I invite you to turn back with
me now to Acts chapter 26. Acts chapter 26 and verses 1 through 19 record
the testimony of the Apostle Paul as he was brought before
King Agrippa and as Rex just mentioned me being here by the
providence of God. This was also God's providence. And he brought him before this
king to defend himself against the false accusations of the
Jews. The gospel is why he was there. The gospel is contrary to every
religion in this world. Totally contrary. A man asked
me one time that I worked with, I knew he wasn't a believer,
and he asked me, he said, what do you believe? And I said, take
everything that you believe and it's the very opposite. I said,
that's what I believe. That's what I believe. The gospel
is totally 100% contrary to all the religions in this world. And I'm talking about religion
which is produced by natural reasoning. How come this natural,
this worldly religion to even be here? Why is it that these
churches are established? You can go through a town like
Danville and you'll lose count of all the churches. There's
a church on every corner. And it's like that all the way
across the country. Believe me, I've just driven
from one end of this country to the other. And there's churches
all along the way, all kinds of different names and things,
but there's church after church after church after church. How come? Why is that? Where
did these churches come from? How come them to be established? Religion is established and produced
by natural reasoning, mixing the word of God and the carnal
principles of men together. It begins in us at a young age. We hear things. I was raised,
my parents were Nazarenes, and I was raised in false religion,
and I began hearing what they believed at a very young age.
And then I was made to attend church and go to all the meetings
and my father was a Nazarene preacher so I had to go to every
meeting, I mean every last meeting. We went to the shelters downtown
and sat on a feed sack and listened to them preach to the winos.
I had to go every night somewhere to church and I began to form,
in my young mind, I began to form an opinion about God and
about myself from listening. Well, it wasn't long before I
started to school. And I had other friends, and
they weren't Nazarenes. Some of them were Baptists, some
of them were Catholics, and I began to listen to them. And I don't
know if you, I know some of you men cook, but I like to cook.
But anyway, when you're fixing, you put a little salt in, and
then you put a little pepper in, and then you put a little
of this, and a little of that, and that's what's going on in
our young lives. We're growing older, and we're
in school, and then we're in the world, and then we're in
college, and then we begin to read books. And it's a mixture,
it's a big mixture in us. And we begin to reason with natural
reasoning, we begin to think with the principles that are
accepted in this world. Things which we, well, if they
weren't right, everybody wouldn't believe them, would they? Well, I'll tell you what a believer
finds out. We are a God and the whole world lies in wickedness. That's what false religion is.
And that's how come it to exist. And over the years, the Jews
produced some believers. There were some believers among
the Jews. But not all the Jews were believers. And the Jews can, at the same
time, typify the church, or they can typify false religion. They're
typical of both, and our Lord uses them in that light. He calls
His elect Israel. Israel. And then he says, but not all
that are of Israel are Israel. And so he talks about them symbolically
as representing false religion. Religion produced by natural
reasoning mixing the word of God with carnal principles of
men. What the Apostle Paul called
And you read it back in the study, the rudiments of the world, vain philosophy and deceit. Our Lord said that his father
had hid these things, talking about the mysteries of God and
the kingdom and the gospel. He thanked the Lord that he had
hid these things from the wise and prudent. What is a prudent
man? He's a man that can fit things
together. He's a thinker. He can reason
things. And he sets, and he hears things,
and he thinks things, and he puts things together. But God
has hidden these things from the wise and prudent and revealed
them unto babes. And this was especially true
of the Jews who searched the scriptures because in them they
thought they had eternal life. They thought they could get in
this book, shut themselves up to it, and study this book, and
come away knowing the truth. They searched the scriptures
for in them they thought they had eternal life. And he said,
they are they, which testified me. But here's what happens when
a natural man opens this book and tries to figure it out himself.
Here's what happens. He said, you will not come unto
me that you might have life. You'll come to everything else
under the sun, but you won't come to him. You won't come to
him. They read its promises, and they
just automatically apply them to themselves. They read its
prophecies and they wrongly interpret them. They read its curses and
they apply them to other folks. That's not talking about me.
I'm talking about them old Gentiles out there. They saw in the scriptures a
promised Messiah and reasoned that he would come out of their
own midst, as David did, as Moses did. They read the promises of God,
and they reasoned these things out, and they said, here's what
he's talking about. He's going to establish an earthly
kingdom. See, I used to sit and watch these guys put up their
little tripod with their graphs and stuff, and they'd start talking
about, now here's what's going to happen. This is going to happen,
and then this is going to happen, and then there's going to be
a rapture, and then there's going to be this, and there's going
to be that, and they take little bits and pieces of scripture.
That's natural reasoning. They sit down with the Word of
God and come away with who knows what. There's no end to it, really. No end to it. But there's actually
only two kinds of religion in this world, works and grace. There is a religion that believes
that by something they do, they can be saved. And there is a
religion in this world that says nothing they can do can save
them, only God can save them. There's just two religions. It
may take on different names and it may take on a different appearance,
but there's only two religions. And Paul said, if it's by grace,
then it is no more worse. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is
it no more grace, otherwise works is no more works. It's one or
the other. It's not a mixture. And it's
carnal reasoning that has spawned religion as we know it today.
Free will, works religion, man's glorying in himself, self-righteousness,
and all calculating some kind of potential in man. Whenever
you hear a falsehood, you can write it down. Somebody is calculating
some potential in man. That's what he's doing. There's
something in him. There's something of some value.
There's one little spark, and if I blow on it long enough,
I can get a fire started. He said he gave us beauty for
ashes. I grew up with a wood stove.
I'm gonna tell you what ashes means. The fire went out. That's
what ashes mean. He gave us beauty for ashes. The Bible says this. The natural
man, that man born of Adam, your children and my children, myself
before my conversion, the natural man receiveth not the things
of the Spirit of God. Do you believe that? Do you believe
that? I've experienced that. Just lately. I've experienced it. And you
can talk and you can pile up scripture around a person until
you've just about buried him in the scriptures and he'll still
be doing this. He'll be doing this. No, you
missed something. I did? Okay, let's see what it
is. Well, here's what it is. The
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,
because there's foolishness unto him. Are you telling me that
I have to hear a preacher? No, God did. Well, that's foolishness. That's what he said. It's foolishness
unto him. You mean I have to be born of
God? I can't read this book and figure this thing out? That's
what God said. So how are you going to hear
without a preacher? How are you going to call on
him in whom you have not believed? And how are you going to believe
in him of whom you have not heard? And how are you going to hear
without a preacher? And how on earth is he going to preach if
God don't send him? He's not going to be any different
than you. The things of the Spirit of God.
What are they? It's the Word of God. It's the
preaching of the Gospel. It's the presence of the Holy
Spirit of God. And Paul was a preacher. He was
an apostle. And as he stood before this king,
he began to tell him why he was being charged and what his intent
was in his ministry. He tells the king that he was
worn exactly like his accusers. He said, they know me. I don't
know why they pretend they don't know me. They've known me since
I was a baby. They know me. They were proud of me at one
time. They loved to see him go get
the papers and go out and persecute believers. They loved it. He was a hero to them until God
saved him. He persecuted true believers
thinking he was doing God a service, watching men and women being
tortured to death and giving his consent. He was a man convinced
of a lie and doing what he thought was right. But God arrested him
on the road to Damascus. And he shined in his heart the
very light of the glory of God in Christ Jesus, and he made
him an able minister of Christ by his spirit. How did he do
it? He gave Paul a heavenly vision. A heavenly vision. What kind
of vision? Well, here's what it says in
Galatians 1.16. He said, he revealed his son
in me that I might preach him among the heathen. In 1 Corinthians
15.3, he said this, I delivered unto you first of all that which
I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to
the scriptures and that he was buried and rose again according
to the scriptures. This is the heavenly vision.
He was taught both by God and by God's man, Ananias. And also, according to Acts 9.13,
the Lord's disciples. And then straightway preached
Christ in the synagogues. God gave to this man, this chosen
man, this chosen vessel, he gave him a heavenly vision. And this heavenly vision is the
revelation of Jesus Christ. He gives this heavenly vision
to all his preachers. Not just his apostle, but all
his preachers. Does he shine a light on them
above the light of the sun? Well, he didn't make. But Paul
understood what that light was all about. God opened his eyes
to see it. He understood that light. And
he tells you all about that light in 2 Corinthians chapter 4. God who shined that light out of
darkness. He commanded that light to shine out of darkness way
back there in the beginning. Have you ever thought about that,
what that light is? What that darkness is? That darkness
back there has to do with an ignorance among any creature. There was no creatures. There
was nothing there but God. And darkness, there was just
darkness. Nobody knew anything about God.
Only God knew himself. He was self-existent. There was
no knowledge of God. And now, he's gonna have his
son create the world. But he's going to have you know
that his son created the world. And the very first thing he does
is command the light to shine out of darkness. Now he ain't
talking about the sun. That didn't happen until the
fourth day. That's when he hung the sun and the moon and the
stars. That's not that light. The light he's talking about
is the light of the knowledge of the glory of God. And in 2
Corinthians chapter 4, that's exactly what he said. God who
commanded that light to shine out of darkness has shined in
our hearts to give us the light of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. The Spirit of God moved on the
face, what face? Whose face? Christ's face. On
the face of the waters. And God said, let there be light.
And there was. A heavenly vision. No preachers
without this heavenly vision. And there's always only been
one vision. It came in different forms. Sometime
it came in the form of smoke rising up into heaven. There
was all kinds of visions given, but all those visions were visions
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Always only been one vision.
In the book of Lamentations, talking about the former state
of Israel, it says, her gates are sunk into the ground. He
hath destroyed and broken her bars. Her king and her princes
are among the Gentiles, they're captive. The law is no more. And her prophets also find. Now listen, no vision of the
Lord. No vision. For there is no vision,
the Bible said, the people will perish. Is that so? Well, what is that vision? That
vision's Christ. That vision's Christ. That which
God has purposed in eternity is to manifest His glory and
the salvation of His elect through the person and work of His Son.
He's gonna manifest who He is. Manifest His glory. And how will
He do it? Through His Son. through his
son. His son is the revelation of
God, the revelation of his glory, the revelation of his will. In the volume of the book, he
said in Hebrews 10, it's written of me, I come to do thy will,
O God. And it's this will, Hebrews 10.10,
by which we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus
Christ once for all. He accomplished God's redemptive
will on that cross and made it known to us. And then the final
book of the Bible is not called Revelations. It's called the
Revelation of Jesus Christ. That's what it is. And gospel
preaching is about declaring this revelation to sinners. Fallen, depraved sinners, helpless,
hopeless sinners, men and women spiritually dead, walking in
the vanity of their minds, none that understandeth, none that
seeketh after God. That's who we preach to. People
wander in here off the street. Somebody will show up, I don't
know, eight or 10 times a year in our church. I've never seen
them before. I don't know where they came from, don't know why
they're there. They'll just come in and say, damn. Well, what
do I know about them? Well, outside, knowing whether
or not believers, I have to assume that they're not. And if they're
not, then there's none that understands it. None that understand. So I'm not building on anything. I'm going right back to the foundation
of God and build there and just hope God will give him that revelation. Salvation is not getting your
life in order. If God ever saves you, if he
ever gives you this revelation, if he ever burns it into your
heart, your life will get in order. Salvation is not about
you accepting or rejecting certain truths. Apart from God doing
a work in you, making you meet to be partaker, you'll keep walking
around in the prison of your depravity rejoicing in life. But if God saves you, he'll give
you the gift of faith and he'll make you willing. Here's what Paul said, it's God
that worketh in you, both to will and to do of his good pleasure. Regeneration is God giving to
us the power, that's what he says in John 1, the power to
become sons of God. Not just to take on their name,
but to become the sons of God. You're not going to take up a
Bible and begin to read it and slowly evolve into a believer. It's not going to happen. And
if you're one of his, he'll call you through his gospel. God's
not left us to conjure up ways to save men. He said it pleased
God through the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.
Well, if this is what pleases God, who cares what pleases me?
Let's do what pleases Him. And Paul stands before this king
and he gives him five reasons for God giving to him this heavenly
vision. Acts 26, every one of them is
in verse 18. Here's the first one. Now God,
he smoked it, he arrested this man, he put his face in the dirt,
He did a lot of things to this man, but he gave this man a heavenly
vision. He revealed his son in him. He taught him personally. Caught
him up to the third heaven and taught him personally. And sent
him out. And this is why he was sent. To open their eyes. To open their eyes. They had
natural eyes, not spiritual. Our Lord looked to his disciples,
and here's all these Pharisees, all these trained and honored
men, honored by everybody in the world, and here's this handful
of disciples who were beginning to be despised, and he turns
to them and he said, blessed are your eyes, for they see. Blessed are your ears, for they
hear. He sends these men to open their
eyes. Christ said, I come to do the
will of him that sent me, John 6, verse 40. And this is the
will of him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth on him may have
everlasting life, and I'll raise him up at the last day. Salvation
is seeing the sun. Look unto me, all ye ends of
the earth, and be ye saved. It's seeing the sun. It's not
understanding some deep, dark mystery about Jews and Gentiles. It's about seeing the sun. Faith is a divine work. It's a miraculous work. Men talk
about faith as though, I don't know, you're fixing a meal or
something. It's just something you can put together and do any
time you want to. I was come to the place where I
was troubled, and the people in that Armenian church told
me, just believe. You mean men can just do that?
No, no. By grace are you saved through
faith and that, not of yourselves. It's the gift of God. What can
we do to work the works of God? This is the work of God, not
you. This is the work of God in you
to believe on him. Believe on him whom he has sent. He'll call you through his gospel.
And Paul tells this heathen king these things, that this is a
divine work, it's miraculous work, it's done in you, giving
to you what you were not born with and could never, never attain. It's the gift of God. The disciples watched that rich
young ruler. Man, what a candidate he was
for salvation. keeper of the law, faithful businessman,
donated money to the church, honored in the community. They
sent him over to Christ, and when he was done talking to Christ,
he went away with his tail tucked between his legs, and they looked
at each other, and they said, who then can be saved? And here's
what the Lord said. With man, it is impossible. And I tell you, this is where
it starts. When God brings you to that place where you see with
man it's impossible. Every mouth is shut. The whole
world is guilty before him and there you stand. You've got nothing
to offer God. You have no understanding. You
have nothing. You're a sinner. Actually, you
get on God's side in your own condemnation. And you stand before God as a
beggar, as a beggar. Oh, my soul. Pharisees saw Christ raise the
dead. Then they watched him call Lazarus
out of a tomb. Bound head to toe in gray clothes,
he couldn't walk. I suppose he floated out. I don't
know how he came out, but he was wrapped head to toe. Came
out of that tomb. Then he commanded the clothes
to loose him and let him go, and all of the things that he
was wrapped in fell to the ground. The Pharisees saw that. You think they bowed to God and
said, now I understand? No. Well, they went back and
called a business meeting. And this is what they said. If
we don't do something with him, everybody's going to believe.
Yeah, everybody but you. With man, it's impossible. It's
an act of God. But when God acts, it's an impossibility
not to believe, isn't it? You have to believe. He shuts
you up, there's nothing left for you to do but believe. Work of God in men causes them
to be teachable. Go ye and teach all nations.
But they're not teachable, Rex. Are they? They are if God works
in them. When God does work in man, he
makes him teachable, he makes him reasonable. Come now, saith
the Lord, let us reason together. Yeah, but he's not reasonable.
He is if the Lord works in him. And I'll tell you something else.
He's willing. In the day of his power, he's
willing. He's willing to be taught. He's
willing to hear a pastor. He's willing for a man to stand
and teach him something from the Word of God. That's an act
of God. And he works in the preacher,
he works in the hearer. He opens their eyes. This is
why he gave them this revelation that their eyes might be opened.
The second reason for God giving to a chosen vessel this heavenly
vision, Acts 26, 18, is to turn them from darkness to light.
Darkness in the scripture has to do with an assumed light. An assumed light. Knowledge they've
been duped into believing that's good and profitable. Our Lord
said this to the Pharisees. He knew the disciples still wanted
to honor, they were afraid not to honor those Pharisees and
they were standing there and the Lord was dealing both with
the Pharisees and his disciples. And here's what he said, if the
light that be in thee be darkness, how can light be darkness? It's
an assumed light. They assumed that they knew something. But they didn't. And if the light
that be in thee be darkness, then how great is that darkness? There's no light in you at all. Our Lord said that. This world, we're told, walks
in the vanity of their mind, having their understanding darkened. Being alienated from the life
of God, the eternal life is to know God, but they were alienated
from the life of God through the ignorance that's in them
because of the blindness of their heart. If everything we think
we know is a lie, if even the things we hope in be false, then
how great is that darkness? And our Lord said this, This
is the condemnation. Light has come into the world,
and men love darkness rather than light. He was the light. In him was no darkness at all.
He was perfect light. And he's not talking about just
their contemptible deeds, adultery and drunkenness and that type
of thing. but their religious deeds as
well. They love darkness rather than
light because their deeds are evil. They love darkness because
it's all they've ever known. They love darkness because they're
comfortable in this assumed freedom. Actually, according to the scriptures,
what we're doing, we don't arm ourselves physically in this
world, we're armed with spiritual weapons. And when we preach to
men, what's going on is a tearing down of strongholds. Isn't it? Isn't that what he
says? A tearing down of strongholds. Destroying false imaginations,
all these imaginations you have about God. My sister told me once, I just
don't believe a good God would send anybody to hell. And I said,
a good God wouldn't, but a just God will. A righteous God will. A God who is wrath as well as
love will. Men love darkness. But where the revelation of Christ
is declared and God is pleased to shine that light in their
hearts, that darkness is made known. All of a sudden you see
it for what it is. You discover your own inabilities. You discover that vast abyss
of nothingness in you. And what does a man do when that
happens? He turns to the light. And what makes that possible?
What turns him? The gospel coming in power. Coming in power. Paul said, when
our gospel came in power to you, talking to the Thessalonians,
you became followers, now listen, of us and the Lord. Darkness is what Paul described
in Ephesians 2 as walking according to the prince of the power of
the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. And it's through his influence
and his deceit and his lies that antichrist religion flourishes
in the world. We're all partakers of it, every
one of us. Nothing can change it, nothing
can overcome it, no man can lose himself from it until one stronger
than he comes upon him and takes away those weapons that he trusts
in, that removes that armor wherein he trusted, and then he spoils
his goods. God gives a man that heavenly
vision and he sends him to turn men from darkness to light. And then thirdly, God gives this
heavenly vision to chosen men and sends them into the world
to turn them from the power of Satan unto God. What is the power
of Satan? Does he go around with A pitchfork
can touch people and they die. Satan can't kill anybody. The
Lord killeth, and the Lord maketh alive. Satan has no power. That's not his power. He told
our Lord, he said, he took him up on a high mountain. He showed
him all the kingdoms of the world. And he said, you bow down and
worship me. I'll give you all these kingdoms. Those kingdoms
wasn't his to give. He doesn't have the power to
give anything. Satan's power is deceit, it's lies. When he
starts talking about turning you from the power of Satan,
he's not talking about alcoholism and drugs and all the things
that this world writes off as that. What he's talking about
is deceit and lies. He has no power to create, he
has no power to kill, he has no power to control providence.
His power is lies and falsehood. It don't even have God surely
say it. Just put a question mark. Put
a question mark. He offers what he has no power
to give. And he's a master at appealing
to human nature, carnal reasoning. and fixed principles of the world.
And those deceived look at God's ministers and they say, so you
think you have got a corner on the truth. You believe you're the only one
that can teach anybody anything. Well, you won't feel that way
when God shows you your absolute helplessness. There's a story
in the Old Testament Not a story so much as it is an account. And Israel was under attack.
And they came upon Israel with massive forces. And they got
outside that city and they began to mock God and to mock his people. And God told the prophet, he
said, you're not going to fight this battle, I am. And he said,
they're not going to dig in and form bulwarks out here. And God,
I forget how many thousand of them died. And the evil king,
he took off back for Nineveh as fast as he could go. And when
they realized that all these men lied dead, that God had actually
did what he said he was gonna do, they took off up in the mountains
to see if there was any left. And they got up on those mountains
and they looked over and there's the king hightailing it back
for Nineveh as fast as he could go with a handful of men. When
he came back, The people said, and you'll recognize this verse,
how beautiful are the feet of them that bring glad tidings. The feet of them upon the mountains
that bring glad tidings of peace. They came back and said, they're
gone. They're gone. The thread is over. They've left. You won't feel that way. If God
ever shows you your absolute helplessness, your total depravity,
it'll be alright with you if God sends a man to teach you. And you'll never turn to God
from Satan until you see where and how Satan works. And he reveals
this to us in the gospel. And then fourthly, God sends
this heavenly vision to a man and sends him out into the world
to preach Christ among the heathens. Who are the heathens? That's
me and you. That's me and you. Every unbelieving
soul. Those typified by the Gentiles
in the Old Testament. The God of this world and the
God of the Bible are two different gods. The God of this world has restrictions. He can just go so far. Then he
can't go anymore. If he goes any further, he's
going to violate your rights. That's what I was told. He has
restrictions. The God of this world is able
to compromise if it's for a good reason. The God of this world
is a God that anybody at any time can approach any way he
wants to. The God of this world has no
sure and certain purpose, just a strong intent. But the God
of this world is changeable. He's forever changing. Well,
he changed his mind. But my friend, God is God and
he never changes and he'll never compromise his character. He
spared not his own son. He has no restrictions but those
by his own character. And our Lord said, no man cometh
unto the Father but by me. And I preach to men and women
who are carnally minded, not subject to God, not subject to
God's law or God's word. And I preach to heathen idolaters
and those steeped in false religion and through the means which God
himself has ordained his gospel is preached and men believe. You know, he said great is the
mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh. What else declares that? He was
believed on in the world. Huh? My soul. My soul. And then fifthly, God sends his
heavenly vision to a man and reveals his son in him that he
might preach to chosen sinners so that they might receive forgiveness
of sins. See it there again in verse 18?
And the inheritance, an inheritance among them that are sanctified. Reconciliation is a two-fold
work. It is a work done for us and
a work done in us. We're reconciled to God in the
body of his flesh through death to present us holy and unblameable
and unreprovable in his sight. And then we're reconciled to
his reconciliation. In 2 Corinthians chapter 5 and
verse 18, he said, and all things are of God who hath reconciled
us unto himself by Jesus Christ. That's the first part of reconciliation. And then, hath given to us the
ministry of reconciliation, to wit that God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto himself, not charging, not imputing their trespasses
unto them. When God reconciles a man with
the gospel, he reconciles him to his reconciliation. He reconciles him to the fact
that what was prayed while ago, that in us is a perfection obtained
through Christ. We're complete in Him. Religion will never tell you
that. You're complete in Him. No, we
have to threaten you or else you will go off the deep end. No, we have everything we need
in Christ. As you have received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walk ye in him. Rooted, built up in him, established
in the faith, as you've been taught. We're reconciled to his reconciliation. And I'm telling you this, there's
nothing else to preach. When he gives a man this heavenly
vision of Christ, he preaches Christ. There's nothing else
to preach. There's nothing else needed to preach. What else do
you need? A full, free, complete reconciliation
in Christ, and those who are able of God to receive it, they
walk in the light of it. Thankful. I'm thankful that I
have a righteousness in Christ. Thank God I'm not dependent on
my righteousness. But I have his righteousness.
I have a high priest in heaven who ever liveth to make intercession
for me. There's never a second, never
a fraction of a second that he doesn't stand before God as my
reconciler. He's my intercessor. He's my
intercessor. And for that very reason, because
he liveth ever, and his priesthood continues ever, he said he's
able to save to the uttermost those who come unto God by him.
Faith and repentance are gifts of God, and they come to men
and women as an inheritance, not a decision. It's an inheritance. Somebody calls you one day and
said, such and such died, your great uncle. You didn't even
know him, but he's dead now. Well, OK. What's that got to
do with me? Oh, he left you a billion dollars. Now I'm interested. Now I'm interested. We have an inheritance. When
the fullness of the time has come, God sent forth his son,
made of a woman, made under the law to redeem them that were
under the law, that we might do what? receive the adoption
of sons. And because you're sons, because
you're sons, God has sent forth the spirit of his son into your
hearts, crying, Abba Father, we're heirs, heirs of God. And I'm gonna tell you something.
And I'm not talking about me, myself necessarily, but I'm talking
about anybody that stands behind this pulpit that God has called
to preach his gospel. For you and God's preacher to
be in an assembly together is a good evidence that God may
speak to you. Wouldn't that be something? Wouldn't
that be something? I attended an assembly one time,
and God spoke to me. And he did it through his preacher.
But he might as well have just spoke to me himself. I didn't
see that preacher so much as I heard what he was saying and
saw what he was talking about. And it's a good evidence. I don't
know if you're elect or not. I have no idea. Paul said, I
know your election of God because my gospel came in power. It didn't
come in word only. It wasn't just some more words,
some more arguments, some more facts. It came in power. What else? It came in the Holy
Ghost. What else? In assurance. You mean a brand new believer
can have assurance? Assurance is not confidence in
your confidence, it's confidence in Christ. And when you see who Christ is,
you'll have assurance. He can do what you can't do. And our assurance leaves us and
goes to Him. There's no guarantee that God
will speak to you, but it's a good evidence. It's a good evidence. When Paul was finished, he said,
whereupon, O King Agrippa, I was not disobedient to that heavenly
vision. I saw everything in that vision
that I needed. And it's everything that I need
right now while I'm talking to you. You know how Paul looked
on his imprisonment? It was God opened the door so
he could preach to the king himself. And what's he doing here in Acts
26? He's preaching to the king. You
think he would have got an opportunity any other way to do that? To
stand before that king and to stand before his court and preach
the gospel? No. But God in his providence
did, and Paul recognized it. And he said, I'm so happy this
day to stand before you and tell you something about
this heavenly vision. And I feel exactly the same way
tonight. This is an act of God's providence.
He's called me here. He's called you here. And I've
delivered what I believe God has given me to give to you.
And it's my prayer he'll use it. Use it. Burn it into your
hearts. Burn it into my heart. And cause
us to see what great things our Lord's doing today. Thank you.