I am preaching today in Mt. Summit, IN, for Pastor Bobby Wright and the congregation of Grace Church. Brothers Jim Casey and Randy Wages are preaching here today in my absence. Please pray for us as we deliver God’s Word in the respective services. The Lord willing, Debbie and I will return home this week. Please pray for us as we travel.
WE WILL SERVE THE LORD’S SUPPER NEXT SUNDAY (6/30), and have our usual fellowship dinner after the services.
DRESSED FOR THE WEDDING
“And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment:” (Matthew 22:11). In the Parable of the Marriage Feast we are reminded that there is a sense in which every sinner may be said to approach the judgment before God clothed in one of two ways. Like the man who didn’t belong at the wedding feast, all of us by nature initially will dare to stand before a thrice-holy God dressed in our own self-righteousness. Sadly, most persist therein and plunge headlong into judgment thinking they will be just fine dressed in their robe of self-righteousness. I recognize that most so dressed don’t see it that way. But do not be mistaken. If by way of your thinking, that which distinguishes you from others as acceptable before God is anything other than (or in addition to) the one righteousness of God in Christ, and that made yours by God having freely and graciously imputed or accounted it unto you, then you will not be accepted. We may be dressed in our ‘Sunday’s best’ so to speak, but hear what God says about our natural attire in Isaiah 64:6, “…all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags…” All who dare approach God so attired shall be cast out from His presence for all eternity. We must have a wedding garment that we can’t buy, earn, furnish, or acquire for ourselves. And that garment is the righteousness of God that our Lord and Savior established on the cross for His wedding guests – the merit of His obedience unto death that God graciously has imputed or charged to the objects of His everlasting love, mercy, and grace in Christ.
—Randy Wages
In the book of Acts 17 we read of some the Holy Spirit describes as “noble,” and this is what He says of these Bereans – “they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” Listening to the apostle Paul they tested what he said by the word of God! May God help us to be so “noble” as they!
THE STRAIGHT STICK
When you stop and think about all the error there is in this world concerning God and salvation, it is overwhelming. I could spend all my time and all my energies exposing various spiritual errors and I would never be finished. Not only that, if I could show those that hear me all these errors, they would still be lost and die in their sins. We are not saved by knowing some things that are wrong but by believing the truth! I once heard someone say this: "The way to show that a stick is crooked is by continually laying down a straight stick beside it." What wisdom! The way to expose the errors of the many false gospels in our day is to keep preaching the true gospel! The way to expose what Paul referred to as "another jesus" is to keep preaching Christ and Him crucified! The way to expose self-righteousness is to keep setting forth the gospel wherein the righteousness of God is revealed! When the Philistines had captured the ark of the covenant, they took it and set it up in the temple of Dagon, their false god. When they came back the next morning, the idol of Dagon was fallen over and broken. This is the way we are to do, set forth Christ who is the Truth and error will fall before Him. There is far too much error to refute and too little time to do it. Let us be repeating, resounding the message of Christ. Who He is exposes who they are. What He has done will far exceed what they are doing. Remember the words of Christ – "And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32). God will call, comfort and care for His sheep with the word of truth. "Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy word is truth" (John 17:17). The gospel of God's free and sovereign grace in Christ crucified is a straight stick and like the tree Moses cast into the bitter waters of Marah, it alone will sweeten the poison stream of error that floods this present world. It is that one "plumb line" that shows how God can be just and yet justify sinners. It is not about many but ONE. One who is Himself the Way, the Truth, the Life and the one Mediator between God and men. He alone is all our salvation and all righteousness is in HIM! - Pastor Gary Shepard
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