writing to the church at Rome
when the apostle began his epistle. He made a very solemn statement. He called on God to be his witness, witness to the sincerity with
which he spoke. He said, God is my witness, whom
I serve with my spirit in the gospel. God is my witness. I cannot imagine words more fearful
to speak if they're not spoken in truth. God is my witness. I want you to know the solemnity
with which I come before you as God's ambassador to your souls. And with all the reverence, solemnity,
seriousness I have in my soul, I say to you, God is my whom
I serve with my spirit in the gospel. I have a threefold desire that
dominates my heart, my mind, my time, and my life. A desire that has dominated my
life for 48 years. God is my witness whom I serve
with my spirit in the gospel. Number one, I want to know the gospel. Brother Don, you've been a preacher
for 48 years. I want to know the gospel. Above all things, I don't want
to be deceived by a false gospel. The apostle warns us in 2 Corinthians
11, that Satan raises up preachers and he sends them forth into
the world and they stand in pulpits all over the world every Sunday
who are ministers of righteousness. They teach you how to live good.
They teach you to pay your bills and read your Bible and say your
prayers and go to church. They teach you to tell the truth,
to dress right and act right. They're ministers of righteousness.
righteousness of God, but they teach you to make yourself righteous. They transform themselves into
angels of light and ministers of righteousness, but they preach
another God, another Jesus, another spirit, another gospel by which
multitudes are damned, following them to hell. Oh, what will it
be in the darkness of that pit of damnation for lost church
folks to look at their lost pastor in the eye and curse them forever? I want to know the gospel. Paul
warned the Galatians. Turn there if you will. Galatians
chapter 1. I want you to see it. He wept
for these Galatians. He had preached the gospel to
them. They were established as a gospel
church under his ministry. But the Galatians had been bewitched. Someone had come in the name
of Jesus. Someone had come with a Bible
in their hand. Someone had come among them preaching
what they called the gospel and had bewitched them, cast a spell
on them, bewitched them by will worship. righteousness, legality. Satan's messengers had come preaching
another gospel. I don't know of a greater curse
in all the world that come upon any preacher or any congregation
than the delusion of another gospel. Galatians 1 verse 6,
I marvel, I marvel, I'm shocked. I'm shocked. That you should
so soon be removed from him that called you into the grace of
Christ unto another gospel. So soon be removed from Christ
himself whom you profess to believe. Or so soon removed from that
man who came to you preaching the gospel of Christ for whom
you would have plucked out your very eyes and have given them
to me. And be turned to another gospel, which is not another,
not even similar. There's no compatibility. There's
nothing about it that's alike, not even similar. But there be
some that trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ.
They use the words, but they gut the words of the meaning
and make them mean what they want to. But though we are an
angel from heaven, Preach any other gospel unto you than that
which we have preached unto you. You pray for him and ask the
Lord's blessings on him. We have to go our separate ways
now. We can't join together in the same denomination, the same
association, but we'll pray for each other. That's not what he
said, is it? Let him be cursed. Let him be
cursed. Let him be cursed. As we said
before, so say I now again. If any man, that includes me,
preach any other gospel unto you than that you have received,
let him be forever damned. Let him be accursed. Lindsay,
that's just about as strong a language as you can use with reference
to another human being. The most dangerous thing in this
world, the most damning thing in this world is the delusion
of another gospel. I hope you see the solemnity
of this, the fearfulness of it. I want, above all things, to
know the Gospel. And I'm here to tell you one
more time, there is but one Gospel. There are many false Gospels,
many false Gospels that go by the name of Papists, and Baptists,
and Methodists, and Mormon, and Campbellite, and Episcopalian,
and Presbyterian, and Pentecostal, and Universalist. They go by
lots of names. They go by lots of names, but
there is only one gospel. And that's the power of God under
salvation to everyone that believe it. The gospel is the gospel
of God. It is of God. It comes from God. It's all about God. It gives
all praise to God. The gospel is the gospel of Christ. It is the gospel concerning God's
Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, His person, God in human flesh, His
accomplishments, not His efforts, His accomplishments. Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, took on Himself our nature. He came into this
world in union with our nature and as a man fulfilled all righteousness
by his obedience under God and then took our sin upon himself
was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him and when he was made sin for us he suffered all the
fury of God's holy just wrath in his body on the tree until
justice was satisfied and sin was put away. The gospel is concerning
God's Son, Jesus Christ. who ascended up on high after
he was raised from the dead and sat down on the throne of universal
monarchy having power over all flesh to rule everything and
everybody exactly as he will to give eternal life to as many
as he had redeemed by his precious blood. The gospel is the gospel
of the grace of God. It's a gospel all together of
grace. amazing grace, wondrous grace,
wonderful grace of Jesus. Free, sovereign, unconditional,
irresistible, effectual, saving grace. The gospel is not good
advice to tell you what you ought to do. The gospel is not good
counsel to teach you how to live. The gospel is good news. The gospel is good news. It is the declaration of the
accomplishment of repentance and forgiveness of sins by the
sacrifice of Jesus Christ, God's darling son. The gospel is the
gospel of God's glory, the glory of the triune God. That is to
say, the gospel reveals God's glory, declares God's glory,
and gives God glory. When you hear something about
religion, when you hear a preacher preach, when you hear a teacher
teach, when you hear a mama talk, a daddy talk, or you hear somebody
else discussing religion, and they cause you to feel good about yourself. It rubs your
feathers just the right way. Oh, that's so good. I like that. You can mark it down. You've
heard of false prophets. The gospel is not designed to
make you feel comfortable with who you are and what you do. The gospel is designed to make
you know the corruption, the depravity, the evil of your heart,
and make you uncomfortable in your conscience before God Almighty. Now, the gospel gives glory to
God. sinners knowing their corruption
and depravity to look out of themselves for help and grace. To God alone who is gracious
and saves sinners. I want to know the Gospel. I
desperately want to know the Gospel. I've got to know the
Gospel. Second, I want to be saved by the Gospel. We read just a little bit ago
in Romans chapter 10, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the
word of God. The only way anybody has ever
been saved and the only way anyone will be saved today and the only
way anyone ever will be saved is by the hearing of the gospel. A person who does not know the
gospel is not saved. I wish you would write that down,
underscore it, put quotation marks around it, and say, Don
Fortner told me this. A person who does not know the
gospel is not saved. And that doesn't matter whether
that's you or me, your mother, your daddy, your brother, your
sister, your neighbor, or mine. A person who does not know the
gospel is not saved. I don't care what church he's
in, what his religious activity is, what he's engaged in, what
he's done. I don't care what he knows or
what he does. I care not how moral he is or
how religious he is or how zealous he is. A person who doesn't know
the gospel of God, the gospel of God's grace, God's glory,
God's does not know God. We are saved by believing the
gospel. He that believeth on the Son
of God hath life. And he that believeth not the
Son of God hath not life. You can't believe the gospel
unless you know the gospel. And you can't know the gospel
unless God reveals the gospel. And God only reveals the gospel
by preaching. Not just preaching, but the preaching
of the gospel. Saul of Tarsus was just about
as religious as anybody you know. He was a moral man. He was a
moral man. He didn't even cheat on his taxes.
He was a good man in the eyes of men. He kept Sabbath days
and holy days and religious feasts. He didn't miss one. He wouldn't
think about going fishing on Sabbath day. He wouldn't think
about doing something other than going to the house of God on
Sabbath day. It would never cross his mind. He read his Bible. He prayed. He fasted. He gave
tithe of everything he had. He was a good, religious, zealous
man. But he didn't know God from a
billy goat. until God stopped him on the
Damascus road and revealed himself to him. Well, how did he hear
the gospel? There was a man by the name of
Stephen. And this young man named Saul
was standing and clapping his hands while folks stoned that
man to death after he told them all the wondrous works of God. and he was holding their clothes
while they stoned him. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing
by the Word of God. And at the appointed time of
mercy, in the very next chapter, in Acts chapter 9, we read of
that young man struck down by the hand of God, and he cries,
Lord, Lord, what would you have me to do? A man is not saved
by anything but by the grace of God. And that grace comes
to sinners through the preaching of the gospel. Now, I repeat,
there's only one. Turn over to 1 Corinthians 15
again. 1 Corinthians chapter 15. Let's look at some Scripture. Paul writes to these Corinthians,
and he says, Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel,
the gospel. Don't miss the definite article.
That means this is the only one there is. Which I preached unto
you, which also you have believed, or received, wherein you stand,
by which also ye are saved, if you keep in memory, that is,
if you hold fast, hold fast, hold fast, don't ever let go,
if you keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless you have believed
in vain. If you let it go, you never believed.
If you let it go, you'll profess faith as a delusion. If you walk
away from it, you never had it. For I delivered unto you first
of all, this is the first thing I preached, this is the most
important thing I preached, this is the overwhelming thing I preached,
that which I also received. Now watch this next word, H-O-W. that Christ died for our sins
according to the scriptures. The gospel is not the declaration
of the fact that Christ died. You can get that from any history
book. Everybody knows that Christ died. The only folks who deny
that Christ died and rose again are folks who try their best
to pervert history and shove it out of their own minds. You
can read those things in history books. That's not the gospel.
The gospel is the declaration of how Christ died for our sins
according to the scriptures. And this is how he died. He died
as a substitutionary sacrifice, like that Passover layman we
were talking about earlier this morning. He died in the room instead of
a people chosen of God who are called God's covenant people.
And because he died, those people go out free. He died for our
sins as a substitute, having fully accomplished redemption,
having put away sin, having turned away the wrath of God. I know
we try to justify everything and everybody in the name of
religion. We want to be nice. I've been being told ever since
I was a young fellow and first started preaching, Brother Don,
you need to learn to be more tactful. You can always catch more flies
with honey than you can with vinegar. I ain't trying to catch
flies. My intention is to kill sinners. I'm not trying to win
a popularity contest. I'm here for your soul. Do you
understand that? I'm here for the glory of God.
I'm here to declare to you the truth of God, and nothing else
is of any significance by comparison. We try to justify everything.
We try to justify everybody. Oh, you just can't tell people
they're not saved. I wouldn't tell you you're not saved. wouldn't
think about telling you you're not saved. I don't know who's
saved and who's not, but I know this, if you don't know God you're
not saved. If you don't know the Gospel you're not saved.
If you don't worship Christ you're not saved. I don't care who you
are. I don't care what relationship you have. Our Savior said, Not
everyone saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom
of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is
in heaven. And this is the will of my Father
that sent me, that of every one which seeth the Son and believeth
on him may have everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the
last day. I want to know the gospel, and
I want to be saved by the gospel. Number three, if you could cut
into my heart, if you could pierce my mind,
If you could see in the depths, in the deep recesses of my soul,
you'd find out that I want to preach the gospel. God is my
witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel. Unless
I'm deceived, you'd find this to be the driving ambition, the
driving force, the driving desire, driving determination of my very
soul. Woe is unto me if I preach not
the gospel. What a statement. Woe is unto me if I preach not
the gospel. I told the men back in the office
Tuesday or Sunday one, I was preaching down in Tampa, Florida.
And God gave me some liberty to preach, dealing with the same
subjects I dealt with here last Sunday morning, limited atonement. And I stated it as plainly there
as I stated it to you last Sunday morning. And the preacher who
professed to believe that doctrine said to me after service is over,
he said, he said, if you were preaching at First Baptist Church,
you wouldn't preach that, would you? And he was serious. He was serious. But I said to him, and I expect
he could see the lightning in my eyes, I said, you make the
arrangement and I'll pay the bills. And you come and listen
and see if I don't. Now, woe isn't to me if I preach
not the gospel. Why wouldn't you? Why wouldn't
you? Why wouldn't a man who preaches
preach the gospel? Why? Woe isn't to me if I'm so
weak and spineless that I preach not the gospel because it might
offend you. Woe is unto me if I'm so persuaded by human influence
that I preach not the gospel. Woe is unto me if I'm so affected
by the desire for approval and praise that I preach not the
gospel. Woe is unto me if I so grovel
for acceptance and praise that I preach not the gospel. Woe
is unto me for the fear of man I preach not the gospel. Woe
is unto me if for love of purse, power, or position I preach not
the gospel. I have a resolute determination. My feet are planted in concrete
and nothing's going to change, God helping me. I'm determined
to preach the gospel of God's free grace. Everywhere I go,
every time I'm preached, to everybody who will listen. I'm talking
about ruin by the fall, redemption by the blood, and regeneration
by the Holy Ghost. The Gospel. I'm determined not
to know anything among you save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This pulpit and this congregation
stand for, contend for, and declare the Gospel. If people want to
come here and hear the Gospel, without the entertainment. There's
not going to be any. There's not going to be any.
If they want to come here and worship God in spirit and in
truth by the hearing of the gospel, they're welcome and wanted. But
this isn't a debating society, and the gospel of God is not
up for debate. In this place, for as long as I have breath,
for as long as I have breath, as God gives me the ability This
will be the message. And this will be the determining
factor of every relationship this preacher has as a preacher. And every relationship this congregation
has as a congregation of believers. You can write this down. You
can write it down now. It's real simple. Tulip or terminate. It's just that simple. It's just
that simple. We will not support We will not
have any association with, there will not be, not by me knowing
it, any man standing in this pulpit to pray, read scripture,
or lead singing. There will not be one standing
in this pulpit to do anything. Not a preacher, not a missionary.
We won't support them. We won't recommend them. We won't
have anything to do with them. Who doesn't believe and preach
total depravity, unconditional election, limited atonement,
irresistible grace, and perseverance of the saints. Tulip or terminate. There's no in-between grant.
There's no in-between grant. You mean your missionaries believe
these things? If they didn't, I would pay them
money to come home. But I wouldn't buy my dime on
the field. That's just fact. That's just fact. Every one of
them do. Folks who don't like it can go play church somewhere
else. Nothing's changing here. Not changing here. This is the business we're about. I've had, in the last few weeks,
a couple of fellows ask me about books and things. I tell them
I write what I write. I preach what I preach. to you
for this congregation. Brother Larry Chris asked me
about this the last time he was at the house and I said to him,
he said, why don't you take royalties for your books? I said, I don't
want anybody to have the idea that I do anything for gain.
That's why I don't take any royalties. Don't take them at all. Just
don't take them. That's not my business. What I preach, I preach
for Denise and Don Lundary and Larry and Carol Brown. What I
write, I write for you. I write for you, not for preachers,
not for theologians. They've got lots of stuff. I
do it for your sake. Anybody else who benefits by
it, I'm delighted. But this is the business. It's not the business
of gaining popularity or enriching ourselves. It's the business
of glorifying God, seeking the souls of men. Now, let me go
back to our text tonight, or this morning, to Romans chapter
5. Romans chapter 5. I'll be very, very brief. I'll
be done here in just a minute. I've taken a long time getting
to my text on purpose, but I'll be very brief in preaching. Let's
begin reading Romans chapter 5 and verse 12. Here's my subject. Three things most religious people
don't know. Three things most religious people
don't know. Three big, big, big questions
that go right to the heart of everything in this book. Now,
I attended two of the nation's most well-respected religious
Bible colleges when I was just a young man. After I got out
of school, I started pastoring. I did some graduate work with
some seminaries that are just very well-known, very highly
regarded, highly respected seminaries. And these three questions, were
rarely even addressed and never once addressed properly. Not
once. Not once. Not one time. Not by
one professor. If you should go around this
town and ask folks today, you'll be sitting down at lunch and
you'll surely hear folks sitting in the restaurant beside you
talking about religion. Ask them these three questions. Ask them
these three questions. I'll guarantee you they won't
know the answers. They won't know the answers. The religious
world does not know these three things, and yet these three things
are what this book is all about. These three things are what this
book's all about. All right, let's look at it.
Romans chapter 5, verse 12. Wherefore, as by one man sin
entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon
all men, for that all have sinned. For until the law, sin was in
the world. But sin is not imputed where
there is no law. Nevertheless, death reigned from
Adam unto Moses, even over them that hadn't sinned the same way
Adam did, hadn't sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression,
who was a figure of him that was to come, who was a picture,
a type of Christ. But not as the offense, so also
is the free gift. For if through the offense of
one many be dead, Much more the grace of God and the gift by
grace, which is by one man Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. And not as it was by one that
sinned, so is the gift. For the judgment was by one to
condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses under justification. For if by one man's offense death
reigned by one, Much more, they which receive the abundance of
grace and the gift of righteousness shall reign in life by one, Jesus
Christ. Now you'll notice the parenthetical
mark is at the beginning of verse 13, at the end of verse 17. All
that we read in verses 13 through 17 are explanatory, giving an
explanation of this whole statement. The statement picks up in verse
18. Therefore, therefore, since this is how we got in the mess
we're in, Since by one man's offense, many were made sinners,
therefore, as by the offense of one, judgment came upon all
men. Let me tell you exactly what
that says. Judgment came upon all men represented
by that one man, Adam, the whole human race. Even so, by the righteousness
of one, the free gift came upon all men. Now, one of two choices,
one of two choices. Either that means the free gift
of justification in life comes upon all men and everybody's
saved and nobody's going to hell. Take that if you want to. That's
not what the book says. That's not what the book teaches.
But these are the only two choices you got. Either everybody is
saved by what Christ did or all men who were represented by this
second man This last man, this second covenant head, Jesus Christ,
all God's elect, received this free gift of justification of
life. Verse 19, for as by one man's
disobedience many, quite literally, thee many, were made sinners,
the many represented by him. So by the obedience of one shall
many, thee many, the many represented by that one man, Christ Jesus,
be made righteous. Moreover, the law entered that
the offense might abound. But where sin abounded, grace
did much more abound. That as sin hath reigned unto
death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal
life by Jesus Christ our Lord. Now, if you're not in too big
a hurry to go to hell, if you have any concern for your soul,
if you're interested in the glory of God and the truth of God,
I urge you to hear the answer to these three questions. Number
one, what happened in the Garden? What happened in the Garden?
I mean really. When Adam sinned against God,
Adam sinned against God as the representative of the whole human
race. You say, I don't like that. Take
it up with God, that's the way it is. God made Adam your covenant
head. wasn't a choice you made, it
was a choice God made. God made Adam the representative
of the whole human race. And we put Adam in the garden.
He said to Adam, he said, you see all this? You see all this
world I've made? Even the angels of heaven are
made to be servants to you. I made it all for the enjoyment
of man, for the benefit of man. You can do with it whatever you
want to. whatever you want to. Isn't that amazing? You can do
with it whatever you want to. It's yours. If you want to eat
rabbits, that's fine. If you want to make pets out
of them, that's fine. Whatever you want to do with
it, it's all yours. It's all yours. Just one thing, just one thing. You see that tree right there?
You see that tree right there? That one tree represents my authority
as God. In the day you eat of the fruit
of that tree, you die. And Eve, being deceived by the
serpent, took the fruit of the tree, and she gave it to Adam. And Adam said, God, get out of
the way. God, get out of my way! I'll do what I want to! You've
got no right to be God! And he took the fruit of the
tree, and when he did, He plunged himself and you and me and the
whole human race into spiritual death. Death. Not physical death,
that's coming, but spiritual death. So that the natural man,
the man lost and ruined, the man without God, without life,
without faith in Christ, has absolutely no spiritual life. He's dead. Dead. Dead in trespasses and in sins.
Adam didn't just dump his toe. Adam died. And we died in our
father Adam. And every child of Adam, every
son and daughter of Adam comes out of his mother's womb speaking
lies. So that deceit and sin and corruption
and death, you don't have to learn that. You don't have to
learn that. We had the idea. Y'all remember
back years ago, they had a commercial on TV that we used to leave our
keys in our cars. Most of you are old enough to
remember that. Never thought about taking keys out of the
car. Mine got stolen when I couldn't let the keys in. I was 16 years
old, 17 years old, and had a Plymouth Barracuda and got a call from
the law. I mean, 10 minutes after I went to bed, someone stole
my car. And I started taking the keys out most of the time.
But folks had commercial on TV, said somebody saw the keys in
the car and a boy walking by and he stopped. Said, don't let
the good boy go bad, take the keys out of your car. The problem
is he wasn't a good boy to start with or he wouldn't have the
keys and he wouldn't have taken the car. No, no, you don't become
bad, you're born that way. You don't learn bad, you're born
that way. It's not your mama's fault, or your daddy's fault,
or your neighbor's fault, not the environment around you, not
because you don't have enough money, don't have enough education,
or folks haven't been good to you. It's because you're evil
at heart. You're evil at heart. That's the nature of man. So
evil, so vile, that there's no inclination in any human being
to return to God. Now everybody wants to be religious.
Everybody wants to be sure they go to heaven instead of hell
when they die, just in case there's either. But nobody wants God.
Our Savior said, no man can come to me. That's you. That's you. And you will not come to me. There's not even a possibility.
It's not going to happen unless God does for you what you cannot
and will not do for yourself and causes you to come to His
Son. Brother Don, you mean, you preach
that God saves people against their will? Of course he does.
Of course he does. If he didn't interfere with your
will, you'd go to hell. If he didn't stop you, you'd go to
hell. God stops sinners in their mad rush to hell and says, hitherto
shalt thou go and no further. Oh, I pray God will step into
your life and stop you from going to hell. I pray he will. Oh,
God give you life and faith in his son. Thy people shall be
willing in the day of thy power. What happened in the garden?
Man died. Second question, what happened
at the cross? What happened at Calvary? What
really happened? You go to churches and they want
to talk about church doctrine, millennial doctrine, law doctrine. They have seminars for everything
under the sun. Seminars for everything under
the sun. The issue is what happened at the cross. What happened?
Did the Son of God actually accomplish anything? Did he actually accomplish
anything? Well, he made it possible for
sinners to be saved. You show me that in the book,
will you? Here. Take a copy and show me. Show
me. Show me. Well, he made it possible
for us to be justified. Show me. Show me. Jesus wanted
to show God's love to everybody so he died. Show me. Show me. Jesus died to make it possible
for sinners to be righteous. Show me. Jesus died to give us
a good example to live by. Show me. Show me. What does the
book say? He shall save his people from
their sins. Now either he did or he's a fake.
There's no in-between ground. He shall bring in everlasting
righteousness. Either he did or he's a phony.
There's no in-between ground. He shall put or make an end of
sin. Make an end of sin. Either He
did, or you're in delusion. One of the two. He, the Lord
Jesus Christ, when He had by Himself, without any assistance
from anybody, purged our sin, He sat down on the right hand
of the Majesty of the High. That's what He did. He hath perfected
forever them that are sanctified. Jesus Christ, by His blood, redeemed
us, justified us, sanctified us, made us righteous before
God. He did it! Before ever we drew
our first infant breath. When He said it's finished, it
was finished and done. He did it. He did it. As in Adam, we died. In Christ, we're made alive.
As in Adam, we became sinners. In Christ, we're made righteous.
In Adam, we're brought into darkness. In Christ, we're brought into
light. In Adam, we're damned. In Christ, we're saved. All right,
here's the third question. How does God save sinners? How is salvation accomplished?
Here is man, dead, dead. Doesn't matter whether he's born
in Danville, Kentucky, and his daddy's a preacher, and his mama's
a Sunday school teacher, and he's got five generations of
Baptist preachers behind him. That doesn't matter. Or if he's
born in a jungle in Africa, And his dad is a witch doctor and
got bones in his nose and mouth and ears. Kind of like folks
downtown do. Got all kinds of nonsense going on. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter. It doesn't matter
whether he's born to folks in a brothel or in a drug house. Doesn't matter. Doesn't matter.
He's born dead and born a sinner. Well, how on this earth does
God save that sinner? He's dead. He's not going to
seek God. If God leads him to himself,
he's just going to drink iniquity like water. That's the way man
is. He's going to invent devices of ungodliness. That's the way
man is. That's the way man is. We shouldn't be terribly surprised
to read the newspapers. You know, you see that, I'm sure
all of you have seen this week that clip, that video, that baby
murdering woman. I meant to use the words exactly
as I did. Report me to somebody will you that baby murdering
woman sitting there feeding her face while she's talking about
Killing babies to get the body parts. Oh That's shocking Shouldn't
be to acknowledge who you are She just invented that I same
heart you've got same one I've got Our indignation is only our pretense
at being better. I don't mean that we shouldn't
be, as a society, indignant at such things. We should be. And
Allen Kibbe, you and Don Fortner ought to be indignant at ourselves. God make us so. God make us so. God make us so. Well, how can
sinners like us be saved? God has to do it. God has to
do it. He comes to dead sinners and
gives them life. Resurrects them from the dead.
Raises them up from the grave. Gives them life, just like those
dry bones in Ezekiel 37. Preach to them, preacher! Okay, you said so. Preach to
them! Call on the Spirit of God, oh
God! Breathe on these slaves and watch
God work. And they stand up a living army. How can that be? Well, they made
their decision for Jesus. They came down the aisle. They
knelt at an altar. They mourned at the mourner's
bench. They said the sinner's prayer. That's worse than a whole yard
full of horse manure. That's blasphemy. That's blasphemy. It's deadening to me. How on
earth can a dead sinner live? Dragging him down the aisle of
a church ain't gonna help him. Getting him to make a statement's not
gonna help him. Baptizing him, not gonna help
him. How can a dead sinner live? God steps into his soul. Christ comes in by omnipotent
power. And when he comes in, he brings
his welcome with him. You have certain friends, don't
you, who, man, when you see them drive up and drive away, you're
anxious for them to come in. You hope they're not just passing
by. When they come in, they bring their welcome with them, whether
you were expecting them or not. Oh, I'm so glad to see you. Doug
came in and grabbed my shoulder this morning. Oh, my soul. Were
you prepared for them? The last thing I thought about
someone that might show up today, I hadn't even given it a thought.
Lots of Sundays I did, but I didn't today. Hadn't even showed up.
But I turned around and looked at his smiling face. Oh, my soul.
My family's here. Welcome. Welcome. Prepared for
them? Always prepared for them. They
bring their welcome with them. Hear me. Oh, hear me. I pray the Lord Jesus will knock
at your heart's door right now. And I'm not going to ask you
to open the door for him, because you won't. But if he knocks at your heart's
door, he'll knock it down. And he'll come in. And he'll
set himself on the throne in your heart. And the first time
you know he's around, he will already be sitting on the throne.
And he brings his welcome with him. Oh, thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord, for invading
my life coming into my soul and taking up residence in me permanently
by omnipotent grace. On to Grace and Eloise. We're
going back to school in the fall. And you all going to have Bible
classes, won't you? You still have Bible classes?
Have Bible classes? I recommend that the first Bible
class, the first time you have a question come up, ask the professor,
the teacher, what happened in the garden. What happened at
the cross? How did God save sinners? Nothing else really matters except
that God saved you. I highly recommend that you give
no rest to your soul until you find rest in our Savior. Amen.