I have a message from God for
you tonight. Isaiah chapter 3. Isaiah chapter
3. The Lord God here specifically
commands me as his messenger to give you this message. It
shall be well with the righteous. That's my message. It shall be
well with the righteous. What a word from God for his
people. It shall be well with the righteous. Actually, I have a word for every
person here from God, for all who hear my voice. I come with
a message of comfort and a word of warning. Isaiah chapter 3
verse 10. Here's a message of comfort A
word from God to all his people. Say ye to the righteous that
it shall be well with him, for they shall eat of the fruit of
their doings. And here is a word of warning,
a word from God to every wicked rebel, to every unbeliever, woe
unto the wicked. It shall be ill with him for
the reward of his hands shall be given him. Are you righteous? Then it shall be well with you.
You shall eat the fruit of your doings. It shall be well with you. You
shall eat the fruit of your doings. Are you wicked? Then I cry with
Isaiah, woe unto you, woe unto your soul, because you shall
receive your just reward and you shall surely die. It shall
be ill with you. The fact is there are but two
classes of people mentioned in our text because there are only
two classes of people here tonight. There are only two classes of
people in all the world, the righteous and the wicked. All
of us fit into one or the other category. There is no middle
ground before God, no middle class before God. You're either
righteous or you're wicked. It has been that way since the
beginning of time and shall be that way until time shall be
no more. Some are of the seed of the woman
and they're righteous. Others of the seed of the serpent
and they're wicked. It's illustrated for us throughout
this book. You've been reading the book
of Genesis. In the first family, there was a righteous man named
Abel and a wicked man named Cain. In the days of the flood, God
destroyed the wicked in his wrath, but Noah, the representative
of the righteous, was preserved by his grace in the ark. Abraham
had two sons, the child of the flesh, wicked Ishmael, and the
child of promise, whom the Lord God made righteous, Isaac. Isaac
had two sons, wicked Esau, whom the Lord hated. and Jacob, the
righteous one whom the Lord loved because he was made righteous
in God's sight. Throughout the ages of history,
God has separated the precious from the vile, the righteous
from the wicked. It is not God's intention that
the two should ever be mixed, and they will not. The flood
came in the days of Noah, because the sons of God married the daughters
of men. That is to say, there was an
unholy alliance made between the church, the professed children
of God, and the world. And that alliance so provoked
God to anger that it destroyed the world in his wrath. The Lord
says to his people over and over and over again, come out from
among them and be you separate. Be not conformed to this world. And particularly, distinctly,
that word of separation, that call to separation, that command
to separation is a separation from the religious world, the
world of idolatry, the ungodly world of religion without Christ. Children of God, we must not,
we dare not form alliances with men and women who hate our God. We must not choose for our companions
those who are the enemies of Christ, his gospel, and his church. God would have us to maintain
a clear distinction between the righteous and the wicked, the
precious and the vile. In the beginning, God divided
the light from the darkness. The light he called day, the
darkness he called night. And he would never have us to
call light darkness or darkness light. The Jews of old were forbidden
by God's law to sow corn and beans together. They weren't
allowed to plant the two together. They were not allowed to plow
with an ox and an ass in the same yoke. They were not allowed
to wear garments that were made of a mixture of linen and wool
together. Why? Do you suppose God's concerned
for corn, oxen, or asses? That God's concerned about the
mixing of cloth? Of course not. Of course not.
Those things were forbidden in God's law because God typically
forbade any unhallowed mixture of righteousness and wickedness,
truth and error, light and darkness. Throughout the law, the distinction
was maintained. God will have a seed to serve
him and fear him. They shall come without the camp,
bearing the reproach of his son, and they shall be a distinct
people from the seed of the serpent. What is it that separates the
righteous from the wicked? The crimson line of separation
that runs between the righteous and the wicked is the precious
blood of Jesus Christ. It's the blood of Christ that
distinguishes one from the other. As the blood of Christ marked
the house where Rahab and her family were hidden, so the blood
of Christ, the blood of the Lamb slain from the foundation of
the world, marks God's elect. Faith in Christ is the great
mark of distinction. As faith grows, the distinction
becomes more and more apparent and more and more necessary for
both the righteous and the wicked. Which are you? Which am I? Are you righteous among those
who believe on Christ, washed in the blood of Christ, robed
in his righteousness, born of God, believing on his son? Or are you among the wicked? those who believe not, those
who look upon the blood and righteousness of Christ as useless things. That's what unbelief is. It is
trampling underfoot the blood of the Son of God. It is counting
the blood and righteousness of Jesus Christ to be useless, meaningless,
unfit for consideration, let alone trust. May God make you
to know your condition before him. If you're among the righteous,
this is a message of comfort for you. If you're among the
wicked, it's a message of warning. May God make you to hear and
know what message is for you. First, here's a message of comfort
for the righteous. I have this word from God. He
commands me to deliver it. Are you looking at it? Isaiah
3 verse 10, say ye to the righteous that it shall be well with him
for they shall eat of the fruit of their doings. Now, this word
of comfort comes right smack dab in the middle of a word of
doom. God carefully words here a message
of mercy. in the midst of a word of curse. God's about to bring great calamities
upon the nation. He's about to bring upon the
nation of those people who professed to be his famine, war, and pestilence. But he says to the righteous
among those who would soon face judgment. Those who would soon
endure famine and pestilence and war, even the righteous among
them will suffer those things as do the wicked. But he says
to the righteous, there shall be no there shall no evil happen
to the just. It shall be well with the righteous. Let's look at the context here
in this third chapter for just a minute. Here in the midst of
horrible ungodliness, in the midst of great evil and divine
judgment upon the nation of Israel. Those who were called the people
of God when the whole nation was given over to idolatry and
immorality, moral perversity and ungodliness. The Lord God
says in the midst of those people are some righteous folks for
whom it shall be well, even when judgment comes upon the nation.
The chapter opens in verse 1 with Isaiah declaring the consequences
of sin upon this nation. For behold, the Lord, the Lord
of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah the
stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread, and the whole
stay of water. The mighty man, the man of war,
the judge, the prophet, the prudent man, and the ancient, the wise
one. He said, I'm gonna take them
all away. I want to take them all away. There'll be none upon
whom you can lean. There'll be none you can trust.
There won't be a man among you, not in the state house or in
the church house. There won't be a man left standing
you can lean upon and trust in. In verses two through seven,
God declared that he would make children rulers of the nation.
And when he says that, he's not just talking about silly children. He's talking about petty, peevish,
self-willed, childish adults, children, wicked children. Have we not witnessed the reality
of that judgment in our day? In the prophets of our land,
in the president, in the congressmen, and the senators, God Almighty
has brought to pass the judgment he recorded. And it's God's doing,
and it's right. It's God's doing, and it's right. Morally perverse rulers in the
church house and in the state house are always tokens of divine
judgment upon any society. Read the Word of God and you
cannot mistake that fact. Morally perverse rulers in the
church house and the state house are tokens of divine judgment
upon a people. When sin, like a disease, runs
through all the nation and through the professed Church of God,
two things are always prominent, idolatry and immorality. The two things always go hand
in hand, idolatry and immorality. Man is worshiped as though he
were God. Man is treated as though he were
God. Man is given attributes that
must be ascribed only to God. And when man is thus elevated,
nothing but moral decadence follows. It has been that way throughout
history. It is that way now. Look at verse
eight. Jerusalem is ruined. Judah is
fallen because their tongue and their doings are against Jehovah. to provoke the eyes of his glory. The show of their countenance
doth witness against them, and they declare their sin as Sodom. They hide it not. Woe unto their
soul, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves. Not only are men left in such
reprobate state as this, that they become more and more morally
degenerate. But that which once was their
shame now becomes their boast, so that they, like the sodomites
throughout the book of God, are violent in promoting their moral
depravity. You read the word of God. It
shouldn't surprise you to see how things turn out in our own
lifetime in history. Sodomites throughout the scripture
were always the most violent of people, pressing their ungodliness
with violence upon those who oppose their ungodliness. So
it is today. And so it is in our society throughout
the day. We now live in a society where
ungodliness is in your face all the time. and men brag about
it, and men brag about it as though it were righteousness,
and as though somehow you are some kind of a deviant, ungodly
bigoted fellow if you oppose their ungodliness. In every age
in history, in every society, the contempt of God, that is
when those who wear his name in profession, I'll tell you what, now you can
go to Europe and find this. Find it in this country. Find
it in this country. Find me somebody in your neighborhood,
in your family, who doesn't wear God's name. Who doesn't wear God's name.
Everybody says they're Christian. Everybody says they worship God.
Everybody says they're righteous. Everybody around us in this country
wears God's name. There are few exceptions, but
they hold God in contempt. Wearing his name in profession,
they cast away the law of the word of the Lord of hosts and
despise the word of the Holy One of Israel. You'll find that
just one page over. in Isaiah 524, they cast away
the law of the Lord of hosts and despise the word of the Holy
One of Israel. When that's the case, when men
who profess God's name hold God in contempt, casting away His
law, despising His word, idolatry, immorality, adultery, pornography,
fornication, sodomy, and all such moral deviation will follow
and will be promoted with the very violence of Sodom. Woe unto their soul, for they
have rewarded evil unto themselves. And so it is. Having forsaken
the rock of ages, men will take any refuge and worship anything
except God. Forsaking the rock of ages, men
will take any refuge and worship anything except God our Savior. They'll trust the reeds of Egypt,
the myths of Greece, the spirits of Africa, and the mystic gods
of India, rather than worship the God of all grace. Blessed Lord Jesus, ever preserve
us by the grace of your spirit, by your power and your mercy,
and calls us to see in the darkest hours of your just judgment that
you alone are God and you alone are our rock, the rock of our
salvation. But God's declaration of evil
has only scratched the surface of things so far. Read verses
13 through 24. I sat down and read this again
just a few minutes before I came over here. The Lord speaks of
the daughters of Zion and describes them as looking and dressing,
walking and talking like common harlots. These are women who
wear God's name, the daughters of Zion. And you read the things
here and just watch carefully what you're reading. They walk
the streets in the attire of harlots with the giddy, childish,
irresponsible behavior of harlots. The Lord God speaks of the daughters
of Zion in just that way. When fathers and mothers cast
God's word and God's way from them. I'm not waiting to say something
because I don't know what to say. I'm waiting because I want
everybody to hear me. I want every one of you to hear
me. When fathers and mothers cast God's word and God's way
from them, they lead their children to hell. You will abandon God, not only
to your own eternal peril, but to the peril of those you influence
and you're responsible for them. Mark Warner, you're responsible
for that family, responsible for them. And if you lead them
to hell, their soul is your responsibility. I'm responsible for my household.
And if I lead them to hell, that's my responsibility. So you can't
put that on anybody. I wouldn't put it on you. God
did. God did read the word of God. Children of God, take heed
to the glaring testimonials before you of utter ungodliness. Those
are the things that describe the judgment of God upon our
nation and upon the church of this decadent, hedonistic age. Still, right in the midst of
this terrible denunciation of woe, the Lord God says to me,
his servant, say ye to the righteous, In the midst of this reprobate
people, in the midst of this people who have cast off God
and his word, who hold God and his ways in utter contempt, say
ye to the righteous here, it shall be well with him, for they
shall eat the fruit of their doings. Who are these men and
women God calls righteous? Obviously, there are none righteous
by nature. There are none capable of producing
righteousness. Our best works, our noblest righteousness
are filthy rags in God's sight. Read the first chapter of Isaiah
and read how God describes men practicing religion without faith
in Christ. Their prayers, their sacrifices,
their Sabbath days, their new moons, their holy days, their
offerings, their incense, God says, is a stench in my nostrils. God speaks of their sacrifices
and said you just as well sacrifice swine's blood on my altar or
the blood of a man. Your righteous deeds, your best
deeds, my righteous deeds, my best deeds, your most holy thoughts,
leave alone deeds are nothing but filthy rags in God's sight. That man who is righteous in
God's sight is one who has been made righteous by God. The only
righteous people in this world are people who have been made
righteous by the work of God our Savior, whose name is Jehovah
Sidkenu, the Lord our righteousness. We have been made righteous in
the sight of God by the gift and imputation of Christ's righteousness
to us. The Lord Jesus. is made of God
unto us righteousness, and we are made the righteousness of
God in him. What does that mean? The gospel
reveals three distinct acts of imputation. Imputation is an
accounting term. We sinned in our father Adam
and sinning in him. Because we sinned in him, Adam's
sin is imputed to us. It is justly imputed to us because
we actually sinned in Adam. The sins of God's elect were
made Christ and were imputed to him so that when he was made
sin for us, God justly, rightly charged him with sin and punished
him for sin because our sins were made his sins. And thirdly,
the righteousness of Christ is imputed to every believer. righteously,
justly imputed to us. Because in Christ, we obeyed
God's holy law in every detail, and his righteousness is our
righteousness. His obedience is our obedience. Children of God, our righteousness
before God is an unalterable point of law and justice, as
well as grace and mercy. The law of God cannot reverse
itself. The justice of God cannot declare
us guilty. David said, blessed is the man
to whom the Lord will not impute sin. Blessed is the man to whom
the Lord will not impute sin, where sin has been forgiven.
blotted out by the blood of Jesus Christ, God Almighty cannot and
will not ever impute any sin. He will never again lay sin against
Bobbi Estes. Christ put your sin away. But Brother Don, you can't tell
people that. Why not? Would you please tell me why
not? That'll cause folks to want to
live like hell. Most folks want to live like hell anyhow. That'll
cause God's people to want to serve him. I don't know of a
better way to illustrate it. I don't dare speak with arrogance
concerning this matter. I have just one child and I was
to her and am to her a pretty good father. I taught her the
way of God, the way of righteousness, life and salvation in Christ.
I worked in the days when I worked a public job. I often worked
three jobs going to school full time to feed her, take care of
her. No complaint. That's what I wanted
to do. I have deliberately on occasion put myself in a position
where I might well have been in harm's way just to protect
her from the influence of ungodly people. I would give my life for her
in the most painful way imaginable in a heartbeat, and she knows
it. Now, wouldn't that just inspire
her? I mean, it would just make sense
to say, well, she must hate you. That makes good sense, doesn't
it? That makes good sense, doesn't it? Let me tell you something.
The only people in the world who would suggest that the declaration
of free grace, absolute free grace, blessed is the man to
whom the Lord will not impute iniquity. Somebody says, well,
that'll cause man to live like hell. That's because he doesn't
know God. The only people in the world who would imagine such
a thing are people. The only thing that rules them
is the fear and terror of law. The only thing that rules them
and constrains them is the fear and terror of judgment. For God's
people, we have a higher rule, a nobler rule, a greater inspiration. The love of Christ constraineth
us. The love of Christ constraineth
us. Blessed be God, there is more to this business of salvation
and righteousness than legality and points of law. All who are
born of God had been made righteous by God in regeneration as well. Salvation, I repeat to you, is
not a pretend game. God did not pretend to make his
son sin. He made him sin. And God does
not pretend to make his people righteous. He has made us righteous. It is our legal standing. That's
true. Righteousness is imputed to us.
That's true. But there's more to righteousness
than imputation. Righteousness cannot be imputed
except where righteousness is. You understand that? We're made
the righteousness of God in his son. God could not and would
not impute sin to his son and punish his son for sin, except
his son be made sin. And God will not and cannot impute
righteousness to Alan Kidby, except Alan be made righteous.
Made righteous. Really righteous. How is that? How is that? In regeneration,
God, the Holy Spirit, makes us partakers of the divine nature. He puts in us, imparts to us
the righteousness of Christ, Christ in you, the hope of glory. The old man, as I stated this
morning, is not eradicated. He's not even improved, not even
improved. Who here would discount that? Who here would deny that?
The old man, my soul, the old man, Don Fortner is what Don
Fortner has always been. But not Christ in me. Not that
which is born of God. That which is born of God is
holy and righteous and cannot sin. Read 1 John 3. Our standing before God is not
improved. Not when we're regenerated. But
a new nature is born within us. We're made new creatures in Christ. A new man created in us in righteousness
and in true holiness. Now here's God's promise to the
righteous ones. It shall be well with him. Child of God, listen now. Read that statement. Isaiah 3
verse 10, say ye to the righteous, it shall be well with him. Read
that statement as broadly as your heart's imagination can
read it. There are no limitations to the
promise, no conditions to the promise. No qualifications in
the promise. To the righteous, God simply
says, it shall be well with him. God, who cannot lie, made the
promise. And believing hearts respond
this way. Well, if God be for us, who can
be against us? It shall be well with the righteous. no matter how things appear.
It shall be well with the righteous, no matter how things feel. It
shall be well with the righteous, no matter what comes to pass.
Always and at all times and in all circumstances, it shall be
well with the righteous. In everything, give thanks then,
children of God, For this is the will of God in Christ Jesus
concerning you. It shall be well with the righteous
when all things seem to be ill. Brother Mark could not have chosen
a more appropriate passage to read tonight to prepare for this
message than the passages he read in Genesis 37 through 45.
Joseph, that man whom God put his hand on. That
man God made ultimately to be ruler of Egypt and ruler of the
world in that domain, that man Joseph. His brothers hated him. You know why they hated him?
Because his daddy loved him. That was all. But they hated
him. They hated him. His brothers
plotted to murder him. One brother, feeling guilty,
said, no, let's do him a favor and set him as a slave. And he's
sold as a slave and he goes down to Egypt and he still finds favor
with God. And God promotes him before men.
And Potiphar's wife lies against him. Why? Because he wouldn't
steal his master's wife. And he's thrown in prison and
he's forgotten in prison. But God raises him up. And all
these things happen to him. All these things happen to him.
because God is moving Joseph up to the throne of Egypt. And
Joseph understood and he said to his brethren, I am in the
place of God. And you didn't put me here, God
did. You didn't put me here, God did.
Oh, but they sold him into slavery, yeah. They hated him, yeah. Thank
God! God put me here to preserve you,
a posterity, to preserve much people alive. It shall be well
with righteous, when with everyone else it's ill. Judgment comes upon this nation.
Horrible evil, horrible evil. You and I live in a morally degenerate,
perverse, ungodly society. I don't know how properly to
express what I want to hear. I'm as aggravated with it as
you are. I'm disgusted with it like you are. I vex my soul with
it like you do. But don't let it overmuch trouble
you. It shall be well with the righteous.
God has put you and me here in this place, in this time, in
these circumstances to serve him and worship him. It should
be well with the righteous when temptation comes. God will make
a way of escape that you may be both barren. It'll be well
with the righteous when trials come. And so the Lord says, can
it all joy when you fall into divers temptations. When Satan
befits, it should be well with the righteous. It'll cause you
to cry to God for mercy as he did Paul. And when you're weak,
it should be well with the righteous for his strength is made perfect
in weakness. And even when we sin, we tend to look on that, and
use those terms in a way so as to almost say, well, I'm not
likely to do that, but just in case I should sin. Rex Bartley,
right now, you and I are full of sin actively right now. And when we sin, it should be
well with the righteous. For if any man sin, we have an
advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he's
the propitiation for our sins. When we fall, and fall we do,
sometimes publicly, openly, like David or Peter, fall we do, God's
people do, God's people do. I've had occasion just recently
to have some conversation with a dear friend of mine who's brought
horrible evil upon himself and his family. And he expected to
be ostracized and cast aside. And I've tried to minister to
him. But when God's people fall, it should be well with the righteous.
Be sure you tell Peter everything's all right. Before the cock crows
tonight for the second time, you will deny after the cock
crowed twice, you're going to deny me three times, Peter. Let
not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also
in me. Rejoice not against me, Micah said. Oh, my enemy, when
I fall, I shall arise. When I sit in darkness, the Lord
shall be a light unto me. So long as we live on this earth,
it should be well with the righteous. And when we come to die, it should
be well with the righteous. and it shall be well with the
righteous in judgment. When the Savior says, come, you
blessed in my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you
from the foundation of the world, and it shall be well with the
righteous forever. For then we shall see him face
to face, who loved us and gave himself for us. And there'll
be no sorrow, no weeping, nor sickness, nor death, because
there shall be no more sin. and the former things are passed
away. What's the basis of this promise?
How can I really be sure this is so? Well, it should be enough,
Lindsay, that God said it. But we are such frail, fickle
things, we need some buttressing, don't we? We need some pillars
to support things. Let me give you seven solid pillars
supporting the promise. I say to you, God's people, it
shall be well with you because your greatest trouble is past. Your sin and guilt has been removed. It shall be well with you. Your
greatest enemy is defeated. Now is the prince of this world
cast out and we are made more than conquerors through him that
loved us. I refer again to my friend, Brother
Harry Graham. He knows it better now than ever
knew it then. When I was just a young man sitting on his hearth
one night, read that statement in Romans 8, more than conquerors
through him that loved us. Harry said, what do you reckon
that means? I said, I don't know, but I think you're going to tell
me. It means that the enemy has been so thoroughly whipped, he
can never rise again. More than conquerors. more than
conquerors. Satan is conquered. He can do
you no harm. Not now, not tomorrow, not forever. Here's the third pillar. Your
indwelling sin, that old man of the flesh that gives you and
me so much trouble is doomed. Flesh is flesh and flesh will
soon die. Number four, your God, who made
the promise rules the world. Your God who made the promise
rules the world. Number five, we live upon the
bank that can never be broken, the bank of grace. Let us therefore
come boldly to the throne of grace that we may obtain mercy
and find grace to help in time of need. Here's another pillar,
number six. Say ye to the righteous, it shall
be well with him, because you are never alone. Never alone. There is a comforter
in you. There is a mighty arm upon which
you may lean. There is a gracious God walking
with you. Number seven, it shall be well
with the righteous. The very justice of God demands
it. For they shall eat the fruit
of their doings. Merle Hart, are you listening? It's right for it to be well
with you. You deserve it. That can't be. Not in you. Not in you. But in the surety
in whom you have lived in perfection before God. His merit is your
merit. His worth is your worth. Is it
right Is it right for everything to be Christ? Is that right? Is there anything wrong with
that? Any injustice in there does not law and justice demanded. He learned it by his obedience
unto God, but his obedience wasn't for him. His obedience was for
us. The righteous made righteous
in him. And now justice demands it shall
be well with the righteous. There is no possibility that
God shall ever exercise wrath or judgment against any of his
children in this world or in the world to come. It shall be
well with the righteous. But our chickens are going to
come home to roost. Leave that to folks who don't know God.
But I'm going to reap what I sowed. Leave that to folks who don't
know God. We reap what Christ sowed. And we sowed in him perfect righteousness. Children of God, get hold of
this if you can. It shall be well with you. In
Christ, by virtue of our union with him, We are well-fed, for
we feed upon his flesh and his blood. Well-dressed, for we're
robed in his righteousness with the garments of salvation. Well-housed,
for the Lord is our refuge. The eternal God is our dwelling
place. Well-wed, for we're married to Christ. And well-provided
for, the Lord is the portion of my soul. But look at verse
11. I'll hardly say more than just
to read it, but read it I must. God says, say this to the wicked,
woe unto the wicked, it shall be ill with him, for the reward
of his hands shall be given him. You who believe not, you who
without Christ It shall be ill with you. Everything ill. Everything. Nothing good. Only ill. Only ill. Ill with you today and ill with
you tomorrow. Ill with you when things seem
to be pleasant and prosperous. Only ill. Ill with you when you
die. ill with you in judgment and
ill with you forever because the reward of your hands shall
be given you it should be ill with you because
that's what you deserve that's what you deserve God's
justice never bends, neither in the exercise of his grace
nor in the exercise of his judgment. If men go to glory, they go to
glory justly because it's right as the reward of perfect righteousness
performed by his own in Christ the substitute. And if you go
to hell, you'll go to hell because it's right. the reward of absolute
justice, giving you precisely what you have earned, exactly
what you've earned. Say ye to the righteous, it shall
be well with him. All your temptations, all your
darkness, all your wanderings, all your failures, All your falls,
God will overrule. It shall be well with you. There
shall never be a night, but that morning shall come. There shall
never be a day of trouble, but a day of prosperity shall follow.
There shall never be an emptying, but there shall be a filling.
There shall never be a bringing down, but that he will raise
you up again. Let it be darkness or light,
sorrow or grief, night or day, life or death, time or eternity. It shall be well with the righteous. If we only knew what God knows. If we only knew what God knows. We wouldn't want anything any
different than it is right now. If we only knew what God knows,
He's doing us good. He's doing us good. Righteous
ones, righteous ones, did you hear what God said? It shall
be well with the righteous. Amen.