Open your Bibles to Romans 10. It's amazing to me how that so many
times, be out working and doing something, the thought of our
Lord would come over our minds Sometimes I can put a whole message
together while I'm out doing things. And I need to learn to
write these things down. Then I had a message today, and
Drew stole my thunder Wednesday night. And you almost did this
morning. My message here is in Romans
13, and I guess if you want to name it, it would be a message
of confidence and peace. Let's read in Romans 10, verse
13. We'll pause here and then read
a little bit more. It says, For whosoever shall
call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Now, doesn't
that throw a question in your mind? It's kind of like John
3.16, God so loved the world. And it says here, for whosoever
shall call upon the Lord. Does that mean everybody? Does
that mean everybody can call upon the Lord and can be saved?
Whosoever is a big word there that means an awful lot, but
it says, whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall
be saved. And the thing of it is, it really
means what it says because the fact that whosoever would call
upon the Lord, or as we know, would be His people, would be
His elect, those children of God that were chosen for the
foundation of the world. But when He says this, whosoever,
He's also making the whole world accountable, because He's telling
them that they should call upon Him. They're responsible. That's
what they're supposed to be doing, is calling upon Him. They should
be seeking Him out. And yet, Those who are lost and
won't seek Him out, they're not the elect. They're the ones that
are enmity with Christ. And so they won't seek Him out.
But this verse makes them guilty. It makes them responsible for
doing so. So anyone who calls upon the
Lord will be saved. This is what you would call,
I guess, a universal call. It goes out to everyone. But
everyone will not participate. Of course, we know that the ones
that will call will be the Lord's, and it's His work that makes
them do so. They must call upon the real
name of the Lord. It must be the One who is truly
our God. The One that you know that in
your heart is truly our Lord. They will be the ones that will
call upon the Lord, And they are the ones that shall be saved
because they are saved by the work of the Lord Jesus Christ,
not their own. If they call upon Him, they realize
at that time that they have a need that they cannot satisfy. In
the eyes of God, their sin is so great and they cannot make
it right. Only the Lord Jesus Christ can
make it right. Let's continue on reading here. He says, How then shall they
call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how say they
believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how say they hear
without a preacher? And how shall they preach except
they be set, as it is written, how beautiful are the feet of
them that preach the gospel of peace and bring glad tidings
of good things? Then the thing of it is, let's
back through these verses here to get more of a meaning of them.
It says, How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the
gospel of peace and bring glad tidings of good things. The message
that is preached is the gospel of peace. It brings peace to
your heart. It takes the burden of searching
for Christ. It takes the burden of searching
for peace. It takes it away because you
receive that all through the knowing of the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one that gives you peace. And once you see Him and know
Him, and realize that your sins are paid for, and that you're
in His hands, and He keeps you, and He protects you, and causes
you to follow Him, that's peace. That's peace. The world's no
longer a scary place for you in the sense that you're in His
hands and protected by Him of the most glorious God who is
in control of all things. And if He's in control of all
things, then nothing can touch you if He says that's the way
it is. And that gives you peace. Glad tidings of good things,
of salvation, of the future with Christ, eternity with Christ,
A God that you know that is a true God in your heart. The one that
is the Lord Savior that sits on the throne. It's not one that
the world preaches that needs you and needs you to be a good
person and to work and to be a religious person and a church
goer and all these things. These things don't add up to
anything in God's eyes to please Him. But a God that has done
all things. He's made you love Him and desire
Him. But it says here in the beginning
of this verse, it says, and how shall they preach except they
be sent? You see, it's very important
that you have a preacher who knows the Gospel, who knows Christ.
The one of the world cannot preach Christ because you don't know
Him. And there's no way that He can tell you who to search
out who to believe. And the thing of it is, we have
so many different religions in this world and different churches
in this world because each one preaches their God just a little
bit different than the other one. But the gospel preaching
church, no matter where you go, the gospel is the same. And we
preach of the same God, the one of the Bible. And if you wonder
about that, how can that possibly be? Meet someone from another
gospel preaching church, another grace church. And when you meet
them, it's just as almost instantaneously, you know them to be a brother.
You don't have to wonder. And they don't have a different
idea of who God is than you have. We all worship, the believers
worship the same God. So meet a stranger. that you've
never met from another church, and they're going to say the
same thing about our Lord. And preachers that come from
other churches are going to preach the same thing that we preach
here. We're going to preach of a sovereign
God. And it's so amazing because this is all controlled by God.
It has to be a preacher that the Gospel has been revealed
to. And Christ only reveals Himself one way, and that's who He is. Not in many ways. He doesn't
tell everybody different things about Himself. He tells them
the same thing. He preaches the same thing. He
reveals the same thing unto all believers. And so, therefore,
He controls the salvation. It's not something that we conjure
up or that we work up within ourselves and come up with our
own ideas of who God is because Melinda's idea of who God is
may be different than mine and then we think we're all saved
and we're just happy and we go to church and we just do all
these wonderful things and then one day we're going to find out
that it wasn't good enough in God's eyes. But a preacher who
preaches the gospel has to be the preacher, the one that lost
sinners here. Now let's go back to verse 14,
and it says, it has to be a preacher that is called by God, and it
says, How shall they hear without a preacher? Nathan touched on
this this morning in the fact that they must hear the Gospel
through the power of preaching. God saves through the power of
preaching of His Word. And the Word and the preacher
that they hear must know the Gospel. So he must be one that
is called of God. He has to be God's man. He has
to be a saved person who knows who Christ is And then also,
he has to be someone who desires or has the feeling of a calling
to be a preacher. It looks like a good job. It
looks like an easy job, but it has to be one who is called to
preach. He's confident and feels assured
that he is one who can lead a flock and take care of a flock. and
lead them in God's way. And so the preacher that they
hear must be one of God's preachers. It says here, how shall they
believe in Him of whom they have not heard? They have not heard
who Christ is. Anyone, I would say in this community,
and I may be stretching a little bit, I don't know, Anyone in
this community that comes in here to hear the Gospel has not
ever heard of Christ. They've never heard of Him, the
true God. They don't know who He is and never heard of Him.
The preachers that preach to them are not one of God's men.
They're of the world and they preach their God that they have
in their mind and their idea of who God is. And so, how can
they believe in Him in whom they have not heard? They can't. They can't believe. They can't
be saved. They don't know who the true
God is. So when they come here, they'll come in and they'll hear
the gospel preached. They must hear the true gospel. They must realize that, be told
and preached to that they are depraved and that they're no
help for themselves that they could become a believer. That
they need Christ. They need His sacrifice of Himself,
His bloodshed of Himself. He died to overcome death. These things they must hear.
And they won't hear it properly from a preacher that he does
not know the gospel. And the biggest problem is that
those who preach that way don't preach and tell you how bad you
are. How much hope you don't have. The fact that you need him so
bad because you don't have the ability to save yourself. They
don't hear that. And so therefore this is very
important from a gospel preacher. And then he says, how then shall
they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How can they
call on the true Christ for salvation if they didn't believe Him? You
ever tell somebody about Christ and they'll look at you like
you've got four heads? And what happens is when you tell them
about the gospel of Christ, you basically are taking away their
free will. And that is a real big thing
for them. They want that free will. They
want that control. Not the fact that Christ is in
control of all things and their salvation. They want to be able
to say, yes, I love you, and no, I don't want to have nothing
to do with you. It's the craziest thing you ever heard of, isn't
it? to think that someone would say, no, I'm not interested. But they do. They want to hang
on to that ability to say yes and no. But it says when they
come and they hear about the gospel preacher and how God does
all the work, everything for our salvation, we just receive
it. He does everything. And they hear that. How can they
believe on Him until they hear about our Lord Jesus Christ,
who is a sovereign God, who sits on the throne and controls all
things? He's ordered all things that
our salvation cannot be lost. We're in His hands, and all things
work together for us in order that we may have eternal life
with Him. But the Gospel says in verse
16, but they have not all obeyed the Gospel, for Isaiah said,
Lord, who hath believed our report? Lord, who hath believed our report? Well, there's people out there
who have not heard and have not believed our report. So we must continue to preach the
Word. And the thing of it is, is when we preach the Word, it's
not necessarily that a preacher is preaching the Word. It's the
fact that it is important that we gather together under the
preaching and hear the Gospel. We should gather together. We
need brethren. We need one another. We need
to gather together in one place. But it's our witnessing also. We're all preachers in a sense.
We all must tell of Christ. The preacher can't get out in
the world and see as many people. But a group of people can get
out in the world and see people and turn that conversation upon
Christ. It can be done. That's what's
very important. We must be the ones to cause
people to turn and listen to the Gospel. And then maybe desire
come to worship. But we need to take realize how important that is. We're ambassadors for Christ
and we're here to deliver His message. And that's why He has
us. He saves through the power of our preaching. We're searching
for those elect, for His children. Verse 11-5 says here, It says here, even so then at
this present time, also there is a remnant according to the
election of grace. There is a remnant out here yet.
The reason we know that to be so is that the last sinner has
not been brought home. When the last sinner comes home
and is saved by Christ and He saves him, this world is done. It's over. So there is still
a remnant out there that needs to hear the Gospel. He says,
at this pleasant time there is a remnant according to the election
of grace. That remnant out there is one
who has been elected before the foundation of the world. Chosen
by Christ before the world began. And so, we as believers are a
remnant. We are the elect. We need to be excited and tell
them about Christ in order that they may come and hear. So they
hear the message, they come, and they learn of Christ. They
must be told. And if by grace then is it no
more works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if be it works,
then is it no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. Basically
saying that We cannot work ourselves unto Christ. We can't do good
things and become unto Christ. The world teaches that you do.
And we must show them and tell them the message that salvation
is completely of Christ. Rest. Leave it alone. He saves
you. You don't save yourself. Come
hear the message and hear who He is. What then? As Israel has
not obtained that which He seeks for, but the election has obtained
it and the rest were blinded. The most important part or great
part of this plan of salvation, the very beginning of it, is
the election. The election of people. When
God chose a people before the foundation of the world, these
elect people. That is such a great part of
salvation because if you're not elect, you're not going to be
one of God's. That's just the way it is. It don't sound fair,
does it? If I listened to the preachers
of the world, I'd say, you're crazy. That doesn't make any
sense. I've got to choose God. He's
not going to cut this down to just so many people. It says
He came to save the world. All I have to do is call upon
His name. Whosoever calls upon His name. See, they twist their
verses and make it sound different. No, the election has obtained
it. Salvation for them. And the rest
were blinded. Those who do not believe that
Gospel, those who do not believe that their salvation is by the
grace of God, that they can't believe God, they are blinded. They cannot see Your message. He says, according as it is written,
God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should
not see, and ears that they should not hear until this day. And
so therefore, their salvation, God even controls that. You say,
well, God would not ever keep anyone from salvation. God would
not ever make it so they didn't understand. Many, many times
the Gospel can be preached to someone. They can understand
what you're saying. They sit in a church pew and
they listen to you, maybe for years, but never ever come to
know the Lord because He has given them the spirit of slumber
and eyes that they cannot see and ears that they should not
hear. We see those out on the street that we witness to and
they're in another religion and they won't come in here. They're
just like those that sit in a pew for five or six years and walk
away. They've never heard the gospel. God controls this because
His salvation is for the elect. Those are the ones that He promised
His Father that He would save and not lose a one. And so therefore,
this message is for those who come to know the Lord. We should
not ever get discouraged about telling others about Christ.
Never. Because it's in His hands. We
do what we're supposed to do. We deliver the message of truth.
And the thing of it is, this message of truth, aren't you
excited about it? Now there's some of us that have
been a believer for quite some time. And there's some that are
brand new at it. And you get a little bit calmer
about it all. But you still desire to preach
the Gospel and tell them of who you love because you never fall
out of love with the Lord. Never. You wonder sometimes about
yourself and how things are going, but you never fall out of love
with the Lord, because if He saved you, you won't ever fall
out of love with Him. And you want others to know about
this salvation, how wonderful it is, and how great it is. So you desire so much to preach
and tell of Him, and never give up on that. Turn that message
upon Christ. Let's turn to Isaiah 43. Isaiah 43. We're going to read
verses 1-7. I'm going to read a few verses
here. He says, But now, thus saith
the Lord that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel,
fear not, for I have redeemed thee I have called thee by thy
name, thou art mine." I have called you by your name. The Lord knows your name and
He knew it before the foundation of the world. Fear not. Put your name in there. I have
redeemed you. I have bought you back. I have
paid the price for your sins. You don't have to do it. He has
done it for you. and the burden of that sin, the
burden of carrying it around, and the burden of the sins that
you do now and the ones that you will do later. I have redeemed
you. I have paid for these sins. I
have called thee by thy name, thou art mine. I called you under
salvation. We preach the Word, but He's
the One that causes you to hear it. He's the One that reveals
Himself unto you. And therefore, He's the One that
has saved you. You are His. He says, Thou art
Mine. No one can pluck you out of His
hand. You belong to Him. You're one
of the elect. And you wonder sometimes, why
me? Why on earth would the Lord in any way, shape, or form want
me? What caused Him to elect me? He didn't do it for you. He did
it for Himself. There is no, we don't need a
reason or wonder why that we were one of His elect. He's the
one that did it. He has His reasons. He's the
one that called you. He did it for Himself and it's
all for His glory. Because when you read all the
way through this Word and learn of His salvation, He's done the
work and everything. When you do the work and everything,
don't you get the praise for it? He gets praise for all that
he's done. He deserves the glory and he
demands the glory. When Thou passest through the
waters, I will be with Thee. And through the rivers, they
shall not overflow Thee. When Thou walkest through the
fire, Thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle
upon You. For I am the Lord Thy God, the
Holy One of Israel, Thy Savior. I gave Egypt for a ransom, Ethiopia
and Seba for Thee." As you walk through this world with all the
problems and the trials that you have in this world, Usually
it's with people. But when you walk through this
world, He says that I have taken care of you. I am with you every
inch of the way. He says in verse 2. And then
He says in verse 3 about how He's I have given Egypt for a
ransom, Ethiopia and Sheba for thee. Since thou wast precious
in My sight, thou hast been honorable, and I have loved thee. Therefore
will I give men for thee and people for thy life." He has
taken and destroyed nations. He has set up kings and He has
taken down kings. He has gone into nations and
killed every living thing for you. For you. Everything. All things work together
for those who love Christ that are called according to His purpose.
Everything. From the very beginning of time
to the very end of time, everything is done for you. And He has even
killed people for you. And you think the world says,
oh, the Lord would never do that. Well, how in the world? What
have you been reading in the old chapters? It tells how He
destroys nations. They were drowned a whole army. It's just all through the Word
that shows how He has given people for you. He's doing that this
very day. Maybe we don't know where and
how, but He's still doing these things. Thou was precious in
my sight, and honorable, and I have loved Thee. Fear not,
for I am with thee. I will bring the seed from the
east and gather thee from the west. I will say to the north,
give up, and to the south, keep not back. Bring my sons from
far and my daughters from the ends of the earth. even everyone
that is called by Thy name. For I have created Him for My
glory, and I have formed Him, yea, I have made Him." Our God
has called us by name and created us for His glory. That's the
answer to all things. That's why we're here. He's done
it for His glory. I formed Him. He made us. He made us who we are and what
we are. You know, so many times we hate
ourselves. We don't like to look in the mirror and we don't like
ourselves. And that probably won't ever change. But it says
here, I have created Him for my glory. The Lord has created
you the way you are for His glory. For Him. Well, what about me? No. He didn't do it for you.
He did it for His glory. For Him. I have created you the
way you are for His glory. Don't beat yourself up so bad.
We still do, but He made you as you are. I have formed Him.
Yea, I have made Him. through 13. He says, "...Ye are
My witnesses, saith the Lord, and My servant whom I have chosen,
that ye may know and believe Me and understand that I am He.
Before Me there was no God-form, neither shall there be after
Me." You're My witnesses. You're the ones. You elect. You
children of God. You're My witnesses. You tell
the world. I made you a witness. I made
you love Me. And I called you. and I'm keeping
you, and I'm protecting you. You're My witnesses, saith the
Lord, and My servant whom I have chosen. He has chosen every single
one of us unto Himself. Chosen us that you may know and
believe Me. He makes you know Him, and He
makes you believe Him. He opens your eyes and your ears
and your heart to cause you to see Him as He is and love Him. He says there's no other God,
none whatsoever, and there won't be one after Him. He is the one
and only God. So all these religions that tell
all these crazy things out here, there's only one God, and it's
the one we preach. Even I am the Lord, and beside
Me there is no Savior, no one else. The gate to heaven is very,
very narrow. It's not a broad gate and it
doesn't take in all the different religions. It's narrow. It's
only through the Lord Jesus Christ. I have declared and have saved
and I have showed when there was no strange God among you.
Therefore, you are My witnesses, saith the Lord, that I am God.
Again, He tells us that we are His witnesses to tell of Him.
He saves through the preaching. Yea, before the day was, I am
He, and there is none that can deliver out of My hand. I will
work, and who shall let it?" He's the one that has done all
things for us in our salvation. Isaiah 44, verse 9. Now, this is where Drew
kind of stole my thunder the other night. Because when I started
thinking about this message, for some reason, somebody had
an idol that I noticed, and it just bugged me something fierce.
And so I was thinking about idols. Now that the Lord will not have
no idols, no graven images before Him. And these idols, they hang
on to them like a rabbit foot. It's going to give them good
luck. It's got power. And they hang on to it. They look at it
for that. They hang them crosses on the wall, and they look at
that, and immediately their mind goes to the Lord, and that gives
them power. That thing has power. And when
you go into some churches, they have these statues and all that,
and they bow down to those statues like they've got power. That
they can do something for you. And He says He'll not have any
gods before Him. It says in verse 9, they that
make a graven image are all of them vanity, vapor, empty. All of them that do this, they're
empty. Their hearts are cold. And their
delectable things shall not profit, and they are their own witnesses.
They see not, nor know that they may be ashamed. They don't realize
that they should be ashamed of these things. And we just want
no part of Him. We know who the true God is.
He says, Who hath formed a God, or molten a graven image, that
is profitable for nothing? Behold, all His fellows shall
be ashamed, and the workmen they are of men. Let them not all
be gathered together, let them stand up, yet they shall fear
and they shall be ashamed together." You see, He's saying, let them
stand up, let them worship them things, let them hang on to those
things. But when it comes time for the
day of judgment, They're going to be ashamed I ever won altogether. The smith with his tongs both
worketh in the coals, and flashneth it with hammers, and worketh
it with strength of his arms. Yea, he is hungry, and his strength
failed. He drinketh no water, and is
faint. You see, the thing of it is,
it's made of man. It's man-made. It's not heaven.
It didn't come from Christ. It didn't come from heaven. It's
done with man and his hands. And that is no sacrifice, that
is nothing to be offered unto God. The fact that you would
make a cross on the wall and look at it and think that's a
great thing, that God would love that, He said no. That's an image
made of man, and I have nothing to do with it. It's not glorifying
unto Him. And the person that makes it,
he gets hungry, he doesn't have strength, he doesn't drink water,
and he's faint. All things that come from heaven
are strong. It doesn't have to depend upon
the things of the earth, the water, and the strength of people. 13, says the carpenter, stretched
out his rule. He marketh it out a line. He
fits it with planes, and he marks it out with a compass, and makes
it after the figure of a man, according to the beauty of a
man, that it may remain in the house." Again, an idol made of
wood. That is not glorifying unto God. 18. They have not known nor understood,
for He has shut their eyes, and they cannot see, and their hearts
they cannot understand." Again, they're controlled by God. They're
not His elect, and they will never be His elect. Because He
controls it. He says here, He shuts their
eyes, they can't see, and their hearts they cannot understand.
Our God does that? God don't do that. He loves everybody. He gives everybody a chance.
I got free will. I can come to Him if I want to. No. It all works together for
the good for those who are called of Christ. So the idols are something
that He does not acknowledge in any way, shape, or form. And
in verse 21, He says here, Remember these, O Jacob and Israel, for
thou art My servant. I have formed thee, and thou
art My servant, O Israel. Thou shalt not be forgotten of
Me. So as we come to the end of the
message, I was hopeful that when you come out and finish listening
to this, Like the message said, you would
have confidence and you would have peace. Confidence in a God
that is sovereign over all things, who has set all things in motion
according to His will, has the power to make it go according
to His will. If you're one of His, you have
safety, you have peace, you have eternal life. No matter what
this world brings your way, you're in His hands, you're protected,
and you're kept. But He also tells us, don't go
the way of the world. Leave idols alone. Leave things
of the world alone. But then on the other hand, He
says we are witnesses for Him in this world. So we must be
in this world. We must go out the front door
and go to work or go to wherever you want to go. We must go out
of our houses and meet people and turn them conversations unto
Christ because we are His witness. We're to be in this world. We
don't need to take this world on. We don't need to take any
part of it on to make us secure and safe. We don't need a lot
of money. We don't need fancy cars. We
don't need all the things of the world to make us happy and
with peace. We don't want to get tied up
in those things to the point where we depend on them for our
safety, for our security. But we go out in the world. and
we witness for Christ. And He's the center of all things.
And while we're doing it, He's protecting us and He's keeping
us. And He's making us happy. And
not only that, while we're out in this world, look around at
all that He has created and made it so that we can enjoy His world
also. We're not to be burdened down
all the time. We will have problems and He'll
be there for us. But He wants us to be comfortable
and happy All the way through the Word, He says, you look at
Him and search Him out and all other things will be added to
you. He's talking about that in salvation,
but He's also talking about the peace and comfort you can have
here on earth and the joy you can have in His creation. Enjoy yourself. You know, when
you don't have the burdens and the care of having to take care
of yourself, and you're resting, You've got peace. You go in your
house, for example, and you want that feeling. You go in your
house and you close the doors and you're surrounded by all
the things that you have there. You can lay back and rest. But while you're in this world,
we can do the same thing. Because if we get our eyes upon
Christ, we can rest. We don't have to worry about
all this stuff going on around us. We can rest in Him. Have peace in Him. He says that
He will keep us and protect us in all areas. So what I was hoping
here, that you would have confidence in our Lord and Savior. Confidence
that you're taken care of. Remember His promises and live
by them and rest in them. Nathan, would you pray? that is sent preaches the Gospel,
so that there are some that you have, that you desire to call,
so that when they hear, they can call on you and be saved. Lord, there don't seem to be
that many who are sent. We know of some. Lord, I'm thankful
that it's not dependent on my memory. that these other preachers
are remembered and blessed, because I will forget them. But all these
preachers that have been sent from the beginning of time until
now, we are thankful that they have preached Your Word. They were sent by You. Lord, we are ever so thankful
for Your Word. We ask now that those other churches
where Your Gospel is preached, where You have sent preachers,
we bring them before You now and ask for blessings on them
if any go through trial. Help them. their nature of being prideful.