Now if you'll turn back to 2
Corinthians chapter 5. I'm going to base what I have
to say. This is very familiar to you. We've been quoting these scriptures
and looking at these scriptures for weeks now. But I'm going
to base what I have to say this morning here in 2nd Corinthians
on verses 14-21 of chapter 5. Now, in order for you to enter
into this text, and before we get to it and get into it, in
any depth, in order for you to understand these things in depth,
you know, often times, like I was reading to you a while ago, Al
Paul's, I pause because we're just grabbing these words at
face value and going across the plane. I want you to enter into
them. I want you to get into the depth
of them. I want you to understand what they're saying. And in order
for us to enter into this text in any depth, we must be aware
of what is said in the chapters leading up to this because this
is the summation of it. This is not the beginning of
it. This is not the reasons behind it. but the summation of it.
And it's kind of like getting in on the end of a speech and
you say, well, what did he say? What did he say? Well, back in
Chapter 3, and if you just want to kind of scan, read over these
while I'm talking to you, you can. But back here in Chapter
3, Paul tells us that he's been made an able minister of the
New Testament. That's Paul, the apostle. We're
no longer under the old schoolmaster of types and shadows and pictures. We're not under the priesthood.
There's no reason to have priests anymore. There's no reason to
have sacrifices anymore. There's no reason to carry around
censors and have altars and burn incense and all that kind of
stuff. There's no sense in having a tabernacle with a division
in it between the holy place and the common place for the
common priest and one place for the high priest and all this
these divisions, there's no reason for that anymore. No reason for
that. We're no longer under a national
church state. And what I mean by that is this. A natural church state in the
Old Testament is how the church of the living God was represented
in figure. We're not under that anymore.
Christ has come. Christ has fulfilled those Old
Testament types. He's brought to light the hidden
things of darkness. He's taken all these shadows
and types. The law having a shadow of things
to come. Those things were given, Paul
said, as a figure for the time then present. Patterns of things
in the heavens. But those things are gone now.
Those things are passed by. He said like an old garment.
The thing's ripped and torn and button it and the button falls
out of the hole and he said, you just take it off and throw
it in the fire. That's that old, that Old Testament church state. We're no longer under that. As
the elect of God, God's chosen people, Israel, they were marked
out. from among all the rest of the
world. Men just fight and fight and
fight today about election. They don't have a better problem
with the election of Israel. Ask anybody in town who Israel
is and let me tell you what they're going to tell you. That's God's
elect. Why I thought you didn't believe in election? You mean it's okay for God to
choose a nation but not an individual? You think it's okay for God to
drown Pharaoh and all of his army in a sea because of a purpose
in this nation, but it's not right for him to do that because
of one of his elect today? What kind of understanding, what
kind of God do you got? He's one way here and one way
here, changes. In this, the way the church was
represented and typified and patterned, go through the book
of Hebrew. Go through the book of Romans. He pictured and typified
the church in this old church state. And he tells you that
they was the fewest of them all. He didn't pick them because there
was many. There was just one, just old Abraham. Raised up a
whole nation out of one man. Made his seed like the stars
of the heavens, like the sands of the seashore. But he wrapped that whole outfit
up. He wrapped old natural Israel up and all the types and the
priesthood and all those old sacrifices and ceremonies and
holy days and everything else when Christ came. Paul said,
I'm a minister, an able minister of the New Testament. Are you
with me? The New Testament. A new day
has risen. Christ has appeared. He has revealed
the true temple. He has satisfied God's holy justice,
and now he sits at the right hand of God. Able ministers of
the New Testament. And listen to this, verse 6,
2 Corinthians 3, 6. Not of the letter, but of the
Spirit, for the letter killeth. The letter killeth. Natural Israel
believed in the letter of the law. They believed that God's
law was something that could be kept. Something that could
be honored by men and that by compliance to it, they could
appease God's anger and obtain God's favor. That's what kills
men. What kills you? That whole concept
and idea of being able to appease God. That's what kills men. It kills them. They won't hear
the truth because they're persuaded that they can do these things
on their own. Listen to what Paul said. He
said, they being ignorant of God's righteousness and going
about to establish their own righteousness have not submitted
themselves unto the righteousness of God. That's why he prayed
for Israel that they might be saved. This whole idea, this
whole concept of righteousness and this whole concept of natural
reasoning, Paul calls it dead letter theology. He said, that's
not what God called me to do. What I got to say to you is spiritual. What I have to say to you, God's
going to have to make it effectual through His Spirit. What I have
to say to you is not dependent on you. It's dependent on Him. You follow what I'm saying? He
said, I'm an able minister of the New Testament. Now, if we're left to ourselves
and left to our own reasoning and understanding, death will
attend to all that we say, death will describe all that we do,
and death will be the sure end of us and for everybody that
hears us. You're not just killing yourself,
we're deceiving and deceiving one another. We're deceived,
Paul said, and you're deceiving one another. Our Lord told those
Pharisees, He said, you won't enter into the kingdom and you
won't let anybody else go in. You see what I'm saying? It kills,
the letter killeth, that whole concept. Chapter 4. Now listen to this, he's building,
Paul's building something here. And he said, therefore, seeing
we have this ministry, we're able ministers of the New Testament,
God's given us something new, something special, something
glorious, something that He accompanied with life. Something that appeared one time
in the end of the world. It's not something you can go
down here and get anywhere. Seeing he gave us this ministry
as we have received mercy, we faint not. But we've renounced
the hidden thing. That's why we followed him to
start with. It's hidden from us. Paul said, I did what I did
being ignorant. Don't you know that's hard for
an old proud Pharisee to say. the hidden things of dishonesty,
not walking in craftiness nor handling the word of God deceitfully,
but by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every
man's conscience in the sight of God. We don't put on airs. I don't have to put on. I just
don't, I don't feel, do you? Do you feel compelled to put
on? Somebody comes around. You know,
religious folks, I'm telling you this because at one time,
I was one of them. I know how it works. See, you
talk just like I'm talking right now, normally. And then somebody comes to visit.
And all of a sudden, you start talking in old English. You ever
notice that? Huh? Start talking in old English,
thou, thee, all this stuff. Or you pray, you bow your head
to pray. You think God's going to hear
you because you use old English? If you believe that, you need
to go back to the Greek. You need to go back to the Chaldean.
You need to go back to the original. You don't need to be saying it
in English. I think we think God's English, don't you? You see, these hidden things
of dishonesty. It's dishonest to do that, isn't
it? It's dishonest. He said, we've renounced these
things. We see them. We don't walk in craftiness.
We don't handle the Word of God deceitfully. We don't put on
airs. We don't try to give an aura
about the place. It's just a place. It's just
a building. It's got four walls and a ceiling.
It's got lights. Got the things that we need.
Got seats that you can sit in and listen to. No aura about
the place. We don't do that. We don't try
to use visual aids or professional musicians. Don't try to bring unusual and
spectacular testimonies of men. Try to sell y'all some interest
in social activities. Paul said, I just preach to you.
I just preach to you. And when I'm done preaching,
I don't try to get you to come down the aisle. I don't try to get you to make
a decision. I don't try to get you to do anything. And when
you come in here like that young man did Wednesday night trying
to get me to get you to do something, I'm not going to do that either.
He said, I want to get down here right now and pray. I said, I'll
tell you what you need to do. Sit down there and shut up. That's
what you need to do. Ask him what I told you. God's not going
to talk to you while you're talking. He's not going to speak to you
while you're telling him what you know. You need to shut up.
I read that to you in Romans. You shut up, sit there guilty,
and he'll teach you. He'll bless you. He's not going
to bless you while you're over there yammering in the corner.
making excuses, and Paul said, we renounced that stuff. We saw
the foolishness in it. It makes me sick, don't you?
I turned a guy on Sunday morning on the TV, and he started in,
and it just turned my stomach. I had to turn him off. I don't
even want to hear it anymore. We leave our message, we leave
ourselves and those who hear it in his hands. Leave them in
his hands. What are you going to do about
it? Huh? John, what would you do about
it if Nathan decided tomorrow morning he ain't going to bleed?
What are you going to do about it? Huh? Nothing. Nothing you can
do. But we think we can. Huh? You
are going to have this. I'll shove it down your throat.
No, you ain't going to. You ain't going to have it. I'll
tell you, your child gets sick, any of you mothers ever try to
give a child a sick medicine? Try to force it down their throat.
They ain't gonna have it. You might put a little peanut
butter on it and make it look appetizing, but you ain't gonna
shove it down their throat. They ain't gonna swallow it.
That's what we try to do with grapes. Paul said we renounce
these things. We don't do that. I'm going to
stand up here as best I know how, and I'm going to tell you
the truth, and I'm going to show you my text. I'm going to read
these words to you that God inspired these men to write, and I'm going
to leave the results of it between you and him. I know I'm going to be excited. You know, man, I read a sign.
I used to go to contractor sales. I built houses. We go around
the backside of the lumber company and had a contractor's desk in
there because we were in there buying whole house patterns and
things that took a lot of time and they didn't want us out there
on the floor. And so we go back there and I
got amused one day. I look back there on the backside
hanging up on the wall and there's this little cartoon thing. And
what it said was something like this. It says, neglect on your
part does not constitute an emergency on my part. But we get in trouble,
and we see the emergency. We get anxiety. We get upset. We get worried. And we think
God's worried. Neglect on our part doesn't constitute
an emergency on his part. He's sitting down. He's sitting
down. He's expecting to his enemies
to be made his footstool. He's not excited over what excites
you. Huh? No. Paul said, if our gospel be hid,
verse 3, it's hid to them that are lost in whom the God of this
world, that's Satan. He's called the God of this world
because he's the author of all false gods. He's a liar and a
father of it. He's the promoter of all false
religion. He's behind every fallen man's
concept of God, Satan. in all his ignorance, in all
his darkness, in all his being deceived, Satan, in whom the
God of this world hath blinded the minds, that is, the way men
think and reason. He didn't blind their eyes, he
blinds their minds. The way men think, the way men
reason, blinds the minds of them which believe not lest the light
of the glorious gospel of Christ who is the image of God should
shine under them. We preach not ourselves, but
Christ Jesus the Lord and ourselves your servants for Jesus' sake. The true preacher of God does
not promote himself. He does not promote himself. I can't even remember their names.
I quit watching them so long ago I can't even remember their
names. But Jimmy Swigert and some of these old evangelists
have been on there for years and years and years. Their pictures
on billboards, their pictures on TV, their pictures on everything. If you call and write or send
them a donation or something, he'll send you something back
and that'll have his picture on it. They promote themselves.
Promote themselves. But a true preacher of God does
not promote, elevate himself. He does not push doors open.
He doesn't force his way in. I'm going to preach out this
soon. You stay home. OK by me. OK by me. I remember somebody
asked me one time, well, why don't you ever come see me? You
never invited me. Huh? That's the truth. I'm not
going to go where I'm not wanted. You don't want me, I stay home.
All right with me. I'm not going to shove doors
open. I don't do that. I don't do that. True preacher of God, he doesn't
promote himself, he doesn't elevate himself, he doesn't shove doors
open, and he don't force things to happen. I'm going to make
it happen. You better not. You better not. It'll all be on you if you do.
Yeah, God's gonna send him to hell, but he's gonna send you
to hell for what you did. And his life, both home and at
church, is swallowed up with this crucified, resurrected Christ. He don't have anything. I don't
have anything else to say. Can't we talk about the wheels
with eyes in them? As soon as I figure out what
it has to do with Christ, we'll talk about the wheels. Till I
do, we ain't talking about them. We just leave them over there.
Let them go rank. I'm not an ambulance chaser.
I'm not one of those religious buzzards that feed on the suffering
and dying of the bereaved and all of these things. I'm just...
Paul said, I'm taking up with this, this, ministry. I'm an able minister of the New
Testament. I've denounced those things.
And this gospel I preach, this glorious gospel of Christ, this
resurrected Lord who appeared to 500 brethren at one time,
whom God gave undeniable, infallible evidences that He was the Christ,
that's my ministry. And the reason why you can't
see it is because the God of this world has blinded your minds. And the only way you're ever
going to see Him is for the same God who spoke light into creation
to speak again and turn the light on. If He don't, darkness, void,
big vacuum. That's all it's ever going to
be. That's all it's ever going to
be. Listen to this, verse 7. Paul
said, I've got this treasure in a clay pot. God emptied heaven of its glory and put it in a clay pot. Can
you imagine? Angels! You think you could have
rolled that boulder away from the front of that Angels didn't even have a problem. Angels been there from the beginning. Angels experienced the war in
heaven. Angels been hearing about the
glory of Christ from the beginning. Angels desire to look into this.
And Paul said he took that glory and put it in a clay pot. Just a pot. Broken. Not much to look at. Not impressive. Just a vessel
of clay. And here's why he did it. That
the excellency of this knowledge, huh? Who's going to get the glory? Not the pot. Not the pot. But the one who
put the treasure in it. Oh, this is of God beginning
to end. It's all of God. Salvations of
the Lord. It's all to the glory of His
name and it's all by His sovereign grace. Now seeing what we see
and knowing what we know, Paul said, I've grown. He said, man,
this world, what do we love so much about this world? God's
going to burn it up. There's nothing in it. The more
I discover about it, the worse I see it. The more I discover
about this body, the less I want to stay in it. Paul said, I've
grown. I'd rather go on and be with
Christ. I want to be close with my heavenly house. I'm tired
of this house. I'm tired of the pain. I'm tired
of the doubt. I'm tired of the shame. I'm tired
of the morning. I want to go be with Him, don't
you? You must be nuts if you want to stay here. There's nothing
here. There's nothing here. Oh, he said, knowing what I know
now. seeing this treasure, having
this treasure in this old clay pot. Oh, I want to be up there
with him. I want to be up there. I want
to have that house that he purposed me to have. I want to stand up
there without hindrance. I want to stand up there without
doubt, without shame, without guilt, without ignorance, knowing
as I know, knowing the things that here I just wonder about.
I'm seeing them clearly rejoicing in my heart. Verse 16. This is 2 Corinthians
5, verse 16. Well, I've lost my place. But
anyway, Paul said, this outward man, though he perish, the inward
man is renewed day by day. That's chapter 4, I'm sorry.
Though this outward man perish, and I feel it every day, but
this inward man, this new man, oh, this inward man, he's renewed
day by day. My hope's stronger today than
it was yesterday. Chapter 5, verse 2, and we groan
earnestly desiring, not in pretense, not in ignorance, not deceived,
but in earnest looking expectantly and with excitement to that day
when we shall fully be delivered from this present evil world. That's what Paul calls it. Preaching is not an occupation.
It's not a career. Preaching is one beggar telling
another beggar where he got his bread. That's what it is. And hungry men, listen. Where'd
you say you got that, huh? Old Jacob went over there and
he said, man, what's that smell? He went over there to his neighbor's
tent, looked in there, man, had that big old pot full of cornbread.
He said, where'd you get that? Down in Egypt. He went back and
told old boy, get your stuff and get down there. There's bread
down there. Huh? Hungry men will listen. They'll
listen. How'd you get it? I just told
him I needed it. I didn't have any. He gave it
to me. I'm going to think I'll go down
and get me some. Oh, filled with divine light,
filled with gratitude and love, he'd been reconciled to God.
God raised him from the dead. Old Lazarus, I think about him,
he could tell you about it. Look here in verse 14, 2 Corinthians
5, For the love of Christ constraineth us, because we thus judge, we
rightly divide the truth, we've got a right understanding of
the matter, understanding that if he died for all, then we're
all dead. It's only a logical conclusion,
isn't it? We're all dead. You hath he quickened
who were dead. Yeah, I know it. I know. And
this knowledge, verse 15, of his death and ours. This death. Who understands it? Who perceives it? What's that say? They which live They which live. Well, what does
it teach? That we should not henceforth
live unto ourselves, but unto him that raised us from the dead. Any man that's been called out
of darkness, any man who's been given life, he knows it wasn't
given to him so he could go back and be what he was. Any man tell
you that, he's a liar. He's a liar. Now, I said all
that to say this, what can a man do to reconcile himself to God? What can he do? Isn't that what
this man reminded me of that Wednesday night when he came
in here? Give me something to do. What can I do to be reconciled
to God? What can a man do? He's born
in sin. David said, we come forth from
the womb speaking lies. Every day of his life, he's faced
with choices. And every choice he's ever made
has been wrong. His mind's enmity against God.
It's not subject to the law of God. Neither indeed can be. He
can't turn to the law. Satan has flooded his mind with
worldly concepts of God and Christ and salvation and the Church,
and he is totally upside down in his theology. Satan deceives, and those that
are deceived, they deceive others. And God has plainly set forth
in the Scriptures the means He is determined to recover His
vanquished But the natural man won't receive them, ain't that
what it says? The natural man receiveth not the things of the
Spirit of God. They're there. Preaching's available
somewhere. Buy a Bible downtown, about anywhere. Natural man won't have it. The
very law that condemns him, he stands and embraces it, thinking
he's got hope in it. And he won't shut up. He just
won't. Ignorant. This fella came in
here telling me what I needed to do
to save him. Just shut up. You're so upside down, you're
so contrary, you're so backwards in this spiritual death. There's
so many opposing factors. What can a man do to be reconciled
to God? What can a man do? Nothing. Nothing. It's out of your hands. It's
out of your hands. You can't do anything. You can't
do anything. A man gets scared, he gets troubled,
he gets thinking about death, and then in the sincerity of
a moment, he hopes to wipe out a lifetime of lies and pretense. Don't he? Huh? He's been Joseph's
brother and pretended their whole life, ever since they sold Joseph
down into Egypt. They're back there putting their
arm around their daddy Jacobson. Oh, we sure miss old Joseph.
You once sold him. You sold him in a pit. It's a
pretense. And then we get in trouble. Doctor
comes in and does this. I'm sorry, you got about six
months at the most. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. I better make my peace with God.
What can I do? Huh? Nothing. Nothing. Oh, and that ain't the worst
of it. That's not the worst of it. One time in the end of the world
Christ appeared. God's true vine. The one hope
for following humanity. The one hope of representation. The one hope for sinners. And
He came into the world as a man. As the one over in Romans 5,
verse 14, it describes Adam as the figure of him. He came into
the world, a federal head, a man representing a man. He represented
a new creation, a man given authority, given responsibility, given a
bride to love, given a world to minister to, given a law to
keep. And as a representative man,
he become a faithful servant. And he become obedient unto death,
even the death of the cross. He appeared one time in the end
of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
He entered in fulfilling the service that the old high priest
was reminded that he couldn't every year when he went back
in with a new sacrifice, every year. And by His own blood, He went
into heaven itself to appear in the presence of God for us,
took the sins of His elect upon Himself, took their vileness
to Himself, and wickedness, and evil thoughts, and all this enmity
of His heart. And He stood before God in our
place, in our room, in our stead before God. Delivered, Paul said,
for our offenses and raised again for our justification. And having
sanctified us with His perfect life and sanctified us once for
all by His death, God raised Him up and seated Him at His
right hand. And according to His promise
and based on His merits and the lordship and authority given
to Him as the risen Savior, sent forth what He promised. He sent
forth the Spirit of the living God. And He sat in the church
and gave gifts to them and appointed preachers. and send His Spirit
to accompany their message, to breathe life into His Word, and
to make His Word known to men. And by the Word of His Gospel,
by the power of God's Spirit, and according to the testimony
of Scripture, He calls sinners to repentance and faith. And
you know what men say? I don't have time. I want you to think about something. Old Joseph, he's down here in
Egypt. He goes to Potiphar's house.
You remember the lies his wife tells about him. He gets thrown
down in that pit. Down in that pit, men have a
little compassion on him and they give him this little job
down there. He runs the prison. He runs the
pit. Pharaoh calls him out. And he
tells Pharaoh his dream, and Pharaoh comes up to him, Lord
of Egypt, richest man on the face of the earth. And he comes
up to old Joseph, and he said, I'm going to call you Zathnath-Payoneer. He said, not a man in Egypt can
lift up a tool without your word. You're going to rule my kingdom.
I'm going to make you equal in power with me. I'm going to seat
you at my right hand. I'm going to take the ring, the
royal seal, off my hand and put it on yours. Whatever you tell
these people goes. Whoever you want to give corn
to, you give corn to. Whoever you want to withhold
it from, you withhold it from. What if Joseph would have looked
at him and said, well, you know, I've got this job down at the
prison. I stand up here and I tell you
about the glorified, resurrected Christ. I'm talking to you this
morning about an eternal inheritance. I'm talking about the treasure
of heaven. Well, I got a bowling tournament,
you know, where I've been over there. One fella said he had
to play tennis. Had a tennis match. You know, I think Joseph would
have told him that. He wouldn't have ruled anything. He probably
just told him, well, he's going back down there to prison. He'll
be all right. Oh, I'll tell you this thing.
What can I do to be reconciled? You can't do anything. You can't
do anything. What can I do to reconcile God? You can't reconcile God. Everything
that God intends to reconcile. Can you hear me? Everything that
God intends to reconcile, He's already reconciled. Huh? Ain't that what this is? God was in Christ, reconciling
the world unto Him, not imputing their trespasses. God's not upset. You're upset. God's not angry. You're the one that's angry.
You're the one that says, I ain't no upset. God's not doing that. God's not upset. God's not angry. Christ's not up there anxiously
twisting, oh, I hope somebody bleeds so I didn't waste that
death and waste that... He's sitting down. God don't
have a gun pointed at you. You're the one with the gun. Brethren, this thing of preaching
anchor, it's not to reconcile God, it's to reconcile you. to
His reconciliation. Read that chapter. Look at this. All things, verse
18, are of God who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ. And He given to us the ministry
of reconciliation. What is it? To wit, God was in
Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not charging their
trespasses unto them. And He's committed unto us the
word of reconciliation. Now then, now watch this. We're ambassadors for Christ
as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you, and Christ
did. What? What's that say? Be ye
reconciled to God. God's already reconciled, honey. He's not upset. We're the ones
upset. He's not troubled. We're the
ones in trouble. Be ye reconciled to God. What's
Paul saying there? He's saying be ye reconciled
to God's reconciliation. That's what faith does. Faith
lays hold, it understands, it rightly divides this thing of
reconciliation. It understands that to satisfy
God, to declare God righteous, the only way he can do that and
justify me is through the substitutionary work of Christ. Now, be reconciled
to that. Quit talking about your good
work. Quit talking about this progressive sanctification. Quit
talking about these things. Let's get over here on God's
side with this. That's what Paul said. He said, that's what my ministry
is all about. It's to take you away from the
lies and take you away from the false hopes and the deceit and
just get you to look for a minute at this reconciliation of God. I was talking with a fellow there
yesterday and I told him this, I said, when a man comes before
God with his righteousness, what he's really doing is challenging
the righteousness of God in Christ. He's saying, now wait a minute,
let's consider my righteousness. You going to hold yours up next
to his? Because that's what we do. Nah. Be reconciled. I just got one
message. Be reconciled to his reconciliation. Let's come over
here and look at that. Oh, I tell you, there's peace
over here. There's rest over here. There's glory over here.
There's treasure over here. Let's be reconciled to that.
Old Scott said, stack your shotguns in the corner, the war's over.
The war is over. Let's be reconciled to Him. Our Father, we thank You for
these blessed, precious promises of Christ. Oh, what treasures! These minds, we haven't even
grasped the surface of it, of the treasure and the glory the
eternal blessings of Christ. Cause these stubborn hearts to
bow. Lay down the weapons. Lay them
down. Quit fighting. Bow to Him. Receive
Him. Rejoice in Him, for Christ's
sake. Amen.