Five Glorious Gifts

Q: What does the Bible say about God's loving rule?

The Bible describes God's loving rule as a sovereign authority granted to Christ for the purpose of salvation. In John 17, Christ speaks of a loving rule given to Him as the God-man mediator, specifically to give eternal life to those elected by the Father. This loving rule is not tyrannical but a gracious authority intended to bring redemption and hope to a lost humanity. It underscores that God didn't send His Son to condemn but to save, as highlighted in John 3:17, which states: 'For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.' This authority ensures that God's purposes are accomplished, including the election and calling of the lost by Christ's profound power as the Redeemer.

Q: How do we know eternal life is given by God?

Eternal life is a gift from God, guaranteed through Christ's redemptive work as expressed in Scripture. Eternal life is affirmed in John 17, where Jesus states, 'I should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given me.' This promise is rooted in Christ’s accomplishments, where He intercedes for the elect, ensuring their salvation. The concept of eternal life in the Reformed tradition encapsulates not merely an endless existence but a quality of life in communion with God. It reflects God's predetermined will and grace in electing individuals before the foundation of the world, illustrating that salvation is wholly a work of Grace, not based on human merit.

Q: Why is understanding God's name significant for Christians?

Understanding God's name is crucial as it reveals His character and our relationship with Him, particularly through Christ. In John 17:6, Christ emphasizes that He has manifested the Father's name to those given to Him out of the world. Knowing God's name signifies understanding His attributes—His justice, mercy, and holiness—as revealed through Jesus Christ and His work on the cross. It also entails recognizing His purpose to save sinners. This understanding fosters a deeper relationship with God, recognizing His profound sympathy and affection towards humanity. Comprehending God's name encourages believers to develop their faith and to trust in His character fully.

Q: How does the Holy Spirit aid in understanding God's Word?

The Holy Spirit illuminates God's Word, granting believers deeper understanding and enabling new birth through the gospel. Christ, in John 17, speaks of giving His Word to His followers, which the world hates because it challenges worldly views. The Holy Spirit plays a vital role in interpreting and revealing the truths of God's Word to believers. As Scriptures reveal, true understanding is revealed by the Spirit, as seen in 1 Corinthians 2, which states that the Spirit searches the deep things of God. Without the Spirit, Scriptures remain lifeless words. The Spirit accompanies the gospel to birth faith, demonstrating that regeneration is not through human effort but solely through divine intervention, emphasizing God’s sovereignty in salvation.

Q: What does sanctification mean in a Christian's life?

Sanctification refers to being set apart by God for His holy purpose, rooted in Christ’s redemptive work. Sanctification is an essential aspect of the believer's journey, illustrated in John 17:19, where Jesus sanctifies Himself for the sake of His followers. It encapsulates three dimensions: the Father's election, the Son's sacrificial work, and the Spirit's transformative power in the life of a believer. This process is not instantaneous but progressive, enabling Christians to grow in holiness and be conformed to the image of Christ. The Scriptures underscore that without Christ's sanctifying work, we cannot be transformed, highlighting the interconnectedness of the Trinity in applying salvation.

Now, in John Chapter 14 through
John Chapter 16, all of those chapters are just
one discourse. Now, to my knowledge, I've been
studying the Scriptures for a while, this is the longest and most
detailed discourse of Christ recorded in the Scriptures, to
my knowledge. And his earthly ministry is drawing
to a close. And he called and taught and
arranged for eleven men. Think of it. Eleven men on all
the face of the earth. In all the nations and countries
of the earth. In all the kingdoms. Among all
the peoples and tribes of men. He selected eleven men. I thought as I prepared this
message how highly privileged and honored these men were. And
He selected these men and set these men apart and arranged
for these men to be witnesses of all that God was about to
do in His Son. In John 1, verse 14, listen to
how the Apostle speaks here. He said, the Word, the eternal
Word, that which was in the beginning with God, that by which God made
all things, the Word, was made flesh and dwelt among us, and
we, he said, we, privileged among the sons of men, we beheld His
glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full
of grace and truth. And then Peter, another one of
these chosen disciples, said this, he said, ìWe have not followed
cunningly devised fables when we made known unto you the coming
of our Lord Jesus Christ and the power, but were eyewitnesses
of his majesty.î He said, ìWe stood on the holy mount with
him and watched him transfigured right before our eyes.î We were
witnesses. We've seen it. It's not something
we heard. It's not something we read in
a book. It's not something we set around,
a group of us, and cunningly devised and made up these fables
and tales. We were there. We watched him.
His raiment and his face had become glistering and white,
and we saw him transfigured. And we heard the voice of God.
Think about that. We heard the voice of God out
of the heavens saying, this is my son and whom I'm well pleased. We were with him. And then in
John's first epistle, his opening address to the people in that
general epistle goes something like this. He said, that which
was from the beginning which we have heard and which we have
seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, And our hands
have handled of the word of life, for the life was manifested,
and we have seen it." We have seen it. We bear witness and
show unto you that eternal life which was with the Father and
then was manifested unto us. And these highly favored men,
our Lord called His friends. If you will read through chapters
14, 15, and 16, He calls them His friends. Henceforth, over
in John 15, 15, he said, Henceforth I call you not servants, for
the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth. But I have called
you friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father I have
made known unto you. Think about that. Think about what he has made
known to you. Their beloved Lord and Master,
their friend and teacher, their comforter, is about to go to
the cross and be forsaken of all. Be cut off, he said, out
of the land of the living. And these events would shock
these men down to their socks. They had been with him now for
nearly three and a half years, and they saw him turn water into
wine. They saw him do things that no
man could do except God do through him. They saw him take a lunch
sack with a few fishes and loaves and feed 5,000 people. They saw
him walk on water in a storm. They were terrified of this storm
and these waves and here he comes and he's walking on They watched
him walk into that ship and command those winds and waves to cease,
and it was a perfect calm. And immediately, something they'd
been laboring to do all night, immediately it says they were
at their desired port. Here they were. Everything they thought they
knew, everything they thought they saw coming to pass, is about
to be dissolved right before their eyes. And knowing this,
the Lord gives them just a multitude of comfort and consolation throughout
these chapters. Everything He says in chapters
14, 15, and 16 is comfort. I'm telling you, if you're down
and out, read chapters 14, 15, and 16. He said, I'm going away, but
if I go away, it's to prepare a place for you. You just read through those chapters.
It's just amazing at all the comfort and consolation that
he gives these men. A place for them prepared in
heaven. the precious promise of the Holy
Spirit of God poured out on them. And that's just to mention a
few. We've been studying on this now for weeks. And then finally,
he bows his head before his disciples, and he said, The hour is come. The hour. You stop and think
on that for just a little One writer said this, he said, this
hour was the keystone in the great arch of time. You think
about that. God has created time. Time is not something that's
always been. When he created the world, he
put the sun in the sky, the moon in the sky, and time began. And there's going to come a time
when this time as we know it is going to be dissolved. And
in this little space of time, if you want to call it, it seems
like a long time to us, but it's a tiny space compared to eternity,
is this great keystone. And it divides time itself. It divides two eternities, this
hour. Eternity past, eternity future. the dividing of two eternities.
And yet another called it this, he said, this is the pivot point
upon which the new opens from the old. All things, he said, old things
have passed away. And behold, all things have become
new. This was the crowning achievement, his greatest work, and the hour
for which he was appointed in old eternity. He stood up to
preach, and he read a verse of Scripture, and they knew exactly
what he was saying, and he said, This day is a Scripture fulfilled
in your ears. And those Jews were enraged,
and their face turned red and flushed, and they came out, and
that synagogue was setting up on a hill, and there was a cliff
out there, and it said they would have taken him and thrown him
off the cliff. But the hour wasn't yet come, and he passed through
the midst. Over and over and over, you keep
reading, they could not do what they wanted to do because His
hour was not yet come. Now, I cannot begin to cover
all that our Lord says in this great high priestly prayer, but
all the accomplishments of this hour is the basis of everything
that He's promised to these disciples in these three chapters. Every
source of comfort that he's talked to them about, it's all based on his accomplishments
of this hour. Everything. And so now he bows
his head and he ceases to talk to his disciples and begins to
talk to God. Now I remember my pastor from
years ago, Brother Henry Mahan, telling us this. He said this
is like listening in on a heavenly conversation. You think about
it. This is God's eternal mediator. This is God's appointed high
priest for His people. This is He who makes intercession
for us. The only one with any power,
with any authority, with any link to God is this man. And he bows his head before his
disciples and he begins to talk to the Father so that they can
hear him. And you say, well, that's those eleven chosen men.
Surely they were highly favored. But he records this prayer so
that not only those eleven men but all his chosen can hear this
same conversation and listen in on it. And I can't begin to
cover all that he says in this prayer in a single message So
I just chose five things for you this morning to consider.
I titled the message, Five Glorious Gifts Given to Us by Virtue of
His Accomplishments. And the first gift he mentions
in this prayer, you might pass right over it. I have for years
passed right over it and went right on here where he talks
about giving eternal life. And I said, well, that's the
first gift. That's not the first gift. The first gift he mentions
in this prayer is a loving rule, a loving rule given to him as
the God-man mediator to give eternal life to those given him
of the Father. Now, this is not talking about
his essential power, his essential authority as God. It says in
Philippians, I think, chapter 2, he thought it not robbery
to be equal with God. Even God himself could not give
his son anything that his son didn't already possess, being
God himself. It's not talking about that.
As God, he could not be given anything. As God, he's all glorious,
cannot be added to or taken from. But this is talking about him
as a representative man. This is talking about us in him.
This is talking about our substitute and representative. This is talking
about God's mediator. And this rule that he gives him,
he said, I've given him, he said, that thou hast given him, I'm
going to accomplish these things. I'm going to give them eternal
life. But he said, Now glorify me. This is what this hour is
about. This is what this time is about. Now glorify thy son,
that thy son also may glorify thee according as he hath given
me authority over all flesh, that I should give eternal life
to as many as thou hast given me. This rule is a loving rule. It's not a tyrannical rule to
destroy or judge, but to give eternal life. That's what this
rule is all about. Folks, folks, misunderstand us
when we talk about the sovereign rule of Christ. God did not have to take to himself
human flesh to judge this world. He can judge this world from
where He sat. He's already done that. He grounded this whole world,
saved eight souls, and afterward destroyed some of them. God did
not have to become a man to judge. He didn't come here to judge.
This was not to establish a tyrannical rule. He rules. He rules. And men misunderstand what we're
saying. This rule that was given to Christ is a loving rule. Listen
to this over in John 3, verse 17. For God sent not his Son
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him
might be saved. And this word world here is not
in reference to how many that's going to be saved, but it's given
to describe their location and their condition. That's what
he's doing. He's telling you where they are
that he's come to save and what they are he's come to save. They're not Jews, they're not
righteous men, they're not men who are seeking God, but they're
men who have no hope, Paul said, without God in the world. He's
talking about those dead in trespasses and sins who walk according to
the course of this world. You see what he's saying? uncircumcised
rebels with no promise of Christ, aliens from the commonwealth
of Israel, strangers from the covenants of promise. They are
in the world, the cursed world. By one man sin entered into the
world and death by sin. You see what he is saying here?
He didn't send him here to judge the world. He sent him here to
save, to save. That is what this rule is about.
This rule is given to him. over all flesh, over all things,
as the Mediator King, before the world began, give him this
authority. And now he is about to purchase
this authority. And the authority is purchased
to give life. Those for whom this gracious,
loving rule is given are locked into a universal curse. They are shackled in chains of
darkness, taken captive by Satan at his will. That is just a few
quotations from the scripture. He said the strong man rules
in their hearts and over their minds and his goods are at peace.
None can challenge his power, none that can resist his cunning,
none that can overcome his lies and deceit. And among Jew or
Gentile there is no difference because they are all under sin.
Therefore, there's none righteous, there's none good, there's none
that understandeth, and none that seeketh after God. There
altogether, Paul said, become unprofitable. And the only hope
for any son of Adam is that God will intervene. How will he intervene? He'll intervene through a representative
man. Well, how can he overcome these
things? Because he's going to give him rule. He's going to
give him power. And he's going to give him the
right to make us sons of God. It's a loving road. And before
ever the world was created, before even the words were spoken and
light began to shine out of darkness, God appointed a mediator to accomplish
his redemptive will, and by virtue of what he trusted him to accomplish. Now listen to this. Folks are
just fighting Brother Don Fortner hand over fist over this thing
of eternal justification. God stands in the beginning and
determines to justify people in Christ. What stands between
God and that justification that God cannot overcome? What's going
to stand between Him and what it is? He said, I'm God. I'm
not like you. I'm God. Beside me there is none
other. I declare the end from the beginning.
Why? Because he can look down through
the telescope of time? No. Because he determines the
end from the beginning. That's exactly right. And what
is there between the end and the beginning that can move God?
Nothing. Nothing. You see what he's saying? That's that rule. And he gave
him this rule, and from that point on, creation was created
for that purpose. Read about it in Romans chapter
8. Creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but
by reason of Him who subjected the same in hope, Christ. All
authority in Him. None that can challenge His power.
None that can, old Satan down here, none can do anything with
Him, but Christ can. Christ can. Oh, the only hope for any son
of Adam is that God will intervene. He'll break that chain of inherited
sin and inherited condemnation and somehow stop what man can't
reverse. How's He going to do it? He's
going to do it in Christ. He's going to do it in Christ. By virtue
of what He trusted. It says He first trusted in Christ
over in Ephesians, I think it's chapter 1, verse 13. In whom
we also trusted. When we found out this is in
whom God trusted, we trusted. as soon as we heard it. This
one Paul said in Colossians chapter 1, in whom we have redemption
and forgiveness of sins, is the very image of the invisible God. Now listen, He's the firstborn
of every creature. Everything in creation is born
of Him. Not a mosquito that flies or
a particle of dust that falls or a rock that you see or a stream
that you wade in. He's the firstborn of every creature. Everything in creation is born
of Him. Rock and mineral, bird, fish,
creeping thing, the atmosphere, the heavens, the sun, the moon,
the universe, the stars and the planets. He
said, for by Him were all things created that are in heaven and
that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones
or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created
by Him and for Him. And He's before all things. Long
before all things. And by Him all things are held
together. That's authority. This is He who is the head, he
said, of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn
from the dead, that in all things, in creation, providence, and
salvation, in all things, he might have the preeminence. Why? Because it pleased the Father.
That's why. It pleased the Father. Oh, Jacob saw that love and rule.
He established it in his life. And that rule changed his brother's
heart and appeased his vengeful anger. After 20 years of hatred,
vengeance, oaths, swearing to kill him if Jacob ever set foot
in this land, I'm going to kill him. And here comes Jacob. And
the man, Christ Jesus, came out and wrestled with him there on
the bank of the Jabbok River. He came out there and wrestled
him into submission. I told the folks at home it wasn't
a boxing match where one knocked the other out, it was a wrestling
match. It was one taking his will and making the other submissive
to it. That's what that wrestling is.
And when we wrestle with him, we're wrestling with one who
loves us. And before the wrestling's done, it's not the man wrestling
with you, but you wrestling with him. And you're wrestling with
him not to take him down, but to hang on to him until he blesses
you. And God brought him into a loving
submission and showed him that loving rule established in him.
And when Jacob left that place, he limped. He limped. He said he halted upon his thigh
when he crossed the Jebuch. And he came up there to his brother
unprotected, unguarded, fully exposed. Here comes his brother
with 400 men in battle formation. And here comes Jacob with droves
of lambs and sheep and tokens of grace to his brother. comes
up to his brother, and here he is already anointed of God, loved
of God, established of God. He's going to be the heir. Esau
is going to serve him, but here comes Jacob and he's bowing himself
to the ground, coming up to his brother. He don't know how God
is going to do it. He don't know what Esau is going
to do, but he knows what he expects. He says he feared his brother.
He feared him. And here comes Jacob up to his
brother, and rather than destroy him, his brother comes up in
tears. And lights down off that camel
or horse or whatever he was on, and he runs up to Jacob and embraces
him with tears in his eyes. And Jacob looks up at this one
who's sworn to kill him, and he said, I see thy face as the
face of God. What's he talking about? He said,
I'm seeing that loving rule in the face of my brother who swore
to kill me. Is there anything that he can't
turn? Huh? Anything? Oh, he said, I've seen. I look
at you and I see the face of God, he said. And Jacob left his brother and
went up there to this little place he called Sukkoth. It means
tabernacle. It means booths. And he built
him an altar and he called it El Elohi Israel. And I took that
name, all them different parts, each one of them are different
names. I took it all apart and I found their meanings and I
just put them in the same sequence as the word is here. And here's
what it means. It means three things. It means
the mighty God rules in Israel. He built that altar. But it also
means the mighty God rules for Israel. And it means the mighty
God rules through Israel. How else could the curse be broken
except one mightier than he come upon the strong man and take
his kingdom from him and establish his rule in their hearts? and
cause him to willingly, lovingly bow to his glorious reign. And
by his authority and loving rule, the world is held in check."
The whole workroom. It's falling apart the way I
see it, but not from his place of vantage point. By his loving rule, the world
is held in check. Peter said it's reserved. Reserved,
held in store. Why is it held in store? Because
he's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come
under repentance. He's long-suffering. God is to
us not willing that any should perish, but that all should come
under repentance. And therefore, he holds the world.
I'm talking about the world. Holds it in check until he accomplishes
his work. By his loving rule, providence
is arranged so as to bring his gospel to men and men to his
gospel. By his loving rule, the mysteries
of God are made known to men. And by his loving rule, even
the wicked deeds of men accomplish the eternal will of God and what
his hand and his counsel determined before to be done, even the death
of his son. Oh, but Brother Darvin, you don't
know my husband. You don't know my wife. You don't
know my sister. You don't know my brother, my
neighbor. You don't know the people I work with. I don't need
to. I know Him. I know Him. God, He said, He showed us some
things, didn't He? He showed us that He's going
to gather in that day all things that are in Christ, both which
are in heaven, earth, and under the earth. Everything is going
to be gathered under Him. He said, "...in whom we have
also obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according
to Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own
will." I'll tell you this, eternal life
is not a prospect. It's not a chance. It's not a
circumstance. It's not at random. It's on purpose. And it's brought to pass by the
command of the Lord Jesus Christ. He walked by. He said, Matthew,
follow me. I picture our Lord not even breaking
stride. Matthew, come on. Come on. A fellow asked me the other day,
he said, let me just give you something
out here to think about. He said, I'm just not understanding
fully what you're talking about when you say that a man has to hear the gospel,
the necessity of gospel preaching. He said, I'm just not sure I
really understand that. Let me just give you something
here. He said, we're out here hunting and somebody misfires
and he shoots my friend and he falls out of his deer stand down
here on the ground and he's down here shivering and dying and
he looks up at me from the ground and he said, I'm not saved. I
need to be saved. He said, you mean to tell me
I can't tell him the gospel that God wouldn't use that to save
him in this kind of a circumstance? And I said, reckon when God knew
he was going to get shot. Reckon why that bullet got fired? Reckon why this thing happened?
Huh? I'm telling you, God does things
on purpose. He saves men on purpose, and
He does what it pleases Him to do. That's exactly right. I know Him in whose hands is
all power. He said, All power is given unto
men, heaven and earth. Now go therefore and preach my
gospel. you go preach my gospel. I have authority in heaven to
give gifts, dispatch angels." He said, you be careful what
you say to these little ones, he told those Pharisees. He said,
because their angels, their, T-H-E-I-R, their angels stand
always before God's face. All God has to do is point, they're
gone. He said, you be careful. He has
power to dispatch angels. Send the Holy Ghost. Arrange
providence. Intervene in life. And he said,
The hour is coming, and now is when the dead shall hear the
voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live. That's
loving authority. And it's not a prospect. It's
not a chance. It's not a circumstance. He does
these things on purpose. And it's brought to pass by the
command of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says this over in Romans.
He said, Whether we live, we live unto the Lord, and whether
we die, we die unto the Lord. Whether we live, therefore, or
die, we are the Lord's. We're His. For to this end Christ
both died and rose and revived, that He might be Lord both of
the dead and the living. You're in His hands. God has given Him a glorious
rule. to give eternal life. And then
secondly, in John 17, look down at verse 6. He said, I have manifested
thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world. Now
let me give you two or three things here to think about. First of all, and I know that
you are aware of this, his name is his character. Isn't that
what God's name is? That's who he is. That's his
attributes. God is love. God is, the scripture
said, holy. God is righteous. God is just. God is long-suffering and kind. God is merciful and gracious.
And God is unchangeable. Somebody, a fellow I was talking
to the other day asked me this. He said, how did you come up
with that idea that God's unchangeable? I said, he told me. He said,
well, you mean He told you? I said, He said, I'm the Lord,
I change not. Now what He says? He's unchangeable. He's unchangeable. I don't know
anything about God except what He tells me. To know His name is to know His
character and attributes, but it's more than that. To know
His name, I must see His character and attributes as they are manifested
in the person and work of Christ on the cross. And then thirdly,
to know His name, I must, by way of what I see in this life
and death, discover something of the will and purpose of God
to save sinners. It's not just seeing God for
who He is and memorizing the doctrines and saying, well, that's
right. I argue where God goes. God merciful, God gracious. You
can learn that in any book, any theological book, you can go
learn about that. But there's more to it than that. I've got
to see that name as it's manifested on that cross. And seeing that
name manifested on that cross, I've got to know this, I must
by way of what I see in his life and death discover something
of his will and purpose to save sinners. And then fourthly, to
know His name is to discover by an experience of grace His
affection and His sympathy for dying sinners. I look into that
cross. I look into that death. I look
into God's purpose in Him and I find hope. How do you find
hope? Because you found His affection
and you found His sympathy for dying sinners. There is nowhere
else to go. Come unto me, he said, all you
that are weary and heavy laden. I'll give you rest. Come unto
me. Paul says this, Whosoever shall
call upon his name shall be saved. You can look into that name and
discern what I've just said to you. Call on his name. Whosoever will. I don't care
who you are. I don't care what your name is. I don't care what
you've done. Whosoever, there's not a wider, broader word than
that anywhere in the Bible. Whosoever shall call on him,
he's going to be saved. Call on that name. But how are
you going to call on him in whom you had not believed? And how
are you going to believe on him of whom you had not heard? How
are you going to hear without a preacher? And how on earth
is He going to find you and you going to find Him unless God
sends Him? It's God's sovereign, loving
authority. He came and called out His elect
and manifested His name to them through His Word. And then thirdly,
here's the third glorious gift down here in verse 14. He said,
I've given them Thy Word. And the world hated them. Huh? Why'd they hate him? Because
of what they preached. Because of what they taught.
Because of this word that he gave them. The world hated them.
Hated them because they're not of the world. They don't reason
like worldly men. They don't reason on religious
tradition. Paul said, after the way they
call heresy, that's the way I worship God. They're not of the world,
and because of that, the world hates them. Well, what's he talking
about here when he's talking about, I gave them thy word? They had his word long before
they knew him, didn't they? Huh? They read it in the synagogues.
I know they were there from the time they were just babies brought
up in the synagogue. The word was read every time
they went in. There were scribes and things all through Israel.
They all transcribed the Scriptures. Word of God has been around and
written for him since the days of Moses and probably even before. I suspect that some form of writing
or historic account had been passed down from the early days
of Cain and Abel. I don't have any evidence of
it. I've got no way to prove it.
But somehow Jude was able to tell us exactly what Enoch the
seventh from Adam preached. Then talk about Christ, what
he preached concerning Christ. Job is the oldest book in the
Bible, predates all the writings of Moses, and we've got an accurate
account of everything he said and everything that God did in
him and for him. So what's the Lord talking about
here when he says, I gave them thy word? He's talking about
understanding the mysteries. Everybody's got the Word of God.
Everybody I've seen got a Bible up on their arm on Sunday morning
going to church, but they don't have the Word of God. Don't have
it. Don't have it. To have that,
he said, is to have an understanding. Paul prayed for them in Ephesians
1 that God would give them an understanding. Give you an understanding. He said in 1 Corinthians 2, we
speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which
God ordained before the world unto our glory. And then down
in verse 8, he said, which none of the princes of this world
knew. All of them had Bibles. All of them carried scrolls.
All of them were doctors and lawyers. All of them carried
what they called the Word of God. But he said none of the
princes of this world knew it. For had they known it, they wouldn't
have crucified the Lord of Glory. They wouldn't have crucified
what this book was all about. But as it is written, I hath
not seen nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of
man the things which God hath prepared for them that love him,
but God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit. For the Spirit
searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. By virtue
of the cross, by virtue of His resurrection and His power and
His position, the Holy Spirit sent forth through the preaching
of the gospel and convinces men of sin and righteousness and
judgment. Through the power of the Holy
Spirit, He accompanies that gospel and men are born, born not of
corruptible seed but incorruptible by the Word of God. A fellow
was telling me the other day that What that verse 23 there
in Peter means is that men can be born again. He said, they
can read the Scriptures and be born again. And I said, you better
go down another verse or two. He said, for this is the word
which by the gospel we preach unto you. This word that accomplishes
this new birth is a word that must be given. Christ said to
the Father, He said, by virtue of my accomplishments, I have
given them this word. Why do you understand it and
your neighbor don't? Huh? Who maketh thee to differ
from another? It's a gift. It's all of grace.
And it's by virtue of this cross, by virtue of His accomplishments. Oh, He dispatches the Holy Spirit.
Paul said, To the praise of the glory of his grace wherein he
hath made us accepted into beloved, in whom we have redemption through
his blood, the forgiveness of sin. According to the riches
of his grace he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence,
having made known unto us the mystery of his will. Glorify thy son, he said, that
thy son also may glorify thee. in a loving, sovereign rule of
grace to give eternal life to all those that you have given
to me, and to manifest your name to those that thou hast given
me out of the world, and to those to which I have given your word. And then fourthly, down here
in John 17, verse 19, he said, For their sakes I sanctify myself
that they also might be sanctified through the truth. Now, that
says a lot. I could preach on that for days.
But in particular, what he is talking about here is that one
sacrifice for sins. By the accomplishing of the Father's
will, he said, Behold, I come to do thy will, O God, written
in the volume of the book about me. this coming to do Thy will."
By the which will? He said, the doing of it, the
accomplishing of it, the appearing on this earth. I've sanctified
them once for all through this one offering. Sanctified them.
Set them apart. Now, there's a threefold sanctification
declared in the Scriptures. Jude writes this at the beginning
of his letter to those sanctified by God the Father. preserved
in Jesus Christ and called. God the Father sanctifies us
in eternal election, in eternal predestination. He sanctifies
us. God the Son sanctified us in
His substitutionary work. And God the Spirit, He sanctifies
us through regeneration and conversion. But neither, now hear me, neither
the Father's sanctification nor the Spirit, is without this sanctification
of Christ. Both of those are based on this. The Holy Spirit will not sanctify
man, will not regenerate a man any other way except through
this gospel and on the basis and virtue of this blood. And
the Father chose us, had to choose us in Him. And then last of all, in John
17, verse 22, He said, The glory which thou
hast given me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as
we are one. The glory of the Father's rule. The glory of the Father's name. The glory of the Father's Word. And the glory of the Father's
sanctifying sacrifice. the glory of His only begotten
Son. You think about that. What a
gift. Paul said, God hath from the
beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the
Spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto He called you by our
gospel, listen, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Now listen to what he says, and
I'll close with this. He said, Now our Lord Jesus Christ
Himself, and God, even our Father, which hath loved us, and hath
given us an everlasting consolation and good hope through grace,
comfort your hearts. Ain't that what He's doing in
that prayer? Comfort your hearts and establish you in every good
word and work. And you know something? Those
five things, He still does. He still does. And he'll keep
on doing it until all his elects call him to glory. I tell you,
I find hope in this. I find hope for my lost relatives. I find hope for my neighbors.
I find hope for folks invited that come there to preach. I'm
excited about it. I can't do nothing for them.
I go to their houses and talk to them. It's just like talking
to the wall. It just bounces off. But boy, when he speaks,
follow me, where they go, drop it off. Drop their nets in the
water, Father Christ.

Five Glorious Gifts

What does the Bible say about God's loving rule?

How do we know eternal life is given by God?

Why is understanding God's name significant for Christians?

How does the Holy Spirit aid in understanding God's Word?

What does sanctification mean in a Christian's life?

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Five Glorious Gifts

What does the Bible say about God's loving rule?

How do we know eternal life is given by God?

Why is understanding God's name significant for Christians?

How does the Holy Spirit aid in understanding God's Word?

What does sanctification mean in a Christian's life?

Sermon Transcript

About Darvin Pruitt

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