Join me this morning, if you
would, in the book of Ephesians. The book of Ephesians, and I
would like to read a portion of Ephesians chapter two. Ephesians
chapter two. We are given this passage because
it shares so much about the grace of God. That's what we find in
this chapter. And to truly appreciate and enjoy
this chapter of the book of Ephesians, we must truly be able to rejoice
in chapter one. But we're going to leave chapter
one to your reading, and we're going to start here with our
services this morning on chapter two. For at least the next five
Sundays, it is our goal to spend some time on the great doctrines
of grace as they are reported to us, found in the scriptures. Now there is a reason that we
have these great truths of the word. The truth has always wanted
to just continue along and don't bother me. And you know, there's
always those that come up against the truth and say, it's not right,
it's not right. And many, many years ago, some
great scholars of the word of God got together and they formulated
what we know as the acronym TULIP. Now, if I were to do that today,
I would probably put these instead of the acronym TULIP. I would
use total inability. Because when it comes to salvation,
we are totally unable, we have no ability of our own to ever
change the position that we are in. I would use the term sovereign
election before creation. I would use particular redemption
because the Lord Jesus Christ went to the cross for a particular
people, and that's declared in the word, effectual calling or
efficacious grace. And then the last one, he shall
lose none of them. That's his promise. So we'll
look at that, but we're going to use the tulip this morning,
but join me if you would in the book of Ephesians chapter two,
and you hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and sins. Now, I didn't used to ask this
question, but as someone who has been born again, I have to
ask this question, who is he talking to when he shares this
information with us? You, Hathi Quickened. Now, that
word Hathi Quickened are found not in the original at this point,
but if we drop down just a little bit, we'll find out that that
was used. You, Hathi Quickened, or you
Hathi made alive, And if we go back, we find out he's writing
to the saints. He's writing specifically to
the saints at Ephesus. But that whole book, that whole
letter that Paul wrote by inspiration of the Holy Spirit is to the
church in general in the world. And you hath he quickened. Now,
there's something that is in those very words. That word quickened
doesn't mean he made us fast. It means he raised us from the
dead. And you hath he quickened. who are dead and trespasses in,
we're in and time passed. Now this is what we were. And
if we can't agree with this, we have a problem. You know,
I used to say, well, I know people just like this. It never really
applied to me. I was the special case. I had a man tell me one time
that he was so special, he was saved without ever hearing the
gospel. And you know the response to that? That's just too special.
There is no special case like that. All right, wherein in time
past you walked according to the course of this world, according
to the prince and power of the air, the spirit that now worketh
in the children of disobedience. Now, I look at this, you know,
Satan is God's Satan. Satan is a created being, he's
God's created being, but I think we deal with someone much more
difficult than that in our very nature, and that is ourself. The God of this world that I
have been able to see is not Satan. The God of this world
is free will. I am able of myself to choose
God anytime I want to, and I can refuse Him at any time I want
to, and it doesn't matter. Satan doesn't have that much
influence on us because he's not omniscient, he's not omnipresent,
and he's not omnipotent. The God of this world is our
own self. One time Nancy and I were cruising
through the Panama Canal and I was asked to speak. But before
that, we went to a Bible study and you know, there was almost
every kind of group of religious people in that congregation that
would meet together for that Bible study. And there was only
one thing that they all had in common, except for me. They all
believed and would say, but we have a free will. Everybody in
the world believes that. And it takes the grace of God
to share with us that our will is just as dead as the rest of
us when we look at the subject of total depravity. There is
no part of us that is apart from the fall. All right, let's go
on. We walked according to the course of this world. And then
in verse three, among whom also we all had our conversation in
times past in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling the desires
of the flesh of the mind. And if we say, I didn't do that,
then we don't know the truth of the gospel. Because we are
by nature, this very thing. We have had that problem all
along. And we are like, or we should
be able to say, as the apostle Paul said, I am the chiefest
of sinners. God saves sinners and chiefest
of sinners. He's going to reveal to us that
we, by no stretch of the imagination, was totally depraved. Sometimes
I have to say as the queen from the South that came up and talked
to Solomon. When I get on the subject of
depravity, I can almost say what she said, the half has not been
told. We just, we haven't been able
to get to the grips of it. It's a subject that is so ingrained
in us that we try to avoid it in any way that's possible. And
then when the Lord saves us, oh my goodness. You know, I have
to come to the conclusion. There was a Pharisee one time
that in his mind was mocking my savior because he let a woman
touch her that he said if he knew who she was, he would not
allow this. And then without him even telling
Jesus, Jesus says, let me tell you a parable about two creditors. Now, every man loans some money,
and he loaned, let's just for a moment say, loaned $5 and $50
million. Now, the guy that owned the old
$5, we can work that out pretty quickly. But the guy that owes
$50 million, that's gonna be hard to come up with. And you
know what? The creditor said, I forgive
you both. And that one creditor went after the other one and
says, you owe me this. Now, Jesus said, who loved the
master the most, the one that was forgiven the most. He says,
you have judged rightly. And then he turns his attention
to this woman. She loved the most because she was forgiven
the most. Jesus Christ is a great savior
to those who are saved. To religious people, he's just
participant in salvation. He's just a good name in salvation. I want his name. I don't necessarily
want anything else that goes with him, but I want his name.
Well, when we come to salvation, he is the savior or he's not
the savior. He's a great savior or he is
no savior. And he is a great savior of great
sinners. But God, who is rich in mercy,
verse four, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when
we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ by grace
you are saved. Now, so often I find and converse
with people that have their will in the median between going one
way and going the other way, going to hell or going to heaven.
They're in the middle and they say, I have the choice of whether
I want to go this way or that way. Well, there is no median. We are dead in sin. That is the
whole nature of us. And our will is just as dead
as the rest of us. So it's not an area that we can
make a choice in. We made our choice in Adam. And some people may say that
I don't like Adam being my representative. I didn't vote on it. That doesn't
matter. God did. Now he's the one that
put Adam in that place, and he's the one that gave Adam this great
requirement. The day you eat, you shall surely
die. And God oversaw the whole thing,
and he witnessed the fall. He witnessed that very thought
that went through Adam's mind. He witnessed it all. so far off
that he cannot hear, and he's not so far off that he cannot
see. He was there and witnessed the whole thing, even though
he was not in the presence of Adam when he did it. He comes
down and says, Adam, where art thou? I've had preachers tell
me, see, God doesn't know everything. That's not what he's saying.
He's not saying that. He wanted Adam to know where
he was. God knew where he was all along. You know, this whole
scheme that played out there in the Garden of Eden, before
all that happened, as we heard this morning, in old eternity,
God had already taken care of the problem before there was
a problem. He already had a lamb slain before there was a problem.
He already had names written down in the Lamb's Book of Life
before there was a problem. He took the initiative. And my
friend, if he doesn't get involved in your life and stir it up by
telling you what you have is not the truth and you must have
Christ, then we're going to hell. That's all there is. We need
him to stir us up. We need him to come down and
arrest us. We need him to get involved in us, and we may not
like it, but we need that more than anything, or we'll go on
our way to a devil's hell. Goes on to say, he's raised us
up together. My goodness, there's a resurrection
took place before we've been raised. will be raised from this
life, a resurrection of the spirit. And that means that God breathed
on us the breath of life and we became a living soul. Before
that we were dead. What a picture Adam is. of total
depravity. There before he was even, he
was just a form in the ground. He's made of the dust of the
earth. You know, I've had people try to explain that to me, and
it's just like trying to explain the Trinity. You're not going
to get the job done. Here we are. We've got to look
at it. He formed Adam of the dust of the ground. and he is
inanimate. He has no cognizance of anything
going on until God came upon him and breathed upon him the
breath of life, and Adam became a living soul. Now he's upright,
and God created him a wife. God didn't need anybody, but
Adam did. He needs somebody to be with
him. How thankful I am for the somebody
the Lord gave me to be with me. But that Adam, by his own free
will, and he's the only man that ever walked this earth that had
that capacity, everyone else doesn't have it. You may tout
it, you may be proud of it, you may live it, you may say it,
but you don't have it because we're dead in trespasses and
sin, but he's raised us up together. Verse seven, that in the ages
to come, you might show the exceeding riches of his grace. Now that's
what these great truths are about, about grace, God's grace, the
grace of God. That's why he created the heavens
and the earth. That's why he created Adam. That's
why he created us, to show his grace. and it is his free and
sovereign grace. There's not works of grace. I've
been in churches where they have signs up, the works of grace.
There is no works of grace. That totally destroys the very
subject of grace is to have some work about it. Grace is God doing
what he wants to do, when he wants to do it, because he wants
to do it. And not because we've done something
good or indifferent or anything else. Verse eight, for by grace
are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It's
a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast, for
we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works,
which God hath before ordained that we walk in them. I don't
know how many times in religion I quoted verses eight and nine
and never touched 10 and never mentioned one through seven.
You always went to verses eight and nine and talked about grace. Well, there's just not much there
until we get through chapter one, chapter two, and then we're
given some insight about this. The early church fathers, in
attempt to stop the tide, Do you know the great truths have
never been popular? Cain hated them. He hated the truths of God, and
he hated God. Any time that we establish an
idol, another God, besides the God, we hate God. We're demonstrating
the fact we just hate God. You know, when those people took
that brazen serpent and went to worship it, they are declaring
to the world, I hate God. I have a dear friend that pastors,
and his daughter came to him one time and said, you don't
believe I'm saved, do you, dad? And he says, I know you're not saved.
And she says, why? And he says, number one, you've
never been a sinner. And number two, you don't believe
the report. You don't believe the word of God. You don't believe
what God has to say about things. And you know, that's the truth.
When God saves us, we quit arguing with God about his word. We may
not, we probably don't understand it, but we will not argue with
him over it. God's word is the word of God
and he is the God that saved his people from their sins through
the person and work of Jesus Christ. And this great God has
a word that he has irrevocably spoken. He says, I will not take
it back. It's in stone, but it's gracious. As we found there, Brother Mike
brought those lessons from the book of Jude. I was impressed
with verse four. Would you turn with me to verse
four of the book of Jude? That verse of scripture summed
up why these great fathers so many years ago said, we're gonna
declare these. Somebody came along and says,
this is the way it is. We have a free will, God's trying
to save everybody. Nobody that's ever saved are
sure that they'll ever make it. You look at what they had to
say, they didn't have much. And they were scholars in colleges. They were not stupid people.
They were ignorant of the grace of God though. And then the scholars
came along and said, you know, Jude chapter one and verse four
tells us we need to do something. Jude chapter one, verse four. It says, for there are certain
men crept in unawares who were before of old ordained to this
condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness. Now, most of the time that that
word lascivious is used in the scriptures has some sexual connotation.
But in this passage of scripture, it shares with us that they're
turning the grace into an unclean thing. So they're turning the,
They're trying to change God's true word about a subject who
have turned the grace of God into a license for evil. They've
turned the grace of God into saying, you know, God's grace
allows us to sin and sin and we can come back to this. begging
for forgiveness. They turned the grace of God
into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord
Jesus Christ. They're denying the sovereign
prerogative of Almighty God. That's what Jude said probably
in 80, 90 or somewhere in there, 40, 50. He could have written
it just after the fall and he could have written it today and
it still have the same truth about it. These men who turn
the grace of God into a lie. One of the commentators said
the turning of the grace of God applicable to everybody. There
are people in hell that God died for. There is nothing in the
Word of God that is so more blasphemous than that, that God, the Son
of God, the Lord Jesus Christ and His death on the cross was
so irreverent to Almighty God that He died for people that
are going to go to hell. There's no hope in Him then.
There's no hope in that Savior. It's up to us, and then we find
out we always want to add ourselves to that equation. It's up to
me. Preachers say that. It's up to you. God's done all
he can do. My friend, if that's all he's done, we are without
help, without hope, and without God in this world. We need someone
who can go against the tide. We need someone who can go against
men's words. We need someone who can, from
his own great lofty position, know the problem and come to
us and with the gospel show us that without him we are nothing. The flesh profiteth nothing. Our mind profits nothing. It
is only the grace of God that profits. And so these great truths
came up, and we find them as an acramen of tulip, and we'd
like to look at just a little bit about ruined by the fall,
total depravity this morning. You know, there is an issue that
comes with total depravity. A great reason so many people,
religious people, Bible-believing people, reject the Bible teaching
of total depravity is because of the solution it requires. The solution it requires. If
there is totally depravity, the solution that's required to get
us out of it, and people want to participate in this act and
participate in this work of grace and get to God on their own.
And when we realize, when God gives us the grace to realize,
and we'll look at a verse, hopefully in time, that it is after we're
born again, we even realize the real serious trouble that we're
in. I've had people say, if I can
get them lost, I can get them saved. You can't. That's a lie. We can't even get them lost.
And that's not our responsibility. Our responsibility is to preach
the gospel throughout the seed, throughout the seed. That's all
we are called on to do. And God will take care of the
increase. Despite the ability of people
to outwardly uphold the law, there remains an inward distortion. You know, a lot of people, I
live around a lot of people and I don't think they're lawbreakers.
I don't think that they've committed a bank robbery or committed a
great crime. They seem to appear that way,
that they've been pretty good with the law and they've not
abused it. And you know, we find people
during the time of Christ that felt exactly the same way. And
Jesus said, that's not the real problem. The real problem is
the heart. That's the problem. And he brought
that up, and you know what they wanted to do with him? Stone
him to death as a result. Don't you dare talk about that
part that we never tell anybody about. The real part, the inner
part, the natural man part, the totally depraved part. I can
take care of the outward. You know, I can tell you, I've
had a couple, three brothers that had, they had their name
on a police blotter. I've never done that. Never had
a name on a police blotter. I was always friends with them.
Coming out this morning, I waved at one of the police officers,
happened to be a former student. I want to be friends with them.
But you know what? Those whose names are on the
police blotter and mine that hasn't been on the police blotter,
when we get to looking at the heart, are both in the same,
all in the same category. dead in trespasses and sin and
angry with God about it. Enmity with God, hatred with
God. Turn with me, if you would, over
to the book of Proverbs. Proverbs chapter 21. Again, I
had this read to me and I just said, well, I'm the exception.
I don't plow. You know, you could make up all
kinds of excuses for not believing the Bible. And we will until
God comes to us and reveals Christ. And then we say, you know, I
don't understand very much of it, but I will say, I believe
it all. All right, here in the book of
Proverbs, the book of Proverbs, we find so much in here about
our Savior, the Lord Jesus. Chapter 21, if you would look
at that. Chapter 21, verse one through four. The king's heart is in the hand
of the Lord. You know, that's hardly believed.
Nobody wants to believe that. He's doing what he wants to do.
Well, he's doing what he wants to do. God has the outcome in
his hands. King's heart is in the hand of
the Lord. As the rivers of water, he turneth
it with us wherever he will. Now, since we don't irrigate
by ditches anymore, we kind of lose the meaning of that. If
we use sprinklers or let the rain fall, we miss the meaning. The meaning of that is he turns
the ditches over where he wants them. That's just like a man
that does that. Every way of a man is right in
his own eyes, but the Lord ponders the hearts to do justice and
judgment is more acceptable to the Lord than sacrifice. A high
look and a proud heart and a plowing of the wicked is sin. What's
he saying? Everything we do by nature is
sin. There's not one positive qualifying
mark we have. We think raising our family without
trusting God is a sin. And then it tells us there in
verse four, a high look, a proud look in the plowing of the wicked
is sin. And then if you would turn with me over to Psalm 14,
Psalm 14. In Psalm 14, we have these words.
In Psalm 14, verse one, we may say we, when we use the terms
totally proud, you know, the sinner are not as bad as they
possibly could be, you know, and I'm thankful for that. I
was reading some words of a boxer. He was a professional boxer and
he had a real shady early life. And he's talking to a, And the
interviewer says, as he shared that, he says, don't you think
that you probably should be a good example for kids since you're
in the limelight? He says, I'm no Hitler. I've done all this, but I'm not
as bad as Hitler is. You know, we just compare ourselves
with ourselves, are not wise. When we start looking at other
people and saying, I'm better than that person, we find that
in the scriptures. A man who is a Pharisee goes
down to the temple to pray and he says, God, I am so thankful
that I am not like other men are, even like that Pharisee
over there. I'm not like him. Well, you know
what? He's worse than him. When we compare ourselves with
other people and say, I'm better than that, we are worse than
they are. And that man, that Pharisee,
went down to his house, not justified, and the publican went down to
his house, justified. And you know what that means?
He's in the fold. God justified him. He put his
sin on Christ. All right, here in Psalm 14,
it says, every, excuse me, I'm still in the, Proverbs, let me
get back to the Psalms. Psalm 14, verse one. To the chief
musician, a Psalm of David, a fool has set in his heart. Now this
is a commentary on God's view of natural man. Psalm 14, verse one. The chief, to the chief musician,
a psalm of David, the fool has said in his heart, there is no
God. They are corrupt. They have done abominable works.
There is none that doeth good. Now notice verse two, the Lord
looked down. What a commentary we have here
of God's view of what natural man is like, left to themselves. He looked down from heaven upon
the children of men to see if there were any that did understand
and seek God. They are all gone aside. They are all together become
filthy. There is none that doeth good,
no, not one. that we've all turned aside. There's none that do it. You
know what that means? Grace is so much more precious. Grace means something. I'll never
forget going to the deacon of the church and it just fired
me. and said, you know, I don't understand completely what's
happened, but I know more about grace than I've ever known in
my life. It is more than a definition
of a word. It is what God does to people. He demonstrates his great grace. I knew what a sinner I was. I
had sinned, but I was not a great sinner. Grace, grace. Who can say I have made my heart
clean? Proverbs 20 verse nine. I am
pure from my sin. Who can say that I have made
my heart clean? There's nobody that can say that. Jesus told all of those Pharisees,
you've cleaned up the outside. You haven't committed this crime,
you haven't committed that crime, but your heart is far from me.
Look at that. It is filled with dead men's
bones. It is a travesty. Can you imagine the restaurant
coming to you with a plate that is clean on the underneath side? And they bring it out and set
it down. You know, some restaurants put that plate down in and you
get to turn it over. It's setting there. And so they take your
order, they turn it over for you. And it is what Jesus said
about those Pharisees. It is a ghastly sight on the
inside. we wouldn't want our food served
on that. And God is just making a statement
about our condition. We may have the outside all beautiful
and clean and do everything as right as we can, and yet the
inside is a mess, is a It's in the fall. There's none righteous,
no, not one. The apostle Paul spends much
of his writing in the book of Romans about this very subject.
There is none righteous, no, not one. And you know what? I've
read that to people and they say, you know, that's not very
fair of God. You know what's not fair? Is
to make a statement like that. God is fair. God is righteous. God is good. God is gracious.
God has all of the great attributes. God is holy. God is just. God
is high and lifted up. God is a sovereign king. He rules
over all. He rules as he sees fit to rule
over all. And he will rule over this salvation
like he rules over everything else. It is his sovereign purpose. that he will carry out. There
is no unrighteous, no, not one. The Bible is very plain on sharing
with us about the fall and the extent of the fall. Would you
turn with me to the book of Genesis for just a moment? Now, the first
few chapters of the book of Genesis cover a lot of time. The other
day, Caleb was in the swimming pool and I'm on the outside of
the pool down there in Orlando and he brings up the subject
of the creation. and talks about, you know, it
doesn't take much time to talk about it. Well, there isn't much
time given to it. It's just a declaration. In the
beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. And time goes
on. He created man after his own
image. Man fell. Find out some of the problems
that go on after that. and here, just before the flood.
Now, how much time has gone between creation and now? I'm not going
to put my finger on it, but some time has taken place, and you
know what? Things haven't got any better. After the fall, things
just don't get any better unless God intervenes, unless God comes
in and works his work of grace. Unless he brings the gospel,
things cannot get better. Well, here in the book of Genesis
chapter six, we read these words, Genesis chapter six and verse
five. Again, this is God's commentary about what was going on during
this time. Cain hated God. And you know, as we read it right
here, there's a whole millions of people, no doubt, that hated
God. Here we have, he's called a preacher
of righteousness in the New Testament. Noah, a preacher of righteousness. And he's preaching for many,
many years about a flood coming. The end is about up. And you
know, when it came time, everybody but eight people says, I don't
believe it. And you know what they're saying?
I don't believe God. I do not believe God about this. Things
will go on just like they are. Well, God put eight souls in
that ark and closed up the door. And you know, a lot of people
say, Noah didn't get much good done. Preached all those years
and look at that, no converts. You know what Noah understood?
The conversion was not up to him. You know what Noah understood? God is the savior. You know what
Noah understood? It's sovereign grace. You know
what Noah understood? I will preach this message and
it doesn't matter who comes because this is the message of grace.
in Genesis chapter six and verse five, and God saw that the wickedness
of men was great in the earth and every imagination of the
thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. Could that
be written today? Well, it is written for us today.
Hasn't changed a bit. You know, God has not changed,
never has changed, never will change. The gospel never changes. The same gospel he preached there
in the very outside of the garden by clothing Adam and Eve with
the skins of animals, that there must be a substitute, that gospel,
there must be a lamb slain, there must be bloodshed, there must
be. That same gospel is being preached
today. And you know what? Man has not
changed at all. of the billions and billions of dollars in our
own country that has been thrown at the problems. Billions. If we have more money over here,
we'll get this mess straightened out. No, we won't. The mess is
in natural man's heart. And once God deals with natural
man's heart, he's going to help him get out of the mess. We'll be right with God. So I'm
not against throwing money at it. I'm just saying it's not
going to improve anything. People might have more money
or more food to eat. They might have more of this
to have, but it's not spiritually speaking going to change their
outlook one iota until they hear the gospel and God uses it. There's
so much corruption. The imagination of the thoughts
of the heart were only evil continually. We find out that the Bible declares
that sinners are blind to the gospel. Talk about blindness. We're by
nature blind to the very gospel that God says will save us. Turn
with me, if you would, over to the book of 1 Corinthians, 1
Corinthians 2. In 1 Corinthians 2, we find these
words, 1 Corinthians 2, it tells us there in verse 14, chapter
2, verse 14, it says this, there's something about natural mayhem.
You know, as much as we may explain it and define the terms and give
them volumes of scripture, It's not going to change their mind,
but you know what? We're still going to define the words, give
the volumes of scripture, and declare the grace of God in Christ
Jesus. We'll not stop. We're not going
to change our tactics. We're not going to say, sign
this card. You know, people believe that by signing a card, that
makes a person a Christian. I had a man one time tell me
he wanted to come out here and present one of the organizations.
And I said, do you believe what's inside of the Bible that you
pass out? And he said, what's that? And I said, right there
in the back, it says, I accept Jesus. I'm signing my name here
to prove that I love Jesus and he's my savior. Do you believe
that? And he says, yes, I do. And I said, you don't have a
thing to say to us then. We'll buy our own Bibles and we'll
pass out our own Bibles. Because nobody is saved by signing
a card. Nobody is saved by coming forward. Nobody is saved by praying through. We're saved by the grace of God
through Christ Jesus, blood and righteousness, and it comes as
a result of God's new birth on us. The problem is so great,
we can't get out of it by ourself. We must have outside help. Well,
here in 1 Corinthians, it says, chapter two and verse 14, but
the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God.
Does that mean we quit? No, no, we don't. There's a whole bunch of people
that would have gladly quit with solitarsis. You know, we quit
praying for him. Well, some people continued on,
and that wasn't what saved him. God's grace, God's mercy, the
gospel that he heard. The natural man receiveth not
the things of the spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto
him, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually
discerned. There's something about the word of God. Now, a
lot of people believe a lot of words about the Bible, but when
it comes to the spiritual truth there, it is a hidden thing. It is impossible for us to get
past that. We are blind to it. We don't
have a spiritual capacity. We're not given that by nature.
It must be given to us by the new birth. We must be born again.
And then we have a spiritual capacity to believe the word
of God and to understand a part of it. The spiritual part of
man is dead in trespasses and sin. The will of man is in the
fall. There is no exemption for it.
There is no part that is left out. And that is what God uses
to judge us by. We find that the scriptures continuously
share with us that the natural man is enmity with God. The natural
man cannot see God. The natural man cannot believe
God. It has to come as a result of the new birth. And that's
the difficult part. If you ever come to the conclusion
of total depravity, then the results are how to take care
of it. is beyond our ability. And then we're only able to understand
that after it's given to us. Second Corinthians chapter four, verse one. Second Corinthians
chapter four, verse one. The gospel is just hid. I don't know how to explain it
any better. It's just hid. Why can't they
see it? Because they can't. Why can't they hear it? Because
they can't. Why don't they believe? Because
they can't. until God gives them that great
requirement of the new birth. And I have to ask this question.
I do it all the time to people. How much did you have to do with
your physical birth? And we have to answer, I didn't
have anything to do with it. And you know another great thing
about the physical birth is how two cells can come together and
be fertilized and grow into a baby. That is a mystery. Can you explain
that? Well, that's about like explaining
the new birth. How can it happen? It's a mystery
that God does. He comes in his great power after
the seed is sown. And he has everyone that he has
ever going to give this to marked out before the foundation of
the world and says, I will come upon them and I will say live. And they shall live up to that
point, they're dead. Now alive, alive. In 2 Corinthians chapter four,
therefore seeing we have this ministry as we have received
mercy, we faint not, but have renounced the hidden things of
dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God
deceitfully, but by manifestation of the truth, committing ourselves
to every man's conscience as a sign of God. But if our gospel
be hid, it is hid to them that are lost. in whom the God of
this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not." Now,
if that's part of Satan's work, that's okay, but I have a firmer
belief that it was more my own thought about it. I have this
idea by nature that I can do something for God. The God of
this world is free will. That's the God of
this world. Everybody bows before it and
worships that. And you talk to people that they
don't and they will get upset with you. And you know, I know
the truth about it. I got upset about it. I traveled
from Oregon to Texas in 1971 to go to Bible school and got
down there. And the guy that I'm staying
with believes in the doctrines of grace. And he began to talk
about it and I says, I've traveled 2,000 miles to get away from
people just like you. You know, the sad thing about
it, in religion, there's a lot of people that believe you can
go from an Arminian gospel to the doctrines of grace and you're
okay. There is no salvation in free
will gospel. There is no salvation in Armenian
gospel. There is none. God's not gonna
honor that. How many of you have planted
candy corn to get a corn crop this year? How many of you have
planted fake peas? How many of you planted fake
potatoes? How many of you planted anything
fake in hopes to get a crop out of it? We don't do that. We plant
the real stuff. And that's the only way that
God is going to get a crop out of this, is real stuff is planted. The seed, the gospel of his word,
and that word is God's in charge of salvation, and Jesus Christ
went to the cross to pay the penalty of all the sin of all
of his people, and not one will be lost. We preach not ourselves but Christ
Jesus the Lord and ourselves for your service for Jesus' sake. We don't preach some commonality,
some common salvation. We preach Christ and him crucified.
Sinners are enemies of God. We're at enmity with God. We're
enemies of God. The sinner is deceitful, you
know. I don't want to be deceitful.
Well, I was by nature. The heart is deceitful above
all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? It is deceitful
to ourselves. We can deceive ourselves about
where we stand with God. I've shared this. I don't know
how many times I went out to do something and I made it almost
like that fleece situation with Gideon, you know, God, if I do
this, I'm saved. God, if you do this, I'm saved. God, if you give me a fish, I'm
saved. That's terrible security. You know what? In salvation,
you don't have to ask stupid questions like that. Lord, I
believe your word. And you promised in your word
what you're going to do with your people. you will present
them spotless. Now I'm not very spotless in
my mind, but he has said, I will present you spotless. I will
present you spotless. In our fallen state, we cannot
produce a right relationship with God. There's no way about
it. Turn with me, if you would, to
the book of Matthew chapter 16. The book of Matthew chapter 16
and verse seven. and they reasoned among themselves."
What a statement. It doesn't say that they reasoned
in the word of God, they reasoned among themselves. And you know
those that compare themselves with themselves are not wise?
I remember hearing of Ralph Barnard, the preacher that brought the
gospel to Brother Henry Mahan. There was a couple of men in
one of the meetings and one of the men was trying to convince
the other one of the men that they were saved. And Rothbarnard walked up to
him and says, only a lost man will try to convince a lost man
that they're saved, and walked away. I've had a preacher ask me, what
do you do when people come to you and say that they're not
saved? I say, I treat them like they're lost people. I'm not
gonna ever try to convince them, but because of their good works
and how they've been kind to me and the church that they,
that's not my job. My job is to preach the gospel.
If God cannot and will not give peace about that subject, what
can he give peace about? It's not going to be found in
this world. We're not going to find peace in this world. We're
not going to find peace anywhere except in Christ Jesus the Lord.
And when he grants that peace, we can be like Job. Though he
slay me, yet will I trust him. Discussable, there's no subject,
the natural man is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed
can be. That's God's words on this whole
subject. Isaiah was a prophet of God and
he wrote about this. He says, from the whole head,
the whole heart, from the sole of the foot, even unto the head
is sick. There's no wholeness there. From
the bottom of the feet, and Paul brings this out when he wrote
to the Romans, our feet are swift to shed innocent blood, and our
head is just a mockery against God. Well, Totally Pravity is
a tremendous subject of the Word of God. It's not popular. It has been thrown out by many.
You don't get good crowds over it. But you know what? It's the
truth of God's Word. Everybody that is ever born into
this world is without help, without hope, and without God. And it
takes God to bring us to God. We'll never find him on our own. We will never see him on our
own. And by our own will, we will never capture the great
truths of the word of God. Thank God he interferes in people's
lives. Thank God he interferes and reveals
Christ into them. Thank God for that grace of God
that we will look at and say, it is effectual. he will win
the battle with every one of his children. Brother Mike, if
you'll come.