Now I turn with me back to 2
Timothy chapter 4. My message to you this morning
is plain words in troubled times. Plain words in troubled times. 2 Timothy 4, verse 1. I charge thee therefore before
God. Now that therefore has to do
with the Scriptures and this young man's calling. The Scriptures
being inspired of God, being His foundation, the one foundation
that could give life to a dead soul. the seed of regeneration. He said, you've known these things.
Your grandmother Lois taught you these things when you was
a child. Some of you have small children
in here, and you wonder, what can I do for them? What can I
teach them? Teach them the Word of God. Read to them the Word
of God. Well, they can't remember very
much. They don't have to. But read
to them what they can. teaching that his grandmother
Lois taught him from the time he was old enough to understand
what words were, the Holy Scriptures. And Paul said, these Scriptures
are able to make thee wise unto salvation. He said, I charge thee therefore
before God. And this young man was called
to preach the Gospel of Christ. He was a young pastor, an evangelist. Paul's understudy. And Paul gives
him this charge. What a solemn charge this is
that this man delivers to this young boy. He said, I charge
thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall
judge the quick and the dead at His appearing and His kingdom. Preach the Word. Preach the Word. Don't get caught up in the issues
and agendas and concerns of this world. Don't get sidetracked when these
evil men and seducers begin to come along with their false charges
and their pet peeves and begin to get on and stir things up. Don't get caught up in that.
Don't get sucked into that. That's a black hole. Don't go
there. Don't get into that. Preach the
Word. Don't get caught up in the issues,
agendas, and concerns of this world, and don't get caught up
in the issues, programs, and concerns of worldly religion.
Preach the Word. Stand up and tell folks the Word
of God. Don't tell them what somebody
said. Tell them what God said. Tell
them what God said. Who cares what somebody said
back in the 16th century? What God said, that's what I
want to know. What did He say? Preach the word and be instant. I believe this term means to
be always ready. Always ready. Commit as much
as you can to memory. Don't let your guard down. Be
ready. Be ready. Who knows when God
is going to work? I'll tell you when He works in
my ministry when I think nothing is going on. When I get the most
depressed and the most downhearted, then I start getting phone calls
and letters on the internet. I've been listening to you for
two years. A lady wrote me this week out
in Montana. Our pastor is in the last stages of a horrible disease, and he's
not able to preach anymore. But we still go down there, and
we still meet, and we still worship God. And I suppose they're meeting,
listening to tapes and CDs and whatever, DVDs, whatever they
can get their hands on, visiting pastors. But she said, I've been listening.
I didn't know that. She'd been listening to me for two years.
A young man out in California wrote me last week, told me the
same thing. He'd been listening to me, heard
me on the Internet, been listening to the messages, and so encouraged. I didn't know God was doing anything.
I didn't hear anything from anybody. Be interested. I don't know when
God works. I don't know when God is going to use me. I don't know a year from now
where I'm going to preach. I don't know where I'm going
to preach tomorrow. Commit these things to your memory.
Be instant, in season, out of season. In Colossians 4, verse
6, he said, let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with
salt, that you may know how to answer every man. Somebody is
going to ask you, somebody is going to ask you, what is it
you really believe? Huh? Can you tell them? Can you tell them? Can you tell
them right? Can you tell them graciously? Can you season what you're saying
with a little salt? Boy, food ain't worth eating
without salt, is it? Huh? I got a big mouthful of
green beans the other day and it didn't have any salt on it.
It's just bland as it could be. Season it. That's what Paul said. Season this thing. Talk with
grace. Be gracious. When they ask you,
be gracious. Don't wait on the spur of the
moment because you're not going to be gracious then. You've had
no forethought about it. You have anything, they're going
to say something to you. They're going to cut you to the bone.
You're going to turn around and take your head off. Be gracious. Season. Plan what
you're going to say and season it. if you can. I'm not telling
you to compromise it or cut it. I'm just saying season it a little
bit. Season it. And then over in 1 Peter 3, verse
15, Peter said, Sanctify the Lord God in your hearts, and
be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you
a reason of the hope that's in you. Now listen, with meekness
and fear. Now, the only way you're going
to do that is to sanctify the Lord God in your heart. That
is, to think on His name, who He is, how great He is. Think of His excellency and His
majesty, of His person, of the vastness and the scope of all
that He's done, and think on that. And then think on you,
who you are. Who is man that thou art mindful
of Him? Think on that. And then when
somebody asks you a reason for the hope that's in you, you can
tell him with meekness and fear. I'm nobody. I'm just an object
of His grace. And then in Titus 1, verse 9,
talking to pastors, he tells us to hold fast the faithful
word as we've been taught. that we may be able by sound
doctrine both to exhort and convince the gainsayers. Preach the word. That's what
Paul told Timothy. Be instant in season and out
of season. Reprove, rebuke, exhort with
all long-suffering and doctrine. Verse 3, for the time will come
when they will not endure sound doctrine. We're already there. We're already there. But after
their own lust shall they heap to themselves teachers having
itching ears. Now watch what happens. What's
the influence of that? What's the outcome of that? When
men won't endure sound doctrine, when they're just not going to
have it, they're not going to listen to it, What happens? They go somewhere else. And they
get them a building, and they hire them a preacher, and they
heap to themselves teachers having itching ears. Now watch what
happens, verse 4. And they shall turn away their
ears from the truth. How they do that? How does a false prophet turn
away your ears from the truth? You know the truth. You know the truth, so how does
he turn your ears away from the truth? By making things appear
to be issues that are not issues. By making things to appear to
be concerns that are not really concerns. He builds a straw man
and beats him to death. That's how he turns your eyes
from the truth. He makes a big fuss over here
about liquor and alcohol and all of these things. And while
you're looking at it, and justly so, it's definitely an evil. Here's these people whose lives
are ruined by it and all these things. And, well, this must
be a good thing. And you join in with him. Well,
you done left the only way to cure the man. You left that to
come over here. And they turn your ears from
the truth over here. What do they turn to? Fables. Ain't that what that says? Anybody
here know what a fable is? Some of you teachers, I know
you know what it is. Fable is a story with pretended
characters in it, isn't it? That's what a fable is. It's
a fable. And it's got characters in it.
They preach of Jesus just like I do. They preach salvation just
like I do. They got all these characters.
They got Christ in there and they got John the Baptist. They
got all these men in here. But they're fictitious. They're
not as they're set forth in the Word of God. And there's no remedy for this
generation except the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ
the Lord. That's the only remedy. Don't
move from that, Paul said. Don't be caught up in these things,
he said. They're over here turning eyes
and ears by the thousands away from the truth with these fables. There's no other basis of which
to shut the mouths of these unruly talkers except the Word of God. You're not going to gain any
ground or make any headway without a good understanding of the Word
of God and the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I've often stated this,
as I believe it bears repeating. I've got nothing for you in the
way of spiritual help, spiritual assistance, or spiritual comfort
apart from the Word of God. I wouldn't cross the street to
discuss it with you. If we're not going to come to
the Word of God, I've got nothing for you. I've got nothing for
you. I don't care what the Pope said,
and I'm not interested in what your grandma believed, and I
refuse to even consider anything that anybody has to say apart
from the Word of God. I'm not even interested. My friend,
it's God with whom we have to do. We're not going out there
to meet Grandma. We're going out there to meet
God. Grandma's got her place. Ought
to be an honored place in this world. But I'm telling you, she's
got no influence out there. You're going out there to meet
God. All things, Paul said, are naked
and open unto the eyes of Him with whom we have to do. And
nothing will ever do you any good until you resign to take
God at His word. This world and everybody in it
are under the curse of God. And they're going about, our
Lord said, exactly the way they did before the flood, living
out their days in the lust of their flesh, fulfilling the desires
of the flesh and of the mind, and are by nature children of
wrath. They're all on the broad road
to destruction. doing what seems right to them
and what seems right to their friends and doing what their
parents and teachers told them to do. And they're marrying and
giving in marriage and building businesses and doing this and
doing that. And nobody has any concern for
the truth. The truth. Trying to raise their children
the best way they know how. And they are unsuspecting and
unafraid and uninterested. And they know not, our Lord said,
they knew not until the flood came and took them away. That's when they knew. That's when they knew. Now listen.
So shall also the coming of the Son of Man. 2 Timothy 4 verse 3, for the time
will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but after
their own lusts shall heap to themselves teachers having itching
ears, and shall turn away their ears from the truth and shall
be turned to fables. Actually, a fable has two definitions. One is that it's a story with
pretended characters in it with a hidden lesson. That's one definition. The second definition, according
to the dictionary, is a falsehood and a lie, a fable. And I believe both of these definitions
fit the context of this verse. We're living in the days described
in this verse. And I don't know more than a
few hundred people in this whole nation that will endure sound
doctrine. Do you? I don't know more than just a
few hundred in the whole country. I heard somebody the other day,
one of the candidates talking about a potential, I mean potential,
oh I know what it was, it was a weather channel. They were
talking about that hurricane that's coming in. Something like 7 or
8 million people up there could be affected by this great storm
that's coming in on the coast. I don't know but a few hundred
people in the whole nation. Do you? who know God, who worship
God, that will endure sound doctrine,
but that heap to themselves teachers, teachers to tell them fables. Tell me fables. Don't preach
to my heart. Just tell me fables. Just tickle
my ears. Pump me up a little bit so I
can go back out there. I'm already full of hot air,
but I've let a lot of it out and I need a little more. Just
pump me up and I'll be ready to go. I'm saying that the overwhelming
majority of so-called Christian religion in our day is nothing
more than the preaching of fables. Let me give you a few of these
fables along with the Word of Truth. To preach of God, here's
the first thing. To preach a God who's willing
to compromise his character in any way to accomplish his will
is a fable. That's a lie. That's lying on
God. God's not going to compromise
his justice and holiness, not even to save his own son. Where
in the world did men get the idea that God would change or
compromise his character? He said, I'm the Lord, I change
not. I'm not going to change. My justice
is not going to change. My holiness is not going to change.
My righteousness is not going to change. I'm not going to change.
I'm not going to change in my purpose. I'm not going to change
in my grace. I'm not going to change. God's not going to compromise.
When He said, the soul that sinneth shall surely die, write it down.
That soul is going to die. That's old going to die. When
he says that every transgression shall receive a due recompense
of reward, mark it down. It will. It will. James said, with him there is
no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Everything our God
does is consistent with his own character. and to preach to men
and women that God will change or has changed or might change
or might be willing to change or lower His standards of justice
and holiness is nothing more than a fable. It's a lie. I'm
not going to do that. God saves sinners in Christ. He satisfies His justice in Christ. He satisfies His holiness in
His righteous obedience. And he's the end of the law for
righteousness to everyone that believe him. He's not going to
change. And then secondly, it's the preaching
of fables to declare that man's destiny is decided by his free
will. I'm going to give you two things
here. First of all, man's will is not free. He don't have a
free will. That's a fable. That's a cartoon. That's a story with pretended
characters in it. Man don't have a free will. Man's
will's in bondage to his nature. In John chapter 5, verses 39
and 40, the Lord said to those scribes and Pharisees, you search
the scriptures. That's what I'm telling you to
do, search the Scriptures. He said, you do that. You search
the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life.
And they are they which testify of me. But now watch this. But
you will not, will not, you're not willing. I read seven other
translations of the Bible. Every one of them said, you are
not willing to come to me that you might have life. You won't
do it. That don't sound like free will
to me. That sounds like will not. Will not. Listen to this, John 6, verse
44. No man can come to me except
the Father which sent me draw him. Now if I remember my basic
English, may has to do with permission and can has to do with ability.
He said here, no man can. He don't have the ability. No
man can come to me except the Father which sent me draw him.
And then he tells us in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 14, that the natural
man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, their foolishness
unto him. Now listen, neither can he know
them, for they are spiritually discerned.
Man's will is not free. And then the second thing here
is salvation is not of man's will. Free or not, it's not of
his will. It's not of him who willeth. Ain't that what Romans chapter
9 says? Not of him that willeth. It's
just a smoke screen that Satan has put into the heads of foolish
men, and they're over here just beating this thing to death,
and arguing about it, and writing articles about it, and man's
free will. It's not of him that willeth,
honey. You're just studying something for nothing. Nobody's saying
that God's going to save you against your will. But He's going
to make you willing in the day of His power. But regardless
of what He does, it's not of your will. If words mean anything,
Romans 9, 16 tells us, it's not of Him that willeth. So why is
that an issue? You see what I'm saying? Man's
free will is a fable. It's a lie. And it turns men's
eyes from the truth. In John 1, verse 12, there were
some folks there who received Christ and believed on His name.
Nobody else would. The world wouldn't. He came into
the world. He made the world. The world
wouldn't have Him. He came unto His own, to His
own people, to His own nation. They wouldn't have Him. But somebody
did. Somebody did. Some of them received. Some of them believed on His
name. And the reason, John tells us, is that they were given the
right and privilege to become the sons of God by a new birth. And that birth, he says, was
not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will
of man, but of God. And then thirdly, it's an absolute
fable to believe that men can win the approval of God, His
blessing, and His affection by their works. Now listen to me. God says by
His own examination in the Psalms, if you want to look it up, there's
none righteous. He looked down from heaven to
see. for himself, his own examination,
David said. He looked down to see. And there
was none righteous, none that understandeth, none that seeketh
after God, none good, no, not one. He said, the whole of man
together is become unprofitable. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. He said, we are as an unclean
thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rag. He said, we
go astray as soon as we be born speaking lies. God says that
the man at his best state is altogether vanity. He loves darkness
and hates light. He calls good evil and evil good,
and he drinks iniquity like water. Now pray tell me how such a creature
could even in your wildest imagination please God. You wouldn't let that kind of
a man in your house, would you? Here's the fourth thing. It's
the preaching of a fable to tell men and women that they're saved
or can be benefited at all by any kind of works religion. That's
a falsehood. That's a falsehood. Paul said, God saved us and called
us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to
His own purpose and grace given us in Christ Jesus before the
world began. He said in Ephesians chapter
2, he said, by grace are you saved through faith and that
not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. And then he tells the Galatians,
he said, I do not frustrate the grace of God, Galatians 2.21. If righteousness come by the
law, men's obedience to the law, then Christ is dead and vain.
How is a religion like that going to benefit anybody? Huh? I'll tell you what religion like
that does. It turns your eyes from the truth. It has a smoke screen over here.
This country is in a horrible moral condition. I agree with
you. You're right on the button. It is. It's the worst I've ever
seen in my lifetime. Degenerating every day, more
and more and more. You can't turn the TV on in the
morning, a bunch of gays on there talking to one another about
stuff. Down there listening to them in the morning, going back
and forth discussing politics and growth of the country and
all this kind of nonsense, you can't hardly turn on a news channel
without it. It's a fable that turns your
eyes from the truth to tell men and women that they can reform
their lives and live as Christians. This is the fifth thing. Without
the work of the Holy Ghost in them. It's just a lie. Oh, you've got to turn over a
new leaf. Honey, you can't turn it over. You can't turn it over. Because it's the same on either
side. It's evil all the way through. Ain't that what the Lord said?
It's not something that goes into the mouth that defiles you.
It's what comes out of the heart. You're evil from the inside out.
You can't turn over the leaf, and if you did, It's still a
leaf. Their minds, Paul said, are enmity
against God. Job said, they're a few days
and full of trouble. And the Lord said, the strong
man keeps his goods at peace. You're not going to turn anything.
The only way anything can happen is for one stronger than him
to come in and take it from him. and free the man, set the captive
free. That's what has to take place.
Natural man cannot produce one single spiritual fruit. He can't do it. He can't produce
faith, not as it's set forth in the Word of God. He can't
do it. Persevering faith, faith that will pass through trials,
faith that will move mountains, faith that believes God no matter
what. Faith, true saving faith, faith
that changes a man, turns a man. He can't produce that. You can't
produce that on your own. You're whistling in the wind.
And he can't produce love if love is defined in the Scriptures.
The only way you can produce that love is to experience it
in your heart by the grace of God. That's what John said. That's how I know that you've
passed from death unto life. You love the brethren. You didn't
before. If you was of the world, the
world would love his own. But you're not of the world,
therefore the world don't like you. Huh? I'll tell you how long they'll
like you until you tell them the truth. He can't worship in spirit and
truth. He can't do it. He has to have
some candles. Just give me some candles over
here. Put a little sin in them so the smell gets out. I don't
know what that is. It's a religious smell. If you've
ever been one of them places, you know exactly what I'm talking
about. There's a smell in there. They
identify that with religion. You ever notice a man gets saved
and he comes away and he's dressed like everybody else in that church?
Some religions are more noticeable than others. You see their hair
all up and buns and them long dresses down to the ground and
everything. They start to talk. They've got
their own language. They've got their own language. But they can't worship in spirit
and truth. They can't do it. They can't
just hear the gospel and rejoice in it. They can't just hear about
the victorious Christ and find hope in it. They've got to have
some candles and something else because they're dead. That's
why. They're dead. They can't turn
from their sins. What they do is quit worldly
sins and start religious sins. But they can't leave their sins.
They can't turn from them. And I don't know if you know
it or not, but religious sins are sins of self-righteousness.
A man says he does this and then he feels like he's righteous
because he did that sin. That's what that is. That ain't
righteousness, that's sin. That's not a good thing, that's
a bad thing. That man will die and go out and meet God and think
he's righteous. That's what our Lord said that
many are going to say unto men that day, if not we preached
in thy name and did many wonderful works in thy name and all those
things. He can't worship in spirit and truth. He has to have other
things. He can't turn from his sins or self or the world. He
can't rejoice in the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace.
Jeremiah the prophet God said through His prophet, He said,
can the Ethiopian change the color of his skin? Can he sit
there by his free will and change it? I don't want to be black
anymore. I want to be white. I'm going to be Chinese this
week. Huh? He can't do it, can he? Can the
leopard change his spots? This is a spotted beast, a carnivore. Can he change what he is by nature?
No. It takes the work of God, don't
it? And so it is in the lives of men and women who are true
Christians who produce true spiritual fruit. It takes the Holy Ghost
in you. It's God that works within you.
That's what Paul told the Thessalonians. There is no working out of salvation
unless God works in you both to will and to do of His good
pleasure. A natural man cannot rejoice
in the gospel of God's free and sovereign grace. He just can't
do it. All right, here's the sixth thing. It's the preaching
of a fable to tell men and women that coming to the front of the
church is synonymous with coming to God. There's no God up here. There's no God in that dish or
in that table. No God up here. God's everywhere. God's Spirit, He's everywhere
present all at one time. A one mediator between God and
me and the man Christ Jesus. And He and He alone God set forth
as the propitiation for our sins. This is the only way to God.
If you're going to come to God, you're going to have to go through
Him. You can't know God apart from Him. No man knoweth the
Father save the Son, and He to whom the Son will reveal it.
You can't come to God. No man cometh unto the Father
but by Me. That's what He said. There's
no other way, no other basis, no other source, no other foundation,
no other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved. It's in Christ alone God is enabled
without compromise to be just and justify the believer. And this is what He reveals in
the hearts of chosen sinners. And they come to Him in an act
of faith, and submit themselves to Him, and commit themselves
to Him, and confess Him in believers' baptism. Here's the seventh thing. It's
a fable to think that in order for Christ to have an active
influence in your life, you must give Him permission. Huh? Some of you are smiling because
you've heard preachers say it, haven't you? I bet one time you
believed it yourself. I did. I thought you had to give
him permission to be Lord. I thought you had to make Jesus
your Lord. That's what I was told. That's what I was told. My friend the Bible said he's
Lord. Period. He's Lord. He is Lord of creation. Not one
thing was created apart from Him. He is the sustainer of the
universe. By Him all things consist. Ain't
that what the Bible says? He commands the winds and the
waves and they obey His voice. We just studied that a few weeks
ago. He orders diseases and devils to leave your body, and they
leave, or to enter it. He caused leprosy to enter into
Miriam's body, didn't He? Yes, He did. And then He commanded
it to leave. The nations, Isaiah said, before
Him are but a drop of the bucket, and they're counted as nothing
and less than nothing. He's Lord, absolute, indisputable,
sovereign Lord. He's Lord of the dead and Lord
of the living. And He is at all times and even
at this very second, your Lord. Yes, He is. He's your Lord. He's Lord by virtue of God's
appointment. He is Lord by virtue of His accomplishments,
and He is Lord by virtue of His excellence. He is the brightness
of the Father's glory and express image of His person, and He is
air of all things. And I tell you this, everything
in time and eternity serves Him. It serves Him. Not a sparrow
can fall to the ground. Not a hair can fall from your
head, but by Him. And it's in His hand to make
you a vessel of honor and a trophy of His grace or to make you a
vessel of dishonor and send you strong delusion to believe a
lie. He's Lord. He's Lord. It's not a matter of making Jesus
your Lord. It's a matter of bowing to Jesus
who's already Lord. All right, here's number eight.
It's the preaching of a fable to teach men and women that they
can worship God any way they want to. Huh? You can't worship God any way
you want to. Israel thought that. God had
already warned them about it. He said, when you go over there,
he said, you're going over into the land of the heathens. And
they build groves up on the mountains, and they have little waterfalls.
They build cathedrals and statues and carve out wooden images.
Now, don't mix those things. When you come into my house,
here's the order of worship. And he pictures all those things
to Israel. We're going to be getting into
that on our Wednesday night studies. God is worshipped in spirit and
truth. That is, in the revelation of
Christ through the preaching of the gospel. And he's worshiped
as he is, as he declares himself to be, and as he manifests himself
in the person of his son. And if we sing, Paul said, you
better sing with the understanding. And now what he told those Corinthians?
You don't just sing. Singing ain't worship unless
you sing with some understanding. Then you can worship God. And
he said, if we pray, Praying is not worshiping God. All prayer
doesn't worship God. Paul said, when you pray, pray
with the understanding, didn't he? And especially if you speak,
he said, speak so that all who hear can be edified. You speak
with the understanding. And everything else, all the
crosses and candles and choirs and entertainment and unknown
tongues and all this spiritual junk All these testimonials and
sharing sessions and all these things, they're just fables.
They're fables. They're put there to appeal to
your flesh. And your flesh loves those things.
Loves those things. I remember one time I was in,
it's kind of like a Southern Baptist church. It was just kind
of a mountain. The mountains of Kentucky had
their own variety. I joined that little church,
didn't know any better. We walked down the aisle, went
to the mourner's bench, did all those things. We were trying
to... I don't know what we were trying to do. We just deceived.
Thought we was worshiping God. Thought we was worshiping God. We'd go into those places and
we'd do this, do that, do the next thing. We thought we were
really doing something. They believed in foot washing,
actually washing the saints' feet. We'd do that one time a
year and all this stuff. Thought we were worshiping God.
Then I found out who God was. Found out who God was. You find out who God is. Then
you'll find out how to worship Him. How to worship Him. Everything else, all these crosses
and candles and all these testimonials and sharing sessions and all
these things, they're all just fables. And then here's the ninth
thing. It's the preaching of fables
to tell men when they die that they go to a place where they
still have hope. That's a lie. Some people call it purgatory.
Some people call it shoal or whatever else you want to call
it. But they talk about a place where a man can go after he dies
and still have hope. The scripture said it's appointed
unto men once to die and after that the judgment. And I don't
care how much money you donate in the name or how many prayers
you pray or whether or not the church gives its approval. If
that man died in his sins, he's in hell. Write it down. If he died in unbelief, his destiny
is fixed forever. He that's filthy, let him be
filthy still. And then here's the tenth thing
and the last thing that I'm going to give you this morning. I could
go on for hours talking about this. It's the preaching of fables
to tell men and women that God loves everybody. That's a fable. That's just flat not so. A fellow said, well, show me in
the Bible where it says that. I said, OK. Turn to Romans chapter
9. I said, what's that say right there? Jacob have I loved, and
Esau have I hated. Well, yeah, but he said that
was after Esau sinned. I said, no, this is before Esau
was born. Ain't that what that says up
there? These two having not been born yet, neither having done
any good or evil, that the purpose of God, now listen, according
to election might stand. It was said unto her, the elder
is going to serve the younger, because Jacob have I loved. If
I didn't have another scripture in the Bible, that ought to be
sufficient, shouldn't it? But there's a lot more. He said,
He hateth all the workers of iniquity. That's everybody outside
of Christ. I'll tell you who God loves.
He loves His elect. He loves them. He loves them. Why does He love
them? It's all of grace. It ain't because of anything
in them. It ain't because of anything that they're going to
do someday. Looking down through the telescope of time, I've heard
that too. That's just not so. God loved
them with an everlasting love. Jacob have I loved. Can you in
your wildest imagination see anybody outside the ark in that
deluge singing, oh, how I love Jesus? The ground shooting up water
and it coming down so hard you couldn't see your hand in front
of you and that ark lifting up and floating away. Can you in
any stretch of the imagination visit anybody down in Sodom and
Gomorrah down there burned and burning and dying under the wrath
of God singing, Jesus loves me, this I know? Huh? You can't even think about it.
You can't even get a picture in your mind. But that's what's
being preached. That's what's being preached
every day. Every day I get up and hear it on the radio and
hear it on the TV. And I cannot believe that any
man in his right mind could say that God in His judgment will
look at these eternal objects of His love, those for whom He
sacrificed His Son, and say, depart from Me, you workers of
iniquity. I never knew you. You can't even
imagine that, can you? But that's what men are preaching.
God loves us. He does. He loves His elect. God loves us, the Bible says,
and He gave Himself for us. And that us is all that the Father
gave to the Son. And He prays for us. Christ said
over in John 17, He prays in His high priestly prayer that
the Father love them as He loved Him. You can't even imagine that,
can you? Huh? This old worthless worm who done nothing but rebel against
God since he was born. And God loves me in Christ exactly
as much as he loves his own son. You can't even imagine it. But
that's the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the grace
of God. Oh, may God help us in this little
ministry to tell as many people as means will allow the gospel
of God's saving grace in Christ and put an end to these fables
that's turning men's ears from the truth. And how are we going
to do it? We're going to put up signs and
billboards and march down 5th Avenue? No, we're going to preach. That's what Paul told him, son. Preach the Word. Let's don't get sidetracked with
things. Let's just preach the Word. If
we get a building, we'll get it. If we don't, let's preach
the Word. If God sends us a crowd, we'll
give Him the glory. But if He don't, let's preach
the Word. Because the only thing that's
going to make any difference is the Word of God preached to
chosen sinners. That's it. That's it. May God help us to understand
that. Our Father, we thank You for this blessed book and for Your Spirit that's given
us some understanding of these eternal things and these issues.
God, help us to be faithful in our day to do just what I said
this morning and preach His gospel for Christ's sake. Amen.