Turn with me, if you will, to
the book of Malachi. I believe God's given me a message
for you. And I'll tell you why I'm preaching
it. For God's glory. For God's glory. How we want
to glorify Him. Who loved us, who chose us, who
redeemed us with the blood of His God and Son, called us by
His grace. And for you who don't yet know
our Redeemer, I pray God will be pleased right
now to give you life and faith in Christ the Lord. This one
Brother Norm just spoke of, in whom alone is all grace. Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ. Right now, right where you sit,
an everlasting salvation is your permanent possession. Oh, God
give you faith in His Son. I had a call from a friend, 85
year old man, a few weeks ago was in a talking mood. I guess
talked to him more than I've talked to him all the years I've
known him. He said, Brother Donner don't know exactly when it was,
but I've been in church all my life. All my life. Busy in church work. All my life. So I believe God saved me. I want you to know something
besides church and church life and church work. I want you to
know the Redeemer. To trust the Son of God. I have
a third reason. I want so very much to be of
an encouragement and help to these men who are brethren, fellow
laborers in the ministry. I was sitting here thinking just
a minute ago that I think we've known each other a long time.
We've been walking together a long time. And I cherish the fellowship
God's given us. I wouldn't take anything for
it. I want so much to encourage men in the blessed work God's
given us to preach the gospel of Christ. And now the fourth
reason. I want to help you to whom God
has given a faithful pastor. You who are members of this assembly
and you who are members of others where God's given you a faithful
pastor. I want to help you to understand
something about the work your pastor does and something about
how he needs you. Pray for him, assist him, care
for him as he seeks to minister to your soul. I'm here tonight
to speak to you as God's ambassador, as a man representing God. I can't tell you how I tremble
at that thought. A man speaking to you in Christ's
stead. I'm here to talk to you about
eternal matters and what I have to say. And I'm dead sure this is so,
Brother Donnie. You'll have eternal consequences. What I have to say will have
eternal consequences. Now if I'm here just talking
to you about my opinion of things, it won't have even momentary
consequences. But if God's given me a word
for you to hear, it will have eternal consequences. Malachi
1, verse 1. The burden of the word of the
Lord, the burden of the word of the triune Jehovah
to Israel, God's chosen people by Malachi, the man's name means
God's messenger. The burden of the word of the
eternal God, your Savior, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit to Israel,
God's chosen covenant-redeemed people by God's messenger. Turn back to the book of Amos.
Amos chapter 8. Amos speaks to us here in this
8th chapter of a bitter, bitter, bitter day. And he says in verse 11, Behold, The days come, these days called
a bitter day. The days come, saith the Lord
God, that I will send a famine to
the land. Not a famine of bread, nor thirst
for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord, and they shall
wonder from sea to sea, and from north even to the east, they'll wander, and wander as you run to and
fro, and seek the word of the Lord. and shall not find it. The burden of the word of the
Lord. This word burden is not used
here to suggest that God's word is a grievous weight. It's not.
It's a heavy, heavy burden, but it's not grievous at all. It's
a blessed burden. A burden of immense importance,
of great consequence, but a burden no man would ever give up who's
had the privilege of carrying it. The Lord's burden, Robert
Hawker said, brings with it the Lord's blessing. Still, God's
prophets of old referred to the messages they carried to God's
people. The message God gave them to
deliver, just as Malachi does here, the burden of the Lord,
or the burden of the word of the Lord. Those faithful men
weren't triflers. They didn't run from place to
place to entertain sinners with their knowledge and learning
on their road to hell. God's prophets of old were men
who carried a burden. as men sent of God, pointed a
burden, as it was then, so it is now.
Those men who speak as God's ambassadors, and I say this without
the least hedging, without the least guarding of my words, Those
men who speak as God's ambassadors to eternity-bound sinners who
dare to stand and speak to immortal souls in Christ's stead have
a burden to bear. The burden of the word of the
Lord. I'm shocked often by the levity
with which Men sometimes speak about the ministry God's given
them, and joking about preaching, and joking about their sermons,
and joking about the way people receive them. God's prophets have a burden. I've been, since Sunday evening
when I finished preaching at home, seeking a message for you. And when I wake up in the middle
of the night, as I do most of the time, several times a night,
I've had you and this occasion on my mind, studying and seeking
a message for you. We get a message from God directly
by prayer and study, and the message is waiting. so weighty
that it's here referred to as the burden of the word of the
Lord. And any preacher who doesn't
find his ministry a burden, who doesn't find it a burden now,
will find it to be a burden hereafter that will sink him into the lowest
hell. I promise you. God's servants
are men who take their responsibilities seriously. They don't engage
themselves with society, but with study. While others play,
they play. While others seek to please men,
they seek to persuade men. They're men with a message, a
message that simply has to be delivered. They're men not sent
into the world to tickle men's ears, but with an errand of life
and death. They've got something to say.
That's just pressing them down. Pressing like a heavy weight. Pressing. A burden they carry
incessantly. The woe unto me, Paul says, if
I preach not the gospel. Woe is unto me if I preach not
the gospel. The word of the Lord is like
a fire in their bones consuming them. As the servants of God,
they must speak those things they have heard and learned of
God. They have a burden to carry,
but it's a burden worth carrying. It's truth, solid, precious,
eternal truth. Not thought and form, not phrases
and poetry, not cute stories and clever sayings, not history
lessons, not church dogma, but the weighty matters that concern
heaven and hell and eternal life and the glory of God and the
souls of men. The men who speak with urgency,
with passion, with earnestness, they have to. They speak for
God. We speak for God. How can a man even think about
speaking for God in cold, calculating, theoretical terms as if he were
lecturing on philosophy or talking about history? We speak for God. We speak for God. The pastor, that man who carries
God's Word, preaching to men with the weight of eternal realities
heaped upon him, moves with decisiveness, he speaks with firmness, he preaches
with dogmatism. He carries the burden of the
Word of the Lord. And don't misunderstand me, he
does so willingly. Brother Bruce Crabtree called
me this week asking me about an incident that happened with
William Carey William Carey on one occasion got word that his
son Felix had been appointed to an ambassadorship representing
the British government and he said, poor Felix he shriveled
from a missionary to an ambassador His son had been a missionary,
laboring in the gospel, side by side with his devoted father.
And he has opportunity now to be an ambassador for the government
of the greatest nation on the earth at the time. And he said,
poor Felix, he shriveled to become an ambassador. God, O Spirit
of God, Give me grace to preach and you to hear four statements
with regard to this thing of the burden of the word of the
Lord. Number one, it's a burden because it's God's word. If this book is, and it is, divinely
inspired, If the Lord Jehovah, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit, of whom alone this book speaks, is alone
God, and He is. If Jesus Christ, that man who
was born at Bethlehem more than 2,000 years ago and was crucified
at Calvary, if that man is himself the incarnate God promised and
spoken of throughout the Old Testament, if he has indeed accomplished
the redemption of his people by the sacrifice of himself,
If there is no salvation except through the precious blood of
God's darling son. Now those things are just facts
revealed in this book. Those things are the glorious
truths of the gospel. If this is God's word, if God
alone is God, if Christ alone is our Savior, that means that
what we are to say with regard to the writings of this book
are matters of eternal moment, and they are a burden. The burden
of the word of the Lord. They're not to be handled lightly.
This makes preaching a weighty matter. on the shoulders of any
man who knows what he's doing. Modern religion is child's play.
Current theology is a trifle as light as air, but not gospel
preaching. Gospel preachers realize that
they are responsible to faithfully declare God's word. When I opened this book, seeking
a message for God's people. Whether I'm talking to young
people or teenagers or children or whether I'm talking to a few
folks at the place we meet in Danville or talking to hundreds
somewhere else. When I opened this book seeking
to find a message for God's people It is my responsibility to faithfully
declare to you what God the Holy Spirit intends in the text that
I'm dealing with. I'm not to take it and run things
over, this is what I think this means, and this is how I'm going
to use this text. I'm responsible to use the passage to declare
what God intends the passage to declare. And the only way
I get that is if God shows me. I'm responsible to faithfully
expound the message and meaning of scripture. That means you
pray and you study. And if you have to do without
something, you pray and you study. And if you have to leave the
family for a while, you pray and you study. And if your children
suffer for it, you pray and you study. And if your wife suffers
for it, you pray and you study. And if you suffer loss for it,
you pray and you study. And if you suffer loss of health
for it, you pray and you study. That's what God's servants do. They pray and they study. And
they're good for nothing else. They're good for nothing else.
God's preachers understand they must seek, must have, and must
deliver God's message to His people. Not just a sermon. Anybody that's got half a good
sense and a little bit of education can figure out a way to outline
the text of Scripture and tell you what the historic meaning
is. All you have to do is get you a couple of commentaries
and read a little bit. You don't have to read much,
just read a little bit. And you can get a good commentary and
find out what the sense of the Scripture is. That's not preaching.
Preaching is to find the message that's needed for this assembly,
this hour. And then tomorrow morning, find
another one. And the next night, find another one. And when you
go across the country, across the water, find another one,
from the text, faithful to the text, that gives the message
God intends, from the text, on that hour. And deliver it to
their hearts by the power of God. You may believe God and
that's what preachers have to do. Well, you can't do that.
You're telling me? No, God says come for ye, come
for ye my people. Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem. And the word is speak to their
heart. Brother Lance Heller, every time
we stand up to preach, whether in English or whether in pidgin,
it's our business to speak to the hearts of those before us. To the heart. Get past the flesh
and the facade and outward things, get past just the living of the
mind, to the heart of Jerusalem. By God, nobody can do that. Nobody
but God, as He speaks through a man. Turn to Jeremiah 23. We're told about a man in 2 Samuel
18 by the name of Ahimehaz who outran Cushiah, but he outran
him and he didn't have anything to tell, because he didn't have anyone
to send him. God's servants are sent for the
message. Jeremiah 23, verse 28, the prophet
that hath a dream, let him tell a dream. If you want to understand what
that means, go home and turn on one of those religious channels
on your radio or television, you'll understand exactly what
it means. He did have my word. That's another
story. Let him speak my word faithfully. And as for the fellows who got
their dreams, and they tell their dreams, just laugh at them and
ignore them. You mean that? Yeah. Laugh at them. Poke fun
at them. Ignore them. Cuss them if you
want to. I don't care. What is the champ to the wheat? Pay no attention. Pay no attention. My dear friend, Brother Harry
Graham, you've heard me mention him many times. I sat on his heart
when I was 19 years old and learned so much from the man. I was talking
to him about the heresy and all the stuff we had all been out
of shape with. He said, Brother Don, He had a tennis ball in
his hand. He said, you can take that tennis
ball there and throw it against that brick wall. And go get you
another tennis ball and throw it against that brick wall. You
can wear out all the tennis balls in the world, throw them against
that brick wall. And when they're all worn out,
the wall won't even know that it's been hit by a ball. What's
chaff to the weeds? What is wrong? Ignore the fellows. Pay no attention. Gospel preachers
know that the word of the Lord is the instrument by which God
does his work among men. This book holds the gold and
the silver and the precious stones with which the church of God
is built. The gold of Christ's precious person, the silver of
his precious blood, and the precious stones of his accomplished work. I don't know how many churches
built on those things. I know they are all built on
wood, hay and stubble. They are built on preachers being socializers
and social workers and hospital ambulance drivers and counselors. I have a cousin who is a pastor
at a church. He is babysitter. Folks at church call him babysitter. That's what I do when I think
about it. Why would he do that? Because he's scared to death
of the women who want to babysit. That's exactly right. That's
exactly right. Well, wouldn't you do that? No. Didn't do it for my own,
nothing to do for yours. No. Well, you're too good to do that?
No. I've got something else to do. I've got something else to
do. Jeremiah 23, verse 29. Is not
my word like a fire? Sayeth the Lord. A fire warms
and a fire consumes. A fire melts and a fire burns
up. That's what God's Word will do. It will do it tonight. And like a hammer, A hammer that
breaketh the rock in pieces. The word of the Lord is a burden
to his servant in the reception of it. Because if God gives me something by
which God will speak to you, Mother Norm has got to have spoken
to me first. You can't preach conviction.
Oh, you can talk about it. You can write theology books
about it, big books. You can't preach conviction unless
you experience it. You can't preach repentance unless
you've been turned. You can't preach faith unless
you exercise it. You can talk about those things,
but there's no power in the talk unless what's said has been proved
experimentally in your own life today. Yesterday's experience won't
do any good. It just won't. It just won't.
It's easy to tell when a man speaks what he's been made to
know by experience. Or when he just parrots forth
some second hand information. God says to his prophet, son
of man, eat this roll. And I promise you before it comes
out sweet, it's going to be bitter in your belly. I promise you. True preaching is the bursting
forth of that which Christ has put in you by the Spirit of His
grace. It's a burden receiving it, and
it's a burden delivering it. The preacher finds it difficult
to preach. I have young fellows ask me all
the time, do dogs get easier? Oh no, no. No, I spend more sleepless
nights now than I ever have. And I carry a heavier burden
now than I've ever carried. And I'm more fearful of preaching
than I've ever been. And if God will give me grace,
Jim Nunes, if it ever gets to be easier, I'll go, I'll come
get you to teach me how to be a mechanic. That's exactly right. I know
most preachers lament the fact that they don't have larger congregations
or they don't have bigger spheres of ministry. So they engage in
denominational politics, and they look for the right move
to the right place, and finally they land in a church that's
big enough to give them respect in the eyes of men that's suitable
to their high opinion of themselves. I pastor a place just like you
fellows do, stuck back in the corner of nowhere, a small group
of people for whom I'm responsible before God. One of our men, Brother Merle
Hart, said to me the other day, I had a young man in our church
who wrote a message a couple of weeks ago. God may do something
with him, we'll see. He said, I remember a sermon
Brother Scott Richardson preached here, conference, several years
ago. He said, I don't remember the
title of the sermon, but I remember what he said about preaching.
He said, if God Almighty has given you the privilege of pasturing
a small group of people somewhere, and you're eating a chicken coop,
and you've just got two chickens in the coop. Stay there till
you die. You're honored of God. You're
honored of God. Oh, what a privilege. To minister
to God's people. To serve God's people. To feed
God's people. To walk with God's people. To
meet together with God's people. with the walking fellowship of
God's people. When we preach the message, the
gospel becomes an even greater burden. Because now you cry out,
Oh God, what will you do with your word? Did you send it out today as
a saver of life unto life? Or death unto death? Will it
be to those who heard it, salvation, eternal life, comfort, joy, and
peace in the Holy Ghost? Or will it be death and damnation
and darkness? Will the blessing be turned to
a curse and judgment fall upon unbelieving men who deliberately
despise the Word of God's grace? A second statement. Psalm 138.
I promise you the next three will be very brief. Psalm 138. The Word of the Lord is called a
burden. The burden of the Word of the Lord because it's a weighty,
weighty message. Now listen to this. Psalm 138,
verse 2. Just the last part of the verse. You've got it. Pick your Bible
up in your hand. Pick it up your head. Now watch
what it says. You know what you've got in your
hand there, don't you? This is the Word of God, is that right?
Thou hast magnified thy Word above all thy name. Wow! Thou hast magnified thy Word
above all thy name. I've been studying that for so
many years. God, what do you mean? This is
the only thing I can make of it, and I'm sure I haven't come
close to scratching the surface yet. God has sent his word over
all his name, so that only by the preaching of his word does
God make his name known in the hearts of chosen sinners. Faith
comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. God has so
magnified His Word, that He will not make Himself known to men,
but by the preaching of His Word. He will not instruct apart from
the preaching of His Word. He will not teach you. He will
not lead you. He will not guide you apart from
the instruction of a man preaching to you. what God says in this
book. Well, now, Brother Dodd, do you
think I'm going to follow some preacher like that? You're out
of your mind. Well, I'll meet you in the Day of Judgment and
we'll talk about that. I'm as serious as I can be. I'm as serious as I can be. What we're doing here tonight,
what we're doing here when we meet together in God's house,
and God sends a messenger with His Word. is every bit as important
as what the children of Israel did once a year on the Day of
Atonement when the high priest slit the throat of that goat
and took the blood in there and sprinkled it on a mercy seat.
And came back out and set that scapegoat free. And I'll guarantee
you, the children of Israel, those, Brother Chris, who understood
what was going on, and they understood in those early days what was
going on, They stood there with bated breath. I mean they came
out before any of us got up this morning. And they stayed till
way after the sun had gone down. And they worshipped God all day
long. And they were sitting there talking
about this day to day. They were seeking to understand
the mystery of redemption. Seeking to understand and rejoice
in how it is that God takes away sin by the sacrifice of a lamb
and puts it away forever! And he shows it to them in a
picture. Now, we come and God shows you what he's done. And folks say, well, I believe
I'll stay at home today. I believe I'll get up and go
to the house of God. Well, my wife don't want to go
with me. Well, let her stay there and go to hell. I'm not being cold
callous. I'm just telling the fact. Well,
my husband don't want to go with me. Let him stay at home and
go to hell. And don't nag him about going to hell. Just get
up and go worship God. Just get up and go worship God.
Nothing is more important. Nothing compares with it in importance.
We're dealing with weighty matters. Here God reveals Himself the
eternal God. He reveals eternal salvation
by His darling Son. He reveals to us the way of eternal
life and gives that life by His Word. He shows us the wonders
of heavenly glory. warns us of eternal death and eternal hell. There is a dreadful, dreadful
hell and everlasting pains where sinners must with devils dwell
in darkness, fire and chains. It's the responsibility of the
faithful pastor, of any preacher of the gospel, of every preacher
of the gospel, to discover, expose, and rebuke your sin. Our Lord Jesus came to that Samaritan
woman, and he started talking to her. And created a little
interest and then he got down to the real issue. He said, go
call your husband. And when he did, Mother Chrissy
stuck his finger right in her heart. I almost feel the ouch. I don't
have a husband. I know. I know. And the one you've got now is
not your husband, but you've had five. Preacher doesn't back off
because of fear that somebody's sins are going to be exposed.
That's what I'm here for. I'm here, if I possibly can,
to get at the issue between you and God where you rebel against
His darling Son. I have a dear friend who is with
the Lord now, who won't mind me telling you this. When I first
came to Danville, hadn't been there long, we were renting a
building downtown, meeting in the community building, that's
a public building, RECC, just an office building downtown.
Church owed a good bit of money, didn't have any. They were going
to give me $225 a week to become his pastor. I didn't ask him
about it, didn't talk to him about it. They said, we'll give
you $225 a week. And I found out that was $100
more than it took in the year before. $100 a week more than
it took in the year before. But we got along all right. There
was one fellow there, one fellow in the whole bunch who had a
little money. Now remember this is back in
1980. A million dollars was a little money. And he came to Danville
with a million dollars in his pocket. He sold out a coal mine
and decided to get in the horse business. And it was good for
him. I was talking to him one day,
and he said to me, he said, Brother Don, I don't know about this
thing of limited atonement. Oh, I said, Bob, to myself, why
did you have to tell me that? Why did you have to tell me that?
It wasn't an issue until I knew it. And now it's an issue. So next time we met, I forgot
when it was, we were talking on Monday, we were talking on
Saturday. Next time we met, I preached on limited atonement. And then
Sunday night, I preached on limited atonement. And next time we met
in the middle of the week, I preached on limited atonement. And the
next time we met, I preached on limited atonement. I preached
nine sermons on limited atonement. I was determined you're either
going to bow and rejoice or get out! There's no room in God's
house for folks who won't bow to His word. No room. He met
me at the door, the last sermon, he said, I see that now. I said, well good, I'm going
somewhere else. You wouldn't really do that.
I'd do it over any issue of the gospel. With anybody, anywhere. Any issue. Whatever it is that
men rebell against, it must be dealt with. Every true preacher
of the gospel, is careless, is careless about
the opinions of men. Just careless. Anywhere God's glory is at stake,
that's the point where he must show himself faithful. You see, the Gospel, this Word
of the Lord, is the doctrine of the gospel that is shaped,
it is designed, its purpose is to bring all human pride into
the dust. Its purpose, its design is to
destroy the wisdom of the wise. It is to bring down the lusty
looks of man. It is to put man in the dust
where he belongs before the sovereign Lord God. And the faithful gospel
preacher doesn't hesitate to do so. That's his business. Here's
a third statement. When I think of the weighty consequences
of preaching the gospel to you, I can't tell you what a burden
it is. You can read for yourself Ezekiel chapter 3, Ezekiel chapter
33, but turn to 2 Corinthians chapter
2. Here's what those two passages
in Ezekiel say, Stephen Doyle. God sent me as a watchman on
the walls of Jerusalem. If judgment's coming against
you, and for whatever reason I keep my mouth shut and don't
warn you, I'm going to hell with you. Is that what it says, Donnie? Exactly what it says. Here's
the blood line across your hand. I'm a lost man. Otherwise, I
wouldn't deal with your soul that way. Read it for yourself. If you can find any other interpretation
that makes any sense, I'll be glad to take it. Woe is unto
me if I preach not the gospel. 2 Corinthians 2, verse 15. We are unto God a sweet savor
of Christ, to them that are saved and to them that perish, to the
one a savor of death unto death, to the other a savor of life
unto life. Who is sufficient for these things? Who is sufficient for these things? Lord God, how can I do this?
How can I do this? Look in chapter 3 verse 5. Not that we're sufficient of
ourselves to think anything as of ourselves, but our sufficiency is of God. I believe I'll give it one more
shot. How about you? Our sufficiency is of God. Number 4. The preaching of the gospel is
called carrying the burden of the word of the Lord. Because
all who truly preach the gospel know that we will soon face God
in a day of accounting. And you who hear and we who preach
must give account. Read it for yourself in Hebrews
chapter 13, 7 and 17. Those who preach but do not preach
the gospel will give account. Oh, what a hell that will be
for the lost damned preacher who meets the lost damned sinners
he's led to eternal destruction in hell. What a hell that will
be for the lost, damned preacher who meets his lost, damned family
in the pit of damnation to which he took them by the head. Those who preach the gospel faithfully must give an account to those
to whom they preached it who would not believe stand before God on the day of
judgment I can almost picture the Lord our Redeemer looking
over at Gene Harmon as we talk about all the folks who have
been in and out of these doors these 28 years they would not believe And she
says, they would not believe. Damned. Damned forever. And you who hear will give an
account before God Almighty for what you've heard, and I'll tell
you something else, for what you could have heard, You've given a count. You've
given a count. Brethren, pray for the preacher.
Pray for yourselves. We have to bear a burden. The
burden of the word of the Lord. But whenever you get the feeling
that the burden's a little heavy, fellas, remember that He who put the
burden on you can take it away quickly. And he who put the burden on
you bear your sins in his own body on the tree. Now what burden
was it we were talking about? Did he devote himself entirely
to me. Oh God give me grace to devote
myself entirely to him. Did he sacrifice everything willingly
for me? God give me grace to sacrifice
everything willingly for him. I keep praying. I keep praying. Lord, if you will, open another
way, another door, another avenue, by which I can do something to
serve you and your people, and give me grace to pursue it with
all my heart. Give me grace to devote myself
to this blessed, blessed business of making Christ known in this
day. What an honor. What a privilege. What a task. Amen.