04-11-2021

Park Meadows Church

Subscribe

Download

Share

00

00:04

All right, last time for Easter, this was my mentor,

00:09

Dr. Rocky Freeman, and I don't know how many of you guys got to hear him preach. I know if you were here years ago, you heard him many times.

00:16

He would come here at least once a year and preach for us, but he was remarkable.

00:23

So we actually played part of one of his sermons last Sunday, and it was really amazing.

00:28

I just wanted to pop this up here so that you can figure out how to find many of his sermons have been put on our website by Ben Mitchell.

00:37

So you just go to Park Meadows Church. Be sure you add the word church at the end or you get the wrong Park Meadows. But Park Meadows Church dot com, click archives, and right under that, you'll see several different types of sermons.

00:49

The top one there is Dr. Rocky Freeman. Just click on there and we have new series that's being added from time to time because we have all of his.

00:58

He sent a tape of the month club when he was in his ministry. He's in heaven now, if you didn't know that.

01:04

But when he passed away, his wife gave me this big metal box full of all those tapes, the originals.

01:12

So Ben digitalized those for us and is starting to add them to our website. They're awesome. So take advantage of that if you could.

01:19

All right. So let's review just a little bit today. We're teaching through the book of Romans verse by verse.

01:27

And so we've made our way all the way to chapter 11. And this to me,

01:36

I, you know, I love preaching through the Bible and wherever I am is my favorite verse. You know, you're probably like that, too.

01:42

I think this is my favorite book or this is my favorite chapters wherever you are. Right. But this

01:48

I do like it when I come across things that cause us to have to study things that when you read it, you go, well,

01:57

I'm not sure I know what that means. Those are good. Those are good ones are ones where you say, I'm not sure

02:02

I'm understanding all that this means. Show me more, Lord, whatever. But this is certainly a passage like that. And I'll show you why this little part here is review.

02:10

But I want you to think with me about this, because a lot of folks, when they read the scripture, they don't stop to figure the things out.

02:17

If it's something they don't understand, they just go faster and then get to the next part. Right. And you should I don't think you should do it that way.

02:23

I think I think that, you know, every cross of the T and dot of the I in the Bible is inspired.

02:29

Every word is important. So certainly every verse is important and we need to understand it all. So I know sometimes it's

02:35

OK to skip past something when you don't have time to study it and find something to read for today. I understand that's fine, but it's really good to try to seek understanding of things we don't.

02:46

And I think this is this could easily be a passage like that. And I'll show you why. Romans 11, 1,

02:51

I say, then has God cast away his people? Now, we know from the context, having started with chapter one, verse one, we know who he's writing this to, you know, who we know, who

03:02

Paul is speaking to. He's basically speaking to the church at Rome, which until around, you know, 300

03:09

A .D. was an excellent church. And then it was ruined because it started taking state money from the

03:16

Romans and it ruined it. But before that, it was really strong. But it consisted of Jews and Gentiles.

03:22

And Paul was always interested in speaking to the Jew first and then the Gentile, even in his sermons.

03:27

If he had both in the room, he would speak to the Jew first and then the Gentile. And then, of course, both of those groups are divided into three types of people.

03:36

And you had lost sheep and you had saved sheep and you had goats. Those three kinds of people are in every room if the room is large enough.

03:45

Now, one this small, I'm going to just go with it and say we're sheep. All right. So I hope everyone here is a sheep.

03:50

And, you know, I can tell you how you can tell the difference. If you're a goat, you don't care and you might probably likely not be here today.

03:58

You would be off somewhere doing something else. But if you're you can be a lost sheep and and just don't feel that you're saved yet.

04:07

But you still have a really strong conscience and, you know, God's watching you and, you know, God's dealing with you.

04:13

And that's kind of the difference between a lost sheep and a goat, because a goat's not going to get saved. A lost sheep is someone who's not saved, who is going to be saved.

04:21

And the Lord knows when their spiritual birthday is. They don't know. But the Lord knows and all that. And save sheep like folks in the room today.

04:29

So don't you think it's interesting that Paul's talking about his people, the

04:34

Jewish people, and he's asking the question, has God cast them away? Why would he even ask that, do you think?

04:42

At this fairly. Yeah, and it was shortly after the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ and whose

04:50

Messiah was he, at least in the mind of the Jew, whose Messiah?

04:55

Yeah. And they missed him for the most part. We know Anna and Simeon were two of the only

05:01

Jews that recognized him as a baby that he was the Messiah. And then very few, you know, some of the

05:08

Jews would hear the gospel and be saved, but very few compared to the number of Gentiles. And then you'd have to say, though, the first part of the first century, the church was mostly

05:18

Jewish, but that changed very, very quickly to the point where it was mostly Gentile and has been that way until now.

05:24

So they basically, as a nation, missed their Messiah. And yet and so Paul asked the question, you know, has

05:32

God cast them away? And then he says, God forbid. Now, what answer does that imply?

05:40

Yeah, he implies, no, God has not cast them away, doesn't he? So think about that a minute.

05:47

For I am an Israelite, he says, of the seed of Abraham, of the triad of Benjamin, God hath not cast away his people.

05:56

Now he's not implying it. He out and out said it, didn't he? He has not cast away his people, which he foreknew.

06:04

But what sayeth the answer of God unto him? I have reserved unto myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal.

06:13

So even in a time when the prophet thought he was the only one saved and God said, no,

06:18

I got seven thousand people that you don't even know that are following me. That was just a small remnant of the masses of people at the time, though.

06:26

But the point is, God has always had a remnant. God, out of the race of humankind, out of the race of mankind, which is a totally fallen race, a totally depraved race of which the

06:41

Bible says none seeketh God, not one, there's not good, not one. But yet out of that race,

06:46

God has saved a remnant. And some places in scripture call that the chosen one. Some call it the elect.

06:52

It's the same Greek word. Some say they've been predestined. Some say predetermined.

06:58

Some say foreordained. Some say foreknown. All of those scriptures are there about that remnant of people that are saved out of the fallen human race.

07:06

Right. But it's true of Israel, too. There's a remnant saved out of Israel, a remnant out of each people group.

07:13

Not every individual is saved, but some people from every race are saved. Right. And the world's heard the gospel now.

07:21

So the general call has gone out to the whole world. So, yeah, if you go down in chapter 11, just a little farther than where we are there with verse four, look at verse 14 in the same chapter.

07:37

If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, that's the Jews, right?

07:43

And might save some of them. Look at this, for if the casting away of them, that's the

07:51

Jews, be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?

07:56

So doesn't that say very clearly that God did cast them away? So which is true.

08:01

Does it contradict? So now you're in a place where you got to go study. You can't just read that and walk away from it and say, well, who cares, and walk away from it because some enemy of the

08:13

Lord, so many of the enemy of the Bible may come up to you someday and say, well, the Bible contradicts itself. Look at this in your own

08:19

Bible right there. How do you explain that? And if you haven't studied it, you can't explain it. And if you can't explain it, you're not doing what the

08:25

Lord said, because he said, always be ready to give an answer study to show that self -approved unto God. Correct.

08:30

So you have to be a student of the Bible in order to be obedient to our Lord. Would you agree with that?

08:37

Well, places like this help, because if you have an inquisitive mind, you can't just read that and walk away from it because it's a what we call a seeming contradiction.

08:46

And the reason we call it a seeming contradiction is because to us, it seems to contradict, but we know God never contradicts himself.

08:53

He's perfect. So it seems like it. So that means we need to study and figure it out. Right. So that's kind of what we're doing here.

08:59

Now, what's interesting about it? Um, we know here in verse 15 that Paul says he did cast away his people.

09:09

Well, let's see if there's evidence that in the old Testament, this is a little bit of review here, so I'm not going to take long on this, but in Jeremiah 15, starting with verse one, then said the

09:18

Lord. And to me, though, though most listen, this is amazing though Moses and Samuel, if they stood before me, yet my mind would not be changed towards this people, the

09:31

Jews cast them out of my sight and let them go forth.

09:36

God said to the prophet, to Jeremiah, he said, you can pray all day. I'm not changing my mind.

09:41

And even if Moses and Samuel stood before us and prayed and said, save this people, I'm not listening to them.

09:48

Sounds like he's casting them away at this point in time. And it shall come to pass.

09:55

If they, his own people saying to me or saying to you, where should we go forth?

10:03

And this is what I want you to teach them. If they ask that question, he says, the say of the Lord, such as are for death to death, those that are going to die, send them to death and such as are to die by the sword, send the sword to them and such are supposed to die by famine.

10:21

Send the famine to them and such as are supposed to go into captivity, send them into captivity, but I'm not saving them.

10:28

Wow. So there is a time he cast away his people. It's not the only time.

10:35

This is an example. And I will appoint over them four kinds, sayeth the Lord, the sword to slay dogs, to tear their dead bodies apart, fowls of heaven and beast of the earth to devour and destroy them.

10:52

Now, let's ask ourselves a question. If he would do that to his own nation, where does

10:58

America stand today? Think about that just for a little bit. And if you read the whole context of this whole chapter, why

11:05

God is doing is it because they had turned away from God and begun to offer their children to bail, you know, um, you might want to consider the millions of abortions we've done, no different than offering them the bail by fire.

11:24

So you have to ask yourself the question, where does America stand today? I'm beginning to call America, the

11:30

U S S a. And if you're old as me, you know what that, what it's a pun, right? U S S R, which doesn't exist anymore.

11:37

It's a lot like that now with the full propaganda and everything that we used to be concerned about the poor Russians.

11:43

Cause all they heard was propaganda. Now our news is the same way. It's not news it's propaganda.

11:48

And there's little truth in it. And so how long will this go on before we see some of this happening to this nation?

11:56

We have to ask the question, not saying I know the answer, but I'm going to ask the question this morning, because this absolutely did happen to Israel when they did the same things and I will cause them to be removed into all kingdoms of the earth, because for one problem they had was they had a bad leader.

12:17

Now that wouldn't be America, would it? I mean,

12:23

America normally does have a bad leader and I don't care whether it's Republican or Democrat, right? Normally like to get where they are in Washington, DC, uh, it's going to be really hard to elect a preacher or a godly man or woman.

12:38

I'm not saying you can't, but I'm just saying, look at our leaders, the best of I had to argue with people, you know, people knew

12:48

I was going to vote for Trump. Right. And then he'd argue with me about it. Well, he's not the right man. I said, look,

12:53

I'm not, I'm not trying to vote for a preacher. God gave two choices. He was one of them.

12:58

Which one am I going to pick? I'm going to pick the one who's against abortion and the one who's for a biblical economic principles, and I'm going to vote against the one who's not,

13:07

I'm not voting for the person I'm voting for the platform, but still, uh, Trump ain't perfect.

13:14

Is he, is that an understatement? He amazes me with his stuff.

13:21

He says, but when I look at the other side's policies, you know, it's like no contest.

13:29

All right. But anyway, look at the problem here because of Manasseh, the son of Hezekiah, king of Judah for that, which he did in Jerusalem.

13:38

We're talking about the people leading the country. We're doing despicable things. And God said, I'm destroying the nation because of that.

13:43

You got, you have brought leadership upon yourself because you're so evil. You deserve this kind of leadership.

13:50

And this is part of the problem. And then, and he goes further in verse five, he says, for who shall have pity on you?

13:56

Oh, Jerusalem, or who shall be moan thee? You have forsaken me says the Lord.

14:02

Thou art gone backwards. You know, that's where we get our term backslidden. You talk about a backslidden Baptist or whatever.

14:09

Um, that's where we get it from. And I think we use it out of context. Cause this is a little bit worse than backslidden the way we use it.

14:17

But anyway, you're gone backward. Therefore I will stretch out my hand against you and destroy you.

14:23

I am weary of changing my mind about it. God, that's what repent means. Um, you know, you've done bad before and I, I just showed mercy, but I'm tired of that and I'm not doing it this time.

14:34

Wow. Now you put yourself in history at this spot and you got your kids and grandkids and your, your mom and your grandparents.

14:42

And here you are and you get this word from the prophet comes and tells you this, and you hear this sermon.

14:47

What do you do? Well, if you're smart, you flee the mountains. Literally you flee, you leave the city and you flee the mountains and I will fan them with a fan in the gates of the land.

15:03

I will bereave them of children. I will destroy my people since they returned not from their evil ways.

15:09

Their widows are increased to me above the sand of the sea. So all the young men are being killed in battle and the women have no husbands and I have brought upon them against the mother of the young men, a spoiler at noon day, and I've caused him to fall upon it suddenly in terrors upon the city.

15:27

Wow. So did God ever cast away his people? Yes or no. Okay. Now let's go back to this though.

15:36

Now, and let's solve the conundrum here. If you read very carefully, what

15:42

Paul says, we know that in verse 15, he said he's cast away his people so that the

15:47

Gentiles may come in. Did he not? But look what he says very clearly before he ever said that up in verse two,

15:53

God has not cast away his people, which he foreknew and the problem we have when we read scripture, we put the emphasis on the wrong syllable.

16:00

A lot of times we like, we don't emphasize the right word. And the key word in that is foreknowledge.

16:07

Because if you study foreknowledge, old Testament and new Testament throughout the whole scripture, what you find out that that's talking about as Ephesians chapter one says it so beautifully is that God knew his own before the foundation of the world, he knew every single human being from every race and every dispensation who would be saved out of the fallen race.

16:27

He knew him by name before he made anything long before Genesis one, one, or at least right about that time, somewhere right in there before any, any of the world that we know was created.

16:39

He already knew who would be saved. And those people, he did not cast away. Isn't that interesting to know?

16:46

So there is no contradiction because think about it. You're part of America, aren't you? And when

16:52

America goes, if you happen to be in that city that gets nuked, you're going to die and your kids are and your family and everybody.

16:59

All right. But if God says, well, don't be in the city and you listen to that and you're off somewhere else and you're not there, you won't die.

17:07

All right. So just like the Jews, many of them were slaughtered, but his, his foreknown people, most of them were taken away captive and protected in different parts of the world.

17:18

Now it wasn't a nice at first because they were captive, but later God's people had God's wisdom and they would end up rising to leadership in all these countries.

17:26

Wouldn't they? That was what Hitler had a problem with. Yeah. Most of the people that control the money were the

17:32

Jews, because the word of God talks about economics and finance. It's a practical book.

17:38

They knew exactly what to do. And the Gentiles didn't know what to do. So they own most of the banks. Hitler said, there's your problem and killed them.

17:45

8 million of them. Right. But he doesn't cast away his foreknown ever.

17:54

Isn't that a good thing to know? Cause let me ask you this. We're part of this country too. Do we not sometimes succumb to the sins of the world and the sins of the flesh and the things that enter our minds because of what we see and do in this country.

18:07

And yet I'm always reminded of the scripture that says he has placed this treasure in earthen vessels.

18:14

And it's a great comfort to know all of this is on purpose. This was God's plan for us not to be perfect.

18:20

Right. Uh, it was his plan for us to serve him. And you think about it, your flesh is not saved yet.

18:28

Only your soul, your spirit are saved. The real you is the new man. It's saved, but the old man is not, and he can go either direction.

18:37

He or she can go either direction. And your brain is part of that old man. Lest we use that as an excuse.

18:45

When we sin, I do think we should understand that it's on purpose that we exist this way on purpose.

18:52

It's God's will. And he gets the glory when we do get it right. Correct. But lest we use it as an excuse to sin, we should always remember that the scripture says that when he bought us, he bought us with a price, the blood of his son, and that this body is no longer ours, which includes our brain.

19:09

It's the Lord's and it's intended to be used to serve him and bring glory to him, even though it's fallen and it's not perfect yet.

19:17

So that means the new man needs to be always thinking about what that old brain's thinking about and, and working with the

19:25

Holy spirit to control your body so that you live for the Lord. But we're not going to be perfect at that.

19:31

Are we? We're just not, but isn't it comforting when we understand that we're not perfect at it, that he doesn't cast away whom he foreknew.

19:40

So even in our imperfections, he never cast us away. Satan will come to you in your mind and make you think he will.

19:46

And that he has the moment after you sin, he'll make you feel that way until you remember these things.

19:52

And then it's like the word of God casts away the enemy. Right? So think how useful this knowledge is every day for us, certainly every week for us, but what say if the answer of God and to him have,

20:08

I have reserved to myself 7 ,000 men. So there, he talks about that remnant, right? Verse five, even so then at this present time, also, there is a remnant.

20:16

Now notice how Paul used that example. When Jeremiah said,

20:22

I'm, I'm the only saved person. All the other prophets are dead. They've killed them all. And they're going to kill me.

20:28

And he's kind of complaining in his prayer life, isn't he? And God says, look, there's 7 ,000 people of mine who have not been the need to bail that love me.

20:39

And they're out there and you may not know it, but you're not the only one. And Paul now uses that example for us.

20:45

Even like that, he says at this present time, there's also a remnant according to the election of grace.

20:52

Now notice that any remnant, which means saved people who have been saved out from a fallen race, they're always saved according to the election of grace.

21:04

I can't tell you how many times around the country when I've been, maybe the trade way meeting and people want to meet me and they come up at a, at a break and they shake my hand, but sometimes they'll want to question something

21:16

I've said. Cause every once in a while, I put a biblical rabbit trail in there with the stock market stuff. And I have some people say,

21:22

I like the rabbit trails better than the stock market stuff, which is cool. But sometimes they'll come up and say, you know, I've never heard what you said.

21:28

I find that hard to believe that what you said, uh, like you don't really believe in predestination.

21:34

Do you? I've had people ask me that exact question. And I'm thinking about verses like that, where it says the only people that ever get saved or saved according to the election of grace, election to the choosing, the predestination for knowledge, all that's what it's talking about.

21:49

And I just sort of shake my head because I know that that means that they grew up in a church where in the seminaries of their pastor taught them, we don't want to believe this stuff.

21:59

So let's eliminate those verses from our vocabulary and let's don't talk about them. I remember I grew up in a

22:05

Southern Baptist denomination where, when you had the little quarterlies to study Sunday school, you never had Romans nine, 10, 11 in there.

22:11

You just skipped them because they don't want to talk about it. Well, how can you say that there's part of God's word?

22:18

I don't want to believe if you're saved, I'm not questioning their salvation really, but I'm just asking the question, how can someone want to pick and choose and make the

22:29

Bible say what they want it to believe and really, truly love the Lord very much. Let's put it that way. Maybe they're saying they just babies or something.

22:35

What is it, Bill? I don't know what it is. I can't explain. It's not to me. I'm not the judge. Hallelujah. But I don't understand it because to me, like I am fine with the scripture telling me, here's what

22:48

I'm saying. You need to change your life to fit this rather than me trying to say, no, this verse doesn't fit that one. I got to change this one.

22:53

I don't like that kind of Bible study. And I, I, fortunately my seminary was

22:59

Dr. Freeman. He wouldn't let me go to seminary when I got called to preach because he said they're too liberal now. And this was, this was like in the late, in the early eighties.

23:08

And so he gave me his library and his time and he discipled me and that was my seminary.

23:14

And so guess what? I'm not bent. No, no seminary can say, Hey David, you got to believe this way or we're going to cast you out because I don't care.

23:20

I'm not part of it. And I hope you're not. And most of us did grow up in a denomination that had certain beliefs.

23:27

We need to be willing to throw any of them out that aren't biblical and keep the good stuff. It's like eating fish, spit out the bones and enjoy the fish.

23:34

Right? I mean, it's, it's like that. So even now there are some

23:41

Jewish people saved, Paul says by the election of grace, but that's the same way the

23:46

Gentiles are being saved too. Now Titus three, five backs this up.

23:51

Remember this one? This is beautiful verse that, you know, this is when, when we, when we used to say we're, we're a

23:57

Baptist church, which we're just a biblionarian church. Now we're, I don't know what we are. We're Bible leaving church at this point, but we used to say this, this is a passage of the church of Christ.

24:08

People around the South don't like, they don't want this one. And then they got some verses that are their verses that we don't like, but look at this one, not by works of righteousness, which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us by the washing of regeneration.

24:23

That means the only way you get saved is when the Holy spirit converts you, which is before you do anything.

24:30

So all the stuff that these denominations say, you got to do to be saved. You don't do any of them until after you're saved.

24:36

They don't cause they are not the cause. They are the return cause and effect.

24:43

They're the effect. I started saying return. I'm trying to do stock market stuff, I guess. I don't know why. So there are the effect, not the cause.

24:50

The regeneration is the cause. And the Bible says, while you're yet in your sins, have he quickened us, brought us to life.

24:56

It's a done deal at that point on your spiritual birthday, he quickens us and we're saved. Then what do you do?

25:01

He changes your want to, at the same time, he does it. He gives you Jesus's faith. And now you want to believe he gives you a change of mind.

25:09

That's repentance because he's already saved you. You did not have that two seconds before you would have just saved yourself.

25:15

Right. All of these things, you want to get baptized. You want to start loving other brothers and sisters. You want to start studying the

25:21

Bible, which previously was boring. All of these changes happen as effects of this by the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the

25:28

Holy ghost. That's called the effectual calling. He comes to you on your spiritual birthday. Well, that fits exactly what

25:34

Paul says in Romans 11 verse five is that the remnant gets saved according to the election of grace.

25:40

What does grace mean? Undeserved favor. So if election is according to something you didn't do to deserve it, then you played no role in it.

25:53

You received it as a gift, which is exactly what hundreds of scriptures say a free gift. It's redundant.

25:59

Even grace means a free gift. So it means a free, free gift, but God can't seem to get that across to humans because we humans love to work for our salvation.

26:09

Why? Because that's pride. It's humanism. It's pride. It's it's what

26:14

Cain did. Cain was the world's first vagabond. First street person was

26:20

Cain. So anyway, that certainly supports it.

26:26

And Galatians three 10 says for as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse. So you try to save yourself by doing good or keeping rules.

26:35

You're you're then become part of the curse for it is written. Cursed is everyone that continue with not in all the things which are written in the book of the law to do them.

26:44

So if you miss it in one point, you're lost. You're on the way to hell. And there's only one man that didn't miss it.

26:51

And that's Jesus. Like you're talking about in Sunday school this morning. Only one John one 13, which were born, not listen to this.

27:01

They weren't born again of the blood. That means because your daddy was a preacher or your grandpa was a preacher, so I must be okay.

27:08

No, you're not born because of your bloodline nor of the will of the flesh, you are not born again because you wanted to get saved.

27:16

Now that totally defies the modern gospel because the modern gospel as well, Jesus died for you on the cross.

27:22

If you just want him, just stick out your hand, shake my hand. And you're born again. That is not the gospel.

27:29

The Bible says there's none. Good. Not one, none that seeketh God, your flesh didn't want to be saved.

27:35

You didn't because all you were was flesh before you got saved. Your spirit was a dead shell. You were deaf.

27:41

You were blind. You were dead. You were walking dead men's bones, right? And your flesh and your will and your brain did not want

27:50

Jesus Christ. And that's why you stayed lost. Right? So it's not by who your parents were. It's not because you wanted to get saved.

27:57

Nor is it by the will of the man of man. It's not because your grandma wanted you to get saved. My grandmother wanted me to get saved really badly.

28:05

She tried to get me to go to church as a little boy, all the way up through high school, all the way into college.

28:10

And just couldn't get me to do it. Cause I was lost as a goose. And my parents were not in church at the time, but they loved the

28:17

Lord. They just, they'd been, you know, they'd been, um, you know, discouraged by things that happened in the church.

28:23

They were going to their first Baptist Mahalia. And so they quit. So I didn't grow up in church.

28:30

Didn't want to go to church. And my grandmother just prayed for me. And I don't, I think when she was on her deathbed, she had a terrible heart attack.

28:38

She already had one when she was 40. So when she was about 60, I don't know, one, two, three or four or five, whatever she was right in her early sixties, she had another one and she lived three days and then went to heaven.

28:48

She was at Baylor hospital. I was lost as a goose, but I loved her so much.

28:55

I spent so much time cause her house was right near my house growing up. I was in her house every day. And, um,

29:01

I went down to the bookstore at the, um, at the hospital to buy some,

29:07

I wanted to buy something about flying saucers or something. I used to love that stuff when I was a kid, all the way up to when

29:13

I was a young adult, I'd read every book on things like that. And so I saw this book.

29:19

It looked like either flying saucers or scientific something. It was called the late great planet earth.

29:27

Little did I know it was a book about the second coming. I mean, they got it wrong a little bit in the book, but I mean,

29:33

I didn't know any of that stuff, obviously never been to church much. So I bought the book and read every page for three days while she was dying, she died and not too long afterwards.

29:43

I got saved. She had prayed for me her whole life. Right? So it's not because she wanted me to get saved that I got saved, but it says it's of God.

29:58

See the last phrase salvation is purely and only of God.

30:03

Now, does he use human instruments? Absolutely. Because not only has he predetermined who will be saved, he has predetermined the means and the methods by which they may be saved.

30:15

And God, as I've said so many times around the country, God started the first family business. That's why I like the idea of creating family businesses where you teach your kids and grandkids, the skill sets and work together is the biblical way to have potential for wealth creation through the generations.

30:29

I believe that's so important because it's good Bible methodology. How do I know that? Because Jesus and God, the father were the first family business.

30:38

Jesus said, I, I never say anything that I haven't heard the father say, and I never do anything.

30:45

I haven't seen the father do. So it's a family business. And then Jesus, right before he left, he looked at us and he said, as the father sent me, even so send

30:55

I you. So now he brings us into his family business. So everything we're doing is part of his business is not ours.

31:00

And all the money he puts in our possessions to use in his business is not ours, but we work together.

31:05

So does he work together with us toward the salvation of his elect whom he chose?

31:11

Of course he does. Every time we do anything, we're a witness, whether good or bad, we can be a bad witness or a good one.

31:17

We're always witnessing to the world with our life and with our words. And God uses that.

31:23

Did he use the prayers of my grandmother? Absolutely. It's, it's in some ways a mystery, how the sovereignty of God and the will of man responsibility of man fits together, but it fits together perfectly in God's mind.

31:38

And he uses the witness of a grandmother and of a mother and of, of a dad and different preachers, you hear, and of Dr.

31:45

Rocky Freeman, you know, and things like that in your life. And, but, but yet it's the

31:51

Holy spirit that quickens us. Would you agree with that? When it comes down to it, it's the

31:56

Holy spirit that while we are still in our sins, he quickens us, he brings us to life.

32:03

And then there are many effects that take place. And so many denominations get all against each other because they all pick different effects and say they're the cause.

32:10

Well, none of them are the cause that's sad, but it's how Satan works. So there it is.

32:16

It's according to the election of grace throughout all scripture, old Testament and new those whom he foreknew.

32:23

He also chose according to the election, which was an act of pure undeserved favor of any human that ever got saved from Adam and Eve all the way down to us.

32:36

Now, Romans 11, verse six says if by grace, so Paul's already put forth the proposition, or you might say, um, the presupposition that anyone who gets saved to say by election, which means they're chosen by God before the foundation of the world.

32:53

And it's by grace, which means they didn't deserve it. It's just because God wanted to save them. Just like Israel was chosen, not because it was the greatest nation.

33:00

God said, on the contrary, you were the weakest, you're the smallest, but I love you. And it's just because I won't use why you're chosen.

33:06

Same as us. And Paul says in verse six, now, if you buy into that, now I'm going to use some logic to take you further.

33:14

Now, here's the problem with modern books on theology is the guys that write these books are geniuses.

33:21

Many of them are brilliant minds and they can so easily, even in the preface, before you start reading the book and throw out there a little presupposition and get you to buy into it, that happens to be false.

33:31

And then they'll have perfect logic to the end. And you'll buy into something that's totally wrong as if it's the truth.

33:38

And if you've read many theology books, you'll know how easily done that is, you know? So you gotta be a little careful.

33:46

I don't really like a lot of the modern ones. I like them if they're roughly 150 years old or so is good.

33:52

Those are good books. Most of them, but you have to hold them all up against this book right here, because this is the only authority that there is.

34:00

The denomination is not, I was sitting, I hate to say it, Bill, but I was looking up something for a few seconds while you were teaching.

34:06

I was trying to see if the Chinese people come from Shim or where they come from. And you've all heard of Morris, the, the, uh, apologetics genius, uh, who writes apologetics books.

34:20

They had quoted him saying, no, that they come from Ham. Well, I've never believed that they came from Ham and still don't.

34:26

So I just clicked and found another source and read it. And it proved you came from Shim. So who's right? They're both scholars.

34:32

They're both PhDs. Who's right? Well, this, this is the only right thing, the only authority.

34:40

So you got to get your clues from here as to which is right. I have my opinion and, and, uh, but it comes based on scripture.

34:46

I think Morris was wrong on that. And I love Morris, but you know what I'm saying? You just got to be careful because just because they're brilliant doesn't mean you buy into everything they say in their book.

34:56

And I hope you don't buy into everything we say up here. You should check it all out. I have so many people around the country that come up to me and just say,

35:03

I just disagree with you. And I say, great. That's what I want you to do, because I want you to go home and prove me wrong.

35:08

I want you to study. And if you do that, that was my job is to get you to study.

35:14

So he throws out this presupposition that nobody gets saved except by election through grace.

35:21

And then he says, now that you've bought into that, I'm going to take you down through some logic. So look at verse six. He says, so if it is by grace, now we're going to have an if then statement with part of logic, right?

35:33

If it is by grace, then it cannot be by works. Boy, this is a problem.

35:39

Even in churches around us, even our, we have so many friends that go to church and, and, and seems that they love the

35:47

Lord and they still have to believe that it's Jesus. Yeah. I believe in Jesus, but you gotta, and then they'll add something you have to do depending on what denomination they grew up in.

35:57

Yeah. You believe in Jesus, but you got to do this or you're not going to be saved. Well, Paul disagrees with that.

36:04

He said, if I can get you to buy into verse five as being the truth, a presupposition, then if that's true, it follows if it's by grace, it cannot be by works.

36:14

Otherwise grace is no more grace. You know what he's saying? He's saying, look, you defy the very definition of grace.

36:21

If you add works to it for salvation. Yeah. Because the very definition of grace is undeserved favor.

36:28

So what do the works accomplish? If they don't get you to deserve anything, nothing. So you just divide the definition.

36:35

And I've got so many, especially down here in the South church, Christ friends. And I've met a few of them that I thought were saved.

36:41

And a lot of them that I thought can't be because they say, yeah, well, you got to get baptized in our water or you're not saved.

36:47

Oh, really? Well, I thought the scripture said it's selection by grace.

36:53

And if it grace, it cannot be by works is what the apostle

36:58

Paul said. Otherwise grace, you just defied the definition of grace. You just changed the meaning of it.

37:04

That's what he means when he says grace is no more grace. You just changed the meaning of it. Now it means something different to you.

37:10

Well, so you're going to change the word of God to fit your theology. Are you going to change your theology to fit the word of God?

37:15

That's my question this morning. I mean, can't you grow up enough as a Christian and be adult enough to not be bothered by what the kids on the playground are calling you.

37:25

If you don't agree with them, you need to just take your Bible and read it and say, Holy spirit teach me.

37:31

Now I know, you know, if I hadn't read the whole thing, I need to read it through because there's about 10 rules to proper

37:36

Bible interpretation. One of them is the scripture interprets the scripture. So what I'm reading here cannot contradict what's over there, but over time, if I have a desire to know the truth and the

37:46

Holy spirit is my teacher and I have the word of God, I'm going to know the truth, even though there's thousands of false prophets in the end times,

37:52

Jesus said, do you know that probably most preachers you hear are false prophets today because Jesus said one of the signs of the end times is there will be many false prophets.

38:03

So just because they look good and they talk well, and they dress nicely and they're in a church, you don't need to believe stuff preachers are saying.

38:11

You need to go check it out in that book and make sure it's in context. Cause like you got to ask, well, who's being spoken to in this passage?

38:19

Cause they may be using something to prove something they want to prove. And then it's not even what it's talking about. You wouldn't know that if you didn't go back up to chapter one, verse one and read all the way down to it, you just have to do it, especially today.

38:30

You just can't trust books and men anymore today. You never should have, but that's just the way it is.

38:36

So now look, if you buy into the fact that salvation is by election through grace, which means it cannot be deserved.

38:43

Then it follows that it has nothing to do with works. Would you agree with that's good logic Paul uses and the Holy spirit told him to write this.

38:50

So that's good logic. The Holy spirit used otherwise grace loses its definition, but if it be of works now, he turns it around and he says, okay, but if you say salvation is by works, then it's not by grace.

39:06

It can't be both. Paul says otherwise works is no more work.

39:11

So now you just defied the very definition of what it means to talk about working for your salvation.

39:17

If you say it's grace plus works, or I believe in Jesus, but you gotta now he's saying, well, you will now, then you just, you just defied the definition of works because if it's works, the grace doesn't come into play because it's free, that doesn't come into play at all.

39:30

It's by works only. So if you're going to say it's grace plus works, you just defied the definition of works, but you already defied the definition definition of grace, which basically ladies and gentlemen's means you're stupid, right?

39:42

I mean, that basically what Paul's saying. And Jews talk like that. If you had Paul up here, he would just say, look, you're stupid.

39:48

If you think that they don't, they don't pull, they don't pull back to be sweet sounding. I mean, they just tell you the truth.

39:54

And, uh, more preachers probably need to throw a little bit of that in because you know, now you dealing with your friends, it's a little different when you're not behind the pulpit, you can't quite do in me too, if I'm not behind the pulpit.

40:07

And I'm just dealing with a person at the coffee shop and they throw out some nonsense like that.

40:12

Well, yeah, I believe in Jesus, but you gotta, well, you don't have quite the vim and vigor you do behind the pulpit.

40:19

So you have to be in meekness. The Bible says with meekness, you teach them, you instruct them, you share scripture with them.

40:27

You can't change them. Only God can. So that's difficult for us, isn't it is for me, but that's the truth.

40:34

All right. So as many as are under the, uh, works or under a curse, and then

40:41

Paul proves it right here with verse six. It can't be both. It can't be an admixture of grace plus works.

40:47

It can only be grace and it is only grace. And his logic is beautiful. Grace cannot be by works.

40:54

And if it is by works, it is not grace. This admixture defies the definition of both words and is therefore stupid.

41:04

Okay. Look at verse seven. What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for the whole history of the

41:16

Jews seemed to be, they were seeking for God. Did it, didn't it? The whole history. I mean, they're the people of God.

41:23

They had the oracles of God, which means the work, the written word. They had the first, they had the spoken word, the carried down by tradition word.

41:31

And then Moses put it in the writing. So now they had the written word and, um, and yet they didn't find what they were seeking for, which means they missed salvation somehow.

41:42

Well, if you go back and you study, which we've done in recent Sundays, salvation by grace was all in the old

41:49

Testament, even under Moses. They just missed it because they're like human.

41:54

They're humanistic. Like all humans want to tend to be is they want to focus on the humanistic side of it, like me doing the work so that I can please

42:02

God. And they didn't notice that they should have been loving the giver of the law rather than the law. They should have loved the law giver.

42:09

Right. And they didn't, they loved the law and that's where they missed out. That's why they missed their

42:14

Messiah. One of the reasons. So Israel didn't obtain what they were seeking for, but now look what he says, but the election has obtained it and the rest were blinded.

42:23

So what does Paul say in that one verse? He ties the whole conundrum up in verse, I believe verse two or three, wherever it was, when he said, has

42:32

God cast aside his people, God forbid is not cast aside his for known now in verse 14 later, we're not there yet, but later he's going to say that he did cast them aside.

42:44

And right here, he says, well, you know, Israel just didn't get to heaven by doing good works like they sought to do, but because of election and grace, some of them are saved anyway, because they're saved because God chose them and he opens their eyes to it.

43:00

And they understand it's all about the Lord. Jesus is not about themselves, but the rest were blinded.

43:06

That's true of every race, by the way, every group of men in the world, there's no way in which you can say

43:13

Jesus died for every individual man, woman, boy, and girl, because if he did, they'd all be in heaven. But what you can say is he, he died for all men, which means all kinds of men.

43:21

The Greek word possibly usually means all kinds of men. So there are men, women, and boys and girls from every kind of people group that will be saved by grace.

43:33

That's a promise of God. And that's how God does it. And that's how it works.

43:39

The rest are blinded. And when we come into this world, blinded and praise be to God that the

43:45

Holy Spirit, when he calls us, he opens our eyes, changes our want to the

43:50

Jews could not find what they sought by works and without grace and election.

43:56

None would have been saved, but God saved a remnant by grace and through election, even of the Jews in the first century, the rest were blinded.

44:04

Verse seven says, so does that mean they were elected to blindness?

44:11

Well, that's a topic for a different day, but you might want to study that. Look into it. Try reading the book of Jude.

44:17

It's only two pages long. Read that tonight and see if you can answer that question. That's not in that scripture, but I just asked the question.

44:27

All right, now let's look at verse eight, according as it is written,

44:33

God hath given them the spirit of slumber eyes that they would not see in ears that they could not hear until this day.

44:43

Well, that's pretty true of all natural men, women, and David said, let their table be a snare and a trap and a stumbling block and a recompense unto them.

44:58

So you remember the beautiful Psalm where you going through the valley of death, the shadow of the valley of death, and God prepares a table for you.

45:08

Right. And you sit and you have a meal with the Lord, the shepherd, and he brings peace in the midst of this horrible situation that you're in.

45:18

Well, that's taken away. Their table becomes a snare rather than a place of peace in the table.

45:24

Pictures fellowship, doesn't it? We have fellowship with the Lord and with each other around a meal usually. Don't we? And, um, so that's taken away from these people.

45:35

Let their eyes be darkened that they may not see and bow down their back always or bow down their back always.

45:43

They're backslidden. It's talking about the same group of people in Jeremiah. It's not the four known ones, but it's just the race itself.

45:50

The fallen race, particularly in this case, the Jewish part, the fallen part, and the uns the unchosen of the

45:59

Jews, the Jews could not find what they sought by works and without grace, they couldn't find it.

46:07

The rest were blinded. But in what way were they blinded? Number one, their eyes couldn't see.

46:14

Number two, their ears couldn't hear. And to this day, Paul said, same, same with natural men and women today.

46:22

Number three, their table is made a snare. No fellowship with God in their homes.

46:30

And there's the Psalm in 23 five that I was referring to. Their table is made a trap.

46:37

The stuff they talk about at dinner is the very opposite of godliness. Usually in homes that don't know the

46:44

Lord, isn't it? Their table is made a stumbling block. The things that the parents teach their children in unsaved homes becomes a stumbling block for the kids that makes it more difficult for them to ever acknowledge that God exists or that he's real or that they should follow him.

47:00

If it's true that my grandfather had an influence on me towards salvation, then it's also true that had she been evil, she could have had an influence on me away from it.

47:08

Isn't that right? So what it's saying, and now you multiply that by millions in America, because we're becoming more and more secular.

47:16

And if you go into Europe and you look at the Protestant former Protestant nations, like Switzerland, Sweden, some of those places, uh,

47:23

Germany, England. They're secular now. And their kids just look dead. When you look in their eyes, they're teenagers.

47:29

They're like walking dead men. Why they've laid aside the scriptures and church and the

47:36

Lord and their parents at the tables at home. We're not talking about that. They're just talking about the things of the world and how to get to the top and in a socialist environment where they can't get to the top because they have no freedom to go anywhere.

47:48

And there's very little joy because where there's no vision that people perish and that's what socialism does.

47:54

So think of Europe is lost. It's gone. America is following soon.

47:59

Our leaders, half of our leaders today, and half the people that vote for them today, or for that type of lifestyle, a secularization

48:07

Obama even said it, I want America to be more like Europe, which means secular. So the table becomes a stumbling block in a secular home.

48:17

Isn't that something their table is made a recompense. Their eyes are darkened.

48:24

Their back is bowed away from God. Always. Wow. Those things are all listed there by Paul.

48:30

That's the result of a nation that doesn't follow God. And I think we're out of time.

48:36

I'm going to pick it up here with Psalm 69 next time, but we've had plenty to think about this morning.

48:42

So what, what do we do though? What do we do if we find ourselves in a nation that's kind of following down this wrong path that history has shown us what happens to nations that do that.

48:55

Persia, Syria, Persia, Greece, Rome, England.

49:01

After World War II, England was no longer the empire upon which the sun never set. She was done.

49:06

Why she, she quit going to church before World War II. The churches were not full, quit listening to people like Spurgeon a long time before World War II.

49:18

And they had the light. I think Charles Spurgeon was the greatest preacher since Paul. And maybe, maybe even a better pulpit here than Paul, because Paul said,

49:26

I'm not good at talking kind of like Moses. Wasn't he? So they didn't stop listening to him.

49:32

And he believed everything we preach today, Spurgeon teaches that these things salvation by grace only through election again, and again, every one of his sermons, they quit listening to it and they lost their power and hadn't had it since where's

49:45

America going. So what do we do when we're in a nation like that? Well, we keep the right things at our tables and we keep teaching our children and grandchildren, the right things and praying for them to be stronger than we are, even because they're going to go through tougher times.

49:58

And then we think about preparing, do we want to be living in the city when these, this thing comes down on America?

50:06

Or do we want to be in the mountains, you know, away from the city, far away from the cities when these things come down, the scripture makes it clear.

50:14

So we have to be thinking about that. Now, does that mean we just quit everything and get on our house and a white sheet and say,

50:20

Jesus, come get me. It's time for you to come back. I like a better plan than that.

50:26

Like the one when they went in to rebuild the wall in Jerusalem. And do you remember the story? They had a trowel in one hand laying bricks and they had a sword and the other one.

50:34

That's where we are today. You have to keep building because you can't predict the hour. Can you, you can see the trees budding and no summer's near though.

50:43

So that you keep the sword and you stay prepared with your family. What do we do?

50:48

And you pray about it all the time, pretty much every day, Lord, you need to show us what to do when the time comes, we need to be prepared before the time comes, so let us know, and then you keep building and working and doing what you need to build

51:00

God's kingdom, like the school that we have here that you lead. So let's think about you this morning, you know, how, what amazing job you do.

51:08

And Glenda, you, you part of that and couldn't be done without you.

51:13

So we need to keep these things going, but we got to keep that sword in our hands.

51:18

And we got to teach those kids in that school about that too, a little bit. Right. So that's where we are and let's stand and have prayer together.

51:26

It's not a negative, sad thing that the tribulation is coming because that means the

51:33

Lord is coming and he's coming back for his church. And there's going to be a great wedding feast and we're going to be right there.

51:40

We're his bride. Let's pray, Lord. Thank you so much for your word. Thank you for your spirit who teaches us with perfect logic through all the penman that you chose to give us the written word of God.

51:54

And thank you that you can enlighten those penned words and teach us even things we didn't see the first 10 times we read certain passages and Lord, it's a living book because you're, you're a living

52:06

God and your Holy spirit is with us always as we study and Lord, thank you for that Lord, help us to be the salt and the light in this country, which you've placed us and in this world, in our generation, give us strength, give us courage, give us wisdom and go with us into our time of fellowship.

52:22

Now we ask you to bleep, uh, to bless the meal we're about to have in Jesus name. Amen. You are dismissed.