One of the apostles said something about being always
ready, being always ready to give an
answer to anyone, always ready to give an answer
to anyone who asks you. a reason for the hope that's
in you. But there's a hope in me, and
there's a hope which I boldly and plainly declare to you. And
that hope is in the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. I'm confident
of it. I'm resting in And I'd like very
much for you to come to rest in it. So I'm going to try to
deal with five or six questions tonight, and answer those questions
as candidly and plainly, clearly as I can, and briefly, I trust. And these are the questions that
come to my mind when I think of this subject of the gospel. The first question is this, where
did this gospel come from? Where'd this gospel, this good
news, this glad tidings, where'd it come from? And then the second
question that I hope to deal with is just exactly what is
this gospel? Everybody talks about the gospel.
Is anyone taking the time to tell you what that gospel really
is? Do you know? And then the third
question I'm going to deal with is this, what is it What is it? Exactly what is it? To believe
the gospel. Believe the gospel. Just now,
what are you talking about? You say, he that believeth hath
life. Well, what is it to believe?
And then the fourth question is this, what is my foundation
or my warrant for believing the gospel? You tell me to believe
the gospel and I'll be saved? On what authority? Pretty good
question. On what authority? On whose authority
do you promise such blessings for a man believing? And then
the fifth question is this. A word I found in the book that
we have in the library now, or in the bookstore, that Paul Edwards
suggested that I read. for Mr. Bonar, The Life of Faith.
What are the privileges of believing this gospel? There's some privileges,
two in particular, that come from believing this gospel. And
then the sixth question, if you can believe it's possible for
me to get to six questions, and I'm going to do it, God willing. And one time a friend of mine
said this, he said, a friend of mine in West Virginia, he
said he was in the office of a lawyer up in Huntington, and
somehow the matter of church came up some way in the conversation,
and the lawyer asked him, said, well just where is it you go
to church? And the friend of mine replied, I go to 13th Street
Baptist Church in Ashland, Kentucky, where Pastor Mahan preaches.
And the lawyer said, Oh, I've heard him on television a number
of times. I've heard him on television
a number of times. Then he paid me a supremely high compliment. But he told the truth, half of
it anyway. He said, If I believed in my
clients like that man believes in his gospel, I'd never lose
a case. I hope I come over that way.
I believe this gospel. And the question is, how do you
know that your gospel, how do I know that my gospel is the
gospel? Now, Paul said there's just one,
one gospel. If a man preaches any other gospel,
Paul said, let God damn him. That's how strong he spoke. That's
exactly what he said, let him be accursed. He said, I'll say
it again. If any man preach any other gospel
than the gospel I preach, let God damn him." That's what Paul
said. He wrote under divine inspiration.
All right, here are the questions. Now, let's see if we can handle
them, and I wouldn't object if you took some of these things
down, but the first question is this. Where'd this gospel
come from? Well, turn to Galatians 1. In
Galatians 1, now, Paul writing in Romans 1, while you're turning
to Galatians 1, said this, that I'm separated to the gospel of
God. It's God's gospel. It's God's
gospel. That's whose gospel it is. It
originated with God. But here in Galatians 1, verse
10, the apostle Paul said, For do I now persuade men, or God? Do I seek the favor of men, or
God? Whose favor am I seeking? Do I seek to please men? If I yet pleased men, I should
not be the servant of Christ. If my goal and end and objective
is just to get along with people and make them happy and please
them, I wouldn't be the servant of Christ. But I certify you,
and that's as close as Paul comes to swearing, I certify you, brethren,
that the gospel which was preached of me is not after man. It's God's gospel. I'll give
you several reasons why this gospel that we preach is not
after man, it's not of man, it's not from man. And there's several
reasons for that. The first of which is this. This
gospel of Jesus Christ, this gospel of redemption, is an everlasting
gospel. Christ is the Lamb slain from
the foundation of the world. The covenant of grace is an everlasting
covenant. Our Lord is called the surety
of an everlasting covenant. His blood is the blood of an
everlasting covenant. The question is this, where were
men when God purposed to save sinners through a crucified Redeemer? This is an everlasting gospel.
Therefore, man could have nothing to do with this gospel, either
its planning or its purpose or the conception of it. This gospel
was conceived in the heart and mind of God. It's an everlasting
gospel. Here's another reason why it's
of God and not of men, and that is it's an unchangeable gospel.
Our God said Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
I am the Lord, I change not. If this gospel came from the
flesh or had anything to do with the flesh, it would have to change
because you and I are continually changing. Oh, what changeable
creatures we are. We try something a while, we
get weary of that, and we try something else. We give ourselves
to this, get weary of that, and try something else. We start
out this way. A man and his wife can't even
build a house without changing the plans before it's finished.
I have a friend who builds houses, and I said to him, I said, which
would you rather do, just buy a piece of land and build a house
and sell it? Or do you rather contract it
and build it for people?" He said, well, I don't like to do
that. He said, you lay the foundation, they start changing right away.
And before you finish it and turn the key over to them, they've
changed a half a dozen things. So this gospel is an everlasting
gospel. It's an unchanging gospel. And the third reason why it cannot
be of men is this. It's totally opposed to human
pride. Man could have nothing to do
with this gospel because it absolutely gives him no glory. I tell you,
we're creatures that seek our own glory. Man loves the preeminence. He loves recognition. He loves
praise. That's one thing that makes our
work so contaminated before God is it's so full of S-E-L-F, self. Mine and yours too, self, self. And this gospel is opposed to
human pride. Who made you to differ, he said?
Where is boasting? It's excluded. By what works?
By what law? The law of works? No, by the
law of grace and faith. I'll tell you another reason why this
gospel has nothing to do with the flesh and came not from the
flesh is this. It's opposed not only to human
pride, but it's opposed to human works. The scripture says it's
without works. And I guarantee you any man-made
religion always has some kind of reward connected with it.
If you'll do this, God will do that. But this gospel is totally
free. Now here quickly is another reason
why our gospel originated only with God, and man had nothing
to do with it, is this. Now listen carefully. This gospel
gives sin absolutely no quarter. It gives sin absolutely no quarter. What are you talking about, Preacher?
I'm saying this, the flesh always minimizes sin, particularly our
own. The flesh always excuses sin. The flesh somehow will make allowance
for sin. But the live God and the justice
of God and the character of God in no way makes any allowance
for sin or gives sin any quarter. This gospel says the soul that
sinneth, it'll die, and die it shall. And die it shall. God will by
no means clear the guilty. Sin will and must be punished. And God in this gospel fully
deals with every sin. without easing up any way, without
giving sin any quarter. In other words, God takes all
sin, be it the greatest sin or the least sin, if sin can be
described that way at all, and deals with it totally and completely. This gospel gives sin no quarter. And if man had anything to do
with it, it'd make allowance for somebody's father or somebody's
mother or somebody's baby. That's right. somebody's kinfolks
or some dear beloved leader. It's like here's an enigma is
one of our most beloved presidents is Abraham Lincoln. He is a man who is so great,
so commendable, so steadfast, so capable, dedicated to freeing
men from slavery, saving the Union, and a man who spoke so
highly of various things, but I tell you this, if he knows
not Christ, he's lost. He's lost. And if some of the
things he said give indication of the foundation of his faith,
then regardless of his Integrity and dedication, he's a lost man,
Ron. He said this himself, all that
I am, I owe to my mother. That's right. And this is what I'm saying,
and if this thing of salvation was left up to you and me, we'd
make room for folks like that. Yeah, we would. We'd make room
for folks like that. Because we just aren't holy like
God is. Our law is, it can be bent. But God's law cannot be bent.
And that's the reason I know this gospel. Man didn't have
anything to do with this gospel. Nothing. Because the character
and holiness and justice and law of God cannot even be shadowed,
let alone twisted or beamed. It can't even be—it's not flexible. It gives sin no quarter. I don't
care where sin is found—watch it—even when sin is found on
Christ. Damnation. See what I'm talking
about now? Even when it's found—I don't care if it's found in Mr.
Lincoln or Mr. Hitler. That's right. You say, you can't compare Hitler
with Lincoln. I can't in this matter of sin. People go to the same heaven
by Christ or the same hell without Christ. And that, you see, that causes
us difficulty. We can't handle that. That's
the reason I know you didn't invent the gospel. Because you
can't handle that one point right there. You can't handle it. Tell
me my mother's in hell, and I wouldn't tell you that, because I don't
know. But I do know she didn't know Christ, she's in hell. Because
God will not bend His law. Now you've got to, and that's
the reason this, the gospel of works, you invented, we invented
it. The gospel of denominationalism,
we invented that. The gospel of walk the isle and
shake the hand and do the best you can or see you in the promised
land, that came straight off our planting table. But that
gospel that gives sin no quarter wherever it's found, that gospel
that will not compromise with any man wherever sin is found,
that gospel that condemns and damns and dooms and destroys
the sinner, who has no mediator and no substitute and no savior
is God's gospel. That's God's gospel. Thank God
we got a savior. And one reason I said this morning,
why do people try another way when this way is so free, so
full, so complete, so fitting, so useful, so applicable? to me. Why would we try another
way? Here's another reason why this
gospel is not of men, is it fits the chief of sinners, suitable
to the chief of sinners. It's the gospel to the poor.
Somewhere in man's gospel there's always a reward for somebody
giving or doing. I don't care where you find man,
you just examine all of the plans of salvation with which men which
men preach or they come up with, and you'll find that somewhere
there's allowance made for reward for somebody doing something. But this gospel of mine, at this
any given moment, can save a thief on the cross. This gospel I preach,
this gospel of God, can at any given moment save any sinner
anywhere to the uttermost. In fact, that thief on the cross,
that dying thief to whom our Lord said today, shalt thou be
with me in paradise, he couldn't walk for Jesus. No reward there. His feet were
nailed to a tree. He couldn't wash. He couldn't
come to your washings or baptisms or ordinances. He was nailed
to a tree. He couldn't work. He couldn't
serve on the board. He couldn't witness. Because
his tongue was cleaving to the roof of his mouth, all he could
cry was, Lord, remember me! And he couldn't wait on you to
have a board of elders, and see if he had a proper experience. That's not man's gospel. That
is not man's gospel. But that's my gospel. It came
from God. It's everlasting. It's unchanging. It's opposed to human pride.
It gives God all the glory. It makes no allowance for human
works. It's by grace alone. Grace alone. It gives sin no quarter. God
doesn't explain away any of His people's sins. He meets them
in justice. We read a scripture in there
tonight. Charlie read this. Turn to Psalm 62. I got a question
for you. Psalm 62, verse 12. It wasn't
any use me asking Charlie this question, and the men in there,
they knew the answer. I'm going to ask you this question
in Psalm 62, 12. Psalm 62, 12. Charlie closed with this verse.
Also unto thee, O Lord, belongeth mercy that thou rendest to every
man according to his Now you just pray, tell me how God can
show me mercy and at the same time render to me exactly what
I deserve. When you find that out, you'll
know the gospel. God's going to deal with us,
save us, justly. You know how God can render me
according to my works? I kept His law perfectly in Christ. And he's going to give me just
what I deserve. I deserve heaven. I deserve it. In Christ I do. He's going to reward the unbeliever
for his works. And he's going to reward the
believer for Christ's works because the believer's in Christ. You
see that? That's how God can be merciful
and give me just what I deserve. He's going to judge every man
according to his works. That's when you don't want to
stand in your works. You want to stand in the works of Christ.
All right, the second question now is this. What is this gospel? Turn to Acts 13. Now, last night,
someone called me on the telephone, and they said, what are you doing?
It's Scott Richardson, that's who it was. He said, what are
you doing? I said, preaching to darlings. And I was. I was sitting in the
den, because I'd found this scripture here, and I couldn't hold it.
Go in there and sit down and preach it to her before I brought
it to you. But I want you to watch. Here's Paul preaching
at Antioch in Acts 13. And here's my gospel. I tell
you, I wish one of the preachers in the congregation would take
this and just preach a whole message on Acts 13 beginning
with verse 38. Now look at it. Be it known unto
you therefore, men and brethren, men of all nations, of all tribes,
of all people, kindreds, tribes unto heaven. Men and brethren.
Somebody said to Scott one time, I heard you call this man brother.
Said, how do you know he's your brother? Well, Scott said, if
I don't get him in Christ, I'll get him in Adam. We're brothers
somewhere. That's Paul saying, men and brethren. If you're not my brother, soul
brother, then you're my flesh brother, because we came from
the same root. Every one of you. Listen to me, he said, men and
brethren. through this man. What man? Paul talks about in Hebrews 2,
the God-man. Every priest standeth daily,
offering oft times the same sacrifices which can never take away sin,
but this man. Pilate stood one day before that
multitude and brought out Jesus Christ, his hands bound and shackled,
a crown of thorns pressed into his brow, and blood dripping
on the ground, his back lacerated from the cat of nine tails, There
he stood before that crowd. They plucked out his beard and
spit in his face, and Pilate looked at the people and then
pointed to Christ and said, Behold, the devil! That's the man I'm
talking about. Born of woman. The God-man. God in human flesh. The holy
man. The perfect man. And he tells
you, he says, I say, men in Bradman, through this man, through this
God-man, this perfect man, this holy man, through this man, is
preached to you. We're not bargaining with you.
We're preaching to you. We're not bargaining with you.
We're not drawing up some kind of agreement. We're just proclaiming
the gospel. We're not explaining. We're proclaiming,
preaching to you that through this man, is the forgiveness
of sins. That's where it is. It's not
in the water, nor in the wine. It's not in your works, nor your
profession. It's not in the law. The forgiveness
of sin, the remission of sins, the pardon of sin, the putting
away of sin, is through this man. Through his obedience and
through his death. through His life and through
His suffering, through the shedding of His blood. That's what I'm
saying to you, verse 39. And by Him, and by Him, for the
heavenly Father hath ordained Him, and anointed Him, and given
all authority into His hands. By Him, all that believe, A-L-L,
all that believe, all who can believe, all who have the gift
of faith, all who believe are justified. acquitted, freed,
not guilty. They're justified from all things. Brother May, and I tell you,
if you just knew my life, it doesn't matter. I don't need
to know your life. I know mine. And you were hatched
from the same egg, dug out of the same pit, and came from the
same father. And our lives are just alike.
We've taken the same course. Oh, you haven't walked the course
I have? Yeah. Oh, we like sheep have gone astray. We all went
the same way, away from God. Oh, if you just knew what I am
in thought and deed and the company I keep and the things I say and
the language I use and the booze I've drunk and all this, if you
just knew. Let me tell you, my gospel is
the gospel for the chief of sinners. My Lord can save to the uttermost,
to the guttermost, them that come to God by Him. There's no
sinner who has gone so far. My Lord can't bring him back.
There's none that's gone so deep. My Lord can't raise him from
the dunghill and sit him on the throne. There's no sinner so
covered with black, slimy filth of sin that my Lord's blood won't
wash him as white as the snow. In fact, He delights to save
sinners. He gets his greatest glory from
saving sinners. And to whom he forgives the most,
that God loves him the most. I'm telling you, he said, folks,
I'm preaching this to you, that through this man, Jesus Christ,
he's no little Savior. He's no small Savior. He's a
great Savior. He's able to do spiritually what
he did materially in creating the world. He can create a new
creature. He's the one who said, let there
be light, split the darkness with light, and he's the one
that can give you light. I'm preaching that by him, through
him, because of him, all that believe are totally justified
from all things. Is that clear enough? See those
two? All that believe. Do you believe? Do you believe? Do you believe? All that believe. I don't care who you are, where
you are, where you came from, what your background is. You're
justified from everything. Not guilty. Acquitted. Set free. Pardoned. God said, I'll bring
it up no more. I'm not going to make you. Now,
your friends will bring it up, but He won't. People will bring it
up. They won't ever let you forget
it. Never! But God won't bring it up. Because
you're justified. And through Him you're justified
from those things, look at that last line, from which you can't
be justified by the law. Like Brother Gary said the other
day, he met that man and said he was living by the big ten.
That's not the football conference, that's the Ten Commandments he's
talking about. I live by the Big Ten. Well, I tell you, my
Lord can justify you from all things from which the Big Ten
can't justify you. All the Big Ten can do is damn
you, condemn you, and show you what you are. He can justify
it. Is that clear? Well, what's it going to cost
me? Well, when the port's open, it'll cost you everything, but
it'll be worth it. But right now, it's just to believe.
But I tell you, once you believe and know Him and love Him, you
want Him to have everything. You want Him to have you. That's
right. Well, here's the next question.
What is it to believe? All right, I'm with you so far,
preacher. This gospel is the gospel of God, the everlasting
gospel, unchanging gospel, a gospel that gives sin no quarter, deals
with it even in His Son. And it's the gospel of free grace.
What is it to believe? Well, you see, all that we believe
relates to a person. Saving faith always relates to
a person. The person and work of Christ.
You see, faith got to have an object. And the object of saving
faith is Christ alone. That's what saving faith is.
He that believeth on the Son. He that believeth on the Son
of God. He that seeth the Son, and believeth
on him. I believe that Jesus Christ is
the Son of God. He that hath the Son of God hath
life. So all of this saving faith has
to do with a person. And it's not believing in me.
It's not believing in the Baptist Church. It's having no confidence
in the flesh, but confidence in Christ. That's what it is.
And let me give you this briefly. What do you preach or what do
you believe about Jesus Christ that gives you the confidence
you have of an eternal hope? Well, I believe, first of all,
that He's the Son of God. I believe Jesus Christ is the
Son of God. I believe He is from the beginning.
I believe He is the beginning. I believe He was with God and
was God, and all things were made by Him. I have total confidence
in the great fact that Jesus of Nazareth is God incarnate. I believe that one hundred percent. I believe that. I know God has
revealed Himself in Christ. Secondly, I believe He's not
only the Son of God, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity,
The Lord our God is one God. Now, don't have any trouble with
that. Please don't have any trouble with the Trinity. Don't try to
answer those questions. Wait till you get the glory,
and God will reveal all these things to you. But the Lord our
God is one God. And they said to the Lord Jesus,
show us the Father. He said, he that has seen me
has seen the Father. He's called the everlasting Father. He's
called the Prince of Peace. But secondly, I believe He's
the Son of Man. He's Jesus, Son of Mary. He is God as if He had never
left the bosom of the Father. But He is so completely and totally
a man, having the nature of men. He is the man Christ Jesus as
if He were not God, He's so totally man. I can't explain that, but
I know it's so. Because in order to be our representative
and our federal head, he had to be so identified and numbered
with us that all that was required of us was met in him, and through
him, and by him. He's a man. And he dealt with
these things not as God, but as a man. That's right. He's man. He's the God man. And thirdly, I believe that Jesus
Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ, Jesus of Nazareth, is the Lord
our righteousness. Now, you see, we ask this question
continually, and I want you to listen to it one more time. How
good does a man have to be to go to heaven? Just how good?
Well, according to the Scriptures, he has to be as good as God.
Did you know that? As perfect as God. Heaven is
a holy place for holy people. To stand in God's presence, we
have to have clean hands and pure heart, and never lift our
soul to vanity. Well, you say, that's a righteousness
I don't have and can't attain. That's right. With men, salvation's
impossible. But now there's a righteousness
of God provided and manifested without the works. It's the righteousness
of God, which is by the faith of Christ Jesus. So therefore,
this man, Jesus Christ, who in the flesh fulfilled every need
of the sinner and every requirement of God, he himself is our righteousness. And we're made righteous in Him.
That's right. We have a perfect righteousness
in Christ. Is that clear? And not only do
we have a righteousness, not only is He the Lord our righteousness,
the Lord our holiness, the Lord our sanctification, the Lord
our acceptance, but He's the Lord our justifier. I told you
about it this morning. That sin offering, that blood
that was put on the mercy seat, the blood of Christ was put on
the mercy seat of glory. That's the only reason God could
tear the veil in two and tell you to come on into the holiest
place of all, because the blood has been shed. Redemption and
atonement has been accomplished. What I believe about Jesus Christ,
I believe He's not only my righteousness and my justifier, I believe He's
my mediator and my great high priest. And as my representative
and the representative of all who believe, he has, as a man,
already entered into and occupied glory for us. There's a sense
in which we're already there, because our Lord's there. That's
what I believe about Jesus Christ. And the fourth question is this.
By what authority, or it turned to 1 John By what authority do
you preach that to us? And by what authority do you
offer us such blessings for such, for just believing? You know
what the warrant of faith is? The warrant of faith is not experience. It's not experience. It's not
feeling. It's not even election. Listen, this is His commandment,
that we should believe on the name of His Son. That's the warrant
of faith, the Word of God. The Word of God. That's the reason
I can stand here and say to you, I don't care where you came from,
I don't care how you got in here, I don't care for what purpose
you came in here. It doesn't matter to me what
your background is, what your religious background or heathen
background. If the Spirit of God has given
you an interest in God and an interest in salvation and an
interest in life and an interest in glory and an interest in God's
mercy, I'll tell you this. If you can, with eyes of faith,
look to Christ. Now look away from yourself and
preachers and everything you've ever heard, read, thought, or
studied. Just forget them. Forget them. Turn from your idols, religious
and otherwise, and just slip to Christ, and see Him as the
surety, as the eternal Savior, as the incarnate Savior, as the
righteous, obedient Savior, as the crucified Justifier, as the
risen, exalted, enthroned Mediator. If you can look, you're living. I promise you that. How can you
promise me that? This is His commandment, that
you believe on the name of His Son. God's ordered you to believe
on His Son. There it is. Gospel's no bare invitation.
Gospel's no bare invitation. He didn't say, and this is God's
invitation, that you believe on Jesus. This is God's commandment.
And I'll tell you what God commands me to do, I can do. Lazarus,
come out of there. I tell you, he came out. Zacchaeus,
come down. Matthew, follow me. To the man with a withered hand,
stretch out your hand. To the man on the bed of affliction,
take up your bed and walk. And I'll tell you, when my Lord
gives an order, it'll be obeyed. That's right. And He commands you to believe.
Told that man, stretch out your hand. May I? With the command
comes the permission. That's what I'm saying. You don't
need to fear the law. He satisfied it. Well, I'd come
to Christ, but I tell you, I just don't think I can live up to
the law. I don't think you can either. I wouldn't have told
you to come. That's the reason I'm coming
to Christ, because I can't do that. If I could do that, I wouldn't
need Jesus. You don't need to fear the curse
of the law. He bore it. You don't need to stand in fear
of the wrath of God. He died under it. You don't need
to try to establish a righteousness of your own. We have one in Christ. Spurgeon said this. I jotted
it down. I read it the other night. The
more spiritual a man is, the more unspiritual he feels. You
think that's so? The more spiritual a man is,
the more unspiritual he sees himself. And the more a man repents,
the more he feels his need to repent. He said one time, he said, it
may be that when you feel the closest to God, you're perhaps
the farthest away. And it may be when you feel that
you're the most unworthy creature God ever let live, it may be
at that point you're nearest to God you've ever been. For
He delights to show mercy. That's right. Mr. Bonar said, thirdly, there are
two privileges of faith that few people, you remember reading
this, have ever laid hold of. Two privileges that few people
have ever laid hold of. It's theirs. But a lot of us,
myself included, not preaching down to you now, but there are
a lot of the treasures that we don't quite realize or enter
into because of, I guess, a lot of reasons. But here are the
privileges of faith. One is safety, and the other
is happiness. Now listen to me. Now listen
to me. If I have believed, as he said, And he said, he that
believeth, he said, as Moses lifted up the serpent of the
wilderness, even so much the Son of Man be lifted up, that
whosoever believeth on him will never perish, but have everlasting
life. God so loved the world, he gave
his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should never
perish, but have everlasting life. If that's true, I'll never
perish. Well, you say it's true. Then
I'm as safe as the Son of God. Is that right? Is that right? You know that's
right. God can't lie. And he didn't say, believe and
hold out. He said, believe. All right,
here's the second thing. Now, if I believe, I'm secure.
That's correct, and I'm safe. Secondly, then if I believe,
why am I not happy and at rest in Christ? That's right. If my inheritance
is mine, why don't I enter into it? Those are the privileges of faith,
safety and happiness. No, I tell you, we run around
and we, you know, we think, well, boy, you know, am I really a
Christian? Well, you know, if you get to
gauging your safety, on your works, then you're unsafe, you're
in trouble. You're in trouble. All right?
If you try to base your rest and peace on your works, you're
in trouble also. Is that not right? So my safety
is Christ, and my happiness and peace is Christ. That's where
I've got to come. Got to come to that most difficult
place that only God can bring me, and that's to the place where
I rest in Christ. I don't care whether I'm on a
mountain or in the valley, what the condition is, my hope is
built on nothing less than Jesus' blood and his righteousness.
That's where you have to be. Now, the last question. How do
you know your gospel is the gospel of God? Well, I know it for several
reasons. I've given you this before, but
I'll repeat it briefly. In the first place, this gospel
glorifies God. It gives him all the glory, this
gospel of free grace. If I'm saved, he saved me. Christ
did all the work. Jesus paid it all, all the debt
I owe, sin left to crimson stain. Secondly, this gospel is true
to the Scriptures. This way David was saved. This
way Abraham was saved. This way John the Baptist was
saved. This way Saul of Tarsus was saved. It's true to the Scriptures.
True to all that, like I was preaching this morning, the blood
atonement. True to the priesthood. And then thirdly, this gospel
enables God, through Christ, to be both just and justifier.
It enables God to be God, and yet deal in mercy with me. That's
right. It's the only gospel that does.
It enables God to be God, righteous, holy, and just, and deal in mercy
with me. And then fourthly, it's the only
gospel that can save a fellow like me. That's right. I'm poor, spiritually. Now, you
can buy land if you've got the wherewithal and the collateral,
but spiritually, I can't buy any room in glory, because I
have nothing to pay. It'll have to be free. It'll
have to be free. And it's really, I'm persuaded,
the only gospel can save you, too. And then, fifthly, it's
the only gospel that'll keep me safe, because God never changes,
and His gifts are without change. Now, this is true. Man's gospel,
your fellow makes a profession, you know, and he goes along and
he has some troubles and difficulties, and everybody does, and man says
he's lost. He didn't live up to these certain
standards and rules and so forth. He's lost. He's got to get saved
again. He's got to go through the man's gospel. But when God's
gospel saves a man, He's saved as the shepherd boy
watching the sheep. He's saved as the exalted and magnified and famous
giant killer. And he's saved as the fugitive
fleeing from a hateful king. And he's saved as the exalted
monarch of God's kingdom. And he's saved when he falls
into his own, victim of his own passions. And he's saved even
as he tries to cover his blame and his sin. And he's saved when
he comes back in repentance and submission. And he's saved as
an old man lying on his deathbed, finding his comfort in God's
covenant. Saved by grace. You see, if salvation was any
other way, old David would have been in and out of the kingdom
twelve times. And you'd have been in and out
more than that. That's right. It's the only gospel to keep
a man safe, because it never changes. Isn't that good news? That's good news. That's the
gospel. And I know sometimes you feel like, well, preacher,
you're just so... I don't know, you don't leave any quarter.
You just don't leave any room for anybody that disagrees with
you to be right. Disagree with me on anything
you want to, and you're probably right, but not on Christ. You
disagree with me on the person and work of Christ, you're wrong.
Now, you're wrong. Because He's the Lord and Savior,
Redeemer, Mediator, Surety, and the only hope a sinner has. He's
the Apostle and High Priest of our profession, and I guarantee
you, Everybody in here that's in Christ is saved and safe and
secure and ought to be happy.