The Lord God sent his prophet
Zechariah to his people shortly after they had returned from
Babylonian captivity. He sent Zechariah with a word
of promise. He assures his people by his
servant Zechariah, in spite of everything that appeared to the
contrary, that though the walls were sitting just as they had
for some time. The temple was not yet built. The city was still in great measure
in shambles. He declares to God's people that
he would rebuild Jerusalem. That he would rebuild his temple. and that the glory of this temple
and the glory of this city would be greater than it had ever been
before. Instead of their young men being
slaughtered in battle, the Lord God tells his servant, tell my
people that old men and old women shall be found in the streets
of Jerusalem leaning on their staff because of their age. And with those old men and old
women, young children, boys and girls, will flood the streets
of the city, playing games with no fear of any kind around them,
because everything in this city will be prosperity and peace. The Lord says, the vine will
yield her fruit, and the ground will give her increase, and the
heavens will pour out their daily dew upon you, and I will give
you all these things in great abundance. And the children of
Israel said, well, that would be good if you could
believe it. That'd be all right if you could
believe it. But we've had a lot of disappointments. We've had a lot of frustrated
expectations. We've had a lot of hopes dashed
in pieces. All these things, Zachariah,
you talk about, they would be wonderful if they could be believed
But we've been in captivity for 70 years and we don't believe
a word of it. Now you know they didn't say
that. No record that they said anything
like that. But that's what they said. God heard their thoughts. God heard their unbelief. He listened beyond their words.
How often we are just like those Israelites. How slow to believe God. How disinclined to take Him at
His word. How obstinate in denying what
He says. God forgive me. God forgive me. We tend to look upon past disappointments
and past sorrows and past expectations that were not fulfilled. And
we look at those things with frustration. And we do not believe
what God promises in His Word, by His Gospel, and by His Spirit. Because we have not seen Him
fulfill desires in the past. The problem was that we have made our lusts to be our prayers. Now, religion everywhere teaches
you to do just that. Religion everywhere teaches you
to, boy, if you want to have good health, just ask God, He'll
do it to you. If you want a new car, just ask
God. He'll take care of it. If you
want things to go well in your family, just pray for them. They'll
be alright. They'll be alright. God will do anything if you just
believe enough. You can't believe God for anything
that He hasn't promised in His Word. Did you hear me? Faith is not a notion. That we will just trust God to
do what we want Him to do. God Almighty ain't about to do
what we want Him to do. That ain't gonna happen. That
ain't gonna happen. That's not faith. That's religious
presumption. That's a mental opiate. It's not faith. Faith believes
that God will do what God says He will do. That's faith. That's faith. But these Jews looked at their
past aspirations and desires, and when God came and said he
would do these things, they said, oh no. And we tend to look at
our frustrated desires, our destroyed plans, our denied lust, and said, well,
God won't do what he says. To just such people as we are,
the words of our text are addressed from God Almighty. Zechariah
chapter 8 and verse 6. Zechariah chapter 8 verse 6. Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the Lord of Sabbath, God who
rules everybody, everywhere, all the time. He's Lord of everybody. He's Lord of everything, all
the time. God says, now I'm speaking to
you to have absolute dominion. Listen to me. If it be marvelous in the eyes
of the remnant of these people in these days. Should it also
be marvelous in mine eyes, saith God, who rules everybody, everywhere,
all the time, saith the Lord of hosts." Now, if you have a
marginal translation That is, if you have a word given over
in the margin of your Bible, you'll notice that this word,
marvelous, is translated difficult. The text might be read like this,
Thus saith the Lord of Hosts. If it appears difficult in the
eyes of the remnant of this people in these days, does that mean
it should appear difficult in my eyes? Just because you think it's tough,
does that mean I ought to think it's tough? Just because you
think it's hard, does that mean I ought to think it's hard? Just
because you imagine it's impossible, does that mean I should imagine
it's impossible? Thank God the word difficult
here is found only in the margin of our Bibles. Good place for
it. Good place for it. This is the
only place in the King James Bible where you will find the
word difficult given. You won't find it anywhere else.
Not mentioned anywhere else. Never brought up anywhere else.
And here, it's just set over the margin. I'm convinced that's
not by accident. Would to God. I had such faith
in Him that I could put difficulty in the margin of my life all
the time. That's how we ought to believe,
isn't it? With God, all things are possible. God and difficulty
cannot exist together. Did you hear me? God and difficulty
cannot exist together. Won't happen. When God steps
in, difficulty is pushed out. When God steps in, difficulty
is gone. The remnant of the house of Israel
could not conceive how God's promise could be fulfilled because
the restored prosperity of Jerusalem would be such a great wonder. They just didn't believe it could
be accomplished. Yet, blessed be the name of our
God, it was accomplished. I can't tell you How often I have seen these words
from God fulfilled before my face. Though we believe not,
he abideth faithful. Muriel, how many times in your
life have you said, Oh God, why did I believe you? Why did I trust you? Thank God
His grace, His purpose, His goodness. Now listen to me. Folks are going
to hear this and think, well, Brother Don popped a cork. It doesn't depend on our faith.
It does not depend on our faith.
Our faith depends on His grace. Our faith depends on His work.
Yes, we should, we must believe God. But our believing God is
not what causes God to work. Our believing God is the result
of God working. Not now and then, all the time. All the time. That just shuts us out of everything. No, it shuts us in to everything. God says, all things work together
for good to them that love God. And we look at something with
our lips. We quote it. But when we do it,
it's almost with quivering lips. But all things still work together
for good to them that love God. God says, say ye to the righteous,
it shall be well with the righteous. And we recite the verse. And
we recite it with obvious unbelief. But, Darwin, it's still well
with the righteous. Always. Always. The Lord God declares that His
strength is made perfect in our weakness. And our weakness casts
us down. Our weakness strips us. Our weakness makes us to know
our nothingness before Him. fall before Him in unbelief,
in such utter weakness that we simply can't believe Him. God, I can't. I can't. And His strength accomplishes
the thing needed and desired. And he even uses our weakness
to do it. I want to talk to you about marvelous
things. Marvelous grace. Not some trivial insignificant by
comparison thing like the Jews being gathered again to Jerusalem,
not some trivial insignificant thing by comparison, like the
temple being rebuilt upon its old ruins. Oh, no, no, no, no,
no. Not some trivial, insignificant
thing, like a blind man being healed of his blindness and a
deaf man being healed of his deafness, or a lame man being
healed of his lameness. No, no, no, no. I want to talk
to you about real, marvelous things. the marvels of God's
amazing grace in the saving of his people. Above and down, where
did you get that in this text? The next line. God said, behold,
I will save my people. You mean all of these things
were brought to pass and revealed here to teach us about something
marvelous called God's salvation? That's what they were all for.
Let me show you three things. First, God's salvation. God's salvation by Christ alone. God's salvation by grace alone. without any contribution of any
kind from you, beforehand, during, or afterward. I'm talking about
all your goodness, and all your works, and all your righteousness,
without any of that, without any of that, with nothing from
you. The teaching of this book, that salvation is by grace alone,
in Christ alone, through faith alone, is totally contrary to
all human reason. So much so, that no natural man
will ever believe God to the saving of his soul. You mean Brother Darnit, a fellow
got to be saved for him to believe? Yeah, I sure do. A man can put
aside his carnal reasons. He first must be taught of God.
That's exactly right. It is so contrary to every aspect
of man's nature and his mind and his reason and his logic
that no man will believe God until God makes a change in him.
We declare, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt
be saved. That's what the book says, isn't
it? What does it say? We declare to men, he that believeth
on the Son hath everlasting life. We declare, he that liveth and
believeth on me, said the Son of God, shall never die, but
is passed from condemnation into everlasting life. That's what
he said. We believe. that salvation is free. Any sinner, will you hear me?
Will you hear me? Any sinner, anywhere, who will
trust Christ has life everlasting, has God's salvation. If you believe
Him right now, salvation is yours. in all its totality forever. To him give all the prophets
witness, that through his name, whosoever believeth in him shall
receive remission of sins." And immediately, as soon as you begin
to hear the good news, and you start to pay attention, you say,
oh man, I want some of that. Satan starts to hiss in your
soul. Can a man really expect to receive
complete forgiveness for a lifetime of sin like that? How can a life of ungodliness
be transformed immediately? No sinner's guilty, screaming,
damning, condemning conscience can be silenced and made clean
without him doing something. My conscience tells me I must. My conscience tells me do. My
conscience tells me God expects more. After all, it just stands
for reason. How many times have you heard
that? It just stands for reason God's going to expect something
from you. It just stands for reason God expects you to do
something. It just stands for reason that you've got somewhere,
somehow, you've got to make up to God. It just stands for reason. Now, we realize that salvation
is by grace, and we realize salvation is of the Lord, and all that
stuff, but that don't tell me a man's got nothing to do. Surely being baptized counts
for something. Surely giving my money and tithing counts for
something. Surely devoting myself to be a missionary and go around
the country and tell folks lies for two years counts for something.
Surely it counts for something if I quit dressing the way I
do and start dressing to look silly. Surely it counts for something
if I'll read my Bible more. If I'll quit doing this thing,
quit doing that, you know, they tell me drinking coffee is bad
for me, and I never did like it anyway, believe I'll give
it up. Sure they all have something. Sure they all have something. It just stands for reason. If
I live better than you do, God's going to have to, God's going
to have to judge that. He dead sure will. He will judge your goodness and
your moral reformations and your great improvements on life. A
fella gets to be 50, 60 years old, been drunk all his life,
a scoundrel, and he realizes he's fixing to die, and he's
lost everything he's ever had because of it. He says, well,
I believe I'll get a little religion to take care of that. I'm going
to kill myself to keep holding it like this. Look at me now. Look at me now. We live in a world full of reformed
folks. Reformed smokers and reformed
drinkers and reformed prostitutes. And oh, they're miserable to live
with. Because I quit that, that makes me good. Well, not perfectly
good, but better than you. And that's got to count for something.
Got to count for something. It just stands for reason. It
does. God counts it all. A filthy,
rotting, minstrel rag in his nostrils. That's the language of this book. Now wait a minute, preacher.
You can't tell me that good works don't merit anything. I would
never tell you that, but God does. But what about after we're saved?
They still don't merit you anything. The one who said, all our righteousnesses
are filthy, rotting, minstrel rags in the nostrils of a holy
God was himself God's prophet. He's saying, even what I'm doing
right now, merits nothing as he writes the inspired word of
God. You mean nothing? Nothing. Doing is a deadly thing. A deadly thing. The whole world
is full of do religion. That's not the language of this
book. God commands us to trust one in whom all is done. Done. Done. You may preach it. You may tell
me that righteousness and redemption and sanctification and perseverance
and holiness and obedience and goodness and immortality is all
already done and I continue nothing. If ever you get it, you're going
to get it just that way and no other way. No other way. So then it is not of him that
willeth, nor of him that runneth, Salvation can't be had by you
choosing it, and it can't be had by you running to get it.
But it is of God that showeth mercy. Now let me show you something
else. This thing called salvation,
grace, eternal life, while it is totally contrary to human is that which is accomplished
altogether by God's grace. And that's the way it's revealed
in this book. That means the revelation of
God ought to undo our unbelief. The revelation of God ought to
correct our notions of difficulty. Yes, God demands that you have
faith in Jesus Christ. Yes, you must be born again.
You must be born again. Well, now let me tell you how
to be born again. Go down to the local idolatry
shop, that's where they sell Bibles and religious trinkets.
And I meant to use the word the local idolatry shop. Go down
there and look for books on salvation. And look at how many will tell
you how to be born again. Isn't that wonderful? That would
be a pretty good trick if you could actually do it. But religious
fools educated brilliant masters in Israel Vainly imagine that
you've got to do something to be born again. Nicodemus was
one, wasn't he? The Lord Jesus said to him, marvel
not, I said to you, you must be born again. And Nicodemus
in his, now this is brilliant. This is deep theology. This fellow was trained in the
ancient languages. I mean, he knew the languages.
He knew how to parse all the sentences in Scripture in proper
construction. He knew how to do it right. This
man, he could recite Scripture. He could identify all the historic
events in the Old Testament. He was a master in Israel. A leader among the Jews. And
when the master said, you must be born again, this is how he
thought. This is how he thought. Well,
are you telling me what I've got to do is somehow crawl back
up inside my mama's belly and come out again? No fool in the world would think
like that, except a religious fool. No one else. The Lord Jesus said, except a
man be born of water, the end of the word. He cannot see the
kingdom of God, much less enter into it. He said, Nicodemus,
you'll never learn anything, and you'll never see anything,
and you'll never understand anything until I give you life. Just that
simple. Much less enter into it. But
preacher, God demands perfection. God demands perfection. I can
do that. God requires, be ye perfect,
even as I, the Lord your God, am perfect. God says, be ye holy
as I am holy. Man, that just eliminates the
idea of relative holiness, doesn't it? Believe Jesus and do the
best you can, that's going to take you to hell. Believe Jesus and live as good
as you can. That's going to take you to hell,
I promise you. Believe on the Lord Jesus. Trust Him. Trust
Him alone. And do all you can to honor God.
It's going to take you to hell. Well, how on earth do you have
this holiness? Believe Him. Believe Him. Brother Don, I've been trying
to believe Him and I can't believe Him. You've been trying to work
up something you could call faith. That's what you've been trying
to do. It ain't hard to fall down. I'm good at it. That's
what it is to believe Him. Let go of everything. I just can't. I know. I know. When Bruce Crabtree told me last
visit he had with his father, dying, the old man had preached
works religion all his life. He was a preacher. And then he
got into some meanness and worked havoc in his family and his life,
but he's still clinging to his good works. He's just hanging
on. And Bruce said to him, he said,
You have to let go of all your righteousness and trust Christ alone. And the
old man died saying, I can't do that, son. I can't do that,
son. No, you can't. And you won't
until God stricts you. and the sorrows of hell compass
you and the pains of death get hold of you and you find yourself
empty and helpless and broken and seeking to hell then you'll
call on him and you'll find out the Lord is gracious righteous
all together and full of mercy but not till then God teaches us we must persevere
in the faith. And I'm afraid I just couldn't
do that. You can't. You can't. I know what I'm talking
about. I've been there. I've experienced
exactly what I'm telling you about today. When I began to
have some real concern about my soul. I had been in church a little
bit, not much. But every time I got in trouble,
go to a meeting and I'd get rededicated up, you know how the preachers
would do. You know, you were saved back
then when you were a little boy, too young to remember that. I remember
it for you. You remember saying that prayer
we told you to pray? That's salvation, boy, don't
ever let me take that from you. All you need to do is just rededicate
your life to the Lord. And I always wondered what he
wanted with the stinking life that I had. I couldn't figure
that out, but I'd go rededicate up and get a dose of revision.
It'd last a week or two or a month. And then I began to recognize
I had nothing. And I was terrified. And just about the time I was
convinced that everything found in Christ This thing of perseverance
came up. Well, you've tried this before,
boy. It ain't going to last. It ain't going to last. It ain't
going to last. Nah. Why make a sham show of
things again? It ain't going to last. God demands
that the righteous hold on his way. He that hath clean hands,
like stronger and stronger, he that doeth to the end shall be
saved. And you know you won't last.
No. And late one night, when hell was holding my heart, I read this word from God. Faithful
is he that calleth you, who also will do it. You know, if perseverance depends
on you, You don't know this. I refer
to Lindsay. Lindsay you don't know. I refer to you all the
time. Loyal Lindsay. One of the most loyal men I've met in my
life. Perseverance depends on you.
You won't last a second. Ain't gonna happen. You can persevere
in every other aspect of life, but not in this. Ain't gonna
happen. But it doesn't depend on you.
We are kept. by the power of His graces. The Savior says, I give unto
them eternal life, and they shall never perish. Never perish. But you know the falls we face? Yeah. You know the corruptions in me?
Yeah. You know how unbelieving I am?
Yeah. So does he who says they shall
never perish. Never. Let me tell you one more thing
and I'll quit. One more thing. God Almighty, God Almighty, never ever looks
to you to fulfill His promise. That ought to be simple enough
to get ahold of you. God Almighty never looks to you
to fulfill His promise. He sent a new heart when I give
and a new spirit will I put within them. If we ask, how can a man
be just with God? How can he be clean that's born
of woman? Who can bring a clean thing out of an unclean? How
can these things be? Lord, if all these things are
demanded, and somebody like this rich, young ruler can't fulfill
them, well, who can be saved? With man, it's impossible. But with God, all things are
possible. Those things that seem to be
difficult to us, seem to be such great difficulties that they're
impossible, with God are such common things that they are his
everyday performances. He alone doeth wonders, and his grace to us is a wonder
indescribable. But brother Don, how does How
does the Lord perform this? He gives life to dead sinners. The reason religion is a mess
it is, there are lots of reasons for it, is nobody really believes man's
dead. You don't believe you're dead.
You who believe not, you can talk the language all you want,
but you don't believe you're dead. You don't believe it for many, not
for many. If you did, you'd quit acting
like you was alive. And you'd quit dealing with other
people as if you thought they were alive. What do you mean by that, John?
Dead folks aren't alive. Now I realize that's confusing
to a lot of folks, but dead folks aren't alive. Years ago, I was
out in West Virginia, I've told you before, Faith was just a
little girl, I'd taken Shelby somewhere, and I was out in Babcock
State Park walking around, out in the woods. I got way out in
the park and found an old cemetery. I mean out in the woods, in the
mountains, just a few, oh I guess 15, maybe 16 tombstones there. And it was trees growing up all
around, leaves everywhere. It had been neglected for years.
And I got to looking around. I wanted to make sure nobody
was there to come lock me up. And I found one of those tombstones
I could read. The fellow had been dead for well over 200 years. And I started talking to him.
And I made him some promises. I promised him, if he'd just
get up and come out of that grave, I'd take him home with me, and
my wife would clean him up, get him used to the clothes, and
she'd fix him a good meal. And I would keep my daughter,
and she got an order that he could marry her. I made promises
to him. He said, well, brother Don, are you an idiot? No, but most preachers are. I
never expected to see the leaves move unless the wind was blowing
on them, much less that dead bulge in that grave. And I preach
to you, I don't expect anything to happen
unless the wind of God blows across this place. And God causes the dead to live. And if that happens, you're going
to walk to glory in Jesus Christ the Lord. Just that simple. Just that simple. That's the
reason I don't beg you to do anything. Don't try to trick
you into doing anything. You come to me with your children
and say, oh, brother Don, come talk to Billy. Come talk to Joey. Come talk to Sammy. Come talk
to Susie. Hey, they're all in such trouble. I believe you get
them to make them face to face. Not me. Not me. Not me. No. You bring them here,
I'll preach the gospel to them. And I plead with God the Spirit. Come, O my wit, and blow upon
these dead. And the dead, hearing His voice,
live. Oh God, teach us to believe You. Yes, I know. God says, I will
save my people. And he'll do it with no contribution
from them. Oh, may God make his salvation
yours for Christ's sake. Amen.