Greetings, friends, and welcome
to another broadcast of the Old School Primitive Baptist with
Elder Don Martin, Sr. Stay tuned for another gospel
message of God's free and sovereign grace. From what I've heard already
this morning, I probably have had about four messages. And
as the brethren kept on ministry and I just kept on getting
deeper and further and more confused as to what I ought to talk about
as far as the scripture text goes. But if God permit, let me talk a little bit about
Isaiah. The prophet Isaiah, some almost
730 years Before the birth of the Lord
Jesus Christ, God had raised him up to go out and to prophesy
unto his people. And out of the book of Isaiah
there is great gleamings to be obtained there in what God had
told him to say to Israel and that had come to pass in time. Now when I say it has come to
pass in time, I believe that the prophets of old that God
had raised up, that had prophesied, and that it has been written
down, has been part of the inspired word of God, has come to pass
and been fulfilled. Because the Bible says in the
Gospel of John that the prophets, the law and the prophets ceased
with John the Baptist. He was the last of the prophets
of the old. John the Baptist. And from that
time on, the New Covenant was determined and established, and
Jesus Christ became the prophet of the New Covenant, New Testament,
with a new message, by a new and living way. Yea, even himself,
Christ Jesus. Now the Bible says in the 42nd
chapter of Isaiah, I'm going to read a number of texts, it
will take you a while to follow me around, but I'm going to read
a few texts out of Isaiah, then I'm going to jump into John's
Gospel. But Isaiah said in verse 8 of chapter 42, I am the Lord,
that is my name. And my glory will I not give
to another, neither my praise to graven images. He says also
in verse 16 of chapter 4 that I will bring the blind by way
that they knew not. I will lead them in paths that
they have not known. I will make darkness light before
them, and crooked things straight, and these will I do unto them,
and not forsake them. He goes on to say in chapter
43 in verse 3, For I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel,
thy Savior. He says in verse 7 of chapter
43, Everyone that is called by my name, for I have created him
for my glory, and I have formed him, yea, I have made him. In
verse 10, chapter 43 of Isaiah, Ye are my witnesses, saith the
Lord, and my servant whom I have chosen. that ye may know and
believe me, and understand that I am he. Before me there was
no God formed, neither shall there be after me." There was
no God before God Almighty, and there's no God going to be after
God Almighty. There's no God that has preceded
God Almighty, and the God-Man, Jesus Christ, deity manifested
in the flesh, born of the Virgin Mary, conceived of the Holy Ghost
of God, there has been no man, no God, no prophet that has come
to succeed Him. as the Muslims say that Mohammed
has done. That is a lie. That is a false
gospel, another gospel, which Brother Micah talked about, which
those who preach that stuff should be cursed. That there's only
one God, the God Almighty, Jehovah God, was the name that Israel
gave Him. The Almighty, there is no other
God beside Him. And the Bible says that the Lord, I am the Lord, your
Holy One, the Creator of Israel, your King, verse 15 of chapter
43. We find also, he is my shepherd
and shall perform all my pleasure. And on and on we find that I
am the Lord, chapter 45 and verse 18. He says, for thus saith the Lord
that created the heavens and God himself that formed the earth
and made it. He had established it and created
it, not in vain. He formed it to be inhabited. And I am the Lord and there is
none else. And we go on down here to the
latter part of the 21st verse of the 45th. There is no God else beside me,
just God and a Savior, and there is none beside me. And it says,
look unto me and be ye saved, O ye ends of the earth, for I
am God and there is none else. I can go on and on and talk about
that God says, I am that I am. He said that in Genesis when
he told Moses to go and deliver his children. Moses said, who
am I going to tell them that have sent me? And he said, you
tell them that I am that I am that sent you. He is the same
I am that is mentioned in Isaiah when he spoke to Isaiah by the
Spirit and he told them to say that there is no God beside me,
there has not been one before me, there shall not be one after
me. Okay? So we've got it nailed
down that it's been prophesied that God is who he says he is,
there's none beside him, neither has there been a minute where
there will ever be another beside that God, Jehovah God Almighty. Now, move with me, if you would,
to the New Testament, the Gospel of John. The Bible says in John,
starting at, let me just read verse 23 of chapter 8, and Jesus
said, ye are from beneath. Jesus was talking to the Pharisees,
the scribes, as they were critics of his works, of signs and wonders,
and his manifestation to Israel as being
the Messiah, the King of Glory. And he says that you guys, you
folks are from beneath, but I am from above. Now Jesus said, I'm
from above. I'm not from down here below
like the rest of you folks and you mortal folks. Other than
the fact that I got a body likened unto yours through the Virgin
Mary that I was conceived of the Holy Ghost of God which came
from above. He said, I am from above. And
ye are of this world, every one born of woman. In this time world,
man, woman, boy or girl is in this world and of this world. But Jesus said, I am not of this
world. We have got a God and a Savior
that is now being manifested to us in the person of Jesus
Christ. God, the Bible says in John 1,
He came and He was clothed with flesh. The Bible says that the
Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory full
of grace and truth. And the Bible says that ye are
of this world, but I am not of this world. I say therefore unto
you that ye shall die in your sins, for if ye believe not that
I am He, ye shall die in your sins. He says, you folks don't
understand the thing I'm saying. He said to them in verse 42 of
the 8th chapter of John's Gospel, Jesus said to them, if God were
your Father, You bunch of critical, rebellious, stiff-necked, sarcastic,
rebellious and sinful Israelites. And those of you of the seed
of Abraham by nature, he says unto them, if God were your father,
you would love me. Let me tell you something. If
God is your father today, spiritually speaking, you will love Jesus. It's just cut and dry. If God
is your father, you'll love me, Jesus said. And the Bible says
you'll love me, for I proceeded forth and came from God, neither
came I of myself, but he that sent me. Why do you not understand
my speech? A question. Even because you
cannot hear my word. The Bible says If God heareth God's word, and
they that be not of God heareth not the words of God, neither
can they know them. You can't understand the things
of God by the natural intellect of your understanding. The Bible
says, and Paul writes in 1 Corinthians, he says, For the natural man
discerneth not the things of the Spirit, neither can he know
them, for they are spiritually discerned. You've got to have
a spiritual mind to have spiritual understanding. That spiritual
mind comes by a work of grace, unmerited favor, by God as he
is pleased to disperse it upon those of his elect favor. You
say elect favor? God's got favors? Yes he does.
It's called his church. in his church everywhere and
include everybody? No, it does not. His church includes
a remnant out of the totality of all mankind. Out of the totality
of all of mankind, God in his determined purpose has chosen
the people for his namesake. He chose Israel in the Old Testament,
Old Covenant. He chose them not because they
were the greatest of number of people. If you recall, the Bible
says, I chose you because you were more or less the least of
the amount of the people of the world as far as the nation. I
chose you because I loved you. That is all that God needs to
do. in order to choose an individual
for his divine favor to be blessed upon, is that he gives merely
11. And he loves all that he has
chosen in Christ Jesus before the foundation of the world to
seek and to save. And there are every tongue, kindred,
and nation in this dispensation of which we now live in. Yes,
he dealt primarily with Israel in times past, but then when
the Bible says his own receipt did not. Then the gospel would
begin then to be preached throughout the regions and it went out from
Jerusalem and then came that great climatic event of Pentecost
when the Holy Ghost came down upon the 120 and blessed them
with spiritual power and endowed upon them the ability to go out
and he said, for when the Holy Ghost shall come upon you, ye
shall be He didn't say you're going to have to work and try
to be a witness. I'm going to make you a witness. If God ain't made you a witness
yet, you best just hang on and pray that God would have favor
to do so. Because if He don't do it, it
ain't going to get done. Man can't make others be a witness. Oh, you can go to seminars and
go through a bunch of different steps on how to strike up conversations
and lean towards spiritual things and then dump on them the gospel
about how Jesus came to die on the cross to save all mankind
and then try to drive them into a position of where they'll make
a decision to choose this so-called open and all opportunity to come
to God's situation which is a lie of the devil. God nowhere has
ever said in the Bible that Jesus Christ was sent into this time
world and put on the cross that any and all peoples would have
an opportunity to be a Christian. You find that in the Bible. I
want you to take me aside and you show it to me in the Bible.
You say, well wait a minute, what about John 3, 16? For God
so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever
believe it. That's the key. God so loved
the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth
shall not perish but have everlasting life. Are you a whosoever believeth
today? I don't know. You would be the
only one to know that. But let me say this to you right
now. I've heard some of the most glorious and sweet and wonderful
testimonies of people that have had a conversion experience back
in 1952 in a little meeting house up in southern Kentucky that
said they've heard bells and everything else and, oh boy,
the Lord just changed their life and everything else. But then
years on down the line they were out there and they were one of
the biggest drug lords of the community. And never darkened
the door of a church again. Let me tell you something folks.
That which God begins is not finished. He that endureth to the end,
brother Michael, shall be saved. And if you don't endure to the
end, you ain't gonna be saved. You say, how do you endure to
the end? By trusting in Him that is the performer of all things
needed for us to make it to the end. Alright? The Bible says
that blessed is Jesus Christ who has begun a good work in
you and shall perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. He's
going to perform it! If you're trusted in your own
self, in your deeds, in the best you can do, in trying to keep
the commandments, give it up! Give it up! The Bible says by
the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. By your deeds
in trying to keep the commandments of old that have come and that
have been abolished by the cross and by the blood and by the body
of Jesus Christ on that cross of Calvary. He abolished and
took away the articles and the ordinances of the law and the
commandments that was nailed up there. upon his body. He took the law on his body.
He took our sin on his body, our transgressions on his body,
and took them from us as far as the east is from the west.
Now, Jesus said, you don't understand what I'm telling you. Oh, then
we took over, look over here now, as I tear along here. I'm tearing too long for what
it is. On the 8th chapter in the latter part of John's gospel,
this is probably one of the most strongest verses, or section
of verses, in regarding the deity of Jesus Christ found in John's
writings. In the 56th verse of the 8th
chapter, listen to this. talking to the Jews. Your father,
Abraham, rejoiced to see my day. Your father, by seed, by nature,
by flesh and blood, you Israelites of the twelve tribes, you, it says, your father, Abraham, desired to see my day. And he saw it. He saw it by revelation
as God revealed it to him in a supernatural way. Because you
know how I know that? Because Jesus said so. That's
all I need to know about Brother Michael. And it says, and he
saw it and was glad. He was glad because he saw the
salvation of God in his day. He prophesied about him, as I
read to you out of the 42nd, 43rd, 46th chapters, about I
am the Lord thy God. Beside me there is none else. There is no God before me. There
will be no God after me. I am the great I am. I am from
the beginning to the end. I'm the first and the last, the
Bible says. He saw my day and was glad. Now
listen, verse 57. Then said the Jews unto Jesus,
Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? You mean to tell me, you, Jesus,
you being a man, you ain't even fifty. He was only, what, thirty-two,
thirty-three maybe? You ain't even 15, you say you
seen Abraham? Abraham was 730 years before,
well no, Abraham was more than that. Abraham was how many years? A thousand some odd years before? Back in Genesis? I was thinking
about Isaiah. He said, and you say that you
have seen Abraham? Listen to what Jesus said in
verse 58. Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily. In other words,
when he said verily, verily, as he did a number of times,
he meant to listen up. Listen to me. Truly, truly, he
says, I say unto you, before Abraham was, Before Abraham was, before he
was born over there in Chaldea, and before he was the father
of the Arab bunch over there, as well as the Jew. You know,
he is the father of the Arabs, but he is the father of the Jews.
They got a common father, that's their problem. They're half-brothers
and that's why they'll never get along. We've been down that
road. I told you all about that. About
Hagar and Sarah and all that business. About Ishmael and Isaac
and Jacob and so forth. There'll never be peace over
there in that land. We might as well just pack up,
lock, stock and barrel and get ourselves back home. And we need
to do it ASAP. I ain't going to be politic towards
you. I'm just trying to tell you what
I think the Bible teaches. We need to be minding our own
business and get back here. The Bible says that before Abraham
was, I am. Oh, to just stir up a hornet's
nest. How could this man that is 50
You're under 50 years old, 32, 33 years old, Jesus Christ, say
that he was before Abraham. And the Bible says, Then took
they up stones to cast at him, but Jesus hid himself, and went
out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed
by. You know what? A number of times
we read in the gospels where Jesus was taken and was pursued
by those who wanted to kill him. But none of them could do it
because he would just ease himself out of the way because he was
God. He was able to just move Himself through the crowd unbeknown
to those around about Him and just escape out of the way. He
did it right here. It says that they picked up stones
to cast upon Himself and it says He went out of the temple going
through the midst of them. He just went through the midst
of them. Not one of them threw a stone at Him. But Jesus said
before Abraham was, I am. And if you study the Scriptures
and look up the I Am's, you'll find that when God said that
He told Moses to tell the children of Israel that I Am that I Am
that sent you, let me tell you, Jesus Christ was there. Jesus
Christ was not yet incarnate in a physical mortal frame, but
He was there in spirit because they're inseparable. Alright,
now, let's go over to the chapter 14 of John's Gospel. Chapter
14. And we find that Jesus writes
and he says this here, let not your heart be troubled, ye believe
in God, listen, if ye believe in God, if ye believe in this
one that says that I am the only God, I am the Lord, there is
none beside me, there was none beside me before, there won't
be one after, I am the Lord God, and the only Savior. Do you remember
us reading that now out of Isaiah? Jesus said, if you believe in
God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many
mansions. If it were not so, I would have
told you. I go to prepare a place for you. If I go to prepare a
place for you, I will come again to receive you into myself. And
there where I am, there where I am, That could be taken in
two ways. Not only is He going to be there
presently, but He is the I Am that's going to be there presently.
God. Okay? There ye may be also. Verse 4. And whither I go, ye know, and
the way ye know. Listen to what Thomas had to
say. Here's old Daddy Thomas. Oh, he was always one to understand
and really get a grasp on things. Here he is again. Thomas says,
he said to this, he said, Lord, we know not whither thou
goest, and how can we know the way? In other words, Thomas said,
Lord, we don't understand this, or at least I don't understand
this, Thomas was saying. He says, you know, I don't know
whither thou goest, and how can we know the way? And look what
Jesus said. This is probably one of the most
popular verses in John's Gospel. Jesus said unto Thomas, I am,
alright, there's that I am, the way. I am the way. I am God Almighty. I am God Jehovah. I am He that has been from the
beginning. I am He that is everlasting. I am God Almighty. He said, I am the way. That is the way to God through
Jesus Christ the Lord. There is no other way. Listen,
Jesus said, for I am the way. You want to know how to get from
here to Wyomama, downtown Wyomama? Then you ask somebody, if you
don't know, where is the way? And they'll tell you, well you
go right out here and you make a right hand turn and you go
about so many miles down there and you'll come into a place
that has a sign that says, Why Mama? And you're there. And when
they was asked of Jesus, how are we going to know the way?
Jesus said, I am the way. He didn't say it's me, plus others
that will come after me in the Hindu religion, or those in Islam,
those that follow other religions that have come about in the world.
But he said, I am the way. And he says, and the truth. I'm the truth. Everything that
teaches that there's a way to God apart from Jesus Christ is
a lie. There is not two truths regarding
how to get to God and know God. There is only one truth. And
that is through the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says,
and I am the life. There is no life outside of Jesus
Christ. were dead and trespasses and
sins were born that way. From my mother's womb did the
psalmist write and say, hath my mother begotten me into this
time world? And I am full of iniquity from
the time I've been born. And my sins have overwhelmed
me and overcome me. And oh, how shall I be delivered
from this thing? And David goes on to write, but
the Lord is my deliverer. The Lord is my refuge. The Lord is my buckler, which
means a fence. The Lord is my high tower, a
place where I can get up above the rest of the folks and be
in a safe haven. The Lord is all and all to me. The Lord is the mediator. The Lord is the intercessor.
The Lord, God, Jesus Christ. On the way, the truth and the
life. Now listen to this. No man. Now I'm going to include
mankind in there. And in that mankind, I'm going
to include every gender, every man and woman. Every man and
woman, all of mankind. No man. cometh unto the Father, but by
me. No man cometh unto the Father,
but by me. If ye had known me, ye should
have known my Father also. And from henceforth ye know him,
and have seen him." Now listen to what Philip said. Philip said,
he said unto Jesus, he said, show us the Father, and it will
sufficeth us." If you just show us the Father, Jesus, Just showing
the Father. How many people have you ever
talked to about the Lord? They said, oh, well, yeah, well,
that Bible, you know, that's been written by men. If Jesus
was to come down here and show Himself to me, then I could believe
it. My own personal flesh and blood
brother, who I had testified to when I was first converted
and brought into an understanding of salvation by God's grace in
the person of Jesus Christ, I tried my best to get him to be a Christian,
buddy. I just did everything and begged him. I said, just
exercise your faith. Little did I know he was telling
me of a truth when he said, I don't have no faith. I said, well you
just got to exercise it. Come up with some. Little did
I know how you come up with it. At that time I was just a babe
in Christ and zealous as some maniac. I run off probably more
than I did any influence to. But you know what? The Bible
says that Philip said, if you just show us the Father, it'll
be okay, we'll be satisfied. And listen to this, I'm going
to close with this right here. The Bible says, if you'll just
show us the Father, we'll be satisfied. Jesus said to him,
have I been so long time with you, and yet you have not known
me, Philip? He that has seen me has seen
the Father, and how sayest thou then, show us the Father?" Jesus
said to Philip, if you've seen me, which he had because he was
talking to him face to face, if you've seen me, you've seen
the Father. Because what he's saying is,
I have the Father incarnate in a human body, and I am a mortal
man, but I am God. I am deity God. I am the God-man
Jesus Christ. If you've seen me, you've seen
the Father. Oh, I pray that everybody in
this house has seen the Father through the man Jesus the Christ. And seen Him high and lifted
up upon that cross of Calvary, which no man could put Him upon
unless God had ordained it to be. The Bible says that by the
wicked and cruel hands of men was Jesus Christ hung upon the
cruel cross of Calvary as it was ordained of God. Let me tell
you something, it was ordained of God that he be put on that
cross. He had to. What if he had not
have been crucified and his sins not, I mean his blood not be
shed in behalf of our sins, where would we be? We would be the
most helpless and hopeless people that ever Have breath, put in
our lungs, we're living in this time world of wickedness. But
God, by His infinite mercy and love were with these loved, a
church in this time realm has chosen a people, as I said earlier,
out of the pall of all of mankind. And He's called them out by His
Spirit, given them a revelation of their sinfulness, of their
wickedness and their transgressions, and has caused them to see Christ
as the only hope and help of this situation. I saw one thing in the scriptures
here within the last couple of days that I'm going to share and I'm going
to close. The main crust of the message
today, as you have heard, was about the deity of Christ and
Him being God manifested in the flesh and He always has been
with the Father. For in the Bible, in Genesis,
when the Bible said, let us make man in our image, who was he
talking about, the us and our? It was a triune deity he was
talking to. God didn't say let me make man
in my image, he said let us. make man an hour. There was always
a triune aspect to the deity of God Almighty and Jesus Christ
has always been with the Father because they're inseparable.
You can't separate the Spirit of the God of heaven and earth. You cannot separate it or dissect
it. You cannot take pieces of it,
cut it and make it over here, he's either here or he's not. He's either in you or he's not. It ain't a part of him in you,
he's either in you by his spirit that has bestowed it within your
heart and mind and soul by a new birth experience or he's not
there. Now I don't know which it is,
only your heart, mind and soul can reveal that as God has revealed
it to you. But let me say this, in Genesis,
in the In the fourth chapter, the Bible says that when Adam and Eve had transgressed
and fell into disobedience, That the Bible says, God hath
told them, thorns also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee,
and thou shalt eat of the herb of the field. And in the sweat
of thy face thou shalt eat bread until thou return to the ground. In other words, until you die.
or out of it, it was thou taken. For to dust thou art, and to
dust thou shalt return. Adam called his wife's name Eve,
because she was the mother of all living. And to Adam also,
and to his wife, did the Lord God make coats of skins, and
clothed them. And the Lord said, Behold, man
is become as one of us. But the Bible says that he had
taken, and he drove them, Out of the garden, verse 23, he sent
them forth from the garden to till the earth from whence it
was taken. So he drove out the man and he
placed at the east of the garden of the Eden cherubims a flaming
sword which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of
life." To protect the tree. to protect the tree and to keep
it from them getting to it and having
access to it. He ran them out of the garden
and then put cherubims to the entrance to it to keep them out
of it. Okay? Now I want you to keep in mind,
remember what I said earlier? I said, I don't care how sweet
your testimony sounds about an experience in 1951, it's where
you're at today. Look at the book of Revelation,
and this is my last verse. Revelation. We find that in the revelation
of the Lord Jesus Christ given to John, The Bible says, he says as he, in verse 2, he
says to the angel of the church at Ephesus, write these things.
And he told him to write these things which he had wrote. And
then here, now listen, here's what he says at the end of it
in verse 7. After he had told him to write these things, which
was a criticism to the church at Ephesus, a reproof to them,
he says this right here, And he that hath an ear, let him
hear what the Spirit saith. unto the churches. Listen now,
to him that overcometh will I give to do what? Eat of the tree of
life which is in the midst of the paradise of God. There's going to be a time, brother
Michael, When Christ comes back and He takes and gathers together
His remnant church with the voice of the archangel and the trump
of God. I think it's in this time frame area because that's
the only time I know that we can truly say we're overcomers
because that would be the end of everything. See? You can't overcome until you
get to the end. So if they that are overcomers
are going to take and eat of the tree of life, buddy, we'll
have access to that tree and all shall be able to partake
of that fruit that was forbidden. Because we are the redeemed of
the Lord, the remnant of God, called by divine free and sovereign
grace, brought into the church of the firstborn, made heirs
of divine grace by the work of Christ on the cross of Calvary,
whose blood paid for our sins, lock, stock, and barrel. past,
present and future and makes us able to be overcomers in that
day. And we will stand there and rejoice
in Christ and all that He's done for us and in us to make us overcomers
that we would partake of the tree of life and partake of the
sweetness of His character and holiness and be as He is with
a resurrected body, not a mortal body, but an immortal body, likened
unto his glorified body, dressed in robes of white raiment, which
is the righteousness of Christ, that are adorned the saints of
God forever and eternity. I had just realized that. I never
realized that in the book of Revelation when Jesus had given
to the angel of the church in Ephesus that the overcomers there
were going to be able to have access to take and partake of
that tree of life. But they are. Now here's another
thing as I close. Now, I want you to think about
this a minute. Every one of these churches, Thessalonica, Ephesus,
Galatia, the Church of Philippi, the one at Colossians, you know
where they're all at? I've got a little map in here.
I've got a little map that has them all I don't know what I
did with it. It's back in here somewhere.
Right here. I have a little map here. It's got here 1, 2, 3,
4, 5, 6, 7. Those are the 7 churches right there. Geographically,
right there in what today is Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon,
Egypt, there is, I'm trying to think of the other ones there.
But anyway, how many times have we heard on the news lately about
Damascus? About Damascus, isn't that the
capital of Syria? Right now I think it is. Damascus
is just destroyed and blown up. They've got a civil war going
on over there. But that's where Paul, he was
headed to when Christ struck him on the road to Damascus. And there ain't a gospel church
as far as I know of any witness at all within thousands of miles
of that whole area. Where are they at? All them churches
that were there, the Church of Galatia, the Church of Ephesus,
the One of Colossae, and the Seventh Festival of Nicaea, and
all those others, they're not there! It's all Muslim Islam!
Oh, let me tell you, where is America going to be if Christ
tarries, say, 50 years? Where's there going to be a testimony
out of a church? You can't find one of any of
those churches written in Revelation right now over there. Is there
not going to be a church, a house preaching the gospel of Jesus
Christ found in this country in time? Maybe not! Delete! Gone! There's nothing over there
but a Muslim world that hate us and hate Judaism. And they hate anything we stand
for. In that world they're trying to make them like a democracy,
a republic like we are. It ain't working. Now we've only
lost 6,500 and some odd boards over there. Twenty-some thousand
come home maimed. It's a sad situation, but I'll
tell you what, we had better take this book, and we better
behold its words, and we better trust in that message that comes
out of it, that Jesus Christ is the only help and hope for
us in this time world. Economically, we are going down
the tubes fast, at breakneck speed. It's getting tougher and
tougher. I mean, just this past couple
of weeks, I'm living on a limited social security income. I'm not
griping. Listen, I'm blessed to do that.
I mean, I don't have any overhead to where I need any more than
that. But I'm telling you what, there's
a bank in my community that has been there since 1977 that's
closing this branch down in June. And I'm going to have to drive
12 miles to a bank now. I mean, and it's just one thing
after another. Businesses are closing up over
there in the county, in Sumpter County. And it's not Sumpter
County, it's Polk County. It's Sumpter County. It's Suwannee
County. It's Osceola County. It's everywhere. It's nationwide. We're in dire
straits, brothers and sisters, and if our hope is not on in
and on the person of Jesus Christ that we're going to be of all
men most miserable. And we'll never make it. We're
not going to endure. But let me tell you what. He
that has begun a good work in you shall perform it. And then
as David said, what shall I render to the Lord for all his benefits?
What can I render to God, Mike, for all his benefits that he's
provided for me after these 68 years that he's given me? I can't render nothing except
for just a sacrifice of praise for my lips. Hallelujah to the
Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of God's people who's
come to seek and save sinners. As Paul said, of whom I am chief.
I feel like often I'm the cheapest of sinners. I'm the greatest
of sinners. But even though I feel that way,
There comes a sweet breeze of grace that says, yes, you are
a sinner, but I've come to give my lifeblood that you might have
your sins removed from you, never to be remembered again. Isn't
that wonderful? Look into Jesus, the author of
Finishing Your Faith. That's the message. That's the
gospel. That's what these brothers preached. Father, in the blessed and holy
name of your son Jesus, I thank you for this privilege today
of being able to be gathered here in this humble meeting place.
I thank you for the message that has been sent forth from this
pulpit. I thank you for what you have
blessed the minds of the brethren to share, because I am persuaded
it's the truth. For Jesus Christ is our only
help and hope, and in Him do we have joy unspeakable. Only in Him do we have No joy
unspeakable, but we have all that is sufficient for us in
time and eternity. For He and He alone is our sufficiency. So now Lord, we ask you to dismiss
us, bless us Lord as we seek to fellowship together, as we
eat together, Lord may it be a sweet time, is my humble prayer
for Christ's sake. Amen. God bless you.