Turn to Romans 8.28. And we know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them that are called
according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he
also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son. that
he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom
he did predestinate them, he also called. And whom he called
them, he also justified. And whom he justified them, he
also glorified. What shall we say then, say to
these things? If God be for us, who can be
against us? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we stand before
you tonight, glad to be here, glad to be here, congregated
around your throne in worship. Father, we thank you for all
things. We know that all things work together for the good to
those that love God, to them that are the called. And Lord,
we're called tonight, and we're called to praise your name. Father,
we thank you for the gift of grace, the gift of redemption
that's in Christ Jesus. I ask that he be glorified tonight.
And Lord, we love you. We thank you for everything. In Christ's name we pray, and
for his sake, amen. All right. The last time I preached, it
was March of this year. And he said I was going to preach,
at that time I was gonna preach on the sovereignty of God, I
was gonna make that my sermon, but the Lord laid it on my heart
at the time to preach on Christian unity. And I said, okay, well,
if I ever get the opportunity again, I'm gonna come back and
preach on the sovereignty of God, and that's what I intend
to do tonight. Okay, so, I hope it's a good word. I hope
that it's helpful to you and that you take it home and you
think about it. And I hope that if you're listening on the internet
tonight, that it does you some good as well. So let's go ahead
and let's read that again. Romans 8, 28 through 31. And
we know that all things work together for good. not just some things, not just
most things, not even those things that we think are good, but all
things. That word all, it's pretty important.
So we know that all things. The New American Standard translation
says that God causes all things to work together. Things may
look like they're falling apart in this world. Things are crazy
out there. But in God's estimation, everything
is falling perfectly into place. And not just because, but it
says right here, it's for our good. Why? It's not because he's casually
observing things from a distance. It's because he's causing all
things to work together. And you gotta consider the audience
that Paul's writing to here in the book of Romans. Who are the
intended recipients of this epistle? Is it everybody in the entire
world? Does it include those who don't believe? No. It's intended only for believers. It's for them who love God. to those who are the called according to his purpose. Book's
written to believers. And if you believe, if you're
listening tonight, if you believe, you can know that this book's
written to you too. All the scriptures are for you.
They contain everything that you need to have a right relationship
with God, with the creator of the universe. So the scriptures
alone, along with his spirit's illumination, that's all we need. And these scriptures are all
about God, and it's how we learn who he is. Scriptures aren't
about Israel, they're not really even about the church. They're
mentioned, they're important parts, but the scriptures, they're
all about God, they're all about Christ. And when you start with
that premise, you can't go wrong. And you can read the scriptures,
and if you read it just to find proof texts and theological arguments
and propositions, whatever, it's not going to do you as much
good as if you read the scriptures to find Christ. Don't ever forget
that. Charles Spurgeon, the famous
19th century Baptist, theologian, preacher. He always would drive
this point home. And there's a familiar story,
you may have heard it, in his preaching school. He was teaching
some men how to preach. And a number of them were being
taught to preach. And in one of his classes, he
was evaluating these men and their various sermons. Each man
would get up and give a sermon. And one of the men who received
a poor review Well, he wanted to know why he got that bad review.
So he went up to Mr. Spurgeon and he said, he asked
him, did I speak clearly? Spurgeon said, yeah, you spoke
very clearly. And then he asked, did I drive
the points of my sermon home well? Spurgeon said, yes, you
drove the points of your sermon very well. And then he asked,
well, what was wrong with my sermon then? And Spurgeon said,
there was no Christ in your message. And then the young preacher said,
but Christ wasn't in the text that I used. Spurgeon said, Christ
is in every text and it's your job to find him. You know, I
don't really consider myself to be a religious person. Religion is concerned primarily
with what you should be doing. You do this, you don't do that.
You know, it's concerned whether you're going to church, or if
you're tithing, or if you're praying and singing and living
your life properly. And seems to be obsessed with
pomp and circumstance. That's the chief business of
religion. But I'm not interested in that. And I stand to you today
not interested in that at all, because I'm in love. I'm in love
with a person. I'm in love with Christ, and
he's in love with me. In one of the bulletins going
back to May of 2015, Jim shared one of the poems that Henry Mahan
had sent to him. We don't know who the author
is, but I'm going to go ahead and read it to you here. Jim read it, well
he wrote it, but then he also added the fourth through the
sixth verses. I sent this to Susan earlier
as a little preview, but I thought you all would like to hear it
today. So here it is. For every pain we must bear,
for every sorrow, every care, there is a reason. For every
falsehood that is said, For every tear that is shed, there is a
reason. For every grief, for every trial,
for every weary, lonely mile, there is a reason. For every
sickness that is ours, for all the brokenhearted hours, there
is a reason. And for every trouble that we
meet, For every time we see defeat, there is a reason. For every
day we are oppressed, for every problem, every test, there is
a reason. For we will trust God as we should,
and all this will work together for our good, because our God
is the reason. I love that poem. And if you'd
like a copy of it, I can send it to you. Just let me know.
And the man who sent that poem to Jim, I know you all know who
he is here in this church, but his name was Henry Mahan, for
those of you listening on the internet. And many times I've
heard him referred to as the Spurgeon of the 21st century. And I agree with that assessment.
He wrote several books and commentaries, and he was instrumental, in my
opinion, in helping to establish many of the congregations, the
free grace congregations you see all over the country, and
most of them are probably still going today. But let me tell
you a little bit how it all began. I've done a little bit of research
and discovered that in 1947, a very young Henry Mahan, became the song leader at Pollard
Baptist Church right here in Ashland, Kentucky. For those
of you who don't know, it's just down the street here on Blackburn.
And at the time, Pollard was the largest Southern Baptist
Church in Eastern Kentucky. And a man named Don Wells was
the pastor there. And in that year, in 1947, the
pastor, Mr. Wells, he wanted to have a long
two-week meeting. kind of like a revival or what
we call a Bible conference, except it goes on for two weeks. That
was a thing to do in Eastern Kentucky, I guess, back then.
But he didn't know who to ask or where to look to come visit
and read and lead the meetings. I guess there was no yellow pages
for sovereign, well, just preachers to do that sort of thing. The
internet didn't exist, so it was a little hard to find the
information. An associate of his, Dr. Charlie
Stevens, was a school principal. I don't know if you know that
name, Ron. He wanted to know if he knew anybody who should
come and preach. And Dr. Stevens said, yes sir,
I do. I'd recommend that you have Rolf
Barnard come and preach. Rolf Barnard, who's he? He said,
well, he's billed as the evangelist who's different. And yeah, he
was different, all right. And so they had scheduled the
meeting with Barnard. And when Rolf Barnard was introduced,
Pollard, of course, was a very large church at the time. If
you drive by the building now, you'll see that it's just a really
big building, bigger than this one, I think. And there was even
a balcony in it, and it was packed. And there was a 21-year-old Henry
Thomas Mahan sitting in the front row. He didn't know what Ralph Barnard
was going to do or say. And all of a sudden, during that
initial meeting, he looked down on that 21-year-old assistant
pastor, Mr. Henry Mahan, he said, son.
And Henry looked around and he said, yes, I'm talking to you. And he asked, do you know Romans
8, 28? Henry said, yes, sir, I do. And Ralph said, well, stand up,
let's hear it. So Henry stood up and he said,
we know all things work together for good to them that love God.
And then he sat down and Ralph said, is that all it says? No, sir, that's not what it says.
Well, stand up, son, let's hear all of it. So Henry stood up
and he said, and we know that all things work together for
good to them that love God, to them who are the called, according
to his purpose. And suddenly, Rolfe said with
a very fervent tone, purpose, purpose, purpose. And then he said, son, God never
does anything by accident. He does it on purpose. And if you will learn that, if
you learn that, not only will the gospel open up to you, but
all the word of God will open up to you. God never does anything
by accident. He does it on purpose. And later
that evening, the pastor and Rolf were headed out to eat and
they walked by Henry. He was sitting in the hall with
his Bible open. And they said, Henry, would you like to go out
to eat with us? Henry said, no, sir. I'm gonna do what you said. I'm gonna search this Bible for
the word purpose. and see what it says. So was,
was Rolf Barnard right or was he wrong? Let's start from the
beginning. When the Lord Almighty created
the heavens and the earth, did he do it accidentally or did
he do it on purpose? Did he determine that he'd create
this universe on purpose? that he would create the vast
galaxies made up of trillions of stars, plants, black holes,
and all kinds of things flying around out there. Did he determine that he would
create this planet Earth that has sunlight during the day and
a moon that you can see at night? Was that on purpose? Or was that
an accident? I believe it was all done on
purpose. And this planet, it rotates on its axis at over 1,000
miles an hour. It may not feel like it, but
scientists tell us that it is. It's generally accepted as such. Question for you, what do you
think would happen if the Earth rotated only a few hundred miles
per hour, or just say 100 miles per hour? Well, to begin, the
days and the nights, they'd be a lot longer. If this planet
only rotated a tenth of what it does now, well, the nights
and the days, they would be 10 times longer than they are now. Instead of a 24-hour day, we'd
have a 240-hour day. But really, life wouldn't really
be sustainable with that kind of day. Any grass or plant life
that existed would either burn up during the day or it'd freeze
during the night. Is it an accident that the length
of our days is perfectly suited for our lives? Or was it made
that way on purpose? Our sun, it has a surface temperature
of over 1,000 degrees Fahrenheit. Is it an accident the sun is
just far enough from us that it doesn't burn us up? and burn
everything up like we see on, let's say, planet Mercury, but
happens to warm things up just right so that life flourishes?
Or was it on purpose? The moon in the sky, it's 186,000
miles from the Earth. What would happen if the moon
was a lot closer? Let's say, like, say 50,000 miles. Well, the tides in the ocean,
they'd be so strong that all the land would be covered by
water. Could life be sustained in an environment like that?
No. No. We'd probably all drown.
Is that by accident? All the planets move in perfect
harmony in their little orbits. Ever wonder why they don't crash
into each other? What would happen if they did? Would the orbit
of our planet continue as it is with other planets? Is this
by design, or is this by accident? If everything you see in the
night sky is working perfect harmony, keeping the balance
just right, is that on purpose, or is that
an accident? Even the air we breathe, 99%
of it's oxygen. 1% is made up of all these other
little gases, nitrogen, krypton, argon, whatever. The air is mixed
just right so that we can breathe without struggling. Is that an
accident or is that on purpose? Your body, your human body, has
over 100,000 miles worth of blood vessels that our hearts pump
this oxygen and other nutrients to all our trillions of cells.
And by the way, we got over 100 trillion cells in our body. I
heard that. Did you know that? All of this is so we can live.
Is that on purpose, or is that an accident? You got all these
organs, got these bones, you have all these different systems
working together in your bodies. I found out this week, I found
out I have a circulatory system. Gotta keep my blood pressure
low. You have a nervous system, you have a respiratory system,
you have a skeletal system, you have a reproductive system, you
have a digestive system, and a muscular system. Is that all
that by an accident? Or is that on purpose? Psalm
139.14 says, I will praise thee for I am fearfully and wonderfully
made. Are we here today on this earth
on purpose? Are we just the result of an
evolutionary accident? Are we merely the products of
chance? Are we merely the products of random mutations? Are we here
on purpose? Did you know that God had a savior
in mind before there ever was a sinner? Did you know that God
had a surety of a covenant of grace before we were created? Did you know that God planned
to be glorified through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus before
he made us? Now, I don't know all of you
who are listening tonight on the internet. I know most of
you in this room. But I can tell you that nobody
is born by accident. You're here today living and
breathing and listening to this sermon, and it's not by accident. You may not even know who your
parents are. You may not know even who your grandparents are.
But that's all right. You're still here on purpose,
and you're no accident. My heart aches for orphans out
there who don't have parents. They need to hear that they're
no accident. Society may tell them that they
are, but they're no accident. Nobody's an accident. And the
truth is, nothing is an accident. It's no accident that you're
sitting here listening tonight. It's no accident you're living
in the year 2021. And it's no accident that you're married
to your husband or your wife or that you're not married. That's
not an accident. Think about all the events that
led up to you meeting your spouse. Do you think those are just random
events or are they planned out for you? I want to talk about Angie here
for a second. I remember back in the nineties, I won a scholarship
to the local junior college. It's the Menorah Area College. It's in the southern Missouri
Ozark region. And you know who else had a scholarship
to that school? Sitting right there, my wife
Angie. We were both in the school's jazz band. I played the little
trombone, and she played the saxophone. You've heard her.
She still plays today. I don't. But she caught my eye. And I caught her off guard and
I asked her out on a date. And our friendship, it developed
into a loving relationship. We got married and we had that
son over there who read the scriptures earlier, Cole. I know that that
wasn't an accident. And it's no accident that the
Lord laid it on our heart to move to this town and be a part
of this congregation. So, If you would, would you please
turn to Ephesians chapter one. Nothing by our God is by accident. We're gonna read in verse 11.
And remember that this is written to believers. In whom also we have obtained
an inheritance being predestinated according to the what? Purpose
of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own
will. You know what this tells me? It tells me if you're saved,
if you have obtained an inheritance which is in Christ, he saved
you on purpose. Read that again, the purpose
of him who worketh all things, not most things, not some things,
not only the good things, but all things, after the counsel
of his own will, all things. God doesn't ask for permission.
He didn't ask for my permission to save me. Salvation isn't about
me, it's about Christ. It's not about you, it's about
Christ. And all you need to know is this, what did Christ say
to his disciples about prayer? not my will, but thy will be
done. And when the Lord personally
stretched out to all of his people, we learned to bow and submit
to his will. Just this week, I found out I
may have stage three chronic kidney disease. Don't worry about
it. But right after this conference earlier this month, I went straight
to the emergency room with really, really high blood pressure. I
found out about my circulatory system. It was 200 over 120, pretty high. And I didn't know
what was going to happen to me. I was sitting there in the emergency
room. And I don't know how I'm going to die. I don't know if
it'll be next week or 30 years from now. But I sat there in
that emergency room and I had a peace. I had a calmness to
me. I wasn't scared. It's because of this. Hold your
place in Ephesians 1. We're going to go over to Colossians
1, starting in verse 16. For by him were all things created
that are in heaven, that are in earth, visible and invisible,
whether they be thrones, dominions, or principalities, or powers,
all things were created by him and for him. And he is before
all things, and by him all things consist. And he is the head of
the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn
from the dead, that in all things he might have the preeminence.
Henry Mahan once said while giving a sermon that the Lord is in
charge of everything. When you drive down the road
and the car in front of you kicks up dust in front of you, every
particle of that dust, it falls exactly where it's supposed to
fall. And shortly after he said in
a sermon, a wasp flew up his leg and stung him. And he looked
up, he said, Lord, what was that for? So everything is for a purpose. And maybe that wasp was stinging
Henry for today. Maybe it was so that it could
be recorded and you could be given a little bit more comfort
that the Lord is in control. God's in control of all things,
and it gives me comfort. No matter what happens, we know
it's by God's hand. How comforting is that to know?
How comforting is that for you to know? The safest place in
the world is submitted to God's will. And the most comforting
place in the world is bowed down, submitted to that will. When you stop worrying and everything,
about everything, and realize it's all by God's sovereign hand,
you can relax. You can be like me in the emergency
room, sitting there, well, I wonder what's going on next. Stop worrying
about everything. Don't worry about your finances.
Don't worry about your health. I'm not saying we should neglect
these things. I'm just saying you should stop worrying. God's
got this. not my will, but thy will be
done. That helps to stop my mind from
racing, but only when I rest in that knowledge. And I rest
right here in scripture in the all things. The Lord, he caused me to learn
to play trombone, and that my grades were just good enough
to get a scholarship to a local junior college. instead of going
to that big prestigious university. He had me be good enough to get
into the jazz band. And then he had Angie be in that
same class with me. All that so that we would meet,
be joined in marriage, and have a son. He's behind everything
in my life. He's behind everything in your
life. He's behind everybody's lives. And it's true whether
you believe or not. And according to Paul here in
Ephesians, this is all according to the counsel of his will, his
counsel. What does that mean? The counsel
of his will. If you hold your place in Ephesians,
you can read that. In whom we also have obtained
an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose of him
who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will. What's a counsel? Well, it's
a group of people that get together to decide something. And in this
case, it's the counsel of the Father, the Son, and the Holy
Spirit, all counseling with one another. And this counsel of
God, it got together before the foundation of the world to determine
all things. It's what it says here. All things
that would happen in space, time, history. And you want to know
what history means? History. It's his story, and
we're part of it. His eternal purpose, his counsel,
and his will is worked out in his story. Remember that, his
story. Okay, but what's all this for?
What's the purpose of all this? What's the purpose of his purpose?
Well, it's to bring glory to himself. that's for God to be
glorified in the highest, and in particular, is to bring glory
to His Son through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. It's to bring redemption to His
chosen and elect people. If you wouldn't mind, you can
read that right here for yourself by turning to Romans 11, verse
36. So it's pretty plainly there. For of him and through him and
to him are all things to whom be glory forever. Amen. Everything is of him. God the Father, he's the source
of all things. He predestinated all things.
Everything's through him also. Says everything is of him, through
him. Everything that he has purposed
in his eternal counsel, he brings to pass. He's working in every
moment. He's working out everything to
make sure his plan, his story is carried out. And this includes
his plan of redemption as well. Christ, our Messiah, he did this. He did this when he lived that
perfect life and died as the perfect blood sacrifice for his
people. And everything is to him, says
right there, to him. It's all for his glory. The end
of the purpose of God is the glory of God. Now, inevitably, when you talk
about this with people, they'll say, well, what about our will?
Well, what about it? People like to talk about a will
that is free. That is, they believe their will
is independent from God's will. But I have to ask them this.
Is it? How could it be if God has purposed
all things, as the scriptures say right here? Wouldn't everyone's
wills be a part of all things? You know, I don't think people
really know what they're talking about when they talk about having
a free will. And I know politicians, they
use that phrase all the time. And a lot of people, when you
say free will, They just think, oh, we're free to make choices.
And I agree with if that, if that's what you mean by free
will. Yeah, I'm free to decide what I want to have for dinner
tonight. But religious people, they usually mean that they're
free to save themselves through an exercise of their will. That's
usually what's meant by the phrase free will. But our will really
isn't free. For those of you who might be
listening tonight on the internet, why don't you will to not eat
for the rest of this year. See how far that gets you. Go
ahead. And I'm willing to bet you money,
wager, that your will will give in to your hunger. And it'd be
pretty quickly too. It's gonna be, it's not gonna,
you're not gonna make it to the end of the year. You're gonna
be, I don't think you'd make it to tomorrow. I'd have a hard
time. I've been able to do it, but
it's hard. Your belly's got more power than your will. And I know
this from experience, and I'm sure most of you all do too.
Do you understand? There's only one being that has
a free will, and that's God. Nothing forces him to do anything. Nothing can coerce him to do
anything. He's not persuaded by any puny
human's will to do anything, really. You can't cause him to
change his mind about anything. He's absolutely free to do according
to his will, but we aren't. Our only freedom is within the
confines of our nature. And as a sinner, I'm free to
keep sinning. But that's not what people mean
by free will. I'm not, old analogy I used to use with Angela, I'm
not free to sprout wings like a bird and fly off into the sky.
I'm not free to change my nature. Does a, question for you, does
a person become a sinner when they sin? Or does a person sin
because they're a sinner? A bird doesn't become a bird
when it flies. It flies because it's a bird.
And we sin because we're sinners. And I'm not saying we don't have
wills. We all have wills. You can decide what you wanna
have for breakfast tomorrow. But God's also got a will. And
by nature, we want our way. We want our will. And you want
your way too. But God wants his way. And there's
going to be a battle of the wills. It's going to be a battle between
your way and his way. And you better hope that God
wins. Because if you win, the prize
is hell. And I don't want to win that
battle. I don't want to go my way. My way leads to destruction. Here's a little secret, though.
God always wins. He always gets his way. And if
you go to hell, it's because he intended to put you there.
It's not because you chose it. And if you're saved and you go
to heaven, it's because God favored you in Christ and sent his son
to die for you. And then he sprouted wings on
you and he caused you to fly like a bird. He caused you to
believe the word of truth when he presented it to you. And you know what else I don't
want besides my way or my will? I don't want my works. I want
Christ's work on the cross. Let's turn to Acts chapter 4.
Let me give you a brief synopsis of what's going on here in this
chapter. Christ's disciples, they've been preaching the gospel.
pretty excited and wanted to spread this good news that they
had heard all around, but the Jewish rabbis, the Pharisees,
they weren't too happy about that. It was undermining their
authority, and so they came out and told the disciples to stop
preaching these things. And the disciples responded and said,
sorry, we can't help it. We can't help but speak these
things. So the Pharisees threatened these disciples. Let's turn to
verse 23 there. And being let go, they went to
their own company and reportedly reported all that the chief priests
and elders had said unto them. And when they heard that, they
lift up their voice to God with one accord and said, Lord, thou
art God, which has made heaven and earth and the sea and all
that is in them. Who by the mouth of thy servant
David has said, why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain
things? By the way, that quote's from
Psalm 2. Why do the heathen rage and the
people imagine vain things? Well, what are these vain things
that are imagined by people? Well, religious ideas, unbelief. It's imagining that their will
is free from God. It's imagining that their will
is superior to God's. It's imagining that there is
no God. Got a lot of vain things in this world today. You can
go out on the street, lots of vain things. So the speaker here,
who's Peter, he's quoting Psalm 2. Let's continue. The kings of the earth stood
up, verse 26, the kings of the earth stood up and the rulers
were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ.
For of a truth against the holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed,
both Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the people
of Israel, were gathered together, for to do whatsoever thy hand
and thy counsel determined before to be done. Thy counsel. These
words, they blow my mind. Y'all know who Herod was, y'all
know who Pilate was. Herod was that awful king who
was scared to death of Christ. He was afraid he was gonna lose
all his power to him. And so Christ was taken to Herod. And
Pilate, he was the Roman governor in charge of the Roman soldiers.
And here in verse 27, it says that they were gathered together,
that is, The Roman, Pilate, Herod, all the folks that were behind
crucifying Christ, they were gathered together to do. What
is it that they did? What they wanted to do. They
mocked him. And they made him wear a crown
of thorns and a purple robe. And they shouted to him, mockingly,
Hail, King of the Jews. And in John 19, It says, the
soldiers twisted together a crown of thorns and put it on his head
and arrayed him in a purple robe. And they came up to him saying,
hail, king of the Jews. And they struck him with their
hands. And they paraded him around to his death and killed him in
a very brutal manner. And it's unspeakable to imagine
what they did to him. And the people yelled, crucify
him. It's what the people wanted.
They wanted this. But look at verse 28. Who else
wanted this to happen? Who else purposed this to happen? God did. Christ suffered and
died. And what took here, what place
here was beyond description. Here we have the innocent lamb
of God taken out and murdered. by these people, and Christ's
blood was spilt on Calvary. Such a terrible sin, it's hard
to speak of it. But right here in verse 28 says
this was part of God's plan. It's what He purposed to do.
Turn to Psalm 22. This is a psalm prophesying the
death of the Messiah. If you haven't read it, I'd ask
that you do, but we're not gonna read the whole thing. We're just
gonna read one verse here. Verse 18. They part my garments among them
and cast lots upon my vesture. Even the casting of lots for
Christ's clothes. That was all planned out. It
was all prophesied here. Such a minor detail, isn't it?
But here we see it's revealed that it's prophesied here by
the psalmist. Now turn to John 19, 24, and we're gonna see the
fulfillment of this. One of these minor details, written
thousands of years before Christ came. Verse 24, chapter 19, John. And they said, therefore, among
themselves, let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it
shall be that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, they
parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast
lots. These things, therefore, the soldiers did. Even something
as innocuous and sinful as the cruel Roman soldiers casting
lots for Christ's garments, this too was predestinated and sovereignly
carried out by the Lord. Those Roman soldiers, their will
wasn't free. They did as they were created
to do. If anyone asks you, does God
predetermine the decisions of everybody, you can answer correctly
according to Proverbs 16.33, the lot is cast into the lap,
but the whole disposing of it is from the Lord. But why? Why did God decide all these
seemingly little things? Well, we read it earlier, Romans
11, 36, for his glory. But how does that bring him glory? How do sinful people carrying
out the decree of God glorify him? Well, I've got some questions
for you that you can ask yourself. Would God be more glorified if
he just made this world and all of his people without sin? Would
there be a need for a savior if we were sinless? Would there
be a need for the cross if there weren't needy sinners who were
loved before the foundation of the world? Was the cross needed
to glorify God? However you decide to answer
those questions, ask yourself this, who are we to question
God? Isn't his mind much greater than
ours? And isn't he capable of determining
what brings him the most amount of glory? Our puny and our weak
minds, they're incapable of thinking like he does. I'll just read
this to you, you don't have to turn there. Isaiah 55, verses
eight and nine. For my thoughts are not your
thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For
as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher
than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Now, my mom and dad are listening
tonight, so I'm just gonna talk a little bit about my mom. And
when I was a young boy, My mother, she was very careful to teach
me proper grammar. I remember she'd shush me if
I came into the room and said, I ain't. I ain't going to go
to school tomorrow. She told me that was a cuss word,
so I'm up here cussing. Anyway, she had me going for
a little while, and she went to these great extents to make
sure I learned proper grammar. And it's served me well. and
it'll serve you well if you read the scriptures. And she also
taught me the difference between may and can. There's a vast difference
between those two words. Can means capability. May means
permission. Mom, can I have a cookie? Yes,
son, you can have that cookie. However, you may not. Dinner
is coming up soon, and I don't want you spoiling your dinner.
See the difference? Now listen up. All of us may
come to Christ. All of us have permission to
come to Christ. Revelation 22, 17 says, And the
Spirit and the Bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say,
Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take
the water of life freely. Do you thirst? and you may come. You have permission to come to
Christ and drink freely of the water of life. But can you come? That's a different question altogether. No, you can't. Seems the vast
majority of the world though, they don't thirst and therefore
they can't come to Christ. Why? Because they don't thirst.
John 644 says, no man can come to me except the Father, which
has sent me, draw him. If you have a Strong's Concordance,
you'll see that the Greek word for draw there is helko. You
know what that means? Well, the first form in the Strong's
Concordance, when you look it up, it means to drag. Let's read
that passage again. No man can come to me except
the Father which hath sent me drags him. You can't thirst unless
the Lord enables you to. You can't sprout wings and fly
like a bird to Christ unless the Lord puts those wings on
you and breathes life into you and takes you to him. You will
be drawn irresistibly by his grace. You'll be dragged to Christ. So you may come to Christ, you
got permission, but you can't come to him unless the Lord breathes
life into you and causes you to rest in him. Do you find an
interest in your heart and your soul for Christ? Do you want
a relationship with him? Well, let me tell you right now,
that desire has been put there by the Lord, if you do. You can't
have that interest unless God purposed it. God's purposed all
things. So if the Lord is working an interest in your heart, then
you can also expect to be called. And when he calls you, it's effectual. What does that mean? Well, my
mom was the grammar teacher, but she was also the disciplinarian
for me growing up. And if I was causing problems,
she'd say, and Brandon, stop that. And I was a mean older
brother to my little sister. And I'd pick on her quite a bit. I'd look at her. And then she'd
say, he's looking at me. And I'd look away. And my mom
would say, Brandon, stop that. My mom was her only defense for
a while. But later she got mean enough, she could whip up on
me. As I was a typical kid, and sometimes
in my mom's words, they just went right through one ear and
out the other. I didn't hear her. Couldn't get my attention.
Usually, although, all it really took, though, to get my attention
was what my family eventually called or deemed the look. We
called it the look. And that's where she'd squint
her eyes like this and just give me a mean old look. And it scared
me to death. It caused me to stop whatever
it was I was doing, whatever mischief I was up to, and start
behaving. It was an effectual look. And
when Christ calls his people to himself, that call is effectual. If you're called to Christ, he
will save you and robe you in his righteousness. And you will
rest in him. And nothing you can do Nothing
you do or can do, you can't do anything to stop it. He's going
to have his way with you. Remember, this is his story.
No matter what you currently want to do right now or try to
do to stop him. And I could spend the next month
standing here in this pulpit pleading with you to believe
on the Lord, but I'm not going to do that because it's not going
to do you any good. The only call that matters is
Christ's effectual call. And when he calls you, you will
come. He'll drag you into his light
with you kicking and screaming all the way if he has to. You
can't stop it. Do you desire to be with the
Lord? Do you desire to come to a saving knowledge of Christ?
Do you desire to have that right relationship with the Savior?
know this, you may come. But if you find you can't, pray
that the Lord enables you to believe and rest in his son.
And when you finally do come, and when you finally do rest
in Christ, you'll find that your life was not lived in vain, no
matter what. You'll find that your life does
have a purpose. you're put on this earth to glorify
God in some way. If you believe, it means you're
meant to glorify the Lord through your salvation, through the redemption
that's in his blood. And even if you never believe
or rest in Christ and die and go to hell, know this, you'll
still glorify God. He will be glorified. He's glorified
in all things, even the death of the wicked. And if you do come to Christ,
you're also going to be a minister. And to minister means to serve.
And being a minister doesn't, it means much more than just
getting up here in this pulpit and preaching. We've all been
given different tasks, different talents, different experiences,
different ways of talking. You know, that's one of the things
I liked about our conferences is we get to listen to different
gospel preachers. And I like listening to Jim.
Don't get me wrong, my little disclaimer, but the Bible conferences
we have, they're great because we get to hear truth in a variety
of different ways. Did you ever notice the different
ways these men talk and deliver these messages? Well, maybe that's
just God's way of reaching and communicating truth to all of
his people. Maybe your ministry, your service,
is to help others in need. Maybe it's to serve this congregation
in some way or to visit lonely widows or people suffering from
afflictions in the hospital. I know we can't do that yet because
it's one visitor per person, but that needs to be done. And maybe It's just to sit in
your pew and pray that His will be done, His stories carried
out. Whatever your ministry is, you can rest knowing that you
will do what God has purposed for you to do in the service
of His kingdom. Don't ever forget that. All things
work together for good to those that love the Lord. If you believe
You can look back on your life and know that everything in your
life, including your life of unbelief and all of you, even
your wicked ways, your sinfulness, that too worked to good for you
and for his glory through the redemption that is in Christ
according to his purpose. That's all I got. You're dismissed
when the music's finished.