Brother Bruce and I have always
seen eye to eye all these years. No disagreements whatsoever until
this morning. He said he believed the Lord
called him to sit and listen and not preach. That ain't so,
is it? No, sir. He's a preacher, buddy. You got yourself a preacher.
Lord, there's none better, no one I'd rather listen to. I mean
that. Listen to him a lot. I'd have
him at our place to preach many times if he'd come. But he's
devoted to you. And you're privileged and blessed
to have him. Same as the people at Collegeville,
my, my. And the Lord gave them an Elijah.
While you're turning, 1 Samuel chapter 6. 1 Samuel 6. I know
I speak on Mindy's behalf. I thank you all for everything. Thank you so much. You've just
been so generous and hospitable and kind to us. We thank you.
All the food and all the service, hard work. I know what goes what
goes into this. I know how hard you ladies work
and the men, and I thank you. We thank you. We just love being
here and love you and thank you. Thank you for having us. Joe,
where are you? Thank you. My, my. Her son's staying in a motel
while we stay in her house. I preached this at home, and
after preaching it, my wife, Mindy, said, I believe any pastor
would be really glad, really happy for his congregation to
hear this message. And I took that to heart. It took me a long time, Fred,
to start listening to my wife, you know. Are you guilty of that? So I preached it at Crossfield
and then preached it somewhere else. And so I'm going to bring
it to you. My father used to say if a stick
will kill one snake, it will kill two or three. And he also said, too, you've
never really preached something until you've preached it four
or five times. And maybe one of these days you think, I'm
really going to preach this. You know what I mean. But he
told us young preachers, don't just grab that outline and preach
it. work it over again so it will
be fresh. And I did that. This is a gospel
story. God forbid I did not preach the
gospel to you. Our Lord Jesus Christ is all
and in all, isn't He? He's in all the Bible. He's in
all His people. He's in every story in the Scripture.
They are they which testify of Him. And this is a gospel story. If you've never seen it, you
will rejoice. 1 Samuel 6, read verses 7 through
9 with me. Now the Philistines had taken
the ark of God, the ark of the covenant, the ark of the Lord,
they had taken it. And now they're trying to get
rid of it. Now they're trying to send it back. Because the
Lord's hand is heavy on them because of the way they abused
this ark. verses 7 through 9. So they said,
let's take a new cart and two milk cows on which there hath
come no yoke and tie the cows to that cart, bind them to that
cart, bring their calves home from them and take the ark of
the Lord and lay it upon that cart. with the jewels of gold,
which you returned to him for a trespass offering, and a copper
by the side thereof. And send it away, put this ark
on the cart, tied to these, bound to these milk cows, and let's
see if it goeth up by the way of his own coast, where it belongs,
to Beth Shemesh, the name means house of the sun, Let's see if
it goes to its own coast, to its own people. Then we'll know
that God hath done all this great evil to us. He's done this. But
if not, if they don't go to the people of God, they turn around
and come back, it's not His hand that smote us, it's just chance. There ain't nothing to this. Now, the gospel. This story is
how the Lord chooses a people, His elect people, in Christ. And how He yokes them to Christ,
binds them to Him, bound by cords of a man through the sacrifice.
How that Christ then becomes their life, their all, their
love, their burden, their all, the gospel, like these two milk
cows. I'm telling you the meaning of
the whole story right now. These two milk cows in a cart
represent all those who are bound to Christ by love's strong cord. They have this burden for Christ
and the gospel. And they'll leave everything
and everyone for Christ. Because this is of the Lord.
This is of the Lord. Exodus 25. Go back there and
we'll look at the design and the purpose of the
Ark, when the Lord purposed and designed the Ark of God. Most of you, all of you that
know the truth know this. You've been taught well. That
Ark of God, the Ark of the Covenant, it's never just called the Ark.
It's always the Ark of the Lord, the Ark of the Covenant, the
Ark of the Lord God. The Ark of God was a vessel.
It was a box. It was a container. It was designed
and purposed by God as the way to worship God, wasn't it? The
way. You could not come to God but
one way. Through this ark by a high priest
with the blood of a lamb, a sacrifice, poured out on the mercy seat
of the ark that was in the Holy of Holies, right? Now all of
that, these three are one, aren't they? Christ is all and in all
of this. He's the High Priest, He's the
Sacrifice, and He's the Ark, isn't it? We still, there's only
one way to worship the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob today.
The same way. The same way. Christ. Our Great
High Priest. Christ. Our Lamb. Christ the
Mercy Seeker. It hasn't changed. God hasn't
changed. The way to approach Him hasn't changed. God said,
see that you make all things after the pattern. We worship
today, the pattern of our worship is exactly like the people in
the Old Testament. Christ is the way, the truth,
and the life. Now this ark, this receptacle
was not a thing to be worshipped. The children of Israel did that
and God smote thousands of them because they worshipped a thing. The ark never was a thing, a
holy thing or a thing to be worshiped, but it symbolized, it represented
a person. We don't worship a thing, we
don't worship a place, but we worship a person, the Lord Jesus
Christ. In fact, He is the place and
He is the thing, that holy thing of God. But we worship a person,
all right? And so this ark We don't use
any symbols today, do we? The Lord tells us not to. There's
only two things, two ordinances that we use to represent the
Lord Jesus Christ. Baptism and the Lord's table. But we don't worship those things.
There's nothing holy or sacred or effectual about those things
that represent Him, His person and His Word. You know that,
don't you? It sure doesn't hurt to say it
again. We need to be reminded of that. All right. Look at chapter
25, verse 10. It said, They shall make an ark
of shitham wood. And He gave the exact dimensions
of it. An ark of shitham wood, verse
11, overlaid with pure gold. Now you know that. That shitham
wood was a wood that was impervious to decay. It would not decay. It would not rot. Our Lord Jesus
Christ, God, became a man. God was manifest in the flesh.
Scripture says, a body hast thou prepared me. A body. Christ,
God became a man. The eternal God, the eternal
Son became a man. Made in the likeness of sinful
flesh, but without sin. Impervious to sin. Decay. Rot. He was sinless. The sinless one. Is this important?
If He wasn't the virgin-born, sinless Son of God, His body
is in that grave today. And He can't save anybody. But
He's the sinless sacrifice, isn't He? Crowned with gold. Covered
with gold and a crown all the way around this box. That's our
Lord's divinity, isn't it? Gold represents deity. That's
His perfection. God and man. God and man. Christ, the vessel of mercy.
the God-man, crowned with honor and glory. In verse 16 it says,
put in that ark the testimony which I shall give thee. That's
the Law of Moses, isn't it? That's the five book, that's
the Word of God. Put in that vessel the Word of
God. The mind, the purpose, the will
of God, the salvation of God, the ways, the works, the mind,
the will, the purpose, all the counsel, all the fullness of
God put it in that ark. That's Christ, isn't it? In Him
dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily. All fullness
dwells in Him. In Him are hid all the treasures
of wisdom and knowledge. He's even called the Word of
God. He's the will of God. He's the
purpose of God. He's the salvation of God. Put
in Christ. Put in Christ. Well, now when
God gave Moses the law and the commandment, while he was up
there getting the law from the Lord, Moses, the people were
already breaking it. Before the law was even written,
the people were breaking it, weren't they? You remember that?
And man, since he fell, Adam in the garden, has been breaking
that law before it was written on him. But God broke this law. All right? So Moses came down
and saw that the people were breaking the law. What did he
do? He broke the law on the ground in anger and wrath. He threw
the law on the ground and it was broken. Symbolic of how the
people had broken the law of God. All of it. Every jot and
tittle they were guilty of breaking. And so I went. So I went. If not in action, in thought.
And our Lord said, if you thought it, you are guilty of it. Alright, so God said, take two
more tables of stone and I am going to write it again. And
keep this law intact. Fulfilled. Complete. And put
it in that ark. Put it in that box. The complete,
intact, unbroken law. Put it in that ark and put a
lid on it so it can be kept forever. That's Christ. He's the keeper
of the law. He came to keep God's law. To glorify God as a man. We have
sinned and come short of the glory of God. We've all broken
His holy law. Christ came to keep God's law
as our law keeper, as our covenant head, as our substitute, our
redeemer, our law keeper. And He kept it. The law was fulfilled. The law was kept perfectly by
our Lord Jesus Christ, wasn't it? And God imputed that and
charged that perfection, that righteousness to God's people.
Do you ever get tired of hearing that? I don't get tired of telling
them. Oh, my. And put a lid on it. It'll always be kept forever
as a testimony. And that's Christ, isn't it?
But now, look at verse 17. They'll make a mercy seat of
pure gold and put that on top of the ark. There was a lid covering
the ark. Okay? A lid over the ark. Now the Ark's chief purpose,
the purpose of the Ark was really one thing. It was for the high
priest to take the blood of an innocent lamb or bullock, a sacrifice,
take the blood of an innocent substitute, sacrifice, kill it,
that blood, pouring out of the blood, the life of the flesh
is in the blood, you take the blood, it's dead. Take that blood
and pour it out on the mercy seat. Cover that mercy seat with
that blood. Symbolic of the sins of the people
have been paid. The soul that sinneth must surely
die. Their sins are paid by the death
of another. another dying in their stead,
in their room, a substitute for them, an innocent, sinless substitute
dying on their behalf and pour that blood over that mercy seat,
covering and even sealing up that mercy seat so that that
law cannot be opened to use against them again. It's covered. It's
paid. It's kept and the sins are paid. All of that is Christ in it.
It's all Christ. That's the whole purpose of this
container, this vessel, wasn't it? Christ came. The volume of
the book written of Him. All through the Old Testament,
this ark is spoken of Him. All through the... And in the
New Testament, it's defined, it's explained in it, it's understood,
it's revealed as being a person, not a thing. And our Lord Jesus
Christ came to live, to keep the law, But He came to die as
a sin payment, as a substitute, as a sacrifice for God's people. He didn't do this for everybody.
Who was this for? Who was the sacrifice made for? Who was the blood shed for? Who
knew about this? Who did God reveal this to? Israel. His chosen elect people did. And that's who Christ came to
die for. His people. Look at verse 20. So this mercy
seat. It says the cherubim, make cherubims
over this mercy seat on high, covering the mercy seat with
their wings, their faces looking one to another toward the mercy
seat. Peter wrote over in 1 Peter 1,
verse 12, speaking of Christ and this gospel. You know what
he said? He said, these are things that angels desire to look into. Wherever the gospel is preached,
where two or three are gathered together, Christ is there. God is there. The angels are
present too. Do you believe that? That's what
the Scripture says. The Scripture says they learn
the Gospel through the church, don't they? Through this Gospel
that's preached. They're not looking into dwelling
on and amazed so much by creation and providence and all of that,
but this Gospel holds their attention. They're enwrapped with this Gospel.
How much more should we be? How much more should sinners
be? This doesn't concern them. It concerns us. Which things
the angels desire to look into. So what does that tell you about
religion everywhere that's doing anything and everything but preaching
the gospel? God's not there. The blessing
of God's not there. They don't know the Lord. God's
people. This is the thing we desire to look into, don't we?
Christ in him hid all the mysteries and the treasures, which things
the angels desire to look into. Look at verse 21 and 22. Put the mercy seat above upon
the ark, and in that ark put the testimony I shall give thee,
the word, the mind, the will of God. And there I will meet
with you, and I will commune with you right there. Nowhere
else. I will meet with you and commune
with you at the mercy seat. Brethren, God will only have
anything to do with sinners in and through the Lord Jesus Christ.
No man cometh unto the Father but by me. All the blessings
of God are in one place. All the mercy of God, the presence
of God, The favor of God, the love of God, the grace of God
is in Christ and Him crucified. There I'll meet with you, commune
with you. We call the Lord's table communion,
don't we? Because it's the communion of
the body broken and the blood shed of our Lord Jesus Christ,
our mercy Savior. Do you know that? I believe you
do. Your heads are nodding in understanding.
Oh, how blessed. Oh, how blessed. Oh, how blessed. My, my. Thank the Lord that He's
revealed Christ to us. See, in Christ, the God-man,
God meets man and communes with man. In Christ, God is reconciled
and man is reconciled. In Christ, only in Christ. See,
that's where I'll meet you. In Christ, God is just and justifier,
a just God and a Savior. In Christ, mercy and truth are
met together. Righteousness and peace kiss
to each other. In Christ. We have a picture
of our firstborn granddaughter. She's in Mindy's bathroom, her
boudoir. And we have a picture of our
firstborn grandchild. And over here on this side is
her father. And over here is on her mother.
And she's in the middle looking straight ahead and both of them
are kissing each cheek. That's Christ. Mercy and truth met together.
Righteousness and peace have kissed each other. See, the light
of the knowledge of the glory of God is seen in the face of
the beloved, the firstborn, the only begotten. Altogether lovely,
Son of the Most High God. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry. 1 Samuel 3, go back there now.
1 Samuel 3. As said, the whole Old Testament
deals with this Ark of the Covenant, Ark of the Lord. It's no mere
box, but it's God designed it because it represents the Lord
Jesus Christ. In chapter 3, Chapter 3, the
light went out, the lamp went out where the ark was. Look at
chapter 3, verse 3. Eli was there, the high priest. Verse 3 says, the lamp of God
went out in the temple of the Lord where the ark of God was.
The lamp went out where the ark was. You know the purpose of
the lamp? One purpose, for light in that temple. to see the showbread,
to see the altar of incense, to see the way through the veil
into the Holy of Holies, to see the ark, light, to see this in
order to make this sacrifice on the mercy seat. That's what
the light was for. It was the job of the priests.
to bring the oil and keep the lamp burning, wasn't it? It was
the job of the priest to keep the lamp burning so the sacrifice
could be seen. All right? There were two wicked
fellows, the sons of Eli, named Hophni and Phinion. Their job
was to keep the lamp burning, but they were evil, wicked men
doing other things. And they let the lamp go out.
And so there was darkness, and apparently, Fred, they weren't
sacrificing any sacrifices this time. It had degenerated. There was
no blood being shed, no sacrifices being made. The lamp went out.
The light went out. And that's a picture of today,
isn't it? That's a picture of religion today. All these so-called
preachers aren't preaching Christ the light, are they? They are
not preaching the light of His Word. They are not preaching
the Word to the law and to the testimony, Isaiah 8.20. If they
speak not according to My Word, there is no light in them. They
are telling their dreams, they are telling their stories, they
are doing other things, social programs, this and that and the
other, having fun, family. This is a family church. This
is not about our family. This is all about the Lord Jesus
Christ. This is all about the worship of Christ. This is so
that sinners may see the light. This is so that sinners may come
and hear about the sacrifice. But they've let the light go
out. There's no light in them. They're doing other things, aren't
they? And it says that Ichabod was
over the door. The glory had departed. The light
of the knowledge of the glory of God departed. Oh, bless God,
people. There are a few places where
this light is still seen. Right here, we're in the upper
room. There's plenty of lights. Oh, man. But now this world's
in darkness. We're in another dark age as
well. We've got more Bibles than ever before, but less preaching
of the truth. More so-called gospel preachers
today, but less gospel than ever. So the light went out. Look at
chapter 4, wouldn't you? Chapter 4, verse 10. So the Philistines,
Philistines came, and they took the ark. The ark was taken in
the hands of the heathen. The ark of God, covenant of God,
was taken in the hands of heathen, wicked men, didn't know God. Strangers. to this covenant.
Strangers all live. And you know God killed many
of them. He killed many of them. One place it says He killed 30,000.
Look verse, well this is not it, but 30,000
over in chapter 3. Then later on God killed 50,000
Israelites for opening the lid of the ark. For messing with
it. Fooling with it. Getting too
familiar with it. Putting their hands on it. God killed 80,070
people because of this ark. Playing with it, toying with
it, misusing it and abusing it. You know, the Scripture says
in Romans 1, we see the wrath of God is revealed from heaven
against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in
unrighteousness. Messing with God's Word. Messing
with God's Gospel. Messing with God's Ark. Abusing,
corrupting, twisting, withholding, adding to God's Gospel. And God
is angry. And He calls them workers of
iniquity. And they're dying and dropping like flies and nobody
knows why. We do. We see it. It's the hand
of God heavy upon everybody. We know why. We know why. Look at verses 10 and 11. The
Philistines thought, and it says, yeah, there it is, verse 10,
30,000. An ark of God was taken and Hophni and Phinehas were
slain. Hophni and Phinehas were slain. Look at verse 2 and 3. Right
before this, the Philistines surrounded the Israelites. They
surrounded them. Verse 2 and 3. And Israel was
smitten before the Philistines. Verse 3. And the people came
into the camp, the elders of Israel came into the camp and
said, Why is the Lord smiting us today before the Philistines?
Let us fetch the ark of the covenant of the Lord out of Shiloh unto
us, that when it cometh among us, it may save us out of the
hand of our enemies." Did you hear anybody calling on the Lord?
Did you hear anybody saying, Lord, have mercy upon us? They
said, no, let's get this box. Treating it like a rabbit's foot.
They got in trouble. They started dying. Sickness,
death, and people get religion, don't they, when bad things start
to happen? Oh, we'll go to church. We'll
do this. We'll do that. We'll join a church. We'll get baptized. It won't save you. It's personal. Call on the name
of the Lord. They aren't doing it. They say,
let's go get this ark. It will save us. Nothing's changing. And God killed
30,000. Well, look at verse 5. It says
that when the Ark of the Covenant came into the camp, all Israel
shouted with a great shout, and the earth rang like one of these
modern Pentecostal medias. Oh, we're here. A Bible has come. No such thing. God killed them.
God slew them all and dispersed them. And God's going to be done
with all this religious mess today, someday. Messing with
the Ark. Messing with the Gospel. Alright,
look at chapter 5 with me. Well, no, wait a minute. Hold
on. Eli. Eli. They came, remember, and
told him that his two sons had died. Look at verse 14. Eli heard the noise and he said,
what's going on out there? And a man came in and told Eli.
Now Eli was 98 years old. His eyes were dim. He could not
see. And the man said to Eli, I've
come from the army. I fled today. And he said, what's
done? What's going on, my son? And the messenger said, Israel's
fled before the Philistines. There's a great slaughter. And
your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, are dead. Now, people, if you've ever lost a child,
no matter if it was a wayward child or obedient child, Great
sorrow, wasn't it? Great grief. And you know this
old man was grief-stricken. Oh, no. You know this broke his heart,
don't you? Huh? But he took it. They told him. He had already been told this,
hadn't he? Samuel came and told him, didn't he, that God is going
to take your son. Do you remember what he said? Do you remember what he
said? It's the Lord. It hurt him, it grieved him,
but something else killed him. They said, look at it, verse
17, the ark of God is taken. And when they made mention of
the ark, he fell over backward and broke his neck and died. What does the gospel mean to
you? The whole story here, like these
two cows, Eli, what does the gospel mean to you? If somebody
took the gospel away from you, would it kill you? Would you
rather them take your family than take the gospel? Our Lord said, if any man love,
father or mother, husband, wife, son or daughter, more than me. Can't be myself. Can you say, Lord take anything,
take anyone, but don't take this gospel. Can you? Hmm. Chapter 5. Go over there. Chapter 5. Now, verse 2. They brought this ark, the Philistines,
into their house of their god, Dagon. Dagon. And, by the way,
Dagon was in the shape of a fish. Seriously. Wasn't it? Their fish
god. Well, they brought the ark in,
mixed it with their idolatry. Isn't that today? Mixed it with their idolatry.
Got a little bit of truth, but a little bit of truth is not
the truth. No lies are the truth, you see. Truth has no lies in
it. And they mixed it with their idolatry like today, like religion
today. They talk a little bit about
blood, a little bit about mercy, a little bit about to say grace.
They don't mean great. They mean an offering. Talk about
Jesus dying and so forth, but it's mixed with man's work, man's,
you know, goodness, man's morality and all that. And they mix it
together. They won't mix. Works and grace don't mix. God
and mammon, uh-uh. Baal and Christ can't stand side
by side. And I'll tell you who's going
to be standing when it's all over. Like that ark of Noah when the
whole world was under water, there's one thing showing. One
thing that rose above it all, that's that Noah's Ark. Well,
they came in to see about their God. They had to check on Him
all the time. I heard you preach on Him, I
think. They had to carry Him around. They had to carry Him
around. You didn't carry them, they had to carry Him. Isaiah
46, our God carries us. Well, they came in to check on
Him. And lo and behold, I loved it. Dagon was falling on his
face before the Ark. Verse 3. Christ said to me, every
knee will bow. All men, devils, gods, all bow
the knee and every tongue will confess, He's Lord. He's God.
Even Pharaoh had to say, Your God is God. Darius. Daniel's God is God. No God delivered
like that. And it cut his... When it was
all over, they propped him up, you know, they propped him up. And they propped him back up
and they came back in and he had fallen over again. His head
was cut off and his arms and legs were cut off. It was just
a stump lying there. Headless, armless, legless stump
bowing before the ark of God. And preachers literally today,
these false preachers literally today say this very thing about
their God. He has no hands but your hands,
no feet but your feet. He can't do anything unless you
let him prop him up. That's an idol, isn't it? I love that, don't you? Well, I got to hurry. Why didn't
somebody just destroy this ark? You know, it got them in trouble.
They said, we've got to get rid of this thing. They start dying,
dropping like flies. And so, look at verse 6 here
in chapter 5. Chapter 5, verse 6. The hand
of the Lord was heavy upon them, smote them with hemorrhoids. Anyway. And they were so pagan. You know the story, Fred. They
made, well, let's appease this God. We'll make God. Men are
so ignorant now. They'll try anything in the world
to appease God. There's only one way God has
approached. And that's the blood of Christ.
And anyway, they said, let's get rid of this ark. Let's get
rid of it. They said, if we can just get
rid of this ark, our troubles will be over. And doesn't modern
society say the same thing? We just get rid of religion.
All this talk about God, let's get the commandments out of the
schools. Well, you can do that if you want to, but it's written
on people's hearts. Let's get God out of the schools,
let's get God out of the government, let's get God to take all these,
everything that has to do with God and the Bible and any mention
of Jesus, let's get rid of it and all our troubles will be
over. Isn't it? They couldn't. Why didn't somebody, I thought
about this, why didn't somebody just say, let's blow this thing
up, this ark. Let's just destroy it. Roland,
you ever think about that? Let's just destroy it right here
and there. And then they couldn't. And me and Greg have tried to
destroy God's Word. They've tried to do away with
it. They have. They've burned it. Can't get
rid of it. Why? The Master copies in heaven.
You just haven't found a way to write another one. In this
Gospel, Christ said heaven and earth will pass away, but not
one word of mine will fail. You can't touch Christ. You can't
touch God. He's seated on the throne. You
can't remove this gospel. You can't get rid of it. It's
forever. It's forever. Bow to it. Believe. Trust the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now they said, here's what we'll
do. And here's where the story comes in. Verse 6. Chapter 6. Chapter 6. Yeah, is that it? Yeah. Chapter 6, verse 7. Here's what we'll do. We'll take
a new cart. and take two milk cows, never
been yoked, never been tied up to anything, never pulled anything,
never plowed anything, and tie it, yoke it, yoke them
to this cart, and let's put on this cart, bring their calves
home from them, their babies, their second children, and verse
8, take the cart of the Lord, put it on the ark, and put these
other things in there with it. And send it away. Get rid of
this thing. And let's see what happens. If it goes home, if it goes back
to its people, the house of the Son, if it goes back to the people
of God, God's in this. God did this. This is all of
the Lord. It's real. We better bow. We better believe. They didn't
say that, but they should have. God's in this. But if not, if
those two mothers, those two milk cows leave the ark and turn
and go back to their babies, their life, their love, if they
go back to their children, God's not in it. It's just chance.
Nothing to it. You see where I'm going with
this? See what they did. See what they
did. Brethren, is this real? Is what
we're doing this morning real? Does God live? Does Christ live? Is this all real? Is this the Word of God? Is this
the truth? Is it real to you? Is it life
to you? Does Christ live in you? Are
you bound, truly yoked to the Lord Jesus Christ? Is He your life? Is He your love? Is He really? I will know. A test, a trial is going to happen.
I want to find out. It's coming. In the book of Hebrews chapter
11 is a story all the way through of people just like you and me. And it tells us how they were
tried, their faith was tried. And how through these trials,
these horrible trials they went through, painful, heavy, fiery
trials that they all went through, the faith of God's elect was
real. substance, evidence of things
not seen, an unseen God. These cows were led by an unseen
hand. These cows were tied, were yoked,
not by man's cords, but by the cord of God, cord of love. They didn't turn to the right.
They didn't turn to the left. They went straight to the house
of God, the people of God, the house of Stories in the Hebrews
11. Abel lost his life. His brother
turns against him. Over doctrine? No, doctrine won't. You won't lay your life down
for doctrine. You will for a person. Enoch walked alone. Enoch walked
with God. He walked with a real person.
He walked alone. He said if nobody else walked
with him, I must. Didn't he? Noah was warned of
God. The whole world laughed and scoffed.
And the whole world said, it ain't nothing to that. Are you
kidding me? God loves everybody, Noah. Rain,
fall from fire, come from heaven upon everybody. That's nonsense. Noah believed God. He was warned. He moved with fear. He prepared
an ark. We come in here like Noah warned
of God. We move with fear. The fear of
the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. We come in here. This
is the ark. That is, the gospel is the ark
of God, the ark of Christ. And we come in here and we want
our children under here, under the ark, don't we? We want our
children in the ark. We tell them day in and day out,
get in the ark, get in the ark, get in the ark. God is going
to destroy this world. It ain't a figment of our imagination.
It's not some cunningly devised fable. God said it. We believe
it. And it's coming. Just sure as
God is. Getting the ark. One thing needful. And buddy, he condemned the world.
Moses forsook Egypt. I'm not part of Egypt. I don't
want to be Pharaoh's son, Pharaoh's daughter's son. I don't want
to be next in line to Pharaoh. I want to be found in Christ.
I want to be found with God's people. I'd rather walk in the
wilderness with God's people, looking for a city whose foundation
builder and maker is God, built on Christ the Lord, bearing reproach
with God's people than give me all the treasures of Egypt, all
the treasures of the world. Is that you? What could make
a man do such a thing but a living God, a living faith? Well, what happened to these?
And the Hebrews, time would fail to tell about what all people
went through. But look what happened. Verse
16. Verse 10. The men did so. They took these two milk cows,
tied them to the cart, shut up their calves at home. They laid
the ark of the Lord upon the cart. Verse 12. The kind went straight, went
the straight way, one way. Along the highway. Isaiah 35
says there's a highway. Made for God's people. Glowing
as they went. Bellowing, crying. What were
they crying about? They were crying about their
babies. But they're not turning back. Our Lord carrying that cross
up Calvary Hill one day. The women were weeping. He stopped
and said, don't weep for me. Wait for yourselves and wait
for your children. And those cows, if they could
talk, they would say, come with us. Come with us. But they're not turning back. They're not turning back. Rather
than there have been many over the years, God's true people,
they'll all leave home. forsake all for Christ as they
will. Walter Gruber took his wife,
Betty, five young babies to a foreign hostile land, Mexico, for the
sake of the gospel. His family said, you don't love
your children to do something like that to them. Yes, he did. He just loved Christ more. And
all of God's people are called to do that. At least in willing,
made willing, aren't they? Not to have to actually do it.
Any of you got loved ones that don't know the Lord? Any of you
got children that don't know the Lord? Any of you got siblings
or a spouse that don't know the Lord? You've got to worship Christ
anyway, don't you? Whether they come or not. Oh,
but you pray for them, don't you? You cry, Lord, save them. Well, how do they know where
to stop? Look at verse 14. The cart came to the field of
Joshua. You got it? Don't miss this.
The cart came, verse 14, to the field of Joshua, of Bethshemite.
Joshua. That's our Lord's name in it.
And stood there. They stopped there. Why'd they
stop? There was a great stone standing there. A rock. They
said, led by an unseen hand to where the people of God, where
are the people of God dwelling? Where ever you see a big rock.
Stop. Right there. And they did. This
is where we were bound. This is where we'll stay. On
Christ the solid rock. If you're looking for the truth,
you'll find it. If you're led by the Spirit of
God, the hand of God, you'll find it. You'll find a place,
an upper room where the Gospel is preached, where Christ is
preached, a man like this preaching the Gospel of Christ, the rock
of ages cleft for you, and if you find it, you'll stop and
you'll stay right there. You don't need to go any further.
And you know what happened to these cows? Forget it. Verse 15, the men of Beth Shemesh
took those cows and burnt them. They killed them and burnt them
as a burnt offering unto the Lord. Those cows laid down their
lives for that ark. They had this burden that they
carried all this journey. going to their destination. They laid down their lives. How about you? What does this
gospel mean to you? What do these people mean? They
were bound together. Those two cows were bound, yoked together
weren't they? What does this place mean to
you? What does this church mean to you? What do these people
mean to you? Are you yoked to Christ? Are you yoked to these
people? Would you leave all for them? Some have. Someday. Is the gospel a burden to you?
Did you carry everywhere? Are you bearing this burden of
the gospel for this pastor and this church and these people?
Would you lay down your life? Would you? We must. We must. It's worth
laying down our life for Him. Oh, He's worthy. He's worthy.
Thank you. Thank you for everything. Thank
the Lord for you. Thank the Lord for your pastor.
Thank the Lord for the gospel. Thank you for having us. May
the Lord bless His Word.