Therefore, seeing we have received
this ministry as we have received mercy, we faint not, but have
renounced the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness,
nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation
of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in
the sight of God. But if our gospel be hid, it
is hid to them that are lost. whom the God of this world hath
blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of
the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should
shine unto them. For we preach not ourselves,
but Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus'
sake. For God, who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in
earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power may be of God, and
not of us." Our Father, in the blessed name of the Lord
Jesus Christ, who here, you say, is the image, the very image
of God, the very image of God while He is on this earth. So, Lord Jesus, we come to You. We come with Thanksgiving, oh, how
thankful we are for your abundant mercies, for those mercies that
are new every morning, for the mercy and grace and strength
you give us in our great hour of need, for how you've stayed
and kept and been faithful to your people, and how you've taught
us to wait upon you in your providence to trust you, not never trust
ourselves or try to find the answers to our own problems.
We just wait on you. And our Lord, we ask that you
cause the gospel to be heard today, to be heard. Not just in the ear, but in the
heart, in the first soul, in the mind, in the understanding.
And may God turn on that light and shine it in a heart today
to bring glory and that sinners would see the glory of God Himself
in the Lord Jesus Christ. And Father, we pray again for
our children, our grandchildren, Have mercy. Oh, God, have mercy. For those who are under great
burden, we ask, Lord, for Your great
and abundant grace, knowing that it is sufficient. And, Lord Jesus, You are the
Father of mercies, the God of all comfort and the God of all
grace. And it is to You whom we come to meet our needs. Bring glory to yourself. Save
your people in this place to the glory of God and the Lord
Jesus Christ, we pray. Amen. In the middle of verse four,
it says this. It talks about the light of the
glorious gospel of Christ. The glorious gospel of Christ.
That's what I want to talk about today. The glorious gospel of
Christ. Now, speaking for myself, I am
truly, truly interested in the Word of God. I'm interested in
what it has to say. If I know anything at all, I
know that this Word right here is the final and only authority
First of all, for my faith. This is the final authority for
my faith. What do I mean by that? Faith
is what I am to believe. How do I know what I'm supposed
to believe? Do I need to go to some organization?
Do I need to go to a denomination? Do I need to go someplace where
they have a headquarters and find out what a bunch of Presbyterians
or a bunch of elders decide what I'm supposed to believe? Or do
I go to the Word of God? and find out what I'm to believe.
And I might go to the Word of God to find out why I believe
it. Romans 10, 17 says this, faith, faith cometh by hearing. But hearing what? The Word of
God. The Word of God. I don't want
my faith to stand in the wisdom of some man, something that he
talked me into. something that He conjoined me
into. I don't want my faith to find its assurance from what
men say about me or of me. I want my faith to stand according
to the Word of God. And secondly, I know that the
Word is my final authority for how I'm to live in this world,
for the practice. People talk about practical Christianity. Well, if I know how I'm supposed
to live in this world, the only way I know how I'm supposed to
live in this world is by this blessed book. I can't leave that
up to anybody else. I can't even leave it up to my
own conscience. I can't even leave it up to my
own heart. If I'm going to find out how to live in this world,
I've got to see what God says about it. And in the scriptures,
I find out what is lawful for me and what is not lawful for
me. What is clean and what is unclean?
That's the only place I can find it. It's in the Scripture. I
don't want nobody else telling me what I can eat, what I can
wear, where I can go, and what I can do and what I can't do.
Nobody else has that authority. Only God has that authority from
His Word. From His Word. The third thing
I know is why I love the Word of God and know that this is
true. I know it's so. And why I'm so
interested in it. Is this the only truth? The Word
of God is the only true, reliable, and infallible source we have
to how and why God saves sinners. How God saves a sinner, how does
God save a sinner, we've got to find out from the book. It's
not like Bill Bright said, started Tempest for Christ, Crusade Tempest
for Christ. It's not four easy steps or five
easy steps. You don't start with the supposition
that man is essentially good. I know that. Because if he's
essentially good, he doesn't need a Savior. If he can come
to God by his own, he doesn't need God at all. He doesn't need
Christ. So we, the only true, reliable,
infallible source we have as to how God saves a sinner is
in his blessed book. And if I tell you this, if you
want to know the truth about something, go to the source.
Go to where it started. Don't take hearsay, don't take
gossip. Be like the noble Berean, where Paul says, you know, when
they started preaching, they went home and searched the scriptures,
daily searched the scriptures, to see whether these things be
so or not. That's why people need to bring
their Bibles. Follow along with us. See whether these things
be so or not. But I know this, the scriptures start with God.
Faith starts with God, and practice that we have is before God. How
we live is before God. And I'm talking about the glorious
gospel of Christ. Now, I'll tell you what, if you
believe the glorious gospel of Christ, and it says here that
He is the image of God, He is the very image of God, ain't
that what it says there? The life of the glorious gospel
of Christ who is the image of God in verse 4? You know how God saves sinners,
and salvation starts with God. Look what it says there in verse
6. I'm telling you, this is the glorious gospel of Christ. This
is what it's about. Salvation starts with God. Look
what it says, for God who commanded. Starts with God. Salvation starts
with God. The salvation of a sinner starts
with God. Salvation must start, He commanded
it, must start, continue, and end with God. Anything else will
end up a man without any hope at all. You see, as God in the
Scriptures, He said He created something out of nothing. He
says there was no light, He said let there be light. He separated
the stars and the moon and the sun and the sky, and they declared
His glory. He done all that out of nothing.
He created trees when there was no trees. He created life when
there was no life. He created out of dirt a man. He created something out of nothing.
And here He says that if He commanded the light to shine out of darkness,
then He has to be the one that commands salvation. Salvation
comes from God Himself. And that's why the Scriptures
talk about obeying God. The gospel's not an option. The
gospel's not an option. The gospel, every time you're
confronted with it, confronts you with the fact that if you're
saved, you're either going to reject God outright, or you're
going to bow to God one way or another. There's no middle ground.
And I'll tell you, this is the beginning of all faith. This
is the beginning of all theology. Salvation and assurance, it starts
with God. In the beginning, God. Oh my,
look over here, now you keep this and look in Romans chapter
1 with me, I want you to see this. So many places, God who
has saved us and called us with the Holy Ghost. Brethren, we're
bound always to thank God for you. God has, from the beginning,
chosen us unto salvation. It was God who brought us and
delivered us from the power of darkness. Salvation, every place
you find in the gospel, starts with God. God, by the Spirit,
has revealed these things unto us. It never starts with man. A man, if it starts with man,
it's like picking up a shotgun at the wrong end, and it's loaded.
Look over Romans chapter 1, verse 1. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
called to be an apostle. Listen to this. Separated under
what? The gospel of God. Salvation
starts with God. God's the one who commands. And
he promised this gospel by his prophets in the Holy Scripture.
And we're talking about Christ, the image of God. This gospel
concerns his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the
seed of David. And you see, beloved, and I want
you to see something else in Romans chapter 8. This is so
plain to me. When we was going through Jeremiah
the other day, and we went through the Lamentations, I believe it
was Jeremiah 3, Lamentations 3. that it started out, almost
every single verse started out with what He had done. He had
done. He had done. He had done. He
had done. Every single verse started Jeremiah
saying, He did it. He did it. He did it. And this
is what he says here in verse 20, 29, Romans 8, 29. Now, what's this? For whom He
did for Noah. that he might be the firstborn
among men, brethren. Moreover, whom he did predestinate,
he also called, he called, he justified, he also glorified. Verse 32, he spared not his son. And that's what I'm talking about.
He, how many times you say he there? Did you find anything
that man did there? It's just talking about what
God did. And beloved, not only is it God,
salvation starts and ends and continues with God, but look
what it says again over here in our text. That God is revealed
in Christ. Ain't that what it says? It's
the light of the glorious gospel of Christ who is the image of
God. Huh? The very image of God Himself. Down in verse 6, it says there,
He's going to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the person of Jesus Christ. I'll say this and say
this and say this and say this, and I'll never get tired of saying
it, and I wish I could. If God would be pleased to ever
cause a revival, this is what He'll cause it with. That if
you ever see God, the only place you'll see is in Jesus Christ.
When God was in this world, the only place He's ever manifested
Himself, where you could see Him, where you could hear Him,
where you could touch Him, where you could believe Him, is in
the person of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. He was the image
of God. What does God look like? He looked
like Jesus Christ. What was the attributes of God
manifested at in Jesus Christ? He gives the light, and that
light means that He is the light of the knowledge of what? The
glory of God. He was the brightness of God's
glory, the expressed image of His person. He says the fullness
of the God is dwelt in Him bodily. It pleases the Father that in
Christ all fullness should dwell. And I tell you, beloved, all
of God's attributes meet and work together and are magnified
in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Let me ask you some questions.
What would God's justice be towards us outside of Christ? Do you
want to face it outside of Christ? I heard a fellow, I was listening
to a message Friday, and this real, real famous man, just a
few days before he died, talked about he didn't believe he had
a soul, Didn't believe there was no heaven,
didn't believe there was no hell, didn't believe there was no God,
didn't believe there was no salvation, didn't believe anything. He said,
you know, when I'm gone, I'm just gone. He knows now. He knows now. And what would God's justice
be without our side of Christ? That's what you're going to face
if you don't believe the gospel of the glorious gospel of Christ.
You're going to face God's justice outside of Christ. And God's
going to be just. He may show mercy, but He's going
to be just. He may be gracious, but He has
to be just. He may show love to you, but
He must be just. Whatever He does, whatever attribute
He shows towards you, He's got to first be just before He does
anything else for you. He's got to do something for
Himself before He can ever do anything for us. And He's done
what He did for us in His blessed Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And
that's why He came into this world. And what would the love
of Christ be? What would the love of God be
outside of Christ? Where would His grace be outside
of Christ? Where would His righteousness
be outside of Christ? And that's what people say. They
try to make God's love and grace and righteousness be manifested
to people outside of Christ, and it can't be outside of Christ.
Our Lord Jesus says, no man, no man, nowhere under any circumstances
can come unto the Father but by Me. There's no other Savior
known among men other than Jesus Christ. And what a horrible thing
it will be for men to face God Almighty after God gave His Son
and manifested Himself in His Son. And our Lord Jesus Christ
said, they said, show us a Father who satisfies. He said, if I've
been with you such a long time and you've not seen me, I want to see the Father. You
see Him, don't you see? I'm standing right in front of
you. When you hear my voice, you hear
what God's got to say. When you see me give life, that's
only God can give life. When you see me cleanse a leper,
only God can cleanse a leper. When you see me say, Thy sins
be forgiven, the only God can forgive sins. So God, in His covenant of grace,
by His blessed wisdom, He devised a way, and bless His holy name,
to be just and justifier of them that believe in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Let me say this, and you think
about this. You think about this. Have you
seen the wisdom of God in Jesus Christ? God made Christ unto us wisdom
unto them that are He called. Christ is the wisdom of God.
Now, what do I mean by the wisdom of God? You see, for a sinner
to be saved, there's so many obstacles in the way. And the
first obstacle in the way is the justice of God. You know, when he says, you know,
the righteous scarcely be saved, save with difficulty. You know,
God, when He commands the light to shine out of darkness, light
come on just like that. But He, when He deals with us, He's dealing
with people that are enmity with Him, that resist Him, that are
deaf, dumb, and blind, have no spiritual perception whatsoever. He's dealing with people that
are sinners, that are rebels, that are God-haters, that are
Christ-rejecters, that want to always look to themselves and
the goodness that they have, some good deed they've done,
some prayer they've prayed, some tears they've shed, some profession
they've made, and God's got them. And the first obstacle in the
way, and the difficulty, is God's justice? How can He be just and
save you? How can He be just and righteous
and holy and save you? How can He do that? Only in Christ. Christ says, yes. He's the image
of God. God has prepared me a body. And
he prepared him a body for one reason, that he himself in his
own body on the tree should bear our sins, the just for the unjust. So God in justice provided himself
a lamb, provided himself a substitute, the Son of God, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And so what he did in justice
when Christ said, yes, I'll stand good for him. I'll pay their
debt, I'll pay their ransom. Charge their sin to my account.
And so God took all our sin and put them on the account of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And Christ, with His death, He
satisfied that justice once and for all. He can let men no more
payment for sin ever again. If Christ bore your sin, nobody
else, no God can ever come back and charge you with sin. And now God is just in every
man, and every woman, and every child who believes on the Lord
Jesus Christ as their only hope, their only righteousness, and
their only obedience, and the law keeper, that's the man that
God will justify. And they believed because they
were justified. Do you agree with that? Now you
see what I say by Can you see Christ as the wisdom of God?
Do you see how He's the wisdom of God? That which starts with
man will end up with man. It must be. Our Lord Jesus Christ
Himself said, The flesh profiteth nothing. If a man's salvation
and hopes are full of I, I, I, you've got the wrong thing. Got
the wrong thing. And then look what He says. I
want you to see this. So, oh my, back up in verse 1
here of chapter 4, so all we see, we see that salvation's in Christ. Oh my, the image of God. Oh,
you know, when our Lord Jesus Christ was laying asleep in that
ship that night, A great storm come up, and the winds and the
rain was just, oh my, just beating on that ship and that wave. And
they run out there, Simon and Peter run in there, and the Lord
Jesus is sound asleep. Now, we know God don't sleep. It's said over in the Psalms,
God neither slumbers nor sleeps. And the Lord Jesus was asleep.
That's the man, Christ Jesus. Lord, master, carry us down,
not that we perish. The Lord Jesus got up. said,
peace be still, that's God. They said, oh, what man of man
is this? The God man. And then it says
there in verse one, therefore seeing we have received, therefore
seeing we have this minute as we have received mercy. See,
this is another thing we know about the Lord's gospel in Christ.
Everything we have, we received it. We have received it. It's just as we have received
mercy. We receive mercy. A believer
knows that everything he has, everything he knows, everything
that he'll ever possess is the gift of God. And it's given by
mercy, not by merit. Huh? Who maketh thee to differ? Who makes you to differ? Who
makes us to differ in this world? Why are you sitting here, hearing
the gospel, and you're not out a drug addict, or a drunk, or
on skid row, or homeless, or sitting on your porch, twiddling
your thumbs, spitting tobacco juice? Why in the world, who
makes a man to differ? Who makes Jacob and Esau to differ? Who made Noah to differ from
the rest of his generation? Who made Abraham to differ from
all the other people down in Calvary? Who made the twelve disciples
to differ? Who made Paul to differ from
all the rest of the Pharisees? Who makes us to differ? Is there
something about us that makes us different from everybody else?
Are we better than anybody else? People, you know, they'll live
a life without Christ and they'll die even drunk, but people say,
boy, he had a good heart. That's a lie, that's a lie, that's
a lie! Nobody has a good heart until
God takes out the stony heart and puts in a heart! Gives you
a new heart! Let's quit lying to ourselves
and quit lying to men and women and tell them that they've got
good hearts! They don't have good hearts until God gives you
a heart! Nobody does. My little great granddaughter,
three years old, she don't have a good heart. She has a heart
that wants to have her way. When she don't get it, she'll
stomp her foot, and she'll cry, and she'll scream, and she'll
holler. Said, I want to go someplace else where people treat me better. We all agree with that. So from now on, let's just stop
that, folks. Stop it. Oh, if you have faith,
where did you get it at? God gave it to you. For by grace
are you saved through faith in that not of yourself. It's the
gift of God. Do you will to follow God? Do you will to know God? Do you will to seek God? Do you
will to be saved? Where do you get that will? In
the bed of His power. His people are made willing.
It's God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His
good pleasure. Blessed is the man whom thou
choosest and callsest to approach unto thee. And why haven't you
quit and made shipwreck of the faith? Because we have received
mercy, therefore we don't faint. You know that's why people faint
in Armenian religion all the time. That's why they faint.
That's why they quit. Because it's on merit. Whenever
they got a bad mark against themselves, they said, well, I can't live
it. I'll just quit. And that's exactly right. That's what they
ought to do. Because you can't live it. It's Christ in you that's
the hope of glory. Paul said, I live by the faith
of the Son of God. Let me tell you something else
about the gospel of Christ. This glorious gospel. It makes
men honest. Makes men honest. Look there
in verse 2. Oh my! Honest men don't go to
hell. But we have renounced the hidden
things of dishonesty. We quit being dishonest with
ourselves. We quit being dishonest before
God. We've renounced. And what does it say in the margin
there? We have renounced the hidden things of shame. The things
we once gloried in now we count as shame. We renounce our false
refuge of lies that we lived in. We renounce our legalism,
our self-righteousness, our self-confidence, our false professions. We renounce
them. We turn away from them. We say,
I don't want nothing to do with anything I believed or did until
Christ was made real to me and I believed Him and saw Him to
be my only righteousness. It makes a man honest, huh? Oh
my, we've come clean with God and we've come clean with ourselves. I hope I don't upset anybody,
but I'll tell you why a lot of these here five-point Calvinists
can be so popular and be so famous and have such great big huge
churches is I'll tell you why. Because they believe that you
grow into doctrine. You're not converted by it. They
believe that the Armenians out here, all they got to do is be
taught and be brought to the five points of Calvin. They don't
have to be converted from Arminianism. They don't have to be converted
from freewillism. Now, you know, grace is a revelation. Salvation is a revelation. You
know, you ain't, I've got no, listen to me, I'm telling you
the truth, I hope I don't upset you. I do not have any Armenian
brethren. Do you? I have some brothers
that are unbelievers. I know a lot of people that I
like. that believed that they had something
to do with their own salvation. They believed that they made
the right choice. They believed that their repentance was a little
deeper and their faith was a little better. And they had a few more
tears on their altar. And I like them. I mean, you
know, get along with a lot of them, but I wouldn't give you
a spit on the ground for their salvation. They're not my brother.
The only place they're my brother is in Adam. Scott Richardson
was sitting at a picnic table in our backyard one time. And
as a young man, he ended up committing suicide after that. But he had
made a profession, joined the church, and started out for a
while. And he was sitting at the house,
and Scott was there, and we were sitting at that picnic table.
And Scott called him brother. He said, Brother David. He called
him Brother David. Brother Scott said, I'm not a
believer, I'm not a Christian, I ain't your brother. He said,
well, if I don't catch you in Christ, I'll catch you in Adam.
And we do. See, we can identify, we understand
where people's coming from in false religion, because we've
been there. That's why it says we've renounced that. We've renounced
it. The things that we once bore
it in, we now call it our shame. That's another thing Scott told
me one time. He says, you know when you're walking down, when
you're out, he'd go out walking. You may be talking to him, he'd
just turn around and walk off and just start walking. He was a
character. But I'll tell you, there was,
he told me one time, he was over in Cherokee, North Carolina,
and he'd been out walking. He'd come back and said, when
you're by yourself and you're ever alone, do you ever just
feel shame come all over you, just so ashamed of something
you've done, something you said, or some way you've acted? Do
you just feel that shame come over you? He said, oh, I said it happened.
And that's what we do. We renounce sin. I'm ashamed
of the things I said about God. I'm ashamed of things that I
did as a professed believer and a preacher. I'm ashamed of things
I preached. I'm ashamed of holding to a false
profession for years until God in His sovereign mercy revealed
Christ to me. Until a preacher finally told
me, quit playing games. Until a preacher finally told
me, you're either going to confess Christ or you're going to be
an Arminian. Which one are you going to be? Are you going to talk
grace or are you going to talk free will? Which one are you going
to do? You can't play games with God. And oh my, we received. And that's
why, beloved, what we receive, the gospel makes men honest.
You see, we don't just wear sheep's clothing, but we actually are
sheep. We're above board. We're above
board in our modesty. We're above board in our methods.
And when you see, when you're with a Christian, what you see
is what you get. Ain't that right? What you see
is what you get. We don't try to be pious out in the world.
Do you try to be real pious and act real pious? When you go out
to eat lunch on Sunday afternoon, do you get everybody around the
table, let everybody know you're Christians, and let's all join
hands now? Or do we ask one of the women
at the table, say, sister, so-and-so, would you pray for us? No, when you've got an ability
with a Christian, what you see is what you do. I mean, they're men. David was a man. Peter was a
man. With all that he was as God's
apostle, but yet he was still just a man. We have nothing to
prove to anybody. And then let me show you this.
Let me move on. Again, in verse 2, we renounce
the hidden things of dishonesty. Not walking in craftiness. Oh,
what does that mean? Deceitfulness. Not walking in
craftiness. We don't use trickery. We don't
use cunning. We don't use manipulation. We
don't flatter people just to get some gain to ourself or get
somebody to glory in us. Now, a lot of folks use religion
and the gospel to promote themselves. They don't care for the glory
of God. They make merchandise. All men are to them is just merchandise. That's why they have such these
big churches. Oh my, we have, you know, we got 15 people saved
this week. We got 12 children saved this
week. And they come in, they go out.
They come in, they go out. All they are is just merchandise.
Sign this card here, how much you don't have on the budget
this year. Just merchandise. They're not souls. They're not
for the glory of God. They don't want to preach the
gospel to them. They're just somebody to make money off, to
promote themselves, and to be somebody and get some glory for
it. And then look what else he says.
Not handling the word of God deceitfully. What in the world
is he talking about here? Talking about the gospel of Christ.
We don't corrupt the word of God. We don't corrupt our gospel
with human works. We don't bring human works into
it, or traditions, or philosophy, or even our opinions. We don't
do it. We don't keep that part of it
because we're afraid of offending somebody. No, we don't add anything
to it. We don't twist it to suit the
flesh. We don't cry peace when there is no peace. I remember years and years ago,
Real, real, real popular fundamentalist preacher. Oh, he was popular. I mean, he'd had, man, he'd preach
meetings 50 weeks out of the year, and all the folks would
just come from all over the place to hear him preach. And he was a good preacher, as
far as preaching would go. But I was starting to see him
in election and God's particular redemption, Christ's particular
redemption, and I was talking to him about those things in
the motel room one time. And he says, you know, election
is a family secret. I said, well, I said, well, let's
tell the family about it. He said, no, no, no. I said,
you can't just tell anybody about that. In other words, he said,
we can talk about it in the motel room. We can talk about it, sit
and drink a cup of coffee. But don't you dare preach it. We ain't going to hold back election.
All right, we're not going to hold back particular redemption
that Christ just died for his elect, for his people. We're
not going to keep back anything that brings all the glory to
God. We're not going to, you say, well, boy, that fell down
on a lot of elections. That's his problem, not mine. Elections
weren't God's trail. God chose us. You know, when a person has a
problem with the Word of God, it's their problem, it ain't
mine. It's because they don't want to believe, and that's where
we'll get to that in a minute. But oh, listen. And that's what
he says here again, now look what he says. We commend ourselves. What he says, we commend ourselves
to every man's conscience in the sight of God. We commend
ourselves. How do we, every one of us here
as believers, we commend ourselves? We're at, in the presence and
sight of God. To every one of us, we present ourselves to every
man's conscience. My conscience is open to you,
and your conscience is open to me. How? By the truth. The truth manifested. I don't
have to know what's going on with you. You don't have to know
what because we're open and naked before Him with whom we have
to do. By the manifestation of the truth. The truth manifests
where we are. By plain, bold preaching of the
truth of the gospel as it's revealed in Christ. Let me hurry now.
Look what he says here in verse 5. For we preach not ourselves,
not ourselves. We're not bragging on ourselves.
We've got nothing to commend ourselves. We're not preaching
not our opinions, our philosophies. We don't preach or teach or do
anything to promote ourselves. We don't do anything to supply
our own life's necessities as preachers. And what men don't
want to hear, that's their problem. We preach Christ Jesus. Ain't
that what he says? the Lord, Christ, this is the
gospel now, the Messiah, the prophet, the priest, the king,
the fulfillment of every Old Testament type and promise. And then it says Jesus. Who's
Jesus? Son of man, Son of Mary, man
of sorrows, that man who was numbered with transgressions,
who was tempted in all points like as we are yet without sin.
And then it says the Lord, very God of very God, Lord of Lord
and King of Kings. And then he says, ourselves your
servants for Jesus' sake. What does that mean? That means
we take whatever is given to us, fished out to us, sent to
us. We just take it. Take it. We take whatever wages you give,
whatever prayers you give, whatever you do. We're your servants.
We're your servants. And oh, beloved, let me give
you just a few more minutes. And look what it says, this glorious
gospel of Christ becomes our gospel. Look what he says there, verse 3. But if our gospel be
yet. It's called our gospel. But if
our gospel, our gospel, the gospel of Christ. Why does he call it
our gospel? Because we're saved by Him. We're
called to it. It's what we witness to, it's
what we preach, it's what we're in love with, it's what we're
obsessed by, it's what we're entrusted with. Oh, I'm obsessed
by the Bible, by the gospel. I've got to have the gospel.
Must have it, got to have it. I need it. If somebody's going
to preach it, I'm going to go listen to it. I mean, I've got
to have it. I'm obsessed by it, and we're
entrusted with it. And then look what he said in
verse seven. We have this treasure in earthen vessels. Oh, my. Hereby knows what a treasure
is. Treasure, treasure, treasure.
I'll watch this show every once in a while with these fellows
here. They're They hunt for gold. They go to
Yukon. They dig gold up there. Now they're
going to... I saw the other night that they cut out a five foot
block of ice. Five foot thick. Took a bulldozer
out on that ice and jerked that big old block of ice out of there.
They brought this big old thing and set it on top of that ice
and this fella put on a suit and down in there he went. You
know what they're after? Gold! Gold! I mean, they'll go to the greatest
extremes to get just a little handful of gold. And when they've
got it, they're going to sell it. And you know they're going
to do that for so long, and they're broke again, you know. And so
they're all interested in that gold. We have treasure. We have this
treasure. And I don't have to move blocks
of ice. I don't have to go down deep.
I don't have to labor for it. We have this treasure. Treasure
is full of riches. Riches of grace. Riches of love. Riches of mercy. Riches of truth. Riches of justification, forgiveness,
and Christ. Oh my. But this gospel's not
everybody's gospel. Look what he said in verse 3.
If our gospel be hid, it's hid to them that are lost." Oh, you
mean the gospel's hid? Well, to them that are lost it
is. And let me tell you something. It's not the gospel's fault that
the gospel's hid. Look what he says there in verse
four. "...in whom the God of this world hath blinded the minds
of them which believe not." It's not the gospel's fault that it's
hidden. It's not the preacher's fault
that it's hidden. I've done my dead-level best by the grace
of God to proclaim the gospel. What is it? The faults in themselves. They're lost, they're dead, they're
blind, they're natural, have no spiritual perception, They
receive not the things of God, and then it says here, the God
of this world hath blinded the minds. The God of this world hath blinded
the minds. Oh, why don't they believe their
understanding? Their understanding of faith
is something that they can produce themselves. Their understanding
of repentance is just being sorry for some few forsaken things
they've done. And Satan takes unbelievers captive,
captive at their own will. Now, I want you to see something
over here in II Thessalonians 2, and I'll be done. Oh my, is
the God of this world blinded your mind? He's called the God
of this world. And that's why I call the Lord
Jesus must come. You know, when a strong man armed
keeps his palace, his goods are safe. But when a stronger man,
stronger man comes and spoils him of his goods, and that stronger
man armed is the Lord Jesus Christ. He's armed with the truth. He's
armed with the power of God. He's armed with the gospel. But
look what is said here in verse 9, 2 Thessalonians 2.9. He's
talking about that wicked, that Satan himself that Christ will
destroy. Even him who's coming is after
the working of Satan. With all powers, signs, and learned
wonders, he has power to keep your mind blinded. Signs, he's
making you look for some evidence instead of looking to Christ.
And He comes with lying wonders. He lies to you about your condition.
He lies to you about sin. He lies to you about God. He
lies to you about the things that you can do. And with all
deceivableness of unrighteousness, now listen to this, in them that
perish, why do it? Because they receive not the
love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this
cause, God, God, shall send them strong delusion that they should
believe a lie. Let me tell you some people in
the Scriptures that believed a lie. Judas believed a lie. Demas believed a lie. Esau believed
a lie. Adam and Eve believed a lie. Surely you don't believe a lie. That they all might be damned,
all might, might be damned, now listen to it again, they didn't
receive the love of the truth, that they all might be damned
who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. Oh my, is the gospel your gospel? Do you see the glorious gospel
of Christ in God, in Christ? Do you see salvation in Christ?
Do you see the wisdom of God in Christ? Do you see Christ
as your only hope? I know this much about people
that have been saved by the grace of God. They still want to be
saved. They still want to be saved.
Don't they? They still want to be saved.
They are, they have, and they still, still want to be saved.