The Grace of God's Call

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Preacher: Ross Macdonald Scripture: Genesis 12:1-3

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Well, we have Dan Anderson to thank for a nice donation of some new audio equipment for the church.
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He had texted and said that he got a wireless mic, and for some reason in my mind
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I was thinking of that hideous ShamWow kind of microphone that wraps around your face, you know, like a phone operator, and I was really happy that it wasn't, there was no headgear, but we'll see how this works.
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I think there's also a wireless mic for our interaction time. I don't know if we have that set up today.
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Maybe not, we'll see, but we're taking great strides technologically here at GRBC, so this is good.
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Well, we're continuing on this morning in the book of Genesis to the very heart of the book. As we begin chapter 12, we begin really what is the core emphasis.
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Chapters 1 through 11, though we had spent, I think, something like seven months in 1 through 11, they really are just the introduction to the patriarchal narrative, which begins in chapter 12, and so we're beginning now this next section in our study in Genesis with the life of Abram, and we're reminded what we considered a few weeks ago about how
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God moves from the great towering city of Babel, which he confuses and causes to disperse over the face of the earth, and in the shadow of that colossus, he's raising up a man after his own heart.
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He's raising up for himself a man in the line of Shem, a man in the line of the promised seed to the woman.
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God is patiently, faithfully, purposely preserving the line of Shem, and His sovereign grace, as we'll see this morning, is reaching down out of heaven, and it's favoring by sheer love.
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It's favoring and unilaterally resting upon a man named Abram, who's living in Ur of the
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Chaldeans. Genesis 12, 1 through 3, now the Lord had said to Abram, get out of your country, from your family and from your father's house, to a land that I will show you.
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I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing.
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I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
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What is Genesis 12, 1 through 3, but the gracious call of God?
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This is the call of Abram. The history of redemption, as Derek Kidner reminds us, is just like creation itself.
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Creation begins with God speaking, and so redemption begins with God speaking, more specifically,
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God calling, and this is the call. Get out of your country. Get away from your family.
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Leave your father's house. Come follow me, and I will show you a land. Enter with me and dwell with me in the land that I will show you.
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I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great, and in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.
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Notice the repetition of, I will, I will, I will,
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I will. There's a priority of God's activity in redemption. Redemption does not unfold by God meeting man halfway.
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Man does not respond to God and then work some things out and develop this symbiotic relationship.
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You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours. You meet me halfway, and I'll meet you halfway. Maybe together we can try to work out this promise
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I made back in Genesis 3. No. There's a priority of God, God's activity,
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God's sovereign grace. I will do this. I will do this.
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I will do this. There's no condition. There's no string attached. There's no qualification. This is just promise after promise after promise, and we're supposed to read this and say, why?
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Why will you do this? What has he done? Surely Abram's done something to warrant this kind of favor.
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You're going to bless everyone who blesses him? You're going to curse anyone who curses him? You're going to take him out of this pagan society and make him a father of the faithful?
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Literally make him a blessing to every human being henceforth? This guy must be amazing.
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There must be no one like Abram. This must be one of the most incredible men you could have ever met. This must have just been a one -off.
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The proverbial needle in the haystack. Well, as we'll see this morning, it's simply the priority of God's grace.
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God has chosen Abram. It's as simple as that. God has chosen Abram to be a recipient of sovereign grace, to receive blessing upon blessing upon blessing.
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And this is really the beginning, not just of God's blessing to Abram, but as we move forward in that bigger picture of the history of God's covenantal dealings with man, of God's bringing forth
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His gospel, we see that this is really the beginning of Israel's history. In fact, when
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Nehemiah gathers the people, we read in Nehemiah 9, when the people are gathered and they're cut to the heart because they realize as a result of the sin that's risen in their midst that they're so strayed from the truth of God.
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And yet here God has reconvened them in the land. And so they have this great day of feasting after the feast of booths.
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And of course, there's these great prayers and the great admonition. The joy of the
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Lord is your strength, Nehemiah 8. And in Nehemiah 9, we have the most incredible prayer that recounts the history of God dealing with His people
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Israel. And this is how it begins. Stand up, bless the Lord your God forever and ever.
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Blessed be your glorious name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise. You alone are the
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Lord. You have made heaven the heaven of heavens with all their hosts, the earth and everything on it, the seas and all that is in them.
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So where are we beginning? Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. This is who you are. You are the
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Creator. This is how we identify you, Lord. You are the Creator. And yet, how do we specifically, uniquely relate to you as your people
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Israel? You are the Lord God who chose Abram.
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And you brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans. You see, you go from Creator to the call of Abram.
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That's Nehemiah 9's summary of the history of Israel at the very beginning. The Creator God chose
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Abram. He chose Abram. He chose Abram. He called
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Abram and led Abram out of Ur of the Chaldeans. These words are lifted up first and foremost to the
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Lord, but they're intended to instruct the people that were listening. Certainly intended to instruct us today.
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This gives us a summary of God's covenant to Abraham. This operation is
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God being faithful to a covenant. The prayer goes on, You have performed your words because you are righteous.
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And that leads us to ask the question, How could Abram be worthy of this grace?
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Well, Abram couldn't be worthy of this grace. We'll see it shortly. So then how could
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God be righteous? If Abram didn't earn this grace, how could
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Nehemiah 9 say that you performed your words, you fulfilled your promise to Abram, because you're righteous.
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How could God be righteous if He's just showing grace to a sinner?
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I thought God was just. I thought He was holy. I thought He couldn't dwell with sin.
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Why would He favor a sin? Should the judge of all the earth show favor to a criminal and count himself righteous?
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That would be a corrupt, a wicked judge. The justice had not been served. So how could
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Abram be worthy of this grace? Well, let's take a moment to remember as we proceed this morning what
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God's grace is. When God in His grace draws near to embrace a sinner, a sinner like Abram, it is a grace that always demands a cross.
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All grace is bloody grace. All grace is cross -wrought grace.
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God cannot justify the guilty. God certainly cannot show favor and blessing upon blessing upon blessing upon the guilty and also be righteous.
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He can only be righteous if He's satisfied His justice toward them. And so for Abram, like all the sons of Abraham by faith, that took place upon the cross.
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God is not arbitrary, in other words. I feel like grace to him, not grace to you.
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He's not plucking some heavenly daisy. Grace to this one, not grace to this one. He's not arbitrary.
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There's a reckoning. It's not some vague motion, some vague gesture, some bottomless attitude of kindness.
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It's the work of a holy God that sovereignly transforms everything He touches. And the grace of this
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God flows out of this mysterious compassion He has for rebels who resist
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Him and even fight against Him and bring dirt and defilement upon His name and make eternal wounds to themselves and bring eternal damage to others.
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And God in His grace and His eternal determination to save countless sinners and continue with them and bring them into a new heaven and a new earth all stands upon what took place at Calvary.
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Grace, if you were to give it a definition. What is God's grace then? What is
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God's grace? At its utmost, in its fullness,
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God's grace is the humiliated Son of God stripped bare and crucified on the cross, crucified for sinners, risen for their justification, ascended to glorify them.
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That's the grace of God. Jesus Christ is the grace of God. Jesus Christ is the yesterday man of God.
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He takes a pack of dogs who eat their own vomit and He touches them with His grace out of this eternal compassion and He makes them into a glorious bride.
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And He delights, He delights to behold them in the splendor that He has created.
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That is the grace of God. So Calvary, in other words, Calvary reaches all the way back to the
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Ur of the Chaldeans. The grace of God begins at the cross and yet it stretches all the way back in time to meet
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Abram in Ur of the Chaldeans. And so from our side, it's a little bit different from God's side.
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Our perspective of grace is different from God's perspective. The cross is that placeholder over all of human time in history that gives the basis in the war for God to show grace in any way, in any capacity to anyone.
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From our perspective, the grace of God begins as a call.
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It begins as a call. Now let's keep in mind the world at this time. The effects of the fall are a little more pronounced.
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I say that because people are dying a lot earlier than they used to. We don't have any more Methuselahs around breaking the
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Guinness World Records for oldest age. Shem died at 600 years of age. When Noah got in the ark, he had only 350 more years to live.
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Terah's father only lives 148 years. Even while Terah is alive,
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Noah's father, Abram's father, his son dies. So Abram's surrounded by death and if he knows anything of his genealogy, it seems like death is approaching men a lot more quickly.
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Lifespans are being shortened, so there's this sharp pronouncement of death, but that's not the only thing in Abram's context.
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We also read this in Joshua 24. We read about his family life in Ur, what
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Abram would have grown up under. Joshua is making a covenant at Shechem.
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Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem and he called for the elders of Israel, for their heads, for their judges, for their officers.
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And they presented themselves before God. And Joshua said to all of the people, thus says the
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Lord God, your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the river in old times.
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The river being the river Euphrates. And they served other gods. Then I took your father
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Abraham from the other side of the river and I led him throughout all the land of Canaan and multiplied his descendants.
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Do you see what Joshua is recounting? Your fathers, Terah and Abram and Nahor and Haran, they were idol worshippers on the other side of Euphrates.
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They were pagans living in Ur of the Chaldeans. Abram was an idol worshipper.
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There's a famous archaeologist named Sir Leonard Woolley who demonstrated that he had found the ancient city of Ur, at least the lowest layer, which would have been consistent with the time for the ancient city of Ur.
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And he tried to describe through various sketches of his excavations the scale of that city and estimate what kind of civilization it could have supported.
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How sophisticated were they? What was the base population? What could be known about some of the challenges they had to face, whether through warfare or famine, disease, other such things.
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And he esteemed that Ur possessed these grand markets, massive civic spaces, halls, a library full of clay tablets, many towering buildings.
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Maybe not to the scale of Babel, but every city became Babel Junior after that.
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He estimated perhaps 200, 250, 300 ,000 inhabitants. You have these stepped temples, these ziggurats.
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The most pronounced one would have been for the chief deity, this god Nanak, who was a Sumerian god, a fertility god, and god of the moon.
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So the chief ziggurat, the chief stepped temple, would have had sacrifices throughout the day and night being given to this false god, this idol.
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And Abram would have learned as a young boy how to get in line, how to pay the priest, how to marvel at the priestesses as they danced around and sang praises and hymns and pinched incense and killed animals unto this false god.
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I wonder how many nights he prayed in vain to this false god, this fertility god, considering he'd married a barren woman.
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How together perhaps they brought more and more sacrifice up those jagged steps for the priest to kill. Maybe this will be the month we conceive.
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He was a pagan. He was an idol worshipper. This towering city, this idolatry, this debauchery, it would have pervaded
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Abram's whole life in Ur. And that is the scene where God's grace finds him.
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That is the scene where God's grace finds him. There's no
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Noah. We don't read of any Noah between Genesis 11 and Genesis 12. It does not even seem like somehow
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God's testimony has been preserved through the line of Shem. It kind of seems like he had to pluck
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Abram out of Ur because there was no one else that was even remotely following him, heeding to him.
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The world doesn't seem to have had a single believer left, if we could put it that way. We read at some point,
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Terah decided to move his family from Ur to the land of Canaan. And most likely Abram had something to do with that move.
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I'll explain why in a moment. We read back in chapter 11, 31, Terah took his son
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Abram and his grandson Law, the son of Haran, his daughter -in -law Sarai, his son Abram's wife, and they went out from Ur of the
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Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan. But they didn't make it all the way to Canaan.
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They came to Haran, right? They came to Haran and dwelt there. And that's where Terah dies.
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And then Abram continues on to Canaan, as we'll see next week. So Abram had lived all of his 75 years between Ur and Haran, between these two cities, who shared many of the same deities.
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Haran was very comfortable for Terah, worshipped the same gods, the temples looked very similar.
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But something happened to Abram. Something happened to Abram when he was living in Ur, in the shadow of the ziggurat, worshipping a false god, praying and praising and sacrificing to a god that was not there.
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Something happened. This is what the great martyr, the first martyr of the
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Christian church, Stephen, has to say about that in Acts 7. Brethren, fathers, listen.
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The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia.
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That's another way of talking about Ur. Before he dwelt in Haran. And said to him,
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Get out of your country and from your relatives. Come to a land that I will show you. Then he came out of the land of the
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Chaldeans and dwelt in Haran. And from there, when his father was dead, he moved him to this land in which you now dwell.
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So what does Stephen say in Acts 7? He says that the God of glory appeared to Abram in Ur of the
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Chaldeans before he moved to Haran. And he only left Haran when his father died. Then he went to Canaan.
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So you see this picture, don't you? Abram had no contact with the
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Lord. No contact with the Lord's people. There was no fellowship that he could go to.
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Grab a paper plate and slop something out of a crock pot onto it. There was no preacher.
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There was no christianbook .com. There was no prayer meeting. There was no bible study group he could join.
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There was no tract that made its way onto his lap. And he said, I'd like to go to this website and find out more information.
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There was no mp3 that made its way into his carceria. There was no brother that came alongside him to bear him up and point him to Christ.
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There was none of this in Ur. But God called him. But God called him.
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All we have in Genesis 12, 1 -3 is this call of God. Get out of your country. Get out of your father's house.
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Leave your people. Come to the land, I will show you. Stephen says there's a little more to it than that.
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It wasn't just the voice. He says, the God of glory appeared to him. Appeared to him.
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We don't have the details here in Genesis, but we have it elsewhere than in Acts 7. Something so intensely personal.
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Very much like Moses' call in the wilderness, isn't it? The God of glory appeared to him.
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Follow me. We're told that God revealed Himself to Abram.
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We don't know the details, but we know the fact of it. We also know that God did not reveal
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Himself to Terah. Did not reveal Himself to Nahor. Did not reveal
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Himself to Haran. He revealed Himself to Abram. God chose Abram.
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His grace found Abram. Out of all of the inhabitants of the earth, the
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Creator chose this one creature and called him and spoke to him. And said, now you will follow me.
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Now I will be your God. You will be mine. Abram was not seeking that.
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Abram was worshipping a false god. He was not seeking Yahweh. He was not seeking the Creator God. He had been worshipping false gods in utter defiance.
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He had been living a life in defiance. And that is when God's grace found him. This was a sovereign, gracious act of God that changed the whole life of Abram and therefore the whole course of human history.
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Abram was not looking for this, but God was. Listen to me,
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Isaiah 51. You who follow after righteousness, you who seek the Lord, look to the rock from which you were hewn, and to the hole of the pit from which you were dug.
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Look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah who bore you. For I called him alone and blessed him and increased him.
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Do you see? I called him alone. And God is saying, look to that.
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Look to my day of power. Look to the kind of grace I show. Are you looking to me? Are you feeling discouraged?
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Look to Abraham. Look at what my grace does. Look at my compassion that never fails. We find this pattern, don't we, of God sovereignly calling
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His people throughout the Bible. We never find someone beating down God's door.
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It's always the reverse. Moses in the back side of the desert, tending for sheep that belong to his father -in -law, doing this work for 40 years, until one day he turns to the corner and there's this bush that is engulfed in fire and yet not consumed by it.
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And there he bows down. He's now encountered the living God, the consuming fire. And out of that fire he calls
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Moses. He calls him. He speaks to him and says, and you're going to speak for me. Samuel lying in his bed.
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Here's the voice of God calling to him. He's just a young boy. Isn't this what we were just praying for? Praying for God to do this kind of work in our children in this church?
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Samuel, a boy, hearing the voice of God. Getting up. Eli, Eli. No, I didn't hear anything.
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It was the voice of God. Meeting this young teenager. She receives this vision, this visitation.
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Blessed are you, Mary. Blessed are you. Come on with me. He comes to a man named
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Matthew. He's there devising how he can perhaps have some deceitful gain from the tax collection.
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The Lord comes to him. He says, follow me. You see some brothers casting a net. Follow me.
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I'll make you fishers of men. Follow me. Saul on the road to Damascus.
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The Lord cries out, Saul, Saul. Why are you persecuting me? Do you see?
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It's always the priority of God's grace. And God's grace begins with a call. It begins with a call.
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And that call is effectual. That call is effectual. We distinguish between the general call and the effectual, the effective, the working call of God.
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There is a general call. It's addressed to anyone and everyone. The world goes forth indiscriminately.
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This is the general call of the Gospel. Go out to the hedges and the byways. Compel them to come in.
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This is the general call of God. It goes to millions and billions across the world in every age.
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It's the call of the Gospel. Repent and believe in the Lord Jesus Christ. And you will be saved. We see it in Isaiah 45.
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Look unto me and be saved, all you the ends of the earth. John ends the book of Revelation.
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The spirit and the bride say, come. Let he who is hungry come. Let him who thirst come.
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You see, this is the general call of God. This is the call that goes out to all. Come. Why will you perish?
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Jesus says, many are called but few are chosen. Many are called.
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Few are chosen. In his own ministry, he saw the truth of that, didn't he?
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He saw the multitudes turn away sorrowful. He saw the chief theologians and the most righteous men of his day reject him.
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He saw even people that he healed turn away carelessly. Where were the others that I healed?
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Why did you alone return? Many are called. Few are chosen. Thomas Watson, the great
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Puritan says, there is an outward call. The same way we're using the word general. General call.
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Outward call. Which is nothing else but God's blessed tender of grace in the
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Gospel. He's engaging with sinners when he invites them to come. Accept mercy.
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This is when the Savior speaks, many are called but few are chosen. This external call, this outward general call, it's not sufficient to save.
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But it is sufficient to leave men without excuse. Now, Romans 1 very clearly says that all men are left without excuse just by the majesty of God's creative power.
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How much more so when we, his people, are declaring his word? All mouths are silenced.
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This is the word of the Lord. But then there's also this effectual call.
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What we could say is an inward call. If there's an outward call, there's an inward call. If there's a general call, there's an effectual call.
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And Watson says, this inward call when God wonderfully overpowers the heart.
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Do you see? It's not that there's complete discontinuity. Though we have metaphors of salvation which imply that.
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Death to life, darkness to light, right? But I think this is very thoughtfully and carefully put.
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He overpowers the heart. You are you. You are you.
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There is some level of continuity. He has not made you into a cyborg or a robot or an automaton.
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His spirit has moved in such a way. How does Wesley put it? You know,
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I was fast bound in nature's night. Thine eye diffused a quickening ray.
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I woke, my dungeon flamed with light. My chains fell off.
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My heart was free. I rose, went forth and followed it. That's what we're talking about. It was still
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Wesley. But there's some level of continuity here.
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He overpowers the heart. I love how that's put. He draws the world to embrace
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Christ. This is as Augustine speaks. This is just straight out of Augustine.
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Augustine who's showing the truth of God's grace against the heresy that's encroaching upon it in his day.
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This is as Augustine calls it, the effectual call. God, by that outward call, blows a trumpet in the ear.
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By the inward call, he opens the heart. You see, these things work in tandem. God ordains the ends.
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He also ordains the means. The word blows like a mighty trumpet. In the language of holy war, these mighty battering rams at ear gate.
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But God's effectual call, it's in the secret place. It's overpowering, moving the heart, moving the center, alluring them to Christ.
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This outward call may bring men to a profession of Christ. Profession.
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Oh, I'm a believer. Oh, I signed the card. Oh, I gave my life to Him a few weeks ago. The outward call can do that.
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The outward call can make men profess Christ. Watson says the inward call makes men possess
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Christ. He becomes their possession. Truly His. And they are truly mine, says the
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Lord. The outward call curbs a sinner. It restrains a sinner. The inward call changes them.
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You see, these are the differences. The calling of those who are chosen is the effectual call.
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Many are called, few are chosen. Those chosen who are called, that's the effectual call. It's the call of irresistible grace.
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It's the call of the Spirit of God. Drawing one out of darkness into light.
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And so, the Westminster, larger catechism. I mean, what a compendium of good doctrinal definitions.
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With Scripture to boot. And this is what the larger, you might be most familiar with the shorter catechism.
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Let me challenge you. Give due diligence to the larger catechism.
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They took the time to write it. We should take the time to read it. Westminster, larger catechism, 67.
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What is effectual calling? What is it? Answer. Effectual calling is the work of God's almighty power and grace.
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Whereby, out of His free and special love to His elect, and from nothing in them moving
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Him to them, He does, in His own time, invite and draw them to Jesus Christ.
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You see this language of invitation and drawing? The effectual call is this sovereign invitation and drawing.
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By His Word and Spirit, savingly enlightening their minds, renewing, powerfully determining their wills.
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You see, He works in the mind, in the heart, in the will. Although they are themselves dead in sin, they are here made willing and able, freely to answer
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His call, and to accept and embrace the grace offered and conveyed in it. That's effectual calling.
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The call goes out. You have that word. Whatever is the outward call, the Lord moves it inward.
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And He removes that flesh. And that heart of stone is cast out. It becomes a heart of flesh. And what was dark now is illumined.
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What was flesh becomes spirit. Eyes are opened. Ears are unstopped. The mind is now not darkened, but rather illuminated.
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And so the heart is warmed. And as the affections grow, the will begins to melt and move.
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And all of that is the Spirit of God drawing a sinner unto Himself. This is the effectual call of God.
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This is the mighty link in the chain of redemption in Romans 8. You know that all things work together for the good of those who love
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God, those who are called according to His purpose, for whom He foreknew.
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That's His decree of election. His decree of election. Those whom He foreknew. He also predestined to be conformed to the image of the
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Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom He predestined, He also called.
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That's the election. That's the call of God's election made effectual in His people.
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And those whom He called, He justified. And those whom He justified, He glorified. From God's perspective, this is a done deal.
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Notice the significance of the tense here. These are not, I will do this for those. This is a done deal.
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This is how sure our salvation is. The Spirit of God, as the catechism put it, savingly enlightens our minds, renews and determines our will, so that we're made willing.
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We're made willing. Able to freely answer His call. I wonder if that's instructive to some of you.
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You're aware of the issues of Calvinism or the doctrines of grace, but we tend to think, oh yeah, any talk of free will, we have no place for that.
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No, we certainly do. We certainly do. God does not do violence to the will.
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He does not do violence to the will, but that does not mean that He somehow reacts or synergistically works with the will of man.
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He sovereignly liberates someone from the bondage of a sinful will. And as He does that by His sovereign grace,
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He makes them willing. He makes them willing. They freely come to Him because of His grace.
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Do you see? You He has quickened who were once dead in trespass and sins.
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All of this then is completely dependent upon the Spirit of God who works both through the external world as well as the internal, through the outward call and then effectually inwardly.
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We are all at best dead men speaking to dead men, dying men speaking to dying men, someone who's found a loaf of bread speaking to those who are starving.
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All the things you've heard before, the Spirit of God gives life. The call of God happens inwardly and outwardly.
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We have this in Acts 16 .14. What happens when Paul is there in Philippi and he's speaking to this woman
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Lydia and he's speaking the counsel of God to her? What's taking place with that outward call inwardly?
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The Lord opens her heart. The Lord opens her heart. Martin Lloyd -Jones says of this passage, there it is.
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The word is preached, yes, but people don't pay attention to it. They look at one another while it's being preached.
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They're writing their books. They're reciting poetry to themselves. She's talking about Philippi.
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Smiling at one another. In a sense they hear it, but they don't attend to it. And you cannot be saved until you attend to it.
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So what made Lydia attend to it? The answer is the Lord opened her heart. The Lord put something in her heart.
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This internal work. And the result of that was she paid attention. And she saw the
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Gospel. And she received it. The external call became the internal call.
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The general became the effectual. She believed and was baptized. It is unmistakable.
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It was the Lord opening her heart that made the difference. Otherwise she would have never believed. The inward work of God by His Spirit through His Word is utterly sovereign.
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Completely dependent upon the will of God. I don't want to spend too much time on this, but I was just fascinated looking at Romans 9 and 10.
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And seeing all the different ways the word call is used.
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It's fascinating. There's so many different angles and depths to this word call. I'll just breeze past this just to point out some of this.
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Romans 9 -10 he's talking about God's purpose in election. And he's answering the question of why God seems to have passed by His people
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Israel. And so Paul begins by redefining terms in Romans 9 -6. They're not all
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Israel who are of Israel. It is not as though the word of God has taken effect.
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For they're not all Israel who are of Israel. No, they are children because they're the seed of Abraham. But in Isaac your seed shall be called.
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Your call is this covenantal purpose of God. I'm purposing to call the people through the line of Isaac.
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That is, those who are the children of the flesh. These are not the children of God. But the children of promise, they're counted as the seed.
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And not only this, but when Rebekah also had conceived by one man, even by her father Isaac, the children not yet being born nor having done anything good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of him who works, but of him who calls.
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Do you see again? Sovereign calling God. His purpose of election is continued.
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Look at this. That he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom he called.
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Just like he called Abraham. Just like he called out of the line of Isaac. Just like he called even us.
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Not of the Jews only, but also the Gentiles. As he says in Hosea, I will call them my people. Now this is more naming, identifying.
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I will call them my people who are not my people. It shall come to pass in the place where it was said to them,
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You're not my people there. They shall be called sons of the living God. Called sons of the living God. Notice how
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Paul moves to chapter 10 and he starts going from that inward sovereign elective calling of God to the outward general call of the gospel.
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We're looking at this electing call of God in chapter 9. Now we're moving to this outward general call.
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The scripture says, Whoever believes on him will not be put to shame. There's no distinction between Jew and Greek.
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The same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. Right? You call upon Him.
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For whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. How then shall they call on Him of whom they've not believed?
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How shall they believe in Him of whom they've not heard? Do you see again and again there's this distinction between the inward work of the
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Spirit of God according to His purpose of election and the outward call of the gospel pardoning, begging, pleading with sinners to call upon the name of the
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Lord. 1 Corinthians 1 Paul called to be an apostle of Jesus Christ through the will of God to the church of God which is at Corinth.
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Those who are sanctified in Christ Jesus called to be saints. Do you see?
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This is the divine calling of God. The Lord Jesus Christ.
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Verse 7 Who will also confirm you to the end that you may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ God is faithful by whom you were called into fellowship with His Son.
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We marvel to see God calling Abram out of Ur. Brothers and sisters, marvel that God has called you.
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God called you. God called you into fellowship with His Son. In the same way, for the same purpose
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He called Abram. In fact, if I might put it this way, He called
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Abram for your sake. He called Abram for your sake. Jesus says,
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Of every man born of women none is greater than John the Baptist but even he is least in the kingdom of heaven.
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Abram is least in the kingdom of heaven compared to us because of our proximity to Christ.
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The realization in our lives of His fulfillment. Abram's call was for our sake.
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Sometimes you hear people say things like I found the light. I found Christ.
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Well, you know, a friend took me to church and I just realized that this was something I really needed and I had to do it. And so I went forth and I prayed the prayer.
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You didn't find the light, brother or sister. The light found you. You can't find the light until the light is shining.
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And that's how it always is. God has to first make the light shine to dead eyes for you to be able to find it.
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You might hear someone say, I found the Lord. No, the Lord found you. When I ask people for their testimony, generally speaking,
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I try to be conscious of that. I say, tell me how Jesus found you. How did Jesus call you? And I say, oh, how did you find
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Jesus? Like you stumbled upon Him. It's already setting the testimony up in a certain way, isn't it?
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Well, I'm wiser than most people and I set out all the major world religions and I rationally compare them and realize that Christianity seems to be the most rational.
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I say, well, I don't think we can baptize you, unfortunately. Tell me how
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Jesus found you. It's like the great hymn, I sought the Lord.
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I sought the Lord. But afterward I knew. He moved my soul to seek
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Him, seeking me. It was not that I found, O Savior, true. No, I was found of thee.
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Every believer has this great hope of God's calling. It's an effectual call.
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It's an effective power and work of God. Paul prays in Ephesians 1 that believers would know the hope of His calling, the riches of His glory, of His inheritance in the saints, the exceeding greatness of His power toward us who believe.
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And the dawning of that exceeding great power is this call. Not just the outward call of providence but that inward, effectual call of the
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Spirit transferring us out of a domain of darkness into His marvelous light. And this is the way that Abram became the father of all who believe.
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And this is why Abram's faith is the pattern for all faith. It always has been. What did we do for God?
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That He should set His love upon us. Why should He choose to intervene in my life or in yours?
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What compelled Him to act? Were you wiser, humbler, more generous, kinder than the rest?
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Were your sins less odious? Were your hurts less violent?
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Was your life less godless? What compelled Him to intervene in your life and call you?
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To melt your heart and open your eyes and unstop your ears? To be the God of glory who reveals
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Himself to you? We didn't deserve the Gospel. We weren't seeking the
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Gospel. We didn't desire the Gospel. But God met us. He picked us up. He loved us. He called us.
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He came to us with a grace that we could not resist, though we tried. Psalm 110 .3
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Your people shall be made willing in the day of your power. Thomas Watson says this,
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When God calls a man by His grace, he cannot but come. This is the reason that the world missions movement began.
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This is the reason that there were great revivals in the 17th and 18th and 19th centuries.
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This reason right here. When the Spirit of God is at work calling sinners to come, they cannot but come.
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They cannot stop themselves from coming. You may resist a minister's call.
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You cannot resist a spirit's call. Isn't that the hope of every preacher? Isn't that the hope of you? When you're talking to someone about your faith and internally you're praying,
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God, open His eyes. Open His eyes. Watson says,
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The finger of the blessed Spirit can write upon the heart of stone. God's words are creating words.
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When He says, Let there be light, there is light. When He says, Let there be faith, there is faith. God rides forth conquering in the chariot of His Gospel.
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He makes the blind eyes to see. He makes that stony heart bleed. If God will call a man, nothing lies against His way.
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This is what we call the eye of tulip, right? Irresistible grace. And it's because of this that we pray for sinners.
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It doesn't matter how rebellious they are, how fouled up in sin they are. Lars Larson always, whenever he hears some prayer request, you know, pray for this, you know, person, they're, you know, an abuser and a drug user, and, you know, they're lying and on the runs, there's a warrant out for their arrest.
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Lars would say, Sounds like a prospect for the kingdom. It's a prospect for the kingdom. On the adverse, brothers and sisters, if God is not sovereign in this call, if He only works through the general call in hopes that somehow some sinner will say,
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Yes, this is in my best interest. I guess I'll come. I guess I'll commit. If God is that weak, if He's that impotent, and it all hangs on a sinner's decision to say yes or to say no, if the church and the pulpit do not have a
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God that sovereignly calls and saves sinners, then inevitably, church becomes a circus and a theater for the entertainment of man, doesn't it?
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The Word of God is watered down to the point of being acceptable, alluring, somehow persuasive to man.
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The church service is designed to make an unconverted man happy and comfortable and say yes to Jesus through the pianos and the smoke and the artful lighting.
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But when our services are built upon worshiping a God who is sovereign in the saving of His people, we roll no punches.
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We preach Christ crucified. If God is all -powerful, we seek to honor
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Him and we humble ourselves before Him and we find this boldness to preach as Peter preached in Acts 2.
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Repent. Let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins.
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This promise is for you and for your children, for everyone who's far off, whoever
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God calls. That's what Peter says in Acts 2 .39. He knows that whatever he's preaching, the result is up to the
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Spirit of God. This promise is for all of you. Here's the general call, but it will only be effectual in those whom
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God has called. This is a call to holiness because it's a holy calling.
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When God called Abram, it was a holy call and it was a call to holiness. Walk before Me. Trust Me.
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I'm going to bless you. And so that call has come to you, brother and sister.
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Follow Me. Walk before Me. Follow My ways. I'm going to bless you. I'm going to bless you.
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Blessing upon blessing. Every spiritual blessing in heavenly places is yours in Christ Jesus. Blessing upon blessing.
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It's a holy calling, and yet this is the beauty of the Gospel, isn't it? This call. This call to the
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Gospel. It's a call. It's a holy calling. It's a call to holiness, but it's for the unholy.
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It's for the unholy. It's for the idol worshiper in Ur. It's for the persecutor of the church on the road to Damascus.
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It's for the coward and the blasphemer. It's for the lover of the flesh and the lover of the world.
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It's for the liar and the fornicator and the drunkard and the sluggard.
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The call of the Gospel is a call to holiness for the unholy. I love what
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Spurgeon says. Holiness is not the way to Christ. Christ is the way to holiness. This is the beauty of the
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Gospel, isn't it? Isn't this the glory of the Savior who calls? So meek, so lowly, wooing sinners to come to Him.
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Jesus says in Matthew 21, what do you think? A man had two sons, and he came to the forest and said,
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Son, go. Work today in my vineyard. He answered and said, I will not.
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I have a very good son. Have you ever had that kind of direct defiance? I will not.
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Usually a son is wise enough to say, Okay, yeah, I'll get to it. No, I didn't quite hear you.
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This is just... I could care less. I'm not going to humor you. No, I'm not doing that, Dad. I will not. I don't respect you enough.
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I don't honor you. I don't care what you're going to do. I'm not going to go work for you. But afterward, he regretted it, and he went.
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And then he came to his second son, and likewise, he said, and the son answered and he said,
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I go, sir. I go, sir. I'm going to follow you. Look at my respect and my admiration for you. But he did not go.
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Which of the two did the will of his father? They, this guy's a nefarious, he said, the first.
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The one who said, in open defiance and rebellion, I will not. But then regretted it. He repented and went and did it.
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What a picture. Jesus is saying, scribes and Pharisees, do you recognize yourself in this?
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The scribes and Pharisees are the first, are the second son. I go, sir.
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Look at my honor and my admiration for you. Look at my ritual and my ceremony for you. Look at how my whole life is ordered around you.
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Look, I go. And yet, I don't do what you command. I've lost my first love.
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You desire mercy, not sacrifice? I only sacrifice. And yet, at the same time, the scribes and the
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Pharisees are watching harlots and tax collectors and Gentile dogs come and follow
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Jesus. That's what's scandalizing them. That's what Jesus is responding to. They're watching poor, needy sinners coming to Christ.
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And Jesus is saying, do you say, at the beginning, they said, I will not. My life is an open defiance of God.
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But they're repenting. And they're coming to obey the will of the Father. And so there's repentance and faith from those who seem so far outside of hope.
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And blindness and rejection from those who seemed in. Already halfway there. The natural recipients of the favor of God.
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And Jesus is explaining this as a defense that He eats with tax collectors and sinners.
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Assuredly, I say, tax collectors and harlots enter the kingdom of God before you. John came to you in the way of righteousness.
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You did not believe him. Tax collectors and harlots believed him. And when you saw, you did not afterward relent and believe him.
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You're the second son. Why is it that the harlots and the tax collectors are responding to Jesus?
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They had said, I will not. Their life was in rejection. When you have that level of dishonor, disrespect, hatred for our
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Father, do you really just say, oh, I guess I will go work for Him now? No. There's nothing but contempt in that response.
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What's taking place that would bring Him to come back and do this hard work for His Father? It is nothing short of the effectual calling of the
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Spirit of God. Taking someone openly hostile to the will of God and the truth of God and making them willing in the day of His power.
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When Jesus calls a sinner, He will follow them. He will follow them.
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And you say, I'm not following Him, so Jesus hasn't called me. You say it's a sovereign work of God.
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Well, if it's effectual and it's sovereign, then I have no place in it. I'll just simply wait. Keep pursuing these things
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I'm pursuing. I know they're wrong. I feel bad about them. That's why I'm here. That's why I'm here. But you yourself said, it's a sovereign work.
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I have no part in it. I'm just dead in sin and trespass. Pray for me. I'm just going to sit here and wait it out. And you're missing it, aren't you?
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You're missing it. You're missing it. This is the outward call. This is the outward call.
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Come to Christ. When He calls you, He will make you willing in the day of His power.
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No excuses. No defenses. No hiding. I've come to see your hopelessness and your need of Him.
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You say, Lord, I know I need to come. I don't even want to come. Save me from that.
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Save me from my own resistance. Save me from my anxiety. Save me from my fear. Save me from my pride and my idolatrous self -destruction.
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Jesus says in Mark 2 .17, those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick...
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Sick. It's not the health you need a doctor. If you're sick and you know it, there's only one place you can go.
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There's only one call you can receive. There's only one name you can cry out to. Have you known
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Jesus as the great physician? What does Jesus say? I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.
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He's not here to call you. I'm not here to call you. If you're righteous, you have no need of a call. You have no need of a physician.
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Jesus came to call sinners to repentance. Is that clear?
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With great awe, He does not come to call the righteous. That's His mission statement. I'm a
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Savior for sinners. I'm a Savior for the resistant. I'm a
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Savior to the son who says, No, I hate you. Be away from me. I'm that kind of Savior. I pursue my people to the death.
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Quite literally, to the death of the cross. Jesus came to call sinners. Are you an enemy? Let's take it away from this language of being sick or broken.
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Are you an enemy this morning? Are you a rebel? Are you a traitor? Are you an idolater? Are you a blasphemer?
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Are you a backslider? Are you a coward? Are you stained? Are you defiled?
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Are you abominable? Are you exhausted? Are you weary? Are you hopeless?
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Are you helpless? Jesus Christ came to call sinners to repentance.
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The same Lord who called Abram by His grace is here in our presence this morning calling sinners to repentance.
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We only pray, Spirit of God, that He's doing an effectual work. An effectual work.
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Our words are mist, pus of smoke, grass that shoots up and dies away.
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His word, His work is everlasting. Friend, Christ is not present here this morning to judge you.
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Just as He was not revealing Himself as a God of glory to Abram in judgment, but rather in blessing.
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He comes to the pagan in the midst of his paganism. He comes to the idolater in the midst of his idolatry and says,
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I'm going to bless you. I'll bless you. I'm going to make you a blessing.
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There's nothing you need to qualify that kind of grace. You came as a heap of sin this morning.
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You are qualified. You are qualified. You don't need to go home and throw a box away.
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You don't need to go delete a browser history. You don't need to break those bottles. You don't need to put away those drugs. You don't need to break your
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TV or whatever is the chain of worldliness around you. You simply need to cry out to Christ to save you.
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He came to call sinners to repentance. God sent
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His Son into the world not to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.
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This is the promised seed. The Savior of Abraham, the one who came to seek and save that which was lost.
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He calls. He calls. He calls. God knows
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He's called some of you so many times. So many times. You grow up and you're brought to church week after week and every week.
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And perhaps every night He's been faithful to call you and call you and call you. Why won't you come?
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Why won't you come? Why will you perish? Why will you die? You have but to answer that call.
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You have but to answer that call because it's a call of grace. He says,
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All that the Father gives to me will come to me. Don't worry yourself about that. Focus on this.
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The one who comes to me, I will never cast out. If you hear that call and you come to Him, He promises
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He will never cast you away. He has a 100 % record of never casting away a sinner.
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He has never met and will never meet a sinner who's too sinful for His grace. In fact, it is
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His delight because it was His mission and it is His heart to save sinners. What a call.
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What a call. What a call. Brothers and sisters, what a call. You've heard that in your life if you're a believer this morning.
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Marvel at that. Praise God for that. He called you. He chose you. For His own sake.
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For His own purposes. He chose to bless you. Blessing upon blessing with more blessing to come. Blessing behind that and then blessing for another 2 trillion years blessing.
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He chose you. Because He's infinite of grace. Infinite in love. What a call.
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Come to Him. Come to Him. If you do not know Him. If you're straying from Him or backsliding.
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Come to Christ who calls sinners. Come to the Physician who heals the broken. Come to the
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Lord and Lover of our souls. I'll close with these lines. Maybe I'll read 1
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Thessalonians 2. You just read these lines. From this great hymn called, Jesus, sinners doth receive.
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We deserve but grief and shame. Yet His words, rich grace revealing. Pardon, peace and life proclaim.
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Here their ills have perfect healing. Who with humble hearts believe. Jesus, sinners doth receive.
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Come ye sinners, one and all. Come, accept His invitation. Come, obey His gracious call.
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Come, take His free salvation. Firmly in these words believe.
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Jesus, sinners doth receive. May the God of peace Himself sanctify you completely.
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May your whole spirit, soul and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. He who calls you is faithful.
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He will do it. Amen. Let's pray. Spirit of God, we pray that You would be working even now in all of our hearts,
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Lord, in all of our hearts. We pray that Christ and His grace would be so magnified in our eyes that our minds would be newly lit, more wondrously illumined, that our affections would not just be warmed but ablaze.
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That our wills, Lord, would be changed. That we would be made willing in this day of power.
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We pray for those who are in that bondage of the night of nature, as Wesley put it.
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We pray, Lord, for those who are dead in trespasses and sins. Those who can hear only the outward call.
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We pray that even now, Lord, they would hear You beckoning them to come to You.
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That they would hear that gracious call. That they would encounter the God of glory. That they would bow down and humble themselves before Him.
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That they would cry out to Him. From their very soul, that they would cry out to Him, Lord. And receive
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Him as their Lord and Savior. Let us all be reminded that You have come to save sinners.
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That Your holy calling comes to the unholy. Let us labor, Lord. Let us labor to be worthy of this calling that You've called us with.
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Help us, Lord, expose those things in our lives that are still displeasing to You. Keep us away from You.
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That make us more like that defiant son who refuses to do Your will. Lord, by Your Spirit, woo us and allure us and draw us back to You.
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Thank You for Your faithfulness. We praise You for Your glory. We're astounded and cannot comprehend
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Your grace toward us in Christ Jesus, who is the yes and amen of all of Your promises.