I invite you again this morning
to turn with me to Acts chapter 2. I don't know how much study that
you've done about this chapter, but this chapter sets the basis
of all the New Testament scriptures. He told his apostles at his ascension
He said, you go to Jerusalem and tarry there till you be endued
with power from on high. And then when the day of Pentecost
was fully come, that is, at the end of the feast
days, which lasted 50 days, 50 days had transpired in Jerusalem,
coming to the end of the feast days, the Feast of the Tabernacles,
and all of these things, they come to the end, to the day of
Pentecost, and when it was fully come, there came a sound from heaven,
like a rushing mighty wind, and appeared before them cloven tongues
of fire. I have no idea what that must
have, looked like. And these things, they culminated in these men
being filled with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit was poured out
in a way, the Holy Spirit has been in this world since the
beginning. You remember our studies back in Genesis, the Spirit of
God moved upon the waters. Holy Spirit's been in this world
since the beginning. He's been actively engaged in
doing things. David, I read to you a while
ago where it says in the scripture, David spoke by the Holy Ghost.
But he had never come into this world as it was on the day of
Pentecost, in these last days, in this gospel age. God has poured
out his spirit in a wonderful way upon his church. And these
men, this was the beginning of the New Testament. And they were,
this was a fulfillment of Joel's prophecy. You can read about
it in Joel 2, verses 28 through 32. And they were endued with power
and gifts necessary to the ministry of the gospel. They didn't just
sit there and talk in some unknown jitterish gibberish or some kind
of language of pretense or even something that Satan may have
given them in their head. This is not what was taking place.
They were speaking very correctly in languages. And all those people,
all those places that I read to you a while ago, all spoke
different languages. Every one of them heard the gospel
in their own tongue. That's tongues. The gibberish
you're hearing on TV and around, that's a bunch of junk is what
that is. This was tongues. And Peter stands up and of course
people are making comments about this and that as they would today. And the Lord's gonna begin this
glorious work that's more glorious than even the crossing of the
Red Sea. He's gonna raise dead sinners
to life everlasting through the gospel of his Son. So Peter stands up and he begins
to preach in the power of God's Spirit to the very people who
called for the crucifixion of Christ. Those who were bound
by the fetters of anti-Christ religion and deceived so as to
think that they did God a favor when they tortured and killed
the Son of God. And as Peter moved through his
message by the Holy Spirit, he began to show them the absolute
necessity of Christ, showed them Christ being prophesied in the
scriptures, showed them Christ, who he was. This is who Joel
was talking about. This is what Joel was talking
about. after those days. He showed him the absolute necessity
of Christ and his person clearly set forth in the prophets, and
them being murderers of the very Christ that they sought for.
And being stirred in their hearts by his words, they said to Peter
and the rest of the apostles, what are we going to do? What
are we going to do? Well, there's only one thing
that a man can do when God shows him what he is. When he brings
him to admit what he is and he sees it and he's stirred in his
heart, there's only one thing for him left to do, repent. Repent
and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ. For the promise And this is my
text, verse 39. For the promise is unto you and
to your children and to all who are far off, even as many as
the Lord thy God shall call. And this is my message this morning.
I pray it's God's message for this hour. The promise is unto
you. It's unto you. If we're gonna talk about the
scriptures, we like to go in there and we'll show what David
said, and what his son said, and what a priest said, and what
this one said, or apostle said, or something else, and we love
going there and use those examples. But we're very hesitant to apply
those things to ourselves. And Peter accuses them of the
murder of Christ. And then he said, the promise
is unto you. The promise is unto you. And
Peter's very broad in his application of this. That is unto you, those
immediately under the sound of his voice, those who were gathered
there in his presence, those to whom God had granted hearing
in their own language. And then he says, and unto you
children, Those who were gathered there with them, those who weren't
even born yet. This promise is to you and it's
to your children. And it's to all that are far
off, those who have never heard the gospel, those who had no
interest in the gospel, those Gentile idolaters, those who
are far off. And they're far off both in distance
from where Peter was standing and they're far off in their
spiritual condition. The promise is unto you and to
your children and to all that are far off. Now listen, even
to as many as the Lord thy God shall call. God's promises are
often stated in connection with God's calling. Here's one you're
all familiar with. And we know that all things work
together for good to them that love God, to them who are what? The called according to God's
purpose. And then here's another one that's
right down under that one. Whom he did predestinate, them
he also called. Paul said he called me by his
gospel and he called me by his grace. Peter said He called us
out of darkness into His marvelous light. He chose us from the beginning
unto salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the
truth whereunto He called us by His gospel. His promise is to anyone, anywhere
that He calls. That's what the promise is. This
is not a blanket promise given to the world. This is a promise
to those that he calls, male or female, old or young, rich
or poor, educated, uneducated, religious or heathen, even to
as many as the Lord our God shall call. So then here's the question,
how does the Lord call sinners? Now if I know that this promise
is unto the called, What's my next thought? Am I called? Has he called me? Because the promise is to the
call. How does the Lord call sinners?
How does a poor ignorant sinner know if he's being called? Is this just another temporary
bout with religion or is God dealing with me? I need to know. First thing Peter told him when
he wrote that general epistle out to all these churches, people
he'd never met before. He just wrote a kind of a to
whom it may concern type of letter. It's a general epistle which
is sent out to all these churches around, established by him and
others. And he said, make your calling
and election sure. Well, how does God called sinners. Well, let me give you several
things. The first thing I see here is
that God uses the preaching of the gospel. These cloven tongues of fire
that set upon them and they're being filled with the Holy Ghost
was given to them not to enable them to be praised by the people,
but to enable them to minister the gospel to the people. They
didn't stand up there and start talking about the Lord told me
for each one of you to mail me $1,000 and we're gonna build
this big school somewhere. No, he preached the gospel to
them. He did it in the power of God's
spirit. He did it in their own languages. He did it in a way they could
understand. He uses the preaching of the
gospel. Paul wrote to the Corinthians
in 1 Corinthians 15, you can read it in those first several
verses. He said, I declare unto you the
gospel which I preached unto you, which also you received
and wherein you stand, by which also you're saved if you keep
in memory what I preached unto you, unless you believed in vain.
What gospel? Well, he's gonna tell you. I
delivered unto you, first of all, that which I also received,
how that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures. Not according to grandpa. Not
according to old grandma. Not according to that preacher
down the road. According to the Scriptures.
Well, you know Christ died for everybody. Show me that in the
Scriptures. It ain't in here. Well, then
why in the world wouldn't anybody believe it? Because their grandpas
and grandmas and their ancestors told them. That's exactly why. You read Stephen's message to
Israel. He said, as your fathers did,
so do you. That's exactly what he told them.
You do always resist. You uncircumcised of heart and
ears, you do always resist the Holy Ghost. You won't receive
the things of the Holy Ghost. You won't receive the testimony
of the Word that He inspired. You won't receive the testimony
of the preacher that He accompanies. You won't receive the things
of the Spirit of God. He died for our sins according
to the scriptures. And watch this, verse four, 1
Corinthians 15. And that he was buried and that
he rose again the third day according to the scriptures. Now if you're here today and
you're here by the, you're here by the providence of God, are
you not? You hear by the providence of
God. When God calls a man, he brings that man to a place where
he can hear. I'm using that word man freely,
man or woman. He brings him where he can hear,
or he sends his preacher to him, one or the other. But these two
are gonna come together when God calls a sinner. So if I were
sitting in the presence of a man preaching the gospel to me, I
might say, maybe he's calling me. You see
what I'm saying? How does a man know if he's being
called of God? Well, has God providence arranged
for you to hear? How should you hear without a
preacher? And then Paul says this, by which
also you're saved if you keep in memory what I preached unto
you, unless you believed in vain. If you can hear and understand
what I'm telling you this morning about the Son of God, our Savior,
could be that God calling you just might be. God calls his
sheep through the preaching of Christ crucified, Christ accomplishing
our redemption on the cross, Christ bearing our sins in his
own body on the tree, satisfying the very justice of God. God
is just. Moses said, show me your glory.
Show me your glory. I want to see your glory. I've
seen your power. I've seen your work. Show me
your glory. And he put him back there in the cleft of the rock,
and he passed before him, and he said, I forgive sin, showing
mercy. I do all these things, but he
said, I will by no means clear the guilty. I'm not going to clear the guilty.
Anybody here not guilty? Huh? Boy, what's he talking about? He's talking about Christ as
our representative, satisfying the justice of God, so that there
is no charge against you. Isn't that what it says over
in Romans 8? Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect? It's God that justifies. And righteousness. How righteous
does a man have to be to enter into heaven? He has to be as
righteous as God. Boy, no man can do that. I hope
you understand that. Christ is the end of the law
for righteousness to everyone who believes it. And this gospel, Paul said, is
the power of God unto salvation, for therein is the righteousness
of God revealed in the preaching of the gospel. Salvation is of the Lord, and
He alone has accomplished it, rose from the dead, declares
it, sent His Spirit into the world to reveal it and make it
a reality in the hearts and minds of His people. When God calls
His elect, He calls them through the preaching of the gospel.
Don't you believe a word when a man tells you I was just sitting
out there in my fishing boat one day? And the Lord spoke to me in a
vision. I heard words out of the trees. I have no doubt that you did,
but it wasn't God speaking to you. If you say God saved you through
the preaching of the gospel, period. And then secondly, when God calls
a sinner, he arrests him. That's a term these old writers
used, and I like it. He arrests his sinner. He brings that sinner's downward
spiral to a halt. He stops all forward motion. Who knows what deception and
lies were used to quiet their guilty consciences. The chief
priest and the elders of Israel persuaded the multitude that
they should ask for Barabbas and destroy Jesus. Did you know
that? Did you know that these chief
priests and such ran out into the multitude and Pilate was
trying to release Christ to them? And he said, you have this day
and we can release unto you somebody else. And he thought he had found
an out, you know, that would please him. And those Pharisees,
they thought, uh-oh, uh-oh, we better get out of here. And the
chief priests and elders, and they all ran out there among
the crowd, and they said, say this, say this, say this. You
read about it over in Matthew 27, verse 20. Oh, my soul. But as the gospel came upon these
same people, they began to see something about their sinful
natures. The lies of men against the testimony and evidence
of God. This man, Peter told him, this
Jesus of Nazareth was a man approved of God among you by miracles
and wonders and signs which God did by him in your midst as you
yourselves also know. They stood there and saw Lazarus
called out of the tomb. They saw the grave clothes fall
off of him. They saw him begin to speak.
They saw his color come back. They saw him after he was raised
from the dead. And they went home and had a
meeting. How'd I know they'd seen it? Because they went home
and had a meeting, and they said, if we don't stop this, man, we're
going to lose our jobs. And we're going to lose our nation,
because Rome ain't going to honor us as a religious people anymore. This man, Peter said, being delivered
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you have
taken and by wicked hands have crucified and slain. But God raised him up. For years I tried to hide among
the religious dead. I explained away my sin by calling
it ignorance, youthful lust, mistakes, bad decisions, and all this such like. Let me tell you something. Sin,
though it consists of things, now hear me, though it consists
of things, it's a sin to steal, okay? That's a thing, isn't it?
It's a sin to do this, it's a sin to commit adultery. It's a sin
to commit idolatry. These are individual sins. But
sins, though it consists of things, is not an act in itself, it is
a nature. And that nature is the same in
all men. I have the same nature in me
that that Pharisee had who was running out in that crowd trying
to persuade the people to destroy Christ. I've got the same nature
in me that Charles Manson has in him. Well, what's the difference? You're not running around here
killing folks. What's the difference? The difference is the restraining
hand of God keeping you from being as evil as you could be.
And people mistake this for righteousness and godliness. It's just not
so. It's a nature, and that nature's
the same in all men. Paul talks about the called of
God in Ephesians chapter two, and he tells them that they were
quickened from the dead. You hath he quickened who were
dead. You were dead in trespasses and sin. Now listen to this. The spiritual death, he said,
wherein you walk according to the course of this world, just
like everybody else in this world. You go in the same direction.
Everybody go in the same direction. Why? Because they've fallen sons
of Adam. By one man, sin entered into
the world, death by sin, and so death passed upon all men,
this spiritual death on all men. And he said, you walked according
to the course of this world. Now watch. And according to the
prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in
the children of disobedience. We all had our conversation,
he said, in time past in the lust of our flesh. Desiring this
and desiring that, desiring something else. And now watch this, and
were by nature children of wrath even as others. So the guilt that these men felt
having murdered the Son of God, I have that same potential in
me. You have it in you, that's sin. Sin. You were by nature the children
of wrath, the nature of Judas, of Caiaphas or Pilate, the nature
of Herod or Saul of Tarsus. Sin is a nature and sometimes
it's restrained by God so that it doesn't seem as evil as somebody
else. But God oversaw their evil, and Christ being delivered by
the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God. Yeah, but these Jews
delivered him, didn't they? They did everything in their
power to deliver him. They did everything in their
power to get him crucified by Pilate. But the end result was
that he was delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge
of God, and you took him out and crucified him. God just overlooked
what you'd done, that's not the right word, oversaw what you
did and used it for his glory. He took away the restraints,
he took away his providential aids, and it says in Luke 23,
25, he turned his son over to their will. There is no difference in the
nature of sin in you or the sin in any other man. When a man
is arrested by the Holy Ghost, he's brought to see his sin as
it truly is. He's totally depraved. He's helpless,
hopeless. He's a sinner. That's all he
can do is sin. A dog can't fly away. It's not
his nature. Neither can we. How do I know
if God's calling me, He's gonna reveal to me my sin, He's gonna
convince me of what I am. And you'll never turn, I was
talking to several of the guys after the Sunday school lesson
this morning, God doesn't, He doesn't press these things on
us to show us how sorry we are just for the sake of you being
sorry. He's not trying to make you depressed
and all this kind of stuff. He's showing you what you are
so you'll turn from it. That's what repent is, turn. Now I know it has other meanings
and goes even deeper than that, but the general idea of repentance
is to turn. What are we gonna do? Turn. Quick, quick, go in the direction
you're going. Stop. Hear the truth, hear what
you are, recognize what you are, and turn. Who we gonna turn to? The only one you can. The only
one you can, the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's my third point. How
does a man know if he's being called? Well, when God calls
a sinner, he calls him to repentance. Repentance. 1 Thessalonians 1
9 says, you turn to God from your idols. That was an evidence
of their election, their calling. This man being, it's not business as usual. Not
business as usual. This man being turned to God,
turned from his old understanding, turned from his old concepts
of God, turned from his old religion. Turn from himself. And how is this turning brought
to pass? How is this calling and this
turning connected? Well, Peter said, we do show
forth the praises of him who called us out of darkness into
his marvelous light. The scripture said, it is the
goodness of God that leadeth thee to repentance. We see the
truth in Christ, God's love for his people in Christ, his goodness,
his kindness, his gentleness in Christ. And it's like seeing
the tornado straight ahead and looking behind and seeing blue
sky. You gonna keep going to the tornado?
No, you're gonna turn around. You're gonna go back where the
sky's blue. You turn to the light because
it's better. Did you know the theme of the
book of Hebrews is something better? All through there. He just keeps saying it. He's
better. He's better than the types and
the symbols, and he's better than the old priesthood, and
he's better than the old kings. He's better. His sacrifice is
better. He's better. His blood is better
than that old animal blood. It's better. I remember years
ago down in Tioga, Louisiana. Anybody in here know where Tioga
is? Well, you can go over here on 371, and you can follow it
down to Cachetto, and then you can turn off of that, and that
road will take you right through Tioga, Louisiana, just before
you get to Ball. And he had a little seafood restaurant
there. He was a member of the church
down there at the time. And we used to go there and eat
all the time. I just love, it was a seafood buffet, and they
had stuff on there just different. That seafood was so good. It
was just so good. And his wife was as Cajun as
she could be, Miss Stoniker, and she could, boy, she could
fix that seafood. But anyway, in that line of stuff,
they had a big seafood buffet there, and in that line was this
one tray, and it had these little half ears of corn in it with
a stick in them. And I'm telling you, them was
the best things. I don't know what she put spices in that butter. I don't know what she put in
there, but them was the best things. And that night, Kathy
and I had finished eating, and we were sitting there at the
table just kind of watching and talking, and we noticed about two tables over
from us, there was a little three-year-old over there. and he had a whole
of this corn, and he was gnawing, he had that stuff all over him.
And it was wintertime. And folks had got done eating,
and it was time to leave, and he was still gnawing on the cob.
I mean, that thing, that spice was all up in that cob, and he
was, buddy, he was about to turn that thing loose. And they come
over, and they're gonna put a coat on him, and he, mm, and he held
on that corn, They'd threaten him, and he'd do this. He'd bow
down where they couldn't get it, and he'd hide that corn.
And they couldn't do anything with him. And they didn't want
to spank him, everybody in there, but now he's watching them. And
finally, the owner of the restaurant came over. And he said, I see
you've tried about everything. He said, would you mind? He said,
I'm not trying to embarrass you or anything, but he said, would
you mind if I tried to get that corn away from him? He said,
go ahead. We've tried everything. He pulled
out a Hershey bar. He dropped that coin and he reached
for that Hershey bar. When are you going to stop going
in the direction of this world? When are you going to stop following
Satan's religion? When are you going to turn from
yourself when you see something better? When you see Christ? He's better than the old types.
He's better than the law. He's better than anything. Christ
is all. He's everything. In Him, we're
complete. Why wouldn't a man want to be
complete in Christ? My soul. You'd rather go try
to obey the law? No flesh gonna be justified before
God by the law. But in Christ, we're fully justified. Fully justified. And not only
that, But he ascended and in that resurrection declared our
justification and then ascended to the Father where he now sits
and makes intercession for us. He makes intercession. His very
person sitting at the right hand of God, the scripture likens
that to my sitting there with him. That's intercession, boy. That's intercession. May the
Lord enable us all to see that very thing. Thank you.