If you have turned with me to
the book of Acts chapter 13, I'd like to begin reading with
verse 42. And read down through verse 49. And when the Jews were gone out
of the synagogue, the Gentiles besought that these words might
be preached to them the next Sabbath. And these words that
they're talking about are found in verse 39, and by him, that
is by the Lord Jesus Christ, just mentioned in verse 38, 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 you could not be justified by the law of Moses. And so the Gentiles besought that these
words would be preached to them the next Sabbath. Now, when the
congregation was broken up, many of the Jews and the religious
proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them,
persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. And the next
Sabbath day came almost the whole city together to hear the word
of God. And when the Jews saw the multitudes,
they were filled with envy and spake against those things which
were spoken by Paul, contradicting and blaspheming. Then Paul and
Barnabas waxed bold and said, it was necessary that the word
of God should first have been spoken to you, but seeing you
put it from you and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life,
lo, we turn to the Gentiles. For so hath the Lord commanded
us, saying, I have set 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, they were glad and glorified
the word of the Lord. And as many as were ordained
to eternal life believed, and the word of the Lord was published
throughout all the region. I wish to speak primarily this
morning upon this phrase that we find in verse 43. where when
the congregation was broken up, many of the Jews and the religious
proselytes followed Paul and Barnabas, who, speaking to them,
persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. I want to talk
about persuading men and women who know the grace of God to
continue in God's grace. Now we believe that a work of
grace is necessary in the heart of a sinner before a sinner can
know God, before a sinner can love God, before a sinner can
serve the living God. the incapacity of man in his
natural state to do anything good in the sight of God. The
Bible says in Romans 3, verses 10 through 12, as it is written,
there is none righteous, no not one. They're all gone out of
the way, they are together become unprofitable, and there is none
that doeth good, no, not one. We contend that the condemnation
under which the sinner lies to everlasting misery necessitates
an entire change of heart, a new principle, a new nature before
he can be a Christian. There's an old verse in 2 Corinthians
5.17, but ever new and ever precious, that says, Therefore if any man
be in Christ, he's a new creation, all things are passed away, and
behold, all things are new. Now this change that we're talking
about This change, this radical change that we're talking about
that's brought about in the lives of those that have been ordained
unto eternal life cannot be brought about by human means or by formal
admission to the external church or by participation in the ordinances
of that church. We must have a standing in the
grace of God. We must have been planted by
God firmly upon His grace and in His grace, but by and through
the operation of the Holy Spirit given by God according to the
good pleasure of His will, of His free mercy, and for Christ's
sake. Those that He's ordained to eternal
life do have regeneration. They do come to life. They do
come out of sin's death into the life and the glory of the
gospel. And the first evidence, I believe,
of this vital change of the heart And we are talking about a vital
change in here. We're not just talking about
your head and your intellect. We're talking about God laying
hold of your heart. that God's speaking to your heart,
that God's power is to come upon the heart and your soul being
regenerated by God's power, the power of the Holy Spirit. And
the first evidence of this vital change of the heart is repentance
towards God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Repentance
toward God. A person's attitude suddenly
is changed. He's suddenly very remorseful
over his life, over the way he's lived, over his sin. Not altogether
just because of what he's done, but what he is. What he is. You see, repentance has everything
to do with what a man is. And we're all born sinners in
this world. We come forth from our mother's
womb speaking lies. We're all depraved creatures. We come into this world, none
righteous, no not one. We all together become unprofitable. There's not one that seeketh
after God on their own. So we come to repentance and
we suddenly discover that we're agreeing with God, we're taking
sides with God against ourselves. We're suddenly discovering that
where God said that we're not righteous at all of sin and come
short of His glory, immediately we say in our own hearts, this
is true. This is true. I've missed the
glory of God. I've trampled the law of God
underneath my dirty feet. I have sinned openly against
God. I have sinned secretly in my
heart against God. And the attitude is one of sorrow
over what we are before God. and then faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. We discover what we are, and
we're alarmed about what we are. We're alarmed that we are so
desperately in need of someone to intervene on our behalf. We need a substitute. We need
somebody that will stand between a thrice holy God and us. Somebody
that will answer to God for us. Somebody that will pay our sin
debt. Somebody that will meet the requirements of the holy
law on our behalf. We need somebody that will represent
us before God. And so, beloved, we hear the
message of Christ and forgiveness in and through Him. We hear the
message of the Lord Jesus Christ as being that one that God has
anointed and sent into the world, that one that He's given a work
to do, that one who came and fulfilled that work, that one
who obeyed every jot and tittle of the law, honored and magnified
the holy law of God, and pleased God in every way. that He has
come, and that He has stood in our place, received in His own
body our sin, and that He went to the tree, and that He suffered
our death, the agonizing death of the cross, that death that
was due the sinner, the Lord Jesus Christ suffered that death. And so faith in the Lord Jesus
Christ. You know, the thing that I want
to hear beings that I cannot make a contribution unto God
in my salvation. The thing I want to hear desperately
from a preacher's mouth is I want to hear how God provided everything
he demanded for this sinner. I'd like to hear what God has
done for me. I'd like to hear what He's done
for lost sinners, how that He's met the need of their soul, how
that He has provided the righteousness that He Himself has demanded
of me. I want to hear about that. I
want to hear about how Christ came into the world, how that
He can justify me freely on the basis of His own redemptive work. I want to hear that, and I want
you to hear that. Now faith in the Lord Jesus Christ,
this faith must come down from God. God must give it as a gift
to your soul. And those that have been regenerated,
quickened to life, they have been given repentance and faith. You see, repentance is not the
act. of the will of the natural man.
Repentance is a disposition of the soul, and it must be given
by God. A disposition wherein you take
sides with God, where you agree with Him, and where you say,
He's right and I'm wrong, I'm a sinner, and then fade in the
Lord Jesus Christ. The ability to see Christ, to
lay hold of Christ, and to trust Christ, this must be given by
the Holy Spirit. Now, beloved, the earnest of
all future good in this life and in the life to come is you
hath he quickened who were dead in trespasses and in sin. I say to you that is the earnest
of all good in this life and in the life to come. Without
this quickening, there can be no salvation. Now, this conversion,
this change of heart, this new birth has been compared in the
scripture to many things. First of all, it is the giving
of eyesight to the blind, without which he cannot begin to see.
In John 3, in verse 3, it says, Verily, verily, I say unto thee,
except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. He cannot see it here, and he
certainly will not see it in the world to come. In John chapter
6 and verse 40, and Jesus said, and this is the will of him that
sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son and believeth on
him hath everlasting life. You say, well I've never seen
the Son. Well, beloved, those who have believed on the Lord
Jesus Christ, those who have been quickened by the Divine
Spirit, they have seen Christ hanging on the glory tree. They've
seen Him dying in their room instead in place. They have seen
Him suffering the agony of the cross on their behalf. They've
seen Christ. And we see the kingdom of God.
We see the rule of God. We see it in our own life. And
the Bible also tells us that this experience of the new birth
is the bringing of the dead to life without which he cannot
begin to exercise the functions of spiritual life. Now in John
chapter 5 and verse 24 it says, Verily, verily, I say unto you,
he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting
life and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from
death unto life. They've passed from spiritual
death unto spiritual life. Remember in John 11 when our
Lord Jesus called Lazarus out of the grave. Lazarus had been
in the grave for four days. And our Lord Jesus called him
out, Lazarus, come forth. And the Bible says he came forth
in his grave clothes and the Lord Jesus said, loose him and
let him go. He came forth. And so those that
are born of the Spirit of God, they come forth. They come forth,
they come out of death and they come into life. And we're all
born in this death and you can't get out of it unless You are
born again unless the Spirit of God brings you out of this
death, Ephesians 2 and verse 1, and you have He made alive,
who were dead in trespasses and sin. It is the release, thirdly,
of a slave from bondage without which he cannot enter the service
of another master. Every one of you this morning
that are lost, Every one of you that are still in the state of
nature, every one of you that still are on the outside looking
in, those of you that have ever tasted of the grace of God, those
of you that are yet in your sin, you have a master. And that master,
my friend, is the devil. And if you ever are going to
come to that place where you pass out of the kingdom of darkness,
out of Satan's kingdom, into the kingdom of God's light and
glory, then you must have a change of masters. And before you can
be married to the Lord Jesus Christ, and before you can say
to Him, I'll take this man to rule over me, I'll take this
man to be my lawfully wedded master, my friend, you must have
this change, this new birth. And all that are in Christ Jesus
are married to the Lord Jesus Christ. They're in union with
the Lord Jesus Christ. Are you in Him? If you are, then
you're married to Christ and you have a new master and this
new master leads you and you follow him and you obey him and
walk in his commandments and his truth because he exhorts
you and leads you day by day and you live no longer unto yourself
but unto him who died in your place, in your room and place. So it's the release of a slave.
And were we not all enslaved in bondage before the Lord saved
us? Were we not enslaved? Were we
not chained up? And I've talked to people who
said, I'm still in these chains, preacher. I cannot come to Christ. Well, I always exhort people,
bring your chains, too, to the Lord Jesus Christ. The master
will break the chains. He'll break them off. Because
when you have a change of master, then the chains, bless God, will
fall off. Now, these are some of the figures.
that are used in the scripture for conversion, for spiritual
regeneration of the soul, and all of these imply a definite
work of the grace of God. While the heart of natural man
is unaffected by the grace of God, the heart of the sinner
remaining unchanged, his spirit unrenewed, it would be vain.
for me to get up here this morning and exhort him to serve God and
go through the motions of leading a Christian life. It'd be vain,
as long as he's still shackled in his chain and his bonds. This
would be to demand, I think, the fruit before the tree is
ever planted. It's to demand and to reap and
try to reap the harvest before the field is ever sown. repent
and believe the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, that you
might be conscious of your need of such a change and believe
that it is the gift and the purchase of redeeming love, even the gift
of the free grace of God to give it to you. This is the foundation,
I believe, of all Christian character. It's that living principle without
which the action, the duty of life, service to God can never
be carried on. You cannot. You say, well, I'm
trying to act like a Christian preacher. Well, why? I'm trying
to act like a Christian preacher. Why are you trying to act like
a Christian? You know, there are many that
believe that you start acting like a Christian and then you
just become one because you act like you're one. That's not true,
my friend. That's a lie from hell. That's not true. You must
be born of the Spirit of God, principle of the grace of God,
planted in the heart, sins forgiven, and Christ coming in to reign
and to rule in the life. And then, my friend, you can
begin to bring forth fruit unto God. Well, Paul and Barnabas
persuaded these that had been ordained to eternal life, these
that believed, and these that had this experience of grace,
They persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. If you're
in it, then continue in it. Well, what is this grace that
they're talking about? What is this grace that we hear
so much about? Grace, the sweetest song I know.
Grace, a magnificent word, a tremendous word. What is this grace all
about? The preacher says that he believes
that the gates of heaven is closed against every one of us in this
building if it wasn't for this grace. And that's exactly what
I'm saying. What in the world is this grace? Well, Paul tells us over and
over again in his epistles that we're saved and justified and
called, sanctified, preserved, and glorified by the grace of
God without our works. But what is grace? Almost to
the very last one of all professing Christians, they all say that
they believe that salvation is by grace. Now the word of God
lays such heavy emphasis upon the fact that salvation is by
grace that it is very difficult for anyone to claim to believe
the Bible and yet openly deny that salvation is by grace. Well, we have the religions of
the world, and they all claim to believe in salvation by grace. Not even the devil himself will
tell you any different. The devil himself will tell you
that grace is involved in salvation, along with all of the denominational
groups in the world that grace is involved in it do you think
the devil knowing the bible like he knows it would stand up in
anybody's face and tell them no salvation is but works do
you think he would? no he'll tell them that but he'll
say it in a roundabout way he'll tell them that grace is involved
in it but he will never ever leave the message there he will
pervert the message of grace. It is so mixed with human merit
and human works that it is no more grace. Romans chapter 11,
if you would turn there with me in your Bible, I would like
to read to you verse 5 and 6. Romans 11, verse 5 and 6. Even
so then at this present time also, There is a remnant according
to the election of grace. And if by grace, then is it no
more works. Otherwise, grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it's
no more grace. Otherwise, work is no more work. So what it's saying is there
is such a thing as grace, and there is such a thing as work,
but if you mix the two, there's neither grace nor works. You
have completely blotted out the page and read anything to talk
about. Grace is gone, works is gone,
because you mixed them, and that will not work. Now, how can I
persuade or prevail upon men and women to continue in the
grace of God and not tell you plainly what this grace is? Brothers and sisters, grace that
looks to the worth of man, waits upon the will of man, or depends
upon the work of man is frustrated grace, and it is not Bible grace. And frustrated grace is not the
grace of God. Now, I believe that works religionists
have committed two crimes. I believe that works religion
is a criminal doctrine. It's a criminal thing. That salvation
is by human merit, human work, human worth. It's that criminal
doctor. They've done two things. They
frustrated the grace of God, and they made the death of Jesus
Christ to be in vain. Paul said in Galatians 2.21,
he says, I do not frustrate the grace of God. For if righteousness
come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. He's dead in
vain. So when a man tells me that God's
going to save us on the basis of our work, our merit, our worth,
then he's frustrated the grace of God. He has so stirred up
the mud in the stream that nobody is going to be able to see what
this grace is all about. Now then, in the book of Galatians
chapter 5, and I would invite you to turn there with me if
you have your Bible. If not, then you just listen
very carefully to what we have to say. The book of Galatians
chapter 5. I want you to look at these two
verses. Verse 2 of chapter 5, Paul said, Behold, I, Paul, that
carry any weight with you, carries a whole lot of weight with me.
Behold, I, Paul, say unto you that if ye be circumcised, Christ
shall profit you nothing. If ye be circumcised and if you
have confidence in that, Ain't gonna help you a bit. Christ
won't profit you at all. You will put yourself into a
situation where Christ will be of no benefit whatever to you.
And somebody says, well, then if you're not circumcised, does
that help? That don't help either. Don't help either way. If you're
gonna trust it, being circumcised is not gonna help you. Being
uncircumcised is not gonna help you. Look in verse four, Christ
is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified
by the law, you've fallen from grace. Christ is become of no
effect unto you. If you believe that you're justified,
that you're set apart unto God by the deeds of the law, by your
fleshly obedience unto the law, then you have rendered Christ
to be of no effect to you. You're all together on your own. Go to the law and stay with Moses
and sleep with Moses and live with Moses. You're all together. You belong to Moses. Now, my
friend, if you are going to trust Christ and depend upon Him wholly,
unreservedly for your salvation, then He will be a fact unto you. He will affect you. There was
two old women. Let me try to illustrate this.
Two elderly ladies, if you please. They were sitting in the congregation
one morning before service, and they were talking about a younger
couple that was in the church. And this younger couple had somewhere
or another strayed from the way. And they were talking about how
awful their sin was, and one of them finally spoke up and
said, they have fallen from grace. Now my friend, you listen carefully
to me. If you understand what I'm about to say, you understand
the gospel. And if you don't understand what
I'm about to say, you don't know this morning the gospel of God's
grace. Now, these two women, one of
them said, they, that is this young couple that got mixed up
somewhere or another in the way of life and fell into some sin,
that they had fallen from grace. But I want to tell you who it
really was that had fallen from grace. That was the two old women.
It wasn't this family. It wasn't this young family who
had fallen into sin. No, it was these women because
these women thought that this young people standing in the
grace of God had to do with what they did or did not do. And it
had absolutely nothing, it's got nothing to do with your merit,
your works, your obedience on your own part unto God. It has
nothing to do with that. Our standing in the grace of
God is all together by the free sovereign grace of our lovely
Redeemer, the Lord Jesus Christ. And so anybody that tells you
so-and-so has fallen from grace, ask them what they mean. Ask
them what they mean. Well, it's because they left
Christ. It's because they went to the law, then that's a true
statement. But if they say it's because
they've fallen into some sin, then you know that they don't
know what they're talking about, and they don't know the gospel
themselves, and they've fallen from grace. Grace is the unmerited
favor of God. Grace is unconditional. Anything that's earned, anything
that's merited or deserved by you is not grace. The man who thinks he deserves
God's salvation does not believe in the grace of God. The person
who imagines that his acceptance with God depends upon his will,
his work, his worth, does not believe in the grace that the
Bible speaks of. He does not believe in it. He
has fallen from grace. The religionists, they talk about
grace, but grace does not mean to them what it does to this
poor, this helpless, this guilty, this bankrupt, this self-condemned
sinner whose only hope is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now that's
what I mean when I say the gates of heaven is barred against everybody
in this building except the man or the woman, the boy or girl
who is hoping in the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. You mark
it down, no one will ever honor No one will ever extol the grace
of God until he has experienced it in his own soul. It was only
after Paul had experienced it that he declared, by the grace
of God, I am what I am. Before he was a religious lost
law keeper, he was a blasphemer who hoped for salvation by something
that he did. But Paul nowhere takes credit
for his salvation. He ascribed the whole of his
salvation to God's free grace alone. He knew that he did not
make himself to differ from others. He never, listen to me, willingly
cooperated with Jesus Christ one minute in his life. before God fixed it where that
he would the rest of his days cooperate with him. Is that a
true statement? I'm telling you that I'm not
looking for people to cooperate with Jesus. When God saves a
man, he makes him willing. God sets up his lordship. He takes down the flag of rebellion
out of a sinner's heart and soul, and he installs in his heart
his lordship. And that sinner, that sinner
will give glory to God. He'll give praise to the Almighty
God, and he'll honor this God forever and ever. So Paul never
cooperated with Jesus. You remember the story. on the
road to Damascus and how the Lord struck him down. He struck
him down. And I'll tell you what, the woman
at the well, she wouldn't cooperate with Jesus either, was she? No,
she wasn't. No, no, no. A great change took
place in their hearts. His opinions, Paul's opinions,
his affections, his ambitions, his desires, his hopes, and his
motives had been radically changed when he met the Lord. And he
attributed this change to the grace of God alone. Well, Paul had a job to do here
in our text. He prevailed upon these people
that had experienced this grace that we've described to you,
that they continue in the grace of God. Why not? Why not continue
in this grace? Well, This is an astounding statement,
indeed, to me. Listen to me, and I'll hurry
here and finish. It is like we save a man, and
here's a house on fire. And we go to that house, and
somebody says, there's a man upstairs in that house. And so
we hurry in, and we're risking our own lives, but we go in.
and we find this man and we bring him helpless out of that burning
building and we get him out and we doctor him and the medics
come and they doctor him and they get him so that he's breathing
good again and it's like you had to hold that man and tell
him repeatedly, don't go back in that burning building. Now
this is exactly what Paul's doing here. He's prevailing, persuading
these people that have been saved from an endless hell, been saved
from the burning pit of eternal death, and then persuading them
to continue in what it was that saved them out of all of it.
Had to talk to them and prevail upon them to do that. Now also
it would be like a man who had climbed upon the Golden Gate
Bridge, and jumped off. He jumped off of the Golden Gate
Bridge, and miracle of miracles, somewhere or another, the man
survived the jump. And so they rescued him, and
they pumped the water out of his lungs, and they got him going
again, and then they have to prevail upon him that he not
climb back up there and jump again. Now that's what all this
is about, persuading sinners to continue in the grace of God
once they've been rescued, once they've been delivered, once
they've been brought out of their sin, is continue, continue in
that grace that saved you, and don't depart from it. To have
to persuade a poor sinner who's tasted the grace of God to continue,
almost inconceivable. It is a testimony, I believe,
to the fickleness of our hearts. And I'm surprised that God puts
up saints and sinners alike, blind and hard, hearted as we
are. It's no wonder that there's so
few grace preachers around. It's a wonder to me that God
still lets us meet together, no more than we appreciate the
grace of God that brought us out of our death. To the average
religionist, a grace preacher is the most useless creature
on earth. He is. Why are they worthless? What's
a grace preacher worth? Well, I'll tell you what, his
message is the only message that's going to save a sinner's soul.
The message he preaches is the message that's going to rescue
you, whether you're far from the kingdom or whether you're
just in the vestibule of death. His message is the message that's
going to deliver your soul. God is good to us. Saints and
sinners alike. Gives us a building to meet in.
Gives us automobiles to get here and chairs to sit in when we
get here. We have good clothes to wear
to the service. We have good singing and good
fellowship and at least a quarter horse of a preacher to listen
to. And we have a Bible to read. And still we have to persuade
men to continue in the grace of God. It shows how low down
and depraved and ungrateful we are by nature. I ask you, what
else can this poor sinner like me do than to continue in the
grace of God? What else can I do? What else
can you do? Is there anybody here that wants
to strike out on your own and leave the grace of God? My friend,
you're foolish if you do. You're foolish. But it's a fact,
though it's a sad fact, that we have to be persuaded to continue
in the grace of God. Now, I'm the one who's supposed
to do the persuading. I'm in the position that Paul
was, and I'm supposed to persuade you to continue in the grace
of God. But every once in a while, I
need someone to call me, somebody to write me, somebody to encourage
me, somebody to tell me. Preacher, keep on, keepin' on,
keep on preaching the grace of God. Now what Paul's talking
about is that we continue in the belief of the gospel of the
grace of God. We continue in the doctrines
of grace and in the teachings of grace, depending upon the
spirit of grace. and continuing to attend to the
means of grace, reading the word, praying, attending the house
of God, fellowshipping with the saints of God. Why is it so?
Because we're all going to let the things of God slip. And I
want to tell you this, and I will be absolutely honest with your
soul. I've got to give an account.
I passed 68 yesterday, and I'm not going to be here very long.
God knows how long. That's in His hands. But I'm
going to tell you this, that we all are Arminians and free
willers and legalists by nature. It's our natural religion. It
is. It's our natural religion. We were born with it. And we're
going to forget God and we're going to forget how he saved
us in a minute if he doesn't keep somebody standing around,
coming around, prompting us and persuading us to continue in
the grace of God. You can teach men to be a plumber. You can teach a man to be an
electrician. You can teach him to be a welder.
You can teach him to be a carpenter. And you don't have to keep going
over day in and day out and telling him, well, let's go over this
again. Let's go over this again. Let's go over this again. But
when it comes to the grace of God, it has to be kept before
the people or we'll let it get away from us. We'll let it get
away. That's why we need one another.
That's why we need a preacher like Paul. Why we need good hymns. And while we need sound preaching,
men must be persuaded to continue in the grace of God. It won't
be long if a man does not avail himself of the means of grace,
and we mentioned them just a few moments ago, if he does not study
the word of God, if he does not meditate in the law of God day
and night, and by the law of God I mean the word of God, the
whole of the revelation of God. If he does not meditate on the
word of God, he'll fall back into thinking and he'll begin
to talk like and think like. A free willer. A free willer. Somebody who thinks that he can
will himself out of death unto life when he gets ready. Somebody
who thinks that it's his will that's dominant in salvation
and not God's will. It's God's will. There's one
will that determines salvation. It's God's will. That's God's
will, and I won't back up from that. We will not do our duty
towards God and our generation unless we maintain and encourage
and support the ministry of the grace of God, because without
it, in a few years even, in this group, we'll slip back and we'll
call an Armenian preacher to this pulpit. That's what we'll
do. Now, listen to these words. I found these words, they were
actually sent to me yesterday in the mail. It is today as it
was in the days of the Reformers. Faithfulness to the scriptures
is desperately needed. This is the day for men. Where
are the men for this day? We have had the gospel of God's
redeeming grace passed to us by prophets, by apostles, and
by the hands of martyrs. We dare not trifle with it, nor
sit by and hear it denied by traitors who pretend to love
it, but inwardly abhor every line of it. Look to your children
and your children's children who will be tainted and destroyed
if they are not faithful to God in his truth today. If we are
not faithful to God in his truth today, we have come to a turning
point in the road. If we take the old paths of sovereign
grace, all God's mercy and covenant grace, Christ's sufficient righteousness
and effectual atonement, the gospel which enables our God
to be just God and a savior, it may be that our children and
their children will believe God and treasure our memory. But
if we turn the other way, generations yet unborn will curse our names
for having been unfaithful to God, to his word, and to them. And I believe that 100%. I think
that's where we are. We don't have to get a man, beloved,
to lie to us. We don't have to pay somebody
to lie to us. We will lie to ourselves. We will tell ourselves if we
go so far down the road that this is the way, this is the
way, this is all right, and we need to understand that we don't
know our own hearts. We don't know our own hearts.
You stay away from the preaching of the grace of God for a while
and only God knows what you do. It scares me to death. These
grace churches across America are full of people who have a
head full of truth, but not one single solitary thing in their
hearts. And that's why the day will come when you'll say or
hear somebody else say, there's really not any difference between
these churches. There's really not any difference.
Well, I say there's a whole lot of difference between a man who's
going to tell me how I can get in through the gates of heaven
and a man who doesn't have a message that'll get me out of the graveyard.
I think there's a whole lot of difference in that. Well, what is it not to continue
in the grace of God? Quickly, if we take away the
person and purpose and work of our Lord Jesus Christ, if we
tarnish his work by adding anything to it, if we rob him of his glory
in the salvation of the sinner. Of God, the Bible says, are you
in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, righteousness,
sanctification, and redemption. We must attend, as we said before,
to the means of grace, patiently, privately, and publicly listening
and meditating upon the truth of God's grace. None of us is going to last without
the means of grace. We're on bear rations as it is. To continue in the grace of God
is to place your very soul, your very life, everything you are,
into the able and willing hands of the Lord Jesus Christ and
be glad you did. All you have been, all you are
now, all you hope to be, into the hands, into the able hands,
of our blessed Lord Jesus Christ. All of the years our children
growing up, we tried to teach them to stand
on their own two feet. And what God has been doing in
my life, all of my life, is teaching me that I cannot stand. on my
own two feet, that I must be kept, that I must be helped,
I must be provided for by His grace. That's what the Lord's
been doing with me for all these years. 49 years ago, I was kicked
out of a Bible college because what I believed about the grace
of God. I'm a preacher of the grace of God, and I don't mind
for anybody to know that. I want everybody to know Maybe
even before you walk through that door. But if you walk through
that door and you're here in a length of time, you're going
to know this preacher believes in the grace of God. And he believes
that salvation is by grace, holy by grace. And nobody's going
to have to ask me, what do you believe, preacher? If they sit
here and listen to me, they're going to find out what I believe.
Because I'm going to tell them. And I have tried to, through
the years, to be faithful to God in preaching the word of
God and the doctrines of grace and standing solidly on these
doctrines and these truths. If you're here this morning and
you want to get in the gate of heaven, believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ. Believe that everything God demanded
of you, He provided for you in the person of His Son. Trust
His Son. Stand solidly in the faith of
the gospel. Father, in the name of Jesus,
bless the message, own the message, use the message, and I pray that
some poor sinner today will find hope in the grace of God, in
and through the merits of the Son of God. We pray it in His
name. Amen.