Well, I'll be honest with you,
I don't know where I'd rather be than here with you folks.
And the Lord is so gracious to us to let us live in this world
another day and let us take time out of our busy schedules to
come with the Lord's people. And just to worship. Just to
worship. What a blessing. I have a simple
text and I want you to turn with me as I read it in Luke chapter
19. Most of you will know where I'm
reading from. This incident that took place
when our Lord was upon this earth and He'd come here to Jericho
and met this man by the name of Zacchaeus. Beginning in Luke
chapter 19 and verse 1. And Jesus entered and passed
through Jericho. And behold, there was a man named
Zacchaeus, which was the chief among the publicans, and he was
rich. And he sought to see Jesus, who
he was, and could not for the press, because he was little
of statute. And he ran before and climbed
up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass by that
way. And when Jesus came to the place,
he looked up and saw him and said unto him, Zacchaeus, make
haste and come down, for today I must abide at thy house. And
he made haste and came down and received him joyfully. And when
they saw it, they all murmured, saying that he was going to be
guest with a man that is a sinner. And Zacchaeus stood and said
unto the Lord, Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to
the poor. And if I have taken anything
from any man by false accusation, I restore him fourfold. And Jesus
said unto him, This day is salvation come to this house, forasmuch
as he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of Man is come to
seek and to save that which was lost. I imagine that you've noticed
as you read the New Testament especially, where the Lord Jesus
came to Jericho. He never stayed in this place.
It was always said that He passed through Jericho. He came to Jericho,
He entered Jericho, but He always passed through. This was a beautiful
city at this time. You can read quite a bit about
it in the Old Testament, but history tells us a lot about
this city. Just a few years 30 or 40 years
before this, that mighty general that you may have studied about
in your high school lessons, Mark Antony, the Roman general,
he owned this city. He called it the City of Palm
Trees. Beautiful, beautiful place. He
visited here. He lived here, son. They said
it was visited by famous people, came here on their vacation.
He loved this city and he gave it to that beautiful queen of
Egypt, Cleopatra, before he killed himself. So it was a famous city. But you know the most famous
person that ever came to this city was this one that we read
about here. The Son of God, the Lord Jesus
Christ. But he didn't come here to sit
under his palm trees. He didn't come here to partake
in its pleasures and its pomp or to rest, but He came here
for a specific reason other than any worldly thing at all. As
a matter of fact, He didn't come here to see this city at all.
The Lord didn't think very much of this place. That's why He
never stayed here. It was several hundred years
before this that the Lord destroyed this place. Remember that? When
we read about Jericho in the Old Testament, that the Lord
broke down its walls and destroyed its people, and cursed the man
that rebuilt this city. So He didn't come here because
this was a beautiful place. He didn't come here to partake
of the temporal advantages and eat its dainty foods. The Scripture
tells us here, and I read it to you, why He came here. He tells us this in verse 9. In verse 10, look in verse 10.
For the Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which is
lost." He came here, the only reason that we're told He came
here is to save this man, this sinner. He came here to save
a sinner. And you know, as far as I know,
if Zacchaeus hadn't have been here, the Lord Jesus Christ would
have avoided this place. He came here to save this sinner. And that's why He came to this
world. He didn't come to this world to partake of its beauty. He could have did that and stayed
in heaven. He surely didn't come here to rest. When He came here,
He was barned and laid in a manger, put in a stable, As he grew up,
he was a man of sorrows. He said himself, I have no place
to lay my head. He was despised and rejected,
even of his own country. Why did he come here then? For
the same reason he came to Jericho, to save sinners. Before he came
into this world, his mission was told us from heaven. And
the Father gave him a name that just suited his reason for coming.
His name shall be called Jesus, for He shall save His people
from their sins. There was, I don't know why for
sure, I like to speculate though, some of the, not all the believers
in the early church was being persecuted. I imagine many of
them were admired. Some of those old gray-headed
men and old Christian women, their neighbors admired them
and probably began to think, Well, that's the kind of people
that Christ came to save. He came to save good old people.
So they got a saying started around. It was probably some
of those old women and old Christian men that got this saying started. And it was this. And Paul said
it's a faithful saying. They said He didn't come to save
good people. He didn't come to call the righteous.
But He came into this world to save sinners. And that's a true
saying today. Jesus Christ came into this world
to save sinners. And you know something, brothers
and sisters? If there weren't sinners in this world, He wouldn't
have come. He wouldn't have come. That's the only reason He came.
Everybody He saved here in this place was a sinner. We know that
Zacchaeus was a sinner. Because he said there, I came
to seek and to save that which was lost. He was a sinner. But
you know, this is not the first time he saved somebody in this
place. In the last part of Luke, beginning
there around verse 35, we're told about another man that he
saved while he was coming into the city. The Lord Jesus saved
a man as he was coming in the city. He saved a man as he was
going out of the city. We never read he saved anybody
in the city. But you remember this account here beginning in
verse 35, a blind bard of Mass, he's sitting by the highway side
begging. It's strange, ain't it? The Lord Jesus saved him. He began to cry, Jesus, thou
son of David, have mercy on me. And the Lord said, what do you
want? He said, Lord, I'm blind. I want to see Him. The Lord restored
his sight. And He said down there in verse
42, Thy faith has saved thee. So here was another lost sinner
that He saved. And you know something? This
is not the first sinner He saved in this place. You go all the
way back there to the first six chapters of Joshua. And He saved
another sinner there. Rahab the harlot. Remember her? A harlot. He saves all different
kinds and classes of people. He saved a harlot. She was a
sinner. He saved this blind man. He saved
him because he said, by faith I save thee. Must have been a
lost sinner. And then he saved this rich public. And it's strange, ain't it strange
that he saved a rich man on his way out of the city. poor beggar
on his way in. He just saves all classes of
people, doesn't he? That has nothing in common. What
did this blind man and this rich man have in common? Nothing.
Nothing. If he ever saw that blind man,
he would avoid him because he was a sorry beggar. They had
nothing in common. But this one thing, they were
both sinners. All of them were sinners. You know most of us here this
evening, we may not have much in common at all. If we was out
in the world living in nature, we may not have much to do with
each other. But you know one thing that binds us together
that we all have in common? We're all sinners, aren't we?
Ever last one of us are sinners. That's why Christ came into this
world, to save sinners. And He wouldn't have came. if
it hadn't been for that reason, because that's the very reason
he came. Save sinners. Somebody said, why don't you
just quit talking about that? You know, talk about morality. Tell us how to be better people.
No, we got a gospel. We got a gospel. And the gospel
says this, the Savior came from heaven to save sinners. We can't
get over that, can we? He came to save sinners. Everybody he saves in this sin-cursed
world is a sinner. Secondly, how can we know that
we're sinners? How can I know I'm a sinner?
Everybody you talk to is a sinner. You talk to them, they'll tell
you they're sinners. Nobody's perfect. I know that. Sure, I'm
a sinner. How can I know? How can you know
that you're that sinner? that Jesus Christ came to save.
How can you know that? Well, He tells us right here
in verse 3. He sought to see Jesus who He
was. You know how you can know that
you're that sinner that Christ came to save? You'll seek Him. You're seeker of the Lord Jesus
Christ. If He's come to save you, you
become a seeker of Him. He finds you before you find
Him. But you can be assured of this
much. If you're seeking Him, He's already found you. He came
here on purpose knowing this man was there, didn't He? But
this man didn't know the Lord was seeking him. Looks like the
Lord went down to Samaria, seeking that woman. He must need to go
through Samaria. One of His sheep was there, and
He was going after her. He was seeking her before she
ever became a seeker of Him. But here's the way we know that
we're one of those that Christ came to save. You begin to seek
Him. It happened like this in every
case. Here, this man ran, got up in
this sycamore tree and began to watch and wait and see the
Lord Jesus Christ. Blind Barnabas, he said, what's
this commotion? And they said, Jesus of Nazareth
is passing by. And what did he do? He began
to cry out, Jesus, have mercy upon me. What was he doing? Seeking
the Lord. Why? Because the Lord Jesus was
seeking him. And you go back to that other
center I mentioned in this city, hundreds and hundreds of years
before this. And those spies that came in
and went up to her rooftop to hide themselves from the King's
soldiers, and she went up where they were. And she said, listen, you may
not think I know anything, but I know something. I know God's
given you this city. I know that. And I know what
your God did. He parted the Red Sea, and you
guys went across on dry land. And I know the Lord your God
slew those two mighty kings of the Amorites. And I know this,
your God is God in heaven, and He's God in this earth beneath. I want you to have mercy on me.
And I want you to give me a true token. I want you to swear to
me. What was going on with that woman? She became a seeker of
the Lord. That's the way we know, Bob.
Here we go along in our lives. Just living our lives. We get
married. We have our children. We raise
our families. We work. We plan for retirement. We got everything all figured
out. Coping with life. Not thinking about eternity.
not thinking about our sin, not thinking about salvation, and
suddenly something happens. What happens? We get concerned. Oh, we need a Savior. We need
mercy. I mean, we need it so bad we
begin to seek Him, don't we? We begin to seek Him. And after
a while, you find Him. You find Him. You find mercy. And then you can know, I'm one
of those the Savior has been seeking. I didn't know He was
seeking me, but He did. And I know it now. I'm one of
His. That's the way you know. That's
the way you know. My dad was a Free Will Baptist
preacher. I was raised a Free Will Baptist. I was raised a
Free Will Baptist by nature, all of us are. But I was taught
the Free Will Baptist doctrine. And the Lord saved me out of
that mess. And I started trying to talk to my dad about the Lord.
He had backslid. You know how most free willed
Baptists do. They stay in and out and out and in so much. He
hadn't been to church in like 30 years, even the free willed
Baptist church. And I was talking to him one day about the Lord's
sheep. My sheep hear my voice. I know them. They follow me.
He said, I'm one of them. I'm one of them. And he started giving me some
reasons how he knew I was one of them. He didn't do like he
used to do and he quit doing this and he started doing this
and all that stuff. I said, you may be one of them,
but you've got no reason to believe it. Because you're not a seeker
of the Lord. You're not a seeker of the Lord.
The Lord's people seek the Lord. Why are you stressing this, Bruce?
For this reason. For this reason. It's impossible
to become a true seeker of the Lord Jesus Christ if He's not
seeking you. It's not only the most difficult
thing a man ever done, it's the most impossible thing a man ever
done. The eye of a man's soul will
never turn towards Jesus Christ until He gives you grace to look.
You will never open your mouth with one groan for mercy, true
saving mercy, until He puts the groan there in your heart. You'll
never make one step to Him savingly until He draws you and tugs on
those heart strings. I'm telling you it's a plain
evidence when a man in his heart begins to seek the Son of God
for mercy to be saved by Him. And it ain't easy. If I come
here this evening and told you the easiest thing you could ever
do was seek the Lord, I'm afraid I wouldn't be honest with you.
Because there's a devil that despises you. Every time you
begin to think, I go to the nursing home and preach to those old
people down there. And one of the things that they're
more concerned about than anything else, there ain't no hope for
me. Ain't no hope for me. You go
in there and you begin to preach the gospel to them, and they
begin to get a little bit concerned, and one of their concerns is,
I've waited too late. Ain't no hope for me. Who's telling
them that? Satan's telling them that, ain't
he? That's what they said over at Jeremiah's day. We've loved
strangers, so after them we'll go. Even in this day, child of
God, don't you feel this, that sometimes you feel in your soul
it's next to impossible to pray and seek the Lord? You've got
all these hindrances in your mind, and sometimes you're overloaded
with guilt, and you think to yourself, I can't seek the Lord.
Ain't no sense even trying. Do you ever feel that way? Dear child of God, do you ever
feel that way? I tell you it's the most difficult thing to become
a seeker of the Lord. And it takes grace to do it.
And if you're doing it, it's because He's seeking you. He's
seeking you. Every time, ever grown in your
heart towards Him, He's put it there. Every side of the eye,
that tear-dimmed eye that looks out of your sorrowful soul to
Him, He put it there. If He didn't, you'd never seek
Him. Why did these men become a seeker of the Lord? They were
His. They were His. That's the way
we know. And here's another way we know
here in verse 5. Look at this. When the Lord begins
to seek us, here's the way He seeks us. Here's what happens
every time without fail. When Jesus came to the place,
He looked up and saw Him. He looked up and saw Him. And
Zacchaeus, Zacchaeus, make haste and come down. For today I must
abide at your house. When the Lord begins to seek
us, how does He begin with us? By bringing us down. He brings
us down. That's the first thing He does.
He never deals with us in mercy. He never manifests mercy until
He brings us down. Can you see the Master standing
under this tree, having a conversation with this man up the tree? It
just don't happen, does it? He wouldn't stand there talking
to him, looking up and say, how you doing today, Zachy? Yes,
it's good to see you. Just want to talk with you for
a while. Maybe have some mercy on you. Don't happen, does it? What's the first thing that happens?
When the Lord calls us, He calls us to come down. Come down here. Come down. My boss one time was talking
with, we had one fellow in our department where I worked and
he was a drunk. He'd come to work drunk and leave drunk. I
guess he carried in his box, I guess. My boss was talking to him. My
boss was another free will Baptist. He said to him, he said, when
you think of Jesus, aren't you so happy? He told his drunk man
that. When you think of Jesus, aren't
you so happy? He probably was when he thought
of his Jesus. And he's drunk and stupid. We're not happy when the Lord
begins to call us and deals with us. Because He calls us out of
our trees of self-righteousness. He calls us out of our trees
of self-sufficiency. He calls us out of that tree
of saved self. And He brings us down to the
dust. And then He begins to speak mercy to us. Ain't that your
experience? That's the experience of every
child of God. The Lord said, I'm going to put
a new heart in them. I'm going to give them a new
spirit. And this is the way they're going to feel about themselves.
They're going to abhor themselves. They're going to abhor themselves.
They're going to come down and sit in the dust and abhor themselves. How do you feel about yourself?
Are you a wretch, a miserable wretch? In your own eyes, I mean. Are you deserving of hell this
afternoon? Do you feel like you're just
amazed that you already aren't there? The Lord's probably called you down.
And you know this will be your lifelong experience. Just every
once in a while we go get up a tree again. Above everybody
else, don't we? And you're the master in His
mercy. He calls us back down again. Come down. Come down. You've got no business
up your tree. Come down. And we come down and do just
what we did when we started this way. We receive Him joyfully. Joyfully. We receive a full Christ. into our empty souls. We receive
His blood upon our guilty conscience. We receive His righteousness
to clothe the shame of our nakedness. We receive Him and we're not
hesitant about doing it. We're joyful when we do it. We're
thankful when we do it. Come down. Come down. And He
made haste and came down. and received Him joyfully. Joyfully. I've been receiving
the Lord Jesus Christ for 35 years. 35 years I've been receiving
Him. 35 years I've been coming down.
When you think, boy, I can't get any lower. He gets you lower,
doesn't He? We receive everything we know
about Him. We receive everything that's revealed about Him. The
Lord Jesus Christ, He's ours. He's ours. And I tell you, every
time He gives you grace to do it, aren't you joyful? Aren't
you thankful? It's not a one-time deal, is
it? And look at this, in verse 8. Look what a change comes in conversion. What does it mean when the Lord
saves a fellow? Well, he may live right and he may not. Maybe
he changed and he may not. May have the same old attitude,
he may not. Who really knows these things? Well, the Bible
tells us, look what a change. Look what it is to be saved by
the Lord of Glory. He said in verse 8, Zacchaeus
stood and said, Lord, behold the half of my goods I give to
the poor. And if I have taken anything
from any man, the false accusation, I restore him four times. Man, what is it to be saved?
What will regeneration do to a person? It changes everything. It changes the essential part
of a person. The very principle of his being.
I imagine this was an old stingy gut. He probably false accused
people to get more money out of them. But look how he's changed
now. He just comes out of the blue.
He's so filled with joy. He's so changed. He's so Christ-like. He says, Lord, half of everything
I got, I know some poor people. I'm going to help them. I ain't
closing my eyes against them anymore. Man, the love, the generosity. Just give it away. Give it away.
Found something better, hadn't he? Found heaven's treasure. And the treasure of this world
didn't mean much to him anymore. And Lord, if I've cheated anybody, I'll go back and pay them. Four
times what I've cheated them out of. You see these rotten
hypocrites? And there's a bunch of them,
ain't there? Live like devils and lie. My wife works where
she works at. She said the most difficult people,
and some of you have experienced that, the most difficult people
in the world to get along with is religious people. And she
said the preachers was the most difficult of religious people.
She said, they'll cheat you. If you've made a mistake, they
won't remind you what you've done or pay you back. You know
what's the matter with those fellows? They need the Lord Jesus
to save them. That's it. That's it. They need
the Lord to give them what He did for this man, to save them. Everything He does for somebody's
sake, it has a profound effect upon them. He saved old blind
Barnabas. And when he called him to him,
he took that old filthy rag that was around him that looked awful.
He just never could see it. He threw it away. And he ran
to the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Lord gave him sight.
And you know what he did? He followed Christ. And glorifying
God. Praising Him and thanking Him
for what He'd done. It changes you. It changes your life. It changes your heart. When the Lord saved Rahab the
harlot. Man, look what a change came
on that woman. When they delivered her out of that town, the scripture
says she joined herself to the Lord's people. Matthew 1, I think,
tells us that she married Salmon, a prince there in Israel. And
they had a child whose name was Boaz. Remember Boaz and Ruth? Boaz was Rahab the harlot's son. And he grew up and got married
and he had a little son by the name of Obed. And Obed grew up
and got married and he had a son by the name of Jesse. And Jesse
got married and had a son by the name of King David. She joined
herself to the Lord's people. And he just included her right
in his lineage. When the Lord saves you, He puts
you in His family. And oh, what a difference it
makes. Somebody said their dog found
out they were saved. That's a difference. He said,
I quit kicking my old dog when I come home. I have to drive.
He noticed the Lord had done something for me. It changes
you. He changes you, doesn't it? He does everybody he saves. There was a lot of people, I
imagine, here in this city. Not many people now. They tell
us it's more or less just a rundown village now. There's a lot of
people here when the Master passed through. Very few of them were
saved. Very few of them. Three in the
New Testament that we read the Lord saved around this city. And you know the reason they
were saved? He tells us, the Son of Man has come to seek and
to save that which was lost. Old Ralph Barner said, there
will not be a sinner in hell. There'll not be a lost man in
hell. He went ahead to explain that. If you're lost, you're
seeking the Master. If you're a sinner, you're seeking
a Savior, aren't you? Because He's seeking you. God
bless His Word. Can we pray? Oh, Father, wise and gracious Father,
we do thank You tonight. Thank you for this great privilege
that you blessed us with, to assemble with your dear children,
to worship you, to lift up voice of thanksgiving, hearts of gratitude
for what you've done for us. Lord, we bless you for it. None
of us here tonight are any different than anybody else. You came to
us when we were bound for hell, ready to perish. Oh, you know
where you found us. But Lord, we love to tell it
back to you. We love to remind you where you found us, on the
path and wide, broad road to destruction. And you rescued
us in tender mercies. You showed us your goodness,
your kindness, your love, and we praise you for it. We've come
here this evening just to lift up our voices, to praise you
for saving us. Praise you for keeping us saved,
for not letting us go. And surely we're still seeking
you tonight because you're still seeking us. And you'll never
cease to seek us till you have us home with yourself in heaven.
Oh, we bless you, Lord. We praise you, blessed Lord Jesus.
May you continue to bless this dear congregation. Oh, visit
them. Visit hearts. Call your people
out of this place. Comfort them here. Bless the
dear pastor and his dear wife. Bless the preachers in this place.
Use them for your glory. Oh, Lord, call them, humble them,
and use them for the glory of Jesus Christ. In His name we
pray. Amen. Thank you, brothers and
sisters. Good to see you.