Well, the passage that Peter
read, he mentioned what a mysterious passage it is, what a deep passage
it is, and that is so. It's been quite a challenge this
week, getting the message ready. If I might remind you, because
I often like to link one week to another, but last week we
saw in Isaiah 49, we saw Christ given as a covenant of the people,
because the whole purpose of the Book of God, of the Scriptures,
is to show to the people of God, the people of His sovereign choice,
the Christ of God, God Himself in human flesh, that He has set
forth to be the propitiation for the sins of his people, to
be the redeemer, to be the debt payer for his people. He's given
him as a covenant of the people. And if you remember, I said that's
more or less the same as saying he's a deal for the people, a
deal. There's a lot of talk in this
country at the moment about deal or no deal when it comes to Brexit. What's it going to be like following
that day of October the 31st when this country leaves the
European Union? Is there going to be a deal in place for how
we relate to the rest of the European Union? Well, I said,
you might remember, that there's a much more important date coming,
and that's the date of our death. And is there a deal in place
with God for how we will relate to God following that date of
our death? And Christ is that deal for his
people. Christ is the deal. He is the
covenant of the people. He is his people's deal. If you'll excuse the expression,
but it's essentially what it means. Christ is the deal that
God has given for his people, which guarantees their peace
with God after death. Those sinners and deserving of
condemnation in themselves, in their flesh, yet because of Christ
and being in him, and what he came and accomplished and suffered
in the place of his people, in his body being broken, his blood
being shed, the justice of God is satisfied regarding the people
of his choice. The sins that they have committed
are taken away. The sinners that they are, it's
removed, and they are made, made, made the righteousness of God
in him. How does he accomplish the success
of this? In qualifying a people to be
the heirs of heaven? Those that go to heaven when
they die? It's in verse 26 at the end of
it, of chapter 49. I, the Lord. This is God. God. God. who is above all things,
who made all things, who sustains and upholds all things. I, the
Lord, am thy Saviour. The one who saves you from your
sins. The one who saves you from just
and certain punishment. Thy Redeemer. Redeemer means
one who pays the ransom price. One who pays the price to set
something free, whether it be an object or a person. The Redeemer. I am your Redeemer. the Redeemer. He is the Redeemer of his people,
for he has paid the ransom price. There is a ransom price because
they are all sinners, condemned justly by the justice and law
of God, and yet Christ has come and redeemed. He's paid the price,
and what was the currency he used? It was his own precious
blood. You are not redeemed. by silver
or gold or corruptible things, says Peter, but by the precious
blood of Christ, as of a lamb, without blemish and without spot.
Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. The Lord thy Saviour,
the Lord thy Redeemer, the mighty one of Jacob. I love the way
God uses different names in Scripture for the same thing, but to convey
different meaning concerning them. This is Israel, his people. This is Zion, the church of the
living God, but here he calls them Jacob. Why? Because Jacob,
the man, the grandson of Abraham, the son of Isaac, the younger
one of the twins, Jacob and Esau, Jacob was a cheat and a liar
and a swindler by nature, as are we all. And yet God loved
Jacob. How do I know that? God's Word
tells me. Jacob have I loved. Jacob, despite his sin, have
I loved. Why have you loved Jacob? For
the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ. Jacob have I loved, but his brother
Esau Have I hated? And why has God done that? Is
that not unfair? God is God. God is sovereign. Grace is God's to bestow. He
will be merciful to whom He will be merciful. So how did God accomplish
His purpose of saving this people? By coming into this world. By
God becoming man. He who thought it not robbery
to be equal with God laid aside His glory. He was equal with
God. Christ was in the beginning.
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and
the Word was God. He thought it not robbery to be equal with
God, but he laid all of that aside for one purpose. that he
might die the death due to his people, and redeem his people
from their sins, to stand as a substitute in the place of
his people, to satisfy the demands of offended divine justice in
their place. Why? That he might qualify them
for heaven. That's it. How are we made fit qualified for the presence of
God by what the Lord Jesus Christ has done. What has offended divine
justice? Look at verse 1 of chapter 50.
He says, where is the bill, thus says the Lord, where is the bill
of your mother's divorcement whom I have put away? See, these
people that thought they were the people of God, these Jews
of this time of Isaiah, 700 plus years before Christ came, about
to go into captivity in Babylon for their sin, the judgment of
God is about to fall on them, and it's as if they're saying,
well, we haven't done anything about it, God has put us away
as his people in this. He said, where's the bill of
your divorcement? Or which of your creditors is it to whom
I have sold you? He says, this is the truth, this
is God to these people. Behold, for your iniquities have
ye sold yourselves. It's your unbelief that's done
it. It's your sin that has done it. It is your transgressions
that has caused your being put away. It's your transgressions. And transgression, sin, what's
the result? What's the end? What's the just
result of sin? It's death. The soul that sins,
it shall die. That's what it is. It's sin that is separate. Your
sins have separated between you and your God. But then in verse
2, wherefore when I came, when I came, this is God in Christ
speaking and saying he has come. And so firstly I want us to consider
God who came as a saviour. In verses 2 to 9 of chapter 50,
God who came as a saviour. Look in verse 2, wherefore when
I came, take it from me, And I trust that the Holy Spirit
will show you that this is the Lord Jesus Christ speaking. This
is God himself. This is the Word of God speaking. He says, When I came, was there
no man? When I called, was there none
to answer? Is my hand shortened at all that
it cannot read? When he came, He came in apparent
weakness. It seemed as if there was nobody.
You know, we read last week about the whole nation abhorring Him,
and they did. The vast majority, though they
came for a good feed at the feeding of the 5,000 and for the other
miracles, yet, in general, the nation, and the rulers in particular,
despised the Lord Jesus Christ. They hated his doctrine. When
it came to his earthly ministry, it appeared to be a ministry
of weakness and of failure, in the sense that the nation rejected
him. Yet he is truly God. Look, he
says, when I came, was there anybody? Look down in verse 6. This is God in Christ, the man,
speaking. And here he is, not fighting
in strength, but in submission giving his back to those that
would punish him. His cheeks to them that plucked
off the hair. He hid not his face from shame
and spitting. Does that not remind you of what
happened to Christ in that judgment hall of Pilate when he was falsely
accused? All according to the determinate
will and counsel of God to the salvation of his people nevertheless
by their wicked hands whom they took. and cruelly and unjustly
slew the Lamb of God, the Holy One of Israel. He came in apparent
weakness, but He wasn't, He was truly God in all His strength.
Second half of verse 2, Behold, at my rebuke I dry up the sea,
I make the rivers a wilderness, their fish stinketh because there
is no water, and dieth the thirst. What's he talking about? He is
alluding to the escape from Egypt when the Red Sea was parted,
when Jordan was parted, that they might go through, his people.
He's saying he is God who did all of these things. He is truly
God. Verse 3, God is the one who clothes
the heavens with blackness and makes sackcloth their covering.
God is the one who speaks, let there be light, and there is
light. God is the one who causes the darkness. God is the one
who holds all things in their place. He came in power. And then in verse 4, As he came,
the Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned. This is
Christ speaking again, as the man speaking of his Father. The Lord God hath given me the
tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season
to him that is weary. He wakeneth morning by morning,
he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned. As God walking
in the earth, our Lord Jesus Christ was taught and equipped
by God his Father from heaven. In John chapter 15 and verse
15, Jesus says this to the disciples. He says, all things that I have
heard of my father, I have made known unto you. God taught him. God gave him his words. Grace
from heaven was spoken, he says, to the weary. Who are the weary?
Who are the weary? Weary and heavy laden with sin.
Those who are hungering and thirsting for the righteousness of God,
blessed are you, for you shall be filled, weary with sin. He said, I've come to speak a
word to the weary. You know, when the scripture
says, whosoever believes on the Lord Jesus Christ, you know,
there is a qualification to that whosoever. It's not everybody
without exception. It's those that are weary with
sin. It's those that are burdened and heavy laden. Jesus doesn't
say to humanity in general, come unto me. He says, all you who
are weary and heavy laden, you come to me. That's who he's speaking
to. And who makes his people weary
and heavy laden with a knowledge of sin? Is it not the Holy Spirit
of God? It must be. There's no other
way. This is what the natural man
with his natural religion cannot tolerate. Because all men think
that they have it within themselves to rise up to know God. And they'll
do God a favor by gathering together to worship Him. And they'll do
God a favor by doing this thing and that thing of a religious
nature. No, no, no. It's all of God. All of God. If God the Holy Spirit doesn't
teach you, you know nothing of the things of God. You know nothing. Verse 5, the Lord God hath opened
mine ear, this is still Christ speaking, and I was not rebellious,
it says there, but better would be I was willing. He was willing
to suffer the just penalty due to others. He was willing, he
didn't flinch back at it. He was absolutely determined
to go through everything that was needed to establish the justice
and righteousness of God in the punishment of sin and the justification
of his people. He says in verse 7, the Lord
God will help me. God, the Father in heaven, helped
God, the Son, as he walked the earth for the salvation of his
people. Therefore shall I not be confounded. As much as the
powers of darkness and of Satan sought to confound him, he shall
not be confounded. He was utterly determined, he
says, therefore have I set my face like a flint. Utterly, utterly
determined. Absolutely determined. Luke 9.51,
in his ministry he said, it says of him that he set his face to
go to Jerusalem. Quoting this verse basically,
he set his face like a flint. You know what a flint is? It's
a rock hard stone. It's an incredibly sharp stone,
an incredibly hard stone, a stone that is so difficult to carve.
It is hard, flint stone, showing the determination of Christ to
fulfill his mission, to satisfy the justice of God for his people.
And so it says in Hebrews 12 and verse 2, speaking of Christ,
the author and finisher of our faith, that for the joy that
was set before him, what joy? The salvation of his people.
Behold, I and the children whom he has given me. In heaven, lift
up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting
doors, for the King of glory shall come in. Who is the King
of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle.
Lift up your heads, O ye gates, and be ye lift up, ye everlasting
doors, and the King of glory shall come in. Who is the King
of glory? The Lord of hosts. He is the King of glory. He takes
His people into heaven, and that's the joy that was set before Him,
and for that He endured the cross, despising the shame, for it was
the most shameful of death. Of all the ways to die, the cross
was regarded as the most shameful of deaths. and he is set down
at the right hand of the throne of God. He is upheld by divine
power, ensuring his success so that in this very book of Isaiah
in chapter 42 verse 4 we read, he shall not fail. All opposition
is frustrated. He is near that justifies me.
Who will contend with me? Let us stand together. Who is
mine adversary? Let him come near to me. Behold,
the Lord God will help me. Who is he that shall condemn
me? Lo, they shall wax old as a garment. The moth shall eat
them up. They'll have no power of any consequence over him. That, basically, is Christianity. That, basically, is the Gospel,
which says that people are made fit, qualified for heaven by
the doing and the dying of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now then,
Now then, all religious systems claiming to be Christian, and
there are a great many in this world, hold to some extent that
qualification of people for heaven is based on who Jesus Christ
is and what he has done. in fitting guilty sinners to
be accepted in heaven. They all say that. The Anglicans
say it. The Catholics say it. The Methodists
say it. The Presbyterians say it. The
Armenians say it. The Calvinists say it. And I
could go on and on and on with the various brands of so-called
Christianity. Their doctrinal detail varies
very greatly, very widely. But basically, all agree on salvation
from sin being the result of Christ's person and work. So
you would say, well, isn't that good? Because there's so many,
you know, there's well over a billion people who would claim to be
Christian in this world. But I tell you, the message of
Scripture is this, not all are saved in actual fact. Very few
are saved. Jesus again and again spoke of
his little flock. He again and again spoke of the
narrow way to heaven, and the broad way, the wide way that
the crowds are on, leading to destruction. Verses 10 and 11
of chapter 50 define for us the difference. And in the time we
have left, I want to see with you who these people are and
the difference between them, just in these two verses. Read
these two verses with me. Who is among you that feareth
the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh
in darkness and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of
the Lord and stay upon his God. Behold, all ye that kindle a
fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks, walk in the
light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled,
this shall ye have of mine hand, ye shall lie down in sorrow.
There is all that calls itself Christianity in these days divided,
as the sheep are divided from the goats, That's exactly what
it is. The who among you, see that in
verse 10, who is among you and the all ye that kindle a fire.
The who among you and all ye. Out of the billions who count
themselves as Christian, a minority alone is truly saved and the
remaining majority, whatever they say and whatever they do
is not saved. When it comes to the day of their
death, When it comes to the day of your death, will you know
that you are among the minority that is saved, or the majority
that is lost? Will you possess Christ as the
covenant guaranteeing your salvation from sin's consequences? Or will
you find that, as those people in Isaiah 28, you have made a
false religious covenant, a worthless religious covenant, a non-valid
religious covenant with death, and that you're hiding, actually,
in a refuge of lies concerning this life, and sin, and righteousness,
and the truth of God, and the righteousness God requires? In
these two verses, 10 and 11, we find the characteristics by
which we can distinguish the two. And fundamentally, it's
the difference between true spiritual religion, produced by the work
of the Holy Spirit in the heart, and that alone. The difference
between that and natural religion, because man is naturally religious.
It's based on the flesh. It's based on natural senses.
You see, it's exactly as 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14 says to us, concerning
that which is of the spirit and that which is of the natural
man. He says, the natural man Us in our flesh as we are by
nature, with our intellect and everything else that goes with
it, the natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit
of God. They are in fact foolishness
to him. Neither can he know them. Why
is that? Because they are spiritually discerned. We must have spiritual
discernment. implanted by the Spirit of God.
This is why Jesus said to Nicodemus, when Nicodemus came to see him
at night and he said, we've got some things to talk about concerning
the kingdom of God and the things that you're doing and I'm trying
to work out what it is that you're saying and what you're doing.
And Jesus said to him, Nicodemus, unless you're born again, you
can't see anything to do with the kingdom of God. I don't care
how clever you are, I don't care how religiously educated you
are, or the experiences you've had, except you be born again. And how are you born again? The
Holy Spirit comes and makes a life. You who were dead in trespasses
and sins, says Ephesians. You who were dead, as far as
the life of God is concerned, you have none. You're dead. in
trespasses and sins. You who were dead in trespasses
and sins, He, God, has quickened, made alive, given spiritual life. And there's a new man of the
Spirit of God inside each one of God's people. How do we know
it? What's the first thing? He brings
repentance. He brings repent, rethink. He brings a complete rethinking
concerning the person and nature of God. There are very different
results of these two positions. Those who are taught of the Holy
Spirit, by Holy Spirit revelation, and those whose religion is a
fleshly, natural, sense religion. Very different results. The one,
the former, the true children of God, Given a new man by the
Spirit of God, they are the heirs of heaven. They will inherit
heaven. They will inherit their place
in the kingdom of God on the basis of what Christ has accomplished.
The rest, whatever they might think, are the heirs of hell. You say, oh gosh, that's a shocking
way to put it. I'm trying to be only as clear
and as blunt and as concise as the scripture is itself. Think
with me first of all about verse 10, the truly saved minority. There are three characteristics
of the true spiritual work of God's Spirit that are given here
in this verse. First of all, this true this
truly saved minority, it says of them that they fear the Lord. Secondly, that they obey the
voice of the Lord's servant. And thirdly, and rather mysteriously,
and something that I've wrestled with a lot this week, they walk
in darkness and have no light. What an odd way to put it. They
walk in darkness and have no light, and they're encouraged,
they're called to trust in the name of the Lord and stay upon
their God. Let's consider these briefly,
we only have a short time. But to fear the Lord, the true
people of God, have a true God-given fear of the Lord. In the true
air of heaven, this fear must be the result of the Holy Spirit's
influence, the Holy Spirit's teaching. There is a fear of
God that arises in nature. There is, truly. A fear of God
that is not the Holy Spirit's doing, but is that which arises
in nature. We read of the devils. James
tells us about, you know, he says, you say you believe. Well,
good for you. Give yourself a pat on the back.
He said, let me remind you that the devils believe. Belief alone
is no good, the devils believe and those devils tremble when
they consider God. The devils fear, but not with
a saving fear, with a fear that knows something of what a terrible
thing it is, what a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the
living God who is a consuming fire. When it came to Mount Sinai
and the children of Israel had come out of Egypt and they were
being given the law by God at the hand of Moses, the intercessor
at Mount Sinai, the Israelites feared God there, but not all
of them were saved. This was a fear that resulted.
Have you ever been frightened in a thunderstorm? I remember,
you know, I've trained as a physicist and I've been in one or two thunderstorms
and You know, you sort of think, oh, here it is. Here is electrostatics
in the atmosphere going mad. And then a huge great flash of
lightning happens about 100 meters from you and nearly blows you
over with the force of the bang. Wow. Doesn't matter how much
you know about it, it scares you stiff just for a moment,
doesn't it? It really does. There's fear in it. There's fear.
There's fear. You know, a storm comes. A great
strong storm comes. There's fear in it. Whoever you
are, there's fear in it. King Saul. You know, back in
the time of Samuel and David, King Saul was terrified when
the prophet Samuel told him of his impending death. Do you remember
when Paul preached in his defense before he went up to Rome and
he preached before Felix? Remember in Acts of the Apostles?
And Paul reasoned, he preached the gospel to him, and in preaching
the gospel he reasoned of righteousness and of judgment, of the reality
that it is appointed to man to die once and then the judgment.
And we read of Felix this Roman ruler, this sort of puppet king
ruler in that province, that Felix trembled. Felix was frightened,
but it wasn't a fear that was taught by the Holy Spirit, it
was a natural fear coming from the reality of judgment to come.
This sort of fear is what Isaiah in 29.13 calls, a fear which
is taught by the precept of men. Religious folks can teach you
to fear. They do it all of the time. Legalistic religion teaches
you to fear the punishment that's coming your way. They teach you
to fear the loss of reward that's coming your way if you don't
obey their set of what they call sanctifying works. No. You don't learn this fear of
God in Bible college, the true fear of God. You don't learn
it there. This fear marking God's true people is planted by God
himself. And why? It's sovereign grace. That's the only reason I can
give. On the strength of Scripture, the only reason I can give is
not because this person did something better than that person. It's
entirely this. For what do we read in Romans
9, quoting Exodus 33, about God showing Moses his glory? He says,
as he says to Moses, he said, I will be merciful to whom I
will be merciful. I will be compassionate on whomsoever
I will be compassionate. Who is the one that does the
choosing in that transaction? Answer, God, for God is sovereign. God is the potter. Humanity is
the clay. God is the potter who makes of
some clay a vessel of honor, and of other clay a vessel of
dishonor. God is the one who does it in
sovereign grace. In Jeremiah 32 and verse 40,
he tells us this. God tells us this by Jeremiah
the prophet. He says, I will put my fear in
their hearts and they shall not depart from me. Who will put
his fear in the hearts of his people that they might not depart
from him? God says He will do it. God shines
His light, the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ, a sight of His majesty, of His being. What is
this fear? It's not a servile fear of the
dread of judgment, for we know that in Christ all of our All
of the judgment on our sins has already fallen, we're standing
on ground that has already burnt, for He has borne the penalty
of that sin. No, it's not that fear and dread
of impending judgment due to us, for we know in Him it is
taken away, but it is reverence for His being. It is reverence
for the power of who God is. It is It is a sense of awe at
the holiness of God. The one who dwells in unapproachable
light. And it's fear that is this, the
scripture tells us, this fear of the Lord is the beginning
of wisdom. It's the beginning, if you want
to truly know the way things are in this life, it's the beginning
of wisdom and the beginning of knowledge. This knowing something
of God. You know, there's a difference
between knowing about and of actually experiencing. As a little
illustration, I mean, this is probably so far short of the
mark that I probably would be better not to do it, but I've
been taught about the magnificence of the new Queen's Ferry crossing
up at Edinburgh. You know, there's this magnificent
new bridge over the River Forth at Edinburgh, and it's a wonderful,
I've read all about it, read all about it, magnificent thing. But in a few weeks, we plan to
drive over it. And when I actually see it and
experience it, I'm sure that I will be completely awestruck
by it. Now then, there you are. It's
a very, very pathetic little illustration, but you see, this
is it with God, and knowing God, and being taught the fear of
the Lord. How do you know that God Himself has taught you this
fear of God? You have this sense within, taught
by His Spirit of who He is, Who he is, you reverence him, and
you bow with awe before his throne. You feel and readily confess
your sin before him, for you know that he is holy and dwells
in unapproachable light. You're conscious of his divine
justice, his absolute right, his absolute sovereignty. Job
was a very religious man who did all the right things and
sought in his flesh to do everything right, and he sacrificed and
taught his children and did everything right. But God was to show him
much more and much deeper things for our benefit. These things
of old are written for our learning. And Job was taken through the
darkest of experiences. Job confessed that he wished
he had never been born because the experiences were so dark.
And it comes to the end of the book of Job, when Job has had
a vision by faith, the eye of faith of the true God. And he
says, I have heard of you with the hearing of the ear. Oh yes,
I've read all about you. but now mine eye has seen you. Which eye? The eye of faith.
Faith, the gift of God, not of yourselves. With the eye of faith,
Job saw, and what did Job say? I abhor myself, and I repent
in dust and ashes. This is what it is to fear the
Lord, and that fear is taught by the Spirit of God alone. As
I say, not a servile dread of judgment to come, but a fear
that is of the reverence and the person and the holiness of
God. And then secondly, obey my servant's
voice. Who is the servant spoken of
here? Surely it's the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the suffering servant. He is the one that God commissioned
to come. We saw it in a previous message
of God commissioning his son to come and be the redeemer of
his people. My servant's voice in chapter
53 and verse 11. He shall see the travail of his
soul and shall be satisfied. By his knowledge shall my, here
it is, righteous servant justify many, for he shall bear their
iniquities. There is Christ bearing the sins of his people. This
is what it is. He became obedient unto death. He took, he who knew, he who
was in the form of God and thought it not robbery to be equal with
God, says Philippians 2 verses 6 and 7. He laid that glory aside
and became obedient unto death as a servant. He took the form
of a servant. This is the servant of the Lord,
the servant of God, the one doing God's will in in manifesting
the Godhead to his people, so that Philip said, show us the
Father, and it suffices. And Christ said, Philip, have
I been so long with you, and you have not known me? He who
has seen me has seen the Father. Christ, who is the Word, the
Word, obey my servant's voice. He is the Word that was in the
beginning with God, who was God. And the Spirit of God applies
the Bible in the heart, and we hear the Messiah's voice, and
we must obey it. And we find that His commandments,
as the Scripture says, His commandments are not grievous. They're not
hard. To the person taught by the Spirit
of God, they're a delight. It's a delight. The precepts
of the Gospel of Grace are a delight. He teaches his people to listen
to the voice. Jesus himself said, I am the
good shepherd. And he said, my sheep, follow
me. He said, my sheep, hear my voice and follow me. Is that
not what this is saying? Obey the voice of his servant.
My sheep, hear my voice and they follow me. You see, many have
the Bible in various different versions and of all sorts. But
this same many, be they theologians, be they scholars, be they whatever
you like, They know nothing of God and His salvation if it is
not the Spirit of God that has led them to hear and obey the
servant's voice, the voice of Christ. Now then, very quickly,
what is it to walk in darkness without light? How can this be
said of God's true people? Hasn't He said, as He said in
1 John 1 John 1 verse 7, that's it, if we walk in the light, And Christ is the light. He said, I am the light of the
world. If we walk in the light, if the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ has shined into
us, if we walk in the light as He, Christ, is in the light,
we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ,
His Son, cleanses us from all sin. What then is this darkness? How can it be said of those who
are the true people of God that they walk in darkness and have
no light? Well, this darkness is not the darkness of spiritual
ignorance that Isaiah speaks of in chapter 9, way back there
when he speaks of the coming of the Messiah. He says, the
people that walked in darkness have seen a great light. Upon
them has the light shined. Verse 2 of chapter 9, the people
that walked in darkness have seen a great light. They that
dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them has the light
shined. He says because Christ is coming, there's a son to be
born. He's coming. So it isn't that darkness of
spiritual ignorance. It cannot be because they're
taught by the Spirit of God, but It is a darkness that is
a relative darkness, resulting from the withdrawal of the light
that they know exists. And God's people often know that
they walk in relative darkness, because God chastises His people. Why does He do it? To bring them
on their way to glory. to teach them, bit by bit, to
trust less and less in the things of the flesh. At times you feel,
if you're a true believer, at times you feel like you're walking
through a dark place. And you say, well that's a conundrum.
And it is, to the flesh. But to the true Spirit of God,
there are times when although you know the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ, it feels like
You are walking, what does Psalm 23 say? Yea, though I walk through
the valley of the shadow of death. There are times when things seem
very dark. As I say, it's not the darkness
of spiritual ignorance, because we have the mind of Christ, we
have the knowledge of the truth in Christ. But if you were up
here at, say, 4.30 this morning, it wasn't light, but it wasn't
dark either. there was a light, there was
a twilight, there was a half-light. And that half-light was the portent
of the rising of the sun in another hour's time. And as it is now,
if you were to go outside, the rain band has passed and we have
brilliant sunshine beaming down in the back garden. And that
is the full sun, of which the twilight at 4.30 this morning
was but a little foretaste, a little portent that it's coming, the
sunrise is coming. But often the children of God
feel, it says there, he walks in darkness and has no light.
What it actually, what would be a better translation, so I'm
told by those who are experts, is that has no brightness of
light, has no brilliant shining of light. Are there not periods
in the experience of a believer when we have no brightness of
spiritual light? Like twilight, not the darkness
of spiritual blindness, But yes, there are periods of darkness.
This is the true spiritual experience of God's elect by grace. And
the call, what's the call? Let him trust in the name of
the Lord, in all that God is, in his salvation, in his Christ. And stay, stay, be anchored on
His God, be anchored upon His God, because God in Christ, we
have an anchor that keeps the soul, and He will take us to
glory. This is the minority that is
truly saved, but let me just briefly, in the couple of minutes
remaining, refer to the deluded majority. Look, behold all ye,
is it not the difference between the, who is there among you?
Are there any? Is there one or two of you out
of this great crowd? Oh, now look at all the rest.
All ye that kindle a fire, that compass themselves with sparks.
They respond, all this great swathes of so-called Christianity,
they respond to the fact of Christ with showy, fleshly religion. They kindle a fire of their own
enthusiasm in whatever way it might be, with physical trappings
of religion, some do it with their priests and their robes
and their buildings and their stained glass windows and their
ornamentation and their liturgies, and others go to the opposite
extreme and do it with their strict, cold, dry, doctrinal
purity and their codes of what they will do and what they
will not do. It's all religious kindling of fire and sparks.
It's all flesh works. It's all religious doings. It's all religious fuss and activity. and the outreach that they go
through, it's all physical activity and they have their great prayer
meetings. Are you saying I'm saying there's something wrong
with prayer meetings with people? Well, what I say is every time
we meet together in a way what we do is a prayer meeting. Yes,
it's good for believers to pray and to pray together. But, but,
there are those who think that they can kindle a fire of a prayer
meeting, or let's have an all-night prayer meeting, let's twist God's
arm up his back and then we'll get him to do this, that and
the other. No, no, no. It's all around us here. Britain
is a largely non-Christian country these days, but this town is
full of this kind of religion. And they live in the light of
the fire and the sparks that they kindle in their fleshly
religion. They make a big show of their
religious activity. And this is what the world around
sees as the Christian religion. But God says what? This shall
ye have of mine hand, says God, ye shall lie down in sorrow. And what do I mean by that? Jesus
said in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew 7, 21 to 23, he said,
many will say to me in that day, many, all ye that kindle a fire
of religion, many will say to me in that day, have we not done
this work and that work in your name? And he will say to them,
depart from me, I never knew you. He will say to them, you
shall lie down in sorrow, because it was all without effectual
salvation. It was all without redemption
accomplished. It was all based on the works
of the flesh, whatever they be. There was no satisfaction of
divine justice in it. Only for the true people of God
in Christ is that accomplished. You see, it's easy to join the
deluded majority on the broad way to destruction, But to know
your trust is in the Lord, stayed upon your God, that requires
a work of God's Spirit. So what do you do? Just fatalistically
sit back and do nothing, because maybe one day He'll show you,
no, no, no, no, no. What does the Scripture encourage
us to do? There's that hymn that I love, Savior, dear Savior,
hear my humble cry, while on others you are calling, do not
pass me by. Are you weary and heavy laden
with sin? Are you? Praise God, that's God
that's shown you that. Hear and heed his call, for he
says, come to me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and
I will give you rest. Well, we'll end that one there,
thank you.