I want you to turn back in your
Bibles to 1 Thessalonians 1, a church in the first century
under the ministry of the Apostle Paul which had a wonderful reputation
for serving the true and the living God. It will be for us
today a framework for once again contemplating a most important
biblical truth with regards to your salvation and mine. The
Gospel of Your Salvation Part 7 is where we are. The title
of our message today is Knowing Your Election of God. Knowing
Your Election of God. We spoke about the four very
important questions that should be contemplated when you talk
to people about God or when you are trying to get a grip on what
this thing of salvation is, the Kingdom of God, redemption, and
eternal life, and all of these very, very important concepts. And I said there are four questions
you have to be able to answer. The first of the four is, who
is it that saves us? You really need to be very clear
on that. You need to be emphatic that salvation is of the Lord.
And when we say salvation is of the Lord, what we mean is
that God is the one who actually saves us, and he saves us all
by himself. God is the one who does the saving,
so the Bible is explicit. It is God who saved us by his
mercy apart from our works, Titus 3, 5. Who saved you, Jesse Gisten? God saved me. How did he save
me? He saved me by his mercy. And
by His grace, who saved me? It was God Almighty in His plan
of redemption which brought about the salvation of my soul. I give
God all the credit for my salvation. I don't attribute anything that
I have ever done or will do to the whole of my salvation. God
does the saving. They shall call His name Jesus.
for he shall save his people from their sins. The man or the woman that has
a biblical gospel is able to say without shame, God is the
one that saved me. God. So the first question is
who does the saving? God does the saving. His name
is Jehovah. His name is Joshua. That means
He does all the saving. Salvation is derived from His
own essence, His own character, His own nature. He is a God that
saves. He must save. It comes from who
He is. He's our Savior. And then we
ask the question of the how of our salvation. How does God save
us? If he's the one that saves us, how does he do that? Well,
he does that by the death of his son, Jesus Christ. Christ's
death on Calvary's tree is the how or the means by which God
saves us. How that Christ died for our
sins, according to the scriptures. How that he was buried and rose
again the third day according to the scriptures. How does God
save a sinner? He saves a sinner by the death
of Jesus Christ. as their substitute, as their
surety, as the means by which atonement is made, his wrath
is satisfied, we call that propitiation, and thus he can take the sinner
out of a place of condemnation and put him in a place of justification
and clothe him with the very righteousness of Christ so that
as the father looks at the sinner, he sees his own darling son and
thus can be pleased with the sinner. How does God save us? He saves us by the death burial
and resurrection of Jesus Christ The next question is when does
he save us? when because there's a time in
human experience where you and I come into the reality of what
you may have heard all the days of your life in church all the
days of your life in church The true and the living God may have
been the God of your parents or your grandparents or your
aunt or your uncle, but he did not become your God until he
revealed himself to you through the gospel. When the gospel came
to you and broke your heart and penetrated your soul and opened
your eyes and gave you a real revelation of who he is and all
of his splendor and glory, and cause you to see that you yourself
are nothing but a sinner. It shut you up to the reality
that God justly must send you to a burning hell for your sins. And when once you realize that
you are a sinner, He also showed you that Christ is your only
hope for glory. And the Holy Spirit through the
preaching of the gospel persuaded you that Jesus Christ is everything
to you. and your soul was made to say
yes to Jesus, He was so lovely to you, you couldn't deny Him.
That's how you know you were born again. As the Apostle Paul
said in Galatians chapter 1 verse 16, when God revealed Jesus Christ
in me, In me, he caused the light to shine out of darkness and
it shined in our hearts to give us the knowledge of the glory
of God in the face of Jesus Christ. How do I know I was saved? Because
one day God cut the lights on. I was not only walking in darkness,
I was darkness itself. according to Ephesians 4. I lived
a life of darkness. My heart was dark. My mind was
dark. My deeds were dark. My ways were
dark until God cut the lights on and showed me the truth of
His splendor, glory, and beauty. And my life has never been the
same since. Has yours? Trouble, yes, but with the lights
on. You know, it's one thing to deal
with trouble in the dark. You don't even know who your
enemies are. You don't know how to handle the warfare, the battle.
You don't know who to look for. But it's another thing when he
cuts the lights on. You can see the enemy for what
it is. And you can also see your captain,
your savior, the one who can deliver you. That's the good
thing about revelation. That's the purpose of the gospel,
to show you the truth in Christ. To show you the truth. That's
the wind. He made you born again. He gave you a new nature. He
calls you to love Him. He calls you to believe on Him.
Do you know that faith is a gift from God? One day you didn't
believe, the next day you did. You looked up and found you were
believing on God. What a wonder of grace for you
to believe God. And it's a wonder that we're
still believing God today, isn't that so? Dozens of years have
gone by for many of us and we wake up today still believing
God hallelujah Still believing God because what God starts he
what he sure enough finishes So we thank him for his salvation,
don't we so we know who saves us. We know how he saves us He
know we know when he saved us But the crucial question we are
dealing with this week and next week is why did he save us? Did
he save you? and me because we were better
than the next chap over against us. To the contrary, you were
worse than the next chap over against you. Oh, pastor, I don't
believe that. You better believe that. God
saves sinners. That's what he saves. He saves
real, genuine, self-acknowledging sinners. See, this is where the
offense of the gospel comes in. When you preach the gospel properly
and truly, people don't like it because God calls you out
for what you are. Like one of my sisters used the
phrase, God will put you on blast. He will let you know that you
are a transgressor. In fact, I love the way God talks
about his elect. He said to Israel, and listen
Israel, I didn't choose you because you were great in number or mightier
or better off. You were few. You didn't bring
nothing to the table when I chose you. In fact, I knew that you
were a transgressor from the womb. That's cold, isn't it? Read it for yourself, Isaiah
chapter 48. What he was saying was, when I chose you, you didn't
surprise me. You didn't put makeup on and
look all good. I knew you to the core of your
being. You're nothing but a sinner by
nature. And I chose you for myself. for other purposes. And we learned
that a little bit later. The motive for which God chose
us is love. You know what he said in Deuteronomy
77? I chose you because I loved you. Now that's wild, isn't it? I chose you because I loved you.
And so the Bible tells us in Ephesians chapter 1, 3 that God
has chosen us in Christ before the world began that we would
be holy and without blame before him in love. Now that's what
divine love does. It chooses It calls, it saves,
it sanctifies, it makes holy, all because he loves you. With
everlasting love have I loved you and drawn you in loving kindness. Jeremiah chapter 33 verse 2 or
3, 31 rather, verse 3. How did God, or why did God choose
us is because he loved us, but he loved us in Christ. Now that's important now. Because
I know we think we're all that, and we're really not. The Bible
tells us in Ephesians chapter 1, He chose us in Christ, didn't
He? And we learned last week that Christ is really God's elect,
isn't He? Isaiah chapter 42 verse 1, Isaiah chapter 48, Isaiah
chapter 49, Matthew chapter 3, This is my beloved Son in whom
I am well pleased, well pleased, well pleased. Where is the Father
well pleased? In the Son. If you and I are
going to ever please the Father, we better be in the Son. So God
secured his pleasure towards us by putting us in the Sun. I'm happy with Jesse Gistan in
the Sun I'm happy with you in the Sun. God is only happy with
us in the Sun y'all got that God's elect is Jesus Christ He
chose us in Christ and thus God is pleased with us because of
all that Jesus did Jesus was the one who kept God's law and
Jesus is the one who loved the Father with all of his heart,
soul, mind, and strength. Jesus is the one that did everything
that the Father told him to do. Isn't that right? Jesus is the
one that kept all God's commandments. It was of Jesus. It can only
be said that he was holy, harmless, undefiled, and separate from
sinners. He's the only person in the world that can say, who
can convince me of sin? Who can charge me with sin? He
knew no sin. He did no sin. In him was no
sin at all. and he was so holy and so righteous
that he could be the only one in the world that could bear
our sin. Therefore, his father loved him.
You know what John chapter 10 says? Jesus said in John chapter
10, and we'll be dealing with some of that today, maybe. He
said to the rulers, my father loves me because I lay down my
life for the sheep. Did you hear that? My father
loves me because I lay down my life for the sheep. And I taught us this last week.
God's love towards you and me is a secondary love. It's filtered
through the love of his son towards us. A couple of people were struggling
with that last week, and they came to me and talked to me about
it after the message. And I raised the question, what
about you is actually lovely? That ended the conversation.
Why would God choose you over someone else? Why would God choose
Jacob over Esau? Why would he choose Peter over
Judas Iscariot? Why would he choose Israel over
all the other nations of the world? Why? Why would he choose
Abel over Cain? Why would he choose David over
Saul? Why? Why? It couldn't have been
because David was better than Saul. You and I know better.
We know David, don't we? Why would he choose Samson to
be one of the most glorious, enigmatic judges in all of Israel? Samson had issues. But God chose
Samson. Why did he choose you? Why did
he love you? Because he chose you in Christ.
And he saw that he could use you for his glory because he
would make sure that you would understand that you weren't saved
by any good works. You weren't saved by merit. You
weren't saved because of something. Now see, you know, people like
to, on the matter of the doctrine of election, say that when you
teach election, you are making God a respecter of person. Have
you ever heard that? Please think it through. Election means that God is not
a respecter of persons. For had he respected your person
and mine, he wouldn't have chose us. I love the way Mr. Spurgeon put
it. God had to choose me before I had a being. Because the Bible
tells us in Romans chapter 9, before the children could do
any good or any evil, before they were even conceived in their
mother's womb, God chose Jacob over Esau. And he chose Jacob
over Esau so that when they came into the world Jacob would know
that God loved him before he did any performances. Because
Jacob was a rascal just like you. See what election does,
it exalts the grace of God. Election exalts the grace of
God. Election says it must be of grace
because there is no reason for which God should choose me. I'm
not better than any other person. I haven't performed any deeds
of any notoriety, of any significance whereby God should choose me.
It had to be purely on the basis of God's grace, and it was. He
chose us in Christ, and then He manifested that in our salvation. Today I want us to consider seven
things briefly in the book of 1 Thessalonians 1-10 because One of the things that we do
want to be able to grapple with, it becomes another question that
arises out of the fundamental question, why am I saved? Or
why did God save me? And he saved me because he chose
me in Christ. And people do struggle with the issue of election. They
really do. But really what they're struggling
with is pride. And the pride that they're struggling
with is the pride of self-worth. in the area of trying to reconcile
how it is that God can choose some and not others. We're all
bad by nature. Did anybody give you that news
yet? We're all rotten to the core by nature. Did anyone inform
you that there's none good, no not one? There's none that seeketh
after God. There's none that understand.
There's none that doeth good. We are all unprofitable and have
gone out the way. If God were just and right, you
know what God would do? He'd abandon us all. What you
should be doing is marveling at the fact that God chose some,
and then you should be shouting for joy that he chose you in
the some, instead of running around trying to figure out why
he didn't choose somebody else or this or that. And this is
the problem in religion and Christianity today, particularly because we
have such a man-centered focus. We don't want to offend anybody.
We therefore want to deny God his glory and having the right
and prerogative to choose whom he wills But do you know that's
part of his nature? remember what Moses tried to
do when God was getting ready to destroy a whole group of the
Israelites in the wilderness for worshiping that golden calf
in Exodus chapter 33 and 34 Moses ran up to God and And he said, Lord, Lord, don't
kill him. Don't kill him. If anything,
take me out. Destroy me. Kill me. He was a
mediator, a type of Christ. Kill me and let these people
go. That was a valiant effort. But you know what God said to
Moses? No. No. I'm not going to kill you and
I'm not going to let them go just because you asked me. Now
watch what the text says. I will have mercy. on whom I
will have mercy and I will harden whom I will harden. I will save
whom I want to save and I will let the rest perish in their
own desires. You know what we call that? Sovereignty. That means the prerogative of
salvation is God's, not ours. Moses stood back and was shocked.
You know why? Because he thought he could twist
God's arm and make God into a humanist. And then he had to wait on God.
Because he realized that God does what he wants to do. God
saves whom he wants to save. And if he saved you, your job
is to simply settle down, accept God as God, doing whatever God
wants to do. Now, the question we want to
work through for a moment today is, how do I know that I am elect,
chosen of God? Well, I'll answer this as we
work through our seven points. You cannot know your election
while legit you don't believe the gospel. You cannot know that
you're one of God's sheep while as yet you're not trusting Christ.
The knowledge of your election is a consequence of faith, which
is a gift of God that comes with being born again. In other words,
it's the blessed knowledge that God not only saved you in time,
but he chose you in eternity. Until you come to a saving knowledge
of Christ and a real vital relationship is established, you will never
know. Now, let me help you parents with this towards your children
or towards your loved ones. You don't wanna be struggling
with the issue as to whether or not God elected your son or
elected your daughter or elected the whole band of children. You
might be so mad at him, you swear that he didn't elect any of them.
I understand that. Understand that but you would
still be wrong Because you cannot determine whether or not God
elected your children based upon how bad they are That would be
flawed logic Because you would be assuming you would be assuming
that the ones that are good are elect because they're good and
I've just demonstrated through the whole of Scripture God never
chose anyone because they were good and So clean up your thinking
because your thinking is flawed. Don't try to determine their
election by how much they obey you and love you and do what's
right. They must be elect because they love to obey me. No, no,
no. They could be the worst devil on planet Earth. They just love
you now because they get stuff from you. Wait till they stop
getting stuff from you. Then all of a sudden they not
elect. Now here's the fallacy with this
doctrine. Here's the fallacy with this assumption. What you
are doing is you are conflating two concepts. Salvation in its
experience and the doctrine of election which is not itself
salvation. Election is not salvation. Election is the cause or grounds
of salvation. It's the reason why God actually
saves. Are y'all hearing what I'm saying?
So you can't determine who is elect and not. I promise you
all of Israel swore that that hard-headed thief on the cross,
on the right side of Jesus, was not only not elect, he was a
son of the devil, a child of perdition. I swear they promised
that that's what he was. His whole life was tore up. He
was God's elect from before the foundation of the world. God
loved him in Christ. And God chose to let him live
like hell until he was about to breathe his last breath. Are
y'all hearing me? And then he showed the world
that he is able to save to the uttermost those that come to
him by faith. Do you know how remarkable it
is to call on God when you're about to die on your deathbed,
you know you are dying? I told you this, this doesn't
happen naturally. Folk don't call on God when they're laying
on their deathbed. If their hearts were hardened
all the days of their life, living with their fist in God's face,
it'll be that way on their deathbed. Someone will have come along
to tell them they were all right, and they will have not made peace
with God. Many of us know this to be the case. But from time
to time, you know what God does? Demonstrates his electing love
in Christ by saving someone in their last hour. Don't we love
it? And don't we give God all the
glory when he does it? Then we say the word of the lord
is right and all of his works are done and true and he certainly
is a high priest Whoever lives to make an intercession for his
elect even when they tear it up all the way through their
life This gives us hope doesn't it? This is the stuff that gives
us hope But election is unto salvation. It's not salvation.
How do we know that we are elects seven things in our outline?
The first one is the elect believe the gospel Do you have that?
The elect believe the gospel 1st Thessalonians chapter 1 verse
4 says knowing brethren beloved your election of God Do you see
that the Apostle says we can know that we are elect of God
and then he gives us the evidence For our election in verses 5
through verse 8 and I want you to mark what he says For this
here is a purpose clause our gospel came not unto you in word
only but also in power and in the Holy Ghost and in much assurance
as you know what manner of men we were among you for your sake."
You know what he just said? The elect at the appointed time
will hear the gospel and the gospel will come accompanied
by the power of the Spirit of God and so work in their life
that they respond to the message of the gospel in faith and in
obedience. The elect alone will respond
to the preaching of the gospel when it comes in power. Paul
says our gospel did not come to you in word alone. Now there
are a lot of people who have heard the gospel all their life
and all they heard was the word. They never felt the power. They
never felt the power. They lived and they died. without Christ. That person is
not elect. See when you are elect of God
there is a day appointed when the gospel comes in power. It reaches down into the grave
of your soul by the voice of the Son of God which is our next
point and calls you out of your death. That's how you know That's
how you know. He said to these Thessalonians,
which were pagan idolaters, he says, we know that you're elect
of God for several reasons. One is, our gospel did not come
to you in word only, but also in power. Paul said in Romans
chapter 1 verse 16, for I am not ashamed of the gospel, for
it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. This
is such a very important point for you and I to know that God
saves and he saves through the gospel because the gospel is
the power that's actually able to bring men into a right relationship
with God. This is why you and I ought to be committed to evangelism.
We ought to be committed to telling people about Christ. Because
wherever the gospel is declared, it has the ability to actually
save people. Am I making some sense? Wherever
the gospel is declared, it has the ability to save people. And
so what the text tells us is that we can only know a person
is God's elect when the gospel comes in power and they actually
experience the power of that gospel in faith. By the way,
faith comes by what? And hearing by what? That's why
we preach the Word of God, because through the Word of God, God
plants faith in the heart and causes a man to say yes to God.
Causes a woman to say yes to God. And very seldom are you
going to be in a venue where lots of people are, the Gospel
is preached, and no one comes to believe on Christ. Very seldom
are you going to be in a venue. You can't find it in the Scriptures
anywhere, because His Word virtually never returns void. This is what's
so critical about preaching the gospel It's critical that the
gospel is preached that your children are taught the gospel
from the youngest age Because the Spirit of God knows the time
of your conversion But the means is always the word the word the
word and this is the word by which the gospel is preached
unto you Thus that seed must be sown into the hearts of those
children because after all one souls another waters And God
what? Whenever He wants to. So your
job and mine is to accompany the Spirit of God in the process
of scattering the good seed of the Gospel. One day these children
will wake up to the reality of the glory of God in Christ and
worship Him just like you do. But see, we're plowing in faith,
aren't we? We're sowing in faith, aren't we? Because we believe
that the same power that raised us from the dead can raise them
from the dead also. How do I know I'm elect? Because
when the gospel came in power, it delivered me out of darkness
into His marvelous light. How do I know that I'm elect?
Because the elect hear the shepherd's voice. John chapter 10, verse
5 through 7. Listen to it. Now, we're getting
a little bit more personal around the preaching of the gospel.
I want you to hear this now. We're getting a little bit more
personal around the preaching of the gospel. When we preach
the gospel, we're preaching the gospel to every creature because
we who are believers do not know who God's elect are until they
come to believe. So we share it with everyone,
don't we? We share it with everyone, preach it to every creature.
But what we know is Jesus Christ is the good shepherd of his sheep.
And Jesus comes in the preaching of the word to actually get his
sheep. The man or the woman that actually
believes the gospel actually hears the voice of the Son of
God in the preaching of the gospel and as a lost sheep. Do you know
sheep are remarkable? First of all, they're stupid.
That means they're a lot like us. But the other thing is that
God has given them a honing device. The ability to hear their shepherd's
voice. distinguishable from every other
voice in the world. Those little sheep can hear the
shepherd's voice when the lamb is in the mother's womb. That's
why I was preaching to my kids. As soon as my wife conceived,
listen brother, as soon as my wife conceived, I used to walk
by my wife, she'd get pregnant. As soon as she'd say, I'm pregnant,
I start preaching to that child in the womb. Are you hearing
what I'm saying? And you know, 30 years ago, people would say,
man, that was dumb. You're just being religious.
That's just a foolish thing that you're doing. You know what?
The doctors caught up with me. The physicians caught up with
me. Guess what they tell us? Our children know their parents'
voice in the world. My children have been hearing
me preach ever since they came into the world. I made sure they
heard the gospel. Cuz see listen ain't ain't no
telling what will happen once they come out the womb in this
crazy world I want them to have the advantage of having heard
the gospel while they were in Some of them was kicking and
shaking and doing all kind of crazy stuff. No, you're gonna
hear the gospel You're gonna hear the gospel I'm gonna sow
that seed in your heart while you're in the womb You don't
have to believe me if you don't want to but I've seen the fruit
See, we plow in hope, don't we? And we plow in faith. You keep
plowing, you keep plowing in hope and faith, you keep sowing
the seed. Listen to what John chapter 10 verse 5 says, verse
4. Let me start at verse 3. To him
the porter opens, Jesus said in verse 1, I better read verse
1. Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that entereth in not
by the door into the sheepfold, but climbs up some other way,
the same as a thief and a robber. What that means is not all roads
lead to salvation. But he that enters in by the
door is the shepherd of the sheep. To him the porter opens, and
the sheep hear his voice." Now watch this. He hears the master's
voice, the shepherd's voice, in the preaching of the gospel.
And when the gospel is preached at the time in which that little
lamb is to be saved, watch this, the shepherd calls his own sheep
by name. That's personal. that's powerful
and he brings them out. It is a personal, powerful call. It's not generic. I told you
he don't save in the HMO program. This is not universal salvation.
This is not universal health care. He saves individually. And the individual sinner who
comes to know Christ can say, I heard his voice. I heard him
call me. He called me and I heard him.
It was as if he spoke to me only. This is what we're talking about
in the business of salvation. We're not talking about just
kind of catching a ride with somebody else to heaven. We're
talking a personal revelation of the glory of God and the person
of Christ speaking to your soul. And if you have a longing for
him to speak clearly and vividly and powerfully to you, ask him. Lord, make yourself known to
me. Reveal yourself to me through
the gospel. Speak clearly and powerfully
to my soul so that I can know you personally. Because the text
tells us that's how the shepherd works. He calls his own by name
and he leads them out. When he puts them forth, that
is his own sheep, he goes before them. And this is how you know
you're saved. And the sheep do what? And the
sheep do what? For they know His voice. Now we're dealing with the whole
scope of salvation in this text. We're not only talking about
the shepherd who saves you. We're not only talking about
the gospel that He uses to save you. We're not talking only about
that time where you were experientially converted. We're talking about
you coming out of darkness, into His marvelous light, seen as
it were by faith, the Savior in front of you, and you follow
Him. This is how you know you're God's elect. Do you follow Christ? It's very good, isn't it? Very
good. You ought to follow the man that
saved you. You ought to follow the man that
died for your sins. You ought to follow him so that
where he is, you will be. This is how we know we're God's
elect, we follow him. We hear his voice. Turn with
me in your Bible now to 1 Thessalonians 2.13. 1 Thessalonians 2.13. I
want you to hear a few more on this point before we go on. We
are talking about the gospel coming to us in a manner where
it is so compelling, so powerful, so effectual, that it radically
changes our life, opens our eyes, opens our ears, Causes our hearts
to long for Jesus and the Apostle said it like this in verse 13
chapter 2 of the same church of Thessalonica for this cause
Thank we God without ceasing because now here it is. Now here
it is when you Received the Word of God You got that See what
God's elect do they receive the word? They receive the word and
as many as received him to them gave he authority to become the
sons of God, right? They received his word. Don't
tell me you're God's elect and you despise his word. One of
the evidences that you are God's elect is you love his word. Oh,
how love I thy law, it is my meditation all the day long.
One of the evidences that you're one of God's elect is because
for you, you've got to have the word. You've got to have the
word. All of the patriarchs, all of
the matriarchs are known by this one undeniable fact all through
the scriptures. They loved God's word. They loved his word. They were
people who were of the truth and they wanted the truth and
they couldn't get enough of the truth. And so it tells us they
received the word, not as it were the word of what? See, when
you are truly God's people and truly God's sheep, You don't
argue or fall prey to debates as to whether or not the Bible
is the word of God. Listen, I have never one time
in my life ever contemplated whether or not that book that
I preach from, which I live out of, was the word of God. I never
once in my life questioned whether Pearl Gisten was my mama. I never
once questioned in my life whether Richard Gistan was my father.
I know we got struggles today. I'm simply saying the source
of your life ought to be clear to you. And men and women that
are arguing whether or not the Bible from Genesis to Revelation
is the word of God or whether we can take part of it as God's
word, the other part is men's word. Listen, you are proving
that you are non-elect. You see what Jesus said in John
chapter 8? If you continue in my word, then
are you my disciple indeed, and you shall know the truth and
the truth shall make you free. Isn't that what he said? If you
are my disciple, you will continue in my word and my word will continue
to liberate you and you will know the truth. See, those of
us who are persuaded that the Word of God is right and all
of its works are done and true, that the Word of the Lord is
a pure word tried in a furnace of fire. You know, people have
been trying to destroy God's Word ever since God gave us His
Word. Isn't that right? But that word keeps rising up
out of the fire, bringing glory to God and saving sinners anyway.
Isn't that right? We've got more Bibles today than
we ever had. And you don't know the history
of those diabolical schemes by which they've tried to take the
Word of God away from people. We've got Bibles in print. We've
got Bibles on cell phones. We've got Bibles everywhere,
don't we? The Word of God is everywhere
now. That's how God works. The more you stuff it out, the
more it spreads. This is the truth. You know why? Because he's going to save his
people. And so he's going to see to it that the word of the
Lord has free course. Listen to it. When you receive
the word of God, you didn't receive it as the word of men, but indeed,
as it is in truth, the word of God. Watch this, which effectually
works also in you that what believe effectually working. You know
what that means? The word of God gets down on the inside of
you and takes over. When you're born of God, the
Word of God gets down on the inside of you and takes over. Now the Word of God will be patient
with you, but it's not gonna let you do whatever you wanna
do. Have you figured that out? You know the Word of God has
the ability to stop you in your tracks, arrest your silly notions
at the right time, right? And then pop up in your brain
and say, now you know, you know, you know what you're doing is
not right. Isn't that the way the word works?
It's able to reprove you of sin. It's able to correct you. It's
able to instruct you. It's able to give you an inheritance
among all those that are sanctified. You know what that means? The
Word of God will check you. You know that check in your spirit,
which is a consequence of the biblical truth in your soul that
your mom and daddy sold in you and you decided to read for yourself?
It's designed to keep you from acting a fool. Because the next
step is for the Spirit of God to come behind that word with
a board and spank you till you get back in line. That's how
you know you're God's. That's a whole other message.
But the text tells us in Hebrews chapter 12, all whom the Lord
loves, He what? Saves. See, before you were saved,
you could act a fool and there weren't any other consequences
other than the earthly consequences. After salvation, you have a tutor
called the Holy Spirit. and you have the Word of God
on the inside of you, and it's very, very difficult to live
in constant open rebellion against God. That's how you know it effectually
works in you. And do you know what? One day
you give up. When you're smart, you just give up and you start
doing it God's way. That's how we know you're God's
elect. Point number three, the preaching of the gospel is essential
to the calling of God's elect, Acts chapter 18. There's just
one verse I want to read there. This is the Apostle Paul's ministry
in Acts 18, where he is doing missionary work, as all the churches
of Christ should be doing. And he's been called now from
Thessalonica over to the regions of Achaia where Corinth is. And in Acts chapter 18, Paul's
having a lot of trouble with the people in Corinth because
the people in Corinth are kind of like the folks in San Francisco
and in Oakland and in Richmond. Very, very bad people. Very,
very bad. The gospel, the true gospel has
a hard time existing in these neighborhoods because these folks
are idolaters, they are fornicators, they are adulterers, they are
very, very ungodly people. But these are the ones to whom
we must go Do you know why? Because god has an elect people
among them Also, I know I was one of them Listen to the language
the apostle paul speaking. Uh, uh, luke speaking in acts
chapter 18 concerning paul and his band over in verse 7 and
when we had departed this and entered into a certain man's
house named justice one that worshiped god whose house was
joined hard to the synagogue, and Crispus, the chief ruler
of the synagogue, who believed on the Lord with all of his house,
and many of the Corinthians, hearing, believed and were baptized,
then spake the Lord to Paul in the night by vision. He said,
Be not afraid, but speak and hold not your peace, for I am
with you, and no man shall set on thee to hurt thee, For I have
much people in this city. Do you see it? See, if Paul would
have looked at the condition of the city through empirical
eyes, he would have said his work was done. Because there
was so much opposition to the gospel, so much hostility. Yeah,
a few believe, but many of the people, even the rulers, even
the magistrates, was hostile towards the apostle and his ministry.
God had to tell the apostle Paul, listen, you stay here. And he
stayed there for a long time preaching the gospel for this
reason, God had an elect people there. My point, it's essential
that the gospel is preached in order for us to know who the
elect are. You guys got that? It's the instrumental
means, instrumental means. In fact, point number four will
help us affirm this. Only the elect are kept from
deception and that through the gospel. Go with me in your Bible
to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. I want you to get this now. I'm
going to treat this for a few moments before I rush through
my other points. Only the elect are kept from
deception and that through the gospel. If you are a Christian
any time now, what you know is that our world is filled with
deceivers. manipulators, crooks of all kind,
especially religious hucksters. And if you've been a Christian
anytime, what you know also is that the manner in which they
manipulate and deceive the masses is accompanied by demonic power
that is so strong that if you don't actually have discernment
of the word of God, you too will be deceived. If you are a believer
today and you are rooted and grounded in the truth of the
gospel, what you know is the vast majority of us have had
to find ourselves working through and out of many, many false churches
and false doctrines and false teachings. Am I telling the truth?
because in your naivete you bought the first thing that was sold
to you because you didn't know any better. And so you were wide
open to all kinds of religious cons and hucksters and crooks
who did not have your eternal welfare in view. They did not
care for your soul. They were building churches,
building numbers, building kingdoms, building ministries, building
their bank account, building their coffers. you were the merchandise
as Peter said in 2nd Peter chapter 2 1 through 4 and there shall
be many false teachers who through their pernicious doctrines will
make merchandise of many and This is what goes on in religion
every day. They cater to your feelings they
cater to your emotions and Most of your false teachings, not
all of them, most of your false doctrines, false churches, false
gospels, know how to manipulate you because they are rooted in
the skills and the arts of psychology. Psychology is the study of human
behavior. If you go and learn your little
tidbit about psychology, you can manipulate people too. Put
on a suit and learn a few Bible verses and you can say the Lord
called you too. and you can start hoodwinking
people by manipulating their emotions. Are you hearing what
I'm saying? And this goes on all around the
world. It is a massive process dominating
the evangelical church world. Here's what the Apostle Paul
says as he warned about the falling away and the anti-Christ system
that will dominate the world, particularly towards the end
time. But we know that this is a pattern of things that have
been working throughout church history since our Lord arrived
and warned us that there would be many false prophets and many
false teachers who would arise saying that they are the Christ
or the Messiah and follow them. So we read over in verse 9, even
him whose coming is after the working of Satan. with all power
and signs and lying wonders and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness
in them that perish. Verse 9 and 10 says the power
behind false prophets is Satan. What he uses are signs and what? Lying wonders to be developed
on its own. But what he does is use signs
and wonders because signs and wonders authenticate his so-called
ministry as a prophet. The signs and wonders that Paul
talks about here are lying signs and wonders We have exposed many
false prophets for for alleging to have the ability to heal and
they couldn't heal a thing But because they were lying Prophets
they were able to manipulate the masses by alleging to heal
diseases Which in fact were never healed authenticated or verified
they have placed people in the audience stooges to manipulate
the masses folks who have two things not a toothache now the
Lord gave me a revelation somebody in here has a headache well now
how many people in the auditorium of 500 people somebody gonna
have a headache what kind of revelation is that and so-called miracle healings
of which there is no empirical evidence to affirm it. And there
would have to be watchdog groups that would have to go into those
churches, plant themselves to prove that these folks are cons.
Now we've been knowing this for decades upon decades, but as
one person put it, there's a sucker born every minute. Christians
seem to check their brains at the door. And they're often deceived
by these folks because they're manipulated by their emotions.
They are made to see things that don't exist. These are optical
illusions. These are intellectual illusions.
Like I can tell you something is happening and over time by
hyper suggestivity, I can get you to believe it's occurring
when in fact it didn't occur at all. Are you guys hearing
what I'm saying? I used to hear these young zealous
preachers come to me all the time. Pastor, we're having a
revival meeting, a revival conference, and we're going to see people
heal of their sicknesses. Their eyes are going to be open.
The blind are going to see. We're going to see the dead raised.
The dead raised. The dead raised. This is how
zealous they were. They'd come back, yeah, pastor,
and it was on. The Lord opened the eyes of the
blind. He healed the sick. He raised the dead. Wasn't one
news reported there to affirm raising of the dead. So they're
perpetuating lies, exaggerations that have no basis in the truth.
But listen to me, ladies and gentlemen, when you want to believe
a lie, you will. When you want to believe a lie,
you will. And if you are not God's elect,
you will believe anything. If you are not born again of
God's Spirit and therefore are of the truth, you will believe
anything. Notice what the text goes on
to say. I want you to see how this works itself out till we
get to verse 13. So, He works signs and wonders with
all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish. This is
the object or targets of his work. All deceivableness is his
method, he's a deceiver, of unrighteousness in them that perish. Because
they received not what the love of the truth that they might
be saved Do you know what verse 10 is telling us watch this verse
10 is telling us that often the people who in mass Come to follow
these false prophets and false teachers have been told by true
believers. You're listening to a crook You're
listening to a con you're listening to someone who is hoodwinking
you but because you do not have a love for the truth You keep
listening You keep watching them. You keep allowing yourself to
be deceived by the propagation of their prophecies, which are
not true, do not correspond to the Word of God, nor do they
affirm the Gospel that we believe. But because of some desire for
self-gratification, and I'm getting ready to talk about that. See,
what people in the world want is to have their needs met. They
want to be the center of attention. They want a God that will bless
them through and through on every hand. This is what we call the
prosperity gospel. Are you hearing me? It's the
gospel that makes a God to be nothing more than your sugar
daddy, or genie in a bottle, or ATM machine. You just push
the button and get whatever you want. And what the preachers
do is they cause you to lust after what they have when they
stand and tell you how good God has been to them when in fact
all it is is that they've been living off the money you gave
them. This is a pyramid scheme. Am
I making some sense, Saints? Why wouldn't he be living large? You're broke. Because he told
you, if you don't tie, God's going to curse you with a curse.
So you're giving every dime you got, even if you don't pay your
bills. You're on the street, and he's
driving a Rolls Royce, talking about how good God is. Right? Am I telling the truth? And here's the fundamental premise
upon which the ministries that do this are successful. Here's
the premise. I want you to understand this.
Every system has an underlying philosophy. Like we have a biblical
worldview and our biblical worldview is rooted in the scriptures completely.
You're not a sound Christian until you learn a biblical worldview.
But in the world, there are lots of worldviews and these false
prophets operate out of several presuppositions. One is what
we call humanism. Humanism is the idea that man
is the center of the universe. that man is basically good and
that with enough effort he can achieve his highest goals. He
becomes the epicenter of life. Humanism. You guys got that?
Humanism. It's all about you. That's a powerful assumption,
isn't it? When you come into a church and
they start peddling, it's about you, it's about you, it's about
you, then it can't be about Christ. But once they get enough of that
in your system, you're sold on the fact that God now is obligated
to bless you because you actually are corresponding to a set of
laws that these guys tell you you must engage in in order for
you to benefit from them. Now you and God are in business.
There's no authentic worship on the grounds of a sacrifice
of someone who loved you enough to give himself for you. This
is just business. What's love got to do with it?
Nothing. This is all about money coming
from God to you because you are doing what he says do. This is
not the gospel. It's humanism. But it's also
rooted in another philosophy called secularism. You need to
get this. Humanist is when the world revolves
around you. Secularism is this. There's nothing
going on in the universe but what's taking place here and
now. Secularism is the ideology that
there is no real transcendent metaphysical dimension. There's
no spiritual world, there's no life after death, there's no
heaven, there's no hell, there's no rewards, there's no punishment.
Are you guys hearing me? And what it's all about is living
life now and getting all you can get. Now watch, when you
take humanism and secularism and put them together, watch
this. It's about you, and it's about here, and it's about now. It's about you, it's about here,
and it's about now. When you live on that kind of
set of presuppositions, then the only kind of gospel you can
receive is a prosperity gospel. It's about you, it's about here,
this world, and it's about now. This is why prosperity preachers
never preach about future glory. They never preach about eternal
glory. They do not preach delayed gratification. They do not preach sacrifice
and service and commitment to the glory of God. They do not
preach the ideal of an eternal judgment. They don't preach any
of that. All they preach is the here and the now and the you. I want you to get that because
if you're vulnerable to that set of assumptions, you're gonna
buy into a prosperity gospel. The true gospel is about God. It's about Christ. It's about
eternal life. And it's about glory in the future.
It's about God, His Christ, eternal life, and glory in the future.
And if you're not ready for that gospel, you are not God's elect.
If God doesn't appeal to you on the grounds of saving your
eternity-bound soul from hell, you're not God's elect. Are you
hearing me? See, if you don't have enough
concern about your eternity-bound soul, you're not hearing the
God of the Bible. Now listen to this. This is what
the Apostle Paul said. And therefore, God gave them
over, verse 11, for this cause God shall send them what? Strong
delusion that they should what? Believe a lot. Now that's the
reason why even though we talk to people as much as we do, and
we talk until we are blue in the face, and some of us, that's
hard to do. But we try anyway, and they still
don't hear us. They still don't hear us because
there's an idol in front of them. That idol is self. That idol
is carnal things. It's the lust of the flesh, the
lust of the eye, the pride of life, the now, the here, not
the eternal. not the heavenly, not the spiritual,
not Christ, not God, not his glory, not the salvation of sinners,
sell here now. Got it? But now watch what the
Apostle Paul says here. He says over in verse 12 these
words, now God shall send them a strong delusion that they should
believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believed
not the truth. Isn't that hard? but have pleasure
in unrighteousness. You know what verse 12 describes?
Getting the consequences of your choices. Verse 13. But we are bound to give thanks
always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord. Why are
you thankful, Paul? Why are you always giving thanks
unto God? Because God hath from the beginning
chosen you to salvation. through sanctification of spirit
and belief of the truth. Do you hear that? You know what
the text says? Because God has chosen you and
he chose you from the foundation of the world. He chose you that
you should hear the truth by the sanctifying work of the Holy
Ghost and keep you from the deception that's deceiving the whole world.
Keep you from the deception that's deceiving the whole world. How
come you still have a love for Christ? God is keeping you. How
come you still enjoy the gospel? God is keeping you. How come
you are still bound for eternal glory and you are setting your
hope on things above where Christ is? God's keeping you. Why is
it that you're still in love with the truth of the gospel
even though people are falling away every day? God's keeping
you. Why is it that you're not giving
yourself over to the lust of your flesh and just jumping headlong
into the arms of these crooks? Because your shepherd is keeping
you. Your shepherd is keeping you. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Listen, I know the battle that goes on. We're all human. We
all have our weaknesses. We all have our inclinations.
We all have our drives. We all have our propensity. We
still have to live in a world where we hold in tandem dealing
with this life and looking for glory too. But listen to me,
child of God, when you're born of God, you must first seek the
kingdom of God and let everything else take care of itself. You
must. Are you hearing what I'm saying?
Let the world pass by All of its goods all of its riches all
of its allurements all of the glitter all of the glamour let
it all pass by And see the world through the eyes of the one who
is coming to save you. You know how he sees it as burning
up As burning up John said it in first john chapter 2 the world
is passing away and the lust thereof now some of y'all are
six, 700, 800 years old already. You have no business getting
wrapped up in a here and now and all about you gospel. You're
getting ready to check out of here in a few minutes. You're
way too old. You couldn't enjoy it if they
gave it to you. You're sick. You're tired. You're old. Sick, tired, and
old. Are you hearing me? Sick, tired,
and old. Old people should be the strongest,
most staunch believers in the church. Well, you know, I want to get
mine. You're too old to get yours.
We talked about this in our witnessing class yesterday. You gotta strike
the iron when it's hot. The iron has cooled off long
time ago. You too old. You young people,
you better get saved now. Save now. And get rooted and
grounded in Christ now. Young people, now get rooted
and grounded in Christ. Because God uses young people
to tear up the world for His glory, to confront cultures,
to swim upstream, to wage war against the many with the few,
to tell the truth as it is in Christ when no one else will
tell it. This is what God does with young people. He allows
them to stand for Christ in the midst of a culture that's falling
away, loving Him, loving His Word, loving sinners. Young people,
commit yourself to Christ and His glory and His truth, and
God will keep you, and He will bless you, and you will make
your parents happy. Fifthly, because in God's electing
love, He will keep us from the deception through the gospel,
we are liberated, children of God, to tell the truth without
manipulation. I'm going to close right here
on this particular point. See, when you come to know that
salvation is altogether of the Lord, Jeremiah 48.10 is the verse
I want us to see. When you have come to understand
that salvation is altogether of the Lord, that when God saved
you, you had nothing to do with it, and that His salvation is
infallible, that if He's going to get work in you, He's going
to finish it, and that the truth shall never return void, When
you can take God's promises and know that God's gonna always
do the right thing with His Word, any time that is shared, will
you listen to me? You can tell the truth and not
varnish the truth or diminish the truth or distort the truth
or deny the truth because the truth will do what the truth
is meant to do. See, when you're God's elect,
you can just tell the truth. You can tell the world that it's
on the way to hell. You can tell men and women that.
You can tell men and women that they are sinners. You can tell
them that they are under the wrath of God. You can tell them
that salvation is only through Christ alone. You can tell them
that salvation is by grace through faith in Christ. You can tell
them that the word of God is right. You can tell them that
the mass of humanity is under a great deception. You can tell
them the truth. You can tell them what Jesus
told them. If you do not believe on me,
you will die in your sins. You can tell them the truth.
You can tell them that all the other religions of the world
are a lie. They're delusion. They're just the vain imagination
of the minds of men who have compromised the truth. You can
tell people that. Are you hearing me? You can tell
people the plain, naked, biblical truth. And God will bless that. Jeremiah chapter 48, 10. Listen
to this. Cursed be the person that does the work of the Lord.
What? So you can go hang out with those folks who corrupt
the Word of God, who twist the Word of God, who peddle the Word
of God if you want to, but they're cursed and you're going to suffer
the consequences of it. Because kind begets what? That's
exactly right. Cursed be the man that does the
work of the Lord deceitfully. Cursed be he that keeps back
his sword from what? What are you talking about, preacher?
The sword here represents the Word of God. The blood represents
the doctrine of the atoning work of Jesus Christ We preach the
atonement through the word because that's what God used to say We
don't do church without the Bible and we don't do church without
be it being based upon the central work of Jesus Christ as our atoning
Savior to do church without the Bible is is a farce. To do church
without the blood, you leave men and women in their sins.
Am I making some sense? To do church without the gospel,
without the word of God, without the atonement of Jesus Christ,
is to be deceitful. For a man or woman to come into
the church, hear a sermon for a whole hour, and go out and
never hear about sin, never hear about the judgment of God, never
hear about the cross work of Christ, the glory of God, the
grace of God, the work of redemption, salvation through God alone,
You have been deceived. You have been manipulated. The
purpose of the church is that we would hear about Christ every
time we come into the doors. Every time. Every time you open
your mouth and preach, preacher, you are to preach the word of
God and point men to the bloody cross and tell them, apart from
this cross, you will perish. That's what you're supposed to
do. That's what you're supposed to do. And I'll enunciate our
other points. In point number six, the elect
will manifest the character of Christ corporately. This is going
back to our text. I got a minute. Go with me there.
First Thessalonians chapter one. I want you to just see the flow
here. This will be easy. The apostle Paul says, we know
that you're elect. Because our gospel came unto
you, this verse 5 of chapter 1, not in word only, but also
in power and also in the Holy Ghost, much assurance. And you
know what manner of persons we were among you. And here's the
net effect of what happens when the gospel comes in power. You
became followers of us and of the Lord. Do you see that? See,
when you're born again and God saves you, you don't get to just
hang out and do whatever you want to in the world. He saved
you and He called you with a holy calling. Holy calling is for
you to follow the Lord Jesus Christ in the ministry of the
gospel the goal of Christ is to save his sheep and to save
Christ sheep is the collective corporate work of the whole church
in the spreading and the propagation of the message of the gospel
in every way possible When God saves you he does not save you
so you can run around the world and figure out what you want
to do He saved you to put you in a fold and in that fold you're
supposed to grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord
and become equipped To do ministry so that wherever you are in the
will of God in the world You are ready now to testify to the
glory of God in Christ Because you were part of a fellowship
that grew you up in the gospel He didn't save you for you to
just do whatever you wanted to do sheep don't abide alone. They abide in foes. When he came
and got your soul, he put you on his shoulders and brought
you back to the fold and put you in a fold. And the fold that
believers are in, true believers, folks who are God's elect, are
a fold where they become followers of Jesus Christ. In fact, they
do the same thing that Christ did. is what we're learning in
our Friday study and learning on Sunday. I'll stop here. You
are only mature in Christ when you have come to learn the gospel,
know the gospel, love the Savior of the gospel, and do the same
work that He Himself came to do. As the Father has sent me,
so send I you. The job of every Christian is
to be an evangelist, to be a preacher, to be a prophet, to communicate
biblical truth everywhere you go. You have within your soul
an eternal treasure of which all God has to do is open the
door for you to open your mouth in any scenario and allow you
to speak forth the words of life. And men and women can have their
world turned upside down. That's the reason why God saved
you and me. And this is how we can know that
we are elect of God. Amen.