excited. I'm so excited about
this message tonight. I know I say that all the time,
don't I? But I started this message knowing where I thought we were
going to go, and then I started digging into the text and reading
Hawker and Gill, and oh my, it just blew up. And I think this
message is going to really bless us tonight. I really do. I think
it's going to be amazing. Now, when we get back, we'll
be in chapter 3, which is where Hosea, Gomer, is redeemed. And that's us. We're redeemed. But tonight, we're going to see
that we're betrothed to Christ. Isn't that amazing? I almost,
I named the message Mercy to the Unworthy, but I almost named it Betrothed
to Christ. I could name it either one. So,
either one. Open your Bibles, if you would,
to Hosea chapter 2. Oh, I hope that this message
tonight is a blessing to you because putting it together I
was so blessed putting this message together. I was just flying high
And I hope it'll be a blessing to we who are the people of God
Because what we're going to see is we're going to see the Lord's
mercy on his bride Israel's a picture of the church And we're going
to see the mercy that God has for his people The speaker is
Christ The speaker is Christ. And something, this is another
title I could have gave this message, I will. I want you to
be aware of the I wills in this text. And we all love the I wills,
don't we? We love them. They're just absolutely
incredible. There's multiple I wills. And we can take those, beloved,
those are promises. Those are, we can grab ahold
of those. And I want you to note too, God
says, I will, and we just receive. There's nothing we can do to
earn salvation, to gain salvation, to merit salvation. As a matter
of fact, we're absolutely unworthy of it by nature, by choice, and
by birth. But watch in amazement at the
words of our King, our Savior, our God, our Redeemer, the Lord
Jesus Christ. Just make your heart sing. I'll
tell you that. Look at this. Let's read the last two verses
we looked at last week. First we'll read verse 14 of
Hosea chapter 2. Now this is the bride he's speaking to. Israel,
again, is a picture of the church. And do you remember preceding
these verses was threatenings? and warnings, terrifying, punishing
words. But look at these words. Look
at the, I will allure thee, Brother Zane. He's telling us, I will
allure thee. Look at that. I will. I will
allure her. Bring it home to us. We're the
bride of Christ, right? He's saying, I'll allure you. and bring her into the wilderness
and speak comfortably unto her, not in anger or wrath, comfortably."
That's sweet, isn't it? That's so sweet. Oh, my. These are loving, merciful words
from our Savior to we who are his people. Oh, this is absolutely incredible.
We are so unworthy, and look at these wonderful words spoken
to. And notice again, I will. When
God says, I will, right? It's going to happen, isn't it?
Do you know we're living proof of this? He drew us to Him, didn't
He? With cords of love. Remember
that. We're bound up by sin. He drew
us with cords of love and set us free. Set us free in Christ. It's absolutely
amazing. And He'll speak comfortably to
us. Oh, these words here, I will
allure her and bring her into the wilderness and speak comfortably
unto her, may be understood in the call and conversion of the
people of God, beloved, both Jew and Gentile, who are leavenly
called to Christ, bought to Christ by the power of God the Holy
Spirit. born again, and given faith to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. The very one here says, I will
allure you, her. And notice the action here. Gomer's still in her stuff, right?
Remember last week we saw the Lord heads her up. She couldn't
go nowhere. That's where we were, right? Lord heads us up to himself. And then he says, I'll allure
you. Because we still wouldn't come by nature. He says, I'm going to bring you.
I'm going to speak comfortably to you. And he speaks words of love to
us, doesn't he? Through the gospel. Oh my. So this is speaking of Jew and
Gentile, the body of Christ, saved by the Lord Jesus Christ
and kept by the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember that. Those who he saves,
he keeps. He keeps. Now let's read verse
15. And I will... Look at this again.
Look at these words. And I will give her vineyards.
I will. If God says it, it's going to come to pass, beloved. You know, people say, you can
take that to the bank. This is truth. You know, somebody says, you
can take that to the bank. Well, that's dependent on if
your word is right. This is happening. Because God's
saying this, isn't he saying? Sovereign God of the universe
is saying this. Brother and sister, we can find
rest in this, can't we? Because of who's saying it? It's
God. Look at this. I'll give her vineyards
from thence, in the valley of Achor, for a door of hope. Look
at that. The valley of Akkor, Akkor means
trouble. Remember last week we saw that
out of trouble, God can give us hope. You know
why? He takes our troubles away. And
I'm not meaning everyday things we go through, but he does carry
us through those too, doesn't he? I'm talking the trouble of
our sin. The trouble of the fact we can't
save ourselves. The trouble that we can't justify
ourselves before God. Beloved, he took it all away,
didn't he? We're justified, isn't it a wonderful system? We're
justified in Christ. The trouble's taken away. Our sin, it demands
death. He dies for us. What a Savior! And notice he says, I will do
this. And he did, didn't he? When He went to the cross, He
came from heaven. He took our nature and came from
heaven and became a man so that He could die and bleed for us
to redeem us, to give His life for us, that our troubles spiritually
are gone. Remember, think of the wrath
of God that was due us. It fell on our King. And He did
it lovingly. He willingly went to the cross.
And notice, and we can see that with the words, I will. He's
willing to do these things, isn't he? And I remember somebody saying,
the only will that matters in this universe is the will of
God. Men talk about free will, this and that. I'll tell you,
there's only one who has free will. That's the sovereign God
of the universe. He does whatever he pleases,
right? We're guided by our nature. Our will governs our nature. Why do we now want to serve Christ
and want to pour our lives out for Christ? Because we have a
new nature. We're born again. Why do we hate sin when we used
to love it? Because we have a new nature. Even though we're still
sinners, we hate it in ourselves, don't we? Sometimes I just loathe
myself. And don't get me wrong, what
I'm saying, I'm not, oh, I'm just saying, man, I'm just such
a sinner, Lord. It just shows me, every day shows me I need
you more and more, Lord Jesus. And my hope and my rest is in
Him, who what? He's the valley of hope now,
isn't He? He's the door of hope, isn't He? Look at this in verse
15. for a door of hope, and she shall
sing there, as in the days of her youth, and as in the day
when she came up out of the land of Egypt. So marvel at these
wonderful words. That door of hope there is Christ.
It's Jesus Christ our Lord. And He's the one speaking here,
beloved. He's the one speaking here. He alone is the hope of
the redeemed. He alone is our Savior, and we're
born again by the Holy Spirit of God, and now we have a great
hope, a good hope, a true hope, the Lord Jesus Christ. So what
matchless grace flows here from the words of our Redeemer? What
mercy is spoken in these words to his people? We are Gomer. Wandering off in our own things,
serving gods of our imagination or ourselves. Making idols of
man. That's what we are by nature,
right? Dead in trespasses and sins. And look what he does.
He doesn't leave us there, does he, Brother Dan? No. He comes
to us. And he says, I will. I'm going
to do this for you. Praise His mighty name. Because
we have no ability to do this, do we? Oh, I'll tell you, this
is wonderful. And the Holy Spirit gives us
a new heart and a new hope, a heart that thirsts after righteousness,
thirsts after Christ, who's the door of hope. My, oh, my. Marvel again that
the valley of Akkor, which is trouble in the Hebrew, Akkor
is trouble in the Hebrew, is now the valley of hope. Again,
Christ takes our troubles away. He takes all that would trouble
us spiritually away from us. Our sin troubled us, didn't it,
Brother Zane, when he was bringing us to Christ? We were fearful
of the wrath of God. The law condemned us. And then
we find out that there's one who died in our place and satisfied
the law for us, and extinguished the wrath of God that was against
us. Who is he? Our door of hope, the Lord Jesus
Christ, the one who's saying, I will in these decks here. Oh
my. And then think of this, the eternal
justice of God, or the justice of God, condemned us rightfully,
right? And Christ, the sinless, spotless
Savior, dies in our room and place, satisfying fully the justice
of God, so that the law of God and the justice of God has absolutely
no claim upon us. It's still there. And don't we
love the law of God? Yeah, it shows the holiness of
God. But we praise God that he fulfilled
it for us, that Christ fulfilled it for us, because we could never
fulfill it on our own. Jane, we can't even keep one
law, can we? Not one. And the scripture says,
if you're going to keep one, you've got to keep it all. See, people fail to realize that,
don't they? They cherry pick certain things
from the law. You can't do that. Praise God,
Christ fulfilled it all in my room and place and yours too
if you're a believer, isn't that wonderful? We say hallelujah,
can't we? Praise ye the Lord. It's wonderful. Oh my, so all that troubled us,
the law condemned us, he fulfilled it. The justice of God would
have destroyed us. He takes it away from us. He
extinguishes it that was against us. The wrath of God troubled
us, because we know we're sinners, can't save ourselves. He bore
it all for us. My, oh my. How did he do it? By his perfect sin-atoning death,
when he died on Calvary's cross and redeemed us with his precious,
precious blood. My. By grace and mercy, we find
out we could never save ourselves. And then we find out that before
there was ever a sinner, there was a Savior. The Lamb slain
from before the foundation of the world, the Word of God, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Praise God. My, oh my. And when do we hear about this
door of hope? Through the preaching of the
gospel. I'm setting them forth right now. Christ is the door
of hope for sinners. The question is, are you a sinner?
Hard to find sinners nowadays, isn't it? But I'll tell you what,
if the Holy Spirit ever shows you that you're a sinner, I pray
God will give you grace just to flee to Him, run to Him. And
if He shows you you're a sinner, He's already starting to work
on you. Because most people don't even think they're sinners. And
they don't. I never did before the Lord saved
me. No? My, oh, my. Praise the name of
Jesus. Everything that troubled us,
He's taken it away spiritually. It's wonderful. By the shedding
of His precious blood to redeem our eternal souls again. Hallelujah. What a Savior is Jesus Christ,
our Lord. Now let's read verses 16 and
17. And it shall be As the day saith the Lord, Thou
shalt call me Eshi. Thou shalt no more call me Beli. For I will take away the names
of Balaam out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered
by their name. Now, as we go in this study, again we see here in verse 17,
I will. I will. You see, we're just receivers
of God's grace. It's God doing the work, isn't
it? He did the work of salvation. He does the work of conversion.
And He will one day glorify us, beloved. And so we can conclude,
like Jonah said, salvations of the Lord. That's what this is.
Salvations of the Lord. It's all His doing. And we praise
His name. Take note, though, of the I will.
We're going to see it here in verse 17, verse 18, verse 19,
verse 21, and then in verse 23. We've already seen it in our
previous verses, too. But I will. This is God saying,
I will do this. And what God says he will do,
it will come to pass. It will come to pass. And it
brings forth, these I wills, brings forth even more that salvations
of the Lord. Because not once do we say, I'm
willing, in these verses. All we're doing is receiving,
isn't it, Zane? God's doing all the work. And then we are born again and
given faith. And what do we say? Oh, Lord,
I love you. Oh, because he wills. Isn't it
wonderful? It's not based upon us, beloved.
It's all based upon Christ. It's marvelous. Now you see why
I was rejoicing as I was putting this message together. It just
started coming alive. It's wonderful. Oh my. We're receivers of the grace
of God. We've been made willing by the
power of God, the Holy Spirit, to come to Christ and receivers
of the grace of God, born again, and now we love Christ. All because he says, I will.
I will. Notice the one who went astray,
which is us by nature, right? will now call him Ishai, which
you know what that means in the Hebrew? My husband. Ah. What are we? The bride of Christ. What is Christ? Our husband. He's the bridegroom, isn't he? Oh my. My husband. And no longer only Balai, which
means my master. He's our master, isn't he? But
he's our husband. He's the one who's loved us with
an everlasting love. He's the one who gave his life
for his bride. Oh my, so marvel, marvel as now
we get going here, we're gonna see the blessings that are gonna
flow, flow to we who are the people of God in and through
the Lord Jesus Christ. We who are the redeemed of the
Lord are the bride of Christ. He's our bridegroom. He's our
husband. He's our Ishai. Oh my. And think of this. He took upon
our nature. He became bone of our bone and
flesh of our flesh. to save us from all our sins. That's why he came, wasn't it,
Brother Zane? Came to save us from our sins. Oh my. And he's the sinless one. Think
of this. Not one sin in thought, not one sin in deed, not one
sin in action. He was tempted yet without sin.
I actually believe in the impeccability of Christ that he could not sin.
He was tempted. But he's perfect. How can a perfect
being sin? It's impossible. He's tempted,
like we are, but not one sin. Isn't that amazing? It's amazing. Absolutely incredible. My, oh,
my. He's without spot and blemish.
He's perfect. He's the Lamb of God sent to take away our sin,
beloved. To save us from our sins. And
look, listen to this. Listen to this in light of He
being our Eshai. Listen to this in Isaiah 54 verse
5. For thy maker is thine husband. The Lord of hosts is his name. thy Redeemer. He's our husband,
he's the Lord of hosts, he's our Redeemer, the Holy One of
Israel, the God of the whole earth, shall he be called. Wow. That's our King. That's our Redeemer. Every mercy, every blessing that
we receive, all spiritual blessings, For the blood-bought, born-again
believer comes from this source, Jesus, who is our hope. Jesus,
who is the only hope for sinners. Jesus, who is the only savior
of sinners. Jesus, who is the way, the truth,
and the life. No one comes unto the Father
but by him. My, oh my. No other name under
heaven given among men whereby we must be saved. Paul said to
the Philippian jailer and says, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. Just believe. People say, it can't be that
easy. Just believe. I know if you believe God given
you faith. Isn't it wonderful? Oh my. What comes first, faith
or regeneration? Amen, you must be born again,
right? And then you have faith, the belief on Christ. Isn't that
wonderful? People say, I was here, I was
listening to a couple of guys on the podcast today talking
about salvation in Christ and security in Christ. And one guy
says, well, often people, he's a preacher, and he says, oftentimes
people ask me, well, how do I know if I'm one of the elect? And
he says, can I ask you a question? The guy says, yeah. He says,
who's your rest? Who's your trust right now? He
says, I'm not talking about years ago. Who are you trusting right
now? for the salvation of your souls. And the fellow said, well,
Jesus. And he goes, well, then you're one of the elect, because
only the elect believe that. Isn't that amazing? Oh, my. We trust Christ. And another thing is, too, we're
not fruit inspectors, right? If a man or a woman says they
believe on Christ, we take them at their word, right? God's going
to sort it all out, but we take them at their word. I don't know. I know that the Lord saved me,
and I'm telling other people about Christ because, you know,
and our spirits bear witness. But again, you take people at
their word, right? My oh my. So the one who was my master,
and he still is our master in that sense, but now he's our
husband. It's wonderful. Listen to what
Robert Hawker says about Isaiah 54.5. He says, his assumption
of our nature is, to all intent and purposes, the marrying of
our nature. Jesus is no longer to be considered as a private
person, but as a public head, surety, and representative of
our nature. He's the second Adam. He goes
on to say, therefore all blessings and promises are made and become
yea and amen in him, end quote. Isn't that amazing? Christ did
that for you and I, beloved. He left heaven for you and I.
That's incredible. That's absolutely incredible.
And how this can comfort our souls, knowing that our union
with Christ comes with all spiritual blessings in Him. Because we're
in Him, because He saved us, we have all spiritual blessings
through Him. And because of his perfect synatony work in our
place as our representative. It's amazing. And these are sure
privileges, beloved. When Paul says we have all spiritual
blessings in Christ, that's right now. You know, there's a group
out there saying that you can't know if you're justified until
you die or you get to the end of your life and you look at
what you've done. No, that's works. That's just works, plain
and simple. You're looking at a man justified
by God. I'm looking at folks justified by God. Isn't that
amazing? And we didn't do anything, did we? Oh my, we couldn't, amen. We couldn't, no. We couldn't
do anything. And here we are. It's just about,
we're rejoicing in Christ. All because of what he's done.
It's wonderful. It's absolutely wonderful. My
oh my. This is just amazing. Now look
at verse 17 here. Look at this. This was incredible
because you guys know I came out of Catholicism and there's
a bunch of idols and everything there, right? And I don't have
to go into how I feel about that. But look at this. I've experienced
this and see if you have too. For I will take away the names
of Balaam out of their mouth and they shall no more be remembered
by their name. Look at that. And look at, for
I will. See, we don't have the power.
We don't have the will to turn from false idols. We don't have
that power. But the one who turns us. And
Paul says that the Thessalonian believers turn from idols to
serve the living God. Because we're turned, beloved,
by God's power. Isn't that amazing? We're turned
by His power, beloved. My oh my. And look at this. Think
of this. The false gods we once bowed
down to, I won't say the ones I did because I was in a religion
that had all kinds of idols. And I remember I told Vicki this
afternoon, I said, I'm ashamed about how I used to light candles
and do all this other stuff and pray to those false idols. I
detest them now. I detest them. And this is what
this is saying. We now detest the false idols
of what we once worshipped. You know, I was one of the guys,
look out for number one. Not anymore. I want to serve Christ, do you?
We desire to live our life for Him now. It's wonderful, isn't
it? Isn't it wonderful? Our whole
perspective on life has changed, hasn't it? We're all approaching our graduation,
aren't we? We don't know when that date
will be, but one day we're gonna graduate. That's what Norm Wells
calls it, I love that. We're gonna graduate, up we go. Oh my, won't it be beautiful?
It'll be wonderful. My oh my. So now we detest these
false gods of our imagination that we cooked up or that we
worship before our conversion. And they're just gods of our
imagination. And this is true also of the
converted Jew and the converted Gentile, right? Because the Jews,
they had so many traditions and everything that God was left
out of it all. It was all about works. It was
all about them, which is the heart of man-made religion, right? It's transactional, isn't it?
I do this, God will bless me. I do that, God will bless me.
It's not like that. Isn't that wonderful? It's not transactional. We see it in the text, don't
we? I will. Is there anything we're doing in that? We're just
receiving these blessed benefits and mercy and grace from God,
aren't we? He says, I will, and we're, oh
Lord, I'm loaded down with benefits daily, the scripture says. Right? You guys like coffee? Yeah? I like unsweet tea, or
just tea in general, right? Do you know that's a blessing
from God? How did that coffee get to your house? Well, some
farmer picked it somewhere, right? Package is all up. Put it on
a truck, comes to the grocery store, you go in there, I'm going
to redeem that, I'm going to buy that, right? You pick it
out, you elect it, right? Think of that. Elections right
before us all the time. You go and there's a whole bunch
of coffee things there, you pick one, I'm going to take that home.
Tom Harding told me that one, I was amazed by that. And then
you go and you redeem it by paying money for it. Oh my. That cup of coffee and that tea
comes a long way. And it comes right to your table
by the providence of God and the mercy of God. And it's a
benefit for you. We love it, don't we? I enjoy
my cup of tea in the morning. I love it. But I know who gave
it to me. Isn't it wonderful? That's a
benefit that we don't even think of every day that's there before
us. It's amazing. We open up our fridge, there's
food in our fridge. My. But then think of that's
just to keep us alive. Think of all the spiritual blessings
we have in Christ. Way more valuable. Justification,
sanctification, redemption, wisdom in Christ. My. Redemption. It's amazing. Now
let's read verses 18 to 21, and we'll take note of each verse
as we go here. And again, notice the I will, again, the I wills
of the Savior. This is the Savior speaking to
his bride. The speaker is the Lord Jesus Christ. Look at Hosea
2.18. And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the
beasts of the field, with the fowls of heaven, with the creeping
things of the grounds, I will break the bow and the sword in
the battle out of the earth, and I will make them to lie down
safely." Look at that. My, again, who's doing it all? I will, God says. I will. Look at how precious this verse
is, and marvel at these wonderful words that when the Lord is at
peace with the redeemed soul in Christ, he makes the whole
creation to be at peace with him. That is, the Lord allows nothing
to hurt him until the time, of course, of our departure. We may be persecuted, we may
be tried, we may go through sorrow, we may go through heartache,
but nothing will destroy us until the time that God has appointed
for us to go home. Isn't that amazing? Marvel at this. My oh my. Marvel at the charter
of grace set before us. No weapon formed against thee
shall prosper. Say it, and that's Jehovah the
Father, to Christ the mediator and to his people in him. In
every tongue that shall rise up against thee in judgment,
thou shalt condemn. Marvel at this, beloved. God
is for us. God's for us. He's not against
us. I was always taught in religion
that you had to make God happy. I can't make him happy. I'm a
sinner. And again, it was transactional
always, right? I'd go to church, and I'd hear,
you have to do this, and you have to do that, and you have
to do that. And I'd leave church with my head in the bottom of
my feet almost. You ever feel that way? You felt
beat up? and wept. That's not how our God is. God
is ever for His people. So much so, that He sent His Son to die for
us. And the Lord said, I will. And he has. It's finished, isn't it? The
work of salvation's finished. He's completed it. And now we
know this. If God before us, Amen, sister. Who can be against us? No one. We're justified by God. Isn't that wonderful? Oh, I'll
tell you, make your heart leap. My, oh, my. And think of this,
too. The truth of us not remembering our gods that
we served before is especially not remembering the God of self. We used to think we could save
ourselves. And we might not have said that,
but we'd say, well, God doesn't send good people to hell. Hell
is full of good people. Hell's full of religious people. But you know what's not in hell?
Saved sinners. They're all in glory. And you
know, everybody in glory admits we're a bunch of sinners. Somebody said, well, there's
good people in heaven. No, they're a bunch of sinners. Saved by grace. You
ask them when you get, you know, if you get there, ask them. They're
all saying, I ain't no good person. I'm redeemed by the Lamb! Oh
my, isn't it wonderful? Just makes your heart sing, doesn't
it? Just makes your heart sing, beloved. Look at verse 18 again. And in that day I will make a
covenant for them, the beasts of the field and the fowls of
the heaven, creeping things of the ground, and I will break
the bow and the sword and the battle of the earth, and make
them to lie down safely. Christ is our city of refuge.
We settle in His green pastures, don't you? That's the green pastures
of His Word. And we hear the gospel preaching,
oh my, just let me stay here. Just let me stay here. It's wonderful. And we're safe in the city of
refuge. Remember a couple weeks ago I mentioned that Brother
Norm had mentioned to me that in the city of refuge, no one
has to ask someone why you're there. Because we're all there for the
same reason. That's why in heaven no one has
to ask anybody if they're a sinner. Yeah, we're all sinners saved
by grace. Right? Isn't that wonderful? Praise
His name. Praise His mighty name, beloved.
I'll tell you why. It's just amazing. Now let's
read verses 19 and 20. And I will, look at this again,
look at these I wills, I will betroth thee unto me, look at
this, forever, yea, I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness
and in judgment and in loving kindness and in mercies. I will even betroth thee unto
me in faithfulness and thou shall know the Lord. Now, in our natural
state, we don't know the Lord, beloved. We may have a cooked-up
thought of who we think God is, but we truly don't know Him.
He knows us. He's known us from before the
foundation of the world, hasn't He? Because He chose us in Christ. But we have no clue who He is.
Now look at this, and think of this now. We know Him. By the
grace of God, we know Him. We know who He is. We know why
He came to this world. We know what He's done. We know
where He is now. I was standing out front before
y'all came, and I was watching all these cars go by, and I just
thought to myself, oh my Lord, they have no care for the gospel.
And they're just headlong into eternity. And you're just praying, Lord,
if one of your elect's going by, please save him. Please show
him mercy. Because I was one of those fellows
driving by. Without a care in the world. But what God did for us, he saved
us. Oh, he's wonderful. Look at this,
though, in these verses here. Remember, look at the love and
tenderness that's here. Christ is speaking to his bride.
Look at the love and tenderness that's brought forth in these
verses. It's absolutely incredible. Absolutely incredible. And this
is the Lord expressing this to his bride. And note the I wills
of our great Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, to his bride, his
beloved bride who he purchased with his precious, precious blood.
And again, we see clearly, even with this statement here in these
two verses, the statements we'll look at, we see clearly again
that salvation's of the Lord. We're just mere receivers of
grace and mercy. It's wondrous. It's absolutely wondrous. Look
at this. Verse 19, and I will betroth thee unto me forever. Three times he proclaims, I will
betroth thee. Look at this, first one. I will
betroth thee unto me forever. We're his forever. We're his
from eternity, and we're gonna be his when we're glorified in
eternity. It's never changed. We've always
been his. Saying, you know, I've talked
about our past. We've always been His, brother! Forever! From before the foundation of
the world! And think of the love we have
for our brides or for our husbands, right? And that doesn't even touch the
love that Christ has for His bride, for we who are the redeemed
of the Lord. Isn't that amazing? Isn't that
incredible? And then look, what's next? Next,
I will betroth thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment,
and in loving kindness, and in mercies. Beloved, what are we
clothed in? The perfect, spotless righteousness
of Christ. It's amazing. We're made righteous
by Christ, by His perfect righteousness. He took our sin upon Him, and
He gives us His perfect righteousness. He fulfilled the law in our place.
I was listening to a message on Christ's baptism this week,
and John says, what am I going to baptize you for? This baptism's
for sinners. And he says, suffer to fulfill
all righteousness. He's not a sinner, is he? He's
perfect. He's spotless. But he's our perfect representative,
isn't he? Oh, my beloved. Bone of our bone
and flesh of our flesh. Isn't it amazing? Oh, my gosh. Oh, it's so amazing. My, oh, my. Look at that. He betroths us in righteousness.
And in judgment, He's taken away our judgment that was against
us. In loving kindness, His loving
kindness for us is unmeasurable. And in mercies, oh, what mercy! Paul said, I've obtained mercy. We all say that, don't we, in
Christ? Mercy for the undeserving sinners such as I. And then look at the last one. I will even betroth thee unto
me in faithfulness. Do you know He's faithful even
when we're not? Oh my. Marvel at this. This is security. This is security for the believer
on Christ. I will. We see three I wills
of Christ here. To his bride. And betrothing his people implies
a marriage covenant. And this is not for a day, beloved.
This is forever. This is forever. This is never to be dissolved. Never. We are betrothed to him forever,
beloved. And he showed us his love for
us by going to the cross and dying to save our eternal souls. And then we're betrothed to Christ
in righteousness, his righteousness. And because of his righteousness,
we are now righteous before God. His righteousness is given to
us, and because we're clothed in His righteousness, now we're
righteous before God. Now we can stand in the presence
of God. Oh my. And this being betrothed to Christ
is founded in divine justice being satisfied, which He did
for us, by Him in our ruined place, and by virtue of our soul's
union with Christ too. I'm crucified with Christ, nevertheless
I live. Yet not I. I live by the faith of the Son
of God who loved me and gave himself for me. Galatians 2.20.
Crucified with Christ. We died with him on the cross.
He's our representative. We're now dead to the law, beloved.
Isn't that amazing? Oh, it's amazing. You know, when
I was in religion, they used to bang your head over. They
wouldn't use the Bible, they used to use the law. Right? Do you know what brings men and
women to repentance? The Scripture says it's the goodness
of God. It's the goodness of God. Now,
the law shows us we need a Savior, doesn't it? That's what it's
used for. is to show us, I can't do this.
I can't justify myself. I need to be saved. And then
God brings the balm of Gilead, doesn't he? The Lord Jesus Christ.
And just like that, he gives us faith to believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. My, oh my, it's wonderful. And
God's justice and God's holiness is dear to the believer too,
isn't it? We know that God can't just wink at our sin and say,
okay, I'll let you go. No, His justice must be satisfied,
and it was in Christ. His law must be fulfilled, and
it was in Christ. Right? The soul that sinneth,
it must die. Christ dies in our room and place.
The sinless one, the spotless one, the Lamb of God. My oh my. And he's the sinner's
surety for all sin and uncleanness. All my sin is forgiven in Christ.
Wonder of wonders. Therefore, Christ is a just God
and a Savior. And we who redeem, we just marvel
at the mercy we've received, don't we? We just marvel at this. And the betrothing of the people
of God by the Redeemer not only is done in righteousness and
judgment, but also in loving kindness. and in mercy. He didn't leave us where we were.
So let we who are the redeemed of God marvel at the sweet compassion
and tenderness and grace towards us. Marvel at the assurances
of God's people that we find here in the I wills of Christ. Our Savior. These are wonderful
assurances for us, beloved. We see His faithfulness. We see His compassion. We were
Gomer, off, polluted in the world. And He sought us. And He redeemed
us. And saved us by His grace and
mercy. Because He said, I will. Listen
to this in 2 Timothy, it says, If we believe not, yet he abideth
faithful. He cannot deny himself. Marvel
at that verse. If we believe not, yet he abideth
faithful. He cannot deny himself. He will
not lose one of his sheep for whom he died, beloved. Not one. Now let's read verses 21 and
22. And it shall come to pass in that day, I will hear, saith
the Lord, I will hear the heavens, and they shall hear the earth.
And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the oil,
and they shall hear Jezreel. When the Lord acts upon the heavens, and the heavens upon the earth,
There'll be showers of blessings for God's people. And I'm not
talking what them fake TV evangelists say. I'm not talking about that
stuff. Spiritual blessings. All spiritual blessings we have
in Christ, beloved. Showered down upon His people
through Christ Jesus our Lord. Come from God the Father, right?
All according to His will. And think of this. Heaven's no
longer iron and brass to us. We're like, well, oh my gosh,
I can't talk to God. Now it's like we can come to
the throne boldly, can't we? Because of Christ. Because of
the mercy. We know now God hears us. Because
we know him now. Remember that verse earlier?
They shall know him, know me. Now we know him. We know He hears
our prayers. We know He's told us to come
to the throne of grace boldly, to find grace to help in time
of need. We now know that. Oh, and the Lord is so gracious
to His people. This is a great and wonderful
change wrought and bought by sovereign, free, and unmerited
grace all through the Lord Jesus Christ. Now let's read the last
verse in this chapter. Chapter 2, verse 23. This is also quoted by the Apostle
Paul in Romans chapter 9. I'll have you put your finger
in Romans 9, because we're going to go there after I read this
verse here. Look at this. I'll read it with verse 22 as
well. And the earth shall hear the corn, and the wine, and the
oil, and they shall hear Jezreel. Look at this. And I will sow
unto her, or unto me in the earth, and I will have mercy upon her
that had not obtained mercy. That's us. Oh my. We're Gentiles. And I will say
to them which were not my people. Look at this. Thou art my people.
Oh my. And they shall say, what do we
say? Thou art my God, Lord, you're
my God, you're my Savior, my Redeemer. Isn't that wonderful,
beloved? Oh, the Lord says to his people,
I'll show my love to the one I call. Oh, they were called
not my loved ones and not my people, and they shall be my
people by his power and might, right? And they shall say, you're
my God, Lord. What do we say now? You're my
Savior. You're my Redeemer. You're my
King. You're my God. That's a miracle of grace, beloved.
Isn't it wonderful? My oh my so what great promises
we see here and in chapter 3 we're going to see clearly the death
of our Lord Jesus Christ for his people Now let's turn to
Romans 9. We're going to close with this
section because verse 23 is bought forth in in Romans Chapter 9
verse 24, but I want to read it in context. So we're started
in Romans 9 20 and we'll read all the way to verse 26 and Nay, but, O man, who art thou
that replyest against God? Shall the thing formed say to
him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over
the clay of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour and
another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to show
his wrath and to make his power known, Look at this. Endured with much long-suffering,
the vessels of wrath fill it to destruction, and that he might
make known the riches of his glory. See, we know the Lord
now, don't we? Look at this. And that he might
make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy. which he had aforeprepared unto
glory, even us whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also
of the Gentiles." The ones who weren't called his people, but were his people. The ones
who said, you're not my God, who now by the grace of God say,
thou art my God. Oh my. As he saith also in Osea,
I will call them my people, which were not my people, and her beloved,
which was not beloved. And it shall come to pass that
in the place where it is said unto thee, ye are not my people,
there shall they be called the children of the living God. And
what do we say? Praise the name of Jesus. Praise
his mighty name, beloved. What a great God, what a great
Savior is Jesus Christ, our Lord. Brother Jim, can you close us
in prayer?