Our message title today is Fallen
Sinners Fleeing to Christ. Fallen Sinners Fleeing to Christ. And I want to use these verses
to illustrate the precious doctrine and Bible truth of God's effectual
calling. There is a general call And there
is an effectual call. What is meant by the general
call is when God's messengers, God's preachers are instructed
to preach the gospel to every creature. It's not my business
to distinguish who may or may not be a subject of God's mercy. It's my business to preach the
gospel to every creature. It is the general call wherein
God hath commanded all men everywhere to repent. This general call leaves sinners
to themselves. It's what people call free will. But the truth is by the general
call, no one chooses Christ. No one comes to Christ. No one
truly repents. Why? Because man's will is not
free. It's in bondage to sin and Satan,
and will not, yea, cannot come to Christ. But the effectual
call is something else. God's effectual call involves
a quickening work, a regenerating work of the Holy Spirit. It is
personal. It is powerful. It is effectual. Not that the general call is
without value and without purpose. God can and does work through
and the preaching of the gospel and the giving out of God's word
and the testifying of God's grace in any manner. God works through
that at his discretion, not ours. to make an effectual call to
the hearts of certain individuals chosen in Christ from eternity. As we consider this thing of
effectual calling, there's another term often used to express the
same truth, and it's the term irresistible grace, that the
grace of God conquers the rebellion in a sinner's heart and draws
that sinner to Christ. It's the same truth. But to me,
the term irresistible grace magnifies our inability to resist, and
that's true. But the term effectual calling
magnifies God's ability to make his call effectual. And that's the thing we're talking
about. Most of you, who grew up in this part of the world.
Many of you grew up in these little mountain churches. And
you've all heard a story similar to the one I'm fixing to tell
you. A young man or woman, boy or girl, stands in church under
conviction. And he or she grips the bench
in front of him while they sing seventeen stanzas of an invitation
hymn, trying to get them to come down to the front. He or she
refuses. They go out, they get in a car
wreck, they get killed, and wind up in hell. God was so close,
but he failed. Satan won. And Satan is going
to be able to giggle and point his finger in God's face forever
and say, I got one you wanted. I don't believe a word of it.
I don't believe a word of it. I believe in effectual God's
effectual calling. From eternity, God Almighty,
God the Father, gave a specific number from among Adam's race,
yet uncreated, but God gave them to His Son. That's what the Scripture
says several, several times in John 17. Them which thou hast
given me, them which thou gavest me. Now, these that the Father
gave to the Son in eternity, all of which He would save by
His grace and give eternal life. It was for these that Christ
contracted in eternity, covenanted with the Father and the Holy
Ghost to come into this world and die for. It was for these that His blood
atoned for their sins. It is these for whom Christ died
that are accepted with God in Him. Ephesians 1, 6, in the beloved. It is these that cannot perish
but have everlasting life in Him. It is these who by the effectual
calling of God the Spirit are brought to believe on Christ
and cannot disbelieve. A believer can no more disbelieve
than an unbeliever can believe. I'm glad I can't quit believing.
Now, I could quit coming. I could quit trying to do right.
I could start doing a lot more bad than I do. But I can't quit
believing. Uh-uh. No. It is the effectual
calling of God that makes the difference. John 6, 44, Jesus
said, no man can come unto me. It's not won't come, it's can't
come. No man can come to me except
the Father which sent me draw him. It is my business to preach
that Christ loved and died for sinners such as you are. It is not my business to convince
you that you're one of them. That's his business. That's the
call made affectionately in your heart by the Holy Ghost. I want
to tell you there's multitudes sitting on church pews this morning
that think they're God's child, think they're saved, think they
have a ticket to heaven because some preacher told some sob sentimental
snot-slinging story, got them down the aisle. Do you believe
Jesus is the Son of God? Yeah. You believe He died on
the cross for your sins? Yeah. Then you're going to heaven.
I've been sitting that way for years. I don't want to be guilty
of that. I'm not going to be guilty of that. So I repeat this. It is my business to preach that
Christ died for sinners such as you are. You're not without
hope. You're not too bad. You're not
too far gone. Christ died for sinners such
as you are. But it is not my business to
convince you that you're one of them. That's his business. That's the call made effectual
in your heart by the Holy Spirit. Now, I can tell you there is
hope for such as you are. But only God can bring you to
really trust Christ as your hope. Now, John 6, 37, Christ said,
All that the Father giveth me shall come to me. It's not that some of them might
come or all of them might come. It's all of them shall come. Everyone. And when they come, Christ says,
I will never, not under any circumstances, in no wise, I will never cast
one of them out. I hear preachers quote that to
the world. Well, I'll tell you right now,
you read this book and you'll find that he cast a bunch of
them out. But they weren't his. They weren't those given him
of the Father. I want to say this morning, many
who come to the preacher, are rejected of God. Many who come
to church are rejected of God. But I promise you, no one who
truly comes to Christ is rejected of God. And it is only by this
divine work, this effectual calling of the Holy Spirit, that anyone
comes to Christ. Now let's look at this text for
a little bit this morning. And the setting is this, David
is in hiding Because Saul, the king, wants to kill him. David
has been anointed by Samuel. He has, just as a teenage boy,
he has slain Goliath. He has conquered. And in reality,
David is the king. Saul is still living in the White
House, but David is the king. And until God removes Saul, David
will not, and you've read this, he will not, of his own accord,
ascend the throne. So he's in hiding. And here he
goes to live in a cave called Adullam. And the Lord, not David,
but the Lord, starts to build an army around David. It's not
Saul's army. It's God's army. And it's not
the successful upper class part of society. But we've read here
in verse two, a threefold description of these 400 men who came and
joined themselves to David and made him captain over them. Look
what it says, and everyone that was in distress, that's the first
thing, and everyone that was in debt, and everyone that was
discontented. Everyone that was in distress,
everyone that was in debt, and everyone that was discontented. Translated into spiritual language,
These three conditions are a description of how God moves men to flee
to the greater David, the Lord Jesus Christ. The name David
means beloved. The Lord Jesus Christ truly is
the beloved. Now, these conditions were used
of God affectionately to bring men to David. And so is God's
working in sinners' hearts, in providence, in circumstances. He makes it effectual to draw
men to Christ. So let's look at these three
things for a few minutes. First, everyone that was in distress
The Hebrew word used here for distress is not just stress. We've all got plenty of that.
We've all got plenty of that in this day and hour. But the
word means confinement or disability, referring to any physical handicap. These were men not physically
able to come to David, but they came to David. We do know that later on over
in chapter 30, when David goes to battle, he's up to 600 men,
but 200 of them were not able to go fight. A third of his men,
not able. And you know that story about
their Ziklag, 200 of them stayed behind with the stuff while 400
of them went and fought. And what all these handicaps
were, we do not know. But they all came to David. Not physically able to come,
no doubt, but they came. Now, if these men had been able
to care for themselves and to enjoy life, why would they leave
their homes and go to live with a man in a cave who according
to the news media, coming right out of Saul's palace, said this
man was an outlaw, a fugitive, on the run, and he is wanted
dead or alive. No man without distress would
go and join himself to David. Yet, everyone that was in distress
came to David. Then it said, everyone that was
in debt, what man, if he had a good job and could pay his
bills and was making good money and saving money and well on
his way to becoming wealthy, what man in that shape would
leave his job and his house he had bought and go live in a cave
with a bunch of men who had nothing and are seemingly going nowhere.
No man would do that. And yet, we read that everyone
that was in debt came to David. And then the third thing, and
everyone that was discontented. Discontentment. What man with
a good family wife, children, good friends he could depend
on. They could depend on him. They helped each other. He had
a great deal of enjoyment and contentment in life. What man
would leave that and go join a man living in a cave with a
bunch of losers who seemingly have nothing to live for? No
man would do that. But yet, Because of these things,
distress, debt, discontentment, these men went and identified
themselves with David, and he received them gladly. But that
was not the cave they were interested in. It was not the cave they
tried. It was David himself. It was
David who became these men's home. and help and hope. Wherever David went was home
to them. And what a picture this is of
who can and who does flee to Christ. It is sinners like myself
brought by the Spirit of God to such distress, first over
the defilement of my sin. Distress. I must flee to Christ,
distressed over my sin. Our part of the country is eat
up with religious folk, distressed over somebody else's sin. I mean, what everybody else is
doing is so much worse than what I do. And people are distressed over
what their reputation is doing to our church. Oh, we'd be so
much better off if they had straightened up. I want to tell you something.
God's child is distressed over his or her own sin. Over the defilement of it. What
sin has cost me. How sin has corrupted me. defile
me, sin in my nature, sin in my heart, sin in my mind, sin
in my thoughts, sin in my words, sin in my actions. This is where God's children
live. I hear good people say, well, back when I was a sinner, I used to be a sinner. The Apostle
Paul said when he is way near the end of the journey, he said,
I still am. And not only that, I'm still
the chief of them. Some false prophet nowadays claims
to be a Baptist screaming at folks, you need to get the sin
out of your life. Sin is in your nature. It's not
just what you do, it's what you are. It's what makes you have those
thoughts and those feelings. You know we're not right. Your
conduct may have improved and should improve and will improve
if the Lord does a work in your heart. But at the same time,
you're no less a sinner than you've always been. Hopefully
you practice a little less wrongdoing, but you're no less a sinner by
nature. And God's children feel this
and know this about ourselves. And not only the defilement,
but there's the distress of our deadness toward God. I'm just
being honest with you this morning, folks. Now, we're not dead. We're
alive in Christ Jesus. But sin in our nature produces
such a feeling of deadness toward God. Till we're brought to ask
sometimes, do I love him at all? Sometimes I don't act like it.
Sometimes I don't feel like it. And what distress that is. But
only God's children deal with that. We have to cry with the psalmist,
quicken me, O Lord. Make me feel alive. The psalmist
was alive, but he felt constant need of quickening, and so do
I. That's evidence of life. That's
God's children. Then there's the distress of
seeming distance from God. We know he lives in our hearts,
but sometimes he seems a million miles away. Excuse me from this crowd that
gets a special and fresh word from God every five minutes.
I don't believe it. Job said, Oh, that I knew where
I might find him. Boy, he was a godly man. He was
in such distressing circumstances. He couldn't find God. He said,
I go forward, and he's not there. Backward, and I cannot perceive
him. On my left hand, on my right
hand, talking out of God's book about godly men, not religious
men. Not people we've known who would
have us think they never have one ounce of unbelief. It's just
not so. God's true children are ever
so distressed over sin in our actions openly, sin in our thoughts
privately, sin in our words audibly, sin in our hearts secretly. And this distress is what keeps
me continuously fleeing to Christ. I need Him more today than I
did yesterday. And I'll need Him still more
tomorrow. You say, don't you count on doing a little better?
I'm counting on it, but I may not. I'm not counting on needing
Him any less. I promise you that. And in this
text, it took that distress in these men's hearts to leave all
and run to David. And it takes this distress of
heart, distress in spirit, to bring anyone to flee to Christ. And from which comes this distress?
Only from the quickening power of the Spirit of God. His work
is Effectual. Today's religious method. By the way, that's where the
term Methodist come from. They've got a method. And so-called
Baptists are no different. They got a method. One, two,
three and you're in. So foolish. as to think you can
just go out and persuade people to come to Christ, drag them
down the aisle, have a big emotional boo-hoo, and think, boy, we're
getting the job done. No. If the Spirit of God has
not done His work of bringing this great distress of the heart
over sin, all you've done is make them two-fold more the child
of hell. And if that's what you want, there's one on about every
corner in this county that's doing that and having two or
three services on Sunday and boasting about it because they're
getting so many people ready to go to heaven. Ain't nobody
getting nobody ready to go to heaven but the Lord himself.
He owns heaven. Look at the next word. and everyone
that was in debt, a debtor to the perfect law of a holy God. Not one of Adam's seed has ever
come close to being able to pay a bit of it. Not even pay a little
bit on the debt. No. And apart from God's working
affectionately in the heart, no one worries about paying it. But those quickened by God's
Spirit, those in whom He works affectionately, the effect is
that we're brought to fear the judgment of Almighty God. For what? For non-payment of
our great debt. These men in the text felt their
hopelessness and they felt their hopeless condition of debt. They
could never pay out. But they had heard of one named
David who was suffering for a debt
he did not owe. Saul has no right to hound David. He has a right to hound these
men, but not David. So it's in these men's hearts
to do what they do. We'll go and cast ourselves upon
the mercy of David. And if he'll receive us, we'll
serve him as long as we live. and he received them. While this religious world is
telling you how to go through some 1, 2, 3 and straighten up
a little bit, the Spirit of God would say to you, give up! Quit
trying to make it on your own. Flee to David. Flee to Christ. In the cave, casting all your
care upon Him, for He cares about you. everyone that was discontented. Discontent. Discontentment. I wonder how many of these guys
lived in a million dollar house with a good wife and children
and highly respected in the community and played golf with his friends
every afternoon and just enjoyed life perfectly contented. I'll
tell you how many of them. Not one. They were discontented. And they longed in their hearts
to belong somewhere. To be worth something to somebody. To fit in for their life to have
a meaning. And their discontentment caused
them to flee to Christ. It was effectual. It was effectual. Someone may be listening this
morning, and your life is just like a
squirrel in a cage. You're on that wheel, running
yourself to death and going nowhere. But I want to say, if you're
one of those wandering sheep the shepherd is seeking, Discontentment will so overwhelm
you. In God's time, you'll flee to
Christ. You won't need any preacher.
You won't need any so-called soul winner to put you under
a guilt trip. You'll crawl off somewhere and
gladly pour out your heart to God and tell Him how sorry and
low down you are and how guilty you are. how wretched you are,
how unworthy you are. God, the Holy Spirit, works effectually. If you're one of His, if you're
to be God, He'll get you. He'll get you. Now in the latter part of verse
2, we learn that not one of these
men came to David to start telling him how it ought to be done. Uh uh. They all came broken men. They all came ready to submit. They all came ready to do the
bidding of David. They made him captain over them. And then note the total success.
It's everyone that was distressed, everyone that was in debt, everyone
that was discontented. Not some of them, but every one
of them. And that's what Christ said,
John 6, 37, all that the father giveth me shall come to me. And when they come. I will in
no wise, not under any circumstances, ever cast them out. Everyone
whom the Spirit of God calls affectionately will flee and
flee successfully to Christ. Our Lord addressed this in Matthew
11, 28 when he said, Come unto me, all ye that labor and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Now he wasn't talking
about laboring over at the factory, working overtime and carrying
a heavy load of goods on you. He wasn't talking about that.
He's talking about laboring, laboring, laboring night and
day to deal with your sin. What am I going to do about this
business that I know I've got to face God someday? Struggling under the load of it. Heavy laden. Christ said, bring it to me. You can come to me if you're
laboring and heavy laden over this. You can come to me. You're
the only kind that can come to me. And I'll give you rest. Anyone can come to church. Anyone
can play religion. But only hearts troubled over
their sins can come to Christ. Nobody else feels the need to
come to Him. Oh, you may feel the need to straighten up a little
bit, do a little better. But until the Spirit of God opens the door in you, shows
you the corruption, and you feel the guilt and the
shame, then and then only will you cry to him. As the songwriter
did, I need thee. Oh, I need thee. Every hour,
I need thee. The greatest news conscious sinners ever heard
is, this man receiveth sinners. He had nothing for good people. He came and died for sinners. The whole need not a physician,
but them that are sick. And our Lord said, I've not come
to call the righteous, that is, those who think they are, but
I've come to call sinners to repentance. It's when fleeing to Christ ceases
to be an option. That's what men preach today.
But it's when fleeing to Christ ceases to be an option, and becomes a dire necessity,
then and then only will you flee to Christ. As long as men are trying to
peddle out Jesus like a piece of merchandise on the shelf,
won't you come and have him today? No. He's waiting. He's pleading.
No, He's working effectually to find His sheep. And He'll
find everyone. He'll find everyone. He commanded to all men everywhere
to repent. But only those effectually called
ever do or can. One of the pictures I'll let
you go Just a few weeks prior to the time of our text here,
the people were praising David. Oh, Saul had slain his thousands,
but David had slain his 10,000. And now in just a short time, things have changed. David is rejected. He went down,
down, down. He's at the bottom, living in
a cave, low as low can go. In like manner, Christ our Lord
attracted the multitudes for a while. They were praising Him. But like David, it seemed like
Humanly speaking, he went down and down and down. Lost the crowd
he had. Wound up on a cross. Crucified. This cave here David
was in is representative of Joseph's tomb. Our Lord went down. and down, rejected, condemned,
crucified, and buried. These men fleeing to David in
the cave are a picture of sinners fleeing to Christ, crucified. We believe that in Him, in His
shed blood, trusting in Him, bowing to Him, making Him, as
they did, captain over us, that our lives are not over. Those
men thought, if we can get to David, there's hope. He's not
going to stay in that cave from now on. He's coming out of there.
He's coming out of there. He's already the king in these
men's hearts. He's coming out of there, and
we want to be with Him when He does. Oh, our Lord was crucified, died
and buried, this tomb sealed. Oh, but he came out. And all
those who are able to flee to him come out with him. It is only as you identify with
the crucified one, lose your pride, Go into the grave with
Him that you'll ever really live. Only the Spirit of God can and
does bring God's elect to flee to Christ. He's not losing any. The Good Shepherd rescues all
that are His. Hell can claim nothing that belongs
to heaven. Satan cannot get a wand that
belongs to Christ. Why? Because the power of Almighty
God, the Omnipotent One, the Sovereign One, is successful. His calling is effectual. We're talking to you about God's
effectual calling. Fallen sinners fleeing to Christ. Oh, that God would touch some
heart today and call some heart today to see the condition of
this sin-cursed flesh and this corrupt heart before God and
flee to Christ.