I was thinking there as Brother
Al was speaking about the Egyptians and their worship of Ra, the
sun god. And I thought, you know, how
great an illustration exactly is that of what Paul said over in Romans
Chapter 1, and he says in verse 20, For
the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are
clearly seen. The Son is clearly seen. A man can't help but see the
Son. Being understood by the things
that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead, so that they
are without excuse. Because that when they knew God,
they knew that there was God. There's not a man on earth that
does not know that. Now they might say they don't,
but they know that. They know that. But they glorified Him not as
God. Now there's the problem, see.
It's not that they don't know there is a God, it's that they
won't glorify Him as such. Now listen to this. Neither were
thankful, but became vain in their imaginations, and their
foolish heart was darkened, professing themselves to be wise, they became
fools. They said, well, we know how
this all works. Now, we laugh at anybody that
would worship the Son, do we not? I mean, you know. You know, they were walking in
their ignorance and they worshipped the Son. Now listen to this,
"...and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an
image made like unto corruptible man, and birds, and four-footed
beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them
up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to
dishonor their own bodies between themselves, who changed the truth
of God into a lie and worshipped and served the creature more
than the Creator who is blessed forever. Now the Egyptians, they
worshipped the creature because you see, they looked up at the
sun and said, this is God. But you know, an amazing thing
if you look in the creation account is that the Lord created the
light before He created the sun. He made the light, and then He
made the sun. Now people think that we get
light from the sun. And I guess in some scientific
fashion there may be some truth in that, in a measure. I'm not
disputing all the scientific things, but I'm telling you this.
When the Lord brought darkness on the Egyptians, He didn't put the
sun out. Did He? We don't know what He did. But
we do know this, that He made it where it was dark. Because
you see, the light resides with Him. It doesn't reside in the
sun. Even though He might give us
light from the sun, but the light doesn't exist because of the
sun. If the sun burns out, the light would still be here if
He so saw fit to give it to us. Because the light does not depend
on the sun, because there was light before there was a sun.
So, you know, it is a glorious thing when we start to think
about that even the light is a thing that is created by God. We do not worship the light,
do we? I mean, we are thankful for the light, are we not? But
we are not worshiping the light, we are worshiping the One that
made the light. Now the Egyptians, you see, they
worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator because
they said, well, here is the Creator. Because, you see, they
thought they could see the Creator. They said, well, we see Him right
up there because, you see, they thought that the Creator was
something that they could behold, that they could even worship.
But the Lord said that He He was hidden. No man can approach.
He dwells in the light to which no man can approach. He is that
one who is unable to be accessed apart from His mercy and grace
in bringing Himself to us. And so the great error of the
Egyptians is the great error of men in all ages, is it not?
that they see things and they say, well, this is God, or they
make God in their own image. They decide how God is. Now that's the great error of
the day in which we live, is that men say, well, you know,
we're reasonable men, and, you know, we think that kindness
is a good thing. So, well, surely if kindness
among men is a good thing, then God must be kind. And if we wouldn't
want harm to come to anybody, well, surely God wouldn't want
harm to come to anybody, would He? I mean, how could He? But you see, that's to make God
in our own image. Now, I can tell you this, the
kindness of God exceeds the kindness of men by a million fold. And
the mercy of God, it envelops any mercy that men might imagine. But the Lord said, I'll show
mercy to whom I will show mercy. He said, it belongs to me. He
said, I'll do according to my will and my purpose, and I will
do my purpose in the earth. And there's no man that can stay
in my hand or say anything about it. That's just the way that
it is. Now, a man can say, well, I won't
worship a God like that. I wouldn't have that. Well, you
know, that's just terrible. Well, maybe not. I mean, I don't know if a man
will worship the true God or not. I know one thing if he does,
it will be because God, who is rich in mercy, opens His eyes
to behold Him and to give him a heart and mind to fall on His
face and worship Him. Because we certainly don't want
to worship the creature or anything we've designed, do we? I mean,
if you could design God, would you want to? I mean, how would
He be? He'd be just like you, wouldn't
He? I mean, the things that you think is all right would be all
right, wouldn't they? I mean, that's how we would have
it. And that's how men like to think
of God. Just, you know, wanting to do good to everybody and this
old pesky devil is over here just causing trouble and what
have you. And every now and then God is
able to triumph over him and bring good out of things and
all that kind of crap. And, excuse that, I shouldn't
have said that, but that's how I feel about it, it is. But the
Lord is the Lord. And the Egyptians, and of course,
as we see with Pharaoh, how foolish. We look at Pharaoh and say, how
foolish was Pharaoh. But you know, Pharaoh wasn't
any different than anybody else. And his honor wasn't any different
than anybody else in the Lord's heart who has hardened their
heart. Now, on the one hand, we pity
Pharaoh. We should. Just like, I mean, if you look
at Judas, We'd have pity on them. There was a manner in which the
Lord had pity on Judas. He said, you know, it'd be better
if this man hadn't ever been born. But that doesn't change
the purpose of God to perform that which He determines to do
and to bring glory to Himself in the earth in the redemption
of His people. And that is the one thing we
must never lose sight of as we look at the Word of God And that
is that the Lord will magnify the name of Christ in the earth
as that one by whose hand all things were created and everything
was made that was made, and He will be glorified. And He will
be worshipped by those whom the Lord is privileged to give eyes
to see who He is. and to fall down on our faces
and thank Him for the redemptive work that He brought about which
gives us access into His presence according to His mercy. Now we've
been looking in 2 Corinthians chapter 4 and last week We looked
at some of these verses, but I want to read them again and
then we will move on a little further. It says, But if our
gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost. Now, if our gospel
is hid, it is hid to them that are lost. Now, we said last week
that there are some that are lost as the lost treasure that
was found See, there are some things that are lost that are
found. They are lost in order that they
might be found. The Lord's people were lost that
they might be found. The Lord's people have been hidden
in Christ, the Scripture says, from before the foundation of
the world. But He subjected them to vanity. He put men in the
world and He determined that they would be lost. but not lost
to destroy them, but his people were lost so that as the lost
sheep in the wilderness, he might go and find that sheep. And so
there are those that are lost, and we don't want our gospel
to be hid to them that are lost in that way, because those to
whom the gospel is sent is to those who are lost. But those
that Paul is speaking of here, when he says our gospels hid
to them that are lost, he is talking about those that are
as Pharaoh whose heart the Lord has hardened, that their conscience
is given over, they have been seared with a hot iron, and they
have no regard to the things of God. Paul said, you know,
oh that, he said, my heart's prayer and desire is that Israel
might be saved. Now we do have compassion as
human beings for our fellow men. That's just a natural thing that
we have. And it is magnified, I believe,
as we are shown that we are the recipients of mercy and we wouldn't
desire that anybody be cut off from the mercy of God. I'm not ecstatic about the fact that
some are cut off from the mercy of God. I mean, it's a troubling
thing. It's a heartbreaking thing, especially
if it's people that are close and near to our hearts, our loved
ones, our family. I mean, we take no delight in
that. But we are declaring the truth
of God in such fashion that those who are lost and not reprobate
might hear it. We declare it, the truth, because
you see, the truth of God falls on the ears of those who have
been given to hear it as a rain shower after a long drought. It's a welcome thing. It's a
thing they delight in. It's a thing they hear and they
say, I want that. And so we don't want our gospel
to be hid to anybody that's hungry and thirsty after the things
of God. We want the gospel to be set
forth in such a plain fashion that a man can't miss it. And
if it's going to be hid, it's going to be hid to those who
can't see it anyway. Even as the Lord said, and he
thanked the Lord, he said, Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast hid
these things from the wise and prudent and revealed them unto
babes. And so we desire that the babes
might hear this, and we do recognize that it is to the glory of God
when some have been blinded, in whom the God of this world
has blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light
of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should
shine unto them." Now, men are in such a state as that, and
they're not in it trying to get out of it. See, here's the mistake
that people often make, is that they think that everybody's trying
to escape the darkness of the world. Pharaoh wasn't trying
to escape the darkness of Egypt, was he? He was happy in Egypt. He was happy to worship the Son
of God. He was happy to rule over the people. The whole thing
he was happy with. He wasn't upset at all. But his
heart was hardened. He was blinded by the God of
this world, lest the light of the glorious Gospel should shine
to him, for we preach not ourselves. And this is the message that
we preach, but Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants
for Jesus' sake. That's what we preach. We're
not preaching ourselves, Paul said. We're not trying to promote
our message. We don't have a series of books
and we say, now if you'll send in a love gift of $25, we'll
send you our new series on the book of Exodus, or whatever. I mean, you know, we're not preaching
ourselves. We're not promoting ourselves,
he said. But rather, we're preaching Christ
Jesus the Lord, because we know that there's only one way, there's only one person,
there's only one thing that can help men, and that is Christ.
And so that's why we would preach that, lest our gospel be hid
to those who desire to hear. Now, if we go forth preaching
some message which is not the gospel, then how shall they believe
in Him of whom they've not heard? And if we're not preaching Christ,
how can men believe in the Christ of the Bible? They can't, according
to what Scripture says. So that's why we preach Christ
Jesus the Lord ourselves, your servants, For Jesus' sake, we
don't have any ax to grind or any program to promote, but we
have one person that we desire to exalt. For God, who commanded
the light to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. There it is right there. God
commanded the light to shine out of darkness. He didn't command
the light to shine out of the sun, did He? He commanded the
light to shine out of darkness. He made the light. And then He
made the sun to have light. But the sun couldn't have light
if He had to give it light, would it? It didn't just make light. He made the light. And the same
God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, who divided
the day from the night, the same one, in the same fashion and
according to the same picture, has shined in our hearts. Now,
what did the day and the night have to do with being divided?
Nothing. What did the Son have to do with
being made a natural source of light? Nothing. I mean, you know, the Lord made
it, and there it was. Well, in that same way, the same
God, in the same fashion as He created the world, He has shined
in our hearts. He gave us light. Now, we didn't get it from the
preacher. We didn't get it from the Bible.
We got it from Him. Now, He has indeed enlightened
us through His Word, and He does do that on a continual basis.
But you see, a blind man has to be able to see before he can
read, can he not? I mean, he has to be able to
comprehend before those things can come into his mind and heart.
So a man does not learn the things of God, they are shown to him. Now over time, the Lord is pleased
to teach us many things concerning the things of God. But in order
for a man to ever begin upon this journey of coming to the
fullness of the stature of Christ, there has to be a light shining.
And it is brought about by one person being the God who created
all things. And He is that one who has shined
in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. Now, what is it that He has caused
us to see? What is it that comprises the
essence of the gospel that we believe? It is that this man,
Jesus Christ, is the Son of the Living God, that He is God Himself. Was this not what the Ethiopian
eunuch confessed when Philip asked him, he said, He said,
can I be baptized? What's hindering me to be baptized?
He says, well, if you believe... He says, I believe that Jesus
Christ is the Son of God. That's what he confessed. Now, there's a lot in that. Now,
a lot of people claim they believe that, but you see, what they
don't necessarily all see is the glory of God. in the face
of Jesus Christ. They just heard that, well, if
you'll say these words and pray this prayer, you'll be given
a ticket into heaven that you can't ever lose. And so they
said, well, I believe it. If He'll write me, sign me up,
I'll believe that. But you see, they often do that
without the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. Because you see, that's what
the Holy Spirit writes upon the heart of a man is who this man
Jesus is. He is not just some historical
figure. He is not just a man who went
about doing good. But He is the fullness of the
Godhead bodily. He is that One who created the
worlds. He is that One who is the revelation
of the Father unto men. And so that is the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And if a man
would confess any other thing than that, then he has not seen
it. He cannot confess who Christ
is. And then he says, But we have
this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellency of the power
may be of God, and not of us. Now this is, I believe, the line
of demarcation between the preaching of that which is true and the
preaching of that which is false. And that is that if anything
that we preach gives man anything to glory in, then it is not the
gospel of Jesus Christ. Because he says here, we have
this treasure. It's a treasure. It's been given
to us. It had value before it was given
to us. You know, something doesn't become
a treasure because you find it. I mean, you can go find a rock
in the ground and so what? I mean, it might have some value
to you, but it's not a treasure to anybody. But you go out there
and find a four-pound gold nugget, in the ground somewhere, and
you found a treasure, have you not? I mean, why? Was it because
you found it? No, it was because it was a treasure.
And so we have this treasure. It has been given to us. That
is, the ability to see Christ as who He is. We have this treasure. And rather than the Lord creating
some golden pot to put this treasure in, he just took an old clay
pot. One that you wouldn't even think
twice about. You wouldn't look at it, you
see. But the Lord had hid these things and the wise and prudent
revealed them unto babes. He shows them to those who...
I remember that there is a scripture in the book of Acts that says
the Pharisees They took knowledge of Peter and John when they had
been with Jesus. Because they said, well, these
are ignorant and unlearned fishermen. I mean, how can they know anything? They are just clay pots. I mean,
they are not like us. They are not educated and upstanding
citizens. Why? I mean, they are nothing. that you would look at them and
say, well, surely you know the Lord will do something for them. That's right. Exactly correct. But we have this treasure in
earthen vessels for the purpose of the fact that the excellency
of the power may be of God and not of us. And so, dear brethren, That is the declaration of the
gospel of Christ, to give Him all the glory. It's not in men,
not in anything you can do or I can do or anybody else can
do, but it's in what He has done. And it's in that that we rejoice
and desire to praise Him.