I don't know who requested that
song, but thank you. Thank you. Brother Paul asked
me on the way over, he said, you're not nervous preaching
here, are you? Well, it's kind of like talking about your father
at a family reunion. You're not nervous about that. But yet at the same time, it's
an awesome responsibility and I don't take it lightly. And thank you for inviting me.
I teased for years, if you really wouldn't tease them, but I've
said about every time I've been up here, this is our number one
vacation spot. Teresa and I love being here
and love being with you. We love you. Turn with me tonight,
if you would, to Matthew chapter 10. I sure want to be courteous
of Gabe's time. It was amazing to me when I first
started preaching, it was hard for me to speak for 20 minutes,
and now it's hard for me to stay under 40. But I'm going to do
my best to keep it brief. I look forward to hearing what
Gabe has for us. Here in Matthew 10, look at verse
28 if you would. The Lord Jesus here is speaking.
And He says, Fear not they which kill the body, but are not able
to kill the soul, but rather fear Him. You know who that's
talking about. Which is able to destroy both
soul and body in hell. And then in verse 29, the Lord
Jesus asks a question He says, are not two sparrows sold for
a farthing? That's one-tenth of a Roman penny. Not much. Not worth much. And one of them, these sparrows
insignificant to the world, shall not fall on the ground without
your Father. Not one of these sparrows shall
fall to the ground without the knowledge the will or the purpose
of God. Do you believe that? I believe
that's what the Lord Jesus said. Our natural fleshly existence,
this thing we call life when it's all over, it really don't
amount to much. We're gone and we're pretty well
forgotten immediately. It doesn't amount to much. The
Lord Jesus said, for what is a man profited if he shall gain
the whole world and lose his own soul? Then the Lord said
here in verse 30, but the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Every one of them. All of them.
They're all numbered. Now hold your place and turn
over with me to Luke chapter 12 if you would please. And look
at verse 6 with me here. Luke 12, verse 6. Again, the Lord is speaking. And He says here, are not five
sparrows sold for two farthings? I was thinking about that, Brother
Ron. That's buy four, get one free. But still, not of much cost. Not worth much. And not one of
them is forgotten before God. You see the birds flying in the
sky this time of year? Thousands of them. Not a single
one of them falls to the ground that the Lord doesn't know about
and care about. No reason for a child of God
to fear man or God. Not a believer. Why? Because of a sparrow which is
insignificant. Not worth much. Cannot fall to
the ground without the knowledge, concern, and permission of God. How much does that apply to you
and I? Those who love Him. Those who are Thee called according
to His purpose. Infinitely so. Look down at verse
24. Consider the ravens, for they
neither sow nor reap. which neither have storehouse
nor barn, and God feedeth them, how much more are you better
than the fowls?" Look at verse 27. Consider the lilies, how
they grow. They toil not, they spin not,
and yet I say unto you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed
like one of these. Verse 28, if then God so clothed
the grass, which is today in the field and tomorrow is cast
into the oven, how much more will He clothe you, O ye of little
faith? Boy, that's a good title for
me. O ye of little faith. Now when the Lord says, but even
the very hairs of your head are all numbered, fear not therefore,
You are of more value than many sparrows. You see, when He who
cannot lie, He who cannot change His mind, says to fear not, He
means it. And I often wonder, why do we
fear so much? Why do we fear so often? Knowing
that the God of heaven and earth, who controls all things by the
counsel of His own will, loves us and cares for us. Yes, God makes His Son to shine
on the evil and on those that He makes good and perfect in
Christ. And yes, God sends His reign
to the just and the unjust. But His specific distinguishing
love and care are to those who are of a special kind. And we're
not special because of anything that we've done. We're special
because of the Lord Jesus Christ. I love that. That's good news,
isn't it? That's the Gospel. Now according to verse 32, they
are those who are these of a special kind. They're those who confess
Christ before men. And they're those that He's going
to confess before His Father in Heaven. One day, I'm going
to stand before God to give an account of the things that I've
done in this body of flesh, this evil flesh that I live in. And the Lord Jesus is going to
say, Father, He's perfect. He's innocent. I fulfilled the law for Him.
I satisfied justice for Him. And He's mine. He's mine. I've never gotten over that.
I hope I never do. I heard a preacher... We know
that God is in control of everything. I mean everything. He's the first
cause of everything. There's nothing that happens
in this world that God is not behind. But I heard a preacher
say recently that he believed God was sovereign and in control
of everything except... Oh, you get in trouble when you
add that word. But he said except for salvation. My jaw dropped
to the ground. I'm like, well, if God is not
in control of salvation first and foremost, then He's not in
control of anything. You can't be sovereign and not
be the one who has mercy on whom you'll have mercy and grace and
compassion on whom you'll have compassion. He controls all things
that come to pass. Whatsoever the Lord pleased,
that did He. He did it. He didn't try to do
it. He didn't want to do it. He does it. Is that your God? We see God's name so legible
upon the creation. He signed His name to it. It's
got His name written all over it. And we see it so plainly
that how could anyone deny the existence of a Creator? Paul
talked about that a great deal in Romans chapter 1. And in the
matter of salvation, we know God to be the one who foreknew
us, and chose us, and called us, and justified us. And friends,
as Gabe sung and Paul mentioned, time's coming very soon when
He's going to glorify us. That's part of what He said there.
He's going to glorify us and He's going to conform us to the
image of our Lord Jesus who loved us and gave Himself for us. Isn't
that good news? That's the Gospel. Some man or woman suffers and
dies in their sin and preachers claim them to be in heaven. I've
never been to a funeral yet where anybody went to hell. It's the
truth. They're going to preach them
right into heaven. The Scripture's clear. The wages
of sin is dead. There's none that doeth good.
There's none that's never sinned. There's none that's righteous. No, not one. Folks say, God loves too much
to do that. Listen, you've been lied to on
that. If that's what you believe, you've
been lied to. God should send us all to hell.
That's the truth of the matter. That's what we deserve. People
say, I just want what I deserve. No, you don't. No, you don't. God says He loved Jacob and He
hated Esau. Loving Jacob is what mercy is. Jacob, no doubt, was worse than
Esau. But God loved him, not because
of anything he did. The Lord said that. He said before
these two boys were ever born, before they'd done any good or
evil, that the purpose of God, according to election, might
stand. It's of God, not a man. It's of grace, it's not of works. And isn't that good news? That's
the gospel. It's called divine providence. That's what I want to talk to
you about just for a few minutes. God should hate us all. God should
send all of us to hell. What is divine providence? I
had a man ask me that one time, and he wasn't really interested
in my answer. The truth of the matter was, he hated God's divine
providence. He hated the doctrine of predestination
and election. And I said, well, it's a bit
over my head, but I'll give it my best shot into finding it.
I said, it's God doing in time what He purposed in eternity.
That's not a bad definition. And he just shook his head and
shook his head. And I said, well, brother, what do you think it
is? And I thought he was a brother. I wouldn't have called him that
after what happened next. And he just shook his head. And
he said, well, I asked you. And I said, and I told you. But
you're shaking your head. So what do you think it is? He
went out the door. I haven't seen him since. God doing for us what He purposed. God doing what seemed good in
His sight. Our English dictionary defines
providence as the protective care of God. You know, some people
call it fate, but there are no twists of fate. You know, men
say it's fate, and there's twists of fate. No, no, no twists of
fate. God always does what He willed
and purposed to do. Always, every time. Fate is defined
as something out of control, but there's nothing out of control
Nothing out of God's control. Is there? No. The Bible's very
clear about that. Our God's in the heavens. He's
done whatsoever He pleases. And that's what He does, what
He pleases. Some call it destiny, which is
defined as a hidden power, a higher power that controls what will
happen in the future. But this is not a hidden power. We know whose power it belongs
to. This power belongs to God. We could call this predestination
predestiny. God predetermining before it
happens. And then we have others that believe in luck. They call it luck. No such thing
as luck. Not with a sovereign God who
works all things after the counsel of His own will. No luck. Let's stop using that word. If we are enlightened, we see
God in creation, we see God in salvation, and we see God in
providence. But many today, even professing
believers, even those who claim to believe, struggle with the
truth that God saved His people and created life in them before
the world began. It's only happening in time because
God purposed it from the foundation of the world. So they attribute
salvation to a choice or a decision that they themselves made or
a work that they themselves did. More than likely, most of you
here tonight once did that yourself. I did. I was told for years and
years that I had to do this to be saved. And I finally gave
up because I never could do it. Man still struggles believing
in God's providence and that everything in God's Word points
to God as the Author and the Creator and the Savior who controls
all things. And I wouldn't have it any other
way. Shall not the judge of the earth
do right? Every single time. Every single time. Our Lord Jesus said in our text,
the very hairs of our head are all numbered. Who numbers them? God does. And as I've already said in this,
we see the minuteness of God's sovereign providence. It seems
that many can see God's providence in great things. If a tornado
destroys all in its path, we attribute that to the terrible,
mighty hand of God. The Lord has His way in the whirlwind,
the Scripture says. And in the storm and the clouds
are the dust of His feet. That's our God. When an earthquake
causes the ground to open and swallow everything above it,
even men and women, including men and women, when the hurricane
destroys all in its path, When there's devastation of war,
we readily declare what I just quoted, "...shall not the judge
of the earth do right." Men readily confess that God is the God of
the hills, but they seem to forget that He's also the Lord of the
valley. We see God in the floods of His
downpouring, but we don't see Him in the drops of the dew on
the ground in the morning. Providence of God is seen in
the small things as well as in the great. I'll get it out in
a minute. And He knows if a single hair falls. Isn't that something? The difference in the definitions
of providence, foreknowledge, predestination, predetermination,
and luck and fortune and chance is just this. Men and women's
definition of providence is based solely, 100%, on who they believe
to be in control and who they believe to be their God. That's why we call it divine
providence. That's whose providence it is.
That's why we call it a divine intervention. Only God can interfere
in our lives and change our direction. It all comes from One who possesses
a divine nature. Our Lord is the only One that
does that. Every drop of rain that falls
from above is determined and known by the One that sends it,
and friends, every tear that falls from our eye is determined and known by the
One who sends it. He breaks our heart. He causes
us to repent. He makes us sorry. He shows us
our need. Oh, how the little minute circumstances
of daily life bring about the great things that come to pass.
God is in the small and in the great. He's the first cause of
everything. Everyone is familiar with the
story of Joseph. When Joseph wound up in Egypt
because of the hatred of his brothers for him, later when
he revealed himself to them while on the throne of Egypt, he said
to them, it was not you that sent me hither. You didn't put
me here. But God. But God. Aren't those
two glorious words throughout the Scripture? But God. I thank
God for that. You know, one day Joseph's brothers
were tending the sheep and Jacob wants to send them. And I've often thought, why did
he send Joseph? Joseph was the son that he loved,
his darling son. He loved them more than all his
brothers. Why does Jacob send him? Was it an absence of good
judgment? Was Jacob finally now showing
his old age? No, it was the beginning of God's
will for Joseph. Joseph's brother didn't find
pastor where they first went, and Joseph does not find them
where he thought they would be. Was it a twist of fate? Were the brothers and Joseph
unlucky? So the brothers leave Shechem
and they journey on to Dothan. Why do they go to Dothan? They've
got the whole land before them. They could have went anywhere.
Unaware by them, God sends them to Dothan. And Joseph arrives
at Dothan and finds his brothers at the very moment that they're
reminiscing about how much they hate him. About his dreams that
he had. They thought he was an arrogant
little whippersnapper. And what did they do? They throw
him in a pit. Throw him in a pit. And they're about to take a 30-minute
lunch break, and some Midianites, just so happened, no, no, no
just so happens with the sovereign God, that they find Joseph in
that pit and they lift him out of the pit, and Joseph experienced
some bad luck. No, that's not it. The Midianites, the Ishmaelites
come by just at that time and buy him and put him into slavery. How was that at just that exact
time they crossed paths with each other? It was the fullness
of time. It was the fullness of time.
How was it that just At this time, these things happened. It was God who ordained them
and caused them to come to pass before time ever was. Why were
they going to Egypt? Why not someplace else? Why were
they not trading in some other commodity instead of slavery? Oh, this was the trade that God
had ordained them to be in. You see how all these little
things work together to accomplish God's will and purpose? How is
it that a man named Potiphar winds up buying Joseph? How is
it that Potiphar has a wife? A lot of folks don't have spouses. Why is it that she makes advances
at him? How is it that Potiphar's wife
be so full of lust? Why is it that she lies on Joseph
and he goes to prison? Is God working all things after
the counsel of His own will? How is it that the baker and
the butler offend Pharaoh? How is it that they wind up in
prison at the same time Joseph does? How is it that they have
dreams and they hear that Joseph can interpret dreams? And how is it that Joseph interprets
them? You know the answer. It's God
Almighty doing what He wills in the armies of heaven and among
the inhabitants of the earth. Why is it Pharaoh dreams? Can
a man's dreams be under the arrangement of God's sovereign providence?
Absolutely. Because all things are under
the arrangement of God's providence. And when Pharaoh dreams, all
of a sudden, at that particular time, the butler remembers Joseph. You know, I just so happen to
remember a guy I was in prison with. No, that's not how it happened. No, it just so happens. And when
Pharaoh dreams, at that particular time, he tells of Joseph, And
it can only be by divine arrangement. Now that's the God who's in control.
And that's my God. And I could rest in a God like
that. Can't you? He's working all things,
all things, all things together for our good and for His glory. Isn't that a wonderful thing? Joseph brought out of prison,
taken before Pharaoh. If any of those simple circumstances
break down, any one of the links of this sovereign shame, the
whole design of God's providence would have failed. But they can't
fail because God cannot fail. God's providence is always punctual. God keeps perfect timing with
Himself. I don't know about you, but since
it's time change, Man, it just messes me all up. But God's timing
is always perfect. Always perfect. And Reuben had
intended to fetch Joseph out of the pit just a half an hour
earlier, but the Scriptures say, and Joseph was not. God had the
Ishmaelites ready and brought them by with the Midianites at
His perfect timing. His timing is always perfect.
When a baby is born before the so-called due date, people say,
oh, He was born early. No, He wasn't. No, they weren't.
They were born right on time. On God's time. At this time, it all seemed insignificant. We always blame it on, you know,
just chance and fate. People do. But that's not what
it is at all. Something much more than chance
in such a coalition of circumstances. Listen, just as there's no luck,
there's no coincidences either. I've come to see by God's grace
that, friends, it's harder to believe that there is not a God
than it is to believe there is a God. And God's punctuality and providence
is always sure and for certain, though we don't know it at the
time, but He's working it out according to His will and purpose. How minute is God's providence? Well, while in Arkansas a couple
weeks ago, I was with your pastor Paul and Brother Gabe. It had
been somewhat a drought out there. They had a burn van in effect. And they were harvesting cotton
at the time there. And at Brother Darwin's church,
you've got to go towards town to go hunting. And so we saw them harvesting
cotton and there was this big harvesting implement, I don't
know what you called it, a big farm something, Tommy might be
able to tell you. But you couldn't see it because
of the dust. was just covering it. It just
looked like dust moving in the field. And I was reminded at
that time of something I heard Brother Henry say in a message
years ago. He said, every particle of dust
that a farmer's tractor kicks up in the air, it all lands exactly
where God determines and purposes it to land. Now, are we taking
that too far? No, you can't take it too far.
Because every little minute thing that happens in this world, whether
it seems significant or insignificant to you or I, it's God's providence. Every particle, right where God
intends it. How minute is the providence
of God? All things live and move and
have their being in Christ. They would not live or move otherwise. God has ordained them. I've been
accused of being a fatalist. Have you ever been accused of
being a fatalist? Well, believers are not fatalists. The difference
between faith and providence is that faith is blind. Providence
has eyes. Fate is just shooting an arrow
that doesn't have any target and hoping it lands somewhere
profitable. But providence has a target and
it's designed to hit that target just as God purposed it. God's
Word accomplishes what He sends it to do. It never returns void. Never. It accomplishes that which
He sends it to do. Do you believe that? Our Lord Jesus is supposed to
be born in Bethlehem, but His mother lives in Nazareth. And
where was He born? Bethlehem. That's where God said
He'd be born. Well, how did this come to be?
Caesar, just on a whim, he decides that he's going to take a census
and that the world would be taxed and that all must pay their taxes
in their own city to assure that everyone is accounted for. Now,
Joseph was a descendant of David. And Bethlehem was his ancestral
home. So he was required to register
there. And this all came to pass. God brings all things to pass.
Every time we see that in the Scriptures. I counted one time
or looked it up. It was thousands of times it
says, and it came to pass. And each and every time it means
God brought it to pass. You could say that. God brought
to pass is just the same as saying it would be more accurate. To
say God brought it to pass and to say, and it came to pass.
It came to pass because God made it to come to pass. Mary was close to giving birth.
The prophecy was fulfilled because of Caesar's whim. No. Who was behind Caesar's whim?
Who put that in Caesar's mind? Who put that in Caesar's heart?
God did. He's the first cause of all things.
So we even see that the will of man, his desire to be a tyrant
is in the hand of God, and God turns the king's heart where?
Whithersoever He will. He's pleased to accomplish His
will. I would have you to consider
that God's providence is kind and a gracious consideration
of God taking care of His people. He knows the number of hair on
your head. Not one falls to the ground He's
not aware of. God takes better care of us than
we take care of ourselves. We all take care and look after
ourselves to some degree, but if you ever took so much care
of yourself as to count the hairs of your head, I haven't. Couldn't
if I wanted to. There's a friend of mine that
had a head full of hair, and because of a condition that he
has and the medications that the doctor prescribed, It all
fell out just in a short period of time. I mean, within a couple
weeks. And God knew about every hair
that fell. God ordained it. God, out of
loving care for him, knew the very hairs of his head. And friends,
that's why we cast all our care on Him. Because He cares for
us. You know, when I used to read
that years ago, Peter said, cast all your care on Him for He careth
for you. Listen, that doesn't mean He just cares about you. That means that He cares for
you. Like a mother cares for an infant. Like a father cares for his loving
son. In divine providence, God reserves
us by His almighty grace. It's preserving grace. It's restraining
grace. All of God's chosen people are
kept by the power and providence of God. Oh, that's another word
I like. Kept. The Lord not only is merciful and
gracious in saving me, but He's merciful and gracious in keeping
me. We're prone to wonder, aren't we? We're prone to leave the
God we love. But we can't do it. Because He
won't let us. We're kept by His power. God's
providence has marvelously arranged all our places. I read a story
about Mr. Spurgeon not long ago. I was
talking to Paul about it over here. illustrates what I'm endeavoring
to say. Mr. Spurgeon intended to attend
college and he had already preached I think 600 times, but he was
still a young man and he had determined to go to college.
He's very bright, no doubt. And the representative of the
college was scheduled to meet him at a mutual friend's house.
Someone of great means, very wealthy, had a big, large, expensive
home that even had servants. And Spurgeon was shown to a particular
waiting room, parlor, whatever they called it, by a young servant
girl who inadvertently showed him into a different parlor than
the principal, the man of the college, was waiting for him
in. And they both sat there for two hours waiting on the other.
In rooms just down the hall from one another. Was that just chance? No, that wasn't chance. That
was the providence of God. And it was then that the principal
got a bit frustrated and left, and Spurgeon himself was somewhat
aggravated. And you know the rest of the
story. Is it Paul Harvey that said it?
The rest of the story? Well, Mr. Spurgeon became one
of the greatest preachers of all time. And just think, if
that little girl, that servant girl, had put him in the right
room, how many souls might not have been saved? It's just amazing
when you think about the minuteness of God's providence. God caused the mistake of that
young girl as a means of providence. She made the mistake because
God caused her to make it. It was but a casual stop at a
business one day that I stopped and spoke with a young lady.
Little did I know at this time that young pretty lady would
one day be my wife. It turns out that she was seeking
God. She'd been raised in Catholic
religion, and I'd been raised in free will Baptist. And I'll
be honest with you, it was out of my attraction for her that
caused me to start seeking the truth. God can use the strangest
things, can't He? They seem minute to us, but they're
not. Little did we know that at that
time we both jumped from one false religion to another, but
it was there that we both began to seek the Lord and His truth.
And God had compassion on us. And what I thought to be just
a transfer and a job that I had because God had opened a car
factory in Tennessee, just south of Nashville. My company moved
me down there and it was there. Within just a couple weeks, there
was a Sovereign Grace conference held. We'd picked the church
out of the phone book. Your dad was the assistant pastor. Gabe was a young man at that
time. And we heard Brother Henry and
Brother Scott and Brother Maurice, my pastor. Were we lucky? Did fate have
a twist? No. God ordained it. And I stand here tonight preaching
the gospel to you, and there's nobody more shocked about it
than me. I can tell you that. All of us have our stories. They're
stories of God's providence. You've got yours. I've got mine.
And stories of how God marvelously arranged our lives to cross our
paths with His. Friends, if the hairs of our
head are all numbered, and they are, and if providence provides
for us all things necessary for eternal life, and it does, listen to me, we ought to be
happy. We ought to be fearless. We ought to be confident. And
we ought to be bold. We shouldn't have anything to
fear. That's why the Lord says this over and over. No, fear
not. The very hairs of your head are numbered. God's got you on
His mind and on His heart. Whatever our care, worry, or
fretting be over, we must resign ourselves in our hearts that
all things are in His hands. I don't know how many hairs I
have on my head. It's less and less every day.
I know that. But I do know that not a single
one of them falls to the ground that my sovereign caregiver doesn't
know about. Because of that, we all rest. We say things to friends like,
I got your back. No, we don't have anything. God
has much more than our backs. He's got our back and front and
both sides, and He's protection over us, and He's protection
below us. We say things like, I've got
you covered. No, we don't. We don't have anything
covered. We can't cover ourselves, but God can. And He covers us
with the precious blood of His Son. And God is satisfied. What must I do to be saved? You
can't do anything to be saved. So what do we do then? Rest.
Rest. We rest. And we've got to labor
to do that, don't we? Labor to enter into His rest.
Is that an oxymoron? I think it's something. The work's
finished. And the best news is that God's
accepted it. God's accepted the work. How
do I know Christ's sitting on the throne? He wouldn't have
had victory over death or the grave had not God accepted His
finished work. Everything's good between the
believer and God. And there's one reason why. Christ
is the Lamb slain for His people's sin from the foundation of the
world. That being so, when God gave
us to Christ, He said, the Lord said, all that the Father giveth
Me shall come to Me, and I will in no way, shape, or form cast
them out. Ever. Ever. When can a man rest? I say this quite often. A few months ago, it just hit me
like it never hit me before. A man can only rest when his
work's finished. And our work's finished. Because
Christ finished it and God accepted it. Is that not the Gospel? Isn't that the best news you've
ever heard? If you're a sinner, it is. Okay, thank you, Brother
Paul.