I invite you this morning to
turn in your Bibles to the book of Acts, chapter 13. I do want to thank all of you that
have had a part in this service this morning. I want to speak this morning
for a little while upon our labor is not in vain. in the Lord. Our labor is not in vain in the
Lord. The Word of God says in 1 Corinthians
chapter 15 and verse 58, Therefore, my beloved brethren, be ye steadfast,
unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch
as ye know that your labor is not in vain in the Lord. We read in the Word of God that
after our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified, before he ascended
up to heaven, that he gave a commission unto the church. And he told
them to go into all the world and to preach the gospel, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy
Spirit. And the Lord said, I'll be with you as you do this work,
as you go in my name. I'll be with you until the winding
up of the ages. Now as I read and meditated upon
these verses in Acts chapter 13 that Brother Randy has read
to you earlier in our service today, I thought about five things
that seems to me to stand out here in these verses. We notice
first of all that I believe that the message of the whole word
of God, especially from the time that the commission was given
by our Lord to the church, Through the book of Acts, we find that
all of those who knew the Lord Jesus Christ were called upon
to be his witnesses here in this world. And how clearly that is
spelled out in these verses that we're meditating and thinking
upon this morning. Here in the book of Acts chapter
13, the Apostle Paul and Bartovus, being on their first missionary
journey, made this statement. Be it known unto you therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you
the forgiveness of sins, and by him all that believe are justified
from all things from which he could not be justified by the
law of Moses. And then we notice in verse 42
that when the Jews were gone out of the synagogue the Gentiles
besought that these words might be preached to them again the
next Sabbath. And then we read further here
where that The Apostle Paul preached to these people, Paul and Bartholus
both, entering into this ministry, preached to them and persuaded
them, in verse 43, to continue in the grace of God. And then
when we read a little further down, we see where that the Gentiles,
they had heard what Paul had said concerning how that unto
them, that through this man was preached the forgiveness of sins.
They had heard this, but they didn't know whether it was for
them. They didn't know whether that word should be preached
to them or not, and whether they could receive it. They thought
maybe it was only for the Jews. But then in the 47th verse, for
so hath the Lord commanded us, Paul sang. Verse 46, he pointed
out to them that it was necessary that the word of God should first
have been spoken to the Jews. But they put the word of God
from them and judged themselves that they were unworthy of everlasting
life. Paul said, lo, we're going to
turn now to the Gentiles. But listen to this. For so hath
the Lord commanded us, Paul quotes the scripture out of Isaiah here
that applied to the Lord Jesus Christ, saying, I have sent thee
to be a light of the Gentiles. He applies it to all of those
who are the carriers of the message of the gospel of God's free grace. He said, I've sent thee to be
a light of the Gentiles that thou shouldest be for salvation
unto the ends of the earth. And when the Gentiles heard this,
when they heard this, it came together in their minds and their
hearts that what Paul had been saying about through this man
is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins and by him all that believe
are justified, all that believe are cleared from, all that believe
are absolved from all blame and from all guilt and sin. When
they heard this, They were glad. It made them glad that this message
that they had been hearing Paul preach and expound, that this
message which is the glory of God in Christ and which reveals
the eternal purpose of God, that He's saving a people for His
name. When they heard this, they were
glad. They were happy in their hearts
and they glorified the word of the Lord. They extolled the Word
of the Lord. The Word of the Lord was very,
very meaningful unto them and they rejoiced in it with great
rejoicing because the Lord had a message for them and they had
received it. And then it goes on to say here,
as they glorified the Word of the Lord and as many of those
Gentiles as were ordained to eternal life, they believed on
the Lord Jesus right then and there. They believed on the Lord
Jesus Christ and so they were marvelously saved. And verse
49 says, and the word of the Lord was published throughout
all the region. The word of the Lord was published,
I'm sure it was published by these Gentiles as well as by
Barnabas and Paul. These Gentiles that had just
been converted, they carried the message. But I want you to
turn back with me. I want to emphasize this to you,
that all of those who are the call to the Lord, all of those
who have been saved by His grace, all those who have been marvelously
transformed from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom
of light, all of those who have experienced this transforming
grace of God in their lives are called upon to be His witnesses. And as we mentioned the commission,
now I read from the first chapter of the book of Acts. And in verse
8, it says, But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost
has come upon you, and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in
Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria, and unto the uttermost
part of the earth. The very motivating force behind
the missionary journeys of the Apostle Paul was this particular
statement of our Lord. They had received power. The
church had received power from God. Therefore, they went into
all the world and preached the gospel. Now, we're to be witnesses
of the Lord Jesus Christ. The scripture is clear on that,
that the responsibility and honor of every believer is to be a
witness. It is our calling, it's our vocation
to be a missionary evangelist. We are to expound the Word, to
preach the Word, to spread the Word as Paul and Barnabas did
here in Acts chapter 13. Now a witness is one who accurately
and honestly relates to others that which he has seen and heard
and felt in his own soul. Have you heard anything? Have
you felt anything? Have you seen anything? Have
you in any way, shape, or form been touched by the Lord? If
so, then you're to be His witness in the earth. Now notice, if
you will, turn over, if you will, to the fifth chapter of the book
of Acts. And let me further this comment. In verse 20, the brethren had
been abused and persecuted, and the angel of the Lord by night
opened the prison doors and brought them forth. They had been imprisoned
for speaking in the name of the Lord, for preaching the gospel.
And then the Lord said to them, go stand and speak in the temple
to the people all the words of this life. Now the Lord spoke
to them and told them what they were to do. They were to go on
and preach the word. They were to go stand and speak
in the temple. They were to use words to proclaim
unto the people the words of this life. Talking about the
word of salvation, the word of everlasting life, that word of
His grace. They were to expound and to preach
in the temple. I like that. You go! and you
stand and you speak up and speak the words of this life. And then
notice in verse 42, and daily in the temple and in every house
they cease not to teach and preach Jesus Christ. They went on as
being the servants of God, as being called of God, as being
sent of God, daily in the temple and in every house. They went
through the city. They ceased not to teach and
to preach Jesus Christ. And we see them fulfilling the
commission. Now if you would, turn over with
me to Acts chapter 8. And we see in verse 4, after
Holy Stephen had been stoned to death, he'd been put to death,
and God had marvelously used him, the Jews could not resist
the spirit and power with which he spoke, and so they would put
him to death. They killed him for preaching
the gospel. And then here in chapter 8 in
verse 4, after that time there was persecution, according to
verse 1, there was a great persecution against the church which was
at Jerusalem and they were scattered abroad throughout the regions
of Judea and Samaria all of them except the apostles and so we
see how just the individual members of the church were driven out
and they were scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea
and Samaria and then it says in verse 4, therefore they that
were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the Word. They went
everywhere spreading the Word of His life, the Word of His
grace. They went everywhere preaching through this man the forgiveness
of sins and that if a man believed on Him, he was justified from
all things from which he could not be justified by his obedience
to the law of Moses. And so we see the brethren fulfilling
the commission which our Lord had sent them upon. And this
is the first thing that I see here, that all of us, if we know
the Lord, if we've tasted and seen that the Lord is good, if
we truly are the redeemed of the Lord, then we're to say so.
We're to bear the message of the gospel. We're to spread the
word. We're to give the word to all of those that we come
in contact with that we can speak to. We're to say unto them what
it is that God has been pleased to say into our hearts, and what
we've felt and what we've heard, we'll explain it the best that
we can. but give the gospel to everybody
that we meet with, and so every opportunity that we have. Now
the second thing that I'll point out here is that all who faithfully
preach the gospel are going to meet with opposition from this
world. It's bound to happen. Brethren,
all those who will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer
persecution. And when the life of a believer
speaks, as well as his mouth, they will suffer persecution.
But we see how that the apostles suffered here in Acts chapter
13. We've already mentioned Holy
Stephen and how that he was stoned to death, but here these Jews
persecuted and abused the apostles. Now then, we see in verse 45
of chapter 13, but when the Jews saw the multitudes, they were
filled with envy, and they spake against those things which were
spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Now the Jews
stirred up, in verse 50, the devout and honorable women and
the chief men of the city and raised persecution against Paul
and Barnabas and expelled them out of their coast. They run
them out of town, expelled them out of their coast. Now these
Jews, of course, represented the religion of their day. They
represented the religion of their day. They were Pharisees, and
these Jews became, they were absolutely unable to deal with
what God was doing here in this place. Now Paul had warned them
in verse 40, Beware therefore, lest that come upon you which
is spoken of in the prophets. Behold, ye despisers and wanderers
and perishers, for I work a work in your days, a work which you
shall in no wise believe, though a man declare it unto you. And
the Word of God was preached. God bore witness that the Word
was His Word. And God did a marvelous thing
in the saving of these Gentiles and these Jews. All they could
do is persecute. All they could do is argue. All
they could do was be envious. All they could do was to cause
trouble and to stir up trouble in the city and to expel out
of their coast. those that were faithfully preaching
the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, beloved, what these
Jews did in rejecting the gospel is a very solemn, a very, very
solemn thing. John Gill said, concerning this
scripture over here in verse 46, where he says, you have put
it from you, meaning you put the word of God from you, and
you judged yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turned
to the Gentiles. When he talked about them judging
themselves unworthy of everlasting life, He said the Jews by this
act of theirs in rejecting the gospel did as it were pass sentence
Upon themselves that they ought not to be saved that they ought
not to be saved other words We're not worthy to be saved and we're
not we're not going to be saved by the way that you're telling
these Gentiles that they must be saved We're not willing to
be saved in that manner. We're not going to be saved by
grace. We don't want to hear any of this message about salvation
being entirely of the Lord from the beginning to the end. We
don't want to hear anything about a man being justified through
believing God and through faith in Christ. We don't want to hear
that. We want to hear about Moses.
We want to hear about keeping the law. We want to hear about
these matters that have to do with our flesh and its obedience
unto the law and what we gain by being Jews to begin with,
being the fleshly seed of Abraham. But no, they could not, they
judged themselves unworthy of eternal life. Now to reject the
gospel of Christ is to court reprobation. It is to court the
judgment of God, willful unbelief, the willful rejection of the
gospel, my friend, is a very, very solemn and serious thing. First of all, it's a very serious
thing, according to 1 John 5 and 10, because it calls God a liar. It calls God a liar. It says,
God, you've lied when you testified that there is life in your Son. This is the record that God hath
given to us, eternal life, and this life is in His Son, and
he that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son
of God hath not life. You lied to us, God. There is
no truth in that. Well, my soul, my friend, we
know that this is indeed gospel truth. These Jews rejected that
and it's a very serious thing when you look God in the face,
when you would take pen in hand and paper and you would write
a letter to God saying, You're a liar. And every time you reject
the gospel, that's exactly what you're doing. You're calling
God a liar. And then it despises the precious
blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. that blood that was shed on Calvary. The Bible says without the shedding
of blood there's no remission. And here a man is in sin and
he stands under the wrath and judgment of God, he's guilty
of breaking the law of God, every point of it, and then he despises
the only bath, the only cleansing that can possibly cleanse his
soul from all guilt. He despises the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And when you hear the gospel
and when you reject that, this is a solemn thing. There is only
one bath. There is only one labor. There's only one way of salvation. You must be washed in the blood.
Through the blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son, we're cleansed from
all sin. You're not going to be cleansed
from your sin unless You, my friend, by faith participate
in the cleansing by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now
then, also I believe these people are fighting against God according
to Isaiah chapter 63 and verse 10. I'll not take time to read
that, but there in that verse it indicates that God is fighting
with these people, that they're fighting with God. And so this
is a serious thing. Are you stronger than He? Can
you overcome God? God will send you to hell. Now
we don't have any problem believing that God is able, capable, powerful,
almighty enough to send men and women to hell, to cast them into
the lake of fire. I know that some people get the
idea hearing these mealy-mouthed preachers of our day and time,
they get the idea that being as if God can't save them, they
won't let him do that, then he'll not be able to cast them into
hell. But my friend, God is very able
to save whom he will and God will cast into hell all those
that refuse his son and reject him and receive not his holy
word. And so my point of this is this
morning, is this a very serious thing for a man to rebel against
and become an enemy of the man who has the message of life and
is bringing it to his soul. They expelled him from their
coast. Now the third point is this.
A man's faithfulness in preaching the gospel is not to be determined
by his success, but by his obedience to the commandment of God. Now
this is very important that you see this. A man's faithfulness
in preaching the gospel is not to be determined by success.
How many? How many? How many? Everybody
is always asking. But my friend, that's not the
test of success before God. The test of success before God
is have we obeyed the divine injunction, go into all the world
and preach the gospel? Have we gone, have we stood,
and have we spoken the word of the Lord as Barnabas and Paul
did here in this text? Now, in verse 47, I've read this
verse a time or two, but I want you to think about it again.
For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, Paul got the message
from God that God had commanded him to be an apostle to the Gentiles. He got the message. God, he said,
and so hath the Lord commanded us. Now, brother, sister, that
is enough. That is enough. If God said you
do it, then that's what you must do. It is required, we're told
in Corinthians, that a steward be found faithful. And if you've
been given the gospel, if you know the gospel, if you felt
the gospel, experienced the gospel, then it behooves you to be faithful
in giving out the message of the gospel and giving light to
those around about you. And so this was the commandment
of God and they were obedient to it to the point where they
were cast out of the city and they shook the dust off of their
feet against these people in this city and they went on to
the next town. and going on to do what it was
that God had called upon them to do. God requires only one
thing of His servants, faithfulness. He does not require success. Success is in the hands of the
Lord. Our labor is not in vain in the
Lord. Let us be steadfast, unmovable,
always abounding in the work of the Lord, because our labor
is not in vain in the Lord. Let us give out the message and
leave the success unto God. It is the responsibility of every
child of God, every servant of God, to serve faithfully the
honor of God, the will of God, and the people of God as providence
directs and as the Holy Spirit of God leads. Preach the word,
be instant in season and out of season. God would have you
to be faithful unto Him. Let us ever be found faithful
to the glory of God, to the gospel of Christ, and the souls of men
with the talents that we have in place, in the very place where
God has put us. Now the next thing is this, number
four, and that is that God's servant faithfully preach the
gospel. When they faithfully preach the
gospel, then God sovereignly accomplishes His purpose of grace. He always accomplishes His purpose
of grace. Isaiah 55 and 11 says that the
Word will not return unto Him void. It will accomplish that
where into He sends it. Now how does that play out here
in this text? If you notice verse 48, when
the Gentiles heard this they were glad and they glorified
the Word of the Lord and as many as were ordained to eternal life
believed. Now here it is, it's spelled
out clearly. Let the Jews, let them persecute. Let them stir up the devout and
the honorable women of the city and the chief men of the city.
Let them raise persecution. Let them drive them out of town.
But the word that was sown, the seed that was sown, the message
that was preached It accomplished, it had a victory. And God saved
his lost sheep in that city by them hearing the gospel. They
were ordained to eternal life. Now, let me explain to you what
happened when these brethren preached there in this city.
Number one, look at it with me and think about this a little
bit. We have here a particular people. As many, as many as God
had chosen and had given to His Son in the covenant of grace
before the foundation of the world, in the holy covenant of
election, as many as God had laid hold of on. Now you see,
this is to the glory of our God. We will not pass over it. We
cannot pass over it. Our God must be exalted as being
in sovereign control of every situation, and no man can preach
the gospel if he preaches it faithfully and be without a victory. He has a victory because God's
going to win the victory, and he will have it. You don't have
to go through life saying, well, now I've got to get a little
slicker here about the way I present. I gotta cut this edge off, I
gotta cut that edge off, I gotta do this, I gotta present a little
different message, I can't preach grace, I can't preach election,
I can't preach the doctrines of grace, I can't do it because
nobody's gonna get saved hogwashed. There ain't a bit of truth to
it. You believe what the word of God says? God will sovereignly
get the victory. He will get it. So here we have
a particular people. As many, no more and no less. This is a specific number which
can never be increased or decreased. As many as the Lord has ordained
to eternal life, they believe. They call upon the Lord and they
believe. And then we have a particular
action. They were ordained. They were ordained, these people
were. The word ordained means to appoint or to assign to a
certain position or lot. In this case, it was God ordaining. It was God that done the assigning. It was God that fixed these people
in a certain position. They were ordained to eternal
life. God was in control here. My friend,
our labor is not in vain in the Lord, and don't you forget it. I never will forget, and of course
I need to go ahead and finish this, but I never will forget
back in the early 80s, about 81, when I was quite ill one
time, and very cast down, very discouraged, very, very discouraged,
ready to give up, ready to quit. And I laid down in the family
room of our home out on a fair field bench, and as I was lying
there, this verse of Scripture came with great power to my soul. Be ye steadfast, unmovable, always
abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch as you know that
your labor is not in vain in the Lord. Well, I got up the
next morning and come to church and preached on that very text.
because I heard from God in my soul. Your labor is not in vain
in the Lord. Oh my soul, how we see the evidence
of the fact that God has been in the thing all along. The hand
of the Lord has been in it, and God has gotten Himself, His holy
arm has gotten Himself the victory. And we need to believe that.
Well then, there's another thing here. There was a particular
benefit, and that was eternal life. Eternal life. These people,
I mean, the scripture says, and as many as were ordained to eternal
life, believe that was the end of it. They were ordained to
eternal life. That was the blessing of it. And then we have also the means,
the particular means, and that is believed. To be sure, faith
is not the cause or the condition of eternal life. It is the result
of being born again. Nevertheless, it's absolutely
vital that you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, that you trust
Him. Okay, and now that brings me
to the very last thing. And I think that it's important
that we go on here and finish the message. I know the time
is going to be getting away from us here in a moment. But I want
us to see this, that unbelief is the cause of eternal damnation. If a man goes to hell, he goes
to hell because that's what he wills to do. Jesus said, ye will
not come to me that ye might have life. Now there's some people
try to put words in the mouth of people who believe what I
believe and say that we preach that some are consigned to hell. Well, my friend, all I know is
that a man is obligated before God to repent and believe the
gospel, and that if you die and go to hell, you've got nobody
to blame for it but yourself. I don't see you running from
your sin. I don't see you fleeing the wrath
of God. I don't see you climbing over
hedge and hill trying to get to Jesus Christ. No, you will
not come to Him that you might have life. And you ought to go
to hell if you will not believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. I tell
you another thing, election is the cause of saving faith. It
is. Now you get that and you get
it carefully. You would have never believed,
I would have never believed, no man would have ever believed
the gospel if it was not for that remnant according to the
election of grace. The election hath obtained it
and the rest were blinded. Only by the sovereign grace of
God's electee of mercy does anybody ever get saved. All who obeyed
the gospel in time, hear me, were ordained to that end. They were ordained to life in
eternity. And we need to believe that.
We need to believe what the Word of God says. The preaching of
the gospel, as we said earlier, always accomplishes God's purpose
and it glorifies Him. But now brethren, this is something
we need to get a hold of, and that is that it honors Him, it
glorifies Him, and it honors His Word. Now, what other agenda
do you have? What other agenda do you have?
Now, what other purpose is worthy of our living and spending our
lives? You see, I got a little idea about how I can trick this
fella into coming in. I think I can slip this fella
in. I may have to use a shoe spoon to do it, but I think I
can slip him in. I can get him in. My friend,
listen to me. We're here for one purpose, that's
to honor and glorify the God of the Bible. That's the purpose
of the New Covenant Baptist Church, is to honor and glorify the God
of the Bible. God will honor His own word,
and He will not share His glory with another! Now you just settle
yourself down, get in this book, fill your hopper with seed, and
get to going out and spreading the word of God, and tell the
truth on God, and God will honor His word, He'll own the message,
and there will be people saved. God will bring His people unto
Himself, because the scripture makes it clear, crystal clear,
to me, that our labor is not in vain in the Lord. It is not
in vain, my dear friend. Now last of all, we see that
by the faithful discharge of the responsibilities that God
had given His servants, they had confidence and they had great
joy before Him. Now this is precious to me. We see at the very end here in
verse 50, of course, we told you that they had been expelled
out of the coast of Antioch. But they shook off the dust of
their feet against them and came into Iconium. And the disciples,
look at verse 52, now here's these disciples. Now they'd been
preaching, and they had preached the word of God, and the Gentiles
come and said, boy, we'd like to hear this again, would you
preach it next week? And so they preached, according
to a few of the men that I've read after, they said that they
preached all week. They preached all week on the
streets. And then they went into the synagogue and preached on
the Sabbath day, on Saturday, and preached the Word of God
there. And these people had heard all that they preached to them. But here's the apostles now,
after all of this has happened, and then they're driven out of
the city. They did what the Lord told them
to do, and here they are, as it all winds up, they were filled
with joy. They were filled with joy. Well,
why were they filled with joy? And with the Holy Ghost. Why?
Why do you think they were? Number one was because they knew
they'd done what God told them to do. They preached the Word.
They'd been at it all the time. Spreading the Word. Like we said,
they spread the Word all week and on the Sabbath. Preaching
everywhere, all the time. Okay, they were filled with joy
because they knew that God had owned His Word and that the sheep
were safely enfolded. They knew that God had got His
people. That His people had been brought
out. Jew, go on to hell if that's
the way you feel about the whole thing. You judge yourself unworthy
of everlasting life? Go on to hell! But God has His
people and my heart is happy about it. Now let anybody that
wants to say something against that, but I'm mighty happy that
God's going to have his people in great fall. He's going to
happen. He's going to happen. Our labor's not going to be in
vain. From the time 1970 until 2002, our labor has not been
in vain. God has his people, and we'll
rejoice, and we'll be glad. And they were filled with the
Holy Ghost, and what'd they do? They just went right on to the
next city, and went right into the synagogue again, went right
in again, and bearded the lion in his den, went right in in
the face of these Jews, and began to talk about this man, this
man again. And so they so spake that a great
multitude, both the Jews and also the Greeks, believed. They're
in that sin of God. But the unbelieving Jews, here
they are again, stirred up the Gentiles, made their minds evil-affected
against the brethren. But I want you to see what happened
in verse 3. Long time, therefore, abode they
speaking boldly in the Lord. They just went right on. They
were filled with joy and with the Holy Ghost. And that's what
people will do. That is, filled with the Spirit
of God and the joy of the Spirit. And they take, counting off their
lives here unto themselves. They're not interested in how
they fare. They're interested in one thing,
being faithful to the God who sent His Son to lay down His
life in their room and standing place, and they're sold out lock,
stock, and barrel to the Lord Jesus Christ. And so here they
are speaking boldly. in the name of the Lord. They've
just been expelled from one city, and they're about to be stoned,
and Paul's about to be drugged out of a city as if he was dead. It's about ready to happen. But
they speak boldly in the Lord, and I want you to see what God
did. And He gave testimony unto the word of His grace. God gave
testimony unto the Word of His grace. I just wanted to throw
this in. It won't cost you a dime. I just
wanted to throw this in. We see there in verse 1, we see
what happened. There was a multitude. The brethren
spoke. And there was a multitude of the Jews and the Greeks that
believed. And then in verse 3, we have
what they spoke. They spoke the Word of His grace.
And it was the Word of His grace that the people had believed
in verse 1. That's what they believed. They
believed the word of His grace. They believed that God is a God
of grace and that it's God that moves toward the sinner. Grace
is God moving toward the sinner, not the sinner moving toward
God. It's God moving toward the sinner. Noah found grace in the
eyes of the Lord, found divine favor, found that favor of God
which cost Jesus Christ his life. They found it. God gave testimony
in the word of His grace. That's marvelous, brethren, to
see how that when a man speaks boldly in the name of the Lord,
and when he preaches the grace of God in Christ Jesus, and when
he sends forth the message of God's sovereign mercy in Christ,
that God loaned it. He'll own it. He always will
own it. You say, I get tired of hearing
it. And some others say, I get tired of preaching it. I get
tired of going over this same old message that God is a sovereign
and that I'm on His hands and that He can do with me. My eternal
destiny is in His hands to fix. Either to salvation or damnation,
it's in His hands. I cannot save myself. I get tired
of hearing that somebody said. I get tired of hearing this grace,
grace, grace business. My friend, you ought to be ashamed
of yourself. You ought to be so ashamed of
yourself, you'd cut the very lifeline that saved your poor
soul from a devil's hell. You're only saved by the grace
of God. Paul said, but God who is rich
in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when
we were dead in sin, hath quickened us together with Christ, by grace
ye are saved. Can't be saved any other way.
The only perfect salvation there is, the only complete salvation
there is, is through the word of his grace. The word of his
grace. And my friend, When the day comes
when the word of His grace is not expounded upon, when it's
not preached, and when it's not believed by this congregation,
you're out of business whether you've still got your shingle
up or not. You're out of business. It's the word of His grace! that
God's gonna bear witness to, and praise God, we've seen some
signs and wonders done by His hand. And you don't know all
the story. I could tell you a little more
of the story, I'm not gonna do it. But I'm telling you, God
has given signs and wonders to the word of his grace and that's
what God's going to bear witness to and don't you ever slack up
one minute from standing up and boldly praying that God will
give you liberty to speak up and to set forth the truth of
his amazing sovereign grace because when that day comes you're out
of business as we said and you may say well no we got lots to
say you may have a whole lot to say but God ain't going to
own it and he's not going to bear witness to it and you will
not be able to say when all of this is over and done that my
labor has not been in vain in the Lord my friend your labor
is going to be in vain if you preach anything else but the
word of his grace The word of His grace. What do you think
these brethren persuaded those that believed to continue in
the grace of God? Why did they do that? Well, because,
my friend, in the grace of God, that's where we have our standing.
We have our standing. Wipe that out and we all go to
hell. We stand because God has bestowed
His favor upon us without works, without merit, without any deed
on our behalf. We found grace in the eyes of
the Lord. And therefore, my friend, let
us rejoice in that and be glad. May the Holy Spirit come with
great power upon us. There's someone here today that
is a stranger to God's grace and free favor in Christ. May
you be brought savingly to Him this morning. We commit your
soul unto God and to the Word of His grace, which is able to
build you up and to give you an inheritance. among them that
are sanctified. May God bless this word today. Father, in the name of Jesus,
we commit this message to you.