Let's be turning to Isaiah chapter
46. Isaiah 46. It's so good to be
back. I think it's been about five
years. We came by last year, but we
missed you. But it's good to be here now.
Let's look at Isaiah 46, and let's just look at these first
four verses. It says, "...Bell boweth down,
Nebo stoopeth. Their idols were upon the beasts
and upon the cattle. Your carriages were heavy loading. They were a burden to the weary
beasts. They stooped, they bowed down
together. They could not deliver the burden,
but themselves are gone into captivity. Hearken unto me, O
house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, which
are born by me from the belly, which are carried from the womb.
And even to your old age I am he. Even to whore hares will
I carry you. I have made and I will bear. Even I will carry and will deliver
you. Now, Baal and Nebo were the two
chief idols in Babylon. And whenever God sent Cyrus,
who was a good type of Christ, He sent him down to deliver the
children of Israel out of captivity, out of Babylon, Cyrus hauled
their idols away on wagons. And that's what he tells us here
in these first two verses. He says here that they put them
on those carriages and they were a burden to the weary beast.
They stooped, they bowed down together, they couldn't deliver
the burden. Those idols couldn't, but they
themselves went into captivity. And just as those worthless statues,
just as they were a heavy burden to those horses and those ox
or whatever they used to haul those wagons, Anything that a
sinner makes his confidence, anything that we make our confidence
instead of Christ, they'll fail to bear our burden. And instead,
there'll be a burden to us. Instead of carrying us, you'll
have to carry it. And instead of taking your burden,
it'll add to your burden. The Lord said, Cursed is he that
trusteth in man, and maketh flesh his arm. You know this, I am
sure, that an idol does not have to be made into an image. An
idol is an imagination of a man's heart. Imagination and image
come from the same word. It starts in the imagination
of the heart. And an idol is any kind of false
confidence. It can be some experience from
the past that somebody is putting their trust in. some kind of
personal achievements, or it can be services in religion,
or works of our hands, or folks make an idol out of faith. Their faith is an idol. Anything
that a sinner trusts in, rather than Christ alone, is idolatry. It's idolatry. It's man worship,
is what it is. There's something that's happening
in our present day that we've been warned about by the Lord,
and all the apostles wrote about it. Apostle Peter said about
false teachers, he said, they will privily bring in damnable
heresies. craftily, very cunningly come
in. And these are not these out and
out idolaters that's just obvious idolatry. We're talking about
folks who claim to preach the truth. Folks who claim to be
preaching redemption by the blood of Christ and claim themselves
to have been redeemed by the blood of Christ. But the message
they preach The very message they preach concerning who Christ
is and what He came to do and what He actually did, the message
they preach concerning Him just denies redemption altogether.
Now, you know that the Church of Rome, when you think of idolatry,
I think of Catholicism and the Church of Rome, and that's obvious
idolatry. That's just obvious with the
statues and all the pictures and all of those things. And
you can remember as late as 20 or 30 years ago, I can remember
preachers saying, it used to be a common phrase to say, God
has no hands but your hands and He's got no feet but your feet.
And that's idolatry. Let's look over at verse That's a description of this.
They bear him upon the shoulder, they carry him, they set him
in his place, and he standeth from his place, shall he not
remove? Yea, one shall cry unto him, yet he cannot answer, nor
save him out of his trouble. Now that's just as much an idol,
that's a description of an idol, but saying God's got no hands
but your hands, no feet but your feet is just as much an idol
as if you carved one out and made a statue and set him up,
told him he can't move unless you let him move, he can't do
unless you let him do. And you know when Satan came
to Eve in the garden, he came to Eve, that's who he came to
first, and he beguiled her. He came to her. And when the
Lord said Eve's going to be in subjection to Adam, That's a
picture of the bride of Christ being in subjection to Christ.
And that's our salvation. And this world is teaching just
the opposite of that. This world is teaching free will
religion, works religion. Religion is teaching the bride
that she can't do anything unless Christ lets her do it. It's teaching
the woman to usurp authority over the husband. And it's backwards. It's all together backwards.
And we see it all in the world, but it's happening in churches. The thing that I want you to
think about is this, and I'm seeing it so much where we are
up there, is that in our day, the old harlot is not dressed
so much like a harlot anymore. It used to be you could tell
free will works religion, and it's just free will works religion.
But it's so much more subtle now. She's trying to pass herself
off as truth. Just 20 or 30 years ago, you
could tell it. Today, the doctrine of grace,
particularly what folks call Calvinism, is extremely popular. It's extremely popular in the
letter. And I say in the letter because
of this. Their statements of faith will be orthodox. They'll
have statements of faith that are true. If they got it preached
what they say they believe, It'd be the gospel. But they say they
believe that, but what they get up and preach is not that. You'll
hear them say phrases like, Christ died for his people, and things
like that. And it sounds like they're preaching
the truth of particular redemption. But you just keep listening,
and they're preaching universal atonement. That's what they're
preaching. And it's much more subtle and crafty than I think
it has been in years past. It might be, I don't know what
you call that, but it's not the simplicity that's in Christ.
It's not just saying God chose a people and put them in Christ
and Christ came and He lived and established a righteousness
and went to the cross and redeemed them and bought them and purchased
them and put away their sin by the sacrifice of Himself. They're
going to be called. This gospel, He's going to cross
their path with it. The Spirit of God is going to
regenerate them. He's going to keep them. He's going to bring
them home. He's going to save them. It's not just a clear setting
forth of the truth. It's a mixing things and trying
to water things down. But, and the crazy thing about
it is, is folks seem very content. I've had folks come in, many
folks come in, and it seemed like they want a statement of
faith that they can just check off this list of things to make
sure, it's almost like Catholicism rubbing their rosary beads. They
just want to check it off. It's almost like worshiping a
system of orthodoxy, you know. But then, content just to sit
and listen to whatever, whatever priest. It's, it's, But, and
Christ said, if it were possible, they would deceive the very elect.
That's not, that, we're not talking about something that's just obvious
to a believer. This is, we're talking about
something that's cunning, something that's very crafty. And it's
no marvel, Paul said, for Satan himself is transformed into an
angel of light. It's no great thing if his ministers
also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness. who in shall
be according to their works." I know you're established in
the truth, but this is just something I'm seeing. I was just thinking
about this thing of idolatry. That was on my mind when I was
thinking about this this week. But guard against everything.
Anything that will be a rival of even the least of your confidence.
Christ is our rock. He is our solid rock. When you
walk through this earth, you need a foundation. You need ground.
If you know the ground is sure, you can take a step with confidence
and assurance. You know the ground is sure.
We need that in our heart. We need that. We need that. in
the message that is being declared and in what we are hearing so
that our hearts are assured. And Christ is that rock. He is
that foundation. Every bale and every nebo of
every kind, they are going to stoop and bow and be brought
down. Alright, here is the Word though of the eternal unchanging
Lord of salvation. And this is what I want to concentrate
on tonight. This is to all His blood-bought,
regenerated children of grace. He says, verse 3, Hearken unto
Me. hearken unto me, O house of Jacob,
and all the remnant of the house of Israel, which are born by
me from the belly, which are carried from the womb, and even
to your old age I am he, even to your gray hairs will I carry
you. I have made and I will bear,
even I will carry and will deliver you." the Lord's Word to His
spiritual Israel in our day just as much as it was to His true
Israel, His elect in the midst of Israel in that day. There's
some Israelites indeed here, sitting right here in the middle
of Taylor, Arkansas. Some elect according to the election
of grace. Some of His chosen, some of His
called. And this is what He says to you.
He says, hearken unto Me. Hearken unto Me. That's the only
way a sinner is going to hear and going to rejoice and going
to have this Word made effectual in our heart is if he speaks
this Word in the power of His grace, in the power of His Spirit
in our hearts, so that we truly hearken unto Him. That's what
I hope He'll do. I hope He causes us to hear His
voice just right in our hearts, right here, right now, tonight.
There's so many voices, so many things that we pay attention
to that we ought not pay attention to. I'm talking about brethren.
I'm talking about believers. Our adversary would love for
us to hearken to him so that he can beguile us just like he
did Eve in the garden. Peter said, whom resists steadfast
in the faith. You know what Peter is telling
us? The same thing the Lord said here, hearken unto me. Heed his
voice. Hear his voice. The old man of
our flesh, he's got his voice. And he's always got his voice
of temptation that would turn us aside. The Lord says, hug
up to Christ the Lord. Hug up to Him and hearken, listen,
heed His voice. We've got heavy trials. We've
got the weights and the burdens of these old shipwrecked bodies
that are just, it just gets more and more and worse and worse
the more we go. And these are great voices to
us. But God says to you, He says
to you that are born of His Spirit, He says there in verse 3, hearken
unto Me, you child of my grace." He says, you are born by me from
the belly. You are carried by me from the
womb. Even to your old age I am He. Even to gray hairs will I carry
you. We came down here and I wanted
to see I couldn't wait. I was just so excited. I wanted
to go around and see some of the things that, you know, I
used to... My mother always heard me talk about the glory days,
you know, and I'm always telling her about this place and that
place, and I couldn't wait to, you know, go look at these things
that I loved so much, you know, growing up. And I've been looking
for them, but I can't find them. I took the kids over to look
at an old log cabin out in the woods that me and some friends
made when we were teenagers. The log cabin's not only not
there anymore, the woods aren't even there anymore. Everything's
different. Everywhere we went, everything's
changed. But what our Lord's telling us here is, I am He.
He's saying, I am the Lord Jehovah, eternal, unchangeable. He doesn't
change. The first day that He called
you by His grace, the first day that He called you and made you
to hear Him in the heart, and gave you faith to behold Him
and rejoice in Him, and made you to behold the glory of God
in the face of Christ Jesus, from that day to now, He hasn't
changed. He hadn't changed at all. He
said, I'm the Lord, I change not. And therefore, you sons
of Jacob are not consumed. Remember when the children were
young, when your children were little children, and they do
things, and they can test you, no doubt about that, but they
get a little sideways, and they get carried away with this or
that, and they get all to threaten, and they can test you, but they
don't change your love for them. And if they don't change our
love for Him, then we are just sinners. We are just men. Even
when our hearts are ablaze for Him and we are full of zeal for
our Lord, or when we are just like smoking flax, He said He
doesn't change. His love is the same. His faithfulness
is the same. His affections are the same.
His care is the same. Our weary steps may falter. And
they do. Our steps falter. But He's the
same. Same in power. He's the same
in protection. He's the same in His promises.
The same in His truth. He's the same in His faithfulness
to His people. Jesus Christ the same. Yesterday,
today, and forever. Everything changes. But our God
doesn't change. He just doesn't change. I'm glad
we have somebody that doesn't change. So glad. Look at this
second thing He says here. He says in verse 4, He said,
I have made you. He said back up there in verse
3, He said, I bore you from the belly and carried you from the
womb. Now there's probably somebody
sitting here that you haven't trusted the Lord Jesus Christ. You haven't been shut up to Christ
by God's grace. And I can tell you this, whatever
your confidence is right now, and everybody has some kind of
confidence, whatever a man's confidence is, naturally speaking,
he made it. It's born of you. It was born
of you. But our God says, that He is
the one who bore His people. He's born His people. He's carried
His people. Those who are born of Him spiritually,
those who have been born of His grace were born in His purpose
of grace before the world was ever made. Born in His will and
His purpose when He chose us and put us in Christ Jesus. When
He descended in the womb, look at Psalm 139, there to your left,
Psalm 139. When Christ descended into the
womb of the Virgin, all His children, all His members were already
written in the Lamb's Book of Life. He says here in Psalm 139.15,
My substance was not hid from thee when I was made in secret
and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. That's
in the womb. And He says, Thine eyes did see
My substance, yet being unperfect. And in Thy book all My members
were written, which in continuance were fashioned, when as yet there
was none of them. We were in Christ when He was
formed in the womb. All our days of rebellion He
bore us. When we came forth and we walked through this life in
rebellion against God, not knowing God, not caring about who God
is, enmity against God in our hearts. The whole time he bore
us, just as he suffered Israel's manners in the wilderness. He
was long-suffering to us. He wasn't willing that any of
his elect children should perish, but he was determined before
the world began to arrange everything in our lives to cross our past
with the Gospel, to quicken us and make us alive and bring us
to repentance. And because He was long-suffering
toward us, He kept us, just like Israel. He said in their affliction,
He was afflicted. And the angel of His presence
saved them. In His love and in His pity,
He redeemed them. And He bared them and carried
them all the days of old. He brought us to hear the Gospel
and He made us. He made us. He made us a new
creation, created in righteousness and true holiness by the Holy
Spirit of God. He says, I've made you. I've
made you. He made us partakers of spiritual
things. Hebrews 3.14 says, we're made
partakers of Christ. If we hold fast the confidence
steadfast unto the end. He said back in Isaiah 43, 21,
this people have I formed for myself. They shall show forth
my praises. If the Lord says He formed somebody
for Himself and He says that they shall do anything, they
shall do it. They're going to do it. He's
got the power to bring it to pass. He's got the wisdom to
bring it to pass. And He does bring it to pass.
And I know sometimes we get to listen to those voices in our
own flesh and thinking about our past sins and trying to find
something we can look to and find some confidence in. And
when we start doing that, that we're looking in the wrong direction.
When we start doing that, we don't ever find confidence. And
if we do find confidence looking in that direction, it's the wrong
kind of confidence. It's the kind of confidence that
puffs up and makes you feel like you're somebody when you're not.
It's better not to find any confidence looking in that direction. But
here's the truth of the matter. If you're a child of God's grace,
if I'm a child of God's grace, we can't unmake what our God
has made. We can't undo it. You can't destroy
the sovereign grace of God. You can't change the unchangeable
God. You can't change unchanging grace. It just can't happen. It just
won't happen. Look at this next thing He says
to us here in verse 4. He said, And He said, and I will
bear, even I will carry. I will bear, even I will carry. I will bear you, and I will carry
you. You see that word bear and that word carry? Let me show
you the same words over in Isaiah 53. Isaiah 53. When He brought
us to see Christ, this is what He revealed to us, just how real
that our Savior has bore us and carried us. This is the same
words, Isaiah 53, 4, translated from the same words. Surely He
hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows. He's borne us and
He's carried us. He bore our griefs and He carried
our sorrows, yet we did esteem Him stricken, smitten of God,
and afflicted. I don't know what happened on
the tree. I don't know exactly what happened
there, but I do know that when it says up here in chapter 52,
in verse 14, it says, As many as were stonied at thee, his
visage was so marred more than any man, and he is formed more
than the sons of men. And then it says, He was despised
and he rejected of men, and surely he hath borne our griefs and
carried our sorrows. Those were all the time he walked
along. And he would come up to someone
that was sick, a leper, and they would say, you know, come up
and beg mercy from him. And he said, I will be thou healed. When he would do that, we don't
realize the fullness of what it was costing him to say that.
I don't know what what happened when Christ was made sin. I don't
know how He was made sin. I don't know even entering into
that. But I know that when it says
His visage was marred more than any man, and His form more than
the sons of men. What men had done to Him and
inflicted on His body, men saw and knew and saw those things
that we had done. That's not talking about that.
Whatever it was that happened on that cross, it was due to
Christ truly being made sin. And men looked at Him and it
says, Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows.
He bore the sin that causes all our grief and all our sorrows.
Peter said He bore our sins in His own body on the tree. And
whatever it was, it caused that centurion and all those fellows
that were walking around that cross It caused him to sit down
and look at Him and said this, Yet we did esteem Him stricken,
smitten of God, and afflicted. Didn't they just do that punishment
to Him? Something caused Him to stop
and look at Him and say, We didn't do this. God did this. I don't know what happened, but
I think there was a change wrought in Him on that cross that was
due to Him being made sin. Jacob, or Job, is a good illustration
of it. And when Job was, his friends
came, and it's all, that's the picture of it, the type of it.
When his friends came, and they sat down there, and they looked
at Job, and Job said, said, he's smitten me, and he's afflicted
me, and he's caused wrinkles in my skin. You ever look up
elephantitis? You ever look that up? That's
what it looks like, wrinkles. It looks like just, made astonishing wrinkles, something
caused His visage to be marred more than any man, more than
what men did to Him. It was what He bore, what He
carried. When He says, I have borne you
and I have carried you, He bore us to that cross, His children,
being made exactly what we are in our room and stand, that God
might be just to pour out wrath upon Him in our place. We esteem
them stricken and smitten of God. This is what it says. Verse
5. But it wasn't for any sin he
did. It wasn't for anything he did. He's that perfect, spotless,
harmless, holy, undefiled man of God, servant of God. It was
for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace
was upon him. And look at these last words,
"...and with His stripes were healed." Look back there at Isaiah
46.4. Isaiah 46.4. There He says, "...even to your
old age I am He, and even to whore hairs will I carry you."
He said, "...I've made you, I'll bear, and I'll carry you." You
know, there may be times It may get to the point, if we live
long enough in this life, it will get to the point where our
bodies, that more and more, if we want to know if we are sinners
in our flesh, all we've got to do is look at it. Because more
and more it just gets more wrinkled and more wrinkled and more wrinkled.
And if we live long enough, it's going to look like there's sickness
in these bodies. It's going to look like we're
wracked with sickness. This is the case. This is the
case of the matter. With His stripes, we are healed. With His stripes, we are healed.
When He says don't look on the natural appearance of things,
and He teaches us as we walk through this earth not to judge
with this carnal sense and this feeble sense. When we get to
that point where we look in the mirror and we don't recognize
the one looking back at us, don't judge with carnal sense. This
is what He says because of what He's done. with his stripes were
healed, were healed, healed in a way that's better, made the
righteousness of God in Christ, made justified, sanctified, washed,
complete. There is not going to be anything,
the longer we go in this life, I do know this, there is not
going to be anything that we are going to be able to look
to in this flesh, in these bodies and get any confidence and say,
ah, there is something I can trust in. There is something
I can look to. That just ain't going to happen.
It's just not going to happen. This is Him though. He says He
is the eternal God and He is your refuge. And He says, are
the everlasting arms. He says, he'll thrust out the
enemy before thee and shall say, destroy. That's who our God is. That's who our Savior is. You
see, there's poor sinners in this world. Poor sinners who
I think about that are yet without Christ. And here's the sad thing
about it is, there's a weight that they're under. They're under
a weight they're under a burden. Just like those, you picture
those horses and those oxen and whatever they were using to haul
those idles away because they were just made out of silver
and gold. That's the only reason they hauled them away or otherwise
they wouldn't have been fit to haul away. But they're taking
those away, and those beasts are just burdened down with that
weight. They're burdened down with pulling those idols. Any
man that's trusting in anything of ourselves, any confidence
of ourselves, is carrying a weight. He's carrying a burden. The burden
of guilt. The burden of the law. And the man that has any kind
of idol, any kind of confidence he's looking to, he's carrying
that idol. He's carrying it. It's not carrying
him. It's not ever relieving him.
It's not ever giving him any peace. It never gives any comfort,
never gives any consolation. Not at all. This is what the
Lord said about that though. He said, come unto me, all you
that labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give you rest. We ought
not make that any more complicated than it sounds. The Lord said,
come unto me. Don't go to a preacher. Don't
go to a denomination. Don't go to this group or that
group or jump through this hoop or this trick or that trick.
He says, come to me. Come unto me. All you that are
to labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. Take my yoke
upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly in heart.
and you'll find rest until you're sold. It's good to rest when
you're tired. It's good when you're heavy laden
and you know what you've been working a hard day's work. It's
good to come in and just lay down in a good comfortable recliner
or something that you know is going to hold you up. You just
lay down in it and you can just rest. And it just feels good.
Or you go down in your bed at night and you're just so tired
and you lay down and you just feel like you just feel your
body resting. You know how that is when you
can lay down and you can just feel your body start to rest
and it just feels so good? Soul rest though. We're told,
he says, come unto me and you'll find rest for your soul. Now
that's rest. Peace that can't be described.
That love of God that's beyond words that you can't put in a
word. You can't describe it to folks. You can't tell folks what
it is to just have soul rest. To have a rest where you know
that the God who set his affection on me didn't set his affection
on me because of anything in me. He did it solely because
of his grace. And if he did it solely because
of his grace, he's not going to change because of anything
in me. He's not going to turn away from
me because of anything in me. That gives you great soul rest
to know, I've got some eternal security here in this God who
says, I've made you, and I've born you, and I've carried you.
To find out that the Lord Jesus Christ, when He went to that
cross, you know, that psalm that Brother Darwin just read, he
said, this is my help. And you know, You feel you're
you're happy to know when somebody you'd love and somebody you care
about when they have some help But when you need help and you
find out this is my hand. This is my personal help my help
That's when it becomes help like no other when it's the help that
you really need and when you find out when Christ went to
that cross and when he when he said it's finished and that he
meant he had finished everything that was necessary for God to
receive you? And you have that word come into
your heart as true and as real, and you just know, this is so,
He did that for me. And when you see Him, and you
see Christ, you see His body come down, and you see them lay
Him in a tomb, and you can really truly see, my body of sins was
put off. when he said, when he gave up
the ghost, and he went into that tomb, I went into that tomb.
All my sins, all my rebellion against God, everything I've
ever been from conception, Everything I'll be tomorrow in myself, everything
that I've always been, every thought, every word, every deed
that I've always been. God said in Romans 6, Reckon
ye yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin. And when he went in
that grave, I died. When he died, I died. And when
that comes home to the heart and you know, this is so, you've
died. Your death has been accomplished.
Your judgment has been accomplished in Christ. That's soul rest. That's soul rest. When you see
Him come out of that grave by faith, and you see Him ascend
unto the Father, and you see Him sit down at the right hand
of the Father, and you know and you hear God speak into your
heart, and He says that your life, your life, Our life, when
He says your life is hid with God in Christ. You're seated
with Him where He's seated. And He says, seek those things
which are above. You realize when He rose to newness
of life, never again to suffer death, never again to have sin
say anything to Him. Just as that woman who's married
to her husband and when he dies, there's nothing else. It says
nothing else to you. And you know that law says nothing
else to me. You know that sin has no more
dominion over you. And it shall not, it cannot,
because you're not under the law, you're under grace. When
that comes home into the heart, and we know that is a true and
living reality. Soul rest. The burdens come off. You got peace with God. Everything you thought you needed
to be substance and evidence. And you kept saying, I need a
little more evidence. Can you show me proof of that?
Can you really make me know that? Show me something. When that
faith is real and you connect with it, you got the substance
now. You got the evidence now. You
know as real as you know. You stop now. You don't even
have to... I don't think there's anybody in here that I would
have to try to persuade that God framed the worlds from the
beginning from things that were not. He just spoke them into
existence. You believe, don't you? You believe He did that,
don't you? You know why? By faith you believe that. That's
what the Scripture says. By faith we believe that. And
by that same faith we know just as He did that. That's nothing. That's nothing. It created more worlds than this
one that we don't even know about. That's nothing. He came here
and was made of a woman. He came here and was made under
the law. He came here and joined His divine nature with this human
nature in one glorious God-man mediator. And He brought His
people who were out here separated from God, and He brought us together
with God. And we're going to go to glory
with Him and see Him. That's soul rest. You can quit
working. You can quit laboring to try
to please God. And then you can start saying,
man, when you know, when you don't, when you don't have to
work, it's a joy to work. You know, when you don't have
to do it, when it's not, when you're not going in and having
a bunch of time clock to do it, it's a joy to show up and do
it. You ever done that? I remember when I was working
in college, I'd go in and and just stop by, you know, where
I was working or whatever. And I wouldn't be on the clock
or anything, but just something about not being on the clock
made it not so difficult to go in and do two or three things,
you know, because you could go whenever you wanted to. You don't
have to be there. You don't have to be doing it. That's what it
is to be at peace with God and to know that I'm accepted. I
don't have to do anything to be accepted of Him. And now you
can say, I want to serve Him just because I want to serve
Him. I want to follow Him just because I want to follow Him.
I want to honor Him in my life just because I want to honor
Him in my life. Because I'm thankful for what He's done for me. I
don't have to do anything to be accepted of Him. I'm accepted
of Him. That's soul peace. That's just soul peace. This is what he says. Look at
Isaiah 40.11. Back on this thing of Him carrying
us. Look at this. Isaiah 40.11. Let's read verse
10. I love this. Behold, the Lord
God will come with strong hand, and His arms shall roll for Him. Behold, His reward is with Him
and His work before Him. I love this next verse. He shall
feed his flock like a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arm and carry them in his bosom and shall gently lead those
that are with y'all. He'll carry them. He'll carry
them. Carry them. He keeps us and he
nourishes us. He brings us into his church
and feeds us with his gospel, this sincere milk of the word.
And he describes it like this. as one whom his mother comforteth,
so will I comfort you, and you shall be comforted in Jerusalem."
You can't get comfort in one phrase many more times than that.
He says, as one whom his mother comforteth, so will I comfort
you, and you shall be comforted in Jerusalem. That's our God. That's our Savior. You see how
much better it is to worship this One who is the true and
living God than somebody who is an idol, somebody who is a
God men pray to and he can't do anything. I wouldn't want
to pray to a God that couldn't do anything unless I let him
do something. Couldn't do anything unless I
gave him permission to do it. Look up there at Isaiah 45, 21.
Look at there at the end. He said, there's no God else
besides me. This whole account of, we've
been going through this back home, this whole account here
of Cyrus and all, it starts back up there in chapter 44. But if
you go through there and read just this account through 45,
he says it over and over. He says, there's no God else
besides me. There's none else besides me.
This is the only God. Isaiah 45, 21. This is the only
God who is a just God and a Savior. A just God and a Savior. There's
never been a court in this earth that's ever been just and merciful. There's never been a court in
this earth that's ever been able to show perfect justice and perfect
mercy together. It just can't be done. It can't
be done. But God is a just God, perfectly
just, and at the same time, perfectly merciful. Only the wisdom who
is our God could come up with that. Only He who is wisdom Himself
could purpose and create and bring to pass a way that He could
be a just God and a Savior. And the only way that can happen
is in Christ Jesus the Lord. This is the thing that when I'm
talking about this thing of subtlety, this is the issue. This is the
issue is the righteousness of God. In this message it pretends
to talk about Christ redeeming His particular people. It's not
an issue just arguing over a doctrine of particular redemption or universal
versus universal atonement. That don't mean anything. The
issue is this. Since the day Satan and that
host of rebellious angels in glory heard that God the Son
was coming into this earth, and that He was going to redeem His
people by the sacrifice of Himself as the perfect man, and then
ascend to glory, and there would be a man in glory who would reign
over those angels, they rebelled, they abode not in the truth.
And ever since then, Satan has tried since the gardens His effort
throughout all of the history of this world has been to try
to stop Christ from coming and accomplishing what He knew from
the beginning He was going to accomplish. And that's the issue
of this thing. I don't even know if men know
they do it. I think some do, but I don't
think others even know what they're doing. It's taken away how God
can be a just God and a Savior. And where there is no righteousness
of God, there's no gospel. It's just no gospel. Paul said,
I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ because it's the power
of God unto salvation, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed
from faith to faith. Romans 3 tells us that it's not
by the law, but it's witnessed by the Law and the Prophets.
It's the faithfulness, the righteousness of God manifest by the faithfulness
of Jesus Christ Himself in what He did. So people will say, they'll
start talking about obedience and this and that and they'll
say, well, you love God with all your heart, your soul, and
your neighbor as yourself. That's what the Lord said. That's
what He said to you. That's the sum of the Law. You
know what that takes? You know what that takes? It
takes you living perfectly in this life so that you're fit
to do it. And then it takes you being made
the wretched, horrid thing that you most despise, sin. And having God forsake you and
everybody for whom you're dying forsake you. And at the same
time that you're doing that, you never ever once, not once,
have an unfaithful thought toward God or your brethren at all. You're doing what you're doing
for them in absolute perfect fidelity, absolute holy, faithful,
righteous obedience. and give up all and be forsaken
unto death that you might satisfy justice. So that's, this is the
thing that I just can't, I just keep thinking about this. That
right there is at the same time, it's the righteous fullness fulfillment
of the law in precept. And at the same time, it's the
fulfillment of the penalty of the law right there at the same
place. That's Christ our Lord. He is righteousness. That's why
He gave the law. That's what He gave the law to
show us. You and I just can't do that.
We can't do that by ourselves. But He can. Alright, let's look
at this last thing now. This is the best for last. He
said, let's read it again. Isaiah 46. He says, "...Hearken
unto Me, O house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house
of Israel, which are born by Me from the belly, which are
carried from the womb, and even to your old age I am He. Even
to your gray hairs will I carry you. I have made you, I'll bury
you, even I will carry you." And here's the last thing, "...and
I'll deliver you." I'll deliver you. If all that other stuff
happened, right up to the point But we want deliverance. You
know? Let's finish this thing. I'll deliver you, He said. I'll
deliver you. Look over at Colossians 1.13.
I have you turn to two more Scriptures. Colossians 1.13. For every believer here that's
been born of His Spirit and all your hope is Christ. This is
what's already a certainty for you and I. It's what He's already
done. Colossians 1.13. He says, He's delivered us. God our Father has delivered
us. He said He would. He said He'd deliver us. It doesn't
say He's going to. It says He hath. It's done. He hath delivered us from the
power of darkness and He's translated us into the kingdom of His dear
Son. That's already done. That can't
be undone. Now look over at Revelation 21. Paul said, he talked about when
they had the sentence of death in themselves, that they should
not trust in themselves. We face that time and time again
in this life. But we have that sentence in
ourselves, Paul said, that we trust in Him who delivered us
from so great a death. and who doth deliver and whom
we trust that He will yet deliver us. He is going to deliver us
out of all affliction. He is going to deliver us out
of all temptations. He is going to deliver us out
of the hand of every enemy. He is going to deliver us from
this body of sin and death. He is going to deliver us from
death eternal. He is going to deliver us from
wrath to come. At last, He is going to deliver
us from the grave and He is going to deliver us from all corruption.
And He is going to deliver us into something. Look here at
verse 1. And I saw a new heaven and a new earth. For the first
heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no
more sea. And I, John, saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming
down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for
her husband. And I heard a great voice out
of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men,
and He will dwell with them, and they shall be his people,
and God himself shall be with them and be their God. And God
shall wipe away all tears from their eyes, and there shall be
no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more
pain, for the former things are passed away. And he that sat
upon the throne said, Behold, I make all things new. And He
said unto me, Write, for these words are true and faithful.
And He said unto me, It's done. I'm the Alpha and I'm the Omega,
the beginning and the end. That's what He's been telling
us in our text. I'm the beginning and the end, and I'm carrying
you all the way. I'll give unto Him that's the
thirst of the fountain of the water of life freely. Our unchanging
God. Our Savior, He says this, hearken
unto Me. Hearken unto Me. Next time I
start hearing all those voices trying to turn me from Him and
point me in another direction, I was going to hearken to Him.
I was just going to listen to Him, to what He said. My flesh
and my heart faileth, the psalmist said. But God is the strength
of my heart and my portion forever, forever. The psalmist said this,
for this God is our God forever and ever, and He'll be our guide
even unto death. Amen.