Romans 11, 29, look what it says
here. For the gifts and calling of
God are without repentance. What he's saying, whatever God
gives you, whatever God tells you, whatever He gives you, He'll
never take it back. You ever heard that old saying,
of course, Indian giver, you know give it to you and take
it back, you know But that's not the way our Lord is what
he gives you. It's yours forever What he does
for you. It's yours forever And that's
what I want to talk about the gift of God the gifts of God
a giving God a Giving God That's what he does. He gives He gives
and you know who he gives it to people who have nothing and
You gotta have nothing before he can give you anything. You gotta be empty before he'll
fill you. You gotta have empty hands before
he'll do anything for you. You gotta have an empty heart
before he'll give you a new one. He gotta give you, he gotta do
it all. And here's what's so blessed about the given God.
What God demands, what he demands of all men, he gives, he gives. Our God is the father of mercy.
He gives us all things richly to enjoy. Our God demanded satisfaction
for his broken law. He himself provided it in his
blessed son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He requires righteousness and
perfection to be accepted of him. He provided this righteousness
and acceptance for us through His blessed Son, the Lord Jesus
Christ. When Abraham and Isaac was going
up on the mountain, Isaac was carrying the wood and the fire,
and his father had the knife. And as they was half going up
that mountain, Isaac said, Father, we got the
wood, we got the fire, we got everything we need, but we're
in the world's the lamb. We ain't gotta sacrifice when
we get up there. He says, my son, God will provide
himself a lamb. And that's what God did for us.
He provided us a lamb and he provided it on Mount Calvary.
He provided it at the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. So I wanna
look at some of the blessed, blessed, glorious gifts that
our covenant God has given us and given his people. And you
know the most blessed gift that He gave us, the most blessed
gift that He gave us was the gift of His Son. He gave His
Son. Now you keep Ephesians, go back
to Ephesians 4, but I wanna go to Isaiah 9, 6, and I'm gonna
read this for you. Or you can go over there either
one. But I'll deal with a few things there, and Ephesians 4
here in a little bit. But look what he said here about,
talking about the gift of his son. The gift of his son. Oh, what a blessed thing. The
gift of God's son. Look what it said in Isaiah chapter
9 and verse 6. Unto us a child is born. It said
in Luke, you know, when the Lord Jesus was born, the angels appeared
under the shepherds in the hill and they began to sing, glory
to God in the highest. For in the city of Bethlehem
is born this night in the city of David, a Savior, which is
Christ the Lord. A child is born, he was born.
And it wasn't a Christmas day. It was the day when God appointed
in the fullness of time. A child was born unto us, but
listen to this, but a son was given. That child that was born
was the son of the highest, the son of God, the Holy One of Israel. And I tell you, you know how
we know it was the son of God and how we know that it was given
unto us? God said, I'm gonna put the government
on his shoulder. The government who? Me, you,
and everybody else in this world. And his name shall be called
Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father,
and the Prince of Peace. And what greater gift, what greater
gift could God give than to give his own blessed son? He called
him the son of his Lord. He said he always pleased him.
He said he daily delighted in his blessed son. And God took
his son and unbosomed him from his heart and sent him into this
world to the womb of a virgin. And that's why the scripture
says God so loved. And the infinite is that God
so, so, so, so loved sinners, so loved
his people, so loved his elect, So loved His righteousness, so
loved His holiness, so loved His glory, that He gave His Son. You know, John said it this way,
in this, in this is manifested the love of God. You want to
know how God manifested His love? That He sent His Son. What for? To be the perpetuation
for our sins. Huh? To be that mercy seat, that
atoning victim, that one that took away the wrath of God from
us. And oh my, the Lord Jesus, the gift of God. And we take
that so lightly, but oh my. And then Lord Jesus being willing
to come, being willing to come. When he is in gray, all the angels
waited on him and God daily delighted in the presence of his son. But
of all that when he gave us his son, of all other gifts guaranteed
because he gave us his son, all other blessings are guaranteed
to us because he gave us his son. Romans 8.32 says this, that
he spared not his own son. but delivered him up for us all. How shall he not all with him,
with him freely, freely give us all things? Oh, what a blessed
gift, the gift of God's blessed son. And I'll tell you something
else about it. Those who receive it, Though
who God gives the gift of his son to, his recipients, this
life, this gift of Christ is given to us freely, freely, freely. And let
me tell you something else that came with our Lord Jesus Christ.
And listen, this is, without this, there'd be no hope. I'm
telling you, he gave the gift of his spirit. Not only did he
give him something, but he gave us the gift of his spirit. Here
in Ephesians four, look what it says down here in verse eight
and nine. And this is from Isaiah, excuse
me, Psalm 68. It says, now wherefore he saith,
when he ascended upon high, he left captivity captive, and he
gave gifts unto men. Now, our Lord Jesus Christ, it
says that he had to descend before he ascended. And when he ascended,
he took captive everything that held us captive. He took sin
away, he took justice away, he took the wrath of God away, he
took everything that was against us away, he took it to glory
with him, and it's captive. It'll never be turned loose on
us. And listen to this, and then
he turned around and he gives gifts unto men. Gives gifts unto
men. And what kind of gift did He
give that was the most precious gift that He come into this world?
First of all, He came and when we got Him, we got His person.
He Himself. We have all of His benefits.
And they're not divided. They're not divided. Christ is
not divided. When with Him comes all that
He does, all that He has, and all that He has done. When you
have Christ, you have all that He is, all that He has done,
and all that He ever will do for anybody on this earth. We
have all of Him. And the greatest gift that He
gave to us other than God giving Him His Son, give by us, was
the Holy Spirit. Do you know that? Let me show
you that. Look over in John. Chapter 14. Good John Chapter 14 with me. You know, the Holy Spirit's the one who
brings, you know, regenerates us, teaches us, fills us. Our Lord said, when He, the Spirit
of truth has come, He'll guide you into all truth. But our Lord
here, he says now in verse 16 of John 14, he's fixing to go.
He said, let not your heart be troubled. Why does he say don't
let your heart? I'm fixing to go to Jerusalem and I'm fixing
to die. I'm fixing to be crucified. I'm fixing to suffer. And he
says, and then they all got concerned. They was very troubled about
it. And he says this, he says, when I go away, When I go away,
I'm not gonna leave you like a bunch of orphans. And when
you look in there in the margin, that's what the word comforter
means. I said, I'm not gonna leave you alone. He said, I'll
pray the Father and He'll give you another comforter. See how
that's capitalized? That's the Holy Spirit, that's
the Holy Ghost of God. He said, He may abide with you
forever. The Holy Spirit said, you know,
if you had not the Spirit of Christ, we're none of His. And
then He goes on to say, Even the Spirit, and that's capitalized
again, even the Spirit, the Holy Ghost of God, the Spirit of God,
the Spirit of Truth, the world can't receive it. Because it
can't see Him. It can't know Him. For He dwelleth
with you and shall leave you, and dwell in you, and I will
not leave you comfortless. And then the margin, it says,
I'll not leave you as orphans. That's what they said, Lord,
if you go away, what in the world is gonna happen? Who's going
to be our comforter? Who's going to be our strength?
Who's going to teach us now? Who's going to guide us now?
Who's going to save us now? And that's what the Holy Spirit
comes to do. He regenerates us. He teaches
us. He fills us. And it's the Spirit Himself that
bears witness with our spirit that we're the children of God.
Every blessing, every blessing we receive, It's through the
merits of our Lord Jesus Christ and the mediatorship of our Lord.
You know, Peter when he was preaching on the day of Pentecost and everybody
there was preaching and they said they're all drunk because
everybody, they heard everybody, a whole bunch of people from
all over the world was there and they heard all them people
preaching in their language. If there was an Arabian there,
there's somebody preaching in Arabic. If there was a Greek
there, somebody's preaching in Greek. If there was a Roman there,
somebody's preaching in Latin. So they was all preaching in
all these different languages. And that fellow says, them fellas
are drunk. Peter says, no, no, no. He says,
you know what's happening here? He said, this is the promise
that our Lord gave us when He ascended up on high. This is
the gift that He promised us, the gift of the Holy Ghost. And
that's what you're seeing happening right here. The gift of the Holy
Ghost on us doing this right now. This is God's work. This
is the Holy Ghost's work. Christ ascended back to glory.
We're down here now. How are we gonna preach? The
Holy Ghost's gonna do it. How are we gonna learn? He's
gonna teach you. How's He gonna save you? He's gonna come by
the Holy Ghost and save you by His Word. And I tell you, not
only to give us the gift of His Spirit, but He gives us the gift
of life. The gift of life. Romans 6.23 says this, the wages of sin is
death. And believe me, God's gonna pay
everybody that. I've already paid the wages of
sin. The wages of my sins already
been paid for. Already been paid for. Who paid
for them? Christ did. He paid for them. But when he
talks about the wages of sin is death. Every day that you
live without Christ, Every day you live without God. Every day
you live as an alien from God Almighty. Every day you live
without grace. Every day you live without God's,
every day you live without God. You're just making, you're just
adding and adding and adding and adding and adding and adding
to your debt. And God one day will pay everybody
what they owe, what he owes them. Everybody outside of Christ,
listen, He's going to pay you your wages. And a lot of people,
that's what they want. They want their wages. They want
God to pay them for what they've done. They want God to pay them
for things that they've thought. They want God to pay them for
being a good person. But let me tell you something. Every man outside of Christ,
he's just... I was a fellow we were staying
with and he says, you know, I said, I only want to work no more than
12 hours a day. He said, of course, if I make
any more than that, Uncle Sam's going to take all of it. So he
works to get paid. And if you think you're working
for Christ and you think that you're sin and all you're doing
is one of these days, God's going to say, here's your payday. Here's your payday. Here's your
wages, I'm going to give them to you. What is it? Death? Eternal death? Eternity without God? Eternity
without Christ? And some people, they're arrogant
about it. They'll say, well listen, I'll have good company when I
get there. No you won't! How can anybody be good company
in hell? where the fires never quench,
where the wrath of God burns all the time. You know what hell
is, and I hate to talk about hell, but hell is a place where
God puts everybody that don't want anything to do with it,
you don't want nothing to do with God, He'll put you someplace
where you'll never be bothered with me ever again. You'll never have to hear another
preacher. You'll never have to attend another
service. You'll never have to read a Bible.
You'll never have to pray. You'll never have to do anything.
I want you out of my sight. You didn't want to be in my sight,
I'll put you out of my sight. You don't want to be in my presence,
I'll put you out of my presence. You don't want to know me, I'll
tell you what, I don't want to know you either. I'll just put
you where nobody knows you and nobody cares. And to think that the wrath of
God, the wrath of God is awful, and to think, it was so awful,
the wrath of God was so awful, that when our Lord Jesus Christ
turned on that cross, the wrath of God comes so down on him,
that it turned out the light, the wrath of God was so powerful
on the Son of God, and so greatly on the Son of God, that God said,
I don't want anybody else to see how great my wrath is against
Him, because He is sin right now. God said, I made Him to
be sin, and you know what I'm gonna do to Him because I made
Him to be sin? I'm gonna kill Him! I'm gonna cause Him to die! Wherever sin is found if it's
not found in Christ and your sins found on Christ. It'll be
found on you If Christ didn't bear you're gonna bear it If
Christ didn't suffer the wrath of God you're gonna suffer it And I wouldn't want that for
10,000 listen, I wouldn't want that for 10,000 worlds like this
one And I, listen, I don't know,
listen, I'm telling you, God's my witness, my soul, God's my
witness. I wouldn't have a soul that I'm
preaching to be lost. I don't want anybody to be lost.
I don't want anybody to not know God, not know Christ. If you
knew, John preached last night, he said, if you knew the gift
of God, if you knew the gift of God, told that woman at the
well, You would have asked Him. You would have asked Him and
He'd give you living water. And then after she found out
who He was, she said, Lord, evermore give me this water. He said, if you have me, you
don't have to go to that well anymore. We don't have to go
to the world of the world. We don't have to go to the world
of false religion. We don't have to go to, I mean, we don't have
to go. Christ is the water of life. He is life. And he gives
us life. And I tell you, death, we earn
it. But here's life, he says, the wages of sin is death. But
then he says, but the gift of God, Ain't you thankful that
there it says there the wages of sin is death? Oh, wait a minute. Is there life somewhere? He said
the gift of God. The gift of God is eternal life. Through, through Jesus Christ
our Lord. And you know he gives us this
life without any consideration in its recipients whatsoever.
Does not consider the recipients. It's given by grace. This gift of life is given by
grace. It's sustained by grace. You
know, everybody talks about Christ offering life. Christ don't offer
life, He gives life. It's not an offer, it's a gift. He gives it. And I'll tell you
something else, he gives it to whom he will. It's like that,
I've told you so many times about that infant that was cast out.
Here's this infant cast out, oh it was a miserable looking
wretch. A little baby, a little baby. And they didn't wash it, it was
just putrid looking, blood all over it, mucus all over it. The
navel was still on it. His hair all matted down. His
little bitty tiny head all matted down. Eyes hadn't been washed
out. All his eyes matted together
because it hadn't been washed out. And his mother and daddy
took it out and threw him away. And our Lord passed by. And He
said, I beheld you. I looked at you. And I saw you. I saw you polluted in your blood. Saw all that pollution. And he
said, do you know what the first thing I did? I put my skirt over
you. I closed you. I covered your
nakedness, your pollution. And then I said, live. Yea, I
say, live. And that's why that baby couldn't
say, Lord, I sure would like to have life. And them dry bones,
they didn't say, Lord, I'd like to live. No, no, no, no. Eternal life is not merited by
us, not earned by us, not deserved by us. And I'll tell you something
else. We never sought it. We never looked for it. We never
even thought about being saved until God came and saved us. You know why Isaiah said it like
this? He said, I was found of them that wasn't even looking
for me. I wasn't looking for salvation.
I wasn't looking for it. But you know why I got it? Because
Christ was looking for his sheep, and I happened to be one of them.
He laid down his life for them sheep, and one of these days,
I was one that polluted in my blood. I was one that didn't
have a navel cut. I was one out there in that field.
And David said, my father and my mother, they'll forsake me,
but the Lord will take me up. And when David the Lord came
by, and I mean, oh, I can't tell you what an awful dog, dirty,
dirty dog, stinking dog, rotten dog, smelly dog, mangy dog, just an awful mess. And God came by. through his
blessed gospel one day, through somebody preaching, through his
word, through me hearing somebody say something about God and about
Christ. And God passed by one day and
said, live. Live. And I'll tell you what, I lived.
And I'm still living. I'm not going to have eternal
life. I've got it. How do you get it? I'm not going to enter into eternal
life, I ain't got it. He that hath the Son, why does
it say he hath life? That means you got it right now. Oh my. You know, in giving eternal
life, when God gives us life, we are totally, totally passive
in that. When God gives life, we have
nothing to do with it. Absolutely nothing. You have
nothing to do with your first birth and you have less to do
with your second birth. I'll tell you a man's passive.
We was dead and Christ had to come and give us life. And what
he does when he comes and gives us that life, just like seed
is put in the womb of a woman, and a child is born, God's gospel
is the seed of God. Being born again, not corruptible
seed, but incorruptible, the word of God. And God takes that
seed, that gospel, and he sows that in people's hearts. He puts
that in people's hearts. Right now, God's sowing seed.
He said, the word of God is the seed. And so he's sowing seed
right now. And where that seed lands in
a person's heart, you know, it's just like when you put it in
the ground, it sprouts up. And when you start hearing the
gospel, and you start that seed sowing in there, and after a
while, your ears start perking up. Well, I've never heard that. I've been going here all the
time. That's new to me. And the next thing you know,
you'll say, I believe that. Yeah, I believe
that. And next thing you know, you
say, I understand what he's talking about. I got it. You know what
happens when that happens? Life is there. You know, we don't act. God acts
upon us. Here we was dead, and God said,
I say live. And when God says live, you're
gonna live. And you know all a baby can do when he's first
born? Cry, cry. He don't know a lot, don't have
to know a lot. Only thing you have to know is
Christ. And if he comes and gives you life, believe me, you'll
know it. And you'll know when he gives you life. You'll know
when he gives you life. Them little old babies, when
they're first born, My goodness, you hear them little fellas just
a screamin' and a cryin' and hollerin' and everything when
they start turnin' this way and that way and washin' them and
wipin' them. Ah, they're just screamin' bloody
murder. You think they're gonna die. You know, but they just
got life. And that's the way it is. You
think you're gonna die when God's givin' you life. You think, I'm
gonna die before God does anything for me. No, no, when you start
cryin' out, oh Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord, have mercy on me. Oh
Lord, I need you. You won't even say I need you
until you've got life. You know that? Dead men don't
say I need life. They don't even know they're
dead until they've got life. Ain't that right? Oh my. Spiritual life right now and
life of glory hereafter. And what life is in Christ, and
he's the very life of God in our soul. And oh, it's a blessing,
this eternal life God gives to his elect people, because the
Lord Jesus paid for him. He said, I lay down my life for
the sheep. He's given him power over all flesh that he should
give, give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him.
And then let me give you another one here right quick. has the
gift of spiritual understanding, spiritual understanding. Yet
there in Ephesians 4, I don't know if you're still there, I
don't know where you're at, you know, I've had you everywhere.
It's hard to keep up with me when it comes to finding scriptures,
it really is. But anyway, it talks there in
verse 18, Ephesians 4, having the understanding darkened, being
alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that's
in them because of the blindness of their heart. Now that's the
way we were. But now look over in 1 John chapter
5 and verse 9. 1 John chapter 5 and verse 9. You know the gift of a spiritual
understanding. That's why, you know, this is
one reason God gave preachers and gave ministry of the word
and gave pastors is so that people You know, you'll read the Bible
and you'll say, boy, I just don't understand that. I don't understand
that. I don't understand what that means. But then when you
hear it preached, it just opens up to you. So that's what preachers
are for. That's what God gives them for,
to make people grow up in faith. Grow up under Christ. Grow up
to see Christ. Grow up in the measure of Christ,
in the measure of grace. And so when he talks about spiritual
understanding, now that's something you don't have till you have
life. And look what it says here in verse 20 of 1 John 5.20. Now
listen to this. And we know, I don't know how
many times John says we know in this gospel. We know that
the Son of God has come. We know that. We know God told
you he sent his Son, gave us his Son. We know that the Son
of God has come. And listen to this, has given
us an understanding. He gave it to us. If you get
an understanding of the scriptures, God gave it to you. And listen
to this. And here's why He gave us this understanding. That we
may know Him that's true. We may know Christ that's true.
We may know God that's true. And we want also not only this
understanding, but not only that we know Him is true, but that
we're in Him. We're in Him that's true. Even in His Son, Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal
life. Now what's communicated to a
saint when he's born again is completely and wholly spiritual. And only he's able to have and
learn and yet understand the scriptural knowledge of the Lord
Jesus Christ. You know, if God doesn't give
you an understanding, John said this the other night, he said,
you believe in aliens? He said, I certainly do. Everybody is
an alien outside of Christ. We were aliens without Christ
one day. But here's the thing about it, God has to come and
give you an understanding. And it's a holy spiritual understanding. When He gives you an understanding,
it's the spiritual mind that He gives you. It's an understanding.
That man was dark and He takes that darkness out of there and
He turns on the light. When you're in darkness and you
don't have light, you don't understand anything, you can't see nothing.
But when God turns on that light, takes out that darkness and puts
that light in that understanding right there, then you start to
understand some things about the Bible, you start to understand
some things about what the preacher's saying, you understand some things
about Christ, you understand some things about yourself that
you didn't know. And it's all, it's absolutely,
you know, and when he gives you that spiritual understanding,
Then you're able to have this understanding, and you begin
to learn. You begin to get more and more understanding, and it
gives you a spiritual knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. We
always had an understanding. I mean, you are not a bunch of
idiots, and you're not, and I'm not, and you're not. We've always
had understanding about a lot of things, but you can't understand
spiritual things until he makes you spiritual, until he gives
you an understanding. Ain't that right? He said, the
natural man, he don't receive the things of the Spirit of God,
but the Spirit has showed us all things, yea, the deep things
of God. And this understanding's been given unto us by our Lord's
coming. And when we have this understanding,
this spiritual understanding that Christ gives us and God
gives us in this new birth, Christ becomes a living reality. He's not something out here now.
He's not a personal Savior we're waiting on. He's not something
we're waiting to understand about. He's not something we're waiting
to receive. He becomes a living reality. Christ is as real to
us as our breathing is to us. Christ is as real to us as our
life that we have right now. We talk to Him, He talks to us. We look to Him, He looks at us. We speak to Him, He speaks to
us. We hear what He's got to say,
He listens to what we have to say. He gave us an understanding that
He loved us. He gave us an understanding that He called. He gave us an
understanding of what it is to put sin away. He gave us an understanding
of how helpless and how without strength, without anything at
all that we have without Him. We understand that if we don't
have Him, we don't have anything. And we now understand that He's
above all, and He's perfectly, perfectly,
perfectly suitable for me and how I am right now. Not like
I wanna be, not like I'm gonna be, not like I'd like to be,
but the way I am right now. He's suitable for me. And you can't understand that
until God gives you an understanding. And the more we know and the
more we understand, you know what it does? It stirs up our
affections. It'll set our heart on fire. Huh? Oh, yeah. We'll come in here and we'll
be about half dead, and the next thing you know, you're wide awake.
You're listening. It quickens you. You know, this
is a living Word. This is a living Word. I was
telling somebody, I heard the story one time that a fellow
was standing on the street corner and he put his hat down on the
street corner. And he pointed at his hat and
said, it's alive, it's alive, it's alive. And he got a big
crowd gathered around, they're standing there looking at his
hat and he kept saying, it's alive, it's alive. Well, he picked his
hat on, put it on, picked up the Bible and had a crowd and
a priesthood. Because he's talking about a
living word. The word is living. And where
it comes, it brings life. It does something for the affection.
It does something for the mind. It does something for the heart.
It does something for your emotions. It does something for your appetite. I mean it suits the whole man.
It suits the mind. It suits the understanding. It suits the heart. Suits your
emotions, suits your affections. I mean, it suits everything about
you. Well, it raises our minds up
to Him. Raises our minds up to Him. And
then I'm gonna give you another one. The gift of faith. Now this is something right here. You know what? All these gifts
that I'm talking about, and they're without repentance. God's not
going to take any of them back. He's not going to take back His
love. He's not going to take back His Son. He's not going
to take back His grace. He's not going to take back the
life that He gave us. He's not going to take back our
understanding. He's not gonna take it back. Once He gives it
to you, it belongs to you. It's yours. He gave it to you.
And when He gives Himself to you, He's yours for eternity. And then there's the gift of
faith. Look at Ephesians 2. You know, the salvation of God,
and I don't know how to say it, but this way, I don't know how
to say it, but this way, is The salvation of God does not
actually become ours until we believe, until we actually rest
upon Christ and come to Christ for ourselves. You know, until man actually
believes, Until he actually believes, that's
when salvation becomes the salvation of the gospel becomes his gospel
and salvation actually becomes a living reality to him. When
you receive Christ for yourself and ourselves. But now I'll tell
you something, we can't see without sight, we cannot see without
light, neither can we believe until life and faith are given
unto us. Now let me ask you, When you
shoot a bullet through a piece of paper, which comes first,
the hole or the bullet? When you shoot, you don't even
see it, you just do it. And that's the way it is. Which
comes first, life or faith? They come together. They come
together. When you get life, God gives
you faith with it. Dead men don't have it, only
God gives it. So you can't see and you can't
believe, we cannot believe, neither none of us can believe until
life gives us. And with that life comes faith. And how does faith come to us?
Well, it tells us right here, verse eight. Ephesians 2.8. For by grace are
you saved through faith. And listen to this now. And that's
not of yourselves. You didn't have it. You weren't
born with it. It ain't in your pockets. You can't get it out
of your pocket. You can't go to the preacher and get it. You
can't go to town and buy it. Can't go to Walmart and get it. Where do you get it at? God gives
it. It's a gift of God. And look
what he says here now. And that not of yourself, faith
is not of yourself, grace is not of yourself, it's the gift
of God. It's the gift of God. God gives you, that's what he
says. Faith, not of yourself, grace is not of yourself. And
it's not of works, everything God gives us is a gift. Not of
works lest any man should boast. Oh my. Grace, let me tell you
something. God must give breath before I
can breathe. God can take a man's breath that
quick. You know, you see these people
with oxygen, you know, and they just barely make it. Just barely
make it. And you see people have to have
it. Well, we have to, before we can breathe, it's by Him we
live, move, and have our being. And God must give me breath before
I can breathe. And God has to give me faith
and give you faith before you can believe. He says the faith which is by
Him, faith comes by Him. Now let me tell you something,
beloved. This business of grace, this business of faith, You say,
I think I got it. No, if you got it, you know it.
Ain't no doubt about that. You know, if God gives you faith,
you know it. If he gives you life, you know
it. Huh? Oh my. Faith, faith, faith. God give me faith. And you know,
listen, right now while I'm preaching, right now while I'm preaching,
faith is coming with what I'm saying. to some people. Faith
is coming. Because you hear what I'm saying,
you understand what I'm saying, and faith, when you hear it,
you say, I believe it, I believe it, I believe it. Yeah, I got
that. I understand that. I believe that, yeah. And that's
what it's talking about. Every time you preach, faith
just keeps coming. All right, I'm gonna give you one more,
and then I'm quitting. One more. And that's the gift of grace.
The gift of grace. Look in 1 Corinthians 1. The gift of grace. Oh, the gift
of God's grace. Thank God for grace. I love the
word grace. Love it. The gift of grace. He said here in verse 3, 1 Corinthians
1.3. 1 Corinthians 1.3. Grace be unto you and peace from
God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. I thank my God
always on your behalf, now listen to this, for the grace of God
which is given you by Jesus Christ. That in everything you might
be enriched by him. Now you know what that's telling
us? That where God gives grace, He said, you're enriched by it.
You know what that word enriched means? Made wealthy. Made extremely
wealthy. Thank God for the grace that's
given you by Jesus Christ that in everything you're enriched
by Him. Grace here is all-inclusive.
All that we have, all that we do, all that we'll receive, it
comes through Jesus Christ our Lord. It includes, grace includes
all that He is in His merits, all of His blessed benefits.
It means that He's going to provide for us. It means we get all of
His promises. It means that He's going to protect
us and provide for us all the days of our life. It means whether
it's a temporal thing or a spiritual thing or an eternal thing. It
includes the new birth, it includes sanctification, it includes holiness,
it includes the new nature, and everything that goes with it.
Faith, hope, and love all come with it. And whatever grace we
have to endure trials, whatever grace we have to endure trials,
whatever grace we have to resist the devil, Whatever grace we
have to overcome the world, it comes from Him. It comes from
Him. If we have any obedience, it's
by His grace. If we have any devotion, it's
by His grace. Everything's by His grace. All
things come through Him and of His own He's given us. David
said, you know, he went over there, David when he was God made him king, you know,
and said, I'm gonna raise up someone after your throne. And
he said, Lord, we've come here just to give to you, give back
to you what you've already given to me. And one of the things,
this is an amazing thing to me, just think about it and I'm done.
You know, God gives us everything we got. Everything. And then when it comes to giving
to him, we count out our money. Well, I'm going to keep this
much. I'm going to give God. This is
God's part. This is my part. And everything you got, God gave
it to you. But let's give God his share. Let's give God his part. Let's
give him part of our time. Let's give him some of our life.
Let's give him some of our money. Let's give him some of our effort.
Let's give him some of our attendance. Let's give him some of our soul.
Let's give him some of our heart. Let's just give a little bit
of it. See how absurd? We're just a
mess, ain't we? If it wasn't for faith and life
and grace, as the old saying goes, we wouldn't
be worth a salt wine in our biscuits, would we? But thank God for the
gift of God. Started with His Son, started
with the Holy Spirit, started with faith, started with grace,
started with faith, and He gave it all, all to Him
I owe. Sin left a crimson stain, He
washed it white as snow. Our Father, Oh, bless your name. Oh, Lord, how holy, how glorious,
how precious, how powerful, how blessed, how precious you are
to our souls and our heart. Your word is alive and it speaks
to me. Oh, Lord, it speaks to me, gives
me life, gives me comfort, gives me hope, gives me hope, brings
me light in my darkness, gives me life in my own deadness. puts
love in this old cold heart, warms it, oh Lord. God bless these dear saints as
I thank you for them. And Lord, I pray that you'd take
the gospel that's been said today, the things that's been said,
the gifts of God, the gifts of God. I pray that Lord, you'd
make them fruitful, make them effectual. That it wasn't just
me that people heard today, that certainly I hope they heard the
voice of the Lord. And may you make it so, for Christ's
sake. Amen. Amen.