While you're turning to Exodus
chapter 3, I must give you a message from Shelby. She very much wanted
to be here tonight, but we have to leave at 4 o'clock in the
morning to catch a plane to go to California, so she's packing
my bags and hers, and she sends her greetings to you. This congregation
is indeed special to me, and I have known many of you for
a long, long time. long time. And God's near our
hearts together in the sweet fellowship of the gospel of our
Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to Matt and his daughter
sing. Great, great job. Great job.
I remember the first time I met them. Angela was pregnant with
their first child and they were sleeping in a tent, a little
tent, in Rescue, California. And we were at the close of the
conference out there. This is 94, 95, somewhere in
there. And Brother Harmon had some folks
to baptize. And Matt was sitting in the very
back. Gene got done baptizing a couple of folks. And Matt said,
here is water. What doth hinder me to be baptized?
And he came down and confessed our Lord and believers baptism.
Brother Brian Dufour, I've known him almost all his life. I know
you can't tell it by looking at me, but I've been around a
while. I used to take Brian to camp when he was a boy. And his
grandfather, the pastor of Beacon Baptist Church in Anstead, West
Virginia, quickly became one of my dearest friends and remained
so until the Lord took him. We met shortly after I came to
look out, and he passed it about 10 miles away. And one thing
we had in common, we were the only two preachers around, nobody
else had anything to do with, so we got along pretty good.
And I believe God's given me a message for you tonight. I've
been working on it today, and I believe I have something for
you. Exodus chapter three. Now Moses, kept the flock of
Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. And he led
the flock to the back side of the desert and came to the mountain
of God, even to Horeb. And the angel of the Lord appeared
unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of the bush. And
he looked, and behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush
was not consumed. Moses said, I will now turn aside
and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when
the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out
of the midst of the bush and said, Moses, Moses. And he said,
here I am, or here am I. And he said, draw not nigh hither,
but put off thy shoes from off thy feet. For the place whereon
thou standest holy ground. Moreover, he said, I am the Lord
the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac,
and the God of Jacob. And Moses hid his face, for he
was afraid to look upon God. Moses was afraid. I've just begun writing a commentary
on this book of Exodus, and looking at it today, those words struck
me as very, very strange. Moses was afraid. In the second
chapter, this is the same Moses who was not afraid to smite the
Egyptian and bury him in defense of his brother. This is the same
Moses who later was not afraid to go to Pharaoh, walk into his
court, the mightiest king the world had ever known, and not
ask but demand that Pharaoh let his people Israel go in the name
of the Lord God. This is the same man Moses. who
took Israel out of Egypt on the night when the Lord God passed
through that land and smote all the firstborn of the Egyptians
but delivered Israel by the blood of the Paschal Lamb representing
Christ our Passover who was sacrificed for us. And he got to the Red
Sea and Moses stands at the head of the congregation of Israel
with the Red Sea in front of them, mountains surrounding them,
and Pharaoh's army breathing down their necks. And this Moses,
who here we read Moses was afraid, when Israel murmured and complained,
what do we do now? He said, stand still and see
the salvation of the Lord. And he stretched out his rod
and watched the sea part. This is the same Moses. who led
Israel in battle after battle against the mightiest kings and
the mightiest armies the world had ever known to that point
and defeated them one after the other. But here Moses is afraid. This same man at the end of his
days was called by the Lord God to go up to Mount Pisgah and
to view the land of Canaan. And God told him, you can't go
into the land. I'm going to bury you in the
mountain. And Moses walked as confidently into that place as
he would walk into a place where his own wife was fixing a meal
for him. But Moses was afraid. This man
Moses, when God gave his law at Sinai, you remember the mountain
shaped and quaked and lightning and thunder was sounded and all
Israel trembled. But Moses walked up into the
mountain, this same Mount Horeb, Sinai, the mountain of God. But here Moses was afraid. Now let's look at that a little
bit. In Malachi chapter 1 verse 6, the Lord God asked this question,
where is my fear? Where is my fear? A question that is proper for
this religious generation. The question I ask churches of
this day. in the light of all the tomfoolery
that goes on in the name of religion, in the name of Christianity,
in the name of worship. And I'm telling you, what goes
on most places, not some places, most places, badness and otherwise,
is just tomfoolery, a mockery of God, not the worship of God.
This idea of contemporary services, contemporary worship. Do you
know what word precedes contemporary in the dictionary? Contemptible. Contemptible. And that's what
this generation is in its practice of religion. Contemptible. This
is a question I ask of you tonight. Where is God's fear? I know this. I know this. No
center has ever had Christ revealed to him and revealed in him who
walked away the same as he was before. When Christ reveals himself
to a sinner, something happens. The result of such a revelation
is always pretty much the same. The flesh withers before the
glory of God. If ever you meet God's Son in
the saving revelation of His grace, your flesh will wither
before the glory of God. The flesh withers away before
Christ when He's pleased to reveal Himself in saving mercy, love,
and grace. And we see this not occasionally,
but throughout the Scriptures. Do you remember when the Lord
God came seeking Adam in the garden? Adam hid himself in the
garden. Why? He said, because I was afraid. I was afraid. When the Lord revealed
himself to Abraham, we read in Genesis 15, lo and horror of
great darkness fell upon him. When the Lord God appeared to
Israel in the tabernacle, turn over to Leviticus chapter 9,
I want you to see this. When he appeared to Israel in
the tabernacle, as they worshiped God according to his precept,
Leviticus 9 verse 22, Aaron lifted up his hand toward
the people and blessed them and came down from offering the sin
offering and the burnt offering and the peace offering. Aaron
had done his business as the high priest and on the basis
of the sacrifices made He comes out as God's high priest and
lifts his hands over the children of Israel with their names upon
his breastplate and says, the Lord bless thee and keep thee.
The Lord make his face to shine upon thee and give thee peace.
He blessed them. And Moses and Abram went into
the tabernacle of the congregation and came out and blessed the
people. And the glory of the Lord appeared unto all the people.
And there came a fire out from before the Lord. and consumed
upon the altar the burnt offering and the fat, which when the people
saw, what was it they saw? They saw more than a fire consuming
a sacrifice. They saw the cost of redemption
by the sacrifice of God's darling son, the Lamb of God, portrayed
in the sacrifice. Then they shouted and fell on
their faces. Remember in Judges 13, when the
pre-incarnate Christ, the angel of the Lord, appeared to Manoah
and his wife, they fell on their faces to the ground. When the
angel of the Lord appeared to David and the elders of Israel
in 1 Chronicles, they fell on their faces. In Isaiah chapter
6, another familiar passage, look at that, Isaiah chapter
6, when Isaiah saw the Lord, now we know this is talking about
our Lord Jesus Christ, in His glory. Isaiah saw the Lord Jesus
because our Savior tells us this is what Isaiah saw in John chapter
12. He saw Christ having accomplished redemption, seated on the right
hand of the majesty on high, having all power over all flesh
given to Him to give eternal life to as many as the Father
had given Him because of His accomplished redemption in obedience
to the Father's will. Look at Isaiah 6. In the year
that King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord, the Lord Jesus,
God incarnate, sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up, and his train
filled the temple. Above it stood the seraphim.
Each one had six wings, and with twain he covered his face, and
with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly. And
one cried unto another and said, Holy, holy, holy. is the Lord
of Hosts. The whole earth is full of His
glory. And the post of the door moved
at the voice of Him that cried, and the house was filled with
smoke. Then said I, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am
a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. For mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of Hosts,
Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in
his hand, which he had taken with tongs from off the altar.
And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched
thy lips. Thine iniquity is taken away,
and thy sin is purged. God sent one of the angelic messengers,
with the coal from off the altar and touched his lips. It's a
symbolic picture. God sends a preacher with the
gospel of his grace and he makes it effectual to you and declares
to you through the sacrifice of Christ, your sin is taken
away and you see Christ in his glory. You see him in his glory
and yourself in your loathsome iniquity. When Ezekiel saw the
Lord Jesus on his throne, And the glory of the Lord appeared
to him. As he heard the Savior's voice, he said, I fell upon my
face. When the Lord showed himself
to Daniel, Daniel said, there remained no strength in me. For
my comeliness was turned into corruption, and I retained no
strength. And behold, a hand touched me,
which set me upon my knees and upon the palms of my hands. When
the disciples Peter, James, and John were with the Lord Jesus
on the Mount of Transfiguration. They fell on their faces and
were greatly afraid. Isn't it? That somehow seems
strange unless you relate it to the believer's experience
of the knowledge of Christ. Peter, James, and John saw Christ
in His resurrection glory before He had ever been brought into
His resurrection glory. They saw Christ on the Mount
of Transfiguration. They saw Moses and Elijah talking
to him and heard them speak to the Lord Jesus about the death
that he should accomplish at Jerusalem. And Peter was perfectly
comfortable there. He was perfectly comfortable
there. He said, Lord, let's build three
tabernacles, one for you, one for Moses and Elijah, and we'll
stay right here. Then they saw the transfigured
Christ and they fell on their faces and were greatly afraid. When John on the Isle of Patmos
saw the Lord Jesus, he said, I saw him and I fell at his feet
as dead. How blessed it is to fall at
his feet as one who has been slain in his glorious presence. utterly slain in his presence. We are never so much alive as
when we are dead at his feet. Did you ever notice in the scriptures
how God describes himself? He said, I kill and I make alive. He never says, I make alive and
I kill, though certainly he does. He says, I kill and I make alive. I bring down and I lift up. I abase and I exalt. I wound
and I heal. Never the other way around. Because
God's people, chosen, redeemed, saved sinners, we are never so
much alive as when we're dead at his feet. Never so truly living
as when our flesh withers in death. before our great and glorious
Savior, the Lord Jesus. Every believer, every child of
God, that's John Greenleaf and Don Fortner, every believer,
wants more than anything else in this world the death of all
that's sinful and rebellious in him. If you're God, you want it more
than anything. The death of all that's sinful
and rebellious. I'm anxiously waiting for my
body that shall never grow old. Anxiously waiting. The Lord Jesus,
who slays the flesh, will always raise and revive those he slays
by the hand of his almighty grace, just as he did John. He laid
his right hand upon me. And life comes. Life comes out
of death. Revival comes out of withering.
If you fall at his feet in humiliation, the humiliation of broken-hearted
repentance, he'll raise you up by his grace. And Christ, revealed
in the heart, always brings a word of comfort and assurance to the
one to whom he reveals himself. Look back at Exodus 3 again. Our Lord Jesus says to those
who fall before his glorious majesty, fear not, for I am first
and last. I am he that liveth and was dead,
and behold, I am alive evermore. Amen. And have the keys of hell
and of death. That's exactly what we see here
in this third chapter of the book of Exodus. The God of glory,
the angel of the Lord, the pre-incarnate Christ appeared to Moses. Now,
whenever you read in the scriptures, in the Old Testament, of the
angel of the Lord coming to a man or coming to a woman, speaking
to someone, mark it down. The angel of the Lord spoken
of is Jesus Christ, the great angel of the covenant, our Redeemer. It is a pre-incarnate revelation
of our Lord Jesus. The angel of the Lord appeared
to Moses in the burning bush. And when he did, Moses hid his
face. for he was afraid to look upon
God. Then the Lord spoke a word of
redemption, grace, and salvation to his servant. Look at verse
7. The Lord said, I have surely seen the affliction of my people
which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of
their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows. Israel in Egypt
portrays throughout the scriptures our bondage and sin. And their
deliverance from Egypt portrays throughout the scriptures our
deliverance in God's grace by the blood of Christ and by the
power of God's grace. Verse 8, I am come down to deliver
them out of the hand of the Egyptians. and to bring them up out of that
land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk
and honey, unto the place of the Canaanites and the Hittites
and the Amorites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites.
Now therefore, behold, the cry of the children of Israel is
coming to me, and I have also seen the oppression wherewith
the Egyptians oppressed them. Come now therefore, And I will
send thee to Pharaoh, that thou mayest bring forth my people,
the children of Israel, out of Egypt. And then he tells Moses
later on in the chapter, he says, I know that Pharaoh is not going
to let you go, not by mighty hand, but I will perform all
my wonders in Egypt. And you're gonna go out of that
place, but you'll not go out empty. In fact, as you go out,
you will carry out of that place with you everything of value
in the whole land of Egypt. God calls the Egyptians to walk
to get rid of Israel, and they gave them their gold and their
silver and said, get out of here. So you and I, who are God, At
last, in resurrection glory, when God has made all things
new, shall be possessors of everything worth anything in God's creation
and Christ himself. Deliverance by the hand of God. Here in Exodus 3, 6, Moses hides
his face, afraid to look upon God. The Lord God revealed himself
to Moses in the person of his darling son as the covenant-keeping
God of Israel, the God of all grace. When he picked out Abraham,
Isaac, and Jacob and made them to be the patriarchs of his chosen
people, it wasn't because of any excellence in those men,
but because of his free grace. The choice of those men, And
the covenant God made with them was a matter of pure sovereignty
and boundless grace. And now he's come to redeem Israel
from the land of bondage. Not because of any good in them,
and not because he expected any good to come from them. Read
their history. Just read their history. Tell
me something good in their history. Read it. God didn't choose them
and make them a picture of his Israel, the Israel of God, because
of something good he expected from them. Oh no, their deliverance,
their redemption, was all together inspired by God himself, by God's
free grace, by God's mercy. The Lord God appeared to Moses
as the God of Abraham, the sovereign elector, The God of Isaac, the
almighty quickener. The God of Jacob, the long-suffering
one who is about to bear his mighty arm, display his power,
and deliver his people. Blessed be his name. That's how
God shows himself to sinners when he comes in saving grace.
The God of Abraham is our God. He who sovereignly chose us in
Christ before the foundation of the world. The God of Isaac
is our God. The one who by his own miraculous
power makes us new creatures in Christ. The God of Jacob. The one who bears with us in
infinite patience. Who never forsakes us. Who has
promised to perfect that which concerns us. He is our God. The Lord, David said, will perfect
that which concerneth me. The Lord will perfect that which
concerneth me. He will bring it to its completion
perfectly. Now, let's consider this thing
of Moses' fear and see what God may be pleased to teach us. Moses
saw God in the bush. He saw the bush burning with
fire and he heard God's message out of the bush and he hid his
face. I presume he wrapped his face
in his mantle and he concealed his face from before the angel
of the Lord in the presence of Christ's manifest glory because
he was afraid to look upon God. What fear is this? What's the
meaning of that word afraid? Now I realize that the word afraid,
as we commonly use it, expresses the idea of a terribly distressing
condition. It comes from some sense of impending
danger. It means to shudder with terror,
to quake and tremble with horror. Those of you men who are my age
and older are close to it. When we were boys growing up,
Boys were not allowed to show fear. They just weren't allowed
to show fear. If they did, they wished they
hadn't. We just weren't allowed to. We
were often afraid, but did our best to cover it up. I remember
when I was a boy, I'd go visit my grandparents up in Spruce
Pine, North Carolina, up in the mountains. They lived up a hollow
and narrow gravel road. not a light on the place, not
a light anywhere. And they would often send me
out up on the top side of that road. I mean, oh, it was a good
mile up the road, right straight up the mountain to my aunt's
house to get stuff. And they'd do it after dark.
Now, they'd been talking about the prisoners escaping and hiding
out in the mountains, and they had about a five-watt bulb hanging
on the back porch. And I'd get outside of that five-watt
bulb, and while they were watching, I'd whistle. Try to. Try to whistle. And then I'd run just as fast
as my legs would carry me. And that wasn't very fast, but
I ran the whole distance until I got right within sight of my
aunt's house. And I'd stop and try to wipe
the sweat off my face so they wouldn't know I was scared to
death, and I'd start whistling again. But the whole time, I
was terrified. That's not what this is talking
about. I recognize that men by nature, all men by nature have
a horrible terror of God. You who are without Christ can't
think of God without terror. You may try to suppress it, and
you may whistle in the dark, and you may make folks think
that you're not afraid of anything, but when you think about God
and death, and judgment and eternity. You shake in your soul. That's just natural. You've got
a reason to be afraid of God. God's angry with you. And God's
going to judge you for your sin. And you know it. But that's not
the word that's used here. The word that's used here is
the word that means to revere. It would better be translated
fearful or reverent. This is the fear that God the
Holy Ghost gives to every sinner born again by His mighty grace.
This is the fear of faith. The word is used throughout the
scripture. It's this word translated afraid,
but it's used throughout the scripture and translated fear.
Behold the fear of the Lord. That's wisdom. The fear of the
Lord is clean, enduring forever. The judgments of the Lord are
true and righteous altogether. Come, ye children, the psalmist
says. Hearken to me and I will teach you the fear of the Lord. That, I believe, is what God's
given me to do for you tonight. This is not a fear to be feared. This is a fear to be craved. A fear to be craved. Blessed
is that sinner who learns to fear the Lord as Moses did when
he was overcome at the bush and he hid his face because he was
afraid to look upon God. Come, my children, hearken to
me. I will teach you the fear of
the Lord. When a sinner is awakened from
the sleep and death of sin, and brought forth into the light
and life of grace in Christ, he comes to experience something
that John calls perfect love. Perfect love. You remember how
John describes it? He said, perfect love casteth out all fear. Now which of you has such perfect
love for God? that your love for God keeps
you from being afraid. That's not the love he's talking
about. He's talking about the perfect love of God for us. Known in our souls in the experience
of grace, casteth out all fear. Therefore, we read in the book
of God, you have not received the spirit of bondage again to
fear. But you receive the spirit of
adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. Turn to Jeremiah 32.
Jeremiah 32. Sometime in my 16th year, early
in my 16th year, God began doing things that I'm aware of now
and I was aware of then. I didn't know what it was. But
suddenly I was seized with a dread of God and a dread of judgment, a horrible
fear of death, a quaking in my soul that caused me sleepless
nights one after another, terrifying dreams one after another. And
it went on for nearly a year, just utter terror. I couldn't
think about God without shaking in my soul. Until one day, late
in my 16th year, God revealed his son in me and gave me another
spirit. Not a spirit of bondage that
was terrifying, but the spirit of adoption. So that now, since
I was 16 years old, for 49 years, Clare, I've been able to look
at God and never tremble. Never shake. I call Him my Father. Abba, Father. It is a blessed
thing. to be freed from that slavish
fear and given the childlike fear that comes by the revelation
of God's saving grace and glory in Christ. This is the promise
of the covenant. Jeremiah 32, verse 40. I will
make an everlasting covenant with them that I will not turn
away from them to do them good, but I will put my fear in their
hearts. Let me show you why we fear and
worship the Lord Jesus Christ, our God and Savior. As we've
seen already, Moses was spoken to here by the angel of the Lord,
our blessed Savior. In fact, in this sixth verse
of Exodus 3, he calls himself God using the plural name for
the triune Jehovah, Elohim, three times. Three times he says to
Moses, I am God, the triune God. And Moses hid his face because
he was afraid to look upon the God, the triune God. The Lord God, that triune Jehovah,
is seen and known only as he's revealed in Christ. You can't know God by looking
at the stars, looking into the heavens, or by listening to the
river run across the rocks, those rapid shoals, just marvelous
sounds. But you won't ever know God by
listening to that stuff. You'll never know God by watching birds
and identifying the sound of their various songs. You can
only know God in the person of His Son. the incarnate God, in
whom dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. Yonder in glory is seated the
God-man, Jesus Christ, our Redeemer. And in him, in his body, resides
all the fullness of the triune Jehovah. And we know God because
He, who is God the Son, in time stepped into our nature, into
our flesh, and became one of us so that He might show God
to us. The Word was made flesh and dwelt
among us and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. He is the God of glory. He is the blessed and only potentate. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the
only being in the universe who is blessed with the absolute
right to do as he pleases all the time, everywhere, because
of his obedience to God as a man, our mediator, because he earned
the right by redeeming our souls. Our Lord, the Son of God, our
Savior, He is King of kings and Lord of lords, the mighty God,
the immortal, who only hath immortality dwelling in light. Christ our
Savior is that God who no man has seen nor can see, Paul tells
us. He's only seen, he's only seen
in the person of Christ our Savior, the God-man, and then only seen
by faith. You remember in 2 Corinthians
5, Paul said, we used to know Christ after the flesh. I suspect,
and I think I've heard your pastor say this a number of times, I'm
sure I have, that the Apostle Paul, Saul of Tarsus, that one
was standing by that young man holding the clothes of those
who stoned Philip. That man was the Apostle Paul.
He was hell bent. on destroying the name of Jesus
Christ. He knew him after the flesh.
Just like people today in churches everywhere know him after the
flesh. They know the historic facts. They know the historic
being. They know the history of his
life and his death on the cross and the story of his resurrection
and exaltation. But they don't know it! We know
Christ not after the flesh, but after the spirit. When he, by
his spirit, reveals himself to us by his outward word from the
inside. How does that happen? Jesus Christ
steps into you by his spirit. He sets up his throne in you. And the first time you know he's
around, you're already delighted to have him. He's sitting on
the throne in you. Made you partaker of the divine
nature. Christ in you gives you the hope
of glory. This one who is the immortal,
who only has immortality, is he who gives immortality to his
own. The Lord Jesus Christ, our great
savior, in his divine essence is too glorious to be seen by
mortal eye, therefore he became one of us that we might know
him. To him alone be honor and everlasting
power. Now, what does this mean? Moses was afraid. Moses was afraid. I've seen God. Have you? Dwayne,
have you seen God? I've seen God. I've seen God
in His glory, in the person of His darling Son. And He has purged
away my sins by His blood and set me free by His grace. Have
you seen God? If you do, a fear possesses you. A fear possesses you. Not a terror,
a reverence. An awesome, awesome, awesome
reverence for God. Reverence. So that we know his
perfect love for us that cast out all fear. I have no reason
to fear anything. The Lord God promised that he
would carry me. He said, I carried you from the
womb. I'll carry you in old age. I'll carry you through your whore
hairs and matter about gold. And I'll carry you to the grave
and carry you to glory. No reason to fear anything or
anybody. No reason. No reason to be afraid
of any circumstance. No reason to fear any apprehension
that comes your way. No reason to fear. Not if you
fear God. Oh, God teach me so to fear you. to reverence God is to be fearless
in the sight of difficulty. I have no reason to be afraid
of God because of my sin. All my past sin, He's forgiven. And all my present sin, forgiven
before it was committed. And as horrible as it is to think
about all my future sin forgiven, blessed, blessed, blessed, happy
is the man unto whom the Lord will not impute sin. Now what was he told I need to
be afraid of? Well, what was it I need to fear? All but preaching. What about judgment? Let me tell
you something about Judgment Day. I know you've heard all
your life in preachers and churches and religious folks, they try
their best to get folks to give money and go to mission fields
and become preachers and do stuff by keeping them afraid. Keep
praying, oh, you better tithe or God will get it out of you.
He'll kill your boy to get it. Isn't that a wonderful God? You
better do this or you're going to meet God in judgment. You're
going to answer for it. Yes, we shall meet God in judgment.
But hear me, my brother. Hear me, my sister. Judgment
Day will not be a day of judgment like you were going to court
to find out whether or not you're guilty. Oh, no. Judgment Day
will be just the revelation of the justice the grace and the
glory of God, just in punishing sin and just in forgiving sin. We shall be judged, every one
of us, according to our works, as they're written in the books,
Revelation chapter 20, 2 Corinthians chapter 5. But brother Don, we're
going to be judged by our works, according to our works, whether
they be good or bad. But God says a wonderful thing
about all his people. In reference to that day, Jeremiah
chapter 15, verse 20, the iniquity committed by Don Fortner shall
be sought. Don Fortner, there he is. That's
the one I'm talking about right there. They shall not be found. The
sins of Don Faulkner shall be looked for. Let's look again. There he is. That's the right
one. Not one found. Not one found. Wait a minute.
Oh, there's his name too. Jehovah said, can you? The Lord
our righteousness and the Lord God in strict justice. because his son redeemed me,
satisfying all his law and justice. And his son obeyed God in the
totality of his life as a man for me, so that when he lived,
I lived. Earth is what's written in the
book of God. I couldn't dream it, let alone say it. When Christ
lived on this earth, this man you're looking at, piece of sinful
flesh, Chuck, that you're looking at right now. I lived in Him
in perfect obedience, in perfect righteousness, in perfect faith. And the Lord God is well pleased
with me. And when Christ suffered all
the hail of God's wrath at Calvary's tree, dawn Suffered all the hell
of God's wrath Personally, I was in him in him. I am crucified
with Christ Nevertheless, I live yet not I but Christ limited
me and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith
of the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me this
fear this fear This fear that comes by the revelation of Christ
in you, by the revelation of the God of glory in you, is a
fear that makes a man like Moses. Do you know who Moses was? Do
you remember as described in the book of God? He was the meekest
man on the earth. The meekest man on the earth.
Now, I know something about meekness. I'm happy to tell you about it.
Go ahead and laugh. It'll be all right. I know something
about it. Meekness is not what you think.
This is what you think. When you think meek, you think
of somebody like that godly fellow. Some of you are old enough to
remember him. A man wearing a dress, walks around in sandals, and
walks like this. It never raises his voice, never
looks up. Oh, he's such a meek man. Oh, he's so meek. Now, that ain't
meekness. Meekness is a man who knows who
he is and whose he is. He knows that
he's God's and is sent here on a mission from God. And that
man, as his flesh withers before God's glory, devotes himself
more and more to God. That's the fear of this man,
Moses. That's the fear of faith. I've been praying for something. I've been praying for grace for 49 years. God, consecrate me to you in
the totality of my being as you are consecrated to me in the
totality of your being. That's the most reasonable thing
I can imagine. I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies
of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy,
acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. I wonder
what God might do with Todd's Road Grace Church in Lexington,
Kentucky, If suddenly we found here a congregation of men and
women who sing God in His glory, afraid to look on His face in
humiliation for their sin, in faith in His Son, utterly devoted
to God. Amen.