Text St. John 6:37-45
IN THIS MESSAGE WE ARE GOING TO DEAL WITH A NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH DOCTRINE WHICH HAS BEEN THE CAUSE OF MANY HEATED DEBATES AND ARGUMENTS DOWN THROUGH THE AGE OF GRACE. THE DOCTRINE OF PREDESTINATION, IF LOOKED AT CORRECTLY, CAN GIVE US A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE OF THE PLAN OF GOD FOR MANKIND, BUT LIKE EVERY OTHER SCRIPTURAL TRUTH, IT HAS BEEN PERVERTED BY SOME WHO ARE WITHOUT REVELATION SO THAT WE HAVE TWO RIDICULOUS EXTREMES TO COPE WITH, AS WELL AS THE REVELATED STREAM WHICH RUNS RIGHT DOWN THROUGH THE MIDDLE OF THEM. THE BIBLE TEACHES PREDESTINATION FROM FRONT TO BACK, BUT IT MUST BE KEPT IN THE LIGHT OF GOD’S FOREKNOWLEDGE. GOD’S ABILITY TO SEE THE END FROM BEFORE THE BEGINNING MADE A PLACE FOR PREDESTINATION, BUT IT CERTAINLY IS NOT AS SOME TEACH IT. THEY WOULD HAVE YOU BELIEVE THAT GOD SAT DOWN ONE DAY AND DECIDED TO CREATE SO MANY PEOPLE TO BE CALLED CHILDREN OF GOD, AND SO MANY MORE TO BE DAMNED. BROTHERS AND SISTERS: I DO NOT SEE ANYTHING LIKE THAT IN THE SCRIPTURES; THEREFORE WITH THE HELP OF GOD, I WOULD LIKE TO TAKE THIS TIME TO HELP YOU SEE THE TRUE LIGHT ON THIS SUBJECT. REMEMBER THIS ABOVE EVERYTHING ELSE, IT IS NOT THE DOCTRINE THAT SAVES A SOUL: WE ARE SAVED BY THE MERCY AND GRACE OF GOD, BUT A PROPER UNDERSTANDING OF NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH DOCTRINES WILL SERVE THE SAME PURPOSE IN YOUR CHRISTIAN LIFE THAT STEEL FRAMEWORK DOES IN THESE VERY LARGE BUILDINGS WE SEE GOING UP ALL AROUND US. THAT STEEL FRAMEWORK IS WHAT HOLDS THOSE BUILDINGS TOGETHER AND SECURES THEM AGAINST STRESS; IF THEY DID NOT HAVE IT YOU WOULD SEE ONE BREAK APART AND FALL TO THE GROUND EVER SO OFTEN.
WHAT LIGHT WILL DO
It has always been the devil’s business to take the things of God, pervert them, and cause mass confusion among mankind with the perversions. That is what has happened with Malachi 4:5-6. God truly did send us a prophet with the spirit of Elijah to turn us back to the word of God before the day of God’s wrath upon this old earth, but look what some men have allowed the devil to do with that. They have set that man in the place of God, and some of them are even hostile toward others who will not do so. They have become so wrapped up in Malachi 4:5-6, that they can no longer see John 3:16. Light is a wonderful thing if it is used right. It will lighten your pathway and enable you to see the beauty around you if you use it for that, or it can blind you if you use it the wrong way. You can either walk by the light or let it set you down in a chair someplace. There is a vast difference between walking In the light and sitting in the light. When it comes to the light of the word: if we will walk in that light we will remain in the presence of God, but if we allow that light to blind us, we can become idolators. Some people look at predestination and see the foreknowledge of God working through it; that makes them want to fulfill their part in whatever God is doing. Others look at it and become blinded. They will say things like this: God has already decided who will be saved, so why should we preach the gospel? They like to quote Romans 9:21, “Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?” That scripture will not prove their point on predestination, for when you apply it to humans you must come right back to God’s foreknowledge. He knew what spirit would be in every living creature that would ever be upon this planet earth, even before He ever began to create. He saw old Pharoah long before there ever was a star in the sky. He knew exactly what kind of nose to give him, what color of hair he should have, and everything else. God could say to him, “Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might shew my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth.” It was the same with Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Christ. He was a full partaker of the goodness and mercy of God up to a certain point, but because God foreknew him, and knew exactly what he would do, He knew exactly when to let something happen that would give Judas his chance to make the wrong choice. You can trace it all the way back to Cain like that. God knew there would be a Cain; He knew there would be a serpent that would seduce Eve, and He knew everything that would ever happen down through time. Now some will say, Why did God go ahead with such a plan in creation if He could foresee all that was going to happen? Others will say, Why did God allow Adam and Eve to commit an act that would cause so much pain and suffering? He could have prevented it; could He not? Yes, He could have prevented it, in the sense that He is sovereign, and not subject to anyone, nor anything, but because of His many attributes that must be expressed, in, and through, His creation, He set a plan in motion that would ultimately draw on every attribute within Him. He did not want the earth filled with robot type creatures, for such as that would not fulfill His desire to be worshipped by His creation. He knew there would be sin and sickness, but in Him was the attribute (ABILITY) to be merciful, and to heal, and so on. Yes; the scripture says, Known unto God are all His works, from the foundation of the world. He does not have to wait until morning to find out what is going to happen that day. No; He knows exactly what is going to happen tomorrow and every other day. Otherwise, He would have been very foolish to inspire the prophets of old to prophesy certain events hundreds of years before they were to take place. What kind of confidence could we have in God if He had His prophets foretell certain events and then let a man like President Carter came on the scene and wreck the whole thing? Carter may refer to himself as a born again Christian and think that he is going to live within the New Testament, but there is a lot that he doesn’t know about the New Testament, because he has neglected to find out what is written in the Old Testament. If he really believed the word of God, he would know that God is going to completely restore Israel, and therefore would not be trying to deal them out like a gambler would a deck of cards. Brothers and sisters, in the next two years, God is going to make poor old Carter look very foolish. What did God promise Abraham? (Gen. 12:3) “I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.” When God has set His hand to restore Israel: I feel sorry for anyone who would interfere, and Carter is no exception.
WHO BELIEVED THE GOSPEL
Now let us open our Bibles to the 6th chapter of St. John where we will begin to look at some scriptures that deal with predestination. We will not find Jesus using that word; it was Peter, Paul, and men such as that which actually used terms such as predestinate, and elect, according to foreknowledge of God the Father, and so forth, but James used terminology that lets us know predestination is a scriptural fact. Notice verse 37, “All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.” Brothers and sisters: I know that verse alone will not convince the scoffers, but let us put it with Acts 13:48 for a twofold witness. “And when the Gentiles heard this, they were glad, and glorified the word of the Lord; and AS MANY AS WERE ORDAINED (OR PREDESTINED) TO ETERNAL LIFE BELIEVED.” Why did the others who heard the same gospel preached, not believe? “ALL THAT THE FATHER GIVETH ME SHALL COME TO ME,” said Jesus. Preachers of modern evangelism will not accept the revelated truth of that statement by Jesus. Their theory is that some will be lost if they fail to go tell them, so they build their man-made programs to reach the world for Jesus, instead of letting the Holy Ghost send them forth as was the case in Acts 13:2-48. They do not mind using Romans 10:13-14, to justify what they are doing, but they have no revelation of the 15th verse, or they would know that the Holy Ghost is the one that sends preachers to the field, not their organization. You do not need to misunderstand me and think I am against evangelism; I am not, but I do know this; If the Holy Ghost does not send you, most of your efforts will be in vain, for Jesus also said, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.” (John 6:44) “ALL THAT THE FATHER GIVETH ME SHALL COME TO ME.” We are not trying to tear down anything that others are doing; at least that is not the purpose for this message. We are believing that a proper understanding of this very controversial church doctrine will help some of you to realize that God is not helplessly dependent upon the feeble efforts of denominational programs. We would also like to point out that the true body of Christ does not need to be afraid to talk about election, predestination, foreknowledge, eternal security, oneness of God, and morality, all of which the charismatics in our day have thrown aside. They have this one great theme of love, and even go so far as to say that water baptism is optional, and has no real significance to the believer; then they turn right around and tell you that it is essential to have the Holy Ghost in order to make the rapture. Let me tell you; anyone who has no need for these church doctrines, has no need for the Holy Ghost either, for they are not going anywhere except in circles. The truth of the matter is, when you do receive the genuine baptism of the Holy Ghost instead of the devil’s counterfeit experience, you will begin to be led into all truth. These are not my words; Jesus said that. (John 16:13) When a person truly has the Holy Ghost they will not be afraid to speak of the oneness of God, nor will they try to avoid speaking of the Father. They will come to understand that the Father is not another person in the Godhead, but He is the sovereign Spirit of all creation, (GOD) and Jesus is the flesh chosen by God to manifest Himself in, and through, to lost mankind. We were elected, predestined, chosen in Christ, or however you choose to express it, before the foundation of the world. That is why Jesus would say, These words that I speak unto you; they are not my words but the Father’s which sent me. That is why He would say, I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of Him that sent me. That simply means that He is not just speaking words that are originating within Himself at the moment, but that He is speaking as one sent with a message from someone else. Saints, that does not make two persons: God the Father is a Spirit, without form, so that it could be written, No man hath seen the Father at any time, but that sovereign Spirit spoke to create, and all that we see round about us was created by Him, a Spirit, not a person. If God the Father were a person, He would have to be of flesh and bones, for that is what a person is, but the only permanent flesh he ever dwelt in was that of Jesus, called the Son of God, and that certainly does not make two persons, for there is only one body of flesh involved. What is it then? Why did Jesus speak as though He and the Father were separate beings? By revelation we understand that the Father (SPIRIT) took upon Himself a robe of flesh, but that flesh was not brought into the world by a man and woman sex act like all other human flesh. No, God spoke creative words, creating a cell of life in the womb of a virgin girl, and when that little baby was born they called him Jesus according to the angel’s instructions. (Matt. I:18-23), It was this body of flesh that the eternal God walked among men in, and this flesh being, was not the literal son of Joseph, Mary’s husband, for Joseph did not plant the seed of life in her womb; it was put there by the Holy Ghost, which is the Spirit of God, or the Spirit which IS GOD. Saints; I hope this is sufficient for those of you who have not understood the oneness of God before now, to understand why Jesus Christ spoke at times like an obedient son, and at other times like the very God of all creation. When He said, I came to do the will of my Father; He was speaking from the standpoint of the flesh, which was the Son. On the other hand, when He stood before the tomb of Lazarus who had been dead for 4 days, and cried, Lazarus come forth; He spoke with the authority of the Father. He explained that to Phillip in John 14:8-10, when Phillip (yet without understanding) said, “Lord, shew us the Father, and it sufficeth us.” Jesus saith unto him, Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Phillip? He that hath seen me hath seen the Father: and how sayest thou then, Shew us the Father? Believest thou not that I am in the Father, and the Father in me? (ONE PERSON) the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: (THE FLESH) BUT THE FATHER (SPIRIT) THAT DWELLETH IN ME, HE DOETH THE WORKS.” That is why it is proper to say, Jesus Christ is God, because the eternal God (SPIRIT) incarnated the flesh of Jesus. In the same breath let me say this, That gives no authority for this JESUS ONLY teaching, which has been the cause of so much confusion. You cannot, by any stretch of your imagination, make Jesus (THE FLESH MAN) the Father. His flesh was not with God in the beginning; it was the Word that was with God in the beginning, and the Word was God, John 1:1. Before God (SPIRIT) began to speak, His word was His thoughts, but when He spoke those thoughts, they became words, creative words that gave expression to this sovereign Spirit. That same Word was made flesh when He spoke to create a cell of life in the womb of Mary. (John 1:14).
THE DOOR WAS SPEAKING
Thirty years after the Word became flesh; that flesh was going from place to place expressing the will of the Father, saying to lost mankind: If you want to come back home, back to your heavenly Father who is your creator, you must come through me. I am the door, the gate, the way to everlasting life. All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. Oh! Brother Jackson: What if he sins after that? What if he smokes a cigarette, or starts drinking and doing other wrong things, Don’t you think he would be lost again? Let us just see what He says about that. We are in John 6, verses 38-39, “For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, (meaning the will of the flesh) but the will of Him that sent me.” The flesh was just an outlet for the words of the Father that dwelt in him. 39, “And this is the Father’s will which hath sent me, that of ALL which He HATH (past tense) given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day.” Praise God! To me, those few words which we have just read, settles the question as to whether a person can be lost again, or not. It lets me know that, in the mind of God the salvation of every individual soul who would ever believe the gospel was pre-thought, predetermined by God the Father before the world had its beginning. That does not mean that God deliberately created some to be saved and some to be lost. We cannot allow predestination to rule out the fact that man does have a free choice in his spiritual makeup. Let me hasten to add this, though: man’s free choice does not override the foreknowledge of God. Our free choice has a boundary line that it cannot cross over, but God’s sovereignty and foreknowledge has no limitations. It is from everlasting to everlasting. I know there are a lot of doctors of theology who would argue against the fact of predestination according to the foreknowledge of God, but it is because they have no revelation on the matter. They want to believe that everyone is going to be saved if they can just wrestle with them long enough to get them to repeat the (so called) sinners prayer. You would think a doctor ought to understand the book he studied to receive his degrees, but I am afraid there is more to it than just studying theology. I want to read 9 verses from the 1st chapter of Ephesians while our thinking is directed in this channel, and let you lay them alongside of what we have just said. These verses show so clearly that God through His great foreknowledge, knew every one of us, and what our spiritual choice would be, before the foundation of the world. He saw every believer, and also every serpent seed that could not believe, and it was the ones that would believe who were predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son as we find in Romans 8:29.
WHAT GOD WILL HAVE
Now for Ephesians 1:3-11 where we see the beauty of this subject laid right out before us. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: (Listen to verse 4), According as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be (WHAT?) holy and without blame before Him in love: Having PREDESTINATED us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, ACCORDING TO THE GOOD PLEASURE OF HIS WILL, To the praise of the glory of His grace. wherein He hath made us accepted in the beloved. In whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins, (SINS, PLURAL, DEEDS OF THE HUMAN MAKEUP) according to the riches of His grace; Wherein He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence; Having made known unto us the mystery of His will, according to His good pleasure which HE HATH (ALREADY) purposed in Himself: That in the dispensation of the fulness of times He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, and which are on earth; even in Him: In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being PREDESTINATED according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the COUNSEL OF HIS OWN WILL.” Let us just go ahead and read verses 12-14, so we will have that seal of God in this reading. 12, “That we should be to the praise of His glory, who first trusted in Christ. 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, which is the earnest of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of His glory.” Brothers and sisters, I say any doctor of divinity who denies the fact of election and predestination is a quack, just as much so as a medical doctor who does not meet the medical code of ethics. No man who has a genuine call of God upon his life to handle this word will ever deny any part of it. Everything that God has inspired these men to write in the chronology of the scriptures, is there for a purpose, and I am thankful that He has allowed us the privilege of knowing how He is working out His master plan for the ages.
HAVE YOU SEEN THE SON?
Alright, let’s read verse 40 of our text chapter. “And this is the will of Him that sent me, that everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life: And I will raise him up at the last day.” He was not talking about the multitudes which saw Him with their physical eyes; that is for all those who see Him spiritually, that is, to know what He is to their soul salvation. All those who ever see Him like that, even though they may go by the way of the grave, there will come a day when He will raise them up again. Hallelujah! Isn’t that a wonderful thing to know? Regardless of the good news, there are always some in every crowd of people who do not rejoice at the words spoken, and this crowd which heard Jesus speak that day was no exception, for many of them were devout Jews, that is, they were very religious in their legal sort of way. They began to turn and look at one another and murmur at Jesus because He had said, I am the bread which came down from heaven. He had just finished saying that everyone which seeth the Son, and believeth on Him, may have everlasting life, and there they stood looking Him right in the eye, physically, but certainly not spiritually or they would not have been murmuring against Him for a previous statement. Who does he think He is? they began to say, Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? how is it then that he saith, I came down from heaven? They knew exactly who He was from the physical standpoint as far as their understanding went, but that was not very far, because they did not know what the angel of the Lord had said to Mary before Jesus was conceived. Luke 1:30-33, “And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found favor with God. And behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name Jesus. He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest; and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of father David: And He shall reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of His kingdom there shall be no end.” They did not know anything about any of that; therefore they just looked upon Him as the son of Joseph and Mary, and considered that He must be a little off in the head to be making such claims as they had heard. “Jesus therefore answered and said unto them, Murmur not among yourselves.” In other words, It isn’t going to do you any good to talk like that. “No man can come to me except the Father which hath sent me draw hint” He could have said, There is not one of you standing here that is going to see me to know who I am, for all you can see as you stand here looking right at me, is the little boy who grew up in Nazareth. You knew my dad, so you say. The man you call my dad may have built a chair for some of you, or a corn crib, or done some other kind of carpenter work for you, but that is as far as you can see. I am sent to those who are able to see beyond all that. Brothers and sisters, that is exactly how modern theologians react to many of these New Testament church doctrines. They only look at them from the standpoint of the natural. Anything that can not be reasoned out with the mind, they reject. Some are even so blind they will say, That is of the devil, when you mention doctrine, even if they have their Bible opened, and it is right before their face. Jesus knew that bunch of legalists, and He knew they could not see Him in the way He was talking about, but they had to hear anyhow. “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me to draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.” After that statement, He quoted a scripture from Isaiah 54:13. He said, “It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me.” Then He turns right around and proves that He is not talking about the Father, as a physical embodied person, for in verse 46, He says, “Not that any man hath seen the Father, save He which is of God, He hath seen the Father.” Yes, He had seen the Father, and He came to reveal the Father to lost mankind. It is only through Him that we are able to see the Father, almost two thousand years after He told Phillip that those who had seen Him, had seen the Father. It isn’t the flesh that we see when we consider the life of Jesus in the few short years of His ministry; it is the life of complete surrender to His purpose, the life that displayed God’s holiness, His righteousness, His light, for He is light; In other words, what Jesus wanted to get across to those Scribes and Pharisees was this. No matter how religious anyone may be, they will never come to God unless they see Jesus and know who He really is. Then I say to you; They could not possibly see Him in that way unless they were foreknown of God from before the foundation of the world. Yes, a statement like this is very frightening to a lot of beautiful revelation to all those who are predestined to everlasting life, for to know where you stand with God just tears the devil’s playground all to pieces. He is unable to use his fear tactics on a revelated believer. When we are without revelation and some little something goes wrong: the first voice we hear is that old accuser saying something like this, You must not be saved for you know that wouldn’t happen to a child of God, or, Are you absolutely sure you have the Holy Ghost? If so, then why are you having all this trouble? Brothers and sisters, the devil is the only one who talks like that. If you honestly feel like God is after something in your life just surrender up to Him, but please do not believe the devil’s lies and surrender up to him. If the Bible teaches us that we are sealed by the Holy Ghost unto the day of our redemption, (and it absolutely does) then you hold on to that word of God no matter what goes wrong.
CARNAL RELIGION OR CHRISTIANITY
The world is filled with church-going people in this age, but sad to say, almost every one of them have laid all doctrines aside, claiming that they are good for nothing but to split congregations apart and let the devil get in. What they do not seem to realize is that the devil has already gotten in, and it is by his leading that doctrines are being ignored and their congregations are being split anyhow. The church of the living God is founded upon certain basic doctrines which world religion in their state of spiritual blindness hates to hear about. The reason they hate them is because their old mother (Catholicism) has already replaced every one of them with a bunch of man-made creeds. They wanted something that was better suited to carnal reasoning, something that would not be so hard on the flesh, but after God had allowed the devil to rule the world for one thousand years in the Dark Ages through that spiritual whore, He began to move upon certain men to call the church back out of darkness. By now the church has been restored to a place where she realizes that everyone of these doctrines belong in the spiritual clothing of the bride of Christ. Faith, predestination, eternal security, sanctification and baptism of the Holy Ghost are all just as essential to the bride’s attire as the motor is to your automobile. Without these necessary things you will not get very far. Let me just be very plain now so no one will miss the point of what I am saying. When it comes down to the individual person, if we are not one of those who were foreknown of God from before the foundation of the world we will go running off after one of those easy on the flesh, forms of religion, and become more a servant of Satan than when we were out in the world in open outright sin. In the 2nd church age, after all the old apostles of Christ had already passed off the scene, that tare element of so called believers was allowed to plant themselves right in the framework of true Christianity and eventually become leaders in the assemblies. It is all according to the parable of Matthew 13: 24-30, 36-43, which Jesus spoke concerning the man which sowed good seed in his field and while he slept his enemy came and sowed tares among the good grain and no one knew the difference until the crop came up and the lack of fruit on the tares made it very obvious what had happened, but what did Jesus tell those who inquired of Him concerning the parable? Remember now, He had said, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto this, so let us see the true spiritual application as we look at His answer to His disciples, beginning in the middle of verse 36, of Matthew chapter 13. His disciples came to Him and said, “Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field. He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; 38, The field is the world; the GOOD SEED are the CHILDREN of the kingdom, (GOD’S FOREKNOWN AND PREDESTINATED CHILDREN) but the TARES are the CHILDREN of the wicked one; The enemy that sowed them is the DEVIL; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. As the tares are therefore gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.” Then He said, “Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.” That is exactly what He said to the apostle John when He gave him the last message ever to be delivered to the grace age church in that first age. Now what does this all add up to when we apply it spiritually as it was meant to be? Simply this: God, by His foreknowledge, sowed some seed in this old world that would produce some genuine sons of God. They were certified seed, guaranteed to produce 100 percent; not one of them would fail to produce when his season came around, (HIS AGE OF TIME) but remember Saints, the devil is a counterfeiter and a deceiver. Therefore, he sowed a bunch of seeds also. He sowed his seed in the same field, (the world) and he sowed more of them, than God did of His kind. Now I ask you what are the results of these two sowings? In due process of time all the seed came up, some bore the nature of the devil, but as far as looks itself, many times the untrained eye might think they all look alike. In other words, they cannot tell one from the other. That is why certain ones will say, Bro. Jackson! There is such and such a group of people over here someplace that surely must be of God; they are healing the sick, speaking in tongues, and doing many outstanding miracles that we do not even have here at Faith Assembly. Let me remind you once again; God even told Cain that if he would do right he would be accepted, or He said it like this, “If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted, and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door.” Now we know Cain was not a seed of God, but God gave him the benefit of the doubt by telling him if he would do right he would be blessed also. The big difference was this though, Cain did not have the nature of a genuine son of God in him; therefore, instead of doing right and being blessed, under pressure he yielded to his true nature, that of his father, the devil, and murdered Able, his half brother. In other words God is very generous. He has provided some benefits in His word and all who desire to partake of these benefits in this life may do so. Was it not so with Judas Iscariot who also betrayed Jesus? Would you not say that he was a full partaker of all the benefits which were available to the rest of the disciples of Christ? Of course he was, and the scriptures tell us that Jesus knew he would betray Him later. That is just further proof that God gives every man his chance to do right, but in the end a person’s true nature will always show up. We will further clarify the issue by saying this, God stands behind His word so emphatically that no matter who preaches it, if some hungry soul someplace hears it, and believes it, they will receive the promised benefit. That is why the charismatics are able to put on such a convincing show; they know many of the right words to say to attract a certain following of people.
WHAT ABOUT A TARE?
Now I want to ask you a question and be very blunt about it. Do you actually believe a tare could become a stalk of wheat if it was cared for properly? You say, Of course not, Bro. Jackson. Anyone knows better than that Alright then, Do you actually believe a child of the devil could become a son of God? Think about it now; Jesus said there were two kinds of seed sown in the world, the children of the kingdom of God, and also the children of the wicked one. Well, why do we even bother to preach the gospel then? We preach the good news of the gospel to the whole world because many of the foreknown sons of God are in captivity to the devil. They are servants of the devil, not sons, but they are in bondage through ignorance of who they really are, and it takes the gospel message to awaken them, and call them to their true heritage. It will help you a lot if you will pay close attention to Matthew 13:30 where Jesus was giving the parable before He explained it. The servants had said to the man who sowed the good seed, Sir: do you want us to go out and gather up the tares from among the wheat? No, he said, for if you do that you will do harm to the good crop also. Just let them grow together until the end, then at harvest time it will be easy to separate the good from the bad. Saints: this is a parable, but it was put forth by Jesus to illustrate exactly how the children of God would be bearing true fruit right in the midst of multitudes of serpent seed, (children of the wicked one) but it in no way gives any indication that the sower of the good seed sowed some to bear fruit, and some to be burned as tares. No, God did not choose some of His seed to be saved and some of them to be lost; all of His seed will be saved, but He has no obligation to save a child of the wicked one; it is enough that He allows them to partake of His children’s bread in this life, it is just like we have said many times before; there will not be one empty chair at the marriage supper of the Lamb, but neither will there be anyone there who does not have a seat reserved for him. Only foreknowledge and predestination could work a thing like that out so perfectly. There will be saints at that marriage supper that have been called out of every old religious system on the face of this earth, but not one of them will have been a child of the devil in the beginning, only his servant until they heard the Father’s invitation to come home. That is what the gospel message is; it is the good news of what the Father has prepared for all those whom He foreknew from before the foundation of the world. Naturally a general invitation like that attracts a lot of outsiders also. That is why there has to be some way to separate the genuine from the imitation, and that is where your doctrines come into the picture. Church doctrines do not call sinners to repentance, but once the call of the good news of the gospel has been responded to, church doctrines will either do one of two things; they will either serve to establish the true believer, or they will serve to separate the genuine believer from the make-believer. The Antichrist element, world religion in general, will never accept nor give any place to Bible doctrines, for the simple reason that they are anti-word; that is what Antichrist is.
WHO WILL GOD DRAW TO HIMSELF?
Did you ever stop to consider just exactly what is involved in the statement Jesus made in John 6:44, “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him?” Have you ever wondered why God did not just draw everyone? When you learn the truth of election and predestination you will not have those questions anymore. In the mean-time I will try to give you an example that ought to help. You all know how a magnet works; it will draw iron, metal, and such like to itself, but it will not draw plastic, paper, dirt, nor anything other than the iron and metal and such substances to it. That is exactly how God is; He has foreknown all whose names are in the book of life, and He has placed enough of Himself in everyone of them so that there is something inside, that will be attracted by that magnetic-like pull of the Holy Ghost when the gospel is preached. If a person’s name is not written in the lambs book of life there is nothing in them to be drawn by the Spirit of God, or shall we say, for the Spirit of God to make contact with. Is that fair? some will say. Please try to remember, God did not sow the seed for that other crop that is growing out here in the world. Bro. Jackson: Are you saying that the devil is a creator also? No, I am not saying that at all. God created Adam after His own image. In other words, a spirit being, with an intellect, and a will, and gave him the place at the head of everything else that He created. God took a rib from Adam, His son, and made him a wife, and committed to the two of them the responsibility of producing sons and daughters that would also be offspring of God. That was God’s chosen way to fill the earth with sons and daughters who would know that God was their Father. But let us look at the other side of the story for just a moment. God also created the serpent and all the other creatures which were upon the face of the earth, so the devil had no part in creation itself, but none of those animals had a soul nor anything about them that placed them in the same realm as Adam and Eve who bore the image of God. However, in the beginning the serpent was a man-like creature in his physical makeup. He stood next to man in that way, and was no doubt a servant for Adam and Eve. He could talk and carry on a conversation with them just like we can with each other. You say, How do you know that Bro. Jackson? Read the scriptures yourself, Gen. 3:1, “Now the serpent was more subtle (cunning and shrewd.) than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said unto the woman, (EVE) Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden? And the woman SAID UNTO THE SERPENT, We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden.” They were conversing with each other, were they not? This is just for the purpose of establishing the fact that the serpent was a man-like creature, but he did not have a soul, and none of his seed would ever have a soul. Furthermore, let me say this, I am sure there are some who will read this and not agree with what I am going to say, but it is necessary to say it anyhow for the sake of this message, without going into the scriptures to prove the accuracy of such a statement. We have messages in print that deal exclusively with the serpent seed, which you may have free of charge upon request. Now this serpent who was very shrewd, but who did not have a soul and could never be called a son of God nor have eternal life in him, came to Eve when Adam was not around and seduced her. From that act she bore a son which they named Cain. Naturally he had enough of his mother’s makeup to know that God was to be worshipped, and he had been raised up in a family that no doubt spoke of God often. This caused him to make an attempt to worship God by making a sacrifice, but he was too much animal to have a revelation of what God required so he just brought God a basket of fruit and vegetables from his garden. Then he became roth when he saw that God would not accept such an offering. After that he killed his half brother, Abel, which was a son of Adam, who was a son of God. Now Cain whose father was an animal took a wife and filled this world with offspring, but they were not sons of God; they were sown in this world (THE FIELD JESUS SPOKE OF) by the wicked one. If you will look in your Bible at I John 3:12, you will see that John even referred to Cain as being of that wicked one. Now, if you will look at this honestly you will have no trouble recognizing that the world is filled with people who look, walk and talk like the sons of God, but that does not make them sons of God. You say, But Bro. Jackson, even if all that is true, would not the flood of Noah’s day have cancelled all that out? That is what a lot of people want to believe, but by the time of the flood there had been so many mixed marriages between the sons of God (SETH’S OFFSPRING) and the daughters of Cain’s descendants that the genes of the whole human race were intermingled between the two lines. Even though all the men who survived the flood were
sons of Noah, the attributes of that Cain line of people came right across those flood waters and out on the other side. That is the reason every man alive today has the potential to murder; it is in his genes all the way from Cain. Nevertheless, even though there is not a serpent seed bloodline in the world today like it was before the flood, there are still thousands or even millions in the world today that are just as much serpent seed as Cain was. They are without revelation, without conscience, and have nothing in them that can respond to the wooing of the Spirit of God. That is why God cannot draw them to Jesus; they are not of His foreknown sons. Most of you have been in evangelistic services where it was obvious that maybe there were at least 100 people who were not Christians. The evangelist would pour his heart out preaching a message that surely ought to bring repentance to every unsaved person in the meeting, but what happened? Maybe there would be two or three who would get disturbed and surrender to God. No, I am not saying all the rest were serpent seed; only God knows that, but it sure emphasizes the fact that no man can come to the Word unless he is drawn by the Father. Furthermore, you listen to some of the remarks from the rest of that 100 people who did not surrender to God and it will cause you to wonder if there could possibly be anything in such a person that could respond to God.
YOUR INVITATION TO COME HOME
There is one thing sure about this gospel message; it is to be preached to all men everywhere, and no one has any right to accuse God of being unjust, for He will receive all who repent and turn to Him. It just simply boils down to the fact that some men are so void of God consciousness that they cannot humble themselves and come to God on His terms, and there are others like Cain who know that God should be worshipped, but they approach Him the same way Cain did; in other words, on their own terms instead of through genuine repentance and baptism in the name of Jesus Christ which is God’s only formula. Now there is one more group and they are the ones whose names were written in the Lamb’s book of life before the foundation of the world. Why are they so special? The answer to that is what this message is all about. God, through His great foreknowledge, looked all the way down through time, before time ever began, and saw every person who would ever believe His word and walk with Him. Bro. Jackson, Is that the reason we can say that certain ones were predestined to eternal life? Absolutely! When you examine the word, PREDESTINATION, it simply means that our destination was determined before the end, or in the sense we are using the word, our destination was determined before we had our beginning. It all took place in the mind of God when He counseled with Himself, (MEDITATED) according to the revelation of Paul, recorded in the scripture we read from Ephesians, chapter 1.
COME — EAT AND DRINK — FREE
Now let us go to Isaiah 55:1-2. These words were spoken by the same prophet that had said, “All thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children.” Notice what the Spirit of God caused him to say here. “Ho, everyone that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money, come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.” Brothers and sisters, I’m glad we did not have to save up a certain amount of money in order to buy eternal life from God, aren’t you? This is a general invitation to sinful mankind. It doesn’t matter whether they are rich or poor; God treats them all the same. It would be more proper to say, God treats US all the same, for we were all sinners, away from God, and had nothing to offer God except our broken sinful lives, but that is all He wanted. He did not ask for silver, nor gold, nor precious stones in exchange for eternal life. It was a free gift, without money and without price. In verse 2, Isaiah said, “Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labor for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.” Naturally this is all figurative language, speaking of eternal life which only God can supply, for He is eternal life. We will turn to St. John 7:37, where the day was approaching that Isaiah was prophesying about, more than 700 years before, in the verses we just read. Here we find Jesus, after He had told them that He, Himself, was the bread of life, which, if man would partake of, he would never hunger nor thirst, standing up on the last day of the great feast and saying, verse 37, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.” Is this the wine and milk that Isaiah was talking about? Of course it was. Listen to verse 38. “He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.” He was speaking of that water of life, everlasting life, the Holy Ghost. Verse 39, goes on to explain it, “But this spake He of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.” John threw in that explanation of what Jesus had said, when he wrote the gospel. Once Jesus had suffered and died though, the way was opened up for that which Isaiah had prophesied, to become a reality. Three days later He arose from the dead, and when He came up He brought those Old Testament saints (who had died trusting God) up with Him. Forty days later He ascended into heaven leaving a command with His disciples, Preach repentance and remission of sins among all nations, beginning at Jerusalem, but tarry in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high; in other words, filled with the Holy Ghost. We do not know how many of His disciples were still believing that He was the one they had looked for, (the Messiah) up until the time He ascended into the clouds, but when they gathered in an upper room, later, where they choose one from among those who had witnessed all the works of Jesus from the day of His baptism by John, until the day He was taken up from them, to replace Judas Iscariot who betrayed Him, there were about one hundred and twenty of them, and they were all in one accord. This was the first group that was privileged to drink from that fountain of eternal life, but brother, once they got a drink, they set out to tell everyone around Jerusalem about that fountain. Because of the time of year, the city was filled with Jews from everywhere. I believe there were about 16 different languages represented in that crowd of people, but the Holy Ghost that had just been poured out upon the 120 disciples of Jesus, caused them to speak in other languages to the extent that every one of those Jews present heard about the wonderful works of God in the language of their hometown. It caused a great stir among the people, especially the scoffers, but right then the command to preach repentance and remission of sins among all nations beginning at Jerusalem began to be obeyed. When the scoffers began to say, These men are full of new wine, ole Peter jumped up, and said, Now you wait just a minute. I believe there is something you ought to know about what is taking place here. Brothers and sisters, I’m paraphrasing this to get your attention.) It’s too early in the day for these to be drunken, as you suppose. This is the very thing the prophet Joel spoke of, that it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams. He went on quoting Joel’s prophecy to them to lay the foundation for what he was going to say later. No, it wasn’t planned like that by Peter: he was being led by the Holy Ghost which he had just received.
GENTILES INCLUDED
When the foundation was properly laid Peter began to tell about Jesus, backing it up with David’s prophecy from the Psalms about God not leaving his soul in hell, nor allowing His holy one to see corruption. Then he said, “Therefore let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus whom ye have crucified, (Acts 2:36) both Lord and Christ.” By the time he finished saying that, three thousand Jews were wanting to know how to be saved. Peter told them to repent, and be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and they would receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. Verse 39, “For the promise is unto YOU, and to YOUR CHILDREN, and to ALL that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God SHALL CALL.” There is where the universal call of God to lost mankind was first revealed. Peter’s words included every lost Gentile that would ever respond to the gospel of Christ. Now that these Jews from so many different parts of the world had heard the gospel message, it is no wonder that the gospel spread as it did; they did not just go home and keep quiet about what had happened at Jerusalem that day. When God laid His hand upon Saul, changed his name to Paul, and sent him to the Gentiles with the gospel, he found in many places that the news of God’s mercy upon the Gentiles had already preceded him. Nevertheless, Paul had a revelation of the plan of God for the ages that few men had. He believed that God had extended a universal call to all men everywhere, even though in many of his letters he preached predestination so strongly that it was hard to detect. If there ever was a person who could talk predestination, it was the apostle Paul, yet he wrote to Timothy in the 1st epistle, chapter 2, verses 1 and 2, and said, “I exhort therefore, that, first of all, supplications, prayers, intercessions, and giving of thanks, be made for all men; For kings, and for all that are in authority.” He went on to say that God would have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth. Why did he say things like that when he had such a clear revelation of election and predestination? Simply because his revelation also let him see the love and compassion of God. God had allowed Paul to look back through time, right on past Genesis 1:1, and understand that there was a time when God actually meditated, planned, and made choices that were to be revealed to mankind through the ages that would follow. That is why he could write so freely in Ephesians that we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world. That means we were actually known by God before He ever created a star. But in all that Paul was allowed to see and understand about God, he certainly came to understand that God takes no delight in rejecting and punishing the wicked. That is what Peter was getting at when He said, 2 Peter 3:9, “The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to usward. “NOT WILLING THAT ANY SHOULD PERISH, BUT THAT ALL SHOULD COME TO REPENTANCE.” Bro. Jackson, Didn’t Peter know about predestination? Yes, he most certainly did. Turn back to 1 Peter 1:2, and notice how he began that epistle. “ELECT according to the FOREKNOWLEDGE of God the Father.” He knew about predestination, but like Paul, he also knew about the longsuffering and forgiving nature of God. It is all so clearly laid out in the scriptures, if we will just allow the Holy Ghost to cast out our old traditional ideas, and replace them with genuine revelation.
WE MUST MAKE A CHOICE
Natural man, with all of his wisdom and scientific know-how takes great delight in the fact that he can calculate the movement of the earth in relation to the other planets right to the very minute certain things are to take place, even months and years ahead of time, but they are for the most part too blind to recognize the God behind all that preciseness. One day they will awaken to the fact that there is an intelligent source in control of all that, that is far greater than anything they could have ever imagined, but it will be too late for them. They will have the wrath of God to cope with until their end. Everything we see around us as well as in the heavens declares that there has to be a creator. This theory of evolution as taught by the man of the world just fails to measure up to what plain common sense tells us. That is why I have to say, when people wonder about the heathen in various parts of the world, God knows how to reach every predestinated seed. Did not Paul write it very plainly in the 1st chapter of Romans? Turn to Romans 1:18-20, and pay close attention to verse 20. “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, concrete mold; there is no flexibility. You can rest assured, there is no more spiritual growth for such an one. You know what you would have to do with a piece of concrete; you couldn’t change it, so you would just have to take a jackhammer and break it up in order to do something different; that is how God deals with certain individuals. They are of no benefit in the plan of God with their minds so set in traditions; therefore God just takes His spiritual jackhammer and breaks them up. Unlike concrete at this point, some of them can be remolded into an acceptable vessel. But Jesus was rejoicing over the ones who had enough flexibility about them to allow them to catch a revelation. That is what the kingdom of God is built upon.
IF YOU DO WELL — WHAT?
We used the scripture which gives reference to the fact that God is not willing for any to perish, and pointed out what God said to Cain, to show you that even though we are presenting this message on predestination, we do know that man is a free moral agent. God allows us to make choices. In other words, what He said to Cain could be read like this, Cain, if you do right, bring the proper sacrifice, and get in the right revelation, you will be accepted and Abel will serve you. Why? Because, after all, he was the firstborn from the womb of Eve, and it was a law of God, that the firstborn should have the birthright. What kept him from that birthright inheritance was the fact that he did not get the right revelation. That same thing goes for this religious world round about us today. It doesn’t matter how many soup suppers you have participated in, nor how many chickens you may have killed, nor how many quilts you may have quilted to support your little religious program; it isn’t going to work for you. That does not amount to a revelation; to God it would be more like an aggravation, to have people trying to support His program with such beggardly ways, if we could say such a thing about God. I am constantly amazed at some of the things I see so called Christians doing in an effort to support their church programs. I would hate to think my eternal destiny was resting in the hands of a God who had to depend on rummage sales, fish frys and flea markets to pay His bills. No, my Bible tells me that the God I serve owns everything and that He will supply MY needs. It isn’t up to me to supply God’s needs; He doesn’t need anything. Hallelujah! That is why we sing the little chorus, He is all I need; if we have a true revelation in our bosom, we know that is the truth. That is what Jesus was pointing to in Matthew 6:33, when He said, “But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” What things? The things God knows we need, and too many people spend too much time worrying about. If God is not big enough to supply our needs, He is not big enough to keep our soul’s out of the hands of the devil. Do you not agree?
HOW MAY WE ENDURE?
Now, while our thinking is directed toward God’s keeping power, let us look back to Matthew 24:13 again. Jesus had been speaking to His disciples about the signs of the end-time, and warning about false prophets that would arise to deceive many, and in verse 12, He said, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. 13, But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.” Oh, this is a verse of scripture that many of the Armenian type people like to bear down on. They often quote that verse in their theological debates, saying, “But the Bible says, He that endureth unto the end shall be saved.” I believe that too; I believe we must endure unto the end, but I also agree with what the apostle Paul wrote to the Romans, in chapter 8:35, 38-39. “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 38, For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels. nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come. 39, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” But let me tell you brother; a man who has a revelation like that is a man that is going to endure. He is a man who has the Holy Ghost in his life as a reality, and not just as a doctrine to be talked about. We are living in the days when the signs Jesus told His followers to watch for as the end approached, are all around us. The nations are in a turmoil, the U.N. is wanting to boycott Israel, and the nations of Ezekiel 38, are moving right into position to fulfill their role against that little nation, so it will not be too much longer before it is known who has endured unto the end. From here on out, God’s fan will be working as never before, separating the tares from the wheat, getting those tares ready to burn. Only those who have that germinating life within, which is the Holy Ghost, will escape the fire of God’s judgment among those who profess to be Christians. I will say this, also. There is no use for anyone to say, Well, If it wasn’t for so and so. or such and such, I could endure, but the way things are right now, I just do not know whether I can or not. That is not the Holy Ghost talking. The Holy Ghost will cause you to look at circumstances the same way Paul did. In other words, regardless of what may come against you, there is something inside that tells you, nothing can separate you from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. You can endure and still be happy: I am not enduring my salvation; I am enjoying it. That is why I act like I do sometimes: it is because I am enjoying my salvation. Of course we will have to endure a lot that the devil throws at us, and we do not like that, but we know he is allowed to do it, and there is a reason for anything God allows him to throw at us, so it just causes us to appreciate our salvation even more. Furthermore, as Paul would say, It is not I that liveth, but Christ that liveth in me.
GOD’S CHOSEN SONS
Brothers and sisters: All who are born of the Spirit of God will endure, and the rest can not possibly endure no matter how hard they try. (We are talking about the multitudes who are professing to be Christians.) I say a thing like that, not to be haughty and high-minded, but because the scriptures reveal it to be the truth, and the truth is what makes us free, free from traditional bondage. No. It is not those who have been fed with a golden spoon and had all the good things in this life who will endure; it is those who have been kicked, knocked down, drug around, talked about, and spat upon who will endure, if the Holy Ghost is in them. The virtue is not in having those things happen to you; a lot of people bring those conditions upon themselves through their carnal ways and lack of wisdom. The virtue lies in the fact that the Holy Ghost is in you to enable you to endure these things. In other words, some people suffer because they invite calamity, but the sons and daughters of God suffer, because they are children of God and stand for truth.
Our confession is not that we are going to be sons of God, but that we are sons already. As we look at 1 John 3:1-3, we find John saying. “Behold, what manner of Jove 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. Beloved, now are we the sons of God, (When are we the sons of God’ NOW.) and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: (Our nose may be crooked, we may have too many freckles, our teeth may not be too good, and our hair may be thin.) but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. And every man that hath this hope in him purified) himself, even as He is pure.” Praise God! Hallelujah! That is where my hope is: I am not trusting in good works to carry me through; I am leaning upon His word. I am trusting in the fact that, If I was foreknown of God, He has already determined to make me into the image of His Son, (Rom. 8:29) Some hear the word of God preached, and it goes in one ear and out the other, but brother. I like to take that word captive, shut it up in my soul and feed off of it until it becomes a part of me. That is how the nutritional benefits are extracted from it: just hearing the word of God with our natural ear will not add one inch to our spiritual stature. The gospel has been freely preached, because God is not willing that any should perish, but that all may come to a knowledge of the truth, and, Many have been called, but only a few chosen. Those who are chosen are the sons that God foreknew, and they hear with the inner ear. Now some will say, Bro. Jackson: That sounds like a riddle; it just seems to go in a circle and come right back to where it started. Brother, You hit the nail right on the head that time. That is what this message is all about. God was, before anything was ever created. He meditated and made plans, and we are a part of the plans that God made, but if we are of those who shall endure until the end, it was because God foreknew us, and purposed to place His Spirit within us at the proper time in our earthly journey, but any way you look at it, everything started with God who was all alone in the beginning, and in the end, only that which is kept by God will remain; everything else will be destroyed.
HOW GOD GOT MY ATTENTION
Speaking of those who are the chosen of God, and the fact that they are the ones who will come to the word of God in this life, and be raised in the resurrection of the faithful if they go by the way of the grave before the end, let us go to Psalms 139, and catch something that David said in the Spirit. This was not David in the natural, doing the talking here, but by the Spirit he speaks something that backs up predestination as strong as anything else in the scriptures. Let us begin with verse 13. “For thou hast possessed my reins: thou hast covered me in my mother’s womb. I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made, marvelous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well. My substance ( that means, the very elements of his physical flesh) was not hid from thee, when I was made in secret, and curiously wrought in the lowest parts of the earth. (You see, he is talking about the physical flesh, knowing that he is from the dust of the earth) Thine eyes did see my substance, yet being unperfect; (God saw his substance before it was even in the earth) And in thy book ALL MY MEMBERS WERE WRITTEN, which in continuance were fashioned, WHEN AS YET THERE WAS NONE OF THEM.” Brother! If that doesn’t give a saint of God something to shout about, what would it take? HALLELUJAH! I’m so glad He saw me before the day I had that wreck up here on old highway 31. That wreck was just His way of getting my attention. Bro. Jackson: Would God do a thing like that? Yes, God will allow whatever it takes to get our attention when we are going the wrong way. He let old Jonah be cast into the sea when he was running from the call of God, did He not? The beautiful part about that story is the fact that God had already prepared a great fish (whale) to catch old Jonah and transport him to dry land, but not before old Jonah was ready to obey the word of the Lord.
SOUL SET FREE BY TRUTH
I will never forget the day when one of the old Methodist brothers came out to my place to have a talk with me. We were already on the verge of leaving the Methodist church because I had begun to see the truth about election and predestination, and had preached on it a little in the Methodist church house. This old gentleman came out to where I was mending some fences and said to me, Bro. Jackson: I don’t believe we ought to preach things that the church doesn’t believe in. That made me feel real bad. I felt like a little boy that had been indulging in things that I should not have been playing around with. I could not help but feel bad as he talked to me about it. He went on to say, Things like this just cause unrest and divisions in the church, and bring up questions in the minds of people that ought not be there; I believe if I were you I would just leave those things alone. He left me feeling very badly about the situation, but it wasn’t long until God let me hear a prophet speak on the subject, and that settled it in my soul. I knew then what I had to do. When you are hungering for truth and truth comes to you, you do not turn away from it; you let that truth direct your life. I went to the tabernacle that night, and Bro. William Branham started preaching on predestination, starting with the life of Abraham; and when he finished the message, he had covered the whole Bible and wound up in the book of Revelation. When I heard that, I said, Praise God, that makes more sense than anything I have ever heard in my whole life, and it still does, brothers and sisters. This old traditional idea that we are born again just because we come to an altar some place is just plain child-like foolishness. Oh, yes, I will agree, that may be where you had an experience that changed your life and got you started in the right direction, but if God had not foreknown you and had your name written in His book, you would not be born again, by His Spirit. Do not allow yourself to think for one minute that God just threw out a lot of ideas, then sat back with His hands folded to see how it would all turn out. What foolishness for men to think that God has just left His great plan in the hands of carnal men for them to play with it, and do as they please. This church world makes me think of a lot of children I have seen in my time. You can give some little boys an electric train and they are just not content to run it around the track the way it should be. No, they have to take it apart to see what makes it run. Before long the train is scattered from the basement to the attic, and it never runs again. On the other hand some children take great pleasure in just playing with the train in the way that it was meant to be played with. Ten years later that little old train will still be clickety clack, clickety clack, right on around the little track. It is the same way with the scriptures; not that we are to play with them like a toy, but using that for an example to show how some people just accept the word of God by faith without having to understand how it works, while others will not have anything to do with it unless they are allowed to tear it apart in an effort to see how it works. Brothers and sisters, you know what the results are; a person spends years in Bible schools and seminaries tearing the word of God apart, then after all their examinations, from every possible direction, they come to the conclusion that the Bible is a book of myths, and that the most we can hope to gain from it is some good examples that show the results of certain avenues of life. Revelation does not come to us as a result of tearing the scriptures apart; it comes when we allow the Holy Ghost to take the various scriptures on each particular subject and place them together, like working a jig-saw puzzle. He knows how to place the pieces together so we can see the whole picture, and once we see it, we have no desire to tear it apart. When some unfavorable situation arises in our life we do not begin to tear the word of God apart, asking questions like, If so and so be true, then why did God allow this to happen to me? No, instead of questioning God, we learn to lean upon scriptures like Romans 8:28, written by a man who suffered many hardships in his missionary journeys. Yet, he could say, “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, (No, not to the man of the world) to them who are called according to His purpose.” That includes all things that happen in the lives of the sons of God, even before our new birth experience, just like the wreck that almost killed me at a time when I was running from God. It worked for good in my life. I did not need anyone to tell me that God was trying to get my attention; when I awoke in that hospital, I knew immediately that God had allowed that to happen for a reason. I had always hated the thoughts of getting dressed up in a suit of clothes, and wearing a necktie. I would rather wear overalls and stay at home on Sunday with a saw and hammer, building a dog house or something, than go to church. Going to church made me feel miserable; I felt out of place there until God worked circumstances to get me into the place where I belonged. I wasn’t searching for God; I liked my wild west adventure stories, and could talk about Zane Grey from daylight until dark, but when God got my attention, and later filled me with the Holy Ghost, Jesus Christ of the Bible took the place Zane Grey used to have in my life. Now I love to talk about Jesus from daylight until dark, if you can understand my comparison.
TRUTH CROWDS OUT ERROR
Yes, I agree with Romans 8:28 one hundred percent. Many times we do not understand how, at the time, but if we are called according to the purpose of God, all things do truly work together for good to us. We have already mentioned this scripture, but let us just read on down through there for a little way. Verse 29, begins to explain the statement made in verse 28, “For whom He did FOREKNOW, He also did PREDESTINATE to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. 30, Moreover whom he did predestinate, them He also called: and whom He called, them He also justified: and whom He justified, them He also glorified. 31, What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us?” How can some of these churches who claim to use the Bible, get from Romans 3:23, over to Romans 10:9, and never seem to see chapter 8:28-31? Of course we know the answer to that; if they believed in election and predestination, it would cancel out their program of good works that they depend so much upon. It is not really a matter of giving up error for truth: it simply boils down to the fact that when truth comes in, there is no room for error. That applies to each specific area we receive revelation truth in. It is like a fellow who enjoys going to the beer taverns, playing cards and getting drunk. A fellow like that would never be comfortable in a Holy Ghost church meeting, but you let that same man get converted through genuine repentance and filled with the Holy Ghost, then see where he likes to go. I guarantee you one thing, he will never be comfortable in a beer tavern again. Where he used to stand at the bar and say, Hey bartender, give me another one, he will now come to church and say, Amen preacher; preach it; that is food for my soul. What has made the difference? He is feeding a different spirit. That alcohol spirit does not control his life anymore, and the Spirit in him now, loves truth, for He is the Spirit of truth. To you young girls who love to read these love stories, I will say, this Bible has some good love stories in it, and you will not have to be running to the news stand all the time. Some of the characters in these stories did not have a very good name in their day and hour, but that is one thing you have to say about the Bible; it tells the bad along with the good. God does not try to hide anything; He does just the opposite of that: He is a revealer of secret things. Did not Jesus say, That which man does in secret shall be proclaimed from the house tops? Even David, a man after God’s own heart, when he sinned, his sin was made known. When God reveals something it is for a constructive purpose though: it isn’t told just for the sake of telling it.
THE FAMILY BIRTHRIGHT
Alright, we are talking about receiving truth and being conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, which is to be shaped, molded and fashioned until we are like Him, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Now that means that He, being the firstborn in the redeemed family of God, holds the family birthright. But unlike the eldest son in most natural families, Jesus is perfectly willing to make every one of us joint heirs with Him in His eternal inheritance. He stands before the Father as our intercessor, Father, here is another one that wants to be like me; let a little portion of the inheritance go to this one also. We will be joint heirs with Him, and there will not be one little bit of jealousy. Brothers and sisters, that is going to be wonderful, being able to see Jesus, to see the angels, and the saints from other ages. Praise God! Just try to imagine being like Jesus. It doesn’t matter what we were doing before; God did not call us on the basis of what we were doing; He called us on the basis of what He knew we would do when we heard His word with our inner ear. That is why David could say, When my substance, my members was yet imperfect, He knew me. That is why Paul could say we were chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, and that is why John could write, “Beloved, now are we the sons of God, (ALREADY) and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that; when He shall appear, we shall be like him: for : we shall see Him as He is.” Then it was the apostle Paul that said, Whom He justified, them He also glorified. He glorifies us by giving us the Holy Ghost which is our seal. Some will say, Bro. Jackson I have always believed that a I person could have the Holy Ghost, and still be lost. Brother, Sister, Where did you ever read anything like that? You did not read it from the Bible. “Grieve not the ; Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption, (Eph. 4:30.) But I thought we were redeemed already, Bro. Jackson. Potentially, we are, but the final phase of that redemption process is when we are changed from mortality to immortality. Right now the important thing to us is to know that we are a genuine product of the word of God. As we said before, predestination is a New Testament church doctrine, and we are not sons of God because we believe in predestination; it is quite the contrary; we believe in predestination because we are sons of God. God’s sons believe all of His word. You will not find a true son of God saying, I just can’t hardly believe a thing like that, when the word of God is presented to him. Absolutely not, he will either say Amen, or Father help me, but he will never say, I do not believe that. You soy, Bro. Jackson: How can you be so sure about that? It is very simple: you are not a born again son of God unless you are sealed with the Holy Ghost, and if you are sealed with the Holy Ghost, that means the God of this Bible is in you. Think about it now. Would it not be strange if the Spirit of God in you would deny His own word? Are you beginning to see where that leaves a person who is always saying, I do not believe that? Do you see where that leaves those who continually say, We do not need doctrine; all we need is to believe in Jesus, and have love, one for another: Would the Spirit of God inspire His apostles to set doctrine in the church, if the church did not need it? But Bro. Jackson, doctrine divides: people just cannot seem to agree 100 percent on doctrine. It is supposed to divide. I said a little while ago that God’s fan is at work separating and bundling tares to be burned. Only the sons of God are supposed to believe His word 100 percent; all the others will have to be separated from the true body through one means or the other. That is an operation to be directed by the Spirit of God though; we need not concern ourselves with trying to figure out, who, among us, might be a tare, or as the apostle Peter referred to them, over in 2 Peter 2:17, as wells without water, (vessels without the Spirit of God) clouds that are carried with a tempest; to whom the mist of darkness is reserved for ever.
WHEN GOD WROTE HIS BOOK
No matter how hard denominational religious systems fight against it, predestination according to the foreknowledge of God is a true doctrine from the word of God. He did not wait until we got here to see what we would do with His word. He knew what we would do. He knew about every religious system we would come through moving to the place where He foresaw us to be, before the foundation of the world. May I say this also? He wrote the book then, not 2000 years ago, not 4000 years ago, but before He began to create. Yes, various instruments were inspired to record it for us as time rolled on, but in the mind of God, the Bible was written before the world was created. He wrote the book then, and time has brought into fulfillment exactly what He foresaw. Bro. Jackson, Did you not say that we are free moral agents? Yes, I did, but I also said our free moral agency does not override the sovereignty of God. Our free moral agency is limited from minute to minute. I can promise to meet you somewhere at 3 in the morning, and it is my choice, but circumstances can prevent that meeting from taking place. On the other hand, when God says, I will meet you 1000 years, 2000 years and so forth, from now, you can be absolutely sure He will be there. Circumstances cannot stop Him; He is God of all circumstances. Not that God has set any dates, but I use these illustrations to point out the fact that God is sovereign; He is Almighty, the Strong One, Elohim, El-Shaddai. Therefore, as sons of God we can read His word with great joy, and regardless of how hard the truth of it may be on our flesh, we have the calming assurance that we can trust Him to do what He has said He will do. When the devil throws stumbling blocks in our pathway, we just keep on getting up, with the assurance in our hearts that nothing can separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus. We have a propelling force that keeps us moving forward with God. It is a love, and God foresaw that, and Paul wrote that we, because of that, should be holy and without blame before Him in love. We were predestinated unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself, according to His good pleasure, or the good pleasure of His will. Now this word, “ADOPTION”, takes on a compound meaning here. In other words it has a two fold application. I will just take a little illustration from natural life to show you what is involved. Let us just say that I was a homeless little boy, running around half naked and hungry, filthy dirty, and with nothing really to look forward to. (We saw little fellows like that over in India.) Then some wealthy person comes along, sees my wretched state, has compassion on me, and takes me into his home. He then gives me a bath, some decent clothes to wear, and allows me to eat at his table. Then for some reason he takes a special liking to me, and offers to adopt me, if I am willing. (Who wouldn’t jump at an opportunity like that?) It was my choice but it was a very easy choice to make, after sleeping in the streets for such a long time. (That is just about the way we looked in the eyes of God, in our lost state.) Now this is just an illustration, of course, but just suppose, for the sake of the illustration, that I agreed, and the adoption was legalized. (Saints, pay attention now, and make a spiritual application.) He has adopted me: therefore I have taken on his name, but that does not make me the boss of the household. It doesn’t give me the authority to run the show, but it does make me a legal heir. I am now a partaker of all the family activities, and have the same legal rights as any other children in the family. Are you making a comparison spiritually? That is exactly how we stand with God; we are adopted into the family of God already, but we are not running the show yet. Bro. Jackson: That sounds awful carnal when you talk like that. Yes, it is a carnal illustration, and maybe the language even more so, but I believe you get the picture In your mind from it, and that is my only reason for using such an illustration. But you said we are not running the show YET! That is exactly what I meant to say, for in the millennium, when we have a body just like Jesus, we will be ruling and reigning with Him, over the nations. That is exactly what the Bible says. In 1 Cor. 6:2, we read, “Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world?” Then in Revelation 1:6, where John is greeting the seven churches, speaking of Jesus Christ that loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and hath made us kings and priests unto God and His Father. It is already done, but it will take the millennium to fully manifest it. Revelation 20. verse 4. sheds more light on that. Chapter 19 verse 19 shows the bride of Christ returning to earth with Him; then in chapter 20:9, we read, “And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them. (Who? The bride saints of course.) and judgment was given unto THEM!” That goes with Paul’s revelation which we read from 1 Cor. 6:2. He even goes on to say that we will judge angels, but it takes John, in Revelation 20:9, to tell us when it will take place. So we are already kings and priests, and we are already adopted into the family of God, and the process of our adoption was by Jesus Christ, meaning, through our acceptance of the provision made on our behalf by Jesus Christ, (God incarnate) when He willingly took the blame and penalty for our sin and suffered on the cross of Calvary, offering us the opportunity to go free. And all this was according to the good pleasure of His will, the will of the Father who foreknew us.
WHAT ABOUT SPIRITUAL SICKNESS?
Presenting a message like this just simply tears to pieces all of this extreme, evangelical, Armenian teaching on the scriptures. They preach faith to their people, and harp on the scripture over in James, which says that faith without works is dead, and the people, without revelation, go along with their ideas until the time comes that Satan begins to make his attack, then many of them become discouraged and go back to the world. Without the proper foundation to hold them up under Satan’s attack, they just get to feeling like it just isn’t worth all that one must suffer and give up in order to be a Christian flight here is where these doctrinal truths will stabilize a true believer, and he will claim his family rights and not allow Satan to drag him back into the world. We realize, of course, that most of these who wind up in such a state were never born again by Spirit of God in the first place, but for the sake of any person who may have had the new birth experience, without ever being properly taught as to where they stand in the plan of God, and through human weakness of some sort, you have wound up in such a state, let me say a few things to you. First of all, you can never be born into the family of God but one time, no more than you could be born by natural birth more than once. Therefore when your friends begin to come around and tell you that you are lost and on your way to hell, and that you need to get saved again, even though you may be doing some of the same things you did before, please remember this, if you have ever been sealed by the Spirit of God you can never be lost again. What you are having is a spiritual sick spell; you need the truth to heal you. Do not bother to say, Bro. Jackson, you are just giving people a license to sin when you talk like that, for if you do, I will simply ask you, What person, who is truly born again, is even looking for a way to sin? My illustration was for those who become discouraged because of a lack of proper teaching. Do not tell me it can not be like that unless you are prepared to furnish scripture that will back up your theory, for I am furnishing you with many scriptures that will place this message right in the middle of what the Bible teaches us about these things. As we have already pointed out; the Bible teaches us that we are saved by grace. (UNMERITED FAVOR OF GOD) and not by our works; therefore we have nothing to boast about. God foreknew us, predestinated us into the adoption of sons, called us, filled us with His Spirit, and that sealed our eternal destiny. What could be more perfect than that? It makes it even more glorious to learn that God did everything on our behalf according to the good pleasure of His own will. He counselled with no one but Himself, and the apostle Paul said He hath abounded toward us in all wisdom and prudence, and that in the dispensation of the fulness of times, He (GOD) will gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven, (there is your spiritual side) and which are on earth; (that would be the living element, speaking from the standpoint of the physical.) even in Him: In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, (That inheritance is obtained only one way; that is through the new birth, and you have not experienced the new birth unless you have been sealed by the Holy Ghost, Just shaking the preacher’s hand and allowing your name to be placed on their church roll is not sufficient for you to obtain this inheritance.) being predestinated according to the purpose of Him who worketh all things after the counsel of His own will.” Why? “That we should be to the phase of His glory, who first trusted in Christ.”
NECESSARY ELEMENTS
No wonder Paul wrote in I Corinthians 2:9, saying, “But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath entered into the heart of man, the things which God prepared for them that love Him.” There is just no way that we can imagine with our human mind what God actually has already purposed to bestow upon us. Verse 10 tells us though, that God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit; for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea the deep things of God.” Now what do we learn from that verse? If I read it correctly, I believe it shows us that those who have the Spirit of God in them may know the deep things of God that the natural man without the Spirit of God can neither know, nor understand, even if he sat in a place where they were taught. Verse 14, clears that up for us “But the natural man (unregenerated man) receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.” Brothers and sisters, we all know there are people in this world who could probably quote word for word, everything we teach and stand for in this old black book, but that does not prove that they understand it. A lot of people memorize the whole Bible, without going away saying, I do not see any need to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ; I will certainly question what you call your new birth experience. Old Cain probably felt real good about himself when he was out there in his garden fixing up that beautiful basket of fruit and vegetables for an offering unto the Lord, but once his offering had been rejected, he either had to do right, or leave the presence of God. It is the same way right today; when truth is presented to you, it requires you to do one of two things; either you will obey that truth, or you will begin to take your journey away from God, for God has no substitute nor second class way to enter in. That is the reason we place so much emphasis on the seal; (THE HOLY GHOST) because He is our assurance that we have brought the proper offering, and that we have been accepted. THANK GOD FOR THE SEAL We are all familiar with the word, SEAL, in its various uses, yet I sometimes wonder just how many people actually do apply it spiritually when they read it so plainly in the scriptures. In Ephesians, chapter 1, we read down through verse 12. “That we should be to the praise of His glory, who first trusted in Christ,” but I want you to pay close attention to that next verse. 13 “In whom (Christ) ye also trusted after that ye heard the WORD OF TRUTH, THE GOSPEL OF YOUR SALVATION: in whom also AFTER that ye BELIEVED. (after you were inspected and found to have brought the proper sacrifice) YE WERE SEALED (with what?) with that Holy Spirit of promise. You say, Bro. Jackson: What is a proper sacrifice for us to bring? A broken and a contrite spirit out of true repentance when you have heard the TRUTH OF GOD’S WORD. We are not talking about emotions that are stirred up when some evangelist (so called) come: along and tells you a lot of pitiful stories. That is what this world a religion has used to capture people down through the ages, and brother that will not get you the SEAL, any more than the sword of Roman Catholicism did when people were either required to become Christians or have their heads cut off. Do you think God filled those people with His Spirit just because some Roman soldier forced them to accept Christianity as their religion? Absolutely not. You must hear and believe THE TRUTH, and that TRUTH, when received and acted upon, becomes the gospel of your salvation, and you are SEALED with that HOLY SPIRIT of promise. which is the EARNEST s first installment of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, unto the praise of His glory. When will that be? When the translation takes place, and we are given a new body that will never be subject to death nor sickness again. Saints; you just simply cannot find the scriptures teaching salvation from the standpoint of being saved today when our emotions are stirred up by some sad story, then lost the next day because of taking a drink of beer or smoking a cigarette, and then getting saved again the next time our emotions are stirred. No, that is not Bible salvation; that is man-made religion. But Bro. Jackson, Ephesians 4:30 says, “Grieve not the Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption,” so don’t you believe that means if I should go out here and get drunk and curse, I would be lost again? If you truly have that seal, why would you even be considering such a thing? Some people are always looking for a loophole, looking for some way to break the word of God. Let me tell you this, It cannot be done. Besides, you did not even read Ephesians 4:30 right, or you would not have placed the emphasis where you did. Please remember that Paul is writing this letter to people who already have the seal of God THE HOLY GHOST) in them. We read that in chapter 1:13, so whatever is said here in this letter, is said to Christians. With that in mind, let us just read a few verses from the 4th chapter, that go along with verse 30. In verse 1, Paul says, “I Therefore, the prisoner of the Lord, (He had been taken captive by the Holy Spirit) beseech you that ye walk worthy of the vocation (the place in Christ which all true believers have, ) wherewith ye are called, with all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering, forbearing one another in love; Endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace.” Remember now, he is writing this letter to Christians, so let us skip down to verse 17, “This I say therefore, and testify in the Lord, that ye henceforth (that means, from this point on) walk not as other Gentiles walk (which is what they were. Gentiles who had received the gospel and been filled with the Spirit of God) in the vanity of their mind. Having their understanding darkened, being alienated from the life of God through the ignorance that is in them, because of the blindness of their heart. Who being past feeling have given themselves over unto lasciviousness, to work all uncleanness with greediness.” Now listen to verse 20, “But YE have not so learned Christ; if so be that ye have heard Htrn, and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: (Here is his instructions to those who have truly repented and turned to Jesus from their pagan religions.) That ye put off concerning the former conversation (or manner of life) the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; and be RENEWED in the spirit of your mind; (this is something that takes place over a period of time, this renewing of the mind that causes us to think like Jesus) And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Wherefore, putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be ye angry, and sin not: let not the sun go down upon your wrath: Neither give place to the devil.” Can a Christian do that? That is where all the problems and misunderstandings among the saints come from; someone has given place to the devil, and believe me, he will take every inch of ground you give him. What we are reading is Paul’s instructions to these Ephesians for Christian growth. That is what we mean by proper teaching. When Paul got through teaching a congregation of people they sure could not do wrong through ignorance anymore. Notice verse 28, now; we are coming to the verse so many people harp on, but we want to get these others in there first. 28 “Let him that stole steal no more: (God is not concerned with what we were before we believed, but He is very concerned that we do not continue on in our former ways after we believe) but rather let him labor working with his hands the thing which is good, that he may have to give to him that needeth. Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. AND GRIEVE NOT THE HOLY SPIRIT OF GOD, whereby ye are SEALED (For how long? Until we smoke a cigarette, or get drunk? No, absolutely not.) unto the day of redemption.” This word, grieve, when applied to humans would take on the thought of distress or sorrowful feelings. Therefore I believe it would be alright to say, in connection with this verse, Do not conduct yourself in a manner that would make the Spirit of God which is in you, feel bad, for, after all. He is your seal, your guarantee of eternal life. Knowing this, we ought to conduct ourselves in a manner that would please Him, rather than make Him feel bad. He knew what we were like before He came in, but He is in there to give us enablement to do differently now. That is why Paul said in Philippians 4:13, “I can do ALL things through Christ which strengtheneth me.” He had that enabling Spirit abiding in him. Brothers and sisters, if there was ever a person that ought to have been sent to hell, Saul of Tarsus, who was later known as Paul the apostle of Christ, was one of them. He had caused Christians to suffer untold anguish, and consented to the stoning of Stephen, and was on his way to Damascus with the authority to arrest anyone he found there, professing to be a Christian. So you see, God did not save his soul and make him an apostle just to stop him from persecuting Christians. He was an apostle in the mind of God before God ever began to create, that is, to manifest His creation. God, through His foreknowledge, saw Paul as a great light to the Gentiles, to be manifested in due process of time. I want you to know, that light which Paul carried lit up the souls of multitudes of pagan Gentiles in that first age. I want you to know also, that he still carried that light right up until the time his head was chopped off, and the letters he wrote, even while in prison, have lived in the hearts of Gentile people who were saved by the grace of God he wrote about, right on down through the ages.
IT IS GOD’S GRACE
Brothers and sisters; I realize that I am nothing except by the grace of God, but I am deeply grateful for what He (God) is, for He has caused my wretched soul to see and understand truth to the point where I do not have to be shaken by every wind that blows, if you know what I mean. We all, (those of you here at Faith Assembly) know better than to go out here to these trinity churches and court their three God teaching, but brother there are some characters, supposedly in this message of truth, who are dispensing more spiritual poison than any denominational person ever could. It is because they are not born again, themselves, in most cases. But rest assured, saints, the time is very close at hand when you will see why it is absolutely necessary to be born again, I mean the real thing, for if you are not filled with the Holy Ghost, these little experiences that you have been having will not be enough to hold you when the real separating pressure comes. God is going to sift, and sift, and sift and refine until there is nothing left but a true word, Spirit filled product. By then many of you are going to realize that thousands who may have thought they were born again, never had any birth at all. There will be spiritual miscarriages and spiritual abortions on every hand, because they did not have a genuine love for the truth of God’s word. Paul said those who have not a love for the truth would be sent a strong delusion, right from God, that would cause them to believe the devil’s lie and be damned. On the other hand those who love truth because they are genuinely born of the Spirit of God will have quite a different end. Let us turn to 1 Peter 1:3, and read a few verses. Peter, writing to the elect, those whom God has foreknown, says, “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to His abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. To an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you, (For who?) Who are kept by the power of God (how?) through faith unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptation: That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honor and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ, Whom having not seen, ye love, in whom, though now ye see Him not, yet believing, ye rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory: Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls.” From those few verses we learn that all who were foreknown of God will be kept by His power, through faith, regardless of how hard the trials may be. God does not allow the trials for the purpose of destroying us. They are for the perfecting of our faith. Our trials gives our faith an opportunity to reflect back to God, but they do not eliminate us from the race if we were foreknown of God. All who were foreknown of God shall endure unto the end, no question about it. How about Judas Iscariot then? some will say; he had a full part in the ministry committed to the apostles; he even had the authority to heal the sick, cast out devils and raise the dead, but he did not make it. Judas never did get to Pentecost, and there are a lot today that have never reached Pentecost. Their fruits will prove it in the end just like Judas. I cannot change the word of God; it matters not what you may have done in the way of good works, if you never reach Pentecost, you will never endure, unto-the-end. In Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus said, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heavy but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? And in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity.” If Judas had reached Pentecost he never would have betrayed Jesus in any way. What he did was no surprise to God though, for God knew what he would do before he was ever conceived in his mother’s womb. It was necessary for Judas to be allowed to go as far as he did, in order to set the type for the Antichrist who is the real son of perdition yet to come. That was God’s way of showing His people that the real Antichrist who is yet to come will not be recognized because of the fact that he is a democrat, nor because he is a republican. Neither will he be recognized as a communist, nor as a racist, but he will be recognized as a religious man just like Judas. The world of religion will receive him, and kneel right down and kiss his ring, or his big toe, if he tells them to. The charismatics took the Catholics right into their fellowship just because they heard some of them speak in tongues a little bit. They say, This is the fulfillment of Joel, but I say, It is the fulfillment of Paul’s revelation in 2 Thessalonians 2:8-12. Paul is talking to them about the son of perdition that is to be revealed in his time, but is now being restrained by the Holy Ghost, but when the time is right the Holy Ghost will no longer restrain him, 8, “And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of His mouth, (after the week of Daniel is fulfilled and the Antichrist has been permitted to rule for 31/2 years) and shall destroy with the brightness of His coming: Even him whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders. And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; BECAUSE THEY RECEIVE NOT A LOVE OF THE TRUTH, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.” What so many of these people are calling the fulfillment of Joel 2:28, is nothing more than God’s process of gathering tares, getting them ready for burning. I will say also, the Lamb’s book of life is not filled with big blotches where He has had to blot out a lot of names who did not make it. If they miss it, their name was never in the book in the first place. Bro. Jackson, Isn’t that being terribly narrow minded? No, I am just being scripturally realistic. There was only one son of perdition to set a type for the one that is to come, and this religious world is so full of confusion that it is becoming harder and harder to show people the truth. It just comes down to the fact that if a person does not have God’s Spirit leading him it is because God’s foreknowledge allowed Him to see that person and know that he never would accept truth. Then you have to say, such a person never did have his name in the book of life.
WHAT ABOUT FOOLISH VIRGINS?
I realize the statements I have made will create a question in the minds of some, concerning the foolish virgins, but let me say, Those who are in the bride are there because God knew they would be there. By the same token, all who are to be foolish virgins according to the parable in Matthew 25:1-12, have their names written in the book of life also. Bro. Jackson, what does that do to the doctrine of predestination? It sure does not change it any. Go with me to Revelation 13:8. This is a time when the son of perdition is on the scene, and has really begun to exercise himself in the middle of Daniel’s week. 8 “And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, (the Antichrist) whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. Your foolish virgins will be in that group, along with many Jews who will be martyred because of their faith in God. Judas found no place of repentance because he had sold his soul to the devil, and the same spirit that motivated him is motivating a lot of people in our day. They are not selling the physical Christ as Judas did, but they are selling the revelated word of Christ, and they are selling it cheap because they do not want it around. But while the bride is in glory with Jesus, the foolish virgins, who finally received the genuine baptism of the Holy Ghost, and who finally received a revelation of the oneness of God, along with a great multitude of Jews who will not renounce God, will be martyred by the beast. We will just look at one more scripture and then bring this message to a close. Revelation 17; is talking about the old whore that has many children and so forth, and when we get to verse 8, we read, “The beast that thou sawest was, and is not: and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, ( that is hell itself) and go into perdition.” There are no corporal bodies coming up out of hell; it is spirits. Let us read the rest of that verse. “And they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose NAMES were the foundation foundation of the world when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.” The beast that was, is the old Roman Empire, but humanity has gone through a time when Rome was not ruling the world, but very soon that old beast spirit will be back in control for the time allotted to the Antichrist, and all those whose names are not in the book of life, who are still here then will be required to worship that beast. The foolish virgins will not worship him, so they will be killed, but their names are in the book. “The Spirit and the bride say, Come! And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” (Rev. 22:17) That is a general invitation from the Spirit of God and the church, but God knows every one who will ever accept the invitation, and their names are written down already. That is predestination. God bless you, saints. Amen.
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