The religion of this world is
calculated, is designed, and it operates to honor men and
women, to make them feel good about themselves. Preachers call
on people everywhere who hear them to stand up and be counted.
Churches and preachers alike bow and scrape before men as
if they were gods to make them feel important, valuable, and
needed. You've all seen church signs.
We can't spell church without you. How silly, how silly, how
absurd. People like to be recognized
and honored. So they give them recognition
and honor. Just about anything will do it. First time visitors, always recognized
and honored. So glad to have you. I can't
tell you how many times over the years I've had preachers
tell me, you ought to do this. Folks like it. That's the reason
I don't do it. That's the reason I don't do
it. They honored fathers on Father's
Day, and mothers on Mother's Day, and youth on Youth Day,
and women on Women's Day, and men on Men's Day, and deacons
on Deacons Day, and even Pastor Appreciation Day. People like
to be honored. And churches and preachers event
some way to honor them every week. People like to have a good
time. So churches and preachers coordinate
activities to show people a good time at church. Instead of having
church buildings now, we have family centers and activity centers. People like to be pampered, so
preachers spend most of their time wiping noses, washing wounds,
mending fences, trying to talk folks into doing what they know
they ought to do anyway. They call it pastoral counseling,
but really the job is basically that of an expensive babysitter
for immature men and women whose God is too little and insignificant
to really be of any help to them. Even the doctrine of the religious
world is calculated. It is calculated to dignify the
flesh and give men a sense of power, goodness, and self-worth. The will of man is made sovereign
and omnipotent so that even the will of God is compelled in the
doctrine of this world to bow to the will of men. The works
of men are made meritorious so that men are taught that if they
do good, they will go to heaven. And folks who don't really use
exactly those words say exactly that doctrine. You're saved by
grace, but you still got some things to do. You still got some
things to do. And if you really do good, then
you'll really have a big crown in heaven and a lot of them.
And if you don't, you're gonna be a pauper in heaven. At best,
salvation is set forth as a cooperative effort between God and man. But somehow or another, that
cooperative effort always makes the whole work of salvation dependent
upon and determined by man and not by God. Men take this revelation
of scripture with regard to God's sovereign will and character,
and they cause God to be made subservient to man and man's
will to be dominant over God's will. They make the blood atonement
of the Lord Jesus Christ, his sin atoning sacrifice to depend
altogether upon man for its efficacy, its merit, and its accomplishments. The work of God, the Holy Ghost
in the new birth, the calling of God, the irresistible grace
of God is made subservient to the will of man so that when
Preaching is all done. And folks, you know, your family
and mine, folks in churches, your neighbors and mine, folks
who go to church three times a week, they have this insane,
blasphemous idea that somehow, Men, after all, save themselves,
and God waits for you to decide. God waits for you to determine
whether or not his purpose is accomplished. God waits for you
to give him permission to do what his purpose to do. God,
the Son, waits for you to make his blood meritorious and effectual. God, the Holy Spirit, has done
all he can now. The rest is up to you. If you
will turn to the second chapter of the gospel, according to the
prophet Isaiah and hear what God has to say. The religion
of this world is the religion of man. Paul calls it will worship
in Colossians chapter two, the religion of antichrist. That's
the religion of this world. It doesn't matter whether you
call it Baptist, Buddhist, Catholic, Presbyterian, Mormon, Methodist,
the religion of this world is anti-Christ. It is man-centered,
man-exalted, and man-pleasing. The religion of the Bible, the
teaching of Holy Scripture, the doctrine of God's word is exactly
the opposite. It is exactly the opposite. Now, I challenge you. I challenge
you. Please prove me wrong. Please prove me wrong. Listen to every sermon. Listen
to every sermon you can get that was preached in Boyle County,
Kentucky today. Every one of them. Get the tapes
and listen to them. And come to me and show me one
that doesn't exalt man, unless it was preached in this pulpit.
Show me one. Find me one. Just one. Just one
that gives God honor and God glory and magnifies God in all
things. Just one. Just one. I ask for
just one. And I'll give you $100 for it
tomorrow. Just one. You're not going to
find it. Not gonna happen. Hear the words
of God by the prophet Isaiah as he describes what happens
in the day God saves a sinner by his almighty grace. Are you
there? Isaiah chapter two, verse 17. The loftiness of man. The loftiness of man. Everything that makes your chest
swell. Everything that causes you to
stand up and walk like a soldier. Everything that lifts you up. Everything that makes you feel
good about yourself. The loftiness of man shall be
bowed down. And the haughtiness of men shall
be made low. Until that happens to you, you
don't know God. Until that happens to you, you
don't know God. And the Lord alone shall be exalted
in that day. It is God's purpose in all things
to humble the pride of man and exalt the glory of his grace
in Christ. And you may be sure of this,
what God has purposed, God will do. Man shall be humbled and
God shall be exalted. When this thing's finished up,
when this thing called time and history is done, when all things
are accomplished, Man shall be laid in the dust before God Almighty,
and God alone shall be exalted, praised, and honored. Sooner
or later, by one means or another, either in mercy or in grace,
God will humble every child of Adam, and sooner or later, God
will break your pride and mine. In all his works of providence
up to this day, If you analyze the pages of history, you will
see that God has been causing the loftiness of man to be brought
down and the haughtiness of men to be made low. Spurgeon once
wrote, if any man would say to me, what is God doing? I would
answer he is lifting up the lowly and is casting down the proud.
He seemeth always to be engaged in this, as though it were his
natural work and he delighted in it. Men build their nest among
the stars, God tears them down. Then he stoops in the almightiness
of his mercy, love and grace to lift the beggar from the dunghill
and set him among princes, even the princes of his people. God
knows how to humble the proud. Go ask Nebuchadnezzar. He can
tell you all about it. God knows how to get honor to
himself even in men who despise him and rebel against him. Go
ask Pharaoh. He can tell you all about it.
God knows how to lift the poor beggar from the dunghill and
set him among princes. Lift your hearts to heaven and
ask Lazarus. He can tell you all about it.
God Almighty will ultimately, in all His creation, cause every
knee to bow and every tongue to confess that Jesus Christ
is Lord to the glory of the triune God. When this thing's done,
God alone, the Lord God, our Savior, the triune Jehovah, shall
be exalted and men shall bow before Him. But our text is talking
particularly about the day of God's grace. Isaiah is describing
that which God does in the hearts of his elect when he saves them
by his grace. There is a day appointed. There
is a day appointed when God will save everyone of his elect. I love I love to go back and
look at things made obvious in God's providence. And I love
to anticipate how God's doing things now. God appointed a day
from eternity when each of his loved ones would be called by
his grace. And he arranged from eternity
by what's called the purpose of God in predestination. And
he arranges in time by the work of God in providence, sovereignly
manipulating and controlling all the time the very thoughts
of men. and all the words of men and
all the actions of men, good and bad, of angels and demons,
he controls it all to prepare the object of his love and meet
them in the appointed place and the appointed day of mercy when
he will bring them down and exalt himself in their hearts. The
loftiness of man at that hour shall be bowed down. The haughtiness
of man shall be made low, and the Lord alone shall be exalted
in that day. In the latter part of this chapter,
Isaiah seems to be obsessed with this matter. Look at verses 10,
11, 17, 19, and 21. Would to God, oh, would to God
that every preacher in every pulpit in the world this hour
were obsessed with this matter. Utterly obsessed with humbling
the pride of man and exalting the glory of God in Christ Jesus
the Lord. Look at verse 10. Enter into
the rock, hide thee in the dust. That's a good place for us. For
the fear of the Lord and for the glory of his majesty. Verse
11, the lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the haughtiness
of men shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted
in that day. Verse 17 again, the loftiness
of man shall be bowed down, the haughtiness of men shall be made
low, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. Verse
19, They shall go into the holes of the rocks and into the caves
of the earth for fear of the Lord and for the glory of his
majesty when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. Verse 21,
to go into the clests of the rocks and into the tops of the
ragged rocks for the fear of the Lord and for the glory of
his majesty when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. Oh God. Come this hour and visit
us and shake terribly the earth
in our midst. Lay low the haughtiness of man
and get glory to yourself alone. With as much brevity as possible,
I want to show you that God's method of saving sinners by his
sovereign grace in Christ Jesus is designed to this purpose.
to humble man and to exalt the Lord God alone. Let me show you
four things. Number one, God's eternal purpose
of grace. God's eternal purpose of grace. The God we worship is God of
purpose. Purpose, purpose. Everything
God does, God does on purpose, exactly as he purposed it from
eternity. Nothing affects him, nothing
changes him, nothing touches him. Man doesn't change God,
God changes men. Man doesn't change God's mind,
God changes your mind. Man doesn't manipulate God, God
manipulates men. Everything's just exactly opposite
to what the religious world would have you to believe. And God's
eternal purpose of grace is humbling to man and exalts God alone in
the glory of his majesty. Natural men and women rebel against
divine sovereignty. They denounce the Bible doctrine
of predestination and ridicule God's immaculate purpose of grace. Proud men can never rejoice in
sovereign grace for this reason. God's sovereign purpose robs
man of all possibility of adulation and praise. If God does everything
absolutely according to his purpose, nothing's in your hands, nothing's
controlled by you. Nothing depends on you. Everything's
in God's hands. Everything's controlled by him.
Everything depends on him. You see, God's purpose of grace
presupposes the fallen, ruined, lost condition of all men. Turn to Jeremiah chapter 31.
Jeremiah 31, I'll get there in a minute. God's covenant was
made in anticipation of the fall. Redemption was planned in anticipation
of man's ruin. The Lamb of God slain before
the foundation of the world was done in anticipation of man's
sin. Anyone who acknowledges God's
sovereign purpose of grace in Christ must acknowledge man's
total depravity and inability by reason of his personal depravity
and sin. God from eternity devised a way
to deliver chosen men from the pit because men from eternity
were looked upon by God as a race fallen into a pit of destruction.
God made an everlasting covenant of peace, securing pardon and
life, forgiveness and righteousness for his elect, because men were
looked upon him from eternity as a race of transgressors and
evildoers. Look here at the covenant words
in Jeremiah 31 and verse 31. Now, I realize this is in the Old
Testament. And I realized these are words spoken by the prophet
Jeremiah in anticipation of Israel's Babylonian captivity. But if
you care to interpret the word of God, as God interprets his
word, you read the book of Hebrews and you find out, wow, this is
talking about God's covenant of grace with the Israel of God. This is talking about God's purpose
of grace in anticipation of our bondage and captivity in sin. And that's exactly how the Spirit
of God interprets the text. Jeremiah chapter 31, verse 31. Behold, the days come, saith
the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel
and with the house of Judah, his chosen. A new covenant. The covenant was made from everlasting.
The covenant was made before the foundation of the world.
What's he talking about then a new covenant? It's new to us
when we come to experience his grace. It is newly revealed for
the first was revealed first, though the new covenant was made
first. And it is new that is fresh every
day. I will make with them a new covenant.
not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers
in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of
the land of Egypt. Now, you don't have to guess
what that is. God brought them to Sinai and he said, do this
and live, don't do it and you're damned. And they didn't do it. He said, I won't make this covenant
like that, which my covenant they break, although I was in
husband unto them, saith the Lord. Verse 33, but this shall
be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after
those days, saith the Lord. I will put my law in their inward
parts and write it in their hearts. I'll make them new creatures.
I'll create in you a new man created in righteousness and
true holiness. I will make them children that
will not lie. I will make them Israelites indeed
in whom is no guile. Men born of God. I'll put my
spirit in you. I'll write my law in your inward
parts. I'll write it on your hearts. And I will be their God. Well, wasn't he their God before?
Yes, but I didn't know it. I will be their God. I'll come
to them and reveal myself to them as their God, and they shall
be my people. When I write my law on their
hearts, when I give them life and faith, I will cause them
to lift their hearts to heaven and know they're adopted sons
of God, called by grace, saved by grace. And they shall teach
no more, every man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying,
know the Lord. for they shall all know me from
the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the Lord. Now
watch this, for I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember
their sins no more. God's purpose of grace is humbling
because it is an unconditional, immutable, unalterable purpose. What does that mean? That means
that what God purposed and what God promised in covenant mercy
before the world began, God performs in time exactly according to
his purpose and there's nothing you can do to change it. It's
unalterable. It's fixed. We know that all
things work together for good to them that love God, to them
who are the called according to his purpose. Nothing in God's
covenant, nothing in God's purpose, nothing in God's grace, nothing
in God's providence is in any way determined by, dependent
upon, or conditioned upon anything in man. God's love, is unconditional
and immutable. God's election is unconditional
and immutable. God's predestination is unconditional
and immutable. God's gifts and callings of grace
are unconditional and immutable. And they were given to us in
Christ Jesus. Do you remember what the book
says? Before the world began. unconditionally, immutably given
to us. Many years ago, Brother Scott
Richardson and I were preaching together down in Rocky Mount,
Virginia. And he had just been to visit his brother who was
in a nursing home and mine was gone. And Brother Scott was preaching
on when I see the blood, I'll pass over you. He said, thank
God, he didn't say when you see the blood, he said when I see
the blood. He said, he saw the blood long before I saw it. And
he saw the blood when I saw it. And if the day comes when I can't
see it, he still sees it. Nothing's changed. Nothing's
changed. He said, you may come visit me
sometime in a nursing home, sitting in a wheelchair, tied to the
wheelchair, slouched over and drooling over myself, and I won't
know my name or yours, and I can't see the blood! But nothing's
changed, because nothing depends on me. This is God's work. He looked on us in Christ the
Lamb, slain from the foundation of the world and gave us all
the blessings of salvation and grace in him from eternity. The
whole purpose of grace is to exalt the Lord God alone in the
Trinity of his sacred persons. Read again the first chapter
of the book of Ephesians and hear how the apostle states it.
He describes God's purpose, the purpose of God the Father. And
he describes God's purchase, the purchase of God the Son.
And he describes God's performance, the performance of God the Holy
Ghost in the new birth. And this is what he says. The
Father's purpose is to the praise of the glory of his grace. The
Son's purchase is that we should be to the praise of his glory. And the Spirit's performance
is to the praise of his glory. In the purpose of grace, the
loftiness of man is bowed down, the haughtiness of man is made
low, and the Lord alone is exalted. Second, the revelation of grace
in the gospel is designed to strip man of pride and self-righteousness
and exalt the Lord God alone. Chemists have a test. called
the litmus test, by which they test water for acids and alkalines. If you put the litmus paper in
water and it turns red, then there's acid in the water. Here's a litmus test by which
you can test every religion, every church, every preacher,
every doctrine you hear, every one of them. If it makes your
face glow red with pride and makes you feel good about yourself,
it is not of God. It is not of God. The gospel
of the grace of God abases the flesh and glorifies God. The gospel of God's grace, you
see, always addresses men and women as sinners. The gospel of God's grace always
addresses you as sinners. Grace is never given to good
men. Mercy is never promised to righteous
people. Christ came not to call the righteous,
but sinners to repentance. Thomas Wilcox was exactly correct
when he said, Christ came to save everybody except the self-righteous. Christ came to save everybody
except the self-righteous. Find me a sinner. Find me a sinner. Oh, I've been looking for sinners.
I'm still looking for. Find me a sinner anywhere in
the world. I'm talking about a man or woman
who knows there's nothing in him but sin. Find me a sinner anywhere in
the world, and I'll tell him as plainly and boldly and confidently
as possible, God chose you. Christ redeemed you. You've been
born of God's spirit. You're the apple of God's eye.
Christ came to save everybody except the self-righteous. If
you're not a sinner, there's nothing in the gospel for you.
But if you're a sinner, I've got good news for you. Christ
died for sinners. The Lord Jesus saves sinners. Your sinfulness, oh God help
you to hear me now, your sinfulness will never keep you from the
Savior, only your goodness. As long as there's something
in you, you cherish as good. Something in you, you've got
to hang on to. Something in you that qualifies
you before God, you can't have his mercy. Your sinfulness will
never keep you from Christ. Only your goodness will keep
you out of heaven. Only your righteousness will do that. In
Christ, there's pardon for the guilty. There's a robe for the
naked. There's bread for the hungry.
There's water for the thirsty. There's rest for the weary. There's
grace for the needy. There's cleansing for the dirty.
There's help for the fallen. But there's nothing in the gospel,
not one word of good news for the good, the great and the righteous. The gospel is addressed to men
and women who are spiritually dead. Talk about helpless. What could
be more helpless than death? Talk about hopelessness. What
could be more hopeless than death? Talk about corruption. What is
more corrupt than death? What's more obnoxious than death? There's not in this book, There
is not a single complimentary, dignifying, honorable word between
the covers of this book about man. Not one. If you want a picture
of humanity as the Bible describes it, go down here to the cemetery
and dig up a coffin and take your crowbar and pry the lid
open. and stand there and look at that
decaying mass of corruption. That's a picture of fallen man. Until Christ gives you life,
you're dead. Your works are dead, your doctrine's
dead, your religion's dead, whatever faith you think you have is dead.
Another humbling revelation of the gospel Is the fact that the
center's only hope of salvation is in a substitute. Our only hope, our only hope,
our only hope is that God undertake for us our only hope. is in a man who is himself God,
able to do for fallen men what no man can do for himself or
another. And that man is Jesus Christ
the Lord. Jesus Christ the Son of God alone
is our righteousness. His obedience is our obedience.
His faithfulness is our justification. We, Brother Gabe Stoddard made
this tremendous statement down in Arkansas last week. He said,
our faith is not in our faith. Our faith is in the faith of
the Son of God. We trust Him who lived and obeyed
God for us. His death, His suffering, His
justice satisfying sacrifice, that alone is our atonement for
sin. His resurrection, His intercession,
His power, His life, that alone is our life. Our works, good
or bad, have nothing to do with salvation. Salvation is the free,
unconditional gift of God's free grace bestowed upon helpless,
hell-deserving sinners in Jesus Christ alone. Our only acceptance
with God is Christ. The Lord God said concerning
his son twice, this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. The only person in the world
with whom God is well-pleased is the God-man, our mediator. And you and I who trust him,
sinners believing him, are one with him. In him as he's in the
Father. One with him as he is one with
the Father. And the Lord God looks on his
son and sees me. and sees me. Do you understand
that? Do you understand that? God looks
on his son and sees us only in his son and says, this is my
beloved son in whom I am well pleased. How else could God Almighty
look on you in the day of judgment and say to you, come, well done,
thou good and faithful servant. How else could God look on you
and say, come, inherit the kingdom prepared before the foundation
of the world for you. Well done, thou good and faithful servant. The gospel calls on sinners to
look to Christ for everything. Just like the children of Israel
bitten of those fiery serpents in the wilderness were commanded
to look on the brazen serpent. Just look. And it didn't matter
who they were. It didn't matter how near to
death they were. Anybody who looked at that serpent,
they might not see very clearly. All they had to do was look.
Look! Look! And looking on him, live. Our Savior says, look unto me,
all ye ends of the earth, and be ye saved. There's another
humbling revelation of the gospel. Even the will to look to Christ
and be saved by him is determined by God and given by God. Even the will to look, even the
will to trust him, even the will to be saved by him, you won't
do it. You won't do it. If you don't
have anything to cling to except the fact that you've got nothing
to cling to, If you don't have anything to cling to, except
just some, some little something that you just can't let go of.
You won't look to it. You won't look to it. Therefore
it is written in the scripture, blessed is the man whom thou
choosest and causes to approach unto thee. If you come to Christ,
It'll be because God graciously, sweetly forced you to come. He forced you to come. You'll
come because you can't do anything else. You'll trust him because
he has stripped you of every other trust. And until then,
you won't come. You won't trust him. So then,
this is the language of the Bible. This is not the language of the
Baptist church, Catholic church, Mormon church, Buddhist church,
Islamic church, this is the language of the Bible. So then, it is
not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God
that showeth mercy. No sinner will ever come to Christ
of his own imaginary, and I, I say that word imaginary, when
you hear it, I'm writing that in letters as big as this building.
Bold-faced and underlying triple. Imaginary free will. What about
man's free will? That just, that robs me of my
free will. Where on earth did you get that
idea that you had a free will? Where'd you get that notion?
Where'd you get that notion? Well, every man's got a free
will. I'll tell you what. Go out here to, they call them,
the training centers now. Go out here to North Point Training
Center and find the fellow who's locked up in solitary confinement
and ask him if he'd like to step out of there. Well, all you got
to do is decide to and you can go. No, he can't. He's locked up. He doesn't have
the key. He can't get out. His will won't
do anything for him. and your will won't do anything
for you. Your will is as free as your nature, and your nature
is corruption and death and sin. Your nature is incapable of anything
good or righteous before God. Free will. It's called will worship,
as I said before. Oh no, those who come to Christ
gladly acknowledge, all of them do, all of them do, "'Tis not
that I did choose thee. "'For Lord, that could not be. "'This heart would still refuse
thee, "'hadst thou not chosen me.'" Here's the third thing
I want you to see. The experience of grace in salvation
humbles man and exalts the Lord alone. Turn to Romans chapter
7. Repentance is a humbling work. It's a humbling work. David said, when I kept silence,
my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long. For day and night, thy hand was
heavy upon me. My moisture is turned into the
drought of summer. Isaiah describes this as God
shaking terribly the earth. God shaking terribly the earth. When God comes to save, God turns
things upside down and inside out and he shakes your world
apart. He just shakes your world apart. Repentance is a humbling thing
for it brings you to nothing before God so that you confess
your sin to Him. Conversion is a humbling work. Conversion is being compelled by God to bow to Christ the Lord. and lay down your life in his
hands. People say, you know, you make
Jesus your Lord. He's always been your Lord. No,
no, no, no. Conversion, God graciously compels
you to like it. He graciously compels you to
give up your life to the rule of King Jesus who loved you and
gave himself for you. So that you can say, I'm not
my own. I've been bought with a price.
I belong to the king. I'm he is do with me as you will. Conviction. The giving of faith
in Christ. Jesus is a humbling work. It's a humbling work. The Holy
spirit comes to comfort. The very first thing he does
is convince you of sin. What a strange way to comfort.
He convinces you of sin, of sin. And if he convinces you of sin,
he'll convince you of righteousness. Of your sin, because you believe
not on me, the Savior said. Of righteousness fully accomplished,
because I've done what I came here to do. I'm going to the
Father. And a judgment, a judgment over all what consolation. There's
therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. Perhaps more than anything else,
the most humbling experience we have is the fact that the
grace of God doesn't change, alter, or improve our old nature. Grace gives us peace and pardon
and eternal life. Grace gives us hope and joy and
righteousness. Grace gives us a new nature,
a new name, a new hope, a new will, a new record. But grace
does nothing to change our old nature. Look here in Romans 7
verse 14. We know the law is spiritual,
but I'm carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I allow
not. And what I would, that do I not. But what I hate, that I do. If then I do that which I would
not, I consent to the law that is good. Now then it's no more
I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me. For I know that in me,
that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. For to will is
present with me, but how to perform that which is good I find not. Brother Claus Peterson back there.
I reckon you're the oldest man here now, aren't you, Claus? I love it. Thank God for you. I admire it. But the fact is, what you are
right now as an old man is not one bit better than what
you were when you were 17 years old. Not the natural man. Not that
old nature. It doesn't improve. It's just
a massive iniquity. And if you're God, you know that.
See, when Adam sinned in the garden and died spiritually,
God created man body, soul, and spirit. His soul didn't die. His body didn't die. His spirit
died. When Christ comes and makes lost
sinners whole by his grace, he doesn't change the soul. He doesn't
change the body. All he does is makes you again
body, soul, and spirit. He comes and takes up residence
in you, a new man created in righteousness and true holiness. So that all the while we live
in this world, in this body of flesh, We live struggling with
sin, with sin. Oh, the corruption, the corruption,
the corruption of my heart. Oh, the depravity, the depravity,
the depravity of my mind. And every step of the way, along
the way in this pilgrimage, God graciously keeps bringing the
loftiness of man low and exalting his grace. Here
we are, here we are. Still in faith, persevering in
grace because God's kept us in grace. That's all. Here we are
still believing because God keeps us believing. Even times of sweet
communion with the Savior. Read the fifth chapter of the
psalm of Solomon. Why is it we have these blessed
times when, oh, it seems like heaven fills our souls and Christ
comes down and visits us and he speaks to us, lets us speak
to him. It's only because he will not let us leave him. He will not let us shut him out. If he left us alone, we would.
Go away, don't bother me now. And he puts his hand in by the
hole of the door and says, I don't think so. I don't think so. And graciously forces us to run
after him. One last thing. The distinction
of grace in the day of judgment. When the sheep are on his right
hand and the goats on his left. The distinction of grace in that
day will lay all flesh low and exalt the Lord alone. I can't
think of a better way to say what I want to say here than
to remind you of a hymn Judy Estes used to sing for us real
often. When I at the gates of heaven
appear to answer the challenge, what claim hast thou here? What
hast thou offered? Yea, what is thy plea? With blessed
assurance my answer would be, all that I have is Jesus. All that I claim is Jesus. All that I want, all that I need,
all that I plead is Jesus. Of all earthly treasures, nothing
I brought. No deeds of merit have I ever
wrought, though vile and unworthy as mortal can be. I've nothing to offer, but this
is my plea. My sins, there are many. I'm
vile through and through. The blood of my Savior will carry
me through. When Christ Jesus died in my
place, when Christ Jesus in my place died on Calvary's tree,
hallelujah, he opened God's heaven for me. All that I have is Jesus. All that I claim is Jesus. All that I want, all that I need,
all that I plead is Jesus. So I send you home with this
on your heart, I hope. Who maketh thee to differ from
another? And what hast thou that thou
didst not receive? Now if thou didst receive it,
why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it? Amen. As we eat the bread and drink
the wine of the Lord's table, if you're God's, this is for
you. If you know our Savior, this is for you. If not, watch
carefully and ask God to speak to you. Children of God, remember
Him who made the difference for you. Amen.