You can be returning to 2 Corinthians
1. We heard from both of our wayfaring
children, and it is the children of ours that are way far away.
And they've had the privilege this past weekend of hearing
Brother Mahan preach. He was speaking at their church
Friday, Saturday, and then this morning. And so, of course, they
told us of good preaching and a good time. And I was a little
jealous because they told me about all the other people that
were there too. Henry's son Paul and Bob Coffey and some others
that I have rubbed shoulders with in times past. And it would
have been fun to be there. But one of the glorious prospects
of believing the gospel is that we'll be with our Lord Jesus
and with everybody in him. The Lord said, or Paul wrote,
you know, the Lord would come back and it says, and so shall
we ever be with the Lord. And all those relationships in
Christ, in this world, shall continue. And that'll be good. We'll just have us an everlasting
conference. As good as some preaching we've
heard is in time past, I think it's going to be better there.
Wouldn't it be wonderful to hear the Lord preach? Wouldn't you
like to hear that? Someone speak with authority,
not with guesses and opinions, not with maybes, but with absolute
truth, pure truth, every word of it. You know, when even the
Apostle preached, the Bereans went home and searched the Scripture.
See if those things be so, but this may sound funny, but you'll
understand it when the Lord's preaching. You can put the Bible
down because he's the Bible in flesh. When you search him, you
found the truth. And that'll be good till then
you're stuck with me. First Corinthians, second Corinthians,
chapter one. Now, there is no disappointment
in the gospel. There's disappointment in a lot
of religion in there, but there's no disappointment in the gospel. I've often been
disappointed in myself. There's a lot about me that's
disappointing. I have never achieved what I wanted to, perfectly. And I really don't know anybody
who has, unless they set the bar pretty low. I've sometimes
been disappointed in others. That is, they did not When I
say meet my expectations, I'm not saying that my expectations
were legitimate, but sometimes I'd hope for more than what I
found in others. In fact, I've discovered this,
that if I look at anybody closely enough, I can find something
to be disappointed about. Me and everybody else. But I've
never been disappointed by any aspect of the gospel. None of
it. Nothing in the gospel has ever
failed to meet my expectations. I have never been disappointed
with Christ. Have you? I've always found him better
than my expectations. I've always found him to exceed
what I thought he was and what I thought he would do. He has
blessed me more than I expected to be blessed. He has tolerated
me more than I expected anybody would ever tolerate me. So Christ
has never disappointed me. The doctrines of the gospel have
never disappointed me. I have not found any doctrine
of the gospel distasteful. I was listening to a message by
Brother Bruce Crabtree this past week on from Romans 7, a message
on the inner man. Terrific message. I'm going to
make some CDs and stick them out on the foyer. You'll want
to hear it. But he speaks where Paul says, on the inward man,
I delight in the law of God. And he went on to say, I delight
in God. The inner man of the child of God delights in God.
Everything about God he likes. All the doctrines of God he likes.
If you met a doctrine of the scriptures you don't like, I
mean, since God regenerated your heart. Now, before God regenerates
you, there's hardly a doctrine at all you can find that you'd
like. But once He opened your heart to understand it, you loved
them all. I love the doctrine of election.
It doesn't disappoint me at all. I'm glad that every time I look
in the Bible, I find that doctrine written large. I love the doctrine
of effectual atonement. by the blood of Jesus Christ. And I've opened these scriptures,
and since I've seen that blessed doctrine, I've never seen anything
to bring it into doubt. I love the doctrine of the sovereign,
powerful, irresistible work of the Spirit of God in calling
me to Himself and in keeping me there. Never been disappointed with
the doctrines of the gospel. I've never been disappointed
with these doctrines by believing them and then going somewhere
in the Bible and finding out they weren't true after all.
Now, I've had my brain twisted up by cultists and heretics. I remember one time I ran into
some Russellites. They're the ones that call themselves
Jehovah's Witness, but I won't call them that because that's
not what they are. But they were started by a guy named Russell,
last name of Russell, so we call them Russellites. And I thought
I had a year of Bible school under my belt, you know, I'm
a pretty smart fella. And a couple of them came up
to a house where I was mowing the grass and the people weren't
home, but I thought, well, I'll show them. You know, by the time
they got done, they showed me pretty bad. And they had me wondering. Now the issue I brought up with
them was the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ. And by the time
they got done, they had me wondering whether or not Jesus Christ really
is God. You know what I did? I went home
and opened up this Bible. And lo and behold, there it is,
plain and clear. I've never been disappointed
when I've gone to this book. I have found the same truth over
and over and over again. And I've never been disappointed
by the power of the gospel in them that believe. Paul said,
I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power
of God's salvation to them that believe. To the Jew first, and
then to the Gentile. I know that we've all done disappointing
things. But I find this miraculous power
in the gospel everywhere where somebody's believed it. That
despite all of their weaknesses and all of their fallings and
failings, they keep believing. They can't let go of Christ for
all their temptations. And I've seen some of y'all go
through some pretty serious ones. Some times of spiritual struggle.
And sometimes when we see someone going through spiritual struggles,
we kind of hold our breath because we don't know what the outcome
is going to be. And yet every time, those that
are plunged below the waves come back up. All the stronger for
having passed through those waters. The power of God to call, keep,
preserve, guard his people, to bring them to everlasting salvation. I've never been disappointed
with that. Now, Paul had told the Corinthians
that he would visit them. He said, here's my plan. I'll
be going to Macedonia. I think I'll come by and see
you on the way up and on the way back. Catch you two times. But the plans evidently didn't
work out. You know, we make our plans. And we can be real careful
in making our plans and try to get all the details, but there's
always details that we couldn't get control of. That's why James
teaches us. Don't say you're going to go
here and there and do this and that. Say the Lord willing, this
is what I'm going to do. And Paul had made some plans
and evidently relayed these plans to them, but they hadn't worked
out. And so the Corinthians were upset. Paul must not really make
Think much of us after all, tell us he's going to come and he
doesn't show up. And there were always people.
In these churches where Paul had preached the gospel, established
a church, set it up and everything, you know, and there were always
men who would come in after him who stood ready to find any fault
with Paul. So they could come in and take
his place. You know, everywhere Paul went
to preach, and people believed, the people that believed held
Paul in high regard. They respected him for his work's
sake. But then he'd move on to another area, because he laid
the foundation. He said, somebody else is going
to build the building. But when he'd lay, they would want Paul's
position, and they would try to capitalize on anything that
appeared to be a fault or a weakness on the part of Paul. So there
were some agitators in this church, evidently. They stirred up the
people there and said, you can't trust Paul. He says one thing
and does another. He said he's going to come, but
I guess he really didn't care about you because he didn't. He went
somewhere else. And they hope to disaffect the
people from Paul. And so what Paul is saying here
is I didn't make my plans lightly. And it's not because I didn't
want to come that I didn't come. And yet, such was Paul that he
can't talk about anything. And you read the Scriptures.
Paul can't talk about anything without getting to the gospel
real quick. He will turn it to an opportunity to preach the
gospel. Now, his word to them about coming
to see them had been, yea, and then nay. Yes, I'm coming. No, I'm not. Yes, I'm coming, but it didn't
happen. Hey, isn't that the way of life?
That's just the way things turn out sometimes. You make plans,
and then they fall apart. But then Paul says, but as surely
as God is faithful, our message to you is not yes and no. He says, OK, I said I was coming
and I intended to, and I tried to, but it didn't happen. But don't let that mislead you.
As surely as God is faithful, our message is not yes and then
no. It's not, as Brother Todd Nyberg
said, it's not yea, nay preaching. He says, for the Son of God,
Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by me and Silas and
Timothy, was not yes and no. That is, it wasn't yes and, well,
no, after all. It wasn't like that. But in Him,
it has always been yes. Don't you like the word yes?
Don't you just like to hear that? Mom, can I go out and play? Yes. He don't like no. Will you marry
me? Yes. Oh, I like hearing that. Yes was an awful good word that
night. Will you take this man to be
your husband? Yes. Yes is a good word. Doc, am I going to live? Yes.
We like yes. And the message of the gospel
in Christ is always, yes. God, I'm a sinner. I cannot save
myself. Will you save me? Yes. If you're willing, you can make
me clean. I'm willing to be clean. Lord, I call it. Will you lift
me up again? Yes. Paul says this in verse 24, No
matter how many promises God has made, they are yes in Christ. If thou shalt confess with thy
mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thy heart that God hath raised
him from the dead, Thou shalt be saved. There's your promise.
And it's as good today as it was when Paul first wrote it
2,000 years ago. Our Lord Jesus said, All that
the Father gives to me will come to me, and he that comes to me
I will in no wise cast out. He gives forth a statement of
fact. All that the Father gives to
me will come to me. That's a statement of God's sovereign
grace. And then He follows it up with
promise. And He that comes to me... See, I can't give myself
to Christ, and I can't look in God's eternal decree book and
find out if He gave me to Christ. But here's what the Scriptures
say, and here's where it comes to me and invades my life and
my experience. He that comes to me, the one
that comes to Christ, Christ says, I will in no way, that
means under no circumstances, in no way will I cast him out. I will not turn him away. Does
that promise ever? No. Has anyone ever come to Christ
according to the promise of the gospel and been turned away?
No. That's why I don't believe these
people that say, oh, I believe the gospel, but I don't know
if I'm saved. I say, well, then you don't believe the gospel.
That's all there is to it. I don't know if God saved me.
I don't know if it's for me. Then you don't know the gospel.
That's all you know. You say, well, no, that's humility. That's not humility. It's never
humility to disbelieve the promises of God. It's just unbelief packaged
up in false, fleshly humility. He said, He that comes to me,
I will in no wise cast out. And if you say that you've come
to Him, but you don't know if He received you, you've told
me you didn't come to Him. You didn't believe Him. For all the promises of God in
Christ are yes. God's never turned away a sinner.
If we confess our sins, He is faithful. and just to forgive
us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But you don't know how deep my
sins are, preacher. You don't realize how great they
are and how often I've done them and how I've polluted myself.
Surely that promise does not reach to me. All the promises
of God are in Christ. Yes. If you come to the Lord Jesus
Christ, you come to God through Him and confess your sins, He's
not going to give you some work of penance to do. He's not going
to tell you, well, alright, then you recite this prayer so many
times, and you walk on your knees on glass and kiss some holy relic,
and then your sins will be... He won't tell you that. Here's
what He'll tell you. By the blood of my Son, your
sins are gone. You're cleansed from all your
unrighteousness. Now, I'm not making that up.
That's right here. All the promises of God, no matter how many of
them He's made, and He's made a bunch of them, no matter how
many of them He's made, in Christ they're yes. Now, outside of
Christ, they have no, they're null and void. God's promise of the forgiveness
of sins is in Christ. His promise of eternal life is
in Christ. His promise of grace is in Christ. Always in Christ. It's always
no outside of Christ, but it's always yes, in Christ. Those
are positive words. And Paul says, and so through
him. The Amen is spoken by us to the glory of God. What is
gospel preaching? It's giving the Amen to God's
promises. Here's what happens, though.
God makes promises. I've heard this. You've heard
it. Some of you grew up under this
kind of religion. God said yes. And the preacher
said, I'm not sure. God said, He that comes to me,
I will in no wise cast out. The preacher said, Yeah, but
that's if you come this way and that way and do this and that.
And they hedge about the promises of God. I guess they're afraid
the wrong person will get in. Here's what I know it is. And
I'm just going to be honest with you, because we all know we know
the human heart because we got one. Here's why they like to
restrict it, because they're in and they like to boast that
they're in. And if you can get in, how in the world are they
going to boast over you? That's what it comes down to, friends.
That's all it is. Our Lord said to the Pharisees,
He says, you won't go in the kingdom of God, you lock the
door for everybody else too. But gospel preaching, according
to Paul, is hearing the promises of God saying, Amen, that's it.
Now, the way they usually say no, it comes out, but. That's the ecclesiastical no.
God says, if we confess our sins, He's faithful and just to forgive
us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. And the
preacher goes, well, but. You have to. You might as well
have just said no, it's not true. Even sometimes I've done it,
I've heard some other preachers do it, preachers that are for
the most part faithful gospel preachers, but they're so afraid
that somebody's going to misunderstand the gospel and believe that it's
by their own works, they won't even use the word if. You say,
oh, we don't tell people that if they do this, God will save
them. I said, well, what about if thou shalt confess with thy
mouth and believe in thy heart that God has raised him from
the dead? Thou shalt be saved. There's a yes from God. And they
went, but. You know something? Anything
that God has said, we can say. And anything that God has said,
we can say it just like he said it and not worry about how men
take it up. If somebody wants to take those
promises of God and thinks that it's by their old works and will
and decisions that they've made themselves saved, I'm sorry,
I can't stop them. Men have been using the gospel
to kill themselves long before I was alive, and they're going
to keep doing it after I'm dead. But here's what I know. That
gospel, preached unvarnished, just preached with a loud Amen,
is the message that God uses to save His people. The sheep
will hear it, they will believe it, and they'll believe it as
God said it. And if some goat grabs ahold of the gospel and
thinks he knows something, and yet twists it and distorts it
to his own destruction, then that's going to be his problem.
I don't have to fix it for him. Oh, it's blessed to be an amen
preacher. Sometimes I've distressed myself because I think, you know,
you preach, well, You know, if I say it this way, somebody's
going to take it up like that. Now, how can I word it? And I think,
well, why don't you word it just like God worded it? You seem
to think that was a good way to say it. And if it's good to
God, it's good to me. Amen. So be it. God give us amen preaching. I
don't mean preaching that makes people say a hearty amen, you
know, that's Christian cheers, you know. That's not what I'm
talking about. I'm talking about God give us
men who will just give the amen to what God has said. And then he goes on to some more
positive talk. Verse 21, Now it is God who makes
both us and you stand firm in Christ. You ever feel like you're going
to fall? You ever feel like in the end you're going to prove
terribly disappointing? That you'll fall away, that you'll
quit believing? Well, I'll tell you something. If it's up to you, that's exactly
what's going to happen. If you've got to stand in your
own strength, you're going to fall. And every time you try
to stand in your own strength, you will fall. But, when it comes
to our salvation, And this is glorious. I'm just going to say
amen to this. It's God that makes you stand.
And He won't let you fall. You feel like you're going to
fall? Well, if He lets you go, you will. But He won't let you
go. Him. I don't know all of it.
I just know the first couple of lines. Oh, love that will
not let me go. I hide my weary soul in Thee. I don't preach a God. We were
looking through, I think it was that hymn book, there was that
song, The God of Second Chances. I don't need a second chance.
I messed it up the first time, and the second, and third, and
fourth, and any chance God's ever given me, I've messed it
up. I don't need another chance. I need somebody else to do it.
I don't need another opportunity to mess it up. I need someone
who will do it for me. God chooses, redeems, calls,
and keeps His people. He never leaves the success of
the salvation of His elect into the hands of the elect. There's only one elect that's
ever had a part in saving God's elect, and that's the single
elect, the Lord Jesus Christ. But all the rest of us elect,
We've pretty much just been standing here watching it happen. And inasmuch as surely as God
is faithful in what He begins, He completes. What He starts,
He perfects. We can be sure of this. If He's
begun a good work in us, if He's revealed that yes and amen gospel
to us, He's going to finish it. He'll make us stand firm in Christ.
Says He anointed us. Now, we've been talking Here
in the last few weeks, we've mentioned this business of Christ
and Messiah several times, and that word means the anointed
one. And here, that's the word right there. The root word for
the word Christ is right there. He has Christed us. He has anointed us with His Holy
Spirit. We've been anointed To like the
prophets of old know the truth. We've been anointed like the
priests of old. To have a sacrifice acceptable
unto God. As we enter the most holy place
not made with hands. By the blood of Jesus Christ.
And he has made us victorious conquering kings in this world.
He's anointed us. He's anointed us by His Spirit. Set His seal of ownership on
us. I've heard people say, we maybe
even use the phrase, I'm my own man. Boy, you're a pitiful creature
then. Paul says, you're not your own.
You're bought with a price. You know, if you get something
that's of any value, you usually stick your name on it, don't
you? Something you don't want to lose, or something you want
to be able to identify, and it's yours, you stick your name on
it. Or you have some kind of title deed to it, so that you
can prove that's yours. And if anybody steals it from
you, or if it gets lost somewhere, you can identify it and say,
that's mine, I want it back. God put his seal of ownership on
his people. He said, that's mine! And he's
jealous of his possession. He's jealous of the things that
he created and bought and paid for. Someone once described a believer
this way. He says, I'm not worth much,
but I sure cost a lot. And that's true. The believer
costs an awful lot. It costs the life of the Son
of God. And while there was no intrinsic
worth in that person, Yet God has set a worth on him by paying
such a high price. And in paying that price, he
said, that was mine and I will not lose it. Things that are gotten cheaply
might be lost and not worried about it. I was up in an attic the other
day. I haven't even told Garen this. I lost a tool up there.
It's a flat bar up in that attic. And you know, as I was climbing
out of that attic, I said, I could go back through there and look around
for it, but it ain't worth it. I can buy another one. Because it ain't
worth it. But God paid such a high price
for His people. He's not going to lose a one
of them. There He is. He has set a seal
of ownership on us, and He's put His Spirit in our hearts
as a deposit guarantee. what is to come. Now, brethren,
you and I have already received a lot, haven't we? We've already
gotten a lot, and there's more to come. This isn't it. But in order that we might be
assured of those blessings which lie ahead, the perfection of
all things, God put His Spirit in our hearts. So how can I tell
if the Spirit of God is in my heart? I don't feel nothing. Is the Spirit of God, is He a
warm feeling? If the Spirit of God is in my
heart, does that mean I can do miraculous things like speak
in odd languages I've never learned before or heal or something like
that? Here's how you know that the
Spirit of God is in your heart. What does the Spirit of God do?
The Lord said, He will take from what is mine and show it to you.
This is what the Spirit of God does for all of God's people.
He takes the things of Christ and makes them wisdom. To a man. And writes them on the hearts
of that man. And he can't say it's not true. He believes it. He can't be moved
from it. It's a simple thing. How do I know if the Spirit of
God is in me? Do you believe Christ? Do you trust Christ?
If you do, the Spirit of God is in you because you couldn't
do it any other way. Guaranteeing what is to come.
Well, what is to come? the perfection of all that we
have now. Paul says we know in part. But
then, we're going to know even as we are known. We see in part. Don't you sometimes get frustrated
at how cloudy your understanding of things is? I mean, basically
you understand it and yet, it's like looking through a frosty
window. You know, you look at it, I can
tell someone's out there, but I'm not sure just who it is,
you know. But then he said, face to face.
I want you to think on this. Someday you will look at Christ
even as we look at each other today. He will be as real and
as fair and as visible Is anybody here this evening? Boy, that's going to be a nice
day. That's going to be a good day. To see Christ face to face. To finally embrace with your
arms Him whom you've embraced in your heart for many years
already. To fall at the real and actual
feet of Him whom you've already worshipped for a long time. to sing praises to his name in
his presence. I know we go to our closets and
pray, our secret places or whatever, privately and pray. And we do
the best we can to understand that even in those situations,
we are speaking directly to him. But oh, to be able to sing when
you say, I love you, Lord, and I thank you, and I praise your
name. for what you did for me." If
you ever look him right in the eye and say that, that'd be good.
That'd be good. Well, it'll happen someday. And
how do we know? He gave us his Spirit. A deposit,
a down payment, an earnest that says, you will receive the rest
at the proper time. You'll get it all. Blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed
us with all spiritual blessings in the heavenly places in Christ. And all those blessings got our
name on them, and none of them are going to be unclaimed. You
know, I remember hearing people talk about a room full of unclaimed
blessings, and there's no such thing. Every blessing has somebody's
name on it, and it will be gotten to them. But we don't possess
them all yet. But we will. And He gave us the
Spirit to call us to Christ, to seal us in Christ, to keep
us there, to keep us believing until that time that we actually,
like Paul says, just lay hold on eternal life and experience
it. Everything about the Gospel is
yes. Everything about the Gospel is
success. Everything about the gospel is, yes, it will happen. Be patient. He will not say yes
today and no tomorrow. He will not say yes today and
then say, but, you know, I thought you were going to do better than
that. That's why I said that you could have it, you know, or he's not
going to say, well, some things came up. And I'm not able to
give it to you after all, it'll never be that. Yes, today. Yes, tomorrow. Yes, forever. In Christ. Heavenly Father, what
a good word. Yes. And we say amen. Bless us in the coming week.
Remind our hearts that it's always yes. May we therefore be lighthearted
in this world, even when we bear heavy burdens. May our hearts
be lightened by the truth. that your word is faithful and
reliable. We pray it in Christ's name.
Amen. Okay, you are dismissed.