Alright, if you'd open your Bibles
to 1 Corinthians chapter 1, just a little note to whoever
buys the peppermints, buy smaller ones. I grabbed one before I
came in. I couldn't get it done before
it's time to preach, and I had to leave the residue back there. It is so good to be with you
all. Always is. For all the years I've known
you all, wherever I've met with you all, it has always been good. And coming back here feels like coming
back home, and then when I head back to Iowa, it's going to feel
like I got home when I got there. I've got two homes and my heart
is split. That's just the way it is. I
don't guess I'm ever going to feel all the way at home in this
life because I am split between here and Iowa in my spiritual
family. But you all have been such a
blessing to me over the many years. Whenever I come and worship
with you, it's always such a peace in your worship, a unity of spirit. a token of the presence of the
Lord among you. And I'm glad your pastor can
relax today. But I relax when I preach to
you all. Now, I know the difference. I
know what you're talking about. When you're a pastor, it's a different thing. You know,
you have a burden to provide for the sheep the best you can.
And yet, when you're the visiting preacher, it's a little different. I would like to bring you some
encouragement from the scriptures here in 1 Corinthians chapter
1. In fact, the title of my message is Four Encouraging Words. And
I don't mean single words. Actually, I mean statements,
four encouraging statements. The people of God are in almost
constant need of encouragement because their courage is constantly
tested. And so they are often discouraged. And those are good words, discouraged
and encouraged, because they describe exactly what I'm talking
about. Courage. Courage is that ability
to persevere in the face of obstacles, in the face of the temptation
to quit. And we get plenty of that. Now,
when the devil tempts, and I understand that whatever the devil does,
he does because the Lord allowed it. The Lord gave him permission.
In fact, the Lord ordained it. And the devil is just the Lord's
tool to purify his church. The devil doesn't know he's doing
that, or as often as it's been proven to him, he still just
can't believe that he's never going to bring harm to God's
church. But the devil is allowed to mingle among professed believers
that it might be proven who really is a believer and who is not.
And yet when Satan is allowed to do the work that God sends
him to do, it's not as though it's an easy thing for the people
of God to endure. And just like Job of old, as
we go through these times, whether as individuals or as churches
or families or whatever, when we go through these times, we
don't necessarily know the purpose behind it. We don't even know, maybe, that
there was some kind of conversation such as the Lord and Satan had
over Job. It might be such a conversation
about us. Lord, you see those people down
there. You put a fence around them. No wonder that church persists
to preach the truth. You won't let me touch them.
And the Lord says, OK, touch them. And so he'll touch the
church. He'll touch some of the people
in the church and cause grief and distress. And all of it is
for this purpose, to prove what is true and reveal what is false. And here's what the outcome will
be. It will be proven that there are some who are utterly false.
And normally that will be proven because they won't be able to
deal with the stress of the trouble and they'll go somewhere else
where life seems easier and they can carry on their religion with
a whole lot less stress. That's one thing that happens.
Another thing that happens is the true are proven. Because
despite the trouble that is confronted, they remain true to that gospel. That gospel. But even in them,
it will be found that certain things have been revealed to
be false. Do you realize, child of God,
there's false in you? There's confidence you have that
didn't come from God. There's expectations you have
that didn't come from God. And so God comes, maybe through
the instrumentality of Satan, And he begins to unravel that
which you have woven of your own. And any rug that you have
stood upon, which you shouldn't have stood upon for your comfort,
he'll pull out from under you. And it goes on to a greater or
lesser degree all the time. But Scott Richardson says, That
there are three relationships that the believer bears with
trouble. He's on the way in, right in
the middle, or just coming out of it. But he is never utterly
free from it, and we should not be surprised at all. The one
we worship was called what? The man of sorrows and acquainted
with grief. And now, the student's not above
the teacher, is he? Should we be surprised? Well,
before I make my introduction last longer than the whole sermon
should be, let me move along here. to these four encouraging
words, okay? We read here, beginning in verse
four, I thank my God always on your behalf for the grace of
God which is given you by Jesus Christ. Now the first of these
terms or encouraging words is this grace of God given us by
Jesus Christ. Now to whom are these gracious
words spoken? We do need to take a minute to
notice that. where it says in verse 2, under
the church of God which is at Corinth. And here's how that church was
known and here is how the church is described. To them who are
sanctified in Christ Jesus. Now the word sanctified is a
broad term and it's applied in various ways. But in the way
that it is applied here, it is simply saying that that which
sets apart the church of the Lord Jesus Christ from everyone
else is Christ. Now, you may see some distinctions
in them. The Lord said, by this shall
all men know that you are my disciples, that you love one
another. Now that's how the world knows
who we are, but that isn't what made us who we are. What is it? When Israel was there in Egypt
and the night of Passover was coming, now what set apart the
Jews from the Egyptians? Because the Lord did not say,
I'm coming to kill the Egyptians. He says, I'm coming through Egypt.
And the implication was he's going to kill everybody. Oh look,
the firstborn in every household in Egypt. And that included those
Jewish households in Egypt. Now, what made the difference?
On that night, Israel was sanctified, was set apart. Their destiny
was made different than the destiny of the households of Egypt. And
what marked out that difference? When I see the blood, I'll pass
over you. Now the church is not known by
its creed. The church is not known by the
building in which it meets or the name that it paints on its
sign. God knows the church by the blood. The blood is upon
every one of God's elect. They are marked out for Him.
So they are sanctified by Christ, called to be saints. Now that
word saints comes from the same Greek word as the word sanctified.
So not only were we sanctified by an objective outside of us,
work of God, in the shedding of the blood of Christ on our
behalf, we're also set apart by the calling work of the Holy
Spirit of God. Now, we know that in God's mind,
the church has been the same from before the foundation of
the world. He chose the church, and it's
never gained a member since. But as we, we don't live where
God lives, out there in the timelessness of his existence. And through
time, the church has grown, has been added to, so to speak, in
our experience. And how is that done? Through
the preaching of the gospel, that's the outward means. But
the inward power is the calling of the Spirit of God. Now, no
man ever came to Christ because of me. or because of your pastor,
or because of Brother Mahan, or any other man in the world
except Christ. He's the only man that can call
someone from spiritual death. Other than that, we are in utter
reliance upon the Holy Spirit to come and sovereignly call
those whom God sovereignly chose and for whom Christ effectually
shed his blood. And therefore, while the church
has always been the same in the mind and purpose of God, yet
it is being slowly revealed through time by the power of the Spirit
of God. And then how do we know that
that work has been performed in the heart of man? Simply this,
with all that in every place, whether in Corinth or Galatia
or Ephesus, or Ashland, with all that in every place, call
upon the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, their Lord, and ours."
Not on those who say, Jesus is my personal Savior. Now, it's
true. He is the personal Savior of
every one of God's people. But that's not how we call Him,
is it? We address Him, Used to be a big debate in the
religion I was raised in, you know, does a man have to submit
to Christ as Lord in order to be saved? Well, let me put it
this way. If God says and he'll submit
to him as Lord, it's just that simple. I mean, there's no such thing as
the Lord Jesus Christ revealing himself to a man, revealing his
salvation to a man. Well, thanks a lot. See you later.
It just doesn't happen. They do vow. Now, there's a lot of people
that make a show of Christ being Lord. You're the only one that
knows. You're the only human being that
knows whether or not you submit to Christ as Lord. But you find a place where they
don't think He's Lord, well, go some other place. as far as spiritual things are
concerned. He's Lord everywhere. He's Lord over everyone. Though
not everyone acknowledges it, he's still the Lord over everyone.
Now he says, I thank my God always on your behalf. Corinth had a
lot of troubles. You know, Corinth had some troubles
that we might be tempted to kick people out of the church for. You think of it. There's things
going on in this church. Make your hair stand on end if
you bother to think about it. Even those that were saying,
you know, I don't know if a resurrection is true or not. And Paul never did say, well,
you're not a church. Paul never did say, forget it.
I tried. I did the best I could there
in Corinth. Evidently, it was a failure of a work. Why, they
even have a man there carrying on an affair. with his dad's
or his stepmother, since that's what comes up. That's the take
I have on it. I've never heard of that happening.
In fact, Paul was shocked. He said, they don't even do that
outside the church. It's going on right here in the
church. And yet he said, I thank God. On your behalf, what for? For the grace of God which is
given you by Jesus Christ. And maybe it was because of all
those troubles that Paul was so thankful for the grace of
God that had been given him. Boy, we need grace, don't we? Without it, we're nothing. Well, we're nothing anyway. But
I mean, we have no hope apart from it. The grace of God. Grace is a charming sound, harmonious
to the ear. Heaven with the echo shall resound,
and all the earth shall hear. You know, there are, as most
of you know, my father passed away a week and a half ago, a
week and a couple of days ago. And we had his funeral last Friday.
And there's always the talk about, I bet he's talking to his mother. And he may be. I've never been
to heaven, have you? But what I do read about heaven
is that it seems to me they're utterly occupied with Christ. I suppose we shall love one another
there just as we do here, but I don't think we're going to
be loving them as mother, father, or child, or wife. That's all
done. That's the relationships of this
life. At that time, we will be wholly and completely united
to Christ together. And He shall be the focus of
all our joy. To those who have received the
grace of God, the very sound of the Word is beautiful. If you've been taught grace,
You just like hearing the Word. It takes you back. Back to that
which called you as a sinner. Back to that which found you
on the dung heap and set you at the table down there with
the king's sons. And when you feel like you're
no better than the dung that made up the heap that you sat
on, you remember, you know, it was grace that found me. Certainly, if grace found me
in an unregenerated, unbelieving condition and can rescue me while
I was still like that in darkness and death, certainly grace can
continue on once it gets the work going. Oh, grace. It's God's grace.
I thank God, He said, always on your behalf for the grace
of God. I'll give you a few introductory remarks about how much I like
being around you. And actually, this word that's
translated grace, it is that love and favor of the heart that
one has toward another. The gospel kind of elevated the
word. Paul redefined it a little bit from its normal Greek usage
to mean not only a matter of favor, but a matter of a favor
that hasn't been earned. But we have favor for one another. We have grace for one another
in the sense we love one another. We hope the best for one another
when we see one another. It just gives us joy to see.
Now, here's the thing to imagine now. God is that way toward you
in Christ. Now, we have to talk after the
manner of men because that's what we are. I remember one time
I went on a fishing trip with a bunch of men. I've only done
it once in my life, and I think that'll be enough for me. We
went way up into Canada, and my son Benjamin got there a day or two ahead
of me. Well, we drove a long time. Finally got there. It was
150 miles north of Winnipeg, and out in just almost nothing
there. But we got into that little area
where we were going to camp, and I was dog tired. You know
how you get feeling so dirty and tired when you've ridden
in a vehicle for a long time? All I wanted to do was find the
place I was supposed to bunk and get in it. And here comes
this boat. Just as I got out of the truck,
here comes this boat. And in it is my son Ben and the
man that he'd come up with earlier. And I saw him and strength returned
to me. The joy of seeing him. The whole world got better. See,
that's grace. That's what grace is. Now imagine
God feeling that way about you. That he rejoices to see you.
That he rejoices to call you his own. No wonder Paul says,
I thank God for the grace of God that he's given you. It's
God's grace. Our guilty consciences perceive
a God of judgment and wrath. And our conscience is not altogether
wrong on this matter, because if we do appear before him guilty,
his wrath and his judgment must certainly fall upon us. But our
guilty consciences lead us astray if they make us think that God
delights in wrath. I love that scripture. Micah
chapter 7, verse 18. Who is a pardoning God like thee? that pardons iniquity and passes
over the transgression of the remnant of your heritage. That's something now. We get
discouraged, and you know, in all these trials that Satan brings,
he does so because he's going after your faith. That's what
he's going for. Nothing would delight Satan more
than to drive a wedge between you and God, between you and
Christ. It would be his utter success
and God's utter failure if one of the elect of God, one of the
called of God, could be actually torn away from him and made to
depart from him. And so he pushes all our buttons. And behind all of that is the
whisper. And you think you're a child
of God. And you think God loves you. Boy, if this is God's love,
who needs it, huh? You feel miserable. Your life's
on the skids. Friends have left you. If God
loves you, you certainly have more money in the bank than what
you've got. It's interesting that when Satan
tempted our Lord Jesus on at least one of those temptations,
he says, if you be the Son of God. Oh, Satan loves the word if.
And he'd like to put a big if in your mind. In truth, the God we worship
is the only God of true grace. The gods of human invention require
something in order to gain their blessings. Their gifts are not
gracious gifts, but are like those free gifts that you receive
via advertising gimmicks on late-night television. They tell you something costs
$19.95, and if you buy in the next ten minutes, we'll give
you this free. Well, brethren, if it was free,
I could just call them up and they'd send it. It's not free. It may be at no additional price,
but I must pay a price before I can get it. And that's what
a whole lot of religions like. And salvation's not free. It's
a good bargain, at least after their fashion, but it's not free.
It's not grace. God's salvation is my grace. And since it's God's grace, let
him be glorified for it. Let all who know the Lord's salvation
magnify the Lord. And we say let all, and we can
also just put it this way, not only let all, they do. They do. And this grace is in Christ Jesus.
We have this grace because of him. Christ has become the guarantee,
the surety of a better covenant. We have this grace through him
because he's the mediator of that covenant. In fact, it is
his grace we have. That is, and this is, I think
this is just a wonderful thing to see in scriptures. The first
time I read it and understood something of what it was saying,
it really kind of confused me. It said, when our Lord Jesus
Christ came into the world, it says that He grew in wisdom and
in stature and in favor with God and men. Now that word favor
is the word grace. Now having this idea in my mind,
grace is always this unmerited favor. We automatically throw
that definition in there. I thought, wait a minute, Christ
didn't need grace. When you realize that grace simply means favor,
and it's only the gospel that added that unmerited aspect to
it. Our Lord Jesus Christ grew in
favor because as God the Father watched him grow up, he did always
those things that pleased the Father. Every step he ever took
pleased the Father. And once again, we are talking
after the matter of men, and I don't know, you know, I realize
he's the eternal, unchangeable God, and yet he reveals himself
as entering the flow of history, too. And he sees what his son
does, and his heart is full of joy in what he sees in his son. And his heart is not only full
of joy, it flows out towards the Lord Jesus, so to speak. So far as I know, the Father
has only spoken audibly twice. And what did he say? This is
my Son whom I love. And then we read this in John. It says, And from his abundance
have we all received grace for grace. And that's another one
of those, it's almost enigmatic. What do you mean grace for grace?
Here's what. I believe is being taught to
us in these scriptures when you compare. God had favor on Christ. He was earned favor. God's heart,
as it were, overflowed with love and affection and grace towards
our Lord Jesus Christ, and our Lord was, as it were, a fountain
filled to overflowing with the grace of God. And just imagine
if you will, there's just this big container and it's just overflowing
out the top of it. And we're standing there underneath
it and it's just falling on us. And that phrase grace
for grace can mean grace upon grace. It just never stops. And so it's not that we receive
a grace like Christ receives, we receive the grace that Christ
receives. It is that grace that is given
to us. So much so, and it's almost too
bold to say it, but it's what the scriptures teach, so much
so that God regards us as though we were Christ himself. He loves
us like he loves Christ. He accepts us with the acceptance
that He gives to His Son. We are blessed with the blessings
that God gave to His Son. We read that this morning in
the study. Now that's the grace of God to
come to my Christ. Now that's encouraging to remember
that. And so when Satan says, you can't be a child of God because
if you'd been a child of God, you wouldn't have done man. You just
say, well, I'm standing under here in a pretty big shower of
grace. Can you dry it up? Can you make the Father no longer
love Christ? Can you make the Father's favor
towards Christ cease to be? Until you can, devil, you can't
make it stop flowing on me. You're right. I didn't act like
a child of God, but I am one. Now you go on your way. All right. Secondly, and these
others will be quicker. We'll just not get to all of
them. One or the other. Verse 5, that in everything ye
are enriched by him in all utterance and in all knowledge, even as
the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you, so that ye become behind
in no gift, waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now this is a word of encouragement
to this church. I suppose we could, that is a
Corinthian church, I suppose we could apply it to individuals,
but he's speaking here to a church. And that's why he keeps using
the plural, ye. Now, I know that we live in a
day when everybody is just enamored of the so-called charismatic
gifts. And you've got a lot of people on television claiming
to have these gifts. Well, I know that I've never
heard anyone who practices these so-called gifts in our day. I've never heard any of them
preach the gospel. Not one of them. Never heard of any of them
set forth the Lord Jesus Christ in truth. So I'll let you figure
out where it is they get their gifts if they have anything other
than magic tricks. But I know this. What Paul said
of Corinth is true of this church. You don't lack anything. And
you say, well, look at us. There ain't many of us. No. with
Gideon, but there was enough to do what needed to be done. There weren't many with the Lord
Jesus when he went to glory. He was enough to get the job
done. And right now in this congregation is every gift necessary to accomplish
what God has ordained for you to do. You lack nothing. You might say, well, I wish we
had more preachers. If you needed more, there'd be more. It's that
simple. You don't lack anything. It says
that lions might go hungry. Some of the most fierce predatory
beasts might go hungry, says the scripture, but not God's
people. They'll have everything they need. And that's true of us with regard
to our normal lives. We know that God will supply
all our needs, but it's true in our spiritual lives, too.
You have everything you need here to worship God, to learn
of the Lord Jesus Christ, and to make him known. The church
of the Lord Jesus lacks nothing, and neither does any believer,
for it says in Romans 8.32, He that spared not His own Son,
but delivered Him up for us all, will He not also with Him freely
give us all things? That's a pretty broad promise.
But here's what it's saying. If the Lord Jesus Christ gave
His Son for you, you can be sure He's going to give you everything
else you need. Because everything else is less a blessing than
the Son. I heard a story, Brother Don
Fortner, I suppose it's true, and it sounds like something
he would do. But when his daughter got married, shortly before that,
he came up to his future son-in-law and handed him a ring of keys
to the house, to the car, keys on it for everything. And the
fellow looked at it and said, well, what'd you give me this
for? He said, I'm giving you my daughter.
That's the best thing I've got. Do you think I'd withhold anything
else from you? God has given us His Son and
given Him for us in a most brutal and harsh way. Gave Him for us
in the way that we needed Him. Do we think He'd do that and
then withhold? One of these lesser blessings?
I don't think so. And then, that's the second.
We've got everything we need. Once again, Satan will use those
kind of things to try to point out the so-called deficiencies.
Say, we're not deficient. We don't come behind in anything.
Thirdly, verse 8, who shall, that's the
Lord Jesus, who shall also confirm you to the end, that ye may be
blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ." Do you ever fear that you'll
fail? That you won't make it to the
end? Well, let me put you at ease. You won't, but He will. And He'll take you with Him. Boy, isn't it nice when you see
all this stuff in Christ? Isn't it a load off? Yeah, we
need to persevere. But you know what our perseverance
is? It's merely the outwork of Christ's preservation. We stand,
but it's Him in us standing. We are like an empty teddy bear
with no stuffing. But he climbs inside and stands
up. And so the teddy bear stands up. You say, I fear I shall fall.
Well, if it's up to you, you will. But if it's up to him, you won't.
It's that simple. And then, very much like it,
is this fourth word of encouragement. God is faithful. Now, we're called on to be faithful,
and we do what we can to be faithful. And His ministers, ones He calls,
they are faithful in the general and broad sense of the word to
preach the gospel. But you won't ever get to heaven
on the faithfulness of a preacher. Not your pastor, not me, not
pastors that have gone before, men who we count solid as a rock. The only reason they look solid
as a rock is because they were standing on the rock. He's the
one who's faithful. He is faithful and it says, I
have said it and I will do it. Don't you hate it when someone
tells you they'll do something and then they don't? Even if
it was an honest forgetfulness on their part or something, still
it irritates you that their actions did not match their words. God's
actions always match his words. God is faithful by whom you were
called. I know the promise says, Whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And we're
glad of the promise. But I don't want to get to heaven
by my calling. It's His calling. It's not so much me calling Him
as Him calling me. And He called us into this fellowship. This word fellowship means to
have in common. There's one thing all believers
have in common, the Lord Jesus Christ. And we need to learn
that that's really, for the most part, the only thing they have
in common. And quit trying to think, you know, that troubles
churches, fellowships of all sorts, you know, to think that
everybody that's in Christ is going to have the same view on
politics, the same view on economics, the same view on social matters. No, they don't. They don't have
that in common. When all those beasts came on
the ark, they were the same beasts inside the ark as they were outside.
And the giraffes were still taller than the other animals. You know what they all had in
common? Noah. The ark. That's what they had
in common. So don't look for commonality
in other areas. Be satisfied with and rejoice
in this. You've been called to have this
in common with all these people here, Christ. But also this. When it says the fellowship of
His Son, to share in common, it means also to have things
common with the Son. In fact, we share everything
in common with Him. He is the Son of God, and we
are sons of God with Him. I realize He's the Son of God
in a sense that we're not. But so far as privilege, so far
as right, so far as the blessings from the Father, He's the eldest
brother who gets the double portion. I'd be quite satisfied with half
of what Christ gets, wouldn't you? and really think he deserves
all of it, but we have these things in common with him. We
have the love of the Father. The Lord Jesus says to His disciples,
the Father loves you. You who are in Christ. God loves you like He loves His
Son. He has affection for you. like
He does for the Lord Jesus Christ. You've got that in common with
Christ. He has a place for you in His home just like He does
for the Lord Jesus Christ. He has open arms for you just
as He does for the Lord Jesus Christ. You have these things
in common with Christ. So, and what you were talking
about Hebrews 12 applies so much here, you know, just stand up
straight. It's all good. Shake it out. Strengthen your
ankles and your knees. Yes, there's trouble. I don't
want to act like trouble's nothing. Trouble's tough. That's why they
call it trouble. But it isn't going to destroy
you. It might kill you, but it won't destroy you. It might bring you down to tears,
but it won't separate you from the love of God that's in Christ
Jesus. You may lose everything you have, but you won't lose
Him because He won't lose you. All right. The grace of the Lord
be with you.