I'm really here for a truthful
purpose, of course, to be here tonight to invite Paul Asher
to speak. But forty-seven years ago, when
we had our first Sovereign Grace Bible Conference in action, there
was a lady And two of her friends drove over to the conference
from Hamilton Road, Virginia. Her name, Burnell Park. She was 34 years old. Member of George Fletcher's church.
Loved the grace of God, loved the gospel. She came over every
year to our Bible conference, and in many years she was a professional
lady bookkeeper. several firms over in Hampton. And we've maintained contact
all these years. She gets my papers, she gets
her passports. She knows where I'm from, maybe
for the first time today. But she's known me, I've heard
her messages. She's been one of our greatest
and most generous supporters of the missionary work in Mexico
and Africa and other places. Very, very generous in her gifts
to the mission. Well, she'll be 82 in Friday,
and she's always been independent. business lady and put her in
a rest home. She had no husband, she had no
children, she had no grandchildren. She had a sister. And she moved. She is very, very powerful. That's one reason I came over
to go see her, and see about her, and see what her attitude,
her surroundings, and all these things are. And I'm too happy
with where she is. And when Paul is leaving, he's
working with her sister, he's talking. But she's down, and
Friday's her birthday, so I tell you what, Paul, I'm sure you
won't mind me doing this. Let me give you her address.
Some of you ladies sent her a card. That's what you have to be saying.
But it's real earthly. She needs this. She needs this
attention. She's been in one of them. She's
the one that, I don't make so much money in this church, and
we put the improvements to this building, and on and on. She's
been so generous to a lot of these churches. She uses base
ten, I don't give a what she uses. And I don't know whether
I've mentioned her name or not. I have, but you haven't. This
is Burnell. Here's the name and address.
Burnell, B-E-R-N-E-L-L-E. Burnell, Perth. Capital F-I-R-T-H. Burnell, Perth. And the rest
home address is 406th Street. That's correct, 406th Street. Blackstone, Virginia. That's
where, if you don't know where that is, we go over 40 minutes.
Over that way. First time I've been there. Blackstone,
Virginia. Now, the zip code, I don't know.
I haven't memorized that. You don't remember either. But
you can find it. You can find the zip code. Her
birthday's Thursday. The card just says Saturday.
I'd find it Monday evening. But if she got a bunch of cards,
it would be wrong. I'll tell you, it would be wrong. And she needs a brighter day
with her son. It's one of those situations
that, it's just, we're both probably working on it to see what he
can do. And it's just been cooperating
wonderfully. We had this wonderful talk today,
this afternoon, after we came back. And, you know, sometimes,
she said this about Bernal, that the last six or seven months,
she's just gone downhill. And she's confused. She just
doesn't know what she wants. In the wilderness down there,
she doesn't know what she wants. And this is aimed at not having
any fantasy. You know, fantasy is so wonderful
to have in a time of old age and trouble. Fantasy is a good
thing. Because of it, there's fantasy. All right, I have a message I
want to bring tonight. I believe it will be a blessing
to you. I want you to, to open your Bible to Jeremiah 23. Jeremiah
chapter 23. Old brother A.B. Hughes, who was
born and raised in Mississippi and finished his ministry of
evangelism two years in a hospital in Louisville, Kentucky. I met
him at that first conference where I met him this way, and
he died just a few months later. He was 64 then, one of our speakers. And I asked him one day, I said,
well, Hugh, what's the secret of good preaching? What's the
secret of good preaching? Well, he said, I'll tell you
my secret. It's very important. Number one, my servant is always
the Lord Jesus Christ. You know, Paul said, I'm determined
that on the death of the month we say, Jesus Christ is in Christi. Paul said, we preach Christ Jesus
our Lord, our Savior, service for His sake. We preach Him.
And he said, secondly, my proof, the proof of what I'm preaching
about Christ is always the Word of God. He said, I don't depend
on illustrations. I don't depend on what somebody
else said. I don't depend on my own imagination
or my own intellect. I just turn to the Word of God.
Paul said that if you preach the Word, the end season and
the middle season is for preaching the Word. Every season is a season
for preaching the Word of God. Isaiah said that if you preach
not the Word of God, it's because there's no light in it. And our
Lord said, my word will not return false. So he said, that's my
truth. Always I preach Christ and I prove what I'm saying for
the word of God. And he said, the third thing
is this, my method. And your pastor wrote about this
in the bullet of my son. I just saw the article a few
minutes ago. My method is to preach the word and leave the
results to the Holy Spirit of God. throw out the net and the
wormhole, and leave it to the Spirit of God to produce results. That's right. It's not by might,
it's not by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord. And Paul
said this, I'm determined, and though nothing among you say
Jesus Christ and Him crucified, that your faith should not stand
in the wisdom of me, but in the power of God. So our message
is to preach. Leave it to the Spirit of God
to make it effectual. My doorbell rang one day and
I went to the door and there stood Becky Gray. You know Becky Gray. Becky goes
to the nest. She's Becky Gray. She has a young
man named Tug. She's baking this young man.
And he's working. He's a man with a father, and
I went to church. Now, this is several years ago. She had him in tow. She said, they won't talk to
you about his soul. I said, all right, where are
you going with that? So he came in, sat down in the living room,
and he's been coming to church with her for as long as he's
been in church. And he said, I'm lost. I said, well, I'm tickled to
death because of that. He said, you are? I said, yeah, I'm just
tickled to death. And he said, well, I don't know how to be
saved. And I said, we'll sure talk about it. So we sat there
on the couch, and I talked, and I read the scriptures to him,
and prayed for him. And I said, now, you just go
on home, read these scriptures I've given you. And I read three
or four of them. And I said, you've been in church some, when?
Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Wednesday night. He said,
well, listen. And I said, you're hearing my gospel. And he said,
well, how am I going to get saved? I said, how do you know? He said,
God tells me. I said, well, He'll show you
what He's saying to you. I can't say anything. I didn't
get your love, and I can't say anything. I said, David, I can't
say to you now, if you believe that, you have a good stage.
I can't say anything, but He can. I can't speak, but He can. And that's true. So that's what
the old man did. He said, I just believe it to
God. Are you afraid to believe it to God? I'm not. This is better
hands in his hands than mine. A man's assurance. If I give
him assurance, I've got to keep it up. If he gets his assurance
from God, I can disappear. He's still safe. Well, now, most
preachers don't agree with that. And this is what Jeremiah's writing
about in Jeremiah 23. Look at the first two verses.
Jeremiah 23.1, Woe unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the
sheep of my pasture, saith the Lord. Therefore, as I said, the
Lord God of Israel, against the pastors that feed my sheep, my
people, they're supposed to do what they don't. That's what
he's saying here. That's what their calling is,
that's what their office is, that's what their job is, but
he says in the next line, they scatter my flock. And they drive them away. And
they haven't visited them. They haven't called them. They
haven't fed them. They haven't ministered to them.
I've been there. They've scattered them, driven them away, and they
haven't ministered to them. Behold, I will visit upon you
the evil of your doings, sayeth the Lord. You know, these false
preachers... Jeremiah's writing about here,
and he writes a lot about false prophets and false preachers.
Our Lord called them false prophets. He said, beware of false priests. He said, they'll come to you
as ravening wolves. You shouldn't call them. Pretend
you know what they're not. Be careful of them. You'll know
them by their fruits. And then Paul wrote about these
false priests. He called them, this is a terrible
thing to call a man. He called them ministers of Satan.
2 Corinthians, you know, he turns it, I quote it, and some of you
remember 2 Corinthians 11, when he said that Satan himself is
turned into an angel of light. He comes in a disguise as an
angel of light, and he says, and that, it's not surprising
that his ministers come to you as ministers of righteousness.
Not Christ's life, he says, man's life. That's what they come to
do. So he said this. Then he says
the same. And then Peter calls them false teachers. He said there were a lot of false
prophets in Israel and there'll be false teachers among you who
bring in damnable heresies. And this is what he said next.
And many people fell out of their positions. But I want you to see how Jeremiah
describes it. This is really out of me. I'm
going to ask you to turn to these scriptures. Turn to Jeremiah
6, how he describes these false preachers who scatter my sheep,
who drive them away, who do not feed my sheep. In Jeremiah chapter
6, verse 13. Jeremiah 6, 13. You had it? Jeremiah 6.13. And
from the least of them to the greatest of them, every one of
them is given to what? Covenants. That's what Moses
is. They're covenants. For gain,
for glory, for applause, a glorious appearance. They want you to
pray. Covenants. And from the prophet
unto the priest, every one of them deals falsehood. If you're
motivated by covetousness, you're going to be a false man. If you're
motivated by the glory of God and the good of the congregation
and the glory of Christ Jesus, you're the honest man. If you're
motivated by covetousness, you're going to be a false man. Now,
look at the next verse, fourteen times, when he says that. They
have healed the hurt of the daughter of my people, slightly saying,
Peace, peace, when there is no peace. I was watching television
last Saturday evening, and a picture was on there, and I thought,
I think I see what he said, how he closes his message, about
to the end. He came to the end, he said,
now I want you to bow your head and pray this prayer with me.
He bowed his head, and he prayed the prayer. And then when he
got through it, he said, Amen. Now he said, you prayed that
prayer with me, listen, Welcome to the kingdom of God. You say,
how can you tell a man's name, just because he repeats the words
that you say? I thought salvation was a law. Salvation is God bringing life,
raising the dead, and redeeming Christ, and bringing the man
to complete peace. But that's peace, peacefulness,
isn't it? The only man that'll tell a lost
man that he's saved is another lost man. That's exactly right. The only person that'll tell
a person, you're saved, is a man that's not saved in time, because
he doesn't know what he did, or he wouldn't save him. He would've saved him.
He wouldn't save him. All right, here's another verse
about returning to Jeremiah 14. Jeremiah has a lot to say about
these false creatures, and we need to listen to him, because
we're surrounded with them in this day. in Jeremiah, chapter
14, verse 13. They deny that God was born of
sin. They deny that God was born of
sin. This is what they say, Jeremiah, chapter 14, verse 13. Then said
I, O Lord God, behold the prophets. They stand beneath you. You don't
seem to be sober. Neither should you be. Have But
I'll give you a sure peace in this place. You don't have to
worry. God's not going to deal with
you. God's not going to pull your
shoes. God's not going to spit a fang. Don't worry about it.
Peace. Listen. Here's what the Lord said to
me. The prophets prophesied lies
in my name. I said to them, not me, that
I commanded them to speak unto them. They prophesied me a false
vision. And divination hath a thing of
knowledge, and the deceit of their hearts. Therefore saith
the Lord concerning these prophets is prophesying my name. I sent
them not, yet they say, soul and hand shall not be in this
way. Thy soul and hand shall be prophesied concerning." The
fact that Christ died on the cross is true, God. There's no
greater proof in this world than God's bloody sins that He spared
and pardoned those sons who have had no sins, but bore our sins. God's bloody sins. He must give
His God, and He will, and He loves, but He forgives Him, too.
He's mercifully delighted to show mercy, delighted to save
sinners. He's delighted to save those who come to Him in Christ.
Christ being their sin offerer. Our sin, dead is pain. God didn't
forgive us our sins without a sacrifice. He forgives us because Christ
paid the debt and is counseled. Now turn to Jeremiah 23. This
is my text from a little while ago. We'll get back to our text. Something else he said, Jeremiah
23, verse 16. And here's the difference between
a true Christian and a false Christian. Jeremiah 23, 16. Thus
said the Lord, if you ever heard preachers on television come
and say now, about three o'clock this morning I woke up, couldn't
sleep, and the Lord spoke to me. And He said this, I had a
vision, I saw the Lord, He spoke. Do you ever hear that? Of course
you do. Well listen to Jeremiah. Jeremiah 23, verse 16, Thus saith
the Lord of Hosts, Hearken not to the words which are prophesied
unto you. They may be vain. They speak
a vision of their own kind, and not the mouth of God. They talk
about what they saw, what they dreamed, what they saw, what
they heard. Listen, look at verse 28. The prophet that hath a dream,
did he have a dream last night? Well, let him tell his dream. But he that hath my word, I didn't
have a dream, but I got the word of God, and he speaketh my word. Which one do you want to hear?
Do you want to hear my dream, or do you want to hear the word of God? If he
hath a dream, let him tell his dream. But he that hath my word,
What is the chaff of the wood, says the Lord. That's what the
graveyard chaff, the word of God, says the Lord. Read the
next verse. Is not my word like a fire, says
the Lord, and burns the chaff, and like a hammer that breaketh
the rock in pieces, crushes the stone behind it? Therefore, behold,
I am against the prophets, the steel, said the Lord to steal
my words, every one from his neighbor. Verse 32, I'm against
them that prophesy false dreams, said the Lord, and cause my people
to err by their lies and by their lightness, their frivolity and
blindness. I said they're not, I commanded
them not, therefore they shall not prophesy to people at all,
said the Lord. And we thought that we had a
bunch of nazis, Jeremiah says they're just blood nazis, colorless
men, using religion to promote themselves. Well, let's get to
some good news now. Dr. LePage, chapter 23. The first
two verses talk about these false preachers. But then the Lord
said in verse 3, But I will gather the ribbons
of my flock." The Lord says, I'll gather my flock. He has
a flock. He has a sheep. Where'd he get
it? All that my father gave him to come to me. Him to come to
me, I don't know who it was to catch that. He said, my sheep,
hear my voice. I give them eternal life and
they'll never perish. My father gave them to me. He's greater than all. and no
man can pluck him out of my pocket. Our Lord hath a flock, and he
says, I will. Yahweh hath a flock. You just hold that right there
a minute, and let me turn, I'll turn over here to the first scripture
I showed Hannah while I was going to tell her to read. Listen as
I read it to you. Let me check and make sure I
got it right. Yeah, here it is. Listen to this. The Lord of hosts has sworn Surely,
as I have sought, so shall it come to pass. And as I have purposed,
so shall it stand. For the Lord of hosts has purposed,
whoso disanalyzes. His hand is stretched out, whoso
turns it back." I love that. Isn't that impressive? Isaiah
14, 23, verse 6. I will bring my flock. The other
sheep I have which are not of this fold, am I? And they shout. What do you love to shout and
wheel? I will, I can, they can. That's not a bad might, maybe,
perhaps. They cannot hear my voice. That's
the word of God. Oh, I have a flock. What's the
next line? I will gather the remnant, twenty-three verse three,
out of all the countries, each out of the people that have tried
to get me. Brother Todd and I, where is
he tonight? Well, one word probably is tonight. He's off to somewhere.
He's down in St. Croix, St. Croix in Virginia. There's some sheep down there.
There's some sheep in St. Thomas, St. Lucia, Tortola, Dominican
Republic, Mexico, and Africa, and all over this country. Out
of all the countries, he says, I will gather a lot. Out of all the countries where
I've traveled, then, if there are not my fathers and my cousins,
and I don't know where they are, and I don't know the address,
and I don't know how to reach them, and I'll send them a picture,
and they'll hear my voice, and they'll come, and I'll give them
up. I will. I shall. The Lord God
has spoken His plan, and nobody's going to disobey. Okay, that's right. Christendom,
we know. And I'll bring them to the fold.
I'll bring them to the fold, and they shall be fruitful. I
like that. What is this fruit business?
Well, I want you to turn to John 15. John chapter 15. He said,
Now, this is, I will, I shall business. He said, I will gather
my flock out of the country. I will bring them again, and
they shall be fruitful. Not that all of them will be,
but they will be. And here's the proof, John 15. First Pope abides in me, and
I in you. The branch cannot bear fruit
of itself. You ever heard of the branch,
branch, branch? No, you've got to have the vine. The branch
is part of the vine. And the fruit is from the vine.
It's through the vine. And the branch gets buried because
the vine gives it the nourishment of the vine. And he said that
the branch cannot bear fruit of itself except it abides in
the vine. Nor can you except you abide
in me. So the fruit is His fruit, but
we vary it by His grace. I am divine, You're the Christ,
He's the Christ indeed, and I am Him, the same, bringing forth
much fruit. But the doctrine is different. He brings every
fruit. Yes, sir, we have that. And if
they want you, you burn them. He said, if you break another
man's fruit, you lock it off and cast it into the fire. What
is this fruit? The fruit of the Spirit, the
fruit of the Lamb, the fruit of Christ. Love, joy, peace,
faith, patience, deepness, forgiveness of spirit, generosity, kindness. That's the fruit. And they've
all been fruitful. Yes, sir, you know, you just
know they're going to be fruitful, because He said so. They shall
be. And they'll increase. Look back at Jeremiah 23. He
said, I'll gather a flock, I'll bring them to the fold, there'll
be one fold, one shepherd, and they'll be fruitful. And they'll
increase. And watch this now. I'll set
over them, I'll set shepherds over them. I'll set up shepherds. I will do," he said. Paul told
him, said, you fellows, you fellows go into all these cities, preach
the gospel, and ordain elders and beakers in the churches. And that's what we preachers
do. But only God can make a shepherd. Oh, my God, a pastor, p-a-s-t-o-r,
a teacher, is a shepherd. And our Lord, He ascended back
to heaven. He that ascended is the same
as he descended. And when He ascended, He gave
some apostles, some prophets, some missionaries, evangelists,
some pastors to teach. And He set them over His rock. That's what the Scripture says.
I'll set up shepherds over them, Yes, sir, that's beautiful. I
want you to turn to Ephesians 4. Let me read something to you. I was trying to quote. I couldn't
remember all of that verse. Ephesians 4, verse 11. This is what I was quoting, and
watch this now. He said, I'm going to put some
chapters over my book. And he gave to all apostles,
and to some prophets, and to some evangelists, and to some
missionaries, and to some pastors and teachers. That's the same
person, pastor, teacher. Why? For the perfecting of the
saints, for the maturing of the saints, for the work of the ministers,
for the edifying of the body of Christ, so that we all, to
all the sheep, come to the unity of the faith. and of the knowledge
of the Son of God, unto a mature man, under the measure of the
statue of the fullness of Christ, that when we henceforth no more
children, tossed to and fro and carried by the devil, when the
doctrine comes along for the slight of men and their cunning
craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive us, but speaketh
the truth in love, the truth of God, we may grow In the hill,
in all things, which is the head of the cross, when I go up, he
stands with a shepherd. You have one here, and they have
another church where the gospel is preached. These men are faithful
to the people of the Lord. The people of the Lord might
be much closer, and grow up, and not be blown away with everybody
that comes along, you know. Sanity surrender. So he says, I'm going to send
them shepherds. Oh, what good news. First of
all, let's go back to the text. I'll set up Shepherd over them, they have
the rule, spiritual rule, people, lives, homes, they think they're
overseer of the church, and they're freedom, and listen, and they're
fear no more. What is this fear? Well, over
here in Hebrews 2, it's fear of death, it's fear of eternity,
it's fear of judgment, it's fear of what's ahead. And the only
way for that to be banished is the knowledge of Christ and His
Word, and the growth in that knowledge of Christ and His Word. Hebrews 2, verse 14. Here's what
it says, they shall fear no more. Fear no more. In Hebrews 2, 14,
for as much man as is mature, Hebrews 2.14, a partaker of the
flesh and blood. He also, like Christ, took part
in the same, that through them he might destroy him that hath
the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver them,
deliver his children, who through fear of death for all their lifetime
suffered in the law. They didn't have any hope until
they met Christ. They didn't have any hope when he turned
the lives of the hurt and the wounded. They didn't have any hope of
the glory to come until they were exhausted, until they were
exhausted. And when they hear these things,
they're delivered from the fear of death. They don't fear it
anymore. They don't fear it. There is
no judgment for those who are in Christ. How do you know that?
That's what the Word means. That's the Word of God. It says, I have a blessing of
it. It's out there. All right, watch this in that
next line. He says, and they'll fear no more, and they won't
be dismayed. I looked up that word, dismayed,
it means bewildered, confused. And then I'm going to be dismayed.
And I'm going to fear death, fear eternity, fear judgment,
I'm going to be confused and dismayed. I'm going to give you
a scripture and I'll put it on your refrigerator. If you ladies
do that, like some of us do, just stick it on the refrigerator
or the cabinet or somewhere, read it. Turn with me to Isaiah
41. Isaiah 41. They won't be confused, and dismayed,
and depressed. Listen. Dismayed, dismayed. Isaiah 41, verse 10. Isaiah 41,
10. Read it with me slowly. Fear thou not, for I am with
thee. Be not dismayed. All that were incensed against
thee shall be ashamed and confounded. They shall live nothing, and
they that strive with you will perish. I don't mean it this
way. And listen, here's another word
I'd like to give you. In Jeremiah 23, I've said I'm
going to gather my flock, I'm going to bring them to the fold.
They're going to be fruitful and increase. I'll set up pastors
over there who will feed them. And they'll fear no more, they
won't be dismayed, and they won't be lacking, not in anything. Not lacking. Two verses. He has,
by His grace, made us qualified, fit, meek, to be partakers of
the inheritance of the second life. We're already qualified,
nothing lacking, in the second Christian life. But my God will
supply all your needs. According to your tradition,
you can go to the cross. Nothing wrong with that. Not
that all their life is over. Even the least of them are not
like that. In Him dwelleth all the fullness
of His Godhead body, and in Him you abide. Complete. Now, I'm
not an English scholar, but I know what complete means. You don't
have to have any knowledge. It's complete. All right, so
it's fine. Now, here, kind of to these things,
please. Well, here's the answer in these next two verses. Here's
the one and only gospel. Here's the good news from a far
country you've heard about. Good news from a far country.
Here it is. Here's the common substance of redemption. Here's
the answer to the two most important questions that can be asked.
What are the two most important questions that can be asked by
a sinner? I'll tell you what they are.
Number one, how can you be cleansed from the war? And that number,
how can he be cleansed, Father? And the second one, I looked
to the sky, how can he be just, a just Father? I thought, when
he answered those two, that's a cross. How can he be cleansed,
born again? How can he be just, a just Father? Here's the answer. First, behold,
the day is come, said the Lord. I'll raise up unto David a righteous
bread. What day is this? The day is
coming. I'll tell you what day it is. It's the day to which
every prophecy, starting at Genesis 3-15, see the woman. Every promise,
every prophecy, every picture in the Old Testament, every type,
Paul. It's that day that Abraham saw. Christ said, Abraham, rejoice
in the city of my faith. He saw it and rejoiced. It's
that day at which the angels spoke when they appeared to the
shepherds and said, this family is born unto you in the city
of David, a sustainer. That's the day. In that day,
God said, I will raise you up. I will raise you up. I will prepare your body. And
you know something? If you ever ask yourself this
question, he said he's going to be, I raised up on the danger,
the seed of David, the root of Jesse, the family of David. And
if you ever ask yourself, what was Mary and Joseph doing way
up there in Bethlehem when she was nine plus five? Now, what
in the world possessed them? They lived in a massive pile
of them. What possessed him to put his
wife on an altar, and her nine months pregnant, and make her
ride all the way to Bethlehem? Because that's where Christ had
to be born. That's where the Scripture said,
God, Bethlehem. In Ephrathah, God liveth among
the thousands in Judah, but out of me shall he come, whose goings
forth have been from the Lord. Well, what did they go there
for? They went there to be taxed. Now, he's of the people who didn't
know anything about Scripture, of the house of David, when they
are ordained and decreed that everybody goes to his home city
to be taxed. Let's read that in Luke 2. The message came to Joseph down
in Nazareth that he's got to go to Bethlehem to be taxed. Because that's his city. He's
a city of ten. That's the city of ten. Twelve
tribes, and each tribe had to go to their own city, no matter
where it was, at that particular time. That's what that king said.
And God used his teeth. I tell you, the heart of the
king, in the hand of the Lord, he turned it with his left hand.
Read this in Luke 2. It came to pass in those days
that when I was free from Caesar, Augustus and all the world should
retire us. And this taxi was the first made,
was first made when Sirenius was governor of Syria, and all
went to be taxed, everyone to his own city. And Jonah also
went up from Galilee out of Nazareth to Judea to the city of David,
which is called Bethlehem. Why? Because he was in the house
of David. Who's the Messiah? It's a secret
name. Who's the Messiah? It's the root of Jesse. Who's
the Messiah? It's the son of David. Got to
be born in Bethlehem. That's right. That's right. It's 11th of June. He's in the
kingdom of God. Thanks be to Jesus. It was done for one purpose. To take David and Joseph to Bethlehem.
Christ must be born right there in that place. God said, I'll
raise you up. It's the seed of David. We're going. He'll be a righteous
branch. A righteous branch. A branch
is taken. He'll grow up as a tender plant,
as a root out of the dry ground. A righteous branch. Our Lord's
the only righteous branch. We're righteous, but He's the
only righteous branch that's righteous within Himself, and
of Himself, and of Himself. Did you know even the demons
of hell call Him the Old One? Let me show you that in Scripture.
Turn it, if you will, to Luke 4. Even, even the demons... You
know, a lot of people in this day don't believe that Jesus
Christ is God, but the demons do, and so do you. Let me read
you this in chapter 4, verse 34. Luke 4, 34. where we first look at Luke 4.33. Luke 4.33, and in the synagogue
there was a man which had a spirit of an unclean devil. And he cried
out with a loud voice, saying, Let us alone! What have we to
do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? Art thou come to destroy us?
I know who you are, the Holy One of God. That's never been... No man's ever been called bad
except Christ. I'm told that. That's who He's
like. I know who He's like. They're not just a man. They're
God's men. Turn to the next page. Verse.
Same chapter, verse 41. Luke 4, 41. And devils came out
of many, crying out and saying, Thou art the Christ. Thou art
the Christ, the Son of God. You know, that's what the apostles
said, when Christ told them their sighting. They had a heart knowledge,
and these demons had nothing in their head knowledge. But
they knew who He was. He was in the world, the world
knew Him, not with the devil's faith. He came in His own legacy,
not with the devil's misery. And we know who He is by His
prophecy. Peter says, Our Lord Christ has something in God.
That's what these demons said. And He rebuked them, suffering
them not to speak. They knew He was the Christ,
but His gospel was not going to be preached by devils. It
was going to be preached by people who know Him, who love Him. It
was not going to be required worldwide by the demons out there,
but by God's people. It's only to keep quiet, to keep
quiet. Or, back to the text. He'll raise
up a righteous branch, Jeremiah 23, verse 5, a righteous branch. A king shall execute judgment. He's the king. I've set my king
on my holy hill of Zion. He reigns on the same throne
as the father. He's a king. He'll reign and
prosper. And the pressure of the Lord
shall prosper in his hands, and he'll execute judgment and justice
on this earth. Judgment and justice. He took
our sins, and he bought on the truth, paid the profit, and enabled
God to do justice and justify. And listen to this. So in his
days, in the day of the revelation of Christ, the incarnation of
Christ, and the death of Christ, Jeremiah 23 states, in his days,
Judas hath the same. shall be saved." Who is Jew? Well, Judah is all of true Israel. That's a true Israel. He's not
an Israelite, which is one in the flesh, but he's a Jew, which
is one in spirit and heart. Sacrification is not an outright,
it's an inward experience, and the operation of suffering in
the heart. So I'm a Jew, you're a Jew. I'm
an Israelite, a good Israelite. All the Israelites shall be saved.
That's what he's saying here. In his name, Judah shall be saved. And the Israelites shall dwell
safely. Always. He done a good work of finishing.
That's what I know you pastors taught you that many times. We
need to re-teach these things. That we are Israelites, not those
people over there fighting over the holy land. But true Israel
are believers. They're the people of God. And they're always saying, our
Lord says, and this is his name, whereby he shall be called. I
want to give you this in the next two or three minutes. I
want you to listen. Number one, he's called the Lord. The Lord. No other name. No other Lord.
He's the Lord Jehovah, God and Savior. And Isaiah forty-five
times, six times, Isaiah forty-five, he said, come to me and be saved.
He looked at him and he said, I'm God and there's nothing else.
Six times he says, I'm God and there's nothing else. Six times. I'm God and there's nothing else.
So he's the Lord. Not a Lord. He's the Lord. The Lord is the Lord. You see that? And he's our righteous. What does that mean? Well, this
man, God knows, was made a woman, and in human flesh he stood on
this earth before God the Father, as holy and as perfect as God
himself. He said to the Father, I have
glorified you on this earth, That boy did glorify me with
the glory of which I had been before the world was. Perfect
man. I was second. And he was tried
and tested. Now, he's not just a perfect
man not having been tried. He's a man who has been tried. He has been tried and tested
in all forces we are, by Satan, by men, by God. That's it. He's righteous, and He's entirely
righteous. He's a stone, but He's entirely
strong. Not only that, as He's all that,
He literally took all the sins of all the elect in His body
called the Trinity, born in Calvary, and there He walked with mine
presence, God's wrath, all alone, without a word of protest, and
paid the utmost Take note. He's the Lord of righteousness,
by testimony of obedience of righteousness, and by heaven's
blood of righteousness. Here's the third word, the Lord
righteously ours. Now this is the most amazing
thing of all this. The life of Christ in His holiness constitutes the
holiness and righteousness in which we stand right now before
God, accepted, clothed, and rewarded as if we did it ourselves. Isn't
that correct? That righteousness is yours so
strongly in Christ as God views it as if you did it yourself.
And I proved that down to Jeremiah 33. Jeremiah 33. Jeremiah 33, verse 15. Now, here's
almost the same wording as I read while I was in Jeremiah 23, Jeremiah
33. And see if you note the difference. It's one line. One word is different.
Now, in verse fifteen, Jeremiah thirty-three, "...in those days,"
at that time, "...will I cause the branch of righteousness to
grow up unto David, and he shall execute judgment and righteousness
in the land." Now, we read about it. "...And in those days shall
Judah be served." I read that. "...Jerusalem shall grow sacred."
I read that. "...And this is the name wherewith
she..." Whoa, that's different. It said, "...he," in that other
verse, didn't it? That other verse said, He shall be called,
His name shall be the Lord of Righteousness. Here it says,
She. Who's She? It's the Church. It's the Lamb of God. It's Jehovah's
Wife. It's called She. We were talking
about that yesterday, Ephesians 5. A person was talking to the
wives of Christ over the chain. His wife, His wife, who gave
Himself for it. And you know something? He is
the Lord of Righteousness. And what He did, and what He
paid, and what He gave, is ours. We're the Lord, and we get it
ourselves, because that's our name, too. Amen. That's the reason why a man marries
a woman, she takes his name. I'm hearing from young people
now, they're getting married, and they keep their own names.
I hear one family, Bob's so-and-so and Susan's so-and-so, and they
got different names, but they're husband and wife. That's wrong.
See, when we're married, we're not just two different people
going two different ways, and two different careers, and two
different friends, and two different churches, and two different religions.
We're one! And what's mine is hers, and
what's hers is mine. And what I am, she is. She writes
my name, she's got your name. I take my five goods and I leave. I come to the Lord. I love you. Jesus, that's our name. That's
it. You were born in Christ. That's
just so beautiful. I hope you do that. Thank you. I'm not through writing notes,
excuse me. Put that Isaiah 41 can on the
refrigerator, and then put Jeremiah 23-6 right by your front door. You know my government. The next
time two people come to your door, Something about New York. You can tell them who he really
is. Jeremiah 236. Honestly. Good side of the door. This will
be real good. All right, let's see. There's only one thing I'm
saying. Fear not, or be not dismayed. 268. I'll burn the foundation. 268. Thank you very much. and praise. Here I am, I am free,
free as we have been made, Lord, I am with Thee. God be with you. God be with
you.