Tonight, we're gonna be looking
in the book of Proverbs chapter three, if you'd like to turn
there. Proverbs chapter three. Last week, we looked at the merchandise
of wisdom. And as a whole, you can see These
little asterisks is what I'm going to call them at the beginning
of some verses. That's the beginning of a paragraph. That's the beginning
of a thought. And when you see the next asterisk, that's the
end. And that starts another one. Now I was going to go through
the entire seven, eight verses that's in this, but I believe
the Lord gave me a message in just the first six. So last week
we looked at the first two. Now we're going to look at the
first six and next week, Lord willing, I guess we'll look at all eight, but
The merchandise of wisdom is what we were talking about last
week and that's the gain of Christ. That's the gain that is given
to his people. Wisdom is Christ and merchandise
by definition is profit or gain. If you have Christ, you have
wisdom. And if we don't have Christ,
We don't have wisdom. We don't have gain. We don't
have profit. The scripture says, what would
a man give in exchange for his soul if he gained the whole world
and lost his own soul? This priceless wisdom that our
Lord gives to us here is consistently declared through Proverbs. You've
seen the word wisdom countless times already. and we'll continue
to see it, but it's also echoed throughout all the whole word
of God. Wisdom is a person. It's the Lord Jesus Christ. And
you and I, we can't gain it by what we do. We can't merit it
by what we do. We can't acquire it by trying
harder or doing better. It's a person. This wisdom is
the gift of God into eternal life. My hope this evening, looking
at these six verses as a complete thought, is I hope the Lord causes
us to see his wisdom. I hope he causes us to see Christ.
I would remind us, because we're about to read this, when it says
she, I mentioned this last week, but I want to reiterate this
again. She is referring to the church, the union of the Lord
with his church. So when it says she, her wisdom,
her is better than rubies, it's priceless, higher than gold.
She, when it refers to that, The reason he's doing that is
it's one of the hidden mysteries of the scripture that the Lord
has in plain sight, where people would say, oh, so wisdom's something
I acquire. It's something, that's why he's
calling it a she. No, it's referring to what God has given to his
church, what God has given to his bride. That's why it says
she. Only the Lord's people acquire this wisdom, and we acquire it
because it's bestowed, it's received, it's not earned, it's not gained. It's like, what did the Lord
say about Noah? Noah found grace in the eyes
of the Lord. Was Noah looking for grace? No,
Noah wasn't walking around trying to find grace. Otherwise it wouldn't
have been grace. It would have been a work, wouldn't
it? And that is the same with the Lord's wisdom here. This
she is the bride. It's the one who indeed has received
the wisdom of God. And if we are to receive him,
he must prepare our hearts to receive him. he must prepare
our hearts to receive him. Do you remember Paul said, I
planted and Apollos watered, but the Lord gave the increase.
When we come together, our prayer should be, Lord, prepare my heart
that I may receive your word. Don't let it fall on stony ground.
Don't let it be choked out from the thorns and the trials and
cares of this life. Cause me to have good ground
for your word to fall on. Where the Lord's people are,
that's where the Lord's wisdom, the Lord's wisdom will be proclaimed. You can go to a lot of churches
around here, but there, to my knowledge, there's none of them
that declare the wisdom of God, the truth of the Lord, the fullness
of the gospel. This is where the Lord said he
would meet with us, reveal himself according to his own purpose
and his own grace. That's my hope tonight, is he
would meet with us and reveal himself. So let's read the text
here. Proverbs 3, verse 13 through 18. Happy is the man that findeth
wisdom, and the man that getteth understanding, for the merchandise
of it is better than the merchandise of silver, and the gain thereof
than fine gold. She is more precious than rubies,
and all the things thou canst desire are not to be compared
to her. Length of days is in her right
hand. and in her left hand riches and honor. Her ways are ways
of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace. She is a tree
of life to them that lay hold upon her, and happy is everyone
that retaineth her. I've titled this message The
Value of Wisdom. The Value of Wisdom. Some people
value the Lord Jesus Christ. You know who those people are?
It's his people. Before we were called from darkness
into his light, before the Lord brought us to the knowledge of
the truth, we didn't value Christ. There was no way we could. We
didn't know him. But when the Lord showed us that we are sinners,
the Lord showed us that we needed a savior, and then showed us
Christ, gave us repentance and faith, we value the Lord Jesus
Christ, don't we? We do. We value his presence. We value his peace. We value
his grace and his mercy. Not everybody does that. Not
everybody can rejoice in the sovereignty of God and His sovereign
grace that saves sinners. In order for us to find this
wisdom, in order for us to have this grace and mercy bestowed,
God's gotta be the one to do it. God's gotta be the one to
do it. In order for us to get understanding, the Lord has to
give it. The Lord must cause it to be given. The Lord must
bestow it. Wisdom, I like, I was writing
this down and It's, last week we mentioned the scripture being
the written word of God, you have the living word, which is
the Lord Jesus Christ, the written word, and you have the spoken
word, and all those three are the Lord Jesus Christ, you can't
separate them. And it's the same with wisdom, wisdom's with him
to give to whom he will, but he is wisdom also, and these
things are too high for our minds, we don't understand that, but
it's true, he is wisdom. He's valued above all, he's priceless.
If you would have wisdom, if you would have peace, And I want
to say this to us because oftentimes we don't mention this, but if
you want the Lord Jesus Christ, if you want his wisdom, if you
want to be found in him, it will cost you. It will cost you. Now it's not for your salvation. That's not required in order
for you to be saved. It's not going to cost you. Christ
paid the debt that we could not pay. No, it'll, Men will not
come to Christ because they don't want to lose what they have.
They don't want to lose their righteousness. If you come to
Christ, if you want wisdom, if you want wisdom of Christ, it's
gonna cost you all of your self-righteousness. You can't have any of it. It's
gonna cost you all your glory. You can't have any more glory.
It's gonna cost you a new heart. He's gonna get rid of the stony
heart. You're gonna get a new heart. It's gonna cost. It costs. And what does it look like whenever
all that happens? Well, the Lord gives us love
one towards another. Somebody said, well, I don't love. Maybe I'm not a believer. Well,
the scripture says, you know, you've passed from death unto life because
you love the brethren. We have unity here in our church and
the love having our hearts knit together. We can't help but love
each other. It's going to cost you being
selfless, selfless. This is the beauty, the value
of wisdom, this is what it does. You can't have a little bit of
wisdom and then have Christ as your wisdom. You can't do it. Christ has to be all our wisdom.
You can't have a little bit of self-righteousness and have Christ
as your righteousness also. No, Christ has to be all of our
wisdom, all of our righteousness. You can't have progressive sanctification
where you're getting better and better and then Christ be your
sanctification. No, he has to be your sanctification
or you have none. And we can't have justification
because of what we do. Christ has to be our justification
freely by grace or we're not justified. You must come to Christ knowing
nothing. Save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
If you want to come to Christ, you have to come to Christ knowing
nothing. Save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
Well, I don't do this anymore, and I don't do that. It doesn't
matter. You have to come to Christ knowing nothing. Save Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. The truth of the matter, brethren, this value of wisdom that what
I'm trying to describe to us this evening is It's valued beyond
measure to the Lord's people, but nobody values wisdom because
they don't want it, because you have to deny yourself. You have
to deny yourself to have Christ. Now, he causes us to do that.
Now, I'm going to say this to preface everything else I'm going
to say and everything I have said. Everything God requires,
he provided and he gives to his people. So if the Lord's looking
to you to do something, he's the one that's going to cause
you to do it. He's the one that's gonna give you the faith to believe.
He's the one that's gonna give you the grace to perform it.
And he does, he does. Christ said this in Luke chapter
nine, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and
take up his cross daily and follow me. Whosoever will save his life
shall lose it, but whoso will lose his life for my name's sake,
the same shall save it. What does he mean by that? We're
not trying to hold on to life and hold on to the flesh and
hold on to the former things of self-righteousness, hold on
to the law with one hand and then hold on to the Lord with
the other hand. No, we come, we lose our life unto Him, don't
we? Paul said, well, I die daily. I die daily. Die to who? Die
to the Lord Jesus Christ. How do you do that? Looking to
Him through the eyes of faith. You deny yourself. You're not
looking to yourself anymore, saying, look at me and my righteousness,
look at me and my good works, look at me and what I have done
or have not done. No, we look to Christ. We lose
all glory coming to Christ. There's none left. He gets it
all. Self-denial is the gift of God, and it's contrary to
our flesh. And did you know it's impossible
to do in and of yourself, in and of myself? You know why?
Because we're creatures of pride. We're creatures of pride. We
always look out for old number one, don't we? That's just how
we are by nature. When's the last time somebody
cut us off in traffic and we said, thank you, Lord, for humbling
me right then? I wish we could do that more
often, don't you? That ain't what happens, though,
is it? Why? Pride. They got close to my car. They got in my lane to mine. Mine, me, me, me. That's what
we do. We don't like denying ourself. It's the gift of God. He creates a new heart in his
people. Gives us faith to look to Christ.
Causes us to cry out for mercy. Everything required he provides.
He provides and he causes us to deny ourself. Our self righteousness. We don't have any righteousness
anymore other than Christ. We don't have any hope outside
of him. This is why his wisdom is so valuable. It's priceless. It's priceless. You remember
the rich man that came to the Lord? He said, Lord, good master,
that's what he said, good master. What must I do to inherit eternal
life? There's a whole lot wrong with
that question, isn't there? Whole lot wrong. The man wanted
to know, give me something to do and I'll mark it down, I'll
check the list, I'll make sure it's done. First of all, the
Lord said, why callest thou me good? There's none good but God.
And then he tells him, go, or he says, you know the commandments,
is what he told him. And the man said, yeah, I know
the commandments. And the Lord began to quote them to him, all
the commandments. He said, all these, I've kept every one of
those from my youth up. No, you haven't. No, he didn't.
No, the Lord's standards are much higher than our standards.
If you hate your brother without a cause, the scripture says you're
a murderer. The scripture says you look upon a woman to lust
after her. You've already committed adultery. God's standard is much
higher than our standards. It's not what we do that makes
us sinners. It's what we are. It's what we
are, isn't it? And the man was told by the Lord after he said,
yeah, I've done all of those. I've marked every one of them
down. I've got that checked off. Now what else do I do? And the
Lord said, go and sell all you have. and distribute unto the
poor, and come and follow me." Come and follow me. And he went
away grieved, the scripture says, because he had much. Now, I understand
that he was a rich man, physically speaking, but this is a picture
here of a man with self-righteousness. This is a picture of somebody
being rich in themselves and in their own self-righteousness,
believing that there's something when they're not. Lord, what
must I do? You're gonna have to deny yourself and follow me. That's the only way you can come
to Christ is complete denial of yourself, no righteousness
whatsoever outside of him. And the man went away sorrowful
because he had much. He had much self-righteousness,
didn't he? And that's the problem with all men by nature is we
have much pride, much self-righteousness by nature. I didn't have to teach
my kids to be prideful. I didn't have to teach them to
not share. I have to teach them to share. They don't like sharing.
One of them, we drink it out of the other one's cup, and it's
a cat fight. There's no reason. It's their cup. You understand
what I'm saying? That's just how we are by nature, isn't it? No, you can't come to the Lord
with righteousness. It's not about me. It's about
him, isn't it? It's not about me anymore, it's
about him. Lord, give me Christ lest I die.
Don't leave me to myself. Lord, in my hand, no price I
bring. I have nothing to offer you. I would not dare offer you
anything because it would be trying to take the blood of Christ,
the place of it. Lord, don't let me offer anything.
Give me Christ. Men today don't want to give
up their own glory. They don't. They treat Christ
as a sports player. You've seen this before. The
quarterback of the team, the head guy, the captain, the leader,
he gets on the screen and he says, well, I couldn't have done
it without my linemen. I couldn't have done it without
my wide receivers. I couldn't have done it without my running back.
I couldn't have done it without all the other positions being done. And all
the team comes up and they hoist up the quarterback off the field
like he's, well, we couldn't have done it without him. He's
the best. And they act like that's how it is in salvation. Like
the Lord needs our help. He couldn't have done it without
him. He couldn't have done it without me and I couldn't have
done it without him. No, no. What does wisdom teach us? Christ
did it all. We didn't even have part in the
game. It wasn't a game, but you understand what I'm saying? We
didn't have part in the work of the cross. We didn't have
anything to do with it. The only thing that we contributed
was our sin, and we couldn't have put it there if we wanted
to. The Lord laid that upon him. The Lord did that. Everything
required the Lord Jesus Christ accomplished for the salvation
of his people. Men that come to the Lord, that
way that I just described, they never realize they're devaluing
the wisdom of God. They're devaluing the blood of
Christ. They're saying we have to add
something to it. But God said, this is my beloved
son in whom I am well pleased. The Lord's not pleased with you
and I. The Lord's pleased with Christ, and we have to be found
in him. If we come seeking self-promotion
or some glory, then we're not seeking the Lord. and to salvation,
it's that simple. Turn with me to Mark chapter
10. Mark chapter 10, look at verse
28. Men don't want to give up their glory. They
don't want to give up their self-righteousness. They don't want to give up their
pride. And that's what keeps men from Christ is their pride. If
anybody wanted to be saved, Lord would save them. That's what
scripture says. Ask and you shall receive. This
is a whosoever will salvation, but the will has to be given
to desire Christ, doesn't it? Lord has to do all of it. He
has to do all of it. Mark chapter 10 verse 28 says
this, began to say unto him, Lo, talking
to the Lord, Lo, we have left all and have followed thee. And
Jesus answered and said, Verily I say unto you, there is no man
that hath left house or brethren or sisters or father or mother
or wife or children or lands for my sake in the gospels. But
he shall receive a hundredfold now in this time, houses and
brethren and sisters, mothers and children and lands with persecutions. And in the world to come, Eternal
life in the world to come. Eternal life. But many that are
first shall be last in the last. First. Now. There is going to come time in
your life times. It's happened in my life already
that the Lord creates division with family members with loved
ones and it's over the gospel and the Lord causes those divisions
to take place. In order to keep us looking under
him. In order to keep up, it hurts.
It hurts, it's painful because you love more now than you've
ever loved because you're in Christ. The Lord gives you more
love. But the Lord's telling us here, if you lose family,
you lose houses, anything you lose, you're gonna get it a hundredfold
back. And is it not true that if I needed a bed to sleep tonight,
I could call one of you and you'd let me sleep in your bed? Maybe
not yours, but on the couch at least, right? Isn't that what
he's talking about here? The land that you have, you needed
my land, you needed, that's what we have in each other. This is
what we've gained. Now I talked about what it costs
to come to Christ, which, and we understand what I mean by
that statement is that we lose all self-righteousness, we lose
all pride, we lose all glory. But what do we gain in this wisdom
that's so valuable? We gain brothers and sisters
and fathers and mothers and children. We gain infinitely more, and
we're gonna be in eternity forever. All we see down here is just
the temporary, and our heart grieves because it's temporary.
My hope is that we're all in eternity together forever. That's
my hope, every one of us. Rejoicing forever with all peace
and joy unto Christ. That's what we've gained in him,
eternal life. That's what he said, you're gonna
gain all this in this life, and in the world to come, eternal
life. Now how are we gonna put a price
on eternal life? I can tell you what it cost. It cost the Lord
Jesus Christ his life. It cost him his blood. It did,
he had to be made a sacrifice for our sin in order for you
and I to be made the righteousness of God in him. But you can't,
it's invaluable, it's immeasurable how glorious it is. Someone told me recently that
if, and I may have mentioned this to us before, so if I've
used this, then forgive me, but someone looked at me and said,
if I believe what you preach, talking about our church, if
I believe what you all preach, they said I would be condemning
my family to hell. That was their words. And to
me, that told me they do not value wisdom. They do not value
the truth. Because damnation or eternal
life of anyone is not up to us. What we believe doesn't determine
something, does it? No. I want to know the truth.
I want to believe the truth. But that doesn't make it the
truth, does it? Me believing in this gospel, you believing
in this gospel doesn't save or damn anybody. You believed it
because you've been saved and the Lord's called you. That's
the result of that. But what the Lord does That's
what he, he's sovereign. He has the right to do that,
which he will. The Lord calls us to believe the truth. And
that's the hard part is sometimes we see our, our loved ones that
won't believe and they, they make a fist at us and they become
angry or hostile towards us over this gospel. And it, it just
grieves us. What did the Lord say? You're
going to get all of it back in this life and in the life to
come eternal life, the life to come eternal life. Truly men saying that if I believe
what you believe, it would just condemn my family. That's just
another excuse to not come to Christ. That's just pride talking.
That's just pride talking devaluing the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, he
must be valued and he is by his people. We value him. He's the
most valuable. I had written down. I was trying to figure out what
word to put after the word valuable. The most valuable man, the most
valuable thing. I just said he's just the most
valuable. Sometimes there's not an exact
word to describe him, is there? He's the most valuable to us. He's the most precious. The only
way that we'll value him is by grace through faith. And you
know what it says? It's not of yourself. You didn't
value him. He said, you loved me because
I first loved you. We value him because he first
valued us. Is that not true? And sent his
son to be a propitiation. Where is boasting then? Where's
pride then? It's excluded. There is no pride
in believing this gospel. There is no boasting in believing
this gospel. This one thing I know, whereas I was blind, now I see,
he did it. He did it. I didn't do anything. He did
it all. And let's go back to Proverbs chapter three. And we'll go down through these
verses here. Look in verse 15. She is more precious. Wisdom
is more precious than rubies. And all the things thou canst
desire are not to be compared unto her. Nothing can compare
to the Lord Jesus Christ. Nothing can compare. He says
it's not to be compared. What are you gonna compare the
Lord Jesus Christ to? There's nothing to compare him
to. If you want Christ, come to him. Deny yourself. If you
see him as valuable, come to him through eyes of faith, begging
him, Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. And he said, I'll
in no wise cast you out. I'll in no wise cast you out.
Look at verse 16, length of days is in her right hand and her
left hand, riches and honor. That length of days, you can't
get lengthier days in eternal life, can you? Length of days,
eternal life. One endless day, length of days.
How far is that gonna stretch? It's forever. That's length of
days, isn't it? That's in his right hand. And
in his left, what does it say? Riches and honor. Oh, we can't
put a price on the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's nothing
richer to the believer than knowing that your sins are put away by
his precious blood. There's nothing richer than that,
is there? There's nothing richer than the milk and the honey of
his word and the love that he's shed on our hearts for him and
his gospel. That's riches, isn't it? Beyond
measure. Beyond measure. None is richer
than the elect of God who has Christ as their portion. The
Lord's given you Christ as your portion, you're rich. You're
rich, you don't need anything. Did you know that? If Christ
is your portion, you don't need anything because he promised
to give you everything. He promised to give you exactly
what you need. No one is more rich than those
who Christ died for, covered by his precious blood. Do you
know why? We have peace with God. The sword of justice is
not demanding justice any longer. Judgment has been executed. Sin
has been dealt with. Payment in full. We have peace
with God. We can approach the very throne
of grace to obtain mercy and find grace to help in the time
of need. We can enter into the throne room, pleading the blood
of Christ, and he hears our cry. And the scepter raises for his
people. The scepter always raises for
his people. And we hear the words, peace be unto you because of
what Christ has done. Oh, we can't put a price on that,
can we? No, this is the value of wisdom. Now, none can have peace unless
they have the Prince of Peace, the Prince of Peace, the Lord
Jesus Christ. He is our peace. He is the pearl of great price.
He is the hidden treasure of God given to his people. His
ways, what does it say next? His ways are pleasantness. Verse
17. His ways are pleasantness, ways
of pleasantness, and all our paths are peace. He's made peace
by his own blood, shed for his people. In his right hand and
his left hand, brethren, he was pierced through on the cross
of Calvary in order for him to have in his right hand and his
left hand length of days, which is eternal
life, and riches and honor to give to his people. That's what
happened. He had to have his hands pierced
in order to have that give to us. Sword of justice pierced his
heart. Now his hands are eternal life and all glory and honor.
We want that glory and honor to be in his hands, don't we?
We don't want it. Not for ourself. We want to be glorified, but
that means just made like him. We desire that. Listen to what
1st John 2.25 tells us. This is the promise that he hath
promised us, even eternal life. God promised eternal life to
his people before time ever began, and he cannot lie. He cannot
lie. His people have been justified.
Titus 3.7 says that being justified by his grace. I love that word
grace, don't you? When you come to the knowledge
of what grace really means, oh, it becomes increasingly beautiful
every day, saved by grace alone, not by works of righteousness,
which we have done, but according to his mercy, all because of
his grace, he saved us. And he justified us by his grace.
We should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
That's why he says, happy is the man that findeth wisdom. Happy is the man that findeth
the Lord Jesus Christ. There's a way that seemeth right
unto man, but the end thereof, the ways of death. No, our Lord's
ways, they're not our ways. His thoughts are not our thoughts,
but we don't think like we used to think. We just say truth,
Lord, you're right. You're right. Give me Christ,
our wisdom. Verse 17 tells us her ways are
ways of pleasantness and all her paths are peace. His ways
are pleasantness and the path of peace. There's only one path.
There's a way that seemeth right unto man, but the end thereof,
the ways of death. But if you want peace with God,
you've got to come to Christ. You've got to come to Christ.
There's no peace outside of Him. Thank God everything He required,
He provided in His Son for us, everything. He didn't leave anything
open-ended. I had a rope the other day. The
end of it was coming undone a little bit. I thought, well, that's
just a little undone. It'll be okay. Well, I kept working with that
rope. And before you know it, the whole thing came apart. The
Lord didn't leave a little sliver of the rope undone for me and
you to tie it or fix it. It's all done. It's not going
to come undone. It's fixed. The Lord successfully
redeemed his people. We can't mess it up. We can't
mess it up. Everything required, he provided,
even the ability to deny oneself. He did that by grace also, didn't
he? Grace through faith. Philippians 1.6 says, being confident
of this very thing, he that begun a good work in you will perform
it until the day of Jesus Christ. He began the work. He will perform
the work until the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. I can rest in that, can't you?
He begun it, he'll finish it, he'll do it, he'll perform it.
Wisdom declares that it's not our performance, but it's what
he performed on the cross of Calvary. This is why he, and
the next verse tells us, this is why he's a tree of life to
them that lay hold upon him. Paul said those words, lay hold
of eternal life, or maybe it was Peter. One of them said,
lay hold of eternal life. You and I lay hold of eternal
life. Did you know that? But when we cling to Christ,
that's exactly what we're doing. He is life eternal. When you
come to him through eyes of faith and you cling to him, it's not
a cling like, Lord, I need your I need your assistance. No, it's
like a little baby that comes up that needs to be scooped up
and held. We cling to him because he's clinging to us. It's not
that we're hanging on to him. He's the one hanging on to us,
but we do cling to him, don't we? We do. We lay hold upon wisdom. This is why he's the tree of
life to his people. His fruit satisfies our hungry soul, doesn't
it? The shade of his grace, the shade of his wing covers us,
covers us, we're satisfied. Verse 18, she is a tree of life
to them that lay hold upon her, and happy is everyone that retaineth
her. That word lay hold of means to cling, to cling to him. You remember being little and
clinging to mom and dad? There was times, you know, you
would be frightened or even those you have children, they'll be
frightened and they cling hold of you because they're afraid. They need protection. They need
your safety to them. You're safe to them. That's exactly
what it's like when we come to Christ. We cling unto him because
he is our safety, our refuge. Our help, our strength, we have
no strength. Our wisdom, he's everything to
us. He's everything to us. Revelation 22 too says this,
in the midst of the street of the city, talking about glory,
on either side of the river, there was a tree of life which
bared 12 men or fruits and yielded her fruit every month. And the
leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. Every
fruit you will ever need is in the Lord Jesus Christ. Every
fruit that 12, you know, that's the number that represents the
children of Israel. That's that means that it's a fruit for every
one of his people. That's what that means. Every
one of them. We just taste and see that the Lord is good. It's
that life giving sustenance, it's his precious blood, it's
his body broken. By grace. He makes his people
like a tree planted by the rivers of water that bring forth fruit
in his season. His leaf shall not wither and
whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. How is it that we're a tree and
he's a tree because we're in him? We're in him, producing
his fruit. That's exactly what it's like.
This is the value of wisdom. Therefore, he says, the very
beginning of this, happy is the man that findeth wisdom. Happy
is the man that findeth. This is the value of wisdom.
It's the value of it. Everything I've described is
the value. You can't put a price on it, but that's how valuable
it is. Happy is the man. Happy is everyone
that retaineth the Lord Jesus Christ. If you retain him, it's
because he's, I thought of a vessel, you know, they talked about,
Jeremiah talked about, my people have committed two evils. They've
forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and they've hewed
them out cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. A cistern
collects rainwater. Well, if it can't hold water,
it means it's broken. If you and I can retain the fountain
of living water, you know what that means? Number one, he's
made us a vessel under honor, but he had to patch up all the
holes. He had to fix us, because we're born broken. That's exactly
what he does. That's the only reason. Somebody
says, I've retained the Lord because I did this. No, you retained
him because he patched you up. That's exactly right. He did
the patching. He fixed it, fixed all the broken
for every one of his people. If you need fixing, come to Christ.
If you need fixing, come to Christ. If you need wisdom, come to Christ.
Deny yourself, come to Christ. Let's pray. Father, cause us
to come to you, cause us to believe, cause us to value you more and
more. Thank you. In Christ's name, amen.