Divine Love And Its Gifts

I invite you to turn back with
me to the book of 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. 2 Thessalonians chapter
2. And our text this morning will
be verse 16 and 17. Verse 16 and 17. We'll be using a few more of
the verses in the chapter. But let me read them one more
time to you before we have a word of prayer. Now our Lord Jesus
Christ himself and God, even our Father, which hath loved
us and hath given us everlasting consolation and good hope through
grace, comfort your hearts and establish you in every good word
and work. I want to speak to you this morning
on divine love and its gifts. Divine love and its gifts. Now we begin here in this chapter
and I'd like to introduce this subject by reading the first
three verses to you and then we'll get on to the text in a
little while. Paul, the apostle writing to
the Church of the Thessalonians, says, now we beseech you, brethren,
by the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and by our gathering together
unto him, that you be not soon shaken in mind or be troubled
neither by spirit nor by word nor by letter as from us as that
the day of Christ is at hand. Let no man deceive you by any
means for that day shall not come except there come a falling
away first and that man of sin be revealed the son of perdition."
Now the Thessalonian church according to what my understanding is of
this chapter was disturbed by the predictions of different
persons that the day of Christ was at hand. Now they were disturbed,
I believe, for two reasons. I believe, number one, they were
disturbed because, as Paul writes to them here, he explains to
them that the day of Christ is not at hand and that that day
cannot come except there come a falling away. Of course they
were disappointed because they had had it told them that the
day of Christ was at hand. And then I believe they were
also disturbed because of the fact that they had received this
message and they had received it from various ones and even
there had been a forged letter given to them or read to them
as it had been from the Apostle Paul And Paul had written no
such letter telling them that the day of Christ was at hand
and they had ceased from their labor, they had shut down their
businesses, they had as it were just ceased living almost as
far as living after the flesh and living in the flesh and doing
the things that they normally would do and carrying out their
duties as a child of God. They just simply set everything
aside saying the Lord's coming. The Lord's coming is imminent.
The Lord will be here just any day, any hour, and so they just
simply shut everything down. Of course, when Paul wrote to
them and told them that you be not soon shaken in mind or be
troubled neither by spirit nor by word nor by letter as from
us as that the day of Christ is at hand they immediately became
aware of the fact that they had been deceived and that they had
been duped into believing that the Lord's coming was imminent
and that they should just cease doing anything except just wait
and that the Lord will soon come. Now, I recognize somewhat of
the feeling that they must have had Now when it was told them
that the coming of the Lord was not near at hand as they suspected
or as they had been led to believe. because I believe that the coming
of the Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together unto
him is the ultimate solution, if you please, to all of the
cares and the troubles and the vexing problems that we have
here in this world. The people of God, as we've said
many times, are a poor and afflicted people in the midst of sorrow
and woe in this world and we need to focus our attention upon
the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together
unto him in order that we might receive comfort and in order
that we might receive the help that the Lord would have us to
have in our hearts. Now, there are always in this
world those who fix dates for the end of the world, and by
their fanaticism, they drive many into insane asylums and
disturb the peace of many by setting dates. I've heard of
people, men that profess to be prophets of God, that would lead
a group of people out onto the top of a hill in certain places,
and their wait because they believed that a certain hour and a certain
time the Lord would come and gather them home to Him. Of course,
they've been disappointed. There was nothing to it. And
this, of course, is fanaticism. Now, this is the same kind of
situation that Paul was dealing with here in the church of the
Thessalonians. And he prays for them, then in
verse 16 and 17, And his prayer is a very emphatic prayer. He
cries to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself and to God, even our
Father, to comfort the hearts of these people because they've
been led astray, they've been disturbed, and they, as it were,
have been told that the solution to all of their cares and problems
in this world was immediately at hand, and it's not so. And
so Paul prays for them and says, now our Lord Jesus Christ himself
and God even our Father, which hath loved us and hath given
us everlasting consolation and good hope through grace, comfort
your hearts and establish you in every good word and work. Now he would that by such consolations
as God would give, by such encouragements that God would give them as they
now were, as it were, sentenced to live out their lives maybe
to the end, and certainly we know that they did live out their
days unto the brave. and not having this tremendous
solution given, the Lord not coming back in their lifetime,
that they would be comforted and consoled to live in this
world and that they would not give up their duties as children
of God, but that they would be able to be so comforted that
they would go on and be able to be established in every good
word and work. Now that was the prayer of the
apostle here. Now perhaps during their frights,
as we've explained, some of them had just said, there's no need
to go on with the service of God. There's no need to go on
with our duty. There's no need to go on witnessing
and praying and testifying of the grace of God. There's no
need to go on with church services because the coming of the Lord
is at hand. And beloved, there are many discouragements
in this world and we must recognize that these discouragements would
keep us from our duty and from our service to God. It makes
no difference from what the source is of these discouragements.
There are so many of them in this world and many of them would
keep us from doing what we ought to be doing as the people of
God. Therefore, Paul would have them to be calm in spirit and
that they might diligently persevere and go on in their Christian
life. That which frightens us from
our duty as believers in this world cannot be a good thing.
Anything that would come to you, anything that you would read,
anything that would happen to you in your life that would discourage
you from doing what you ought to be doing as a child of God
is not a good thing. It's not a good thing. True comfort
establishes every one of God's children. True comfort that comes
from Him based on the testimony of God in His Word will enable
a man or a woman, a boy or a girl in this world to go on to every
good word and work. Now while this prayer was useful
for the Thessalonians, I'm sure that it was, And I'm sure God
answered it on the behalf of this church that Paul here prayed
for. I think it's also very instructive
for us. I think there's a great teaching
and a great lesson here for every one of us. While we look into
it, may the Spirit of God this morning lead us into a personal
enjoyment our personal enjoyment of the love of God and the gifts
which that love bestows upon his chosen people in this world. Oh that the love of God might
be anew shed abroad in our hearts this morning by the Holy Spirit
which has been given unto us. Every one of us need to feel
afresh and anew the love of God amidst the discouragements and
the trials and the tests that we have in this world. Now to
hear of the love of God, and Paul mentions it here in verse
16, he says, which hath loved us. Now our Lord Jesus Christ
himself and God, even our Father, which hath loved us. Paul speaks
here of the love of God for his people, for those that he's chosen. And God is a God of love and
we need to understand that and we cannot be consoled in this
world as God's people unless we know and believe and experience
the love of God in our hearts. And to hear the love of God is
sweet. To be enabled to believe In the
love of God by divine grace is most precious Indeed to being
able to believe it. I say it's one thing to hear
about it It's another thing to believe in it to the point where
it does something for your soul but to enjoy the love of God
and all this morning that we could enjoy it and that we could
be refreshed by a thought of God's love and affection for
us is paradise below the skies. Now, beloved, I want to talk
about three things this morning that I find here in this text.
The first is the blessed fact which is revealed, and that is
that God loves us, that our Lord Jesus Christ himself and God,
even our Father, hath loved us. And then second, I want to talk
a little bit about the manifestations of that love, which we find here
in the text, when it says, He hath given us everlasting consolation
and good hope through grace. And then last, or thirdly, I
want to talk a little bit about the prayer here, which was Paul
based upon the love of God and its manifestation to us. That is, that God would comfort
your hearts and establish you in every good word and work.
First then, I want to talk a little bit about this fact. And it is
a glorious and blessed fact that God hath loved us. The Lord, in the Word, all through
the Word of God, it very plainly set forth that God has a special
and particular love for those that he chose and gave to Christ
before the foundation of the world and that this special people
that they're in the Father's affection and in the grace of
God and that they are in particular loved by God. Now the blessed
fact of our Lord Jesus Christ himself and even the Father loving
us Beloved, it is something that just is beyond my ability to
explain. Let me go into that a little
bit. Brethren, I believe the love of God is a theme that is
fitter for solitary contemplation by each person that feels themselves
to be in Christ than for any public utterance or explanation. In other words, it's something
that we can best understand if we just personally, individually,
sit down and study it and meditate upon it. Now, who can speak of
the love of God? It's to be felt, beloved. It
cannot be explained. There is not a word or there's
not a set of words that can utter the meaning of the love of God. The songwriter said, could we
with ink? the ocean fill, and were the
skies of parchment made, were every stalk on earth a quill,
and every man a scribe by trade, to write the love of God above
would drain the ocean dry, nor could the scroll contain the
whole, though stretched from sky to sky. I'm telling you there's
not a word or a set of words that can set forth this theme,
which hath loved us. God even our Father which hath
loved us. There's no word that can describe
it. Now listen to me, you may go
round about and we might try and make every attempt that we
could to make a long definition and still not define the love
of God and he who never felt it in his heart will still be
a stranger to it, depicted however you will, You cannot, no man
can sows forth the love of God so that those that are strangers
to it in grace can understand it. Now love must be felt in
the heart, it cannot be learned from a dictionary, God hath loved
us. Brother, sister, do you know
that? Do you feel that? Drink that truth in, if you will. One writer, one old writer said,
take these words, God hath loved us, take these words and lay
them under your tongue and let them dissolve like a wafer made
with honey till it sweetens all of your soul. Just let it sweeten
all your soul. Hath loved us. Hath loved us. Divine love. Now it does not
say that he pitied us. That would be true, for like
as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that
fear him. Pity, I believe, is one degree
below love. Now often it leads to love, but
it is not love in itself. Neither does it say that God
has had mercy on us. Now it is quite understandable
that the good and gracious God of heaven is merciful to his
creatures, and it is right to understand that God has had mercy
on whom he will, and that he will have mercy on all of those
that were chosen by him and given to the Son in the eternal covenant. God has had mercy upon us. But
it's a far greater thing that he should love the people of
God. This love which he has for the
Lord's people. Love is a feeling vastly more
to be valued than mere pity and mercy. It's to be more valued. Now merciful is a man to his
beast, but he does not necessarily love his beast. Merciful has
many a man been to his enemies for whom he has had no affection. But God does not merely pity
us and have mercy upon us. He loves us. He loves us. And it's also, I think, more
than complacency. Theologians say that the love
of God towards His elect is the love of complacency. And the
statement, I think, is perhaps true, but it's a little cold,
I think. I don't think that I would be
willing to strike out the word love here in the text and put
in the word complacency. No, the Lord has loved us, that's
what the text says. Truly the Lord has a complacency
in His people when He sees them in the Lord Jesus Christ, but
He has much more than just mere pity, mercy, and complacency. The Lord is merciful, He is pitiful,
He is everything that is good, He is benevolent to His people,
but He is more than all of that. The text says, He hath loved
us. He hath loved us. Now, beloved,
this is the consolation. I'm driving at this. This is
the consolation that enables a man or woman, boy or girl who
believes on Christ to continue in service and duty in this world. And you're going to have to get
a hold of this because the trials are so manifold, there's so many
discouragements and so many ups and downs in this world that
we've got to have the knowledge of His love for us or we will
not be consoled so as to stay or encouraged so as to stay about
the duties that the Lord has given us. You know how you look
upon your child or upon your children? They seem a part of
us, do they not? They just seem to be a part of
us. And you love them as you love
yourself. And your thoughts of them do
not differ from your thoughts about your own welfare. You're
as concerned about them and their welfare, what becomes of them,
and what happens to them as you are about yourself. Because they're
your own flesh and blood. Now our children, are intertwisted
or intertwined with our very being. Now God also himself has
united his people unto himself in a union that is more real
than any union you could describe or talk about or find an example
of in this world. Every one of God's people are
in Christ, and they're all bound by cords of love and bonds of
affection unto Him, unto the living God. And He thinks of
us as He thinks of Himself. I'm talking about the God of
the Bible and how He feels toward His special chosen people. Now I can tell you this. Beloved,
that I believe in this love. I have known it, and I have felt
it in my own soul, but I cannot explain it like I'd like to,
and sometimes my tongue seems to be tired when I would like
for it to be loosed in order that I can talk about God having
loved me from the foundation of the world. He made the heavens
and the earth, and I'm less than a speck Yet He loves me. It is His eternal arm that has
held up the universe in all ages. But we do all fade as a leaf. Yet the Lord loves us. Now then, and He always will,
love His own. With His great infinite heart,
He loves me. As a God, He loves me. Divinely loves me. Hath loved us, the text says,
us. That's who He's talking about,
us that are His children, us that belong to Him by covenant
bonds and by the shed blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. So insignificant
we are, so frail, so foolish, so sinful, so ungrateful, so
provoking, so willfully obstinate in returning to our old sins
again and again so that we deserve to be abhorred and cast off and
rejected, yet the Lord says that he hath loved us. We sometimes
think of his love to the early saints of God in the early church
and we don't wonder about that. We think of the love of God toward
the confessors and the patriarchs and the apostles and the martyrs
and with no wonder because we would say, well, God surely would
love them because they were such diligent, faithful Christians
and they persevered unto the death And so surely the Lord
would want, no wonder that God loved them, but that our Lord
Jesus Christ Himself and even our Father God, even our Father
should have loved us. Is an amazing thing indeed, beloved. Do you not agree? It's an amazing
thing indeed that He should love us. And I believe this morning
that He does. Now let me pass on from this
blessed fact of the love of God to the manifestations of this
divine love, the manifestations of it. Now there are two things
that I want to speak about and that number one is the everlasting
consolation that's mentioned here and the second is the good
hope through grace. Now these are the consolations
which God has given. This is the manifestation of
His love. Here we are in this world. The
Lord found us. And I don't know what state you
feel you were in when the Lord found you. And it was the Lord
that found me. I didn't find Him. He found me. He was looking for me. And I
was in the world and I was a poor, lost, ruined, wretched sinner.
miserable sinner, and conviction, the errors of conviction had
hit my heart, and my heart, I was bleeding to death in my soul,
as it were. And he came to me with consolation,
he came to me with some encouragement, he came to me with comfort. And
the word of the Lord said to me, whosoever believeth, in him
shall not be condemned. Whosoever believeth in him shall
not be condemned. And here I was, a condemned ruined
sinner on death's throw, ready to be executed at any time and
sent off to an eternal hell. And the Lord found me and said,
Whosoever believeth in me shall not be condemned. Shall not be
condemned. Yes, when we were unable to see
the Lord Jesus Christ as our substitute, suffering in our
room instead, our sins being laid upon Him, our sins being
forgiven for His namesake, This, beloved, was the first consolation
that we experienced. God finding us in our sin, ruined,
and showing us Christ who had lived and loved and died for
us in our place, and now being willing to forgive our sin for
his sake, for Christ's sake. What a consolation that was.
And since that day, we've had many sorrows, many troubles,
many difficulties, many ups and downs and adversities in this
world, but consolations have always followed upon the heels
of tribulation, upon the heels of trouble. God has always been
pleased somewhere or another to come with encouragement. He's
never left us to ourselves. One of the most amazing things
about the life of children of God is that God does not leave
them. He never forsakes them. David
said in Psalm 27, The Lord has been my help, neither will he
forsake me, neither will he leave me. And he does not. God does
not abandon his children, but he just keeps coming back and
consoling. He keeps coming back and giving
them a blessing. But the greatest delight of all
the consolations of God is that they're everlasting consolations. They're everlasting. They're
not temporary. God's consolations are eternal. They're everlasting. Think about
it with me if you will. Other sources of comfort, other
sources of encouragement dry up. with time, but in the Lord
never. The encouragements of God are
new, the mercies of God are new, the blessings of God are new
every day and they're eternal. Now there are those who have
had the consolations of God for many years here this morning. I've had them for 40 years and
better. And I can truly say to you this
morning that whom once the Lord loves, He never leaves, but He
loves them unto the end. That God continues to love and
He never will leave His own. We have this consolation. Beloved,
we have this consolation and oftentimes this has come to me
and has been a real blessing to me. And I know that it will
be to you to just think about it a little bit this morning
that our salvation does not depend upon ourselves. That salvation
is not a human project. It is not something that you
and I are to do, but it's something that God does for us. Everlasting
consolation, everlasting salvation that does not depend upon me. Now as we fail and we're lost
by the first Adam's unrighteousness, so we have risen and are saved
through the second Adam's righteousness beyond all risk and fear of ever
perishing eternally. We're in the Lord Jesus. the eternal rock of a work which
Christ himself has completed and there on the cross he said
it is finished the work which redeems my people which saves
my people I've completed the work I've done the work I've
finished the work And beloved, one of the greatest consolations
for a poor troubled soul in this world who feels the weight of
their guilt and their sin is to know that Christ has finished
a salvation which is an eternal salvation which does not depend
upon them but it depends upon what he's done and what he successfully
accomplished on the old rugged cross. Now then, there's another
consolation, and I just want to mention these to you briefly,
but there's another consolation which I know that many of you
have rejoiced in in this world, and that is the consolation that
we find in Romans 8 and 28 where it says, and we know that all
things work together for good to those who love God, to those
who You are the called according to His purpose. That's Romans
8 and 28. And this consolation is one,
beloved, that you will dwell upon, I'm sure, many, many times
in this life. And many, many times when things
seem like your world is coming apart, and many times when you're
very much cast down in spirit and heart, you'll be able to
look at this verse and God will be pleased to encourage you with
it that you might be able to continue on to be what you ought
to be in this world believing that God's not going to allow,
that God's too holy and that he's too good to allow anything
to come into your life or to affect your life that is not
for his glory and ultimately for your good. Now next we have
this consolation also, and that is that even though we shall
fall asleep in this body and be put back into the dust of
the earth for a while, yet the Lord has said, I will that they
also whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they
may behold my glory. Beloved, I know that each one
of us think about the grave, and we ought to. I think the
wise do consider that there's coming a time when they will
depart this life, and I believe that death has many fears for
many of those that are the Lord's people. And some of God's people
are subject to the fear of death all their lifetime. Some have
been enabled to get the victory in their hearts to where it no
longer troubles them and no longer bothers them. But isn't it a
glorious thing that our Lord said that we're not going to
stay in the dust of the earth, but that it's His will that we
be with Him where He is. That it's His will that we be
caught up out of the graves and that we be raised out of the
graves and that we be made like unto the Son of God and that
we live in a glorified body for all eternity in the presence
of God, being there in the fellowship of the holy angels and the saints
of God of all ages. Now, beloved, I cannot give you
all the consolations which God has given to us. because it would
need many an hour to be able to give all these consolations
and to fully enjoy these consolations would of course take an entire
lifetime. For everlasting consolations
are not such as you can spread out before the Lord's people
and they partake of them to the full in any one sermon. You cannot
do that. But I've just given you briefly
what I think that Paul is referring to here when he talks about hath
given us everlasting consolation. He's giving us something in our
hearts, something that we've been encouraged by, something
we've been helped by, something we've been enabled by to be able
to get up out of our sins and wretchedness and to be able to
put on Christ and to be able to walk in the ways that the
Lord would have us to go. All right, now then we come to
this and we must pass on to this and quickly this second part.
He's given us good hope. He's given us good hope. You
know one of the things that we hate more than anything else
is to be deceived. Is that not right? We hate to
be deceived. We don't want anyone to deceive
us. We just simply don't want anyone to give us a false hope
or to tell us something that's not so. Well, Paul said that
the Lord's given us a good hope. And this good hope is a good
hope through grace. He's given us this good hope.
Now this means that there's consolation for the present, and there's
hope for the future, and that is a good hope through grace.
The hope when days and years are past, we shall all meet in
heaven. The hope that whatever the future
may be, it is full of bliss for all God's children, for all God's
elect. Yes, it's the hope of immortality
for our souls and of resurrection for our bodies. For when Christ
shall come, we also that sleep in Jesus shall come with him.
This is our hope. It's a good hope, for it is based
and founded on a good foundation. Now a fanatic's hope will pass
away. it will pass away, but the hope
of true believers is good because it is founded in truth and it's
founded in grace. The Greek here reads like this,
a good hope in grace, a good hope in grace. All the people
of God have a good hope in grace. Now if I, this morning I want
you to follow with me, just bear with me so that I can present
these things to you that you might be able to appreciate what
Paul is saying here in our text. If I trust in my own merit and
base my hope there on I should be only self-deceived and blind,
for what merit do I have? As the poet said, what is there
in me to merit esteem or to give the Creator delight? What is
there? Well, if my hope be fixed alone
in grace, in the grace of God. Since God is assuredly gracious,
since he has made a covenant of grace with all believers,
since he has ratified the covenant by the gift of his own Son, and
since he has sworn by his holiness that he will not lie unto David,
a hope founded on his grace, beloved, is a good hope. If your
hope is founded on the grace of God, it is a good hope. Since God will be as good as
His word, His hope and grace has got to be a good hope. Why is it that our hope flickers
from time to time? Why is it that your hope of eternal
salvation, it seems to dim and grow very weak. Why is that?
Well, it's because we get away from a hope in grace. That's
the reason. And we begin to look towards
ourselves and we begin to dwell upon our own merits. We've not
prayed as we did before. And we've not been reading as
much lately as we ought to. I do not feel as I did, somebody
says. Well, somebody says, I've had
thoughts that I ought not to have had lately. and therefore
my hope is dim and it's flickering. But beloved, listen, was your
hope founded on your prayers? Was your hope founded on your
feelings? If so, my friend, then that's
the reason why that your hope flickers. But if the hope is
founded upon Christ and His finished work, if it's founded upon His
Word, then my friend, your hope will remain steadfast and sure
because that is a good hope through grace. If our hope is based on
this, that God has promised and cannot change His promise, then
I have a foundation both steadfast and sure. Paul said in Titus
1 and 2, in hope of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised
before the world began. Now, there are some people who
I talk with from time to time who believe that if they behave
themselves, and I'm talking about religious people too, I'm not
talking about those that are whirlings, I'm not talking about
those that are irreligious, I'm talking about religious people.
I talk to them from time to time and they believe that if they
behave themselves that they'll get to heaven at last. that they'll
get to heaven, that they'll surely walk the streets of gold, that
they'll surely be there where the roses ever bloom and where
the flowers never fade, that they'll surely get there if they
behave themselves. But do you know of a son of Adam?
Pray tell me, do you know of anyone who has behaved themselves
perfectly since they've been in this world to this hour? No,
my friend, no. Their hope is that if they're
faithful, God will be faithful. That's their hope. But my friend,
this is not a good hope of a child of grace, a child of God. This
is not the kind of hope that Paul is talking about. Any simpleton
could come up and imagine such a hope as that. But that's not
the hope of the gospel. A divine revelation was needed
to set before us the great hope of the gospel, and it needs grace-given
faith to believe that God will not change nor lie, and therefore
must save all those who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Son of God. It takes a divine revelation
to see that and to believe that. Now there's no wonder to me that
people that are still in their sin, dead in trespasses and sin,
that they do not have light to see this good hope through grace. But those who have been enlightened
understand that salvation is entirely by the grace of God,
that salvation is God's work from beginning to end. And a
good hope, if you're going to ever have one, has got to be
based and founded upon the promise of God that cannot lie. It's
got to be based and founded upon the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He cannot suffer one of his sheep
to perish or his promise would be of none effect. And he said,
I give unto my sheep eternal life, and they shall never perish.
Well, some would say that if that was my gospel, I'd just
live in sin. And I'd just do whatever I wanted
to do if that was my gospel. Well, perhaps you would, but
not true believers. On the contrary, we feel that
if God so loves us and has dealt so generously with us, and he
does deal generously with his elect in grace, I think everyone
here this morning that lays claim to being a child of God would
say amen to that. God has dealt graciously with
us. Well, and He takes away the whip
of the law and He places us entirely under grace and we love Him as
we never loved Him before when we come to understand this. That
God has given us perfect liberty in His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. And because of that love, sin
is hateful to us and we shun it as a deadly thing. Because
the love that we have in our hearts toward the Lord. Now the
law which you think would drive men to holiness has never done
it. It's never done it. Never. Now while the grace which you
imagine would lead you to licentiousness binds us with solemn bonds of
consecration to serve our God ten times more than we ever would
serve Him if we were under the law and under the whip of the
law. I'm talking about a good hope
through grace. Suppose someone were to tell
my children that the continuance of my love to them would be based
or would be dependent entirely upon their good behavior. Suppose
someone would tell my children that. Well, my children, I'm
sure, would reject such a suggestion as this because they know better.
They know that I will always love them because of the relationship
that exists between me and them. They know that they have my heart's
affection and my love. Even so, the Lord's children
know that their Father's love is immutable. Sonship is not
a relationship which will ever change so long will the Lord
love us He will love us throughout eternity Because he has become
our heavenly father through grace, and we belong to him Do you think
that children become disobedient because their relationship is
unchangeable? I never heard tell us such a
thing Do you think people that say, well I mean this is my daddy
and I know he's never going to be anything other than my daddy,
I'm going to be his son forever and so I'll be disobedient and
be a rebel just because the relationship is unchangeable. I never heard
tell of anything like that. And so I never heard tell of
anybody who understood the grace of God and understood how God
had been merciful to them through mercy, through grace, and they
become a rebel because of that. I've never heard tell of it.
I don't believe that. I believe that people that just
deliberately live in sin and habitually walk in paths of unrighteousness,
that those people have never known the grace of God in truth.
Well, this is the holy reasoning of love. Let me give it to you.
And that is it draws no license from grace, but rather feels
the strong constraint of gratitude which leads to holiness. It leads
to holiness. That's what an understanding
of the grace of God will do in an individual's life. Since the
grace of God has made us new creatures in Christ Jesus, the
love of God constrains us not to sin, but to walk in holiness
all our days. Blessed be the name of our God. We are not ashamed to rejoice. in the love of God and in the
manifestation of that God of ours which has given us everlasting
consolation and good hope through grace. That brings me to the
last thing which is the prayer that flows out of all of this. It's in verse 17. Comfort your
hearts and establish you in every good word and work. The prayer
I want you to understand is not for everybody but those who have
a good hope through grace, those who have been encouraged, those
who have been consoled, those who have been helped in the way.
It is of the utmost importance that a child of God struggling
in this world, tested as we are, it's the utmost importance that
their hearts should be comforted, that somewhere or another they
receive some encouragement and some comfort. Well, the Lord
has provided that. Cheerfulness and habitual calm,
peace of mind, contentment of spirit. These ought to be the
very atmosphere we breathe. as believers in this world. Now I know that you have many
troubles and there are very few of God's people that are without
trouble in this world. I know you have many losses and
many crosses and trials in your life. I'd like for you to turn
with me back to the book of Romans, the eighth chapter. Let me read
a verse to you and this has become very important to me. And that
is for us to understand that the comfort of the Lord and the
encouragement of our God through His Word, that He comes to us
while we're in the trials and in the test in this life. Look
at it, in verse 35, I begin reading there, who shall separate us,
in Romans 8, verse 35, from the love of Christ, shall tribulation
or trouble it means, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or
nakedness, or peril, or sword, as it is written, for thy sake
we are killed all the day long, we are counted as sheep for the
slaughter, Nay, look at verse 37, in all these things, in all
these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved
us. And I like that little expression
there, in all these things, not over them, under them, around
them, but in. all these things. And so, beloved,
it's while you're in your sorrow, while you're in your difficulty,
while you're in your problems in this world and in your insurmountable
difficulties in this life, it's while you're in these things
that you're more than conquerors through Him that loved us. And
so, we need to be encouraged by this. May the Lord comfort
your hearts. with this thought, that you're
more than a conqueror, regardless of what your situation is. Let
not your heart be troubled, the Lord Jesus said in the Gospel
of John, neither let it be afraid. Don't let it be afraid. Trust
and believe God. Trust Him. Now the last part
of the prayer says, establish you in every good word and work. And the thought is this, I believe,
that God would make His people so happy, or He would so encourage
them by what He tells them and what He shows them in His truth,
that they would be able to, that they would never have an inclination
to leave off any good word or work. That they would continue
on to faithfully serve the Lord and to do that which He's told
them to do. We know that depression of spirit often leads to slackness
of hand. And when a person is discouraged
and when they just simply can't find any encouragement, then
they often become slack. in their duties. And I know something
about that by experience, and I think probably every one of
you here knows something about that. But when we're cast down
and discouraged, we have a tendency to slack up and not do the things
that we should. The apostle would not have any
of us to cease from serving God in good words and works. through
a want of consolation, through a want of comfort. It would be
my business to try to comfort you and encourage you so you
would be faithful. Does God love you? Do you know
it? Now listen, do men abuse you
for speaking the truth and living out the truth in your life? Did
you say what you said when you were at work or somewhere else?
Did you testify a word because you love the Lord? Did you do
it because of the glory of Christ? Did you do it for His glory?
Then go out and say it again. Say it again. Don't be discouraged. Does the devil say to you, leave
off those good works? Leave off those good words. Leave
it off. If the devil says that to you
then just go on my friend and continue to do what you are doing
because think of what God has done for you and all the encouragement
that he's given and you'll be enabled to do that. Because we
love God and we do what we do for his glory and we must keep
to it. We must keep to it. We must not let down. Many times
we're just about ready to give up. Have you ever been to that
place? Well, if you ever get to that place, remember this
text of scripture. that Paul said that the Lord
hath loved us and hath given us everlasting consolation and
good hope through grace that our hearts might be comforted
and we might be established in every good word and work and
that was their consolation. Have you ever heard of a consolation
game? that is played by the losers in a tournament, and it's a consolation
for them for having lost, not being the winners of the tournament.
And you and I, because Christ is not coming back immediately,
well, there's some consolation for us. Our problems are not
over today, our problems won't be over tomorrow, but there's
some consolation. There's something to encourage
us to go on anyway. and to do what we ought to do.
And that's what we've tried to do for you here this morning
in this message and I hope that God will bless it to your heart
and give you remembrance of it. May the Lord be with you.

Divine Love And Its Gifts

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Divine Love And Its Gifts

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