Ephesians 4. Ephesians 4. My prayer, my desire for this
message and every message is that God will be glorified. That
those who don't know Him might come to know Him. Repent, believe,
that those who do know Him will be comforted. That's my prayer
and my desire with every message. And there's no greater glory
of God than to talk about His mercy. When Moses said, show
me your glory, what would the Lord say? I'm going to make all
my goodness pass before you. I'm going to be merciful. No
greater glory, nothing that should lead someone to repentance more
than God's great goodness to us. And nothing should comfort
us more And His mercy, His kindness, same word, endures forever. Forever. Look at verse 31 and 32 with
it. These are words to us, how we ought to be. It tells
us how God is. Let all bitterness, wrath, anger,
clamor, evil speaking be put away from you. with all malice,
be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as
God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." The kindness, tenderness,
and forgiveness of our God. Verse 31 tells us how the world
is and how we are by nature. Verse 32 tells us how God is. Verse 31 are bitter words. Verse 32 are sweet words. Look at verse 31. Let all bitterness,
wrath, anger, clamor, evil speaking be put away. Malice. Bitterness.
The world... because of the dregs of sin. Something bitter. Have you ever
drunk something and got to the bottom of the dregs, the bottom
of it, like a cup of coffee or anything, and it left a bitter
taste in your mouth? Bitterness, that's what it is. It's hard to swallow. The world,
because of sin, leaves a bad taste in your mouth. And everybody in the world is
bitter. They really are. You remember Exodus 15? You remember
the waters of Marah where the waters were bitter? You remember
that message and people couldn't drink it? God's people. It's
too bitter to drink. We couldn't live here if it wasn't...
God didn't do something about this place and make it livable. He cast a tree into the waters.
Remember that? Made the bitter waters sweet.
What's that? Tree. Christ crucified. To me, to live is Christ. To
die is gain. Bitterness. And then, you know, our Lord,
to make everything to us a blessing, We see it's all a blessing because
of Christ. But Christ said it. Whom the Lord loves, He chases.
Whom the Lord loves, He sends trials. Whom the Lord is bringing
out, stirs up a nest. Makes you uncomfortable. Makes
you miserable. Sends trials and tribulations.
Stirs you up and makes you want out. That's the goodness of God. That's
the love of God. That's the mercy of God. But the world is bitter.
Who are they bitter against? God. He's the first cause of
all things. They're not thankful. They don't
worship Him. So God says, no peace. And they're
bitter. Wrath. Anger. Romans 1 talks
about it. Let me just read it to you. Romans
1 says, because they weren't thankful,
the world, They think they're wise, but they're fools. They
don't thank God. They change the truth of God
into a lying and worshiping the earth, Mother Earth, man, rather
than the Creator, who's God-blessed forever. So he gave them up,
he said. And now they're filled with unrighteousness,
fornication, wickedness, filthy, backbiters, haters of God, proud
boasters, and on and on it goes. Romans 3 says, their mouths are
full of cursing and bitterness against God. Everybody is cussing
God. Anger. Anger. And such were some
of you. But God. How does Ephesians start? With God choosing the people.
Go into chapter 2, Ron, where it says, and you, and you, hath
he quickened who were dead, just like them, children of wrath,
even as others, children of disobedience. But God, who's rich in mercy,
for his great love, wherewith he loved us, God's people, quickened
us. He said to your enemies, remember,
your enemies, aliens, far off, but made nigh now. How? Wrath
and anger. God ought to be angry with us.
We're still sinners. We're still ungrateful. Some
of the time, not all the time. God has given His people a thankful
heart. A new man. That new man's thankful.
That new man's holy. That new man's just. But this
old man still murmurs, complains, full of bitterness and wrath.
He hasn't changed. God ought to be angry with us,
but He's not. Why? Why? Because of Christ. For Christ's sake. Clamor. Look at the next word here in
our text. Ephesians 4 says, let all bitterness
and wrath and anger and clamor, that means outcry, cry out. I want you to turn to Genesis
18, Genesis 18, a couple of scriptures I want you to turn with me so
you know where they're at and won't forget them. Clamor means
to cry out, a clamoring cry of this world is anger and wrath
and man is a public outcry all the time against whatever. And people gather together and
this whole world, all these, this social media, I hate it
with every fiber of my being. It's just a bunch of people spouting
off. What are they spouting off? It's
a clamor. Everybody complaining. Everybody
spouting off what we ought to do. I hate it. God hates a multitude of words.
He hates it. But that's this world. It always
has been. And look at Genesis 18 verse
20. The Lord said, because the cry,
that's the word, the clamor, Sodom and Gomorrah is great.
Their sin is very grievous. I'll go down now and see whether
they've done all together according to the cry of me. It's come up
to me. I hear it. It's so loud. I hear it. Look at chapter 19.
Chapter 19. God did come down, didn't He?
His name was Jesus Christ. Oh my. Verse 13 of chapter 19. The angel said to Lot whom God
sent to mercifully bring him out, we will destroy this place
because the cry of them is waxing great before the face of the
Lord. And the Lord sent us to destroy this place. These messages go together. You
can't read anywhere in the Bible where you don't see fear and
rejoicing. You don't see warnings and promises.
You can't read anywhere. Or you don't see destruction.
and preservation, salvation. Clamor. It's all clamor we put
away from you. We've got nothing to cry out
about except mercy. We've got nothing to complain
about except our own sin. Why should a living man, you
know this scripture, why should a living man complain for the
punishment of his sins? We are not getting what we deserve.
He hath not dealt with us after our sins. We've got nothing to
complain about. David one time wrote a psalm.
I love this. I preached on it. Let there be
no complaining in our streets. No room for complaining. No room
for boasting. Let me go on. Isaiah 3 talks
about this clamor where they hide They don't hide their sin
at all. They declare it like Sodom. God
hears it. He hears it. Go back to our text. Evil speaking. Verse 31. Doesn't
all this put a bitter taste in your mouth? It does God. Verse 30. It grieves Him when
we do it. It grieves Him. He said, let
me be done with evil speaking. We need to preach very soon on
2 Timothy 3, the last days. It describes the last days. We
haven't preached on that in a long time. We need to now so much
more as we see the day approaching. It is so descriptive of the modern
day we're in, the last day. But in that passage it talks
about evil speaking is not just saying bad things, it's pride. Pride. God hates it. Listen. He hates it. And isn't that all
you hear today? Six things the Lord hates, seven
are abominations. Is that Proverbs 16? The first
thing God hates, and foremost, is a proud look. These athletes, these runway models, these stars, Sickening pride. Don't let that be named once
among you. We've got no room for boasting. What do we have that we have
not received? And if we've received it, how,
why could we possibly boast as if it was something we did? To
this man would I look. He is poor and with a contrite
spirit. Humble yourself. Humble yourself. Wrath, anger, evil speaking,
malice. Look at that word, malice. That
means intent to do evil. Malice means you want to hurt
somebody. You want to see them suffer.
Have you ever known a generation that that fits more? Have you? Violence. People relish
it, don't they? These martial arts, these sports,
blood sports, are now more popular than ever, more so than the history
of the Roman gladiators. It's sad, isn't it? You know
it's sad. Malice. And nowhere is the malice
of man more clearly seen than Calvary. Nowhere is the wrath,
the hatred of man toward God, his bitterness toward God, more
clearly seen in Calvary. When God came down, holy, righteous,
just, perfect, merciful, love personified, kindness, grace
poured from His lips, went about doing good, and mankind said,
kill Him. Don't just kill Him, make Him
suffer. That's man. That's man. I'll tell you the truth. That's the
truth as it is in Jesus Christ and Him crucified. Man got a hold of God one time.
One time in the history of the world. And he said, I'm going
to make Him hurt. Malice. But you know our God is not like
that. Our Lord Jesus Christ didn't
deserve any of that. He deserved the opposite of that.
But He took all of that. Why? For you. For you. For you. We deserve that. We deserve that
malice. God ought to be full of malice. I'm going to make you suffer.
I'm going to make you hurt because of what you did to my son. Shouldn't
it? God's not like that. You know
the scripture says God takes no pleasure in the death of the
wicked. That's amazing. That's amazing. But God, the
opposite of that, God is kind. As bad as those words sounded,
these next words have a sweet sound to them. Wrath and anger
and malice and bitterness just sounds awful. Kindness. I like the way it sounds. Kindness. And the word kindness is mercy. If you look it up in the dictionary,
it means mercy. Look up mercy. It means kindness.
Kindness. God spares many. More than spare. He does more than spare judgment
and wrath. He loves. This is what God is. Verse 32.
Boy, I wish I could preach this. It says, Be ye kind one to another. That's how God is to us. Be ye
merciful, tenderhearted, forgiving one another. That's how God is
to us for Christ's sake. This is what God is for Christ's
sake. These words, oh, sweet were kindness. Look at, well, Psalm 145. I read this to you. Let me just
read again what it says there. One of my favorite psalms, as
I said. But this verse just stands out. All of them stand out. But when he talks about God's
greatness, And he starts out by saying, I'm going to declare
His greatness. I'm going to abundantly utter
the memory of His great goodness. He goes on to say, the Lord is
gracious. The Lord is full of compassion.
The Lord is slow to anger. He's of great mercy. That's kind. The Lord's good to all. He's
tender. Mercy's over all His works. He's kind to all. He delights to show kindness,
mercy. He takes pleasure in them that
fear him and asks for mercy. He delights to show mercy. It
gives him great pleasure. Oh, my. You know, creation groaned. Turn to Psalm 104. I do want
you to turn here. Psalm 104. Creation groans because
of man and sin, and so do we. We groan, don't we? Don't we? Sin, sin without, sin within. We groan because of it. All the
injustice, all the pain, all the suffering, all the sin, all
the wickedness and filth without and within. We groan because
of it. But creation sings, though. Creation sings of the goodness
of God. Every day, in spite of what man
and sin has done to creation, the trees clap their hands. If
you listen, you'll hear it. Who are they clapping to? God. No man's going to cut them down.
No. The wind is whistling through
those trees. What's that wind saying? Holy,
holy, holy. Love, love, love. Goodness, goodness, goodness,
mercy. The birds wake up singing. They
don't have a place to lay their head. They're out in the cold,
out in the snow, out in the rain while we lay in our beds and
wake up grumpy. They wake up singing. In spite of man, in spite of
sin, They wake up sick. Psalm 104. This is my favorite
psalm. This really is. Until we read
the next one. Look at verse 10. He sends the
springs to the valleys that run among the hills. They give drink
to every beast, every beast of the field. He waters the wild
asses, quenches their thirst. By them the hills, the fowls,
the trees grow. The fowls of the heavens have
their habitation and sing. Among the branches, he waters
the hills with his chambers. The earth is satisfied with the
fruit of thy word, causes grass to grow for the cattle, herb
for the service of man, bring forth food out of the earth,
wine that makes glad the heart of man, oil to make his face
to shine, bread to strengthen his heart, trees of the Lord
full of sap. Verse 17, the birds make their
nests. High hills, verse 18, a refuge
for wild goats, rocks for the conies. On down, verse 21, there
are young lions, predators, killers. They roar and the Lord gives
them their prey. Seek their meat from God. He
feeds the killers. Man, what about man? He does
all this for man. Oh, Lord, verse 24. Don't ever
say that unless you mean it. Oh, Lord. OK? Don't ever say that. Oh, Lord,
have mercy. Don't ever say that unless you
mean it. Oh, my God. Don't ever say that unless you
really mean it. Oh, my God, how great thou art. Oh, Lord, how
manifold are thy works. Look at verse 7. He talks about
the whale. God just loves to see the whale
play in the water. Man, do you want to see a whale
so bad? Claim she has, but we didn't believe her. I believe
her. Anyway, the glory of the Lord,
verse 31. His works, rejoice in His works.
Verse 33, I'll sing as long as I live. As long as I live in
the goodness and kindness of God. God does all this. God is kind. He feeds everything
that has need. And he said in his sermon on
the mountain, this God who's a consuming fire came down to
this filthy, rotten, wretched place in love and mercy and great
kindness and sat on a mountain one day. He said, come. And the
first words out of his blessed mouth were, blessed, blessed,
blessed. And he said, your heavenly father
knows what things you have need of. He said, those little birds
out there, not one of them falls to the ground without your father.
He feeds every one of them. Are you not worth much more than
many sparrows? Fear not. Again, you heard about when I
was sitting in the study down there and the bird feeder was
empty. And I stopped what I was doing, very important. Preparing
them where to go. Stopped what I was doing. Drove
all the way to Walmart. Got a bag of feed. Well, stopped
at 40 West first. They didn't have it. Went all
the way to Walmart. Got a bag of feed. Came back
and fed those birds. Well, yesterday I was studying. Looked out there. The bird bath
was empty. No water. They were coming down,
no water. Stopped what I was doing. Went
out there. Filled up that bird back. Just filled it. You know
how I filled it? It was running over. Running over. Went back in. I was no sooner inside that building
than I sat down and a robin, of all birds, a robin got in
there. She's drinking it. She's splashing
in it. She's washing, drinking, frolicking.
And then two sparrows came. And then a finch came. And then
a bluebird came. And I'm telling you, there was
five birds in there of all kinds. Every tribe kindred of birds
was in that bath, drinking it, washing it, frolicking. Thank
you. Thank you, thank you. If he feeds
the little birds, how much Doesn't he well deserve our praise?
Shouldn't we be sitting here waiting to praise him inside? Praise waiteth to be. He waits
to be gracious. He waits on you to wake up. The key just feeds you, and waters
you, and be kind. Be so kind. Look at the next
word, kindness. And in Luke 6, verse 35, the
Lord's one that says this. He said, be like him. He's kind. God's kind unto the unthankful
and the evil. Oh, man. And let me add this. How kind is He? How merciful? The greatest show of all. He's
hanging on the cross. And the very ones that When malice,
wrath, and anger against him, his first words were, Father,
forgive me. And in one last show of kindness,
the worst fellow that ever walked the planet, on his right hand,
he turned and said, today you're going with me in paradise. Isn't he kind to the unthankful? That proves it. The greatest
proof of all. Calvary. Tenderhearted. Psalm 103. This really is my
favorite. Psalm 103. It's yours too, isn't
it? You know it is. Psalm 103. I
love it. Love it. Love it. Love it. Tenderhearted. Tenderhearted. Softhearted. Not
hard. The opposite of hard is tender. Tender. Touched. Moved with compassion. moved with compassion. The Lord
came, and he was sitting there, and the scripture says he's moved
with compassion on the multitude. He saw them as sheep without
a shepherd. They were hungry. He fed every
one of them. Every one of them. Psalm 103, look at verse 3. Oh,
bless the Lord. He forgives all your iniquities.
He healeth all thy diseases. He redeemeth your life from destruction,
keeps you from destroying yourself. He crowns you with loving kindness
and tender mercy. He satisfies your mouth with
good things. Your youth is renewed like the
eagles. Verse 8, the Lord is merciful,
kind, gracious, slow to anger, plenteous in mercy. He will not
always chide. He ought to, shouldn't He? You
ought to approve, rebuke, and correct us. We need it. Let the
righteous smite me. It'll be a kindness. It'll be
a kindness. We need it. We need these afflictions. It's good for us to be afflicted.
There's so much less than we deserve. And the afflictions
He sends us are good for us. It's because of His love. It's
not because of His anger. It's because of His love. He said that and He punished.
You chasing your children? Why? They need it. Read on. It says in verse 10,
he hath not dealt with a second sin. Who did he deal with? God will by no means clear the
guilty. Then one word. He dealt with Christ after our
sins. He's talking about mercy. He hasn't rewarded us according
to our iniquities. But God has laid on Christ the
iniquity of us all. Two things that a human being,
it's impossible for us to do. Number one is not get credit
for something we've done. That's the hardest thing to do
is to give an anonymous gift. Yes, it is. What if somebody
else gets credit for it? It's humanly impossible to do
that. The second thing is to take the
blame for something we have not done. That's impossible. That's exactly what Christ did
in both those things. He gave us the credit. What was
charged to us is what He did, this righteousness, this holiness. God looks at us and says, You're
holy, unblameable, unapprovable, and blessed. We say, Oh, yeah.
No, He was. We're the opposite of that. But
God laid on Him. And God made us righteous. That's what he did. He opened
not his mouth. They blamed him. They accused
him of everything, of blaspheming God. He can't. He loved God with all his heart,
mind, soul, and strength. They said you blaspheme God.
He took the blame for what we've
done. That's astounding. That's amazing. Where am I? Verse 11, As the
heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy, his kindness
toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the
west, he has removed our transgression from us. As a father pitieth
his children, tenderhearted toward his children, the Lord pitieth
them that Do you look on that when you
were with your grandson? You do love him, don't you? We
were just in her house. We saw 143 pictures. Almost. You love him, don't you? You love him dearly. Did you
look on him with compassion? Did you look on him with tenderness?
Did you look on him with love? Did you look on him? You feel
for him when you cry, do you? Sure you do. How much more? Where did you get that, God?
God's love is not like a mother's love. A mother's love is like
God's. He's the supreme example of all
goodness and mercy and love and grace. Confuse God's kindness and tenderness
and compassion with love now. Don't do that. As said, I quoted that God takes
no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but the wicked need to
die. God is just. And God is merciful to many of
the most wicked men that ever walked the planet. Nebuchadnezzar.
I believe the Lord saved that man. And he talked about an idolater. Manasseh. God says the worst
man ever lived. Never was one after him. That
bad. I believe the Lord saved Manasseh. Don't you? Man. Thief on the cross. Present day. Do you remember Saddam Hussein?
You remember how evil that man was? He was evil. I remember when
they found him. Found him hiding in a hole. Boy,
do the proud come down. And they got him out of there.
And that people of Iran, Iran or Iraq, I forget, Iraq. They got that man out of that
hole. And they started torturing him. Did you see it? I saw it. they had him on a rope in front
of everybody the whole crowd was just having a big old party
because they were going to hang this man and the fear on his
face i feel sorry for him i really do he needs to die he
needs to die he's urgent but i feel sorry for him No pleasure. I've got no pleasure in what's
going to be there. That's our God. So don't let anybody call
our God a monster. He's not a monster. He's not
even like man. Man's worse than a monster. Tenderhearted. Feeling. Healing. And the last word. Forgiveness. In our text, be kind, tender-hearted,
forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven
you. Forgiveness. Buddy, if you're
guilty, there's not a more blessed word you'll ever hear. That woman caught in the act
of adultery, and they brought her in. She's guilty. She knows
it. Everybody else knows it. The
Lord knows it. And they brought her. They brought her to Him. Who brought her to Him? He did. The Lord's working. They brought her to Him and cast
her at His feet and said, the law says she's to be stoned. Well, you say. And they just
were going on and on, talking like social media. And he stooped down to say a
word, writing in the sand, as though he heard them nod. They
said, are you hearing us? Writing in the sand. He's listening
to one person. And that person's not saying
a word. What the law says is, shut her mouth. She's guilty.
Everybody knows. She knows it. All she needs,
all she wants, her only hope is mercy. And she knows her mercy's
in one person. And it's that man right there.
And he stooped down where she was. And he's listening. He's
not listening to all these words, all this clamor. He's listening
to a heartbeat. A broken heart beating rapidly. And when he was gone, when it
was over, all those people were out of there, and him and this
one guilty sinner. And he said, woman, where are
your accusers? Does no man accuse thee? And
she finally lifted up her head. Ain't nobody here but me and
you, Lord. No man, Lord. He said, neither do I. Boy, if you're a sinner, that's
what he said to you, Kelly Grant. Forgiven. Why? For Christ's sake. Forgiven. Blotted out. Erased. Put away. Everything. Covered
under the blood. Atoned for. Remitted. Paid. All of it. And you. Who? You, who's the worst sinner in
here? If I take a show of hands, every
hand will go up with him. You, having forgiven you all your sins, all manner of sins should be
forgiven. But you don't know how bad I am. No, I don't, but
God does. And he says, you, past, present,
And we just don't know what we might do in the future. Forgiven. He said their sin and forgiveness
means forgotten. You understand? God's forgiveness
is forgotten. He said their sins and iniquities
I'll remember no more. I will never bring them up. If
you look for them, you won't find them. I told you that story, my father
went to the court and he had that wreck and the judge, you
know, he just knew he was going to throw the book at him. It
was time before the judge and the judge looked up and said,
what are you here for? He said, well, I'm supposed to
be here. I had a wreck and it's my fault. And the judge said, it's not
on the record. You're free to go. And to this day, to this
day, to that day, Dad never did know how that happened. He knows
now. God said, John, God said, I blotted
that out. Those hands out of your mortgages
against you, anyway, I covered it in red. So that judge, that
unjust judge, can't convict you. God covers. You're talking about a happy
man going out of that courtroom. No more. I don't remember no
more. No charges. There's therefore now no condemnation
to them that are in who? Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ. You know, Scripture
says He's so kind, so good, He's ready to forgive. ready to forget. Let me close by giving you this
illustration. The judgment of God against us, we're
guilty on all charges. And everyone's going to stand
before the judgment seat of God. to receive in their body the
things done by them. But God says, because of Christ,
because Christ was judged for us, His people, that there's
no condemnation, there's no judgment, there's no wrath. In the whole
world, those outside of Christ are going to hear God say, guilty
as charged. I therefore sentence you to death. be cast in the lake of fire,
bind them hand and foot, and cast them into a lake of fire.
They'll be weeping and wailing and gnashing their teeth. That's
just something. Christ preached that. But to
God's people, who feel themselves to be every bit as sinful and
guilty as the worst criminals, Saddam Hussein, I'm going to
stand before him in a judgment. I'm not trying to be clever,
but this is it. Stand before him in the judgment
someday And he's gonna and they're gonna hear him him say to every
one of them. I hereby sentence you to life eternal I Hereby sentence you not to
death to life eternal Why what have I done nothing? Christ did it all. Christ paid
it all. And it's without parole. Life eternal and nothing and
no one can change it forever. Why? For Christ's sake. That's why we're all going to
be praising Him through eternity and eternity. And he said in
Matthew 18, I was going to have you turn there, but he gave the
illustration of a man who was forgiven 10,000 talents. You
remember that? He frankly forgave him everything.
And that man turned around and grabbed somebody by the throat
that owed him 1,000 talents, just a little bit. And he threw
him in prison. And our Lord was angry. He said,
I've forgiven you everything. So He says to us, those who have
been forgiven much, you love much. Those to whom God has been
so kind and merciful, be ye kind as He was kind to you for Christ's
sake. Be tender-hearted, testive, as
God for Christ's sake is tender-hearted toward you. And forgive, even
your enemies, as God for Christ's sake forgives. Okay, well done
gentlemen.