How can it be, how can it be,
how can it be, how can it be, that God is love of soul like me? The world can't understand why
we would say God doesn't love every man. But as the song says, we are
amazed that God would love any man, especially us. How can it be? We talk about
sovereign love, distinguishing love. The world says that can't
be. And we do too. We say, how can
it be? Why would God love me? Romans chapter five now, Romans
chapter five. This will be a message of hope,
message of encouragement, message of comfort. should be a blessing to you.
We're just going to go down through these verses. We've already looked
at them, but we'll devote a little more time to them and dwell on
a few of them. Romans 5, he says in verse 1,
therefore, therefore, and you need to know why he said
therefore. In verse 25 of chapter 4 said, Christ was delivered for our
offenses. Romans 8.32 says that God delivered
Him up for us all. Spared not His Son, but delivered
Him up for us all. Delivered Him to the mob. Delivered Him to Satan, if you
will. Delivered Him up for us all. Who was delivered for our offenses. He had no offenses. But he was
delivered for us. He was made sin for us. Who knew no sin? God hath laid
on him the iniquity of us all. He was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. Therefore, being justified, being
declared holy and righteous because of his righteousness, being justified
by faith. Whose faith? We saw that back in chapter three,
by the faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that
believe. All believe because of Christ,
because of the gift of faith and grace that Christ obtained
for us. and purchased for being justified
by his faith. We have peace with God. We have peace with God. God's
not angry with that. He should be. He should have been from the
outset, but he wasn't. He should be even now, but he's
not. He should be in the future because
we will yet sin against him, but he won't be. Why? We have
peace. Present tense. We have peace. Being justified. Past tense. We have peace. Present tense. With God. We have peace. He ought
to be angry, but he's not. He is with the world. He is angry with the world. And
he will someday vent his anger upon it. He will someday, he
said, vengeance his mind. I will repay, saith the Lord.
He will someday vent his anger on the Lord and burn it up like
we would burn a yellowjacket's nest, a hornet's nest. That's what you do to a bagworm
in your tree. That's what you do to it. You
really want to annihilate it, you burn it up. That's what God's
going to do to this world and the inhabitants thereof. But
not us. Why? Because He was delivered. for our offenses. Not anything
in us was all in Him. We have peace with God. We have
peace because Christ obtained that peace. That's the reason
it's such a blasphemy for men to talk about making peace with
God. It angers God, and I believe hell is the hottest part of it
reserved for people like that. We have peace with God because
Christ obtained peace with no less than His blood. He was delivered
up. What are we going to give to
God to obtain peace? Ain't nothing good enough. It
took nothing less than the blood of God's Son. A bloody sacrifice. And therefore we have peace through
him. Through his bloody sacrifice.
Because Christ obtained it. Because he was chastised for
our peace. He took our weapon. He took our weapon. Why are we not going to be beaten
with forty stripes save one? Because he took our weapon. Because
he was. By his stripes we are healed.
The chastisement of our peace was laid on him. The whip was
laid on him. The rod of God's anger was laid
on his back and it broke. The rod broke. Verse two, by
whom? By Christ. We have access by
Christ also. Not only do we have peace with
God through our Lord Jesus Christ, but we have access by faith into
this grace wherein we stand. We have boldness, Paul said in
Hebrew, we have boldness to enter into the holy of holy. We can
draw near, he said, with a heart with full assurance. We can come
near to a thrice holy God whom no man has seen at any time.
No can see, no will see, but he says come. If you see, we're
not coming to the mountain that quaketh with fire, down to Mount
Zion. We can come near. We can come
with boldness. Yea, full assurance, he said.
We can draw near with a heart full of assurance. Why? Because our elder brother went
before us. And he obtained peace. And he ripped the veil in two.
I found a way. I've found a way through the
veil into the Holy of Holies with God. How? Christ is the way. He ripped
the veil in two. He said, y'all come on in. Come
on. I'll go before you. And He brings us to God. It's just like Him. It's becoming
to Him and bringing many sons to glory. just becoming under
here. We have access by faith into
this grace wherein we stand. Or this grace he's talking about
is this access. That's grace. Isn't that a gift?
Free access? How many of us have, we went
to Washington D.C. and I didn't get to see Bill.
I didn't get to see our president. Why? I didn't have access. I
didn't have a pass. I had ventures to say I couldn't
have gotten one if I wanted one. He just said, who's somebody
wants to see you, who? Paul Mahan. Who? Paul Mahan. Where's he from?
Rocky Mount. Where? Rocky Mount, Virginia. Well, I know where Virginia is.
Well, what's he want? He just wants to see you. What?
I'm busy. Well, God says. Somebody wants
to see you. Holy Spirit says to the Father,
somebody wants to see you. Who? Joe Park tell him to come
on in. It ain't Bill Clinton. At the risk of sounding disrespectful,
I didn't want to see him either. Forgive me. But at any rate,
we have access. We have free access into the
Holy of Holies, the only one worth seeing. Jesus Christ. Into this grace, this is the
grace that he's given us. This is the gift. That's what
grace means, a gift. We have access by faith into
this grace, this gracious place wherein we stand, this grace
wherein we stand. We stand on his grace. That's
where we stand. We better stand right there.
Don't move an inch. Don't budge an inch. You better hold fast to the place
you started hanging on to in the beginning. Better hold fast
to the beginning of your confidence, steadfast to the end. What's
that? Grace. Don't ever leave that. Here I
stand. Be like Martin Luther. Here I
stand. Oh, come on, let's go on to other things. No, I stand
right here on grace. Get off that rock like that ant.
You know, those ants I burned up that time, that one got under
the rock. I said, you stay right there, you're safe. Move an inch and I'll burn you
up. Stand right here, Joe, Steve,
Terry. Where you stand? What's your
stand? What's your stand on the law?
That's what one of somebody, one of these reformers, reform
fellows asked one of our brethren pastors. He said, what's your
stand on the law? He said, guilty. What's your stand before God?
Grace. Here, that's where we stand. Better stand right there.
And you will stand before God in that great day. And we rejoice,
he said, in the hope of glory, of the glory of God, in the hope
of God's glory and seeing God's glory. What is God's glory? What
is this glory we're going to see? It's not of what? Aren't those glorious gates?
pearls. Aren't those glorious streets
gold? I said before, that's the reason
I believe the streets are going to be gold is so we'll show our
utter contempt for it. We'll walk on
it. Would you look at him? Now there's
glory. There's glory. That will be glory
for me, the song says. Christ said that they may behold
my glory. Look at verse 3. He said, and
not only so, not only that, we're justified by faith, we have peace
with God, we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand,
we rejoice in the prospects of seeing Christ and forever being
with him, and not only so, he said, verse 3, not only so, but
with glory, in tribulations also. Now, this is where it gets difficult, maybe, but at least takes a little understanding.
With glory in tribulations, he said in, I think it was 2 Corinthians
12, yeah, he said, I rejoice in infirmities when I am weak. He said, I rejoice in infirmities
that the power of Christ may rest upon me. When I'm weak,
then I'm strong. My grace is sufficient. My strength
is made perfect. And we, he says, we glory in
tribulations. Like I told you the story of
Brother Walter Gruber's little adopted Mexican girl. how that
she lived with them for so long a time and was never chastened
or punished like the others because she was a dutiful child. And
finally, one day, she pitched a bid for no reason at all. And finally,
Walter whipped her. And with tears running down her
face, she had a smile on her face. And she told Brother Walter
in Spanish, Now I know you love me. You whip me like you did
your own, your real children. She thought, you know, she wasn't
one of the real children because he didn't whip her. And that's
what the scripture says about us. If we'd be without chastisement,
we're bastards. But God loves those whom he loves. He chastens us. And he chastens
them many times. And he doesn't let his soul spare
for our crimes. If you really love a child, you
want it to conform and grow up to be something, and no matter
how much it cries, you'll keep whipping it until it learns a
lesson. Love is not, oh, I don't want
to hurt it, don't want to hurt it. Love says, I want to hurt it
until it learns, so it won't hurt or kill himself, so it won't
go the way of destruction. The way that seems right at the
end is destruction. I know the way. And if I train
him up or her up in the way that they should go, the Scripture
says they'll not depart from it. So I'm going to chase them
many times and let not my soul spare for their crying. It's
going to hurt them. And that's exactly what God the
Father says about us. It's going to hurt. It has to
hurt to learn a lesson. Read on. He says, Tribulation
work of patience. Tribulation work of patience.
Patience is just waiting on the Lord's will to be done. Tribulation
is trial. It's trouble. That's what tribulation
is. And it wouldn't be a trial if it wasn't hurtful. I hear
people talk about minor inconveniences as trials. You know, car breakdown,
stuff like that. That's no trial. Peter talked
about fiery trials. The world has minor inconveniences.
The world has aches and pains. The world has sicknesses. Don't talk about these things,
these minor inconveniences and everyday struggles and things
of the flesh that everybody goes through, as necessarily being
a trial. At any rate, tribulation or trials
and troubles work patience. Patience is what we need. We
need to wait on the Lord. He said that several times, didn't
he, in the scripture? Wait on the Lord. Wait, I say.
Wait. Don't we need that patience? A little child, that's a sign
of maturity. When you finally get some maturity
about you is when you have a little patience. Little children have
no patience, do they? So they're going to have to go
through a lifelong period of trials, aren't they? To gain
some of this patience. Nancy, it's going to take a life
of living to learn a little patience in. And so it is with the spirit
and spiritual matter. Tribulation worketh patience.
Patience is waiting on God's will to be done. Something happens
to us and we get all bent out of shape like a little child.
Well, we need patience. Because God said, now this is
going to work together for your good. God said, I brought it.
I'm too wise to err. I know what I'm doing. But, but,
but, no buts about it. I know what I'm doing. I did
this. But I can't take it. I wouldn't
have put it on you if you couldn't take it. Now, you just wait. But, but, but, when are we going
to get there? When is this going to be? Just wait. Wait, I say. Wait on the Lord. Tribulation
worketh patience. The more you go through, the
more patience you have to. That's what the next word is,
patience worketh hope or experience, I mean, patience, experience. Patience, experience, the old
saying is experience is the best teacher. Experience is the only teacher. Right? Isn't that right, Roberta? It's the only teacher. Not the
best. Book learning. I better watch
what I'm saying because I'm going to deal with this in a couple
of weeks. But you don't learn, you really don't
learn anything from a book. You learn it from experience.
And I'm here to tell you, if I wouldn't shock you, you really
don't learn it from this book until you learn this book from
experience. And that by trials. Promises
come. He said, I'll never leave you
nor forsake you. When does that mean anything to you? When the world forsakes you and
leaves you and you have trials like that. Then that promise
means something to you. Huh? When it says, will my mother
and my father forsake me? Then the Lord will take me up.
When does that mean anything? Well, you're going to have to
go through a mother and a father forsaking you for the gospel
sake. Right? Who shall separate us from the
love of God? Shall death? When do you really experience
the love and the tender compassion of God Almighty? When you experience
death. and so on and so forth. Experience. Patients' work is experience.
Now, don't ask for trials. They'll come soon enough. But
I'm telling you, they're the best teacher. They're the only
teacher. Patients, experience. Experience. The more experience
you have, the better your hope. The more experience you have,
the better your hope. All right, I build a boat. I build me a
boat. How do I know that boat's gonna
float? Unless I get it in the water. How do I know it's really gonna
float? Unless a little wave comes up. How do I know it's really
gonna float? Unless a wave crashes over the
bow. Unless the wind crops up. Unless everything adverse to
a boat floating hits it. The Scripture says in Psalm 107
verse 23, it says, They that go down in ships do business
in great waters, deep waters. They that go down in ships. You
in a ship? Are you in a ship? You better
believe it. Truly, we're fellas in a ship. Ship called Christ. That's what's
written on the bow and the stern. Ship called Christ, the ark.
We're fellows in a ship. Well, is it going to be smooth
sailing now that we're in Christ? No. He promised us tribulation. That's how you know the boat
floats. Huh? That's how you know you
stand sure, Joe. That's how you know you got on
a good rock. The rock doesn't sink. You stand. You stand in
the midst. The greater the trial, the greater the trial. And after
it's gone, you're still standing. I've got a good hope. You see
what I'm saying? Oh, you say, I hope, I hope,
I hope, I hope. A trial comes along and you're still standing.
I hope, I hope, I hope. Another one comes and you think,
I won't make it through this one. And you still stand firm
where you were. I've got a good hope. Matter
of fact, it's a sure thing. And faith becomes the substance
of that hope. Faith is the substance of things
hoped for, the evidence. Faith becomes its own evidence
of things not seen. How can you believe somebody
hadn't seen? Now, he's shown himself to me.
How do you know he's real? Oh, he's proved himself real
to me too many times. When I thought I was going down,
I didn't. Why? Because he reached down
and picked me up. You really don't understand or
believe the Scriptures to experience and live it. That's what he's
saying here. Patience, experience, experience,
hope. And hope maketh not ashamed. Hope maketh not ashamed. How
are you going to be ashamed of your hope? All your hope. You're all in all. Why would
you be? Real hope. Hope maketh not ashamed. Real hope in Christ based on
experience through trials, proofs of promises, will make one confident
in this cry, I know whom I have believed. Now, young people can
say, I know what? There was a time when I said,
and I still say, I know what I believe. I'm a Calvinist. I strongly believe, oh, I believe
God is sovereign. I believe in the sovereignty
of God. That's what I would have said. I believe in the sovereignty
of God, yes. I believe in limited atonement. I believe in this
and that and the other. experience comes along and brings
hope, and hope brings this, I know whom I believe. And I am persuaded he's able.
You see, the doctrine, you know the person, you have to believe
the doctrine. Right? You have to believe the doctrine.
and hope maketh not ashamed." You can become more confident
in the Christ you believe, unashamed of him. The Pilgrim's Progress, I love
that book. There's a fellow in that called
Mr. Pliable. A Christian was fleeing the wrath,
fleeing the city of destruction, fleeing the wrath of God, going
to the celestial city. And a fellow got a little glimpse
of the wrath of God and all that, and he got interested in the
city, and he stepped in alongside a Christian. His name was Mr. Pliable. And they walked along
for a little while and began to talk, and finally when they
came, they came to a big marsh-like thing called the Slough of Despond,
and a Christian fell in it. First thing, Mr. Pliable didn't
have a burden on his back, Christian death, at the weight of his sins
is what it was. And he fell in this slew of despair and trouble and the muck and
the mire and got down and out. Mr. Pliable didn't. And he said
he stood out on the outside there and said, Where are you now?
What is your faith? What is your venture gotten you now? Now,
what are you going to do? And Mr. Pliable went back. Turned
back. The scriptures or that book says
that he became the laughingstock of the town he returned to. But
a Christian, somebody came along, helped him out. You know what
the fellow's name was? That was his name, Help. A fellow
named Help came along and helped him out, pulled him up, and he
was more determined than ever to flee the city of destruction.
Once he got out of that, and you read the book, you'll see
he got into more trouble than that. And always somebody came
along to help him out. And through each time, through
everything he went through, he was more determined than After
getting through that, he was more determined than ever to
go to the celestial city. He became a fool for Christ's
sake. See, real hope maketh not a shame.
No turning back. Put the hand to the plow. Because,
now here's the depth of the message here. All right, you got it? You with me? Still with me? Verse
5. Hope maketh not a shame. Real hope. Hope experienced.
Experienced through patience. Patience that comes through tribulation
and trial. And this hope maketh not ashamed
because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy
Ghost which is given unto us. The love of God is shed abroad
in our heart by the Holy Spirit. Excuse me, till now, till now,
till I just read this verse the other day. I thought of this verse, I thought
of this love of God shared abroad, and I maybe talked about it along
this line. I thought about this as the love
that God puts in us for Him or for others. That's what I thought he was,
this man, the love of God shed abroad in our heart. In other
words, the love of God. That's in us love for him and
love for one another, because that's not what makes us unashamed. That makes me ashamed. My lack
of love for God. Right. And love for other that
that shames me. That puts the love of God. Is shed abroad. in our heart,
another shed, light shed on, just how broad the love of God
is, the length, the depth, the height, the breadth of His love
that passes understanding, that shed abroad in your heart. You
see that? That's what he's talking about.
That shed about half by the Holy Spirit. That's what the Holy
Spirit testifies to our hearts, to believers. Not to every man. That's not the first thing God,
the Holy Spirit, brings to every man. No. Conviction of sin is
the first thing. But then, in giving faith and
assurance, this is how he assures our hearts. This is how he increases our
hope. makes us unashamed or not fear
shame, because God's love for us is shed abroad. It's shown
to us. It's clearly shown to us. God's
love for us. You see, this perfect love that we read about, this
casts out fear. Well, I know I'm going to go
be with God because I love Him. No. No, herein is love. Not that
we love God, but that He loves me. I know I'm going to go be
with God. Because He loved me. And those
He loved He will never cast out. See, so perfect love cast out
the fear of being cast out. See? That should have brought
in your heart. God's free, sovereign, eternal,
inexpressible love. Turn over to Malachi chapter
1. Malachi chapter 1. The last book
in the Old Testament. Malachi. You know, we talk about, we believe,
we declare, we glorify, we hail sovereign love. Hail sovereign
love. We hail it. Shout hallelujah
to it. Sovereign love, discriminating
love, distinguishing love, electing love, effectual love, eternal
love, saving love, omnipotent love. Sovereign love. Hail sovereign love. We talk
about sovereign love. The difference between the love
we talk about and the love the world's talking about is the
love we hail is sovereign love. And this is the only kind of
love worth hailing. This is the love that's shed
abroad in your heart that will make you, give you hope. I love a God who loves everybody,
and yet they might send them to hell anyway. What hope is
there in that? Or Kestrel, could she live in peace? Without fear, if she thought
at any moment, at any time, I'm liable to cast her out, I'm liable
to kick her out on the street. You can see right now she's not
too concerned about it. Well, this is what gives us hope. Sovereign love. Eternal love. Saving love. Distinguishing love,
electing love, a love for everybody without exception does not give me any hope that sovereign
love does. Look at Malachi chapter 1. I
didn't get there. Here it is. Malachi 1, verse
2, he says, I have loved you, saith the Lord, yet you say,
well, how? Wherein hast thou loved of? Now listen. Was not Esau Jacob's
brother? Yet, I loved Jacob. And hated Esau. And this is not love less, people,
that's what the world say to me, love less. Does this sound
like love less to you, Stan? Laid his mountains and his heritage
to waste for the dragons of the wilderness. Love less? He sends them to hell. Love less? People, God doesn't love anybody
less than anybody else. God's love is perfect. Right? He can't love. If God loves,
it's perfect. It can't be less. He loves me
like he loves his son. No less. You believe that? We're
going to see it in a moment. We're going to see it in a moment. Was not Jacob Esau's brother? Yet I love Jacob. I chose Jacob. In other words, there wasn't
a whit difference between the two of them. Neither one of them deserved
to be loved. I hear in his love. Not that
Jacob loved God, but God loved Jacob. Here in his love, God
chose Jacob. Passed by Esau. Here in his love,
sovereign love. Sovereign love. Here in his love,
fear not thou worm, Jacob. Fear not. Here in his love, Jacob
lived all his life as a sinner. He said, fear not, you sons of
Jacob. You'll not be consumed. Why?
Because of the love of God. I mean the love of God. Sovereign love is revealed to
our hearts. Real love. I love to talk about
God's love. Sovereign love. Free, sovereign, eternal love. Eternal love. And as I said before,
we'll never, you never need fear, shame. Go back to the text. We
never need fear being put to shame. He'd have done it by now,
answer. He'd have done it by now. You're
50. You're going on 60. He'd have done it by now. If his mercy ever ends, it'd
have ended by now. You'd have exhausted it by now
if it's exhaustible. Wouldn't you? If he's lovely,
quit loving you. He loves the unlovely. Doesn't he, John? The unlovely. The ungodly. That's what he says
next. He said, Love of God is shed abroad in our heart by the
Holy Ghost given unto us. When we were yet without strength,
in due time, Christ died for the ungodly. He said, here's
how the love of God is shown to us. The love of God is shed
abroad in our hearts. This is how it is, by the Holy
Spirit, through the preaching of the gospel. This is how the
love of God is revealed to us, when we were yet without strength.
The world says God helps those who help themselves. God doesn't
say that. God says when we were without
strength. This is the love of God, not
love of those that love Him, but love of those that don't
love Him. Here's the help of God helping the helpless when we were yet without strength.
Here's the love of God, not dying for the good and the righteous,
for the ungodly. Now, there's love. There's love. Ungodly. Look over at Romans 8, Romans
chapter 8. How do I know God loves me? How do I know God accepts me? Because of my goodness. Oh, God
forbid. How do I know God loves me? Because
I love him? No. Not that we did love him. How
do I know God will eternally save me? How do I know? Look
at Romans 8 verse 34. Verse 32, verse 32, he that spared
not his own son, but delivered him up for us all. He spared not his son, that's
how I know. How do I know God loves me? He
says Christ died for the ungodly. If Christ died for me when I
was a rotten no good sinner. Then he sure is not going to
kick me out now that I'm a rotten no good sinner. Right? Christ doesn't have to
die again. He's seated on the throne. He
paid the greatest price there was. He despaired, not his own son,
for an ungodly wretch. See, I wasn't any good. I was
ungodly, rotten. Well, what about now? I'm still
no good. Well, that's what he's saying back in our text in Romans
5. He says, look at verse 7. He
says, for scarcely for a righteous man will one die. For a righteous man. Who's righteous? There's none righteous. No, not
one. Just folks think they are. Would you die for one of those
birds? She's not here. Would you die for one of those
people? Would you die for one of these self-righteous? I'm
talking, I'm one of these Southern Baptists. Well, one of these
Presbyterian, pick one, pick a denomination. Pick one of these
self-righteous people for risk of fearing. One of these independent
Baptists. Play him a little, fun a little,
fun a little. Play him a little, fun a little.
Baptist, goody, you know, holier than thou, just, you know. A fella I do business with's like
that. Oh, I just, I just hate to, hate to see him come. But I wouldn't die for that guy. I wouldn't sacrifice, well, I
better be careful. I got some livestock worth more
than that dude. That's what he's saying here,
for scarcely for a righteous man, self-righteous man, would
you die for him? Would you sacrifice Joseph Aaron
for one of those dudes, Stephen? I wouldn't even think about it.
Or read on. He says, yet for adventure for
a good man some would even dare to die. Good men. I know some
good folks. We have some people in the community
we call friends. Them calling us friends is getting
less and less. But we like them. I mean, they're
just good people. Y'all know some. Nice people. good as far as men go, good people,
good men and women, nice, moral, upright, fine people. You know
anybody like that? You know anybody like that? Would
you die for them? Doubt it. Might, but I doubt it. Wouldn't
send your son to die for them. Well, look at this. But God,
verse 7, commendeth His love toward us. Now, I do know what many of you
think about yourself. All the time, I brag on certain
people. I say, oh, I love you. I appreciate you. I just brag
on you. And you say, this is what you
say to me. If you only knew me, you wouldn't
say those things. Right? We all say we're less
than the least. We're not fit to be called a
disciple. We say we're the chief of synod.
You know, other people love you and esteem you highly, but you
esteem yourself so lower than a snake's belly, as Donnie would
say. And you say, if you knew me,
you wouldn't say those things. God knows you. But God commendeth His love toward
us. In that while we were yet what?
Have some faults? Have to make some mistakes? I
don't know how far God reached to pick you up, but He went to
the uttermost to get me. He scraped the bottom of the
barrel to get me. God commended His love toward
me. In that way, and while I was yet a sinner, Christ died for us. There's no way that you could
illustrate this. There's no way that any man could
expound this as it ought to be. No way. Someday we'll know. Someday we'll know. What Christ
did for us, how Christ died for a vile, wretched, God-hating
children of wrath, even as others. And we're just saying, you wouldn't
die for some of these people. Would you die? You wouldn't die
for a self-righteous man. You wouldn't die for a pretty
good fella. You sure wouldn't die for these scumbags, would
you? Would you die for one of these
pimps or harlots or drug pushers? What if they raped and murdered
your daughter? That's what we did to God's Son. You see? Now how do you see the
love of God? And that's the reason this love
is not shared abroad. It doesn't mean anything to men
and women until they realize what they've done to God's Son
and how they're undeserving, how they're ungodly. Love of
God doesn't mean a thing. They can talk about it all they
want. But that God who so-called loves them, a minute of trial
comes along and they're gone. You know, how could a God of
love do that? They don't understand that, do
they? But we through, and we can go right back, can't we?
We through tribulation works patience, and patience, experience,
experience, hope, and hope makes not a shame because the love
of God. We see that a loving God did that, an all-wise, loving
God. And this is the greatest proof,
He commended His love toward us, and that while we were yet
sinners, Christ died for us. It would be much worse than me
throwing my daughter into a pack of perverts. That's exactly what God did to
His Son for the likes of that. Is that last line of that
psalm anything to you now? Love so amazing, so divine. demands my soul, my life, and
my all. Huh? Does that mean something
to you now? I believe we can sing that line
now. No greater show than this, that
a man lay down his life for his friends. We were his enemies. His enemy. Verse nine, it says,
Much more then, much more then. I love the much mores of Scripture.
My pastor preached on that one time. Much more. Much more then. Being now justified by his blood,
we shall be saved from wrath through him. Rock of ages cleft
for me. Let me hide my soul in thee.
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. We shall be saved. Why? I like
that. Did you notice there it says,
much more than being now justified by his blood. Romans 8 said,
Who is he that condemneth Christ died? We shall be saved. Don't you like that? Much more
than being justified, we shall be safe. God might be. We shall be safe. Why? Because
He poured out His soul on it. Because of the price it took
that God paid to purchase me. How do I know that God's going
to save me? Because of what it cost Him. He's going to keep
me. I'm still not worth any more
to him now than it was when he paid the bride. I told you the
story about that old cat that we got, that we rescued from
the pound. Worthless, no good cat. Paid
good money for a cat. I mean, there's cats everywhere.
Why would you pay money for a cat? Huh? We paid, Stan. Rick, he doesn't like cats. We
paid money. for a cat. I mean, they're everywhere. You can stir them with a stick. Not only that, we not only paid
money in the beginning, we've been paying for it ever since.
Feeding and watering and petting and taking to the vet, we had
once a billion dollars invested in these cats. Slight exaggeration. But what does God have invested
in us sinners? You know, I've got so much invested
in those cats, I'm going to keep them. I'm going to get some fun
out of those cats. I'm going to get some joy out
of those cats. They keep me up at night going in heat. But we paid money for that cat.
I'm not going to keep it. God paid a lot more for us. It
ain't no ifs, ands, or maybes, and buts about it. He's going
to keep us. Well, let's quit on this. It
says, much more than being justified by his blood, we shall be saved
from wrath through him, through him. For if when we were enemies,
We were reconciled to God by the death of his son. Much more.
Much more. Being reconciled, shall we be
saved by his life. Christ said, I ever live to make
intercession to them. Because I live, you shall live
also. He ever liveth to make intercession
for the transgressors. He was numbered with the transgressors.
And now he ever lives to make intercession for them. And the
Father says to the Son, who paid to this end, Christ both died
and was buried and rose again, that he might be Lord. As Psalm
2 said, ask of me, I'll give you the heathen for your possession. He bought the right to do with
his own as he pleased. And the Father says, what do
you want, my son, for sacrificing, for doing what you did? You know
what Christ said in John 17? I will, that they be with me where I
am, that they might behold my glory. Who? Those sinners. I want them up in heaven with
me. Dictum facto. Whatever you want, what you'll
get. We don't need those sinners. I know, and I'm just going to
figure your speech, but I want them. That's who I
want. That's who I want. You can have any of it. I want
these sinners. I want the worst. They give more glory to God. God commended his love toward
us while we were yet sinners. Herein is love, and the love
of God is shed abroad in our hearts. And then we have hope,
but it's not a hint. One will soon, you'll see. But I guess I will. It's pretty. That's the reason
no one will see it. But it's a good one. The way that He loves is as fair
as the day that blesses my way with love. The way that He loves is as soft
as the breeze caressing the trees. at night. So tender and precious
is He, contented with my Savior I'll be. The way that He loves is so thrilling
because his love reaches him the way that he loves is as deep as the sea His spirit
shall be my stay The way that He loves is as pure as a rose
Much sweeter He grows each day His peace hovers near like a
dove. I know there's a Savior above. To Christ I now cling. Life's a wonderful thing because
of the way He loves. Christ, I now believe, life's
a wonderful thing, because of the way He died. All right, you just believe.