All right, thank you. Just a
word of want you to remember Marty in prayer. She has her
injection in the morning at 10. And it's only a 20 minute procedure. And the doctor says that she
should be in good shape when she receives this injection,
and I hope and pray that they are correct. And we'll look forward
to seeing her, the Lord willing, Wednesday night, if it's God's
will, of course. One of the sweetest things for
a believer is to think upon the truth that we are God's people. You don't have to turn to this,
but John wrote in 1 John 3, Behold, what manner of love the Father
hath bestowed upon us that we should be called, that we should
be called the sons of God, that we should be sinners, depraved,
Undone, ungodly, filthy in our sin, and yet God calls us his
sons, his children. And he says, therefore the world
knoweth us not, because it knew him not. The world doesn't understand
what we're all about, folks. drive up and down 13th Street,
see us meet Sunday morning, Sunday evening, Wednesday evening. They have no idea what's going
on in here. They don't know us. They see us as some odd people. You know, the scripture does
say in 1 Peter 2 we are peculiar people. That means a redeemed
people though. But in some ways we are peculiar,
right? We are peculiar to the world. Because we meet every time we
gather through the week for Bible class, Sunday morning, Sunday
night, Wednesday night, we meet to honor God. We meet to worship. We don't meet to memorize a catechism
or to go over denominational beliefs. We meet and open God's
word, see what God has to say to us, ask God to speak to us. And the world says, we don't
understand you folks. I remember a few years ago when
Nancy was teaching and somebody, you know, they knew she was the
preacher's wife. They said, how many times a week
do you go to church? And Nancy told, said, do you
have to go that many times? She said, I want to go that many
times. And then I think they said something about Sunday morning
and Sunday night. Does he preach the same message
Sunday night he preached Sunday morning? She said, no. They said,
that's so unusual. Well, we are unusual to folks
out there. I'll tell you, this little group
right here and those of you who are watching by live stream,
we meet together as a little group to do what no doubt thousands
of other little groups across the face of this earth are doing
today to exalt the Son of God who loved us and who gave himself
for us. We're called the sons of God.
We're the children of God. And to finish this, it says,
beloved, now are we the sons of God, right now. It's not going
to happen later on. We're not gonna be the children
of God in the future. We're the children of God now.
Actually, we've always been the children of God. There never
was a time when we weren't the children of God. We just didn't
know that we were. But we've always been His chosen
people. We were redeemed by the bloody
sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. When He died, He washed us from
our sins. We didn't know a thing about
that. We weren't even born then. But it really took place. And
that eternal decree of justification, why, that was sealed with the
blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. He ransomed us from the law that
we had broken. He bought us from divine justice. And we're His, we're His children.
And because we were and are His children, He sent the Spirit
of truth to us to make known to us the gospel of God's saving
grace, how God can be just and justify the ungodly. He sent
His Spirit to us. We cannot receive anything unless
it's given to us from above. That's what the scripture says
in John chapter three. We are now the children of God. And it doth not yet appear what
we shall be. We got a vague idea of what we're
gonna be like in glory. But this is what we do know.
When he shall appear. When the Lord Jesus is manifested. we shall be like him. Oh, blessed
day to be like the Savior. You see, we read in Romans 8,
we're predestinated to be conformed to the image of the Lord Jesus
Christ. For we shall see him as he is. Now understand this. All of the
human race has been divided into two groups. The division is made known at
last at the judgment. And it is manifested through
the years as God reveals his saving grace to sinners who were
chosen unto salvation. But this division of the whole
human race is an eternal decree of God. The division was made by the
Lord himself, and nothing that happens in time can change that. Back in old eternity, as I refer
to it, God made a difference. There are the elect and the reprobate,
and that's always been a division forever. The elect are those
chosen unto salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ, loved by God
with an everlasting love. We were given grace in the Lord
Jesus Christ back in old eternity, and in time He came and saved
us by His sacrifice upon the cross of Calvary. We're the elect. and the elect were never reprobate. The word reprobate means unfit
and unapproved. And God, before the world began,
He gave to a chosen people a fitness in Christ Jesus. He's always looked on us in the
Savior. He's always viewed us in the
beauties of the Son of God. We have therefore always been
approved of God. And our fitness, our worthiness
to enter into His presence is Christ Jesus and His obedience
unto death, even the death of the cross. Now that's a division that was
made from old eternity, as I said. And the reprobate, they were
unapproved, unfit, they were not chosen unto salvation, and they never will be saved.
That's a big pill for some people to swallow. But God said, I'll have mercy
on whom I will have mercy. And whom he wills, he hardens. God doesn't owe you anything,
doesn't owe me anything, due to anything we've ever said,
done, or thought. And that which we do experience
in our lifetime, is just the manifestation, and
that I'm talking about what happens to us in grace, is the manifestation
of that which God of old eternity purposed to do for us. And you who love the Savior,
you who believe Him, You who have cast your soul with all
of its sinfulness upon the glorious Great Physician of the spiritually
diseased sinners, you who believe Him, who look to Him, who look
to His blood and to His righteousness, I tell you, you have always been
loved of God. You have always been His children.
He has never been mad at you. He has never been angry at you. And he has never looked to you
for satisfaction of his justice. He has always looked to the head
of the church who is Christ Jesus, our Lord. Two groups, elect and reprobate. Two groups, sheep and goats. Sheep will never become goats,
and goats will never be converted to be sheep. Now, some of God's
elect, many of God's elect, I suppose, are still lost, straying sheep,
who must yet be found by the seeking shepherd and brought
home to God. Other sheep have already been
found. Some of you are sheep who've
been found. But know this, sheep were never
goats. Never. And goats will never become sheep.
I don't have a problem with that. Because our God is sovereign,
he does what he wills to do. He is not accountable to us. He doesn't give an answer to
all of our questions. He owes us no answers. He owes us no explanation. He is God, the sovereign Lord
of the universe. He does His will in the armies
of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay
His hand or say unto Him, what doest thou? He says, I will do
all my pleasure. And I don't know what He will
do with you. But whatever He does with you,
He made that determination from old eternity. He doesn't react to us. We react to Him. And He always fulfills His purpose. There are two groups called elect
and reprobate, sheep and goats, also the woman's seed and the
serpent's seed. The woman's seed is our Lord
Jesus Christ, Genesis 3 and 15, and all of God's elect in him. God's elect are the seed of him
who is the woman's seed. And all others are the serpent's
seed. Two groups, elect and reprobate,
sheep and goats, the woman seed and the serpent seed, children
of God and children of the devil. Our Lord said to those Pharisees,
you are of your father, the devil, and the works of your father
ye will do. Our Lord said in Matthew 13,
38, the good seed are the children of the kingdom, but the tares
are the children of the wicked one. And I'll tell you, the only way
we can know one group from the other is by God making manifest
to his elect that they are. And he does that, you say, well,
I don't know whether I'm the elect or the reprobate. I don't
know whether I'm a sheep or a goat. I don't know if I'm of the woman's
seed or the serpent's seed. I don't know if I'm one of the
Lord's children or the children of the devil. God makes it manifest
to his people by the gracious operations of his grace in our
hearts. Peter said, give diligence to
make your calling and election sure. And the only way you're going
to know that you're one of God's elect, one of the sheep, one
of the children of God, one of the woman's seed. If you have been irresistibly
and powerfully called to cast yourself upon the Lord Jesus
Christ, the only Savior of sinners, and you look to Him and say,
oh God, be merciful to me through that Redeemer, God puts a desire
in your heart to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. if you have been drawn powerfully
and irresistibly by the Spirit of God to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. No matter what your family says,
no matter what your wife says, your girlfriend says, your husband
says, your boyfriend says, what your mama says or your daddy
says, no matter what they say, you believe the Lord Jesus Christ
and He is your all in all. Well, then you can say, I'm one of the Lord's people. I'm a child of God. You see, what we commonly call
salvation is our God making manifest, making
known to us that we're the sons of God. By the work that He does
within us, Not by some work we do. I know a lot of people are seeking
assurance of salvation, looking within, have I been faithful
enough? Have I prayed enough? Have I
repented enough? Am I doing this enough? Am I
attending enough? Am I giving enough? So on and
so forth. You're looking in the wrong direction
for your assurance. Look to Him whom God hath sent. He is the only Savior of the
sinful. God makes known to us who are
His. How does He do that? Well, by
regeneration, the new birth. Bill and I were talking this
morning about that coin in the parable of the Lost things. Coin didn't have any life. Had
no ability. Had coin laying in the dust. Couldn't say, hey, here I am
right here. Find me. Well, it had no ability. But I'll tell you this. That
coin had as much physical ability to cry out for help as a sinner
has spiritual ability to cry out to God for help. None. See, this is our problem. We're
dead in trespasses and sins. And the Lord has to do the work
within us. He did the work of salvation
upon the cross of Calvary. He has to make known what He's
done within our hearts. He does it in regeneration. Our
Lord said to Nicodemus, you must be born again. That will never
change. Except a man is born of the Spirit,
he'll never see the kingdom of God, much less enter into it. What does God have to do? He
has to effectually call us to faith in Christ. And the scripture says in Psalm
110 verse 3, thy people, see the Lord's got a people. Thy
people shall be willing. We're naturally unwilling. but
thy people shall be willing, willing to come to Christ, willing
to cast yourself upon him, willing to see that he gets all the glory
and all the honor because he was God's sacrifice for sin.
Thy people shall be willing, willing to honor him, willing
to believe him, willing to worship him. Thy people shall be willing.
When is that going to be? In the day of thy power. in the
beauty of holiness from the womb of the morning, the womb of the
dew of the morning. God calls sinners. Well, how
do we know that we're one of God's elect, not one of the reprobate? How do we know? By the revelation
of Jesus Christ in you, in you. the Spirit makes somebody known
to you. I know He teaches us, He teaches
us truth, He teaches us doctrine, but more than that, or in addition
to that, maybe I should say, He reveals to us who Christ is,
and how vital it is that we be joined to Him, and that we know
Him, and that we believe Him. How do we know we're the Lord's
people? By the gift of faith in His Son. What is it to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ? Well, number one is to realize
the glory of His person. You see, the Bible says God was
in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. God came down here and joined
Himself to man, and that God-man died upon the cross of Calvary.
And in Him, God and sinners are reconciled. We were reconciled
to God in, through, and by Him. You're not reconciled to God
for something you do. You can't do business with God. You've got to have somebody stand
between you and a holy God to do business with God on your
behalf and to do business with us on God's behalf. You're not
qualified to stand in the middle. You're not qualified to be a
mediator. But I know who is. Christ Jesus,
our Lord. You see, to believe him is to
realize the glory of who he is. Oh, that God would give us sunburned
eyes, somebody said. S-O-N. People get caught up with
denominations and religion and this and that. Salvation is in
somebody. It's in Him. Oh, to know Him. Don't miss Him. You miss Him. all the good things God has for
his people. Oh God, don't let me miss Christ. You can be a five-point Calvinist.
You can cross every doctrinal T and dot every doctrinal I. And you can memorize confessions
of faith by the old writers. You can get them out and dust
them off, get the cobwebs off of them and study it. Study the
catechisms and all that. But salvation is not to know
some things. Salvation is knowing somebody. To believe Christ is to realize
the glory of his person. Have you seen his glory? That's
what I'm asking you. Not the glory of church or the
denomination or anything like that. It's to see His glory.
The glory of His deity. My Savior is God. What about
yours? He had to be God to save somebody
like me, Alvin. I'm just a sinner. I can't offer
Him anything. What am I gonna give God? He
owns everything. Somebody says, well, give Him
your heart. What's He gonna do with it? I'm not gonna give him
my heart. I say, oh God, give me a new
heart. Create within me a right spirit and a new heart. To some degree, I realize the
glory of the person of Christ Jesus. Nobody has seen the fullness
of his glory. I know that. I tell you what, we've seen something
of his glory, of his majesty, of his honor. And all through
eternity, all of the saints of God gonna be basking in the glory
of the exalted king. What is it to believe Christ?
It's to trust the power of his blood. What can wash away my sin? Not
my tears of repentance won't do it. Not all my supposed good works
put together won't wash one of them away. But I'll tell you
what does cleanse from all sin. Interested? I like to find some
people who would be interested in that question, answer that
question. What had to be done to wash me
of my sins? The Son of God had to come down
here and bear our sins in His own body on the tree. And God
the Father had to pour out on Him the fullness of His infinite
wrath and hatred against sin. And that necessitated Him turning
His back on His only begotten Son. And I hear the agony in
the son's voice when he says, my God, my God, not my father,
my father, but my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why are you so far from my roaring? Oh, why? And Psalm 22 verse three
tells us the answer. for thou art holy, that's why,
that's why. And there's only one reason you're
not gonna be forsaken by God forever, and you will never,
you have not, and you will never be forsaken by God, is because
you had a worthy substitute to be forsaken in your stead. That's
the only reason. You seek to trust Christ as the,
trust the power of his blood, And to believe on Christ is to
rest in the merits of his righteousness. All of our righteousnesses are
as filthy rags. Christ is the Lord our righteousness. I'm filthy in myself, I know
that. The best we've ever done Take
Christ out of it is just more filth. I don't care who you are. And I'll tell you this, even
for those of you who are the people of God, you have the capability
of doing anything and everything that any other son or daughter
of Adam has done, some horrible thing. You got that capability
within you. if you have the physical strength
to carry it out, unless God keeps his hand on you. That's the only
reason you hadn't brought embarrassment to your family. That's the only
reason you hadn't done something terribly despicable. That's the
only reason you haven't brought reproach upon the church of our
Lord Jesus Christ or upon the name of the Savior himself. I often pray, oh God, keep me
on a tight leash. In a moment, just a quick moment,
you can lose your temper and do something, say something,
then you'll get off to yourself and say, oh, I'm so embarrassed
I said that, or I thought that, or I did that. You see, to believe on Christ,
is to trust the merits of his righteousness, not mine, not
mine, not my deeds. He's all my righteousness. He's
Jehovah my righteousness. Jehovah Sidcanu, the Lord our
righteousness, Jeremiah called him. And you know, that's the
same name the Lord gives to his church, the Lord our righteousness. Because as amazing as it is,
as the Lord looks on every one of you who are His people, those
of you who are watching too by way of the broadcast, the live
stream, those of you who are the Lord's people, He sees no
fault in you. He sees only the beauties and
the glories and the wonders of the Son of God. That's why when
you die, like Paul talked about in 2 Timothy 4, when we die, the Lord's gonna say, enter in,
thou good and faithful servant. I said, Lord, I hadn't been a
good servant And I hadn't been a faithful servant. And the Lord
says, well, I'm not looking at you. I'm looking at my son. That's why we're accepted. That's
why Ephesians 1 says we're accepted in the beloved. We always have
been. I'll tell you something else. To believe Christ is to bow to
his sovereign rule as Lord. Saul of Tarsus said, Lord, what
will you have me to do? Tell you what, when you believe
Christ, that's your attitude. What will you have me to do?
Well, be baptized and confess me before men. I'll do it. I'll do it. Years ago, and I've
shared this with you before, I was pastoring in Rocky Mount. And I became convicted of the
fact that I had not been scripturally baptized since I learned the
gospel. Oh, I was put under water when
I was just a little fella. And I got to thinking about it.
I'd never been scripturally baptized. And you know, I had even some
preachers, when I told them what I was going to do, they said,
you don't need to do that. You confess Christ every Sunday when
you preach and every Wednesday when you preach. I said, I've
got to do it. How can I preach to people, confess Christ publicly
in believers baptism, if I don't submit to it? And I submitted
to it. And I'll tell you the reason,
because he's Lord. He's Lord. He commands us to
be baptized. And the last thing I want to
give you, and you can turn to John 17, and I don't hardly have
time to even get into this, the meat of my message, but the last
thing I want to tell you about this, how can we know we're the
Lord's people? In believing Him. It's to believe our Lord Jesus
Christ is to fully trust the great power of his intercessory
work. As I read through this chapter,
John 17, there's several things jumped out at me again, and I'll
just point them out to you. Don't have time to elaborate.
Here's some things that he talks about in this prayer concerning
his people. And his people, beloved from
old eternity, are a people divinely given to Him. He says this in
verse 2, John 17, As thou hast given Him power over all flesh,
that He should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given
Him. We were given to Him. Can you
imagine? You. And you see, divine election,
it's not like the Lord just said, well, here's a big chunk of mankind
and I'll save them. He chose us individually. He chose me. If that ever grips
your heart and really fully grips mine, we won't be able to get
over that. We were given to Him, entrusted
to Him by God the Father. And I remind you, this is an
eternal decree. It wasn't that back in eternity
God just decided He'd save some people. As long as He's been
God, that's how long we've been His people. And we can't understand
the concept of eternal. Divine election. God chose us. God chose me. It's like it says
in Romans 9-11, for the children being not yet born, neither having
done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election
might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth. The Lord sets himself forth as
the great potter. And out of this massive ball
of clay, Look, he formed some as vessels of mercy, and others vessels of dishonor. Vessels of honor, vessels of
dishonor. And this is before we did anything
either good or bad. That's what it says. You read
Romans 9, before we did anything, Say, well, when we were fallen
sinners, God chose us in Christ. We fell in time. We were chosen in eternity. We
were chosen before we fell. See, God didn't give any consideration,
like people say, look down through the annals of time, through the
halls of time, see who would do what. And then based on that,
he made a choice and then he rejected others. That's not the
way it was. We've always been his people.
We were given to Christ Jesus. It's his divine election. He
shaped us into vessels of mercy. Could have made you anything
you wanted to. Made you to be anything he wanted you to be,
and he did. Some of us he fashioned in the
vessels of honor. And I'll tell you something else,
these are a divinely kept people. Look at verse 11. Now I know,
now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world. And
I come to thee, Holy Father, keep through thine own name those
whom thou hast given me, that they may be one as we are. Watch
verse 12. While I was with them in the
world, I kept them in thy name. I kept them safe. We are divinely
kept people. If God didn't keep us, if Christ
didn't keep us, if he didn't preserve us, we would all have
fallen long, long time ago. We've been preserved. This is
divine preservation. We're preserved in Christ Jesus. Jude says, And then here's a divinely taught
people, that's who we are. Look at verse eight. For I have
given unto them the words which thou gavest me, and they have
received them, and have known surely that I came out from thee,
and they have believed that thou didst send me. Look at verse
14. I have given them thy word, and
the world hath hated them, because they're not of the world, even
as I am not of the world. He has taught us. We've been
taught of God. He's given us his word. And I'll
tell you something else. We're a divinely sanctified people. Look at verses 17 through 19.
He says, sanctify them through the truth. That word is truth.
as thou hast sent me into the world, even so have I also sent
them into the world, and for their sakes I sanctify myself,
that they may also be sanctified through the truth." He set us
apart. You're running with the world.
He set you apart. He said, you're not going to
be among them anymore. You're one of my sheep. You're
not going to run with the goats anymore. We're a separated people, and
we're made holy in Christ Jesus. And I know there are a lot of
people who think we grow in holiness. Not true. Not true. In Christ, we are holy. There
are no degrees of holiness. And in Revelation chapter 22,
verse 11, says, he that is holy Let him be holy still, that's
what it says. You're looking at a sinful man
here, but in Christ, I made the righteousness of God in him through
his substitutionary death, and I am a holy man in Christ Jesus. And I'm not gonna be any more
holy in the presence of God as I am right now in your presence. Say, well, you don't act like
you're holy. My holiness and my righteousness is seated at
the right hand of God. Thank you very much. You're not going to find any
fault in Him. And we're a divinely united people,
verses 20 and 21. Neither pray I for these alone,
but to them also which shall believe on me through their word,
that they all may be one as thou, Father, art in me and I in thee. that they also may be one in
us, that the world may believe that thou hast sent us. We are
a united people. Somebody could say we're stuck
with one another. But we are united. He's the head,
we're the body. That's what the scripture says.
And we're a divinely blessed people. Verse 22. And the glory which thou gavest
me I have given them that they may be one even as we are. We're
blessed in him. Every once in a while I'll get
something in a store or whatever and the cashier will say to me,
the clerk will say to me, have a blessed day. Anybody ever said
that to you? Have a blessed day. And usually
my response is I've been blessed from eternity by God. in Christ Jesus. Oh, okay. Have a good day. They don't understand. I have been blessed. I'm being
blessed. I'll always be blessed and I'll
never be cursed. And we're a divinely Perfected
people, verse 23, I and them, thou and me, that they may be
perfect in one, and that the world may know that thou hast
sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved me. We're divinely
perfected people due to our eternal union with the Lord Jesus Christ
by his redemption. See, we have righteousness imputed
to us. And we've been regenerated. Life
has been imparted to us. And the last thing I'll give
you is we're a divinely loved people. Verse 23, I in them and thou
in me, that they may be perfect, made perfect in one, that the
world may know that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as
thou hast loved me. How much does God the Father
love his son? Can you ever calculate that?
Well, that'd be impossible. But I'll tell you this, that's
how much he loves you. We've been divinely given to
him. We're his people. We're the sheep
of his pasture. And he says, I'll never leave
you, and I'll never forsake you. He is ours, and we're his. Well, let's sing a closing song.
469.