Good to see you again tonight. Thank the Lord for this day.
Thank Him for His blessings. I appreciate you people. A joy
to be with. And I certainly enjoyed my time
here. Turn with me in your Bibles to
the 42nd chapter of Isaiah tonight. And I'm going to preach on something
that's been on my mind for the last several weeks. That is, He shall not fail. That's our text in chapter 42
in verse number 4. It says, He shall not fail, nor
be discouraged. till he have set judgment in
the earth, and the isle shall wait for his law." This chapter starts out with,
Behold. And here the prophet speaks,
and it's God. He's saying, My servant. Behold, My servant. The Lord
Jesus Christ. And he says, In whom I uphold. He says, mine elect, in whom
my soul delighteth. I have put my spirit upon him
and he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. Look at verse
number seven. To open the blind eyes, to bring
out the prisoners from the prison and them that sit in darkness
out of the prison house. I am the Lord. This is my name
and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise
the graven images. He shall not fail. Where is hope among men? Can you trust in your flesh or
another man's flesh? Our trust Our hope, our peace,
and our rest is not in man, but is in the Messiah that this is
speaking of, the Lord Jesus Christ. The servant that is set before
us, the mediator that is set before us, the redeemer that
is set before us, and the Savior that is set before us. There's
the word, behold. And this is something that we
need to do. Behold our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, at all
times, in all seasons. John the Baptist says, behold,
the Lamb of God. I had this thought this afternoon,
coming from the book of John. Our Lord's priestly prayer. And if you behold the Lord Jesus
Christ, behold Him in the sense of the word, beholding
Him as Savior and Redeemer, the Lord of all. You know what it
tells us in the book of John? One day we're going to behold
His glory. It tells us that there in that chapter, we'll behold
His glory. So we are to behold the Lord
of glory, and we look at Him, and here He's brought before
us as a servant. He says, My servant. And this
is His humiliation. Our Lord is exalted in His exaltation
now. He lived in this world, and when
He lived here, it's called humiliation. And certainly it was. as he went
to the cross and so forth and so on. But now he's exalted. He's at the right hand of the
Father. But here he says, Behold my servant. That position that
he took upon himself. It's amazing he chose this, didn't
he? He came voluntarily and took
upon himself as a servant. Then you notice also it says,
Whom I uphold. Then he says, Mine elect. He
is chosen of God. He is chosen for atonement. He is chosen for this salvation. Then notice God says, whom my
soul delighteth. He is well pleased with him,
isn't He? Always been. He delights in the mediator.
He is only begotten Son. And then He tells us in verse
number 4, that this one and only shall not fail." Now, if we look at Adam and the
history of Adam, what do we find? Failure. We look at mankind and
what do we find? Failure. We look at ourselves,
what do we find? Failure. And Christ says he shall
not fail. God's glorious purposes is carried
out in the Lord Jesus Christ. When we talk about him, we talk
about his accomplishments. This ever-living Lord who's at
the right hand of the Father. We behold Him with the eyes of
faith and we behold Him as God's servant. We behold Him as God's
elect. The one that He delights in.
And He's the one that is appointed deliverer of that of His people. So our text tonight says, He
shall not fail. That is, whatever that He undertakes. I'm glad of that. He came to
save. That means that He's not going
to fail. He's not going to fail to save that of His people, is
He? And He's going to save every one of them. Turn with me over
to Isaiah 53, that great chapter of the gospel of Isaiah, that
He continues to write the gospel Look at verse number 11, and
I want you just to be reminded of these shalls. Now, I like
shalls in the Bible when it says God shall. I like those. I don't care anything about man,
but when God says He shall, we know it's going to happen and
it shall be done. And look at verse number 11 of
53rd chapter. He shall. See the travail of
his soul and shall be satisfied. He shall see. Now that tells
us that what he came to do, he's going to perform. And also says
up here, he shall verse number 10, see his seed. That is, he
lives. He's going to see his seed. He's
going to see his fruit. That is the believers. That is
his church. And it also says that he shall
prolong his days. He's ever living, Christ is. And it says, the pleasure of
the Lord shall prosper in his hand. You and I, we fail. We become discouraged, but He
shall not. He's going to accomplish the
purposes of God. We see His travail that speaks
of the cross, the suffering, the dying, and there is a certainty
of success. He shall see that of His seed,
the fruit of His labor. There's going to be success.
He's going to enjoy fruit. He's going to obtain And there's
no miscarry at the cross. Oh, what a terrible doctrine
when people talk about miscarry at the cross. There's no miscarry
at the cross. He accomplished at the cross. He accomplished. And there's
a people given unto Him. They're given unto Him by the
way of reward. And they're also given to Him
by the way of charge. Our Lord prays and He says, Thine
they were, and Thou givest them Me. They were given to Him before
the world. And they tell us, the Scripture
tells us that He is satisfied. You know that's going to be for
all eternity. Isn't it? It's going to be for all eternity.
Matthew chapter 1 and verse number 21 says he shall save his people
from their sins. There is the accomplishment of
the work and not only that, there is the accomplishment of the
work of applying salvation to hearts and lives. His people,
they're stubborn, they're going their own way, they're rebellious,
they have hard hearts, and they have to be conquered. by grace,
sovereign and free grace. He has to give light in darkness. He has to deliver from bondage.
And our text says he shall not fail. So what we have taught
to us is this, that the great undertaking of the Lord, and
let's just think for a moment about a single soul. That's what
it takes to save a single soul. That's a marvel in itself. That's
a miracle in itself. But, let's think about what it
takes to save the whole church. Boy, he's going to accomplish
that, isn't he? The whole, he's going to accomplish
that. Man's in darkness, the scripture says, he's at enmity
and in bondage. And look at this great undertaking.
Look what it takes to save one soul, but here's the Lord and
he's going to save his whole church. And he shall not fail. What a great achievement and
what a great task is before him. All the multitudes and From that
of Adam, Dan's been saved, and we don't know how long this world's
going to last, but there's his people throughout the world,
his multitudes. So it's a great undertaking,
and we find that he shall save his people. We look at sin and
how sin holds people. The darkness, man's dead according
to the scriptures, spiritually dead. Sin's a destroyer and it
afflicts man. I remember one time years ago
when I was a young boy, my dad set a fire out and these hornets
would fly into it and they'd fly right into this fire and
burn their wings off. But nevertheless, they just kept
flying right into it. That's how sin is. It destroys. But what we find
is that the mighty power of the Lord Jesus Christ saves a soul. And that's the only thing that
saves a soul. It takes His power to draw one. And there's none going to come
except they're drawn by the Spirit of God. Because man's going in
the opposite direction. Oh, how thankful we are that
there's a drawing power of the Spirit of God. It's a conquest. Do you know when it speaks of
creation, it speaks of God's fingers? But when it speaks of
salvation, it's speaking of His arm, His powerful arm. He is Lord of Lords and Lord
of all heaven and earth. And I ask you tonight, will He
fail? Will the Incarnate One fail? Will Christ of glory fail and
be defeated? Will the Chosen One fail? God has placed it all upon the
Lord Jesus Christ. You see the covenant and it's
sure in Christ Jesus. There's honoring glory upon the
mediator, and there's a trust in Christ and the Father opposed
him, and he shall not fail. He says, mine alike, my chosen,
I delight in him. He's the very chief delight of
the Father. You know, he said of this world,
God, when he created, he made it good. He didn't say he delighted
in it, he just said he made it good. In Christ, he says, I delight
in him. He's filled with delight in the
Lord Jesus Christ. There's none like Him. We look
at Him and we see the Son and we just think about Him and the
Father's delight in Him. The Spirit is upon Him. There's
the fullness of the Godhead bodily in Him and the Holy Spirit descended
like a dove and rested upon Him. Will he fail? Will the Godhead
fail? No, he cannot fail. Christ is owned and honored and
trusted and sustained and loved and anointed. God has spoken
and he says he shall not fail and that it shall be because
he's spoken it. Now here's something else about
all of this. His work is different. The Scripture says it's not weapons
that are carnal. But how does He work? Now, just
think about this. He shall not fail. How does He
work? We find that He works with the
Gospel truth. He works with His Word. You see, militaries, armies, All of this, but God works with
His Word. His precious Word. And He works
by that of His own truth. It goes forth. And here's the
wonder of it that is proclaimed by that of lowly men. Now, much
of the Bible, God used shepherds. Now, that wasn't a high-ranking Office, was it? It was shepherds. God used them. And here it is. God uses those that are made
out of clay to spread out of His Word. It's not the high-ups
and it's not kings and rulers and presidents and all of this. But it's His gospel. It's the message of grace. It's the message of mercy. And
again, it's not the eloquence of the preacher and the great
talents of the preacher or being a scholar and so forth and great
pop, but it's the message of Christ. You know, we've learned. This Bible is Christ and that's
what we've learned. And it's a treasure in earthen
vessels that we have. It's Christ from the beginning. Now, I've met people that say
this. We was talking about this the other day. I heard a fellow
preaching one night. He said, there's just two or
three letters for us in this Bible. I said, aren't you glad?
It's not for you. Just two or three letters of
Paul. See? Paul is Christ from the
beginning to the end. He's Alpha and Omega, the beginning
and the end. And the Holy Spirit, He drops
the Word like dew in our hearts. He's a giver of divine life.
James said, By His own will, He has begotten us with the truth. That's so important when we think
about it, how He begets us. And here again is how He works. The power of the gospel through
the Holy Spirit is how He works. And it goes on and says, He'll
not be discouraged. He'll continue to work. He'll
work to the end. He's patient. And you know, He
always gets the fruit at the right time. The old man wants to pick it
green. And green fruit just not much. I like good apples, don't
you? Good apples. And Lord, He knows
when to pick the fruit. And He picks it right. Now, He
shall not fail. Let's talk about His finished
work. And He's not going to fail in that of His finished work
for His people. The Bible says He's brought in
everlasting righteousness. And we see Him as He is upon
the cross and as He bore the penalty of our sin. He bore the penalty. There, the
words from Him is, it is finished. There's His toil and His grief. And the Bible says He was set
like a flint. He was determined to go to that
cross and die. and die for that of His people,
and pay everything that was owed to divine justice. He bore the
shame and the curse of our very sin. He bore that. And the Scripture
says even the Father turned His back, didn't He, when He was
made sin for us. But He never turned His side.
We seek preserving love. everlasting love. And I see it
as love to the Father and also love to His elect. There is a finished redemption.
This is what He did upon Calvary's cross. It's a complete redemption. And that's not going to fail. If you don't have a finished
redemption and a complete redemption, you don't have a redemption.
Do you? There's a finished redemption.
There's complete redemption. That's what he accomplished.
And people talk about, well, you've got to finish it. No,
Christ finished it. He finished it. And so he's not
going to fail. He finished it. Now, he also
finishes the work in his people. He finished it for his people.
and He's going to finish it in His people, they're going to
be completely saved. It says He obtained eternal salvation,
didn't He? For that of His people. Over
in the book of Philippians, in chapter 1 of Philippians, in
verse number 6, a wonderful verse that we have, it tells us here
in this verse, it says, Paul writes and he says, I'm confident
of this, this very thing, that he which has begun a good work
in you will perform it unto the day of Jesus Christ. I don't worry where there's a
good work begun. If there's not a good work begun,
that's a different situation, isn't it? But if he's begun a
good work in you, he's going to perform it until the day of
Jesus Christ. It's going to be performed. He
will not fail. Lord begins. He's not going to
quit. He's not going to be taken from
that of his purpose. That's the marvel of grace. And
we just think about him so much. And our sales, we look at our
sales, but he doesn't grow weary and quit the work. Aren't you
glad? I've started a lot of things.
Several years ago, my friend and I, we ordered these clock
units and we was going to start making clocks. We've never made
a clock yet. I mean, there's many things I've
started. I never did finish. But our Lord finishes those things. I'm glad. He doesn't grow weary. He knows our shortcomings. He knows our backsliding. He
knows our ingratitude. You know, we've read verses tonight
in the prayer room and out here, the brother did, on giving thanks
to the Lord. But I'm afraid we're at times
having gratitude, going to have all gratitude, hadn't been thanks
to it. He knows all of this, but he'll
not fail nor be discouraged till it's all done. See, it's different with Him
than it is man. Then also, He's going to finish
His work by His people, that of the church. You know, He sends the church
forth and He says, I send you forth. He's the one behind sending
us forth. It's the Almighty One. There's
His power that goes with His people and with His church, and
there's His power that goes before His church. And there's going
to be no defeat of that of His church. There's not going to
be any defeat of that of His gospel and of His truth and of
His grace. There's no failure. Just as it
tells us here in verses 7 there, 6 and 7. He's going to open the
eyes of the blind. He's going to bring out the prisoners
from the prison. And them that sit in darkness
out of the prison house. He's going to open and give liberty.
Give sight. He will not fail. Let me just give you just a few
things right quick that he's not going to fail. He's a shepherd
that will not fail. A shepherd. He's going to care
for that of his sheep. He's going to enfold that of
his sheep. And he's going to gather that
of his sheep. I must bring. That don't sound
like failure, does it? I must bring. And there's a sheep,
and he's a shepherd that's not going to fail. That's a beautiful
picture in the scripture. The psalmist said, the Lord is
my shepherd. I shall not want or lack. We
don't lack with the Lord. We have it. He's not going to fail as a friend. You know, friends, they come.
A lot of times, friends go. But our Lord says, He sticketh
closer than a brother, doesn't He? He's a friend that's not
going to fail. You can count on this friend. He's not going to fail as a refuge.
That is, in times of trouble, times of danger, a refuge is set for safety. And
our Lord is a refuge for that of safety, isn't it? He's a refuge
for us that are in trouble. We go to Him. He's a foundation that's not
going to fail. When you build upon Christ, He's not going to fail. You build
upon sin, the Bible says, When the rains come, you know what
happens. But here's a foundation. He's
the rock. And he's not going to fail. He's an altar. He's our one and
only altar. And that is that his sacrifice He's that one altar, our altar. And He's the appointed altar.
And He's the living way. And He's that altar that we go
to God. And we find acceptance. What
a wonderful thing it is to read in the book of Ephesians, we're
accepted in the Beloved. He's a sweet smelling savor,
the scripture says. Sacrifice. So here's an altar. This altar is not going to fail.
These people that depend upon a wooden altar, what's that? Christ is our altar. He's our head. And our head is
a living head. And our head is not going to
fail. He's Bishop of our souls. Now I like that. That is overseer. Now, who would you want to be
the overseer of your soul? I want one that will not fail.
And that's Christ. He will not fail. He's overseer. We find also that as we look
at Him, He is King of Kings. Doesn't that speak that He will
not fail? He's Lord of Lords. That speaks
that He will not fail. He's mediator. And He's the one
mediator between God and man. If he failed, it wouldn't be.
It'd all be failure. But he can't fail. He will not
fail. He's mediator. Job speaks out
that he's umpire. Like it, he takes the hand of
God and he takes us and he brings us together. That's what the
mediator does. He brings us. And he'll not fail. Oh, the Bible sets out much about
him being a mediator. I was listening to old Ralph
Barnard one time, and old Ralph said, you may not need one, but
I do. I need a mediator. He's our high priest. Now, you think about this. There's
just one high priest. All these other priests, the
so-called priests, and men want to call them priests. Right failure
right over them. But our high priest, he shall
not fail. He intercedes for us. He's our advocate. He's a high priest. He's not
only priest, but he's a sacrifice, both in me. So we see he's not
going to fail. Now you can just carry this and
you can just carry it as far as you want to. But let me give
you this thought. Christ is all in all. And I'll
tell you that tonight, that all in all can't fail. The psalmist wrote this, and
I used it for a funeral several years ago, and it's always sort
of stuck in my mind. The psalmist says he's going
to give grace and glory. You know, those two things go
together. It's not just grace, but it's
grace and glory. And it's not glory without grace. But He's going to give grace
and glory. So it says, He shall not fail. You can put your trust right
here. You can put your confidence right here. I would not advise
you to put it in any man. You put it into God, man. You
put it in Him. He shall not fail. Glory to His name. Give Him thanks. Give Him honor. Oh, bless His name. You know, we're
all the time talking about blessing us. Scripture speaks and the
psalmist speaks about blessing His name. And we talk about blessing,
that's something coming to us. But you bless His name. Give
Him the blessings. Bless His name. Give Him spiritual
sacrifices. Thanks. Because He shall not fail. Our Father, we thank You for
this time that we spend together this day. We just thank You that
our Lord, as He's set up as he come forth, that he shall not
fail. Let us ponder and think upon
this, and it give us that of comfort and gives us assurity
in life, that he shall not fail. We know you write over man and
write over Adam in all failure, but the second Adam, our Lord
and Savior, He shall not fail. Bless these people, we pray,
as we bless your name. In Christ's name, amen.