It does my heart good to see
you. It does. You have a special place in my
heart. Your pastor and his wife have
a special place in my heart. I've known your pastor a long
time. Since we were 22, 23 years old,
I've known Paul and Mindy. And this has just been a, you
know, it's been a blessing to have that kind of friendship
over the years. To have that kind of, and to
have that kind of friendship, though, in the Lord Jesus Christ.
That's, that's the foundation of, that's the foundation of
real friendship, is our friendship, fellowship, in the Lord Jesus
Christ. We love the same person. We have
the same goals. And by God's grace, we have the
same end in His presence. Turn with me to 1 Thessalonians
chapter 1. I want us to look at this chapter
for a little bit this morning. My main focus is going to be
on verses 4 through the remainder of the chapter. chosen to salvation. Isn't that amazing? God chose to save me. That's
just amazing to me, that before the world began, God in his greatness,
and we can't even begin to scratch the surface of the greatness
of God, But God, in his greatness, before he created the heavens
and the earth, the host of angels, all that he's created, he thought
upon me. He thought upon me, that I actually
was in his thoughts, that I had his attention, that I had the
attention of Almighty God. David said, I am poor and needy,
yet the Lord thinketh upon me. That one such as God. What is
man that is not mindful of Him, it says over in Psalm. And who
am I? Who am I that God would think
upon me? God would think upon me. and choose Me in His Son. And here's one of the wonders
of it all, that it pleased God, it says in Scripture, to make
you His people, it pleased God to conform us to the image of
His Son. That it pleased Him to make me,
this sinful man, and the sinful men and women here, that it pleased
God to make us just like His Son. I can't even put that into
words. There's no words for that. Now
Paul here says, Paul, Silvanus, and Timotheus unto the church
of the Thessalonians, which is in God the Father and in the
Lord Jesus Christ. There is a local church here. in Rocky Mount, one in Spring
Lake, Lexington, all over this world there's a local church.
But you know the church, the local churches in all these places
are all at one time gathered in the Lord Jesus Christ. The
church that's in heaven already and upon this earth, the whole
church is gathered in Jesus Christ. We're gathered here this morning.
They're gathered in Spring Lake this morning. But you know right
now, we're all gathered together in Christ. And we ought to have
that in our minds because, you know, when we come together,
we're not the largest group in town. Never. We're never the
most popular group in town. We're never the largest group
in town. But when you consider right now that we are all gathered
together in Jesus Christ, there's a large number. There's a large
number. Thousand times ten thousand times
ten thousand. That's a definite number for
an indefinite number. And we are gathered in the Lord
Jesus Christ and grace be unto you. Grace. You know, this is
something I've learned as I've gotten older in the Lord and
grown in grace and knowledge of Him. I don't need more of
this world. I don't need more of the material
things of this world. I don't need them. You know what
I need? More grace. I need more grace. And I need
to experience. I want to experience more of
that peace that is in the Lord Jesus Christ. He said, My peace
I give unto you. I want to experience that. I
want to know that on this side of eternity. I want to know that
when I get up in the morning. I want to know that when I go
throughout the day. I want to know that when the news is giving
nothing but bad news and exaggerated news. I want to know peace, the
peace I have in Jesus Christ when the world is in such tumult
and there's so much going on. I want to know peace, the peace
of God in Jesus Christ. That's what I want to know. And
so peace be unto you. And I say to you this morning,
grace and peace be to you. And the rest will take care of
itself. The rest will be taken care of. From God the Father
and the Lord Jesus Christ. When I look at that this morning,
I thought the Father does nothing. I wrote this out by this verse.
The Father does nothing apart from his Son. You will never
know grace apart from Jesus Christ. You'll never know peace apart
from Jesus Christ. Not from the Father you won't.
Whatever you and I experience from the Father, given to us
from the Father, comes to us through His Son Jesus Christ.
Now we give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of
you in our prayers. And I tell you what, I thank
God for you this morning. As I said, it does my heart good
to see you. And I'm serious, it does. And I thank God for
you. Remembering without ceasing your
work of faith, labor of love, patience of hope in our Lord
Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father. Knowing brethren,
knowing this, you know this, don't you? Knowing brethren,
beloved, beloved of God, your election of God. God chose you. That's what I was saying this
morning. It's just astounding. God chose you. He's going to
populate a new earth with a people just like His Son. That's what
God's doing. That's what He's doing now. He's
making a people. Bringing them together. Putting
together the body of Christ. Just like when God put Adam to
sleep, and He took a rib from His side, and He made a woman
for Adam. When God put His Son to death
at Calvary, He has taken out of Him His own bride. And she's
being put together right now. And when that last part of the
body is put together, then we are going to be presented in
glory to the Son. Isn't that amazing? That's amazing. But it starts here, He chose
us. The doctrine of election is a Bible doctrine, and that's
why we preach it. We preach it from the Word of
God. It's a doctrine of praise. It's a doctrine of praise. It's
because God chose a people that anyone's going to be saved. You know, election never kept
anyone out of heaven. Election doesn't keep anyone
out. It opened a door. and brought us in. He opened
the door and brought us in. If God had not chosen a people
in Christ before the foundation of the world, no one would be
saved. You know, we have the elect angels, and then you have
those angels that have fallen. You know, not one time have they
ever asked the Lord for mercy. You ever notice when you read
the Gospels that when the Lord cast out a devil, that that devil
never said, Lord, would you have mercy on me? You know why? Because without God choosing
you, calling you, loving you, bringing you to himself by his
grace, you won't come. You will not. Christ said to
this, here's your problem. We have a will problem. You will
not come to me that you might have life. That's your problem. You have a will problem. And
left to ourselves, if God leaves us to ourselves, we absolutely
will not have anything to do with God. God is light and we
are what? Darkness. So if you want to be saved, God
has to choose to save us. And He does so by His grace.
He didn't do so because He saw that we would believe or saw
that we would straighten up or saw anything. Everything about
our salvation has to do with God. It has to do with God. Listen to this. In Romans 11,
5, Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant
According to the election of grace and I have the privilege
and the responsibility this morning of preaching to a part of that
remnant You know you're a part of it You're a part of the remnant
of the election of grace, and it's all grace Paul says in 2
Thessalonians 2.13, But we are bound to give thanks always to
God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath
from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification
of the spirit and belief of the truth. He's a God of means, but
He's chosen you to salvation. And He's going to save you. He's
going to save you. Simply put, we cannot preach
the gospel and not preach the doctrine of election. He can't
do it. Can't do it. And the way, now
listen, the way Paul knew that the Thessalonians were the elect
is the same today. Changed lives. Now I want you
to notice as I point these out, I'm going to try to point them
out as briefly as I can. But I want you to know what a 180
degree turn happened to those Thessalonians. Now, we've been
going through the book of Acts, and Paul goes into each of these
towns and they're given 100% to idolatry. They don't know
God. One of them had, there in Athens,
they had an altar to the unknown God, just in case we miss one
and he shows up, we got an altar for him. Well, they missed one,
then he missed the only one that is. And Paul said, I'm going
to tell you about it. I'm going to tell you about it. So, but let me, let's look at
this. Now the gospel is about Jesus Christ, the son of God.
He's the good news, isn't he? He's the good news. It's about
his person as a son of God. He's God manifest in the flesh.
Jesus Christ is the living God. Is that not our hope? Who he
is? And Jesus Christ, who is the
living God, is a very real man. This is why He's able to be our
substitute. He has to become one of us, bone of our bone and
flesh of our flesh. The Scripture says He bore our
sins as our substitute. He bore our sins in His body
on the tree. He bore my sins, your sins, you
who believe. He bore our sins. And this is
the amazing thing about the doctrine of election. When God chose me, he knew everything about me.
There's nothing about me he doesn't know. Before the foundation of
the world, there's not a sinful thought I ever have, he didn't
know. There's nothing, there's not a wicked act that I have
ever done or ever will do that he didn't know. And he chose me anyway. And he
put it away at Calvary. He put all of my sins away at
Calvary. So I'm not going to do anything
that's going to cause him to unlove me. You say, you preach
like that, people will do what they want. They do what they
want anyway. Except hypocrites. People are going to do what they
want anyway. Don't you would to God that you could do what
you really want? Don't you really want to worship Him this morning?
Don't you really want to serve Him? I'd love to serve Him without
sin, to worship Him this morning without sin. With all my heart,
I wish I could worship Him. You don't have to fear. You don't
have to fear preaching grace. It never leads to sin. The gospel's all about Him as
God, as man, as mediator. He is the gospel. You know, if
you're going to talk about election, you have to talk about Him first. God said in Isaiah 42, Behold,
mine elect. Jesus Christ. If you're going
to talk about election, you've got to start with Him. You don't
start with me. Don't start with us. Start with Him. He's the
elect. And then God chose us in Him. God chose us in the Lord
Jesus Christ. You see, if you start with the
election just as a doctrine and you miss the person, then it
becomes a cold, dry doctrine. But if you start with the elect,
Christ, you love it because it's Him. The doctrine's Him. He is His teaching. He is the
doctrine. I have learned this. Christ is
the doctrine. Take my yoke upon you and learn
what? Doctrine? Learn of me. When you learn of
Jesus Christ, you learn doctrine right. I remember my pastor Henry
saying that so many times. You learn Christ and you learn
the doctrine right. That's when you get it right.
And that's when you love it. Because it's his teaching. Now
Paul calls the gospel our gospel. I noticed when Ron was speaking
up here, he said he preaches, he preaches, he preaches, John
will preach your gospel. He called it, you said your gospel.
It is your gospel. It is. God gave it to you. Paul
said this. He said, our gospel, he says
there in verse five, for our gospel, you know, he says our
gospel because there were many so-called gospels being preached.
Remember Galatians 1? Paul said they'll come preaching
another gospel. He said that to the Corinthians. He said to
the Corinthians, they'll come preaching another gospel, another
Jesus. Make sure the Jesus Christ you
believe is the right one. Because there are many false
ones out there. Christ said there'll be many false Christs come. And
there are many false Christs being preached out there this
morning. And I say this to you. Open the Bible. Make sure the
one you believe is the one in this Bible. is speaking of. Don't ever assume anything. I
tell the people back home all the time, open your Bible and
check me out. Don't just assume it. Listen. Check me out. Follow along. And that's why
Paul calls it our gospel. And he calls it our gospel because
God entrusted it to him. You know, God has entrusted the
gospel. He's entrusted it to me. He's entrusted it to your
pastor Paul. God has entrusted the gospel
to you here at Central Grace Church. The gospel is entrusted
to you. And you know how precious the
gospel is to Him? It's the gospel of God's glory. It's the gospel
concerning His Son. You know how precious that is?
Don't mess with the gospel. I mean, you can mess with anything
else, but don't mess with the gospel of God's glory. Don't do that. Paul said here
in 1 Timothy 1 11, according to the glorious gospel of the
blessed God, which was committed to my trust. And now listen here,
this gospel, that's our gospel, that Paul said was committed
to us, came not to you in word only, but also in power. It came
in power. The gospel came to you. You didn't
go looking for it. I wasn't looking for the gospel.
When it came to me, I went over to mom and dad to eat supper. And dad said, there's a man,
that man, Henry, was preaching on television. He said, that
man's preaching the gospel. And I sat down and I heard the gospel. Now listen, I heard the gospel
in power. I didn't just hear some words.
I heard it in power. I heard the power. He said it
came not in word only. If the gospel comes in word only,
it will not save you. It will not save you. We naturally
won't come to it. We naturally don't believe it.
Men may be moved by the power of truth and yet never experience
the saving power of it. You know that? Lord, don't let
that be me. Don't let that be me. Herod heard
John gladly, but he perished. Felix trembled. at the preaching
of Paul, and he perished. Devils believe there's one God,
and they perish. They perish. The gospel can have
a profound effect on people, and they still be lost. Felix
trembled. He trembled. Read the parable
of the sober. Read the parable of the soul,
and you see what a profound effect the gospel had on some that never
did save them. But here's the key. It came to
you in power and in the Holy Ghost. You see, when the gospel
comes in power, it comes in the power of the Holy Ghost, who's
God. It doesn't just come in words. It's not just me standing
here giving you an outline that I have put together But it's
God, the Holy Spirit, taking the Gospel, the Word of Truth,
and piercing your heart with power. The Gospel is the dynamis,
the dynamite of God. It came in the power of the Holy
Spirit. The Holy Spirit takes the Gospel and He quickens the
dead sinner. It says in James 1.18, of His
own will beget He us with the Word of Truth, not apart from
it, Not apart from, but with the Word of Truth. That's how
He begat us. That's how we were born of God,
is with the Word of Truth. The Word is the seed. There's
a seed in every birth. And the Word of God is the seed
in our birth, our new birth. And in much assurance. And in
much assurance. Let me ask you something. Are you absolutely, beyond a
shadow of a doubt, convinced that Jesus is the Christ? that
he's the son of the living God. That's what the eunuch said,
I believe that Jesus is the son of God. I believe that with all
my heart. Well, that kind of assurance comes by the work of
the Holy Spirit. He convinced you of that. He's
the one who convicts of sin, righteousness, and judgment.
He's the one who convinces us that Jesus is the Christ. No
matter what happens to me, if I go to hell, Jesus is the Christ.
Jesus is the son of God no matter what happens to me. He is. Much assurance. You are convinced that there's
no other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved. You're
convinced of that. Paul said, I know whom I have
believed, and I'm persuaded he's able to keep that which I've
committed unto him against that day. I'm persuaded of it. I'm
persuaded of it. That Jesus Christ is all my salvation. He's going to deliver me before
the Father spotless. and everyone to whom he's died
for. And Paul says, you know what manner of men we were also
among you for your sakes. He reminds them of their conduct.
And Paul tells them, we were sincere. You know that. You know
that our preaching was sincere. We didn't seek your wealth. We
sought your souls. That's a big difference between
a false prophet, a false preacher, and a true preacher. Someone
said this, preachers must live up to their message. And here's an evidence of your
election. You say, am I elect? You know, when I first heard
the Gospel, that didn't concern me. You know what really concerned
me when I heard Henry preaching? Here's what concerned me. I am
a sinful man and I need the Lord to save me. Save me from my sins. That's what, I can remember that,
that just, that's what consumed me. Lord, you said, you said,
he that comes to me I'll never cast out. That's what concerned
me. But here's evidence of our election. Here's evidence of it. You became
followers of us and of the Lord. You became followers. You've
got to realize they were just steeped in idolatry. They followed,
and they, you think this country's immoral now? Everything went
with them, just like it pretty much does in our day. I mean,
they were part of the Roman community, and I tell you, anything went. But listen, faith is evidenced,
not just by what it believes, but by who it follows. You're
following someone, I am too, following the Lord. The believer
follows the Lord, and he does so by seeking out God's servant,
God's people, and unites with them. You're not out there just worshiping
by yourself. I can stay home. Someone told me this the other
day. I can stay home. Go to worship service. You do
if God saves you. You do if God saves you. You're
going to seek out God's people, because that's where the Lord
is. It's where He is. Before salvation, you and I followed
after the world. We followed after our own sinful
lusts and pleasures, but now we follow the Lord in faith,
hope, and love. And that's how we follow Him.
And now listen, they suffered for the gospel. Our gospel is
not a popular gospel. I thought when I first heard
the gospel, I told the people where I was going, attending,
I thought, man, I've got good news. I mean, I was thrilled,
but they weren't. When I told them, they didn't
like it. And I ended up, I left there. I couldn't, except to
agree, how can they walk together? You got to, you got to be in
agreement. But he says here, having received the word in much
affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost. You see, the true gospel
brings affliction inward and outward. It brings affliction
inward. There's a warfare going on, and
that warfare doesn't end until we die, until we leave this life.
But it also brings much joy of the Holy Spirit, even while we
go through this affliction, because it's evidence the Lord's with
us. He's with us. We have the joy
of forgiveness, the joy of cleansing, the joy of election, the joy
of suffering for Christ. It's an honor to suffer for Jesus
Christ. It's an honor. And they were missionary-minded.
Let me wind this up. They were missionary-minded.
And from you, in verse 8, from you sounded out the word of the
Lord, not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in Every place
your faith to God will be spread abroad, so that we need not to
speak anything. You sent the gospel out. You
wanted others to hear it. Don't you want others to hear
it? Your pastor's on the radio, and he travels and preaches,
and you want others to hear it. You know, if you have a sickness,
if you have a serious illness, and you go to a doctor, and he's
able to treat you, and you get over it, The next time somebody comes
along and they say, you know, I've got, I've had this. And
you say, well, you know what? I had that too. And I'm going
to tell you who can help you. And I'm telling you what, when
God saves a sinner, that sinner wants to tell other sinners about
the great physician. I can tell you about a physician
that can do something for you. Because sin is a condition that
no other physician on this earth can do anything about. Remember
that woman with the issue of blood? She spent all her living
on all these physicians of no value. But one day, she met the
physician of souls, and he cured her. Oh, you sent the gospel out.
But now listen, you sent it out, but also in every place your
faith to God would have spread abroad. You don't have to wear
a t-shirt. It's got stuff written on it,
you know. I remember back before I heard the gospel, you know,
I was religious. And I had a t-shirt that had
a hand pointing one up, directly up, straight up, you know, like
this, pointing up to heaven. And it said one way. You don't
have to wear paraphernalia and crosses and stuff like that.
First of all, your testimony and your life says God's done
something for you. Paul says, in every place I go,
your faith to God was spoken of. You're giving people, you're
loving people, you're gracious people, kind. You know, the fruit
of the Spirit just hangs off the leaves, hangs off the vines,
the branches. Christ is a vine. But I tell
you, when that vine is, that branch is connected to that vine,
the fruit of the Spirit just hangs off of kindness, joy, love,
peace, long-suffering. And you don't have to go around
saying, you know, I'm a kind person. No, you don't have to do that.
It's known because you are a kind person. That's how it's known.
You don't have to go around telling it. If you have to tell it, you
don't, it's not you. The gospel makes a difference
in your whole life, publicly and privately. You're the same, whether you're
at home or whether you're at work or whether you're here.
You're no different here than you are at home. If you are,
there's a problem. There's a problem. For they themselves, in verse
9, show of us what manner of entering in we handed to you,
and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living God.
They tell us, they tell us, you turned from your idols. You know
how hard it is to get someone or people to turn from their
idols? You know how hard it is to get someone to turn from a
false hope and a false profession? God has to do that. And they
tell us that you turn from your idols to worship the true and
living God, to serve Him. I'm glad to be called a servant
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then last of all, and to
wait, and to wait for His Son from heaven, whom
He raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from
the wrath to come. We are waiting on a person, aren't we? Our bags
are packed. Are your bags packed? Huh? Is this going to surprise you? Your bags are packed and you're
ready to go. You're waiting for the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, He may come back now and put an end to this, but
I tell you what, He's going to come back for us individually.
He's going to take us home individually. The Lord's coming for us. If
I go and prepare a place for you, I will what? Come again
and receive you to Myself that where I am, not where I was. You know, when the Lord says
that to His disciples standing there in front of Him, He says,
where I am, there you may be also. Ain't that good news? Waiting
for Him, waiting for Waiting for the Son of God from heaven,
whom He raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us
from the wrath to come. We're in the ark. We're in the
ark. Listen, if we are truly waiting
on a person, now this is important. If we are truly waiting on a
person, that means He's very real to us. If you're not waiting
on Him, it's because He's not real to you. If you're waiting
on Him, He's very, very real to you. And we say, we say, and
I say this morning, come quickly, Lord Jesus. You know, I can tell
you when the best day of your life is going to be. You want
me to tell you? It's the day you die. That's
the best day of your life. It's when God takes you home.
It'll be sorrow for us, us who are left behind. We'll sorrow,
but not as others who have no hope. But now the best day of
a believer's life is when they die and leave this world, when
their body dies and they're gone. Isn't that good news? That's just good news. All right.