If you would now turn with me
to Romans chapter 9. Romans the 9th chapter. You may
want to mark this. We'll refer back to it at least
once in the message. Romans chapter 9. Verse 1. I say the truth in Christ. I lie not. My conscience also
bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost. that I have great heaviness
and continual sorrow in my heart. For I could wish that myself
were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according
to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom pertaineth the adoption,
and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and
the service of God, and the promises, whose are the fathers, and of
whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all
God, blessed forever, Amen. Not as though the word of God
hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel,
which are of Israel, neither because they are the seed of
Abraham are they all children. But in Isaac shall thy seed be
called. That is, they which are the children of the flesh, these
are not the children of God, but the children of the promise
are counted for the seed. For this is the word of promise.
At this time will I come and Sarah shall have a son. And not
only this, but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by
our father Isaac. For the children being not yet
born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose
of God according to election might stand. Not of works, but
of him that calleth. It was said unto her, the elder
shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have
I loved, but Esau have I hated. What shall we say then? Is there
unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For he saith to Moses,
I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion
on whom I will have compassion. So then it is not of him that
willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.
For the scripture saith unto Pharaoh, even for this same purpose
have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that
my name might be declared throughout all the earth. Therefore, hath
he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will, he hardeneth. We'll end our reading there.
Let's bow in prayer together. Our great God, our holy, sovereign,
merciful Heavenly Father, how thankful we are You've enabled
us to gather together tonight, here in the middle of the week,
to gather together from a dark and dry and difficult world,
and to sing your praises, songs of praise, to open your word
and to read it, to come before you in prayer. And Father, we
pray that we would be enabled to worship together as we open
your word, read and study the things that are prepared for
us. Father, enable us to see the Lord Jesus Christ. Enable
us to see he fits our every need. How desperately we need him. How dependent we are upon thee. Father, I pray that you teach
each one of us that. If you teach us how dependent
we are upon thee, surely we'll look to you. We'll cry out to
you for mercy. We'll believe you and trust you
and rest in you and come to you. Father, bless your word tonight,
I pray, for your glory. Father, show us your glory through
the preaching of your word this evening. Enable your people,
Father, to see your glory and have their hearts comforted and
fed and leave here confident in Christ our Savior. And Father,
what we pray for ourselves, we pray for All your people, wherever
they may be meeting together tonight, bless your word. Bless
your people, we pray. Father, we continue to pray for
those that you brought into the time of trouble and trial. There
are many right now from our congregation and other places, those we know
of and those we do not. We're thankful you know. And
Father, we pray that you would meet their need, that you'd heal,
that you deliver, until you are pleased to deliver, Father, that
you comfort their hearts with your presence. All these things
we ask, and we give thanks to that name which is above every
name, the name of Christ our Savior. Amen. All right, and
like I said, you may want to mark your place there in Romans
9, and turn back to Genesis chapter 25. Genesis chapter 25. We looked
at some of these verses a week or two ago, but I wanted to come
back and look at them in another light, from another angle, I
guess, if you will. Beginning in verse 21, Genesis
chapter 25. And Isaac entreated the Lord
for his wife because she was barren. And the Lord was entreated
of him, and Rebekah, his wife, conceived. And the children struggled
together within her. And she said, if it be so, why
am I thus? And she went to inquire of the
Lord. And Lord said unto her, two nations are in thy womb,
and two manner of people shall be separated from thy bowels.
And the one people shall be stronger than the other people, and the
elder shall serve the younger. Now, I titled the message this
evening, Election Must Be Preached. On more than one occasion, I
have been accused of preaching too much election. And I take
that accusation very seriously, because I want to preach the
truth. I want to preach the word. I
want to deal honestly with the word of God. And I examined my
preaching. At those times, I was accused
of that. I examined my preaching. I did, because I wanted to be
sure that this wasn't true. Now, I will grant you that it
is possible to distort the truth of election. If you preach election
at the expense of the other doctrines of grace, if you preach election
at the expense of other truths that are revealed in scripture,
and the example that I thought of is Hardshell Baptists. They preach that election is
salvation. They say that's salvation. They
say if the father elected you unto salvation, then you will
be saved, whether or not you ever hear the gospel and believe
it. You may go through this life having never known the gospel,
having never known Christ, having never believed him, having never
loved him, having never trust him and just wake up in glory
to your shock simply because the father elected you into salvation.
Now that's not so. That's not so. I used to know
a man who I worked with him. He was a hard shell Baptist and
he was, we were talking about this one day. And he told me
once, he said, he said, my preacher, he preaches for two hours, two
hours solid, at least every Sunday, he told me that. And I asked
him, if election is salvation, father elect of the people, they're
going to be saved whether they hear the gospel or not. Why have
these services? Why bother preaching so long?
People are going to, because people are going to be saved
anyway. He didn't really have an answer to that, but I thought
that was a fair question, you know. But what they believe is
not so. My friend, if you would be saved,
you must hear the gospel and you must believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ. So you see what these hardshells
are saying, that distorts the truth of election, doesn't it?
Now, if the father elected you, you will be saved. If the father
elected you, he sent his son to die for your sin and he put
your sin away with his blood and the spirit will come in the
preaching of the gospel. God's going to cross your path
with somebody preaching the gospel and you're going to hear it and
believe because the Spirit's going to give you life and give you
faith to believe it. But you must hear. You must believe. Election is not salvation. It's
unto salvation. And I'll tell you this about
election. This is a doctrine, a truth that we hold very, very,
very dear because it tells us who God is. I'll get to that
in just a minute. You don't have to believe in
election in order to be saved. I was talking to a man last night
at Danville. He went and talked to a preacher
friend of ours. He told him, now, I need to get
right with God. And the man told me, you can't
do it. You can't do it. Well, then he
got kind of offended like the man was telling him, you're right.
You're not right with God. He said, wait a minute, I believe
in election. He said, I didn't know that wasn't the gospel.
There's more to it. I believe in election. He said,
I didn't know. My problem was I need to believe
on Christ. That's what I'm saying. You don't have to believe in
election in order to be saved. In order to be saved, all there
is to it is this. Believe on the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Believe him. Come to him. Trust
him. You must trust Christ alone to be saved. Nothing else. Nothing
else. But, if the Lord saved you, he's
given you faith in Christ, the very first time you hear the
truth of election, you're gonna say, that's right. That's right. You're gonna say, I see that.
That's the only way I can be saved. That's the way God saved
me. So you don't have to believe in an election order to be saved,
but if God saved you, you'll believe it. You'll believe it.
So truth be told, it is an impossibility to preach the gospel without
preaching election. It cannot be done. You cannot
preach the gospel without preaching God's electing love. Because
all of the gospel declares how God saves sinners. And all of
that is founded upon God's election of the people. The salvation
of a dead sinner, if he's a dead sinner now, it has to begin with
God choosing him, doesn't it? The salvation of God's people
is all built upon the cornerstone, the foundation where it all began,
God's election of a people. God's electing love. So if a
man denies the truth of election, he cannot be preaching the gospel.
He cannot. His doctrine is all wrong from
the get-go. He's wrong at the start and he's
just gonna stay in error from there on out. Now the main teaching
of our text this evening here, Genesis 25, the main teaching
of it is this, the absolute necessity of God's electing love. That
is the purpose of this story in the Old Testament. And if
you'll turn back over to Romans chapter nine, I'll show you that. Romans chapter nine, verse nine. For this is the word
of promise, that this time will I come and Sarah shall have a
son. And not only this, but when Rebecca also had conceived by
one, even by our father Isaac. For the children, being not yet
born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose
of God according to election might stand. Not of works, but
of him that calleth. It was said unto her, the elder
shall serve the younger. As it's written, Jacob have I
loved, but Esau have I hated. Now why does Paul tell us we
have this story of the conception and the birth of Jacob and Esau? That the purpose of God according
to election might stand. This is given to us as a picture
of God's electing love. The story of Jacob and Esau illustrates
the necessity, if we would be saved, of God's electing love.
Now the only way God Almighty could love Jacob is if God chose
to love him. Isn't that right? You know the
story of Jacob's life. He never did one thing, I mean,
he never did one thing right that would ever earn God's favor. If God would love Jacob, if God
would determine to redeem and save Jacob, God had to choose
him first. Not of works, not of any works
that Jacob did, but simply because God would choose him, simply
because God would be merciful to him. And it wasn't wrong for
God to pass Esau by, was it? Wasn't wrong at all. Esau wanted
to be left alone. God left him alone. And he got
exactly what he earned. So now remember, my title is
election must be preached. And from the understanding of
that story, Let me give you three points to show this is true.
Election must be preached. Number one, election must be
preached because election is taught all throughout the word
of God. It's everywhere in the word of
God. Now, if election is taught all throughout God's word, we have to preach election because
you're going to preach the gospel. You have to be consistent with
God's word, don't you? See, this is God's gospel. This
is God's message to people. The apostle Paul told Timothy,
preach the word. At all times, in every season,
in every situation, Paul said, Timothy, you preach the word.
Well, if you're going to preach the word, you're going to tell
the truth about what God's word says. You're going to preach
God's electing love. And I spent a little bit of time
studying this now, based on what I see in the Bible. God's election
of a people is true. This is true. And if you're going
to preach the gospel, You got to tell the truth. You got to
say what God's word says and you got to tell the truth. Well,
here's the truth. God chose to be merciful to Jacob
and he chose to leave Esau alone. That's election. That's what
it is. That's as simple as can be. And
all the scriptures teach this truth. I'm going to show you
some examples. In John chapter 15, our Lord
gathered his disciples around him. And verse 16, you know what
he told them? You have not chosen me, but I've
chosen you. That's election. Look at Deuteronomy
chapter 7. Deuteronomy chapter 7. Verse
6. For thou art an holy people unto
the Lord thy God. The Lord thy God hath chosen
thee to be a special people unto himself, above all people that
are upon the face of the earth. The Lord did not set his love
upon you, nor choose you because you are more in number than any
people, for you are the fewest of all people. But because the
Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he
had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out
with a mighty hand. and redeemed you out of the house
of the bondman from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. Know therefore that the Lord
thy God, he is God, the faithful God, which keepeth covenant and
mercy, his promised covenant mercies with them that love him
and keep his commandments to a thousand generations. Now of
all the nations on earth at that time, the Lord chose this little
nation, Israel. to be his people. He chose them,
Israel, to be a picture of spiritual Israel, to be a picture of God's
elect. And God didn't choose them for their works, did he?
You know their history. That can't be so. God didn't
choose them because they were so great they could do something
for God. Because they couldn't. They were the fewest of all.
I mean, they started out with Abraham. They started out with
one old man who's married to a woman, both of them too old
to have a child. That's how the whole nation started out. Fewest
of all people. But the Lord chose Israel to
be his people. He passed by the Philistines.
He passed by the Amalekites. He passed by all the other heights
that lived around him and he chose Israel. God gave his word
to Israel. He gave the prophets to Israel.
He gave his law and the ceremonies to Israel. He gave the priesthood
and the sacrifices to Israel and no other nation, not one
other nation on earth had them. That's election. That's election. God made a difference. Now look
at John chapter 17. John chapter 17. God has an elect
people. And the Lord Jesus Christ came
to save God's elect. He came to die for God's elect
and only God's elect. John 17, verse six. He says,
I've manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me
out of the world. Thine they were, and thou gavest
them me, and they've kept thy word. Now they have known that
all things whatsoever thou hast given me are of thee. For I've
given unto them the words which thou gavest me, and they've received
them, and have known surely that I came out from thee and they
have believed that thou didst send me. I pray for them. I pray not for the world, but
for them, which thou hast given me, for they are thine." Now,
who did the Lord Jesus come to save? He told us here. He said, I came to save those,
Father, which you gave me. That's the elect. The Father
chose them and gave them to Christ. And when he was here on earth,
just like he's doing now through the preaching of the gospel,
who does the Lord reveal himself to? He said, I revealed myself
to the people you gave me. I gave them the words that you
gave me. I gave them faith. Who did he reveal the father
to? Those 12, didn't he? Those 11, I mean, he told the
12, but he gave it to those 11 there. Who was it that had a
saving knowledge of God? Who did the Lord give that to?
those whom thou has given me, the elect. And who did the Lord
pray for? He knows he's going to suffer
and he's going to die. He died for somebody specifically
and he prayed for them. Who did he pray for? Not the
whole wide world, the elect, those that thou has given me. I'm telling you, it can't get
any clearer than that. It simply can't. Let me show
you another example, Ephesians chapter one. Ephesians chapter 1, verse 3. I know, you know, the flesh gets
awful angry about this thing of election, but look how Paul
talks about it here. Ephesians 1, verse 3. He talks
about it as a happy thing, doesn't he? Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual
blessings in heavenly places in Christ, according as he hath
chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should
be holy and without blame before him in love. Now, when did the
father elect the people? Paul tells us before the foundation
of the world, when only God existed. Well, who did God choose? He
didn't choose good people, did he? No, he chose sinners. God
didn't choose the people because they did something good so that
they deserve to be chosen. No, they hadn't done anything
yet. They hadn't done anything yet. The world hadn't been created.
Just like Jacob and Esau, they hadn't done any good or evil
yet because this thing's not of works. It's of him that call
it. It's of God's mercy, of God's
grace. God chose to save a sinful people, a people who couldn't
do anything good, that he would make them, that they should be. holy and without blame before
him in love. Not that they were that way,
their own selves. That's what God had to make them. That's why
Christ came to die for them, to make them holy and without
blame before him in love. And God chose a sinful people.
He chose to make them holy so that God would get all the glory
for doing it. Pretty clear. All right. One
more scripture. Second Thessalonians chapter
two. I told you this truth of election is taught all through
the Bible, and I could be like my friend's pastor and preach
for two hours on it, but these scriptures will be enough for
you to see. This is what's taught all throughout
scripture. God's electing love. 2 Thessalonians 2 verse 13. But we're bound to give thanks
all the way to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because
God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation. through sanctification
of the spirit and belief of the truth, were it not that he called
you by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, Paul is writing to save
people here, and he tells them, I know your election. Now, how does Paul know that?
When he caught up in the third heaven, did he get a glimpse
at the Lamb's book of life? No, that's not how he knew. He
says, I know God chose you. I know it. How does he know that?
because God sent the gospel to them and they heard it and believed
it. You see, the Holy Spirit only
gives faith to God's elect. He gives faith in Christ to those
that the father gave to Christ to suffer and die for, his elect.
So the only evidence you and I can ever have that we're one
of God's elect is faith in Christ. Please don't waste your time
trying to figure out if you're one of the elect. Because you'll
never figure it out. We don't need to know if we're
one of the elect. We need to know Christ. We need to know
Christ and believe Him and trust Him. The only evidence you'll
ever have on this earth that you're one of God's elect is
faith in Christ. Because God gives it. God gives
it to His elect. And if you're here tonight, you
believe on Christ. You trust all of your eternal
soul to Him. And brother, You're one of the
elect of God. You sure are. That's what's taught
all throughout the scriptures. Do you know the most common name
to describe believers in the New Testament? Is elect. Believers are called believers
just two times in the New Testament. Believers are called Christians
three times in the New Testament. They're called the elect 14 times. Let me read you a couple of them.
Our Lord talking about the end of the world when he returns. And he says he should send his
angels with the great sound of a trumpet and they should gather
together his elect. The people who are saved, the
people that God has redeemed are gonna bring to glory, he
describes them as his elect. That's who's gonna be gathered
together. 2 Timothy 2, verse 10. Paul told Timothy, I endure
all things for the elect's sake. I get on these ships and get
shipwrecked. I go preach the gospel and get run out of town.
People throw me in jail and whip me within an inch of my life.
They stoned me one time, and the only reason they quit stoning
me is they thought I was dead for preaching the gospel. And
the Lord enabled me to get back up, and I got back up and kept
preaching Christ. You know why I'm suffering all
this? For the elect's sake, that they might hear of Christ and
believe on Him. He calls believers the elect. In second John, John
says he's the elder writing unto the elect lady and he must, he
was somewhere with her sister and he tells her your elect sister
greets you. That's how he describes, believes
the elect. The scripture is just full of
this. Doesn't that make it plain? God has a people he elected unto
salvation. So if we're going to preach the
gospel, we must preach this truth of election. All right. Number two, That's the doctrine. That's true. It can't be any
more plain than that. But now these next two points,
I'm gonna apply it right to us. Election, secondly, must be preached
because the doctrine of election is the only doctrine, the only
thing that men preach, of all the different things that men
preach, election is the only doctrine that makes God sovereign
in salvation. Election is the only doctrine
that makes God be God and I'll give you an illustration free
will religion Now they tell you you see if I'm right about this
they tell you Christ died to pay for the sins of every son
of Adam and They tell you now the way you get saved is you
decide to accept that sacrifice They say you've got to make a
decision You've got to make a decision. You've got to make this decision
to accept Jesus as your personal Savior. And if you make that
decision, you get saved. That's what they say. And if
you don't make that decision, then they tell you, you're not
saved. But they want to twist the knife of, I don't know what
you call it, emotions. Well, all right, you're not going
to make that decision to get saved, but don't you feel sorry for
poor little old Jesus who suffered and died and you're just wasting
his blood. You're just wasting it because you won't accept it.
Now that doctrine is a heinous abomination. It's an abomination
and it sends people to hell, believe it. That doctrine is
a lie on so many levels, but I'll just give you two of them.
First, this free will doctrine ignores the character of God.
If anything's playing from this book, God's holy, isn't he? He's
holy. And God is just. And God's nature
determines what He's going to do. God's nature is holy and
just, so everything He does is holy and just. So God in His
nature, He can never punish Christ for your sins and then damn you
for the same sins. He cannot do it. Can't. Nothing
would be more unholy or more unjust than that, would it? God is holy. God is just and
here's something else that is so obvious in scripture. God
is sovereign. He's sovereign over everything.
These free willers seem to make it like God's sovereign over
everything, but salvation. And I wouldn't say God's especially
sovereign in salvation, but brother, he's sovereign in salvation.
God is sovereign. He directs everything that happens
in his creation. from the biggest things we can
think of to the things that we never even notice. God sovereignly
directs everything that happens in his creation because he's
God. God is never a bystander to this
earth, what's going on in his creation. And if I can say it
this way, God's never a bystander, especially for the salvation
of his people's concern. God set his love on the people.
He loves those people. He's not gonna be a bystander
and let them do what they will and end up where they will and
just wait and see what happens. God's not a bystander. He's active. He actively directs everything
going on in this creation. Now man's free will doctrine
makes man to be sovereign in salvation. And it makes God a
bystander, doesn't it? God's got this plan of salvation
for you, but he's got to wait and see what you'll do. He's
got to wait and see how this thing comes out. He's a bystander. Just like me when I go to a sporting
event. I'm a bystander. I cannot play. I'm a bystander. I wait and see
what will happen. If the salvation of my soul is
left up to my decision, then the only conclusion I can draw
from that is I am sovereign in salvation. Brother Henry said
one time, well, if I've got to choose, if I have the power to
choose to accept or reject Jesus, well then I've got the power
to refuse to accept God's judgment and I refuse to let him send
me to hell too. I mean, it makes sense, doesn't it? If salvation
is up to my decision, It's a vote. I just get a vote. Like I vote
on a president or I vote on a congressman or something. Free will doctrine
makes salvation to be a religion, a salvation of the people, by
the people, and for the people. Now our government's that way,
isn't it? And it's the best government known to man. Our government
is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people.
But don't ever mistake that for God. Salvation's not that way. God's government is not that
way. God's government is a dictatorship. God is sovereign. I used to tell
all the people that worked for me, the best form of government
is a benevolent dictatorship. And Sean, I told them that's
what we got us here, a benevolent dictatorship. God's a dictator. He's the sovereign. It's a supreme
sovereign. God's salvation is a salvation
of God, by God, and for God. Salvation is of the will of God. Salvation is by the doing of
God, and salvation is for God. It's for God's glory, for Him
to display His greatest glory, that He would be merciful to
sinners. Now God's sovereign, He's sovereign
in everything. He's sovereign in salvation.
That just lets you rest easy, doesn't it? Since God's sovereign,
and none can stay His hand or say unto Him, what doest thou?
God will see to it that everything that's necessary for the salvation
of His people is done. He'll see to it that it's done
because God Himself is gonna do it. God the Father, God the
Son, and God the Holy Spirit are going to see to it this thing,
the salvation of God's people is completed. They're not going
to leave it up to the creature. God himself is going to accomplish
it. So free will doctrine, first of all, just ignores the character
of God. Secondly, free will doctrine
ignores the character of man. Now man is dead. We're dead in sin and we can't
do anything good. We're dead so we can't choose
God and we won't choose God. We won't. What'd our Lord tell
the Pharisees? You will not come unto me that
you might have life. It's not that you're not allowed
to, you will not come unto me that you might have life. That's
our nature. Now if man's free will religion,
free will doctrine is true, then the whole Bible is not true.
Can't be. Because what does the Bible say
about all men? All men died in Adam. Death came by Adam. Death passed upon all men in
Adam. Well, if man's free will religion
is true, then the nature of our flesh can recover enough to decide
to accept Jesus. I can suddenly decide I will
come to Christ, that I might have life. If that's so, I'm
not dead. I've gotten banged up pretty
good, but I'm not dead. Thankfully, the Bible's true,
and man's free will religion is a lie. All men are dead, spiritually
dead in Adam. And just like God must be consistent
with his holy and just character, you and I must be consistent
with our dead sinful nature. Now, there's no question we have
a will to make choices to do things. I can choose to raise
this arm or raise this arm. We make choices. But our choices
will always be death instead of life. Our choices will always
be our works instead of God's grace. We will always choose
by nature, my way, not God's way. 100% of the time. Well, since we're dead, that's
our nature. There's no hope of salvation in us. There's no hope
of salvation based upon our decisions or our doings. But if Almighty
God elected you, oh, you have sure hope of salvation. Because if the Father elected
you, in the fullness of time, he sent his son to die for your
sins on purpose, particularly. the Savior bore your name on
his heart as he hung on that cross suffering and dying. He
was dying for your sin, particularly when he cried, my God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? He suffered and died to put away
your sin, to pay that penalty for your sin so you'll never
will. And if Christ died for you, if
he did something so wonderful for the likes of me and you,
He's going to let you in on it. He's going to send His Spirit
to you, and He's going to cross your path with a preacher who's
going to tell you about salvation by grace, not your works, and
you're going to believe it. Because the Spirit is going to
give you life to believe it. Now, I know by nature we will
not come to Christ, that we might have life, but that's just no
problem that the Holy Spirit can't overcome. He's just going
to move in power and give you a new want to in the new birth,
and you're going to come running to Christ. All He's got to do
is reveal Christ to you. You'll see Him and you'll come
running. Willingly. Willingly. Now that's how God
saves sinners. That's how God regenerates sinners.
And the whole process, I hate to call it that, but the whole
process of the work of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit,
where did it begin? It began with God's election
of the people. God's electing love, they set his love upon
a people. So if we're gonna preach God
as he is, we must preach election. If we're gonna tell sinners how
it is God saves them, that's where we've got started. Because
God is God, we have started his electing love. All right, here's
the third thing. Election must be preached because
God's electing love is the one and only way A sinner like you
and me could be saved. If Almighty God did not elect
a people unto salvation, I wouldn't waste my time preaching. Wouldn't
do it. Wouldn't do it. I certainly wouldn't
waste my time begging dead people to do something spiritual. Wouldn't
do it. See, man is dead in sin. And
I'm not just talking about man out there, not us here tonight.
That's the way we're born dead in sin. We can't do anything
to save ourselves. We can't do anything to make
ourselves more savable. We can't do something to get
God to save us. We can't choose God. Try as we
might, we cannot choose God's way of salvation in Christ. We
can't do anything righteous because we're too busy drinking iniquity
like water. We can't do something that would
impress the eternal, holy God. Because we're dead. We're dead. See, spiritually, we're just
like Jacob, aren't we? Just like Jacob. We can't do
anything right. I mean, poor old Jacob. He's a slave to his
nature just like you and me are. He couldn't help but scheme somebody. He couldn't help but try to trick
somebody, just skim off the top. He couldn't help it. He just
always doing it. But God chose him anyway. God
loved him anyway. At the end of Jacob's life, what
did he tell Pharaoh? God has shepherded me. He's led
me. He's guided me. He's protected
me. He's kept me from going off the
deep end. He's kept me from falling off
the cliff. And He's fed me all the days of my life. See, our only hope, and if this
is your only hope of salvation, you've got a good hope. Our only
hope of salvation is that God would choose to save sinners. I know people that say this.
They say, well, you can't deny election, but what they say is
God looked down through the telescope of time. He chose to save people
who would be good. They'd be better than everybody
else. He chose to save people who he saw ahead of time, you
know, would choose him. Well again, that's not what scripture
says. Scripture says God looked down
through the telescope of time and you know what he saw? There's
none good. No, not one. So God chose to save sinners. See, that gives hope, doesn't
it? This thing gives hope to you and me. God chose to save
sinners. And you know, it's unpleasant to the flesh if God would reveal
to you, your name's Jacob. Dead in sin, can't do anything
good, offensive to God. That's unpleasant to the flesh
to have that revealed to us. But I tell you, It's a good thing
if God's taught you, you're Jacob. It's a good thing. You know why? You know how God describes himself
in scripture? I'm the God of Jacob. God saves Jacobs. God saves sinners. Oh, so if we're going to tell
sinners how it is, how can I be saved? How does God save sinners?
We've got to start with God's electing love. Because that's
where it all began. Remember when the Lord sent Ananias
down there to preach to Saul of Tarsus? Ananias said, Lord,
I've heard about that fella. I'd just as soon not go. And
you know what the Lord told him? You go ahead and go. He's a chosen
vessel unto me. And you know how Ananias began
preaching the gospel to Paul? The God of our fathers hath chosen
thee. He began with election, didn't he? Might be a good idea
if we did, too, because that's where our hope of salvation begins. It begins with God's electing
love. So not only must we preach election. Eric, I love it. I love to preach
election. I love to preach God's electing
love, and God's people love to hear it, because that's the foundation
of my hope. God would choose to love and
save sinners. Thank God. for his electing mom. All right, let's bow together. Our Father, we're thankful for
this passage of Scripture that you enable us to look at tonight,
and we're thankful for just a glimpse of your redemptive glory, that
you would, a holy God, could choose to love sinners, could
choose to, of His own will, to choose sinners to save and put
in his son to put away their sin. Father, how thankful we
are. Father, I pray you'd bless this
message, this word as it's been preached, to your glory. Enable
us to see your glory in your electing love for your people
and cause us to trust you, cause us to run to thee and to trust
Christ in Christ alone. It's in his name, for his sake
and his glory, we pray. All right, Sean.