Glad to see you back this morning.
I almost said I'm surprised to see you back. Please turn back to Romans chapter
9 this morning. I always think about what the prophet said when he said he's not a prophet and
not a prophet's son. He's just a gatherer of sycamore
fruit. And the Lord came to him and
called him. Well, I was not a gatherer of
sycamore fruit. I was just the floor man's son. The Lord, for some reason known
only to himself, gave me this burden of the word
of the Lord. This morning again, I would like
to talk to you about the sovereign will of God. but especially the sovereign
will of God, resisted, but always overruling. I said in the first message that
the salvation of sinners has to be traced back to the initiator. Because the one who initiates
and accomplishes is the one who gets all the glory. And it begins by an act of God's
sovereign will. That 15th verse, Paul reminds
us of what the Lord was pleased to say to Moses. I will have mercy on whom I will
have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. The Lord acted alone, uninfluenced, unaided, And since I must believe that
none could stay his hand, that he acted successfully. He acted without any possibility
of failure. But even though this is a fact,
even though it is the truth, This is also the thing most rebelled
against. It was the thing first rebelled
against. But as is demonstrated, it can
never be rebelled against successfully. It is the will of the sovereign
God of the universe. And that is why that Satan and
those angels that followed him in that rebellion, that's exactly
what they found out. When you read in Isaiah chapter
14, It says, How art thou fallen
from heaven, O Lucifer, son of the morning? How art thou cut
down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations? For thou
hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt
my throne above the stars of God. I will sit also upon the
mount of the congregation in the sides of the north. I will
ascend above the heights of the clouds. I will be like the most
high. Yet thou shall be brought down
to hell to the sides of the pit. When His will defied the will
of God, when He willed to do all these things, God said, ìNo,
you wonít.î As a matter of fact, He said,
ìThey that see thee shall narrowly look upon thee, and consider
thee saying, Is this the man that made the earth to tremble
and did shake kingdoms? That made the world as a wilderness
and destroyed the cities thereof that opened not the house of
his prisoners? Is this the one? Is he the one
that willed so much? Defied God's will so much? Look at him now. He could not
resist God's will successfully. But not only that, this is what
man first defied. Because the tree that was there
in the midst of the garden Contrary to so much thinking, was not
an apple tree or this special tree or any other tree except
that it was distinguished by God. It was simply representative
of God willing and God's right to be God and to demand of His
creatures what He would. But Adam defied that. And when he defied that, all
our race fell in him. And Paul says, by one man's disobedience,
the many were made sinners. And therefore, death and judgment
and condemnation came upon all men. And this rebellion to the will
of God is at the real root of what men call free will. Free will is simply man's desire
and man's attempt to be free of the will of God. We would by nature be free from
this will of God. Because the truth is, man's will
is not bound, but it is rather, it's not free, but it's bound
to a fallen nature that is entity against God. Contrary to God,
against God. And this is the will that was
demonstrated against Christ when he came to do the will of God. Look over in Luke chapter 19. In Luke chapter 19, when the
Lord was giving this parable or story, an example of how He
as the Lord's Christ is received, when He does so with the nobleman's
ten pounds, look at what it says in verse 13. And He called His
ten servants, and delivered them ten pounds and said unto them,
Occupy till I come. But his citizens hated him and
sent a message after him saying, We will not have this man to
rule over us. We will not have this man to
rule over us. And so when our Lord came to
this earth, when he took on himself human flesh, and he met first
with those and their opposition who claimed to know God, and
speak for God, and be the people of God, what did he say of them? He said,
you will not come to me that you might have life. You see, Christ is the will of
God as to how God saves sinners. or has come to do the will of
God, which is to save his people from their sins, and men in their
rebellion sought to kill him, and they did kill him. They thought that they had stopped
the will of God. But if they thought that, they
were very wrong. Because if you look over in Acts
chapter 2, in Acts chapter 2, the very first
things, among the very first things, that these apostles are
led by the Spirit of God to tell men and women after his death,
after his burial is this. He says in Acts chapter 2 and
verse 22, you men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth A man approved
of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs, which
God did by him in the midst of you, as you yourselves also know. Him being delivered by the determinate
counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have taken and by wicked
hands have crucified and slain. Whom God hath raised up, having
loosed the pains of death, because it was not possible that he should
beholden of it." In other words, in doing just exactly what they
wanted to do and what they willed to do, the overriding, overruling
will of God brought them to do just exactly what he willed to
do. You took him You exercised your
free will. You with every desire and intent
of your heart took him and by your wicked hands you slayed
him. But when you did it, you did
that determined counsel and foreordained will and act of God. In doing what you thought you
were doing against God, you actually did what God had long before
determined to be done. And then, not only that, but
as the Apostle just probably days later is led as he stands
before men and women to preach, Look over at what it says in
Acts chapter 4. In Acts chapter 4, when they
had been released after being stopped in the preaching of this,
they go back out and they begin to preach again, and guess what
they do? They preach the same thing that
got them in trouble in the first place. Verse 24 of Acts 4 says,
And when they heard that, they lifted up their voice to God
with one accord, and said, Lord, thou art God which hast made
heaven and earth and the sea, and all that in them is. who by the mouth of thy servant
David hath said, Why did the heathen rage, and the people
imagine vain things? Let me assure you, when you imagine
anything contrary to the will of God, you are imagining a vain
thing. He says, Because the kings of
the earth stood up, And the rulers were gathered together against
the Lord and against His Christ. For of a truth against thy holy
child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod and Pontius Pilate
and the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together. Now if there ever was a diverse
group of individuals, If there ever were divided groups
that hated and despised each other, they're listed right here. But they all got together on
one thing. Just like in our day, that's
the way false religion does. They have their disagreements
with each other. They have their little differences
with each other that they're always pointing out. But they'll
always bend together. They'll always be in agreement
against one thing. And that's the true gospel of
the sovereign free grace of God. But all these individuals, all
these various groups that hated and fought against and despised
each other, it says they were gathered together for to do whatsoever
thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done. In doing what they willed, they
really did the will of God. And to God's great glory and
the accomplishment of this will of grace and mercy to His people
in Christ, they did just what they willed to do to them, but
in doing so, they could not stop Him. They could only aid Him. That's what Nebuchadnezzar found
out. And if the Lord is pleased to
show mercy on us, that's what we're going to find out. Because
Nebuchadnezzar, after being brought to an end of himself, he confesses
this. He says, And all the inhabitants
of the earth are reputed as nothing, and he doeth according to His
will. In the army of heaven, and among
the inhabitants of the earth, and none can stay His hand or
say unto Him, what doest thou? Now let me tell you what I've
observed. I've observed that men and women, especially religious
women, they like to say that God can do anything He wants
to. But what they hate is what the Bible says that He's
already done. They love to talk about how His
will is going to be done. in one sense or another, but
they hate what it says about His will having already been
accomplished in the Lord Jesus Christ. Or they like to say,
God wants to do this, or His will might be to do this, but
that doesn't necessarily mean that it'll be done. There's a verse in the book of
Job, That's always settled the matter for me. Well, not always. But he says, he is in one mind,
and who can turn him, and what his soul desireth, even that
he doeth. The notion that God wants to
do something, but he's going to do something else, or he wants
to do something and he can't do it, It says whatever he desires,
whatever he wills to do, that is exactly what he does. And men just do all kinds of
stupid things. They invent all kinds of stupid
terms. in order to somehow circumvent
this unchangeable, immutable, unstoppable will of God. They call it things like His
permissive will. And they call it things like
His direct will, or His revealed will, or His will of purpose. No, it's just His singular sovereign
will that He has made a will of grace and mercy to an elect
people that He chose in Christ before the world began. There's no need of sugarcoating
that. He does according to His will
in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of this earth,
and no one can stay His hand. And when Paul writes this in Romans chapter 9, look back
at what it says in verse 17. Somebody was reading one of the
texts such as this to a man who was listening to him, and he
read a text like this, or it was Ephesians 1 or something
like that, and he asked the man, he said, do you believe what
I just read? He said, not the way you read it. There's just
one way to read this. He says, For the Scripture saith
unto Pharaoh, even for this same purpose have I raised thee up,
that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might
be declared throughout all the earth. You see, God is going to get
glory in His just judgment against the reprobate. as He is His just
salvation in His people. He's going to get glory. If we speak of His glory in these
services, He's going to be glorified in all you that believe, but
He's going to be glorified in all of you if you don't believe. I sent a message to the man that
will speak in my place this morning, or tomorrow morning. And my message is this, we preach
first of all for the glory of God. And this message is a savor
of life unto life to some and a savor of death unto death to
others. But God, He always finds it a
sweet savor, a sweet fragrance going up to Him. He says, therefore hath he mercy
on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will, he hardeneth. I
don't know how many chapters I've read of commentators trying
to dilute that in some way or another, and every time I come
back to this book, it says the same thing. He can do that, you know. Somebody
said, well, that's double-edged predestination. Is there any
other kind? This is the sword of God. It
cuts both ways. He'll have mercy on whom He'll
have mercy, and whom He will He harden. Thou wilt say then
unto me, Why doth He yet find fault? For who hath resisted
His will? Every sinner. Every sinner. The devil. Nay, but, O man, who art thou
that replies against God? Shall the thing form say to him
that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? You know, we're
real quick to blame our sin on God Himself. That's right. We'll blame our righteousness
or the one we think we've got. We'll blame that on us, but our
sin You remember that comedian who'd always say, the devil made
me do it? That's the way we are. But he says, hath not the potter
over the clay? Now that's about as clear a demonstration
of divine sovereignty as I know of. Here's a potter and he's
got a ball of clay. But he says, hath not the potter
power over the clay of the same lump? to make one vessel unto honor
and another vessel unto dishonor. What if God willing to show his
wrath? And when we read that, we think
of, well, he's going to allow his wrath to be. No, no. There's nothing passive about
the will of God. He says, what if God willing
active, willing to show his wrath and to make his power known,
endured with much long-suffering, the vessels of wrath fitted to
destruction." Then they would start on that too, you know.
They fitted themselves, they did that. Well, you lose the
whole potter thing when you start down that track. I don't believe I ever saw a
potter. I've got a brother-in-law who's a potter and he's a good
one. But I don't think he ever set a lump of clay on that potter's
wheel and all of a sudden it determined something about itself.
It's always in the potter's hand. He says, and likewise that he
might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy
which he had aforeprepared unto glory. Boy, I like that verse. Because it's followed with this.
He said, even us. Even us. Even us whom he hath
called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles. You see, God says this. He said, all souls are mine. That's pretty universal if you
like universal things. But he also says, can I not do
with my own what I will? I'm just telling you. The Lord's
going to have to bring us to this. Or we'll just die in rebellion. And we'll be like that free bug
flying through the air. And he can challenge the windshield, but he's going to lose. This
is the will of the sovereign God. And in saving us, He must bring us to submit our
sinful wills to His sovereign but also good and gracious will. His will in Jesus Christ the
Lord. That is where you are going to
meet His will. As Brother Mahan said a long
time ago, the first message I ever heard him preach on a little
old cassette tape had that permanent ink stamp on it. You remember
how they were? He said, God's going to meet
you right there, and you're going to be saved, broken,
or you're going to perish. I think Brother Tim said the
first thing we confront in the command to believe is to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. But the truth is our wills are
never in submission to His apart from a mighty work of His Holy
Spirit. Only omnipotent grace. Only the mighty God the Spirit,
only the Lord of glory can make us such. You see, when he talks about
these that are called, one meaning of that word called is named. That means election, distinguished
in divine sovereign election. But another meaning of it also
here is to be effectually brought. And when God calls His people
in that sense, He has to break their wills in order to manifest
and bring them to His will. And you know that can be a painful
process. But if He saves us, it absolutely
has to happen. Because, according to Brother James, sometime
way back in the early 80s, he brought me to notice that
verse in 2 Timothy chapter 1, verse 9 and 10. It says, He hath
saved us and called us. Now that's just the exact opposite
of religion in our day. Religion in our day says He'll
call you and if you respond to His call, He'll save you. One preacher said one time, I
heard him on the radio, he said, he said, if you'll accept Jesus,
He'll write your name in the Lamb's Book of Life. I thought,
you're a little late, friend. No, Paul said, He has saved us
and called us. In other words, He by His power,
in a response, you might say, to what work has already been
accomplished by the Lord Jesus Christ in saving us, He mightily,
effectually brings our wills to submit to His will, which is to be saved only through
and by the Lord Jesus Christ. Turn over to Psalm A hundred
and ten. I love this psalm because it's
God the Father talking to and about His King. He said, I've
set my King on my holy hill. And the psalmist writes, the
Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, until I make
thine enemies thy footstool. The Lord shall send the rod of
thy strength out of Zion. Rule thou in the midst of thine
enemies. Now, what is the rod of his strength? Rod here is actually scepter.
And scepter, according to what we read in Hebrews, the scepter
which is what characterizes a king or a kingdom, his scepter is
a scepter of righteousness. So what is this rod that goes
out? It is the gospel. Now, I may not know a lot about
the gospel. I believe I know a little bit,
but I may not know as much as some. But I know this. Paul describes
the gospel as that gospel wherein the righteousness of God is revealed. And I know what the charge is
against preachers like me. Bill and others. You talk too
much about righteousness. How can I not and preach the
gospel if I preach it? Well, you don't talk about what
we're to do in order to be righteous. What? It's the gospel wherein
the righteousness of God. Where's that at? It's in the
Lord Jesus Christ. He's the Lord our righteousness.
And I just hate to tell you this, but there's no other righteousness.
There just is no other righteousness. You can talk about creature righteousness,
you can talk about imparted righteousness, you can talk about whatever you
want to, but it's only the righteousness of God is where? In Christ Jesus. They say, well it says we're
made the righteousness of God. It doesn't say, by Christ Jesus,
it actually says, in Christ Jesus. The only way God will ever see
you righteous, the only way you will ever be righteous, if He
by His grace makes you so, it will be by viewing you, counting
you, dealing with you, in Jesus Christ alone. He said, Brewed thou in the midst
of thine enemies. You see, his people, the subjects
of this king, the Lord's king, they're scattered all amongst
his enemies. Arthur threw this in also. God's
people were not enemies and then made his friends. No. They were never the children
of wrath. I'm sorry, I mean, that's just
the truth. They were by nature the children of wrath, but they've
always been the children of grace. They've always been the children
of God. He's always dealt with them as His children. But the
children of God are all scattered in this world amongst His enemies. And not only that, by nature,
they're just like His enemies. That's why we preach the gospel
to all. I don't know who they are. Some of you that don't look
like you might be his enemy, some of you sweet dear ladies,
you really might be in your heart. Some of you rough, more common
folks like me, you might just be one of his children. I don't
know. But I know this. These unwilling ones will be
made willing. They're going to be made willing.
Somebody said, well, you don't believe that they're willing
at all. That's exactly right. I don't. I believe they have
to be made willing. Just like He says in the third
verse, the Father saying to His King, Thy people, not everybody,
Evidently, Pharaoh didn't die willing. Most of those Jews,
those Pharisees and all, they didn't die willing. But thy people
shall be willing. How can you be so sure, God?
In the day of my powers. Thy people shall be made willing
in the day of my That's when that will of rebellion
and defiance and unbelief and self-righteousness and error
and false views about God, they're going to come in contact with
this sovereign will. And an amazing thing is going
to be happening. I can't tell you the day and
the time and the hour, but I can tell you about when it took place
with me. It was the day when a man said something and I opened
this book and somehow overnight God had changed the words in
it. And I couldn't do anything but
believe it. Nobody had to force me. As a
matter of fact, nobody could stop me. They said where I was
preaching, they said, we might can work this out if you just
quit preaching what you're preaching. I told him, I said, I could do
about anything you asked me to do, and I would. But you asked
me to do the one thing I can't do. I'm willing to preach this
gospel. I agree with what God says. I have fellowship now with God
in this fellow and what he says about him. I'm willing. You see, all that it is God's will to
save, they shall be saved, they shall be brought to willingly
submit to the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Paul said,
that's the problem with my people. They have not submitted to the
righteousness of Christ. How do you know that? Because
they're still going around trying to establish their own righteousness. Everyone God saves, he brings
to a stop of going about to establish their own righteousness, and
they bow to the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. They
cast off those old garments. They do things that they never
in their whole life were willing to do. Believe things that they
did not want by nature to believe. Cast off what they once counted
as the very best thing, like Paul says in Philippians 3, and
they count it but done that they might be found in Him. They don't just change gears,
or change religions, or change doctrines, or change this and
that and the other. They're brought from unwilling
to willing. And bow before divine truth. Though they're naturally stubborn
and unwilling, they'll be made willing because of His will. Paul said, for it's God that
worketh in you both to will and to do. of His good pleasure. Turn over to 2 Peter. 2 Peter chapter 3. Now you might have been like me.
I was raised up under half-verse religion. I could quote you a whole lot
of half-verses. I could quote you half of John
6, 37. Him that comes to me, I'll in
no wise cast out. What I didn't know was what he
said before that in the same verse. All that the Father giveth
me shall come to me. And then there was always this
verse. They would say, God is not willing
that any should perish. But if you don't do this, that,
and the other, that's what you're going to do. No. In verse 9, the apostle says,
The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count
slackness, but is longsuffering to us. If you want to know who
that is, I do believe that in grammar no pronoun stands by
itself. It has to be identified with
something. It has to be identified with
a person or a place or something like that. And so you need to
go back to chapter 1 and verse 1. a servant and an apostle of Jesus
Christ to them that have obtained like precious faith with us through
the righteousness of God and our Savior Jesus Christ." They didn't have faith and therefore
get righteousness. They got faith through the righteousness
of God in Jesus Christ. That's the order. Faith is a
gift given because of a work done and accomplished. Faith
can only lay hold of a righteousness that has already been established.
That's who he's writing to. God's believing people. And he
says, the Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count
slackness, but is longsuffering to usward, not willing that any
of this usward should perish, but that all should come to repentance. In other words, in the context
here, Peter is talking about how God has promised that He
will destroy this world again, the second and the last time,
but it will not be by water, it will be by fire. But the reason
why that hour has not come, though it shall come, is because of
this. Because he has a people that
he had said long before in old eternity, I will have mercy on
them, and I will be gracious to them, and I will have compassion
on them. And this world will stand until
that last one has been called out and brought to Christ in
faith. And He's not willing that any
of them should perish, but that they should all have
eternal life. Not by their decision, not by an act of their so-called
free will, but the birth that they will experience, that birth
from above, will be an act according to the will of God. That's what James writes, of
his own will begat he us with the word of truth. John writes in that first chapter
that he came unto his own and his own received him not, but
as many as received him. They didn't any by nature receive
Him. But there's some that did receive Him. But as many as received Him,
to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His name, which were born, not of blood, nor
of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. You see, the will that causes
our salvation as a whole is the will that also causes our regeneration. Men are always saying, if you'll
believe, you'll be born again. No. Christ said, He that liveth
and believeth. Somebody said, well, you know, Catholicism has an old saying. Demas, I believe, was his name.
I can't remember. But he was supposedly, as a martyr,
had his head cut off and picked it up and walked all the way
around the world. Somebody said that's stupid.
Maybe not. If he could take that first step.
If he could take that first step
as a dead man, he could walk all the way around the world.
See, that first step is the one we can't take. But because of
God's sovereign will and act of grace, He's going to bring
that sovereign work and act of His Spirit, giving us life and
faith. Men say, if man is spiritually
dead, if he's unwilling, if he doesn't have a free will, why
preach the gospel to him? Because of God's will. because
of God's will of power and grace, because he's not willing that
his people should perish. And he'll make them willing in
the day of his power. When Abraham sent his servant
down to get a bride for his son, that servant said, what if she
won't come? He said, if she won't come, the
burden's all for you. But don't you go get him and
take him down there." So Abraham's servant, he went
down there faithful. I believe he's a type of the
Holy Spirit, maybe a type of a gospel preacher. He went down
there to where she was at in that foreign land and you know
what? He told her. He said, my master, he's got
cows, sheep, camels. He's just, he's loaded. And he's just got one son. He's
just got one heir. And he's given all he has to
this one son. In other words, if you marry
this boy, you're set for life. You get everything. And that's
God's sovereign grace. He's put everything in one person. All the eggs of God's grace are
in one basket, in his dear son, in his work of righteousness,
in his salvation that he by himself accomplished. He's the heir of
all things, and if we have him, we have all things. He makes us willing. But you
know we're still weak. That's what Paul's talking about
in Romans 7. He said, God's made me willing.
But this flesh is always fighting against this. That which I would
do, I would will to do, that's what I don't do. That which I
would will not to do, that's what I do. But thank God. His will is what
saves us. And that will is accomplished
through and by the doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ. I may on any given day have to
cry out, oh wretched man that I am, but the Lord lift my eyes and
let me see myself as a man in Christ Jesus. His sovereign will is resisted,
but it always overrules, especially as it pertains to His glory and
the salvation of His people. Thank you.