And we've looked at this so many
times. We usually dwell on the first few verses, but we've looked
at all of it many times together. But in the words of Paul, to
look at these things again is not grievous to me, and I know
it's not to you. It's safe. Salvation. We need to be constantly reminded
of these things. So much more as we see the day. We need to be reminded that there's
one thing needful to win Christ and be found in Him, that all
else is done, is lost. What shall it profit a man to
gain the whole world and lose his soul? So this is the theme
of what we're going to look at. Paul said in verse 8, doubtless. He said, there's no doubt in
my mind. There's no doubt in my heart.
I have no doubt. He said, I count all things but
loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my
Lord. And there needs to be no doubt
in our hearts and minds about this. And down in verse 15, after
everything that he said, that the Lord said through him, after
everything that is written, he said in verse 15, Let us, therefore,
as many as be perfect, or that is, mature, have real and complete
faith in Christ alone, be thus minded. Think this way. Be thus minded. And if there
is anything that we think otherwise, of what he just said. If we think
of anything, anything as anything other than loss, then he says
God will reveal this to us. And it's usually in the form
of trials and chastening to show us that we have here no continuity. We have nothing here. Nothing
here. It's manica. He said, and this is what we
need to learn. This is what I need to learn. We all need to learn.
And again, in verse 7 and 8, he said, What things were gained
to me, and were gained to me, those I counted lost for Christ. By the grace of God, Christ came
to Paul and revealed to him that everything he used to be, everything
he used to do, everything he used to know, everything he thought
was profitable, everything he thought was gained to him, It
was a waste of time. It was lost. And so the Lord
made him to see that those things were nothing, and to see Christ
as his all. And he says, now I do count all
things. All things, but lost. All things. When we count our blessing, that's
what he's saying, counting, when you consider things. When we
count our blessings, where do you start? That's a good question. We have
many blessings. When you start counting your
blessings, where do you start? Let me show you from Scripture
three saints. First Samuel chapter 2. Three
saints in Scripture. What they said was, their greatest and chief blessing,
the thing they gloried in most of all. One, a woman, and two
men. 1 Samuel 2, Hannah. You know the story of Hannah.
Hannah was a young wife, and she wanted to be a mother. And
that's a good thing. Being a mother is a wonderful
thing. It's a blessing. You consider your children gifts
from God, don't you? If you don't, you should. They
are. Give life. I give life, the Lord said. He
gave us children as a blessed thing. Well, she wanted children,
which is not a bad desire. It's a lawful thing. And the
Lord graciously granted her children, a child named Samuel and then
others after that. Well, when the Lord gave her
Samuel, she prayed to the Lord. And you know she never mentioned
Samuel in that prayer. She never brought up that boy.
She didn't say anything. There's no mention of that son
concerning her blessing. Look at it. Verse 2, Hannah prayed and she
said, My heart rejoiceth in the Lord. Mine horn is exalted. My strength is in the Lord. My
mouth is enlarged over mine enemies because I rejoice. Well, Hannah,
aren't you thankful for that child? No one could be more thankful,
Hannah would say. No one. I did not expect to have
a child, and the Lord gave me one. But my greatest blessing,
my chief blessing, she said, is salvation. She went on to say in this prayer
of hers, she said, The Lord shall keep the feet of His saints.
The Lord will give strength to exalt His anointed. Can you say
that? Can you count your blessings?
Can you start that? David, Psalm 103. You know this. David, one of God's saints, a
man after his own heart. And David said in Psalm 103,
he's blessing the Lord for all his benefits. Blessing the Lord
for all his blessings. Look at what he said. Bless the
Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless his holy
name. Bless the Lord, O my soul. Forget not all his benefit."
Okay, David, what benefit? Here it is. First, he forgiveth
all thine iniquity. David says, My greatest blessing.
When I start to count my blessings, and there more than can be numbered,
he said, This is number one. God has forgiven me my transgression.
And then Paul, the Apostle in Ephesians. Oh, how we love the
book of Ephesians, don't we? And especially chapter 1 and
2. Well, Paul, you know these verses.
Ephesians 1, Paul's blessing God for all blessings. And he says in Ephesians 1, verse
3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings, Where are they, David?
I heard Paul. What are they? They are in heavenly
things in Christ. What do you mean? According as
he has chosen us in Christ before the foundation of the world that
we should be holy and without blame before him in love having
predestinated us under the adoption of children by Jesus Christ unto
himself according to the good pleasure of his His will, He's
accepted us in the Beloved. We have redemption in Him, even
the forgiveness of sin. He's abounded toward us in making
known His will and His purpose. He's gathered us together in
Christ. Not one mention of one earthly thing. We count our blessings. Can you
say that with Hannah? I rejoice in the Lord and His
salvation. Can you say with David? Blessing. My chief cause for thanksgiving
is He's forgiven my iniquity. Can you say with Paul, I bless
the Lord for His spiritual blessings in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
I count, he said, everything else done. Done. Yes, we bless the Lord for all
things. Every good gift comes from above. But every perfect gift, one perfect
gift, Every good give. We bless the Lord for health,
don't we? We bless the Lord for provisions we should, and everything
give thanks. We bless the Lord for these things,
for family, for friends, for all things we should. But
what if, or rather I should say when, He takes them away? Then we need to be able to say
with Job, The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away. Blessed
be the name of the Lord. Some have said that. Some do. All will. All saints will. Every saint will come to that
point. Job said this, naked I came from
my mother's womb, and naked I shall return. Paul said this, we brought
nothing into this world. And it is certain that we can
take nothing out of it. What is our greatest blessing?
There are two great revealers of true saving faith. Two great
revealers. Two things revealed whether or
not we have true saving faith or not. The cross and loss. These two things. The cross.
Our Lord said, If any man come after me, let him deny himself
and take up his cross. The cross. We deny ourselves. This is what
Paul did in the first part of Philippians 3 when he denied
all that he used to be, all his religion, all his knowledge.
He had great knowledge of Scripture. When he learned of the true God
and the true Christ, he said, I didn't know anything. I didn't
know God. We renounce all that. We deny
self. We deny self-worth. We deny our
self-goodness or self-righteousness. We deny that. We deny our wisdom. We don't know anything. We don't
know nothing yet as we ought to know. That's why I say, we've
looked at this many times, but we know nothing yet as we ought
to know. And we deny our self, our pride
to take up the cross. And many people use that scripture
to refer to troubles that you go through, that people, I must
bear my cross. That is not what that's talking
about. Our Lord was crucified on the cross for the truth's
sake. Our Lord was crucified on the
cross for what he said, for his word. They said, you're a man,
you make yourself be God. We will not have a man reign
over us. He said things like this, no
man can come unto me except the Father which hath sent me draw
him. Hard sayings that people didn't
like the truth, and so they put him on a cross. Well, it did
what God determined before it began. It pleased the Lord to
bruise him. But we read, John, you read Isaiah
53. He is despised and rejected of
men. Why? For the truth's sake. And
you will be too. Every one of God's people will
be. He said, take up the cross. My cross. It's not your cross. It's my cross, Christ said. It's
my glory. It's my honor. It's my person.
It's my work. It's who hung there. It's what
he did there. It's whose glory is at stake
here. It's who was there and what he did and who did he do
it for and did he get it done. Who's glory here? Christ and
him crucified. All salvation is in Christ and
him crucified. Christ's life and Christ's death.
It's all in Christ. And that's what he said, I am
the way, I am the truth, I am the life, no man cometh unto
the Father but by me, only by me, what I've done for him, my
choice, my work, my will, my blood, my righteousness, my knowledge
of the law, my fulfilling law, me, it's all me, Christ said.
They said, we don't like that. And people don't like that today.
But God's people love it. Don't they? That's all our hope.
Christ is all our hope. So we take up that cross. We
bear that cross before men and say, this is our hope. This is
your hope. Our only hope. Dare not trust
the sweetest frame, but Holy Lent on Him. And our Lord said,
you will be hated for that. You will be hated for the truth
said. Scripture says, given unto us not only to believe, but also
to suffer for His name's sake. And every believer in here has,
to some degree, suffered for the truth's sake. You've gone
to people that you know, you love, your neighbors or whomever,
to tell them the truth as it is in the Lord Jesus Christ,
and have them turn on Him. And many have suffered loss,
actual loss of friends and family and reputation, and then our
Lord said, blessed are you when men persecute you and revile
you and say all manner of evil against you falsely for my name's
sake. That's what they do to every true church. That's what
they do to the people of God. He said, you're bled. He said,
rejoice. That's what they did to the prophets
of old. The offense of the cross. We
take up the offense of the cross. It's an offense. And if you do,
you will be an offense to people. So this is a great revealer,
the cross. Paul did, as we said here in
chapter 3, he said, if you think you're something, I'm more. Anybody
who thinks he's something, Paul said, I'm better than he was.
I was more religious than anybody. I was more zealous than anybody.
I was more orthodox than anybody. I knew more Bible than anybody.
I was more zealous. He said, but I didn't know God. Boy, that's denying yourself,
isn't it? All my righteousness, all that I ever did. He gave
his life for his religion, and he said it was a waste of time. And then he suffered loss, didn't
he? He was hated. Religion, if it's not all Christ,
it's done. If Christ is not all, it's done. It's worth it. So the cross is
a great revealer. We sang those hymns, Forbid it,
Lord, that I should boast, save in the death of Christ my God. All the vain things that charm
me most, religion. People are so charmed by music
and this and that and the other, and people. Let us not be charmed
by or taken with anybody but Jesus Christ. I sacrificed Him through His
blood. Oh my, love so amazing, so divine. What a song that is. So the cross
is a great revealer Every single person who comes to know the
true God and the true Christ renounces their religious past. And they're not ashamed to do
so. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of the Gospel. And they get in
that pool and they say, everything I used to believe was wrong. The God I used to believe was
not God at all. The Christ I used to believe
was not Christ at all. It was another Jesus, another
Gospel. And they do that before me. And you lose. In Mexico, it's such a predominantly
Catholic country, so in the grips of Roman Catholicism, that if
you are baptized, literally baptized, all of them are christened, that's
not baptism, you know that, when they're babies. But if you get
in a baptistry and are baptized, you are disowned. You are cut
off from your family. You lose everything. If you had
any inheritance, forget it. That's the way they do it down
there. But their church is full of believers
down there. You say, it's alright. What is
it anyway? What are they going to inherit?
A grass hut? That's the same with us. Wood, hay, and stubble. It's all going to be reduced
to stubble. The finest tone. And losses. is a great revealer. Paul lost his fame. Paul lost
his fortune. Paul lost his friends. Paul even
lost his freedom. He was put in jail for the Gospel
site. Put in jail. Will it come to
that for us? I don't know. It might. It used
to be up until a few hundred years ago. People were hauled off to jail
for believing the truth. But Paul said, that's all right.
He said, I know the things that have been following me fell out
for the furtherance of the gospel. They sure did, Paul. We wouldn't
have this letter if the Lord hadn't put you in jail. Prisoner
of crime. So Paul said, I'm doubtless.
And I hope we can say that. Doubtless. No doubt in my mind.
I count all this loss for the excellency. Listen to this. For
the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, for the most excellent knowledge,
that knowledge that excels any and all knowledge that men have
about anything, far excels the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is why he went on to say
that I may know Him. I don't need to know anything
else. I don't need to know what the world wants to know. I need
to know Him. in whom are all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge."
The excellency of the knowledge of Christ our Lord, it far excels,
far excels all human and worldly knowledge. The world strives
for knowledge of so many things. People striving to get their
degrees, you know, in this and that and the other. Science,
falsely so-called, Paul said. Study of truth, science, that's
a lie. medicine, technology. Are we gaining from these things? Are we? What have we gained through technology? What have we gained? Are we living
longer? Come on. Are we better off? Are we better off than believers
were thousands of years before? Are we better off? I think we're
going the other way. I think the more knowledge we
attain to, the further we get from God. I know it's true. I know it's true. Further from
the truth, men and women are looking for life, for peace,
for happiness, and they're rejecting the One who has it. Oh, the One
who has it. Christ said, my words are life.
Christ said, come unto me, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke upon
you and learn of me. I'm meek and lowly, you'll find
rest for your soul. But know that they would reject
him. They'll listen to anybody but him. People will listen to
any fool who comes along and believe him. They suffer fools
gladly, Paul said. You suffer fools gladly. You'll
listen to any joker that comes along that's telling you lies.
They won't listen to him who cannot lie. Oh, bless God he's
given us an understanding that we might know him that is true. And we believe him, and now what
do we say? We reject everybody else but
Him. We're so wary of everybody, aren't we? We believe Him and
we trust Him implicitly. He whose wisdom personified. Peace personified. Look at Him.
Excellency of the knowledge of Christ. Look at Him. Peace. Perfect
peace. Nothing fazed Him. Nothing bothered
Him. No one impressed Him. No one
feared no one, feared nothing. Perfect peace. I want to know
that. I want to know Him. The excellence
of Christ our Lord. That's why He said in verse 8,
He said that I may win Christ. He said I count everything done,
all these things, I was, all that I had, all that I knew,
all that I did, and the knowledge I thought I had, the things that
charmed me most, it's all lost. It's all dung. And in our modern
vernacular, cow manure. That I may win Christ. That I may win Christ. And I
believe only those that have won Christ know what that means. Because you don't win pride.
That is, you don't do something to win it. It's not like you are running
a race. And I know the Scripture says
this, but that's not what that means. In other words, you have
a prize in mind when you run. He that does it to win a prize,
But we do what we do. We walk this walk of faith with
our eyes on pride. He's the pride, but it's not
us running. It's not us doing. It's not our
faith. It's not our works that make
us win pride. It's the grace of God. He's a
gift. He's not something we earn. He's
a gift. But when it says win Christ,
look at verse He said, I pressed toward the
mark of the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Here it is, the prize of the
high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Scripture calls it a high
calling, a holy calling. What if the President of the
United States called you tonight and said, I've chosen you to
come be with me in the White House and sit and have dinner
with me. Would you consider that a high calling? Would you? Well, if it had been Abraham Lincoln,
would you? But to most people, it would
be a high calling, wouldn't it? Most people would think, who,
me? Why me? I'm nobody from nowhere. And
he called me. He chose me. That's nothing. Princes and rulers come and go,
and presidents and queens and popes and kings and all that
come and go, and they die. The King of Glory has called
us by the gospel. Called us by the gospel and said,
you and me. I've chosen you that you may
know me. Oh my, a heavenly calling, a
holy calling, called to be saved, called to be a child of God,
called by the gospel to tell us that you've been found in
Him, holy, unblameable, and unapprovable in God's sight. You've been accepted
in the Beloved. Good news, you're accepted in
the Beloved. Me? Yes, you are. Verse 9 says,
"...be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness which
is of the law." We need to be righteous. We must be righteous. It must be. We must be perfect. God is holy. God loves righteous
things. We must be. You know, our Lord
said all men will be gathered before Him someday in the judgment,
stand before Him to receive what they've done, whether good or
evil. It will be a judgment. The books will be opened. And
all men will be judged out of the books. You know what he said? That's what he said. Some are
so deluded. Some are so in love with themselves. Some are so self-righteous, they're
actually going to stand before the holy, all-seeing eye of God
and say, Lord, we did many wonderful works in your name. We won souls
to Jesus. We gave our bodies to be burned.
We gave up everything that we had for Jesus' sake. And he's
going to say, apart from me, I never knew you. You're a worker
of iniquity. I found you to be wicked in my
sight. While others, like the thief
on the cross, like Mary Magdalene, the harlot, the harlots, the
publicans, the chief of sinners, are going to be found in Christ.
Christ is going to appear for all His people. And the Lamb's
Book of Life will be opened. And their names will be there. Found in Him. Found righteous
in Him. You understand that? You do,
don't you? Oh, we sang that hymn. The hymn writer put it best,
When He shall come with trumpet sound, Oh, may I then in him
be found, dressed in his righteousness alone, faultless to stand before
the throne. Oh, on Christ the solid rock
let me stand. Be found in him, for all else
is shifting sand, and all else is dung and loss, and will not
be accepted. Verse 10, he said, Oh, that I
may know him, not about him, but know him. That means a personal acquaintance.
You know somebody by communing with them. You know somebody
by walking with them and talking to them. You get to know somebody.
That's what that's talking about. A personal acquaintance with,
a relationship, a union with the Lord Jesus Christ where you
know Him. Paul said, I want to know Him. Listen to this. Our peace and
our happiness depends on how well we know Him. Our peace and our happiness depends
on how well we know Him. Thou wilt keep Him in perfect
peace. His mind has stayed on Him. How
well we know Him depends on how much peace and happiness we have. This is why Peter said, Grow
in grace in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ, because
you will have peace. He said, Take my yoke... I want to repeat
this again. Take my yoke upon you and learn
of me, and you'll find rest for yourselves. Paul's talked about knowing his
love that passes understanding. A love that we can't understand,
but we can understand a little bit. Oh, that we might know with
all the sanctity, the length, the height, the depth, the breadth
of His love that passes understanding. We'll not know until we get there.
But we can know a little bit about it, and the more we think
about it, the more peace we'll have, the more happiness we'll
have. He loves His own. He loves His people. Ron, you
love that granddaughter. I know you do. You love your
own, don't you? You love them dearly. How much
more? Scripture says. How much more?
How much more? If we could get a hold of that.
That He loves His own much more than we can know. He provides
for. He cares for. He careth for you,
He says. He careth for His people. He
watches over. He watches over His people. At
all times. His eye is never off of His beloved. I used to go
in and gaze at my daughter when she was a child. Well, she was
asleep. You ever do that? I used to go
in and gaze at Hannah. Well, now I'm gazing at her daughter
with the same love. And I just look at her. If she
only knew how much I love her. If we only knew that we might
know Him He thinks on his people. He thinks on them. He gazes on
us. He said, I know my thoughts toward
you. Thoughts of peace. And I know your thoughts. He
knows our brains. The more we know Him, the less
fears we would have. The more we know Him, the less
worries we would have. The more we know Him, the greater
our faith would be, the greater our trust would be, the greater
our peace would be, the greater our happiness would be. Who can
hurt me? What can be bad for me if He loves me like that?
Huh? Oh, then I know Him. This is why Paul did say, I know
whom I have believed. I know whom I have believed.
So he said, this prison I'm in, He and Silas were put in prison
for preaching the gospel. They didn't understand it. I
want you to see something here. We don't understand the things
that follow. Look at chapter 2. We don't understand, but we
need to trust the Lord, trust His goodness, trust His wisdom.
Chapter 2, verse 23. Paul is in prison in Rome. He's
not getting out. He's not getting out. He's going
to have his head cut off. He doesn't know that yet. He was
there for a long time, and finally, in the end, he realized, I'm
not getting out of jail. And he wrote Timothy, one of
the last letters, he said, my departure's at hand. I know. The Lord's telling me that it's
over. He said, I'm ready. But here he thinks he might get
out. Look at chapter 2, verse 23.
It said, Timothy, I hope to sin presently so soon as I shall
see how it's going to go with me. I don't know how it's going
to go with me, you see. But I trust in the Lord that
I will come shortly. I'll come to you." Well, he did. He wanted to. We have many hopes. We have many wishes and wants
and wishes. We want to live maybe a full
life and see our children and our children's children and so
forth. We don't know how it's going to go with us. Some have
not lived too long, but how's it going to go with us? Well,
it is well. It is well. Why? Because He's good. Know that
for your peace, for your joy. If we knew Him better, we'd have
more peace. We'd have freedom. Not complete
freedom, but much freedom from doubt, fears, and worry. But
somebody said, well, I'm so sinful. Well, I'm so sinful. I'm the
prodigal. I'm no good. I'm the black sheep
of the family. I don't even know if I'm one
of his children. If you just give me some proof.
Well, isn't that what the disciples said? Show us the Father. Here's what he said to Philip
and the disciples, and here's what he said to us when we're
looking for more proof than himself. He said, Have I been so long
time with you and you haven't known me? Like Manoah's wife. He wouldn't
have showed us his thing. He wouldn't have told us his
thing. He wouldn't have accepted the sacrifice if he was going
to kill us. He wouldn't be here tonight loving this gospel if
he was going to kill you. Don't you know him? He's better
than us. He's loved better than us. His
love is not fickle. Christ came to save sinners.
How many times do we have to repeat that? Maybe a thousand
times. Oh, Paul said, Oh, that I may
know Him and the power of His resurrection. I've got to hurry. His resurrection. What that means.
Christ said, Because I live. Because I live, you shall live
also. In other words, death Where is
your stain? Grave, where is your victory?
Thanks be unto God that giveth us the victory through our Lord
Jesus Christ. Our Lord Jesus Christ was the great High Priest.
And like the High Priest of old who went into the Holy of Holies
with that blood that poured on the mercy sea. And if God accepted
that, He came out. He came out alive and the people
were happy. God is not angry with us. He
accepts that blood. Well, Christ went into the Holy
of Holies, not with the blood of bulls and goats, but with
His own precious blood to obtain eternal redemption for His people.
Well, you know what? He came out. He came out of the
grave. He said, now death has no hold
on you. Grave has no victory over you.
Because I live, you shall live also. He that liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. You believe this? Well, I think
I do. Well, it's so whether you do
or not. Because I can't lie. The power of His resurrection.
The fellowship of His suffering. He made conformable unto His
death. The fellowship of His suffering. Our fellowship is
in the gospel of Christ and Him crucified. Most people don't
know anything about it. You do, don't you? God's people
do. All God's people do. Christ's
sufferings. Ah, the fellowship of the gospel.
We know that all our salvation is because, who shall lay anything
in the charge of God's image? It's God that justifies. Who
is He that condemns? Christ died. We know all our
hope with God is because Christ died. his blood, and made conformable unto his
death. Like Paul said, I am crucified
to the world, and the world to men. In other words, he said, I don't
care what the world thinks of me. I don't need the world. I'm crucified. And they crucified him and they
cut his head off. But he said, that's fine with
me. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.
He said, I'm in a straight betwixt the two here in Philippians.
I'm in a straight betwixt the two. To depart and be with the
Lord, which is far better. He said, for me to live is to
know Christ. To glorify, serve Him somewhere. But to die is... Gain. Everything else is loss that
dies gain. To win Christ is gain. It's not
like the fools say, he that dies with the most toys wins. No,
you're judged by those things. The canker of the silver and
gold of the rich people will rise up in the judgment against
them. He who dies with Christ wins. Oh man, I know that. Be made
conformable. We've got to be made that. We've
got to be made that. He's got to make us see that
this is all vanity, that everything in it is loss, and the only thing
you need is me. That's what he's got to do. Make
that. And in closing, read with me,
just read down through here, he said, if by any means I might
attain unto the resurrection of the dead, whatever it takes,
he said, Lord, whatever it takes. And in that sense, we do say
with the hymn writer, sin picks grief for pain. And he will,
to show us that we don't have anything here, that there's no
lasting joy here, no peace here, you don't have anything here.
Get any lasting happiness here. In me is that peace and happiness
found, the Lord said. Any me, a resurrection of the
dead, because all this is going to perish in a moment and a twinkling
of an eye. It's all going to be perished.
Isn't that right, sir? And Paul said, but it's not as
though I had already attained or already perfect, but this
is what I'm doing. By the grace of God, I follow
after. What are you after, Paul? Christ. One thing that I desire
David said, and Paul said, and all of his people may say, he
said that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended
of Christ. That reminded me of Jacob when
I read that. The Lord came and laid hold of
Jacob or else Jacob wouldn't have Jacob wouldn't have known
the Lord. The Lord hadn't come to him.
But when the Lord came and laid hold of Jacob, Jacob laid hold
back. The Lord apprehended Jacob and
Jacob apprehended back. He said, I will not let you go
unless you bless me. And that's what we want. Lord,
don't let me go. And by your grace, I don't want
to let go. I don't want to leave the gospel until I'm there. He
said, Paul said, I'm not there yet. But this is what I do. I forget, he said, those things
behind. Forget yesterday. Forget the
sins of yesterday. Forget your past religion. Forget
your faith or lack of faith. Forget it. Do you believe now? Now, forget
those things behind. Reach in forth unto those things
before. What things? What's not things? It's Christ. The prize, he said,
I press, this is a pressing matter, I press toward the mark for the
prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus. Now, let
us therefore, as many as know this, you know this, do you believe
this? Do you know this? Not just in
your head. Paul didn't say, I know doctrine.
I come with the knowledge of the doctrine of grace. I want
to know the truth. in all its form, he said, I want to know
Him. And I want to be a good Dr. Calvinist. No, he said, I
want to be profound in Him. So as many as have this perfect
knowledge, it's not, you know, our knowledge is not perfect,
but we know this perfectly well. We know this perfectly well.
Christ is all. I don't know that like I should,
but I do know this. First, without doubt, Christ
is our Lord. So let us be thus minded. And
if anything, you be otherwise minded, God will reveal this
to you. You know, we're so easily distracted,
aren't we? We're such flesh and blood. This
message, you couldn't have heard a more important message. Well,
in preparing this, and I spent two days on it. Right before we came here, I
was just trying to pace in the floor. So I walked outside in
the garage, and there were some things in there, some projects,
and I started thinking about those. Then I walked outside,
and I thought, well, I'll take a walk down the garden. And I
thought, well, what can I plant? I can plant a binklet. Then I walked up here and I looked
around. Oh, that gutter neat. Wood, hay, stubble, it's all
nothing. There's not going to be one stone
left standing on another. Christ is coming real soon. Lord,
get my mind off this stuff. Don't let me be so easily distracted
by stuff. Dung. Dung. Dung is waste. After everything
you've used, it turns to waste. That's everything in this world.
Everything. It's going to be waste, waste. Oh, the unsearchable riches of
Christ. Oh, that I may win Christ, know Christ, be found in Him,
and know the power of His resurrection. Our Lord. Stand with me. Our Lord. You must impress the
truth in not our minds only, but in our hearts. With the heart
man believeth, a woman, a young person, believeth unto righteousness,
believeth and trusteth the Lord Jesus Christ, looks to him, believes
him, walks with him, talks with him. comes to know Him, united
with Him. Lord, do this work in our hearts,
in the hearts of others. Lord, we pray that You might
be pleased to call out Your sheep. This is the day of Your coming. The time is short. Surely, Your
coming is near, even at the door. We see the signs. We read the
sky. It's very clear. It's perishing. Perishing things of clay, born
but for one brief day, pass from our hearts away. Let the Lord
Jesus be ours. It's in His name we meet here
tonight. Amen.