Now, if you would, take your
Bibles and turn with me to Ephesians chapter 1. I want to talk to you this morning about the will of God. A fella I know from work came
over yesterday to help me. I was putting a roof on my house
and he helped me nail some shingles on. And he knew that I was preaching
this morning and he said, what are you preaching on? And I said, well, I hope to preach
on the will of God in Christ. And during this conversation,
he asked me some questions and I told him that nothing ever
happens in this world contrary to the will of God. And he looked
at me like I was a two-headed lizard, but it's so anyway. Nothing, nothing ever happens. Just try to think about what
I just said. Nothing ever happens in this
world apart or contrary to the will of God. All of creation and providence. Now most folks can see the will
of God in the death of Christ at least to some degree. They
know that historically that Jesus Christ was born in Bethlehem.
Most of them will at least confess of virgin birth and that he died
on the cross for our sins. But when it comes to providence,
And when it comes to creation, they know nothing of the will
of God. But all of creation and all of
providence exists to bring about that glorious work of redemption
in Christ. That's what it's there for. Listen
to this in Romans chapter 8 verse 20. Creation was made subject
to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected
the same in hope. And creation itself shall be
delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious
liberty of the children of God. My generation knows nothing of
the will of God. They're ignorant of the will
of God, just like every other generation from the fall of Adam. Yet in the predestination that
I read about in my study over in Ephesians chapter one, in
that predestination of the children of God, everything in time and
eternity is according to the purpose of him who worketh all
things after the counsel of His own will. Nothing happens in
this world or as far as that goes in heaven apart from the
will of God. In John chapter 6, verse 38,
the Lord said, For I came down from heaven not to do My own
will, that is, not to do something contrary to the will of My Father
who sent Me. I came down from heaven by the
decree and purpose of heaven from the mercy and grace agreed
to in heaven, and by the holiness and purity of it, not to do my
own will, but the will of him that sent me. And this is the
Father's will which has sent me, that of all which he hath
given me I shall lose nothing, but raise it up again at the
last day. What did the Father give? What did the Father give to the
Son? to raise up at the last day. Well, I read in Revelations
that he gave him a seven-sealed book of divine counsels and decrees
of God. Everything that God decreed from
eternity, he gave to his son. And he gave it to him because
he was the only one worthy to unloose the seals. Well, what's
that all about? Well, in that book of decrees,
is revealed, the holy attributes of God, the whole character of
God is going to be demonstrated in this work of redemption. And
those seals can't just be opened any old way. You can't, in other
words, you can't reveal, you can't open, you can't make known
to the sons of men the mercy of God at the expense of the
justice of God. And you can't declare to the
sons of men the holiness and justice of God at the expense
of His mercy. All these seals have to be undone
equally. They all have to be magnified
equally. The glory of God, and that's
the glory of His character. His justice is not above His
mercy. His mercy is not above His justice. One is as glorious as the other.
And none were worthy to do that, just this one. Just this one. He gave him the seven sealed
book. What else did he give him? Well, he gave him charge over
everything that is. And now what it says in John
chapter 17? Gave him power over all flesh,
that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given
him. He's over this whole business. All the providence of God, all
the creation of God, all these things were made by Him and for
Him. He gave Him charge over everything
that is to accomplish this work. And He gave Him a people to redeem
out of every nation, tribe, kindred, and tongue under heaven. Now
watch this, verse 40, John chapter 6, verse 40. He first says that this is the
will of God, that everything that That my Father hath given
me, He said, I'll lose nothing, I'll raise it up again at the
last day. Now watch this. Verse 40. And this is the will
of Him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and
believeth on Him, may have everlasting life, and I'll raise him up at
the last day. This is not a contrary statement
to the one He just made. It's just a further explanation
of it. He's not saying, well, this is
the will of God, and this is the will of God. He's saying,
this is the will of God. Now watch this. He's not talking
here about a corporal sight of those who walked with Him and
saw Him with their natural eyes. And He's not talking about an
historical faith, which most people have, like I talked about
a while ago. They believe that Jesus was born
in Bethlehem. that his mother was married,
that he was a preacher and he died on the cross and all these
things. It's not an historical faith,
but it's the seeing of the union, the purpose, and the will of
God in him. That's what it is. In a representative man. Accomplishing
the will of God in divine justice and the will of God in the redemption
of sinners. It's a seeing of yourselves.
in the will of God, in this man. And all those who seeth the sun,
that's what he's talking about. What do you see in the sun? This fellow I was talking to
yesterday, he saw poor little Jesus boy, who he saw. Sweet little Jesus, that's who
he saw. Who do you see? Who do I see? What do I see? You see what I'm
saying? That's what Christ tells these
Pharisees over here in John chapter 6. All those who seeth the Son and
believe on Him, find in Him a confidence, find in Him a rest, find in Him
the accomplishment of the will of God. Those who see the Son
and then rest in Him, believe on Him, they may have everlasting
life. And he said, I'll raise Him up
at the last day. And in the doing of this will,
this eternal counsel and purpose of God, Larry read to us the
other night, He taketh away the first All those things in the
providence of God that he sent, the temple and the tabernacle
and the priesthood and all those things, he taketh those away. Why? Why? He took away the ceremonies which
were patterns of things in the heavens and figures for the time
then present, shadows of good things to come. They were taken
away because he established what they were sent to represent.
He established it. How did he do that? He did the
will of God. He revealed the will of God. There was a priest chosen from
among the people, chosen of God, ordained to be the high priest
over Israel. Everything pertaining to sacrifice
and worship was accomplished by his hand. Everybody for whom
he was ordained were written on his heart and written on his
shoulders to bear them up before God. He had a special dress and he
had special duties and he and he alone could take that blood
and go under that veil into the Holy of Holies. Christ is our
high priest. Christ is our high priest. And
all those old types and ceremonies showed in meats and drinks and
all these washings and carnal ordinances, it says, was imposed
on us until the time of Reformation. But Christ being come a high
priest of good things to come by a greater and more perfect
tabernacle, not made with hands, neither by the blood of goats
and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy
place. having obtained eternal redemption
for us. He taketh away the first, that
he might establish the second. And by the doing of the will
of God, it says in Hebrews 10.10, we are sanctified through the
offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. It was the will of God that brought
Christ to this world. It was the will of God that caused
him to be made a servant under the law. It was the will of God
that brought upon him the pain and sufferings and grief of our
sins. And having paid the price of
God's offended law and having satisfied divine justice, all
those for whom he died are declared to be justified once for all,
righteous once for all. How can that be? Because he did
the will of God. Because he came. He said, I come,
lo, it's written of me in the volume of the book, to do thy
will, O God. Everything our Lord did, is doing,
and yet shall do, is the accomplishing of the will of God. Now look
with me over here in Ephesians chapter 1. In Ephesians chapter 1 verse 8. Having stated all that He purposed
from eternity. God purposed to bless us with
all spiritual blessings in Christ. When the time come, Christ came
down. He died. He redeemed us by His
blood. All these things. Now look here
in verse 8. He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, having made known unto us the
mystery of his will, according to the good pleasure which he
hath purposed in himself. You see, the gospel is a great
mystery. It's called a hidden mystery.
It's called the mystery of godliness. and the mysteries of the kingdom
of heaven. And primarily the mystery is this, the will of
God. It's the will of God. Now think with me just a minute.
Is the gospel about the will of God or the will of man? Because
what I'm hearing today is talking about the will of man. But this gospel set forth in
this book is about the will of God. Is the gospel accomplished by
the will of man or the will of God? Is the ministry of the gospel
in this world the will of man or the will of God? Is the change and effect of the
gospel the will of man or the will of God? Not of him that willeth, not
of him that runneth, but of God that shall with mercy. You see, the hearing of the gospel,
how often did our Lord say, he that hath ears to hear, let him
hear. What's he talking about? Hear
what? Hear the will of God. The hearing of the gospel with
spiritual ears is coming to know the will of God. It is God abounding
toward us in all wisdom and prudence, making known unto us the mystery
of His will. Nobody willed down Christ from
heaven. If you'll read carefully through,
I think it's Romans chapter 10. If you'll read through there,
when Paul starts talking about what faith don't say, here's
what he said. Faith don't talk about going
up and willing Christ down from heaven and don't talk about going
down to hell and raising Him from the grave. What faith does
is see the will of God accomplished and says in its heart, accepts Him in their heart, submits
to Him in their heart as Lord. I like what the old leper said.
The leper came and fell down on his feet. He said, if you
will, if you will. And that's where God's going
to bring you if he saves you. He's going to bring you to that
place where you're going to see him and see the will of God accomplished
in him. And you're going to see that
that's the only place salvation is. And then you're going to
say with the rest of us, if you will. if you will. Listen to this over in John chapter
1. It says, He was in the world. The world was made by Him, and
the world knew Him not. He came to His own, His own received
Him not. But as many as received Him,
to them gave He power to become the sons of God, even to them
that believe on His name, which were born, not of blood, nor
of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." And I believe this. The first
thing sinners are brought to see is the sovereign will of
God. You're looking at somebody who
used to practice religion, and I could go I tell you the truth,
I used to go and I played a guitar and sang and I'd go from church
to church to church and there were all kind of different denominations,
but they were all saying the same thing. They conducted their
services a little different. But basically, they all preached
the same thing. And what they preached was the
free will of man. The free will of man. God will
save you if you let Him. Let God? Come on. That's the first thing you've
got to see. It's His to give or withhold. It's His to reveal
or conceal. It's His will in the promise
of it. It's His will in the prophecy
of it. It's His will in the accomplishment
of it. And it's His will in the revelation
of it. It's not of Him that will it.
It's of God. And the gospel's not some desperate
plea of a defeated reformer. It's the sovereign will of him
whom God sat on the throne. Victorious. It's victorious. And that scripture I read to
you over in Matthew chapter 4, that's a beautiful picture of
what I'm trying to preach to you this morning. He left Nazareth. He left his home. He left the
place where he was raised. And he went down to Capernaum.
And he said, there was a people. And these are the three things
I saw now. I was talking to Don about them last week. I see there
a people, and a place, and a preacher. And that's what that chapter's
all about. There was a people, verse 16,
over Matthew chapter 4, which sat in darkness. And that's always
where the elect of God are found. He finds them in darkness. They
sit in darkness because of the judgment of God on their father
Adam. And this darkness is a darkness of nature. I thought about old
Blind Bartimaeus when I was first reading through Matthew chapter
4. He sat there on the highway side begging and he'd listen
to the conversation of men when they, you know, and this was
a main road right there through Jericho. And some had been down
to the sea and they'd come back and they'd talk about all the
different shades of aquamarine and the water and how the sky
looked and the depth of it. You could just look out at that
vast expanse of sea and see all these things. And then they'd
talk about the sky, the pure blue sky early in the morning
out on the sea and the little white seagulls that flutter and
fly around in the sky. and the big puffy white clouds. You know what that meant to blind
Bartimaeus? Absolutely nothing. You know why? Because a blind
man has no depth perception. He can't perceive depth. He can't perceive color. He can't
perceive all these things that are this vast expanse and all. He just sits there in his darkness. That's what Christ is talking
about. He went down to Capernaum to a people who sat in darkness. And you can pour the Word of
God on an unbeliever. Just pour it on him by the page
and by the chapter and by the verse and just keep arguing with
him and declaring it to him and whatever it is you want to do.
And he'll take it and arrest it to his own destruction. He'll
do it every time. Why? Because he sits in darkness. He sits in darkness. He's shut up in darkness. This is condemnation. Light came
into the world and men love darkness rather than light. Listen to
this over Matthew chapter 6. Our Lord said to those Pharisees,
He said, the light of the body is the eye. It's the eye. If your eye be
single, he's talking about faith here. If that eye of faith be single
and it be focused on the Lord Jesus Christ, your whole body
is full of light. It's filled with light. Everything
that goes on around you is light. You see the providence of God
in the migration of the geese. You can see God in everything.
You see God in butterflies. You see God in everything. But if that eye be evil, then the whole body's filled
with darkness. And he said, if that light that's
in you be darkness, how great is that darkness? How great is
it? Old Blind Bartimaeus sat out
there on that old dirty rag in darkness. He didn't know anything.
But one day he heard. He heard. That Jesus, the prophet
of Nazareth, opened the eyes, Bobby, of the blind. I don't think he knew a whole
lot about what that meant. But I think he knew everything
about what it meant to be blind. And somebody said Jesus of Nazareth He's passing by. It wasn't just another day at
work. That old blind beggar started crying out. You couldn't shut,
an army couldn't shut him up. Everything he longed for was
in that man. And I know another man, sat in
darkness. You can sit in darkness and know
nothing. If Martin Mayes could talk to
you about the blue skies, he just didn't know what they meant. He talked to you about the snow-capped
mountains rising up out of the desert, but he never saw one. That's where I was at, sitting
in darkness. religious and lost. And you know why? The will of
God. The will of God. Just in... In everyday problems, began with such a small And yet begin to turn and begin
to shut up and begin to push and guide until he gets you in
that place where you call on his name. The will of God. He went down to this place. There's
a place. And the place over there in Matthew
chapter 4, He refers to that place as the
region of the shadow of death. That's where God found me in
this world. Death looms over this world. Once your eyes have been opened
to see, you see it. There's nothing here. People go on these treasure hunts
and they hunt for treasure that's just not here. Our Lord said,
don't lay up treasures here. There's nothing here except what
the moth and the rust is going to consume. Don't lay no treasures
up here. This is the place. This is the
shadow of death. That's all this place is. It's
a reflection of death. Everybody in it's dead. You're
surrounded by dead people. There's no treasure here. Everything's dying. Our Lord
talked about the flower, the grass. He said, that's just the
way you are. He said, the grass comes out green in the spring
and the flower buds forth and you look at it in all of its
glory. And he said, and then the sun hits it and just shrivels
up and swept away. Surrounded on every side by death. Sit in darkness. Only a blind man could find comfort
in a morgue. And that's what we do. That's
what we do. But it also says over here in
Matthew chapter 4 verse 16, that in this awful place of death
and darkness, light sprung up. Imagine that. Why in the world,
Capernaum? of all the places in the world
to go, why Capernaum? Do you know what that name Capernaum
means? I did a double take when I looked
at it. It means city of consolation. And if you look at it in a natural
sense, it's beachfront property there. He's right there on the
sea, and it's right on the main highway between Syria and Palestine. It's the main social and commercial
center of the whole area. There's a lot of natural things
I guess you could look at there. A lot of potential there. But that's not what made it a
place of consolation. You know what made Capernaum
the city of consolation? The will of God. God moved on
his prophet. And he said, you write this. When the Messiah comes, he's
going to go to Capernaum. That's the consolation. Spurgeon
said, in the place of greatest darkness, God shined his brightest
light. Why Danville, Kentucky? The will of God. I'm telling
you the truth. It's the will of God. The will of God. And that's why I
look at this world. Of itself, it has no consolation,
no lasting comfort, no place of rest or peace. But Paul said,
this is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that
Christ Jesus came into the world. He didn't go into hell. He came
into the world. That's where I'm at. That's where
I live. He came into the world to save
sinners. That's what I am. And Paul said I was the chief. And I'll tell you this, it's
the purpose and will of God that brought you here this morning,
whether you know it or not. He said, I just got up this morning
and decided I was going to church. Think that if you will. But I
know why you're here. And I know why I'm here. I'm telling you, he didn't come
into the world to save everybody. And he didn't come into the world
to just save anybody. He came into the world to save
somebody. Somebody in particular. And he said to that people, he
had the boundary in all wisdom and prudence, having made known
unto us the mystery of his will. And it's mysterious to men because
they can't see it. And it's mysterious to men because
it's foreign to their thinking. I was talking to this man yesterday,
and he said, why do you call yourself sovereign grace churches? Because I said, God, who gives
grace, is sovereign. Is that right? Everything God
does, He does as an act of sovereignty. Whether it be justice, or mercy,
or grace, or love, it's sovereign because He's sovereign. It's foreign to their thinking. God give me the presence of mind
and spiritual eyes to see that every day is the will of God. You know, I'm going to jump ahead
myself. A small church down in Arkansas
approached me the other day about going down there and being their
pastor. And so this spawned a lot of talking between my wife and
I back and forth. And she said, how do we discern? the will of God in this matter. Now, the will of God is revealed
in the Word of God, and it's revealed in the sacrifice of
Christ, in the appearance of Christ in this world. And in
general, I can open this book, Larry, and find the will of God.
I'm going to give you some examples. It's the will of God to save
sinners, to establish faith in the hearts of His elect, through
the preaching of the gospel. How do I know that? Because he
said it pleased God through the foolishness of preaching to save
them that believe. How shall you hear without a
preacher and how shall he preach except he be sent? How do I know
I'm a preacher? Whoa. That's a horse of a different
color, ain't it? I know that God has established
in his word that over these congregations over the country and over the
face of this world, these small churches, these little congregations,
to place over them a pastor-teacher. That's the will of God. I know
that. I don't know if I'm a pastor. How do you figure that out? Well,
I found some help. If you'll go through. You're going to be amazed at
how many times in the four Gospels that these three words appear.
It came to pass. How do I know I'm a preacher?
Because it came to pass. That's how I know. How do I know if this place or
that place is calling me there as a pastor? Because it'll come
to pass. And she said, well, what if you
decide I ain't going? I said, ask Jonah. Ask Jonah. Jonah, you're going
to Nineveh. No, I ain't. Yeah, you are. No,
I ain't. Yeah, you are. And I'd rather not be spit out
on the bank down in Arkansas by a whale. I don't know. I don't know any
other way to determine the things that go on in this. How do we
know that this thing with the internet is going to do anything?
How do we know this is the will of God? Because it came to pass. We just, we try things and we
do things and if God will bless it, it'll come to pass. It's
just the way it is. It'll come to pass. You know what he does? He shuts
us up to his problems. That's what he does. He just
eliminates everything. He just takes it away. Takes
it away. God opens the doors of opportunity. He stirs the hearts of his people
in the heart of a particular man and he brings them together.
I used to come down and preach to this group years and years
ago, and they met. One time, they met over there
in the School of the Deaf, and then they started meeting over
at the old KU building, or the new KU building at the time. And one day in God's providence,
oh, there's a lot of men come down here to preach. God sent
one here, the pastor. And he stirred your heart by
me. He fused your heart with him. And I'm very careful not to advertise
myself or promote myself or recommend myself to anybody as anything.
And that way, if God opens the door of opportunity, I know it's
from Him. I know it's from Him. Let me
learn anew every day to pray as our Lord taught His disciples
to pray. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be
done. And then rest. Just rest in that. Our Father, I pray that the things I've said here this
morning will be a blessing to Your people. and that we ourselves can learn
to pray from our hearts and find consolation in the will
of God. Bless this message for Christ's
sake.