Good morning to each of you.
It is a joy and a delight always to come back here and try to
preach the gospel. I don't know whether I'm fit
to judge this or not because God deals with us according to
our need. I've been to all these conferences
and the preaching has, to me, and never been better than it
has this year from the very first message by your pastor. And I'm
delighted to have been here and to have heard it all. It's just
a joy and a delight. I appreciate this church. I appreciate
the opportunity and the privilege of being here each time I come. And I pray that God will bless
us a little bit this morning. I've been preaching ever since
I got here. One of the hazards for me, when you preach near
the end of the conference, the first night I was here, I sat
and listened to those two messages, and I said, now I know what I'm
going to preach. And then it all changed. It got turned upside
down. This morning at 4.30, I woke
up and never did go back to sleep thinking about what I was going
to preach. I'm still not sure what I'm going to preach. I know what I want to say. I
hope I get it said by the grace of God. I'm one of these fellows
that was born a little bit before 86. So I get to go down and eat
first. I go down first. I slip out the
back because I'm always tired. And I get down there and I sit
down and rest my feet and legs. I grew up in the adjoining county
over here, Gary County, Kentucky, Lancaster. I grew up in the best times, and
I say this without any reluctance, in the best times that this country
has ever known or ever will know, unless God is pleased to intervene. In our church at home, we are
praying that God might be pleased one more time. to reveal himself
to this country. Blessed is the nation whose God
is the Lord. What about that nation who said,
We don't want a name on anything. We don't want to hear about it. I read in Jeremiah one time about
this God of this book. He said, You've shown me your
back, not your face. That's why I won't treat you. What can be worse than for God
to turn his back on a nation? I read in the New Testament one
time where his disciples said, Lord, I believe you offended
those fellows. And he said awful words. Let them alone. What can be worse than for God
to let you alone? I read in Jeremiah in another
place where he said, They have sinned so grievously, so wickedly,
and so continuously. He said, don't even pray for
them anymore, no remedy. Well, I hope we're not there.
We are praying for our country. And the men in our church are
praying, and I hope you're praying. And God would be pleased to reveal
Himself one more time. Men might learn who He is. I'm
going to make some shocking statements to you. I hope they shock you.
I hope you remember them. Not only when I come back next
year, but if I come back, live to come back three or four years
from now, you'll remember them. Number one, I have lived out my days so far
in a great time, in a great country. And right now, I have a nice
home. It doesn't leak. warm. If it's
too hot inside, I turn that switch down a little bit. It cools off.
If it's too cool, I turn it the other way and it warms up. Just
set it wherever you want it, and that's where it goes. The
church furnishes me a nice automobile. I just told the church I must
be the happiest fellow in the world because I don't want anything,
except sometimes I have a strong desire to go home. I remember
being in Okinawa for a year and a half, and I got along very
well, but that never was my home. When the day went by, I didn't
think about my home. And I'm living down here presently,
but like Abraham of old, I'm on the way home. I'll be glad
to get there. And I'm a happy camper. But as
one old preacher said a long time ago, I must be the, a Christian,
he said, is the happiest, most miserable man in the world. I
am happy, I am thankful to have God and all these other things
too, you know, know the Lord. And yet, there's not a day that
I'm not plagued tormented by what has gone on in our country
and what's going on today. And the problem is religion.
That's the cause of all of it. I remember, permit me to talk
a few minutes at this point, I remember growing up in a church
over in Garrett County. Things started happening after
the Second World War and the convention, and I'd hear the
old men talking. And they said, that's not right.
But they go along and get along, you know. And now we live here
today, and God said, I'll visit the iniquity of the fathers who
are born in the third and the fourth generation. They've passed down a gospel
to us. There's no gospel. Fill the churches
with entertainment, and that's what our children are born into.
May God be pleased to help us. Well, I say this, and it used
to be a little bit occasionally considered so, that the most
precious, important, valuable, tangible possession that you
have in your home in this world is that book. Do you consider
it so? You ought to. God said, I've
magnified my word above all my name. You don't deal with God
apart from this word. And how you treat this word is
how you treat God. Paul told Timothy, say, from
a child, you've known the Holy Scriptures, which are able to
make one wise unto salvation through faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. Oh, what a book! It's a book
of life, a living book, the Word of God, able to make us wise
unto salvation, able to quicken us unto life from the dead. Now, I will tell you one other thing,
and I tell these things to the church occasionally. But the most important issue,
as you live out your days before God, the most important, most
important issue, is what you think about God's Son. A lot of things may be controversial,
but this is not. This is life eternal. that they might know thee the
only true God in Jesus Christ whom thou sent. And all of these
terms of closure with Christ in the New Testament all epitomize
in that one thing. If you know Him, you love Him. If you know Him, you'll come
to Him. If you know Him, you'll trust
Him and follow Him and serve Him all the days of your life. Knowing Him is everything. This
is life eternal, knowing God. And the only way you can know
Him is in Christ. We grow up in a day when everybody out here
across Danville and Boyle County, Geary County, and the state of
Kentucky, and the United States, and mostly the world, thinks
they know God. They think they know God. Now, this is something else that
may be shocking. Most of the people in those places
I named have never heard of God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Think about that. They have preachers
with Bibles. They talk to them from these
Bibles, and they've never one time described God's Son from
this book. They don't know who He is. They
don't have a clue who He is. Who is the Lord Jesus Christ? He's God Almighty, as one of
the brethren said last night. God Almighty, not less than God. God in human flesh. The Ruler, the Creator, the Inheritor,
the Sustainer, the Proprietor of this world. That's Jesus Christ. Nothing less. Nothing less. And the Apostle Paul said this.
He said, All of these things I used to
consider advantageous in salvation. He said, I suffered the loss
of all of them, and I counted them at dawn. For the excellency
of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord, because that's life.
You know Him, you have life. Excellency. I looked up that
word one time, and it means surpassingness. Whatever else you may know, you
put it all together in one big old pile, if you know that much,
and it's nothing compared to the knowledge of Christ. That
surpasses it all. That's life. Life. Life. Let me show you something. We
grew up in a day, as I said, when everybody thinks they know
God. But look what it says here. Matthew chapter 11. Our Lord speaking to His Father. Verse twenty-seven, "'All things,'
and I don't leave out anything, "'All things are delivered unto
me,' says the Lord Jesus Christ, of my Father. No man knows the
Son but the Father, neither knoweth any man the Father except the
Son. And thank God for this remaining
word, and he to whomsoever the Son is pleased to reveal it."
Only God can reveal God. The preacher can't do it, I can't
do it, church can't do it, the Pope can't do it. Only God can
reveal God. And when he does, that's salvation.
You know it. You'll know it. You can't deny
it. It's a living testimony of God
in your soul. Now, let me tell you something
briefly. Try to be brief. And it well describes how most
people feel about God today. My friend, we ought to be concerned
about it, because I'm talking about my family and your family.
There's not a family here that's not affected by these things
I'm going to say. They talk about a God that's
hoping to do this and trying to do this, the would-be Savior,
the hoped-to-be Savior, and it's not the God of the Bible. It's
not God's Son. He's not trying to do anything, never has tried
to do anything, never will try to do anything. He's God, I said. A man came by my study one time.
I'd known him for several years, perhaps 20 years. He stopped
by occasionally. He went to a little Southern
Baptist church out past where I pastored. He stopped in and
he learned to respect me over the years. And he knew I'd tell
the truth. He knew I'd tell the truth. We'd
sit and talk sometimes for two or three hours about God, who
He is. He stopped very occasionally.
One time he stopped and said, Wayne, that's one of my names. He said, you have to have an
alias if you're as mean as I am. He said, Wayne, you know
about preaching preachers? I said, I got a pretty good idea.
Well, go ahead and tell me. He said, witnessing and giving,
witnessing and giving. I said, that's how he grows.
That's a step up for him. That's what they're offering,
witnessing and giving. He said, I get so tired, never
hear anything but witnessing and giving. Give more and witness
more. Get more people in the church.
Witnessing and giving. One day he stopped, the last
time he ever stopped at the church. He died shortly after. He said,
Wayne, he said, something's bothering me. I said, what is it? He said, my pastor, and by the
way, the different ones he's talking about when he's talking
at different times, well, they change about every year to 18
months. And he said, my pastor is always
talking about, won't you let God do this or that. He said, I get so tired of hearing
him say, won't you let God, let God, let God. He said, doesn't
sound very God-like, does it? I said, no, sir, it's not very
God-like. I could never make a statement
concerning my God the way He does, but that's His God. It's
not just a different idea about God, it's a different God. You
either know the true God or you don't. He left, and I sat thinking about
that. I thought, how in the world can
anybody with any sense, with any Bible, make such statements
about God. This whole book is an open rebuke
against those who would make such statements. An open rebuke. Won't you let God? God trying
to do this. You're not talking about my God.
You're talking about yours. You're talking about another
God. It wasn't long after he stopped
by there until some of these Poor, pitiable teenagers came
by from a church there in town. And, hey, mister, this is flippant
and disrespectful. You know God? I said, I hope
so. Been trying to preach Him all
my life. Okay, and they started to leave.
I said, well, I'll take one of those tracks. And I took that
track and went in and sat down and I read it. And I knew they
were saying things like that, but it's still a shock. Here
I am sitting on my couch in my living room and got this tract,
and on the back of it, you're just about finished reading it,
on the back of it, please, exclamation mark, won't you let God save
you this very moment? And I thought, what kind of God
is that? Who does he believe in? That's not just a different
way of looking at things. That's a different God. That's
the difference between life and death. The difference between
knowing God and idolatry. Purely blasphemous to talk like
that. And I called my wife in. I said,
I wish you'd sit down and read this. It's shocking. Please! Big exclamation mark. Won't you let God save you this
very moment? I went to the computer and wrote
an article and put it in the paper. Won't you let God what? That's the caption. Let God what? And he even got a letter from
an old Methodist preacher. He said it sure wasn't right
to use terms like that. I don't know what he uses. I'm
afraid to ask him. Please let God save you this
very moment. Such statements should raise
the issue in the minds of men and women who's in trouble, God
or me. Who needs favor, God or me? God
needs a favor. Won't you let Him do this? Who's the dependent one? God
dependent upon me or am I dependent upon God? As I say and I repeat again,
the whole Bible is an open rebuke against those who make such statements. This, I repeat, is life eternal,
knowing God. That is life. If you know God,
you have life. If you don't know God, you don't
have life. And if you have these false, prevailing ideas of contemporary
religion, you don't know God. That's another God. That's an
idol. That's somebody conjured up in
the imagination of men to make God pleasing to carnal, fallen
enemies, enemies of God. If I had come in here this morning
and I had told you all, I had told you, I want you, I want
you, somebody, won't you let the sun shine today? You'd have said, that man is
tensed. He has lost his mind. But that makes more sense than
saying, won't you let God do something? I'm telling you the
truth. These are serious times in which
we live. The Bible says that in every
generation, most of those who profess faith in Christ, claim
to be followers of Christ, are serving Christ the best they
know, I guess, most of them are lost. And when you tell that to people,
they all look at me and think it must be me. And I've wondered
perhaps it may be me, but I'm pretty sure it's not me. It's
those who have these blasphemous thoughts about God. Most of the people who profess
faith in the Lord Jesus Christ in every generation do not know
Him. One day they'll stand before
Him and say, Lord, we've preached in Your name. Do you remember?
We even cast out devils in Your name. Don't you remember? And
all these words that caused the world to wonder. Wonderful works. Don't you remember? He said,
get them out of my sight. Can't stand to look at them.
He said, I never knew you. And all the works that you ever
did were works of iniquity. Think about that. That's where
we live. You know, the Bible teaches from
one end to the other. without any explanation or any
need for one, that God is absolutely God indeed. That means He's the
supreme ruler of everything. Everything. He rules over all
things. He's absolutely sovereign. And
that word absolute, someone said last night, doesn't leave any
room for another one. Absolute. He is exclusively the sovereign
of this universe. Try you and God. And I like this
word. Not only absolutely sovereign,
he's absolutely free. The only free being in the universe. Free! You know what that means? He can step this away or that
away, do whatever he wants to. Free! and independent. Boy, people like to be independent,
but they're not. But he is absolutely sovereign,
absolutely free, absolutely independent. Whatever he sets his hand to
do, he can't be turned back. He can't be constrained by men
to do anything. And he can't be restrained in
whatever he's doing. Sovereign, free, independent. You know the way to describe
him? He's God. That's what that means. But everybody talks about God,
but they don't believe what I've just said about him. The people
in the Bible did. All of them did, from first to
last. God's people, that's what they believe. That's a God they
trust in. That's why when He says, I'm
God, I'm your God, I give nations for you and people for you, don't
be afraid. We don't have to be afraid because
He's God. For any of my enemies, spiritual
enemies, could get by me. All of them joined hand in hand,
they can't get by my God. I'm pretty safe if God be for
it. Since God be for us, who in the world can be against us?
Just mark him off. Just mark him off. Daniel 4.35 says he does according
to his will. Does according to his will in
the armies of heaven and among all us inhabitants down here.
And none can stay his hand or question what he does. That's
God. Anything less and he wouldn't
be God. He'd be a hope to be God or trying to be God like
men believe him. The Bible said in Psalm 115 and
135, paraphrase, why should the heathen now say, now where is
your God? That's what I've been explaining
ever since I started preaching, where my God is. David said our
God's in the heavens, doing whatever He pleases. In the heavens, in
the sea, in the earth, in all deep places, everywhere. He's
doing what He pleases. Won't you let God? That doesn't
go together. One minute I read here in these
places, He does what He pleases. Whatever He pleases, whenever
He pleases. And then he said, won't you let God do this? I
think he's going to do what he wants to. But we ought to bow to it the
best we can. The best we can. And then there's
a passage in Job 23, 13, and it's in the very context of all
of those things that happened to Job. It says in the 13th verse,
he's of one mind. Who can turn him? And whatsoever
his soul desires, that's exactly what he does. That's why we call him God. Anything
less than that and he wouldn't be God. He wouldn't. He does whatever he pleases.
You know, I'm just going to name a few things, but think about
it, how foolish is it? Who let God create the world? Did he take counsel with anybody?
Look at Romans 11 just a moment. I don't believe he did. Romans 11. An old dear brother named Tolliver
used to live near me, and I tried to visit him every week. I preached
his funeral when he died. He was 90-some years old. Arthur
Pink, when he first came to Kentucky, dwelt with this band in his house
for three weeks. And then he came back and lived
there for three years in Morton's Gap, Kentucky. That old man,
sometimes he'd quote this to me, big tears running down his
face. He said, oh, the depth of the
riches. both of the wisdom and knowledge
of God. Oh, the depth. How unsearchable
are his judgments and his ways past time and health. We're smart
today, though we know everything about God and His works. We don't
know anything. For who hath known the mind of
the Lord, or who hath been his counselor? Or who hath first given to him,
and it shall be recompensed to him again? Now look at this tremendous
statement, for of him, and through him, and to him are all things. And it says in Revelation 411,
and for his good pleasure, they are and were created. That's
the God of this book. He doesn't have to leave anybody
to do anything. He does whatever He pleases.
He created this world, it was in His own mind, from His own
heart, made it just exactly like He wanted to, exactly when He
wanted to, and it's still standing because He wants it to stand.
And when He's finished, He'll wrap it up and throw it away and make all things new. Who
lets God rule this world? Providence over all creatures. Read in your leisure when you
get home, Job 37, 5 through 14. God thundereth marvelously. And then you look at something
great to follow, and it says, He says to the snow, be thou
for it, and to the small rain and the large rain. And with
the breath of His mouth, He freezes the waters up, and they become
icy. You say, well, that's just a natural thing. We don't think
much about it. You can't do it. You can't do it. You have to
stand back if you've got any sense and say, what a God. And
that's what he says there in that chapter. He worketh all
things, Ephesians 1, living after the counsel of his own will.
He doesn't ask leave of anybody. He rules this world. Lock, stock
and barrel. Never, never a little bird, you
know how many birds there are? We couldn't even count that out.
Never a bird falls to the earth without God, without His will,
apart from His will. And on the other hand, you're
worth a lot more than the birds. And never a hair fall from your
head that he doesn't know about it. He knows the numbers of hairs
on every head here this morning. And if we got any sense, we just
stand back and say, What a God! What a God! We need to let him
do something to make him happy. I don't think so. I think he's
happy before he made us, and he'll be happy ever since. And we didn't add to his happiness.
We just add to his glory, the glory of his grace. Who lets
God give them life and breath? We didn't give it to ourselves.
I didn't choose my parents. I didn't choose where I'd be
born, when I'd be born, but God did. What a God! You know what this
Bible says about me as I stand before my God? He knows my words,
the words of my mouth before they ever come out, before I
ever speak them, and my thoughts before they ever come to mind. What a God! And yet men run around
all over this world, a bunch of little hypocrites trying to
hide things from God. trying to act pretty before God.
My soul. He giveth to all life and breath
and all things, and set beforehand the bounds of our habitation. Daniel chapter five, Nebuchadnezzar's
son You're talking about somebody that's dumb. He's dumb as me. He saw. Now, think about this.
Check it out when you get home. He saw everything that God did
to his father. And yet on one of his long-grown-out
drunken feasts, he sent to get the things they'd taken from
the temple of God to use in their drunken party.
The vessels of the temple. And directly there, there appeared,
that's a Kentucky word, directly. There appeared a hand writing
on the wall. Oh, it scared him, and it would
have scared you too, I think. He didn't understand what it
meant, and so he got the soothsayers and the fortune tellers, and
they didn't understand what it meant. And they got old Daniel. Somebody said, Daniel can do
it. Daniel told him what it meant. He said, you know everything
that happened to your father. You know what God did to him
when he raised himself up in pride. And yet knowing that, and knowing in whose hand your
breath, your next breath is, you didn't give God the glory.
And what that sign on the wall means is your kingdom's ended.
You lost it. And you're going to die. And
he did. He did. Right soon. Let God. You know how many times
destinies of men and nations have been changed because God
sent somebody a dream? We need to let God do His will. Pretty soon everything will be
all right down here. That's the kind of God you've
got and everything never will be all right down here. God sends
out through the universe this great, loud question that ought
to roar in our ears and find an answer in our hearts. Is it
not lawful for me to do whatever I please with my own Isn't it
holy and just and good for God to do what he pleases with his
own? And I say, yes, Lord. That's
right. Now you come to this thing, please,
won't you let God save you this very moment. Every example and
every precept in this book is contrary to that statement. Everything. And those who use it, and they're
all around our country, They're in churches here in town this
morning, and in Lancaster, and throughout Goode County, and
Boyle County, and the state of Kentucky, saying, won't you let
God do this? God has a great plan for your
life, and you just let Him carry it out. Have a thing be all right?
I don't think so. Let God save you? You know, I
thank God almost daily. from my parents' circumstances
under which I grew up, I never one time ever remember thinking
that God owed me something or that God was trying to do something
for me and I wouldn't let Him. I came to the place in the sovereign
providence of God where I realized that I needed God to do something
for me. But I wasn't saying, God, I'll
let You do it if You want to. I know You want to. That's so
stupid. It really is. It's stupid. Whoever lets God save them, maybe somebody let God send His
Son to be the propitiation of our sins. I don't think so. I think that's the reason He
made this world, because He's purposed to give His Son to save
some sinners. An old preacher said a long time
ago, he said, God got up early one morning. He said, this is
what this world is all about. God got up early one morning,
gazed upon His only begotten, altogether lovely Son, and determined
to make an innumerable multitude just like Him. out of a bunch of sinners. And
that's what this world is all about. He's bringing many sons
unto glory, making them to be conformed to the very image of
His Son. That's what this world is all about. Everything that
happens in this world under God is subservient to that one purpose,
God saving His people. I can imagine. I see that old
lost sheep way out there on the hills, Luke 15. And Lord, I'll let you find me if
you want to. It doesn't make sense. It's laughable.
It ought to be laughed at. When you hear somebody make statements
like that, you ought to laugh. Make a mockery out of it. That's
what it is. The Bible said he went and he
searched out that lost sheep, and he searched until he found
it, and he picked it up, and he laid it on his shoulder, and
he carried it all the way home. Let God? Then this old blind boy, Timaeus,
I can see him there by the roadside, and the people coming by, and
the dust flying up in his face, and him blind as a bat. dependent
upon the public, public love offerings, you know, to keep
him going. I believe I'm going to let God
give me sight today. That just doesn't sound right. Doesn't sound right. Old Syrophoenician
woman, do you remember her? Lord, she's crying after I sent
her away. She's a bother. Send her away.
And she cried the more. My daughter is grievously vexed.
Oh, Lord, thy son of David, have mercy. I've decided to let you
have mercy on me. I know you've been wanting to
for a long time. It doesn't make sense. And then old Saul of Tarsus,
he's going down there to go all the way back to Adam. What was he doing there running,
trying to hide from God, trying to create his own righteous robe,
robe of righteousness? And God pursued him and subdued
him and renewed him. God clothed him. God provided
the skins. God saved him. It wasn't a matter
of let God, it was God pursuing a sinner and saving him. Because
he chose to do so. And then old Saul of Tarsus,
boy, he going down there to mask his robes. I wouldn't want to
have met him. His face, no doubt, was etched
with anger. You could see it. Bitterness. against the Lord Jesus Christ.
And then a soul winner came along and said, won't you let Jesus
save you? I wouldn't have wanted to have
been that soul winner. He might have found my name in his pocket,
you know. It doesn't work. It just doesn't work. God is
God. He's God indeed. Always has been. Always will
be. God came along, turned on the
light. Saul of Tarsus fell in the dust. Lord, who is it, Lord? What do you have me to do? God
told him and he did it. He never said, if you let me
have my way, I'd like you to go into the city here and wait
till I contact you. He said, go in and wait. And
he did. And the Bible has language in
it like, seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness. All these other things be added
to you. You seek it. Try to enter in at the street
gate. Once you let God, it doesn't
make sense. If any of you here have a pastor
that tells you to let God do this or that, find another preacher. Because you're listening to a... I'm not even going to try to
name him. Just find another one. He doesn't know God. If he did,
he wouldn't talk about him like that. Read about an old Man, one time
I had leprosy, incurable disease. And if anybody comes near you,
inadvertently, put your hand up and cry, unclean, unclean,
stay away, contagious, deadly, incurable. And I read about one of them,
he heard that Jesus was coming, and he'd heard a lot of things
about him evidently. Heard enough anyway. And he,
rather than avoiding the crowd, he ran through the crowd. Kneeled down at the feet of the
Lord Jesus Christ. You know the first thing he did?
The Bible said, worshipped. And I can see him lifting up
his face. And he said, Lord, If you will,
you can make me whole. May God bless these words to
every heart. Our God is great. Our God is
God.