Again, open your Bibles up to
the book of Nahum. Nahum means comfort. Comfort. But in this prophecy, there's
no comfort for the city of Nineveh. It's a prophecy against Nineveh.
Let's read in chapter 2, in verses 1 to 13. Do you know that the scriptures
declare here that the Lord was against Nineveh? Now Nineveh,
there'd been a great revival in Nineveh, hadn't there? When
Jonah was sent there, there'd been a great revival. But years
later, they'd gone back to their idol worshiping. And we're going
to see here that the Lord says He's against them. He's against
them. Nahum, chapter 2, verse 1. He that dashes in pieces has
come up before thy face. Keep the munition which the way
make thy loins strong, fortify thy power mightily. For the Lord,
that's Jehovah, hath turned away the excellency of Jacob as the
excellency of Israel. For the emptyers have emptied
them out and marred their vine branches. The shield of the mighty
man is made red, war. The valiant men are in scarlet,
covered in blood. Chariots shall be with flaming
torches in the day of his preparation, and the fir trees shall be terribly
shaken. The chariots raids in the streets,
they shall jostle one against another in the broad ways. They
seem like torches. They shall run like the lightning. He shall recount his worthies.
They shall stumble in their walk. They shall make haste to the
wall thereof and the defense shall be prepared. The gates
of the river shall be opened and the palaces shall be dissolved.
And Hesop shall be led away captive, she shall be bought up, and her
maids shall lead her with the voice of doves taboring upon
their breasts. But Nineveh is of old, like a
pool of water, yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall
they cry, but none shall look back. Take ye the spoil of silver,
take the spoil of gold, for there is none end of the store in the
glory out of all the pleasant furniture. She is empty and void
and waste, and the heart melteth and the knees smite together,
and much pain is on all her loins, and the faces of them all gather
blackness. Now she's been ravished, the
city's been ravished. The city's been taken by war. Where is the dwelling of the
lions and the feeding place of the young lions? Where the lion,
even the old lion, walked, and the lion's whelp, and none made
them afraid? The lion did tear in pieces enough
for his whelps, and strangled his lioness, and filled the holes
with prey, and the dens with ribbon. Here we go, here's verse
13, here's our text. Behold, I am against thee, saith
the Lord of hosts. I'm against thee. And I will
burn her chariots in the smoke, and the sword shall devour thy
young lions, and I will cut off thy prey from the earth, and
the voice of the messengers shall no more be heard. My. The Lord says here, behold,
I am against thee. What a terrifying verse. The
Lord of glory against them. Can anyone stand up against the
Lord? No one. No one. My. Nineveh was a great city
of evil. at one time in Genesis chapter
10 it says in Cush begot Nimrod he began to be a mighty one in
the earth and he was a mighty hunter before the Lord wherefore
it is said even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord
in the beginning of his kingdom was Babel in Iraq in Ascod and
Calna in the land of Sinai out of the land went forth Asar and
belted Nineveh Genesis 10 verses 8 to 11 Nineveh was a prosperous city,
very prosperous city in the ancient world. We see in chapter 1, it
says here, the book, the burden of Nineveh, the book of the vision
of Nahum, the Ecclesite. What does the burden of Nineveh
mean? If you look in chapter 1, in verse 1, it says the burden
of Nineveh, the burden of Nineveh. What does that mean? Well, she
repented once, didn't she? She repented once, but she's
returned to her wicked ways again. And that burden is that this
city will now be totally destroyed. It'll now be totally destroyed. And this book was written around
100 years after the repentance in Jonah. It was one of the world's largest
cities at the time. The inner city was surrounded
by a wall eight miles long. Eight miles long. A hundred feet
high. Could you imagine an army coming
up and seeing this wall a hundred feet high? Now to men that's insurmountable,
right? And they say the walls were so wide that you could run three chariots
around it. They could race around the walls.
That's how thick, how wide they were. A hundred feet wide and
enough to run three chariots on those walls. Now men would look at that and
go, how? Just walk away, right? But for God to destroy that city,
it's nothing. See, men builds up all their
foundational lives, right? all their foundational lives,
I did this to gain merit and favor with God, I did that. All
these things, all these bulwarks, and God just lays them bare.
Doesn't he? Just takes them down to nothing.
My. So at the time, it was one of
the world's largest cities. And beyond the outer wall was
an inner city. in outer city as well. And what
we would call extensive suburbs. So there was multiple walls. And they would be like suburbs,
like we call them suburbs, living around the city. The expanse was so big of the
city that in Jonah chapter 3, 3 it says, so Jonah rose and
went into Nineveh according to the word of the Lord. Now the
Nineveh was an exceeding great city of three days journey. It
took you three days of walking to get from one end of Nineveh
to the other end. And why too? It was huge. It
was a huge city. And when Jonah got there, it
was a city given over to idolatry, wasn't it? And then the Lord
did a mighty work. And now we see a hundred years
later, they're back to their idol worshiping. See, God doesn't guarantee that
our children will be saved, does he? No, he saved us. And we praise
God when he does save our children. We praise God, but it's not a
guarantee, is it? Oh my. It's all by the grace
and mercy of God. All by the grace and mercy of
God. If you're saved here, if you're sitting today and you're
a saved person, it's all by the grace and mercy of God. God's
had mercy on us. You know, it's wonderful. Wonderful. One professor of old said that
the vast city is estimated to be 216 square miles in size. That's huge. That's like our
cities nowadays. Huge. And this prophecy is about the
fall of Nineveh. In verses one and two, we see
the vengeance of the offended true and living God. He that dashes in pieces has
come. Actually, look at verse 2 of
chapter 1. God is jealous, and the Lord revengeth. The Lord
revengeth and is furious. The Lord will take vengeance
on his adversaries, and he reserveth wrath for his enemies. See, that's
why the scripture says, vengeance is mine, saith the Lord. We're
not to seek vengeance. The Lord will take care of it.
He'll take care of it. And we can have comfort in that,
can't we? We can find comfort in that. So Nineveh, as mighty as it was,
was about to be destroyed. People say, well, how can God
do that? How did the walls of Jericho
fall? By a word. By his command. One angel, he sends one angel
to kill the 185,000 Assyrians in one night. One angel. What
power he wields, our God. And that was one of his servants
that did that. That was an angel that did it. Imagine if the Lord
himself, he could take the breath out of everyone living on this
earth, couldn't he? He has so much power, and yet
people think, I don't believe in him. My. My. As mighty as Nineveh was, it
was about to be completely destroyed. Completely destroyed. And so
Tolo was the destruction that not only were the people lost
from history, but the city itself was non-existent until it was
discovered by archaeologists in the 1800s. God just wiped it off the face
of the map. My oh my. Go over to chapter
3 and look at verse 11. And it's brought forth that none
of us shall be hid. Again, it was only rediscovered in the
1800s. Look at this. Thou also shalt be drunken, thou
shalt be hid. Look at that. God said, I'm going
to so destroy, it's going to be hid. And it was hid until the 1800s. Thou also shalt seek strength
because of the enemy. And the Lord used the armies
of the Persians, the Medes, the Arabians, and the Babylonians
to utterly subdue this city. Over in chapter one, verse eight,
it talks about this being as an overwhelming flood. Look at
this. But with an overwhelming flood
will he make another end of the place. thereof, and darkness
shall pursue his enemies." Utter destruction. Utter destruction. And even those great armies could
not have taken Nineveh unless the Lord allowed. Always remember
that. If God didn't allow it to happen,
it never would have happened. He allowed them to destroy Nineveh. See, God uses means, doesn't
he? Oh my. And according to secular accounts,
unusually heavy rains caused the rivers to flood and undermine
the city walls. Which in chapter 1 verse 8 it
says, but with an overwhelming flood shall he make another end
of the place. A flood happened and undermined
the walls. Couldn't get over them, but now
they could get under them. My, oh my, behold the mighty
power and hand of our great God. The walls were a hundred feet
high, eight miles long, and so wide that three chariots could
race abreast it. How much water would it take
How much water would it take to destroy the foundation that
was underneath them? Take a lot of water, wouldn't
it? My, oh my. And as the walls began
to break up, the king remembered an oracle to the effect that
Nineveh would only fall when the river itself declared war
against it. See, they couldn't have taken
the city without this happening. And God had it come to pass.
Now they could get into the city. Now they could ravage the city. The king abandoned all hope of
saving himself, and he had built for him a huge funeral pyre,
heaped up large quantities of gold and costly clothes, and
shut his concubines and eunuchs in the chamber in the midst,
and burned himself, his family, and his concubines and eunuchs
in the place when this all was occurring. Awful. Awful what men will do. What the depravity of man will
cause man to do. And there was unparalleled looting. It was reported that the slaughter
was so great that the blood of the multitude of slain mingled
with the rivers and changed color for miles. There was so much
blood. Unparalleled looting for centuries,
the wealth of the world had poured into Nineveh. The wealth of the world. As a
result of the Assyrian conquest, and one historian said, they
plundered the spoil of the city, a quantity beyond counting. They
took so much, there was nothing left. They plundered it so much. And the great host of the enemy
had silver, gold, copper, ivory, all precious materials. This
is described in verses 8 to 10 of chapter 2. Let's turn there. It says, but Nineveh is of old
like a pool of water. They shall flee away, stand,
stand, shall they cry, but none shall look back. Take ye the
spoil of silver, take the spoil of gold, for there is none. End
to the store in glory out of all the pleasant furniture. She
is empty and void and waste. and the heart melteth, and the
knees smite together, and much pain is in all loins, and the
faces of them all gather blackness. My. See, when judgment falls,
it falls quick. It falls quick. And the enemy's
plundered all the silver, gold, all the wealth of this great
city. She's pillaged, she's plundered, she's stripped of everything. Could you imagine how the citizens
felt as they were led, carried out, away in captivity? How their
hearts would be grieved over that great destruction of their
city? And how they would tremble in
fear over their enemies? Now, one may ask, what caused
all this? Well, we find the answer in the last verse in chapter
2. It says, Behold, I am against
thee, saith the Lord of hosts. My, that's chilling. The whole
cause of this destruction, the whole cause of this destruction
was because the Lord was against them. Now think of this. Our Lord not
only speaks these words to all who were in Nineveh, but he seeks
them to all who sin against him. These words are to all in Alamont,
Michigan, in all the surrounding towns. whose sins have not been washed
away in the precious blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Where's deliverance to be found?
Oh, here's the good news. Deliverance is to be found at
the cross. Deliverance is to be found in
the man, Christ Jesus, who gave himself a ransom for all the
sins of his people. God poured out His wrath, just
as His wrath was poured out on Nineveh. God poured out His wrath
on Christ. That wrath that was due us, He
poured it fully out on Christ. He bore it all, beloved. He bore
it all. So much so that God doesn't remember
our sin anymore. It's God. It's washed clean in
the precious blood of Christ. We stand beneath the cross. We
stand at, we actually sit at Christ's feet. We stand and He stands before
us and all the judgments of God fall upon Him in our room and
place. What a Savior. What a Redeemer. And these people of Nineveh,
they died such violent deaths. But you know what? They faced
a much more terrifying, a much more terrifying situation after
their deaths. And that's true for all who die
without Christ. The Scripture declares, it's
appointed unto men once to die, but after this, the judgment. And it does not make any difference what death
you are appointed to in this life, but it does make a great
difference whether or not you're appointed
to that judgment. That judgment. I am against thee, saith the
Lord of hosts. He's going to say one thing or
the other. He's going to say, I'm against thee. Or he's going
to say, well done, thy good and faithful servant. Enter into
the joy of my rest. And the only reason we are going
to hear, well done, thy good and faithful servant, is because
of what Christ did for us. Isn't that amazing? It's counted
for us. It's counted for us, beloved,
by the mercy and grace of God. So I ask you, have you bowed
to the Lord Jesus? Have you cried out to Him and
said, Lord, save me or I die? Save me or I die? If one does
not bow to Him here, they're going to bow to Him at the great
white judgment throne. People say, I don't believe in
God. Well, you're going to meet Him. And I pray you meet Him as a Savior,
not as your judge. That's my prayer. If one does not bow to Him here,
they're going to bow to Him at the Great White Judgment. Look
at verse 13 again. Nahum chapter 2, verse 13. Behold, I am against thee, saith
the Lord of hosts, and I will burn her chariots in the smoke,
and the sword shall devour thy young lions, and I will cut off
thy prey from the earth, and the voice of thy messengers shall
no more be heard. My, what an awful statement to
hear if you're not delivered from your sins. Behold, I am
against thee, saith the Lord. Do you know the only one that
made us to differ is God himself from us here in that statement
as believers? It's the grace and mercy of God.
That's the only thing that makes us to differ. It's incredible to think that
God would have mercy on us. Why? Well, as we looked at in
Sunday school, because we're the children of promise. And
we always have been. We didn't know it, but we always
have been. You know, God's not ordained
us to wrath as believers. Isn't that incredible? That's what the scripture says.
He's not ordained us to wrath, but to salvation through the
Lord Jesus Christ. It's absolutely wonderful. My, could you imagine hearing
these words though? I am against thee, saith the
Lord. What chilling words. What chilling words. And then
comes the wrath, the eternal wrath of God. Listen to the psalmist crying
in Psalm 31 verses 1 and 2. He says, deliver me in thy righteousness. Oh Lord, deliver me in thy righteousness. Who's his righteousness? The
Lord Jesus Christ. So the psalmist is crying, deliver
me. Deliver me in Christ. Who do the Old Testament saints
look to? The Messiah. Who do we look to? The Messiah.
Right? The Lord Jesus Christ, God incarnate
in the flesh. Isn't it wonderful? It's absolutely
wonderful. Deliver me in thy righteousness.
Bow down thine ear to hear to me. Deliver me speedily. Be thou
my strong rock for a house of defense to save me. Christ is
our defense, isn't he? He's protected us from the wrath
of God. He bore it all. You know, you
hear about soldiers throwing themselves on a hand grenade
for their buddies. and given their life, given their life. Greater love hath no man than
this, though. The eternal wrath of God fell upon our Savior,
the sinless. Think of this, He's sinless.
We're a bunch of sinners. And the eternal wrath of God
that was due us fell on Him in our room and place. His love
is so great for us. So majestic, so unmeasurable. And the great need of sinners
is to be reconciled to God, right? And having made peace through
the blood of his cross by him to reconcile all things to himself
and you, who were sometimes alien and enemies in your mind by wicked
works, yet now hath he reconciled. We're reconciled to God by absolutely
nothing we did. All by what Christ has done. All by what he's done. The grace
of God brings salvation. Oh, it brings salvation. Being
justified freely by his grace. Remember justified rendered innocent?
Tom, you guys were talking about how we're made that way, by God. And there's a work to do that,
and that's the work of God. We're born again by an operation
of God. My. being justified freely by His
grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. See,
redemption is only in Christ. Salvation's only in Christ. To
be saved from our sins, we must look to Christ and Him alone.
There's no other hope. There's no other way. No other
way at all. Not by works of righteousness,
which we have done, but according to His mercy saved us. And we've tasted that mercy,
haven't we, beloved? God's so merciful to us, so wonderful
to us. And think of this, we don't seek
grace out, God brings it to us. Were you looking for Christ when
he came to you? Oh, he made us willing, didn't he? And then
we looked at him. But before that, were we looking
for Christ? Not at all. We could have been
raised in the church and heard the gospel. Had no effect on us until one
day, that appointed time, you're born again by the Holy Spirit
of God, given life. Now that message is real. Now
you hear the shepherd's voice through the preaching of the
word. My, oh my. I ask you, you who do not know Christ, do
you want to be complete and have all your sins forgiven? And I
want us to think of this, as believers, we're complete in
Him. And just let that sit. We're
complete in Christ. And we know what complete is,
don't we? Can you add anything to complete? Rejoice, beloved, we're complete
in Him. We're complete in His perfect
sin atoning work. The hardest thing for us to do,
as Sister Linda was saying, is just rest in that. Just trust
in that. That's why Peter said, Lord,
help my unbelief. Did we not say that too? Lord,
help my unbelief. Help me. Give me faith and grace. And you know what? I'm always
amazed as I talk to the saints of God. As I talk to them and
they look back and they say, Wayne, I look back at that now
and I see how God just carried me right through that. He gave
me the strength. He gave me the strength. He gave me the peace
that passes all this, just when I needed it. He gave me the grace
that I needed to get through that situation. Don't take that lightly, beloved.
Look back at that and marvel. Marvel at that. We couldn't have
made it through the situations that we go through in this life
without God. So the grace of God comes to
us. It brings salvation to us. And that salvation is in and
through the Lord Jesus Christ. And we are complete in Him. In
Christ, the believers fulfilled all the law. Now think of that.
Think of that. I was talking to someone about
the Mosaic Law. They asked, well, when did God give the Mosaic
Law? Well, it was right after he gave the Ten Commandments,
right? So if someone wants to live by the law, they've got
to keep all the Ten Commandments plus all the Mosaic Law. But
we can't do any of it. And we look at the Ten Commandments
and say, well, yeah, we shouldn't lie, right? We shouldn't bear
false witness against one another. We shouldn't kill. We shouldn't
commit adultery, right? And we don't want to, do we?
We don't want to as believers. But when the Lord spiritualized
the law and said, if you're just angry with your brother, you
already killed him. Well, we're all done, aren't we? Every one
of us. Is there anyone in this room
that doesn't get angry? Even now, after we're saved,
do you ever get angry? Praise God it's covered under
the blood. Oh, when I see the blood, I'll
pass over you. I'll pass over you. Now if one sincerely desires
grace, it'll come. You know why? I always get excited
when I see someone, when I see someone get an interest in our
great God. A true interest too. When you
start to see them, start to see them slowly start to, hey I want
to read the Bible, or hey I want to do this, or I want to start
listening to a message here and there. I always get excited because
it's God that's giving them that desire. And you just pray that the Lord
will make it fruitful, right? Just pray that that seed is found
good soil. And if God's planted that seed,
it'll be good soil. But there are some that fall
on stony ground, thorns, and the cares of this world choke
it away, right? But praise God for the seed that
falls on good ground. You know what that good ground
is? You know what that good ground is? That good ground is prepared
ground. It's prepared ground. It's already
prepared. That ground's already prepared
before the seed even falls. Brother Neil, you plow your fields
and everything before you plant and all that? You get the field
all ready for whatever seed you're going to plant? And then you
plant the seed, and God gives the increase. See, God, the Holy Spirit, prepares
the ground. Before we even hear the word,
he's prepared the ground, the soil of our hearts, beloved.
So when that seed comes at the appointed time that God's appointed
for us to be born again, that seed falls on good ground. And
God gives the increase. Isn't that wonderful? I remember
when we were working in construction. Our builder would buy plots of
land. So you'd just see this field, just a field, empty field. And all of a sudden, you'd start
to see these signs. And ours was Whittle Construction, the
fellow who we worked for Whittle. And so they had a sign there,
Whittle Construction. And another one had another sign here for
another. But that property was Carrick's. And the next thing
you know, you start to see, here comes the dozers. and the diggers, and they start
digging that ground. And they prepare that ground, right? And here comes the concrete guys,
and they lay the foundation. And here comes the framers, and
they frame it up. And here come the drywall guys
and the roofers. The next thing you know, about three weeks later,
everything's done and they're working inside. See, God prepares,
God prepares the soil of our hearts to receive that word.
Isn't that wonderful? And he purchased us, didn't he?
Just as that builder I worked for purchased that land, out
of all the other land. There was a whole bunch of, whole
field of land, but he says, I want this plot right here. That's
mine. That's mine. God says, you're
mine. You're mine. My son, I'm gonna
send my son, I'm gonna send my son to purchase you. 2,000 years ago, our Lord, our great
God, sent His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, to purchase
us with His precious, precious blood. And because we're children,
because we're the elect of God, God sends His Spirit into our
hearts. See? The prepared ground. You're mine. It's my property. Tills the soil
of our hearts. We hear the Word. We might have
heard the word a week before and had no effect on us. No effect
at all. And then now, could be driving down the road.
Could be driving down the road, right? The Lord quickened you
just like that when you heard the message. That happened to
one of our brothers here. I believe! I believe! Isn't that wonderful? You'd be at home thinking about
the message. Holy Spirit just quickens you.
I believe. Oh, isn't it good? Isn't God
so gracious to us? Isn't he so merciful to us? that
the judgment doesn't fall upon us, that he's not against us,
but you know what? He's actually for us. And the
scriptures say, if God be for you, who can be against you? Right? He's not against us. He's
not up there going, away, and you messed up on Thursday, and
you messed up on Friday, and you really messed up on Saturday,
and man, Sunday you did, oh my. No, God don't do that, does he? There's one of my sheep. He's
clothed in my son's righteousness. And I don't see his sin anymore. There's one of my dear little
sheep. She's clothed in the righteousness
of Christ. She's mine. I made her and I
bought her. I'm going to take her home. I'm
going to take him home too. Isn't that wonderful? Oh, it's so wonderful. I'll tell you what. It just gets
better and better. And we're complete in Christ.
We're complete in Him. The law of God now has no terror
for us. Because God's wrath against sin has been satisfied. You know, it's been absolutely
satisfying. One commentator I read and then I actually got to hear
him preach one time. I love this. You've heard me
use it before. God is so forgiving us for all our sins that there's
not even smoke coming off the offering anymore. You know, when
they burnt an offering, there'd be smoke rise up. The wrath of
God against us has been so extinguished that it's like a fire that has
no smoke. It's gone. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's
absolutely, there's not even a, because sometimes you go by
a house that was on fire and you see smoke still, even after
they put water on it. See smoke still? There was no
smoke. His wrath has been totally extinguished.
It's gone. It's gone against us. And that's
why the love of Christ, the love of the Father is so amazing to
us. It's not at all, it's not at all like the love our fathers
had for us. God's ways are not our ways,
and our fathers and our mothers love us dearly. But this love
is so different. This love is eternal. This love
is unchanging. This love has no depths to it,
no depths. Do you know God loves you as
much as he loves Christ? Let's look at that. John chapter
17. John chapter 17. I'll tell you
what, praise God he's not against us. Praise God he's not against
us. That his wrath has been appeased
in Christ. My oh my. Let's start up in verse 20. Our Lord here is praying. He's
prayed for himself in the first five verses. Then he's prayed
for the apostles from verse 6 to 19. And now he's going to pray
for the elect. For all who believe on him. And
that's us too. Think of this. This prayer occurred
2,000 years ago and the Holy Spirit has kept it, preserved
it, right? So that we can read it. Now as
we read these words, remember that this portion here is speaking
of us. Speaking of we who believe from
what the apostles preach. See, the gospel that we believe
is the same gospel that Paul preached, the same gospel that
John preached, the same gospel that Peter preached. Look at
this. Neither pray I for these alone, not speaking of the apostles,
but for them also which shall believe on me through their word,
through the preaching of the gospel. that they all may be one as Thou,
Father, art in me and I in Thee, and that they also may be one
in us, that the world may believe that Thou hast sent me. In the
glory which Thou gavest me, I have given them, that they may be
one, even as we are one. I in them, look at verse 23,
here's the key, I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be
made perfect in one, that's one body, perfect in one and that
the world may know that thou has sent me and has loved them.
Okay now, love them? Who's it speaking of? God's elect. Now buckle in, buckle in. Has
loved them as thou has loved me. God the Father loves we who
are his people as he loves Christ. Why? Because he's the head, we're
the body. We're one with him. See? We keep,
it's so hard for us to grasp this really, this unchanging
love. But this is the master's words. This is God in the flesh saying
this. And he's telling us here that God the Father has loved
us as he's loved Christ. That's truth. And he said, Father, I will that
they also, whom thou hast given me, be with me where I am, that
they may behold my glory, which thou hast given me, for thou
lovest me from before the foundation of the world. Oh, righteous Father, what a
title. Holy, righteous is our God. Oh, righteous Father, the
world hath not known me, but I have known thee, and these
have known that thou hast sent me. Now look at verse 25. Verse
25 is very interesting. Look at this. Oh, righteous Father. He's going to name two parties
in this verse here. He says, the world hath not known
thee, But I have known thee, and these have known that thou
hast sent me." See, there's the world, there's Christ, and then
there's his elect. Who's in the middle? Who's the
one made us to differ? Christ. There's a division there,
he says. The world, himself, and his people. The world doesn't know him. But
we know him by the grace of God. And we know now that God's not
against us. We know that, don't we? We've
been taught that by the Holy Spirit of God. See, the first
part of this message is pretty sobering. But the last part brings
us comfort as God's people. Not only are we loved by God
the Father as he loves Christ, But the only one who made us
to differ is the one in the middle, being Christ. The only reason we're saved is
because of what Christ has done for us. And it says, and I have declared
unto them thy name, and will declare it in that the love wherewith
thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them. Again, you've
heard me say many times, the one thing Satan can't counterfeit
is the love of God and Christ in the believer. He can counterfeit
a lot of things, but he can't counterfeit that love, because
it comes from God. It doesn't come from us. And really, even our works don't
come from us. It comes from the Holy Spirit
of God. It's Him working in us. See? Even those works we looked
at that God has ordained from before the foundation of the
world in Sunday school, for us to do, they're all done in us
by the Holy Spirit of God. Isn't that amazing? So who gets
the glory? God gets it all. He gets it all. He gets all the glory and honor
and