If you would, please turn to
Luke chapter 23. Luke chapter 23. And I want to read verses 39
through 43. Luke 23 verse 39. And one of
the malefactors, which were hanged, railed on him saying, If thou
be Christ, save thyself and us. But the other, answering, rebuked
him, saying, Dost not thou fear God? Seeing thou art in the same
condemnation, and we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward
for our deeds, but this man hath done nothing amiss. And he said unto Jesus, Lord,
remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said
unto him, verily, I say unto thee, today shalt thou be with
me in paradise. Now I could stop right there
and sit down. Not going to, but I could. Because brothers and
sisters, that's a message right there. We do, and by God's grace, we shall
continue to teach and preach doctrine in this church, in this
assembly. But I wanna make this perfectly
clear again, just for maybe somebody on television, because there's
a point to this. We don't find Christ by doctrine. We find doctrine by Christ. And there's a world of difference
between those two statements. The religious societies around
us, and even some so-called grace people, have a tendency to be
more enamored of the doctrine than they are of the Lord of
the doctrine. And that's wrong. That's wrong. And I know, personally, and have
known in times past, a lot of people who have their doctrine,
then they go looking for the scriptures to find a way to prove
it. I said it before, I'll say it
again. Man, especially the religious man, will not let the scripture
get in the way of his theology. He won't let it get in the way
of his doctrine either. But our Lord here at this time,
and you gotta remember where he is, he is on a cross hanging. At this time, our Lord performed
an extraordinary, compassionate, gracious, and good act. While he was being crucified,
our Lord had been tortured. And now, at this present moment,
he was being tortured to death. And yet, he took the time with
all those that were around him. This was a big to-do. The Jews,
Herod, Pilate, everybody was involved with the crucifixion
of Christ. The Jews, the Gentiles, that's
everyone. The big shots, Herod, Pilate, the chief priests, the
scribes. They were all there, but our
Lord took just a moment of his time and took pity and saved
one of his sheep that was hanging on a cross beside him. I don't
know if it was right or left hand, doesn't matter. While he was dying, he saved
a sinner. He was dying the death of the
cross, the death of shame. Cursed is everyone that hangeth
on a tree. And yet while he was laying there, hanging there,
being a curse, he saved a sinner. Free grace is a wonderful thing. It's prized by the recipients
and it's confounding to the religious. That's just a bonus. I'm sorry,
I do take pleasure in confounding the religious, that's just me.
It's the kind of person I am. I don't wanna be a stick in the
mud. I wanna be one that rejoices
in what our Lord Jesus Christ did on this day, this very day
of his death. Verse 39 starts out in one of
the malefactors. There were two malefactors with
him. One on each hand. It's what it says in Mark 15
and 28. He tells us there were two thieves crucified with him,
one on each side. And that reminds us, according
to the scriptures, that Jesus Christ was numbered with the
transgressors. It's in Isaiah 53. What? Fulfilling the scriptures. Matthew
27 and verse 44. It says, the thieves also which
were crucified with him did something. Because I do want to look at
this. Matthew 27, I'm going the wrong
way. I'm going too far anyway. Because both of these thieves
at one time, it's very clear. If I can find it and get there,
there's my bookmark. Matthew 27 and verse 44 says
this. The thieves also, which were
crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth. What did they cast into his teeth?
Both of the thieves. And they that pass by, verse
39, reviled him. They reviled Christ. Wagging
their heads and saying thou that destroy us the temple and build
it in three days save thyselves If thou be the Son of God come
down from the cross Likewise also what the chief priests? mocking him with the scribes
and the elders said He saved others Himself he cannot save
if he be king of Israel Let him now come down from the cross
and we will believe him No, they wouldn't. No, they wouldn't. He trusted in God, let him deliver
him now if he will have him, for he said, I am the son of
God. Then it says, the thieves also,
which were crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth. Both of these thieves, one on
each side, were railing against him. But something happened. Something happened. Because when
this one of malefactors, which were hanging, railed on him,
saying, if thou be to Christ, save thyself. But the other one
answered, rebuked him, saying, dost not thou fear God, seeing
thou art in the same condemnation? And we justly. You understand? The thieves were
there because they were thieves. And they got caught. But this thief, this one thief,
and thief he was, rebuked his fellow thief. Now they both had
been railing, and they both had cast the same in his teeth. They
both had done the same thing as the chief priests, the scribes,
and the elders did. But one of them stopped. One
of them stopped. Because this thief, and a thief
he was, acknowledge his own guilt and his due condemnation. Now, y'all know, most know, Walter
works in a prison. And the toughest thing in a prison
to find is a man who's guilty or will admit to it. Nobody's in prison right now,
folks. Nobody's in prison now for doing
what they got convicted of. They may admit to other things,
but they'll never admit that they did what they're in there
for. Welcome to human nature. But this thief, this thief somehow
became what Henry Mahan calls an honest sinner. You understand? An honest sinner. You know what an honest sinner
is? As a sinner, who knows he's a sinner? And will own up to
it. The world's full of sinners.
We're all sinners, brother. Yes, we are. But the world will
not own up to its sin. And the world will not own up
to being a sinner, truly. A sinner who deserves to die. Why? Because a sinner sins against
God. Sin is not against me. And my
sin is not against you. Even though I might offend you,
I might harm you. Sin is against God. A holy and a just God who says
The soul that sinneth shall surely die. And this thief was on that
cross next to our Lord, had been railing on our Lord just like
everyone else, but he stopped. And I'm here to tell you why.
The grace of God Almighty in the face of Jesus Christ. That's
the only reason. I'm telling you, the only thing
that can make an honest sinner is the Holy Ghost. He confessed his own sin and his own worthiness of death.
But he didn't stop there. He didn't stop there. And I can
tell you this, an honest sinner will not ever stop there. And
he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou comest into thy
kingdom. The first thing, he said it unto
Jesus. You understand, all those people
around, other than Christ's disciples and his mother that were there,
all those people around were talking at Jesus. They weren't
speaking to Jesus. There's a difference, this thief
spoke unto Jesus. This is a personal interchange
between a man and the God man. And I can tell you this, this
thief spoke to Jesus himself. Why do you wanna point that out?
No man can speak to Jesus for you. Y'all know my background, born
and raised Catholic, you understand? They teach that you need to go
to the priest to get absolved, to take the wafer. If you go
to confession, you gotta say your prayers and do your penance,
and then I absolve you. That's what they say. They can't. They can't, and they don't even
when they say they do. You personally must speak to
Jesus Christ. And that's what this thief did.
He spoke to the only one who could help him. He spoke to the
only one who mattered. No man can intercede between
you and him, no matter who he is and no matter what he says.
That goes for preachers, priests, whatever. I cannot call out to
you, to Jesus Christ for you. I can pray, I can preach, I can
teach. We can tell you to whom to go.
We should go to Christ. Call upon the name of what? The
Lord. And that's all. That's all a
man can do for another man. Or a woman can do for another
woman. Is point them in the direction of Christ. This thief spoke to
Jesus. I like that, I do. Because I can tell you this,
Jesus Christ, the Lord, will hear if you truly call upon his
name. And then he said this word. And
he said unto Jesus, the first word out of his mouth he said
to Jesus is this, Lord, not savior, not lamb of God, not son of God,
Lord. Lord, this man, this thief called
Jesus hanging on that tree, Lord. And he meant it. How do I know he meant it? Christ
answered it. You understand? If you don't
mean it, you're not gonna get an answer. But if you mean it,
truly mean it, and he'll know. He knows. You can fool yourself,
but you can't fool him. You understand? We say we have
no sin, we deceive ourselves. That's what it says, guess what?
That's what it means. But you ain't gonna fool him. A miracle happened to this thief
on that cross before he called out this one name, Lord. First Corinthians 12, verse three
says this. Wherefore, I give you to understand
that no man speaking by the spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed. And, here's the important part
that I wanna point out. And, that no man can say that
Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. So, if you truly call upon the
name of the Lord, he'll know it, cause he put it in you. Well, let's say free grace is
a wonderful thing. It's a marvelous thing. It's a miraculous thing.
No man can call him Lord except by the Holy Ghost. We saw that
sign, Walter. I'd seen it before going out
to Paul and Paula's yesterday. Let's say about true freedom
only comes from knowing Jesus as Savior. Now I'm not denigrating
Jesus being a savior. He is. But I'm gonna tell you
this. True freedom comes from knowing
the Lord, Jesus Christ. Or you don't know him. There's
lots of people around and they'll tell you all day long, you need
to accept Jesus as your personal savior. That's not in the scripture. It's not in the scripture. You
need to confess him Lord. It says that. If you confess
with your mouth Jesus to be Lord and believe in your heart God
raised him from the dead, you're doing that by the Holy Ghost.
That's what Paul says. It's got even worse nowadays.
When we were starting out, Walter, they were all talking about Jesus
made salvation possible. Now it's worse than that. Evil
men and seducers are waxing worse and worse. It's worse than that.
They say Jesus Christ made salvation Available. You know what they
mean by that? It's available. Go get it. You can't get salvation. Jesus Christ is not Home Depot
or Walmart. Salvation is of the Lord. It's the gift of God. By grace,
through faith, you believe, and not until. No man can truly say Jesus is
the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost. Believing and confessing with
your mouth, the Lord Jesus Christ takes the Spirit of God in you. Only the Lord can save. And only
the Lord gives that to a man. Even a thief on a cross. What'd he say after this? He
said, Lord, these two beautiful words, remember me, remember
me. That's the title, Paul, Lord,
remember me. I wanna tell you this before
I get started in this. This thief who spoke to Jesus,
who called him Lord, knew the Lord Jesus Christ. He knew by
the Holy Ghost. No man calleth Jesus Lord except
by the Holy Ghost. And this man did. But he made
this request. Just a simple thing, two words.
Remember me. Remember me. This is why we sang
that song this morning. Remember me. Just the glory in
that statement. Because here's one thing I definitely
want to point out before I forget. You can't remember someone you
didn't know. It's not possible. This thief
said, remember me. Lord! Lord! Not Savior, although
he is. Lord, remember me. That's calling upon the name
of the Lord. Because in order for Jesus Christ
to remember that man, he had to know that man. And knowing,
is more important than we ever will realize. I wish I could. I wanna say this correctly, very clearly. My knowing Christ,
or your knowing Christ, as glorious as that really is, and we don't
get that that well, as miraculous as that is, is absolutely nothing
when compared to the Lord Jesus Christ knowing me or knowing
you. You understand? We know in part,
we prophesy in part, we see through a glass darkly. He doesn't. When they were nailing him on
that cross before, he was led out to those crosses. Those two
thieves were with him. I'm gonna tell you something.
They both railed on him, but even while the one was railing
on him that was gonna stop, he knew him. He knew him. Moose sang that song. He was
the lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. He knew
exactly who he was being slain for. Ah. I'm not denigrating what
the Lord has given me or you to know Christ. It's great, it's
glorious, it blesses my soul. But his knowing me, his loving
me is far more important and more glorious than can ever be
because he sees me as I am. I don't even see myself as I
am. And I think bad enough about
myself, I do. But I'm wrong, I should think
worse of myself. You understand, if the Lord's
remembering you, it's because he knows you. And he's always
known you. If the Lord remembers you, the
Father gave you to the Son before the foundation of the world. That's where Christ first knew
this thief on the cross. Remember me, because I can tell
you this, the four worst, coldest, heart-wrenching words in the
English language is this. I never knew you. That's in Matthew. And you know
who spoke those words? The Lord Jesus spoke those words. And that's four words you never
ever want to hear in your life. Because there are those that
have come to me. That's what he told them. They're gonna come
to me. And they're gonna say, hey, Jesus, we did this in your
name. We did that in your name. We
preached in your name. We did many wonderful works.
And you understand, Jesus didn't deal with any of those claims. Maybe they did them, I don't
know. And here's the point, it don't
matter. Because he said in that day,
I'm gonna turn to him and look at him dead in the eye and say,
I never knew you. And those are the four worst
words in this world to be heard from the lips of Jesus Christ.
Because what follows them, depart from me. Ye that work, You did
many wonderful things, preach to my name. Ye that work, iniquity. Guess what? The Lord Jesus Christ
is not gonna remember those people because he never knew them. That's
the words you don't wanna hear. But this thief on the cross says,
Lord, remember me. Because if the Lord Jesus Christ
remembers you, he knows you. I'd say good and bad, but we
ain't got no good. The only good we do is what he
works in us both to will and to do of his good pleasure. All
our righteousnesses are still filthy rags. But he remembers
his own. He knows his own. This foundation
stands sure. It ain't that you know him, The
Lord knoweth them that are his. So what do we say? Lord, remember
me. I love that, I do. And I can
tell you this, the other beautiful thing about this statement, remember
me, understand? Walter's mentioned this, and
I got to thinking about it when I was looking over this stuff. I worry about my mind deteriorating. Mason talks about his all the
time. Well, the same thing's happening to me. I'm a little
behind you, Mason, but it's still happening. I can't remember what
I used to know. I make notes and I lose them. But here's the thing. My memory
is not the issue. Understand? I can go completely
crazy and I have worried about that from time to time and still
do. I could suffer a traumatic brain
injury. I saw a guy at work fall and
hit his head on the concrete floor. And this was just from
maybe this high up in the ground, two feet above the ground. But
he fell and he hit the back of his head. And while I was talking
to him, trying to comfort him and telling him again and again
that his wife knows she's on his way. I mean, I'm not trying
to belittle this, but here, while I was talking to him, I could
see his memory disappearing. from what he told me, because
he kept asking me the same three questions over and over again.
And then the question's like, how did I get here? Stuff like
that bothers me. But my memory's not the issue.
If he remembers me, it doesn't matter whether I remember him
or not. I'm not making little of it. I'm not looking forward
to it. I don't want it. I'd like to
go out with my eyes clear, my mind sharp, and my body healthy
would be nice, but I'm not worried. This is the thing, it ain't on
me. And here's the thing, it's not
on you. If the Lord remembers you, you're
in. You're in. He knows you. And he only knows the ones that
he loves. And he always says the ones that
he loves. My memory's not the issue. Understand,
I just said it. The Lord knows them that are
his. That foundation is sure. Our
foundation is never sure, except for where we're standing on the
rock. We might be building wood, hay, and stubble all around us.
It's not a good thing, but it's not a fatal thing. Because he'll
just burn it. And there you are, but you're
still on the rock. And he said, remember me when
thou come into thy kingdom. He was king then hanging on that
tree. He was. This thief called him
Lord. Because he is Lord. And this
is the truth also. He is both Lord and king. King
of kings and Lord of lords. And guess what? He changes not.
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, and today, and forever. So if
he was king, gonna be king, he is king now, and he always has
been king. But remember me when thou comest
in thy kingdom. Lord, you're not gonna stay dead. You're not gonna stay dead. Yeah, how he knew, I don't know. Might have something to do with
them fellas sticking out their lip and saying, destroy this temple
in three days, rebuild it again. Somebody might have revealed
unto him what that meant. And even if they didn't, he knew
Jesus Christ is God. And God's not gonna stay dead.
Remember me when thou comest in thy kingdom, and here's the
glorious thing, and Jesus said unto him, verily, I say unto
thee, today shalt thou be with me in paradise. Truly I say, verily, truly. You know when Jesus speaks, his
sheep hear. I ain't gonna say they all understand,
but they hear. He that hath ears to hear, let
him hear. Now, if you don't have ears to hear, you're not gonna
hear. And I can't give you ears to
hear. Somebody else has got to circumcise your heart and ears. But when he speaks, his sheep
hear. We may not understand everything.
Okay, wait a minute. We don't understand everything. We don't know what it all means.
but we hear him. Why? Because he said, verily
I say unto thee, unto thee, unto thee. He wasn't talking to everybody
else that was around. He said it to that one thief
who confessed him Lord. I say this unto thee. Today thou
shalt be with me and And I can tell you this, that
day, that thief was in paradise with Jesus Christ. Can you prove
that? No. Now ask me if I care. Because you get me to this point,
I don't care about that. Whether you believe it or not
is so. Because Jesus Christ said it. And that settles it whether
I believe it or not. Whether you believe it or not.
This day, that thief was with Christ in paradise. I'm not going
into where this is and what happened, because it don't say. And it
doesn't matter, because I'm gonna tell you something, when you're
with the Lord, it doesn't matter where you are. And that goes
as much today as it will that last day. Oh, Lord, remember
me when thou comest into thy kingdom. I'll say it unto you,
today you're gonna be with me in paradise. And that day, that
man was in paradise. That thief, well, former thief. By that time, former thief was
gonna be in paradise with Christ, and he was. A thief crucified
was saved while being crucified. An honest sinner was saved while
being crucified. Think about it. Our Lord in that
day bore the very sins of that man on his right hand or his
left hand in his own body on the tree and saved that sinner
while he was still hanging there. They were both still hanging
there. Sovereign grace is a wonderful
thing. Salvation is of the Lord Because
I want to point out one thing and I gotta quit should have
quit a while back but it's okay Notice this very carefully, okay
Because of what goes on all around us that thief on that cross Didn't
do anything for God That thief never witnessed for
Jesus. Well, wait a minute. Yeah, he
did. It took Luke to write it down,
but we have his witness. But still, he didn't go out and
witness to others. He didn't have time to take the
Lord's table or get baptized. You know what he had time for?
He had time to believe the Lord Jesus Christ. That's all he had time for. And
you know who gave him that time? Our Lord Jesus Christ. No man calls Jesus Lord except
by the Holy Ghost. I remember years ago hearing
a message by Henry. He said, you know, they don't
talk a lot about, you don't read about deathbed confessions. And he said, I don't put a lot
of stock in them. He says, there's one in the scripture and it's
right here. Just so you know, it can happen. God can save a
man on his last breath. Yes, he can. And he did, right here. By his grace. Oh, the other thing that thief
had time for was to be in paradise that day. You understand? Jesus Christ
will make time for his people. In the fullness of time, God
revealed his son in me. Guess what? This thief on the
cross, this was his fullness of his time. It was the fullness
of time for Jesus Christ to save that man and take him to paradise
that day. That's all I got to say to you
today. Believe the Lord Jesus Christ. That's all. It takes
his faith, his power, and it's by his grace, but believe Christ. You give him the glory, but I
want you to believe. And guess what? If you do, he's
with you right now. He's with you right now. Lord,
remember me. Our Heavenly Father, we're thankful
for this time and thank you for this place and this gathering,
this assembly of your saints to try to worship you in spirit
and in truth. Be with Moose as he comes to
preach your word. Lord, remember us. your people,
fallen, staggering, stumbling. But remember us, for we believe
you. We ask in Christ's name, amen.