I invite you to turn back with
me now to Philippians chapter 3. In the first two chapters of
Paul's letter to the Philippians, he laid the foundation of his
hope for them. That which he preached to them, that which he tells the Corinthians,
wherein you stand and whereby you'll be saved if you keep in
memory what I preached unto you, otherwise you believed in vain. And he lays a great foundation
for faith. They had by the grace of God,
he said, grace and peace be to you. That's the way of fellowship
with God. Grace and peace with God. By the grace of God, they had
a fellowship together in the gospel. If we have a fellowship in this
place today, it is a fellowship of the gospel. If we have fellowship, it means
we both believe it. We both rejoice in him of whom
this gospel speaks. We have peace with God and it's
told to us in this gospel. They had, by the grace of God,
a fellowship. God had done a work. in them. And they'd use Paul to do it. And it was a similar work that
God did in him that God did in them. The gospel of Christ, which was
the basis of their fellowship, is the good news of God to sinners. A self-righteous man can't find
anything in this to rejoice in. He can't find anything amazing
about it. It's foolishness unto him. But it's the good news of God
to sinners that the promised Messiah had come. He's come,
of whom the scriptures all the way from Genesis to Malachi testified
of him who was to come. He's coming. Brother Mahan said
the Bible's broken down into three things. The Old Testament
says somebody's coming. It just keeps telling you that
every book. Somebody's coming, somebody's
coming. He's gonna be this, he's gonna be that, the root of Jesse. the seed of the woman, a servant
like unto my servant Moses, a prophet. He's coming, somebody's coming.
Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John said somebody came. Somebody came. And all the rest of the Bible
says somebody's coming back. He's coming back. That's what
the Bible teaches. It's a hymn book, H-I-M. This promised Messiah had come
and accomplished his promised redemption and rose from the
dead and ascended back to the Father and sat down expecting
till his enemies be made his footstool. Reigning there. the blessed and
only potentate, King of kings and Lord of lords, reigning in
the ease of his sovereignty. And then in chapter two of his
letter, he tells us something of the character and attitude
of Christ and how he humbly gave himself to do the redemptive
will of God. and for us to strive to have
a similar mind and heart. Let this mind be in you which
was also in Christ Jesus our Lord. Let this mind, this way, this
attitude, this condescending spirit be in you that was also
in Christ Jesus. And then he comes to chapter
three and he says in Chapter three, verse one, finally my
brethren, rejoice in the Lord. The Christian work is a labor. It's a labor. It don't just happen,
it's a labor. It's a labor. We're to strive
to do these things. Paul likened it here in Philippian
Street to running a race. And he could see out there the
prize and he was running for it. Running for it. It's a labor, it's a sacrifice,
it's a bearing of heavy burdens. But we're not always to go about
tired, forlorn, and mourning. The scripture says rejoice. Now what that says? Rejoice. Paul told the church at Rome, The kingdom of God is not meat
and drink, but righteousness and peace, now listen, and joy
in the Holy Ghost. Joy. He said to the Galatians, the
fruit of the Spirit is joy. Has the Spirit done a work in
you? Have you been grafted into that vine of which Christ spoke?
then you're gonna have fruit, and the first fruit on the tree
is joy. That's the first thing he says. The fruit of the Spirit is joy,
Galatians 5.22. He wrote to his kinsmen, and
he said that the author and finisher of our faith, for the joy that
was set before him endured the cross. despised the shame, and
sat down at the right hand of God. It wasn't the fear of death
that motivated him, but the joy sat before him. Hard to imagine, isn't it? Hard
to imagine the Lord finding joy in you, in his people, redeemed, chosen,
those for whom he willingly, lovingly laid down his life.
David sang of the experience of grace. He said that the Lord's
anger endureth but for a moment, and we may indeed weep for a
night. But he said, joy comes in the
morning. You know what happens in the morning? The sun comes
up. I love getting up early. I always
have since I was a little kid. I love getting up early in the
morning. And now more so than ever. It's nice and cool and
I get my coffee and I go outside and I watch the sun come up. That's what happens in the morning,
the sun comes up. You know what Peter said about
that? He said, you keep reading, and
you keep praying, and you keep hearing, you keep listening,
don't go anywhere, you just keep doing what God's told you to
do until the day star arise. The sun comes up, the day star,
Christ, and he'll come up in your heart, and he'll shed light
on all things. Oh, joy comes in the morning. Rejoice in the Lord. Let me ask
you this, is there anything in the Lord to cause doubt? Can you find anything in Him
to make you doubt? He's given every evidence that
his coming was in love to save sinners. This is a faithful saying
Paul said and worthy of all acceptation. No exclusions. It's worthy of
all acceptation. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners of whom I'm chief. You can't find no doubt in him.
Can't find no doubt. There's nothing in him to doubt.
There's nothing in him to fear. How many times did our Lord come
to his disciples in the middle of a storm? Fear not. And now he said, fear not. Fear
not. Fear not. Boy, I wanna know something
about that, don't you? Fear not. You doubt his work of redemption?
You doubt that his blood was sufficient to atone for your
sins? Do you think it covered some
of them but not all of them? Do you think it covered just
your past sins? Or which one of your sins was
past when the Lord died? They was all future, weren't
they? He put away sin, our sin. by the sacrifice of himself.
We wander around and, oh, what a sinner I am. And truly I, truly
I am. I confess it without reservation,
I'm a sinner. I think I can say, well, Paul,
I'm the chief of sinners. But in Christ, I have no sin. I have no sin. If I'm one that
he redeemed, God can't find anything in me to even make better. I'm perfect in Him. Unreprovable, that's what the
scripture says. Unreprovable. You doubt His work of redemption?
You doubt His work of righteousness? You think you have one of your
own? You think one that you can trust in? Paul said, if you think
that, I've got, you talk about overkill, I'm way above you.
I'm a Jew. I'm a Jew. You talking about
being circumcised, I was. I circumcised on the eighth day,
exactly as Moses said. It's touching the righteousness
which is of the law, I'm blameless. I was a Pharisee. I'm a Hebrew
of the Hebrews. I've got more things. If you
go glory in the flesh, I've got you topped in every area. You
think you're zealous? I went out and sought papers
and went out and got people and put them to death for what I
believe. You want to talk about sincerity? Huh? You doubt his work of righteousness?
Well, I'm gonna tell you something. If he fell short, he'd still
be in the town. That's right. If one debt was
owed that he went there to satisfy, he'd still be in the town. If
one law was left undone, then I don't have a righteousness
and neither did he. You see what I'm saying? Can
you doubt his righteousness? Can you doubt his redemption?
Do you doubt your justification before God? Oh, Paul said, I
want to know something of the power of his resurrection. You
know what he's talking about? He's talking about that authority
by which God raised him from the dead. When he raised him
from the dead, it was to declare his justification for all for
whom he died. That's right. Who is he that
condemneth? God that justified and Christ
that died. He was delivered for our offenses,
raised again for our justification. Do you doubt the presence of
his spirit? Maybe that's your problem. You
doubt the presence of his spirit, John 14, 16 says, This is what
the Lord said to his disciples. Are you a disciple? Are you a
follower of Christ? Has he said to you what he said
to Matthew, follow me? Did you rise up and follow him?
Now John 14, 16, he's talking to his disciples and he said,
I will pray the Father and he shall give you another comforter
that he may abide with you forever. You doubt that? Huh? You think the Lord's withdrawn
his spirit? He said he'll never leave you.
Ain't that what that says? Our great intercessor, on the
basis of his person and work, asks these things of his father
and our father, and he always gets what he asks. because he always deserves what
he has. Do you doubt his power over your
own heart, over providence, over all that? Is there some doubt
in his power? Is there anything that God purposed
to be that didn't come to pass? Can you find a chink in his armor Oh, God wants to save everybody,
but they won't let him. What kind of God you got? Our God does all his pleasure.
Is there anything that God purposed to be that didn't come to pass?
Oh, but you say, I don't doubt Christ, I doubt myself. I don't
believe that. I don't believe that. If you
really doubted yourself, You wouldn't be so anxious about
losing your soul. If you really didn't trust yourself,
you'd trust him. I'll tell you where your anxiety's
coming from. You're trusting in yourself.
That's where it comes from. Salvation's not of us. It's of
him. You mean it ain't in my hands?
That's what I'm telling you. It's in his hands. Who's gonna
pluck you out of my hands? I read that to an Armenian preacher
one time and he told me, yeah, that's true, but he said you
can pluck yourself. I doubt myself. Scripture said,
by grace are you saved through faith and not of yourselves.
You got plenty of reason to doubt yourself. It's the gift of God. Oh, oh. Paul looked at that little group
and the Holy Spirit's moving him and he's writing these things
inspired of God and he said, here's my confidence in you.
He that hath begun a good work in you will perform it under
the day of Jesus Christ. Christ is the way, not my devotion,
not my willingness, not my sacrifice. Christ in you, the hope of glory. And I don't know if we'll ever
believe what the scripture says, that he came to save sinners,
How long before we even believe a part of that? He came to save
sinners. Or maybe this is the problem.
You're doubting your election of God. Maybe that's the problem. Or what's the basis of that doubt?
Some evidence you can't find? Huh? Some feeling you don't have. Because of these doubts and fears,
Paul says to them, I write the same things. To write the same
things to you is not grievous for me. I have the same problem.
Not grievous for me. I have to deal with it in myself.
And it's not a grievous thing for me to tell you. And for you,
it's safe. What I'm telling you is safe.
It's safe for you to practice. It's safe for you to believe.
It's safe. We doubt our election of God.
The election of God is known if you come to Christ. Are you
coming to somebody else? We're coming to Him. Why are
we coming to Him? Because He's sufficient. In Him dwelleth all
the fullness of the Godhead bodily. We're complete in Him. Where
else are we going to go? You mean to tell me you're going
to find something above that in your feelings? No, sir. You're going to find
it in Him. That's where God put everything,
in Him. We're complete in Him. Don't go anywhere else. Don't
look anywhere else. Stay right there. Stay right there. Now watch this. But beware of dogs. Beware of
dogs, religious packs that hound believers, always questioning,
always drawing doubt, always ready to accuse. That's the Sanhedrin
of which Paul's talking, the Pharisees, the scribes, defenders
of their religion. They're like a pack of dogs, always drawing doubt. Beware
of evil workers. An evil worker is a man who pretends
to represent God, but in reality serves himself. That's an evil
worker. Beware the concision, those who
would impose the Old Testament seal of circumcision on you. Listen to this, Galatians 5.2,
Paul said, behold, I say unto you that if you be circumcised,
Christ shall profit you nothing. You better find all your hope
in the circumcision because Christ ain't gonna profit you anything.
He tells us in Colossians 2.11, in Christ also ye are circumcised
with the circumcision made without hands and putting off the body
of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. He is
being cut off for our sins. And he said to beware of these
men, beware of their principles and their doctrine and their
idolatry because Now listen to this, we're talking about doubting
our election. He said, because we are the circumcision. They're not, but we are. We are,
we are the children sealed. We are God's elect, the bride
of Christ, the true sons of Jacob and Abraham. And he gives us
three undeniable evidences of our election. You interested
in that? You wanna know if you're God's
elect? Well, here it is. Are we ready to submit our faith
to the word of God? Here it is. We are the circumcision,
first of all, which worship God in the spirit. The woman at the well took her
traditional understanding of religion, same way everybody
else out here does when they come in. They've all been raised
in something. and they bring it with them.
I always call it their luggage, and they bring it with them. And that's what she did. She
took her traditional understanding of religion and she said to the
Lord, our fathers worshiped in this mountain, but you say the proper place
is Jerusalem. You know what the Lord said?
You worship you know not what. But we call everything in the
world worship, don't we? I was listening to a fellow on
the radio the other day and he was talking about worshiping
God at a song fest. And what was he singing? I'll
Fly Away. If anyone makes it, Lord, surely
I will. You gonna worship God in that?
Got a good rhythm. Get your heart beating, get your
foot tapping. Got nothing to do with worshiping God. There's always been a running
controversy over worship. That's why the Jews of old went
up into the mountains. They wanted to build groves even
though God forbid it, they wanted to build these little groves
and plant some special trees, some flowering trees and things
and get a little pond there And they had to be up on the mountain
so the water would run downhill and they'd make a little waterfall
and that water would come out here and go into there. And they'd
go up there in that beautiful little grove and they'd get all
solemn. Maybe somebody would play some
music and they'd do this. You've seen them do that in church,
ain't you? Huh? If I did that and closed my eyes,
I'd fall down. I'd lose my balance. That's not worship. We worship God, now listen, in
the Spirit. What's that mean? That means
that everything that I know about God, Winston, has been revealed
to me by His Spirit. His Spirit is what enables me
to know Him. Otherwise, I'd be right out there
with them. I'd be saying the same things,
doing the same things. But God's spirit, we know, we
know, we know. That's what John just kept telling
them, we know. We know the whole world. We are
God in the whole world, life and wickedness. How you know
that? The spirit of God. Try the spirits, whether they
be of God. He that knoweth God understandeth
us. How does he do that? Spirit of
God. Natural man, he receiveth not
the things of the Spirit of God, they're foolishness to him. Preaching's
foolishness. Foolishness. We worship God in the Spirit,
and here's something else this means. God is Spirit. You can't
see God, can you? Now come on, we make these little
images and set them around and call it God. He talks about that
in Isaiah. Almost makes fun of them. He
said you hire a carpenter and he takes that old piece of wood
that you found, Dorisco wood or whatever it was, Might have
been some old chest that had family value to it, and he took
it, and he carves it all out, and he makes this image, and
then you carry it down here to the metalsmith, and he puts a
little silver on it, a little gold on it, and you put it over
there in the corner, and you bow down, and you call that God.
You call that God. He said, I'm God. Now listen,
there's none like me. You can't make his image. There's
only one that had the image of God and it wasn't talking about
his fleshly appearance, he was talking about his attitude and
his spirit and what he came to do. That reveals who God is. He is the image of the invisible
God. Ain't that what the scripture
said? You wanna know who God is? Read about the Lord Jesus
Christ, that God come into the flesh. No man has seen the father
save the son. Now listen, and he to whom the
son will reveal him. Oh, I was looking up and I saw
God. You saw your God. You didn't
see this God. Oh. He'll have no graven images before
him, no pictures, no statutes, no representations of himself. Hebrews 1.3 says that Christ
is the brightness of the Father's glory, now listen, and the express
image of his person. Don't you trust your eternal
soul on something that you think. You want to know who God is,
how God will deal with men? You study the Lord Jesus Christ.
You find hope there. You find hope there. It's the
very character and glory of God and the salvation of God's elect
by His Son that manifests His image to us. John said, the Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. Now listen. And we beheld His
glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full
of grace and truth. We saw Him. Our hands have handled
Him. We know what we worship, Christ
said, and we worship Him in spirit. We worship Him who is spirit.
And we worship Him in the spirit. Without the word of which the
spirit is offered, without the gospel which is the revelation
of the spirit, and without an inward enabling of the spirit,
we cannot worship God at all. We're the circumcision that worship
God in the spirit. I have no mental vision of him.
I just know what he is. He's God. And I only know that
in part. I don't know him like I want
to know him, but thank God I do know him. I know him. I'm not left to the deceit of
my own heart. The heart's deceitful above all
things, desperately wicked. Only a saved man, a man given
the gift of faith, a man born of God can perceive or see the
glory of God. Listen to this, 2 Corinthians
4-5. For we preach not ourselves, our values, our worthiness, or
our ability, or potential. We preach not ourselves, but
Christ Jesus the Lord, and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake.
Now watch this. For God, who commanded the light
to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. You remember at the beginning
when I told you that his goings forth in Sunday School Lesson,
his goings forth, one of the first things he did was to shine
light on creation so that we might see the glory of God in
it, the purpose behind it, why he's creating a world. He's gonna
manifest his glory in his son. and a people that he's chosen
before the foundation of the world. He shines that light on
creation. Here in 2 Corinthians 4, he said by that same light,
he's gonna shine on all these things that his son does in this
world. Everything, his cross, his birth,
his life, his death, his resurrection, his ascension into glory, he's
gonna shine that light on that. That you might see the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. You're gonna know God. You're
gonna know God. And then he says, secondly, we
are the circumcision that rejoice in Christ Jesus. My friend, faith in Christ is
not a insurance policy that we get and we put it up there on
the shelf and if I ever need it, I've got it, there it is.
Faith is the enlightening of the soul to be partakers of of
the saints in light, the inheritance of the saints in light. When
the gospel comes in power and in the Holy Ghost, Paul said
it comes with much assurance. Assurance that Christ is who
he said he is, that Christ did what he said he'd come to do.
that he was delivered for our offenses and raised again for
our justification, that he took his rightful place at the right
hand of God. We're never told to hope in our
faith. We're never told that faith is I hope, I hope, I hope.
No, Christ in you, that's the hope of glory. Never told to hope in our faith
or in our works, Christ in you, the hope of glory. Faith perceives
every jot and tittle of what God requires from the sinner
accomplished in Christ. If God demanded one thing yet
from you, you still couldn't produce it. You still couldn't
produce it. That's why we continue to cling
to him. We rejoice in Christ Jesus, not
in a feeling and not in an experience, not in a vision. We rejoice in
him, the God-man, our Savior, our Redeemer, the Son of the living God. You remember what Peter said?
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. He said, flesh
and blood didn't reveal that to you. You didn't take all your traditional
understanding and the contributions of your friend's traditional
understanding and go home and get in your closet and come up
with that. That was revealed to you, Peter. And then thirdly, he said, we
are the circumcision which have no confidence in the flesh, and
without a doubt, This is the spring of all doubt, the flesh,
the flesh. Looking within, seeing within,
desiring a sign, some evidence of this inward work of grace. We just keep looking within. He never tells you to look within.
He always tells you to look to Christ. You know what he tells
you is within? You can read about it on Romans
3. He said, you're like the sepulchers, white on the outside. What's
on the inside? Dead men's bones. We're looking in an open grave,
Winston, and expecting to find something. Ain't nothing in there
but bones. Nothing in there but dead men's
bones. What do you want to look there for? Our Lord said, an evil and adulterous
generation seeketh after a sign, and there ain't no sign gonna
be given to them but that of the prophet Jonah. He was three
days and three nights in the whale's belly. Even so, the Son
of God's gonna be three days and three nights in the heart
of the earth. That's your sign, that's your evidence, the Son
of God. You wanna find the sign, look to Him. He's the sign. He's
the sign. I'll give him a sign, God said,
a virgin's gonna conceive. Gonna bring forth a son. Huh? Ooh, gonna call his name
Emmanuel, God with us. This is the God-man laying in
that manger. His name gonna be the mighty
God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Believers need nothing but Christ.
And they have zero confidence. Ain't that what no confidence
means? Zero confidence in the flesh.
They don't look within because within are dead men's bones.
They don't look without because without are dogs and sorcerers
and whoremongers and murderers. Idolaters. Those who love and
make a lie. That's what's without. You don't
look without. You don't look within. We look to him. We're the circumcision who worship
God in the spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence
in the flesh. A fella said to me the other day,
you don't have any doubts, do you, preacher? My soul, I'm one
big doubt. I'm one big doubt. But I'm gonna
tell you something. I'm not talking to you about
doubt. I'm talking to you about the cure for the doubt. And the
cure for the doubt is to look to Christ. When you look to him,
doubt vanishes away. Just like when the sun comes
up, all the stars disappear. Everything you saw out there
in that night sky is gone. The only thing you can see is
that big old sun up there in the sky. That's exactly what
happens when Christ arises in the heart. All your doubts vanish.
You can't find no doubt in Him. There's nothing to doubt. All
the doubt was in you. You can't look to the resurrected,
glorified, victorious Christ in doubt. Doubt's all in the
flesh. And it's your work, not God's.
But when you look to Christ, All those doubts vanish away.
Listen to this. He said, though they believe
not. Who's he talking about? He's
talking about his people, his elect. Though they believe not,
now listen, yet he about as faithful, he cannot deny himself. Do you doubt? Doesn't change
his mind one bit. Not one bit. He's faithful. He cannot deny himself. You want
some assurance? There's where it is. It's in
Christ. I wrote this down several years
ago. I don't know if I've ever even
used it to this congregation. But I titled this, Imagine This. Imagine an authority so irresistible,
so powerful, so far reaching that none could stay his hand
or say unto him, what doest thou? Imagine a wisdom so great, so
high, so all-seeing, so eternal, so all-knowing that he could
declare the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things
that are not yet done saying my counsel shall stand and I'll
do all my pleasure. Imagine a will So sure, so absolute,
so fixed that everything that he was pleased to do, he did
in heaven, the earth, the seas, and all deep places. Imagine
a love, a love so pure, so self-sacrificing, so inseparably fixed in the heart
that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor
powers, nor things present, nor things to come, neither life,
nor death, nor any other creature could separate you from the love
of God, which is in Christ Jesus the Lord. Imagine a grace. We hear about grace. I see signs
on churches every now and then that says Grace Church. But I read about them and there
ain't no grace in it. Imagine a grace so free, so undeserved,
so irresistible that it could reach into the lowest part of
hell and this cursed world and bring life and forgiveness to
hell-deserving sinners. Imagine a mercy so tender and
so full of goodness and compassion that it's said to endure forever. Imagine a justice so strict,
so pure, so infinite that it would by no means clear the guilty. And imagine a righteousness so
perfect that even the eyes of the all-seeing God couldn't find
any fault in it. Now, imagine this authority and
this wisdom, this will, this love, this mercy, this grace
and justice and this righteousness all in a representative man.
whose sin of God to save your soul. Huh? Can you still doubt? You might,
but you're not gonna doubt him. And it's him I'm trying to get
you to look to. Look to him. It's all in him. All in him. May the Lord use this message
to cause us All my folks rejoice in him. What we got not to rejoice in?
Huh? If we're in him, it doesn't matter
what's coming, does it? Nah, it don't matter. Fact is,
we can even rejoice because we know who sends it. And he sends
it for our good and his glory. Oh Lord, let us see that in our
hearts.