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. There's so many times
in the Lord's Hymnal, as well as the Gatsby and and the Goble
and others that the old Baptists have sang from over the years
of history. That the hymn writers have often
made reference to God's people as poor and needy. Poor and needy people. is making a reference to tangible,
material things, but in the spiritual realm. We're poor folks. By nature, we're deficit of anything
spiritually. We're dead, the Bible says, that
we are dead in trespasses and sins. The Bible says that there's
none righteous, no, not one, for they've all gone astray.
For there's none that doeth good. And so, on and on it goes. The prophet Isaiah, he pens that
the righteousness that is that which man can boast of in the
mortal realm is as filthy rags. It's nothing. It's dung. It is
of no profit whatsoever. But there is no righteousness
in the natural mortal. We're depraved. We're depraved
and we're depraved beyond the ability to recover from this
state of depravity by the efforts, the duty, and obligations of
man. As religious as he can try to
be, to keep the commandments of God
and do all of the commandments and all of the statutes of God. This is the whole duty of man,
I believe Solomon wrote. But yet man cannot do it. It's a proven thing that the
law of God is given by Moses to the children of Israel, and
to we which have the Old Testament record of it, that it is a law
that is perfect in its application, and it is holy in its application,
but yet man is unable to keep it. Man is unable to walk in
obedience to it. And what the law does, as it
is revealed to us in the New Covenant, in the New Testament,
in the promises of God, as we see in the revelation revealed
to us today, is that the law is a teacher that teaches us
that we are sinful. And we are unable to recover,
as I mentioned earlier, and that it is a schoolmaster. It's a
teacher. It is that which teaches us that
we are sinners by nature, we are born that way, and our blood
is tainted with that of the federal head and parents of the human
race, Adam and Eve, and through that all we have been poisoned
with sin. And there's only one antidote
for that poison. And that is that the blood of
Jesus Christ cleanses us from all unrighteousness and makes
us righteous. For the Bible says that he who
knew no sin became sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. Oh, what a glorious gospel message. That is the trumpet that needs
to be blown from Zion's walls time and time again. I never
get tired of hearing about it. That Jesus Christ is our righteousness. He is our sufficiency. He is
our perpetuation. He is our advocate. He is our
mediator. He is all our all in all. He's everything that's needed
for us to peace. God the Father in heaven who
demands perfection and holiness and righteousness. Jesus Christ
as sums it all up in himself and what he had accomplished
on the cross of Calvary. Paid in full the debt of those
of the elect family of God throughout the ages and generations of time.
that he has purchased him that precious pearl of great price,
that precious bride of the Lord Jesus Christ. He purchased it
with his own blood and body on the cross of Calvary. He took
all the law and the commandments upon himself. They were nailed
to the wall. They were nailed to his body.
His body bore the law on my behalf. And he not only was a sin-bearer
of all of God's select family, but he also bore the law on his
body as well. The body in sin had came and
took and died. devastated him even to the death
of his mortal frame upon that cross. But oh, that death and
hell would not defeat the Savior of sinners. He was raised miraculously
that third day, wasn't he? He was brought up from that that
grave to him, and he was raised miraculously by the power of
God, demonstrating that he himself is deity. He is God. He is Immanuel. He is God with
us. He is God, the fullness of the
Godhead bodily, the very image of the invisible God that had
come and manifested himself Jesus Christ, that's the only
message I know to preach. That's the only message I know
to take to anybody that can give them any kind of comfort or help
in a time of need. Jesus Christ, come to Seacon
Slave Center. That's the message. I can't make
people believe it. I have tried that for years.
It didn't work. I failed. Oh, there were some
that gave lip service to it. Yes, I had some that would kneel
with me and say a sinner's prayer. But, oh, a few weeks or months
later, where would you find them at? They weren't in church. They
didn't have a hunger to fellowship with God's people. They didn't
want to hear anything from this old book here that we preach
from. that God has preserved for 309 some years, translated
into this language we speak today. Oh no, they didn't have a love
for this Savior that the Bible talks about is the Savior of
sinners. What happened to them? They just
merely had given lip service to something, but they didn't
have a treasure. and then have the visitation
of the Spirit of God that would make them new creatures and translate
them in the kingdom of God's dear son as he has his elect
children through that experience of being born again of the Spirit. David, David had penned In a couple of places, about, I'm trying to find the verse
that I had. He says that, the poor and the needy,
the Lord has come to bless with mercy. And then in the 70th song,
if my memory serves me right, there's another verse. Let's see here. Here's the one. Let me start
at this one here. I was in the 39th chapter, but
it's actually the 40th chapter. Listen to what David says. He
says, in the 17th verse of the 40th chapter of the Psalms, David
pens these words, but I am poor and needy. Now we know that David
was not poor. He was not a needy man of material
things. He was the king of Israel. He
had all that he ever had desired to have. And yet in time, Solomon,
who succeeded David, his father in time, had far more than what
David had. But yet David himself was one
that did not lack for anything. But yet we find him saying that
I am poor and needy. What's he poor? What's he poor? He's poor in spirit. He is poor. He is empty. He is deficit. He is without spirit. The spirit
of God, for he has only the spirit of man. And the Bible says, Paul
writes to the Corinthian church, he says, for the natural man
receiving not the things of God, neither can he know them. For
the spirit of man, it can only teach him the things of man.
Human logic and intellectual things of this world are limited
in any understanding of the Almighty and the Kingdom of God. And we
find that in the 70th Psalm, as I was turning to, in verse
5, It says this, but I am poor and needy. Again, he reiterates
the same verse. He says, but I am poor and needy.
Make haste unto me, O God, for thou art my help and my deliverer. O God, make no tarrying. Oh, he's a poor man. He's needy. And you know something? I think
that that's one of the prerequisites. As God deals with his elect children,
they see themselves and experience themselves as poor in spirit. They're poor. They don't have
anything to offer God. They are destitute of spirituality. I believe that's the operation
of God's Spirit upon the little child of grace is to reveal how
really poor they are. Let me tell you something, unless
a person comes to know themselves as poor, Brother Dale, spiritually,
they have no need for a Savior. And if a person believes they're
good enough, to stand before God and by their own deeds and
righteousness, that they're not that bad of a person. They have
no need for Jesus Christ. Do they? Jesus said even, he
said, for those who are not sick, they don't have no need for a
physician. Those that are sick and needy and poor and lowly
of heart and mind and soul, they are the ones that God is revealing
their depraved natures to and are realizing that they're in
a desolate situation and they need help and they need hope.
And I've come to tell you this morning, the only answer to help
and hope for a poor and needy sinner It is Jesus Christ the
Lord, God the Almighty, manifested in the flesh. The Bible goes on to say, as
David continues to pin in Psalm 72, verse 12. Psalm 72, verse
12, he says, For he shall deliver the needy when he crieth. And the poor also, and him that
has no helper. Let me tell you something. There
was a time in my life, Brother Michael, when I didn't have a
helper. I was my own helper. I was not only the boss, but
I was the helper, and I did it all my way. I did it my way,
and I was going down through life's journey just thinking
that everything was fine. I was a young man, been married
a few years, had a young daughter at that time, and I was 27 years
old, and religion was something for other folks. I didn't have
no need for it. But there was a time that God
had got my attention about my poor and needy condition. A dear
friend of mine who almost lost his life, I've seen a transformation
come about in his life. He was in a hospital and I went
to visit him. And he told me, he gave me a
testimony, and I'll share it with you briefly because I think
it's important. He told me, he said, Don, I know
you've known me for a while, but he says, you know, he says,
I left California and I moved down to Florida. And I come over
here because I was running from my parents. And I got tired of hearing about
it. And I got tired of the pressure. Because I didn't go to church
anymore and I didn't take my family to church anymore, I couldn't
stand the pressure anymore. So I ran from it. It was like
Jonah. He was heading on a ship another
direction. And he says, but this situation That came about in God's determined
purpose and caused him to be laying in the hospital with third
and fourth degree burns on about 40% of his body. And he was in the hospital and
he told me, he says, God has laid me down here to get my attention. I said, above myself, wow. I never heard a man talk about
God before. He was a nice guy. I never heard
him say a foul word, a profane word. But yet again, he never, they probably wouldn't want nothing
to do with him. He was just a good old boy. But he told me, he said,
Don, let me give you something here. And he handed me a little
blue New Testament book, Brother Dale. And he said, I want to
give you one of these. And he says, I'm laying here
like this. I mean, he was all gauzed up
and everything in pain. And he said, I'm laying here
like this. And he says, Jesus Christ. to reveal himself to me now in
a way that I have nowhere to run to anymore. I'm here now. I'm confined to this bed. My
body's burned up in pain. And he said, I want to give you
this little Bible. Maybe it'll have a meaning to
you if God so desired to cause you to want to read it. And I
said, well, thank you. I mean, I felt sorry for the
man. And in God's design and eternal purpose, in this time
where he had caused that man to go through the suffering he
went through to give me that little Bible book. I took that
little Bible book home with me, and I set it right there on a
table in my family room. And it was about two or three
weeks later, and I went to see him another time or two, and
he was pretty sedated and still going through it all. I didn't
stay long and talk very long, but I was sitting at home one
night and nobody was home. My wife, I can remember to this
day, it was around May of 1971 and my wife had gone to a Tupperware
party and my little baby girl was in bed. And this book was
sitting there on a table, Brother Mike, there where I set it when
I brought it home that night a few weeks before. And I was
sitting there and there wasn't nothing on television worth watching.
And I picked that book up. Now listen to me now. I ain't
been in a church house since I was 11 years old. And I'm 27
now. I picked up that little Bible
book, Brothers and Sisters. And I opened it up and I saw
in the front of it where it talked in there about about this. Some of you have heard of the
Roman Road. The missionaries come up with
that little aspect of scriptures to where, you know, they lined
out different scriptures on there to tell people about how we've
all sinned, come short of the glory of God, and the wages of
sin is death, but the gift of God's eternal life through Jesus
Christ our Lord, and on and on and on. And I began to look at
a couple of those verses there, And I said, you know, I am a sinner. I was overwhelmed. For the first time in my life
that I have sinned before a holy God that I have not believed
in before this particular occasion at night. God had taken and got
my attention that He was I did not believe that before
this evening and this occasion, and it was a supernatural miracle
of God that I now believed it. I am persuaded without a shadow
of a doubt that God is sovereign in calling His elect children,
and it's apart from any means or method. You say, well, the
Lord used a means. The Word of God is a means, yes. What's it do? It teaches this
child of God that life and immortality is of Jesus Christ, and man has
nothing to do with obtaining it. He's blessed as the recipient
of it by God's divine, sovereign, predestined mercy. That's all
there is to it. I sit there and I read a few
of those verses and I begin to think of the things I have done
in my life as a young man, as a rebel against the things of
God. I used the name of Jesus as a
curse word just in my vocabulary constantly. God was just somebody
I used to use in cursing vocabulary. I was a vile wretch. But this
night here, Jesus became a sweet sounding name in my ear. I fell down to my knees. I began to weep. I can't tell
you. any more than just what has happened
to me on this particular occasion. I can't explain to you any more
about it than what I can tell you, that I just fell down overwhelmed
with my sinfulness. I said, God, if Christ is who
He says He is in this book, I said, I want to be a Christian. Now, I didn't want to be a Christian
before. I didn't want nothing to do with
it. They were just religious folks. I was happy along my sinful
way. But on this particular situation
here, I wanted to be a Christian. I wanted to have a hope of heaven. And I said, God have mercy on
me. I began to weep and I prayed
to a father of heaven who I had never known before this particular
night. I've never known anyone called
to him father before in my life. But I said, Father God, if you
could be true. And Jesus said that he is the
way, the truth, and the life. Lord, change me. Make me the
husband I'm supposed to be. Make me the father that you've
called me to be. Make me the Christian and God transformed my life.
He took a foul tongue and He took it out of my mouth that
night. Now, I didn't hear no bells and whistles. I didn't
see no angelic beings. I didn't see no images. I didn't
have no dream. I'm just telling you of my experience. And when I prayed that night
and I got up, I felt as if there was probably about Three hundred
pound bags of potatoes lifted off of my shoulders. I just felt
light. I felt light. Something happened
to me, Brother Michael. And it was a supernatural work
of God. The next day I went to a little
Bible bookstore not far from me and I bought me a bigger Bible.
I went from this size to one of these bigger ones because
I wanted to read more about this Jesus Christ that promised that
he would save sinners if they came to him. And I said if they
came to him because that was the only knowledge I had of it
at the time, not knowing that I came to him because he called
me. Oh beloved, listen to me. He calls his people. And when
he calls him, they hear him. He says, my sheep hear my voice. And he says, oh I love my sheep. And my sheep, when I call them,
they hear my voice. And what do they do? They follow
him. Oh listen to me, Brother Michael
and I were talking last night late in the evening at his house.
We were singing some songs and just having church there at Brother
Mike's house almost. And we were sitting there talking
about how God calls His people. And when He calls them, He comes.
Listen to me. When the Lord Jesus Christ, He
went and saw Peter who was there mending his nets and said to
him, come, come. Because Jesus healed his mother-in-law
of a fever that was almost unto death. So he had a wife, but
she was never mentioned anymore in scripture. He left his family,
kind of like a pilgrim in Pilgrim's Progress. What did he do when
he found that woman? He left his children, his wife,
and they waved goodbye to him, and they thought he'd lost his
mind, Brother Michael. But he was heading toward that
celestial city. That's all ahead in view! And
in a similar experience, that's where I was headed for. I was
marching to Zion. I was looking for something that
was now a miracle that had transformed my life. And just as Jesus called
Peter, he said, come follow me. He came. He saw Matthew at the
gate, and Matthew the tax collector. And he said to him, he said,
Matthew, come follow me. Matthew didn't make no excuses.
He said, well, wait a minute, I've got to finish my job and
do this and that. He left his post and followed
Jesus. When Jesus calls, you come following,
because his call is effectual. I believe in the fervent, My sister, when he calls, you're
coming. And when you come, you're going
to experience something, something that's sweet and something special. Because he's going to reveal
himself to you. He's going to say, here I am.
Oh, come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden. Oh,
you've been trying to do it by duty. obligation, being religious,
doing the best you can. He says, hey, come unto me all
ye that labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. I'll give
you rest. The writer of Hebrews says this,
as I conclude. He says, for they that have entered
into his rest, cease from their labors. Every
man, woman, boy and girl of the elect family of God throughout
the ages of time have been called into the Kingdom of God in this
time world through the experience of grace and being born of the
Spirit of God. They come, and they come and
they see Christ. They see Him as the one that's
high and lifted up. The one who suffered on the cross
of Calvary and ultimately paid the price for sin. and redeemed
us and paid in full every jot and tittle of sin that was held
against us in times before. Oh, listen to me just a second
here. Jesus Christ had came and give
himself a sacrifice on that cross of Calvary and took away every
sin of God's elect and had removed them as far as the eastern from
the west And never to be remembered again. Never to be brought to
our account again. And we've got people preaching
today that all if you don't do thus and so that you're going
to stand before God and have to give account. And it's going
to be revealed to all of those in that general resurrection
time of your ungodly deeds and duties and things you didn't
do. Well, I got news for you. Jesus went to the cross. of God and be condemned and ridiculed
and embarrassed for all my wickedness. Jesus took it all upon himself
and because of that I can say praise be to God who is worthy
of all honor, glory and praise forever and ever and evermore.
So may God bless His word today. May this gospel be that which
rings throughout and around about Zion's host. And when He calls, they come. It's an effectual call. And all
that atonement is particular in its application. It's not
a general thing that Jesus provided. It's an applied application of
blood for His elect children and them alone. For that blood
is particular in its application and His body was put on that
cross. for them whom he loved from the
very onset that God had given him to come and to die for. To him be the glory. Thank you
so much for your time. God be with you.