Well, good morning. Good to see
you here this morning. Spring has sprung, and you can
probably hear it in my voice. I think the sinuses have sprung
along with the spring for me and Susan and others. But it's
good to see you here. You know, in our verbal communication
with people, much more is conveyed than merely that which we can
derive from the words alone. The body language and our facial
expressions actually convey a great deal of understanding. And sometimes
the same words may actually be understood in totally different
ways based upon how they're spoken or due to the inflection of the
speaker. And you'll see an example of this in how I apply the title
I've chosen for today's message, the title, You Will Not Believe
This. If I speak this sentence as a
mere declaration, so as to say, I've got something to tell you,
but I know you won't believe it, well then that conveys my
resignation to the fact that though I tell you, I truly know
you will not believe it. However, if those same words
are spoken with excitement, as an exclamation, so as to say,
I've got something to tell you and you won't believe this, well,
that carries a totally different connotation, doesn't it? I'm
conveying the excitement I anticipate in your response to hearing my
good news. See, news so wonderful, it's
almost too good to be true. Well, this particular sentence
is found in the scripture that we're going to consider today.
And we're going to consider that scripture or that sentence from
both of these two perspectives. As one, as the sense in which
it's given in the scripture, which is certainly a declaration
of the truth that many will not believe what is said. But also
as we'll consider the sentence as an exclamation of how wonderful
the good news of the gospel is to those who do believe. And
these words paraphrase those found in Habakkuk chapter 1,
verse 5, and then again as they're quoted by Paul in Acts chapter
13. And we're going to look at both
of those passages. We'll look extensively in Acts
13, but I selected Habakkuk 1-5 as my primary text because that
was where I got the idea for this message and where I want
to start our consideration this morning. As you know from our
Bible study hour, Habakkuk was a contemporary of the prophet
Jeremiah. Both of them prophesying of God's
judgment upon Judah, excuse me, upon Judah and the soon to take
place ruin of Jerusalem at the hands of the Chaldeans or the
Babylonians. And then they're being taken
from their homeland into the Babylonian captivity. The first
four verses of Habakkuk one opens with the prophet lamenting over
the sinful conditions and the compromising idolatry now that
had become rampant among his fellow Jews. But as we get to
verse five, God begins to speak through the prophet to the Jews
saying, behold ye among the heathen and regard and wonder marvelously
For I will work a work in your days which you will not believe,
though it be told you." Here God is exhorting the Jews to
look around and regard what was happening among the heathen nations.
At this time, the king of Babylon had overturned the Assyrian empire,
and he was going from place to place subduing one nation after
another. And God tells them in the verses
that follow this one that their time is coming as well. He's
exhorting the Jews to consider and regard his works of providence
among the nations of the earth. He tells them to wonder marvelously. That actually is the same Hebrew
word repeated as if he's saying wonder, wonder. God's telling
them here to marvel at the work that He, God, would do very soon,
a work they will not believe, though He, God Himself, is declaring
it to them through Habakkuk, just as He had been doing through
Jeremiah. And we see from the verses that
follow that this work of God he's speaking of is the destruction
of the Jewish nation, the city, the temple by the Chaldeans.
So look at that beginning in verse six. For lo, I raise up
the Chaldeans, that bitter and hasty nation which shall march
through the breadth of the land to possess the dwelling places
that are not theirs. They are terrible and dreadful,
Their judgment and their dignity shall proceed of themselves.
And this description just continues if you read on of how God would
use these terrible evil nations. We read later who would attribute
their success to their pagan gods, their false gods. And he
used these pagan nations as instruments of his own will so as to achieve
this work of destruction as God had determined would take place.
But as we saw from verse five, the Jews would not believe it,
even though the one true God, the one that we read of in Isaiah
46, 10, where it says, God who declares the end from the beginning,
this God has so declared through his prophet that it would take
place, but they won't believe it. So in verse 5, God is foretelling
them that they would deem that to be incredulous, even though
He, God, declares otherwise. He tells them, you're not going
to believe this. And you can kind of understand how it would
be natural for the people to not believe that such an amazing
turn of events would occur. In fact, if you read on into
chapter 2, you'll see where Habakkuk himself sought understanding
from God as to how God could cause the wicked to so prosper
by raising up this violent, wicked nation to punish Judah. See,
the Jews had beforehand presumed the Chaldeans to be their allies.
And after all, they knew their nation was the chosen people
of God under that temporal mosaic covenant. And so they knew they
would never be completely abandoned. And so it was imagined that they
wouldn't even be given over to a wicked people such as this
for any length of time. And so even though Jeremiah and
Habakkuk had told them again and again of the approaching
defeat that God determined would take place at the hands of these
nations, they gave it no credence. They would not believe it. Well,
as I noted earlier, the Apostle Paul refers back to Habakkuk
1.5 in Acts chapter 13, so let's look at that. Let me give you
a little background there. Paul and Barnabas were on their
first missionary journey, and as you get to verse 14 of Acts
13, they had arrived at a town called Antioch in Pisidia. where
on the Sabbath we're told they went into the Jewish synagogue.
And there, Paul, he started recounting their history as a chosen people,
how God had brought them out of bondage in Egypt, how they
had wandered 40 years in the wilderness, how he had then given
them the promised land of Canaan. And he continued on recounting
the period of the judges and then the kings, and that brought
him to King David. He told how, in keeping with
God's promise, he raised up from David's posterity a Savior, Christ
the Lord. He made note of John the Baptist
as the forerunner, pointing to Christ. And then Paul begins
to recount to them how their kinsmen, their fellow Jews in
Jerusalem, did not know Christ when he came, nor did they believe
the prophets concerning Christ, even though those very prophets
were read each Sabbath day. And yet Paul relates how these
prophecies were fulfilled by the same Jewish kinsmen in their
evil condemnation of Christ and in their desires that Pilate
would put him to death. It's interesting that God used
the wickedness of the heathen nations to inflict his punishment
on the Jews back in the days of Habakkuk and then used the
wickedness of the religious Jews in Jerusalem to bring about the
glorious accomplishment of Christ's death on the cross. Well, they
didn't believe either one of those prophecies, did they? Well,
then Paul relates how, as was also prophesied, Christ died
and was buried by how God raised him from the dead. and how there
were numerous witnesses in the days after his resurrection to
corroborate that indisputable fact. And then in verse 34, Paul
adds this, he said, and as concerning that he raised him, that's Christ,
up from the dead, now no more to return to corruption, he said
on this wise, or on that basis, I will give you the sure mercies
of David. Those for whom Christ lived,
died, and rose again, incorruptible, never to perish, they have the
same sure mercies of an incorruptible, eternal salvation in him of whom
David spoke. David, Paul had mentioned David
back in verse 22 of Acts 13 as the one God had described as
a man after mine own heart. Well then, In verses 35 through
37, lest they mistakenly think that the sure mercies of David
referred to something that David accomplished, he reminds them
that David had died. His body had deteriorated or
saw bodily corruption. But this one he's speaking of
here, he said, was raised from the dead and saw no corruption.
And with that backdrop, then Paul begins saying this in verse
38. Be it known to you, therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you
the forgiveness of sins, and by him all that believe are justified
from all things, from which he could not be justified by the
law of Moses. Paul's declaring the gospel of
God's grace here in these two verses. And we're gonna look
at that extensively here in a few moments. But first I want you
to see this in the context of Paul's quotation from Habakkuk.
Here he is now, he's just declared how sinners are forgiven and
justified. And in that context, he adds
this in verse 40. Beware therefore, lest that come
upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, ye despisers,
and wonder, and here he adds, and perish, for I work a work
in your days, a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though
a man declare it unto you. Now, clearly, Paul is warning
them not to be like those such as Habakkuk spoke of, who would
not believe what God told them through his prophet. He's telling
them, don't be like them by your not believing what God was now
telling them through the Apostle Paul. Telling them of the sin-forgiving,
justifying person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Most all of Christendom will
say, well, I don't need to worry about that because after all,
if you claim to be a Christian, you claim to believe on Christ
and what he did. But I want you to think about
that perhaps more seriously, remembering this was spoken to
the Jews who had met to worship in the synagogue. They were religious
people who seemed to want to hear of Christ. You can read
verses 42 through 45 on your own, but just in the interest
of time, let me paraphrase what took place immediately following
Paul's warning to them. We're told after the Jews left
the synagogue where Paul was speaking, the Gentiles approached
Paul and they asked him if he would preach those same words
to them on the next Sabbath. And so when the next Sabbath
came, we're told almost the whole city gathered together to hear
the word of God. Well, when the Jews saw all those
Gentiles there, were told they were filled with envy. And what
did they do? They began to speak against and
contradict Paul's message. And the response to that's found
in verse 46, where we read, then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold.
And they said, it was necessary that the word of God should first
have been spoken to you, that is to the Jews, but seeing ye
put it from you, They spoke against it, they contradicted it. And
judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life. Now how did
they do that? They did that in that they had
no need for the forgiveness of sins and the justifying work
that came exclusively through Jesus Christ. So they were unworthy
of the everlasting life which he accomplished for all those
he saved. He said, but seeing you've done
that, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded
us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that
thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth. He's
quoting there from the prophecy of Isaiah 49, six of how the
gospel would go out to the Gentiles. And now in verse 48, look at
the response of the Gentiles. And when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad. You know, that suggests to me
that they may well have thought, you will not believe this. This
is too good to be true. They were glad and glorified
the word of the Lord. And as many as were ordained
to eternal life, believed. So, just as the Jews did not
believe God speaking through Habakkuk concerning their physical
destruction, here we see that some of the Jews who supposedly
had an interest in Christ and that they initially wanted to
hear from Paul concerning Christ, they proved to be those who would
not believe the gospel he was proclaiming to them back in verses
38 and 39. They were religious. But they failed in large part
to heed Paul's warning to not be found in unbelief of God's
declaration, as was trucy of their forefathers, to whom Habakkuk
had prophesied. And so listen, all who hear this
message from God's word in our day, all of us who sincerely
presume to have an interest in Christ, we too should likewise
heed this warning. We should beware and take care
lest we be found in unbelief of the words spoken here, that
is, of God's justifying accomplishment through his dear son as it's
declared to them and as it's declared to us by God through
Paul. Our response to God's gospel,
as we consider it today as declared by Paul in verses 38 and 39,
It may be ultimately characterized in one of two ways. It'll be
said of you that hear this message that you were told of this work
of God, but you would not believe it. Or else, you were told of
this work of God, and it was made such good news to your soul
at some point that it was almost too good to be true. You will
be like one who will exclaim in excitement, you'll not believe
this. So with that, let's look into
that declaration and see if that's true of us. The declaration of
the gospel in verses 38 and 39. Be it known unto you therefore
now, therefore men and brethren, that through this man is preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. Let's just stop right there for
a moment. In verse 38, Paul declares that
the true gospel preach includes first the forgiveness of sins
through this man, the Lord Jesus Christ. So we see here something
first of his glorious person. Not just a mere man, but one
who is God as well as man. We know that from other scripture.
And we also know that had he been a mere man, his death, his
shed blood would have been insufficient payment for the forgiveness of
sins. Men die every day who are perishing. Their death does nothing to pay
the debt due to their sins. See, it's because he is truly
God that there's an infinite value and virtue in his blood
to take away sin and cleanse those for whom it was shed. But
this person was truly man as well. He had to take on humanity,
body and soul, that he might stand in the place of those he
saves, do for them what they could not do for themselves,
and die in payment of the debt due unto their sins. But as Paul
had explained earlier, though he died as a man and was buried,
he saw no corruption. So clearly this verse tells us
the forgiveness of sins is through this man, the God-man. the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, I
want you to look at verse 38 because, and notice this, that
it does not say that forgiveness of sins comes through or as a
result of your exercise of faith or your repentance or lessen
even as a result of your confession of your sins. And I say that
because so many like to twist 1 John 1, 9 to get that meaning
from it. And in fact, when we read 1 John
1, 9, by nature, that's the way it seems to us, that forgiveness
would be conditioned on our confession. It says, if we confess our sins,
he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. You know, in our natural state,
the state we're all born in, Apart from spiritual life, we
tend to perceive scriptures such as this consistent with a preconceived
notion that salvation, including the forgiveness of sins, is at
least in part based upon some condition or requirement we meet. You know, that shows up when
we first become interested in the gospel, doesn't it? Our first question we may ask
others or ourselves is, well, I want to go to heaven. What
do I need to do to be saved? You see, it's just inherent within
us to imagine we can do something to save ourselves or to gain
the forgiveness of sins. So that makes us prone to read
all the ifs of scripture as if they're conditions to be met
rather than evidences. We're kind of spring loaded to
that position. And that's in keeping with why
so few embrace salvation by grace alone. Grace is salvation that
the sinner can't merit for himself. It takes spiritual life, you
see, to see it any other way. And once you do, you can't see
it any other way. except God's way. You know, in
spite of clear scripture to the contrary, without the God-given
eyes of faith, we can no more grasp that there truly is absolutely
nothing we can do to save ourselves than those Jews of old could
imagine that God would use those heathen nations to inflict such
punishment upon them, God's chosen people under that temporal covenant,
chosen as a nation to bring the Messiah through. But you know,
it's not a matter of intellect either. It's not because we're
stupid that we can't do it. It's because we're spiritually
stupid. The scripture says, the natural
man knoweth not the things of God because they're spiritually
discerned. And we're born spiritually dead.
And we know it's not of intellect because we, when it comes to
non-spiritual things, we don't have problems discerning conditions
versus evidences. We understand words by their
context, and here 1 John 1-9 needs to be understood in the
context of the whole of scripture. I've shared this illustration
before. If a team of EMTs arrive on the
scene of an accident, they begin to treat an unconscious person
or two. Let's say there's a couple of
them. One says, I'll take this one and you take that one. And
he suggests to him, he says, hey, you check and see if he
or she breathes. They are alive. Now, we don't
have any problem understanding that as if it would be a suggestion. Go over there to that dead person.
and tell them if they breathe, they can live. Now, breathing
is an evidence that they are alive. But apart from God-given
eyes of faith, we just naturally insist on finding some condition
we can meet. Rather than seeing that if God
truly blesses us to bring us to truly confess our sins, that
means He, God the Holy Spirit, has convinced us of sin. That
means we perceive of and we confess our total inability and unworthiness
as sinners to meet any condition that would gain a holy God's
favor and blessing. So if by that God-given faith
we confess our sin, it's the evidence that God has forgiven
us and cleansed us from the very sins we confess. And he does
that in a way consistent, as that verse says, with his faithfulness
and his justice. I want you to strive to see how
understanding this that way would be consistent with the forgiveness
of sins as declared in the gospel of God's grace. For you see,
the gospel of grace proclaims that all of salvation is fully
and was fully and exclusively accomplished by the doing and
dying of Christ. Can you see that the interpretation
of 1 John 1.9, that would have us imagine forgiveness to be
conditioned in some way on the sinner, as if God would forgive
you if you will confess, if you will believe, if you will repent,
if you will do something, that Christ will respond in turn and
on that basis forgive you. I hope you can see that such
an interpretation is actually consistent with the false religion
of salvation by works. That's salvation conditioned
on something that you or I do. And the Bible's clear. For by
grace are you saved through faith, that not of yourselves, it's
the gift of God. It's not of works, lest any man
should boast. It's very telling that This word
translated forgiveness here in Acts 13 is the same word, the
same Greek word in the original that's translated remission in
Luke chapter 24. I preached on that not too long
ago. There in Luke 24, Christ, he's talking to his disciples
after the resurrection. And after having opened their
understanding to see how the Old Testament scriptures were
all pointing to him, In verse 46, we read, and Christ said
unto them, thus it is written, and thus it behoove Christ to
suffer and to rise from the dead the third day. and, or better
translated even, so it would read, it behooved, or it was
also absolutely necessary even that repentance and remission
of sins should be preached in his name among all nations beginning
at Jerusalem. Now, that word remission is the
same Greek word that's translated forgiveness in Acts 13.38. And
that makes sense. You know, when we remit something,
we pay for it. And that's similar to the meaning
of that Greek word that's translated remission here in forgiveness
in Acts 13, because it actually denotes a complete forgiveness
as in a full release or a full pardon. When money, see, is remitted
to pay a bill, we're thereby released from that debt or that
obligation to pay. The debt has been forgiven, we
say, but only if a full payment has been remitted, a full payment
of all that was due. There is no forgiveness of the
debt unless it has been paid in full. Now it took the blood
of Christ to pay that and we dare to think if I'll just be
sorrowful enough and confess my sins that on that basis, he'll
do what took the blood of Christ to do? No, God won't have that. And here Christ is telling them
of the necessity that this be preached. He said that if we,
he's in essence saying if we preach his gospel, the gospel
he commands all to believe. the gospel which the scripture
says all who are saved shall believe, then it must include
the truth here that the sin debt otherwise owed by the saved sinner
has been paid in full so as to be remitted, forgiven. And see, only thereby does God
really realize his chief design and purpose in salvation, that
he, not the sinner, that he gets all the glory. Now, think with
me of the God-dishonoring thoughts held by the majority in our day
who presume to be forgiven or pardoned, as I once did, based
upon some response or decision that they make. In Ephesians
1-7, we're told that those who are accepted in the Beloved,
that is the Beloved Son of God in Christ, that they have redemption
through his blood. the forgiveness of sins, understood
to be through his blood, according to the riches of his grace. So
this forgiveness of sins is sure and certain for all for whom
that blood payment or remission was made. And to rely on something
other than that or something in addition to that, whether
it's your sincere good intentions, your Act of faith, your church
going, your baptism, you're just trying to live a good life, your
decision for Jesus, your confession of sins, whatever. If the difference
maker is something done by or through you instead of solely
owing to the blood of Christ, then you can see from this passage
that would be a denial and would be actually refuting God's gospel. which sets forth the finished
work of Christ as the sole basis or ground of your salvation.
I'm telling you the doctrine held by the majority of religious
so-called Christians of our day accuses God of being unjust. You know, now, like me in years
past, many today believe Christ died for all who ever lived,
supposedly, and I'd put it this way, I'd say dying for our sins,
And in that natural state of spiritual blindness, I didn't
realize that thereby we were accusing God of being, in essence,
an unjust monster. Think about our own laws, the
Double Jeopardy Clause and the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. It prohibits anyone from being
prosecuted twice for substantially the same crime. This is part
of the laws of our lands because our forefathers knew just naturally
that that would be unjust. They wouldn't have double jeopardy.
And yet, we dare to imagine that, I dared to imagine, that God
had Christ bear the penalty due to the sins of everyone as a
sacrifice due unto their sins. And yet God will punish many
of them again in everlasting torment for the very sins for
which he has allegedly already exacted the punishment? Can you
see how that actually denies there's any forgiveness or remission
of sins through his blood? And it has multitudes worshiping
an idol of their natural imaginations. You know, we know God by what
he's like. Well, that accuses God of being unjust. That makes that idea we have
of God nothing more than an idol, just as much as if we had built
one out of stone or wood. And it's to worship an imaginary
Jesus. You see, one that, not the Jesus
of the Bible, because that would perceive his blood, his death
on the cross, as actually worthless to remit for the sins of any.
It would place the sinner's response in a position superior to the
work of Christ, which so many presume just made us savable.
Now the Bible says Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. All for whom Christ died have
forgiveness of sins through this God-man by his redeeming blood,
whereby, as we read in the book of Acts, he purchased his true
church. So look with me again at verses
38 and 39 of Acts 13. As we read, be it known unto
you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. And by him, all that believe
are justified from all things, from which he could not be justified
by the law of Moses. And as we've seen in verse 38,
we see the blessing of the forgiveness or pardon of sin through Christ
alone. But here in verse 39, we see
another blessing that's enjoyed by and through Christ and declared
in God's gospel. And that's the blessing of justification
from all things. Justification is based upon God
having imputed to his people Christ's perfect righteousness. The perfect satisfaction that
he made to God the Father's law and justice. The satisfaction
made, see, by their substitute, the Savior, Jesus Christ. To be justified means to be declared
righteous, not guilty. You know, at the end of a president's
term, we often see them issue presidential pardons for certain
individuals guilty of crimes. And back in the days of sovereign
kings, most of them had absolute power, and they could pardon
a criminal just because they decided to. so as to make that
person no longer liable to be punished for their crimes. But
that wouldn't entitle the guilty criminal to the inheritance of
the king's kingdom, such as a son or a prince would have. The forgiveness
or pardon of sins, it takes sins punishment away, but justification
declares one righteous. And since both of these result
from Christ's finished work, all whose sins are forgiven are
also justified from all things. All things. You see, those who
are justified, the saved, they are the adopted children of God
in Christ. They are children of the king,
the king of kings, who are justified from all things by his obedience,
even his obedience unto death in their place. That means they're
justified. They're declared not guilty from
all sin. Their past sins, their present
sins, their future sins. They're justified from Adam's
original sin and then their subsequent own sins in each generation.
That include their secret sins, their open sins, their sins of
presumption, their sins of spiritual ignorance and unbelief in which
we all start. Their sins of omission, that
is the omitting, failing to do the things they should do, and
their sins of commission, just their committing of sin, they're
justified from all things. All they could possibly be charged
with before the holy and strict justice of God, for which he
justly demanded satisfaction for, in the obedience and death
of his son, their substitute. See, all for whom God's justice
has been satisfied, they're declared righteous. And as a result, they
have all that the very merit of their perfect righteousness
could earn for them. They have an eternal, incorruptible
inheritance as children of the king. And I saw some eyebrows
lift up. See, it's because of their righteousness
The only righteousness they have is the very perfect righteousness
that Christ established by his perfect obedience and the suffering
of death in their place. It's his righteousness. This
graciously made theirs by God's merciful imputation or crediting
of it to their accounts. In the same way that the guilt
or demerit of their sins were charged or credited to Christ
so that he, as their sin-bearing substitute might die for the
remission of them. You can read of that great exchange
in 2 Corinthians 5.21. And if you think about it, it's
interesting. Justification may be accurately
said to have passed on Christ himself as the head and representative
of his people. Justification, see, being the
result of that which he alone merited by his doing and dying. Sinners are justified by his
justifying work for them. But on the other hand, Christ
needed no pardon because he was sinless. The scripture says he
offered himself up without spot. You'll not believe this. It's
too good to be true. What great love is found in his
payment for the imputed sins of his people, sins he had no
part in producing whatsoever. Yet, for God to achieve his design
to glorify himself in the salvation of sinners, to save sinners,
that sin debt had to be paid. Because the very perfect obedience,
the righteousness that he rendered was on behalf of guilty, otherwise
hell-deserving sinners such as you and me who desperately need
to be pardoned. See, God doesn't declare you
righteous by pretending you're not who you are. He declares
you righteous in Christ as He accomplish for you that righteous,
but he knows who we are, and our sins must be dealt with. And all those who are saved,
they were dealt with at Calvary. Now, strive to see the truth
of verse 39 in light of these things. Paul says that sinners
could not be justified by the law of Moses, that is, as in
their obedience to that law, their meeting conditions or requirements. Rather, they are justified by
Christ. And so we have that dichotomy
of religion. What you believe right now, it
falls into one of two categories. It's either grace or it's works.
Grace, that's God's way of salvation. That's forgiveness of sins and
justification unto eternal life, having been fully accomplished
by this God-man, by his doing and dying alone. Or else you
believe the antithesis, the false religion of salvation by works,
as so many unwittingly do in our day. And I say unwittingly,
and if they're deceived as I once was, so as to imagine I was believing
salvation by grace simply because we called it grace when I was
actually trusting in my own works to make the ultimate difference
in my salvation. and salvation by works, no matter
what you call it, is no salvation at all. It's akin to imagining. You could be saved by the law
of Moses because it's to imagine your forgiveness of sins and
justification is conditioned, at least in some way, at least
to some degree, on that which you, the sinner, does or does
not do. That's self-righteous works.
But again, strive to consider verse 39 from point of view different
from that which we're naturally inclined to see. You can see
there that it clearly does not read that by believing in him
or by believing on him that you are justified from all things.
It says by him all that believe are justified from all things.
from which he could not be justified by the law of Moses. So the issue
here is that you don't believe in order to be justified or in
order to procure for yourself the forgiveness of sins. If you
truly believe on him, on his doing and dying alone as the
sole ground of your justification, as the sole basis of your pardon
of sins, that just gives evidence that you are among the justified
because that requires the God-given blood-bought gift of faith. So what do you do? You know,
many may naturally think, well, Randy, if your understanding's
true, that'd mean there's nothing I can do to be saved. Yeah. And listen, if you're given eyes
to see, that it must be by Christ in him alone. It must be that
way for God to be true to himself, see, as both a just God and a
savior, as the prophet Isaiah, he describes himself through
the prophet Isaiah. If you see that, then join with
us mercy beggars. That's what it is to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. It's going to God for mercy in
Christ. It's to trust in His doing and
dying for all my salvation with no contribution from me, the
sinner. Now who are these for whom Christ died? They're those
God described in Ephesians 1 as having been chosen from before
the foundation of the world unto salvation in Christ. You can
read that on your own. They're called in the Bible God's
elect. They're those who are ordained to eternal life in Christ. We read that concerning the Gentiles
in Acts 13, 48. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believed. See, salvation's entirely of
the Lord. The command of the gospel's not
try to determine if you're one of God's elect, rather the secret
things of God. It's to believe his gospel and
God's declaration that all who truly do shall be saved. For
that identifies those for whom Christ lived and died. I'll close
with an illustration from an old writer who said, you know,
for someone to be sidetracked, you've heard this before, I know,
but To be sidetracked to try to know the secret things of
God as if I'm trying to determine if I was one of those for whom
Christ died, rather than simply taking him at his word and heeding
God's command to believe his gospel of grace and be saved,
he said it could be compared to this scenario. It's like a
hungry man who is starving to death, and suddenly someone graciously
places a delicious plate of food in front of him. But instead
of chowing down, he irrationally hesitates to eat it simply because
he's busy trying to figure out whether this life-saving nourishment
placed before him was intended for him or not. Reason would
cry out to him, fool, you're starving. Here's the food, eat
it and live. And today the bread of life has
been placed before you. Do you hunger and thirst for
it, for Christ and His righteousness? Does that fit your need? If so,
eat and live and rejoice, for as many as are ordained to eternal
life, so partake. They believe the work of salvation
which God has wrought in the Lord Jesus Christ. So heed Paul's
warning to not be found among those to whom God's work of grace
in Christ has been declared, but of whom he says, though I
declare it you, you'll not believe it. Instead, I pray Christ and
his righteousness as revealed in the gospel will be impressed
upon your heart as your only hope for eternal life so that
you'll see with the eyes of faith what wonderful news it truly
is for a sinner. Even today, my hope is you've
heard with the God-given ears of faith, God's preached gospel
of grace as the wonderful news it is, the wonderful words of
life that will cause you to exclaim with us, wow, this is too good
to be true. You'll not believe this. I pray
that you'll be found among that group.