Psalm 65. There's a vast difference in what we preach A vast difference in what
the Word of God says about God and about man and what the world
is saying about God and about man. A vast difference, a huge
difference in what we preach here and what most so-called
churches are preaching. A vast difference. I'm firmly convinced it's the
difference between life and death. It's the difference, as you said
last night, of worshiping the true God and worshiping another
God, a false God. It's a vast difference. The Bible
says—I believe that what we preach here can be summed up, what the
Bible, what the Scriptures say, can be summed up in this one
short statement. The Word of God says that the
eternal destiny of every human being depends completely, one
hundred percent, completely upon the will and the choice of God Almighty. While men say, while the world
is saying that our destiny, that the destiny of every human being
lies within their own will and choice and decision. And that basically summed up
The world says our destiny, our eternal destiny, lies within
our own choice, our own will. And the scriptures say, no, that
man's destiny lies completely within the will and the choice
of God Almighty, whatever he chooses. Listen to these verses
of Scripture. As I say all the time, I don't
desire at all to stand up here and tell you what I think. Not
even what I think the Word of God says. I just like to quote
Scripture after Scripture and tell you what the Word of God
does say. It's very plain. The Scriptures are very clear.
If a man, if a woman, would just honestly look at the Bible and
what it says, Very clearly, we'll see what it says. Verses like
this, Romans 9, 16, that says, It is not of him that willeth,
or him that runneth, but it is of God that showeth mercy. That's
very clear, or should be, anyway. John 1, 13 says, Those that believe
were born not of blood, not of the will of the flesh, nor of
the will of man, but they were born of God, supernaturally born
of God, born from above. That's what born again really
means. When Christ said that to that
religious man, he said, you must be born from above. God Almighty
must do something miraculous, supernatural for you. You don't
get yourself born again. You get born by God. Philippians 2.13 says, It is
God that worketh in us, both to will and to do of his good
pleasure. Very plain, isn't it? It is God
that worketh in us. Both to will, that is, if we
do will and choose God, it's because God worked in us to will
and choose God, and to do of his good pleasure, that is, to
do good works. With such verses as these, and
many more like them, and many more, it should be very clear
that it's God who must exercise his will. That it's not our will,
it's God's will. Shouldn't it be? It should be
very clear from the Scripture that it is God who must choose
us, and then the only way that anybody is ever willing to even
think on God, to worship God, to believe, to love God, is that
they are made willing. Psalm 110, verse 3. The only reason anybody ever
wills or chooses or believes or loves God is because they
are made so. They are made willing in a day
of God's sovereign power. Psalm 110 verse 3. Let me clear up a common misconception
about the will of man, okay? I'm talking about the will of
man as opposed to the will of God. Let me clear up a common
misconception about the will of man. The Bible does not teach,
nor do we preach, that man cannot exercise his will and choose
what he wants to. The Bible doesn't teach that.
He does. Man can choose what he wants
to, and he does. The Bible doesn't teach that,
and we don't preach that. It does not say man cannot choose
between good and evil, right and wrong. God has said he can,
and he does. But it does teach that man will
always choose according to his will, that man will always choose
wrong as opposed to right. It does teach that, and that's
what we preach here, that man will always choose himself over
God, sin over holiness. That's what the Bible, the Scriptures,
does teach. It does not teach that man cannot.
It teaches that man will not. You see, man's will is according
to his nature. Man wills and chooses, all right,
but it's according—he wills and chooses according to his nature. Now listen to me very carefully.
Jeremiah 13, 23 says this, Can the Ethiopian, can the black
man, change his skin Why, he couldn't do it if he wanted to.
Can the leopard, that spotted cat, change his thoughts? Why,
no. No way. It's not within his power.
Neither, he said, can you do good which are accustomed to
doing evil. All creatures act according to
their will. They will, they choose, they
act according to their nature. This is the reason a horse, a
cow, a horse will eat grain. You can put a T-bone steak, no
matter how big it is, you can put a freshly killed carcass
in front of a horse, you can try to stuff it down his mouth,
he will not eat it. He is an herbivorous animal. That means he eats herbs, he
eats grains, he eats grass. You can't make him, it's not
his nature to eat meat. He won't eat it. He doesn't have
any desire for meat, he wants grain. Now, you can take a lion
and put the prudest loaf of fresh-made bread in front of him, and he's
not going to eat it. He's a carnivore. He's a meat-eating
animal. He doesn't have any desire to
eat grass or grain, he wants meat, and he kills accordingly.
And man will choose sin. and the world. That's his sinful,
dead, depraved will. That's the will of man. That's
what David says throughout the Psalms. He says, I come forth
from the womb speaking lies. I was born a liar. I was born
a sinner, and sin did my mother conceive me. I'm born a sinner,
dead in trespasses and sin. You don't believe that? History
itself should prove the depravity, I mean the utter. When we talk
about the depravity of man, man being a sinful, wicked creature,
we're talking about utter depravity. I'm talking about the whole person,
his mind, his will, everything is permeated with sin. And proof of that is just history.
If you do a little studying down through history, you'll see what
man is made of. the plight of the Sioux Indians,
how the white man treated—or mistreated, rather—the Sioux
Indians, and all other Indians for that matter. And the white
man did that with a black man, and the white man with a white
man. But go down through history and see man's inhumanity to man. Men are worse than animals. They're worse than animals. Go
down through, look at the war, look at the civil war in the
United States. Brother against brother, killing one another
for what? You want proof of man's depravity,
just go look at the wars that have happened down through history. Man's utter depravity, selfishness. We're dead in trespasses and
sin. God said to Adam the day He said,
Adam, the day you eat of that fruit, and that is the day that
you choose that fruit over me. Adam, I'm God. I'm reigning and
ruling. You're not the God of the world. I'm God. I'm over you. And that
apple, that fruit there, is a symbol of my authority over you. Now,
which will it be, Adam? Are you going to serve me and
be submissive to me the rest of your days, or do you want
to be your own God? Do you want to be in charge of
your own destiny? Now, Adam, I'm warning you. The day you
eat of that fruit, the day you say, I want to be my own God,
to know good and evil, you've chosen evil, Adam, and you're
going to die. In other words, you're going
to be evil for the rest of your days. And your son's going to
be evil, and your son's son, and every son of Adam born from
there on out is going to be an evil. monster, that he's going
to be born with this spirit, this principle within him that
chooses evil, not God, but want God. Adam, Edith, you'll die. You'll no longer be holy and
good and submissive to God. You'll be a sinner, rebel against
God. Would Adam do it? This was the
only man who ever had a free will. Adam would be chosen. Now, you and I don't have a free
will. Our will is conditioned upon—our
will is controlled by this nature within us. We can't choose good. We won't choose good. Here's
the difference between depravity and inability. Depravity says
this, you will not come unto me that you might have life.
You won't do it. I said, I've come that they might
have life. He said, but you will not come. You won't come to me.
You won't do it. You'd rather have evil. You'd
rather have sin. You'd rather have the world than God. And
here's an ability. No man can come unto me except
the Father which has sent me draw him, except a new work be
done in him. So we by nature, listen, we by
nature are bound by this sinful nature of our until. God Almighty
makes a change. We're bound by this principle
within us until God makes the difference, until God exercises
His free will. He doesn't have to. He does not
have to, does He? Oh, no. God gave Adam a choice. What did Adam choose? He chose
himself over God, right? We really don't have that choice.
We'll choose self every time. But God has a choice now. He
can choose to damn us or save us. This is the difference in
what we preach and what the Bible says about God and what the world
is saying. We'll say it's not up to our
choice. If it were left up to our choice
and our will, we'd all be goners. But it's in the sovereign choice
and will of the holy God. And thank God he is willing. He said, I will have mercy on
some people. Thank God he's willing. He didn't
have to. He didn't have to. None deserve
it. All earned the wages of sin. We're all sinners. If any man
say, John said, he hath not sinned, that is, original sin. You can't
hold me accountable for what Adam did. You can't. That's not
unfair. Okay. Then if that be the case, you
can't have any part in the blood of Christ either, because you
weren't there when Christ died. You weren't there when Adam sinned.
You weren't there when Christ died either. What shall it be?
You going to take your part in Adam? If so, then you can take your
part in Christ, but not vice versa, and not otherwise. But God, in love, too, in salvation
for and preservation of some people, God chooses to save some
people from sin and destruction. He ought to destroy us all. He
should destroy us all, but he doesn't. Now, look at here in
verse 4, Psalm 65, and salvation is God's choice. Who is saved
depends entirely upon God's choice. This is what the Scripture says.
Look at Psalm 65, 4. If there wasn't another verse
of Scripture in all the Bible, if this was the only verse of
Scripture in all the Bible, this right here, this would tell us
the whole work of salvation. If there was just Psalm 65, 4
in all the Scriptures, this would tell us the whole work of God
in salvation. Verse 4. is the man whom thou choosest." Christ said, no man can come
to me except the Father, which hath sent me to draw him. I want this one. Come on. except God will and choose and
will and bring that person. And Christ said, and I will raise
him up at the last day. Salvation is of the Lord. The salvation of any human being
depends entirely upon God's choice. God's choice. That's what makes
these silly decisions decisions that men make, so abominable,
so ridiculous, so unfruitful. Big deal, so you've
made your decision for Jesus. It's the wrong one. So you have accepted Jesus as
your personal Savior. The Bible doesn't say anything
about that. It does say we need to be accepted in the beloved.
It does say that God must make his decision for us. It does
say that God must choose us, that God must accept us. And
after the fact, then we will choose. Because man is foolish,
he's unable. Because man is depraved, he's
unwilling. The will, the affection, the
desires of man are constrained by his nature. Christ even reminded
his disciples of that twice. They were walking along, and
Christ said to them, you remember, you didn't choose me. I chose
you. He said it another place. He said, haven't I chosen you
twelve, and one of you is a devil. He had to remind those old boys
twice. They got to be too big for their britches. And he said,
you don't ever forget who did the choosing here. "'Tis not that I did choose thee,
Lord, that could never be, for if thou hadst not chosen me,
I would never have chosen thee.' But, God, if God Almighty in
sovereign mercy, love, and grace chooses you, elects you to save
you from your sin, yourself, and your destruction by his sovereign
power," listen, By the instrument of that sovereign power. What
is that? Well, some people say, God diselects you and you go
to heaven whether you do anything or not. No, that's not so. That's
not what the Scriptures say. 1 Corinthians 1.21 says, It pleased
God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. And
we must come to Christ by faith. But that's the gift of God. It's
not of yourselves. It's the gift of God, lest any
man should boast. It's not of works. Not of works. But it's by his sovereign power,
and that power, that instrument that God Almighty uses to save
people, is the preaching of the gospel. The preaching of the
gospel. The preaching of who God is.
Holy. Sovereign. He's not a sugar daddy. He's not a helpless one at the
beck and call of his creatures. We're in his hands. We're helpless. We're at his beck and call. to
preach who this God is. There's no other gospel. This
is the gospel, who God is, holy, holy. He won't have anything
to do with sin. We've got to be made holy to
get to Him. And who we are, dead in trespasses and sin, dead. And who Christ is, our only hope
to get to that God. That's the gospel. That's the
instrument of His power. And now listen, in that day,
in the day that God chooses to reveal this gospel to you, At
first, nobody likes it. I don't like that. I will not
have this God to reign over me. I don't like this gospel of sovereign
grace. That's the response of most people
when they first hear it. But in the day of God's electing,
saving power, you better believe you'll be made women to believe
that. No, I'll never believe that. Yea, you will. No, not me. Yes, you. God says, I
shall do all my good pleasure, and you will do all my good pleasure. I like it that way. I don't know
about you, but I like it that way. In the day he causes you
to hear this gospel—I mean really hear it—in the day of his power,
you're made willing. Made willing. Look at verse 4
again. Blessed is the man whom God chooses. You see, salvation is God's choice. Why do we harp on that? Because it's true. Why
do we insist upon that? Because that's the way it is. Why do we insist upon that? Why
do we keep preaching this and just preaching the sovereignty
of God, the sovereignty of God, the sovereignty of God? Because
God's sovereign, that's why. And because our only hope lies
within the power of the sovereign God. And only then, only when
men realize this, will they call on this God for mercy. And only
then will they get mercy. See, that's where salvation begins,
to see God in all his holiness and all his power and see yourself
as in his hand, and then you call out, God, be merciful to
me. a hell-bound, no-good, worthless
sinner. As old-fashioned as that may
sound, it's true. All of God's saints fear Him
above all else. And the indictment against our
present generation is there's no fear of God before they're
out. What? God loves you, they say. So why fear Him? Come on up. Accept Jesus. He's
your buddy. He's your friend. He's just like
you. He tried and failed, too. He knows how you feel. And there's
no fear of God. That's the reason all of these
abominable practices in religion today, all these clowns, these
boasters are clowns. But here's the discriminating,
distinguishing mark of a true child of God, that fear of God.
They bow first and foremost, bow at the feet of this holy,
sovereign God, call on Him for mercy, and then He, in mercy—look
at verse 4—causes them to approach unto Him. Blessed is the man
whom God chooses. He doesn't have to. He can leave
us alone just like everybody else. Go on then, you rebellious,
sinful creature. You don't deserve my mercy, my
grace. Go on then. That's what he ought to have
done. But the blessed, happy man is the one whom God says,
No, you don't. I will not have you. Yes, you
will. I'm the one down here. No, you're not. You're coming
to me. And he causes us to approach
unto him. You see that? Causes us to approach
unto thee. How does a man approach God?
How does a man approach God? Well, because of men's ignorance
of the holiness of God, they say all manner of things, don't
they? Well, God's waiting on you. No, he's not. God wants to. No, he doesn't. What God wanted to do in the
eternity past, God did in the eternity future. Lord, unto God
are all his works from the beginning. God will work, and who shall
let it? Who shall withstand it? Who will say differently? O men,
who art thou that are even replaced against God? They say all manner
of things. You come to God any way you can. No, you can't. You come to God
one way. How does a man approach unto
God? How do we call on God? God? You can't even call on God, except through a mediator. You
don't, and that's not Mary, and that ain't Saint Christopher,
and that ain't Saint Jude, and that ain't Pope John Paul, and
that ain't Preacher Smith up the road, and this one. There's
one mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus. One
way. How do we come to God? Who shall
ascend? Look over there with me, Psalm
24. Psalm 24. Who shall ascend into this holy
hill of God? Remember now, God is holy. He
dwells, the Scripture says, in a life which no man can approach
unto. No man. We can't go right up
to God. That'd be like me trying to go
up to the sun. I mean the sun in the S-U-N.
It'd be like me trying to approach the sun. I don't care how formidable
my spaceship would be, the closer I got, I'm going to be consumed. The sun is a consuming fire,
is it not? No material substance can approach
the sun without being consumed. The Scripture says you're God
is a consuming fire. It says that God dwells in a
light which no man can approach unto. We can't even look at that
globe in the sky without being blinded. No man has seen God
at any time without being blinded. We can't do it. We're flesh.
Listen to me now. How can a man approach unto God?
We can't do it. We're flesh, God's Spirit. We
don't even know where to go. I'm going to God. Where's that?
Go down to church. God doesn't dwell in a building
made with hands. We can't do it. We're sinful.
God is holy. He said, I will by no means clear
the guilty. He says, the sun and the moon
are not pure in his eyes. How much more filthy and abominable
is man which drinks iniquity like the water. He says, God
cannot look upon iniquity. He won't do it. God's too holy.
He will not defile himself. We can't do it. We're on earth.
God's in heaven. Christ said that. He said, I'm
from above. You're from beneath. How in the world are you going
to find me out? How are you going to approach
unto God? How? How? Who shall ascend into the hill
of the Lord? Verse 3. Who shall? Who shall
stand in his holy place? Who? Here's the answer. He that has
clean hands. Well, I've lived a good life.
All these things have I done for my youth. I've kept the Ten
Commandments. I've never defrauded anyone.
I've never stolen. I've never gone out with my wife.
I've been a good citizen. I've done all these things. Well,
all right, how about this? A pure heart. Have you done all
of that with a perfect, absolutely perfect will and motive for the
glory of God, totally, completely selflessly? for the glory of
God, for the love to God, for appreciation and thankfulness
to God, for the love of your brother. Have you loved God with
all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and your brother, your
neighbor as yourself, a pure, perfect, spotless heart before
God? Can you stand before God and
say, My heart is clean? Oh, man, it's getting more serious
now. Go on. Who has not lifted up
his soul unto vanity, that he has Sacrificed himself, every
fiber of his being, his heart, mind, soul, and strength unto
the service of his God. Never devoted one minute of his
time to the worldly and vain pursuits of this world. Never,
always for living for God. Can you say that? That's what
God requires. It shall be perfect to be accepted, he said, Leviticus
22, 21. Oh my, let's go on. Nor swore
unmercifully, never uttered one word out of your mouth but thanksgiving,
praise, honor, glory, blessings, good to your neighbor, edifying,
comforting, encouraging. Who could do it? That's what
David said. Well, the answer to this, look
back at the text, Psalm 65. The answer to the second part
lies back in the first. Look at this with me. Look at
verse 4 again. Blessed is the man whom thou choosest and causes
to approach unto thee, for me. You see that? Huh? Who's he talking
about there? Do we have a clue? Who's the
blessed man? Who's the only man? You mean
he's talking about the manhood of Christ? We're talking about
the son of man, who he calls himself. The only normal man
who ever lived was the Lord Jesus Christ. Every other man, from
Adam on down to me, is totally abnormal. Our mind, our will,
our affections, our walk, our talk, our speech, everything
about us is permeated with sin and corruption. Abnormal! Not
the way God created man, but this man. He walked before Pilate
one day, and Pilate said, Behold, the man. Now, there's a man,
and God said it from heaven himself. There's the man I preside. Look
at him! What a man! The only man. And that's the only man God said,
I'll accept into my prison. He what? He got clean hands.
He's never done anything but perfection. He got pure hearts. Oh, he's loved God with all his
heart, all of his life, from a boy to a grown man. He's never lifted up his soul
unto vanity. He served me. He said, I must
be about my Father's business. Nor sworn deceitfully. Grace
pours from his lips. Blessed is the man whom God chooses. Behold, mine elect, in whom my
soul delighteth, God said. This is the man of my choosing. Here's Adam. Here's the second
Adam. Now, the first Adam was created
perfect, but not with the righteousness of God, not the holiness and
perfection of God. He had his own. He failed. God said, reject it. Here comes
the second Adam, the second man. Oh, he was perfect. He had the
righteousness and the holiness of God. God said, accept it.
Now, I reject that man and everybody that's in that man. Rejected.
That means everybody. Cain, Esau, keep going, on down
the line. Everybody that came the way of
Adam. The flesh. Came the way of Cain. That works. Rejected, rejected.
But this man, God says, accepted. Accepted. And everybody that
comes the way of that man, God accepts. Blessed is the man whom
God chooses, that's Christ, and causes to approach unto God for
us. Who shall go for us? That's what
the scripture said. Over in Judges, I believe it
is, chapter 1, the children of Israel said to God, who will
go for us and fight against the Philistine? Who will go for us?
And Joshua said, Judah, he'll go and fight. Does that
ring a bell with anybody? And we say, at the sight of this
holy God, what he requires, we say, we'll go to God for us.
We can't go ourselves. We'll go for us. The learner of the tribe of Judah. He'll fight for us. He'll stand
for us. He'll offer up that sacrifice
for us. Will he do it? Will he be successful? Oh yeah. Better believe it. He's
able to approach this holy God. Only Christ alone is able. And
He appeared in the presence of God for us. Who's that us? Those made willing. Those who
see God, who see themselves, those who submit to and bow and
believe this gospel. And look at this. Look at it
again, verse 4. I'm not keeping you long. Blessed
is the man whom thou choosest and causes to approach unto thee. God causes Christ to approach
unto thee. He said, no man can come unto
me except the Father which hath sent me." He said that more than,
I forget how many times, I looked at that one, now thirty-four
times, I believe. He's called the sent one. We weren't looking
for God, we weren't calling on God by nature, but He was looking
for us. He was calling for us, and He
called us. So we answered, better believe
me. His people hear His voice, and they know Him, and they'll
follow Him. It affects your calling, they call it, the powerful voice
of the Son of God. No man can come. No man comes
to God until God in Christ comes to him. And this is why Christ came to
us, so we come to him. Right? Christ came to reveal
the Father to us. He said, He that hath seen Christ,
he that hath seen me has seen the Father. Christ and the Father are one.
Christ came to reveal the Father to us, and then came to take
us to the Father. We can only go to the Father
through Christ. Let me illustrate this. There was a poor beggar dressed
in rags, standing outside of a huge palatial mansion, the
home of a great man, a lord, His poor beggar out there in
rags, standing out there, wanting so much to get in. Looking inside
the huge glass doorway, he sees the fire. He's looking inside
there, and he sees the fire. He's cold. It's cold outside.
He needs warmth. He sees the huge blazing fire
in the fireplace. He's cold. He sees the food set
upon this very huge, vast table, and it looks so good to him.
He's hungry. He sees all the people gathered
around that table enjoying the fellowship and the food and enjoying
one another, and he's lonely. But he has no right to enter.
He has no right whatsoever. He's a beggar. And evidently,
obviously, this is the home of a great man. He's got to be somebody
to be in there. He can't just barge right in.
No, no. He doesn't have the right to
go in there. And he doesn't have the right
clothes on. He looks in there and everybody in there is dressed
in finery. Dressed in robes, beautiful robes
and all. He's got rags on. He says, they'll
never accept me looking like I am. I don't have on the right
garment. And he must have an introduction. He must have an introduction.
He can't just barge in there, he'll be cast out. But all of
a sudden, all of a sudden the door opens, and out comes the son of the master of the
house. A beautiful and a glorious man. Glorious in his personage,
in his apparel. And he comes out to this baker
in rags and says, uh, who are you? Well, I'm the son of, uh,
Jack, no, he doesn't say I'm a, he says I'm a baker. What
do you want? I'm hungry. And I'm cold. And I'm lonely. And I, when it's all said and
done, I really don't know what I need. I need something, somebody.
I'd like to get in there. And he says who are you? And the fellow says I'm the son
of over the house. I own this place. Oh and the more he looks at him,
the more he hears his beautiful voice, the more he falls for
him, the more he falls in love with him. And he falls down at
this man's feet and says will you, will you take me in there? You don't have to, but I sure
would appreciate if you would. I'd like to go in there." So
the man says, yeah, I'll take you. I'll take you. You see, he came out to him and
revealed himself to him and agreed to take him in. He says, you
can't go in there, though, unless we do something about you. And
then he takes him down to a pool and washes him up, and he finds
the best robe, the perfect robe. Apparel, he puts it on, changes
his raiment. That's the robe of Christ's righteousness.
Puts that on him. And then he takes us in, and
then you know what he does. He introduces us to the Father.
A man can't just barge right up and say to the Lord and the
Master, the head of the table, here I am. No, no, wait a minute.
He stands behind this man. Stands behind him, holding his
hand. And the man, don't throw him
out, he's going to be afraid. You're with me. He said, I'm
the son of the house. And he takes him right up to
the head of the table and says, Father, there's a friend of mine. He wants in, too. And what does
the father say? Well, every friend of yours is
a friend of mine. You come on in. Sit down here
at the head of the table. But I don't deserve to sit there.
Why? Why me? Who am I? And what does
my have? Such a dead dog that you should
look upon me with mercy. You came in with a right person.
You were invited and drawn in and introduced by the right person.
Because he came to you, you can come to me, he said. Wretched
is that man whom God chooses and causes to approach to you
so that you can approach to him. To what? To dwell in his courts,
less so. To dwell in his courts. David
said, I'll be satisfied with the goodness of thy house, even
of thy holy temple, a poor, helpless sinner. You reckon that old beggar
was satisfied once he got in that place? You reckon for a minute he said,
boy, I don't like these pork chops. Oh no, he was satisfied. That's the best feeling you've
ever had in your life! You reckon you'd like to come in some other
way? I'll try the window. What if Christ would come on
in with me through the door? I'll try the window. I see an
opening over here. I'll try that. No, no, he wanted to go in with
him. The only way. And the people
of God, changed by God's Holy Spirit to see who God is, to
see themselves, to see Christ, the things of God, see God's
gospel, they're satisfied. with God's way of salvation,
are satisfied with Christ, satisfied with the goodness of his house,
are satisfied with the gospel, gospel's all they need, all they
want. Don't need me to preach anything
else to you, do they? Now, you're satisfied with the
gospel, you want something else. You want something other than
Christ? Is Christ enough? Is Christ all to you? You need
something else. If you do, you might as well go someplace else.
You know, that's all you're going to get here. A good, steady diet
of the gospel. But God's people know they're
satisfied with the goodness of his house, even at thy holy temple. And that's what David said. He
said, I'll be satisfied completely someday when I awake with his
likeness, to dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my
life, to behold the beauty of the Lord and inquire in his temple. to inquire in his holy temple,
with his temple, the church of the living God. Bless it. See, salvation is not in my will
or my choice. It's not in my will or anybody
else's will or choice, not of the will of the flesh, not of
blood, not of the will of the flesh, not of the will of man.
Salvation's in the will of God. It's whom God chooses. Blessed
is the man whom God chooses and causes to approach to God through
Jesus Christ the only way. And they'll be satisfied. Everybody
that hears this gospel through the sovereign power of God, His
Holy Spirit, they'll be satisfied with it. Yeah, that's it. Everyone
of them will say, that's it. That's the way He saved me. And
that's the way I want it. And that's what I want to hear
about from here on out. until I dwell in his temple one day,
to hear that throughout eternity. Okay, stand with me. Now dismiss
us in prayer. Our Lord and our Savior, God, make your word effectual
to your people. Cause your people to rejoice
in it. and call out your sheep whom
you've not yet called to your cell. Make them hear that powerful
voice. Lord God, words aren't sufficient
to thank you for the blessings of being chosen and called by
God. We can't even enter into it. We don't have the slightest
inkling, really, what it means to be blessed, chosen by God
Almighty. Lord God, thank you, though.
that little bit of understanding we have, a little bit of light
we see, we thank you for it. And, Lord, increase that knowledge,
that faith, that understanding. Increase our love for you and
see in your love for us. Lord, send your Word out. Touch
some heart in here this morning. Touch my heart. In Christ's name
we pray. Amen. You're dismissed.