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Bro. Otis Fisher
I want to start with verse 5 in chapter 11, right where we left off. I had asked two questions. Does time march forward into time? The answer is no, there is no future time. The other question, is this creation expanding into space?
No, space is expanding. The word election doesn't appear very many times, five or six. Eklage, eklage, election of grace, the remnant. This is nothing short of the entire exclusion of all human work. It is an act of God.
It's an act of his free will by which, before the foundations of the world, he decreed his blessing to certain persons, the decree made by choice, by which he determined to bless certain people through Christ by grace alone.
Verse 6, and if by grace, then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. It's either one or the other, Russell, but I don't want you to worry.
All of God's people will be saved, and that's because he said so. Turn to Matthew 129, if you will, and David, will you read that out loud for us? Matthew 121, excuse me. Yes. The Greek reads, he will save the people of him from the sins of him.
Now let me ask you, she shall bring forth a son, did she? Yes. You shall call his name Jesus, did they? He shall save his people, will he? None of us will miss out on salvation in the up and hill. The conscience of a child of God is the voice of God.
I cannot stress that enough. Seven. What then? All right. The conscience of a child of God is the voice of God. Listen to it. What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it, and the rest are blinded.
Blinded. They don't even know they're blinded, David. God's grace does not depend on your attendance in church, or singing in the choir, or paying tithes, giving to projects, Wednesday night prayer service.
According as it is written, God hath given them the spirit of slumber. What is the spirit of slumber, David? All right. Do they know they're asleep? No. Eyes that should not see, and ears that they should not hear unto this day.
Should not see. That brought me to the question, what is the basic reason for blindness, Greg? What is the basic reason for blindness? What causes it? What if everybody in the whole world was blind, never had seen?
Would there be blindness? The basic reason for blindness is that some of us see. Now if no one saw, never had saw, totally blind, you wouldn't be blind. That'd be your way of life. But some people in this world are blind because some see.
Do you see the difference? Man is the object of grace. The atonement is the effect of grace. Christianity is entirely independent of man. Blindness is seen only because there is some that see the light.
If none of you saw the light, never had seen the light, no one in the world saw the light, never had seen the light, there would be no blindness. Yes. That's right. That's right. Now, we see the light, spiritual light.
Is that also passive? I can't see your head. Somebody else did it to us. Stands to reason. I wouldn't be able to make myself see. Romans 9, and David said, let their table be made a snare and a trap and a stumbling block and a recompense unto them.
Russell, what is their table? All right. It's a stumbling block. They can't get over it. The material things in their life, material prosperity, if you please. Let their eyes be darkened that they may not see and bow down their backs always.
Their eyes will be more and more darkened as they persist in their unbelief. Now, the word more darkened is redundant. And their backs shall be bowed down always, far from becoming a great and powerful nation.
They shall continue ever in a state of slavery and oppression till they acknowledge Jesus as the promised Messiah and submit to receiving the redemption in his blood. What group of people is he talking about?
The Jews. Eleven. I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid. But rather, through their fall, salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy. Now, the Gentiles here is in place of the elect.
In Hebrews 5, 12, we have, for when for a time you ought to be teachers, you have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God, and are become such as have need of milk, and not of strong meat.
For everyone that uses milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe. How many of you believe that the Bible is complete? Anybody believe otherwise? All right. Hebrews 6, 1. Therefore, leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ.
What are the principles of the doctrine, David? All right. Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptism, of laying on of hands, and of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment, and this we will do if God will permit.
We'll move on. Hebrews 6, 4. For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again unto repentance, that they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame.
All of that to say this. If you have salvation, it was given to you, and you cannot lose it. You cannot misplace it. You are among the elect. In 1 Corinthians 3, 2. I have fed you with milk, and not with meat, for hitherto you were not able to bear it, neither yet now are you able.
This church, this group of people, you have passed beyond that. The reason that you're not wallering around in the first part of salvation forever is that you've passed on. You're studying more. You now have meat.
Some are all their days in the foundation unable to build upon it. There are those that just, they always stay at the front end of salvation. They're a baby. Now the reason is, and they have not studied this out, they have not been taught, that with the foundation stones, those stones that are for the building, such as obedience, duties, removal of sins, these are precious stones with which to build, not to be used in the foundation.
I hope you make the difference in that. The apostles laid the foundation, and we build on that. The foundation is pure grace. That's where they started. It's pure grace. Is somebody back there wanting?
Oh, I can't see the difference. If anything of ourselves be mixed with grace in salvation, it utterly destroys grace, which if it be not grace alone, it is not grace at all. We have to get to the point where I can do nothing before I'm saved.
I can't make that strong enough. David will. Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fullness? That's a good question.
They're going to be restored someday. Since the grace of God came to the Gentiles after the setting aside of the Israelites, what about the Gentiles after the Jew is reinstated in his grace? I believe it will be multiplied.
In Acts 15, 16, He's going to build a temple again. 13, How many of you are dissatisfied with your life? How many are satisfied with your life? You better be, because that's where God has you. The most uninteresting life is one spent looking for someplace else to serve.
God has a place for you, and you're in that place, so rejoice in it. You cannot be out of place, or God wouldn't be sovereign. I was thinking earlier this morning, if God is not running this whole thing, if he has not spoken into existence and is not orchestrating everything, of course I realize it's all been done, but if one thing is left up to man, just one thing, what would that do to the whole thing?
Right. And it's very predictable. If you could control one thing, it would be he would not be sovereign. If by any means I may provoke you to emulation, then which are my flesh, and might save some of them, our greatest days lie ahead.
You may think that today is a low day. It is when you get into tomorrow, but right now it's a high day. For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?
It'll come to pass that when the Jews come to the gospel, the world will be as it were come to new life again, rise up from death to life. For if the first fruits be holy, the lump also is holy, and if the root be holy, so are the branches.
Now we're called the branch. We're branches. Can the branch of a fruit tree supply its own nourishment? He says here, for if the first fruits be holy, first fruits. Who was that, Greg? Well, it is Jesus.
He is the first fruit. Now, who's this lump? Who is the root? Who are the branches? You and I and Jesus. What? Well, that's all right. Only the first fruit was Jesus. He's called the first fruits, and he existed before Abraham and Jacob.
Yes. All right. For if the first fruit be holy, and if some of the branches be broken off, and thou being a wild olive were grafted in among them, and with them partakers of the root and fatness of the olive trees, when the Jew, the natural branch, were broken off by their unbelief, the Gentile Christians, not natural branches, not of the seed of Abraham, but of the wild olive, were grafted in, that is, were adopted into God's family, and became Abraham's children, you and I benefit because of the nation Israel.
This is another reason that we must never be anti-Semitic. Boast not against the branches, but if thou boastest that thou bearest not the root, but the root thee, we may rejoice in the Lord, but in such a way that we do not despise the Jew, whom we ought rather to encourage to join in the good battle with us.
Thou wilt say then, the branches were broken off, that I might be grafted in. Paul's anticipating a statement. You may think that you have reason to triumph over them, but you don't, because it's a fact that God has been displeased with them, and therefore has broken them off, has cast them out of the church, and taken you into the church in their place.
That's nothing for us to brag about. Well, because of unbelief, they were broken off. And thou standest by faith. Be not high-minded, but fear. It's true that the Jew was broken off, but in order to show that there was no occasion for boasting, he adds that they were not rejected in order to admit us.
They were not broken off so he could put us in, but because of their unbelief. And their fate should have a favorable impression on those who had no occasion for boasting, but who might be rejected for the same cause.
Unbelief. For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. Behold, therefore, the goodness and severity of God on them which fell. Severity, but toward thee goodness, if thou continue in his goodness, otherwise thou also shall be cut off.
As the apostle had said, the same God that rejected them is able to restore them, and he re-engrafted them. The only obstacle is their unbelief, and this God is also able to remove the unbelief. The more I study, the more I marvel at how God has worked everything to hold man responsible for that which he does.
And they also, if they abide not, still in unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. Individual Jews have been all of the time admissible, and have been admitted to the Church through the gate of faith in our Lord Jesus.
This is the remnant, even as this present time, according to the election of grace. We are a remnant. And remnant means what, Bill? Small part. We're just a small part. If you would count all of the Christians, and by Christian I mean those that truly are, at this moment in the world, how do they compare in number against the unsaved?
Very, very small. For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much more shall these, which be natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?
The meaning of this whole verse may be thus expressed. If God had mercy on the Gentiles who were outcast from his favor, shall he not much rather on those who were so long his people, to whom he had been given the promises and the covenants and the law, whose ancestors had been so many of them his friends and among whom the Messiah was born?
In some respects their facility among the Jews for their conversation which had not existed among the Gentiles. They worship one God. They admit the authority of revelation. They have the scripture of the Old Testament.
They expect a Messiah. And they have a habit of professed reverence for the will of God. All they lack is belief. Twenty-five. For I would not, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery. Mystery.
Dwayne, what is a mystery? Or Dennis, what is a mystery? All right. Lest you should be wise in your own conceit that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles come in.
The word mystery is so often used by our apostles does not mean a Sherlock Holmes story. That's a mystery. It means something before kept secret, either holy or for the most part, and now disclosed. And he discloses only that part that we need.
And so all Israel shall be saved as it was written, there shall come out a Zion to deliver and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. I believe every living Jew at the time of the millennium will be saved.
All these verbs are passive, meaning that it was done by someone else, not by us. For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins. The Lord's covenant unto them is that it follows, take away their sins.
Hence, these passages imply the restoration of Israel to the divine favor. There is coming a day. 28. As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes, but as touching the election, they are beloved for the Father's sake.
God is called Father. He is called Father of the stars, the heavenly celestial body, because he is the creator and upholder and ruler of all rational and intelligent beings, whether angels or men, because he is their creator, preserver, guardian, and protector of spiritual things and of all men.
Those who through Christ have been exalted to a specially close and intimate relationship with God and who no longer dread him as a stern judge of sinners, but revere him as their reconciled and loving Father, Father of Jesus the Christ.
I don't understand, but the scripture says so. As one whom God has uplifted to himself in the closest bond of love and intimacy, made acquainted with his purposes, appointed to explain and carry out among men the plan of salvation, and made to share also in his own divine nature.
He is called Father by Jesus the Christ himself and by the apostles there be. They are beloved for the Father's sake. All things are for the Father. He not only made everything, but everything was made for him through Jesus.
For the gifts and the calling of God are without repentance. For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance. Meaning he doesn't repent because he called you. For God's gifts and his call are irrevocable.
What's that mean, Greg? He never withdraws them when once they are given, and he does not change his mind about those to whom he gives the grace or to whom he sends his call. God is absolute. His calling is not an invitation.
So many times we are here, let's now have an invitation. That's wrong. It is an effectual call which is without repentance. God's not a man that he should repent. He doesn't know the word. No one can refuse this call.
It is imperative. It is irrevocable. The call of God depends not on any human movement. He changes our belief when he notifies us. He does it all, and I do mean everything, all of it. For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief.
There was a time when you were not saved. Do you remember that time? And you did not want to be saved? Oh, I do. But then came a time when you did want to be saved. It was God who changed that desire, and I didn't even know it.
It was as though I did it. Even so have those also now not believed that through your mercy they also might obtain mercy. I've heard of a Baptist church that felt that they were qualified to give God advice.
I said, I have heard of a church that is qualified. Well, he doesn't need it. For God hath concluded them all in unbelief that he might have mercy upon all. All in unbelief. No one has ever been born of a woman in this world and was saved to begin with.
Neither do you grow into it because Mama and Papa were. There is a divine necessity pervading and controlling all the freedom of men. David, do you believe that? A divine purpose mastering all seemingly random activity of human will.
Greg, do you believe that? A divine purpose mastering all seemingly random activity of human will. God subordinates sin to his purpose, but it is not a subordinate element in his purpose. Bill, what does that mean?
God subordinates sin in his purpose. You got that? But it is not a subordinate element in his purpose. Everybody is staring at me. He uses sin, but sin is not part of his purpose. 33. Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God.
How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways are past finding out. We sat here this morning trying to find them out. We can't. We do not understand God. In 1 Corinthians 2 .14. But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him.
Neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. Roger, they are spiritually discerned. What does that mean? What means that they are not spiritual? Now, they may be spiritual the wrong way.
Isaiah 55 .9. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Numbers 23 .19. God is not a man. That he should lie. Neither the Son of Man, that he should repent, hath he said, and shall he not do it?
Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good? Whatever God has said comes to pass. Is there foreknowledge with God? Roger. What? Roger. In the eternal mind there is no word foreknowledge. Knowing and foreknowing is all the same thing.
For who hath known the mind of the Lord? Or who hath been his counselor? Now, this saying overthrows the doctrine of foreseen works and merits. There are those that believe that God looked down through the telescope of time and he saw Bill Nichols.
He's going to be a good man. He'll serve me, so I'm going down and save him. Is that the way it worked, Bill? Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? Name one thing, Greg, that you have really given to God.
Name one thing that would put him in the position of owing you. This is impossible. According to Greg, this is impossible. For it would make God a subservient. Remember, he is the cause of the first cause.
I'm going to have to stop here. No. We can give the Lord grief, but not the Father. He doesn't see grief. The Lord sees grief. He sees us. He walked with us. But I'm going to stop there. Is that the last verse?
For of him, and through him, and to him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. All things flow toward God. All things are for him, from him, by him, through him, to him, of him, only for his pleasure only.
All things originate with him and come from him. And all things center in and are brought to completion and to end in him. It goes back to God. The very prayer life is from him. Our meeting here is from him.
The thoughts that we discussed today are from him. Greg, it's good to have you back. Will you stand and dismiss us, please?