All right, brethren, let's be
turning to Romans chapter 1, where Brother Kevin was just
read. And before we begin, I want to,
Brother Paul mentioned the building, and I want to thank you all for
helping us get into that building. And I really, really appreciate
that. And now you just need to come
visit us and see it. We're so thankful, so very thankful
to have a quiet place and we don't have to worry about fire
trucks and bells and whistles and all of that. And it's nice,
it's really nice to have a quiet place. So good to be with you
again and I appreciate you having me. Let's turn now and look at
Romans chapter one. Paul begins here and he says,
Paul, a servant, of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated
unto the gospel of God. Now that's gonna be our subject,
the gospel, the gospel. What is the gospel? What is the gospel? And what
does God accomplish through the gospel? And for those who believe
the gospel, what's our purpose for being in this earth? In this
salutation here, this short salutation, Paul answers those three questions
for us. Clearly, understandably, and
that's what I wanna look at tonight. First of all, what is the gospel? He says in verse two, which God
had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures concerning
his son, Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of
David according to the flesh and declared to be the son of
God with power according to the spirit of holiness by the resurrection
from the dead. The gospel is the one message
of holy scripture It's the one message of Holy Scripture, and
it's concerning God's Son, our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the
gospel. It's impossible to preach the
gospel without preaching the person of our Lord Jesus Christ. It's impossible to preach the
gospel without preaching his accomplished, finished work. Not sometimes, not on special
occasions, all the time, all the time. All the Old Testament
scriptures are concerning Christ in picture and type and ceremony
and prophecy. That's what our Lord told the
men on the road to Emmaus. And the scripture says, beginning
at Moses. It says in all the scriptures. in all the scriptures, talking
about the Old Testament scriptures, in all the scriptures, he expounded
unto them the things concerning himself. And he told them, he
said, while I was with you, he said, this is what I told you,
that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law
of Moses and in the prophets, and in the Psalms concerning
me. They must be fulfilled because
it was all the promise God made that Christ would accomplish.
And all the promises of God are yes and amen in Christ. He's
the one who must fulfill those promises. So all these scriptures
are the Old Testament scriptures are concerning Christ. The prophets
of old, Those that God sent, they didn't preach a different
gospel than Paul preached. And they didn't preach a different
gospel than I'm endeavoring to preach to you tonight. And the
believers who were saved by God's grace were not saved by a different
gospel. They're saved by the same gospel
as we are. Same gospel. Abraham rejoiced to see my day,
Christ said. And he saw it and was glad. And
we know how he did it because Galatians tells us, The script
seeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, he
preached the gospel to Abraham. Abraham had the gospel preached
to him. So Christ is the message of all the Old Testament scriptures,
just like he's the message of the New Testament scriptures.
After Adam plunged the whole human race into sin by his disobedience,
God promised Christ the seed of woman, right there in the
garden. He told the devil, I'll put enmity
between thee and the woman. Between thee and the woman. Christ
is a woman, see. You'll bruise his heel and he'll
crush your head. We're ruined by Adam's sin. Totally,
thoroughly ruined by Adam's sin. And we all came under the power
of the prince of the air when we came into this world. That
is the devil. And scripture says, because the
children were flesh and blood, because God's elect were flesh
and blood, he likewise took part of the saying that through death
he might destroy him that had the power of death, that is the
devil, and deliver us who were all our lifetime subject to bondage. And that's what Christ was saying,
God was saying in the garden concerning Christ the seed of
woman. And then in the garden, one of my favorite pictures is
when It says unto Adam and to his wife, did the Lord God make
coats of skins and clothed them. All God's elect, because we broke
the law, we came into this world naked before God's righteous,
holy judgment seat. Guilty of breaking the whole
law. And we were naked. And we had our little fig leaves
like Adam did and Eve did by which we kind of thought we were
good and thought we were earning God's favor and God would accept
us and God stripped us. He stripped us of that. And he
revealed to us Christ Jesus the Lord and shut our mouths with
the law, declared us guilty. And he showed us then that now
the righteousness of God is manifest without the law, without our
doing the law. And it's witnessed by the law
and the prophets. That's what Paul's saying here,
that all the old scriptures are bearing witness to one. And that
righteousness of God is manifest through the faith of Christ,
through his faithfulness. That's how it manifests. And
not only did God provide us a righteousness in Christ, establish us in righteousness
by Christ, he covered us in that righteousness. He covered us. The reason he covered us is because
Christ already made us righteous. And Isaiah said, My soul shall
be joyful in my God for he's clothed me with the garments
of salvation. He's covered me with the robe
of righteousness. And like a bride decks himself
with ornaments and a bride adorneth herself with her jewel. That's
what God did for us. He didn't just establish us in
righteousness and then depend on us to do something. He established
us in righteousness and he clothed us. And he clothed us. And then
we see in the Old Testament the first murder ever committed. The first murder ever committed
was a wheel worshiper who slew a child of grace because that
child of grace came in a substitute lamb and God accepted him. God
accepted him and we see Christ in that lamb. You see what the
Spirit of God is moving Paul to say in our text? The gospel
is what God promised. in all the scriptures. That's
all the scriptures were saying. That's what all the scriptures
were saying. When Abraham went up that mountain, he was gonna
sacrifice Isaac. And we see Christ in that substitutionary
lamb caught in a thorn bush. And when Christ came, you behold
that lamb. You behold God providing himself
a lamb in that crown of thorns. hanging on the cross. That's
why John pointed to it and said, behold, the Lamb of God. This
is Him that takes away the sins of the world, the sins of His
people all over this planet. We could go on and on. Melchizedek,
our great high priest, the Passover, the night they passed through
Egypt, everybody died. Everybody died. The firstborn
in Egypt and Israel died. The difference was God provided
a lamb for Israel. They died in the lamb. I think
my favorite, one of my very favorite, is when Moses, I mean, when our
Lord told Nicodemus, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the
wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up. And
whosoever believeth on him shall not perish, but have everlasting
life. Have you ever thought about how
in the wilderness, when the very thing that was biting the children
of Israel and killing them, is what God made and lifted up.
And the very thing that was killing His people, He hath made Him
who knew no sin, sin for us. that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. He made his darling son the very
thing that was killing his people, all through the scriptures. And
I can't stop talking about the Old Testament scriptures until
I talk about this type, the foundation and the tabernacle. You know
everything about the temple and the tabernacle, the priest, the
sacrifices, the ark, the mercy seat, everything about it. And
we could go on and on, there's a lot more in the Old Testament.
It's all concerning Christ. The Psalms, you read the Psalms,
you read them first and hear Christ speaking. You read them a lot and you hear
Christ as he's hanging on the cross, faithful though God has
forsaken him. He's bearing the justice and
wrath of God and yet he's remained faithful, pouring out his heart
unto God. But one of my favorites is the
foundation in the tabernacle. God commanded that all the children
of Israel 20 years and above should bring the pure shekel
of the sanctuary. It couldn't be a shekel that
had been carried around in your pocket, had been shaved off or
anything. It's got to be the exact minute shekel of the sanctuary. Perfect. And they were to bring
that shekel of the sanctuary for atonement. It was made ceremonial
atonement for them. And then God told him, he said,
now you take the shegel of the sanctuary, you melt it down and
make sockets out of big triangle sockets. And they all gonna fit
together and they're gonna make up the floor of the tabernacle. And the boards fit into that
foundation and it held up the whole house. And so everything
that the priests did in serving God, when they went into that
tabernacle, they did it on the foundation of redemption already
accomplished. And everything, the whole house
of God is founded on Christ, the church's one foundation.
And everything that we do as we feebly attempt to serve our
Lord Jesus, constrained by his love for what he's done for us,
everything is done on the foundation of redemption already accomplished.
Isn't that a beautiful picture? That's such a beautiful, you
hear, sometimes I hear people preach from the Old Testament
scriptures and they don't say anything, you know, it's a history
lesson or it's just so sad, so very sad, so very sad. So what is it brethren that the
gospel is? It's the promise of God declared
by the prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning his son, Jesus Christ
our Lord. Now secondly, let's ask this
question. What does the Lord accomplish
through the preaching of the gospel of God? Paul says there
in verse five, he says, by whom? He talked about Christ and he
says, by whom we have received grace and apostleship. And then in verse six, he says,
among whom are you also the called of Jesus Christ? After accomplishing
the redemption of his people, Christ arose and God gave him
all power in heaven and earth as the God-man. He had it as
the son of God, but he gave him all power in heaven and earth
as the God-man. And Ephesians 1, the very end
says, and he made him head over all things to the church, which
is his body, that Christ might fill all in all. That Christ might fill all in
all. You know who's gonna fill Christ's
preacher with the gospel so he can go preach it? Christ did.
You know who's gonna fill the pew so that Christ's sheep's
there to hear it? Christ did. You know who's gonna
fill the heart of his people so they hear the gospel? Christ
did. Christ did. He filleth all in
all, just like he filled all the Old Testament scripture,
he fills all in all his people. And he receives all the glory
for establishing, just like he receives all the glory for establishing
us in righteousness, he receives all the glory for the work of
sanctification and giving us a new spirit and a new man and
making us holy and pure within. We sing it. Let the water and
the blood from thy wounded side which flowed be of sin the double
cure, save from wrath and make me pure. Blessed is the man unto
whom the Lord will not impute iniquity, but it is not there,
and in whose spirit is no guile. You remember when he saw Nathaniel
and he said, there's an Israelite indeed. There's an Israelite
indeed in whom is no guile. Why'd he say that? Why'd he say
that? An Israelite indeed. Where'd
that name come from? Remember when he wrestled Jacob
down, pinned him down, and Jacob quit trying to wrestle, and he
went to praying for mercy? And that's when he prevailed
with God. And he said, now your name's Israel. And the Lord was
saying to Nathaniel, I saw you when you were under that tree.
And you know what he was doing? He was praying is what he was
doing. Because the Lord said there was no guile in that prayer.
The Lord knew it because the Lord put it there. He's the one
that put it there. He knew what he was talking about. We can't take any credit for
this work of sanctification. And that's the big lie right
now. give lip service to the doctrines
of grace, always open up the door for works by making sanctification
to be a joint effort between Christ and the sinner. Christ wouldn't get all the glory
if that was the case. Christ must get all the glory.
Paul said, I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live,
yet not I. But Christ liveth in me, and
the life I now live, I live by the faith of the Son of God,
who loved me and gave himself for me. Christ, and he does this
work through the preaching of the gospel. That's why Paul's
mentioning it here in conjunction with the gospel. This is how
we were called, he said. Christ sent forth the gospel.
He don't have a problem getting the gospel to his people. Anywhere
he has somebody, he gets the gospel to them. I have some dear
relatives that are primitive Baptists, and I've heard them
say over and over and over again, you know, what if a man was deserted
on an island somewhere, never heard the gospel, long as he's
God's elect, it's all right, he'll be saved. No, if he's God's
elect, deserted on an island, God'll shipwreck Paul on that
island. He'll preach the gospel to him. He don't have a problem
getting his gospel to where his people are. And we can't take
credit for making disciples of the Lord either. God's chosen
the foolish and the base things and the weak things, and that's
me and you. That's his preacher and the church
he's gonna use to send the preacher forth. And he's chosen us to
bring to nothing things that are. He said, I'm gonna bring
the wisdom of man to nothing. And he's going to do that in
everybody he saves. And the way he's going to do
that is using a nobody to preach somebody who can save anybody.
That's which is, you told me that on the way down here. Scott,
is that who, Brother Scott used to say that. And that's what
he's going to do. And he, that no flesh should
glory in his presence. But of God are ye in Christ Jesus,
who of God has made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification
and redemption, so that we glory only in the Lord. If we ever
get the feeling like we can command one of Christ's lost sheep and
try to make them into disciples of Christ, just go try and command
somebody else's dog. You can't command somebody else's
dog. much less a lost sinner. My dog minds me. My dog follows
me. He's not going to follow somebody
else. And Christ's faithful dogs, he's
going to make them faithful dogs. They're going to follow him.
They're not going to, to our own master we stand or fall.
I'm convinced that's what the whole book of James is about.
I think James learned from that fiasco at Pentecost that you
can't You can't try to make disciples and you can't try to grow God's
people faster than Christ is growing them. And so you'll preach
the gospel and wait on Him to do it. I'm convinced that's what
that whole letter is about. I've seen new believers, I was
this way, and I've seen new believers that'll, so a visitor will come
in and they'll corner them, you know, and now, boy, they'll get
to really laying some heavy doctrine on them Just almost like they're
trying to make them believe it right there, you know. And I
learned when I was lost and I was getting in fights and everything
else, you don't dare corner something that's meaner than you. And when
you corner somebody and you start trying to make them believe the
gospel, you're going to see the depraved, God-hating sinners
we are by nature. and that won't accomplish anything. Now lastly, we see that the gospel
is concerning Christ. All the scriptures are concerning
Christ. We see what Christ accomplishes through the preaching of the
word. He sends the gospel and he sanctifies his child, brings
us to faith in Christ. Now what, for those that believe,
to what end has he called us unto? Why did he leave us here
in this world? What are we doing here now? Why
are we here? Paul said there in verse one,
I am separated unto the gospel of God. He said there in verse
five, by whom we received grace and apostleship for obedience
to the faith among all nations for his name. When Christ calls us, He calls
us to rest entirely in His obedience. By His grace, He calls us to
rest in His obedience. And He calls us to, He puts love
in the heart, and He makes us to love one another, and He makes
us to follow Christ, obeying Him, His charge to send this
gospel into all the world, to send it into all the nations,
And that's the obedience of faith. Resting in Christ's obedience,
loving your brethren. We need each other. We need this
fellowship because. We have to have the gospel ourselves. And the only way lost sinners
are going to be saved is by hearing it. And so that's what causes
us to love one another, not take one another to the law and not
try to push one another out, overlook one another's faults
and love one another. Because we're here to preach
this word. That's our cause. That's the
cause of Christ. That's what we're here for. That's
what we're doing. And this is how he cast down
imaginations and every high thing that exalts itself against the
knowledge of God. And that high thing, usually
when you read the scripture, the New Testament scripture,
and it talks about base things and high things, it's talking
about us. We're the, by nature, we're the
high thing that exalt ourself against the knowledge of God.
And he brings us down through this word, through this gospel,
and brings us to the obedience of Christ. to rest in him and
then start to obey him and follow in him as he works in us. And
so Paul said, therefore seeing is how we received mercy. We
have this ministry and seeing how we received mercy. How'd
you receive mercy? We see how Christ received it.
God arrested him. Christ arrested him on the road
to Damascus and what did he do? Brought him down. And then he
brought him up, said, now go pray. And that's how we receive
mercy. And he said, because by this
same way that we receive mercy, we faint not. This is what makes
us renounce the hidden things of dishonesty. This is what makes
us not walk in craftiness, using the word of God deceitfully,
trying to water down the gospel and take the offense out of the
scripture. This is what makes us, by the
truth alone, commend ourselves to the conscience of every man.
This is what we're using, the gospel. You don't do that unless
you've experienced the power of the gospel. You don't do it. I've never seen anybody who professed
to be saved apart from the preaching of the gospel that would stay
in the church of God. I've never seen. There may be
exceptions, but I've never seen one personally. And the reason
is, If they were saved by the power of the gospel, saving them,
they don't know the God. They don't know the need of the
gospel or think they need the gospel. You who were saved by
it, you see the importance of it. You know you need that gospel.
And you know it's the power of God and the salvation. But a
man who says I was saved without it, doesn't know that. He doesn't know that. Now have
I preached anything tonight that gives Christ, that does not give
Christ all the glory and the salvation of God's people? And
I've quoted scripture to you, I've quoted the word of God to
you. So why then do some not believe? That's what, Paul, by the truth,
we commend ourselves to every man's conscience. And I'm just
saying to anybody here that doesn't believe this gospel, Why don't
you believe it? Everything I've told you is God's
word. And if you don't believe it,
you're not mad at the preacher, you're mad at God. That's just
the truth. That's just the truth. Mr. Webster said this, truth cannot
tolerate a lie without denying itself. And so we don't compromise
on this gospel. We can't compromise on the gospel.
You compromise on the gospel and you got no gospel. And Christ
is not saving through a lie. He came to establish the truth
and He is the truth and He's going to save through the truth.
Why? Because He can. Because He's
able. I think it's much more, a much
greater manifestation of the sovereignty of our Savior. that
he could tell us beforehand how he's going to save us and then
save us exactly like he told us he was going to do it. If
I told you I was going to do something, I'm probably going
to have to change it up somewhere because it's going to get messed
up. Not the Lord. Not the Lord. And he said there,
we preach for his name. We preach for his name. You remember
when the Lord, after he arrested Paul on the road to Damascus,
he sent out an ice to him. He said, you go to him. and you
declare he's a chosen vessel unto me to bear my name. To the Gentiles and the kings
And he said to children of Israel, "'Cause I'm gonna show him what
great things that he must suffer for my name's sake, for the gospel."
That's what he's talking about. He gonna bear my name by preaching
my gospel. Same thing with that demoniac.
He wanted to go with Christ and Christ said, no, you go home
to your people and you tell them what great things the Lord's
done for you. What a great way to witness,
isn't it? Just tell them what the Lord's
done for you. Verse three, what's his name?
We bear his name by preaching he's God's son. Equal with God,
second person in the Trinity, he's the son given. We bear his name by preaching
that he is Jesus, the savior, for he shall, he shall save his
people from their sin. We bear His name declaring He's
the God-man, made of the Son of David according to the flesh,
the Son born and declared to be the Son of God by the power
of His resurrection. He raised Himself from the grave. And thereby we know He accomplished
redemption. We know that everything He said
about Himself is true. We got a Savior that's not in
the tomb. You remember the very end of
Genesis, and it says, and they buried Joseph in a coffin in
Egypt. Joseph was the very first one
in Egypt that they made one of those pretty sarcophagus things
in Egypt. And the purpose of it was, every
time they looked at that thing, they had a reminder of God's
promise to save Israel out of Egypt. And we've got the same
thing. We got an empty tomb. And every
time we see that empty tomb, we're reminded that God's promise
is gonna come to pass every time. You just bet on it. We bear his
name, verse three, by declaring that he is the Christ, God's
chosen, God's anointed. God said, behold, mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth. He
shall not fail. He shall bring forth judgment
to the Gentile. He shall not fail. He's mine. He's mine elect. He's mine anointed. He's my Christ. And we preach,
we bear His name by preaching He is the Lord, the sovereign
Savior. He's not only controlling everything
in providence, He's controlling everything in the salvation of
His people. He is the one we're talking about
when we say, He doeth as He will in the armies of heaven among
the inhabitants of the earth. No man can question Him. That's who we're talking about,
Christ, the God-man. That's what Ephesians 1 is saying.
He gave all power, put all things under His feet. All things under
His feet. In every message, we've got to
preach the person, of Christ, and if he's not preached, and
he's not preached victorious, having fully accomplished the
redemption, the righteousness, established righteousness for
his people, and having fully, being fully accomplishing sanctification
in his people. And we hadn't preached Christ.
We hadn't preached Christ. He's the author and finisher.
The alpha and the omega. Beginning and the end. And Paul
said, I'm separated unto the gospel of God. And that's why
he said in Corinthians, I'm determined to know nothing among you save
Jesus Christ and him crucified. That's why he told the Corinthians,
I'm very fearful for you. I'm afraid somebody's going to
come along and they're going to trick you just like the devil
did Eve in the garden. And you're going to be turned
from Christ alone. From the simplicity of Christ. Christ himself said, he is the
one thing needful. He's the one thing needful. He's our rule of life. Where
do you learn how to walk in this life? Where do you learn what
to do in this world? You look to Christ. You look
to Christ. He's the believer's rule of life.
We ought to preach that it matters how a believer lives in this
world, because it does. It does. Titus is very clear
that we ought not do anything to bring reproach on the gospel
of God. We ought not do anything that's
going to be dishonoring to this gospel. And that's the constraint
for a believer. You don't want to dishonor your
Lord. You don't want to bring reproach on the gospel. But when
we preach that, when we preach those things on how the believers
should walk and all that, We've got to preach, first of all,
that the believer is not gonna establish righteousness or make
himself holy by doing any of that. Actually, it's on the footing
of redemption accomplished. And also preach that Christ is
the perfection of everything he command. And then, because
you're constrained by that love of him accomplishing everything
for you, then declare, now, let's go forth and do this right here.
And that's what's missing in most of the preaching. They try
to make people obedient by preaching morality. And that's not how
people are made obedient. We can't mortify the deeds of
our flesh by ourselves alone. You remember when Paul in Colossians
3 was talking about, he said, he told us, mortify the deeds
of the flesh. He told us how that's done. He
said, Christ is gonna set your affection on things above where
Christ sits at God's right hand, because that's where your life
is. You're dead and your life is hid with Christ in God. And
then he says, and that's how we're renewed after the knowledge
of him that created him. And by him continually doing
this through the gospel, continually renewing us through the gospel,
he created that new man in us and he continually renews that
new man in the image of him that created him. And as he does that,
we had all these different things that we used to think was important.
We used to think this is what we need to hear, how we can help
him make us righteous and how we can help him make us holy
and we use those things to try to take the differences between
us and exalt ourselves over others. And now, those things just make
us sick. When he keeps renewing us, you
know, you'll get puffed up in self-righteousness and don't
you hate that? and get to thinking, you know, I wouldn't do that
or whatever. And the Lord will just rebuke
you in the gospel and he'll bring you down in the gospel. And when
he does that, he just makes that so bitter to you. You don't want
to have anything to do with that anymore. And he becomes so sweet
to you. And what happens all over again?
There's neither Jew nor Gentile. There's neither. There's neither.
Circumcision or uncircumcision is not law or not law. It's not
having the law or not having the law. It's not bond or free. It's not barbarian or educated. Christ is all and in all. And we'll go a little while longer
and we go back out into the world to work our jobs and it doesn't
even take from one service to the next service. And we get
all defiled and all puffed up and twisted this way and that
way and we come back in here and sit down and he does it again.
And brings us back out for a little while longer and brings us back
and just keeps on doing it. That's why David said, I've got
to have the gospel more than I've got to have my food, my
daily food. I got to have the gospel over
my necessary food. And we say that, that's so, we
have got to have this gospel. Because Christ promised wherever
two or three are gathered in his name, he's meeting there.
This is the one way. that no flesh is gonna glory
in his presence. The one way, when we're talking,
we've been talking this week, telling stories, this past day,
but telling stories about everything, this and that, and while we're
talking, the other person is thinking of what they're gonna
say. Ain't that right? And when you're trying to bear
witness to Christ one-on-one with somebody, they're just thinking
about what they're gonna say. But when you're preaching the
gospel, and you're sitting there listening to the gospel being
preached, You got to hear what's being said. And when Christ speaks
into the heart, you're not going to glory in your flesh at all.
And then he's going to bring you to glory in him. That's just
how it is. Well, my prayer, brethren, my
prayer is that every true preacher and every true church be taken
up with absolutely nothing but the preaching of Christ and him
crucified. And I guarantee you this, God
said over there when he was dealing with Eli, those that honor me,
those that honor my son, I'm going to honor them. And he will
do that. He will do that. So we're just
going to preach Christ. Follow Christ. Believe Christ.
Trust Christ. Amen. Thank you all. his gospel. Thank the Lord for
the message. Thank the Lord for the messenger.
Thank you, Father Clay. Thank you. Kevin, thank you for
coming. Appreciate it. And I want to
ask these men to stand down here and you go out this door and
greet them and tell them goodbye at the same time. So let's stand
and be this man. Our Father in heaven, thank you
so much. Thank you so much for this, another
privilege and honor. As our brother has already prayed,
this is a blessed privilege. We thank you for it. You've honored
us with your truth, your word. You've sent a preacher to preach
it. What a gift. We thank you, Lord. It's a high,
holy, heavenly calling, the gospel. those that are beloved of God
and called of God, called to be saints, sanctified ones in
the Lord Jesus Christ. We thank you, Lord. Thank you
for Christ and him crucified. Thank you for the truth as it
is in him. Thank you, Lord, for those you've
raised up to preach the truth, to preach Christ. It's so evident
a man that's been been called by you, he'll preach you. And
we thank you. Thank you for Brother Clay. Bless
him. Thank you for Kevin. Bless them. They travel back home. Give them
a safe journey there. Bless the church there. Send
out your gospel throughout that land. Call in your sheep into
the fold, we pray, for thy glory and honor. And thank you again
for this time together. In Christ's name we pray. Amen.
You're dismissed.