Now, I am a person. I am a human being. I am a marvelous work of the
divine Creator. David felt this way. Turn to
Psalm 139. In Psalm 139, he says in verses
13 and 14, For thou hast possessed me, possessed
my reins. For thou hast possessed my reins,
Psalm 139, verse 13. Thou hast covered me in my mother's
womb. I will praise thee, for I am
fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are thy and that my
soul knoweth right well. I have a body. Because of Adam's fall and sin,
this body has been marred. It's not like the first one God
made. But even with the marring and
the scarring by sin and disease, this body is still fearfully
and wonderfully I have eyes to see, and sometimes as I stand
and look at God's wonders, when I behold the heavens, the stars,
the moon, the sun, the things that God has made, I marvel that
he has given me this miraculous gift of sight. I know a lot of
people who complain because they have to wear glasses. I don't
know why we do that. Well, to thank God we can see
even with the aid of glasses, we can see. And then I have ears
to hear, to learn. Through my ears this morning
comes information, knowledge, understanding of the things that
God Almighty has revealed. I'm glad, I'm thankful. I have
to wear some aids to help me to hear. And I'm so thankful
for them. I'm just glad that I can hear
those birds sing. You know, somebody said, God
didn't need to get a copyright on the birds' songs. He wrote
them. I can hear the breeze blowing
through the trees. I can hear the rippling of water
over the rocks in a stream. I can hear a man preach the gospel. And I have a mouth to speak.
I can communicate. I can put into words those things
that I feel. That's a marvelous thing that
God has done, given us a voice with which to speak. I know we
use them in so many useless things, so many foolish words, so much
frivolity, and we don't speak enough of the riches and the
wisdom and the grace of God, but I'm grateful that I can speak. And God's given me a brain. I
often think about young people who are going to school, and
I did this when I was young, and I regret it. God has given
us a marvelous thing up here in our heads, a brain. They talk
about all the computers that have been invented, nothing like
this computer, nothing. And nobody has ever used it to
its fullest extent, nobody ever will. to one ten millionth of
its potential, Charlie, this brain. But we, you young people,
sit in school and you don't apply yourself, you don't concentrate,
you don't study, you don't listen, you don't learn. And every one
of us go through this, we get a little older, I wish I'd have
listened, I wish I'd have done, I wish, wish, wish. Well, why
don't you start doing it now? You don't have to make our mistakes,
you know that, don't you? If a fellow in front of you falls
in a ditch, And he gets out and tells you about it. You don't
have to fall in it to believe it. You just don't have to experience
all that. If you'll just concentrate, use
this brain. God's given you a marvelous gift
to think, to consider, to contemplate, to form thoughts and ideas and
ideals in this brain. It's marvelous, marvelous. And then I have feet to walk.
hands to build and construct and to plant and, yes, to tear
down. But what a gift is a hand. I
believe it's W. A. Criswell in his book, Did
Man Just Happen? He goes through all the arguments
against evolution and finally comes to this one. Man is the
only creature with a hand. The birds have claws and the
Animals have paws, but only man has a hand, a delicate, masterful
instrument of precision that can operate on a heart, or operate
on a brain, or hands that can play an instrument or play a
violin. or a guitar or a harp or an instrument,
or Bob can paint a picture. You couldn't paint a picture
with an animal, paint a picture. All of these marvelous things,
God has given me hands. And that's the reason David,
when he considered this body, and I know some of us, if we
could We'd exchange, we'd feel like our bodies maybe aren't
as strong or as handsome or this, that or somebody else's. But
I tell you this, in your possession there, in that body and brain
and eyes and ears and mouth and all these things, God's given
you a marvelous and fearful and wonderfully made facility. He really has. It's marvelous
what God has done. And then I am a soul. I didn't
say I have a soul, I said I am a soul. I have a body. I'm living in this tabernacle. I'm living in this body that
someday will be buried, go back to the dust. But I am a soul.
I'm a person. God breathed into Adam the breath
of life, and he became a living soul. I am a person. I'm an individual. I have a will.
Whatever you think about what happened to it or what condition
that will is in, I still have a will. And then I have emotions,
I have passions, I have personality. I am a person. And this soul,
this person, has an eternal existence. Eternal existence. Now, I want
you to think a minute. I am a person. And what I'm saying
about myself is true of every one of you. I was born individually. I was born individually. We weren't born in groups. We were born individually. I
was born individually. I live, I think, I act, I speak
as an individual, as a person. That's separate from every other
person as the stars differ in glory. So every individual isn't
is a person I live Individually, I'm gonna die that way I'm gonna
die alone as an individual and someday I'm going to face God
as an individual This is all this is me. I know I know this
I know whatever relationship you have with others I know you're
sitting there by a wife, and you'll say, Nothing will ever
separate us. Don't bank on it. You are an individual. She's
an individual. We may be one flesh, but we're
still individual. Scripture says, Every man shall
bear his own burden. Every man shall give an account
of himself to God. Whatever relationship you have
with other people, you are an individual. You are a responsible,
accountable individual. I cannot merge with, I cannot
get lost in, I cannot partake of the life of another. Impossible. There may be two boys born in
a home, one may be a Charles Spurgeon, one may be a Charles
Manson. There's no way you can make them
alike. They're different individuals, they're people, persons. That's
what you are and that's what I am. We influence others. We affect others. We learn from
others. We have parents. family circles
and mates and children. I'm an American. I'm an American. We congregate
socially. We congregate theologically.
We have friends, we have circles of acquaintance, we have people
we like better than other people or prefer to be with. But I am
an individual. I'm as single and alone and personal
as if I were the only person on the face of this earth. That's
exactly right. I'm a human being, a person.
I want this morning to isolate you and me as we've never been
isolated before in this message, in our thoughts. in our consideration
of what God is saying in my text. Joshua stood out in front of
the people in Joshua 24, and he said, Choose you, you, you,
choose you this day, whom you will serve. But as for me and those over
whom I have control, we'll serve the Lord. That's what he said.
Choose you. Now, what's this verse? Our Lord
said, and Paul had this on the bulletin board this week, no
man can serve two masters. It doesn't say men, it says no
man. I may be living in a household
of people who serve another master, but I serve Christ. And then
the scripture says, if any man come to me, let him deny himself. And that's not denying yourself
of a new suit, new pair of pants, or a new house. That's not it.
Let him deny himself, look to Christ alone, Christ. Denying
yourself. It may have some particular emphasis
on these things, but the main thing is an overall denial of
self in attitude and spirit. So let a man deny himself, and
this can only be done as an individual. Are you with me? I am a person,
I am an individual, marvelously, wonderfully made by God himself. I have a body, I am a soul, I'm
an individual. Whatever relationship I have
with Doris or Mindy or Bob, Becky, Paul, Dan, my family, you, my
friends, this church, it is as if all of a sudden everybody
was whisked away, gone, and here I stand. That's how personal
and individual and responsible I am before God. Now then, set
before me as an individual, and let's just don't say, well, I
hear people saying all the time, well, the wife and I are going
to do this. I ain't talking about you and the wife. Well, the family
is going to do it. I'm not talking about your family.
Well, the 13th Street Baptist Church, I'm not talking about
the 13th Street Baptist Church. I'm talking about one person,
Mike Bell, presents you. Jim, one person. Russell, one
person. And you let one person. Set before
me as an individual is the testimony of God. I'm not left to my own
thoughts about those things which are of some value. I'm not left
to my own thoughts about what life is and what life will be
and what life ought to be, who God is. I'm not left to the opinions
of men. Thank God for that. I have set
right here before me the Word of God. God breathed, God inspired,
God given, infallible, inerrant, verbally inspired, unbroken,
the Word of God. I have it right there. I'm not
left to my thoughts, I'm not left to my opinions, I'm not
left to the opinions of others. God Almighty has not left us
without divine counsel. There it is, right there, divine
counsel. I don't depend on dreams and
feelings and visions. I don't depend on the testimony
of the Fathers, except these inspired Fathers. I have the
Word of God. God has revealed to me his character. It's all right here. Who is God?
God is a spirit, invisible, immortal, eternal, infinite, almighty,
omnipotent. The Lord our God is holy, just,
wise, and loved. He's revealed to me his character,
his attributes, right here in the Word. God has revealed to
me my beginnings, my nature. He's revealed my character. God
has revealed in his Word, in his testimony, my innermost thoughts. God really tells me who I am. And God's version is better than
even mine. I hear people say, well, if I
know my heart, well, brother, that's one thing you don't know
too well. But this book sure discloses it, it sure reveals
it right here. It's here. We may deny it, but
it's here. God has revealed to me my fall,
my guilt, my condemnation. He's revealed to me my insincerity,
my hypocrisies, my secret sins. God has fully revealed to me
and shown by example. And shown by example in the Old
Testament, every area of life. I don't care, you find anything
you may deal with in life, and one of these old soldiers back
here, Abraham or Isaac or Jacob or David, one of these fellows,
or Daniel, well, I've been through it. God's shown you by example. Every decision you may encounter
has already been encountered by one of these examples. They're
given to us as examples. I'll tell you this, not only
that, but my Lord God even came down here himself in the flesh
and was made bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh in my likeness,
in the likeness of flesh, numbered with the transgressors, and was
tested in all points as I am, yet without sin. He gave me the
true God came down here in the flesh, speaking our language,
and talked to me about life. I don't have to be in the dark.
If I'm in the dark, it's because I want to be. I don't have to
be spiritually dumb. If I am, it's because I want
to be. That's exactly right. I don't have to be, because God
Almighty has revealed right here in the Word. And one fellow was
sitting outside one time talking to a preacher, and he said to
him, He said, if only somebody would
come down here from up there and tell us what it's all about. Well, the preacher said, he did,
he did, and you won't hear it. He did! And when he came down
here, the Father spoke from heaven and said, this is my beloved
Son, Hearing! I wish we'd hear it. But Christ
said, you'll hear everybody but me. He said, another comes in
his own name, and him you'll receive. I come in my Father's
name, you won't hear me. Anybody can get a hearing now,
any silly, stupid character can get on television and get a hearing
and pop off about everything under the sun, but the gospel
and everybody. The other night I tuned in on
that a terrible, terrible, charade, vaudeville show called P.T.L.
And the head on there, Pearl Bailey. Do you know who Pearl
Bailey is? She can sing, I'll tell you that,
boy. She can flat sing. She sang, Where He Leads Me,
I Will Follow. I thought for a minute there
the girl was really meaning it. But she got up there and she
said, Now, honey, I believe we saved ourselves. We saved ourselves. She said, I baptized myself.
And Tammy just clapped, amen, she said, that's so. She said,
I was at the River Jordan on one of those tours, and I came
to a wide spot, and I walked right down in there and baptized
myself, honey, we saved ourselves. She said, I got everything going
for me. This is verbatim, friend, I heard it. She had three necklaces
on. One of them was a cross, one
of them was a Star of David, and one of them was an emblem
of Islam. She said, I got it all going
for me. I got the cross and the Star
of David, and I got the mark of Islam, so I can't miss. Now, I don't have to be ignorant.
I don't have to be ignorant. I don't have to be. The Lord
Jesus Christ said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man
cometh to the Father but by nature. I don't care how much they talk
about Jesus, that's their theology. I don't care how much they talk
about the Bible, that's their theology. And I warn you, I warn
you, just keep on playing games with this world religious system,
and you'll perish with them. Our Lord said, Come out from
among them, and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing.
But what fellowship can darkness have with light? And that's darkness.
I don't have to be ignorant, for I hear in the Word, God has
instructed me clearly. Our Lord Jesus came down here
in the flesh and declared to us those things which shall endure
and those things which shall be destroyed. He declared unto
us those things which please God. They said, What shall we
do that we might work the works of God? He said, This is the
work of God that you believe on him whom God has sent. He has revealed to us those things
that displease God. He has revealed to me that which
promotes my good and that which promotes my ruin. Turn to Matthew 6. Our Lord speaks
here concerning a worthless, unprofitable life in Matthew
6. So I have a body That's the reason
why I tell young people about drugs and alcohol. You're a fool
to do those things. You're a fool. You don't have
one body. One body. Now, you dissipate it and wreck
it and ruin it, and you're going to live with it. You're going
to live in that. Go ahead. You live in that house over there.
Tear it up. Bust the windows out, but you're going to get
cold in the winter. Well, rip up the floors and burn
them so you can have a good hot fire for five minutes. But it's
going to be a long winter. And you take alcohol and put
it in your body and give you a little thrill for five minutes,
but I tell you, you burn up those things, liver and stomach and
other things that God has given you to last for 70 years, and
you'll just live 50 years in a wreck. That's stupidity. To take drugs, something that
addles your brain, something that makes you do things you
don't know what you're doing, you're a fool. You're tearing off the
roof from the top of your house. That's stupid. Not only unspiritual,
it's stupid. Christians ought not take drugs.
Nobody ought to take those things, unless you have to, if you're
sick and the doctor prescribes them. You girls have one body. Just go out here and wreck it
and give it to every Tom, Dick, and Harry, and you'll live with
the ruin of it the rest of your life. That just makes good sense
to me, to take care of that. precious treasure that God has
given you, just one. And the things I give my life
to, they matter. I'm a soul. Now, listen to our
Lord here in Matthew 6. He says this in verse 24, No
man can serve two masters. He'll hate one, love the other,
else he'll hold to the one, despise the other. You can't serve God
in riches, materialism. Therefore I say unto you, don't
take any thought. Now, this is don't take any thought.
You men sitting here and you've got businesses and responsibilities
and jobs, you have to give some thought to it. You can't just
say, well, let her go, you know. You can't do that. But he's talking
about anxious thought, overly anxious thought. Don't get that. In other words, use the world,
but don't abuse it. Don't let these things get out
of their place. Put them in the right perspective. Take no anxious. overly careful thought for these
things where you just give yourself to it. Don't be overly concerned
about your life, what you're going to eat, what you're going
to drink, your body, what you're going to put on. Your life is
more than meat, and your body is more than clothes. Then down
here he says in verse 31, "...therefore take no thought, saying, What
shall I eat? What shall I drink? Wherewithal shall I be clothed?
After these things the heathen seek." The Gentiles. Your Father
knows what you have need of. And he'll supply these things.
But seek ye first, there it is, in this altar, first, first the
kingdom of God. Let's turn to our text in Matthew
13, and our Lord illustrates it. I said there in that scripture
our Lord condemns a useless life, a wasted life, a foolish life,
a materialistic life, a person that gives themselves to this
world. to its relationships, to its
comforts, to its luxuries, to its cares, to its involvements,
to its entanglements and all these things. Set your affection
on things above. Seek ye first the kingdom of
God. I've got to eat, I've got to
have clothes, I've got to have a place to live. Your Father
knows you have neither of those things. David said, I'm old,
I've been young, I've never seen God's seed begging bread. I've
never seen God seed in a bread line, never have. God takes care
of his children, you take care of your children. And he says,
you just don't need to be so overly concerned and anxious
about these things to the neglect of your soul. They that live
by the sword will perish by the sword, and they that live with
materialism will perish when God burns up the material world.
The passion of this world fadeth away. Here he illustrates it in Matthew
13. He illustrates, watch this now,
this is what I like, he illustrates the dedication, he illustrates
the desire and the direction of the man who truly and successfully
seeks the kingdom of God, the glory of God, and life everlasting. Now, as I said to you, this is
my responsibility. And this is yours, Mike, this
is yours. We're not going to do it together. We're not going
to seek the kingdom of God together. It's going to be an individual
choice, preference, decision, or whatever. Choose you. Now, you'll have to be motivated
by the Spirit of God, I know that, but you're going to make
the choice. If thou shalt believe with thine heart and confess
with thine mouth. Watch this scripture, verse 44,
Matthew 13. The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure. Oh, what
a treasure! What a treasure! What a treasure! What is this
treasure? Well, it has to be the gospel
of Christ. It has to be Christ himself,
his person and work, Bobby, has to be the gospel. That's the
treasure, that's the riches. the unsearchable riches of God.
Oh, what a treasure it is, this gospel of Christ. Because everything else is going
to pass away. It's the gospel of Christ. It's
the person of Christ. It's the person and work of Christ.
That's the treasure. It has to be there. Why is it a treasure? Well, first
of all, it enables God to be just and justified. What a treasure
that enables God to be just and yet justify the ungodly. It enables
God to do it. What a treasure, what a treasure
that enables God, what a gospel that reconciles the living God
to the creature. It puts away the wrath and the
enmity and the judgment and the anger and makes us one with God. Lifts the beggar from the dunghill
and puts him on the throne. makes a child of darkness to
be a child of light, a child of wrath to be a son of love,
to give sight to the blind and hearing to the deaf and healing
to the sick and life to the dead and riches to the poor, puts
away all our sins past, present and future, and makes us holy
and perfect in God's sight. Talk about a treasure. That's
the treasure. What a treasure! And all of it
purchased by and procured by our Lord Jesus Christ, who in
this body, in this human body, perfectly fulfilled all that
God required and satisfied his unchangeable, immutable justice
and reconciled us to God. That's the treasure. That's the
treasure. That's the reason when Moses
said, Lord, show me your glory, after having seen all that Moses
saw. Gracious. And God said, here's
my glory. I'll be merciful. I'll be gracious
to whom I will be gracious. That's the treasure. All right,
read the next line. It's a treasure hid in a field. Hid in a field. If our gospel be hid, it's hid
to them that are lost, in whom the God of this world hath blinded
the mind. How is this treasure hid? Turn
and look at Matthew 13.16, back just a few verses. Matthew 13.16,
the Lord said, The blessed are your
eyes, they see, and your ears, they hear. For verily I say unto
you, many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those
things which you have seen, and not seen them, and to hear what
you have heard, and not heard them. Let me tell you something,
this gospel of Christ is hid in the field of God's promises. And only a man who has ears to
hear those promises and eyes to see the mysteries of those
promises can see Christ in those promises. When he said to Adam
and Eve, The seed of woman shall bruise the serpent's head, Christ
is there, but only the man with spiritual eyes can see that,
only that man. Everybody else reads that. And
then when Abraham, going up the mountain, said to Isaac, God
will provide himself a lamb, Christ is in that. All the way through the Old Testament,
he's hid in the field of types. When Moses lifted up that serpent,
that was Christ. When they slew the Passover lamb
and put it on the door, that was Christ. Right there. He was here in the field of the
tabernacle, that old tabernacle sitting out there in the wilderness,
and that old wind blowing across it, and that old gray badger
skin covering that flat thing in the breeze, and that white
fence around it, and it's cold and gray and dark, and the sun's
gone down, the moon's up, and the wind's howling, everybody's
asleep, and there out there right in the middle of the whole camp
is the tabernacle. And the people ride by and they
look at their old tent, that's Christ. Oh, I tell you, it's
so beautiful. On the outside it's so common
and everyday and just like the other tents, but on the inside,
over that ark between the cherubim, the glory of God fill that place! And a man could ride right by
on a horse and not even see it, not even see it, not even Those Amalekites and Philistines
up on the hillside looked down there at that old tabernacle.
They didn't see anything. And inside that tabernacle, the
very glory of God himself. And they rode by to get some
water out of a creek. Or they rode by to shoot a deer
so they could have something to eat, feed this old body that's
going back to the dust and their souls passing by, him who is
life! Oh, it's there, it's here. It's
here. Most folks miss it. It's here
in the message of the apostles. It's here in the message of some
country preacher down there in a little church that dares to
be different, that dares to be bold, that dares to tell men
the truth, that will not be browbeaten and will not be a conformist. who will not say what they want
to hear, who will not join with the religious crowd, but who
dares to stand and preach the gospel of God's infinite, immutable,
eternal, elective grace in Christ Jesus. Right there in that message
is the gospel. And men go right by his church,
and they go down to where the windows are taller. And they
got pictures on them. They like those pictures on the
window. Stained glass window. Looks pretty, you know. Impressive. Where the choir sings, the cow,
the cow, the cow jumped over the fence, the fence, the fence
and calls it a cantata, you know. They like that sort of thing.
They go down where they give them out a card, you know, and
they write their name on the card. And tomorrow morning the
pastor knocks on the door and says, we hear you've moved to
our community. We just can't hardly have a church down there
without you. Would you add your influence to our congregation?
They like that sort of thing. They like to see their names
in the bulletins. They love for people to brag on them. They
like that. The gospel is hid. It's not extent,
it's hid. And it's hid. Christ is where
he is, not where you think he is. He's where he is. You may
not like the vessel, because God's put this treasure in earthen
vessels. But it's still the treasure,
and it's here. And a man will never find it
if he looks for where it is, where it is, where it is. But
he's got to have eyes to see and discriminate, which most
men don't have. And ears to hear and tell the
difference. Can you tell the difference? People whose ears have been touched
by the Spirit of God can tell the difference. There ain't no
error when they hear it. And they know error when they
see it. They know error when they smell it. They know that
which gives glory to God and glory to Christ and puts a man
in the dust, a discriminating eye can see it and hear it. But our Gospels head to them
who are lost, in whom the God of this world hath blinded their
minds, lest the glorious light of the gospel of Christ should
shine unto them, and they be saved. That's sad, but he's hid. But this man, watch it, the gospel
is a treasure. It's hid. It's hid. It's hid in a field. And when a man had found it,
this fellow found it. Oh, he found it. His eyes were
opened. Look at Matthew 13.11. Our Lord
said to the disciples here, It is given unto you to know the
mysteries of the kingdom of heaven. I found it. I found it. My eyes have been opened to see
past all of the tradition and past all of the custom and past
all of the frails and frivolity of religion and past all of the
froth and the foam and the foolishness and the entertainment and past
all of these things, to see the glory of God in the face of Christ
Jesus. I see it! the fulfillment of
the word of God. I see, my ears hear, my hands
have touched, my heart's been enlightened, old Bartimaeus sitting
there where he had sat so long, so long, so long. People sit in church so long.
They come to church and they sit and they go through the motions
And Bartimaeus was sitting there in his blindness and darkness,
and he heard a commotion, something different, something unusual,
and the gospel is unusual. Where Christ is, there's a commotion.
Where Christ is, men aren't neutral. They're not indifferent. I'll
tell you where today there's that. Somebody said, well, we
need peace in our churches. There's peace in a graveyard,
too, but it's dead. We need the gospel in our churches.
We need some excitement, some life. We need some folks drawing
some lines. We need some commotion. We need
some hearts. We need some plowing up, some
roots dug up. And we need some hearts trouble.
We need to hear sinners cry." And Bartimaeus was sitting there
that morning. He'd gone that same place every
day for 25 or 30 years, and there was a commotion. And he kind
of roused up and he said, what is it? And somebody said, Jesus
of Nazareth passeth by. He has come through this
city, himself, Christ. And he knew what that meant.
He'd heard about that. Oh, he'd heard about it. He'd
heard how he'd given sight to the blind. He'd heard how he'd
even raised the dead. He'd heard how he'd made the
lame to walk. And old Bartimaeus said, Oh, my son of David, have mercy
on me." One individual, one poor, dirty,
ragged, blind beggar sitting in the one, and the rest of them
around him, they were religious, they were sons of Abraham, And
they tried to quiet him down. They couldn't quiet him down
because he just wouldn't be denied. He wouldn't be passed by. He
wouldn't be left in that state for the sake of peace. Our son of David. I'm an individual. I found him
in that field. What does he do? As a treasure
hid in a field, when a man finds it himself, he hides it. Now, listen to me. What do you
mean, preacher? He stores it away in his heart. He stores it away in his heart,
and he searches the scriptures to see if these things be so.
That's what those Bereans did. They searched the scriptures.
I heard that preacher preach. He preached about God's greatness
and sovereignty. He preached about man's ruin
and fall, and he preached about God's purpose and grace in electing
a people and giving them to Christ. He preached about Christ's effectual
substitutionary work and his obedience unto righteousness.
That preacher preached about the reign of Christ as our mediator
and the death of Christ. I'm going to see if those things
are so. I'll tell you another reason
he hides it in his heart. He holds it close for fear of
losing it. For fear of losing it. Oh, I've
heard something. I've heard something today. I
heard something I haven't heard. I felt something I haven't felt.
I've understood something I've never understood before. I'm
not going to lose it. I'm not going to let anybody
take it away from me. I'm not going to let anybody
offend me so that I'll lose it. I'm not going to do it. I'm not
going to contact anybody for an assessment of the value of
this treasure. Paul said, when I heard the gospel,
I didn't even consult those who were apostles before me. This
is so dangerous. You, my friend, are an individual.
If God's been pleased to reveal something to you, don't you ask
your wife what she thinks about it. That's exactly right. Don't you ask your husband what
he thinks about it. You don't ask the blind man what
he thinks about the sunset, do you? You don't ask a deaf man
what he thinks about how an instrument sounds, do you? You don't ask
a religious profiteer what he thinks, do you? This man, God
dealt with him, and he found the treasure. He found it. Wasn't a search
party, a whole bunch of us, we're seeking the truth. You ain't
going to find it. He found it. He found it. We're going to get a committee
together and decide whether you're preaching the truth. You'll never
find out, because God doesn't. The only committee that they
ever appointed went down into Canaan and came back and said,
We can't take it. Twelve of them. Two of them said,
We can. The rest of them died and went
to hell. You're not going to find it with
a committee. When he found it, He found it. He saw. I see! I see! Honey, what do you think about
this? Well, I just don't think much of it. Well, we won't go
then. Well, you can sit on the can there and do nothingness
and perish if you want to. I'm going to hear the gospel.
I found something. I found something. God's done
a work of grace in my heart. I found some. David said, Oh,
Lord, be not so with my house. He made with me an everlasting
covenant. And that's my salvation and my
desire. It's not our, mine. I'm telling
you the truth. Mine. He hid it. He didn't go
to anybody to assess the value of it or to be discouraged or
to be talked out of it. There are too many voices and
too many opinions. and too many profiteering religionists. I don't want to hear any of them.
I want that treasure, and I'm going to hide it in my heart.
It's Christ. It's Christ. And then notice
the next thing he did. And with joy, no sadness, with
joy, he goes and sells all he has and buys that treasure. He goes with joy, no sadness. I hear people talking about,
well, I used to be in business and I gave it up for Jesus. Sure
miss it, too. I used to be this and used to
be that and used to be the other, but I gave it up for Jesus. I
never gave up anything for Christ. Everything that I have in Christ,
he gave me. Everything that I laid down wasn't
fit to hold anyway. It was hurting me. It was to
my ruin, my eternal damnation. That's right. This man, when
he found Christ, when he found the fulfillment of all scripture,
when he found life everlasting, when he found God revealed in
the person of Christ, he clutched it to his heart. He hid it in
his heart. He was afraid of losing it. He
took that precious treasure and said, you're not going to talk
me out of this now. You're not going to sidetrack
me. You're not going to turn my affection. This is mine, God
gave it to me, worth 10 million worlds. And he went and made
adjustments. He made all kinds of adjustments
in order that he might have that treasure. He disposed of his
old traditional religion. He had to lay her down. I hear
people say, well, this church ain't preaching nothing, but
I've been there since I was a boy. If you ever find that treasure,
you'll get out of those counterfeiters. You get away from those imposters.
You lay her down. Lay her down. Paul did. He said,
I was a Hebrew of Hebrews, a Pharisee, and all these things, and I count
these things, but love to know Christ, for the excellency of
the knowledge of Christ. Embrace that treasure. That's
right. Also, you'll dispose of your
own righteousness too. Boy, I tell you, when you pick
up his robe, that treasure of righteousness You don't want
that smelly, old, filthy rag garment of yours. You'll just
be glad to take it and put it out the back door and drop it
and let the garbage man haul it all and not hear anything
else about it. Our old righteousness is gone. Our worldly connections. People
often say, well, I have to give up my worldly friends if I come
to Jesus. No. No, sir. No, sir. I tell you, if you really come
to Christ, they'll split with you quicker than you can split
with them. because they'll be just as miserable around you
as you are around them. I tell you the truth, that's
right. A man who knows the gospel, I'm
not talking about a religious fellow, I'm talking about a man
who knows Christ, knows the gospel, loves it, he's miserable around
people that hate him. They may have the same name he's
got, but he's still miserable around them. And that ain't the
only thing, they're miserable around him. But they are flat
miserable. He makes them miserable. He makes
them miserable. And they'll find a reason not
to invite him, and then he disposes of that honor that comes from
me. Now, one other statement, and I'll quit. In verse 45 and
verse 46, he says, The kingdom of heaven is like unto a merchant
man who seeks the best pearls. Who, when he had found one pearl,
That's Christ. He found everything in Christ,
everything. He went and sold all that he
had. And my friend, listen to me. It wasn't a reluctant disposing. It was with joy that he got rid
of it. Let me tell you this, and please
don't make any adjustments to follow Christ that are painful
to you. because you don't know Christ
yet. He said with joy he sold what he had. Because here's what
I'm saying. I'm saying that Christ, listen
to this, in my building he's the chief cornerstone. In my
eyes he's the altogether lovely one. There's no, he has no rival.
In my hunger, he's the bread. In my thirst, he's the water.
In my need, he's the unsearchable riches. In my heart, he's the
lover of my soul. In my ignorance, he's my wisdom. In my loneliness, he's my friend.
In my worship, he's my Lord and my God. In my guilt, he's my
peace. In my trouble, he's my rest.
In the storms of life, he's my hiding place to my feet. He's
the way! There's no decision to be made. Just part with those things,
just like, I believe, a man who's found Christ is like that real
estate company that sells houses. I see them advertising on TV,
they've got a thing comes up and out and down here, and when
they advertise a house, they put on it, sold, sold. That means you can't buy it.
That means somebody else already got it. And that's the way a
man is who's found Christ, he's sold out. You can't buy it. If somebody comes by and says,
I'd like to have that, it's sold. I'd like to have that, and it's
sold. You'll have to look somewhere else. And that's the way a person
that's found the pearl of great price, he's sold, Charlie, you
can't buy him. He's not for sale. I don't worry
about, you say, well, that preacher, think he'll quit preaching grace?
Not if he knows it. If he's sold, you can't buy him.
You know he's offering him anything. And it's offering him a bigger
opportunity. He's sold out. He's found the
pearl. You ain't got one that can match
it. He's found the treasure. You don't have one that can come
close. You can't bargain with him because he's got everything
in Christ. Everything.