by nature is willing. The Lord
said, you will not come to me that you might have life. Now,
I see four things in that statement by our Lord in John 539. He said,
you search the scriptures, and in them you think you have eternal
life. If I can figure out how to obey these laws, I'll have
eternal life. He says, and they are they which testify of me,
and you will not come to me that you might have life. Now, the
first thing that that tells me is the natural man doesn't have
life. not spiritual life. You will not come to me that
you might have life. When Adam ate of the fruit, he
died spiritually. Now he didn't die physically,
but he died spiritually. He lost the ability to perform
the functions of spiritual life. That's why the natural man can't
believe or repent or love God. It's impossible for him because
he's dead in sins, dead. You will not come to me that
you might have life. Now, we also see in that that
there is life in Christ. You will not come to me that
you might have life. There is life, spiritual life,
a life More abundance in Christ. Life before God's law. You live
before God's law. This spiritual life, there is
life in Christ. Thank God for that. And there's
life for all who will come. He said, you will not come to
me that you might have life. If you come to him, you'll have
life. He said, all that the Father
giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. If you come to Christ, He will
not cast you out. Come right now as you are. Come
to the Lord Jesus Christ. You'll be received. Don't wait
to get better. Don't wait for something to happen.
Don't wait till you're no more. Don't wait till you give up this
sin and become better. You come to Christ right now
as you are, and He'll receive you. He said, Him that cometh
to me, I will in no wise cast out. But men do not have the
will to come. He said, you will not come to
me that you might have life. The will is so fallen, so corrupt,
so wedded to sin that we will not come to Christ for life. And that's our crime. That's
our crime. We will not come. Free will? No, the will is controlled
by an evil nature, a nature dead in sins that will not come. I think of the parable of the
king in the next chapter that made a great feast for his son. And everybody with one consent
began to make excuse. They didn't want to come. And that's the state of every
natural man. You will not come to me that
you might have life. Christ is willing to save you,
my friend. Christ is willing to save you
if you are willing to be saved. I'm not asking you. if you're
willing to not be punished, or if you're willing to not go to
hell. I'm asking you, are you willing to be saved? Somebody says, well, suppose
I'm not one of the elect. Suppose Christ didn't die for
me. Suppose God the Holy Spirit never gave me life. Can I come
to Christ? You know, supposing such things
is supposing nonsense. If the Father gave you to Christ,
you will come. He said, all that the Father giveth me shall come
to me. And then he gives us this blessed promise, him that cometh
to me, I will in no wise cast out. Now what I want more than
anything else for both myself and for you is for us to come
to Christ. Lord said, I would, and you would
not. What does it mean to come to
Christ? It's mysterious, isn't it? Because
it's not a physical coming. You know, people talk about,
preachers have invitations for people to come down to the front
of the church and receive Christ. You don't have any of that in
the Bible. There's no such thing as an altar call in the scriptures.
That's a man-made pressuring situation. Let's get them down.
That's not of God. Coming to Christ is something
spiritual. It's something done in my heart.
Now, what does it mean to come to Christ? I want to do that,
and I want you to do that, so I want us to know what it means
to come to the Lord Jesus Christ. In John 6, verse 35, the Lord
said, He that cometh to me shall never hunger, and he that believeth
on me shall never thirst." Coming to Christ and believing on Christ
are the exact same thing. If you come to Christ, that means
you believe on Christ. If you believe on Christ, that
means you come to the Lord Jesus Christ. They are the precise
same thing. In Acts chapter 16, verse 30,
that Philippian jailer who was getting ready to kill himself,
and then because he thought all the prisoners had escaped, and
Paul said, do yourself no harm, we're all here, and he came in
trembling before them and called for a light and said, sirs, what
must I do to be saved? Now some people would answer,
well, there's nothing you can do to be saved. Salvation is
by grace. You shouldn't even be asking a question like that.
But that's foolishness. Yes, he shouldn't be asking a question
like that. And Paul and Silas gave a specific answer. They
said, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Believe on the Lord. He's the
Lord. He's Jesus. He's the Savior. That's what His name means. He's
God's Christ. He's God's prophet. He's the
Word of God. He's God's priest. If He brings you into God's presence,
you must be accepted. He's God's King, and I need Him
as a King to rule and reign over me and cause me to do His will.
Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. Now,
here's an illustration. There's a boy in a second floor,
fire. He's scared to death. The flames
are coming in. He looks out the window, and
there's a fireman on the ground. And he says, jump, and I'll catch
you. Now, that boy believes in that
fireman's ability to catch him. But what good would that do if
he didn't jump? If he believes in the fireman's
ability to catch him, then what he needs to do is believe on
that fireman, jump out the window, and trust that fireman to catch
him. Now, that is believing on the
Lord Jesus Christ. You are committing the entire
salvation of your soul to him. Now, if you do that, you've come
to Christ. John 3. 14 and 15 says, As Moses
lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the
Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth on him should
not perish, but have everlasting life. Now you know the story.
I love that story. The children of Israel were murmuring and
complaining. They even complained about the
manna coming down from heaven. They said, Our souls loathe this
light bread. And so God sent fiery serpents
into the camp, and they started biting the children of Israel.
Many of the children of Israel were dying, and they came to
Moses, and they said, we're sorry we said that. Pray to God that
he'd deliver us from these fiery serpents. And God told Moses,
you take a serpent made out of brass and put it on a pole, as
represents Christ on the cross. And anybody who looks, when he's
bitten, when he looks, he'll live. Now, they weren't to look
at their bites. They weren't to look at the serpents.
They weren't to look at ways to keep the serpents away from
them. They were simply to look, to behold that serpent, to look
to Him. And everybody who looked lived. If you look on Christ, if you
look to Him, if you rely on Him, you will be saved. The Ethiopian eunuch says, what
hinders me from being baptized? I want to know. If there's a
reason I shouldn't, please tell me. Philip said, if you believe
with all your heart, you may. And he replied, I believe that
Jesus Christ is the Son of God. He didn't say, I believe I'm
one of the elect, or I believe I'm regenerated, or I believe
Christ died for me. Everything he said regarding
his faith was concerning the person of Jesus Christ. I believe
that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. Now, you believe, you'll
be saved. Do you believe He's God the Son?
Do you look to Him and rely upon Him as all in your salvation?
Beloved, that means you've come to Him. And he said, Him that
comes to me I will in no wise cast out. Listen to this scripture
from Matthew chapter 11 verses 28 through 30. He said, Come
to me. Come to me, all ye that are weary
and heavy laden. Your sin is a burden to you. It crushes you down. Oh, what
a burden it is. What does he say? come to me,
and I'll give you rest." Now he has the power to give it,
and he has the willingness to give it. He says, you come to
me. Come to me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and
I will give you rest. Now what is rest? What's he talking
about when he's talking about this rest? Well, the first time
rest is used is in Genesis chapter 1, after God had finished creating
the universe. The scripture says He rested.
He looked at what He did, it was very good, and He rested. Now, He didn't rest because He
was tired. He rested because the work was
finished. To rest in Christ is to rest
in the finished work of Christ. There's nothing for me to do.
The job's already been done. When He said it is finished,
salvation was accomplished. There's nothing for me to do
but rest. You know, preachers are always
trying to get, do, do, you need to do this, you need to do that.
No, you need to rest. You need to rest in the Lord
Jesus Christ. Come unto me, all ye that weary
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon
you and learn of me. For my yoke is easy, my burden
is light. I am meek and lowly in heart.
You'll find rest to your souls. Now here's what the Lord says.
Come to me and I will give you rest. He is willing to give rest
to everyone that comes. And that's what I need. I need
rest. It's such a burden to be thinking of what I need to do.
I need to do this. I need to do that. No, I need to rest. May the Lord enable you and I
to come to Him and rest. In Hebrews 7, verse 25, it says,
He is able to save them to the uttermost that come to God by
Him. Now, if you come to God by Him,
He is able and He is willing to save you to the uttermost. Now, what in the world does that
mean, salvation to the uttermost? It's a big word. Here's about the best way I can
explain it. What you're looking at right now is a sinful man
like you are, like all other men are. But do you know that
God is able to take this sinful man and make it to where when
he sees me, he doesn't see any sin? That's salvation to the uttermost.
No sin. Sin put away. Sin taken away. Now that's what God does in salvation. My sin was placed upon Christ. Christ bore the punishment of
it. He became guilty of it. And He died. He took my place.
He died. And you know what He did with
my sin? He put it away. It is no more. Now that's salvation to the uttermost.
When I stand before the thrice holy God in judgment and He sees
no sin. He was manifested to take away
our sins, and in Him is no sin. Now that's salvation to the uttermost,
actually standing before God without sin, being perfectly
justified, perfectly accepted. And this word says, wherefore
he is able to save them to the uttermost that come to God by
him. Now, the only way I come to God
is by him. I don't come in my own name.
I don't come in my own merit. Trusting only in thy merit would
I seek thy face. I don't come pleading anything
that I've done, anything that I believe. I come only in his
name. Oh, save me for Christ's sake. I have nothing else to say but
save me for Christ's sake. In Revelation chapter 22, I love
this statement. In the last chapter of the Bible,
verse 17, and the spirit and the bride say, This is God's
Word to you. This is what God the Holy Spirit
says. This is the Word of the Church. Come. Not go and do. Not go and make yourself better.
Come right now as you are to the Lord Jesus Christ. Come.
The Spirit and the Bride say, come. and let him that heareth
say, Come, not go away, not improve, not straighten up, but right
now as you are come to the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul spoke in 1
Thessalonians 1 how you turn to God from idols. Now notice
he didn't say You left your idols to come to God. No, he said,
you turn to God. And in turning to God, that's
when you left your idols. It's not like you need to get
everything straightened out and then come to God. No, come right
now as you are to the Lord Jesus Christ. Let him that heareth
say, come. And let him that is a thirst,
come. What is it to be thirsty? Well,
there's something that you don't have that you need. It's a conscious
awareness of not having what you need. You need water, you're
thirsty. Oh, if you're thirsty, if you
thirst for righteousness that you can't produce, if you thirst
for acceptance that you can't achieve, Come to Christ for it. Let him that's a thirst come,
and whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely. Hey, did you hear that? Whosoever
will. Is that you? Yes. Let him take
the water of life freely. There's nothing you need to have
to pay for it or to buy it. It's free. Absolutely free. Whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. Now the Lord says, how often
would I have gathered thy children together as a hen gathers her
brood under her wings? When the hawk is coming, how
often would I, and you wouldn't. Charles Wesley tells the story
of being up in a bell tower on a cold November day, and he was
watching a hawk chase a little sparrow. He felt sorry for the
sparrow. The sparrow was flying around all over the place with
a hawk on its tail, and all of a sudden that little sparrow
flew into his bosom for safety and refuge and protection. And
Wesley said, I wasn't going to let that hawk touch that sparrow. That hawk or that sparrow had
now come under the shadow of my wings and it's going to be
protected. And he went out and wrote this
hymn in response to that experience. He said, Jesus, lover of my soul,
let me to thy bosom fly, while the nearer waters roll, While
the tempest still is high, Hide me, O my Savior, hide, Till the
storms of life be past, Safe into the haven guide, O receive
my soul at last. Other refuge have I none, Hangs
my helpless soul on Thee. Leave, O leave me, not alone,
Still support and comfort me, All my trust on Thee has stayed.
All my help from thee I bring, cover my defenseless head with
the shadow of thy wings. Thou, O Christ, art all I want,
more than all in thee I find. Raise the fallen, cheer the faint,
heal the sick, and lead the blind. Just and holy is thy name. I am all unrighteousness. False and full of sin I am. Thou art full of truth and grace,
plenteous grace with Thee is found, grace to cover all my
sin. Let the healing streams abound,
make and keep me pure within, Thou of life the fountain freely
let me take of thee, spring thou up within my heart, rise to all
eternity. Now, if the hawk of your sin
is chasing you, he says, how often would I have gathered thy
children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings? If
you're willing to be saved by him, He is willing to save you. Now, is someone wondering, could
he really be willing to save me, the son of God, as sinful
as I am, as far as I've fallen? Is he really willing to save
me, the chief of sinners? Well, there was a leper who came
to him once, and he was full of leprosy. And he was not sure
of Christ's willingness himself. He said, Lord, if you will, You
can make me clean. Now he had no doubt about Christ's
ability. You can, you have the power to
make me clean. But he wasn't real sure about
Christ's willingness. It says of the Lord Jesus Christ, it
says, and Jesus moved with compassion, reached forth his hand and touched
him. Wonder how long it had been since
that man had been touched. He was full of leprosy. And the
Lord gave these words, I will, be thou clean. Now, if you come to the Lord
the way that leper did, Lord, if you will, you can make me
clean. You're gonna hear the same thing
that leper did. I will, be thou clean. Now we have this message on DVD
and CD. If you call the church, write
or e-mail, we'll send you a copy. This is Todd Nirett, praying
that God will be pleased to make Himself known to you. To request a copy of the sermon
you have just heard, send your request to messages at toddsroadgracechurch.com. Or you may write or call the
church at the information provided on the screen.