and I didn't say it. That was, oh my. You can't preach
too much grace for me. Oh, that was such a blessing.
Turn to Ezekiel 16. You all know how much I think
of all of you. I really, really love and appreciate
you so very much. And you know how I think about
your preacher and his wife, daughter. Nobody like them. Nobody like
them. Just so precious. But this meeting has, that's
just, ah, it's just been wonderful. I mean, been wonderful. And I
wished I could just say amen and amen and amen and quit. I sat back down. I did that one
time when Bruce Crabtree got through preaching. I was supposed
to get up and preach, and I said, I ain't gonna do it. I'm not gonna do it. I said,
listen, he said enough for all of us to keep us busy the rest
of the day. How you gonna clean up anything
these fellas said? Good. My word, it's been just
wonderful. Wonderful. And I dread this. Ain't that awful? Preachers dread
to get up and preach. But after that preaching, and
all this preaching has been going on, what in the world can I possibly
say to add to it? But I'm going to take a shot
at it. I'm going to take a stab at it. Look in Ezekiel 16 with
me and read the first six verses. Ezekiel 16, again the word of
the Lord came unto me, saying, Son of man, cause Jerusalem to
know her abominations, and thus saith the Lord God unto Jerusalem,
thy birth, or the cutting off of thy habitation, and thy nativity
of the land of Canaan. Thy father was an Amorite, thy
mother a Hittite, As for thy nativity in the day that thou
wast born, thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed
in water to supple thee. Thou wast not salted at all,
nor swaddled at all. None eye pitied thee to do any
of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee, but thou wast cast
out in the open field to the loathing of thy person in the
day that thou wast born. And when I passed by thee, when
I passed by you, and I saw you polluted in your own blood, I
said unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live, yea, I said
unto thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live, live. You know, our Lord Jesus Christ
The Old Testament is full of pictures and types of how God
saves sinners. And in fact, Nicodemus, you know,
when our Lord told him he should have known these things about
the new birth, all he had to do if he understood the Old Testament,
especially Ezekiel, and understood the Passover lamb, he would have
understood clearly, clearly, and read this chapter here, he
would have understood clearly that salvation was the new birth.
that it had to be something that God done, like this infant that
was cast out, polluted in its own blood. But our Lord often
used the, when he's preaching, he referred to the Old Testament.
He said, as Moses was lifted up as a serpent in the wilderness,
I gotta be lifted up. I gotta be lifted up. And then
he said, as Jonah, was three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth, the Son of Man shall be three days and three
nights in the heart of the earth. And then he said, as it was in
the days of Noah, and he just read that a few minutes ago,
as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be when the Son of
Man come. And he told them one time, he
said, if you'd believe Moses, you'd believe me, because Moses
wrote of me. And so if they would have just
read this like I read just now, they would have understood that
it took somebody to do something for someone who could do nothing
for themselves. They'd have just understood that.
All you gotta do is read the Bible and you can find it. Once
you see it, you never cannot not see it. And so here he was,
and oh God make us wise. Oh may the Lord make us wise.
Give us some understanding of all the types and pictures of
our Lord, who is the same today, yesterday, and forever, because
He never changes. And the way He saves sinners
is the way He's gonna always save a sinner. And our Lord Jesus
Christ here, I mean, as Ezekiel here is talking about Jerusalem. And you know, He's not talking
about, He's talking about earthly Jerusalem and earthly Israel.
But yet he's speaking to us, God's children. When I read the
Bible, I don't read it for what it's gonna say to somebody else,
I read for what it says to me. I read what it's gonna talk to
me about. And among the heathen nations, this baby, like this
baby, you know, was taken. His mother and daddy was born
wrong. And because their mother and
daddy was born wrong, the baby was born wrong. And the baby
was born with a deformity, so something was wrong with him.
And in those heathen nations, in those Amorites and Hittites,
in those heathen nations, when they had a baby, if it was deformed,
or if there was something wrong with it, they would take it.
They wouldn't wash it, they wouldn't do anything for it. They would
take it and throw it out in the field, or walk out in the field
and lay it down, or lay it out in the desert, and they'd leave
animals to get it, or birds to get it, or anybody that wanted
to get that baby. And they'd cast it out in the
field. And this is how God found Israel, in idolatry, paganism. And He took this people and He
made them His own. Gave them His glory, gave Him
His prophets, gave Him His law, gave Him His Son, gave Him the
priesthood. And yet, there was something
bad wrong with them. Something bad wrong with them.
And what God pictures here, He shows us exactly how God saves
a sinner. I won't take too long, but look
at our condition. Our lost condition. That's the
first thing. You know, people say, boy, I don't wanna be lost.
Man was born lost. And somebody else gotta find
him. Who preached that last night?
John did. Christ said, hey, this is his
mission. He come to seek. He has to seek. And then when
he seeks you, he has to save you. And who is it that he saves?
The lost. The lost. And this baby, this
baby, in our lost condition, this baby was born wrong. What
was wrong with him? He was born in the land of Canaan. He was born, his father was a
Hittite and his mother was an Amorite. And you know the first
time that Canaan's mentioned, it's mentioned about Ham, Seth,
and Canaan. And Canaan was cursed. Abraham,
I mean, Noah cursed his son Canaan. And he was a cursed man. And
he was always a cursed man. And Canaan was cursed. And that's
what was wrong with our problem. And you know, it wasn't separated
even from the navel. But that's our problem. You know
what our problem was? When we was born, we was born
wrong. There's people that get into
genealogy and they want to find out how they was born, where
they come from and all that. But listen, I can chase my genealogy
all the way back for hundreds and thousands of years and I
know exactly who my daddy was. I know exactly how I got in the
condition I did. Through my father Adam, I got
lost. I was shaping, my mother was
shaping in iniquity. I was conceived in sin. And as
quick as you be born, you're wicked, go astray, speaking lies. And look with me over in Job
chapter 25. Look in Job 25. It's a... I don't want anybody to,
Only hope at anybody is for somebody else to do something for them.
But look here in Job 25. I'm getting too far away here. Look what he said here. We were
born wrong. We was born wrong. Oscar Richardson
said one time, said, somebody said, boy, I said, I'm confused.
He said, you know why you're confused? Your daddy was confused.
Your mama was confused. Your grandma's confused, your
grandpa was confused. You can't help but get confused. And that's what it is. We cannot
help. We are not, when we was born, there was something desperately
wrong with us. And I'm gonna show you what I'm
talking about. Everybody's ever had a child, and you leave that
child at home, and you say, now listen, you're welcome to the
whole house, and I'm gonna lock this one door, and don't you
go in that door. Don't you go in that room. You
won't be in your car and out of the driveway before they'll
be in that room. Why is that? Because they got
something bad wrong with them. They say, well, my child. It's
your child. Ain't that right? Don't get in that drawer. And that's why we're born wrong.
But look what he said over here at Job. Chapter 25 and verse four. How
then can a man be justified with God? Oh, what a question. When you're born wrong, when
you got the wrong parents, when there ain't nothing right about
you. And you're in the presence of an infinitely holy God and
a righteous God. How in the world's a man gonna
be just? God look at him and say, I'll
justify that man. How's that gonna happen? Huh? And then he asked this question,
how can he be clean? Clean, pure. That's born of a
woman. How can it possibly happen? And
to me, to me the most urgent Message for me is how in the
world God? Himself can look at me or look
at you and see us as we are Not like we think we are not like
we hope we are not like we'd like to be but sees us as we
are And we said how in the world can God have anything to do with
me? How can he touch me and? love me, do anything for me,
and me being the sinner that I am, I've been polluted in my
blood, I was born wrong, my mother was born wrong, my father was
born wrong, and my mother and father walked off and left us
when I was six years old, never raised by either one of them,
and I was a rebel from the time I was born, and let me tell you
something, how in the world can God have anything to do with
me? I wanna know the answer to that
question. How can God look at me and say,
listen, I'm gonna take that man, and as he is, I'm gonna punish
him for his sin. I'm gonna punish him for what
he's done. I'm gonna pour my wrath on him,
and he's gonna pay for his sin. But oh my, there's a man that
stood up, a man from glory. He stood and he said, smite me,
beat me, pour your wrath on me. And how can God slay me and save
me all in the same stroke? How can God punish me and justify me all in the same
stroke? There's only one way. That's
through the blessed Lord Jesus Christ, who you just preached
so clearly. But oh my, and that's what I'm
talking about. Look over here, that's how can
a man be just with God? When I first started preaching,
let me stop a minute and tell you this. When I first learned
the gospel, and I started preaching where I'm at now, I'll be there
46 years in March. When I first started preaching,
for two years, for a solid two years, All I preached was how
in the world can God be just and have something to do with
a sorry, miserable bunch like us? And all we done was done
that and I'd preach a while and we'd cry a while. I'd preach
a while and we'd cry a while. That's all I could preach on
for two years. Two solid years. How could God have anything to
do with us? With all that we was, and all
that we did, and all the lies we told, and all our self-righteousness,
and all of our works, and all of our legalism, and all our
fundamentalism, how could God have anything to do with a miserable
bunch like us? And you know what? I'm still
preaching the same thing. But I'd preach a while, and we'd
cry a while, and preach a while, and we'd cry a while. But let's
go back over here Job, and let me show you something. How can
he be clean this morning? And look what he says here. Behold,
even to the moon, it don't even shine in God's sight. Yea, the
stars are not pure in his sight. How much less man that is a worm,
and the son of man which is a worm. Oh my, that's what I'm talking
about. That's our lost condition, that's
our lost condition. And then back over here in our
text, here was this infant, it says, it says there, you know
that, it's in verse five, he said,
you know, verse five, he said, you know I pitted you and you
was cast out into the open field to the loathing of thy person.
Now this infant, this infant that we just talked about, that
was cast out into that open field, and there in verse five, to the
loathing of his person. Now, listen, what could this
infant do for itself? It was cast out, it was hopeless,
it was helpless, it was friendless, its own mother, its own mother
had said it didn't worship. You know, they didn't worship.
When their baby's born, the first thing they start doing, put stuff
in his eyes and wash, wash, wash, wash, swallow, swallow, swallow,
and they'll wrap him up so tight, the little fellas can't move.
But that's not what happened to this baby. No, no. It's infinite in this condition.
Oh my, look what it says there in verse four. They didn't even
cut your navel. When they pulled you out of your
mother's womb, they didn't even cut the navel. So she had the
navel still on there. Oh my, they didn't wash you.
Ain't nobody washed you. They didn't sample you. They
didn't salt you. They didn't purify you. Nobody
swaddled you. Nobody picked you up and wrapped
you in a blanket and said, oh, this precious baby. They didn't
do that. And then look what it says there. And I tell you what,
when people looked at it, it said, not one eye pitied you. Not one eye pitied you. Not one
eye pitied you. Our love, I don't remember who
said it, but they said, as a father pitieth his children, even so
the Lord pitieth them that fear him. You know why he pities us?
Because we're pitiful. We're pitiful people. And that's
why he pities us. You know why he's pitiful? We're
dust, but oh my, but no eye pitied thee. No, I pitied David. David said, when my father and
mother forsake me, he said, the Lord will take me up. Here's,
no, I pitied you. And look what else it says, to
have compassion on you, to have compassion on you. You know,
when I was a young man, I came back from Vietnam and I was a
mess. I was a mess. I spent 18 months
in hospitals. And the only person that ever
visited me was my wife. I had friends. I had acquaintances. I had people that I worked with. But not one friend ever visited
me. Not one. Not one. No compassion. No pity. And here's
the thing. Here's the way this baby was.
It was impotent. It was helpless. It was powerless. Is there anything done for this
infant? If it's done, somebody else has
got to do it. Somebody else is going to have
to do something for this baby. Oh, it's going to have to come
from the hand of another, from the will of another, from the
power of another. Jeremiah asked this question, can the Ethiopian
change the color of his skin? Can a leopard change his spots?
And I'll tell you something else, not only was this infant helpless
and friendless, no, I pitied it. Nobody had compassion on
it. And here's the thing, this infant wasn't even aware of his
condition. It had no idea of the condition
that it was in. And oh my, and this is the thing
about it, we can no more save ourselves than this infant can
save itself. Oh, we couldn't do anything for ourselves. Oh
my. Then look what it says about
this infant back up here in verse five. It said, he was thrown
out in the open field. This infant was dirty, loathsome, polluted. It says in verse six, it said,
when I passed by and saw you polluted, polluted in his own
blood. Can I ask you all a question? Do you ever, ever feel your sin
to where you feel like you're loathsome, your sin is so loathsome
to you that you can't hardly stand yourself? Huh? Do you ever feel that your sin
is so bad that you can smell it and you hope nobody else can
smell it? You know, when Paul talked about
a dead man, what they used to do, they'd take a man, if he
committed murder or something, they'd take the man he killed
and wrap him and tie him on his body. And he would carry that
dead body, and that dead body, after a while, get to stinking,
and it would corrupt, and he'd have to carry that. Now, that's
why Paul said, Oh, wretched man, I am. Who shall deliver me from
this body of death? Do you all ever feel that way?
This baby was thrown out here to the loathing of its person.
Who loathed it? Everybody loathed it. But do
you ever loathe yourself? Does your sin ever become so
awful to you that you say, Oh, I used to say, if anybody knew
what I was really like, they'd never invite me to their house
and I'd never eat a meal at their table. That's how low, if you
really, and that's why he's this infant, dirty, loathsome, polluted,
and it said it was in his own blood, in his own blood. God said he gave ashes for beauty,
shame for glory, rottenness for hell, and oh my. But look what happens. Look what
happens. I'm going to say sovereign grace.
Look what happens in sovereign grace. Look what God does. Look
what God does. This is what has to happen. And
God saw him. He said, I see him. Nobody pitied
you. Nobody had compassion on you.
You was cast out in the open field to the loathing of the
person the day that thou was born. But listen to this now. I passed by. I passed by. I passed by you. You. Oh my. This infant wasn't looking for
help. I don't even know if he was crying. He didn't know the
condition he was in. He was senseless. We're like
the old hymn writer, tis not that I did choose thee for Lord,
that could not be. For hast thou not chosen me,
thy glory I would not see. But he said, oh, he said, when
I pass by you, there in verse six, when I pass by thee, when
I pass by thee. What was this time when he passed
by him? There was a time of love, there
was a time of love. You know, I'll pass by you. And after everybody that's preached
this week, every single service that's been preached, everybody's
preached, every single one of them said, not one of us ever
sought the Lord. Not one of us. Not one person in this world
has ever been saved by the grace of God. People say, well, I found
the Lord. Was he lost? How you finds it? But that's what, I found the
Lord. And you don't run into Christ. The salvation is not
by accident. We didn't seek the Lord. We didn't
seek the Lord. And you know, and think about
it is, our Lord Jesus Christ, He passed by us when we was yet
in our womb. That's when he passed by me.
Paul said, would it please God who separated from my mother's
womb and called me by his grace? He said, I passed by you. We
never sought the Lord. He got to pass by where we are.
He came where we are. And he's the one that has to
give us life. Look what he says. And when I saw, passed by thee
and saw you, and you was polluted, polluted in your own blood, Polluted. You know what pollution is? Oh, pollution, huh? When I think
about pollution, if a person wants their own righteousness,
this is the way I view this. I may be wrong, I may be gross,
I hope I'm not gross. But if a person thinks that they
can come to God by their works or by their own righteousness,
the thing is, just lift the lid off your septic tank, Step down
in it and get out of it and say, Lord, here I am. That's what
your righteousness is. That's what this baby was. He
was polluted. He was polluted in his own blood. Your friends may not know your
heart. You may not even know your own
sinful condition. But I do know this, God knows.
God knows exactly where you're at. God knows exactly what you
are. God knows exactly how you think. God knows exactly what you're
feeling right now. God knows exactly what you think
about him. He knows right now exactly what
you do. And he said, I saw you. I saw
you. I saw you polluted in your own
blood. And look what he says when I
saw you polluted in your own blood. He said, live. He said, live. Oh, that baby
looks awful. He looks awful. He's polluted. I said, live. He's not been washed. I said, live. He's loathsome. I said, live. Yeah, I said unto you, I'm gonna
tell you again, live. Why did he say that? Look what
he says down here in verse eight. Now when I passed by thee and
looked upon thee, behold, thou time was the time of love. Whose love? His love. Oh, when
I passed by you the time and saw you there, it was the time
of love, time of love. And look what he says. And I
spread my skirt over you, covered your nakedness. I swear unto
thee and entered into a covenant with thee but thou becamest mine. Mama didn't want you, daddy didn't
want you, but I want you. Thou becamest mine. And he said
he spread his skirt over us. And look what he's, why'd he
have to spread his skirt over us? That righteousness of Christ. Because why? Because we was naked. Naked. Oh my, you became mine. And oh my, I covered your nakedness.
And I swear, God said, I swear by no greater, I swear by myself. And I entered into a covenant
with thee. And the Lord God said, you became mine. Oh my, I can't
get over the fact that I belong to Christ. John Chapman said
last night, the Lord's responsible for me. The shepherd's responsible
for the sheep. And oh, he took it upon himself.
And oh my, I said unto you, live, live, live. And oh, look at the
sum of the things our Lord did for this infant here. And I tell
you, when He said He lived, it was a time of love. Look what
He did for this child. You know, in the creation, when
God created, the first five verses of Genesis is a perfect, perfect
illustration God saving a man in the condition he was in. But
in the creation, God's Spirit moved upon the dark waters where
earth was without form and voice. But, oh my, God said, let there
be light upon that old thing. But look what our Lord did. One
day, God, and like this infant, He said, in the time of love,
I came. God's Spirit came over us, moved over our hearts, moved
over our souls, moved over our darkened hearts and minds and
said, Let there be light. And He shined a light into our
darkened hearts. Oh, the light of the glorious
gospel of Christ. God's Spirit moved over the virgin's
womb and said, Let there be life. And that life was the begotten
Son of God, the Son of God that came into this world. And one
day, God moved over our lifeless, lifeless souls And he said, live
because you became mine. Live because you became mine.
He stood outside Lazarus' tomb. And you know why Martha, Martha
said to him, Lord, my brother, he stinks. He's been dead four
days, he stinks. He's as bad as this infant here.
He said, he stinks. You know why Martha didn't want
him to take that off there? She said, I don't want people
to see my brother, the condition he's in. that it'll be embarrassing
for people to see my brother laying there, rotten, corrupt,
dead, lifeless, and I don't want people to smell him. That's why she didn't want that
thing to come off there. But that's what the, that's the
kind of people Christ sent. Four days dead. I said, come
out of there. I said, Lazarus come forth, and
Lazarus came forth. He that was dead came forth.
And oh my, but look what he did. Look at these sovereign gifts,
sovereign gifts. Look what he said. I entered
into a covenant with you, and then look what he did to us.
In verse nine, then I washed you. I washed you. He hadn't
been washed before, but I washed you. And look what he said, not
only did I wash you, but I throughly washed you. He didn't say I thoroughly
washed you, throughly washed you. That means going inside
to outside, outside to inside. Throughly, throughly. We say
do that thoroughly. God does things throughly. He
starts on the inside and comes to the outside. Religious starts
on the outside and tries to get to the inside. Christ starts
on the inside and goes to the outside. And oh my, he washed
him. What did he wash him with? Blood,
blood. Well, the blood of Christ cleanses
us from all sin. Unto him that loved us and washed
us from our sins in his own blood. And then look what else he said
there in verse nine. Then I anointed you. I anointed
you with all. I gave you the Holy Spirit, the
Holy Ghost of God come upon you. He said, I anointed you with
all. The Holy Spirit comes and saves us and makes Christ known
unto us. And I love to listen to this.
I'm gonna hurry, I got to hurry. I know you're getting tired.
He said, and then I put clothes on you. I clothed you not only
with clothes, but I clothed you with broided work, special work,
beautiful dress. Adam's fig leaf didn't do. If
Adam's fig leaf wasn't gonna work, I clothed you. You know,
they had a marriage supper And everybody's in there, you know,
is dressed for the marriage. You know, when you go to get
married, everybody tries to dress nice. Now, I was in a marriage
here a while back, and the people come to the wedding, you know,
they had their caps on backwards and, you know, their tobacco
in their back pocket with a big thing on the back of it, you
know. And they did shorts and everything else, you know, to
be in this wedding. But oh, my. But when I go to a wedding, I
want to look nice, especially if I'm the preacher. But anyway,
Adam and his fig leaf, it didn't work. But God said, listen, you're
naked. You're just naked. I had to cover
you up. And what did he cover us up with?
Broidered work. Oh my, broidered work, pretty
work, blessed work. Glorious work. Oh my. And covered our nakedness. And how many of y'all read Bunyan
Pilgrim's Progress? You know, here's one thing that
happened. When Bunyan got through the Slough Despond and finally
got to the cross, and he got to the cross and his sins were
rolled away. They was taken off of his back.
And there was a man there with him. God clothed them and they
were shiny. Do you know when they were shining?
And they both was clothed. And one looked at the other and
said, boy, you got the most beautiful dress on I've ever seen. It's
beautiful. And he turned around and said,
well, you got one of them too. He could see the one in the other
one, but he couldn't see it in himself. And that's what God does. We
can see the righteousness and we can see Christ in other people,
but it's hard to see Christ in ourselves. And that's what he
said here. He said, I closed you. I closed
you. And then look what he says here.
And he said, I closed you with fine linen and covered you with
silk. That's the best that you can
get. That's the best you can get. I've been to Ireland a couple
of times and I couldn't afford any of that Irish linen. Too rich for my blood. But he
said, I covered you with fine linen and with silk. And then
he said, oh listen, look what he said there in verse 12. And I decked you with ornaments,
put bracelets on your hands. Oh my, I dressed you up. I dressed
you up real nice. I put ornaments, I put ornaments
on you. What kind of ornaments? The righteousness,
justification, Lord, love, joy, peace, the fruit of the spirit,
gentleness, goodness, faith, and then look what else he did
for us. And he said there in verse 12, and I put a crown on
your head. A crown on your head. Paul called it a crown of righteousness.
I put a crown on your head. Crown on your head. And oh my,
he's crowned us with righteousness. Beautiful crown. God, when he
looks at us, he sees that righteousness of Christ. And then last of all,
let me show you this. Down in verse 14. And thy renown
went forth among the heathen for thy beauty. You know what? For it's perfect. Your beauty was perfect. How
was it perfect? Through my comeliness. Through
what I did. Through my comeliness. My comeliness
is what makes you beautiful. My comeliness that I, look what
he said, that I put upon you. You were perfect through what
I did. Through my comeliness. And I
tell you what, we're perfect in Christ. Perfect, absolutely
perfect. And it was a time of love. And
I tell you, once God loves you, He don't never stop. You say,
boy, I've done things that I tell you what's very unlovable. Yeah,
maybe me and you, it might be, but not to Him. It was a time
of love. Thank God that it was. Live,
live, live, live, love, love, love. Well, all right. Y'all know what I think about
you. Love and appreciate you. Lord bless you. Thank you, toddler. Ain't nobody like you. Boy, that's a good thing. I do love you. Thank you, preachers. You preachers and priests, oh
my. What a blessing y'all been to me. What a blessing.