Open your Bibles, if you would,
to Acts chapter 13. The name of the message is, Ordained
to Eternal Life. Ordained to Eternal Life. Acts chapter 13. We'll continue
our study in this wonderful book about the New Testament church's
beginnings. And let us always remember that
the bride of Christ, the elect of God, is made up of Old Testament
saints and New Testament saints. They are comprised the elect
of God. Scripture calls them that in
1 Thessalonians chapter 1 and also in Ephesians chapter 1. They're chosen in Christ before
the foundation of the world, not based upon anything in us
at all. Nothing. but all because of the
grace and the mercy of God. That's what makes God's grace
amazing. That's what makes it incredible
that he would choose a sinner such as I, and such as you, if
you're a believer, to save us by his grace and his mercy. Especially since the scripture
says there's none that seeketh after God, which means there's
none that seeks him. And the scripture says there's
none righteous, no not one. That means there's none of us
good. No one who's good. We're all a bunch of sinners
and we're born that way. I stand before you a man, a sinner
saved by grace proclaiming the only one who can save sinners.
And He saved my soul. And I proclaim Him. Until the
Lord gives me breath, I'll proclaim Him in His wondrous salvation. Oh, it's amazing. So let's stand
up and read together verses 38 to 44 of Acts chapter 13. Verses
38 to 44. Scripture declares, 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 ye could not
be justified by the law of Moses. Beware, therefore, lest that
come upon you which is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, ye
despisers in wonder 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. And when the Jews were gone out
of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now, when the congregation
was broken up, many of the Jews and religious Protestantites
followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them, persuaded them
to continue in the grace of God. In the next Sabbath day, there
came almost the whole city together to hear the word of God. Now
we're going to continue in our study down to verse 48, but I
wanted to read those chapters to give us the setting of our
text here before us. Now last week we left off at
verses 38 and 39, which proclaims that salvation for sinners is
only found in and through the Lord Jesus Christ, and by what
he's done. Through this man, that's Christ,
is preached unto you, to me. Right? The forgiveness of sins
is only through Christ. Look at that again. Look at verse
38. Be it known to you, therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you
the forgiveness of sins. Every time I step into the pulpit,
I'm preaching to you and me. Remember? In religion, I remember when
I was in religion, it was like, well, you're a bunch of sinners,
you're a bunch of, you're this. No, we're sinners, we, we, collectively,
we are. I'm no different than any of
you. I'm a sinner saved by grace, right? It's amazing. But through this man has preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. The only way that we can be forgiven
of our sins is through this man. Through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Not Mohammed then. Right? Not Buddha. Not Mary. Not through a church. Not through
baptism. Right? Not through going to church
on a certain day. Through this man. the Lord Jesus Christ, who is
God incarnate in the flesh. We can say as God's people, God
saved me. Brother Tom, God saved us. Not
no mere man. God saved us. The God man. That's incredible. And we can
say that. It's God who saved us from beginning
to end. He's the author and the finisher
of our faith. It's wonderful. In Marvel, again,
at verse 26, which we looked at last week, it says, to you
is this word of salvation sent. So not only was Christ sent by
the Father, right, from heaven to here to earth to redeem us,
but this word is sent to us by God. See, preaching has purpose. God doesn't just have a man stand
up who's been saved by the grace of God and preach and proclaim
words that have no purpose. That's why the scripture says
his word will not return unto him void. It has purpose and
something will happen. Whether it heaps condemnation
upon a person or whether, as a believer, we rejoice even more
and more This word of salvation, it goes out to all, doesn't it?
I read something by Spurgeon this week, and I love it. I love
it. He says, since I don't know the
role of the elect, so he said, since I don't know the names
of the elect, I'm gonna preach the gospel of whosoever will.
Let him come. Isn't that beautiful? Because
we don't know who they are. God knows, and we're gonna see
that. Paul had a multitude of people. The whole city came out. And we're going to see that as
many as were ordained to eternal life believed. Paul had no clue
who they were. And it was manifest that they
were God's elect because they believed. I'll tell you why. It gets better
and better. Election, again, when I first
heard it when I was in religion, I rejected it. I rejected it. But God revealed the truth of
election to me in the fact that the scripture says he loved us
before we ever loved him. And he said, you didn't choose
me, I chose you, to his disciples. That's the same for all of God's
people. When the scripture says there's none that seeks after
God, there's none. The whole reason we're believers
is because God sought us out, as we sing in that beautiful
song. That's why we say hallelujah to our great God. Because it's
all his work. It's all him. So this word of
salvation is sent with purpose. And it will accomplish what it's
sent to do by the power of God and by the might of God. So this
gospel then, we can see then, that this gospel comes by divine
appointment, doesn't it? It's not chance or luck. We need to strike those words
from our vocabulary, don't we? It's by divine appointment that
we're saved, that this word of God comes. The reason we're all
here today is by God's divine appointment. We made a decision to come, but
it's still by God's divine appointment. Nothing catches him by surprise.
Nothing. Oh my. And it's also sent by
divine direction. Think of this. You four are sitting
there, right? The word of God can come and
save you, Sister Barbara, and leave everyone else behind. Praise
God it didn't, but it can, right? So it comes by divine appointment
and it comes by divine direction. So when you guys, when the Lord
saved you, it was by divine appointment and by divine direction. That's
beautiful, isn't it? It's wonderful. God saves his people from their
sins. He did it at Calvary's Cross,
he accomplished the work, and then the Holy Spirit comes and
we call it fetching grace. The old timers called it, I like
that, fetching grace. The Holy Spirit comes and fetches
us. He does too, don't he? And it's wonderful. Praise be
to God. My oh my. And you know what?
All that is happening according to God's will and purpose. If
you're saved and you're sitting here today and you're a saved
person, trusting in Christ and resting in Christ, it's all according
to the will and purpose of God. Now how that warms our hearts. Because there was a time when
we were not born again. There was a time when we saw
no beauty in Christ. And now, is this not right, brothers
and sisters? He's the fairest of 10,000 to
our souls. He is the most beautiful one. He's incredible. He's God. God saved my soul. God did that. And why did he do it? Out of
his great love for his people. Out of his great love. You mean
that God loved me so much that he went to Calvary's cross and
bled and died for me? If you're a believer, yeah. And whosoever will come, let
them come. Taking the water of life freely. It's free, it doesn't
cost nothing. Salvation's free. Everybody says,
there's nothing free in this world. Well, it cost Christ,
didn't it? But it's free. All the scripture
says is look unto me and live. Look. And if you do look, it's because
God's ordained you to look. Isn't that amazing? Now, you
will look, right? We must believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ in order to be saved. We must. But even that faith,
for by grace that you say through faith, and that in all yourselves,
it's a gift of God, not of works less than any man should boast.
That's beautiful. God saves sinners. He really
does. As I said, heaven's not full
of good people. Heaven's full of a bunch of sinners
saved by grace. That's why we rejoice when we
go to glory. He saved a sinner like me. This
is amazing. That's why we rejoice while we're
on this earth too. Because he saves sinners such
as we. It's beautiful. It's absolutely amazing. And
he does it by his almighty power. And look at verse 38 and 39 again.
Through this man, that's the man Christ Jesus, has preached
unto you the forgiveness of sins. Not just some of them, but all
of them. The forgiveness of sins. And
then look at this. It even gets better. Not just our sins forgiven,
right? But we're justified before God
by what Christ done. Look at this. And by him, all
that believe are justified. Brother Tom, we're sitting here,
we're justified before God. That means God accepts us. And we're justified by Christ.
That's what it says. And by him all that believe.
Do you believe? Do you believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ as he saved you? Look at that. And by him, all
of that was justified. It doesn't say, well, it might
be if they make a decision, or it might be if they do this,
or it might be if they're obedient, or it might be if they do that. In no way does it say do, does
it? Because it's already done. It's already done, isn't it,
Brother Brian? It's finished. Look at this. Now, we are obedient
because we love the Lord. We desire to live a holy life.
We desire to be obedient to God. We don't want to go out and live
a reckless life. No. We desire to honor our God,
don't we? But we're sinners still, aren't
we? And this is the most wonderful news for sinners. that by believing on the Lord
Jesus Christ, not only are our sins forgiven, but look at this,
and by him all that believe are justified from all things from
which he could not be justified by the law of Moses. The law
of Moses cannot justify any man or woman. What the law of God
does is it says we're all guilty before God. That's in Romans. And then if one tries to keep
the law of God and they break in one, which every one of us
do, you're guilty of it all. So as we've been looking at in
Sunday school, we're lawbreakers, we're criminals before God's
justice and law. But praise be to God, we've been
redeemed by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're
justified now. from all the things that the
law of Moses could not justify us. See, all the law can do is
kill. It slays us. It makes us realize
we can't save ourselves. And we are hemmed in, shut in
to Christ and him alone. And by God's grace, he lovingly
draws his people to Christ, gives us faith to believe in repentance
before God, And we're never the same, are
we? We become new creatures born again by the power of God, the
Holy Spirit, and we are never the same. We're not citizens
of this world, are we? Our citizenship is in heaven. My, everything, isn't that wonderful?
This world's not our home. What's that old song? We're just
passing through. That's all, we're just passing
through this world, beloved. My, you guys are American by
citizenship. I'm Canadian by citizenship.
But you know where our true citizenship is if we're a believer? It's
in heaven. It's in heaven. Paul said that our citizenship
is in heaven. Isn't that wonderful? And all
the benefits that our citizenship, like the benefits that citizenship
gives is amazing. Right? In this country and in
where I'm from. Those benefits are for the citizens
of that country. You can vote. You can do other
things. Those are benefits. See, I can't vote because I'm
not a citizen of this country. But that's a benefit you guys
have. Right? So, think of this. All the benefits
of being a citizen of heaven is wrapped up in Christ. And what are the benefits of
being a citizen of heaven? Justified from the law. Redeemed
by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Sanctified in Christ.
giving eternal life. And then we find out that all
the promises of God are yea and amen in Christ, therefore
the believer in Christ. Spurgeon used to say, take those
promises and grab ahold of them and pray them back to God. Because they're ours in Christ.
And these are blessed benefits that we as citizens of heaven
have. We have all our sins forgiven.
Christ has made an atonement for our sins. Not for everybody,
but for his people. For his elect, and we're gonna
see as many as were ordained to eternal life believed. Oh my. Turn if you want to Ephesians
chapter one. Ephesians chapter one. So marvel at this fact, Jesus
Christ, by the supreme sacrifice of himself, took care of our
sin debt, took care of the sin debt of all the people, all his
elect of all the ages. He took care of it all. He took
care of it all by His perfect, senatory death upon Calvary's
cross. He paid the ransom price in full
by the shedding of His precious blood. When He suffered and bled
and died in our room and place on Calvary's cross 2,000 years
ago, our salvation is completed. I preach a completed salvation.
It's already done. We look to Him and live. We look
to Christ and live. Look at this. And let us rejoice
as the redeemed of the Lord. You know why? Because God has
accepted the ransom price made by the Lord Jesus Christ. God's
accepted it. Which that ransom price is to
save us from our sins. And all those who are in Christ,
when that ransom price was paid, which is the elect of God we're
going to see here, right? have all their sins forgiven.
Now look at this. Oh my. Blessed be, verse one. Ephesians one, we're starting
verse three and we're gonna read all the way to verse seven. Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ.
Now remember who Paul's writing to. He's not writing to all the
citizens of Ephesus, is he? No, he's not. He's writing to
the church at Ephesus. Right? He's writing specifically
to the saints at Ephesus, the born-again, blood-washed believers.
It's so important for us to know that, the context of who the
author is writing to. And we know that Paul is just
like a secretary, right? He's penning the words that God
the Holy Spirit wants him to have written down. Look at this. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us, so he's talking
to the Ephesian church, the born again believers, with all spiritual
blessings in heaven and places in Christ. Now remember, I said
the name of the message is ordained to eternal life, right? Look at this. according as he
has chosen us in him, that's Christ, before the foundation
of the world. So Paul's writing to these Ephesian believers,
and this is God's word saying, this is not Wayne Boyd's words,
this is the truth of the scriptures. Now, why God chose me? or chose
you, the only thing we know is it pleased him to do so, because
we don't see anything in us that would make him choose us, because
there's nothing in us to make him choose us. But see that word
chosen? In the Greek, that means to choose,
to select. Isn't that amazing? Now, when
Spurgeon said, I don't know the role of the elect, what he's
saying there is, I don't know the names of the elect. I don't
know them either. So we preach, whosoever will, let them come.
Right? We don't fence it up. Let them
come. Come take the water of life freely.
knowing that God's people will, because they're made willing
by the power of the Holy Spirit. Look at this. Look at this. This
is absolutely mind-blowing. And when did it happen? According
as He, God the Father, had chosen us in Him, in Christ, before
the foundation of the world. Brother Kevin, before the foundation
of the world, brother. Before there was ever anything.
Before there was ever angels. Before there was ever worlds.
Before there was ever stars. Before there was ever anything.
Before he laid the foundation of the world, Brother Tom. Before he said, let there be
light, and there was light. God chose a people in Christ.
That's scripture. That's not twisting the scripture,
that's not bending it, because we're reading it in context,
aren't we? Context and who it's written
to is always so very, very important. This is amazing. This is what's
called the doctrine of election. And it's marvelous, because if
God hasn't chose us, We never would have chosen him. If God
hadn't have chosen to save some, what did DJ Ward used to say?
What was that again? He said, oh, what did he say?
Yeah, if God hadn't have chosen some, then heaven would have
none. Isn't that amazing? If God hadn't
have chosen some, heaven would have none. Because we're all
a bunch of sinners. Look at this, though. This is
amazing. According as he has chosen us in him before the foundation
of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before
him in love. That's being in Christ. Look
at this. Having predestined us unto the
adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according...
Now, here's the reason. We always say, well, why me?
Every one of us as believers say, why me? Why did God choose
me? Oh, this is wonderful. Here's
the answer. It has nothing to do with us. It's not based upon us. It's
not based upon anything we do or continue to do. Look at this. And when was it done? Somebody
tell me when it was done. Amen, sister, before the foundation
of the world. Right? Look at this. According
to the good pleasure of his will. That is magnificent. That is
mountaintop scriptures, isn't it? Now look at this. To the praise
of the glory of his grace. What are our dear brothers and
sisters doing in heaven right now? They're praising our Savior,
aren't they? And we will be there one day
soon. to the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he, God,
see, we can never, this is a fact too. Since we're sinners, we
can never make ourselves acceptable to God by anything we do. We can never gain favor with
God by anything we do. It's just flat out that way. We can't keep the law. We're
not good by nature. We're sinners. The scripture
says, from the top of our head to the bottom of our feet. See,
and when we preach that, it offends a man's pride, because man thinks,
well, there's something I got to do. Because we're wired to
works. We're wired to do something.
We come out of the womb thinking, well, we can do something to
gain our salvation, when we can't do anything to gain our salvation. But look at this verse. This
is marvelous. Look at this. Wherein he hath
made us. Who made us? God's made us. Accepted
in the Beloved. Who's the Beloved? Christ. Jesus Christ is the Beloved,
isn't he? This is my Beloved Son in whom I'm well
pleased. He's the Beloved. That's Christ. Look at this. In whom we have
redemption. How? So Christ is our redemption. How? Through His blood. He shed His blood as the ransom
price to pay for our eternal souls. And look at this. Here it is.
Remember Acts chapter 13, verse 38 and 39, right? Through this
man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. in whom
we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins
according to the riches of his grace, according to the riches
of God's grace. And you know, God's grace will
never be emptied. And you know, the merit of Christ's
sacrifice is so great that for millions and millions and millions
and millions and millions of years, it'll never lose its value
before God. We're saved, and we're saved
forever by the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Who's
God in the flesh? That's the important thing. He's
the God-man. He's God incarnate in the flesh.
That's why, as we were saying earlier, Tom, God saved us. God
shed his blood to ransom his church, beloved, which is the
elect of God. Oh, and this is the glorious
gospel that the Old Testament prophets preached. They preached
Christ. He said, the law and the prophets,
they testify of me. All the apostles preach this
wonderful gospel. And this is the gospel that all
of God's ordained preachers, wherever they may be, preach
the same gospel. Salvation is only in and through
the Lord Jesus Christ and by the shedding of his precious
blood. Let's go back to our text in Acts chapter 13 we'll read
verses 40 and 41. Now here's a very serious warning.
Here's a very serious warning set before the Jewish folks there
and before all the hearers because we know that a whole bunch of
them came back. Beware, therefore, lest that
come upon you which is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, ye
despisers in wonder and perish. For I work a work in your day,
a work which ye shall in no wise believe, though a man declare
it unto you. Here I am preaching the gospel,
right? And unless we're born again by the Holy Spirit of God,
unless we're given faith to trust Christ, we will not believe this
message. How do I know that? Because I didn't before the Lord
saved me. The Lord saved me in my thirties.
I did not believe the gospel before that. I did not believe
that Christ was the only way to heaven. Oh my. I believe it now and I
proclaim it now by the grace and mercy of God. But you see
what the scripture says? That's a warning. Don't turn
a deaf ear to the salvation that's only through Christ and his merit. Don't despise and reject the
Christ who the preacher preaches. Oh my. But natural man, and when
we were in our natural state, we rejected Christ. And rejecting
Christ is rejecting God himself, isn't it? Because he sent Christ.
God the Father sent God the Son to save a people from his sins.
from our sins. And he laid down his life for
us. And if one dies in their sins, not trusting Christ, they
will perish and go out into eternity. And they will still despise the
redeeming work of the Lord Jesus Christ. I remember talking to my dad
after the Lord saved me. And he told me, well, the Pope's
got all the answers. I said, salvation's not in any
church, dad. The Pope's just a man. No, no,
he knows what's right. I said, no, he doesn't actually.
He preaches a works-based salvation. Surely he can't be wrong and
billions of other people that follow him. I said, yeah, yeah,
we can be wrong. Anyone who teaches you that you're
saved by something you do is teaching you another gospel.
Because salvation is only through this man, only through Christ
and him alone. There's no other Savior but the
Lord Jesus Christ. None at all. Oh my. Habakkuk says this in
chapter 1 verse 5. Beloved, do you remember, as
I remember, a time when someone talked to us about the gospel
and we did not believe a word they were saying? I remember talking to a friend
of mine when I was in my 20s, really good friend of mine. Did
a lot of stupid stuff together though, unfortunately. But I
walked into the store where he was working. Man, he was beaming. He was usually a pretty happy
fellow, but he was just beaming this day. Hey, Jeff, what's going
on? He goes, the Lord saved me right
away. And I said, what? And he said,
the Lord saved me. I said, he saved you from what?
I didn't know you needed to be saved. I didn't know what he
was talking about. I had no clue what he was talking
about. I thought maybe he was drowning or something. So I mockingly
said, where did he save you from? I didn't know you needed to be
saved. He said, he saved me from my sins. I said, what? And he goes, are
you saved? I'm, oh, of course I am. Of course.
I'm a Catholic. He goes, I didn't ask you that.
Well, you know what? About 10 years after that, the
Lord saved my soul. Isn't that amazing? And I wasn't
even looking for him. My, now I know what he meant.
God saves his people from their sins, doesn't he? And he sends
the gospel to us, beloved. But there's a time when we hear
these words and we don't believe them. When we're in our natural
state, as a matter of fact, I tore out of that store when he told
me. I didn't want, I was like, okay, buddy, I'm out of here.
And I took off. Didn't want to hear nothing.
My oh my. Look at verse 42 here, it says,
and when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue, the Gentiles
besought that these words might be preached to them the next
Sabbath. Somebody else is listening. Now, we see here Paul finished
his sermon. The meeting in the Jewish synagogue
was over. It could be that the Jewish leader
said, well, that's enough of Paul speaking. We're going to
break this up now. I don't know. It doesn't say. The text doesn't
tell us. All it tells us is that the meeting ended. The meeting
ended. It could have been because they
disagreed with what Paul said. But again, the text is silent,
so we're not going to say anything about that. Now, the Gentiles
here, it could refer to the Gentiles who were Jewish proselytes, who
were in the synagogue, worshiping as Jewish proselytes. Or, it
could have been some who had heard. Again, the scripture's silent.
Or it could have been both. Could have been both, too. But
we see that those Gentiles, and heard the message of Jesus Christ.
And look at this, and when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue,
the Gentiles besought that these words, that preaching of Christ, that preaching of Christ might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. They heard something,
didn't they? Beloved, they liked what they
heard. They wanted to hear it again.
And here, this is encouraging the
preachers, I'll tell you what, they were genuinely interested.
They wanted to hear more. Paul and Barnabas must have been
running to the synagogue the next week. That's exciting. It's wonderful. So what happened here? Well,
God pricked their hearts, didn't He? Look at verse 43. And when the congregation was
broken up, many of the Jews and religious proselytes, so that
would be the Gentiles that had become Jewish believers, followed
Paul and Barnabas. Now look what's said here. This
is very interesting right here. Who, speaking to them, persuaded
them to what? Continue in the grace of God. The Lord saved some of them.
Because you can't continue in something unless you've already
started in it. Right, Brother Tom? We can't
continue to do something unless it's been started. Who's the
author and finisher of our faith? The Lord Jesus Christ. Some of
them heard and were born again. Oh my. They wanted to hear more. So
these ones spoken of in verse 43, they followed Paul and Barnabas. Here we see the drawing power
of God, the Holy Spirit. And look, they persuaded them
to continue in the grace of God. God had begun a good work in
them. They're persuading them to continue in the grace of God.
Don't go back to the law. continue in the grace of God.
You don't tell that to someone who's not saved. Oh my! But there's even more to this.
Those are not the only ones who the Lord's going to save. Look at verse 44. In the next
Sabbath day came almost the whole city to hear the word of God. So here, Brian, could you imagine
if it was a few of us would come out? Whoa! Getting ready to preach
the gospel, and there's almost the whole city there. Oh, my. You know what it reminds
me of? Remember Peter with Cornelius? And he goes into Cornelius' house
thinking, oh, I'm going to talk to Cornelius about the gospel.
And he goes in the house, and it's full of Gentiles. And he preaches the gospel. And
the Lord goes, he just saves whom he wills. There's a whole
bunch of lost sheep there, wasn't there? Well, there's lost sheep
here too. Now, Paul and Barabbas don't know that, but they're
commanded to preach the gospel to every creature, right? They're
commanded to preach the gospel to all. And God does the saving,
doesn't he? Right? Oh, this is marvelous. I love this. And so we see here,
this is an obvious manifestation of the drawing power of God the
Holy Spirit, beloved, right here before us. Right? Because he draws his people to
hear the gospel, doesn't he? And we're born again and he gives
us faith to believe and repentance before God. So we see here the
drawing of God the Holy Spirit. And what an encouragement it
must have been to Paul and Barnabas. They could see that the Lord
was blessing the preaching of the gospel. And remember, they're
on a missionary journey. They've been sent to the Gentiles,
haven't they? They've been sent to the Gentiles. Well, here's
a Gentile city. And there's a whole bunch of
Jewish proselytes and a whole bunch of Jews, and there's a
whole bunch of Gentiles all there too now, isn't there? I love
that. Almost the whole city. I should
have looked up to see how many people they thought were here,
but I don't know. But could you imagine? Could you imagine if
we went to Ann Arbor and the Lord brought like almost the
whole city to hear the gospel? Could you imagine that? Or even
here in Elmont, right here. Wouldn't that be amazing? Oh,
we get encouraged when we have one or two visitors, don't we?
Could you imagine the whole city? Man, their hearts must have just
been beating ready to preach the gospel. I'll tell you what,
they'd be like a caged lion, beloved, just ready to let it
go. Oh my, because God's entrusted
them with the gospel. See, we're here as a church,
we're entrusted with the gospel. We've been entrusted with the
gospel. That's why we won't water it down. That's why we won't
hold back. We preach that Christ came to
save sinners, and we're all a bunch of sinners. And we need to be
saved, don't we? Oh, yeah. Look at verse 45. Oh, here we
go. Here's the religious folks. Here
we go. But when the Jews saw the multitudes,
they were filled with envy and spake against those things which
were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Remember, these
are unbelievers. Whether they're Jews or Gentiles,
they're unbelievers. They're not born again. They're
not born again. And we see that Paul's warning
in his sermon on the previous Sabbath had absolutely no effect
upon him. Remember he warned them? He warned
them, had no effect upon them, no effect upon them. The unbelieving
Jews here, we see in verse 45 that the work that God had done
in and through his son meant absolutely nothing to them. And
that's how we were before the Lord saved us, right? So they're no different than
us. They're just unsaved men and women. Oh, my. How do we know it meant nothing
to them? Well, we see in our text. They didn't believe the
gospel Paul declared. He declared the gospel to them.
They didn't believe it. And this applies to all throughout
the gospel age who turn a deaf ear to God's preachers and who
declare that the the perfect redeeming work of the Lord Jesus
Christ, that's what God's preachers declare, and when people turn
a deaf ear to that, they're turning a deaf ear to God. And that's just as true today
as it was back then. To deny God's perfect redemption
for his elect is to deny that Jesus Christ is the savior of
his people. And you know what else? More importantly, it's
denying. When people deny that Christ
is the only Savior, they're denying what the scripture declares in
Jonah 2, 9, salvation is of the Lord. That's really what they're
denying. When a man thinks they can save themselves or a woman
thinks they can save themselves, they are denying the scriptures
that say salvation is of the Lord. They're denying when Christ says,
no man can come unto the Father, or come unto me, except the Father
draw him. And I was talking with a friend of mine this week, and
we were talking to another friend of ours about this very thing.
And my buddy said to him, he said, you're calling God a liar. It's true though, isn't it? If
we deny what the scripture says, we are calling God a liar. That's serious business. That's serious business. Oh my. My oh my. Let's read verses 46
and 47. So Paul and Barnabas are now
facing opposition from the Jews. What do they do? Well, I love
this, and this only comes by the power of God, the Holy Spirit,
right? This only comes by that. Preacher
can only be a preacher by the power of God and by him making
the man a preacher. Look at this, then Paul and Barnabas
waxed bold. Brother Tom, they didn't say,
oh man, you hurt my feelings, did they? These were manly men,
right? But they were manly men by the power of God, and they
waxed bold. They waxed bold, but they didn't
turn tail and run. They waxed, these are soldiers
of the cross, right? That's what we are. Right? Then Paul and Barnabas waxed
bold and said, it was necessary that the word of God should first
have been spoken to you. But seeing ye put it from you,
and look at this, oh my goodness, and judge yourselves unworthy
of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. Now, there's
a whole bunch of Gentiles there listening, isn't there? Because
this is a Gentile city. 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. So
in verse 46, we see, by the power of God the Holy Spirit working
in Paul and Barnabas, that they waxed bold to declare the gospel. They didn't back down. They waxed
bold. My oh my, they declared the truth
of the gospel, which is Christ Jesus is the only savior of sinners. And no, Paul said this to the
unbelieving Jews, it was necessary that the word of God, which is
the gospel, should first have been spoken to you. It was necessary
because the Lord commanded his apostles to preach the gospel
to the Jews first, beginning at Jerusalem. We saw that at
the first of our study in the book of Acts. But we know that from our study
previously, that the Holy Spirit had said, separate Paul and Barnabas
unto me, and they're sent to the Gentiles, aren't they? And then verse 46, look at what
he says in verse 46. It was necessary that the word
of God, which is the gospel, should first have been spoken
to you, but seeing you put it from you and judge yourselves
unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles. So these unbelievers, these unbelieving
Jews, are filled with loathing and indignation. They are mad.
They are mad. Oh my, they put the gospel truths
out of their darkened minds as quick as they could. They had
heard Paul warn them the week before. They put it right out
of their minds, haven't they? They're like plugging their ears.
I'm not going to listen to this. But when they did that, they
judged themselves unworthy of eternal life. Listen to what
John Gale says about this. He says, no man is worthy of
everlasting life. None of us are. He goes on to
say, on account of anything done by him. So nothing we do makes
us worthy for eternal life. Nothing. Nothing. For it is the free gift of God.
And all who are sensible of themselves and of the just demerit of sin
conclude themselves unworthy to inherit eternal life. So we
as believers even know and declare that we're unworthy of this eternal
life that we have. But this was not the case of
these Jews, nor is it the sense here. But the meaning is that
the Jews, by this act of theirs in rejecting the gospel, did
it as it were to pass sentence upon themselves and determine
against themselves that they ought not to be saved, since
they despised the only true means of salvation. My oh my. They rejected the only
true means of salvation. And so after Paul and Barnabas
told those Jews that they were counted unworthy of everlasting
life, they said in the last part of verse 6, look at this, lo,
we turn to the Gentiles. We're going to turn to these
idol worshipers. We're all a bunch of Gentiles
here. Aren't you glad? Aren't you thankful
that God included Jews and Gentiles in the body of Christ? Remember, nothing happens by
chance. It's all done on purpose. God
had purposed the salvation of elect Jews and elect Gentiles,
right? As we saw in Ephesians 1, because
it pleased him to do so. There's nothing in us. So those
Gentiles must hear the gospel, right, Brother Zane? They must.
So God's gonna send the gospel to them. And could you imagine if we were
there as Gentiles? We'd be thinking, well, this
is for the Jews. And the only way we could receive
this is if we became, you know, a Jewish proselyte. That would
mean giving up all our false gods that we thought were real
gods. Oh, my. But God, we see, has
a plan. Because those he chose in Christ
are composed of Jews and Gentiles. Right? And we become what? One
in Christ, don't we? Oh, it's magnificent. Look at
this. This is amazing. Lo, we turn to the Gentiles.
Then look at verse 47. 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. Now,
they're not preaching salvation in them, because we know that,
because the salvation's only in Christ. When it says, thou
shouldest be for salvation to the ends of the earth, it just
means they're carrying the gospel of salvation in Christ and Him
alone. They're going to proclaim the gospel of Christ and salvation
only in Him. Remember, these are saved men.
These are men who have been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ. They were born again. Paul, Mars,
they were Jews. They were Jews. And now, they're
born again blood-washed believers. And look again at verse 47. The
Lord commanded them, saying, I have sent thee to be a light.
So they're sent to be a light. They're sent to be a shining
light to the Gentiles. How? By preaching the gospel to them.
And by the power of God the Holy Spirit, Gentiles would be born again.
As many, we're going to see, as were ordained to eternal life.
Believed. believed. Oh, and how does God
get the gospel to his elect? Well, he sends a preacher, doesn't
he? He sends a preacher. And don't forget, I'm not just
preaching to us as a congregation. The message is going all over
the world, isn't it, from here? So whomever God wants to hear
that message, they will hear it. for his glory and honor and praise.
So Paul and Barnabas are to be shining light to the Gentiles
by preaching the gospel, but again, it's the power of God,
the Holy Spirit, who does the saving. So they're sent to preach
the gospel until the end of the earth. Now look at verse 48,
look at this. And when the Gentiles heard this, okay, these are a
bunch of idol worshipers, man. They're bowing down to wood and
stone. Very similar to the statues of
Mary I used to bow down to, my shame. Just a piece of stone. Nothing there. Just a piece of
stone. Some man carved it, made a lot
of money. And I foolishly paid money, well
my mom and dad back then paid money to buy those things. Oh my. You ever see a statue
of Mary out there or any of the other ones? It's just an idol. Lord save me out of that. I know.
It's nothing but idol worship. You say, oh, how can you say
that? Because it's true. Oh my. Now here, bunch of idolaters. And when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad. And they glorified God. They
were saying, you know what they were saying? Hallelujah. In their
own language, they were praising God. Remember, hallelujah means
praise ye the Lord. It's a word that's been taken
by certain groups. And we Baptists think, well,
better not say hallelujah. No, let us be joyful and happy,
beloved. We're born again. Praise you,
the Lord. We're saved. It's in Psalm 150.
It starts off with, praise you, the Lord. Hallelujah in the Hebrew.
And it ends with, praise you, the Lord. Hallelujah in the Hebrew. It's wonderful. It's a beautiful word. So they
were glad, they were rejoicing. And they, look at this, they
glorified the word of the Lord. These idol worshipers are now
glorifying God. And the scripture says, and as
many as were ordained to eternal life, what? Believed. Does it say they prayed a prayer
and not text? Does it say that Paul and Barnabas
manipulated them by having certain music playing and setting an
ambience? No, all they were doing was preaching
the gospel, wasn't it? That's all they did. They proclaimed
Christ, didn't they? They proclaimed Christ. Look
at this. And when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad and glorified the word of the Lord. And as
many as were ordained to eternal life believed. This verse, beloved,
says what it means and means what it says. Let's read this wonderful verse
again. Look at this and marvel at this truth that's set before
us. And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad and glorified
the word of the Lord and as many as were ordained to eternal life
believed. Oh, now we can take this verse
apart, we can take verse 48 apart, we can execute it, we can examine
it, we can look at every word carefully, looking up the correct
meaning of every word, and we can put it all back together,
and it means what it says, still. As many as were ordained to eternal
life believe. You know what this verse does?
This verse destroys universal redemption, which says Christ
died for everyone. This verse is a destruction,
a blow to that false teaching. Because Christ said, I lay my
life down for the sheep. Again, I don't know who they
are, so I preach the gospel to everyone. But this is a truth
that's set forth before us in scripture. And as I said, in
my natural state when I was in religion, I rejected this truth.
But now, it's become one of the most beloved doctrines for me
in the scriptures. Because I never would have chosen
Christ if he hadn't chosen me. It's wonderful. It destroys universal redemption. Do you know that the doctrine
of universal redemption, which says Christ died for everyone,
cannot be put forth without twisting and maligning a whole bunch of
scriptures and ripping things out of context. Oh my. And folks that do that,
they're wrestling the scripture to their own destruction. Do you know, listen to this,
I looked it up in the Greek literal Bible. When someone's appointed
to a position, they're chosen to that position, aren't they?
Somebody chooses them and appoints them to that. You know you're
going to be choosing who's president pretty soon? You're going to
be electing who's president? Isn't that amazing? Man says, well, men can choose,
but God can't. No, let me tell you this. There's
only one real free will in this whole universe. Our will is bound
to our nature, whether it be a dead nature or whether we're
born again. The only one who truly has free
will is God, because he can do whatever he pleases, can't he?
And none can stay his hand. None, but listen to this in the
Greek literal Bible. I thought this was amazing. It
brings forth, as I said, you can break verse 48 down, you
can exegete it, you can do all kinds of things, but it still
says what it says and means what it says. Listen to this in the
Greek literal Bible. And the Gentiles, hearing it,
were rejoicing, that's the gospel, and glorifying the word of the
Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal life, believed. They
were appointed to eternal, well, who appointed them to that? Amen. God appointed them, didn't he?
They didn't appoint themselves. Does it say as many as appointed
themselves were ordained to eternal life? No, it doesn't, because
none of us would appoint ourselves to that. Because by nature, we
do not want anything to do with God. But again, in the Greek
literal Bible, and the Gentiles hearing it rejoicing and glorifying
the word of the Lord, and as many as were appointed to eternal
life believed. Oh my. So marvel at what the
text says. The Gentiles heard. They were
given ears to hear, weren't they? See, they were born again and
given faith to believe the gospel. Regeneration always precedes
faith. You must be born again. And if
you're born again, God's going to give you faith to believe
the gospel, which we never believed before. It's wonderful. Oh my. So someone asked me, well, all
this whole election thing, all these elect, who are the elect?
All who believe. That's who the elect are. And I mean believe before
they pass in to the next, before they pass from this world. Because
God will save all his sheep, every one of them. My, oh, my. So all who God had
appointed, all who God had chosen before the foundation of the
world, believed the gospel. They believed what Paul said.
All those Gentiles who were ordained to eternal life. And they were
rejoicing, which means they were cheerful and happy. They were
filled with great joy. Well, one might ask, well, why? Why? Well, they believed the
gospel Paul preached, which is salvation in and through Christ
alone and the forgiveness of sins through Christ alone. Why
did they believe that gospel? Because they were ordained to
eternal life. See, it's a very God-glorifying and God-honoring
doctrine, isn't it? It gives God all the glory. See,
natural men, we want something to do. And we want the glory. God won't share His glory with
anyone. This doctrine glorifies our great God. It puts Him high
above us. And we are left in wonder and
awe that God chose us in Christ according to the good pleasure
of His will. And we rejoice, don't we? We
rejoice. So salvation, these same truths
then, apply to all who believe that we were ordained to eternal
life because the Lord Jesus Christ, by his perfect sin-atoning work
on Calvary's cross 2,000 years ago, saved us from our sins.
And then we're born again by the Holy Spirit of God. Why?
Because we're chosen in Christ before the foundation of the
world. And he redeemed us on Calvary's cross. And now with
God-given faith, We believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. What caused these Gentiles who
were idol worshipers to turn from those idols and to serve
the living and true God? God did that. God the Holy Spirit
by his almighty power. Isn't that wonderful? Oh, and
so we glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. We embrace his gospel. We're not ashamed of it. We acknowledge
that his gospel is the power of God and the salvation to everyone
that believes. And we say, whosoever will, let
him come. Take in the water of life freely. We glorify the word of the Lord
by humbly bowing our hearts. before the Lord Jesus Christ.
He is the risen, exalted God-man who saved his people from their
sins, and he alone is deserving of all our glory and all our
honor and all our praise. And those whom the Lord Jesus
Christ has redeemed, he must have, he will save every one
of them, and he will take them home at their death. He will. Oh my, because he saved them
by his perfect sin atoning work on Calvary's cross. And the Holy
Spirit will find them and bring them to Christ. Bring them to
Christ. And all those for whom Christ
suffered and whom he died for to redeem will be with him in
glory. Because not one of those whom
he redeemed with his precious blood shall ever be lost. Praise his mighty, mighty name. My. Brother Brian, can you close
us in prayer, brother?