Sermon #1380[1] Miscellaneous
Notes
Title: “It
Pleased GoD”
Text: Psalm 135:6
Reading: Psalm 115:1-18
Subject: Divine
Sovereignty
Tape #
Introduction:
There are certain things
about God which are believed and held in common by all conservative “Christian”
religions. All who profess to be Christians believe, or at least profess to
believe, that…
·
“God is a Spirit,” eternal, immutable, and
independent.
·
God is holy, wise, and good.
·
God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.
·
God is just, true, and faithful.
·
“God is love,” merciful, gracious,
long-suffering, and forgiving.
These are characteristics of
God’s nature, attributes of his Being, which all religious people, to one
degree or another recognize and applaud. Both Baptists and Methodists believe
these things. Presbyterians and Pentecostals, Episcopalians and Catholics,
Campbellites and Russellites, Adventists and Mormons all acknowledge these
things to be true. Neither Quakers nor Papists would deny any of these
attributes of God. Every man, woman, boy or girl, who professes to believe in
God will tell you that these things are so. You believe them; and I believe
them.
But there is something else,
another attribute which is essential to the character of God, which most
religious people refuse to accept. In fact, they despise it. Though they sing,
“O How I love Jesus,” with beaming faces, when a preacher dares tell them that
this attribute is at the very core of his Being, essential to his nature, they
become enraged.
Here is the one attribute of
God’s Being which distinguishes him from all the imaginary gods of men. In
fact, if you will read the Book of God one more time, you will find out that it
is this attribute of his Being to which God himself most often points when
showing the difference between himself and the idols of men that are called
gods.
Because God himself has
chosen to use this one attribute above all others to distinguish himself as
God, when I am asked to answer the question, “Who is God?’ it seems most
reasonable to me to answer it by setting forth this one distinguishing
attribute of his nature.
Proposition: He who truly is God is totally sovereign.
The God of the Bible, the one true and living God, the God whom we worship,
trust, and love, is an absolute sovereign, in total control of all things, at
all times, always performing his will and pleasure.
Psalms
135:1-6
1. "Praise ye the LORD.
Praise ye the name of the LORD; praise him,
O ye servants of the LORD.
2. Ye that stand in the house
of the LORD, in the courts of the house of our God,
3. Praise the LORD; for the
LORD is good: sing praises unto his
name; for it is pleasant.
4. For the LORD hath chosen
Jacob unto himself, and Israel for
his peculiar treasure.
5.
For I know that the LORD is great,
and that our Lord is above all gods.
6. Whatsoever the LORD pleased,
that did he in heaven, and in earth,
in the seas, and all deep places."
Psalms 115:1-3
1. "Not unto us, O LORD,
not unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy, and for thy truth's sake.
2. Wherefore should the heathen
say, Where is now their God?
3. But our God is in the heavens: he hath done
whatsoever he hath pleased."
The Lord our God is
absolutely and universally sovereign. And I am here to assert in the plainest,
boldest terms possible that anything less than an absolute sovereign is
not God, but only the idolatrous figment of man’s depraved
imagination, an image carved out of one of the trees in the dark forest of
man’s idolatrous imagination.
When I assert that God is sovereign, I am simply
declaring that he is God. God almighty has the right and power to do what he
will, when he will, with whom he will, as he will. The god of this apostate religious age is anything but sovereign.
This religious generation is well described by the prophet Isaiah. – “They pray unto a god that cannot save!” Modern
religion has set aside the sovereignty of God to make room for the autonomy of
man. Today, men everywhere deny the sovereignty of God’s will, in order to
exalt the imaginary freedom of man’s will.
The fact is, the god of the “enlightened” twentieth century, church is a weak, helpless, frustrated, effeminate idol which commands the respect of no one. The god of the modern pulpit is an object of pity, rather than reverence.
·
If God loves everyone alike, and some still perish in hell, his love is
meaningless and irrelevant.
·
If Christ died for all men alike, shed his blood to redeem all men, and
some are not redeemed, his blood is meaningless and irrelevant.
·
If God the Holy Spirit is trying to save all men by the operations of
his grace, and some are not saved, his grace is meaningless and irrelevant.
Those things describe the
god of this age. They describe your fathers’ god and your neighbors’ god. They
may even describe your god. But that is not the God of the Bible. A weak,
helpless, frustrated god, is no more God than the totem poles of barbaric
tribesmen.
The God of the Bible is an absolute sovereign. It is
written of him, “All things are of God.” You can take those words
just as far as your imagination will allow; and when you have gone the full
length of your mind’s imagination, you have not even begun to get started
measuring the magnitude of those words. – “All
things are of God!”
·
In Creation (Pro. 16:4).
·
In Providence (Matt. 11:20-25; Rom. 8:28-30; 11:36; Eph. 1:11; Ps.
76:10; Ex. 34:24).
·
In Salvation – “Salvation is of
the Lord!” (Rom. 9:16; Eph.
1:3-14).
When we talk about God’s sovereignty, we are simply
declaring that God is God. Divine sovereignty means that God always does
exactly what he wants to, that he always does all his pleasure (“I do all my pleasure!”), that nothing
ever comes to pass except that which God brings to pass according to his own,
sovereign, eternal, immutable pleasure. He who is our God is that great and
glorious God who works all things after the pleasure of his own will (Eph.
1:11).
Everything that comes to
pass in time God purposed to bring to pass in eternal predestination and
effectually brings to pass in his sovereign providence, “According to the good pleasure of his own will, to the praise of the
glory of his grace!”
Realizing that those things
are so, I want to know this – What is
God’s pleasure? What is it that God is pleased to do? I know that the “secret things belong to the Lord.” I am
perfectly content to leave the secret things secret until he is pleased to make
them known. I have no desire to pry into that which God has chosen not to
reveal. But I do want to know as much as I can about what he has revealed; for “the things which are revealed belong to us
and to our children.” Does God tell us what his pleasure is? Does God
reveal in his Word what he is pleased to do? Let’s look into the Book and see.
Here are five things
revealed
in the Word of God,
which God declares he is
pleased to do.
I.
1 Samuel 12:22 – “It
hath pleased the Lord to make you
his people.”
1 Samuel 12:22-24 "For the LORD will not forsake his
people for his great name's sake: because it hath pleased the LORD to make you
his people. (23) Moreover as for me,
God forbid that I should sin against the LORD in ceasing to pray for you: but I
will teach you the good and the right way:
(24) Only fear the LORD, and serve him in truth with all your heart; for
consider how great things he hath
done for you."
If you and I belong to God,
if we are numbered among his people, if we are heirs of God and join-heirs with
Jesus Christ, it is because “it pleased
the Lord to make you his people.” HOW?
A.
By Divine Election Special
Adoption.
Psalms 65:4
"Blessed is the man whom thou
choosest, and causest to approach unto
thee, that he may dwell in thy courts: we shall be satisfied with the
goodness of thy house, even of thy
holy temple."
John 15:16 "Ye have not chosen me,
but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth
fruit, and that your fruit should remain:
that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it
you."
2 Thessalonians 2:13-14 "But we are bound to give thanks alway
to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the
beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and
belief of the truth: (14) Whereunto
he called you by our gospel, to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus
Christ."
1 John 3:1
"Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that
we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not,
because it knew him not."
B. By Sovereign Regeneration
and Effectual Calling.
·
John 3:1-8
Ephesians 2:1-5 "And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins: (2) Wherein in time past ye walked
according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of
the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience: (3) Among whom also we all had our
conversation in times past in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of
the flesh and of the mind; and were by nature the children of wrath, even as
others. (4) But God, who is rich in
mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, (5) Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together
with Christ, (by grace ye are saved.)"
C.
By Willing, Voluntary
Surrender to and Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
·
Psalm 110:3
II.
Colossians 1:19 – It pleased God to put all fulness in the
Lord Jesus Christ.
Colossians 1:18-19 "And he is the head of the body, the
church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead; that in all things he might have the preeminence. (19) For it pleased the Father that in him should all
fulness dwell;"
The triune God has given the
Lord Jesus Christ, our God-man Mediator, preeminence in all things and over all
things, and put all fulness in him, so that he might be preeminent in the
faith, praise, and adulation of his saints forever. – “All fulness” is in Christ.
A. the Fulness of the Triune
God
Colossians 2:9-10 "For in him dwelleth all the fulness of
the Godhead bodily. (10) And ye are
complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power:"
B.
All the Fulness of Covenant
Grace
John 1:14-16
"And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld
his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and
truth. (15) John bare witness of him,
and cried, saying, This was he of whom I spake, He that cometh after me is
preferred before me: for he was before me.
(16) And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace."
Ephesians 1:3-7 "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us
with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ: (4) According as he
hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be
holy and without blame before him in love:
(5) Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ
to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will, (6) To the praise of the glory of his grace, wherein he hath made
us accepted in the beloved. (7) In
whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according
to the riches of his grace;"
2 Timothy 1:9
"Who hath saved us, and called us
with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own
purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world
began,"
C.
All the Fulness of God’s
Salvation
1 Corinthians 1:30-31 "But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who
of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and
redemption: (31) That, according as
it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord."
D.
All the Fulness of Heaven’s
Glory
John 17:5 "And
now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with the glory which I had
with thee before the world was."
John 17:22
"And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they
may be one, even as we are one."
III.
Isaiah
53:10 – “It pleased the Father to bruise him,” to crush his
darling Son to death as my Substitute!
Isaiah 53:10-12 "Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him;
he hath put him to grief: when thou
shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his
days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. (11) He shall see of the travail of his
soul, and shall be satisfied: by his
knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their
iniquities. (12) Therefore will I
divide him a portion with the great,
and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his
soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the
sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors."
2 Corinthians 5:21 "For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that
we might be made the righteousness of God in him."
Galatians 3:13
"Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a
curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is
every one that hangeth on a tree:"
Whenever you think about the
death of our Lord Jesus Christ, remember these four facts, these four words,
which define and explain what took place at Calvary 2000 years ago.
A.
Sovereignty – “I lay down my life.” “The good Shepherd giveth his life for the
sheep.”
B.
Satisfaction – “Then I restored that which I took not away.” (Righteousness and
Redemption).
C.
Substitution – “For the transgression of my people was he stricken.”
D.
Success – “He shall not fail!”
IV.
Galatians
1:15-16 – It pleased the Lord to
reveal his Son in me.
Salvation does not come by a
decision,—saying a prayer,—walking an aisle,—doing good works,—baptism,—or
anything else preachers tell you to do to “get saved.” Salvation comes to poor,
blind, hell-bent sinners by the sovereign interposition of God, by divine
revelation, by God the Holy Spirit revealing Christ in you!
2 Corinthians 4:3-6 "But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to
them that are lost: (4) In whom the
god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the
light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine
unto them. (5) For we preach not
ourselves, but Christ Jesus the Lord; and ourselves your servants for Jesus'
sake. (6) For God, who commanded the
light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ."
John 17:3 "And
this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus
Christ, whom thou hast sent."
When God the Holy Spirit
comes to a sinner in effectual, irresistible, saving power and grace, he does
some teaching, convicting, reproving, and convincing.
John 16:7-11
"Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I
go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I
depart, I will send him unto you. (8) And
when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of
judgment: (9) Of sin, because they
believe not on me; (10) Of righteousness,
because I go to my Father, and ye see me no more; (11) Of judgment, because the prince of
this world is judged."
If God ever saves a person,
that person will know…
·
Who Christ is.
·
Why he came (Matt. 1:21; Heb. 10:5-14).
·
What he did (Heb. 9:12, 26).
·
Where he is now.
·
What he is doing. – “The pleasure
of the Lord shall prosper in his hand!”
V.
1 Corinthians 1:21 – “It
pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.”
God saves sinners through
the instrumentality of gospel preaching, by the preaching of Jesus Christ and
him crucified. – Not by preaching, but by GOSPEL PREACHING!
Illustration: The Man Who Worked at Matthews
Romans 10:17
"So then faith cometh by
hearing, and hearing by the word of God."
James 1:18
"Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should
be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures."
1 Peter 1:23-25 "Being born again, not of corruptible
seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for
ever. (24) For all flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as
the flower of grass. The grass withereth, and the flower thereof falleth away: (25) But the word of the Lord endureth
for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you."
Ephesians 1:12-13 "That we should be to the praise of his
glory, who first trusted in Christ. (13) In
whom ye also trusted, after that ye
heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation: in whom also after that
ye believed, ye were sealed with that holy Spirit of promise."
Application:
1.
Sinner, Come to Christ, and
confess him before men. – “He that
believeth and is baptized shall be saved. He that believeth not shall be
damned.”
2.
Children of God, rejoice in
the great and glorious sovereignty of our God. Our faith and confidence in him
is a well-founded faith and confidence.
3.
Preachers, Preach Christ!
[1] See Misc. Sermon #1170 preached at Danville (12-11-94), Rescue, CA (1-29-95), New Castle, IN (12-10-94), Wichita Falls, TX (1-22-95) – Bethel Baptist, Spring Lake, NC (05-28-00)—First Baptist Church, Pottstown, IL (Friday PM 11/19/99)—Buck Mountain Baptist Church, Roan Mountain, TN (Thursday PM 08/07/03)