Let's begin our service opening
our Bibles to John chapter six. John the sixth chapter. I wish
I could, I wish everybody could have had the week that I've had
and the blessings I've had this week and our classes with our
young adults. I just am just kind of riding
on cloud nine. This has been such a good week
and I thought we've had a very good week and I'm so thankful.
that Marvin's come made this week a whole lot easier for me.
I don't have to preach again tonight, I'm so thankful. Alright,
John chapter 6, we'll just read a few verses beginning in verse
41. The Jews then murmured at him,
because he said, I am the bread which came down from heaven.
And they said, is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father
and mother we know? How is it then that he saith,
I came down from heaven? Jesus therefore answered and
said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves, no man can come to
me, except the Father which has sent me draw him, and I will
raise him up at the last day. And it is written in the prophets,
and they shall be all taught of God. Every man, therefore,
that hath heard and hath learned of the Father cometh unto me."
We will end our reading there. Good evening. Let's turn in our
red hymnals to page 359, My Faith Looks Up to Thee. My faith looks up to thee, Thou
Lamb of Calvary. Savior divine. Now hear me when I pray. Take all my sin away. Oh, let me from this day be wholly
Thine. May Thy rich grace impart Strength
to my fainting heart, My zeal inspire. As Thou hast died for me, O may
my love to Thee Pure, warm and changeless being, a living fire. While life's dark maze I tread,
and griefs around me spread, Be Thou my guide, bid darkness
turn to day, wipe sorrow's tears away, nor let me ever stray from
Thee aside. When end's life's transient dream,
When death's hopeful sullen stream, Turn back to page 272, the solid
rock. 272. My hope is built on nothing less
than Jesus' blood and righteousness. I dare not trust the sweetest
frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. On Christ the solid rock
I stand, All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground
is sinking sand. When darkness veils His lovely
face, I rest on His unchanging grace. In every high and stormy
gale, My anchor holds within the veil. On Christ the solid
rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand. His oath is covenant, His blood,
Support me in the whelming flood. When all around my soul gives
way, Even is all my hope and stay. On Christ the solid rock
I stand, All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground
is sinking sand. When He shall come with trumpet
sound, O may I then in Him be found, Dressed in His righteousness
alone, Faultless to stand before the throne. On Christ the solid
rock I stand, All other ground is sinking sand. All other ground is sinking sand. Let's open our Bibles together
to Mark chapter 5. Read the first 20 verses of Mark
5. And they came over unto the other
side of the sea, into the country of the Gadarenes. And when he
was come out of the ship, immediately there met him out of the tombs
a man with an unclean spirit, who had his dwelling among the
tombs, and no man could bind him, no, not with chains, because
that he had been often bound with fetters and chains, and
the chains had been plucked asunder by him, and the fetters broken
in pieces, neither could any man tame Him. And always, night
and day, He was in the mountains and in the tombs, crying and
cutting Himself with stones. But when He saw Jesus afar off,
He ran and worshipped Him, and cried with a loud voice and said,
What have I to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou Son of the Most High
God? I adjure Thee by God that Thou
torment me not, For he said unto him, Come out of the man, thou
unclean spirit. And he asked him, What is thy
name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion, for there
are many. And he besought him much that
he would not send them away out of the country. Now there was
there nigh unto the mountains a great herd of swine feeding.
And all the devils besought him, saying, Send us into the swine,
that we may enter into them. And forthwith Jesus gave them
leave, and the unclean spirits went out and entered into the
swine, and the herd ran violently down a steep place into the sea.
There were about 2,000 and were choked in the sea. And they that
fed the swine fled and told it in the city and in the country.
And they went out to see what it was that was done. And they
came to Jesus. and seen him that was possessed
with the devil, and had the legion sitting, and clothed, and in
his right mind, and they were afraid. And they that saw it told how
it befell on him that was possessed of the devil, and also concerning
the swine, and they began to pray him to depart out of their
coasts. Can you imagine? What a request. He healed this man and they asked
him to leave. And when he was coming to the
ship, he that had been possessed with the devil prayed him that
he might be with him. I bet Jesus suffered him not,
but he said to him, go home to thy friends and tell them how
great things the Lord had done for thee, and hath had compassion
on thee. And he departed and began to
publish in Decapolis how great things Jesus had done for him,
and all men did marvel. Let's pray. Our God and Father in heaven,
for we thank thee for this day. We thank Thee for this opportunity
to gather together. Lord, that You've brought us.
Lord, it's no accident that we're here this evening. You've gathered
Your people and You've brought us here this evening. Lord, bless us with Your presence.
Lord, we thank You that You've brought our brother Marvin this
way. Lord, bless him as he stands in this place. Take that which
you've laid on His heart. Lord, enable Him to speak freely
to us. Lord, give us ears to hear. Lord,
bless us with a hearing ear this night. Lord, we not hear just
the words of a mere man, but Lord, that You'd be pleased to
speak to Your people. Bless us with Your presence,
we pray Thee. But we thank you for your many blessings. We thank
you for our families. We thank you for our homes. We
thank you for all that your hand has provided. Forgive us. Forgive us when we murmur. Forgive
us when we complain against our problems. Lord, teach us in all
things to look to Thee, to rest in Thee, to give Thee thanks
and praise Thee. Lord, we pray for our country.
We pray for those who serve in our military, Lord, those who
are in harm's way, Lord, that you would protect and keep. Lord, we pray for this church, Lord, that you would continue
to bless this place with the sound of the gospel. And Lord,
in all places where thy people are gathered together, Lord,
bless your gospel. Bless the preaching of your word. Now again, we thank you for your
many blessings, but above all things, we praise thee and give
thee thanks for the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, we desire to know
more of him. Bless us to know the Savior. In his name we pray and give
thee thanks. Amen. treat this evening before Brother
Marvin comes to preach to us. Amber Jennings is going to sing
us a special accompanied by her brother-in-law, Isaac Floyd.
Amber attends the congregation there at College Grove Baptist
Church, or Grace Church, excuse me. Chris Cunningham is the pastor.
But her great claim to fame is that she's Marvin Stoniker's
granddaughter. That's her claim to fame. And we are very glad
she's here. I hope she's going to be back
and sing for us often now that she's got a reason to come visit.
So I'm very much looking forward to this. You come sing for us
now. When peace like a river flows Ever, my Lord, Thou hast taught
me to sing Though Satan should baptize,
Though trial should come, Let this blessed assurance control
That Christ hath regarded my helplessness to the cross Then, Lord, haste the day when
my face shall be sighed, The clouds be rolled back as a scroll,
The trump shall resound, I have to say about that song,
every verse is my favorite verse. That is such a good song. Well
done. Thank you so much. Well, our speaker tonight needs
no introduction. Pastor Marvin Stoniker of the
Katie Baptist Church. Brother Marvin is one of my very,
very dearest friends. I just cannot tell you how I
treasure his friendship and his fellowship, and I have greatly
look forward to tonight to getting to hear the message the Lord
laid on your heart. So you come and preach it to us. It is so good. It's so good to be with you this
evening. I can say truthfully, as Brother
Frank just said, We are good, good friends for Janet's wife. I'm so thankful. Thankful for
this congregation. It's always an honor to be able
to be here with you. I'm so thankful what the Lord's
done, raised up the gospel and kept it in this place. As Amber was singing, Isaac was
I was just thinking, here's a young man that I'm so thrilled, I'm
so thankful. This was my first grandchild
to ever perform a wedding for. I mean, a grandchild, getting
old. Afterwards, and I meant this
just so affectionately, Just before that, I'd come up to Isaac
and just stood there and just looked at him. He stood his ground,
just looked right back at me. He did. I just looked at him. I reached over and touched him
on the left shoulder. And I touched him on the right shoulder. And
I said, you may now call me Papa. And he did. I thank the Lord
for you, Isaac. In that passage, Eric, that you
read, right after I went to Katie,
and out of that passage, that demoniac that was healed of that
legion of demons, he wanted to go with the Lord. And the Lord
told him. He said, no. And Brother Scott,
Out of that passage that I'm about to mention right now, Brother
Scott told me something. Frank, this is a good thing for
us all to remember. He told me, he said, there's
going to be times that you're struggling to get a message. He said, all of us go through
that. He said, but I want you to remember one thing. Remember
what the Lord told the demoniac of the Gadarenes. When he asked
if he could go with the Lord. He said, no, you go home and
you tell your friends what great things the Lord has done for
you. Old Brother Scott told me that and I remember that. You
tell men what great things God's done for you. That's a good subject,
always a good subject. I'm going to ask you to take
your Bibles and turn with me to the book of Proverbs Chapter
22, Proverbs 22. I've been going through the book
of Proverbs now for 10 years, and I'm just, I'm in the 22nd
chapter of Proverbs. Been trying to go through this
verse by verse. And this is a passage of Scripture
that has been a great blessing to me, and I pray that the Lord
might be pleased to bless it to us tonight. Proverbs 22 and
verse 6 declares this truth. Train up a child in the way he
should go. And when he is old, he will not
depart from it. Now, I'm sure that this passage
of Scripture is one that every believing parent, one that is
absolutely concerned with the well-being and the eternal security
of their children, would desire to hear. They want to know, they
want to understand, and they want to witness the fruit of
this promise. and to have some comfort in what
it says. Now this scripture is one with
some great instruction. Now you listen to this instruction.
Train up a child in the way he should go. Inspire that child. Place a quality within that child. You train up that child in the
way that he should go. Now, when you look at that wording,
train up, train up, train up a child, you look that up and
here's what that word has to do with. We have a marginal reading
there for training. It says, catechize. Well, actually when you look
the word up, it has to do with the mouth. And you'd say, well
it means to speak something. Well, no, not exactly. That's
not what it means. What it actually means is, To
give them a taste for is what it actually means. To give them
a taste for. You train up a child in the way
that he should go. You give them a taste for. And then it's a passage that
gives some future assurance. If you will do that, comfort
concerning that training. And it's got an absolute promise
of success. Now I want you to listen to the
wording. And when he is old, he will not depart from it. It didn't say that he might not
depart. You train up a child in the way
he should go, and he will not depart. He will not depart. Now, that passage of scripture
right there is one that can be very, very perplexing to many
believing parents who read that passage of scripture And they
truly want to know. I want to know what that passage
of scripture is saying. I want to understand that passage
of scripture. And they have done all that they
could possibly do to obey that passage of scripture. They want
to be obedient. They want to be honorable before
Almighty God. They want to raise up their children
in the way they should go. And so here's what they've done.
And they've done the right thing. They have brought them up in
the nurture and the admonition of the Lord. They did not leave their children
to their own carnal thinking where I've heard parents say,
well I want my child to be able to experience some things and
leave them. They didn't do that. A believing
parent knows what's going to happen. You leave a child, like
Brother Scott said one time, he said, you can't be telling
people these things, you'll confuse them. Scott said, they're born
confused. They're already confused. No, they did not leave their
children. They did the right thing. They
brought them, had them under the sound of the gospel, and
they disciplined them according to these scriptures when they
were disobedient and they prayed that the Lord would bless His
Word to their understanding and call them out of the darkness
of sin and unbelieve them. And only to watch them so many
times. They come up to 18 years old,
20 years old, they get out of college or something like that
and they go off and they don't come. They quit coming. They rejected the truth that
the parent kept them under. They prayed for them. They had
them in services and they did not leave them to themselves. How many times possibly a child
would leave this world? have never made a profession
of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, and that parent knew that that
child left this world without a priest to answer, without a
mediator. How many times have we read in
the Scriptures concerning this very thing? Adam and Eve had
two boys. They had a Cain and an Abel. David, he had a Solomon and an
Absalom. And Isaac had a Jacob and an
Esau. And I don't doubt for one second
that these parents taught their children the gospel. But the
end was so different. Now that, you think about what
this passage of Scripture is saying. You train up a child
in the way he should go, and when he's old, he will not depart
from it. Well, if left to ourselves, feeling that we have somehow
failed, we've done all that we could possibly do, that passage
of scripture, if we begin to look at ourselves only, and that
It happens to be the scenario where we have a child or know
of a child that didn't. They left this world without
knowing the Lord. The sting of guilt and sorrow
is all we've got. We'll blame ourselves thinking
that somehow we failed. Well, knowing that God's Word
is sure. There's no doubt heaven and earth
are going to pass away, but God's Word will never pass away. Let's
consider this passage of Scripture in the light of the glory of
Almighty God. And may the Spirit of God give
us some understanding on this Scripture. Now here's what it
says. Train up a child. Instruct it, as I said before.
Give him a taste for. Give him a taste for. Teach him
the truth. Put in his mouth and give him
a taste. But somebody said, I've done
that. No. No, here's where we've missed
it. We don't have the ability to give our children a taste
for. You heard this, you can bring
a horse to water, but you can't make him drink. You can bring
your children unto the sound of the gospel, and that's absolutely
right. You can pray for them, and we
ought to, and need to, and must. We can bring them where the Word
of God is faithfully set forth. Instruct them. Teach them the
responsibility of walking, but we cannot categoize or put a
taste in a dead heart. We cannot make a dead heart have
a savor for Christ. I told someone one time concerning
this. I told him, I said, I don't like
boiled okra. I don't like it. And to this
day, when I said that, I thought about when I was living in central
Louisiana, my dad, he had a bowl of black-eyed peas. I can still
see it. It was sitting right there on
the kitchen table there. And he had some boiled okra,
Frank, and he had it laid on it, and it was kind of crisscrossed
and all that, and he cooked it. And he'd cut that. He'd stick
that and it would be a slime. And I thought, I don't like that. I don't like the taste of it.
Taste this, Marvin, it's good. Dad, I don't like it. I don't
like the taste of it. I just don't have a taste for
it. Train up a child. Give him a taste for it. What is required for a child? And the Lord has children. What is required that a child,
one of God's children, what is required for him to have a taste
for the gospel? Let me tell you what's required.
First of all, Almighty God must love that child from before the
foundation of the world. He must have given that child
into the hand, the superiority. He must have chosen him in Christ. He must have laid the responsibility
of that child's eternal well-being upon Christ Himself. must have, assuming the responsibility,
been made flesh and come into this world and on the behalf
of and for the glory of the Father, lived for and died for, laid
down His life for that child. And then in the process of time,
The Spirit of God must come and cross the paths with that child
and remove a heart of stone and give him a new heart, a new mind,
a new will, a new love, and give him a taste for. And now, by
giving him life, he tastes the Lord, that he's good. And he grants unto that child
an understanding. He trained him and has given
him a taste for the Lord Jesus Christ. I know this, there is
a remnant according to the election of grace. A remnant that has,
according to Jeremiah 31.3, that has been everlastingly loved.
I know according to Ephesians 1.4, God's children have been
chosen in the Lord Jesus Christ, predestinated unto the adoption
of children by Jesus Christ unto the Father, unto Himself, sheep of whose on behalf of the Lord
Jesus Christ was made sin and bore their guilt and put away
the debt that they owed to God's law. and regenerated by the power
and grace of Almighty God and robed in the righteousness of
Christ. That's what's required to train
up a child. And we don't have the ability
to do that. Do you know what, when I say
train up a child, do you know what I could just go ahead and
say that that's equal to? Salvation is of the Lord. Because
I can't train up a child. I can't give them a taste for
it. And I know that that scripture is emphatic. The Lord is going
to have to give them life from above. They must be born again. Therefore, only God can train
up a child. Only God can do that. I can't. I can pray for them. I can bring them here, the gospel
preached. I can encourage, read the scriptures
to them. Got a little granddaughter back
in West Virginia. Try to read the scriptures to
her. She don't want to hear that, does she, baby? She don't want
to hear that, you know what I mean? She wants to play, and you know,
I can't give her, I can't train her. How can I give her a taste
for this? The Lord's gonna have to. But here's what I know. If Almighty God, in power and
grace, mercy and compassion, crosses their paths, the Lord
can open their hearts. Just like the Lord opened up
the heart of Lydia. She was there. She was hearing
Paul preach, but when God Almighty opened her heart, then she attended.
She had a taste for it now. She comes to Paul and she said,
if you count me worthy, would you come to my house and preach
this to my family too? Why did she say that? Well, she
had a taste for it now. You that know it. You that know
the Lord. You know what I'm talking about
with before. You'd heard the gospel before. You'd heard the
truth preached. I've told this story so many
times. I've probably told it here. That's okay. I'll tell
it again. My youngest daughter, Becca, We were at Bob Coffey's
house, Bible school, years and years ago. And Becca came to
me one night. She said, Dad, would you baptize
me? And I said, yeah. Yeah. Why? I want to know why. And she said, I grew up hearing
what you said. And she said, I understood it.
I understood exactly what you were saying. And she said, I
could give a good argument. I could give a good argument
between Arminianism and Calvinism. I knew the difference. I knew
the difference. I knew somebody was saying something. And I knew whether it was right
or wrong. But she said, I just didn't have
a heart for it. I didn't have a taste for it.
But she said, I believe the Lord saved me. And it's given me a
heart for Christ. And I believe it. And I want
to confess Him. I said, Becker, that's the best
explanation I've ever heard in my life. I told her, I said,
I understand communism. I can give you a good argument
between communism and capitalism. But I'm not a communist. I don't
want to be. I don't have a taste for that.
If I did, I'd be a communist. I don't have a taste for that.
Train up a child. John 6, 45. It's written in the
prophets. It's what you just read. And
they shall be all taught of God. That's how a child is trained
up. They're taught of the Lord. Every
man therefore that hath heard and learned of the Father cometh
to me. Who are these they? And they shall. Well, it's God's
kids, God's elect, God's children. The Lord is going to train up
His children. He's going to give them a taste
for Christ. He's going to give them a taste for the truth. They're sons of God, sons of
Abraham, the elect. God spoke of Abraham and his
children, Genesis 18, 19. And this is what the Lord said,
For I know him that he will command his children, his household after
him. They shall keep the way of the
Lord to do justice and judgment that the Lord may bring upon
Abraham that which he has spoken of him. That means all of Abraham's
natural children, that they would all know. He's talking about
spiritual children. The Lord told some Pharisees,
some Jews, that they were saying, you know what, we're sons of
Abraham. The Lord speaking of spiritual sons of Abraham said
this, they answered and said unto him, Abraham, if Abraham
is your father, If you were Abraham's children, you would do the works
of Abraham. What was the works of Abraham?
He believed God. There was a work of faith. There was a labor of love. There was patience of hope in
Christ. Train up a child in the way he
should go. What's the way he should go?
Well, he should go after the way. The Lord said, I am the
way, the truth, and the life. I am the way. You train up a
child in the way he should go, and obviously we know now, as
I've said before, we don't have the ability to do that. If I
had the ability to give my children, my grandchildren, if I had the
ability to give them a taste for Christ. All I do is brag
on it. And the scripture says, Frank,
they're not born of blood. They're not born into it. They're
not born by the will of the flesh. That's all I do. I glory in what,
you know, I don't know what y'all did for y'all's kids and grandkids.
Let me tell you what I did for mine. That's right. If y'all was as spiritual as
I was, They could train up your children like I did. No, no,
no. You train up a child in the way he should go. And when he's
old, when he's aged, that's what it means. Listen to this. He
will not depart from it. Now this is only true one way.
As I said a moment ago, that salvation is of the Lord. That's
the only way that this is emphatic. And this is emphatic. You train
up a child in the way he should go, and he will not turn aside. He will not reject that which
has been taught. That for which he's been given
a taste for. If someone says they have a taste
for, what if they do leave? Well, they went out from us because
they were not of us. But had they been of us, surely,
They would have continued with us. No, this is in fact, this
truth is given to God's elect. This is the promise. This is
the truth of God's word. It's given to those that's been
everlastingly loved and redeemed. Regenerated, sealed, taught,
kept by God, trained up and instructed by God by the Holy Spirit. They've been sealed. And they're kept. That's the
only reason that they don't depart. If we weren't kept by the Spirit
of God, what would we do? We'd leave. I think about Peter. After the Lord was raised from
the dead and the Lord met with him the first time, Thomas wasn't
there. Came back a week later, Thomas
was there. Thomas said, unless I see him,
I'm not, I won't believe. He did see the Lord. After that,
after that, Peter said, I go fishing. You know this, you've
been taught this by your pastor. What was he saying? I quit. I
quit. I'm done. And the other says,
we go with you. Why didn't they quit? because they were children trained
up. When they were old, they were
not going to depart from it. God was going to keep them. That's
the only reason that they didn't leave. These have been loved
of God, placed in Christ, given to Him. The Lord says, they're
in My hand, My Father's hand, and no man is able to pluck them
out. But in closing, I want to share
something with you. Look back at Proverbs 22, 6.
This is so sweet. Train up a child and the way
should go. And when he is old, he will not
depart. Now, everything that I just read
to you, if you look this up and you'll notice that this is in
the book of Proverbs. Now, I can tell you, if you want
to look up all of those words, that we just read. Train up a
child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not
depart. All of those words are written
in Hebrew. They're all written in Hebrew. You can get a good,
a blue letter Bible is a great one to look this up. Strong's
will tell you the same thing. Look it up in Strong, it's the
same thing. They're all written in Hebrew. But when it comes
down to those last two words, From it. Whenever you look up
those two words, they're not written in Hebrew. And this is
in the Old Testament. Those two words are written in
Greek. And when you look up those two
words, what it is, is from it. It. And that word right there
means alpha. That word. Alpha. And it's Greek. It's amazing. I was looking those
words up. I like to look them up. I want
to know what I'm saying. When I looked at looking those
words up and I came to that word and there wasn't a Hebrew word
for it. Looked it up and it was a Greek
word. Alpha. Alpha. Revelation 1A. I am the Alpha
and the Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord,
which is, which was, and which is to come, the Almighty. Here is the absolute proof of
our Lord's eternality. God, who cannot lie, declares
that none is before him, none is after him. He's the beginning,
He's the ending of all things eternally. Where's your God,
David? Our God is in the heavens. And
He hath done whatsoever He hath pleased. He is the Alpha and
the Omega, the beginning and the ending. Let me tell you what
this passage of scripture in closing says. You give a child a new heart. You give them a new heart. You
give them a new will. You give them a new love. You
give them a taste for Christ. You let them taste that the Lord,
He is good. You let them eat of the bread
of heaven and drink of the water of life. You let them be taught
of God that all of their hope is in Christ. You train up a
child in the way that he should go. And it doesn't matter how
long he's on this earth. It doesn't matter the trials,
the tribulations, the chastisements. And when he's old, he will not
depart from Christ. He will not. He's going to be like Peter. And the Lord told that crowd
that was following him when he told him no man can come to me. Except the father which is sent
me drawing and I will raise him up at the last day. That's a
hard saying. And they departed. Follow him
no more. The Lord immediately turned to
the disciples and said, will you go away also? They said, Lord, where are we
going to go? You have the words of eternal
life. He ran up a child and away he should go. When he's old,
he won't depart from it. I pray God bless these words
to our heart for Christ's sake. Truly, salvation is of the Lord. I remember being a while ago,
calling Brother Marvin. We were talking on the phone.
I asked him if he'd ever preached from that verse. And he said,
well, I'm getting ready to preach from it in a couple of weeks. And he
told me about the outline he had. I said, that is the first
time I've ever heard the real meaning of that verse. I'm confident
that's the first time I ever heard it. Well, a little while
later, we met at a restaurant where they're eating. And he
told me about that, those Greek words and that alpha. And I just,
The top of my head came off. Oh, that's it. It's just such
a blessing. And I'm thankful, thankful. Let's bow together in prayer. Our father, we thank you for
your word. We thank you that salvation is
of the Lord. It's of your purpose. It's of
your purchase. It's of your application to the
hearts of your people. How thankful we are that our
Salvation is not up to us earning it or keeping it, but it's all
in the Lord Jesus Christ. Father, how we thank you. And
Father, I beg of thee that you would give each of us who are
gathered here this evening, that you would give us a heart for
the gospel, that you give us a heart, a taste to seek after
the Lord Jesus Christ, to hunger and thirst after him, to not
be satisfied, unless we're found in him. Father, bless us with
faith. Be gracious to us, we pray. Salvation
is of the Lord. Lord, would you be gracious to
us? Would you save us? Would you reveal the gospel to
us? Would you save our children?
Would you reveal yourself and be pleased to save them? Father,
these things we ask and we give thanks in that name which is
above every name, the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. All right,
Jonathan's picked out a good closing song for us, number 125.