Rousing The Soul

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I have a question this morning, several questions. Here's the first one. Did God choose you?
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You know, God has chosen some people to go to heaven and other people not to go to heaven. Has God selected you to be in His presence forever?
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You know, the Bible teaches that God selects some to be with Him forever, and He passes by others.
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Does God have a special love for you? God has a special love for some people and not for everyone.
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So did God choose you? Can you know? Is it important?
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Well, today is Resurrection Sunday, but for Christians, every day is Resurrection Sunday. This is about the 100 ,000th
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Resurrection Sunday since Jesus was raised from the dead. Give or take 500 or so.
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That's a lot of Easter dresses. 100 ,000 Resurrection Sundays. And so what
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I like to do on Resurrection Sunday is I like to remind Christians why you have a great salvation.
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I also like to talk to visitors, or some of our own children maybe, or some of our own members, or anyone who is not a
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Christian, and ask them the question, are you a Christian? What are the claims of Christ?
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And a good way to do it this morning, I think, is to ask you the question, did God choose you or did
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He not? A little background why I ask that question. There was a great evangelist.
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His name was George Whitefield. And Whitefield went up and down the seaboard in the 1700s preaching the gospel.
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Maybe the greatest evangelist ever on American soil. And he loved to talk about election,
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God's special love for some people, when he talked to people who didn't know about the gospel. And this is what he said.
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This is one reason, among many others, why I admire the doctrine of election, and am convinced that it should have a place in gospel preaching, and should be assisted on with faithfulness and care.
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Now he gives the reason. It has a natural tendency to rouse the soul out of carnal security.
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God has made an election. Did He choose you or did He not choose you? If I were to say to you, now
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God loves everybody, and He has a wonderful plan for your life, and everybody is chosen, everybody's got the same love.
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If you're a Christian, you might say, well, that's good. But if you're not a Christian, you might say, well, then I'm good to go.
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I'm not right with God, but He loves me, and so nothing needs to be done. But if I ask you the question, are you chosen or not?
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If you're not a believer today, you should ask yourself, am I? Could I know? How would
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I know? Wouldn't anyone like to know if God has chosen you for His special love, which includes heaven?
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This morning, you can know for sure if God has chosen you. Where do
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I stand with God? Am I chosen? You can find out. S. Lewis Johnson said, if we preach a universal love of God, then we're not forced to think,
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I may not be there. So Whitfield says, election has a natural tendency to rouse out the soul of a carnal security, therefore many carnal men crowd against it.
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Whereas universal redemption, God loves everybody the same, is a notion sadly adapted to keep the soul in its lethargic, sleepy condition.
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So many natural men admire and applaud it. So this morning, we're going to talk about God's sovereign, distinguishing, electing grace.
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And if you're a Christian, you can say, I'm so glad God chose me. And if you're not a Christian, I want you to say, did
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God choose me or did He not? So turn your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 2 this morning, and we are going to have an
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Easter sermon on election. God's favorite topic, R .C.
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Sproul said, is the sovereignty of God, and I can see why it's his favorite topic, because God is sovereign and it has wonderful implications.
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Why is election important and am I elect? We'll answer those questions today from God's Word.
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James Dane said, sermons on election are so rare that even a regular churchgoer may never hear one.
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No other doctrine has been so central in theology and so ignored in the pulpit. Sermons on election are rare and sermons on Easter are even rarer than the way
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I like my steaks cooked, or in my particular case, uncooked. Am I elect?
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Am I going to heaven? You should be asking yourself that question. The God who raised Himself from the dead declares in His Word that you can know if you're chosen or not.
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Thomas Arnold said, the distinction between Christianity and all other systems of religion consists largely in this, that in these other systems, men are found seeking after God, while Christianity is
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God seeking after men. And by the way, we all like to choose, don't we?
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If you think about your life, most of us live in the Western culture and I got to choose my bride freely.
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You're probably same as me. You can choose your bride, you can choose what food you like, you can choose what church you go to.
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You can choose all kinds of things. We are basically people who like to choose. Why? Because we're made in God's likeness and image and God chooses by nature and we are made in the likeness and image of God and we choose as well.
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You can even choose your own sports teams, can't you? Of course you can. It shouldn't surprise us that God chooses because God chose out of all the nations.
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First of all, no nation deserved to be chosen, but He chose Israel and He didn't choose any other nation.
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God chose Jacob and He didn't choose Esau. God chose Moses and He didn't choose
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Pharaoh. God chose 12 disciples and not anyone else to be disciples.
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God said only the Levites can be priests and no one else can be priests. God is just a God who chooses and He chooses who gets to go to His heaven.
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After all, it's His heaven. Did God choose me? By the way, as we talk about this topic this morning, if you're a
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Christian and God has chosen you, you're going to say, I'm so happy that God would choose me.
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It is like a second blessing. The second blessing is not speaking in a bunch of gibberish. The second blessing is
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I can't believe that God chose me, me of all people. As Persians said, if you really know that God has chosen you, your hearts would dance with joy.
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So let me give you four questions this morning and answers about election. Four questions and answers about election which will help you understand
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God. And if you're not a believer today, you need to learn more about this God with whom you'll have to do one day.
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Soon is forever. Four questions about election. Very simply write from Ephesians chapter 1 and 2.
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Question number one, why is election needed? Why is there even a need for election?
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Answer, because unbelievers left to themselves would never choose God. Unbelievers left to themselves would never choose.
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And so for anybody to get to heaven, it has to be God that chooses first. Only the resurrecting power of a sovereignly gracious God could save people who don't want to choose
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God. And let's see this in Ephesians chapter 2 verses 1 to 3. This is my resume.
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This is your spiritual resume before you were a Christian. If you're not a Christian, this is your
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CV. Ephesians 2, 1 to 3. You were dead in trespasses and sins in which you once walked following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desire of our body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath like the rest of mankind.
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The Bible says we are spiritually dead. We're physically alive as unbelievers, but we're spiritually dead.
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And we don't give honor to Jesus Christ and homage and glory and adoration because we're dead to those things spiritually.
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We're walking, but we're dead men walking, not giving honor to God. Because we're spiritually dead. It's like as one writer says, you take a dog over to Niagara Falls and say, look at the beauty of the falls.
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And what does the dog do? The dog doesn't appreciate the beauty at all. Maybe my dog does, but your dogs don't.
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What would a cat do? But they're alive, but they're not keen to see the realities of the beauty of God.
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And so for the unbeliever, the Bible says simply that they're dead in trespasses and sins. Comprehensive terms, trespasses, plural, sins, plural.
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By what we do and what we don't do as unbelievers, we're dead. We can't do anything to choose
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God. Horatius Bonar said, in all unbelief there are two things, a good opinion of self and a bad opinion of God.
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If God just isn't quite as holy and we try to bring him down in our minds, and we're not quite as in the spiritual gutter as we think, we're pretty good, especially compared to those other people that we know.
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Then the gap can maybe be bridged by education, by religion, by baptism, by being good, by doing more good than bad.
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It's not this huge chasm that has to be bridged by Christ's death alone.
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I went to Walmart this week. And I don't really like to shop at Walmart per se, but I always have good stories.
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And so if I ever need a good illustration, I just show up to Walmart. And so I'm just walking around and I got what
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I needed. Pepper spray, mace, ammo.
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The visitors are like, where am I? I just needed some vitamins and a few other things and some creamer and I show up.
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And the lady in front of me, the cashier, she said to this other couple who were buying things, have a blessed holiday weekend.
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I thought, that seems odd to me that she thinks Easter is a holiday anymore in our post -Christian culture. And so I walked up and she didn't say anything, so I do the same thing every single time.
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How are you today? I always think it's their job to say that to me, that I'm the customer. But since I'm the pastor, it's my job to say that to them.
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So I've got kind of a rip curl hat on and my Volcom jacket or something.
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I walk up and I say, how are you today? And she said, fine. And now she feels like she has to say the thing back.
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How are you today? And she's, you know, going, scanning my items. And I said, compared to what
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I deserve, I'm doing so well. Now, most people just let that go because they know it's a setup.
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But she, she, she didn't know. And I liked it because she would just, this blunt person, and she goes, what do you mean you don't deserve everything?
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What do you deserve? And I just thought, oh. I said,
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I deserve death and judgment. She goes, you? Who said?
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I said, the creator said that, and my conscience says that. I'm a sinner.
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She said, oh, and I said that the real question today is, are you a sinner?
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And she goes, no. So now I have to buy more things in the high impulse aisle to keep the conversation going.
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Tic -tacs, beef jerky, ostrich jerky.
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And then she looked at me kind of with a twinkle, and she said, no, I know I'm a sinner. I just don't like to. And I said, here's the good news.
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When we know we're sinners against God, then we know we need a Savior. Hence, Friday, Good Friday, and Easter Resurrection Sunday.
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And she said, here's your receipt. I said, goodbye. And I prayed for her on the way out.
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I mean, our society doesn't want to remind us how bad we are. We've got diseases and syndromes and problems.
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Like when someone wrote, Dear Abby, I'm 44 and would like to meet a man my age with no bad habits.
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Signed, Rose. Dear Rose, so would I. You can't be ready for heaven until you know you deserve hell.
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I could ask you the question today, if you're not a Christian, do you deserve to go to God's holy heaven? When God knows all about what you've said and done or not said and done, do you really think you deserve to go to heaven?
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Westminster Confession said, man by his fall into a state of sin has wholly lost all ability of will to any spiritual good.
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So what Ephesians 2 says about all unbelievers is that there's no thing they can do to please
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God. To make us commendable in God's eyes can't be done. Early on in my marriage when
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I realized how I wasn't a Christian and I realized that I don't have an anger problem,
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I don't have a selfish problem, that at the core and the root of my being,
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I am the problem. If you've got an anger problem, you go to anger management. If you've got a selfish problem, you work on such and such and you have some resolutions and you do better.
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But when you're the problem, how do I extricate myself from me when I'm the problem? So Paul says, this is the
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MO, this is the CV, this is the resume for all unbelievers. They're not going to choose
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God. Dead men don't choose God. Dead men can't choose God. Jonathan Edwards said, if a servant only spit in his master's face once a year, this would surely label him a bad servant.
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No matter how impeccable his behavior is the rest of the time. Humbling doctrine.
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The doctrine that we are dead spiritually. Listen to Jesus' words in John 5. You are unwilling to come to me that you might have life.
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Can you imagine how insidious sin is when God the Son says, the reason why you won't come to me is you're not willing.
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Your heart won't will it because your heart's depraved and fallen and corrupt. Henry Mahan said, there's enough evil in the heart of the best sinner to make another devil.
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So that person who's darkened in their understanding and not willing to come to God can never choose
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God. Why is election mandatory? Because we would never choose God. God has to choose.
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If you are going to be forgiven and have your sins cleansed, you cannot do that yourself.
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It must be done to you. John 6, no one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws them.
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Without election, no one would be saved. Question 2. Why is election needed, number 1?
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Because we would never choose God. Question 2. Why does God elect anyone?
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In light of our CV, our resume, dead in trespasses and sins, why would God choose them?
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I mean, think about how you choose. I like to choose a wife who is smart, who is pretty, who is godly.
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I have reasons to choose. When I used to play basketball, and we would play at the University of Nebraska gym, and we would play against some of the college guys, if I didn't have 4 other guys who were good, we would lose that game and not play for another 2 hours.
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So I would choose the best. So when God looks at humanity and sees corrupt, sinful, fallen, all in Adam, why would
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He choose? What's in God to make Him choose? Why does He elect anyone?
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He's so pure, He can't behold evil. Why would He choose anyone?
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Look at what it says in chapter 2, verse 4. Two words that are monosyllabic that sum up the gospel, really, and I'm so glad they're here.
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Two great words. But God. But God steps in.
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He doesn't leave man left to himself. How wonderful those words are. But God.
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It's dark in chapter 2, verses 1, 2, and 3. It's brooding.
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It's insidious. And then here comes a beacon of light. There could be hope. God comes to the rescue.
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Impossible solution. Our own sins when we are the problem. But then God shows up.
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But God initiating salvation. The author of salvation. The only mover. We're dead.
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Let me give you five reasons why God chooses people. Number one, He's merciful.
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Why does God elect anyone? See, He's not just full of judgment and justice and wrath and holiness.
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Yes, He's all those things. But He also has other attributes. And take a look at verse 4.
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Why does God elect anyone? Not because I deserve it, but it's all about His nature. Number one,
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He's merciful. Do you see that in verse 4? But God being what? Rich in mercy.
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Not just merciful undeserved kindness, but He's rich in it. If I'm ultra bankrupt, chapter 11, chapter 13, then
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I need someone who has many riches. And His riches are not physical riches per se, but here
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He's rich in mercy. The Old Testament talks about a steadfast covenant loyalty.
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He abounds in mercy. Why would God choose anyone? He's not choosing based on what we deserve because then He'd give us judgment, but He is a merciful
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God. Titus 3, He saved us not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy.
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1 Peter 1, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to His great, what?
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Mercy, has caused us to be born again. Why would God choose anyone? One, He's merciful.
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Two, you could fill in my sermon for me because I'm just looking at the rest of the verse.
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Verse 4, because God is loving. Loving the sinner,
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I guess I would say yes, He sure could hate the sinner, but here's there's love. Look it, because of His, with a good adjective, just like rich in mercy, now
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He has His great love with which He loved us. Son of God, love me,
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Paul said in Galatians 2, and gave Himself for me. That we would be the objects of God's love.
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I understand we'd be the object of His wrath, but the object of His love. 1 John 4 ,19, we love because He first loved us.
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Before we had one centimeter of desire for God, God loved us first.
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God demonstrates His own love towards us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. This is how we know what love is.
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Jesus Christ laid down His life for us. This is love, not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent
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His Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. But as bad as it was in Ephesians 2 for dead and sin and following the world, following Satan, it's better here.
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Not only God is merciful, not only is He loving, but also number three, why would He choose anybody?
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He's gracious. Look at verse 5. This is amazing. Even when we were dead in our transgressions,
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He made us alive. He made us born again. Together with Christ, by grace you have been saved.
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Undeserving favor. Demerited favor. Grace that says it has nothing to do with you being good, you being baptized, you going to church, you doing anything.
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It's just undeserved kindness just poured out over the top. Utter generosity.
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Unselfish, one man said, recklessly prodigal generosity. Thomas Goodwin said grace is attributed to princes.
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They are said to be gracious to their subjects, whereas subjects cannot be gracious to princes. Now God, who is an inferent sovereign, who might have chosen whether ever
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He would even love us or not, loved us through grace. Well, God's more than that.
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It's just a pile on verse 7. He's not only gracious, kind, merciful.
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I just gave that one away. He's kind. Number 4. Merciful, loving, gracious, now kind.
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Do you see that in verse 7? In order that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
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The death of Christ on the cross. What an act of kindness toward sinful people.
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Titus 3. But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared. Well, not only that, but number 5.
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Why would God ever elect people? Because He gets glory when He elects people and saves them. Because it's all of God.
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Look at verse 7 again. That He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness. To demonstrate, to display, to say, look what
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I've done. Look what I can do. How can I uphold my holy law yet still love sinners and allow them into my presence?
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By placing their blame and sin and guilt on Jesus. And then taking Jesus' perfection and laying it on them.
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This great double imputation. God gets credited, the Son gets credited with our spiritual bankruptcy and sin.
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And then God credits us with spiritual riches because Christ has earned them for us.
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And when God shows that great transaction, it'll take an eternity's worth of praise.
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To exhaust how wonderful that display is. Why is election needed?
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We would never choose God. Why does God elect anyone? He's kind, merciful, gracious, loving.
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He displays His glory. Question 3. When did God elect? When did God elect?
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Question 3. When was this? Well, there's a bad way to think about this.
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And here's how most evangelicalism thinks about it. God's outside of time and He looks down in time.
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And He sees that Mike in 1989 will come to the end of His rope and He will accept
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Him. God will accept, Mike will accept Jesus. So then God says, you know what, based on Mike's accepting
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Jesus, I pick Him. So, when did election occur?
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If that paradigm is right, then election occurred when I believed in 1989. And if you believed in 1994, it occurred then.
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But if God really is in eternity past looking for someone to repent and to believe and to honor
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Jesus and to follow Him and to love God with all his heart, soul, mind, and strength, He's going to wait a long, long time.
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Because no one will ever respond because why? They're dead in trespasses and sins. They'll never respond.
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So when would God have to decide? God will have to decide and choose people in eternity past.
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Go to chapter 1, if you would, please, Ephesians 1. When did God elect? Before time began.
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Not when you believed. He elected people before time began.
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Now let's look at Ephesians 1, verse 3. Paul is going to be praising God. Now if you're a
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Christian today and I say, do you ever praise God for things? You'd say, hopefully, yes. Praise God I got a new job.
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Praise God I got a child. Do you ever praise Him for spiritual things? Yes, I praise Him for having His Son die for me.
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That's a good thing. But before the Father is praised for having the Son die for sinners, there's something else that in Paul's thinking here precedes praise.
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Before the praise of the Son, it's that the Father chooses. So look at verse 3 of chapter 1.
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Remember, this has been 20, 25 years since the Damascus Road, and Paul is still full of enthusiasm.
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And he just shouts out with his pen, Blessed be the God and Father of our
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Lord Jesus Christ. Celebrating is like eulogy language. You speak well of. I'm going to tell you some good things about God.
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And he says, this is why I'm going to praise Him who has blessed us. Look at the text. In Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies.
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What are those? What has God blessed believers with? Even as He chose us in Him.
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Everybody believes in election. Before the foundation of the world. That we should be.
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Not that we were, so therefore I pick you. But that you should be. You weren't, but I pick you anyway because I know what
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I'd make you into. That you should be holy and blameless. Can you imagine if God has set
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His love on you and you're a Christian. When did it start? The day you allowed
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God to do it. When you said, okay God, I guess I can't run my life. You run it. No, the day that love started was an eternity past.
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And God knew every sin you'd ever commit. Past, present and future. And God said, deserves wrath.
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But because I'm kind. Because I'm merciful. Because I'm loving and gracious.
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I'm going to choose you. And then in time I'm going to have my son die for you.
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And then in time I'm going to have my spirit regenerate you. When did God choose?
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In eternity past. The very time, one reformer said, of election shows it to be free.
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For what could we have deserved? Or in what did our merit consist before the world was made?
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Who went to church before the world was made? Who became a member of a church before the world was made? Who got baptized before the world was made?
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Who did something good to their friends before the world was made? Who did something helpful to the poor before the world was made?
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Nobody did anything before the world was made. And God, because He loves to choose, often chooses and always chooses.
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He says, I'm going to put my love on some of those people. And now the bristles go up. What do you mean on some people and not others?
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God could have said, I don't choose anyone because they get justice. God could have said,
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I choose everyone. Or God could have said, I choose some. And the question is not, why didn't you choose everyone?
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The question is, in light of Ephesians 2, 1 to 3, why did you choose anyone? If you go to Africa and say,
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I'd like to adopt some children. If you go to India and say, I'd like to adopt some children. If you go to China and say,
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I'd like to adopt some children. And you walk into the orphanage and there are 500 kids there and your heart is breaking.
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Because for me, I just think, I'll take one of you and one of you and one of you. And boy, girl and brothers and sisters.
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And I just think, I just want to rescue you and adopt you into my family.
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If I adopt one, do you complain that I'm hard -hearted? You say, he didn't adopt the one.
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Why didn't he, I mean, he only adopted one. Why didn't he adopt the 399 other kids? No, what do you say?
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That was nice of Pastor, he adopted one. What if I adopt ten? Boy, he adopted ten.
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We never say, why didn't he adopt the 390? He adopted the ten. It's the same thing. If we deserve hell and he adopts some for heaven, who's complaining?
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2 Timothy 1 .9, it says that He saved us and called us with a holy calling. Not according to our purpose, but His own purpose, which was granted in Christ from all eternity.
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Revelation 13. And all who dwell on earth will worship Him. Everyone whose name has not been written from the foundation of the world in the book of life of the
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Lamb who has been slain. Language to say before time, God chose some and not all.
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God set His love on people ahead of time, beforehand. He knew we would never choose
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Him, so He had to choose. And do you notice what it says at the end of verse 4 and the beginning of verse 5? Oh, predestination is unloving.
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What does it say here? In love He predestined us. What amazes me,
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Spurgeon said, is not that God does not choose everybody, but that He chose me. That God would choose me.
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Michael Horton said, God is more love than you are sin. A man said,
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God enjoys imparting His riches to many children. It just pleased
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God to do it. Look at the verse 5 of Ephesians 1. According to the kind intention of His will. And when
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God does and He does all the saving, we're not going to high -five God and say we did it together. It's to the praise of the glory of His grace which
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He freely bestowed on us in the Beloved. It just pleased God. It pleased
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God to have Jesus die in our place. Look at verse 7. In Him we have redemption. Only Jesus.
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Not anyone else. Not Muhammad. Not Buddha. Not anyone. In Him we have redemption.
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We were in the slave pit of sin and God paid the price, His own Son, to rescue us.
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The ransom price was Jesus. Mark 10 says, For even the
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Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give His life a ransom for many. And it was an excruciatingly vicious death.
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Look at verse 7 of chapter 1. Through His blood. What was the price of redemption? His vicious death.
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To give His life a ransom for many. We earned death. He took our spiritual death in our place.
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And then look what we get. Verse 7. It goes on. The forgiveness of our trespasses. Every unbeliever here today should know that they've sinned against God.
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And wouldn't you like to have forgiveness? You know, you can't out -sin God in the sense that you've committed so many sins.
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I've met people. How could God ever forgive me? How would you like to have forgiveness of all your trespasses?
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Here's the line in the sand. God says, Don't go over it. And you do it anyway. And God could give you justice.
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But now He offers mercy. Forgiveness. Rest for your soul. I don't know if it's a true story or not.
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But the story is told of a man in Spain. A teenage man.
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And a father. And their relationship became strained. The son runs away. And this is before all the electronic media we have now.
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The father was searching furiously to find his rebellious son. And so in Madrid, he didn't know what else to do.
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And so he put an ad in the newspaper. Dear Paco, meet me in front of the newspaper office at noon.
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All is forgiven. I love you, your father. The next day at noon, according to the story.
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In front of the newspaper office. 800 Pacos showed up.
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All seeking forgiveness and love from their fathers. God gave you a conscience.
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And your conscience knows that you've sinned against the creator. And your conscience wants relief. And because of Christ Jesus, relief is offered.
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Oh, the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are His judgments.
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And unfathomable His ways. For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who became His counselor?
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Or who has first given to Him that it might be paid back to Him again? For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things.
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To Him be the glory forever. Why is election needed? We would never choose
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God. Why does God elect anyone? Because He's gracious, kind, and loving, merciful. And He displays
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His glory. When did God choose and elect? In eternity past. And now comes the final question.
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How can you know that you're elect? Did you know you can know? Everybody in this room can know.
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Did God choose me? God's a choosing God. God's just like I am except greater.
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I pick and choose all the time. God picks and chooses. And if He chooses some and not others, that's
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His prerogative. They all deserve hell. But He chooses some for special blessings, for heaven, for eternal life, for forgiveness.
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And if you're sitting here today and you're not a Christian, you should ask yourself the question, Am I chosen or not?
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If I just say, God loves you, you just walk out. Nice to know God loves me. But am
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I chosen? God has two kinds of love. The first love is a creator love.
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And He gives all kinds of good gifts to even unbelievers. Hitler had a palate. Hitler enjoyed the sun and the moon and the stars and rain, food and companionship.
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He gives that to everyone. It's a love of creation. And then He has a special love, a reserved love.
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If I were to say to some of you ladies here when I greet you at the door, I love you. And then
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I would say to my wife as she walks out the door, I love you. I mean two different things. I love you ladies in general.
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And then I love my wife specifically. Same with God. God loves all creatures with a love of,
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I'm giving you something good so that when you wake up in the morning, you say another day that God has blessed me, maybe
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I should repent and believe in the gospel today. The goodness of God leads to repentance, Romans 2. But there's another love that was determined in eternity past, secured at Calvary, confirmed by the resurrection, but that you can know today.
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You can know if God chose you. How do you know? It's super simple.
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If you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and repent of your sins, you know you're chosen.
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Now listen very carefully. When God chooses in eternity past, the cause of salvation is
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His choosing. The fruit of His salvation is my belief. Never confuse the two.
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God, I chose you, therefore that caused you to save me. No. How do I know I'm elect?
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It's because I believed. And when God started the process, election in eternity past, having
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His Son die at Calvary, being raised from the dead, now what God says the effect is or the fruit is, is when a person believes.
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Every Christian knows they're chosen by God because if you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, you've experienced the cause and effect of God and you believe.
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How do you know? Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll know. Sirs, what must
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I do to be saved, Acts 16. They said believe unto, with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.
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Charles Spurgeon, how can you know if you're elect? Most people want to know their election before they look to Christ.
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But they cannot learn it thus. It is only to be discovered by looking unto Jesus. Look to Jesus.
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Believe on Him and you shall make proof of your election directly. For as surely as you believe, you are elect.
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If you will give yourself wholly up to Christ and trust Him, then you are one of God's chosen ones.
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Go to Jesus just as you are. Go straight to Christ. Hide in His wounds and you shall know your election.
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Christ was at the everlasting council. He can tell whether you are chosen or not, but you cannot find out in any other way.
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Go and put your trust in Him. There will be no doubt about His having chosen you when you have chosen
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Him. So if you're a Christian today, you can rejoice because you get to know.
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And if you're not a believer today, you can know. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Romans 10, whoever will call upon the name of the
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Lord shall be saved. If you call upon the name of the Lord with saving faith, you will be saved.
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No one who has trusted in Christ Jesus has ever perished. Whoever believes in Him, Romans 10, 11, will not be disappointed.
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You say, you know what? Yeah, but forget about me now. What about these other people that He didn't choose?
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That seems to be not fair. That seems to be harming those people.
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What if somebody who wasn't chosen wants to go to heaven? They'll never want heaven.
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Edwin Palmer said, let it be firmly stated that everybody gets precisely what he wants. To put it in the most blunt way possible, hellions are glad they are in hell.
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Nobody is in hell against His will. Everybody there is glad that He is there. They do not want to be in hell, but when they know that the alternative to hell is to go to heaven with a pure heart, they would much rather stay in hell.
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In other words, if you say, I don't want to accept this today, I don't want to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, how can
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God choose some? He didn't choose me, therefore I'm off the hook. And how can God do all that? You'll get exactly what you want.
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You might not want the horrors of hell, but you certainly won't want to worship Christ Jesus with a pure heart.
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Election harms no one. Election is not the cause of people going to hell. It's their own sin.
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Sproul said, It seems that if God gives grace to one person in the interest of fairness,
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He ought to give grace equally to another. It is precisely this oughtness that is foreign to the biblical concept of grace.
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Among the mass of fallen humanity, all guilty of sin before God and exposed to His justice, no one has any claim or entitlement to God's mercy.
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If God chooses to grant mercy to some of that group, He does not require that He give it to all.
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No one receives punishment at the hands of God that they do not deserve. Some receive grace at His hands that they do not deserve.
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Because He is pleased to grant mercy to one, does not mean that the rest deserve the same. So is grace.
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Can you imagine? There were angels created, and out of all the angels created, one third of those angels rebelled, and God said,
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Just leave them be. We'll just judge them. All of us in Adam have rebelled, and God says,
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I'm not going to leave you all. I'm going to save some. What a gracious God. Sinners slam the door in the face of God, not the other way around.
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How do we know all this is true? How do we know that's going to happen? How do we know that there's a heaven and hell when we die?
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Romans 1 said, It's as clear as the horizon, because God raised Jesus Christ from the dead.
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If Jesus is in the tomb, whatever happens, happens. But today
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I have forgiveness to proclaim to you, full and free in Christ Jesus. If you're a Christian, I hope you just can't contain yourself.
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God chose me. I've told you before, I basically flipped out when I asked Kim to marry me, and she said yes.
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She knew some of my scoundrel background, but she didn't know it all. She'll never know it all, praise the
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Lord. Because she would have never said yes. So I gave a few little trial balloons of, you know, if I ask you, will you say yes kind of thing.
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You know how guys are. At least I know how I am. I was in sales. I don't want to have her say no.
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Will you marry me? No. And then when she said yes, I know exactly where I was that day.
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We took the kids there years ago, and I tried to recreate the scene, and they wanted to go have a bomb pop or something, some kind of ice cream.
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And I'm thinking, this is the place in time. Will you marry me? And she said yes.
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And I thought, I'm going to make sure I heard that right. I'm going to ask it again. I'm going to ask one more time. Will you marry me? Yes. And she said yes.
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I couldn't believe it. Here God, in eternity past, in spite of all the things that I've said and done, says,
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I'm going to choose you. You didn't deserve any of it. Elect people aren't any better. They're probably worse. But to show my glory, how great
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I am saving sinners, I'm going to pick you. And you're a sinner on your way to hell, and now you're a saint promised heaven.
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Aren't I gracious? And then we say yes. But if you're not a Christian today, my offer for you is forgiveness, full and free.
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Lay down your arms of rebellion, and follow Christ Jesus, the risen King. And then you'll know you're elect, but you won't know one second before.
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Donald Gray Barnhouse preached a sermon, and a little 12 -year -old boy was listening. He always talked about forgiveness in a very biblical way that he had jammed promises from God's Word into a single sentence.
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And in his sermon, he talked about the forgiveness of Christ Jesus. Our sins are forgiven, they're forgotten, cleansed, pardoned, atoned for, remitted, covered, they've been cast into the depths of the sea, blotted out as a thick cloud, removed as far as the east is from the west, cast behind God's back.
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A little 12 -year -old went up to Donald Gray Barnhouse in Philadelphia and said, Good sermon, Doc. Gee, we're sure sitting pretty, aren't we?
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We're sure sitting pretty, aren't we? Confirmed by the resurrection of Christ Jesus. Let's pray.
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Thank you, Father, for your grace, for your mercy, for your kindness, how you display your glory in choosing sinful people like us.
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I would pray for the Christians here today that you'd give them a sense of joy that would make their hearts dance. And I pray for all those who are here who aren't
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Christians. I pray that you would break them, give them no rest or sleep until they rest in the
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Son. I pray that it would drive them to think, Am I chosen or not?
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And then you would grant them, every person here, the gift of your Son, Christ Jesus the