Well, good morning. Good to see
everyone this morning. If you would, open your Bibles
with me to Mark chapter 3. Mark the third chapter. Before
we begin, let's bow before our Lord and seek His blessing. Our Father, we come before your
throne of grace this morning, and a thankful people. Father,
how thankful we are to be able to come before you and pour out
our hearts in praise and thanksgiving, to be able to pour out our petitions,
the cares of our heart before the God of all earth, who has
the power always to do as he pleases. Father, we're thankful.
And we ask that you would hear our prayer, our praise, our thanksgiving,
and our petitions, all in our Lord Jesus Christ because of
who he is and what he has accomplished for his people. Father, I beg
of you that this morning that you would enable us to worship
you in spirit and in truth. How thankful we are that you've
given us one more opportunity to open your word and to read
it and study it, and I pray that you would reveal your son to
us from it. Don't let us, Father, just go
through the motions of religion, enable us to worship from the
heart. And while we pray for ourselves, we pray especially
for our children's classes at this time. Father, that you'd
bless our young ones, that you would bless our teachers as they
teach and bless our children as they hear. Father, I pray
you'd give them a hearing ear and a heart that would receive
and believe your word. Cause us always to be faithful
to point them to Christ our Savior. we also pray father for your
people wherever they're gathered together this morning to worship
you father blessed for your great namesake in this dark dark day
father we pray that you'd show forth your glory show us your
glory your redemptive glory in your son our lord jesus christ
father in his name for his sake and his glory we pray amen I've titled our lesson this morning,
The Lord Calls His People. And our text reveals us several
very good lessons. It'd be good for us to always
keep in mind. And the first one is this. The
Lord is the one who calls his people. Look at verse 13 of Mark
chapter three. And he goeth up into a mountain
and calleth unto him whom he would. And they came unto him. Now, I love the power and the
grace of our Lord that's so clearly displayed, just so clearly stated
in this verse. The Lord called unto him whom
he would, and they came to him. I love that. You remember, we
ended last week in verse 12, where the Lord charged those
demons. Now, they said, you're the son of God. He said, don't
you tell anybody. He forbid them to tell anybody that he was the
son of God. And you know, if they had done
that, those demons, their demon-possessed people, if those demons would
have had those people go around shouting, this is the son of
God, boy, that would have impressed the flesh, wouldn't it? Well,
that just is another example. We don't need what impresses
the flesh. The Lord told them, don't you
be telling people who I am, because the Lord doesn't need demons
to do that work for him. No, he reveals himself to his
people. and He calls His people to come to Him. And when the
Lord calls, they come running. Not because the flesh is impressed,
but because the Lord speaks to the heart and calls them to come
to Him. Now that's the electing grace
of God. The Lord calleth unto Him whom
He would. He called to Him whoever He would,
who He chose. That's election. You see, the
Lord made the choice, didn't He? He made the choice of who
he would call to him. Now, I think this is a pretty
good question. Who did he call? Who did he call? Did he call
people who appear righteous to other men, the scribes and the
Pharisees? Did he call the religious leaders
of his day, thinking, well, if I have these religious leaders
behind me, you know, I'll have more clout? Did he call the political
leaders of his day? You know, if he thought, well,
I've got the powers that be in Rome, you know, behind me, then
I'll be able to, you know, accomplish my mission. Did he call rich
folks, influential people who would have the ability to help
his cause? No, that's not who he called. Look over 1 Corinthians
1. The Apostle Paul here tells us
who the Lord calls, and this is who he called to himself when
he was in that mountain. 1 Corinthians 1 Verse 26 For you see your calling, brethren,
how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not
many noble, are called. But God hath chosen the foolish
things of the world to confound the wise, and God hath chosen
the weak things of the world to confound the things which
are mighty and base things of the world. And things which are
despised, that's who God chooses. Yea, and things which are not,
to bring to naught the things that are, and here's the reason
that he does it that way. That no flesh should glory in
his presence. But of him, of him, of his will,
of his calling, of his redeeming, of his choosing, of him are you
in Christ Jesus. Who of God has made unto us wisdom
and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. that according
as it's written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. Now,
the Lord always does this, and this is who he called on this
day. He calls common, everyday, sinful men and women to come
to him, and they come. When he calls, they come. See,
the Lord chose his people in eternity past. He chose them.
He set his love upon them, and in time, he comes to them, and
he calls them to come to him. Now we don't choose Jesus, do
we? No, He chose us. Now we choose Him now, but only
because He chose us first, right? Our salvation is not based upon
our love for the Lord. No, we only love Him, why? Because
He first loved us. See, it has to begin with the
Lord. The Lord chose a people, He loves
those people, and He will always call those people to come to
Him. He'll not miss one of them. He
said, I've loved you with an everlasting love. Therefore,
because of that everlasting love, because I chose you, because
I set my love upon you, therefore with loving kindness have I drawn
you. He draws his people to come to him with cords of love. And
I just love reading this so much, I just read it over and over
and over again in the last few days. He calleth unto him whom
he would, and they came unto him. I love reading that because
that's the only hope this sinner has, that the Lord chose me and
he'll call me and make me come to him even though I don't deserve
it. Now the salvation of a sinner when the Holy Spirit is pleased
to reveal Christ to the heart, give life in the heart, give
faith in Christ in the heart, you know what that is? All that
is is the Lord carrying out his eternal will and purpose, applying
to the heart one of his children, what he purposed to do for them
in eternity past. That's all it is. And the only
way the salvation of a sinner can be sure is if God chooses
him, God calls him, God applies that salvation, God keeps him. That's the only way the salvation
of a sinner can be sure. And you know every believer of
every generation, of every race, of every culture, of every background
loves it that way. They love to hear that. You just
can't exhaust the glory of God's electing love for his people,
can you? The Lord is the one who calls his people. All right,
number two. The Lord is the one who calls and makes his preachers. Verse 14, and he ordained 12
that they should be with him and that he might send them forth
to preach. Now, the Lord calls his people
to come to him. And out of that number, the Lord
calls some and he makes them preachers. They're not already
preachers. He has to make them one. You
know, the Lord doesn't use the natural gifts of men. If he's got a magnetic personality
or he's a very gifted speaker, he's very talented or something.
That's not the talents or the abilities that the Lord uses
in preaching. The Lord takes weak, sinful men and he makes
preachers out of them. He makes them something that
they're not. He makes them preachers. Mark says here that the Lord
ordained preachers. Now, we all have an idea in our
head of being ordained or an ordination service. Today, when
the church ordains a man, what we're doing is we're recognizing
the Lord has already made that man a preacher. We're just recognizing
that those gifts, what the Lord has made this man. We're just
recognizing what the Lord's already done. But that's not what this
means. When the Lord ordains a preacher,
it means that he makes him a preacher. The word ordain Mark uses here
means to make, to make. And it's used, that Greek word
is used many times in the New Testament. Let me give you three
of them to show what, to make. In Matthew 20, verse 15, the
Lord says, is it not lawful for me to do what I will with mine
own? That word to do, translated to
do, is the same word ordained in our text. The Lord says I
can do what I will, I can make what I will, I can do with them
whatever I will. That's that word ordained. In
Mark 5, verse 19, after the Lord healed that leper, he told him,
now you go home to thy friends and tell them how great things
the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee. Those words, hath done, what
the Lord hath done, he's healed you. He's healed you, he made
that leprosy go away, he's healed you. It's the same word ordained
in our text, it's to make. Was it something that the Lord
did? And then 2 Corinthians 5.21. For he hath made him sin for
us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him. That phrase hath made, it's the
very same word translated ordained in our text. He hath ordained
him to be sin for us. He made him sin. The word means
to make. So the Lord called these men,
these 12 men, and he made preachers out of them. And the way he did
it is by teaching them the gospel himself. They didn't get out
a bunch of commentaries, a bunch of old scrolls. No, he taught
them the gospel himself. Now that's what an apostle is,
is someone who's been taught the gospel straight from the
lips of the Lord Jesus. That's why there's no apostles
today. There's only ever 12 of them. And the Lord made these
men preachers by making them be with him. See what it says
here, he ordained 12 that they should be with him. The Lord made these 12 men to
be with him. I mean, you think what a blessing
that had to be. These men saw the Lord every
single day for three and a half years. He taught these men publicly
and privately. He taught them for three and
a half years. They watched him. Not just did he teach them by
word, he taught them by example. They watched him pray. They watched
him preach. They learned from watching him.
You think what a blessing it was to be with the Lord, to be
taught directly from Him. And you know, it worked too.
Being with Him made a difference to these 12 men. In Acts 4 verse
13, when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived
these are unlearned and ignorant men, they marveled and took knowledge
of them. They'd been with Jesus. The only
way that these men can be so bold and clear and know these
things, they've been with Jesus. And the Lord still teaches his
preachers that way today. Now not, again, it can't be by
his mouth, that's just the 12 apostles. But he teaches them
by spirit and by his word. The Lord is with his preachers. That's how they learn. Let me
show you that in Revelation chapter one. Revelation 1. Verse 20. The mystery of the seven stars
which thou sawest in my right hand, and the seven golden candlesticks. The seven stars are the angels,
the pastors of the seven churches. And the seven candlesticks which
thou sawest are the seven churches. Now, where are these seven stars,
these seven pastors and these seven churches? They're in the
hand of the Lord. That's where you found them. He's with his preachers today
because he's holding them in his hand. And he's teaching them. He's giving them the message
to preach. Now, God's preachers, they're just fallible men. I understand that better than
anybody. God's preachers are just fallible men. the Lord is with them. And it'd
be a mighty good idea to at least stop and think about what they've
got to tell you from the word of God. Could be that's what
God's talking. Be mighty good idea to at least
stop and listen, wouldn't it? All right, number three. The
Lord sends his preachers, and when he sends them, he equips
them for the job. Verse 14 says that they should
be with him and that he might send them forth to preach. Now
the apostles, the Lord called them for this purpose, not so
that they be with him forever, but that he'd send them forth
to preach. And they went wherever the Lord
sent them. Now remember, one time Paul determined
he was gonna go here, and the Lord said, nope, don't go there.
He said, well, I'll go here. No, don't go to this place. This
is where I'm sending you. They went where the Lord sent
them. And he sent these 12 men all
over the world to preach the gospel. And these 12 men, except
for the Apostle Paul and probably Matthew, from what I can gather,
probably largely uneducated men, they turned the world upside
down. Not just the religious world,
the political world, they turned the world upside down by this
message that they were preaching. And they went wherever the Lord
sent them. And that's what it is for all of God's preachers.
How can they preach except they be seen? Except they be sent
by God. Here's the definition of a preacher.
He's a man sent by God, from God, with a message from God. He doesn't have his own message.
He's not preaching his own ideas. He's sent by God to a specific
place with a message from God. God always sends his preachers
to specific people. at specific times. The Lord sent
John the Baptist to the Jews. There was a man sent from God
whose name was John. He came to the Jews. The Lord
sent Ananias to a man, Saul of Tarsus. Saul of Tarsus was somebody.
In that world, in the world of the Jews, Saul of Tarsus was
somebody. And the Lord didn't send one
of the other 11 to go preach to Saul of Tarsus, did he? He
sent a man, Ananias. It's the only place in scripture
we read of this man. Don't know anything else about
him. He sent a nobody to preach the gospel to another nobody.
That's what he did. The Lord sent Paul to Lydia.
He sent Peter to Cornelius. He sent Paul to Corinth. He sent
Peter and Silas to Philippi, because there was a jailer there
that needed to hear the gospel. One day, some years ago, the
Lord sent a man named Ralph Barnard to Ashland, Kentucky. He came
preaching the gospel. Then the Lord sent Henry Mahan
to Ashland, Kentucky. Raised up a ministry that made
him the pastor And now it's me. For better or worse, now it's
me. And you know, before I was called to be the pastor here,
in those years prior to that, I had opportunity to go to several
different places to be the pastor. And I liked the folks there.
I kind of wanted to go. I mean, I liked them. They're
great folks, you know. But I knew this. I knew it beyond
a shadow of a doubt, the Lord was not sending me there. I knew
it. And then the Lord sent me here.
Yep, this is where I just knew it. This is where the Lord sent
me here to preach to you. And I want to tell you, I take
that very seriously. Very, very seriously. This is
something God has laid on me, on my heart to give me the desire
to preach Christ to you. Isn't that something? Well, when
Lord sends his preachers, he's not just going to send them out
there willy nilly. He sends them and he equips them. Look at verse
15. And to have power to heal sicknesses
and to cast out devils. Now, the Lord gave the apostles
these gifts. They could do that. They could lay their hands on
somebody and heal them. They could speak and cast out
devils. They had that power. And Lord gave these 12 men those
abilities. So it would be obvious. These
men are sent. No man could do what these men
are doing unless God's with them. They knew that. So people would
know these men have a message from God. I better listen to
him. And the apostles, they could lay hands on someone and give
them those gifts. But now, if you had that gift,
the gift of these apostles, and then you laid your hands on me
and gave it to me, I couldn't lay my hands and give it to somebody
else. That gift could only be given from the apostles. So when
the apostles died, these gifts died with them. There are no
more of these gifts today. Everybody that talks about doing
that today, now they're just lying. They're charlatans. That's
the only thing you can say about it. Nobody has these gifts anymore. And you know what? Nobody needs
them. Nobody needs them. A man doesn't
have to be able to work these miracles today. so that you'll
know, ooh, this man sinned from God. You know why we don't need
him to work those miracles? We have this. We have the completed
word of God. Now, when the apostles were going,
when the Lord sent them out preaching, they were still writing the New
Testament. They couldn't turn to the New Testament scriptures,
but now those scriptures are complete. And if you want to
know, is a man got a message from God? Here's how you can
tell if he's got a message from God. Does his message match the
word of God? If it does, he's sent from God. God's given him this message. If the Lord sends a man to preach,
he's going to equip that man and enable him to preach. God's preachers, they don't do
any healing today. We don't cast out devils today. It scares the living daylights
out of me. You hear to your preachers, both men preachers and women
preachers saying, oh, you devils, I, you know, I rebuke you and
all. Don't go hunting them. Don't go hunting them. There
are a whole lot more than we can handle. God's preachers,
he didn't heal people today. He didn't cast out demons today.
But our message does. Our message does. Our message
spiritually heals sick souls. Our message cast out the power
of devils today. The message cast it spiritually.
Nothing heals the soul of a sinner and heals that soul of all its
spiritual deadness and spiritual sickness like the message of
Christ alone. Only Christ can give life. We
preach Christ, he gives life to the soul. And nothing heals
the soul of all of its spiritual wounds and bruises and putrefying
sores, all of our spiritual leprosy that's just defiled our soul,
nothing heals the soul like the message of Christ alone. That
message heals the soul. If you know Christ, you know
this, the Lord Jesus Christ is the sweet balm of Gilead. There's nothing comforts your
heart, there's nothing that does your soul better than hearing
of Christ alone. Just tell me about Him one more
time. Nothing will cause you to look
away from your works. You know, that old man is constantly
trying to get you to look at your works. Nothing causes you
to look away from your works and look to Christ and trust
Him alone like the message of Christ when you hear it preached. When you hear that message of
Christ one more time, you say, yes, yes, He's my hope. Yes, I look to Him. Yes, I trust
Him. And nothing refreshes your soul.
Boy, you know, we all come in here from all different walks
of life, from work and family responsibilities and all the
things that were thrust upon us out there in the world. And
you just drag yourself in here a lot of times, don't you? And
nothing refreshes the soul like hearing Christ preached. Christ
alone. Nothing will calm your fears.
like hearing Christ alone one more time. And nothing casts
out the power of the devil more than hearing the message of Christ
alone. You know, Satan just has one
goal. Just has one goal. To make one, if he can just find
one of God's people, one of God's elect, and get them to trust
something other than Christ alone, he'll have won the whole war.
That his only goal is to get you to trust in something other
than Christ alone. And the flesh will always fall
for it, hook, line, sinker. Every single time, because that's
what the flesh loves. But the new man won't fall for
it. Because the new man hears the message of Christ alone.
And it casts out Satan's power to deceive. It casts out Satan's
power to get you to look away from Christ alone. When you hear
that message of salvation, Lord Jesus Christ, Christ and Him
crucified. He's your righteousness. He's
your sanctification. He's your wisdom. You trust Christ
and Christ alone. And that takes Satan's power
away, his power to make you look away from Christ. Now, only the
Lord can send a man with that message. And then we depend upon
the Lord to make it effectual. All right, here's the fourth
thing. The Lord calls ordinary men to
be his preachers. Look at verse 16. And Simon he
surnamed Peter, and James the son of Zebedee, and John the
brother of James. He surnamed them Boanerges, which
is the sons of thunder, and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew,
and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and
Thaddeus, and Simon the Canaanite. The Lord called these 12 men
to be his apostles. And that word apostles means
the sent ones. They were sent, sent from God.
Now these men were from all different backgrounds. They're fishermen,
there's a tax collector, we think there was a farmer, and most
of the rest of them, we don't know what they were doing. We
don't know what they did for the Lord called them. There's
no record of them, there's nobody saying nothing about them. The
Lord just called, they're just plain, common, ordinary men living
ordinary lives. And there are men with different
personalities, weren't there? There was Peter who could be
so bold. Peter was bold. I mean, bold
and plain spoken when he was correct. And he was just as bold
and just as plain spoken when he was in error. Peter's just
bold unless he's before a teenage girl saying you know Jesus. Peter's
a bold man. They were the sons of thunder.
And then there were quiet men. Quiet, backward men. All different
personalities. And they were different ages.
Peter, he was an older, or yeah, Peter was an older man at this
time. John was most likely a teenager. Just a teenager when the Lord
called him to be an apostle. You know what that tells me?
None of us are too young to come to Christ. And none of us are
too old either. None of us are too old. And these
men, they were with the Lord for three and a half years. The
Lord taught them every day. And they're men of the flesh,
just like you and me. After that three and a half years, these
men, they struggled with unbelief. How many times did the Lord tell
them, I'm gonna go to Jerusalem, suffer or die in three days,
I'm gonna rise again. The Lord suffered and died, and three
days later, the ladies came and said, the Lord's risen. They
said, I don't believe you. They struggled with unbelief, just
like we do. They struggled with pride. They struggled with weak
faith. Oh, ye of little faith. How many
times did the Lord tell them that? These were real men, just
like the people that they preached to. Real men who need Christ. Preaching is one sinner telling
another sinner where he found bread. That's what it is. Now,
the Lord's blessed these men. His preachers today, God's blessed
them. He's gifted them. He sent them. He's using them
for His glory. But they're just plain old common
ordinary men. Isn't that who you want to hear
the gospel from? You know, I don't wanna hear the gospel from a
man who's maybe intellectually so far above
me or in his experience, he makes it sound like he's experienced
all these wild things. I can never experience, I just
want to hear the gospel from another plain, ordinary fella
just like me. That's who I wanna hear the gospel
from, and that's who the Lord calls. Now here's the last thing,
and I think this could be very helpful to us. The Lord uses
both his people and his enemies for his glory. Verse 19, and
Judas Iscariot, which also betrayed him. And they went into an house. Now our Lord called Judas Iscariot
to be one of the 12. Even though the Lord already
knew he would betray him, the Lord called him to be an apostle.
Now we know Judas lost his apostleship and it was given to the apostle
Paul. So we still have 12 apostles, but Judas was not one of the
original 12 by accident. No, it was by the divine purpose
and will of God to fulfill the eternal will and purpose of God. He chose Judas so that Judas
would betray him to be crucified. And that hurt the other 11. It
hurt them. Mark writes it here, Judas Iscariot,
which also betrayed him. Every time the apostles write
of Judas Iscariot, they write that he betrayed, I mean, he
betrayed, they just never did get over it. It hurt them forever,
it always shocked them, it just was so hurtful to them, they
didn't understand. Even when they understood how
the Lord did this to accomplish his will and purpose, they still
didn't, Judas was one of us. He betrayed the Lord, you know.
Well, if you think about it, that's comforting, isn't it?
When the same thing happens today. When there are tears among the
weak, it's going to be painful. They're going to tear some stuff
up. You can rest assured of that. But those tears are there because
the Lord put them there. See that? Just like he did Judas,
those tears, God had put them there to accomplish his purpose. That's what they're doing there.
They're there to accomplish God's purpose. They're going to tear
stuff up. I mean, they're going to die.
I mean, they just tear me up. They tear my heart up and my
emotions up like a train wreck. But you know what Bob always
tells me? Everything's right on schedule. They're doing what
the Lord determined for them to do from all of eternity, just
like he did his people. Now, it's still gonna be painful,
but that just helps. I mean, I hope that helps you.
It really helped me, so I hope that'll help you and hope that'll
be a blessing to you, how the Lord calls his people.