We're talking about that great
high priest that Walter mentioned this morning, but it's very difficult
to Hold the line here, and I won't hold the line this morning. I
I don't know how far I'll get I just try I'm only going to mention the
fact that he that is our great high priest the Lord Jesus Christ
paid the price for of Walter of eternal redemption
for us. Because being chosen in him before
the foundation of the world means that it had no beginning and
will have no end. I want you to keep in mind constantly
that every child of God has an eternal salvation. No matter
what you read, no matter what you hear that seem to be otherwise
He is, salvation is eternal, and I went into that thoroughly
the last two Sundays. Don't let any, me, Walter, or
anybody else throw any doubt upon that. If you're a child
of God, it's because of the election of grace. And it had no beginning,
and it will have no ending. You can never lose that quote,
salvation, unquote, It will never be taken away from you if you possess it. And you will never lose the position
that you have in Jesus Christ of being righteous in God's sight. It doesn't matter at all that
men have for a long time been engaged in arguments concerning
some very difficult scriptures. And like I say, I may not get
to it this morning, but I'll make an attempt and finish up
sometime. But they argue about eternal salvation. They argue
about our security in Christ. They argue about position. They
argue about works, until your mind is almost destroyed with
their wretchedness. But in reality,
we have ample scripture, and they're given to you here, both
Walter and me, not because we're anything special, but the scripture's
what gives evidence of this truth. And we simply remind you of things
that you already know. Now, see how Paul says it in
chapter 10 of Hebrews, And verse 9, then said he, this is Christ
and is taken from Psalms, then said he, lo, I come to do thy
will, O God. In other words, his dying for
our redemption, his death on the cross, the shame that he
suffered was all at God's hands. through evil men, but all of
God's hand. He said, lo, I come to do thy
will, O God. It was God's will that Jesus
Christ die for the sins of his people. And we still have these
idiots that are running up and down the land and all around
the world saying, who killed Christ? I did. And so did you, if you're a child
of God. He said, lo, I come to do thy
will, O God. What was God's will? The salvation
of his people. And Christ said, I'm going to
do that. I'm going to perform that for in the place of every
believer, every child of God, every living sinner. I'm going
to do that for him. Now, he taken away the first
that he may establish the second. What is the first? The first
is the law. And that includes, and I don't
know where these expressions come from, but they're used continually.
When you talk about the Ten Commandments, you talk about the moral law,
right? That's what religion does. You
talk about the ceremonial law, that is, the sacrifices and the
offerings that the priests made. They were of the tribe of Levi,
and they made the offerings. The great high priest, the high
priest at one time was Aaron, and he had charge of the whole
shooting match. All right. That's gone. This is what Paul
is saying here. He taketh away the first, that
he may establish the second. By the which will, oh boy, by
the which will, we are, believers are sanctified. They're set apart
to God. Every one of them. They're sanctified
through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. See the little words for all
in your Bible? Again, they're interpolations.
They're not in the original. Now don't get tired of Walter
and me saying that, but that helps to clarify this. You see,
it was by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. But every priest standeth daily
ministering. This was going on then. He's
talking about the temple in Jerusalem. Every priest standeth daily ministering
and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take
away sins. Never. Well, why did God require them
if they weren't to take away sins? These people that offered the
sacrifices were being saved on credit. That's right. On what would happen. You take out a loan, you're saying,
I will pay at a certain time. So God is giving them shadows
and types here, saying at one time, we're going to get into
that. the same sacrifices which can never take away sins but
this man this man and boy do I like that this man not a theophany not an angel not something that
we don't know and can't identify with but this man and I think
that's astounding keep that in your mind that this is a man
we're talking about after he had offered one sacrifice
for sins forever sat down on the right hand of God from henceforth
expecting till his enemies be made his footstool. Now look
at verse 14. For by one offering he hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified. He hath perfected forever. You
say, well, my family tell you they don't see much perfect in
me. But I'll tell you this. He is
perfect. Amen. And it's he that hath perfected
every one of us. Amen. In God's sight, judgment
is gone. You know, every lamb that was
offered signified judgment somewhere. That's right. There, that was,
the lamb died. Yes sir. And its blood was spilt. The red heifer died. And the
cattle died. And the doves died. All of these offerings died.
Yeah. But, one offering. One offering. He hath perfected
forever. What was that offering? His human Isn't that a tremendous thing?
His human body. Can you see why the reprobate
recoils when we say that Jesus Christ was slaughtered? He was led as a lamb to the slaughter. That's what the book says. And
yet they recoil at it. Old Harry Emerson Fosdick said
that the blood of Jesus Christ could no more atone for sin than
the blood of a sheep or a goat. He was pastor of the Marble Collegiate
Church in New York City. Well, sure he's a liar. Well,
I agree with Harry Von Zell. Most of you people here don't
remember Harry Von Zell. I've told this story before.
Harry Von Zell was a newscaster. And he was announcing Fosdick
on a program. You know how on radio they used
to hold their hand up by their ear like this, so you could hear
your own echo. Try it sometime. Your wife will
think you're crazy, but it'll work. He'd hold his hand up like
this, and he said, now I want to introduce to you the prince
of the power of the air, Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick. He couldn't
have been more right. He couldn't have been more right.
Of course, I don't know whether Harry got on the program again
or not. But this one offering, this blood, not spilt, but shed, and offered unto God. And God accepted that offering.
How do I know that? The scripture tells me that because
of this, God raised him from the dead. Something that had
never been heard of before or since. Now you see, I get taken
away with this. The law, all of the law, is to
be taken away. The Ten Commandments, let me
tell you something, and get mad at me if you will, that old Judge
Dunner in Georgia had no right to put the Ten Commandments on
his wall. I still stand for the separation
of church and state. And I still am not under the
judgment of the law. You say, well, the sinner is.
Absolutely. Absolutely. And is our system
based upon canonical law, on biblical law? Well, some of it,
but not all of it. If it was, thou shalt not commit
adultery would fill the jails right at this present time. You see, We get emotionally involved
with these things. Don't do that. Look at them objectively. And when someone professing to
do right does something, and if it's religious, don't immediately
applaud. If I had little children, I wouldn't
want prayer in the public schools. Well, why is that? I don't know
who's doing the praying. And I don't know who's doing
the teaching. One woman said, wouldn't it be wonderful if we
had Bible lessons in our schools? No! No, God help us, I don't
even want Sunday school teachers teaching our children. Because
I had one one time to profess to the children in her class
that she was a witch. And that's just the truth. And
I fired her. I did, and her husband left with
her. No great loss. But who took the
law away? Who took it away? Who took it
out of the way? The Lord Jesus Christ. What did
Paul write? Nailing it to his cross so that
for the believer it no longer exists. God took it away, and yet these
free will addicts would establish the law in every case and in
every instance from now on. Verse 19, having therefore,
brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest, how? By the blood of Jesus. Not by
works of righteousness that we have done, but by his mercy hath
he saved us. You see, when you talk about
the law being taken away, they would still bind us with the
law, you know that? I mean, free wheelers would bind
us to the law. Every day, after day, after day,
they put them on the walls of their churches, they put their
church covenant up there too. And then the law, and then the
Sunday school board, Which tells how many were there and who filled
up a pew and who did this and who did that. I've been there. Having therefore, brethren, boldness
to enter in the holiest by the blood of Jesus. You ought to
read this and you ought to mark that by the blood of Jesus. There's no other way. And this
is the new and living way which he hath consecrated for us through
the veil, that is to say, his flesh. And having an eye preached
over the house of God, let us draw near with a true heart. and in full assurance. Having our hearts sprinkled with
what? The blood? From an evil conscience. That's a strange, Walter, that
is a strange expression. Evil conscience. Now I can, evil
mind? Yes. Evil emotions evil desires all
of this I can see but an evil conscience Do you know how would you explain
an evil conscience? What does your conscience do? It either inflates your righteousness,
or it condemns your sin And remember that it's fallen
Some people go, let the conscience be my guide. You better not,
it'll guide you right into hell. Because it's fallen. Just like
your mind is fallen. An evil conscience. Let the word
be your guide. Not your conscience. This is
an evil conscience. And you know what that evil conscience
would do? It would applaud you when you're
wrong and condemn you when you're right. It's an evil, it's a lying conscience. Well, my conscience condemned
me. You probably did right. And some of you walk into the
most awful situations with a clear conscience that ever anybody
would want to get into. and our bodies washed with pure
water. Now, remember what I said, that in
no way can we lose this righteousness, this salvation that God has given
us. The Word testifies to it. Now somebody's going to say,
well Earl sure disagrees with Walter. No, Earl doesn't disagree with
Walter. Walter doesn't disagree with Earl for the most part,
at least he hasn't said so. I want to get it fixed in her mind.
It's not only the moral law. While I believe very, very certainly
that the natural man is governed by the moral law. And it condemns
him. It condemns him. Well, wait just
a few minutes and I'll get to something else. Let us hold fast
the profession of our faith. Hold fast that profession, this
profession that we're preaching. Walter preached it, I'm trying
to. For he is faithful that promised. And let us consider one another. Hold fast the profession of our
faith. Let us consider one another. Well, what did I read just before
that? Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith. Now you can do that. You can
do that. Because the scripture supports
you in professing, confessing the fact that God has given you
that faith. The Bible's clear on it. But what is he saying here? Let us consider one another to
provoke and to love and to good works. You know something? We're
supposed to try to inspire each other. Sure. That's what we're supposed to
try to do. Instead of the criticism that
makes the rounds constantly, and I'm as guilty as you are,
we ought to become concentrated. focused as i've been saying all
through these message focused consider one another provoking
not just provoking we provoke one another enough the scripture
says that we are to provoke unto love and good works encourage
people to do good things well the question is Do we do it as we have opportunity,
as God gives us opportunity? I think so. But look at verse
25. Not forsaking the assembling
of ourselves together as the manner of some is. What's he
talking about? You ought to go to church. And it is God's will and God's
purpose and God's instruction to believers to attend a house
of worship on Sunday morning. Now, I'm not a Sabbatarian, nor do I uphold religious profession
without any possession. I know there are filled churches
all around us today that give forth a hollow sound. with no
truth, I know that. But insofar as God's people are
concerned, they are not to forsake the assembling of themselves
together in sacred assembly, as manner of some he is. Some do. We know a man, Dave
will remember who this is, I'm not gonna say, I'm not gonna
mention names. But almost every time I see him, he's one of my
friends out of the Primitive Baptist Church, old Baptist,
and he knows what I preach. And so the other day we were
in the shop and he said, Earl, you still trying to preach? I
said, yeah, that's about all I do is try. Well, he said, I'm
going to come to visit you. Now, I probably won't get this
conversation right. And David was in there, and David
said, when? Well, right away, they hadn't
traveled very much, and his wife has been ill. But here came this
flood of excuses. So I've quit asking him when,
because he says it almost every time that I go in there. Now, why? because he knows he
ought to be in a worship service on Sunday morning. He knows that. He doesn't need
me to tell him that. You don't need me to tell you
that you ought to be here on Sunday morning if you're not
crippled or sick. And that's just the truth. Now
sickness does happen. Don't you tell him I said this,
but I wouldn't have wanted to see Roy come in here limping
on that cane today, because that's overdoing it. I wouldn't have wanted to see
him here, but there are reasons why. I know that's oversimplification. All right, let's go. We'll try. We got a few minutes here. not
forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some
is. I would think that this forsaking
is the greatest deterrent to spiritual growth that I know. And somebody will look at me
and say, well, you're not saved by going to church. Nobody said
you were. But I'm giving you what God says
here, that you ought to be there. And that was in a day when it
cost something. I mean, you attend a service
of believers, and the Roman law may be hammering at your door
within the next three minutes. Or a gang of evil Jews wanting
to kill you. That's right. That's right. And much more so as you see the
day approaching. What day? What day? That great and terrible day of
the Lord. Now I'm not talking about the
rapture of the church. I'm talking about that great
and terrible day of the Lord when Christ comes and every eye
shall see Him. and they that pierced him, the
Jew, shall wail because of him." Now, don't be fooled by this
modern sociology and psychology. The Jews committed Jesus Christ
to the Romans. The Romans crucified him, and
they both share in the actual guilt of that crucifixion. But
the Jews were the drivers of it. They initiated it, and here,
this Poor, senile, old man, sitting
all humped over. I may get in that condition someday,
but I'll tell you one thing, I won't be pronouncing canonical
law to millions of people. He said in his term as il papa,
the Pope, he's not my papa, but he said, All of a sudden, he
and his red hats, you know, the College of Cardinals, said that
the Jews were not guilty. We thought they were, but they
weren't. Well, I thought they were, and they were. Now, that's just the way it is.
The scripture says so. Sure, it was by God's foreordination,
His determination. He ordained it to happen, but
Christ was taken by the hands of wicked men. And those were
Jews. Did the same thing with Paul
the Apostle. That day approaching, oh that day approaching. I may get clear away from things
here, I don't know, let me see. let's look let's look at isaiah
no i'm sorry jeremiah thirty-one jeremiah thirty-one and uh... what first thirty three i think or not let let let me go back
uh... behold the first verse thirty-one
behold the days come saith the lord that i will make a new covenant
with whom with the House of Israel and
with the House of Judah. This is addressed specifically
to Jews in a Jewish congregation. And don't ever let anybody change
your mind on that. Not anyone. Not according to the covenant
that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by
the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, which my covenant
they break. That's right. Although I was a husband unto
them, saith the Lord. And this shall be the covenant
that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith
the Lord. I will put my law in their inward
parts, and write it in their hearts, and will be their God,
and they shall be my people. And they shall teach no more
every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know
the Lord, for they shall all know me. Now just look at this. the least of them unto the greatest
of them, saith the Lord, for I will forgive their iniquity
on what basis? The basis of his sovereignty
in the blood of Christ. I will forgive their iniquity
and I will remember their sin no more. No more. Thus saith the Lord, which giveth
the sun for a light by day, and the ordinance of the moon, and
of the stars to light by night, and on. This God, this God is
going to keep his promises made to Israel. This is what Paul
is saying to these Hebrews here in this congregation. God's going to keep his promise.
Now, I don't want to hear anybody say that this is the church. It isn't the church. It says
very plainly, this is the covenant that I will
make with the house of Israel. This is the covenant. We enter a very difficult, but
let me try something else here this morning, and I know I'm
kind of leaving my schedule. Here, and there shall come forth
a rod out of, I'm in Isaiah 11. There shall come forth a rod
out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his
roots. Who is that? Who is that? That's Christ. That's
Christ. And the spirit of the Lord shall
rest upon him, and the spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge, and
of the fear of the Lord, and shall make him of quick understanding
in the fear of the Lord. And he shall not judge after
the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of
his ears. But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and
reprove with equity the meat. He shall smite the earth with
the rod of his mouth, And with the breath of his lips shall
he slay the wicked. That's going to happen. Yes,
sir. That's going to happen. Now understand this, that between
this that shall come forth, this rod that comes forth out of the
stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his roots, that branch,
that rod, and so forth, is the person of Christ, which we've
said already. And between Isaiah saying this, and
when that rod came forth, was over 750 years. And yet, I have been trying to
spiritualize this and tell me that this is the church. Well, there's a great space between
verse one and the final scene as you come over here. If this be the case, we're here
right now. If this is the church, we're here. If this is the kingdom
of God, we're here. Now if you can make that so,
you talk to me after church, or come out to the ridge and
sit on a stool and convince me of it. Now listen, this branch,
this rod that came out of the roots of
Jesse, the son of David, now with righteousness he shall
judge the poor. and reprove with equity for the
meek of the earth. And he shall smite the earth
with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall
he slay the wicked. and righteousness shall be the
girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. The
wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie
down with the kid, and the calf and the young lion, and the fatling
together, and a little child shall lead them." Oh, I hear
preachers quote that. You know, there is a church that
has the blessing of the animals. And people bring their dogs,
and their cats, and their iguanas, and their canaries, and their
conures, Walter, their squawking parrots, and they bring them all into
the church. The man stands at the front and
he sprinkles this water around and he does this, you know, I
can never get it right, Joe can. He does, and he blesses all these
dogs and cats and hamsters and whatnot. It's useless. It's useless. It's a stupid publicity
stunt is what it is. It's to try to get the the religious
societies Accepted by the masses They're undoubtedly probably
more dogs in that area than there are believers, but They shall
not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain are we there I? Don't think so And the earth shall be full of
the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. Are
we there? No, but we're going there. We're
going there. I tell you, it's an amazing thing. And it shall come to pass in
that day, this is the 11th verse of the 11th chapter, that in
that day that the Lord shall set his hand again the second
time to recover the remnant of his people which shall be left.
That's the Jew! From Assyria, and from Egypt,
and from Pathos, and from Cush, and from Elam, and from Shinar,
and from Hamath, and from the islands of the sea, he shall
set up an ensign for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts
of Israel. Time gets away from me. Here in chapter 13, he says,
I will make a man more precious than fine gold, even a man than
the golden wedge of Ophir. Therefore, I will shake the heavens
and the earth, shall remove out of her place in the wrath of
the Lord of hosts, and in the day of his fierce anger. Now, I'll give you this, and
I think this will be worth it, even though I'll have to go on
next week. 19th verse of chapter 13 of Isaiah. Now, you wonder about the war
that we're in right now, which is over, of course. I want to be a little bit encouraged,
and I want to encourage others. And verse 19 now, and Babylon,
that's Iraq. Babylon is Iraq, they're synonymous
terms. And Babylon, the glory of kingdoms,
the beauty of the Chaldees excellency shall be as when God overthrew
Sodom and Gomorrah. God's gonna destroy Iraq. There
it is. It won't be George Bush that
does the job. It'll be God. And it shall never be inhabited,
neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation,
neither shall the Arabian pitch tent there, neither shall the
shepherds make their fold there, but the wild beasts of the desert
shall lie there." You see, that's going to come to pass. It's going
to be abandoned under the hand of God's judgment. Oh my, there's
so much here. Look at the first verse of the
14th chapter. For the Lord will have mercy on Jacob and will
yet choose Israel and set them in their own land. And the strangers
shall be joined with them and they shall cleave to the house
of Jacob. Gentiles are going to come and say, take us into
the house of the Lord with you. and the people shall take them
and bring them to their place and the house of israel shall
possess them in the land of the lord for the servants and handmaids
and they shall take them captives and whose captives they were
and they shall rule over their oppressors that's going to happen
god has spoken it that thou shalt take up verse four in chapter
fourteen that thou shalt take up this proverb against the king
of Babylon and say, how hath the oppressor ceased? The golden
city ceased. The Lord hath broken the staff
of the wicked and the scepter of the rulers. This is God's
business. And God will do as he promised.
He promised that a branch would come forth out of the root of
Jesse, back in the hills of Bethlehem in a stable. That branch was
born and lived the life of a boy. Lived the life of any other boy
that was around. Immediately, they tried to kill
him. They're still trying. Yes, sir. They're still trying. and he lived thirty three and
a half years about here on this earth a man and they took him and killed
him who was basically responsible religion they said we will not have this
man to reign over us people are still saying it whenever into the lives of a
believer I'm going to say this. I won't be able to complete the
statement, so I'll just leave you dwell on it, mull on it,
as Tim James says for a while. Whenever the enemy comes in to
a child of God, a believer, and tempts them. Now God doesn't
do that. Scripture says He doesn't. God doesn't tempt any man. But when the tempter comes, and
we know We know that this is wrong. We know it. And yet we say, I don't care. I'm going to do it anyhow. Or we let greed take hold of
us. Or we let, Walter, as you were
saying this morning, we let lust rule in our heart. And we give
up. to the influence of this world
in which we live today, which is foul. Well, you just said we weren't
saved by works. That's what I said. But you better hear what the
rest of it is. There is a price that we pay.
And we pay. And we pay. And we reap what we sow. We reap what we sow. Be not deceived,
God is not mocked. For whatsoever a man soweth,
that shall he also reap. And Paul said, if you sow to
the flesh, you're going to reap destruction. I'm going to talk
about that destruction next Sunday. The redemption of Jesus Christ
is a reality. We're surrounded by trouble.
The wars in Iraq, the war here, the war there. We've got soldiers
in 127 countries in this world. We can't do that. We're going
to keep the peace. We can't do that. The Prince
of Peace. I'm not being political either.
What I'm saying is the Prince of Peace is the only one who
will bring peace. That's the only one. And let
me tell you, Yahshua Arafat isn't in that. And none of the other Amalekites.
Our Father, we're glad this morning that Christ is real, that the
Word is true. and that we're enabled by thy
grace to turn away from that which is evil and harmful, and
to sublimate, to put off, in a measure, the old man, and walk
with Christ. We pray that you'd give us that
ability, and that it be not boastful or self-righteous, but that it
be in humility and in truth, knowing that in ourselves we're
absolutely nothing. For we pray it in Christ's name,
amen.