Tough to follow that. You may
need another handkerchief. Paul and Mindy, we love you.
Been very gracious to Kim and I. Undeserved hospitality. Paul and Mindy have been telling
me for years that I would love their people, and that I would
love these sister churches that have come, and they didn't sell
it short. I do love you. I do love you. You know, believers can say that
instantly, can't you? The world, if I wasn't married
and saw some pretty lady out there, not many prettier than
my wife, She said, I loved you. You wouldn't believe that, would
you? But you can believe that with
believers. Instantly. Isn't that amazing? I do, I love
you. And these two men, all said the
same thing. He said, do you know them? I
said, no, I've heard of them. Heard of John, but my mother
told me. She said, tell John. I said, hello, he's a sweet man. But I loved him. Instantly. Power to write again. Love them. He said, you're going to love
them. A friend and I were talking recently
about the difference between what people hold as doctrine
and the truth, the five points. Among other things, people sometimes
go to that five points. But sometimes you try to figure
it out. I'm not going to name any names or any branches of people
who believe the same thing. But there's a difference sometimes.
And this guy, I said, what's the difference? He said, well,
some men have the letter of grace, but not the spirit of grace.
And that's the difference. These two men have the spirit. Paul has the spirit. of grace,
it makes a difference. Doesn't it? Teaching doctrine
or feeling the doctrine. Kevin did. John did. Humble. Difference. And I've been privileged. I can't tell you, I can't bring
anything to Kevin, John hadn't just sort of a rehash. And it
is Christ. So if you would, just a few minutes,
Matthew 17. And we know what it's like. Let
me just say one more thing. All of us men who have been,
we know the work that has gone into this week. It's tough, because
we've been there, haven't we? We've done the duty, and I know
you're tired, and I appreciate you being here to listen to us
this morning. Matthew 17. And after six days, Jesus taketh
Peter, James, and John, his brother, and bringeth them up into a high
mountain apart. After six days. That tells you
something happened prior to this. after six days. What happened
prior to this? Well, four major truths concerning what we hold
and believe. Four major truths happened, uncompromising
things. Our Lord taught those men prior
to this. So let's look back at them. First
thing He taught them, Matthew 16, verses 13 through 17, Who he was? Who am I? That's
a vital truth. Who am I? Look at it there. Verse 13, And when Jesus came
to the coast of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying,
Whom do men say that I, the Son of Man, am? And they said, Some say that
you're John the Baptist, some Elias, and others Jeremias. or
one of the prophets. He said to them, whom say that
ye that I am. Men say a lot about who Christ
is. They say a lot. Who do you say
I am? Who am I to you? You and Christ
have got to have a personal relationship. You got to. What we say he is, You've got
to know. You've got to know in here. There's
so many. Know it up here. They know the
truth up here. They don't know it in here. Who
is Christ to you? He asked you that personally.
Who am I to you? It must be personal. He asked the
Pharisees two different things. He said, what think you, in Matthew
22, he asked the Pharisees, what think you of Christ? They never
gave him the answer that Peter's fixing to give him. Like so many
give him, he was just a definition. Christ is just a definition. Jesus is just a definition to
so many folks. Who am I to you? What think I
of Christ? You ever ask yourself that? What
think I of Christ? I don't want everyone to stop
asking me, what think I of Christ? Peter answered. Peter answered
for them all. Peter answered. He said, as in
Simon, Peter answered and said, thou art the Christ. You're the
Christ. He didn't say you're Jesus. You're
the Christ. He already knew. He saw it already. We avoid that
title, nothing wrong, because we know, we know, but we have
to be careful. We've been taught for half a
century, grace folks have, be careful about how you use Jesus. You just about have to define
it. Now, I don't have to define it here because you know I can
use it and you'll be fine with it. But I go out there and you
just have to say, what Jesus are you talking about? when it
comes up. Nobody knows much that Jesus
we're talking about. Peter answered. Peter answered
right. Peter answered right. Peter said, You're the Christ,
the Messiah, the Savior. You're the Savior. We know that. He's our Savior. You're the Son
of God. You're God. You're my Savior
because you're God. Only God can be my Savior. And you know, this alone, this alone,
this knowledge alone is Christianity. It all begins with this doctrine.
And this begins all true doctrine. Now if He's not this to you,
you don't know Christ. Now you may know These two young
girls sitting down, I love them. Boy, I'm glad I got to know these
two girls. They've had three generations. Think about this.
Three generations of the absolute truth. Most of the folks in here,
I was blessed. I never knew anything but the
truth. So you may know this in different degrees, but you've
got to know this. If Christ isn't this, if He's
not the Savior, the Son of God, you don't know Him. You don't
know Him. Here's the second thing. Church's
foundation was established, verse 17 through 20. Jesus answered
after Peter's reply, profound reply, and Jesus answered and
said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, Flesh and blood
hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father, the Father's sovereign
choice. Like I just said, we tell you
all day long who He is, but He's got to reveal Himself to you.
And He has. So many in this room, you can
just tell. He has. Your faces are bright. You love
this. He's done it. I couldn't do it. for flesh and blood hath not
revealed unto you, but my Father, which is in heaven. And I say
unto you, Peter, or thou art Peter. And upon this rock, we
know this, not on Peter, but on this foundational truth, who
Christ is, the church was built. These men, have you ever thought
about this? These 12 men were the church. This was it. And from it, these men, it sprang. And we've been blessed, like
I use these girls, we've been blessed to know, had so much
over the years. We're living in the best times
to live right now. And we're under the, if you're
in a grace church, you're in the best place to be, because
you know so much. You realize you know more than
these disciples knew? Isn't that amazing? We do. Every person in this sitting
in here knows, and I'm going to show you in a minute, you
understand more than these disciples did. What a blessing. Upon this truth, Peter, based
on what you just said about me, I'm going to build my church.
And what did he say? We had a fellow leave our church
several years ago. This is what he said. He said,
if we take our families and we pack up and we leave, they'll
have to shut the doors of the church. Shut the doors of Christ's
kingdom? Man, that's a bold statement
to make, isn't it? Wow. He just said the gates of
hell won't prevail against no matter what man is going to try
to do. I mean, church may tremble a little bit at times, rock a
little bit. It's going to be here till Christ
comes and gets us out of here. There'll be a church. There'll
be a people. May have to run in the woods
and hide. Who knows? But there'll be a people. There's
going to be a group. He says, I will give unto you
the keys of the kingdom of heaven. What are these keys? What are
these keys? What are you talking about? It's
the gospel. It's the gospel in all of its ingredients. It's
a big key ring. It's all the ingredients of the
gospel. It's Christ. Who He is. How He works. Substitution. The substitution is a key. One
of the keys. One of the keys is redemption.
One of the keys is righteousness in Him. A lot of keys. That's the keys. That's the keys
He gave Peter. He said, Peter, you're going
to lead things off. And Peter did at Pentecost. He said, you're
going to lead it off. These other men are going to
follow you. But here's the keys that I'm going to give you. I'm
going to give you the gospel. And you'll understand more and more
of it as time goes on. Here it is. Preach the gospel.
He said, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven,
and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Now
what in the world does that mean? He said, whatever the requirements
of the gospel are, don't compromise them. Don't compromise them for
anybody. Have faith in me. Don't you compromise
my word. I'll take care of you. Don't
you sell me short. Don't sell me for a nickel. Don't
compromise these, not one single key. Don't compromise it. You
don't compromise. Whatever, whatever you bind in
heaven, whoever the Lord is pleased to receive this message with
joy, whoever he's pleased to break and humble, he said they'll
be received in heaven. He said, if they reject it, they're
rejected in heaven. Shake the dust off your feet
and move on. Somebody out there will hear
it. If they don't want to hear it, don't sell it short. Move
on. Move on. If your friends don't want to
hear it, don't worry about it. Don't compromise it. Move on. Let the Lord deal with them.
He'll bless you for not compromising. Whether you're a preacher, or
whether you're training horses, or whether you're working in
a chicken house, or whatever you do out there, don't compromise
our Lord. And He'll bless you. And then the third thing He teaches
these men is that He's going to have to suffer. Verse 21 through
23. From that time forth began Jesus
to show unto his disciples how that he must go into Jerusalem
and suffer. Suffer. It's going to be a drawn
out thing. He's going to have to suffer.
Be an instant death. Wouldn't be a painless death.
What's that for? That's for us. It's for us. Go in and he suffer many things
of the elders, the chief priest and the scribes and be killed
and raised His kingdom wasn't going to be
what these fellas thought his kingdom was going to be. His kingdom would be a suffering
kingdom. His kingdom would be a heavenly
one. It's going to be made up of common folks just like me
and you and folks that just put on their britches one leg at
a time and they're humble and they're not too full of themselves
and they exalt Christ. That's his kingdom. And that's
what he's going to make. Not going to be a pompous group
of people. Going to be a people who get up in the morning and
say, Lord, let this day start with you. And if you get through
it, you're going to say, oh, thank you. It's only your grace
that got me through another day. Because we know ourselves. And
we're scared to death of ourselves. I am scared to death of me. Scared
to death. But that's who he makes his kingdom
of, just normal folks. Normal people. Like the master. Like the master. Luke says he talked about how
he would go to the cross, this same narrative. He said, I will
accomplish my death. Accomplish. I'll succeed. Had to succeed. He had succeeded. You and I wouldn't be sitting
here enjoying his word today, would we? He succeeded. He said, blood's got to be shed.
I got to suffer. I got to die. Peter took him
aside. Peter was converted, but he took
him aside and said this. He said, Lord, be it far from
you. This shall not be. He loved the
Lord. He just didn't understand any. You see, you can't be this
way. You can't be this way. Be it
far from you to think, the cross, that's the worst way to die.
The cross. Peter, you know, Peter's like
us. I mean, you know, Peter was converted
and he knew some truth, and we do. We know some good doctrine,
some grace. But don't ever think you know
enough doctrine or enough grace. Just keep on digging in there.
Keep on listening. Brother Paul's talking about
the text he sends out on Monday. Man, y'all take that and dig
into it. Dig into it. Learn. Don't ever quit learning. Don't
ever think you know enough grace. Then the Lord replies to Peter
and to Satan, both of them together. He said, eternally, get behind
me, Satan. You're an offense to me. He's
an offense to the cross. You're an offense to me. For you don't understand. Peter,
your mind's not in the right place. You savor not the things
that be of God, but you're thinking about what men think. Quit doing
that. That's my prayer. Lord, let me
think more about what you think about things. Any suggestion that this is a
fact, any suggestion of salvation in any other way than by the
cross is up to Satan. You mark it down. It's straight
from hell. Our Lord said, I must be lifted
up. No, I'm Christ. I must be lifted
up. There must be the cross. There
must be blood. Must be the death of our Lord.
Substitution must be or you and I have no hope. And be thankful
we understand that, truly understand that here, not here, here. Anyone else, any way else, anything
else that you ever hear is of Satan. He told Peter, he said, Peter,
you learn it, you learn it, you preach it, and you stick to it.
And that's what I pray. Learn it. Preach it and stick
to it. And here's the fourth thing.
There's a cost. There's a cost of following Christ. The Gospel. Verse 24 there, Jesus said to
his disciples, if any man will come after me, let him to die
himself and take up his cross and follow me. And whosoever
will save his life shall lose it. And whosoever will lose his
life for my sake shall find it. That's a cost. Some of you folks
here know that cost. The cost of the gospel. Some
of you, like any other congregation, some of you have lost wives because
the gospel found you. You didn't find God because the
gospel found you. Probably lost wives. Gospel never
found your wife, maybe. Found you, didn't it? They couldn't
tolerate it. Or maybe your wife here. Gospel
found you, but never found your husband. They're gone. There's
cost. Cost. I can't compromise the
truth for you to stay. And you know. And it could be
worse. It could get worse. Don't compromise
it. And let's pray for one another.
Because it could be tough at times. I mean, I know some good
men I thought were good men. And I think, Lord, that could
be me. Without grace, without you holding
me, don't leave me to myself. Don't let me go. Hold on to me. And then he gets into chapter
17. After this dialogue, now the Father is going to show these
men His glory. I'm going to show you a glimpse
of something, and this is going to encourage you to preach. I
told you some things are not so great, but now I'm going to
show you some glory, and this will inspire you to preach the
gospel. First one, and after six days,
Jesus taketh Peter, James, and John, his brother, and bringeth
them up into a high mountain park. and was transfigured before
them, and his face did shine as the sun, and his raiment was
white as the light." I know what part of that he is, but the rest
of his body stayed the same. But his face shone, and then
his clothes. And I don't know, maybe that
was just that robe of righteousness. Maybe it was just a glimpse of
it, but his clothes shined. I don't know, maybe y'all study
it next week. Somebody call me and let me know. They said Moses and Elijah was
with him. Why? Moses and Moses had been gone
1,500 years or so and had died. And Elijah had been gone 9, 800,
900 years and didn't die. But these men knew him, didn't
they? And that's how we'll be one day. One day, one day, Paul's
going to Go in the glory, and he's going to see Henry Mahan. But Paul's not going to say,
hey, daddy, like so many out here think. He's not going to
say, hey, dad. He's going to say, hey, brother
Henry. Because we'll all be brothers and sisters. He goes, hey, brother
Henry, what have you learned to cry since you've been up here?
That's what the conversation will be. I promise you, if you
think it's going to be seeing mom and daddy You miss Christ. It's all about Him. Here, and it's going to be more
about Him. Nothing will get in our way up there. But we'll know
each other. We'll know each other. It's going
to be brother and sister in Christ. But why was it Moses and Elijah?
Well, you know this. Every one of these preachers
already preached this, but I'm going to say it again. You know
why it's Moses. It's the Law and the Prophets. What did they talk about? Christ.
Christ. Go back to Luke again, they talked
about his death and what he would accomplish at Jerusalem. Gives
you a little more detail there, but that's what they talked about.
Same thing Christ talked about in the previous chapter, verses
21 through 23 there, same thing. What's the message of the Law
and Prophets? What Luke tells you over in 24? Christ said it's
going to be fulfilled, everything that the Old Testament, that
the prophets, that the law, the prophets, and the Psalms said
regarding me. We know that. That's all it was
about. Everything's about Christ. Back
then, right now, and in the future, everything's going to be about
Christ. If you think heaven's going to
be anything else other than Christ, you don't want to go there. You
don't want to go. You're going to be disappointed. That's not
where you want to be. And then Peter again. Peter again. Peter's like me. Luke said, sort
of funny Luke said, Peter not knowing what he was saying. I
do that all the time. You know, like so many of us,
we have a right to remain silent. We just don't have the ability
to. That thing's hot. We don't have the ability to.
Peter just didn't have the ability to. And he talked. And sometimes I do the same thing. I do it a lot of times when I'm
preaching. And I'll sneak downstairs maybe or in my truck and I'll
run sermon audio backwards because I hate to hear myself talk. And
I'll say, did I say that? And I'll say, I did say that. I did say that. Why did I say
that? I do it. Why did I say that? That's not what I meant. Peter,
we're all Peters. And that's another prayer. Lord,
keep me from saying things I don't need to be saying. Keep my mouth
shut, son. Verse 5, while he gets fake,
Well, verse 4, then answered Peter, let me tell you what Peter
said, I'm sorry. Then answered Peter and said
to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here. If you will, let
us make here three tabernacles. Peter wanted that to be heaven.
There's a lot of folks on earth that would like for earth to
be heaven if they could just adjust a few things. That's what
they'd like. I love to fish and hunt Food
with cows and horses, and I love to do all that stuff. But there's
a lot of folks who love that stuff, and that's what they like
heaven to be. They think they're going to go fishing all day. That's what Peter was thinking
right here. This is great. Let's just build it right here.
Have heaven on earth. Build three tabernacles. And
the other place he went wrong, one for you, one for Moses. and one for lies. See how much
graciously the Lord has been to us and we've come so far from
that? We know that now, don't we? Christ is all. Christ is all. Moses lies. No, they don't have
a tent here. We don't have a tent in our heart.
Christ has a tent in our heart. Verse 5, while he yet
spake, while he yet spake, Peter was talking, shouldn't have been,
Well, they should have been, because that's for our good.
Peter spoke for our good. While he asked faith, behold,
a bright cloud overshadowed them. And behold, a voice out of the
cloud which said, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well
pleased. Hear him. Our Lord spoke three
times of his Son. And every time in the New Testament,
he spoke of his Son. Hear him. Hear him. And when
the disciples heard it, they fell on their face and were afraid. When Isaiah saw His glory, he
spoke of Him. John, I guess this is the first
time John, but John fell a couple of times, didn't he? John fell
on his face as a dead man, it says. That's what you do when
you see it. God's glory, like John was saying
the other night, you've got to get lost. You've got to be a
sinner before God will ever deal with you in salvation. God's
got to slay you. God's glory will slay a man.
If you ever see it, You're not going to jump these pews and
foam at the mouth. Glory to God, praise Him. Thank
you, Jesus. No. Hit the floor, won't you? Hit
the floor. Well, better raise your head. What's the lessons that we learned
here? Chapter 16. Lessons there with who He is.
His church, His death, His gospel, that's what He taught us in chapter
16, those verses, those four things. Verse 7 verses of chapter
17 here was His glory. And that leads us to verse 8.
But before that, before that, let's go back just a second to
Peter. What if, what if we had gone
along, what if our Lord had gone along with Peter? Just what if? What if he had said, OK, let's
do that. Let's build that. Let's let these men stay here.
Let them work with me. Let them work with me. What if
he had come down the mountain with both Moses and Elijah? Peter
thought that'd be a good idea. He thought it'd be good. Moses could hammer home at law,
just hammer home at law, the law message. And our Lord could
follow it with a message of grace and mercy. That'd be good, wouldn't
it? Or Elijah could come down with
him. He could call down fire from heaven. And then Lord could
step up and comfort those slain sinners. That'd be good. Peter thought.
Like I said, Peter thought that'd be good. Don't men still think
that? They do out there. They do. Let's
help. Let's just help out the message
of grace. Let's help it out a little bit. Let's help out the message of
faith in Christ alone. It needs just a little help.
Maybe we could hold on to these people a little longer. Let's
help it out. Let's just scare the hell out
of them and preach hell for a while. That'll do it. That'll help it
out. Let's be in Elijah for a while. Tell them what Moses said. Let's
give them a bunch of do's and don'ts and keep them in here.
Isn't that it? Let's help grace. Let's help
the Lord out. Well, Peter was wrong and they're
wrong. It's best, mainly because our Lord said it was best, but
it's best to see the law in Christ and the prophecies in Christ
and not with Christ. Isn't it right? That's best.
That's best. You know, somebody said the absence
of something often hints of better things. And let me give you an
example. If I had a heart surgery in the
morning and my surgeon walked in and he had his college manuals
with him, I'd probably say, let me find another doctor. That
ain't, you know, you don't want him bringing his books in. The
absence of those books means he's probably learned some things. Well, the absence of the Law
and Prophets being in Christ now means it's better. So much
better. Christ don't need help. We don't
need to help Christ out. Just let Him have His work. Like
you said, let Him have His work. Just have faith in Him. Patience. May get down to nearly nothing
somewhere. Just have patience. Patience. His work. If He shuts
the door, then He shuts the door. But a man ain't gonna shut the
door. Wait on Lord. Christ is all and in all. That's
what Paul wrote to the Colossians. Christ is all and in all. Both
men, both Elijah and Moses, both those men were men of great honor. And we use them like you do.
We use them. They were highly used of God.
But they were still men, weren't they? Both were sinners in need
of this same Savior. The same Savior that saved you
and I saved Moses and Elijah. Same Savior. They needed Him
just as much as we needed Him. So we must never allow these
men and their greatness or what they symbolize, the types, or
any other man or woman married. None of that should ever supersede
what we have in Christ. Types are good, symbols are good,
but Christ is best. Christ is best. And Christ alone is the Father
well-pleased. Christ only is my comfort. Christ
only is my master. Christ only is my guide and my
reward. The substance of true religion
is Christ alone. True Christianity, true Christianity
is Christ only. Christ only is my study and my
message. Sometimes folks will ask me,
what do you think of this? And I'll take a little bit, but
it aggravates me because it takes me away. And sometimes they'll
ask an important question about, I don't know, something in the
scriptures, divorce or whatever, you know, principles. But I quickly want to get back
to Christ as being my main study. I'm not the smartest tool in
the shed, so I had to stick to Christ. I said, man, I'll give
you the answer you want. Stick to Christ. He's my study. He's my message. Christ only
is our discussion. And I was telling Paul, and it's
like this everywhere you go. You know, sometimes we get a
little convicted. We have what we call a fellowship,
and sometimes Christ isn't honored quite like we should be. But
what's heartening is I was talking to Kelly the other day. We were
talking about horses, and it wasn't long before Kelly was telling me about
this new way to ground train a horse, and he brought Christ
into it. And these men were talking about
deer hunting last night, and not long before the Lord came
up again. Are we talking about serving in the army or something?
No, the Lord's there. The Lord did. With a believer,
Christ is never far away from His conversation. He's there.
He's there. He's it. He's it for us. So chapter 17, verses 1 through
8, it wasn't the splendor of this transfiguration. That wasn't
what it was. It was a wonderful thing. But that wasn't it. It's not the wonder about seeing
these saints. Again, that had to be a wonderful
thing, but that wasn't it. The splendor, the wonder, the
glory of it all, the life of the believer, like I just said.
Now let me tell you, in the morning is going to be
a bad day for us all, because we've been, for the last three
days, we've been as close to heaven as we can get on earth.
So you're going to be down in the morning, because I'm going
to be. Aren't we? Aren't we, Paul? Aren't we? We're
going to be down. We're going to be down. Because we've been
as close to glory as believers can be here. But remember this. Every moment of every day, heaven
to come, heaven to come, and throughout all eternity, it's
right here in verse 8. Remember this always. You don't
remember anything else. And when they had lifted their
eyes, grace raised them back up. Mercy raised them back up.
And when they had lifted their eyes, they saw no man save Jesus
Christ only. Thank you again. Let me talk
to you.