1 Corinthians chapter 14, and
this will be our starting text. We endeavored, I endeavored to
speak to you this morning on a subject that is very vital, where
it's easy to be understood. I took both the text and title
from 1 Corinthians chapter 14 and verse number 9. This is where, of course, instructions
are being given by the Apostle Paul to the saints of God in
the church at Corinth, and they have to do with this issue of
speaking and other languages and the necessity that there
must be always somebody who interprets. It is of little worth for someone
to speak to you or to me or to anybody in a language that we
don't understand without there being another who is designated
as an interpreter. And I'll get to this statement
again, but I was thinking about this. You take the Word of God, the message of grace, the message
of salvation by Christ Jesus. You know, actually, that's a
language we don't understand. If one came to us preaching,
as most preachers preach, a message of good works, a message of duties
that you must fulfill in order to be saved. Someone came to
us and said, in order to be reconciled to God, you need to go into the
baptismal waters And in those waters you will wash away your
sins. We understand that. I mean, on
a natural level. Because that makes sense to us. It makes sense to us that in
this matter of deliverance from our iniquity, the subject of
the salvation of our souls, That which the language we grasp,
that we can understand, is a language of works. That comes natural
to us. If someone says to us, if you'll
do this for God, God will do this for you. Okay, I understand
that. As the natural man, you understand
what I'm talking about? As a natural man. That makes
sense to us because we're born... dead in sin spiritually. We have
no spiritual grasp of anything concerning God, or salvation,
or everlasting life, or righteousness, or substitution, or satisfaction,
anything like that. Here's the message that we grasp,
and the natural man always does, is the message of you do something
for God, God will do something for you. That's a language. We understand. We don't need
an interpreter. But the message of grace, the message of salvation fully
accomplished by the Son of God, The message that says this redemption
and salvation, deliverance of sin, it originated with God.
It's all of God in His electing grace. And God's already worked
it out. He sent His only begotten Son
into the world and by His work of redemption and reconciliation,
He's already saved the people of His choice. He's already removed
their sins. He has already fully satisfied
His own justice. And therefore, grace is to be
shown to that sinner in a manner consistent with the law. And
the way that message is received by us is by the spirit of grace. doing a mighty work within the
heart. As we hear the word of God proclaimed,
the spirit of grace works within us mysteriously, miraculously. He raises us from spiritual death. He brings us to life in Christ
Jesus. And he gives us the ability to
believe the gospel. And then this same God who originated
our salvation, He keeps us. He preserves us. Someday He'll
take us home to glory and God alone gets the credit because
God did the work. Now that's a message we don't
understand without an interpreter. Thank God there is an interpreter
to our souls. It is the Lord God himself who
comes to us. And he makes these things known
unto the heart. And that which was before a message
that we said, I don't get it. I don't understand. I don't understand
what that preacher's saying. I get the impression he believes
what he's preaching and the other folks there, they seem to grasp
what he's talking about, but I don't get it. I can't see it. I just can't see it, preacher.
I know you can't because I'm speaking in an unknown language. But when the Spirit of grace
deals with you in His quickening quickening power and ability. All of a sudden, you'll know
the language. You'll know the language. You'll
recognize. You'll say, that's the truth.
That's the truth. Because the Spirit of God will
see to it that the very gospel of God's grace is stamped on
your heart. And then as you hear the message,
then the Spirit of God within you will relate to that message
that's going in your ears and you'll be saying, I understand
that language now. See, the natural man understands
the language of works. Brother Allen, he doesn't understand
the language of grace, does he? He just doesn't do that. So we
have to have an interpreter. We've got to have one who will
make the things of God real to us. We've got to have one who
will introduce us to the Father. We've got to have one who will
bring us to the Father. We've got to have one who will
educate us on the things of God, and His name is the Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the interpreter. No wonder,
therefore, we read that the apostles said to Timothy, for there's
one God and one mediator, one interpreter, one go-between,
God and men. There's a reconciler. There's
one who makes the message real to us. And he's the God-man,
Christ Jesus. Now, no servant of the Lord, All of God's true servants, we
desire people to understand the message of grace, the message
of salvation by redemption, by substitution. Though we endeavor
to lay it out very clearly and distinctly, only God can give you understanding. And I'll tell you this, there
is a distinct difference between the message of grace and the
message of works. And if you, I don't think I'm
speaking to anybody here this evening who is under this delusion. I don't know who's watching,
of course, and I can't read your hearts either, but if you're
under the delusion that it really doesn't matter what a person
believes, that we're all gonna wind up in the same place anyway,
then you are still deceived, and you need a teacher. You need
an interpreter, and I pray that God will make the things of the
gospel real to you. I will endeavor again this evening
as I endeavored this morning to speak to you words that are
easy to be understood. And that is exactly what the
Apostle did. Go back to 1 Corinthians chapter
2. This was always his goal. This is his mission. in setting forth Jesus Christ
and Him crucified, the necessity for the death of Christ, it was
necessary on God's part and necessary for us. It's necessary on God's
part because God is not going to show mercy, He's not going
to save any sinner at the expense of His justice. The death of
our Lord Jesus Christ was absolutely required. It wasn't an option
with God. God didn't have many options
from which to choose in the salvation of sinners, and then He decided
He would land on this one. There's only one way justice
could absolutely be satisfied. There's only one way the law
of God could be silenced. Because the law of God always
cries out against sin. The justice of God always demands
vengeance. God says vengeance is mine, saith
the Lord. The death of our Lord Jesus Christ
was necessary on God's part because His justice had to be silenced. The wrath and the anger of God
against our sins. A righteous indignation the Bible
speaks of. God must strike out against iniquity,
transgressions, and sins. He must, if he is to remain God,
and he must remain God. He cannot remain silent against
sin. He must go against it. So the
death of the Lord Jesus was necessary for God. In fact, I would say
first and foremost, He died for God. He died to honor God, to
satisfy God. This was the only way God could
have any pleasure. Pleasure? That doesn't mean it
made Him joyful. That it means it satisfied God.
The scripture says, God says, I have no pleasure in the death
of the wicked. What does that mean? God says,
I have no satisfaction in the death of the wicked. My justice
is never fully honored. My wrath, all the absolute fury
of my vengeance being poured out, it will never be satisfied. It's like it's going to be poured
out and poured out and poured out forever because there's more
after that. Because justice cannot be satisfied
with the death of a sinner. But it was satisfied in the death
of the Savior. And that's because of who He
is. That's because He's God. You say, how could one man's
death do so much good for so many people? Because of whose
death it was. It's the death of the God-man
who died on that cross. The God-man did, Christ Jesus.
His death was necessary to satisfy God. His death was necessary
to reconcile us to God. Something has to be done about
our indebtedness to God. We owe a debt we can't pay. He
paid a debt He didn't owe, except in the sense it was charged to
Him, imputed to Him, reckoned to Him, and that from old eternity. And He paid it. He paid it. It's a message that here the
Apostle Paul, he delighted to preach. He's already said he
preached nothing but Jesus Christ, Him crucified, or that's what
he says here in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 1. And I, brethren,
when I came to you, I came not with excellency of speech, where
speech is word. I didn't come with some kind
of superiority attitude over you. I tell you, this man, he's
an educated man. He's a brilliant man. He grew up being educated at
the feet of Gamaliel. He's one of the most outstanding
teachers of the day. But he said to these people,
he said, when I came preaching to you, I didn't come trying
to be superior to you. I hate it when a preacher tries
to talk down to me, don't you? I just absolutely hate that.
He comes with it every once in a while, not very often, not
around here, not behind this pulpit, but every once in a while
you'll hear preachers talk. They even get up behind the pulpit
and they say, We've come together tonight. And you just want to say, would
you please, would you put, get rid of that facade. Don't try,
don't put on an act for me. You're just like the rest of
us, buddy. You put on your britches like the rest of us do. Ain't
got no vile heart like all the rest of us do. Don't put on airs
with me. I don't like religious air, do
you? I don't, I don't like that. Somebody
come around me, act like they're, they're real do-good or they're
really holy or something like that. The Apostle Paul said,
I didn't come to you as your superior. I didn't come flaunting
my knowledge and my education, although he had it. He was somebody. He said, not with excellence
of speech or of wisdom. I didn't come like somebody who
knows everything there is to know. I've had people tell me,
Preacher, I bet I know as much as you do, maybe more. Maybe
you do. I bet you I can ask you a question,
Preacher, it'll trip you up. You probably can. Whoopee! I don't know what that proves.
But it's not how much you know, it's who you know. It's who you
know. He says, declaring unto you the
testimony of God. That word testimony is record
or report. Record a report. I'm declaring
to you the report of God, the Word of God. He says, for I had
a determination when I came to you, not to know anything among
you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And I was with you,
He says, in weakness and in fear and in much trembling. My speech,
my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, but in
demonstration of the Spirit and of power." Why did you preach
that way, Paul? That your faith might not stand
in the wisdom of men, but in the very power of God. And back over in our text, he
says, I came preaching to you words that are easy to be understood. Easy to be understood. I always
like it when a young person or a child gets word to me or even
says to me, I understood what you're saying. At least understand
my words. We're not up here, I'm not trying
to educate you. I'm not trying to enlarge your
vocabulary. I'm trying to teach you the gospel.
Trying to teach you about Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I know
a few five dollar words, but very few. And it wouldn't do
any good if you know those. We set forth the word of God
simply. Words easy to be understood.
We start this morning talking about the person of God. Words
easy to be understood about God, about the glory of God, the person
of God, the attributes of God, the works of God. that we stand
in awe of God. And this is the God of the Bible,
as you know, is most people are ignorant of God. And I was thinking
this afternoon, I was reviewing my message for tonight, I was
thinking about when, here's the Apostle Paul, he goes to Athens,
up on Mars Hill. You know they had, it's estimated,
30,000 different gods? In Athens? Well, you couldn't
even remember all you gods. That's too many for me to remember.
But he says, when I came in, I saw all these statues. He said,
and I perceived you're too superstitious. What do you mean? This is a religious
city. That's what he's saying. You're
a religious city. And then he said, I saw a statue
to the unknown God. In this case, we miss one. Maybe
there's actually 30,000 in one. And we left one out. To the unknown
God. Paul said, that's the one I preach
to you. The unknown God. The God that
the natural man doesn't know. The God that Israel didn't know.
That's the reason the Lord said to Israel, thou thoughtest that
I was altogether such in one as thyself. When I look at religion
today, and as you look at religion today, I recall the words of
A.W. Pink in his great book, The Sovereignty
of God. And he said this, he said, the
God of this century no more resembles the sovereign of holy writ than
does the dim flickering candle resemble the glory of the moonday
sun. You see, the world, the heathen
world outside the church, they whittle out gods of wood
and stone. The heathen world inside of religious
edifices, they whittle out gods from the dark forests of their
own depraved imaginations. The God of this age that most
people worship is no God at all. A God whose will that can be
resisted, a God whose purpose can be frustrated, a God whose
work is thwarted by man, such a one is no God at all. And I
mean to be understood when I set forth the God of the Bible. He
is God indeed. He is God indeed. He is unchangeable. He is sovereign. He is omnipotent. He is omnipresent. He is absolutely
wise, altogether holy, faithful, gracious, and infinite. He had neither beginning of days
nor end of days. He's the creator, the sustainer,
the provider, and the savior. And there is none other but our
God. Nebuchadnezzar found out who
God was. He said, he ruleth among the
armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth, and
none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? Job
found out a few more things about God, and he said to his friends,
the Lord giveth no account of his matters. God doesn't answer
to you. God doesn't answer to me. God's
not standing before the tribunal of man, waiting to see if men
okay what He's doing, or whether they disapprove of what He's
doing. From God's throne in the heavens,
He reigns over all things to fulfill His eternal purpose.
The God of the Bible is the God of everlasting purpose. And all
things that happen in time take place just exactly the way He
ordained for them to happen. God is making no new decisions. He's making no new decrees. That
which is, that which happens, that which will ever happen is
because God, before He made the world, ordained it to happen.
That's the God of the Bible. And that's the God this religious
world doesn't know anything about. Oh Lord, let me put my lips to
the trumpet and make a very loud, distinct sound. Let me lift my voice up and let
me be easily, let my words be easily understood. As David said,
the heathen said, where's your God? That's what Joe read to
us there in Psalm 115. Where's your God? Here are our
gods. We've got them all lined up.
Aren't they beautiful? We got them all shined up. And
when the housekeeper comes in, we make sure she dusts every
one of them. These are gorgeous gods. These
are our gods. But where's your God? And David
said, our God's in the heavens. That's where He is. And He hath
done whatsoever He had pleased. And then let me sound a distinct
and certain message. Let me speak words easily understood
about the corruption of all men. I don't want to give an uncertain
sound on this either. Here's a question that needs
to be asked and answered. What in the world happened in
the Garden of Eden? You know, as I do, in the studies
of the Scripture, if God the Spirit gives us some understanding
of Genesis chapter 3, if we're given some comprehension of Adam's
fall, of his sinfulness, of his rebellion against God, and how
great was that fall, then we'll see the necessity of salvation.
And really the rest of it just kind of falls into place, doesn't
it? You know, we talk about the five
points of grace and the five points of Calvinism, and I don't
use the term Calvinism very often at all. because I'm not a disciple
of John Calvin. But these, just put these in
a nice consistent and concise is the word I'm looking for,
outline, T-U-L-I-P, and the first one is total depravity. Now,
I would say all things, first of all, all things begin with
God. Kind of hard spell, tulip beginning
with a G though. But all things do begin with
God. But then, rightfully, total depravity. Total depravity. And I say rightfully so because
as you have an understanding of God in His holiness, God in
His righteousness, God in His infinite perfections, in the
light of who He is, now look what we are. We're totally depraved. And really, it is only in the
light of who God is, in the light of God's impeccable character,
that we're going to see ourselves as we are. Fallen creatures. And in Romans chapter 5, wherefore
is by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin. And so death passed upon all
men, for that all have sinned, all sinned in Adam. He was our
representative. Oh, let me speak words that are
easy to be understood. In Adam, all die. 1 Corinthians
chapter 15. We weren't disabled. We weren't
handicapped. We died. We lost all spiritual
ability in the fall. That's you and me and everybody
else. We're born evil. We're not born
in spiritual neutral. and then dependent upon our environment
or, you know, whatever kind of surroundings we grow up in, whatever
family, then that will influence us to either go forward or backward. That's not the way it is. We're
born in reverse. We're born going backwards. We're
born in sin. That's what David said in Psalm
51. That's true of all of us. That's the reason our babies,
when they grow up, you have to say, no, don't do that. And then they do it again. I
told you no. But if they're not depraved, they wouldn't do that. They wouldn't rebel. They wouldn't
be defiant if they weren't depraved. If they weren't depraved, they'd
share. They wouldn't lie to you. I've
had mothers say to me, my child doesn't lie. Are you kidding
me? You don't know your child. He
doesn't lie. Yes, he does lie. Because you
lie. You lie. We're all liars. Let God be true
and every man a liar. You're a liar and I'm a liar
and everybody else is a liar too. Only God's the truth. We're
all depraved and you don't have to teach a child to do wrong.
You don't have to teach them to misbehave. You don't have
to be stingy. Teach them to be stingy. You
have to teach them to share. You have to teach them to tell
the truth. Why is that? Here's the reason. Sin is the
reason. Depravity is the reason. Let
me speak words that are easy to be understood. We're sinful people. That's why people don't come
to Christ Jesus. We lost all ability to come to
Him. The Savior said, no man can come
to me except the Father which has sent me. Draw him, raise
him up again at the last day. In our Bible class this morning,
I was talking about two people with faith, talking about the
ruler of the synagogue and his daughter was sick unto death
and she died. came to the Savior for help.
And there's the woman with the issue of blood, 12 years. Both
of them came to the Savior. Both of them seeking the Savior.
Why did they seek Him? Because He was drawing them.
He's drawing them. You see, no man seeks after the
Lord. No man of his own volition comes
to Jesus Christ. There was something mysterious
and miraculous. Here comes Darius. He draws near
to the Savior. My daughter, my daughter. She's
in desperate need. She's dying. Savior's drawing
that man to himself. And here's the woman with the
issue of blood. 12 years she had spent all she
had on other physicians that didn't do her any good. And now
here she comes to Jesus Christ. She heard, somebody told her
about it. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing
by the Word of God. Somebody told her. She heard
some good news. And then she comes to the Savior.
Little did she know, little did he know, the reason they came
to Christ Jesus, because he's drawing them. That's why you
came. He's pulling you in. That's what
He does with all of His people. At the right time, He pulls you
in. He sets the hook in your jaw. And with sovereign, effectual
grace, He pulls you unto Himself. And you're going to come then.
You're going to come. They'll all be taught of God,
it says in John chapter 6. They'll all be taught of God.
Why? Sovereign effectual grace. It's going to pull us to Jesus
Christ. And He has to do that, you see,
because of our depravity. Our depravity. And then thirdly,
I want to sound a clear note on this. This is a most vital
subject. Let me speak in words easy to
be understood. What happened at the cross of
Calvary when the Lord Jesus Christ died? There's no question but
what he died. Most everybody has some awareness
of the fact that he died. And they believe on some very
shallow level that Jesus of Nazareth lived, that he is born. That's
the reason they celebrate his birthday every year at Christmas. Christmas. Everybody says Jesus
was born. All right, He was. And then they
celebrate His resurrection at Easter. He arose. And if they
say He arose, that must mean they know He died. So the majority
of this country will acknowledge He is born, He lived and He died
and He arose. But they don't have the foggiest
idea why He came into this world, what His mission was, and what
He did when He died on that cross. They don't know. Oh, some of
them will say He was making a provision for everybody, if we'll let God
save Him, that sort of thing. But they really don't know why
He died. Well, He died to show us He loved us. How does that
show us that He loved us? How does the death of Jesus Christ
show anybody that He loved them? Unless there's something about
that death that honored God and saved His people. See, we need
to speak in words easy to be understood about the substitutionary
death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Here's what the scripture says,
He obtained eternal redemption for His people. You read in 1
John chapter 3, He was manifest. Why was He manifest? He was manifest
to take away sin. That's why He came. I know everybody
talks about how they love Jesus, and they don't even really know
what the name Jesus means. He shall save His people from
their sins. He's Jehovah, our Savior. He's not a wannabe Savior. He
doesn't desire to be the Savior. He is the Savior. And I have
news for this religious world. He's already saved His people
from their sins. He's already done that. And we
have the evidence. That empty tomb. That empty tomb
announces all that he did was honoring to God, satisfied God's
purpose, silenced his law that condemned those for whom he died,
and now there is no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. Christ put away the sins of his
people by the sacrifice of himself. And lastly, I want to sound a
clear note, speak in words that are easy to be understood about
this. How is it that a sinner is saved anyway? Well, it involves divine election. It involves divine predestination. Well, don't talk to me about
predestination now. Well, then we won't talk about
salvation then. Because predestination, that
started the whole thing. God's election of grace. That's
where it began. God in his infinite wisdom, oh,
how wise is our God. His ways are past finding out. Ere he made the world back in
old eternity, none but the Father, the Son, and the Spirit dwelling
in perfect unity. Back in the, what would we call
it, the timeless eternity. God decreed to save. And that salvation meant a choice
of people. Some were chosen unto salvation. A multitude. Undeserving, ill-deserving. Like all the rest of mankind,
they'd fall in Adam's transgression. But God loved a people. I can't
explain that. I've heard it said, maybe years
ago in my ignorance, I may have said it myself, I can't remember.
But I've heard it said that God could have saved everybody or
damned everybody. Well, he sure could have saved
everybody if that'd been his will. It wasn't. But I disagree with that part,
God could have damned everybody. I disagree with that part. Say,
what do you base that on? Because the scripture says God
is love. And love in the heart must be
expressed. Somebody is going to be saved. And God ordained a multitude
under this great salvation. He didn't look down through the
halls of time to see who would choose Him, who would be more
useful laboring in the work of the gospel or something like
that. No. No. of his own will and purpose.
A purpose hidden in the very heart of God himself. God ordained
a people unto salvation. The only reason you believe the
gospel tonight, if indeed you do believe the gospel, is because
he set his heart's love on you. Love's behind it all. That's
right. Love's behind it all. And these
people he gave to his son He said, they're your responsibility.
Christ said, I'll be their surety. I'll be their surety. The father
said, and you permit, give me a little leeway here, will you?
I'm just, I'm speaking of things that are, I'm really in deep
water now, but I'm just kind of improvising. Try to put it
on our level, where it's easy to be understood. The father
said to the son, these I give to you, I entrust to you. Save
them. Redeem them. Make them righteous. This is my family. And the Son
of God stood for us in that day. Oh, thank God like he's always
stood for us. There never has been a moment
when he didn't stand for his people. You understand that?
Not for a moment. You've never stood before God
by yourself. You've always been in Christ
Jesus. You've always been united. There's
a union. This is glorious. A union of
the child of God and the Son of God. A union that is from
old eternity that can never be broken. It can never be severed. There is no divorce between the
bride and the bridegroom. And the Son of God said, I love
them. I accept the work that you have
assigned me. I will in due time go to the
world, go to the earth, take into union with myself their body. And I will take a
human soul. I can't comprehend that. Take
a human soul. And I will live for them. And
then, according to our appointment, I will, being responsible for
their sins, I will die under our wrath. and all of the hell
that they would have suffered forever, I will bear it in my
own soul. Oh, Father, I will make my soul
an offering for sin." And the Spirit of God, He agreed that in time He would
be the one to reveal the Son of God to all of these chosen
ones. And he would convince them of
sin and of judgment and of righteousness through the preaching of the
gospel. And our Lord Jesus came into the world and he did that
which he purposed to do. Therefore he said, I have finished
the work Thou gavest me to do. And bless the name of our Savior,
if He said He has finished the work, then He has in fact and
indeed finished the work of redemption. He died. He was buried. He arose again. He ascended back
to the Father, and then the promise of the Father was given, the
Holy Spirit. And the Spirit of God takes preachers,
puts the message of the Gospel within them, gives them a desire
to exalt Christ Jesus, and they go forth preaching the Word,
some to just a few, some to many. Doesn't matter, that's all in
God's hands. because his sheep must hear the
word of the gospel. And at that time, ordained in
old eternity, the Spirit of God takes that gospel and makes it
real to the heart. And then, having been quickened
by divine grace and power, we say, Lord, I come to you willingly,
lovingly, Believingly, I cast my poor soul on you. Believing
that you can save me, that you have saved me and you will keep
me. There is no savior but you. And
I love you and I worship you. And like John says, we love him
because he first loved us. And someday he'll take us home
to glory. And then we will forevermore
give thanks that he sent the gospel to us in words that are
easy to be understood. And we'll praise him forever.
Amen.