This morning, turn with me to
the book of Habakkuk in the Old Testament. I would like to read the first
three verses of the first chapter. The burden which Habakkuk the
prophet did see, O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt
not hear? even cry out unto thee of violence,
and thou wilt not save. Why dost thou show me iniquity,
and cause me to behold grievance? For spoiling and violence are
before me, and there are that raise up strife and contention. I wish to speak this morning
on the first part of verse 3. Why dost thou show me iniquity? Now in this message I will endeavor
to give you some reasons why that God causes his people to
see iniquity in themselves and in others. But I would like to
preface my remarks this morning by reading a quote of Mr. Spurgeon's. If you would listen
carefully. He says, there are some professing
Christians who can speak of themselves in terms of admiration. But from my inmost heart, I loathe
such speeches more and more every day that I live. Those who talk
in such a boastful fashion must be constituted very differently
from me. While they are congratulating
themselves, I have to lie humbly at the foot of the cross of the
Lord Jesus and marvel that I am saved at all. For I know that
I am saved. I have to wonder that I do not
believe Christ more, and equally wonder that I am privileged to
believe in Him at all, to wonder that I do not love Him more,
and equally to wonder that I love Him at all, to wonder that I
am not holier, and equally to wonder that I have any desire
to be holy at all, considering what a polluted and debased and
depraved nature I find still within my soul, notwithstanding
all that divine grace has done in me. If God were ever to allow
the fountains of the great deeps of depravity to break up in the
best man that lives, he would make as bad a devil as the devil
himself. I care nothing for what these
boasters say concerning their own perfections. I feel sure
that they do not know themselves or they could not talk as they
often do. There is tender enough in the
saint who is nearest to heaven to kindle another hell if God
should but permit a spark to fall upon it. In the very best
of men there is an infernal and well nigh infinite death depth
of depravity. Some professing Christians never
seem to find this out. I almost wish that they might
not do so, for it is a very painful discovery for anyone to make,
but it has the beneficial effect of making us cease from trusting
in ourselves and causing us to glory only in the Lord. My friend, this morning we've
heard the seventh chapter of the Book of Romans read to us,
and certainly I know that many, many times when we hear that
book read, there are many questions that come up into our minds.
We often ask the question, why am I thus? Why am I like I am? Well, the seventh chapter of
the Book of Romans, of course, gives us the answer to that question. That question can be answered
by saying that we're all sinners and that we are depraved by nature.
Now, in the book of Job, chapter 40, in verse 3 and 4, then it
says, Job answered the Lord and said, behold, I am vile. What shall I answer thee? I will
lay mine hand upon my mouth. Now, Job, outwardly speaking,
was probably the best man in the East at the time, and I think
the meaning of Job 1 verse 1 that we read there, there was a man
in the land of Uz whose name was Job, and that man was perfect
and upright, and one that feared God and hated evil, but he said,
I am vile. He said, I am vile. David the
sweet singer of Israel, the man after God's own heart, said in
Psalm 73 in verse 22 and 23, so foolish was I and ignorant. I was as a beast before thee. Nevertheless, I am continually
with thee. Thou hast holden me by thy right
hand. In Isaiah 6 and 5, the prophet
Isaiah said, Woe is me, for I am undone, because I am a man of
unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. For mine eyes have seen the king,
the Lord of hosts. Paul, the writer of scripture,
said in Romans 7, verses 14 and 15, I am carnal, sold under sin. For that which I do, I allow
not. For what I would, that do I not. But what I hate, that do I. And in verse 17 of the same chapter,
he says, Now then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth
in me. And in verse 18 he said, for
I know that in me, that is in my flesh, No good thing, for
to will is present with me, but how to perform that which is
good I find not. Now listen to John Newton, the
writer of the song Amazing Grace. Strange and mysterious is my
life, what opposites I feel within. a stable peace, a constant strife,
the rule of grace, the power of sin. Too often I am captive
led, yet always triumph in my head. Thus different powers within
me strive, and grace and sin by turns prevail. I grieve, rejoice,
decline, revive, and victory hangs in doubtful scale. But
Christ to me, his promise passed, that grace shall overcome at
last." Well, how did these good men come to this? How did they
come to this mind? How did they come to understand
their experience, what was going on in their lives? Well, God
showed them the iniquity and depravity in themselves. This is painful, very painful. This is distasteful, very distasteful,
yes. So much so that man would not
on his own learn the doctrine of depravity, and he will not
listen to you as you try to explain to him what is the matter with
him, what his condition really is. We come to see that they
that know God best know most about themselves. Those that
know God best know the most about themselves. I used to think,
and I've often mentioned this to you, that when I got older,
when I was a young man, I used to think that when I got older,
I would get better, surely get better. Well, that's not so.
The more you have the mind of the Spirit of Christ, you will
think less of yourself. The more the mind of Christ indwells
you, the less you will think of old sinful self. God never
reveals himself to a man until he first empties out the man
of his own self-righteousness and pride. Sick of self, fond
of Christ. This is the order, beloved. One
must become sick of himself in order to be really fond of the
Lord Jesus Christ. He wounds, He heals, He kills,
He makes alive. Well, why does God cause us to
see iniquity in ourselves? What is the reason of the discoveries
which the Holy Spirit makes to us of the evil of our hearts? It is well known to all who love
the Lord that there are seasons when the Holy Spirit takes us
into the darkest chambers of our being and there reveals to
us evils which perhaps we had never suspected actually were
there. He lays bare the loathsome kennel
of the human heart and lets us look at all our deformity and
depravity. He takes us to the rock whence
we were hewn and to the hole of the pit where we were digged. He bids us look with horror upon
our natural state. and see that awful and hideous
corruption that still remains in our hearts, even though we
have been regenerated by the Spirit. Why does He do this,
I ask? We will try to answer this question
in several ways. Number one, I think that the
Lord shows us our iniquity and our sin, reveals to us our hearts
in order, first of all, to confirm us in the doctrines of His grace. to confirm us in the doctrines
of His grace. My brethren, Arminianism is the
natural religion of us all. I think one of the surest ways
in this world to put down all self-sufficiency and all erroneous
views of the gospel is for God to show us our own depravity. We hear all this preaching, but
we must, my friend, all spiritual truth, we must experience spiritual
truth. All spiritual truth is learned
experientially. You don't know anything that
you haven't really experienced. from the hand of the Lord. A
man may talk about free will as long as he knows nothing about
himself. But when the Lord is showing
him what he is in a state of nature, his mouth will be shut
and he will say no more. Say no more about his sufficiency,
say no more about his ability, say no more about his free will. A man untaught of the Spirit
of God says that sinners of their own free will turn to God, but
it is not so. That man is not taught of the
Spirit. He further says that by their
own strength, at least to a degree, they keep themselves and their
final perseverance is dependent on their own diligence and is
not left entirely to the hands of God. No. This man that says
that is untaught by the Spirit of God. He never has really truly
understand, he never has understood his own heart, his own weaknesses,
his own spiritual death and inability. Or he would quit talking about
free will, creature strength and creature merit, and talk
of free grace and sovereign mercy. He'd have nothing more to say
about the creature's ability. Brother and sister, I know if
God had not begun the good work in me, it would have never originated. in such a filthy cesspool as
my own wicked heart. It never would have originated
there. I believe that we are His workmanship
created in Christ Jesus unto good works which God hath before
ordained that we should walk in them. And if He does not carry
on the work from the first to the last, it will come quickly
to a standstill. Is that the way you feel about
it? The Bible says in Philippians 1, 6, He that hath begun a good
work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Philippians
2 and 13 says, It is God that worketh in you both to will and
to do of His good pleasure. If I am not robed in the righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ, I must stand, beloved, naked before
the bar of God. I must stand before God in all
of my iniquity and all my sin. If the work be not entirely His,
or if He is to be turned away by any sin or sinfulness in the
creature, then O Lord, Oh Lord, I know that I must perish. I know that I would turn Him
away. If He could be turned away and
turned back from finishing His work of grace, I know that I
would perish finally in the lake of fire. If sheep of Christ could
fall away, my fickle, feeble soul, alas, would fall a thousand
times a day. And my friend, I'm telling you
the truth. And this right view of the subject will drive us
to believe in discriminating grace, in irresistible vocation
or calling, in omnipotent keeping and in the infallible perseverance
of all the children of God. You see yourself, you'll believe
these doctrines, you'll believe these truths, you'll be driven
to believe these truths if you understand who you really are. You must believe these things
because there's no other answer, there's no other deliverance
except those that are found in these precious, valuable truths
of the Word of God. Now notice, it seems to me that
the belief of one of the doctrines of grace naturally leads to the
belief of all the rest. The Lord begins by teaching us
this foundational truth of our utter depravity. He burns it
into our conscience by bitter experience and by terrible discoveries
of our sinfulness. And he knows right well that
the other doctrines will follow when this truth is really understood
by us. We will very soon have right
views of the whole covenant of grace. So this is, I think, the
number one reason why the Lord shows us our own iniquity is
that we may be sound in the faith and believe nothing, believe
nothing but that salvation is entirely of the grace of God,
believe nothing but that our keeping is altogether of God's
sovereign grace. People who deny this truth, I
think they ignore the obvious, they lie to themselves, and they
never seriously inquire, why am I thus? They never do. But if you ever get well grounded
in the doctrine of depravity, all these other truths will come.
I remember visiting with several people along the way, and it's
interesting that when you bring up this subject of depravity
and bring up the subject of unconditional election and irresistible grace
and the doctrine of a definite atonement and final perseverance
of believers that they all have hesitation and the reason they
have hesitation is because they don't believe in depravity. If
the sinner's dead, these truths must be so, and they are so,
and thank God they're so, and then we can see that there's
some hope for us, even us. So the number one reason why
God will take you into the back room and strip you of all of
your self-righteousness and pride is so you will believe and will
be sound in the doctrines of God's grace. Number two, I believe
that he does this to show us our sinfulness to keep us humble,
to keep us humble. The Puritans used to say that
God has given the peacock black feet that he may not be proud
of his bright feathers. In like manner, he has allowed
his people to see the black feet of their own sinfulness, that
they may not glory in any of the graces which God the Holy
Spirit has given them. While we do have various graces
given to us, these graces are the gift of God, and the sight
of our natural depravity brings us low and humbles us before
our God. It is like eating the lamb with
the bitter herbs in Exodus chapter 12 and verse 8. Pride is natural
to us all. Pride of race and face. But worst
of all, we're proud of our grace, are we not? This pride is woven
into our very being. We shall never get rid of it
till the worm has eaten up our flesh. But God will keep his
people in the right place There is no legitimate cause for pride
in any of us. No legitimate cause for pride
in any of us. God will humble you and I with
discoveries of our own sinfulness. This is a great service to us,
teaching us not to be high-minded, but rather to fear, and to remember
that your standing in grace is not of yourself, and you dare
not boast. For by grace are you saved through
faith, that not of yourselves. It's a gift of God, not of works
lest any man should boast. Number three, A third reason
why God sometimes shows his people their own wickedness is to make
them submissive in the hour of trouble and in the hour of test,
in the hour of trial. A Pharisee of all people in the
world would be the worst man to be in old Job's position,
being greatly tried, the Lord having taken away that which
he had given him and left him in a miserable state, afflicted
with morals from the crown of his head to the sole of his feet.
And in the state that he was in, he blessed God and said he
sinned not, but said the Lord gives and the Lord takes away.
Well, I say that a Pharisee of all people would be the worst
man to be in Job's position. You know what a Pharisee is?
A Pharisee is somebody who's self-righteous, somebody who
trusts in themselves that they're better than other men. They're
not like other men. They are better than other men,
and they're not cut out of the same cloth that other men are
cut out of. They're just several notches
higher than the ordinary sinner. Well, Listen, if I must have
trouble, I'd rather have it as a publican than as a Pharisee. Now why, you say? Well, a Pharisee
never deserves a pain. He never deserves any misery. He never deserves a problem at
all, because he's such a good, upstanding individual, that really
and truly, he deserves a better lot in life than ordinary men,
and he shouldn't have all of these afflictions that others
have. I do not deserve this, he would say. I do not deserve
it. But the poor publican would say,
I'm a great sinner. I'm a great sinner and my miseries
are not a millionth part of what I deserve to suffer. These aches
and pains are nothing compared to what I would merit at the
hand of God. Therefore, I will bear them all
and I will bear them with submission unto God. Why should a living
man complain? of the punishment of his sin. The Bible says in Lamentations,
well, why should a living man complain? Why should a sinner
ever complain? He's out of hell, isn't he? Well,
this will keep murmuring down for a man to be humble and for
a man to be submissive unto God in the time of his trial. This
will keep murmuring down. This is a sheer cure for murmuring,
for God to let us know what we really deserve, and then when
we compare that with what we do have, then we'll shut our
mouths and stop our complaining and our carrying on. My friend,
listen to me this morning. The poor wretch who has had a
rope around his neck and has been about ready to be hung from
the gallows when he gets his pardon, Then he, and goes his
way, you'll not find him murmuring where he has to live. You won't
find him murmuring about his lot in life. You won't find him
murmuring about what he has to eat. No, he'll say, oh, it is
such a wonder to me to be alive at all. It is such an act of
mercy that I've had my life spared that this dry bread and this
cup of cold water, it tastes to me like a delicious meal would
taste to another man. There was an old Christian woman
one time who was very poor and she was given a piece of a crust
of bread and a cup of water and she said, and all this and Jesus
too. All this and Jesus too. Our afflictions
are less than we deserve, brother, sister. Are they not? Whatever
be our afflictions, they are less than what we deserve. Should that not silence our murmuring? Now our troubles are but the
small dust of the balance compared with the mountains of tribulation
and anguish which we ought to have received in hell if we'd
have got our come-ups, if we'd have got our desserts, My friend,
it's just a small fraction of what you would have received.
Oh, it's wonderful to be able to say, I'm out of hell. I'm
out of hell. And by the grace of God, I'm
not going there. I believe in hell. The Bible
teaches that there is a real place called hell and that sinners
who die outside of Christ go there. and they spend eternity
there under the judgment of Almighty God. I believe the Bible teaches
a literal hell. Thomas Watson said, those are
the best prepared for the greatest mercies that see themselves unworthy
of the least mercy. They are great as prepared to
receive the great mercies of God when they see themselves
unworthy of God's least blessing. How is God going to teach us
our own unworthiness? Well, just show us how bad we
are. And that'll show us exactly our unworthiness. Well, fourthly,
it makes us value God's salvation more when we see what really
wretches we are. Why do you suppose Paul in Romans
chapter 7 said, and the next to the last verse I believe it
is, why did he say, O wretched man that I am, who shall deliver
me from the body of this death? Who's going to deliver me out
of this dilemma that I am seeing that I am such a wretched man
by nature? that I am so undone and so unable
to do that which is good, who is going to deliver me out of
this? Well, he thanked God through Jesus Christ, his Lord. that he was going to be delivered,
that God was going to, through Jesus Christ, deliver him from
this great dilemma. And I believe this morning that
we should value highly God's salvation. And the more you know
about yourself, the more you will value the mercy, the grace,
and the kindness, and the compassion of the living God toward your
soul if he has brought you out. I mean if the Lord Jesus Christ
has died in your stead, I mean if he's died in your room and
place, if he suffered your hell for you, then this should make
you value this salvation. Do you know yourself? Do you
know how close you were to ending up in a devil's hell? Do you
know how close you were to burning for all eternity? Do you know
how close? Well, I'm sure that none of us
really know how close we were. There were times when due to
our ignorance and our stupidity that there were many things when
we were in a lost condition that we found ourselves doing that
could have ended our lives in just a fraction of a second and
sent us off into that awful place where the worm dies not and the
fire is never quenched. But thanks being to God, He did
not cut the cord. Thanks being to God, He did not
put an end to our flesh life. But we value the salvation of
the Lord when we think of how bad we are. The man who thinks
most of the doctor is the man who is sick. The man who is sick
Oh, my friend, God commendeth His love toward us, and while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for the ungodly, the whole, need
not a physician but the sick. I come not to call the righteous,
but sinners to repentance. And God has greatly worked on
our behalf to bring us out. God's plan, God's scheme was
to charge Christ with all of our sin and all of our iniquity
and our wickedness, to lay it all on Him. and to put His righteous
garment upon our sinful souls, that we might be comely in His
presence, and that when we would come before Him, He would smell
that sweet savor of His own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, and welcome
us into His presence, and welcome us into His everlasting abode. My friend, we should vow you
highly God's salvation. And when you come to see your
iniquity, the reason why God is slowly and painfully to you,
just showing you day by day who you really are, what you really
are. is in order that you will value
his salvation. Any salvation that can save a
poor sinner like you and I is a salvation that ought to be
highly evaluated, ought to be highly valued by our souls. If a man is sick, then he wants
a doctor. When we're well, we joke about
the doctor. Oh, we got all kinds of jokes
and we talk about them, you know, and about how, how, well, we
won't get into that. because I've been guilty of a
little of that myself. But we might, we are very, well,
we somehow or other, we don't appreciate them like we do when
we get sick. But when we really get sick,
we find ourselves getting to one pretty quick. And we won't
be going with a joke on our lip. It is so with God's people when
they discover their own leprosy. Then they greatly value the Great
Physician. The Great Physician now has come,
the Sympathizing Jesus. The Lord Jesus Christ has come
and He will heal the sin sick soul. He is able to do that.
When they realize their own ruin, then it is that they prize the
God-given remedy. They'll prize it, highly value
it. John Warburton said, listen to
his words, he was an old sinner, he had a degree, SS degree, sinner
saved, and here's what he had to say, the longer I live, the
more I feel that if there were one thing left undone, if the
devil were not conquered, if sin was not paid for, justice
was not satisfied, the law not honored and magnified, death
not overcome, and every burden carried I would not have a ray
of hope. I wouldn't have a ray of hope.
Now, beloved, this is the hard experience to all true believers. All true believers come to that.
You see somebody that's always exalting the grace of God, there's
got to be a reason for that. You see some preacher that's
carried away with the mercy and grace and sovereign kindness
and love and the riches of the mercy of his God, and there's
a reason for that. And that is that he don't have
any hope anywhere else. Nobody gets excited about something
like that unless they have found the answer to the plague of their
soul in those truths. That's the only reason why they
get carried away with it. And the more you brethren, the
more you sing about, the more you talk about, the more you
pray about, the grace of God and the love of God, His mercy
and kindness enduring forever unto your soul, the more I know
that you know something about yourself. You know something
about yourself. Now you see, We understand, and
I believe this is so important that we understand this, that
salvation is of the Lord from the beginning to the end. And
it's not only of the Lord because of who He is, it's of the Lord
because of who you are. My friend, God is an absolute
sovereign, demands perfect righteousness. You can't produce it. You can't
produce it. God must be, salvation must be
all. Old Ward Burton was right. Every
burden must be borne by God himself. Every jot and tittle of the law
must be fulfilled by the Lord Jesus Christ, the God-man himself. He must provide all that God
demands of us or we're going to hell. And I tell you this
morning, salvation is of God because of who He is and because
of who you are. You're unable to save yourself.
You cannot deliver yourself. What are you? Now I want to try
in the little time that I have left to answer the question of
the text in another way. Sometimes the iniquity of the
Lord shows us is in someone else besides ourselves. The Lord causes
us to see, as he did the prophet here, calls me to behold grievance,
spoiling and violence are before me, and there are that raise
up strife and contention. So sometimes the iniquity the
Lord shows us is in somebody else, a family member maybe,
or in somebody we work with, somebody around us. somebody
that we're in touch with day by day. Well, why does the Lord
expose us to iniquity in others? Why would he do that? Well, I
suppose to let us see what we might have been if it hadn't
been for his grace. What we might have been. Old
John Bradford, when he used to see people going past his window
on the way to Tyburn to be hanged, said, There goes John Bradford,
but for the grace of God. There he goes. That would have
been me if it had been for the grace of God. Human hearts are
very much alike, you know. Very much alike. As in water
face answereth to face, so the heart of man to man. Other men
are a picture, those who have fallen deep into sin, are a picture
of what I might have been. What I could have very well been.
if it hadn't been for the grace of God. I often think of that.
Where I could have ended up as a young man and already been
in hell burning right now. Could have already been. But
God in his sovereign mercy was pleased to spare me. Now, so
God sometimes allows us to see the sin of others to teach us
to admire his sovereignty which plucked us as brands from the
burning. is sovereignty. Did God, has
God kept you? You know there's various reasons
why people are kept from various things in this world. Various
reasons. But one of the main reasons is
the lack of opportunity. And one of the main reasons is
the fact that God rules over the situation to the point, rules
over our, in our lives, the circumstances of our life to the point where
that opportunity never presents itself. for us to fall into the
kind of sin that we otherwise are thirsty by nature to fall
into. That's exactly what I'm telling
you. What's made us to differ from others that have fallen
into sin? Grace, my friend, free grace
is what makes us different. It's what makes us different.
Why? Grace to us and not to others. Father, so it seemed good in
your sight. For so it seemed good in your
sight." The reason is to be found with God, found with Him. The sovereignty of God is not
so much seen amongst the righteous by themselves as it is when we
find the Christian growing up amid the booshes and the brambles
of an ungodly world. You very seldom see lightning
bugs in the daytime, very seldom. But at night, Believers are more
conspicuous when they live among sinners. When they live among
sinners. Last, I want to show you, God
shows us the sin of others that we may be more earnest, more
useful as an instrument in God's hand. I have to go ahead with
this. I've got to deliver my soul.
that we may be more earnest, more useful as an instrument
in God's hand to proclaim the gospel of free grace in which
there is power to break sin's bondage and slavery. Now, just
give me a minute. Where sin abounds, the Bible
says, grace does much more abound. It does much more abound. We've
got to keep that in memory in order to be able to be the instrument
that God would have us to be in this world. So if God were
to show us the sins of this city this morning, if we were, and
not only that, but those among us who are outside of Christ,
if God were to just open up their hearts and minds and open their
hearts and we would see their condition, their true condition
before a holy God. Would it make us preach better?
Would it make us preach different if we really knew their condition,
their sin? Well, if God were to, as it were,
show us the sin of this city of Great Falls, it would, no
doubt about it, it would make us better witnesses, it would
make us better servants of God, it would make us better preachers
of the gospel if we just could see what all is going on. Spurgeon said on one occasion,
he said, it has been a long time since I made a good speech at
a public meeting, but I do remember, he said, doing it once. He said
he went to a house where a lady lived who wanted to join the
tabernacle, join the church. and her drunken husband was beating
her. And it stirred him up, said he
preached like a man on fire. He said it would do all preachers
good if they were drug through the city streets to see the dark,
the black, the filthy, and the abandoned in the cities. Do men
need the gospel? Do they need it? It is the only
hope we know for fallen sinners. fallen sinners, there ain't no
hope for them except this gospel that we profess to believe, this
gospel that has delivered our souls. Whitfield said, George
Whitfield, when I think how this wicked city is perishing and
how many are dying for lack of knowledge of the gospel, I feel
as if I could stand on the top of every coach in the streets
of London and preach the gospel. Well, I think it would stir a
man's soul, would it not? God enables us to see sometimes
what's going on around us in order it'll stir us up to be
the instruments we ought to be. Now, if you're here this morning
and the Lord is showing you iniquity, it is not that he might damn
you. It is in order that he might deliver you from it, that he
might save you from it. If you've been convicted by the
Spirit of God today when we're talking about depravity, talking
about your heart being opened up before the Lord, talking about
a hell that is enduring and eternal, a hell where the worm dies not
and the fire is not quenched, if God has broken your heart,
and it'd be a wonderful thing if He were to break your heart,
your heart must be broken, no salvation apart from the Holy
Spirit going before and breaking the heart of the sinner. and
convicting the heart of the sinner and preparing the heart of the
sinner for the seed of the word of God and for the salvation
of the Lord. If he has killed you by the law,
it is that he might make you alive by the gospel. The law
demands perfection, and God will have perfection either out of
you or out of your substitute. Now I mean that God is never
going to wink at sin. God will punish sin. Let me say
it in a different way. God has punished sin. He has. He's going to punish
it in the wicked for all eternity. He's punished it in Christ our
substitute at Calvary. Judgment fell at Calvary when
the Lord Jesus came before the Father and presented himself
as surety on the behalf of John Mitchell and said, I'll take
responsibility from here out for all of his sin, for all of
his undone condition. I'll take responsibility, Father,
for him. And from that hour on, the justice
of God looked him over and sought to find in him a ransom for my
soul. And I'm here to tell you this
morning that the gospel is the only way of salvation. And if
he's killed you by the law, it is that he might make you alive
by the gospel. That he might make you alive. The law makes
way, the sharp needle of the law makes way for the red thread
of the gospel. And so if you feel convicted
that you don't measure up to what God demands in his word,
none of us do, then it is that he might deliver your soul by
the gospel. If he has wounded you in your
conscience, he's done it that he may have room to pour in the
oil and the balm of Gilead. If he stripped you, he has only
pulled off your rags, that he may put you a perfect robe of
spotless righteousness. And if you're a convinced sinner,
then Jesus died for sinners. Died for sinners. Are you here
this morning? Are you weary? John Newton wrote a poem on rest
for weary souls, and I'll close with this. Does the gospel word
proclaim rest for those who weary be? Then my soul put in thy claim,
sure, that promise speaks to thee. Marks of grace I cannot
show, all polluted is my breast, yet I weary am, I know, and the
weary long for rest. Burdened with a load of sin,
harassed with tormenting doubt, hourly conflicts from within,
hourly crosses from without. All my strength is gone. Sink
I must without supply. Sure upon this earth there's
none can more weary be than I. In the ark the weary dove found
a welcome resting place. Thus my spirit longs to prove
rest in Christ, the ark of grace. Tempest tossed I long have been,
and the flood increases fast. Open, Lord, and take me in, till
the storm be over past." Now, I have picked a few flowers from
other men's gardens, as the French writer said, and tied them together
with my string. I trust this morning that the
Lord has been in our midst. and that you have been helped
and blessed. And you, if you're without Christ,
the Holy Spirit might be pleased to enable you to come to Him. Coming to Christ is not a physical
act. We've stressed that over and over. It is not a physical
act. If I could get to Him physically,
I would. I would. And you know what? He
said He'd be here this morning. That's why I came. The other
brethren have said the same thing, basically. That's why we're here,
because he said he'd be here. If he wasn't going to be here,
it wouldn't be any need for us to be here, would it? I mean, just get here
and congratulate each other on how sound we are? Land, sex,
no. Nothing in that. Nothing in that. If you are here and you have
a weariness in your soul, there's a longing in your heart, for
Christ. And you do want to overcome.
You don't want to be left in this polluted state that you're
in. You want to be delivered in your soul. You don't want
to go before God with a bare, naked soul. You want to be clothed
in the white righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Come to
Him. Come to Him. Come to Him. He ever lives to make intercession
for us. For all those who will come to God by Him. Him. Can't get to God. Mitch quoted
it this morning, John 14 and 6. Can't get to God without coming
through Christ. He is the way, the truth, and
the life. He said He's the door. He's the door. He's the door.
Father, in the name of Jesus, we ask a blessing upon the message
and we ask that thou will deliver souls here this morning. We pray
that in their hearts they'll come to Christ and unburden themselves
at His feet. Beg for mercy. Beg for mercy
this morning. We pray, Father, that you will
encourage your people. May they understand better what's
been going on in their lives, what's been going on in their
souls. Now may they be able to say, I've got the answer why
I am thus. The Lord is teaching me. The
Lord is instructing me. The Lord, by the Spirit, is bringing
me more fully unto Himself and to a better and more full understanding
of the gospel of his grace. Lord, bless your people, encourage
your people, meet their needs. I pray that that poor soul, which
we were assured in our hearts when we came this morning, was
going to be here that needed this message. Oh Lord, may they
go out of this place with a lighter load in their soul today. May
there be victory won, may salvation come to some poor heart. In Jesus
name, Amen.