Good evening. I invite you to turn with me back to Ecclesiastes chapter 3. As we sang that song, I was just thinking how I'm nervous. And singing that song just reminded me, no matter how we feel when we get up here, we just desire to praise Him. Jesus, our blessed Redeemer, praise Him. That's my desire tonight, may we praise Him. Ecclesiastes chapter 3, our text is going to be the last half of verse 7. Ecclesiastes 3, middle of verse 7, says that there is a time to keep silence. and a time to speak. That's what I'd like to look at tonight. Now, where it says a time to keep silence, what that means is to be silent, but it also means to be inactive and to be still. I didn't know that until I looked at it, looked it up. And I sincerely pray God might teach us what this means. Religion, we're here at a church service. It's what the world calls religion. Religion is so busy. They're doing so much, and they're making so much noise. As a church, what we say and what we're doing matters. It really does. People think, oh, well, you go to church. Well, you must be saved. No. No. God's word tells us otherwise. It's not enough. The message we preach is of utmost importance. False religion says, ultimately, here's what they say, if you will, fill in the blank, you ultimately are going to do something here. You've got to make a decision. You've got to do this or quit doing that. It's all up to you. It's in your hands. God says it's not of him that willeth. People lost in religion are running, running to the law, running to do things, running away from things by which they hope to be saved. They hope to find themselves in heaven one day. But God's word tells us it's not of him that runneth. It's of God that showeth mercy. What salvation? If we're gonna have any hope, it's of God and his mercy. False preachers point men and women to the law. They see God's word and they see law. We gotta keep the law. And they do so, they center their message around that, not knowing God's law. Not truly understanding the purpose behind God's law. Turn with me to Romans chapter three. This is so important. Romans chapter three. And this right here has everything to do with being silent. Romans 3, verse 19. Romans 3, 19. Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law, that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God hear the law speak. Here's what the law says. Guilty. Guilty, that's it. Guilty. God's law will shut our mouths. Look at verse 20. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. If we ever truly hear, if God ever enables us to truly hear God's law, we will shut our mouths, we will be still, and we will cry out to God for mercy. If we ever truly hear God's law, I thought of Moses. You know, Moses represents God's law, right? You remember when the Egyptians were coming after him? They'd hit a dead end. There was nowhere to go. There was no escape. What are we going to do? Moses said, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord, which he will show to you today. And that's exactly what happened. And that's my prayer for us tonight, that God would cause us to just be still. Stop trying to save ourselves. What in the world could those children of Israel have done to escape the Egyptians? There was nowhere they could go. They couldn't walk on water. There was nothing they could do. They were completely dependent on God to deliver them. And He did. They stood still and they saw the salvation of the Lord. Have we seen the salvation of the Lord? Are we just running about trying to do this and that and hoping God at the end of our life will have done enough to be accepted by God? Or have we seen, has God stopped us and shown us his salvation? I pray that he has. I mentioned our message is so important. What's our message? in Christ alone. That's where our hope is found. Look to Christ. Trust in Christ. Don't trust in ourselves. We're not trustworthy. Trust in Him. Rest. Be inactive. Be still. Rest in Him. In Him alone. There's a time to be silent. Time to keep silence. Turn back to Ecclesiastes, this time chapter 5. Ecclesiastes 5. Ecclesiastes 5 verse 1. Ecclesiastes 5, 1. It says, keep thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear than to give the sacrifice of fools, for they consider not that they do evil. First, we would do well to come to the house of God, that's where we ought to be. I'm glad we're here. I was glad when they said, let's go to the house of the Lord. I'm, by God's grace, always glad to be here. Anticipating hearing a word from our God, there's nothing better, is there, to hear from Him? But we must acknowledge that what we're doing is a fearful thing. When I talk about our message and what we're doing and why we do it, why it's so important is so many people are just lost in religion, caught up in playing church. I don't want that for us. I don't want that for anybody. It's too serious. It's far too serious. Many people are coming to church services and they're just giving sacrifices of fools. You remember what our Lord said? He won't have sacrifice. He's not interested in our sacrifices. I will have mercy, not sacrifice. There are many, and I wrote this deliberately, there are many who forsake not the assembling of themselves together. Many who attend every church service. They're very faithful, as the world would say. who by their religion, by what they're doing in their church services, they're doing nothing but just making a mockery of God. And I tremble to even say that, but we know it's true. This world is so full of false religion. They go and make it all about themselves and put on a big show, but it's nothing but pretense. It's fake, it's phony, not giving God the praise, all the praise. glorying in self, not worshiping God in spirit and in truth, thinking that God is altogether such and one as themselves. God's not like us. Who is like him to the Lord our God? There's none like him. He alone is God. I'm telling you, I don't ever want to walk through these doors with any desire other than to praise him. Glory in him, hear of him, rejoice in him. I'm not here to make a show in the flesh and get you to look at me and whoa. Oh God forbid we do that. We've come into the house of God. Where two or three are gathered together in his name. We've come here in his name. Precious name, oh how sweet. Hope of earth and joy of heaven. There's no other name like his name. We've come here and we've opened His book. We've got His book in our hands or on our lap. God's word. See how important this is? See how important it is that we're not coming here making a show and giving the sacrifice of fools? Look right here at verse two. It says, Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before God. For God is in heaven, and thou upon earth. Therefore, Let thy words be few. Let thy words be few. As I read those words, I can't help but just feel so insufficient to stand here before you. Because I know that in my flesh, I am a fool. I know it. I know God has, God in his grace has caused his holy law to shut my mouth. I'm only standing here because I was called upon to do so, and all I have for you is what God has for us. His word. I don't have my own words. I have His word. Nothing else I have any interest in saying. I'm not here to glory in myself. I'm not here to glory in you. I'm here to glory in the Lord. I'm here to give Him all praise, honor, and glory. You know, this matter of getting up and preaching, it seems foolish, doesn't it? The foolishness of preaching. The only thing I see foolish about it is that someone like me might be truly caught upon to do it. It's not a foolish means, otherwise God wouldn't have ordained it. This is something God ordained by which to save His people from their sins, reveal salvation in the Lord Jesus Christ to His people through His word, through the preaching of it. That's why we do it. That's why I'm standing here right now. God's ordained means. Look here at verse three. For a dream cometh through the multitude of business, and a fool's voice is known by multitude of words. You ever known someone who just won't stop talking? Again, I can't help but feel convicted here. But according to God's word right here, a person who won't stop talking is a fool. A fool. And likewise, let's put this in a spiritual perspective, to think that what I have to say must be so important. Listen, if what I have to say is anything other than God's word, he said, don't add to it, don't take from it. If what I have to say is God's word, then it's important. But nothing else is. Nothing else is. May our words be few. And as verse one said, may our hearts be ready to hear. More ready. May we be more ready to hear from our God. Turn with me to Zechariah chapter two. Your Bible's like mine, page 1171. Zechariah chapter two. Zechariah chapter 2, look at the last verse here, verse 13. Zechariah 2.13 says, Be silent, O all flesh, before the Lord, for he is raised up out of his holy habitation. We must be silent. before the Lord. Now, the word be silent here means hush and keep silence. We need to be silent before God, silent in our heart, silent before him. I'll say it again. I don't need to be heard. I'm not that important. I don't need to be heard. Well, you need to hear what I have to say. There's just one we need to hear. There's just one we need to hear from. And it's not me. And it's not Gabe. I love Gabe. But we need to hear from our Lord. We need to hear from the Lord, our God. I want to mention a couple passages here. You remember the Mount of Transfiguration. What a wonderful account that is. And Peter, when he first spoke up, he started off okay. Lord, it's good for us to be here. But then he kept talking. And let's make three tabernacles. One for you, one for Moses, one for Elijah. And God wouldn't have that. God won't have that. It thundered. God spoke from heaven. He said, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well pleased. Hear ye him. He's the one, the only one. We need to hear him. And I love it. It goes on to say, they fell down sore afraid. The Lord came and touched them. And they stood up. And they saw no man save Jesus only. He's the one we need to hear. He's the one we need to see. You recall when our sister Mary sat at our Lord's feet and heard his word. And it tells us that Martha was cumbered about much serving. Understandably so, Martha got a little frustrated. She said, Lord, do you not care that my sister's left me here to serve alone? You bid her, therefore, to come help me. And he said, Martha, Martha, oh, you're careful and troubled about much serving, he said, but just one thing is needful. Mary hath chosen that good part which shall not be taken away from her. There's just one thing needful. What's that? You mean to tell me serving's not important? Of course it's important. Of course serving the Lord's important. But we can't serve him if we don't know him. We can't serve him if we haven't heard him. The one thing needful is to sit at his feet and hear him, hear his word. We need to stop working. I told you. Where it says keep silence, be still and quit talking. Salvation's of the Lord. He does it all. We sit down. We stop talking. We're at his feet and we listen to him. That's it. I love this verse, John 5, 25. It says, Verily, verily, I say unto you, the hour is coming, and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of the Son of God, and they that hear shall live. Oh, that we might hear Him speak in power to our hearts. Pray we might hear Him tonight. Turn with me to Job chapter 40. Job chapter 40, just before the Psalms. I want to briefly consider God's providence in our lives, okay? When it comes to speaking and being silent. Let's consider God's dealings with us in this life, okay? Now I couldn't help but think of Job because Job endured a lot of suffering. the Lord, by means of the adversary, Satan, afflicted Job. Now, no, it was the Lord that afflicted Job. Now, we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose. We know that. We know that God does all things well. We know God performs all things just for His people, for the elect's sake. We know that. All right? Now, when the Lord afflicted Job, Job said some great things at first. The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord. Job sinned not with his lips. He said some great things, but it didn't take long, and his miserable comforters didn't help, but it didn't take long for Job's sin and his foolishness and his just wrong thoughts towards God to Come in. And it doesn't take long for us, does it? For us to start questioning our God, replying against Him. It doesn't take long. But God in mercy, as He does for all His children, rebuked Job. The Lord gave Job some strong rebuke, and he needed it, and so do I. So do you, if you belong to Him. Now look here, Job had a response here in Job 40. Look at verse one. Moreover, the Lord answered Job and said, Shall he that contendeth with the Almighty instruct him? Job, do you think you know better than God? He that reproveth God, let him answer it. We know better than to try reproving God, don't we? Now look here, verse three. Then Job answered the Lord and said, Behold, I am vile. What shall I answer thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth. Once have I spoken, but I will not answer, yea, twice, but I will proceed no further. What else can I say? Oh, what a fool I am. What a fool I've shown myself to be. Who are we to doubt our kind, loving God's gracious dealings towards us, honestly? And I feel so convicted to say this because I am so guilty of this. I'll give you an example. Apply for a job, interview for a job, and think, oh, I'm going to get it. This is it. And then I don't get it. And then here I am. What in the world happened? Why? I can't tell you how many times I've been in that specific scenario. But there are so many more. Oh, God forgive me. How has God dealt with us? He hath not dealt with us after our sins. He hath dealt bountifully with me. What about you? There's a time to be silent. Oh, may we learn this. There's a time to keep silence. God forbid we murmur against him who does all things well. He does all things well. Way back in our text, Ecclesiastes 3, verse 7. Ecclesiastes 3, 7, there's a time to keep silence and a time to speak, there is a time, brethren, to speak. Now, we do a lot of speaking. We do a lot of speaking. Religion does a lot of speaking, but what are we speaking? There are some who may get up here and boast of their wonderful works, boast of things that we've done, or I'm not as bad as I used to be. It's not so with me. I find myself becoming worse and worse, or so it seems. That's how I feel. Like Paul, oh wretched man that I am, I feel like that's growth and grace as we grow more weary and loathsome of ourselves. There are some who may stand in boasts of things that we do and things that we no longer do, the way we are. That's not the kind of growth we need. If that's us, it's time for us to be silent. May God silence us. May God reveal the truth to us. May God speak to us. Well, what is this time to speak? Turn with me to Psalm 145. Psalm 145, verse one. This is David speaking, but I believe by God's grace it's us too. I will extol thee, my God, O King, and I will bless thy name forever and ever. Every day will I bless thee, and I will praise thy name forever and ever. Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised, and his greatness is unsearchable. One generation shall praise thy works to another, and shall declare thy mighty acts. I will speak of the glorious honor of thy majesty, and of thy wondrous works. And men shall speak of the might of thy terrible acts, and I will declare thy greatness. They shall abundantly utter the memory of thy great goodness, and shall sing of thy righteousness. What are we gonna speak? It's time to speak. What are we gonna say? Speak of our great God. Praise His wonderful name. Declare His mighty acts. Speak of the glorious honor of His majesty. There's no other majesty. Declare His greatness. Abundantly utter the memory of His great goodness. Sing of His righteousness. Look here, verse 21, last verse. My mouth shall speak the praise of the Lord. Speak that. And let all flesh bless His holy name forever and ever. Amen. Let's speak these things. Turn back to Psalm 71. Psalm 71. Psalm 71, look at verse eight. Let my mouth be filled with thy praise. and with thy honor all the day. Look at verse 15. My mouth shall show forth thy righteousness and thy salvation all the day, for I know not the numbers thereof. I will go in the strength of the Lord God. I will make mention of thy righteousness, even of thine only. O God, thou hast taught me from my youth, and hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works." Oh, brethren, let us speak his praise. declare his righteousness and proclaim his salvation. You know, there's no other righteousness. I've mentioned several times tonight, people lost in religion and just what they're doing is they're going about to establish their own righteousness. They've not submitted to the righteousness of God, who is Christ. Not known Christ, have not learned Christ. Oh, may Christ himself reveal himself to us. That's what we need, brethren. We need to hear Him. May we speak of Him. Speak of Him who spoke, He spoke, and He spoke not like you and me. He spoke as one having authority, not as those scribes, not as those people who thought they were somebody. I love the fact that there's a verse that says, never man spake like this man. Don't you love that? Wouldn't you have loved to have been here when He walked this earth? Wouldn't you have loved to be one of those when there would be a multitude that gathered to hear what he had to say. Wouldn't you love to have been there? The Lord still speaks to multitudes today in places like this, through his word, through the foolishness of preaching. Oh, may we speak of him, may we praise him, praise him, and as we just sang, tell of his excellent greatness. Speak of him and him only. Come with me to Isaiah chapter 53. Just read this a couple weeks ago, familiar text. When I studied this verse in Ecclesiastes, this right here is the prevailing thought that came to my mind. Isaiah 53, okay? Look with me at verse six. Isaiah 53, six, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth. He is brought as a lamb to the slaughter and as a sheep before her shears is done, so he openeth not his mouth." That right there is the greatest Most amazing silence this world will ever know. No silence like that. Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, God manifest in the flesh, led as a sheep to the slaughter, and he opened not his mouth. He who spoke the world into existence hung on a cross in silence while being mocked. If you be the Christ, come down. Hail, King of the Jews. They didn't believe him to be anybody. But he's the only somebody, the only anybody, the only one worthy of any praise, worthy of all praise. That's who hung on that cross. He who alone deserves to speak remains silent as his sinful creatures nailed him to a cross and spat on him and plucked his beard and beat him. Our Lord humbled himself. You think of the humility that that took. We don't know anything about humility. Our Lord hanging on that cross, that's humility. Not saying a word. He opened not His mouth. He died for sin, but He did no sin. There was no guile found in His mouth. He was reviled. He did not revile again. He didn't. He suffered, but He threatened not. How? Honestly. Let's try to enter into the cross and what happened there. How did He open not His mouth? When someone wrongs us, are we not ready to just unleash the worst words we know on them? Honestly. And however anybody could wrong us can't come close to comparing to what we did to the Lord of glory. And he opened not his mouth. How can he remain silent? Scriptures tell us he committed himself to him that judgeth righteously. And here's the conclusion, okay? As our substitute, and that's who the Lord Jesus Christ is, the substitute of sinners, as our substitute, it was His time to keep silence. His appointed time, according to the eternal purpose of God Almighty, it was His time to be silent. Now, as he was silent physically, he was working salvation. He was accomplishing something. It wasn't a passive thing. He was saving his people from their sins. He was burying our sins in his own body on that cursed tree. Oh, but he opened not his mouth. Our Lord, he bore our sins. made sin, he was made a curse. Hebrews tells us, he became us. And having become us, Having traded places with us, he was guilty, became guilty, and therefore he had nothing to say until he bowed his head and gave up the ghost and cried, it is finished. Oh, praise God. It was his time to keep silence, but it was also his time to speak. Oh, praise his name. So when we speak, let's speak of him. Nothing else worth speaking. There's no one else worth speaking of. I want to close with this verse. Turn with me to 1 Peter 4. 1 Peter 4, verse 11. If God ever reveals to us that Christ is all, and all in all, will be resolved to hear Him and Him alone, to speak of Him and of Him alone. Sing His praise and His praise alone. Look here, 1 Peter 4, verse 11. If any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God. If any man minister, let him do it as of the ability which God giveth. that God in all things may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom be praise and dominion forever and ever. Amen. There's a time to keep silence, brethren, and there's a time to speak. To Christ be all the glory forever and ever. Amen.