something this morning as I was
reading down in my room. We just sung a couple songs,
hymns, and that first song I picked out before everybody got here
just because I was reading through it, kind of struck a chord with
me. But everything that we just sang, the Lord and His sovereignty,
His providence directed about throughout all of what's
going on, we have a hope. This morning I was thinking about
whenever God gives us a hope, everything that we hope in whether
it's our forgiveness of sin, whether it's our justification
before God, whether it's a removal of wrath, whether it's a promise
of Christ's return, or whether it's a promise of eternal life,
the destruction of the wicked, the being with Christ forever
and ever. I mean, all these things we have
hope in, right? And that hope is all based and
founded in the Lord Jesus Christ. But that hope that we have in
those promises are only as good as the one who promised them,
right? It's only as good as the one
who makes the promise. If the one who makes the promise
isn't reliable or trustworthy, then there really is no hope.
It's a false hope. As a matter of fact, clear in
several places throughout Scripture that if this is not true, if
it isn't all on God, our salvation, if it isn't all upon Christ,
then we're most men, most miserable. We're still in our sins and we
have no hope. The only reason that we have
hope is because God does not change. His promises are sure. there is no variable in us in
God. I mean, honestly, I cannot have a hope that stands sure,
I cannot have a hope that wavers if God does not sustain it within
Himself and by Himself. He has to sustain it within himself
by who he is, his characteristics, his attributes, his very essence
and nature is what sustains that. And through him, by his work
in us, he upholds us in that hope. If I have hope, it's because
he has given me hope. The Bible says that His Spirit
bears witness with our spirit that we are His. It is God that
is in us that gives us this hope, this hope that is assurance of
our faith, this faith of assurance or this hope of assurance. All
of this is given to us by God through the work of the Spirit
of God in us because of the work of Christ Jesus for us. But that
is only good if God makes good on His promises, right? But if
we have a God that cannot be trusted, then there really isn't
true hope. We have a hope-so hope, but not
a hope as the biblical hope is. A true hope, meaning an earnest
expectation. And so I got to thinking about
that, because I often see people looking at portions of Scripture
and they'll point to this, especially those who believe in a conditional
time of salvation that God will do otherwise depending on what
you do. And so I got to thinking about
that. If God determines and purposes all things and that known under
him are all his works, the end from the beginning, and he has
predestined all things. Now, of course, I realize that
the conditionalists out there, they do not believe that God
has predestined all things. They only believe that he has
predestinated salvation. And then some conditionals only
believe that he predestinated a plan of salvation, not actual
salvation. But if we know, as the scriptures
clearly teach throughout, that God has determined all things,
purposed all things, then with that being the case, if he is
purposed to determine all things, then any notion that we could
do something that would cause God to actually change his mind
and do something else is contrary to what God has said about himself.
Therefore, it's not God who is being wrong, or God has lied to us,
or there is inconsistency in God's Word, it is us who has
misunderstood the intent of what has been written. What am I talking
about? Well, turn in Exodus chapter
32. I want to read a portion of Scripture,
and there is actually several whenever I I looked at this phrase
actually. I found there is like 5, 6, 7
places in Scripture that we see this particular phrase that seems
to have bothered people. But we want to get some clarity
on what is being talked about in these. Exodus 32. Now I'm going to start reading
at verse 1. The verse that I particularly
want to look at is later on down the way, but I want to get us
in the context here. If you remember, leading up to
where we're at here, God has delivered the people out of Egypt.
They have now come. They're at the base of Mount
Sinai. Moses has went up to receive
the law from God, and he's been gone for a little while. down
below getting a little anxious, getting a little ahead of themselves,
wondering what all's going on, thinking Moses has surely went
up there and got killed him or something. Don't know if he's
coming back. And so they have began to murmur. They've been led away to worship
after hours. And of course, we'll see that
as we get into this. But this is the backdrop where we're at.
Verse 1 says, And when the people saw that Moses delayed to come
down out of the mount, the people gathered themselves together
unto Aaron and said unto him, Up make us gods, which shall
go before us. For as for this Moses, the man
that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we want not what
has become of him. And Aaron said unto them, Break
off the golden earrings which are in the ears of your wives,
of your sons, and of your daughters, and bring them unto me. And all
the people break off the golden earrings which were in their
ears, and brought them unto Aaron. And he received them at their
hand, and fashioned it with a graving tool after he had made it a molten
calf. And they said, These be thy gods,
O Israel, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt. And
when Aaron saw it, he built an altar before it. And Aaron made
proclamation and said, Tomorrow is a feast to the Lord. And they
rose up early on the morrow and offered burnt offerings and brought
peace offerings. And the people sat down to eat
and to drink and rose up to play. And the Lord said unto Moses,
go get thee down, for thy people which thou broughtest out of
the land of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have turned
aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They
have made them a molten calf and have worshiped it and have
sacrificed thereunto and said, these be thy gods, O Israel,
which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. Now just
kind of think about that for a minute. They have just been
delivered out of the land of Egypt. They walked right across
the Red Sea on dry land. God had parted the sea for them. They walked across on dry land.
They saw God bring the ocean back over the top of all of Pharaoh
and his army and destroyed them. They had seen God provide for
them in just about every way. All the miracles in Egypt, as
a matter of fact, all the plagues. They were in the land of Goshen,
surrounded by all of Egypt, and all of Egypt was afflicted by
all those plagues that God sent, but it didn't happen in Goshen.
They were protected from all those plagues. Whenever God sent the angel to come and kill all
the firstborn of everybody, it wasn't effective to all those
that God had chosen. It wasn't effective to all those
people. He sent and he killed all those of Egypt. But yet here these people now
are at the base of the mountain, just a short little bit of time,
and they have turned back and began worshiping idols, even
to the point of saying, this golden calf is that they just
fashioned. I mean, This is really, when
it gets down to it and you think about it, our idolatry runs deep,
brethren. These people just fashioned this
calf out of their own earrings, and they made this thing, saw
the man that made it, he fashioned it with his own hands, and yet
they're going to turn around and give credence to that as
the very thing that brought them out of Egypt. The very thing that they've created
with their own hands They said, this is our deliverer. We have made a deliverer after
the liking of our own selves. Romans 1 said they made idols. They worship the creation rather
than the creator. But let's take it a little bit
further into the spiritual understanding of these things. We believe that
we can deliver ourselves by the works of our own hands. These people made their own God
and then turned around and began to bow down to this inanimate
object and give credence to it as delivering them out of something
that came from them, made by them, worked out by them. And they said, hey, this is what
brought us out of Egypt. This is what brought us out of
Egypt. Brethren, do we not still, this natural man, still think
that there is something that we can do by the works of our
own hands to make us something acceptable before God? Do we
not worship the works of our own flesh? These Israelites had bowed down
and began to worship a golden calf. And can you imagine the
indignation of the Lord to see, after all this that I have done
for you, and yet now you're going to say that calf that you made
with your own hands? Brethren, can you imagine the
indignation of the Lord whenever men say by the works of their
own hands they can make themselves something acceptable unto God?
When God has provided in Christ Jesus salvation, I'm thankful that the Lord is
merciful. I'm thankful that the Lord has forgiven us of our sins. Because even the children of
grace turn back to the golden calf. Even the children of grace,
look at that, and that is a spit in the face of God whenever we
think by law keeping, by our own efforts, by our own religious
works, by our zealousness, by whatever we do, that we can do
something that is pleasing and honoring to God and worship the
works of our own hands and not the Creator. by whose hands we
have been delivered. And so here we see these people
and God has looked down upon this and he says, and the Lord
said unto Moses, I have seen this people and behold, it is
a stiff neck people. That word stiff neck there, that
word means that they are obstinate, that they are set in their ways.
They're bound and determined to be this type of people, that
they are immovable. Brethren, that's who our natural
man is. Our natural man cannot be anything else but that. Our
natural man cannot be anything else but stiff-necked towards
God. We see this all throughout the
Word. The word stiff-necked is found. You know, He said these
people are stiff-necked. That doesn't mean that they have
a will that they can exercise that can do what I want to do. No, that just means that the
natural hand is always stiff-necked against God. We are in enmity
with God. We do not like the God of the
Scriptures. We do not like to wait on God
and what His purpose and plan is. We just talk about that,
or sing about that in our hymns, about the temptations and trials
and all the things that God does in His trying in grace. He tries us. He purifies us as
gold and silver through the trials and the temptations of life.
And our natural man says, I don't like that. I don't like this
process that you're bringing me through. I don't like the
way that you're doing this. I'd rather look at it a different
way. I'd rather see it a different way. Or be like Job, I don't
deserve this. But yet God has determined these
things for us. Our timing. We think that if
we pray about something, God automatically just answers our
prayer about it, right? Sometimes God says, no, that's
not how I will. And doesn't answer it. And then
we get huffy at God because He didn't, I prayed, you told me
if I prayed to you, you'd answer my prayer. Well, He answered
your prayer all right, it just wasn't the answer you wanted.
He answered no, because He is God. We see these people are stiff-necked.
And the Lord said unto Moses, I have seen this people, and
behold, it is a stiff-necked people. Now therefore, let me
alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I
may consume them, and I will make of thee a great nation. So basically he's saying, Moses,
get out of the way. I'm fixing to go down and wipe
everybody out. and just out of you make a great
nation. And then look what Moses says. And Moses besought the Lord his
God and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy
people which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt
with great power and with a mighty hand? Wherefore should the Egyptians
speak and say, for mischief did he bring them out? to slay them
in the mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth?
Turn from thy fierce wrath and repent of this evil against thy
people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and
Israel, thy servants, to whom thou swearest by thine own self,
and said unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars of the
heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give
unto your seed, and they shall inherit it, forever. Here's the
verse I wanted to get to. And the Lord repented of the
evil which He thought to do unto the people. Now that can almost be a quandary
for some of us, right? Number one, can the Lord repent?
What does the Lord have to repent of? He can't sin, right? Well, brethren, we need to understand
that the word repent can mean more than one thing. The word
repent to most of us means a change of mind resulting in a change
of action. At least that's what we've been told all of our whole
entire life. And some people say repentance is to turn away
from sin to not do it anymore, which I can't find that in the
Bible anywhere. We can surely turn from sin,
but that doesn't mean we're not ever going to turn back to it.
We have a change of mind about something. So if we take that
concrete definition and say, well, repentance is a change
of mind, then we're saying here that the Lord changed his mind.
He was planning on going and killing all these people, but
because Moses was such a great orator, and I've actually heard
people say, this is the actual case, that Moses was such a great
orator and stood for the people and reminded God what he said. He went and reminded, hey, don't
you Don't you forget that you told Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob
that you were going to make them a great nation and that you were
going to give to them a seed and that seed would be great
among the peoples. And don't forget, you said that. Now, there are people that actually
believe that that has to be done with God. And they try to do
that. Matter of fact, all of us do that whenever we say, well,
God, didn't I do this for you? You said that You would bless
me if I would do this. Don't we say that a lot? Don't
we think that a lot? Lord, You said that if I do right,
that You would do right by me. If I give to You, You would give
back to me. See, we try to put God in a box. But what do we
see here? We see, and the Lord repented
of the evil which He thought to do unto the people. Was Moses such a great orator
and reminder of God that God changed his mind? Is that what
it meant whenever it says the Lord repented? Well, that word
repented, I looked that up in other places where it's used
throughout Scripture and seen that in many places it's used
different ways. The word repented just means
to turn coarse. and go in another direction.
It means to go back. It means to change course, like
I said. But it does mean to change mind. But again, my question is, is
did God change it? Did Moses change God's mind?
Did Abraham change God's mind whenever he was going to destroy
Sodom and Gomorrah, whenever He said, if you find 40 people,
if you find 30 people, if you find 20 people, if you find 10
people, was God changing His mind? Okay, well, I won't do
it then. Okay, well, I won't do it then. But you've got to
find this man. Okay, well, no, God determined to destroy Sodom
and Gomorrah, right? And He knew exactly who it was
He was going to deliver from Sodom and Gomorrah. and who he
was not going to deliver from Sodom and Gomorrah. But what
did he do? He exercised in Moses. He exercised in Abraham. He exercises in us these trials,
these temptations, these afflictions. He does these things to purify
us in our faith. And just with Abraham, What did
Abraham learn in that? Well, number one, God hates these
things, and he destroyed those cities because of that, and he
was just in doing so. But God didn't change his mind.
God had always determined to do that, but he knew he had a
people in that town, and he removed them from that, and whenever
he removed them from that, he carried on with his plan to do
exactly what he done. However, the language being used
was in a way that we could understand. Just as this, God is using a
language that we understand. He is setting a principle. He is setting up a principle
for us to learn and understand. That if the people would not
be doing this, I would not be bringing my wrath upon them,
but their sinfulness deserves my wrath. and I will come upon
them. But see, we have to read further
into the Scripture. We have to understand more of
what's going on. Now, before I go further in this,
I want us to get something clear. Whenever we come to some places
in Scripture where it seems to be a contradiction or inconsistency,
as of here, because we know, we don't believe that God changes
His mind. We don't believe that God made
a mistake. We don't believe that Moses was
able to convince God or remind Him of something because God
can't forget. So what was going on here? Well
look with me if you would because we need to get some absolutes
down. I always say if you look at something, we need to interpret
the gray area in light of the black and white. So here it seems
that God is changing His mind. It seems that God is being reminded
of something that God possibly has forgotten. But let's look
at a few things. Look with me if you would, Malachi.
The last book of the Old Testament. Malachi chapter 3. Look with me, if you would, down
to verse 6. Malachi chapter 3, verse 6. It says, for I am the Lord, I
change not. Therefore, you sons of Jacob
are not consumed. Now here is a black and white
verse that says that I am the Lord. I change not. So God doesn't change. He doesn't
change in nature, nor does He change in purpose, nor does He
change in will. His will stays. His determination stays. God does not change. So whenever we see that, we must
look back and say, well, did God repent? Was God sorry? Sometimes people say God was
sorry for what He did. So does that mean that God made
a mistake? God was sorry for what He did? Man, I'm sorry,
man. I'm sorry for what I did now.
As if God did something of imperfection? As if God did something that
was not right? No. And I know I can already
hear some people saying, well that's what God said whenever
He sent the flood. That God was sorry that He made
man. That's another example of what we're talking about here.
God had a purpose. And if you remember, now keep
this in mind, brethren, hopefully I don't get too scattered in
my thoughts here. The Lord be gracious to let me
keep a good train of thought. Remember, everything in the Old
Testament, number one, is written about Christ. And everything
in the Old Testament was written for our good, that we might learn
of Christ. It was written on our behalf.
So everything, even though those millions of people throughout
all those thousands of years in the Old Testament, they lived
and died and they moved and had their being and did all their
stuff and went places, stayed home from places, exercised in
this and that and did evil and did good and sacrificed and did
not sacrifice and everything that took place They really did that. But yet
God had orchestrated every person, every activity, every event,
that everything that we have record of that we see throughout
all the Old Testament, that all those interactions with relationships
and people and things and places and buildings and cities and
all the wickedness and the righteousness that we see, all of that was
orchestrated that it might show forth in type and foreshadow
the Lord Jesus Christ. Now that to me is an amazing
thing. That here, a nation of what is being estimated, maybe
a million or two million people coming out of Egypt, being delivered,
coming through the Red Sea and being, wandering through the
wilderness to be led to the land of Canaan and all the things
that took place in their lives, that all really happened, but
yet it is a perfect illustration and picture of the deliverance
of God's people. All the types and foreshadows
of Aaron and Moses and Abraham and all these things perfectly
show, even though they were real persons with real lives and real
interactive situations. God orchestrated so that their
lives, their stories, their histories would show forth perfectly Christ
and His salvation. It's amazing. So we can't forget
those two things. Christ is the center of everything
and everything is about Christ in the Old Testament. And everything
is written in this so that we might learn and that it might
be an example for us of Christ in His salvation. So whenever
we look at these things, we must see through the letter and look
to the spiritual, right? He says here, the Lord repented. Did the Lord change His mind?
Or was the Lord sorry for what He had done? No, He's speaking
in terms, but the principle is there. My determination is to
bring judgment upon the wicked. But praise God, just like in
Noah, just like in every other situation, Sodom and Gomorrah,
And every other place where we see these things, especially
where it talks about the Lord repentant, we see there is a
judgment of the wicked, but a deliverance for the people of God. I am the
Lord. I change not. God didn't change. Our perspective, our viewpoint,
our vantage point is that Moses stood before God and pleaded
with God and sent forth the Word of God from his very own lips
that he had given to the people of Israel throughout the ages
through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and now down into the children
of Israel as they came out of Egypt. He has reiterated to them
the Word of God. What is Moses doing? He is interceding
for the people. What is Moses doing? He is bringing
forth and preaching the message of the Gospel. He is reiterating
the very fact of the covenant of God. He's not trying to tell
God, you need to do this because you said this, or He's making
God change His mind. No, what is happening? There
is an interceding. As Christ has gone before God,
after He has died and resurrected and has ascended to the throne
of God, where the Bible says that He ever lives to intercede,
is He having to remind God, uh-uh God, you can't judge them, I
died for them. Is Jesus doing that? Is He having to remind
God, uh-uh-uh, we forgive them of their sin. You can't do that. No, no, no. You can't destroy
them. And on the Day of Judgment, whenever
we stand there and judgment is being wrought out, and He separates
the sheep from the goat, and He says, alright, sheep, you're
off. No, no, no, wait a minute. Remember,
I did that. Do we have to remind God those things? And I know
people say, well, preacher, I think you're being a little silly now
and everything. No, brethren, whenever we look
at this Scripture and we see that God repented of the evil
and we lay to that an interpretation that God changed His mind or
God had remorse or sorrow or was sorry for what He had done
in that something didn't go according to plan, then we're doing basically
the same thing. We're saying that someone, Moses
here, is having to stand up for God and remind Him of His duty,
His covenant. No, what is it? It's Jesus. Remember back a few weeks ago,
whenever I talked about Christ interceding for us in that intercession,
that the fact that Jesus was sitting on the throne alive,
there was the intercession. He is there. All has been completed. He is wrought. Perfect salvation
for His people. Therefore, He is the constant
reminder, just the fact that He ever lives, the constant reminder
that He has delivered His people. Moses is the interceder. He is
the proclaimer of the covenant. He isn't changing God's mind.
Matter of fact, God is bringing Moses through something. See,
what happened when Moses went down the mountain? Well, let's
look here. Now, remember, Moses just pleaded for these people.
God, don't do it. Don't do that. Don't do that.
Remember your covenant with your people. Now, let's look what
happens. Let's go a little bit further. And Moses turned and
went down from the mount, and the two tables of the testimony
were in his hands. The tables were written on both
their sides, and on one side and on the other were they written.
And the tables were the work of God, and the writing was the
writing of God, graven upon the tables. And when Joshua heard
the noise of the people as they shouted, he said unto Moses,
There is a noise of war in the camp. And he said, It is not
the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is the voice
of them that cry for being overcome, but the noise of them that sing
do I hear. And it came to pass, as soon
as he came nigh unto the camp, that he saw the calf, and the
dancing, and Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out
of his hands, and broke them beneath the mount. And he took
the calf which they had made, and burnt it in the fire, ground
it to a powder, and strawed it upon the water, that means that
he cast it and threw it upon the water, and made the children
of Israel drink of it. So he took the very gold that
they had made that camp, he ground it down to a powder fine enough
that he'd thrown it out on the water, and he said, now get down
there and drink it. And Moses said unto Aaron, What did this
people unto thee that thou hast brought so great a sin upon them? And Aaron said, Let not the anger
of my Lord wax hot, thou knowest the people that they are set
on mischief. For they said unto me, Make us
gods, which shall go before us. Whereas this Moses of the man
that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we want not what
has become of him. And I said unto them, Whosoever
hath any gold, let them break it off. So they gave it to me,
then cast it into the fire. And there came out this calf.
And when Moses saw that the people were naked, for Aaron had made
them naked unto their shame among their enemies, Then Moses stood in the gate
of the camp and said, who is on the Lord's side? Let him come
unto me. And all the sons of Levi gathered
themselves together unto him. Now let me just stop right there.
So here is the very person who pleaded to God on behalf of the
people, came down, got mad, and his anger waxed hot at him. And
he said, who's on the Lord's side? And all the Levites came
to him, but everyone else stayed. Now, let's remind ourselves again
something. We read that the Lord repented
which He thought to do unto His people. Moses was pleading for
the people. He came down out of the mountain
amongst the people. He saw that they were naked.
Now, I don't believe that this is talking about they were physically
naked. I think this is that they were naked in their sin, meaning
that they were open with their sin and they had no shame in
what they were doing. They were down there worshipping
this calf. They were worshipping and giving
credence what God had done to this calf and they had no qualms,
they had no problem being there. Just as Adam, whenever sin was
laid naked before God. Meaning God knew everything that
had happened. God knew everything about their heart and what they
were doing. Same thing here. So let's remind ourselves. We
just read that God changes not. Well, what about James chapter
1 verse 17? James chapter 1 verse 17. The
Bible says every good gift and every perfect gift is from above,
and cometh down from the Father of lives, with whom is no variableness,
neither shadow of turning." There is no variableness. That means
that God doesn't go back and forth on things. Okay? He doesn't change. That's what
that word means, changing. There is no variableness. and there is no shadow of turning. That means there's no even hint
of God turning. So, there again, that to me is
a more explicit verse than God repenteth, meaning He changed
His mind that He changed or that He turned. Because here, He said
there's not even a shadow of turning in God. While we're there in Hebrew,
There, look at Hebrews chapter 13. Just back a few pages. Look
at Hebrews chapter 13 and verse 8. We read, Jesus Christ, the
same yesterday, today and forever. God is the same yesterday, today
and forever, brother. He does not change. There is
no variableness or shadow of turning. Let's go back to the
Old Testament. A few more verses just to solidify
our thoughts here before we look at the rest of this. Numbers
23. Look at Numbers 23. And look with me down to verse
19. It says, God is not a man that
he should lie, neither the son of man that he should repent. hath he said, and shall he not
do it? And hath he spoken, and shall
he not make it good? Now, brethren, that is pretty
clear to me. He is not a man that he should
lie, nor the sin of man that he should repent. If he has said it, hath he said,
and shall he not do it? That's a rhetorical question.
The answer is yes. If he has said it, He will do
it. If He has spoken, He will make
good on what He has said. Look at 1 Samuel. Verse 15. 1 Samuel chapter 15. I believe it's verse 29. It says, "...and also the strength
of Israel..." Now, who's the strength of Israel? Well, that's
Christ, right? Christ is the strength of Israel.
"...and also the strength of Israel will not lie nor repent,
for he is not a man that he should repent." Now brethren, those
are explicit verses that say that God will not repent. So what is happening back in
Exodus? What is happening in all those
other five or six verses where the Bible says that God repented? Well brethren, it was written
with an understanding for us that what seems to be the direction
that God is going to go, God's providence had something else
purposed and planned. There was a change in direction,
not on God's part, but in our view. There was a change in His
providence. What seemed like utter destruction
for all these people God's direction changed and did not kill all
of them. Let us read forth the rest of
the account. He said, verse 26, Then Moses
stood in the gate of the camp and said, Who is on the Lord's
side? Think about the end. There will
be a separation of the sheep and the goats. Who's on the Lord's
side? Who's on the Lord's side? The
weak is. Who's on the Lord's side? The
elect of God. Who's on the Lord's side? The
child of grace. Who's on the Lord's side? The
vessels of honor. The vessels created for glory. Who's on the Lord's side? Those
who are the children of God. Those who are in Christ Jesus. They're the ones on the Lord's
side. Here it says that it was the sons of Levi. What does that
mean? Who were the sons of Levi? Remember,
Levi was the tribe that God sanctified apart from the rest of the people
as priests unto God. Does not the New Testament tell
us that He has made us priests unto God? Doesn't the Bible say
that we have been sanctified? And that doesn't mean getting
holier and holier. It means to be set apart for
a purpose for God. Romans 9 says that He has made
us vessels unto honor and for His glory to show forth the praise
of His mercy and righteousness. There is a purpose in us being
sanctified apart from the other people. There is a purpose that
God elected the people apart from the reprobate. There was
a reason for the reprobate and there's a reason for the elect.
And God had that purpose and that purpose is not going to
be thwarted. That purpose is going to be the
same throughout all generations and it's not going to waver.
It's going to look like it's going to come and go and do different
things. But brethren, it is the same. The end has been already
declared from the beginning. And God doesn't change. He doesn't
turn. He doesn't repent. There may
be a change in direction of God's prominence, but there is no change
in God's mind or God's actions. Look what he says here. So we've
just seen, the Levites, he gathered themselves together unto him,
verse 27, and he said unto them, Thus saith the Lord God of Israel,
Put every man his sword by his side, and go in and out from
gate to gate throughout the camp, and slay every man his brother,
and every man his companion, and every man his neighbor. and
the children of Levi did according to the word of Moses. And there
fell of the people that day about three thousand men." What did
God purpose to do whenever He told Moses? He said, I have seen
this people and behold it is a stiff necked people. Now therefore
let me alone that my wrath may wax hot against them and that
I may consume them and I will make of thee a great nation.
Did God repent? No. He carried out exactly what
He said He was going to do. But what was in the midst of
God purposing to destroy these people? There was grace and there
was mercy. Who was on the Lord's side? Those
who were on the Lord's side, He spared. Whenever Noah preached for 120
years, if you remember, 120 years Before, God said, He looked down
upon men and seeing that their heart was continually evil always. And He said, the Lord said, I
want to destroy. And for 120 years, Noah preached
to those people. And for 120 years, those people
were stiff-necked. And for 120 years, Noah continued to do and follow
and trust in what God had told him to do. And at the end of
those 120 years, God did exactly what He said He would do. He
destroyed everybody. But in the midst of that, what
did He do? He found grace. Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. God reserved for Himself a people
that did not come under wrath. And He delivered them. Whenever
Sodom and Gomorrah, God said, I want to kill everybody that's
sitting there, what happened? He did exactly what He said He
was going to do. However, in the midst of wrath
and destruction, God had a people who He saved for Himself out
of Sodom and Gomorrah. Brethren, that's what we see
here. God did exactly what He said He would do. What changed? Well, on our side, it looked
like it changed, but God's providence did something that he had not
revealed to Moses. I am going to destroy these wicked
people, but I have people within them that did not. And I can
only assume that these people that are being talked about did
not partake of this folly of worshiping the gold. They did
not have the folly of bowing down to the works of their own
hands. Think about that. Even among professing people
that claim to be Christians. Didn't Jesus say that on that
day they're going to say, Lord, Lord, did we not do all these
wonderful works in Thy name? Oh, we were only worshiping this
because we knew we needed to worship You and we knew we had
to give You praise and we had to do Your work and spread Your
kingdom and we had to be zealous for good works and get out there
and do all these things. The Lord's gonna say, depart
from me, you workers of iniquity. And maybe you're not. And He will cast them into everlasting
fire. Now, the Bible says a few things. Look with me, just turn to Nahum. Y'all know where Nahum is? That's
somewhere where we often go, right? Isaiah, Jeremiah, limitations,
Ezekiel, Daniel, Josiah, Joel, Amos, Odiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahan. Nahan, right before Habakkuk. Habakkuk, how you say it brother?
Habakkuk. Habakkuk. Look at Nahan. Verse one. or chapter 1 in verse
3. It says, The Lord is slow to
anger and great in power and will not at all acquit the wicked. The Lord hath His way in the
whirlwind and in the storm and the clouds are the dust of His
feet. He rebuketh the sea and maketh it dry and dryeth up all
the rivers. languisheth in caramel and the
flower of Lebanon languisheth." You can go on and read more stuff
there, but the point is, it says right here in clear language,
God will not acquit the wicked. Now, let's move from the letter.
We've seen Moses hearing God's going to destroy these people,
but then the Lord repented And then what happened? The Lord
destroyed all those people, but He found grace upon His people. What do we see here? The Bible
says that He is not going to acquit the wicked. Let me ask
you, brethren, if you're a child of grace, are you not wicked?
Absolutely we are. Absolutely we are. So if we take
the letter of the law and we say that God cannot acquit the
wicked, then that means the child of grace cannot be acquitted
of the wicked because God said it. And if God said it, He cannot
lie. He's not going to acquit me.
Did God repent and change His mind? No. Why? Because at the
very beginning, He always had a purpose that amongst the same
group of people that he would reserve for himself 7,000 people,
not literally, but figuratively, that amongst the one loaf, out
of one loaf, he has made vessels of honor and dishonor. Out of
one people, he has divided those people who are the very same
But yet He has chosen to give grace to these and not these. And He has made a pledge that
He will not acquit the wicked. Therefore, if they are wicked,
there is no acquittal. There is no grace. There is no
mercy. There is no hope. There is nothing
but wrath for them. You say, well, what about these
people that are saved? They're wicked. There was wrath
for those people on the Lord Jesus Christ. who stood as their
substitute, who stood in their place, who advocated on their
behalf. And because of that, the wrath
of God still was delivered, but instead of being delivered upon
them, it was delivered upon Christ Jesus in their place. God found grace. God found mercy
upon His people. So whenever we see the Bible
says that God will not acquit the wicked, then we turn around
and we look at Psalms 145. Look back at that with me. Psalms 145, verse 20. It says,
here it is. The Lord preserveth all them
that love Him. but all the wicked he will destroy."
See, that's not a contradiction in terms. You say, oh, so there
we go. If we love the Lord, then He'll
protect us. Well, wait a minute. Nobody loves
the Lord. That's the problem. Nobody loves
the Lord with all their mind, soul, and strength. I'm just going to ask for you
to be honest with yourself. Can you honestly say that you
have loved, or am loving, or think you at some point are going
to be able to love the Lord with all your mind, soul, and strength?
We can't do that. The Lord Jesus Christ loved the
Lord with all His mind, soul, and strength. And guess what?
That love was laid to our account as well.
Have you loved your brother as yourself? Your neighbor as yourself? Those of the sheepfold, that's
what that word neighbor means. Those of the sheepfold. Have
you loved them as you love yourself? I can't
say that I have. I want to. I try. I want to. But I find I can't. Not perfectly. I can't do that. But you know what? Jesus loved
us to the uttermost. He loved His friends and laid
down His life for them. He loves us with an everlasting
love, the Bible says. Because there's no variable that
changes in Him, right? He doesn't change. Therefore,
His love doesn't change. Therefore, we are not consumed.
That's where we see what's going on in God repenting. God isn't
changing His mind or going back on what He said. It is a change
in the direction as we perceive it of God's providence. What
looks like total destruction for everybody, we see, whoa,
wait a minute, there branches out a grace and mercy for some
of them. But it was all predicated upon
something being done on their behalf. Someone had to intercede
for them. Somebody had to substitute for
them. Somebody had to take that payment
for sin. Somebody had to live that obedience. And Christ did. Christ obeyed
for us. He died for us. Therefore, all
the living for God and all the dying under God's wrath has been
accomplished on our behalf and has been laid to our account
if we be His. Therefore, the living here in
this life by us does not determine whether or not God blesses us,
whether or not God gives us salvation, whether or not we become saved
or born again or whatever term you want. That does not determine
anything. Now that doesn't mean that God doesn't work out things
in us. Faith, repentance, hope, all that stuff. God works in
us those things. But brethren, they surely is
what gets us to heaven. The Lord preserveth them that
love Him. We love Him because He loves us. He has shed His love abroad in
our heart. See, we can't love God without
God first loving us. And even at that, this flesh
can never love God. That spiritual man, He desires
the things of God. He loves the things of God. It
just can't be accomplished in this flesh. Those are the ones He will preserve.
The Lord preserved all them that love Him. See, we've got to get
the full story. We've got to see the whole thing.
If we take and we cherry-pick verses out of the Bible, we can
make God to do anything we want Him to do, right? Just like the
motley calf. We can make that calf and fashion
it anyway. They could have made that into
a kangaroo, but they didn't. They made it into a calf. There may be something behind
that. I don't know. I've not been enlightened on why it was
a calf, but there you go. Something for you to go look
at. But they could have made that anything they wanted. They
could have made it to look like Moses himself. Or Aaron. Or Joshua. But they didn't. They made it into a calf. Bovine. Brethren, listen. God has preserved
His people. And He does not repent by changing
His mind. He doesn't go back on His Word. He may go in a different direction
than what our assumption was by what He has said. God doesn't
reveal to us all His plans. He said, well, you know, there
was a lot of people that did against the Lord. Well, yeah.
Well, Jonah, he jumped ship and went, instead of going to Nineveh,
he went to Joppa, right? He was on his way to Joppa. Well,
let me ask you, where did Jonah end up at? He ended up at Nineveh. And he said that he wasn't going
to preach to those people because he didn't think they deserved
it. What did Jonah end up doing? Preaching to those people. Did
Jonah even like the fact of what God did? You said you were going
to destroy these people, God, but now you've shown them mercy.
So did God change His mind? He said if these people would
repent, then He would turn His wrath away from them. Is that
a condition? Was that a condition on their
part? Was God going to destroy every one of those if they didn't
repent, and therefore they repented so God changed His mind? No. It was a principle that God set
down. He said, if these people will repent, I will turn my wrath
away from them. God was letting them know this
is what the case is. These people are wicked people
and they are not looking at me, but if they repent, I will turn
my wrath from them. And that they did. He turned
His wrath away from them. But He destroyed them later whenever
they forgot God. See, God does not change, brethren. So let us let Scripture interpret
Scripture. Let Scripture shed light upon
Scripture. Another verse just came to mind. A double-minded man is unstable
in all his ways. If God repents and changes His
mind or goes back on what He said, He's a double-minded man.
That means God is unstable. But what was my point in all
this? Why did I even look at this this morning? Well, getting
back to my first point before I started here. If God repents
and is a double-minded man, unstable in all these ways and can change
his mind and go back on what he has said, then where is our
hope? We now have no hope. This thing
right here is just another religious book to throw along with every
other book, the Book of Mormon, the Hindu's books, the Muslim's
books, the Hare Krishna's books, I mean, Dr. Phil, you know, whatever,
you know. We don't have any hope. If God
can change his mind, if God can go back on what he said or not
follow through with what he said he was going to do, but no, we
got to understand that we don't have the full revelation of what
God is doing. Moses didn't have the full revelation
of what God was going to do. He just thought God was going
to wipe out everybody, but God had reserved for Himself His
people. Abraham didn't know that God
had reserved for Himself a people. To us, it looks like God changed
His mind, but He didn't. I get up every morning saying,
I'm going to go do this, or I'm going to go do that, or I'm going
to do this. And what do I say? Well, God had something else
planned for me. God changed my mind. God revealed
His will. This is what happened. God revealed
His will a little bit further to His brethren. But praise God
that in every situation we see, that in the midst of that wrath,
in the midst of that anger, in the midst of all that judgment,
the Lord had a people that He showed mercy to. Because He didn't
have to show mercy to anybody. I say He didn't have to. He has
to, in this respect, He purposed it from the foundation of the
world to show mercy to some. Therefore, He has to do it because
that's what He purposed. What I'm saying is nobody is
deserving of that and God is not beholden to man to give it
to him other than the sheer fact that he has chosen to do so.
The boys have not done anything good or bad. Isn't anything about
what they did? But God's purpose according to
election. What was His purpose according to election? That there
might be some that God shows mercy and grace to and some that
He shows wrath and judgment to. Both. to show forth the glory
of God alone in the face of Jesus Christ. So let us give Him praise
and glory today. Anybody got anything you'd like
to say? Anything to add? Corrections
or reviews? I'm not always right about everything,
so I'm always open for that. I think, brethren, whenever we
get a Christocentric view of the Old Testament, whenever we
get in our mind to always look for the Gospel in all of it and
everything, a lot of times it clears up the inconsistencies
in our theologies about a lot of this Old Testament stuff,
especially whenever it comes to conditional salvation, conditional
works-based stuff. God has never, ever, ever, ever,
ever, ever, ever conditioned salvation upon works. In the
Old Testament or in the New, it never was. That system under
the Old Covenant of killing bulls and goats, that was not their
salvation. Any children of God throughout
that whole time, they were not saved because of those bulls
and goats being slaughtered. Those offerings being made. They
were not saved because they were people of God. The Israelites,
now they only say because of the new covenant, because of
Christ Jesus. So I think if we always look
for that, a lot of times that will clear up some of these inconsistencies
that we seem to find in the scripture, although they're not inconsistencies,
they're inconsistencies in our own mind. The error is on us
always, just know that. It's always our lack of understanding. So we need to find out, look
at the, look at the, look at the plain and clear and let that
interpret the seemingly gray areas. Lord, once again we do thank
you for who you are and we thank you that you are a God that does
not change lest we be consumed because our hope is in your promise
that you will never leave us nor forsake us. that You have
saved us from our sin, that You have forgiven us of all things,
that we have been judged in Christ Jesus and justified from all
of our works of unrighteousness. Lord, we thank You that because
of the blood of Jesus Christ, we have access to You. We thank
You for the ever-living Christ who intercedes on our behalf.
Father, we thank You that in Your purpose that You have chosen
a people. We know that we are no different than anybody else
and we are so undeserving of salvation and that nothing we
have done has gained us this merit of grace. But Father, we know that Christ
has merited it. Christ has given all so that
we might be free. Christ has lived perfectly on
our behalf that we might not be held under the law He has
died, the death that He has died with the full wrath of God being
poured out upon Him, that we might be free, that we might
not be consumed. Thank You, Father, for grace.
Thank You for mercy. And thank You for the Lord Jesus
Christ. We pray that everything that we have said and done today
has been an honor and glory to Him. We pray, Lord, that You
would ever keep that in our forethoughts, Lord. that we might ever be looking
unto Christ Jesus, the author and the finisher of our faith,
the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, that all
things were created by Him and for Him. And may we understand
that He has faithfully done all that you have given for Him to
do and is going to be the one in whom all we bow. And Lord,
we just thank you again that you've given us this day together. I thank you for all these brethren
here today. And I ask, Lord, that you continue to minister
to us, grant us faith, that you might continue to keep us in
the doctrine of Christ and the faith of Jesus. Lord, I pray
that you would give safety to these brethren as they travel
into your home this week, Lord, and that, Lord, that you'd be
with them throughout the week, that you might sustain them,
that you might encourage them and edify them through your word. And Lord, I just thank you again.
that you give us this opportunity and what a blessing it is to
be able to meet with others of like faith, Lord, and how you
do edify and comfort our souls whenever we meet together and
hear the works of Christ and what he has done for us. Father,
Lord, we pray that you would be gracious enough to allow us
to continue in that for days to come, years to come, until
you come. So Father, Lord, we just give
it all to you now in the precious name of Jesus Christ.