Open your Bibles now to 1 Corinthians
1 again. I have a question for you. What do people really want from
a preacher? What do they really want? What
do you want? Paul says in verse 22 that the Jews require a sign. That's what they want. Let's
see a miracle, and we'll believe. Let's see you heal somebody,
some real demonstration of healing, and we'll believe. Let's see
an impressive movement. Let's see some great impressive
crowds, and then we'll believe. It reminds me of those folks
walking around the cross of our Lord. If you're the Son of God,
come down from the cross. and we'll believe. If you're
the Son of God, save thyself and we'll believe. What sign,
they said, when they heard Christ preach, what sign showest thou
that we may believe? Our Lord said, this evil, evil
and adulterous generation seeketh after a sign and no sign shall
be given but the Word of God. No sign. The rich man in hell said, Father
Abraham, I have five brothers on the earth, and I fear lest
they come to this awful place. Send Lazarus back that he might
warn them. And Abraham said, they have the
word of God. They have Moses and the prophets.
That's what he was saying. They have the word of God. Hey,
Father Abraham, they don't believe the word of God, but if one rose
from the dead, they'd believe. Isn't that what he said? If one
rose from the dead, they'd believe. They'd believe that. They'd believe
a miracle. They don't believe the word of God. They don't believe
the promise of God. But if one rose from the dead
and appeared to them, they'd believe. Abraham said no they
wouldn't. No they wouldn't. They will not
believe though one rose from the dead. Christ rose from the
dead and they didn't believe him. Paul puts his foot down
and he says in verse 23, but we preach Christ. Let the Jews
require a sign. We're going to preach Christ.
Let them demand a sign. Let them cry after some miracle
of healing or some great movement or some great impressive organization. We're going to preach Christ.
I'm determined to preach Jesus Christ and him crucified, whatever
others may attempt to do. We preach Christ. What do the
people want? Well, look at the next line,
verse 22, and the Greeks seek after wisdom. Now, not the wisdom
of God. And I'm afraid this is not what
our colleges and universities and seminaries are seeking, not
the wisdom of God. They seek the wisdom of me and
Corinth This is first Corinthians. This is the first epistle to
the church at Corinth. Corinth was the center of learning.
As far as I can determine, it was the center of philosophy
and human wisdom, and the Greeks were in love with human wisdom.
They were in love with oratory. They were in love with something
new and something clever. That's the reason Paul said in
chapter 2, look at chapter 2 verse 1, Brethren, when I came to you,
when I came to Corinth, This great center of learning and
philosophy and oratory and human wisdom, I didn't come with excellence
of speech or wisdom, human wisdom, declaring unto you the testimony
of God. I determined, I determined not to know anything among you
save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. I determined I would not quarrel
with you and debate with you and argue with you and speculate
with you. I determined in my heart not
to know anything among you. save Jesus Christ and Him crucified.
And I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling,
and my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of
man's wisdom, but in demonstration of the spirit and of power that
your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the
power of God. What shall we be, Brother Joe,
clever preachers or Christ preachers? What shall we be? This is what
Paul's saying. I didn't attempt to be a clever
preacher. I didn't attempt to impress you
with my intellect or with my knowledge. Shall we be a clever
preacher or a Christ preacher? Some preaching requires a dictionary
rather than a Bible to understand. Did you know that? I've heard
some preachers and I must confess some what we call grace preachers
that I wish I'd have brought my dictionary instead of my Bible.
Shall we be philosophical preachers or shall we be plain preachers? Just plain preachers. If you
be the Christ they said, tell us plainly. He said, I told you.
I told you. Shall we tickle men's ears or
shall we prick their hearts? That's what I want to do. I'm
not interested in tickling the ear. I sure would like to send
an arrow of Holy Scripture into somebody's heart tonight. Shall
we impress the people with our knowledge or shall we lead them
to the knowledge of a person, the Lord Jesus Christ? Paul said,
my intention, my full intention is to know nothing among you,
you wise, intellectual, philosophical people. I'm determined to know
nothing but Christ. For Christ is the power and wisdom
of God. I read a story one time about
a couple who went to London, especially to hear Mr. Spurgeon. And they couldn't get into his
building on Sunday morning. Wouldn't that be a joy if we
had so many people that folks couldn't get in? But anyway, he did. And they
couldn't get in to hear him. So they said, well, we want to
hear somebody. They'd gone early, terribly early,
but they couldn't get in. So they went on down the street
to a very impressive, very impressive building, very large, impressive
cathedral type building and they went in sat down and and when
the service was over they were walking out and the wife turned
to the husband and said my what a sermon what a sermon and it
was quite a sermon that's what they said they agreed it was
a sermon what a sermon and that night they did get in to hear
Mr. Spurgeon and they listened to that that great preacher of
Christ and him crucified and on the way out there was a there
was a sign of tears in their eyes and the husband turned to
the wife and said my what a Savior what a Savior now that's we've
got to come to that that conclusion are weak what a song or what
a Savior what a sermon or what a Savior What a knowledgeable,
personable preacher, or what a proclaimer of God's mercies. It can't be both. And Paul, in
this regard, is a model for every preacher. He said the Jews require
a sign, and that's what these prophetical preachers are doing.
They're going back here and there, and they're saying over in the
little town of Petra is this, and over in the Dome of the Rocks
coming down, there's going to be a tabernacle, there's going
to be all these signs. These signs, that's what the
world wants. They want a sign. They want a sign. And they want
something different, something on you, something that appeals
to the eye or to the ear or to the flesh. If you'll give ten
percent, then God will bless you. I give my ten, he blesses
me. Ooh, he's right, wasn't he? Isn't that something? But if
you give your ten, he doesn't bless you. He's right anyhow.
He's right anyhow. Do you know something? I tell
you, I believe in God. My aunt, let me tell you something. Let
me tell you something. This may impress you, it doesn't
me. My aunt had a bad heart and the doctor said she's going to
have to be operated on. She went by the doctor's office and he
examined her and he said, Honey, you're well. She said, Praise
the Lord. He is real, isn't he? He's real if that old girl had
died on her way to the office. Now my friends, let me tell you
something. This generation seeketh a sign, a sign. And I warn you
with everything that's within me, Satan's a deceptive creature. He's a crafting. He can give
signs. He can give wonders. If that's
what you want, he'll give you one, and you'll go to hell looking
to it, and clinging to it, and hoping in it. The Jews require
sign, and the Greeks seek after intellect and wisdom of this
world. But we preach Christ. We preach
Christ. I'm determined. I'm determined. One of the men of this church,
who used to be a high-ranking officer here, had this to say
about my preaching. I regard it as a compliment.
He didn't mean it as such. He said, there's no need to go.
It's the same thing every service. That's all right. I got me a
one-string fiddle, and his name's Jesus Christ, and I never get
tired of preaching him. It will be. God willing. I hope
it's the same thing every time. Sure, hope so. I hope next Sunday
morning. I've got a message on Christ
Paul played a one-string fiddle He's played a one-stand. I'll
tell you I warn you this if you ever get tired of hearing about
him who is our life There may be you've missed him Because
to the believer he gets more precious every day That's what
I want to hear about my lord. I Noticed some of you don't get
tired of folks bragging on your grandchildren And you don't get
tired of folks bragging on your children. You don't even get
tired of folks bragging on you. And I'll tell you this, I hope
we're more in love with Christ than we are our children and
grandchildren. And I never get tired of somebody bragging on
him. And I hope we're more in love with Christ than we are
ourselves. What do you want? If you want signs, go where you
can find them. If you want intellect and wisdom,
go where you can find it. If you want Christ, I hope I
can say, here's where you'll find Him. Christ Jesus. Or what do we preach? He said
in verse 23, we preach Christ crucified. What do we preach
about Christ? Well, number one, we preach Christ
as God, His deity. Now listen to me a minute. I
got this letter yesterday from a dear friend in Paul, Paul,
Kentucky. I don't know where Paul, Paul,
Kentucky is, but it's got a zip code. And my friend, he likes
what we preach. Now he's got a problem. He's
got a problem, and I hope I can help him with his problem. And
it's a conscientious, serious problem. I like the way he writes.
He says, dear brother man, send me your last two sermons you
preached on TV. He says, My Father and I sincerely
enjoy the way you bring forth the Word of God on TV. We believe
God has given you some wisdom and knowledge in His Word. So
there's one subject I can't see. I like the way he says, there's
one subject I can't see. I can't see that Jesus Christ
is God when He came to this earth. For when He was baptized, now
listen to it, listen to it. For when he was baptized, God
spoke from heaven. You see, God's in heaven, he
said, and Jesus down here, so he can't be God, God's in heaven.
God can't be in heaven and on earth, can he? The man, he's serious, I like
the way he writes. He says, he came to this earth,
and when he was baptized, God said, this is my beloved son.
And then God said this, God says that there's one God, and one
mediator between God and man, the man. He says God calls him
a man. God didn't call him God. You
see, the man. I love this letter. I think it's
written in all sincerity and honesty, and he's a simple man
with a profound problem. He's reading words. Well, let
me tell you something, my friend. I don't claim the power or ability
to explain God. But I do know the Word says this.
I know the Word of God says this. When God created man, God used
a plural word. I don't know a lot about Greek
or Hebrew or English or any other language, except I know what
us means. He said, let us make man. He
wasn't talking to an angel, and he wasn't talking to a creature
or an animal or anything, because God Almighty says, let us make
man in our image. The Bible presents God as a Trinity,
three in one, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And throughout the
Bible, it refers to the Father as God, it refers to the Son
as God. You know, when God, when our
Lord, when our Lord spoke of the Son in Hebrews, He said,
Thy throne, O God, is forever. He didn't say that to the angels,
He said that to the Son. And then our Lord Jesus Christ
said this to the people around him. He said, I and my Father
are one. We're not two gods. We're one
God. I and my Father are one. And
the disciples said, show us the Father. And Christ said, he that
has seen me hath seen the Father. I and my Father are one. And
then in Isaiah 9, verse 6, it says, unto us a child is born,
unto us a son is given. His name shall be called Wonderful,
Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father. That's his
name. Christ is the Father, and the
Father is Christ. Now, I don't know how to explain
that. His name is the Everlasting Father. There's a sense in which
they're one, and yet there's a sense, Jay, in which they're
three, and I can't explain it. And I won't be able to explain
to this dear man, but what he'll have to do, he'll have to just
get over here with me and wait till we get to glory to understand
it. I know in part, and I preach in part, and I confess I know
in part, I see through a glass dimly, but I'm not going to deny
the Word of God because I don't understand how it can be. I don't
understand how Jay read this morning how the things that are
made are made from nothing, not from things that appear. There
was a time when there was nothing but God. I don't understand that,
but that's what the Word said. There was a time when God spake
by Christ. In the beginning was the Word,
and the Word was with God, and the Word what? Was God. That's Christ. The Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. And we beheld His glory, the
glory as of the only begotten of the Father. God spake by Christ
and the world was made. And God sent His Son. into this
world. God himself came into this world. The scripture says, feed the
church of God which he purchased with his own blood. What we're
going to have to do is take this by faith. If I could comprehend
God, I'd be God. It's higher than the heavens.
What can you know? It's deeper than hell. What can
you understand? It's broader than the sea. Actually,
I heard a story one time. It was a little boy and his mother
and daddy went to the beach and he was sitting there with his
little with his little bucket and shovel and he was sitting
beside the water and he was scooping the water up putting in the bucket
like this and his daddy came up and said what are you doing
son he said I'm gonna put the ocean in my bucket well now there's
a sense in which he did put that ocean in his bucket but not all
of it not all of it And there's a sense in which God dwells in
me, but not all of Him. There's a sense in which I know
Him, but not all of Him. There's a sense in which I understand
something of His wisdom, something of His will, and something of
His way, but by far not all of it. It's like the old lady who
came and stood and looked over the ocean, and she said, how
big it is, and somebody said, that's just the top of it. And
when we think of the vastness of God's wisdom and glory, that's
just the top of it. We haven't commenced to begin
to get started to comprehend the glory of our God. And I say
to my dear friend here, yes, Jesus Christ is man. He's man,
very man, a very man. Bone of our bone and flesh of
our flesh. He was a man, born of a woman, made under the law.
Revealed from this book. He's God in human flesh He's
without sin. He knew no sin. He was from the
beginning He was the man the man the flesh part was born,
but the son was given He lived before he came to this earth
He's eternally lived. He has no beginning or ending
of days no mother or father in that sense that he was a created. Christ is the only begotten Son
of God. We got a lot to learn. I like
the story Brother Barnard used to tell. There was a preacher
trying to do what I'm trying to do tonight. One of these fellas
trying to explain the Trinity and he was going through all
this and there was a boy in the congregation called Silly Billy.
And he was sitting back there talking. That was back in the
days when the usher deacons, you know, had these poles and
every so often tapped you on the head if you disturbed the service.
And they tapped Silly Billy on the head. And Silly Billy just
kept, he was writing. He just kept writing. And he
was writing something. And the usher came, tapped him
on the head, and he kept on writing. So the usher took it away from
him and brought it down the aisle and put it up on the pulpit.
And the preacher was going through all of his all of his exposés
of all of the arguments and theories about the Trinity and he looked
down and there was what Silly Billy had written. And it took
him so much by surprise he stopped talking, preaching, and he just
read it to the congregation. He said, three in one and one
in three. That's too much for Silly Billy.
But this one thing can Silly Billy see. One of them died for
me. I like that. I like that an awful
lot. And I'll tell you, this is too
much for Silly Henry, too. But I believe it. I believe God. Jesus Christ is God. He's God. He's their God of their God.
What do we preach? We preach Christ as God, His
deity, and we preach Christ the Messiah. The Messiah. He's the sent one of God. All
through the Old Testament, all the way back here, all the way
back here, there's somebody coming. That's what it's saying. In Genesis
3.15, after Adam and Eve sinned, look over there a minute, after
Adam and Eve sinned, in Genesis 3.15, God said to the serpent,
I'm going to put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed and her seed. There's somebody coming. And
when Cain was born, Eve thought he had come. She thought she
had him. She said, I've gotten the man.
I've gotten that seed. But that Cain wasn't woman's
seed, he was Adam's seed. and he partook of Adam's transgression.
But all the way from there, and then on down through the writings
of Moses, Moses talks about that prophet. God's gonna raise up
a prophet. And they talked about that priest
of which Melchizedek was a type. They talked about that king,
and that priest, and that prophet, and that Christ, and that Messiah.
And there was an old priest in the temple at Jerusalem, or wherever. Jerusalem, I think, is where
he was. Simeon. And God told Simeon that he wouldn't
die until he had seen that priest, and that prophet, and that king,
and that Christ, and that Messiah. And he was looking for it. He
was looking for it. God promised him that. God told
him that. And when Mary brought the child
Jesus into that temple to do for him what the law required,
that old man took him in his arms. The revelation of God's
Spirit made known unto him that he had in his arms that promise. That Messiah, that prophet, that
priest, that king, all it talks about over here. Everything written
in here. In Christ Jesus our Lord said
all that was written in Moses and the Psalms and in the prophets
about me. That branch, shallow. The scepter shall not depart
from Judah till shallow. That lamb, that redeemer, somebody's
coming. Bless your heart, see me and
said he's here. I'm ready to die now, I've seen
him. And I'm saying to you that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment
of every one of these things back here. I appreciated something
Doris told me a while ago. She's teaching her class this
morning and she was talking about Rahab and Jericho. You know, Joshua came. That's
about all most folks know today is is the walls of Jericho came
tumbling down. Well, let me tell you something.
Before they tumbled down, there was a red string, a rope was
hanging off of one of those windows, a red rope. And there was a woman
who let some spies down that rope. It was a red rope. It wasn't
black, yellow, or green. It was red. And it was hanging
down that, and where that red rope was, the window, there was
one of God's sheep. And when Joshua and them came,
that sheep was delivered. And she asked that class of,
I mean little fellas, they just up to the first grade, second
grade. She said, what was that red rope? What did it signify
back here? And one of the fellas raised
his hand and says, that's the blood of Jesus Christ. Let me
tell you something, that little fella knows the gospel. That's
the gospel, and that rock was Christ, and that Passover's Christ,
and that tabernacle's Christ, and that brazen serpent's Christ,
and Jonah's Christ, and all the way through. That's who he is. And then we preach the work of
Christ. Now, I couldn't take the few moments I have tonight
and even give you a summary of that which would take years to
tell, but let me tell you something. We are a body of redeemed people. We're called the sheep of Christ,
the family of God, and so forth. But we have been in the mind
and purpose of God for a long time. Back in eternity past,
the Lord God, the scripture says, gave his son a people. That's
what scripture says, the Father gave them to me. In the beginning,
God chose you to salvation. and made Christ our surety. This
work of Christ, when we preach Christ crucified, we don't just
preach the six hours or so he was on the cross. We're preaching
from eternity past to eternity future. Preaching Christ crucified,
you see, if he's a mediator, he has no blood to plead unless
he died. He has no blood sacrifice or
atonement to offer if he didn't die. If he didn't die, you see. And back yonder in eternity when
God gave him a people and made him surety for those people,
he can't be their surety unless he dies and pays their debt that
they owe. He can't be our representative
before justice unless he dies. So what we're saying is when
we preach Christ crucified, we're not just preaching just one act
of Christ or one part of his redemptive work. Christ crucified
encompasses all that he is from eternity past to eternity future,
all that he is and all that he does and all that he did. So he was our surety. And then
he came into the world and fulfilled the law and gave us a righteousness.
He went to the cross and died as our atonement, as our lamb
before God. He went to the glory to intercede.
He's coming back to claim that which he purchased. So all of
this is Christ in him crucified. Actually, you talk about somebody
saying, somebody saying that if you go over there, you only
hear the same thing. We hear the same person. But
my friend, to preach the work of Christ, a man could spend
his life and the lives of ten other men and not finish Christ's
work. We could talk forever about Christ, and we will. We'll praise
Him forever. We could talk of His work forever.
Let's just take this Sunday, let's take the next year and
just talk about the suretyship of Christ, the covenant mercies
of Christ. Let's take the whole year and
talk about the types of Christ. Let's take the whole year and
just study the promises of Christ. Let's take the whole next year
and just talk about the birth of Christ, the miraculous, sinless,
immaculate birth of Christ, the incarnation of God in a man. Let's take the next 10 years
and talk about the righteousness of Christ and the sin offering
and sacrifice of Christ, the resurrection of Christ. He broke
the grave asunder. He came forth because I live,
you shall live. You have no hope of living if
Christ doesn't live. Paul said if we preach the resurrection,
you can't preach the resurrection without preaching Christ. Because
if Christ be not risen, there is no resurrection of the dead.
We're false witnesses of God. We've lied on God. Those who
perish in Christ are dead. We're most miserable. And if
Christ didn't die, he didn't rise from the dead. So to preach
Christ, and here's another thing. We preach holiness in Christ.
The very motive, you gave your gifts while ago to preach the
gospel. Why did you give? You give because you love Christ.
Why do you love Christ? Because he loved you. And we
give, Paul says, here's the motive for giving. He gave himself. Here's the motive for forgiving.
He forgave us. Here's the motive for love. He
loved us and gave himself for us. You can't motivate a believer
without taking him to Calvary. And if you do, you're a fool.
Because every other motive will fail except that motive. Christ
died for my sins. Christ forgave me. Christ showed
me mercy. Christ loved me. Therefore I
love you. That's the whole motivation.
We're motivating people with the wrong purposes and and that's
preaching Christ him and then let me show you this we preach
Christ as the sinner's only hope and sufficient hope let me tell
you something there is no real joy outside of Christ I declare
that with all that is within me but I'll tell you this there's
fullness of joy in him now the world can it can satisfy for
a while but not for long There's pleasure in sin for a season,
that's so, but only for a season. There's pleasure in Christ eternally.
There's only, the only rest, rest, total rest that your soul
can ever know is to be in Christ by faith. That's rest. The only
peace that you can ever know, the only real lasting fellowship
that you can have is that fellowship that lasts, and that's Christ.
That's, I'm telling you the truth. The old medicine man used to
travel over the West with a bottle of cure-all. He'd sell his medicine. Dr. so-and-so, Dr. Jones' cure-all. He'd say, what's it for? Oh,
athlete's foot and dandruff and dropsy and rheumatism and arthritis
and you name it, it'll cure everything. Well, he was a liar, wasn't he?
But I'll tell you this, I'm no liar when I say Christ can cure
every need. He can meet every need. I don't
care what you got, I don't care what your sin, or what your disease,
or what your need, or what your infirmity, or what your failure,
Christ Jesus is God's divine remedy, He's God Almighty's yes. That's right. Whatever form sin
can take, He can cure. He can cure. And I'll tell you
this, He's satisfaction. I found this to be so, in a great
measure. He's peace and joy and happiness,
and he becomes to you husband, wife, brother, friend. He becomes
to you life, substance, wisdom, everything. And when he does,
you'll find wherever you are. This, I believe Paul, I believe,
I know, I know, may not have experienced, but I know where
Paul was coming from when he said, I've learned in whatsoever
state to be content. If Christ is there, I'm content. If I have Christ, I can be content.
If I have Christ, because He's everything. We preach Christ
crucified without the shedding of blood, no remission. This
is the sum and substance of redemption. It's the essence of salvation.
It's Christ and Him crucified. Now let me say this. It's not
the Christ of the manger. It's the Christ of the cross.
It's not the Christ of the law, even the Christ of the healing
power, or Christ of tender love. Without the cross, there's no
message. Because my friend, to deny the
cross is to deny the holiness of God. The holiness of God demands
satisfaction for sin. It does. To deny the cross is
to deny the wages of sin. The wages of sin is death. To
deny the cross is to deny the justice of God. Now let me close
with this. To whom do we preach Christ crucified?
We preach Christ crucified. To whom? Alright? Briefly, to
sinners. To sinners. Therefore to everyone. Because everyone's a sinner.
Our Lord said go into all the world and preach the gospel to
every creature. So I preach the gospel to sinners.
All have sinned and come short of God's glory. All we like sheep
have gone astray. There's no person between these
walls that is not in God's sight and in the sight of the law,
a desperate, depraved sinner. That's so. I don't care what
you claim, how good you say you are. You may be good in the eyes
of people, but God's not going to measure you by people's eyes.
He's going to measure you under the under the searchlight of His
holiness. And you can't come up to that. You can't pass the
test. You just can't do it. I can't
pass the test. And I preach the gospel to sinners,
to sinners of every age, to children. Now children here tonight may
not have experienced, they may not have experienced their depravity
to a great extent. But I'm telling them this, they
will. they will. And children need the same Savior.
I preach the gospel of Christ to the old and gray-headed. If
I could find a man as old as Methuselah, you know what I'd
tell him? Christ died for sinners. Christ died for sinners. And
I preach the gospel to sinners of every rank. We don't have
one message for President Carter and another message for the porter
at the railroad station. We have the same message for
presidents, or parliament, or kings, or queens, or doctors,
or lawyers. I have nothing greater to preach
to them but Christ, and I have nothing less to preach to the
poor but Christ. It's the same message. It's the
same need. Let me tell you something. If
you take all those diamonds off, and crowns off, and clothes off,
and silk and satin off, and stand them up, they're just sinners.
They ain't no difference. No difference. We preach the
gospel to sinners of every station, in religion or out of religion,
in good works or in the gutter, in the pulpit or in prostitution.
Christ is the only hope. He's my only hope, and he's that
drunkard's only hope. And mothers, he's your only hope,
and he's that prostitute's only hope. And in God's eyes, don't
let me upset you, and don't let me make you mad. but you're no
whit, one whit better in the sight of God than that fallen
girl. I'm telling you the truth. I'm
telling you the truth. Sin is sin in God's sight to
offend in one point of the law, to be guilty of the whole law.
That's what God's Word says. Now in people's eyes you're better,
and in some eyes you're better, but in God's sight all have sinned. Does that offend you? Well, you
just have to be offended. Because it's the truth, and at
the judgment you'll find it out. I hope you don't wait till then
to find it out. But the heart is deceitful. Whose heart? Every
heart! The heart is desperately wicked.
Whose heart? Every heart! Adam's sons and
daughters are sinners. Who are? Whose sinners? Every
son and daughter of Adam. Every man needs it. Your need
will never be greater. It'll be more evident someday,
but it'll never be greater than it is right now. Your heart will
never be blacker than it is right now, only harder but not blacker.
Your inability will never be more certain, only more understood. And your time to repent will
never be better, just shorter. Huh? That's right. It'll never
be better. Let not conscience make you linger,
nor fitness fondly dream. All the fitness he requires is
to feel your need of him. I need him. Come ye sinners,
poor and needy, weak and wounded, sick and sore, Jesus ready, willing,
able to save you, stands and says, come unto me, all ye that
labor and are heavy laden, I'll give you rest. What shall I do,
preacher? Plead to Christ, look to Christ,
or give me something to do. All right? Plead to Christ, look
to Christ. But I mean give me something
to do. It is done. The great transaction
is done. Christ died for you. Shed his
blood. What do you want to do? What
can you do for God? What can you contribute to God? Suppose
you tell me what you want to do. What do you want to do? And we're talking about salvation,
and I'm not talking about after salvation. I'm not talking about
witnessing and praying and reading God's Word and growing in grace
and worshiping God. I'm talking about for salvation,
the justification of your soul. Tell me what you want to do.
What do you want to do? Well, surely there's something
for me to do. No. Christ died for our sins. You want to add
something to that? Would you like to add something
to that? What could you add to that? Christ obeyed the law. He is our righteousness. You're
going to bring your rags and say, sew this on that beautiful
robe. I wouldn't do that, Fajir. The robe's finished. The robe's
complete. He said, it's finished! It's
finished! Can you understand that? It's
finished! What's finished? Righteousness,
redemption, salvation, forgiveness, justification. Finished We keep
Joe won't dig something up and add to he got that robe of righteousness
And we come along with this little old scroungy ragged piece of
works and said that'll look good on there, won't it? No, I won't
look good on there They won't look good on there Glory there
holiness there perfection there That old rag at old dirty filthy
rag of yours just won't help it a bit you distract from it
It's finished And this is the preachers bless their hearts
and yet don't. But they keep wanting to give
somebody something to do. If you do this, God will save
you. Brother, let me tell you something. I'll tell you what you do. What
Scripture says to do. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ
and thou shalt be saved. That's what Scripture says. He
that believeth on the Son hath life. He that believeth not shall
not see life. Not he that worketh, or he that
prayeth, or he that holdeth out, or he that doeth in, he that
believeth! I believe. I believe. That Philippian jailer stood
there in front of Paul, what must I do? Believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved. And that's what you're
doing in believing on Christ. He's giving credit to what he
did. You're laying hold upon what he did. You're being identified
with what he did. You're resting in what he did.
You're receiving from him all the benefits and blessings of
what he did. And then as a result of that,
as a result of that union with Christ and that acceptance in
Christ and that salvation in Christ, you'll show forth his
praises. You'll serve him to God takes
you home, and then you'll serve him for eternity. You'll praise
him. You'll love him. You'll do those
things. But the salvation of your soul, the redemption of
your soul, the forgiveness of your soul, rests entirely and
completely on what Christ did. And somebody may be critical
of this preacher, and you have every right to be. You're welcome
to be. Any man who steps up here puts himself in the place for
criticism. But I don't know what to tell people to do at the close
of a service. I don't know. Except look to
Christ. You know anything else to add
to that? Well, tell him to come forward. Well, there's no salvation
down here. No more magic in my hand than John's hand or anybody
else's hand. It's in Christ. Now then, if
Christ has saved you, if he's redeemed you, you want to confess
it, and you will confess it. You will confess Christ. If you
want to come to the front of the church and tell people God
saved you, you're as welcome to as you can be. But I'd follow
him in baptism. That's what everybody didn't
hear daily. They followed him in baptism. And I'll tell you
another thing. They identified themselves with
the church. He said God added to the church them that were
saved. Added daily to the church. I
don't believe, let me tell you something. I just don't believe
a man loves Christ who doesn't love the things of Christ. Read
the back of the bulletin that I wrote and put on the back of
the bulletin for today. You love Christ, you love everything
that is identified with him. And you want everybody to know
that's what you're identified with. Those are my people. Those are my people because they're
God's people. That's my book because it's God's
book. That's my Lord because that's God's Lord. And that's
my gospel because it's God's gospel. And I'm not ashamed of
it. Our Father, bless this message
tonight. We believe that thou hast spoken
to us. We believe you've given us a
word from thy word. And I pray that you'd bless it.
Bless it to somebody's heart. Use it for the salvation of a
sinner and for the glory of Jesus Christ the Lord. We pray in his
blessed name for his sake. Amen.