I'd like for you to take your
Bibles now and turn with me to Colossians chapter 1. My message this morning I've
taken from verse 5 of Colossians chapter 1, and I titled it, The
Truth of the Gospel. Paul talks about another gospel. He said, if any man, even an
angel from heaven, come and preach any other gospel to you than
that which I preach to you, let him be accursed. And then in
his letter to the Corinthians, he said the same thing. He talked
about another gospel and another spirit and another salvation. The truth of the gospel. Now,
my friends, the Bible says something. It doesn't say everything. It
says something. And the something it says is
very critical. It's very critical. And whatever
this something is, it's very divisive. He said, I've come. He said, think not that I've
come to send peace between you and everybody else on the earth.
That's not why I came. He said, I came to set a man
at variance. What's that mean? That means
there's a problem. He's setting you in contrast
with somebody. He's causing a division between
you and somebody. I've come to set a man at variance
between his father, his mother, his sisters, his brothers, and
so on. I've come to make a division. And what this Bible says is very
divisive, whatever it is. Whatever it is. It doesn't say
everything, but it says something. And whatever it is is so critical
that He said, He that believeth not shall be damned. Now that's
as divisive as you can get, isn't it? He said, Go ye into all the
world and preach a gospel. That's not what He said, is it?
He said, go ye into all the world and preach my gospel, and he
that heareth, and he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved,
and he that believeth not shall be damned. This book says something,
and it says it in particular, and it says it in such a way
as to set men in variance with one another. And I invite you
this morning to read through this first chapter of Colossians
and Ephesians and all these other New Testament epistles, and you'll
find when you read the introduction to the book, you'll find that
he's not talking to every man, woman, and child. He's not talking
to all of Adam's sons. But he goes to great pains in
his introduction to tell you who he's talking about. He is
talking to a particular people. Beginning in verse 2 here in
Colossians chapter 1, listen to this, to the saints and faithful
brethren in Christ which are at Colossae, grace to you and
peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. We give
thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying
always for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus,
and of the love which you have to all the saints. For the hope
which is laid up for you in heaven were of ye heard before in the
word of the truth of the gospel. which is come unto you, as it
is into all the world, and bringeth forth fruit, as it doth also
in you, since the day ye heard it, and knew the grace of God,
and listened each as it again in truth." Now, here in this
remote part of the world, God had sent this apostle to the
Gentiles. That's what Paul called himself.
That's what God anointed him to do. for him to take this gospel
to the Gentiles, to the Gentile nations, to the heathen nations
who had no prophets, who had no understanding, who had no
religion of God. They knew nothing whatsoever
about God. And over here in this little
remote part of the world, God sent this apostle to the Gentiles
and he preached the gospel to them. And the Holy Spirit opened
their hearts and minds, and they heard the truth of the Gospel,
and God taught them who Christ is, and what Christ was all about,
and who God is, and who they were. I tell you, the Bible has got
a lot to say about the truth of the Gospel. A lot to say about it. In 2 Corinthians
4, verse 2, the man who wrote this book, this epistle to the
Colossians, the Apostle Paul. He used to be a Pharisee. A Pharisee. His name then was Saul of Tarsus. Listen to what it says here.
He said, We have renounced the hidden things of dishonesty. Now Paul wasn't a a brawler. He didn't go to bars and he didn't
visit brothels and he didn't do all those things that we normally
attribute to worldly people and ungodly people. He didn't cheat
people. He didn't go out and take advantage
of people. He was a very religious man.
In fact, he was a Pharisee of the Pharisee. Somebody said, if only two people
are going to be in heaven, one of them is going to be a Pharisee.
That used to be the the saying that they had in those days.
But here Paul talks about renouncing the hidden things of dishonesty.
They were hid to him. He didn't know they were dishonest.
He didn't know they were ungodly. He was deceived. Not walking
in craftiness. The devil is crafty. He said,
I'll cause you, our Lord said, they'll cause you to kill a saint
thinking that you do God a service. That's how crafty Satan is. Paul
said, we renounce these things. We don't walk in craftiness.
We don't handle the Word of God deceitfully, but by manifestation
of the truth. You see that? By manifestation
of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience in
the sight of God. What did the Lord call those
Pharisees? He said they were hypocrites
and blind. Isn't that what He said? Hypocrites
and blind. And God did for Him and did in
Him what He could not do for Himself. And He goes on to tell
us that in chapter 4 that God Who caused light to shine out
of darkness when He created the world. He caused light to shine
out of darkness. Shined in your heart. He said
that's the only way it can happen. Shines in your heart. What does
He shine? To give the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And it is this glorious person
of Jesus Christ who is himself the truth of the gospel. That's what Paul's talking about
here in Colossians chapter 1. And he goes on in chapter 2 to
tell you that in no uncertain time. What he's talking about,
Russell, he's talking about a person. A person. The Lord said to Thomas, he told
Thomas, he said, whether I go you know and the way you know.
Thomas said, whoa, wait a minute. He said, we don't know where
you're going, how can we know the way? Thomas, he said, I am
the way. What else did he tell him? I
am the truth. Ain't that what he told him?
I am the truth. The truth is a person. It's a
person. Well, you say you're just swatting
at gnats. Well, I'm going to tell you this,
you miss this, you miss salvation. You miss this, you miss the Gospel
altogether. The Gospel is a person. You miss
this, you miss eternal life. John said, this is the record
that God has given to us, that is to all that believe, eternal
life, and this life is in His Son. That's where it's at. It's
in His Son. It was purposed in Him, manifested
in Him, it's revealed in Him, and it's secured in Him. He that
hath not the Son hath not life. Whatever else He has, He doesn't
have life. And he that hath not the Son
of God hath not life. You have Him, you've got everything
God has for sinners. You don't have Him, all you've
got is hell. That's it. He said, these things have I
written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God,
that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may
believe on the name of the Son of God. And then here in our
text, in Colossians 1.5, Paul speaks to those faithful believing
saints who had heard and embraced the truth. They embraced Christ,
the truth of the gospel. And he tells them that there
is a hope laid up for them in heaven. That's where the hope
is, John. It's laid up for believers in
heaven. Don't look for it here, it ain't
here. It's up there. It's up there. Set your affection,
he goes on to tell them in chapter 3 of Colossians, set your affection
on things above where Christ who is our life. That's where
he's at. That's where our hope is. It's
laid up for us in heaven. Now, last Sunday morning, I briefly
read to you six things that constitutes the believer's hope. These six
things are all found to be in the Lord Jesus Christ, and they
all give the glory to God, and overall, they reveal the truth
of the Gospel. You say, well, shouldn't you
be talking to God's elect? I am talking to God's elect.
Nobody else is going to believe. You can substitute the word believer.
Nobody else is going to believe but God's elect. It's given unto
you to know these things. A man to whom it's not given
is never going to believe. He's never going to believe.
Well, don't that take away it? No, he's responsible to believe. But it takes an act of God's
mercy and grace. There'd be no mercy and no grace
if there weren't sinners. Depraved, ungodly sinners. That's whose mercy is for. Mercy
is not for the proud. Mercy is for the sinner. Our
Lord said, think not that I come to save the righteous. If you're
righteous, He didn't come to save you. That clears the nose
on your face. He said, I came to save sinners. Sinners. The truth of the Gospel of Christ. Listen to what this says. It
says, this is the will of Him that sent me, that everyone which
seeth the Son and believeth on Him may have everlasting life,
and I'll raise him up at the last day. Preacher, are you saying
that I can't believe? No. No, I'm not saying that. I'm telling you by the commandment
of God to believe. Who believes? But I'm telling
you, you never will apart from Him. One's not a contradiction of
the other. Well, what is the truth of the gospel of Christ?
What sets our hopes in distinction to this world? Well, I believe
it's this and this alone, and I've come to find it out, and
it's been affirmed to me time and time again throughout my
life. The believer's hope is in a person. That's what makes
him distinct from everybody else. The first thing a so-called church
does when they organize, and I've read a little bit of church
history, is they sit down and they say, here's what we believe.
And they make out this confession of faith, and they write it all
out. This is what we believe. Now everybody that believes this
says, oh no. No, no, no, no. You can believe
in the Philadelphia Confession of Faith or the Westminster Confession
of Faith and be lost as a goose. You're not saved until you embrace
Christ. Christ. The seated, ordained,
anointed, chosen Christ who sits at the right hand of God. You
embrace Him, you've got everything God has for sinners. I don't
care what else you got. You lost as a goose. Salvation is not in a program.
It's not in an experience. It's not in a decision. It's
not in a denomination. It's not in a plan. And it's
not in these empty promises and pledges. Lord, if you'll save
me, I'll do this. I had a mason laying up a chimney
for me one time. He got talking to me about the
Lord. I won't mention his denomination, but it was something very common,
and he was talking to me about it, and I said, well, tell me
how the Lord saved you. Oh, he said, I was out on the
battlefield, and he said it was a fierce battle, and he said
my neck was slit from ear to ear, and I was standing there,
and my blood was gushing out on my chest, and he said, I cried,
Lord, if you save me, I'll serve you till I die. I said, I got
one question. Did you? He hung his head. No. Salvation is not in that,
my friend. It's not in your empty promises.
It's not in your experiences. I don't care how sincere you
were. It don't matter. Salvation is in Christ. That's where it's at. It's in
the Glorious Person of the Lord Jesus Christ. What am I saying? I'm saying that right now there's
a man in glory. A man. Look around this room. A man, just like every other
man. A man with a body and a mind and hair and a mustache. Whatever
he has, he's a man. A real man. Flesh and blood.
Bone of our bones. And he's seated on the throne
at the right hand of God. And God has committed not only
all of his elect, but everything and all the benefits of that
election. All together, trusted into his
hands. You want to be saved? Seek Him.
Believe on Him. Embrace Him. At the right hand of God. And
He is from eternity to eternity the hope of all God's elect. Now let me see if I can show
you these things in these six things. First of all, the believer's
hope. What am I talking about when
I talk about the believer's hope? I'm talking about that on which
you hang your soul. You hang your soul. I'm not talking
about an insurance policy that you use when you come to die.
I'm talking about what you hang your soul on. What motivates
your life? What dictates how you live? How
you serve? How you pray? Your hope. What affects the tenor of your
life? And the first thing is that God
the Father, for the great love we're with, He loved us, His
church. He appointed for them a federal
head. A federal head. A representative
man. And everything that will come
to pass in time and eternity was trusted into His hands. That's
the Lord Jesus Christ. Everything. You can find it over
here, back just a few pages from where we're at, over here in
Ephesians chapter 1, where he talks about in that day gathering
all these things up in Christ. He wouldn't gather them up in
Christ if he didn't purpose them in Christ. He tells you down
here in verse 9 of Ephesians 1 that he made known unto us
the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he
hath purposed in himself, that in the dispensation and fullness
of times he might gather together in one all things in Christ."
Things in heaven, things in earth, everything he purposed in Christ.
What did he purpose in him? Everything. Finish reading through
Colossians 1, you'll see it. Everything is purposed. Creation,
providence, everything. It's all purposed in him. In
whom? In him, this one. Also, we have
obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the
purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His
own will, that we should be to the praise of His glory, that
is, God the Father, who first trusted in Christ." You see what
I'm saying? All of the future standing and
destiny of God's sheep was trusted into the hands of God's sovereign
mediator. Now before you go off pouting
and crying about how unfair and how irresponsible that was to
stand up and say God's only going to save a few, let me tell you
something. In Adam all die. Let that go on. In Adam all die. There's no hope in Adam. There's
no hope in Seth. There's no hope in any son of
Adam. It's not there. The only hope
is that God appointed another head, and He did it before He
ever created Adam. And that head is the Lord Jesus
Christ. He didn't trust everything to
Adam, but He trusted everything to Christ. You see that? Now you go through Romans chapter
5 and see if what I'm telling you is not true, or 1 Corinthians
chapter 15, either one. You go through Romans chapter
5 and you'll see, by the offense of one, what happened? Condemnation
came on all men. Even so, by the righteousness
of one came this pre-justification. On and on and on, God dealing
with these two men, dealing with Adam and dealing with Christ.
There's no point in going through and dealing with all of His sons.
Adam was a perfect man and he fell. What chance you got? What
are you going to do? Angels in glory couldn't stand
in the presence of God. What are you going to do? All of the future standing and
destiny of God's sheep was trusted into the hands of God's Mediator.
You can write off any hope you ever imagined that arises from
man's ability and will and decisions and mankind dead. Ain't that what Ephesians 2 teaches?
You, Hathy Quicken, who were dead. What do you mean dead? Well, you walked according to
the course of this world. What are they doing? What's this
world? This world don't know God. Christ wouldn't even pray
for the world. I pray not for the world. And
then in Romans 3, he says, religious or heathen, raised in the church
or in a barn, Jews and Gentiles have, by the Word of God, been
proven all to be under sin. So that their religious things
and religious benefits didn't do them any good. Now you read
Romans 3 and see if that ain't what Paul said. He said, are
we better off than them? No. And know why. Why? Because
we're all under sin. We're all under sin. Give an unbeliever a Bible. Give
him the Word of God. Give him the Bible. Give him
a church to go into. Give him a congregation to join.
Give him some tradition. You know what he'll do? He'll
go say, well, the Lord spoke to me and told me that if everybody
here sends in $10, I've got to build this 400-foot statue of
Jesus out in Oklahoma. That's what natural man does. These things don't do him any
good because he's under a sin. He's under sin. He got to have
a resurrection to life. And God appointed for him, made
provision for him. What does all that mean? It means
that there are none righteous. None that understand it. None
that are good. None that seek after God. It
means they're all gone out of the way. There's no profit in
them anywhere. It means their nature is like that of a serpent.
No fear of God. It's the fear of God that causes
men to depart from evil. That's what you read in Proverbs.
In Romans chapter 3, it says there is no fear of God before
their eyes. So they're never going to depart
from evil. The only hope of any son of Adam is that before he
fell, God made provision for him in another representative
and committed all his future hope in him. See, this is what
messes men up on election and predestination and all those
things when you're talking about the eternal counsels of God.
What makes them opposed to this is their own self-righteousness.
That's right. They think they're deserving
of a choice. I'm deserving of this. Oh, you
make your choice and God will hold you responsible for it.
A fellow told me one time, He said,
I just want what's coming to me. I said, oh, no, you don't.
No, you don't. But you're going to get it. You're
going to get it. The only hope given in the first
destruction of the world, he said, God said it repented Him
that He even made man. Man was so base and depraved,
and He said every thought of the imagination of man's heart
is only evil continually. He never had a righteous thought
in his head. It's not that he thought good
and thought evil and chose the evil. He never thought. He never
had a good thought. Never did. Not one. What did God say about that?
He said, Noah found grace. Isn't that what he said? In the
eyes of the Lord. Noah. Out of all the world. Noah. Do you believe that? Do you believe that man is totally
depraved? A sinner, lost, no understanding? Nothing in his heart to cause
him to seek God. But I tell you, when He reveals
that to you, you'll seek Him. You will seek Him then. You'll
seek Him. And you want to go to hell hanging
on some traditional sentiment, you go right ahead. But you'll
go being told the truth. I told you the truth this morning.
There's no hope outside of Christ. How did Christ get into this
thing? God anointed Him, chose Him, appointed Him, and made
provision for all His elect. I tell you, if words mean anything,
it says, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ, according as He hath chosen us in Him before
the foundation of the world. And tell you what he said, having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children. And I tell you,
you don't believe that, you need to go home and rip the book of
Ephesians out of your Bible. Just throw it away. You might
as well take Colossians out too. And I think pretty soon you'll
find out you just need to trade that Bible in on another one. Everything in time and eternity
works together for them, good to them that love God, to them
who are called according to His purpose. And then secondly, the
believer's hope is that in the fullness of time, God sent forth
this One He appointed. He prophesied. One old preacher
said, the Old Testament weaves a garment that will only fit
one man. And Christ came into this world
and put it on. He put on the garment. He's Christ.
He's Christ. God sent forth His Son in the
fullness of time, made of a woman, made under the law. Why? Why
must God come into the flesh and become a servant to the law?
Why must God come into the flesh and go to a cross and be nailed
on there and ridiculed and suffer shame and suffer wrath before
a holy God? Why must that be? to redeem them
that were under the law. That's why. The incarnation of
Christ was absolutely necessary to the saving of our soul. If
our sins is not paid for in Him, we still owe the debt. If all
He did, like churches teach, I've heard them stand in the
pulpit and declare that the only sins that God forgives is your
past sins. Huh? Which one of your sins was
passed when Christ died? Huh? Every one of them was spiritual,
wasn't it? He died for your sins. He took
your place as a person. Now you think about it. He took
your place as a person. If you're a believer, He came
into this world and as a person, with your name, Hung on that
cross before God. And God treated him like he would
you, the sinner. That's exactly right. And he
poured out his wrath on him. Ain't no hope apart from that.
This one that God represented, that doesn't excuse sin just
because he appointed a substitute. That substitute must become a
man. And he got to suffer and die
to satisfy the holy law of God. and satisfy the justice of God.
And he has to become a servant to the law because you're not
able to produce a righteousness. And God's not going to let anybody
into heaven apart from having a righteousness, a perfect righteousness. That's what happened in the garden.
That's what separated man from God in the garden was sin. Well,
He's not going to excuse your sin and let you into heaven.
That sin has to be paid for. And you're not coming in without
a perfect righteousness. And that's what Christ's life
was all about. The incarnation of Christ is
absolutely necessary. Our covenant surety and federal
head must, as our representative, meet every requirement of the
covenant of grace. David said it's ordered in all
things. He must, as a man with like passions
as we are, be tempted as we are, be assailed as we are, have the
devils in hell assailing on him, have all false religion barking
at him and nipping him and following him everywhere he went, and yet
obey that law in motive, thought, and deed without one blemish. When God dislooses the enemy
a little bit, I go peep. He had a perfect obedience, Winston,
with everything in this world assailing him all at the same
time. Satan's never taken me out by myself for 40 days and
tempted me, but he did Christ. And it's not my reformed life
or my committed life or devoted life that brings me hope. It's
His perfect life. Paul said, for me to live is
Christ. That's what life is, is Christ.
Christ. And he must die for sin. Folks got the idea that God saves
sinners by overlooking their faults. They've got the idea
that God saves sinners by simply forgiving their sin. You're forgiven.
Go your way. God doesn't save sinners by giving
them another chance. God saves sinners through the
substitutionary sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ. No other
way. The Bible said He appeared one
time in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice
of Himself. Was it sufficient? It said in
Romans 10, it perfected us forever. sanctified us 100%. All of the sins of all His elect
was laid on Him and He bore our sins in His own body on the tree.
And so David sings in the Psalms, Blessed is the man, and this
is a man who knew. He knew by gross outward sins
and he knew what he was. You read through the Psalms,
he confesses what he was by nature. He knows what mankind was in
the fall. He knew that. And listen to a
song. This is a song of the believer's
heart. He said, Blessed is the man to whom God will not charge
sin. Won't do it. Why? Paid for in
Christ. And then thirdly, the believer's
hope, that which he hangs his future on and by which he presently
lives, is based on the man Christ Jesus being raised from the dead. Paul said, if Christ be not raised,
then there is no resurrection from the dead. Isn't that what
he said? What does that mean? That means
we are still dead in Adam. Where is the resurrected man?
Where is the man who came out of that death, who was raised
up and obeyed God and honored God? Where is that man? There's only one. Only one. He is the first begotten from
the dead. Ain't that what it says? But
if Christ be not risen, Then there is no resurrection. You
can forget believing and all that stuff and going there. You
can forget that. You can forget this being born
again and all that if Christ be not risen. Because He is the
resurrection. He is the resurrection. Folks
run around, Martha and Mary both, told the Lord. They said, Oh,
we believe. We believe in last days. We believe
in that last day. He said, I am the resurrection. You get a hold of this, and that
will take on some meaning. If Christ be not risen, our preaching
is in vain. We are just wasting our time. Because if he be not risen, then
he's not ascended to the Father, and the Holy Spirit hasn't been
sent, and you can forget convincing anybody of anything. Our preaching
is in vain, and if Christ be not risen, we're all false prophets. Because we preach what the apostles
preached, and they preached the resurrection. If Christ be not
raised, we're yet in our sins because it is the resurrection
of Christ that declares the justification of God for all His elect. He was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. I know that His righteous obedience
was sufficient. His death satisfied God's justice
because God raised Him from the dead. Listen to this. He talks in Ephesians 2 about
how we walked according to the course of this world, according
to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now
worketh in the children of disobedience. He talks about our depravity
and sin and spiritual death. And then he said, but God, who
is rich in mercy for His great love wherewith He loved us even
when we were dead in sin, quickened us together with Christ and has
raised us up together. See that? Together. And made us sit together in heavenly
places in Christ Jesus. Why did He do it? That in the
ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace
and His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. That's what judgment
is going to be all about. That's right. God manifesting
His justice in His justification of sinners. Our hope is in the
resurrected Christ, and then fourthly, the believer's hope
is in Jesus Christ enthroned. I forget who I was listening
to the other day. I thought his name would come to me as I was
preaching, but he was preaching on TV, and he talked about, folks,
about Christ's sacrifice being vain Because men did not
believe. Just vain. The Word of God was
vain. That declaration was vain. His
sacrifice was vain. Because it's all up to you and
you wouldn't do it. I'm going to ask you something. Somebody wills you a fortune. Million dollars. Two million
dollars. Who in here you going to trust
that to? Anybody in here? Huh? Anybody in here, John, you
take that two million dollars of cash, have it in a couple
suitcases and say, here, you hang on to this for me? Huh? No. No, you're not going to trust
anything. I'm not going to trust anything. God trusted everything to Him. And it says in that very next
verse in Ephesians, it said, "...in whom we also trusted after
we heard..." After you heard what? After you heard who God
trusted, you trusted. If God can trust Him, you can
trust Him. But I'll give you another reason. I'll give you
another reason for trusting Him. He sits at the right hand of
God. And men talking about what He
wants. I don't mean to be critical,
but God don't want anything. He don't want. He never has wanted. I want. Because I don't have. But God has. He don't want. Everything
He purposes to do, He does. He does. And I'm telling you,
this one at the right hand of God is now enthroned. He sits victorious on the throne
of God. And everything he purchased,
he's going to have. Everything he purposed, he's
going to do. Everything he bought, he owns.
He's seated, it said in Hebrews chapter 10, expecting till his
enemies be made his footstool. Now you can trust Him. You can
trust Him. Because He can do what He says
He can do. He's Lord. He's enthroned in
glory. And it's the seated victorious
Christ who has all power in heaven and earth. He said all power,
that's what He told those disciples, is given to me in heaven and
earth. Now you go preach. Oh, but Lord, what about these,
they seek, don't go up to Jerusalem, they want to kill you. All power
is given unto me. How many times they seek to throw
him off a cliff, and he passed through the midst. He walked
right between them. The whole outfit standing there
ready to throw him off a cliff. He passed right between them.
Why? Because his time wasn't yet. And they're not going to throw
you off a cliff until your time comes either. And that bug ain't
going to bite you until it's your time. He sits enthroned, all powers
in His hand, all power. He arranges providence and He
preserves creation for the good of His people. He's not going
to let one of them perish. God is not willing for one of
them to perish, but that all should come to repentance. And
He teaches, matures, and establishes His people. He's the Lord. He's
the Lord. And He's not desiring to be Lord
or waiting to be Lord or expecting to be Lord. He is Lord. I shake my head all the time.
People start talking to me about making Jesus. You can't make
Jesus anything. He's the Lord. He's the Lord,
it's said, of the dead and the living to this end. To this end
was he resurrected. Then fifthly, the believer's
hope is that Jesus Christ is seated at the right hand of God
as his high priest. He's not just sitting there.
He's sitting there in the capacity of a high priest over his people. Now, we're getting ready to study
in Exodus pretty soon. As soon as we get out of these
plagues, and we're going to get out here in the wilderness, and
God is going to give Moses the pattern. He's going to show him
the pattern for the tabernacle. And we're going to begin to get
into that and how they worship. But here's what happened. The
individual, like you and I, they didn't do anything. They brought
whatever it was they brought and gave it to the priest. And
then the priest took it because he represented them in things
pertaining to God. They gave it to the priest. It
was the priest's responsibility then. Jesus Christ is our priest. I don't have anything to offer
God until I give it to Him. If it's washed in His blood,
and it's robed in His righteousness, now God accepteth your works. That's what the Scripture says. What a thought! The great High
Priest of God might call out your name. Huh? Might call out
your name, Nathan, to God Almighty. Call out your name. I know what
He is. But you gave Him to me. And I
gave Him a perfect righteousness, and I put away His sin. and you
gave them to me out of love." He pleads God's love. He pleads
His blood. He pleads His righteousness.
He pleads the very purpose of God for you that believe. What a thought! And then, sixthly, the believer's
hope is that when his brief stay in this life is over, and he
closes his eyes in death, that in an instant of time, In an instant of time, in a twinkling
of an eye, he will awake in the arms of
his Savior. Not going to lay in the box. You don't need to be worried
about the worms and worried about the water and worried about all
those things when you go to the funeral home. They keep trying
to sell you better and better. They want you to buy these vaults
and these waterproof caskets. You can bury me in a paper sack
in an instant. In an instant, before you can
even bat an eye, you'll be in the arms of your Savior and you
won't care about that tent anymore. Let the water have it. Job said,
I don't care. He said, after this skin, the
worms devour. He's talking about maggots, wiggling
maggots. Devour this body of mine. He
said, yet in my flesh will I see God, and I see Him for myself
and not another. That's hope. That's hope. That rich man, he profited down
here on this earth. Oh, he had all kinds of stuff.
He had big houses and lands and money and friends and notoriety
and all those things. But then he died. And old Lazarus,
he didn't have nothing. He was a beggar. But he loved
Christ. He was one of God's chosen. God
revealed the gospel to him and saved his worthless soul. And
when he died, when he closed his eyes in death, he laid in
the bosom of Christ. And he laid up there and that
rich man was down in hell. Which one of them treasures that
rich man had do you think would be worthy of that end? Huh? Then why do we do it? Why do we do it? A rich man had
nothing. My friend, I'm up here this morning
not trying to convince you of some ancient creed. I wouldn't
walk across the street to argue Calvinism with anybody. I could
care less. I'm up here trying to point you
to a risen Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. But I guarantee you this,
You study the Bible and you study these things of Christ and when
you come to see Him, if God ever opens your eyes to see Him, you'll
be a Calvinist through and through. If you will. You'll be able to
talk about total depravity and you'll be able to talk about
irresistible grace and you'll be able to talk about election.
You'll be able to talk about all those things if you ever
see Him and see what He's all about. Christ. That's what we That hope, he
said, that hope that's laid up for you in heaven. Now, if that's
your hope, he said, set your affection up there. Not down
here. Not down here. Quit grumbling
about down here. Start looking up there. That's
where eternity is. That's where forever is. That's
where peace is and life and grace and mercy is all up there secured
in him.