Well, it's good to be with you
again this evening, and I'm very thankful I can speak to you about
the things of our God. I'm going to be reading from
the 27th Psalm, and I invite you to go with me to Psalm 27, as all of you certainly are No,
we don't meet in person, but we are thankful we can gather
together as the people of God and listen and watch as the Word
of God is set forth. And it is such a privilege that
we can do this. I want to share something with
you before I read the scripture, and it's actually quite humorous.
This is something that happened to me Monday, and all of you
special folks of our congregation will appreciate this, but I was
in the office working, and I got on the computer, and as I often
do, I go to sermon audio, and I was looking to see who was
broadcasting if there was anything special going on. I noticed there
were three churches that had services going on. This was Monday
morning. And I noticed one of them was
Brother Tim James' church. And so I clicked on that, and
all it was was a picture of his sign. That's all. Just Sequoia
Baptist Church. And so I gave him a telephone
call, asked him how I was doing, and I said, well, I thought you'd
be preaching. He said, no, I preached yesterday. And I said, well,
according to the internet, you're live right now. Broadcast. He said, oh no, I left that thing
on. And so he hung up the phone,
and I watched the computer, and he did turn it off. Well, yesterday
I called him. And he said, yeah, he had left
something on. They told him to turn it off.
And I said, did you know you'd been on for 430 minutes? He laughed, and I said, but here's
something that's really amazing. You had five people who stayed
with you the whole time. He said, boy, I've got some faithful
church people, don't I? We have some faithful church
people. We hope we will remember to turn
the machines off afterwards, but I thought I'd share that
with you. It was quite a humorous thing,
and sometimes we can forget to turn switches on and turn them
off. And that does remind us to be
prayerful for all of the preachers of God's sovereign grace, now
broadcasting live. And in Tim's case, he was the
only one in the building. I'm blessed to have a few other
souls here this evening, but we're thankful that we can come
into your home and speak to you from the Word of God. Alright,
I'm sure you've got the text now, or the passage I'm going
to read. And this is a very familiar passage
of Scripture, Psalm 27, which speaks to us of our dependence
on our God. This is a Psalm of David. He
says, The Lord is my light, and my salvation. Whom shall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my
life. Of whom shall I be afraid? When the wicked, even my enemies
and my foes, came upon me to eat up my flesh, they stumbled
and fell." And here's the implication. But I didn't. They fell, David
says, but I didn't. Therefore he says, though in
a host should encamp against me, my heart shall not fear. Though war should rise up against
me, in this will I be confident. One thing have I desired of the
Lord, that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house
of the Lord all the days of my life, to behold the beauty of
the Lord, and to inquire in his temple. For in the time of trouble
he shall hide me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle
shall he hide me. he shall set me up upon a rock. And now shall mine head be lifted
up above mine enemies round about me. Therefore while I offer in
his tabernacle sacrifices of joy, I will sing, yea, I will
sing praises unto the Lord. And then he says, Hear, O Lord,
when I cry with my voice, Have mercy upon me, also upon me,
and answer me. When thou saidst, Seek ye my
face, my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek. Hide not thy face far from me,
put not thy servant away in anger, thou hast been my help. Leave
me not, neither forsake me, O God of my salvation. When my father
and my mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up." And he says, teach me thy way,
O Lord, and lead me in a plain path because of mine enemies. Deliver me not over unto the
will of mine enemies, for false witnesses are risen up against
me, and such as breathe out cruelty. I had fainted unless I had believed
to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living." And
then he says this to all of us, wait on the Lord. Be of good
courage, and He shall strengthen thine heart. Wait, I say, on
the Lord." Wonderful Psalm. Let's bow together. Lord, it is so good of You to
enable us to be able to speak publicly the Word of God We're
thankful for the means that you have given to us so we can communicate
with our brothers and sisters, those of like faith, those who
also believe this great salvation in Christ Jesus. Lord, we come
together in order that we might hear of the grace of God to us
through the Lord Jesus. Thank You, O Father, for giving
us a mediator. Thank You for revealing Him to
us. Lord, You didn't leave us in
our darkness. You didn't leave us in our error.
But You brought the very gospel of Your grace to us. And then
the Spirit of life, He used that gospel making us to be new. He gave us new life, a life in
Christ Jesus. There has been formed within
us the new man who loves righteousness and hates evil. We thank you,
O God, for the work that you have begun within us. And we're
so grateful that you have said that the work that you have begun
you will finish it to the day of Jesus Christ. Our Father,
in these days of turmoil, in these days of unrest, days of
sickness, days which will find many people in financial straits,
Lord, enable your people to look to you, to believe your very
promises of our safety and our provision of all spiritual needs
in Christ Jesus. Let us be a people that we walk
by faith, not by sight. Sight would say be very afraid,
Sight would tell us there's lots to fear. Sight would say to us
there are enemies, invisible enemies against us. And these
things are certainly true in their own way, but faith says
our God rules over all. Faith listens to the Voice of
the Scriptures. And we believe the voice that
says, Thy God reigneth, O Zion. And as we hear the words of our
God, Lord, they have a soothing effect upon the heart. They speak
peace to the troubled soul. Indeed, we will take precautions
and give us wisdom to follow the instructions of those who
have the authority over us, and we ask for them wisdom. And the
mercy that you will give, that we ask you to give to them, to
govern in a way that is beneficial for our welfare And yet, when
all is said and done, it is always true that the issues of life
and death are in the hands of our God. Indeed, as John saw
in Revelation 1, he saw that the keys of death and hell were
in the hands of the Lord Jesus Christ. Yes, He is our sovereign,
and He is the governor of the nations. He has been made to
be the ruler of all things by virtue of His death for us upon
the cross of Calvary. We bow before King Jesus. We bless Him. We worship Him. And oh God, we thank You for
such an able Savior. that One who has all power in
heaven and in earth, and He will give eternal life to as many
as thou hast given Him. Bless these to whom I speak this
evening, and Lord, give to your people a comforting word, and
the comforting word is, our Lord Jesus Christ is the Savior of
sinners. There's never been a message
to us, Father, more comforting than the gospel of your saving
grace of unworthy people through the doing and the dying and the
rising again of the Lord Jesus. Bless the sick ones, those of
our congregation who are ill, who are feeble, We ask, O God,
that you would minister to their needs and give to all of your
children grace, grace to trust you, grace to be at peace, grace
to know and to believe that with the righteous all is well. So we thank you for all things.
Be with us as we go through the message. These things we ask
in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ and for His sake. Amen. Well, as you know, we have been
looking at Psalm 91. And even as I say we've been
looking at Psalm 91, we haven't really gotten very far. I've set as my intent to not
get in a hurry, but to milk every verse for all that I could. And having said that, I know
that after I go to each verse and look at each verse as I intend
to do, even yet there will be much more that we can gather.
from each of the verses of this great psalm. And that's one of
the wonderful things about the word of God, about the scriptures.
is that as often as we go to portions that we know, and many
of you, in fact a couple of people have indicated to me, this is
your favorite psalm. And even as we go through this,
we'll never exhaust it. And that's true with all of the
scripture, isn't it? We can never exhaust the Word
of God, and every time we go back to it we find a fresh bounty
to nourish us, to feed us. And that's the way it is here
in Psalm 91, of course. And so this evening, I really
want to deal with just the first half of the first verse again,
because as I continue to read and just kind of roll this over
in my own mind and in my own soul, I saw some other things
in here that they blessed me. And this is the way I look at
it. When a portion of scripture is a blessing to me and God so
impresses me with it and with the magnificence of it, I just
feel like it'll be a blessing to you. And so I hope this will
be this evening, as we look again at Psalm 91, and for the very
first part of the first verse, and here's my subject, this is
where believers dwell. This is, right here, this is
where believers dwell. Well, where do we dwell? It says
here in the first part of the first verse, he that dwelleth
in the secret place of the Most High. That's where we dwell. I disagree
with, I appreciate the preaching of Mr. Spurgeon, and I have benefited
from his sermons. I don't always agree with everything
that he says, and he says something on this verse that I disagree
with, and listen, I wouldn't be worthy to carry his briefcase,
but he says that this doesn't affect, this doesn't have to
do with all of the people of God. He said this has to do with
only those who are near to our God. Well, I would say all of
God's people are near to God in Christ Jesus. I don't think
that this is for specific people. This is not for a people who
rise above others. This is not for special Christians. These are not for those who in
themselves have kind of pulled themselves up above others, and
therefore they dwell in the secret place of the Most High, but rather
this is for all of the Lord's people. This is a promise to
you. And to me, he that dwelleth in
the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow
of the Almighty." That's all of us. This is where we dwell. We don't come in and go out.
I know that in our spirituality we can be cool, we can be warm,
there's no question about that. There are times when we have
more faith and there are times when we have less faith. But
listen, we always dwell in the secret, in the secret place of
the Most High. Where is that secret place? Well,
it's in Christ Jesus. And we're always there. I don't
want you to become discouraged even though you are a sinner
and we confess our sin and we know that God is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins. But remember this, your sins
will never lead God to remove you from dwelling in the shadow
of the Most High. No, He's not going to put you
out. Just because you have failed, that doesn't mean that he will
cease to be faithful. I love that scripture in 2 Timothy
2 where it says, though we believe not, yet he abideth faithful. Well, who is it that's going
to keep us in this secret place? Who is it that's going to watch
over us and make sure that we do abide in the shadow of the
Almighty? Well, it's the One who has saved
us. You see, He has not saved us
to let us do whatever we want to do. He has saved us, He has
brought us unto Himself to make of us a people who love Him and
believe Him and who follow Him. Did He not say in John chapter
10, My sheep hear My voice and I know them and they follow Me? They follow me, and that's what
we do in the book of the Revelation. Who are these? Who are these
who are these virgins washed in the blood? These are those
who follow the Lamb, it says. They follow Him whithersoever
He goeth. And so the Lord, by His grace,
He has pulled us. He has drawn us into the secret
place. And that's where we dwell. And we have everlasting life. This is a life that will never
end, and the reason it will never end is because it is the life
of God. And He keeps us. He secures us. And we shall never
fail. We shall never fall. Now in this
message, I want to give you four things. We'll go right into it. Number one, here's a secret place.
Number two, I wanna talk to you about secret grace. And then
thirdly, I wanna talk to you about secret work. And then lastly,
I wanna talk to you about secret truth. So that's the roadmap
for the message this evening, a secret place, secret grace,
secret work, secret truth. Let's consider this secret place.
Well, when I think of this secret place, I think of, oh, how special
it is. Because it's a secret. And God
doesn't reveal his secrets to just anybody. He reveals his
secrets to his people. It's a secret place. And when
I think of this, I think of how lofty this must be. Because this is in the very shadow
of the Almighty. How high up is this secret place? How high is this that where people
abide under the shadow of the Almighty? It is right there at
the very throne of God. And nothing can endanger anyone
who dwells there. There can nothing enter in that
defiles? There's no poisonous breath going
to enter in? What do you mean by poisonous
breath, preacher? Falsehoods. False Gospels. It's not going to enter in to
this secret place. No, this is a place for truth.
This is a place where the people of God are. This is way above
any poisonous religious lies. This is way out of the reach
of the errors of the enemies of the people of God. Oh, how
very safe is the continual condition of those who dwell in this secret
place. Why, it's by the very throne
of God. It's in the presence of the Lamb
of God. I think of how privileged it
is for us. What a great honor it is for
you and for me, for each one of us who are believers, for
you who are at home and you believe the gospel. Christ Jesus is your
all in all. You've been washed in the blood
of the Lamb. He's your only hope of glory.
What a privilege this is to dwell in the secret place. That's where
you dwell. God keeps you in there. I was thinking today about Aaron,
the high priest of Israel. And as you know, he went into
the Holy of Holies on one day of the year, and that's all,
the Day of Atonement. And I wondered, as I thought
about that, I wondered if some of the people, probably many
people, after that day was over, didn't come up to him and say,
Brother Aaron, what was it like? What did you experience? What
did you see when you're in the secret place? When you're in
the Holy of Holies and you gazed upon that bright Shekinah glory
of God and you saw the mercy seat? And as you took the blood
and you sprinkled the blood on the mercy seat and before the
mercy seat, oh, what were your feelings? What did you experience?
What did you see? What beauty did you behold in
the Holy of Holies? And I'm sure he'd say, it was
such a privilege to be in the presence of God. And I would suspect he would
say, I can't even begin to describe to you what it means to just
dwell there for just a little bit. And I'll bet he said, here was
the hard part. I had to leave. I couldn't stay in there. And
you know, I won't go back in till next year. But for you and me, we dwell
in the secret place. We dwell there in the midst of
the glory of God, where our Lord Jesus is, in the very presence
of that One who is the Most High God. And we're there by right,
by right, You see Aaron, he went into the Holy of Holies by right,
because God told him to, but he could only stay in there for
one, go in and out on one day, and that was it. But you and
I, by virtue of the death of our Lord Jesus Christ, we enter
into the very presence of God Himself, and we can dwell there,
and we behold His glory. the glorious of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and full of truth. This is where
we dwell. This is where we abide. This
is where we lodge. I speak to those of you who are
the children of God, and I say to you, oh, how happy is our
condition. Oh, how blessed we are. Think
of it. We live in, we dwell in, we lodge
in the secret place of the Most High. I wrote some words this
morning, so near, so very near to God, I cannot nearer be For
in the person of Christ Jesus, I am as near as he. So, so dear,
so very dear to God. Dearer, I cannot be. For as the father loves the son,
that's the way my God loves me. More richly blessed, more richly
blessed, I cannot be. For in the Son of God I'm blessed
eternally. More safe, more safe this sinner
cannot be. For dwelling in the secret place,
I'm safe eternally." This is where we dwell. You see, to know
Christ Jesus is to know God. To speak with Christ Jesus is
to speak with God. To visit with Christ Jesus is
to visit with God, and to see Christ Jesus is to see God. That's what our Lord told Philip.
You know the passage of Scripture there in John chapter 14, when
Philip said, show us the Father and it will satisfy us. And the
Savior said, have I been with you all this long, Philip, and
you don't understand? He that hath seen me hath seen
the Father. Therefore, to be very close to
Christ, to be near to Christ Jesus, is to be near to God. And to dwell in Christ Jesus
is to dwell in God. We dwell in the secret place
of the Most High. This is where we dwell. This is where we dwell. I know
we sojourn down here. We make our pilgrimage in this
world. We have a race to run. We have
a course to finish. But make no mistake about it,
if you want to know where we dwell, we dwell with Jesus Christ
in God. That's where we dwell. We dwell
in the secret place. If you would look with me in
the book of Colossians chapter 3. Colossians chapter 3. Turn to Colossians chapter 3.
Look at verse 1. If ye then be risen with Christ,
or since you then be risen with Christ, We arose in Him. We died in Him. We were buried
in Him. We arose in Him, chapter three,
verse one, Colossians. Seek those things which are above,
where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set your affection
on things above, not on things of the earth, for you are dead.
You're dead. You're dead to sin. How's that?
Christ died for it. And you're dead to the world.
You're dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. Hid with Christ. See, here's the secrecy of it,
and here's the safety of it. We're in Him. In Him. Our life is hid. It's not us,
but Christ Jesus. You can't see me. Oh, you see
the body, but my soul, it's in Christ Jesus where it has always
been. I've always been in Christ Jesus
because I was wedded to Him in old eternity. I was put in Him
by the Father. I'm hidden with Christ Jesus.
I'm hidden in Him. My life, my life, my real life,
your real life, spiritual life, is hid with Christ in God. That speaks to me of security. That speaks to me of safety. I wish we were more acquainted
with, and the Lord would impress even more upon us, the glorious
truth of our union with Christ Jesus. We're in Him, we're one
with Him. I mentioned this passage of Scripture
this past Sunday, but I want you to turn with me to Ephesians,
the second chapter. We're in Him, Ephesians, the
second chapter. We're identified in Him. We're
acknowledged as being in Him. Ephesians chapter two, and you
have to be quick in verse one, who were dead in trespasses and
in sins. wherein in time past ye walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince
of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the
children of disobedience. Among whom also we all had our
conversation in times past, in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature
the children of wrath, even as others. But God, not but you,
but God, but God who is rich in mercy, for his love, wherewith
he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened
us together with Christ. By grace ye are saved, and hath
raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places
in Christ. Jesus. We've been seated in the
heavenly places in Christ Jesus. We're seated beside of Him. We're
seated with Him. We're in Him. We're in Him. He's
seated on the very throne of God at the right hand of the
majesty. And we're in Him. We've been seated in the heavenlies
in Christ Jesus. This is the teaching of the Word
of God. That we're in Him. And haven't
we learned as we've studied just in my Bible right across the
page in chapter 1 that all of the mercies of God, all of the
salvation of God is in Christ Jesus. All of the grace, all
of the blessings, all of the good things that God has for
us are all in Christ Jesus and that's where we are by divine
choice. For instance, go back into chapter
1 and look at verse 1. Chapter 1, verse 3. Blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. In whom have we been blessed?
In Christ Jesus. Where are all of the blessings
of God? We say, count your many blessings,
name them one by one. And usually men mean by that
those material mercies that God gives us and we're thankful that
we are partaker of those physical temporal mercies. But real blessings,
real mercies are to be found in Christ Jesus. That's where
we are. That's the reason we got the
blessings. Look in verse 4, "...according as He hath chosen us in Him."
This is our union with Him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love. And
over and over again He uses this sort of language. Look at verse
6, "...to the praise of the glory of His grace, wherein He hath
made us accepted in the Beloved." Where are you accepted? You're
accepted in Christ Jesus. There's no acceptance anywhere
else. We're seated in Him, in the heavenlies. There's a verse of scripture,
and it really, it doesn't actually pertain to the thought that we're
pursuing, but it is worded just the way that, actually the way
Paul Words are here in Ephesians chapter two and verse six, a
verse that we just read a little bit ago about seated with him
in heavenly places. We sit together in heavenly places
in Christ Jesus. And here's the verse. It is in
Luke 22, 55, and it's about Simon Peter. When he goes in and he
sits down with the enemies of our Lord. And the scripture says,
and when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, They
were set down together, and Peter sat down among them." And really,
that's the exact same idea here, is that we have sat down right
beside of the Lord Jesus. Even as Peter sat down with the
wrong crowd, and we learned valuable lessons from that, we have sat
down with the Lord of glory. That's the thought. We're seated
beside of Him. by sovereign almighty grace. We have been put in Him and put
with Him, and that's where we are today. He's the head and
we're the body. Let all of the people of God
embrace this glorious truth. And if God impresses it upon
us, we won't be fearful of anything. We're seated with Christ Jesus. in the heavenlies. We're hidden
in Him. We're hidden from the world.
We're hidden from the evil one. We're hidden from all real dangers. We're made to sit right down
with Him. Just like Peter sat with those
enemies, you and I sat with Christ Jesus. You see, maybe you're
watching this by yourself, but it may be you're sitting there
beside someone. even as we have two couples here
this evening who are sitting beside one another. But know
this, all of us who are the Lord's people, we're seated with Christ
Jesus. How safe is that? How much more
glorious could it be? We're seated in the heavenlies
in Christ Jesus. We're in Him. We're in Him. And we're certain to be with
Him, body and soul, one day. He's the one who sustains us.
He's the one who bears our names upon His heart. He's the one
who represents us. The Lord Jesus, He's the secret
place of the Most High. And we dwell in Him. and He abides
with us. Here's the second thing. We talked
about secret place. Let me talk about secret grace.
The reason we dwell in Him is by sovereign, saving, secret
grace. For you see, this was grace given. Turn with me to 2 Timothy chapter
one. This was grace given to us before
God ever made the world. This is secret grace. Secret
grace. Second Timothy chapter one in
verse nine, who, that is God, hath saved us and called us with
unholy calling, not according to our works, but according to
his own purpose and grace, which was given us, and here it is
again, in Christ Jesus, not out of him, but in Christ Jesus. Well, when did God do this? Before
this world was made. This was grace given to us in
Christ. This is God's electing grace. This is God's saving grace. And
it's his secret grace. Because it isn't given to everyone. It's only for a remnant according
to the election of grace. And it is true that remnant is
a multitude to which no man can number. Nevertheless, it is not
universal grace. It is not for all the world.
It is not common grace. It is not grace that God wants
to give to everyone And it is not grace that God is in search
of people who he asked them to accept it. This is secret grace. It is selective grace. It is
sovereign grace that he gives to his people. And I just read
to you there in Ephesians chapter one, After speaking about election
and some of the other blessings of the covenant that God has
given to us in Christ Jesus, He then says, this is all to
the praise of the glory of His grace wherein He hath made us
accepted in the Beloved. In other words, what He has enumerated
there, adoption, is due to this grace. Acceptance with God is
due to this grace. Redemption by the blood of the
Lord Jesus is due to this grace. The forgiveness of our sins is
due to this grace. And indeed, our justification,
the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit, our preservation,
our sanctification, our resurrection, the resurrection of our bodies
and our glorification, all of these are ours and we're sure
to receive them because grace was given us in Christ before
the world began. You see, the reason we will be
the recipients of all of these spiritual blessings that are
in Christ Jesus is because of this secret grace, that is sovereign
grace, that God chose us. I'm never ashamed of the doctrine
of election. And if you have difficulty with
it, I sure feel sorry for you and I pray for you. Surely nobody
who's under the sound of my voice has difficulty believing in the
sovereignty of grace or the necessity of God choosing a people unto
salvation before the foundation of the world. This is to me,
this is the foundation grace. Because as you read here, as
we did in Ephesians chapter one, all of the other blessings that
God has for us, they all flow out of that secret electing grace
of God. It's one of the sweetest truths
that God has ever taught me. He chose me under salvation. It's a very humbling truth. Because
for years I thought it was me. I thought I made the difference.
And you did too. Until God came to us in regenerating
grace and He illuminated our darkened minds. And He shined
the spotlight of the Word of God upon our hearts. And we came to understand that
salvation is of the Lord. He didn't have to save us. He
didn't have to show us grace. He didn't have to reveal the
Savior to us. This was God's doings and we
glory in Him. This is secret grace. You see, the reason we dwell
in the secret place is because of secret grace given to us in
Christ Jesus. And then here's the third thing,
secret work. Secret work. The reason that
we have come to understand that we dwell in the secret place
and that we're saved by this secret grace is because of a
secret work. What do you mean by secret work?
I'm talking about the work of the Spirit of God. because it
was a work that was not evident to anybody around us. In fact,
when the work began, it wasn't even evident to us. We didn't
know what was happening. We knew, we do remember a time
when we had no interest in the things of God. The gospel did
not move us. Neither the threats of the wrath
of God nor the promises of heaven and the glories of that great
paradise, that didn't move us either. The love of God had no
real effect upon the heart, and the wrath of God did not stir
up within us any true fear of God. Under the preaching of the
Word of God, we pretty much remained unmoved. Oh, we might get a little
disturbed, but it soon wore off. But then, there began to be a secretive
work within us, and without any stirring up of
our own hearts, without us doing anything, suddenly we found ourselves
listening with interest. And maybe we couldn't even put
our finger on it. I don't know why I listened closer
today. I really can't understand. I can't explain it. And maybe
you went home and you talked to your wife or you talked to
your husband or you talked to your mother or your father or
your kids or whoever and you said, you know, he said a lot
of interesting things today. It kind of got me to thinking. What has happened? A secret work. A secret work. And all of a sudden,
all of your false refuges, they came crashing down. And you found you had no hiding
place. You had no salvation. He had
no Savior. And then, like the Lord said
in Isaiah, you heard the word, look unto Me and be ye saved. All the ends of the earth, for
I am God and there is none else. And you said, I'm looking, Lord.
I'm looking to Christ Jesus. And without any prompting or
twisting of the arm by a preacher, He just set forth Christ and
Him crucified, the blood of the cross of Calvary, and the forgiveness
of sins that resulted, that was the result of His death, and
you just found yourself casting your soul with all of its sinfulness
upon this glorious, blessed Savior. And you say, I don't know what's
happened to me. I can tell you what's happened
to you, a secretive work. that the Spirit of God has wrought
in your soul. Our Savior said, ye must be born
again. And he went on to tell Nicodemus,
the wind blows where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof,
but you can't tell where it's coming from or where it's going,
so is everyone that's born of the Spirit. And for so many years,
others, the wind was blowing their way. So there wasn't a
leaf of you that was rustled. But then all of a sudden, the
wind began to blow your way. And lo and behold, it was the
breath of life. A secretive work. No wonder. John said in Revelation chapter
20 and verse 6, Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first
resurrection. On such the second death hath
no power. No power. What is this first
resurrection? It's the new birth. It's regeneration. It's when the Spirit of God gives
us new life. He gives us grace. He gives us
a new attitude. He gives us a new nature. He
gives us a new desire. He gives us a new will. And it's
a secretive work. You see, it's the life of Christ
Jesus in the soul that loves the Gospel, that loves the Word,
that loves the people of God, that loves the servant of God,
and hates evil. You see, we're like Job in this.
The Scripture says of Job, he eschewed evil. That is, he turned
away from evil. He hated every evil way and so
do we. Why is that? Because of a secretive
work. A secretive work. Which brings
me to the last thing, secret truth. For you see, if we dwell in the
secret place of the Most High, the secret of the Word of God
has been made known to us. Look at Psalm 25. Look at Psalm 25. And verse 14. See, we dwell in the secret place. And it's because of secret grace. And it was revealed to us by
secret work. Wherein the Spirit of God revealed
unto us secret truth. Psalm 25, 14, the secret of the
Lord is within that fear Him. Well, what does this secret have
to do with? Read the rest of the verse, and
He will show them His covenant. Clearly, the secret of the Lord
has to do with His covenant. The covenant of grace. The covenant
of grace that gave birth to the gospel of our Lord Jesus. You
see, there are people who read the Word of God, read chapter
by chapter, who really do not know the secret of the Scriptures. The secret of the Word of God
has to be revealed. Of that secret, I think we can
speak of it as Daniel. spoke, he interpreted a dream.
He was about to interpret a dream for Nebuchadnezzar. And when
he went to reveal it to the king, he said this, but as for me,
this secret is not revealed to me for any wisdom that I have
more than any living man. That's what it is with the gospel.
This secret, the secret of how God can be just and justify the
ungodly, this secret is not revealed to anybody because of any wisdom
that they may have. Because this is a wisdom that
defies any wisdom that man could ever have, the wisdom of how
God can remain just and holy and yet deal in mercy and forgiveness
with folks like you and me. It's through the death, the burial,
and the resurrection of our Lord Jesus. Quickly, let me give you
a couple of references more. Turn to Romans chapter 16. And I'll only have time to just
kind of touch on these. Romans chapter 16. And let me read verse 25. Romans 16, 25. Now, to him that
is a power to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching
of Jesus Christ according to the revelation of the mystery
which was kept secret, it was kept secret since the world began,
but now is made manifest. by the scriptures of the holy
prophet or of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting
God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith. Made
known to a people through all nations for the obedience of
faith. Another reference, Matthew chapter
13. Matthew chapter 13. 34 and 35. Matthew chapter 13, verses 34
and 35. And these of course, the parables
of Matthew chapter 13, which we have studied, of course. But
I wanna read just two verses here, 34 and 35. All these things
spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables, and without a parable
spake he not unto them, that it might be fulfilled which was
spoken by the prophet, saying, I will open my mouth in parables,
I will utter things which have been kept secret, from the foundation
of the world. Well now, if they were kept secret
from the foundation of the world, who only knew this secret? God, right? He's the only one
who existed before the foundation of the world. The Father, the
Son, and the Holy Spirit. Three in one, one in three. This
has been kept secret in the heart and the mind of God, but He's
been pleased to reveal it. through the preaching of the
gospel and the work of the Holy Spirit. He makes known the truth. One of the most secretive truths,
of course, is that when our Lord Jesus came to this world, that
God was in him reconciling the world unto himself. This was
a secret people didn't know. People didn't recognize that.
It was a secret. That little infant in the manger.
There's a secret about that. That was God. He's dependent
upon Mary for his nourishment, for his safety. for provision,
but all at the same time, he's God over all, blessed forever.
That's a secret. There are a lot of people who
choke on that. They can't be. Oh, it is that
way. When he was 12 years old, that
lad who went into the temple at the Passover and stayed there
and he was questioning and listening to the doctors, those who knew
the Old Testament. You mean that is the Lord who
grew in wisdom and in stature? Grew in knowledge? Oh yeah. And
many people, they couldn't comprehend that. This is what the Jews had
great difficulty with. They choked on His deity. They
said, we know who You are. You can't be God manifest in
the flesh. When He said, My Father worketh
hitherto and I work, they were ready to stone Him to death.
He said later on in John chapter 10, he said, I and the Father
are one. They picked up stones to stone him to death. He said,
why do you stone me? They said, for a good work we
stone you not, but because you being a man, you say you're God. That can't be. That's contrary
to human reasoning. It's a secret truth. It has to
be revealed. It has to be revealed. And that man who died, Calvary? Blooded, gory looking, suffering. Surely, surely you don't believe
that's God hanging right there on that tree, do you? Yes, I
do. Well, that don't make sense to
me. I know it doesn't make sense to a natural man. It's kindly
a secret. But that's how God saves sinners
right there, through that God-man dying and being buried and being
raised again because of our justification. And then let me give you one
more verse. And I want you to go back to the Psalm I began
with, Psalm 27. So I'll go back. We've kind of made a circle here. I'll go back to Psalm 27 in verse
five. Psalm 27 in verse five. And David says this, for in the time of trouble he
shall hide me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle
shall he hide me. He shall set me up upon a rock. Who is this tabernacle? Christ
Jesus is the tabernacle of God. That Old Testament tabernacle.
You know it typified our Lord Jesus, not only the tabernacle
itself, but everything about it. That tabernacle from a distance,
it looked ordinary like any other tent. Though it was in the middle
of the camp of Israel, from the outside, the appearance wasn't
any different from the rest of the tents, but all within, oh,
it was magnificent. That's our Lord Jesus. And that's where God has hidden
us. He set us up upon a rock. You
see, our God gives to us the best shelter. The best shelter
in the worst time of trouble. The best shelter in the worst
time of trouble. And if the troubles aren't great,
guess what? It's the same shelter. The Lord Himself. This is where
believers dwell. This is where we dwell. This
is where you dwell. We dwell where nothing and no
one can enter in and harm us. No evil shall come near the people
of God. And here's the reason I say that.
Because we dwell in the secret place of the Most High. Let's close with prayer. Father,
bless the Word that has gone forth this night. Encourage your dear people. Ah,
this is a blood-bought people. This is a people who dwelled
in a secret place. And it's all because of secret
grace that was given to them in Christ before the world began. And it's been revealed to us
by secret work. The work of your Spirit, which
is ongoing. He is still teaching us and drawing
us to Christ. We're growing in grace and in
the knowledge of our Savior. And He has taught us secret truth. And He's still teaching us. And
we're thankful. Oh, how safe are the sheep of
the shepherd. Give us confidence in Christ
Jesus. In His name, amen.