Okay, Matthew, Chapter five. Matthew, Chapter five. Let's read verses ten through
twelve. Blessed are they which are persecuted,
for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you. and shall say all manner of evil
against you falsely for my sake. To rejoice and be exceeding glad,
for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets
which were before you. Blessed are they which are persecuted
for righteousness' sake. This is the last of the eight
Beatitudes that our Lord pronounced upon believers. Beatitude meaning
blessing. This is the last of the eight.
And as we've gone down through here, it should be clear to you,
I believe, as it has been to me, how that this is a progressive
work. progressive work of God and this
work of grace in the heart of every believer. And it's a continual
one. I remind you, it's a continual
one. The first work of the Holy Spirit, I'm just going to review
a little bit here, down through here. The first work of the Holy
Spirit is found in verse three, is to convict or convince of
sin. That's what the Lord said, wasn't
it, to his disciples. When the Comforter, when the
Holy Spirit has come, he will convict the world, convince the
world of sin. Verse 3, and that brings about
a poverty in spirit. Blessed are the poor in spirit,
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven, or the gospel of the
kingdom. The poor have the gospel preached unto them, Christ said.
The poor man, this is the first work in this work of salvation. It's when the Holy Spirit makes
a man or a woman or a young person realizes that they are nothing. They have nothing. They know
nothing. They can do nothing for God,
who is and has everything. They are nothing, have nothing,
know nothing, can do nothing for God. And secondly, This causes
them to mourn. Verse 4, blessed are they that
mourn, for they shall be comforted. They have nothing, know nothing,
then they mourn the fact that they have nothing. They see their
lack of anything to merit salvation, anything to
recommend them to God, a righteousness, and they mourn their lack of
that. And that causes them to seek it. Verse 5, and this gives
them a humility before this God. Blessed are the meek, for they
shall inherit the earth. Realizing you are nothing, have
nothing, know nothing, can do nothing for God, you don't have
anything that God needs or God wants or that God is pleased
with, that will humble you. Contrary to what I see today
in most so-called new converts today, I see in many new so-called
converts today, they become very loud and very vocal as soon as
the Lord supposedly saves them, or as soon as they got saved
in their own word. They become very loud and very
vocal. They become immediate experts on religion, you know.
That's not so with a true convert, not so with a true child of God.
I've seen countless cases, well every single person I've ever
run into, whom I feel the Lord has truly converted and regenerated. They may have been a public figure
at one time, they may have been in religion and singing and playing
and performing and preaching even, but once the Lord gives them a glimpse of His glory,
who He is, and gives them a glimpse of themselves. Nothing. The blackness
of their own heart. It stops their mouth. They don't
become loud. They become quiet. Oh, sure,
they'll be zealous for the truth and go out and tell people what
the Lord's done for them, but they won't be braggadocious. Is that a word? They won't be
proud. They won't be immediate experts. No, they become babes. They become
babes and sitting with a willing and teachable spirit. Humble
before this holy and sovereign God. Then verse six, blessed
are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness, for
they shall be filled. Poor in spirit, mourning their
lack of anything good, any righteousness. Humble before this holy and sovereign
God. They begin to cry out. for Christ,
for the substitutionary work of Christ, for salvation. They
see their need of Christ. Christ to be their representative,
to be their substitute, to be their mediator. And like I said,
this is an ongoing work. This continues. The child of
God never leaves any of these points, does He? He stays with
you. You always stay poor before the
Lord. You always mourn your sins, don't
you? You always stay humble before your God. You continually cry
out for Christ, hunger and thirst after his righteousness. This
is a continual work. Though it's a progressive work,
it's a continual work. And then verse seven, feeling
the mercy of God toward their own souls, they in turn become
merciful. They hear the gospel and feel
the mercy of God toward them, and they become merciful themselves.
Blessed are the pure in hearts, for they shall see God, experiencing
and seeing the mercy and grace of God in Christ. They see, every
child of God sees where the mercy and grace of God is, and the
love of God, Romans 8, 39. They see where the love of God
is, don't they? It's in Christ. They see where the mercy of God
comes from, because of Christ. They see where the grace of God,
the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life.
Where? Through Jesus Christ. They see where grace comes from.
Grace is unmerited favor, mercy. So that makes them have a pure
faith that is 100% Christ and Christ alone. They look to Christ
and Christ alone. Their faith is grounded, settled,
unmoved, they're firmly persuaded, they know whom they have believed,
they know what they have believed, they know how they were saved,
they know who did to save them. There's no doubt about these
things. They know it's Christ and Christ alone. They may not
be able to articulate perfectly their theology, but if you ask
them, what is salvation? How were you saved? They may
be able to only say one word, Christ. That's enough. They know
that pure Christ. I believe that's the true meaning
of this word pure in heart. They have a heart that's purely
100% grounded and settled faith in Christ. And it's also a sincere
heart. Purity means sincerity as well. They're a sincere seeker and
follower. They're not a half-hearted, so-called half-hearted Christian.
No man can serve two masters. They don't have half a heart
for the world and half a heart for Christ. No, sir. No, ma'am.
Not possible. Christ, it is not possible. He said you cannot love two people
to love one supremely. All right. Christ is all to the
true convert, and then they become when they see Christ as their
all. Christ is all their wisdom, their righteousness, sanctification
and impurity. And they see all they need in
Christ. They in turn, verse nine, become these publishers of the
gospel of peace, peacemakers. I believe that's a good definition
of that verse there. They become publishers of the
gospel of peace, willing and wanting to tell others of this
gospel, of their Lord, if given the opportunity. And it also
makes them become gentle and peaceable people. They become
peaceable toward others. As much as possible, they try
to live peaceably with all men. Now, we come to our text here
in verses ten through twelve. And like I said, now this is
a progressive work, the grace of God, and He brings a man,
every single child of God, every single regenerated person, God
brings them through these things. They have this attitude within
them, and it stays with them. This is where they begin, and
they carry it right on through by the work of the Holy Spirit.
Now, this person is a disciple of the Lord Jesus Christ, a follower
of the Lamb, a contender for the truth. They are, in Christ's
words, not of this world. You know what he said? You're
not of this world. He said, if you were, they would
love you, because the world loves its own. If you were, they would
hear you. I've got a quote going in Sunday's
bulletin that says, you've heard the charges against the gospel
of grace. They say the gospel of grace
leads to antinomianism. They say the gospel of God's
sovereign grace will cause people to sin? Augustus' top lady said
this. He said, if the doctrines of
grace promoted sin and licentiousness, then you would see it as the
most accepted form of doctrine today. That's what everybody
would be teaching. Right? That's a good statement,
isn't it? But it's not. But the fact that
you're not of this world and you don't speak of this world,
but you rather speak of your God, the world won't hear you.
The world hears what the world wants to hear, right? What the
world's saying, not what God's saying. Never has, never will.
Peter said you don't run to the same excess of riot as you once
did. You're a different person, a
changed man. You may not feel it on the inside
all the time, but you are indeed a changed man or woman. And you
become a zealot for the gospel. Yeah, you're a religious zealot.
And ready to tell others of the truth of the gospel. And whenever
you tell somebody the truth of the gospel, you naturally have
to tell them the error of their ways, don't you? The gospel condemns
that the truth will expose error. And that's what men will hate
you for, won't they? Christ said, if I hadn't come, they would
still have a cloak for their sin. Religion would be going
on just fine and dandy if the gospel hadn't been introduced.
And if we introduce the gospel, if a man introduces the gospel,
it breaks up people's religious playhouses and it makes them
mad. He or she then becomes persecuted. Persecuted. In the words of Scripture,
they become hated. maligned, shunned, scoffed, lied
upon, avoided, misconstrued, misrepresented. But our Lord
says here in verse ten, you're blessed. You're blessed. Blessed. This needs to be understood.
He said, Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness
sake. Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
They are the ones who inherit this kingdom. They're the ones
who are going there. They're the ones who have it
now. This needs to be understood in much the same way as the other
Beatitudes. God is spirit. His words are
spirit and truth. That's what Christ said. has
to be understood first in a spiritual light. Are you with me? I just
did a sermon. Alright, you're persecuted for
righteousness sake. Christ said, blessed are they
which are persecuted for righteousness sake. Our righteousness? Huh? Turn over to Romans chapter
13 with me. Now this is the way that 999,999
out of 101 million will interpret this passage of
Scripture. They're going to persecute you because you're a religious
man. No, sir. The world doesn't hate a religious man. They won't
persecute a religious man. Well, they'll say, he's a good
old Christian boy. I worked with a fellow out there the other
day. He said, yeah, so-and-so, you need to get him to work on
your bill. He's a good Christian, you know. Romans 13, nobody hates or persecutes
a good old boy, a decent, moral, law-abiding citizen. Nobody hates
or persecutes. Look at this, Romans 13, verse 3. Paul said,
Rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Would thou then not be afraid
of the power? Do that which is good, and you'll
have praise of the same. If you do what's right, then
nobody's going to get on to you. Right? That's what he says there. Turn over to John chapter 10.
If you do good works, you be a humanitarian, if you be a good... How can I say this? A good Methodist,
I'll just say it, a good Catholic, you know, a nice, good, law-abiding,
decent, moral, upstanding citizen, religious man, going to church,
On Sunday, you know, paying your bills. Good old Joe. Good old guy. Everybody like
you. No problem. No problem. You do good works, be humanitarian.
You know, the Catholic Church probably does more in the way
of humanitarian efforts than any other denomination. You know
that? They feed the poor. They do a lot of things. It doesn't matter, though, how
ridiculous you are or your religion. It doesn't matter. It doesn't
matter how far from the truth of God's Word it is. And some
of these cults and these sects, and that's where I put all of these I just mentioned,
a sect, and their erroneous doctrine and their ridiculous ways, it
doesn't matter. You be a good old boy, and like I said, good
to others, even religious. And all men will speak well of
you. They'll speak well of you. Just don't start talking about
this sovereign God, though. We'll be all right. Right? Just don't be talking about the
sovereign God. And don't talk about His sovereign Christ. Now,
you can talk about Jesus, how He loves everybody, and He needs
you and wants you. We'd love to have you as a member
of our church, but don't be talking about some sovereign Christ who
doesn't need you, who doesn't want you. If he does want you,
he'll have you. Don't be talking about that.
Don't be talking about a sovereign Holy Spirit. No, don't talk about
that. And sure don't talk about a helpless,
worthless, hopeless creature called man. Don't leave this
man in the hands of this sovereign God. Oh, no, he can do something.
He's got a will. He's got some power with God.
Do good works, and they'll speak well of you. Speak about the
sovereign God, and they'll kill you if they can. Look here at
John 10, verse 32. Christ said, Many good works
have I showed you from my Father. Which of these works do you stone
me for? Oh, they said, Oh, we don't stone you for a good work.
As a matter of fact, we wish you'd just keep right on feeding
us. We'll take your health and wealth gospel, right? We'll take
this lovey-dovey God and Jesus that, you know, just wants to
so bad and can't. It's up to us, and He makes us
feel real special and needed. We'll take that. But you're blaspheming. When you start talking about
God, they said, you're just a man. You make yourself God. You make
yourself God. No, he didn't, did he, Joe? God
made him God. God made him Lord a long time
ago. Don't start talking about this, that God made Christ Lord
before the foundation of the world, and he was Lord when he
got here, and he was Lord when he left, and he's Lord now. And
you don't make him Lord. Don't start talking about that.
Everything will be fine. Don't start telling men about
man's righteousness being filthy rags. Don't dare do that. If you want peace, you ought
to be loved and liked in the community. Don't start telling
the best man, good people, that their righteousness, the best
thing I've ever done, is filthy rag. Don't tell them what the
Scripture says, Henry. Right? Don't tell them that the
best man who ever lived, the Pope, is altogether vanity. Don't
tell them that. That they're unacceptable to
God. Don't start talking about the impossibility of pleasing
a holy and righteous God by our works of righteousness, our good
deeds, or our religion, if you want peace. Right? If you want to be well liked.
But if you dare to tell men and women that the best deeds of
the best man who ever lived are not good enough, that the only
way a sovereign God will accept them is by Jesus Christ doing
something for them, altogether outside of themselves, by Jesus
Christ imputing to whom He will His righteousness. He doesn't
have to, but He does to some people, and they're even called
the elect. You dare to tell me in that,
that Jesus Christ is the only hope of salvation, that only
by Jesus Christ will they be saved and received by God?" And
Christ said, you will be persecuted. You will be persecuted. He said,
you will be reviled. Have you ever had anybody gnash
their teeth at you? Huh? Just for when you sit in
their eyes. I don't like that. What'd I say? What'd I do? I just read Romans 9 to you.
I don't care. Have you ever had that happen? It baffles you, doesn't it? It
baffles your mind. But Christ said, blessed are you. I'm glad he said this. Blessed
are you. Look at it again. Matthew 5.
Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness sake, for theirs is the kingdom of
heaven. He said that before. Kingdom
of heaven. Verse 3. What is the kingdom of heaven?
It's the gospel of the kingdom. It's the Christ of the kingdom.
You have the true gospel. If you didn't, they would speak
well of you. Right? A church that is huge and I'm
going out on a limb here, but I have scriptures to back me
up here. Of one of these great, big, huge
monstrosities, these huge religious edifices with thousands of people
swarming into them, where a man's standing up saying nothing, it's
a pretty good evidence that that's not God's church because most
of the people go there. Because the majority, the people
are flocking to get into it. It never has been the case with
the truth, has it? Never has been. Were people flocking
to get in Noah's Ark? Well, they were sitting back
laughing at them. Eight people in that little church. The New
Testament church started with twelve disciples, and they killed
all of them. And there were little churches popped up here and there.
Jerusalem was about the biggest of the day. But they wiped that
thing out, and it spread out all over to little churches here
and there. Every now and then, God will raise up a rather large,
by our standards, a large church with a lot of people, back in
the 18th century, 17th century, thousands of people. Some of
that, though, is due to the fact that back then they didn't have
televisions. They didn't have theaters. Well, they had some
of those plays and so forth, but everybody was, that was a
form of entertainment. Charles Spurgeon, George Whitefield
were renowned men of their day, and they were highly esteemed. The clergy were highly esteemed,
and everybody just went out to hear the preacher. Dignitaries,
notable people. Benjamin Franklin, you've heard
that statement. He went to go hear George Whitefield
all the time. They asked him, he said, Do you
believe what he preaches? He said, No. Why do you go? It's the thing
to do. Everybody else does. But what
he said was that he believed what he was preaching. But back
then it was a form of entertainment. And it's pretty much that way
now. But the truth, the gospel, the church, based upon history,
look back through it. Small, few, right? For odd is
the road that leads to destruction. Many there be that go in it.
Narrow, is that way that leads unto eternal life, and few there
be that find that. Right? Many are called. Many people have the Bible. Henry,
many people have a general call, don't they? Providence, God's
Word, few are chosen. Blessed are you if you're chosen
to be persecuted for the truth. I don't relish, I don't delight
in the fact that we have a small number in it. I'm not gloating
in that fact. Not at all. I'm thanking God
for the truth of the gospel. I'm thanking God for revealing
the gospel to me. I'm thanking God for revealing
the gospel to a little handful of people He didn't have to.
He didn't have to reveal it to any of them. If there were just
two people in here tonight, that would be a real blessing, wouldn't
it, if the gospel was preached? Two people believed it. Blessed are you when men shall
revile you and persecute you and shall say all manner of evil
against you, falsehood. Lie on you. Ellis, they're talking about
you behind your back. I guarantee you. Yes, he's one of them. Predestinarian. Oh, is it in the Bible? Is predestination
in God's Word? Do you believe God's Word? What's wrong with that, Tim?
Huh? Blessed are ye, Ellen. You believe God's predestinating
power. You believe in a predestinating
God. You're a blessed woman. You're more blessed than most
of those women you work with. For Christ's sake. For Christ's
sake. We need to, and by God's grace,
we'll continue to preach Christ high and man's real low. We can't get man low enough,
Joe, can we? We can't get Christ high enough,
can we? You can't get God sovereign enough, can you? Not according
to this Word. And you will be hated and abused,
but you're blessed of God. You're blessed of God with true
faith, true faith is believing in the true God. This is eternal
life, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus
Christ, whom he has sent. Light? You're not in religious
darkness anymore, John. You're walking in blessed light,
buddy. And it's the light of the gospel
of the glory of God, isn't it? Not the light of the gospel of
the sugar daddy up in heaven, is
it? The glorious God. And life? Life? Religious life? How many of you
went through religion and put on the show? Played the game?
Were you happy? Huh? I mean, really, there's
no life, there's no real enjoyment in religion. There's enjoyment
in Christ. You can rejoice in the Lord,
can't you? Discernment? You can look at God's Word, read
God's Word, and understand pretty much everything. Not one in a
million. Not one in a million understand
some of the simplest of passages in the Scripture. Blessed is your mind, Terry Kindler.
It's had some truth revealed to it. And, verse twelve, you
have cause to rejoice because of this. Rejoice, be exceeding
glad. Great is your reward in heaven,
and you're in good company. You're in good company. So persecuted
they the prophets which were before you." He said, great is
your reward in heaven. Well, I can hear them now. I
can hear them take off with that verse, can't you? Reward. What is a believer's reward? Yeah, that's my punchline. I
didn't mean for you to answer it. Generally, I want you to
answer it. It's not, the believer's reward is not a crown in heaven. It's not a front row seat in
glory. No, you get the same thing that
Abraham got. Right? Abraham is called the
father of the faithful. And you remember that story.
Abraham was, as we are many times, upset with his lot in life. His nephew. No pun intended. But lot, you know, it came to
that that point where God or Abraham was tired of the fuss
and the fighting and all that. It was a church play joke. And
Lot, you know, went down there and joined a big church. Abraham
went up into a little mountain place. But what Abraham got,
you know, he looked back on and said, Why can't we have that?
Why can't I have that? And Lot, you know, was in the well-watered
plains of Sodom. Oh, wasn't Lot well-off? what Abraham did. And that's
when the Lord came to him in Genesis 15 verse 1 and said,
Abraham, I am thy exceeding great reward. David, you can go on and on through
the scripture and give illustrations. David, the man after God's own
heart, what did he get? Well, he was in exile. He was
on the run. You're talking about somebody
persecuted him, hated his children. That's what Christ said, wasn't
it? A man should be hated by his own family. A man's enemies
should be those of his own household. His own son sought to slay him. He was hiding in caves, in caves. And David, one time, just like
Abraham, just like we get, he was mourning. He was a little
bit murmuring, complaining. He said, he said, the people
out there are fat and sassy, the wicked people, they're having
a big old time in the world. They've got this, they've got
that, and look at me. Why am I getting all of this? He said,
when I came to my senses, he said, I was a fool. I entered
into the house of God, heard the gospel. He heard what great
things I had in my God. He thought, I was a fool. How could I have been so foolish?
And that's when he said down there in Psalm 73, 25, Who do
I have in heaven but Thee? And really, there's none on earth
I desire beside Thee. God is what I want, then and
now. Right? Christ... Okay, Terry, you can say it now.
and the gospel are reward enough for the believer now. And he'll
be reward enough for the believer then, won't he? Just to see his
face. What's that song, Face to Face?
That will be glory for me, won't it? But now listen to this. See if this doesn't make sense. That's the majority of people
today, religionists, mere religionists. That's what Christ said. That's
what Isaiah said, didn't it? Christ quoted Isaiah and he said,
The prophet said, Would this people draw near to me with their
lips? Their heart is far from me. They're just religionists,
right? In this thing for gain. Religionists who are in it for
gain, health, wealth, reward, they are taken up with, and you
know this is so, they're taken up with everything, most everything
but Christ right now. Right? And consequently, what
are they looking for in heaven? Happiness? Mama? Things? Right? If you're not taken up with Christ
now, you'll not be taken with Him then. You'll not be taken
up by Him then. Right? If you're not taken up
with and in love with, if Christ is not your all now, you won't
have all of Christ then. You won't have him then. It's sad, but it's true. If you contend for Christ and
the gospel above man and his works, if you contend for Christ and
the gospel above man and his works, You will be persecuted
and scoffed at as being a heresy. The way they call heresy, though,
is the way we preach it, and so I believe. Yes, it's hard
to believe in. There's only one way you can
explain this. poor, dumb, blind, ignorant religion. They haven't seen the glory of
God in the face of Christ. Else they would be taken up with
it. Else their preaching would be full of Christ and Christ
alone, right? A man sees his glory. What else
is there? I heard my pastor preach not
too long ago. He said when a man in Asheville, he preached from
Hebrews 10, Hebrews 10 verse 1, he said, God has in His last
days spoken unto us by His Son. And he said, once a man ever
hears that powerful voice, the voice of the sound of many waters,
the voice of wisdom, the voice of the ages, the voice of the
shepherd, he'll not listen to anybody else's voice. And he'll
be listening for that voice from then on. He said, once you hear
that voice, everything else is anti-climactic. Anything anybody
says or whoever does the speaking, no matter how charismatic he
is or good-looking or what he does, that's well below hearing
the Master's voice. Once you've heard the gospel,
all this babbling and foolishness and hand-waving, that's a bunch
of bull. I wish I could say it like the
Greek reads. Right? So persecuted they, the prophets.
Do I have time? I got five or six minutes. Turn
over with me to First Kings 18. Let's just browse through here
a few minutes more and look at how they persecuted the prophets
before you. Same thing happened to them as
now. And this is good. This confirms
what we believe. Look at the word. First Kings
18 did I say? First Kings 18. I'm sorry. First
Kings 18. Many of you know this story about
Elijah facing all these false prophets. It says in 1 Kings
18, beginning with verse 19. Now, Elijah said, we're going
to have a showdown here. And he says in verse 19, send
and gather to me all Israel into Mount Carmel and the prophets
of Baal, 450. And I read this to be in 400
more prophets of the groves. That's idols, groves. Wherever
you see the word grove, that's an idol. 450 prophets of Baal,
or the devil, false prophets, and the prophets of idolatry,
whatever they were, 400. So that's 850. Elijah was one man. One man, Henry. And I've said this many times,
and I contend, I'm just certain of it, the ratio is greater than
that now. I mean, yeah, is that right? It's about 850,000 a woman now. Everybody's brother and his mother
now is a preacher. Women! All right, so verse 20. Ahab
sent unto all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets
together to Mount Carmel. Elijah came unto all the people,
and here was his message. How long halt ye between two
opinions? You don't know what you believe.
In other words, isn't that what Christ said to the woman at the
whale job? You don't know what you believe. If the Lord be God,
if there is a God, a sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient, omnipresent,
absolute ruler, controller, judge, creator of all things, if there
is a God in heaven, you better be worshiping Him, right? But
now, if your little Baal or your little Jesus is God, if He can
really save you, then worship Him. If he'll give you all of
it, then go ahead. And, oh, Elijah, you know, he
got to thinking about it a little bit later, verse 22. And he said
to the Lord privately, I even, Lord, I even, I only remain a
prophet of the Lord. I'm alone. Prophets of Baal were
450 men. Now look down at verse 27. But
came to pass, they got together, you know, this, Elijah told them
what to do, we'll put some Bullock's on the altar and so forth. In
verse twenty-seven, it came to pass at noon that Elijah, these
fellows, remember Elijah told them, he said, if fire falls,
whoever's altar the bullock is, the fire falls on it, that's
God. That's God. So they began to
leap and shout, you know, and talk in the... and cut themselves,
you know, go through all this and slay people in the spirit
and jump on the pews and do all this stuff, you know. But there wasn't any gospel being
preached, was there? There wouldn't be any lamb being
consumed, was there? There wasn't any blood being preached. In
verse 27, Elijah began to mock them. And I'm not afraid, Steve,
I'm not afraid to mock these people. They deserve to be mocked,
don't they? They're mocking us behind our
backs just for claiming the truth, right? Call a spade a spade. Call a false prophet a false
prophet. But ships fall where they may. It came to pass Elijah
mocked them. Verse 27 said, Cry louder! And
that's what they're doing. This is exactly what they're
doing, isn't it? Give Jesus a big hand! He can't
hear you. Louder! One more verse, same as the first. Cry aloud if he's God. He's a
God. He must be talking. He must be
busy over somewhere else. He's talking or maybe he's pursuing.
I challenge you to look that up and see what that's saying.
I mean, Elijah now was a prophet, and buddy, he got down where
the rubber meets the road. He said he's off doing his business.
That's what he's saying here. And he's in a journey, or perventure.
He's sleeping. He must be awake. And they did. They got mad. They cried aloud
until they were just worn plum out. Worn plum out. All right. Down in verse 36 and
verse 37. It came to pass, the time of the offering of the evening
sacrifice, it was time for Elijah to speak. He got up to preach.
And it was a short message. He got up. said, Lord God of
Abraham, Isaac, and of Israel. In other words, my God's the
Old Testament God. I'm going to preach God from the Scriptures,
not just what I think, right? I'm not going to come up with
a little silly sermonette. I'm going to tell you what Abraham believed.
I'm going to tell you what Isaac believed. I'm going to tell you
what Israel believed. I'm going to tell you about this
covenant God. I'm going to tell you about the
God of the Scriptures and what He's saying in it. Let it be
known this day that thou art God, in the true sense of the
word, in Israel, and that I am thy servant, and I have done
all these things at thy word. Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that
this people may know. What are you in this for, Elijah?
Money? No, the glory of God, that this people may know the
Lord God. That's why I'm here. And turn
their heart again in the fire. That's typical of the Holy Spirit,
I believe. The Holy Spirit falls on the
hearts of His people and assumes a sacrifice, a sacrifice of their
praise. The Lord is God. Turn over quickly
to Lamentations, chapter 3. Let's look at what Jeremiah has
to say. Well, you know, shortly after
Elijah did that, you know what Jezebel started chasing him.
Jezebel was after him to kill him. He slew her preacher, her
preachers. He killed all of her preachers.
And she started after old Elijah and he was hated, persecuted,
reviled. Lamentations chapter 3. Jeremiah here, this is what he says, if I can
find it myself. Jeremiah was hated just like
old Elijah here. Look at verse fourteen. He said,
I was a derision to all my people. Jeremiah was a true prophet of
God, but none of the people liked him. I was a derision to all
my people and their song all the day. Verse twenty-two. And this was his message. This
is Jeremiah's message. And this is why he was hated.
It's hard to understand, isn't it? Why a man would be hated
for a message like this, John? Verse 22. It's of the Lord's
mercies that we're not concerned. We need mercy, people. We've
offended an angry God, a holy God. We're sinners in the hands
of an angry God, and if we're not consumed by His wrath and
His judgment, it'll be by His mercy and grace through the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's of the Lord's mercies that we're not concerned.
His compassion is failing us anew every morning. It's because
of His faithfulness. It's not going to be because
of your faithfulness. It's going to be because of His faithfulness.
The Lord is my portion, Jeremiah said, and I'll hope in Him. But
I'm a derision of my people. And I don't know if you've heard
of Daniel. Do you know the story of Daniel? Everybody else was
bound to the king, and this false god, Daniel, refused to do so,
and they cast him into the lion's den. And the story goes on. Isaiah, Isaiah was hated. Ezekiel, David, Zechariah, go
on. John the Baptist. Old Rock Barnard
preached a message one time entitled, Preaching That'll Get Your Head
Cut Off. And that's what John the Baptist
preached. Terry, all he preached was repent and behold the Lamb. He got his head cut off. If they could do it today, they'd
do it. They'd keep doing it. And time would fail us to tell
about the martyrs and the Puritans, right? I've been reading about
John Knox, the life of John Knox, and the ruler of some town in
Scotland, he wanted to go preach here in St. Andrews, Scotland.
Hired the army to keep him out of the city, to keep him from
preaching. They said, you will be shot on sight if you enter
this town. They're all preachers. You see,
that is, you're not going to be hated or persecuted for being
a good person. The righteousness Christ is talking
about here is talking about his righteousness and his alone. Was not Noah a preacher of righteousness?
What about Isaiah? Keep on going. Whose righteousness
does David talk about? Christ. Jehovah Sidkenna. He will be hated for his name's
sake. What's his name? Jehovah Sidkenna. He'll be hated for his righteousness. But blessed are you, blessed
are your eyes, your ears, with the gospel. You have the person
and work of Christ in the gospel. Blessed are you when you're persecuted,
reviled, lied upon for Christ's sake." And Christ said, Rejoice! Rejoice! This is a witness of
the Holy Spirit bearing witness with your spirits. He said this, and I'll close.
Let me quote this verse and close it. Paul said this in Philippians
1.29. It is given to you. Here's a gift. God is going to
bless you and highly favor you, John David, with a wonderful
gift. You ready for it? You want it?
It is given unto you, not only to believe, as faith is a gift,
right? You didn't drum it up. You just
did nothing to accept Jesus and decide for Jesus, did you? Oh,
no. God revealed Christ in you. You
couldn't help but believe. That's given to you. That's not
all. You know the rest of it, don't you? It is given unto you on behalf
of Christ for Christ's sake, not only to believe, but to also
suffer. That's a mystery, isn't it? That's
a mystery. Suffer for righteousness, isn't
it? Well, my prayer is that the Lord
will lead me and teach me and guide me and mold me and make
me and impress upon me and consume me and dedicate me and commit
me and submit me So great a salvation, so great a cause is this. It's
my reasonable service. It's given, see, given me this
great gift of faith. It's the least I could give Him,
isn't it? My life. My servant. Okay, stand with me and I'll
dismiss it. Dear Lord, we, Your Word, convicts us greatly. We have
done nothing up to this point. Compared to what we read in your
scriptures, Hebrews 11, that those people of whom the world
is not worthy, what all things they suffered for your namesake,
we hang our heads in shame. But he who believeth on thee,
this whoever believeth, shall not be ashamed, shall not be
put to shame in that great day, and by your grace, by your help,
by your strength, by your encouragement, will not be ashamed of you now. Ashamed of Jesus? Yes, I may,
when I have no sins to put away. Lord, we don't want to be ashamed.
We want to be zealous for the truth. We want to speak, tell
men what great things the Lord has done for us. Would you help
us? Would you strengthen us? Would you cause us, compel us
to do just that? For your great name's sake. We're
a blessed people. We've got a blessed thing here.
Don't take it from us. You removed the gospel from the
Jews. Don't take it from us, Lord.
We need it. For Christ's sake, for the glory
of God, we ask these things. We're meant together. Amen. You're
dismissed. That's a good start.