Let's go back to that scripture,
Galatians chapter 6. If you would, Galatians chapter
6. Here's my target verse, verse
14. And here's my subject, the singular
reason to glory. Let me read this to you again,
verse 14, Galatians 6. But God forbid that I should,
glory, save or accept in that cross of our Lord Jesus Christ,
by whom the world is crucified unto me and I unto the world. You'll notice even in the last
of the 13th verse, the word glory is used. Speaking of these false
prophets, their desire was that they may glory, the apostle says,
in your flesh. And then he says, but God forbid
that I should glory, in other words, I'm not going to glory
in whatever results come about as a result because
I preach the gospel. I'm just going to glory in the
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now that original word, glory,
And they just work on that a little bit. It's actually translated
four different ways in the New Testament. And you don't need to look at
these, but in Romans chapter 5 and verse 11, it's translated
as the word joy. Joy. So we read there, and not only
so, but we also joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom
we have now received the atonement. or the reconciliation. So when
it says, we also joy in God, he's saying, so we also glory
in God by whom we've received the reconciliation. That is Christ
Jesus reconciled us to God. We receive this reconciliation
and we do so with joy in God. That is, we glory in God. Another way it's translated,
this original word, is in Ephesians, the second chapter in verse 9. It's translated as boast. So stay with me. First time it's
translated joy. The second way, it's the same
original word, and I'm not going to give you a Greek lesson this
morning, but the same original word, it's translated as boast. And so we read in Ephesians chapter
2 verses 8 and 9, for by grace are you saved through faith.
And that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works,
lest any man should boast. That is, lest any man should
glory, or lest any man should joy in your works. So it's translated joy, Romans
5.11, translated boast, in Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 9. You see,
if our salvation, if it was determined by something we do, then we would
glory in that work, wouldn't we? We'd joy in that work. We
would boast in that work. But it's not of works. It's of
grace. It's of grace alone. All right,
then here's another way to translate Philippians chapter 3 and verse
3. It's translated, Rejoice. And here's the verse in Philippians
3, 3, For we are the circumcision, that is, we are the true people
of God. We are God's Israel, which worship
God in spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus. He's our joy. We boast in Him. We glory in Him. And we have no confidence in
the flesh. You see, the true people of God
are identified there in Philippians chapter 3 and verse 3. We're
the ones who worship God in spirit. He said, where is the circumcision? You know, here in the context
of Galatians chapter 6, there were those legalists who came
into the church at Galatia, and they didn't take away at
least verbally, from the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. They
just said in addition to faith in Christ Jesus, there's got
to be the works of the flesh. And they specifically mentioned
circumcision. Circumcision. That's the cutting
off of the flesh of a little boy. Now even so, spiritual circumcision. You just say a word about that.
Spiritual circumcision because In Philippians chapter 3 and
verse 3, the Apostle Paul talks about another kind of circumcision. Not a circumcision of the flesh,
but a circumcision of the heart. This spiritual circumcision of
the heart is when the Spirit of God cuts off all fleshly confidence
of salvation in anything we do. That's spiritual circumcision.
He cuts it off. He cuts it off. You see, before
we're born of the Spirit, before we're circumcised in the heart,
our hope, our assurance, our confidence of salvation was in
something we had done, something we had contributed, some experience
that we experienced. But the Spirit of God, He takes
the Word of the Gospel and He circumcises the heart. That is,
He cuts off from us all fleshly hopes of salvation. In real circumcision of the heart. The Spirit of God leads us to
renounce all righteousness of our own and makes us willing
to be saved by the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. We worship God in spirit. We've
been circumcised in the heart. And we rejoice in Christ Jesus. Now remember the meaning of the
word. He's our joy. He's our glory. The Savior is
the one in whom we boast. We rejoice in His person. He's
God and man. We rejoice in His life of perfection. We rejoice in His exact obedience
to the law of God. We rejoice, we boast in, we joy
in, we glory in His work of redemption upon the cross, His sacrifice
for sins, His satisfaction of divine justice for all of His
people. We glory in Christ Jesus. We joy in Christ Jesus. We boast in Christ Jesus. Or as it says here in Philippians
chapter 3 and verse 3, we rejoice in Christ Jesus. And therefore
the third description of God's people is this, we have no confidence
in the flesh. We used to have confidence in
the flesh, but that got circumcised. That got cut off. That's what
the Spirit of God does. He circumcises the heart. He
cuts off every other hope of life and salvation and forgiveness
and righteousness except in Jesus Christ the Lord, His blood and
His righteousness only. That's circumcision of the heart. So here in this, our text for
the hour, Where it says, but God forbid that I should glory
save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is saying this,
God forbid that I should joy in anything else except the cross
of our Lord Jesus Christ. God forbid that I should boast
in anything else except the cross. of our Lord Jesus Christ. God
forbid that I should rejoice in anything else except that
cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is a fact that all men glory
in something. All men find their joy in something. And all men will boast in something. And all men will rejoice in something. Maybe your glory or boast or
joy or rejoice in your wealth. Many do. Many joy and boast and
rejoice in glory in their possessions. Many joy and boast and rejoice
and glory in their families. There are a multitude of things
that people joy in, that people boast in, that people rejoice
in, that people glory in. In this context, this is what
the Apostle Paul says, I only joy in, I only boast in, I only
rejoice in, all of my glory is in the cross of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Now in the context, the apostle has made this statement,
go back to verse 12. He said, as many as desire to
make a fair show in the flesh, Galatians 6.12, as many as desire
to make a fair show in the flesh, They constrain you to be circumcised
only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of
Christ." He's referring to these false teachers who have infiltrated
the visible church of Galatia. They profess to believe the gospel
of grace. But in addition to the gospel
of grace, they insisted on obedience to the law. specifically the
Levitical part of the Law. So they came preaching a combination
of grace and works, of salvation by the substitutionary death
of Christ Jesus, along with the works of the flesh. Now brethren,
that cannot be. It cannot be. There is no mixing
of grace and works. Go back to Romans chapter 11. Look at Romans chapter 11. There can be no mixture. There
can be no blending of grace and works. Romans chapter 11. He says in verse 5, even so at
this present time, and I would say this is so to this day, even
so at this present time, on January the 10th, 2016, even so at this
present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of
grace. At this present time, God has
His people in this world, scattered throughout the nations. There
is a people of every nation and kindred and tribe and tongue.
They are His people. He chose them unto salvation. Our Lord Jesus bought them with
His blood. And the Spirit of God will send
forth the gospel to all of these who are the remnant according
to God's election of grace. He will send forth the gospel
to them in saving and convincing and reconciling power. And they
will be brought to believe this message because it pleased God
by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. So
I rejoice to know at this present time There's a remnant according
to the election of grace. This past Friday we had the funeral
for Brother Joe's son here in the auditorium. Captain Benjamin
Joseph Ronk. I'm so thankful to see Joe and
Faye here this morning with us. You continue to lift them up
in prayer. God brought together quite the
assortment of people on Friday. And I made this statement. No other event in the world could
bring such a mixture of people together except Captain Ronk's
death. You know who's behind it all?
God is. And I made a statement something
like this. It may very well be that all
of this has happened, and all things happen according to God's
purpose, don't they? You believe that, don't you?
There are no accidents in this world. And I know men choose
to do things every day. But God reigns over all. God's
purpose was fulfilled. in order to gather together a
specific group of people to hear a specific message that he gave
his servant. Now that word may be a savor
of life unto life for some, and it will be. And it may very well
have been a savor of death unto death for others. I hope that God will use that
message even yet to bring forth life. He may use the message to hold
men without excuse. But this is my confidence in
preaching the gospel. There is at this present time
a remnant according to the election of grace. I heard Brother Mahan preach
a message many years ago on the trail of God's lost sheep. We're
on their trail. If you're one of his lost sheep,
you don't know it yet, but I'm on your trail. Even more than
that, the gospel's on your trail. And in God's appointed time,
God's gospel will seek out and find you. There is a remnant
according to the election of grace. Just a remnant. But I'll tell you that remnant
is pretty big. Especially when you get them
all together. It's a multitude that shall never be numbered
by man. But now look at verse 6. And
if by grace, if by grace, and you know, In Baptist churches
especially, but really in most all denominations, they're going
to say something about grace today. They use the word grace.
See, most churches, and I probably ought to qualify that, there
are a few churches that are just lots of goat pastures out there.
But even in the goat pastures, they speak of grace, and they
speak of the blood, and they speak of Christ Jesus. But you
know, when we speak of grace, we really mean grace, don't we? We mean grace as God means it.
We mean God's riches at Christ's expense. We mean God has been
favorable to His people. If by grace, Sovereign grace. Electing grace. Justifying grace. Redeeming grace. Regenerating
grace. Converting grace. Revealing grace. Keeping grace. Preserving grace. Sustaining grace. Supplying grace. Glorifying grace. then it's no more of works. Otherwise, if works has got something
to do with, if your salvation is in some way conditioned upon
something you must do, then it's not grace. It's works. Let's just say that now. We've got to be straightforward
with people. If it's of grace, then works
has got nothing to do with it. If it's of works, then grace
has got nothing to do with it. And what's coming out of the
mouths of most men today, they're saying grace, but it comes out
works. That's the way it comes out.
Because that's really what it is. You see, we believe that this
salvation is altogether God's work from beginning to end. Therefore, it has to be a matter
of pure grace. Works has no part of it. You
make no contribution. That's so offensive to the flesh. What do you mean? Don't I have
a say-so? No. No. God has to say so. And He said
so. He issued forth His edict of
salvation in the council chambers of eternity. He did it Himself
for His glory and He saved sinners His way by grace through the
obedience unto death of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the people
of God say, Amen. And the worksmongers say, Oh,
too much grace for me. Too much grace for me. That much
grace is too much. I had somebody cease to hear me
preach one time. And this is what they said, you
just preach too much grace for us. Well, goodbye. Goodbye. Sure not going to beg
you to stay. Our message is now and shall
always be by God's good grace. It will be grace alone. Salvation
by grace alone through Christ alone. Who is received by God
given faith alone. And to God alone be the glory.
Now watch it. If by grace, then it's no more
of works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of
works, then is it no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. It's of grace. Go back to our
text in Galatians chapter 6. You see, the message of these
false preachers who had entered into the church at Galatia was
a message really of salvation by works, salvation by man's
doings, acceptance by God as a result of something you have
to do, something you have to contribute. It's what the apostle
Paul called in chapter 1 the presentation of another gospel. That's what he said in chapter
1. It's not really another gospel. What they've done is pervert
the true gospel. They perverted it. There's a
lot of perversion in the world today. I know that. Literally. There are a lot of perverts in
the world. But the biggest perverts in the
world stand behind the pulpit. They're perverting the gospel
of God's glory. That's where the greatest perversion
is. And these, the Apostle Paul,
he didn't speak real kindly to them. No, He said in verse 12 again,
they desire to make a fair show in the flesh. Fair show is an
expression which literally means to put on a good face. To put on a good face. That is, what they did was for
appearance sake only. So they would look good to others,
so they would impress others with their religiosity. Our Lord
spoke of this sort of thing in Matthew chapter 6 when speaking
of the Pharisees. He said they do their religious
works to be seen of men. Their goal in doing the supposed
good works, their motivation in acting religious was not the
glory of God, but to impress people so folks would think more
highly of them. Their outward demonstration of
devotion, their outward religious actions, the appearance of being
spiritual was just a show to impress the onlookers in an attempt
to gain more followers. And he says, they constrain you
to be circumcised lest they should suffer persecution for the cross
of Christ. You see, the message of salvation
by a crucified Savior, salvation conditioned upon His obedience
unto death, that message was a very offensive message to the
Jews and continues to be so to the natural man. So these legalists In an attempt to appease the
Jews who still sought acceptance with God by outward obedience
to religious ceremonies, in addition to saying Christ had to die and
you must believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, messages like that,
language like that, they added, and you've got to be obedient
to the Levitical law. Which in great measure meant
that they would avoid the anger of the Jewish community. It would
kind of quiet them down. But look at verse 13. For neither they themselves who
are circumcised keep the law. Nobody can keep the law. God
never gave the law as a way of salvation and then the way of
the cross as an alternative way. Oh, how foolish. The Law is not the way of salvation.
It was never intended to be. It was never given to be. The
Law was given to shut our mouths. The Law was given to show us
our guilt. The Apostle Paul says the Law
is our schoolmaster, our cruel schoolmaster, who backed us up
in a corner and the Law says, you've got no way out. And when
the Law does its work and it backs us up in the proverbial
corner and says, you've got no way out, you've got no hope,
You're a goner! You're going to hell! I'm going
to punish you! That's when the gospel becomes
a sweet message to us. The law is our schoolmaster.
It doesn't say anything about mercy. It doesn't say anything
about grace. The law says, I've got to have
perfection. The law says, I demand righteousness. You don't have it? Well, I'm
going to get you. He said, Oh God, I'm such a sinner.
And then somebody says, Christ died for sinners. What? What? Oh, there's hope for me. There's
mercy with the Lord. His blood washed away sin. Oh
yes. His death brought in everlasting
righteousness. Oh yes. And you say, you look
at the Lord and say, I can't handle you, but I'll have this
Savior. I sure want Him. And you fall
at His feet and you say, Oh Lord, show me mercy for Christ's sake.
And he does. He's already showed you mercy. These people, they couldn't keep
the law. But they desire to have you circumcised
that they may glory in your flesh. This is their motivation. And
there's that word glory again. Their joy. Their reason for boasting. They
rejoiced. They gloried in getting another
follower. Back in our days of Bible college,
at our mailboxes, you got your mail every day in the mailbox
and you'd always get a little slip of paper, how many tracts
did you give out today? How many souls have you won to
Jesus today? Some two or three of us sovereign
grace people would get it out of the mailbox, look at it and
say, yeah, they want to know how many notches on your soul-winning
gun you got, how many more you got now. How many more souls
have you saved? Glory in the flesh. Go to the preacher's meeting
on Monday morning. Preachers get together drinking
coffee. How many did you have yesterday? How many decisions
do you have over at your church? Let me tell you how many we had
at our church. Boy, I had them walk in the aisle yesterday.
Oh, glory in your flesh. Glory in your flesh. Let's put
a board up on the wall that says, how many we had last year, a
year ago, and how many we got today. Look how many more we've
gained. Glory in the flesh. That's what Paul's talking about.
He said, I don't go in for that garbage. God forbid that I should glory.
God forbid that I should joy. God forbid that I should boast. God forbid that I should glory,
joy in, boast in, rejoice in anything except the gospel of
substitution. You see, when he talks about
glorying in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, he's not talking
about that wooden beam upon which the Savior died. He wouldn't
wear a cross around his neck. He wouldn't say to the women
in the congregation, you need to go buy you some earrings,
got a cross on so you look real religious. That's not what he's
talking about. Go get you one in big gaudy.
Go down to the jewelry store and say, what's the most expensive
gaudy looking cross you got? That's what I want to wear. He'd
say, phooey with that. That's not what I'm talking about.
He'd say, you missed the point altogether. I'm not talking about
a literal cross. I'm not talking about that wooden
beam upon which Christ Jesus died. If they was to find that
cross, men would worship it. They'd ship it up and sell it
for no telling how many dollars and people would glory in that.
We'll just say like the servant of the Lord said when he found
the brazen serpent, it's no Houston, just a worthless piece of brass.
And the cross, the liberal piece of wood, it's just a worthless
piece of wood. He's talking about the doctrine
of the cross. He's talking about salvation
by substitution. Salvation by sacrifice. That's
what He's talking about. And He said, this is my glory.
This is what I joy in. This is what I boast in. This is what I rejoice in. This is my glory. I glory in the cross of our Lord
Jesus Christ. How did he glory in the cross?
Number one, he made it the singular object
of his ministry. You read through the writings
of the Apostle Paul. Start with Romans and you just
work your way through to the book of James. And that's assuming
he wrote Hebrews. If he did, if he didn't, That's
okay. Spirit of God wrote it. But you
read through all the inspired writings of the Apostle Paul.
How did he glory in the cross? He made it the singular object
of his preaching. He said in 1 Corinthians chapter
2 and verse 2, he said, I determine not to know anything among you,
say this, Jesus Christ and Him crucified. No matter what other subject
he may have started off with, he always made his way back to
substitution and satisfaction. When he was dealing with being
a generous giver in the book of 2 Corinthians, it's like he
just stopped and said, thanks be unto God. for his unspeakable
gift. How can you speak about giving
and then not speak about God the giver and the greatest gift
that was ever given? The gift of the Lord Jesus Christ.
When he was addressing the duties of husbands and wives, he ran
back to his favorite subject. He said, wives, submit yourselves
to your own husbands, as unto the Lord. He said, Husband, love
your wives as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for
it. He always goes running to Jesus Christ the Savior. He goes
back to substitution every single time. How did He glory in the
cross? He made it the singular object
of His ministry. We better do that. We better
do that. And if we ever stop doing that
here, It's time to close up the building and lock the doors and
get a real estate agency and just sell this building because
it's lost its usefulness. We only exist as a pillar in
support of the truth. We're here to preach the gospel
of Christ. I'm not here to make you feel
better about yourself. I'm not here to build up your
ego. I'm not here to encourage you
to go out and motivate you to be successful in life. I hope
you are successful in life, but that's not what we're all about
here. We're all about preaching the
gospel because we're looking past this life. We're looking
out into eternity. That's why we compel men. Come
to Christ. Come to Christ. That's the reason
we preach the gospel. I'm concerned about you spiritually.
I'm concerned about you eternally. My goodness gracious, I don't
want you to perish and go to hell. Go to hell with the Bible
in your hand. Go to hell from 13th Street Baptist
Church, where you've sat under the gospel, many of you, for
years and years and years. Two faithful preachers preceded
me in setting forth Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and I'm trying
to walk in their footsteps, and you perish in your sin. God's
not going to show you any mercy. You despise His gospel? My soul,
how blessed you are, how blessed you are. And I'm not talking
about me. I'm talking about this message. I'm talking about Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. And you hear this message of
grace every single time you come in the doors. Every time you
gather in a Sunday school class, you're hearing this same gospel. This is our reason for existing,
is preaching the gospel. I told somebody the other day,
I said, when I can't preach anymore, the day comes that I can't physically
preach anymore, well, I've lost my usefulness. That's the only
reason I feel like I'm in this world. I've got some secondary
uses, I hope. But my primary reason for being
here is God has taught me the gospel, and I'm like that young
man in the book of Job as he listened to Job's three friends,
and they were just full of hot wind. And he said, I tell you,
I'm like a wine bag that's ready to burst. I've got to say something.
And I've got to say something to you. And the something I say
to you is we glory in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. We
don't glory in anything else here. We're not going to brag
on the flesh, we're not going to tell you how much we need
you, how much God needs you. Let me tell you something, God
will still be God whether you believe or not. He's still going
to get glory whether you believe Him or not. And you try to stand
in the way of God's eternal purpose, He'll just roll right over you
and there won't be even a smell left of you. There won't be a
memory left of you before too long. You'll be gone, God still
be God. Still be doing His purpose. Out of His glory in the cross,
He made it the singular object of His ministry. I think I'm going to stop. I
think I'll just pick this up tonight. Is that all right? I've
done that a time or two. I'm just going to stop right
there. If I go on, I'm going to get into something that I'm
going to be another 40 minutes and you're already going, what?
We glory in the cross of Christ Jesus, don't we? And I want us
to sing 351. Let's sing 351 near the cross. This is a good song