I would invite you this morning
to turn in your Bibles to the book of Hosea. Hosea chapter
2. Hosea chapter 2. I'm afraid that you'll have to
put up with me a little bit because of where I'm living these days.
Today would have been our 51st anniversary if Betty had lived. And this week has been full,
it seems like, of so many reminders rushing into my mind. On the
14th, I was in the Register of Deeds office. I had to get a
copy of the marriage license for legal thing. And when the
lady handed me the copy of the marriage license, she stopped
a minute and she said, you purchased this license 14, on the 14th,
51 years ago today. And I came as close to just bursting
in tears as I ever have. Marriage is a wonderful gift
that God gave when he established it between the first man and
woman. But it is more than just a gift
to our race. And the reason is because Adam
was more than just the first man, and we are told that in
the scriptures. He is a type of the Lord Jesus
Christ. And so we read in Romans 5 that
even though death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over them
that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgressions,
Adam, who is the figure of him that was to come. People can
say, I don't believe in types. Well, you just don't believe
the Bible. Adam was a figure or a type of
the one that was to come, the Lord Jesus Christ. And this means
that the relationship between Adam and Eve was also typical. It also foreshadowed something,
and that was the eternal betrothal. The title of my message this
morning is Betrothed to Christ. And I thought about it, though
I count it among the greatest of my blessings, to have been
married to my dear wife for so long. What would have happened
had that not been the case? What would have happened if she
had died much sooner, or if we had never married, or if our
marriage failed? Whatever the case. And it came
to my mind, if I am a child of God, I would still have been
betrothed to Christ, to the greatest I would still have been married
to the Son of God. Hold your place here in Hosea
and turn back to Genesis chapter 2. Because in Genesis chapter
2, which is the seedbed, you might say, of all these glorious
things concerning Christ, and the salvation of his people. In Genesis 2 and verse 21, it
says, And the Lord God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam. And he slept, and he took one
of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof. And the
rib which the Lord God had taken from man made he a woman. and
brought her unto the man. And Adam said, this is now bone
of my bones and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman because
she was taken out of man. Therefore shall a man leave his
father and his mother and shall cleave unto his wife and they
shall be one flesh. And they were both naked, the
man and his wife, and were not ashamed. What I want you to see,
first of all, is the union between Adam and Eve. Adam said, this
is now bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh. And then in verse
24, "...therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother,
and shall cleave unto his wife, and they shall be one flesh."
And amazingly, when you come to the New Testament and you
read the words of the Apostle Paul in verse 5, it is the same
thing. In Ephesians chapter 5 and verse
20. He says, giving thanks always
for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of
the Lord, wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto
the Lord. For the husband is the head of
the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church, and he is
the Savior of the body. Therefore, as the church is subject
unto Christ. So let the wives be to their
own husbands in everything." Husbands, love your wives even
as Christ also loved the church. and gave himself for it, that
he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water
by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should
be holy and without blemish. So ought men to love their wives
as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth
himself. For no man ever yet hated his
own flesh, but nourisheth it, and cherisheth it, even as the
Lord the Church. For, or because, we are members
of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones, and for this cause
shall a man leave his father and mother, and shall be joined
unto his wife, and they too shall be one flesh. Notice the next
verse. This is a great mystery, but
I speak concerning Christ and the church. In other words, the
whole purpose of giving this relationship and of talking about
this union and setting it forth in the scriptures is because
of what it pictures. It pictures Christ and His church. So that the marriage union is
representative of a union between Christ and the church, between
Him who is the bridegroom and this body of people that are
called His bride. And it is an amazing thing. It is an amazing union and a
glorious relationship because again and again God uses it and
all of its variety and its particulars in describing his feelings toward
his bride and the feelings of the bride toward him. There is a sense in which They
are given to each other, Christ and his church. So that the bride
says in the Song of Solomon, she says this, I am my beloved's
and he is mine. He is mine. And so, in Isaiah
62, the prophet is led to give, as an illustration of God's delight
in His people, these words. He says, "'For as a young man
marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee, and as the bridegroom
rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.'"
That is so far above my ability to comprehend that there could
ever at any time or in any way be that God could rejoice over
a sinner like me. That he should delight in one
such as my own miserable self. That he would say, as the bridegroom
says in that same Song of Solomon, concerning me, what is said of
the bride, when he says, Thou art all fair. There is no spot
in Thee. And yet, if we know anything
about God, if we know anything about His holiness, that is the
only kind of bride He could have. That is the only one that He
could ever be in union with. Those who are in His sight without
You say, preacher, you don't know me. I'm full of spots. I'm full of blemishes. I'm full
of faults. I'm full of failures. But you
see, he does not view us as his people in the light that we stand
in alone. which is really only darkness. He sees all His people, and get
this, He's always seen them only in the Lord Jesus Christ. You see, He said what He said
of His bride, the Christ Himself, before He ever came into this
world, and certainly before you and I were ever born. He saw
her, and He says, You are all there. There's not a spot in
you. And that is the way it has been
from old eternity, and this is one of the things that is emphasized
in Scripture in order to show two things. In order to show,
first of all, that all the glory in our salvation belongs to God
in His grace alone. And to show also that we have
never and therefore could never stand now or in the future before
Him and be accepted by Him in anything we have done or said
or felt or stopped doing or anything like this, we can only be accepted
in the Beloved. And so one of the many aspects
of this union that I pray that the Lord will always cause us
to see is that it is of and was born out of this eternal betrothal. In other words, how did the bride,
how did the Lord's Church, how did I, if I am a believer in
Christ, how did you, if you are one of his people, how in the
world did we come to be in this marvelous position, in this wonderful
union, one that Some of the old preachers used to call it a grace
union. That's what this union is. It's
a grace union. But if you look here in our text,
in the book of Hosea, here in Hosea chapter 2, you find that
the Lord in the face of the natural situation that all of his people
are in. You see, God never glosses over. what we are as sinners. He never
glosses over our inability to save ourselves or to do anything
to please Him. He never glosses over our helplessness
or our continual sinlessness. He always reminds us of what
we are and what we were and what He has made us by grace in the
Lord Jesus Christ. You see, He's commanded this
man by the name of Hosea to take him a wife. And to our directly
opposite way of thinking, to the way of religion in our days
way of thinking, in a way that, as God says, is not our way,
a higher way than we can imagine and comprehend, He commands him
to take a wife. that he's described in verse
two of chapter one. The beginning of the word of
the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, go
take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms for
the land hath committed great whoredom departing from the Lord. So he went and took Gomer the
daughter of de Blom, which conceived, and bare him a son. and other
children. Now why in the world would the
holy God of heaven tell a man, tell his prophet, to go take
a wife of a whoredom? Well, because when you read all
these verses, the following up into the latter part of chapter
2, the description here is simply one of an idolater. What did
she do? She committed that whoredom that
the Bible describes as running after other gods. She not only ran after other
men, she not only failed in every way imaginable, she not only
sold herself into slavery, she not only committed all these
ungodly and immoral acts, when he gave her gifts, she attributed
them to her lovers. And that's the way we are. before
we're ever called unto his son. Here we are received life and
breath and food and help of every kind sustained day after day
and yet we do not attribute those gifts to the true giver of. What do we do? because all of
us by nature are idolaters. The description that we find
given of Gomer in these verses, though it might make us recall
with some kind of indignation as to her character, every one,
God says, is far worse in themselves. But he says, you take her for
a wife. Now I can just imagine Hosea being a fairly upright
fella. And he kind of shrieks back at
the notion of this. But the Lord has commanded it. And the reason he's commanded
it is to show a picture of his grace and his mercy to the bride
that he has given to his son, the Lord Jesus Christ. You see,
in knowing and in God showing us something of our relationship
and our position in Christ, what He has made us by grace. We are
always to remember what I call the condition that grace always
meets. You see, if we weren't this way,
we wouldn't need grace. If you and I had any worth or
worthiness in us, we wouldn't need grace. If we could do anything
to please God, if we could do anything to save ourselves, if
we could in any way do something that would get us out of the
awful mess we're in or free from the awful nature we have, We
wouldn't need grace. And let me tell you this, that
condition and that knowledge of what you and I are as sinners,
that didn't surprise God. I know to this day, sometimes
I find myself thinking things and saying things and doing things
that I kind of surprise myself. I thought I'd made more progress
than that, but I haven't. But nothing ever surprises God,
especially as it pertains to His people. It may surprise us. You may do something or I may
do something. We may be surprised at each other.
But it never takes God by surprise. And that's why we have to be
saved by His grace. That's why we have to be saved
by His sovereign mercy in the Lord Jesus Christ. Because when
he talks to Hosea, God, in His discussion to Hosea, He lays
out really what He's going to do for His people. So when you
look here in chapter 2, in verse 19, after He has talked and His
conversation has gone really from Gomer to the nation of Israel. And not only does Gomer, but
also this whole nation of Israel is a picture and a type of spiritual
Israel. And the Lord says what He's going
to do. So in verse 19, the very first thing that He says is this.
He says, And I will betroth thee unto Me forever Yea, I will betroth
thee unto me in righteousness, and in judgment, and in lovingkindness,
and in mercies. I will either betroth thee unto
me in faithfulness, and thou shalt know the Lord. Now you know that could never
be said of the nation of Israel physically. No way. So it has
to be that God is speaking of this people, this bride, his
church, that are the true Israel of God, spiritual Israel. Those that Paul describes in
this way, he says they are not all of Israel that are of Israel. He said he is a Jew not who is
one outwardly, but he who is one inwardly. And circumcision
is not a matter of the flesh. True circumcision is a work of
the Spirit of God in the heart. But just like everything in God's
salvation, just like everything in true grace, it always begins
with what God does. He says, I will betroth thee
unto me. He doesn't say anything about
the will of man. He doesn't say especially anything
about such a notion as free will. He says, I will. Salvation always
has to do and always begins with God and what he does. I will. And so when we come to the New
Testament, we have to be reminded that every promise of God has
always been according to what he would do. And so he says,
it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but
of God. who shows mercy." Why do they
receive him? It's because of a birth. And
that birth, he says, is not of the will of man, but of God,
who shows mercy. God says, I will betroth thee
unto myself forever. Now, I just imagine that you
didn't hear that word betrothed or betrothal much this week,
because it's a rather old word. But the word betrothed or betrothal
means to engage for matrimony. To betroth means to espouse or
it is a promise or covenant to marry. And in a former time,
in the day in which this was written, Betrothal was an ancient
formal ceremony which in most cases preceded the actual marriage
service, usually by a period of some time, even though the
marriage be delayed for a number of years. It was still thought
and still regarded as totally binding. In other words, God's
not saying here, I'm going to make you a proposition, or I'm
going to give you an offer, or I'm going to think about marrying
you, or I'm going to think about identifying myself with you,
or I'm going to think about, or there's a possibility I might
bring you into union with myself. No. He said, I will betroth thee
unto me forever. He cannot change, He cannot lie,
He cannot die, and you and I can do nothing. So all our hope is
in God and His grace. And when this actually took place
regarding His true church and His people, it took place in
a time, or rather before time, so that you and I could never
ever mess it up. We can never undo, we can never
change what the unchanging God has done. And in these verses,
three times he uses this word. Why? Because the triune God is
who has done this. The Father says, I will betroth
thee unto myself. The Son says, I will betroth
thee unto myself. The Spirit says, I will betroth
thee unto myself. And it involves not only the
whole Godhead, it involves all the Lord's election. It involves
that whole body of people who were secretly betrothed to the
Lord Jesus Christ in that everlasting covenant from all eternity. In other words, the father chose
this bride and his son before the foundation of the world.
That's why he gets all the glory. That's why it's not our choice
that saves us, it's his choice. He said, Christ said, you've
not chosen me, but I've chosen you. And so Paul writes this,
he says, blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ, according as he hath chosen us in him before
the foundation of the world. He chooses his bride. We would
never have chosen him. But the Father chose a bride
for Christ his Son, and it says that he gave her to him. When
he writes in the book of Matthew, Matthew gives us these words
and this description from Christ. He says, the kingdom of heaven
is like unto a certain king which made a marriage for his son. You think of God's purpose to
give his son a people. If He purposed and determined
that they shall all be His possession, that they all should be redeemed
by Him, that they all should be for His glory and for His
inheritance forever, would you imagine that could ever not happen?
He says, I will betroth thee unto Me forever. You see, this
is an arranged marriage. Just like, just like Hosea and
Gomer, or just like Jacob's marriage to Rachel, or just like a bride
that Abraham sought for Isaac? But when our Lord comes into
this world, he says in John 6, all that the Father hath given
me shall come to me and him that comes to me I will in no wise
cast out." Father, you've given me power over all flesh to do
what? To give eternal life to as many
as thou hast given me. But did you notice he said, I
will betroth thee Unto me. Unto me. To God Himself. To God Himself in Christ. And so when the people that are
described as being there in the revelation, the bride in that
context, seen in heaven, what is it they say? They praise the
Lamb because He has redeemed us to God. Not just to a better
life, not to perfect health, not to happiness. That's what
our generation's all always considering, happiness, but they never are
happy. But he says, Thou hast redeemed us to God. You have
brought us into the nearest relationship, one with Him. You have brought
us into the best of fellowship, fellowship with the Father. You
have brought us into the greatest possessions. You have done so
and done so for eternity." And then he says, you have done it.
I will betroth thee unto me forever. Now, I'll be the first to admit
that words like eternity and forever I don't know much about. And the reason that I don't know
much about those words is because in my experience, I've never
known anything but time. And I'm coming to the point where
my experience of time is that it's very short. Passes swifter
than a weaver's shuttle. Few days. Swifter than a post
that runs. This is not a temporary betrothal. This is not one that will end
in divorce. This is one with the one who
will never leave us or forsake us. This is with the one who
says, I'm with you always, and always, and eternity, and forever. As best I can tell from this
book means worlds without end. His salvation is an eternal salvation
that will never end because it never had beginning. It's always
in the eternal God. Isaiah 61, he says, for I, the
Lord, love judgment. I hate robbery for burnt offering,
and I will direct their worth in truth, and I will make an
everlasting covenant with thee. In Jeremiah, he says to Jeremiah
what he says to all his people. Jeremiah said, the Lord hath
appeared of old unto me, saying, yea, I have loved thee with an
everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness
have I drawn thee. He said, the Lord appeared and
said that to me. Has the Lord ever appeared to
you and said that to you? I don't know, but if He does,
He'll say it from this book. He'll bring His people, He'll
bring this bride to a knowledge, to a convincing, to a believing
by faith that He's talking to me. He's talking to me. He says
He came into this world to save sinners. That'd be me. Says in
due time Christ died for the ungodly, That would be me. He came to seek and to save that
which was lost. That would be me. As a matter
of fact, it seems to me more and more that everything he sets
forth in this book, he sets forth to me. And the truth is, this
book is a love letter to his people. I have betrothed thee
unto me forever. I've made the Lord Jesus Christ
the author and the finisher of faith. I've made him Alpha and
Omega in everything that pertains to your salvation, your deliverance,
to everything that pertains to bringing you unto myself forever. You can have a salvation whereby
you're lost one day and saved the next day and lost again the
next day if you want to. But in Christ, it only goes one
way and it never stops. I heard a preacher use this expression.
He talked about the Jesus train. Well, if you're on the Jesus
train, that train is never stopping. That train is bound for eternity.
That train has never stopped. and let anybody off forever.
In Mark's gospel he says, but from the beginning of the creation
of God he made them male and female. For this cause a man
shall leave his father and his mother and cleave to his wife
and they twain shall be one flesh so then they are no more twain
but one flesh what therefore God hath joined together that
no man put asunder. What he's talking about there
most of all is that union between Christ and his church. I have
betrothed thee unto me forever. But not only that, he says also
I'll betroth thee unto me in righteousness. In righteousness. Amazing. That is, in this betrothal,
in this marriage, in this union, it will be upright and he will
be upfront in every way. It will not soil his name to
take this bride to himself. because he has made her righteous
in the Lord Jesus Christ." This isn't something that he does
to us in our person. I don't care what people say.
Because when you read what the Lord Jesus Christ is made by
the Apostle Paul in places like 2 Corinthians 5, it says that
we are made the righteousness of God in Him. And we're not righteous anywhere
else, and we're not righteous any other way, except in Christ
Jesus. Viewed in Christ Jesus. He was made a curse for us, made
sin for us, died the death for sin for us, that we might be
made the righteousness of God in Him. Because just like in
this marriage, He said, they too shall be one flesh, one person,
counted as one before God. So whatever he is, that's how
God sees us. He imputes to us, charges to
our account, the righteousness that we do not have and could
not ever produce. And he brings us by this imputation
into a standing and a state of being actually in God's sight,
justified. which means declared to be righteous
in Him. And you know we've been looking
on Wednesday night about those names that are associated with
Christ when they came to Him in the garden and they asked
Him who He was, or He said, who are you looking for? They said,
Jesus of Nazareth. And all He said in response to
that about three times was, I am. Well, here's another one of them.
Jehovah Sidkenu. What does that mean? Well, I
am the existing, ever-existing, self-existing God. I am the Lord,
your righteousness. He is. So, it says in Jeremiah
23, in the days Judah, in his days, Judah shall be saved, and
Israel shall dwell safely, and this is the name whereby he shall
be called Jehovah Tidkenu, the Lord our righteousness. But the name he gives to his
people is not one of these hyphenated words, or rather hyphenated names
like we find in our day. I'm sorry. I just don't like
that. My wife never was Betty Jane Reese hyphenated Shepard. She became Betty Jane Shepard. And there will about not be any
carrying on of anything of ourselves associated with this union. Because listen to what it says
in the 33rd chapter of Jeremiah. Thank you. She shall be called.
Who's that? His bride. What is it? Jehovah said, can
you? The Lord, our righteousness. He said, I'll betroth thee unto
me forever in righteousness. He's not bypassed anything. He's
not swept our sins under the carpet of eternity. He's met
our condition. He's dealt with our sins. He's
put them away forever by the sacrifice of himself. And so
he says, in judgment, That is according to justice and truth.
If he is to be the justifier, he must be just as he does it. Justice has to be honored. Justice
has to be satisfied. And one of the clearest pictures
in all the Bible is when Boaz goes down to the city gate to
make Ruth his wife. He didn't say, well, I'm a pretty
big man in this town. I'll just marry her and everybody
can keep their mouth shut. No, because he's a picture of
Christ and she's a picture of the bride of Christ. Boaz goes
down to the city gate and he satisfies every claim against
her. He honors the law and the tradition
that required that one who had the first claim on her and the
right of redemption, that he might be dealt with and satisfied
and all that was necessary to redeem her be paid. And then
he says, in loving kindness. I personally think that that
word loving kindness in the Old Testament is the Old Testament
word for grace. The loving kindness of God. All by God's grace. All giving
us what we do not deserve. All given to us as a gift. And then he says, in mercies.
What is mercies? Mercies are simply God not giving
us what we do really deserve. David made many mistakes, sinned
greatly, but the word that David got through Nathan the prophet
concerning how God viewed everything, sure, There'll be many consequences
to your sin, David. There'll be many natural consequences,
as there always is a natural consequence to our sin. But you
need to know this, David. The Lord hath put away your iniquity. You say you can't tell somebody
that. They'll just turn around, they'll
do more, they'll sin worse. We already do that. We do it
every day. We do it in everything we do.
And if we haven't done the very worst, it's only because God
has restrained us. But the Lord says in His gospel
to His people, God hath put away your sin. You say, well, what
about if I sin later? What about it? You will sin later. And later, and later, and later. We pray that God in grace will
keep us from sinning. But we'll sin. What then? The
Lord hath put your sins away. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth
us from all sins. David laid down on his deathbed. And he confessed that he'd either
been a king, or a father, or a husband, or a leader, or anything
to the standard that God requires. But he says, yet God has made
with me an everlasting covenant, ordered in all things and sure,
and this is all my salvation. All of it. I always think about
when the Israelites were going into the land of Canaan, they
crossed over the Jordan and Joshua was leading them in. Moses, he
was the type of the law, he couldn't take them in. Joshua was the
type of Christ, he brought them in. You know what God said to
them? He said, you're going to live in houses you never built.
You're going to eat from crops you never planted. You're going
to drink wine from vineyards you never set out. You're just
going to go in there and possess that land, and you're just going
to get all these things for free. Somebody says, now wait a minute.
That's not really fair, is it? This doesn't have to do with
fairness. It has to do with grace. Grace. You're going to forgive
David? You're going to bless David?
You're going to do this and that and the other, and you can look
back at Noah and every other Why? God says, yes, because I
don't view them in themselves. I view them in my son. And in my son, by his precious
shed blood, washing away all their sins, by my blotting out
justly all their iniquities, they are every one all fair. In faithfulness, he's going to
be faithful. I betroth thee and myself forever
in faithfulness." Now let me tell you what characterizes us.
Unfaithfulness. If not in one way, surely in
another. Unfaithful. And sometimes I can't
help but believe that the Lord shows us our unfaithfulness because
maybe we get to thinking just how faithful we really are. If
you want to find out your weakness, just get to thinking how strong
you are. If you'll get to thinking how
good you are, God might just remind you how bad you are. But
He's faithful. He'll always be faithful. Faithful
is He that calleth you who will also do it. He abides faithful. Know, therefore, that the Lord
thy God, He is God, the faithful God, who keepeth covenant and
mercy with them that love Him, and keepeth His commandments
to a thousand generations. Whenever Ruth went back to Naomi
and began to tell her about what Boaz had said, Boaz was going
to do this and Boaz was going to do that. Boaz told her to
just go home, take this grain with her, and everything be cool. And so Naomi says to her, sit
still, my daughter, until thou know how the matter will fall,
for the man will not rest until he have finished the thing this
day. And the bridegroom did not rest. when he came into this world
until he hung on that cross and could say, it is finished. Finished. Complete. You can go
and read Romans chapter 7. One example is in the Old Testament,
a woman by the name of Abigail. She had a wicked, vile, husband
by the name of Nabal. You know what God did? God killed
him and David married her. Something's got to die. If we're
in union with that first Adam, something's got to happen if
we can be in union with that second Adam. He has to die. We
have to die. And that's exactly what's taking
place in that cross death. All his people are dying to the
law, dying to sin. They're dying to that first Adam
that they might be married to the last Adam. He says, and thou
shalt know the Lord. This bride's going to know the
Lord. They're going to know who He is. They're going to know
Him in this relationship of faith and salvation. They're going
to know Him because He knows them. The Lord knows them that
are His. So the gospel preacher is on
an errand. He's on an errand. Not a fool's
errand either. He's sin of God preaching, looking
for the bride. looking for the bride. You know,
there was another man who was sent looking for a bride. Abraham
sent his servant into a land that was foreign to him and stranger
to him, but he sent his servant into a land to find a bride for
Isaac. He had a lot of questions, but
when he got to the one that the Lord seemed to be pointing out
was the bride, when he got there tired and weary and everything,
here she came and started watering all the camels for them. Now
that's a good woman, if you water your camels. But here's what
the servant said, and essentially this is what the gospel says. He said, I'm Abraham's servant,
and the Lord has blessed my master greatly, and he's become great,
and he has given him flocks and herds, and silver, and gold,
and menservants, and maidservants, and camels, and asses, and Sarah,
my master's wife, Bear a son. Only one son. That's all she
had. That's all he had. You say, well, what about Ishmael?
God didn't recognize him. He said, you take Isaac, your
son, your only son. Go up on that mount. Well, and
Sarah, my master's wife, bear a son to my master when she was
old, and unto him he has given all he. You mean to tell me that
if I marry Isaac, Abraham's son, I'll be joined to the one who
has everything. That's it. And that's the way
it is with God's son. He's given everything. He's put
all spiritual and eternal blessings in his son. He that hath the
son has everything. Everything forever. That's why
it's so ridiculous all these false religions out here offering
you something here, and then something better, and then something
better, and something better. Oh, we believe on Christ, but
we got something, a second blessing, and a third blessing, and something
higher, and deeper, and greater. No. He that hath the Son hath
life. God's given everything to His
people in Christ. And if you have Him, you have
got it all. Paul says, he that spared not
his own son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not
with him also freely give us all things? Brother Tim James
said, all things means all things. All things. Do those be truth
to Christ? I sure do want to be found among
that people. When you read in the Revelation,
you see that there's one day going to be made manifest who
He is and who they are. At that occasion and event that
is described as the marriage supper of the Lamb. How is his
bride dressed? She's clothed in His righteousness,
white linens. She has not spot or blemish. She comes down out of heaven
as a bride adorned for her husband, glorious in His righteousness. Father, we pray this day that
you would call out your people and reveal to them the blessed
salvation that you've given to them by grace in your dear Son. Help us to look to Him. Help
us to forsake our own imagined righteousness, which is filthy
rags, and to look to the perfect Son of God, who loved us and
gave himself for us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. We thank you and we pray in his
name. Amen.