to Proverbs 16. And while you turn there, let me share a story with you that was told to me as a true story. There was a man who had some work done on his tires, and one of the incompetent workers failed to tighten the lug nuts on the right rear wheel of his car. And while he was driving down the road, those lug nuts fell off and he lost his wheel right in front of the compound of the mental institute. Well, he retrieved his tire, jacked it up and put the wheel on and said out loud, now how am I going to get to town to get some more lug nuts? And there was a man on the other side of the fence in this middle institution and he said, just take one nut off of the other three wheels and put them on that wheel and tighten them up. You'll be able to drive down to the parts house. He said, that's a great idea. I don't know why I didn't think of that. He said, you're pretty smart. What are you doing in that institute? And he replied by saying, I might be crazy, but I'm not stupid. And I say that to establish a point. It is true that we come into this world with Adam's fallen nature, totally depraved, hating God, running from God, no interest in him or his gospel, But we're not stupid. We can understand words. And the Lord calls His preachers to declare those truths for the glory of Jesus Christ, telling who Jesus Christ is. He's Jehovah God, our Creator. Telling our hearers what He has done. He established a perfect righteousness for all of His people. He, by the supreme sacrifice of himself, purged our sins from God's sight forever. God remembers them against us no more. And he came out of the grave on the third day, ascended to glory, and sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, which denotes his sovereign power, and We've been made to sit in heavenly places in Christ. Now that's not difficult to understand, but it's impossible to believe in our unregenerate state. Our Lord told his disciples, it's easier for a camel to go through an eye of a needle than it is for a rich man to enter into heaven. And they didn't misunderstand what he said. They replied by asking this question, who then could be saved? And our Lord replied, with men it is impossible. So people don't have any problem knowing what the word of God says when they read it or when they hear it preached. They just don't believe it. And our first verse of Proverbs 16 says, the preparations of the heart and man and the answer of the tongue is from the Lord. Now, that's referring, I believe, mostly to preachers. God brings us under the preaching of his gospel. He delivers us from the power of darkness. We sit under the gospel preaching, being taught of God, equipped by God, and then sent out to preach his gospel. And God gives us an understanding in our mind, and we form that understanding into words and then into sentences, and then we preach those truths for the glory of Jesus Christ, knowing that God must give the increase. And so the preparation of the heart in us is of the Lord. And the answer that comes from our lips is also from him. And it doesn't matter if we're preaching the gospel or if we're receiving the engrafted word with gladness, those thoughts are formed in our mind and they come out of our mouths with a testimony. of the sovereign power of our Lord, who has delivered us from darkness and has translated us into his eternal kingdom. Now, the true gospel of Jesus Christ is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes. There are no exceptions. But it's our responsibility to believe. If we have Christ, we have life. If we don't have Christ, we don't have life, and the wrath of God abides on us. That's not difficult to understand, that's just impossible to believe unless the Lord himself sends his spirit into hearts, giving us an understanding of Jesus Christ, who is the sovereign Lord over all of his creation, and his perfect redeeming work for those who are promised to him by God the Father, back in the eternal covenant of grace before the world began. Look at verse two. All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes, but the Lord weigheth the spirits. Now all unregenerate men and women have a very high opinion of themselves. Not just some, all of us. And he that compares himself with another is not wise. The Word of God teaches that. Even a man who kills somebody will say, well, I'm not as bad as so-and-so. He killed three people. People think their good is going to outweigh their bad. What good? We don't have any good. In our natural state, there's not only no good in us, we can't do any good. We sin against God and we need a Savior who takes care of our sin debt and brings us into a relationship with Him, giving us the full assurance that no matter what happens, it is well with my soul. Our Lord tries the spirits, He weighs the spirits, and He knows, He knows without a shadow of a doubt if our faith is in Him or if we're trusting in our own righteousness. Verse three says, commit thy works unto the Lord and thy thoughts shall be established. Now every enlightened child of God has been taught that we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. So God's preachers, we don't leave out works. But there is absolutely no work involved in the salvation of God's elect produced by man. We are His workmanship created unto good works. Any good thing we do is a result of the Spirit of God working in us, and we give Him all the glory for what He's done for us, and we commit these works that He allows us to do unto the Lord, and our thoughts are established by Him. Our thoughts will be established with these truths, Lord. May you be blessed with the efforts that you allow me to produce in my walk before you. Lord, may I always keep this before my own mind that you're in sovereign control over everything. Nothing happens apart from your permissive will. As any good comes from me, may it always be for your glory. Lord, I know that you're the only one that can make whatever we're allowed to do in your kingdom a fatso. And we pray. We pray this prayer. Lord, not my will, but Thy will be done. And God's will is going to be done. Who's going to stop Him? He has purposed it all. He executes it all. It's all for His glory, for the good of His people. Romans 8.28 holds true in every situation. My wife has been going through a very painful and difficult time, and this is the second time that she's felt like coming to church in over two months. And believe me, I thought, oh Lord, her appointed time of departure is close. I even shared that with David. But the Lord has healed her up and all of that which she has gone through and is still going through was ordained by our Lord to not only bring glory to His name, but to bring us closer to Him that we need Him every second of every minute of every hour of every day. Our Lord Jesus is the divine potter, and He forms a vessel as it pleases Him. Look at verse 4. The Lord hath made all things for Himself, yea, even the wicked for the day of evil. Now, this is not to be understood that God makes men evil. He does not. He made man upright, pure, perfect. But when Adam ate the forbidden fruit as the federal head over all of his people, as our representative, we were in the loins of Adam. And by that one man's sin, sin entered into the world, and we come into this world with Adam's fallen nature. We can't do anything but sin. That's what we are. We don't become sinners because we sin. We sin because we're sinners. Now our Lord Jesus, like I said earlier, forms a vessel as it pleases Him. Now He raised up Pharaoh for this very purpose, to destroy him. The Word of God teaches that. The whole Egyptian army, under the leadership of Pharaoh, rebelled against God would not hear even though God plagued them with plagues that you would think would get their attention to the fact that God's in control of all things and it didn't change their wicked hearts. Now, I don't know if you've ever given any thought to this, but Pharaoh and all of those men in his army were little babies at one time. They were mama and daddy's pride and joy. They were grandpa and grandma's delight. But they were still sinful babies. They grew up to be sinful men, hating God, loving a God of their own imagination. And we came into this world with the same wicked, sinful heart that Pharaoh and that whole Egyptian army had. The same wicked heart that Judas Iscariot had. God has to give us a new heart. And that's not talking about the muscle that pumps the blood. That's talking about the inner man where our thoughts are formed. Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh. As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he. So it's the inner man. corrupt through and through. The number of a man is six, six, six. Number seven is used in the scriptures as a number that illustrates perfection. Six falls short of perfection. Man is corrupt through and through. Body, soul, and spirit fall short of perfection. You can take an archer who shoots a bow and arrow and aims at his target, and if it's too far out of his reach, that arrow's going to fall short of its mark. Anything we do in our unregenerate state falls short of the mark of perfection. Our Lord Jesus was perfect in everything He thought, said, did, and His motive was perfect for the glory of His Father. And that's the Savior that we need. Our Lord Jesus, by His sovereign power and His sovereign grace, teaches every one of us that we need Him. And when He reveals to us that we need Him, He reveals to us that Christ is all we need. In Him dwells the fullness of salvation. Everything we need to take us from that awful pit that God dug us out of, all the way to eternal glory, is found in Christ and only in Christ. He redeemed us with his precious blood, and we give him all the glory for this unspeakable gift, eternal life through Christ our Savior. Look at verse five. Everyone that is proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord. Though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished. Folks, listen. God must punish sin. His holy nature demands it. He must. And He's willing to show His wrath. And He's going to pour out His wrath on all of those ungodly men and women who refuse to believe the gospel message of Jesus Christ and Him crucified. But we read in the first chapter of 1 Thessalonians, that those saints of God who were delivered under the preaching of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ, and the gospel came to them, not in word only, but in power, and the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance, and we read that they rejoiced in the fact that Jesus Christ had delivered them from the wrath to come. God bless you. I tell you, I think about standing before my Savior when this is all over, when my appointed time of death comes, faultless. Boy, that's hard for me to embrace. I see myself anything but faultless. And it doesn't matter if we join hands with the whole world. If we don't have Christ, we're gonna be punished. We're gonna be turned into eternal torment. We can be the most religious person in the world. Make every meeting, even where the gospel is preached, where the true gospel is brought forth. We can be seated listening to the truth Week after week, month after month, and if we don't embrace Christ, we're no better off than those people who are drinking a nickety-like water and have no use for Christ, rebel against Him, shaking their fist in His face, saying, I'll not have this man to reign over us. We must, we must, and I emphasize must, worship God in spirit and in truth. Without the Spirit, that's impossible. Without the truth, that's impossible. They go hand in hand. When God sends the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father, He does that under the preaching of the truth. And we embrace the truth because God has given us faith to believe that Jesus Christ is our Jehovah, that He by Himself purged our sins. And so, join hands with Him. Don't join hands with these wicked people who are blaspheming God by saying He's done all He can and the rest is up to you. If God has done all He can and the rest is up to us, we're in a world of hurt. We can't do anything without Christ. We must have Him. So, our text is teaching us that Everyone that is proud in heart is an abomination to God. And we come into this world with that old proud heart, weighing our foolish good that we don't have in a balanced thinking that our good is going to outweigh our bad and we don't have any good. Look at verse 6. By mercy and truth, iniquity is purged and by the fear of the Lord men depart from evil. Brethren, mercy and truth kissed each other at Calvary a little over 2,000 years ago. Jesus Christ came into this world sent from God the Father to do his will. And everything he did was pleasing on the side of God. Mercy and truth kissed each other at Calvary because our Heavenly Father saw His Son as the perfect example of righteousness, giving Him a name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow if things in heaven things in earth, and things under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. And it's by the fear of the Lord that men depart from evil, and the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. There's no fear of God before the wicked. We had no fear of God. We might have had a little fear of death, or fear of eternal torment, going to hell, but we didn't fear God. And that fear is a holy reverence to God for who He is and what He has done. And we don't have that until God gives us a new heart. Then that fear or that reverence is the beginning of wisdom and God gives us that. He gives us a new heart that bows before him in humble adoration, saying, great is my God, and greatly to be praised. We read this, that the fear of the Lord moves us to depart from evil, and we still have the old nature. I'm not saying that as an enlightened child of God, we're without sin. Someone told Walter Gruger, If I believe what you believe, I'd sin all I want to. He said, I already sin more than I want to, don't you? And God's preachers don't teach that we're to live licentiously, no. We tell you, hate sin, depart from sin. If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And if we confess our sins, He's faithful and just to forgive us our sins. Even though we know we have a full pardon from God, we want to keep a close relationship with the Lord Jesus. And if we harbor sin, if we don't confess that sin, we have that Sin that builds upon itself to where pretty soon we don't even pray. We just justify everything we do and have no use for God. I want a relationship with the Lord Jesus that's a daily relationship. And we must, and I emphasize must, acknowledge before Him that we're sinful. and we need his grace. Oh, how we need his grace. Now look at verse seven. We read, when a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Now it's true, humanly speaking, that a man who is a follower of Jesus Christ can be at peace with others like Jacob and Esau, but that's not what the Lord is emphasizing here in verse seven. And it's true also when we have the spirit of Christ dwelling in us, we can be at peace with that old Adamic nature that's still part of us. We've been made partakers of the divine nature, but we still have that old nature that wars against the Spirit of God that dwells in us, and these two are contrary, the one to the other, so that we cannot do the things that we know we should, and we do things we know we shouldn't. I can't wait until I'm delivered from this body of death. This is referring, verse seven is referring to the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only man who ever walked on this earth the whole of his life without sin. Everything he did pleased God the Father. He allowed himself, and consider the humility of Christ, he allowed himself to be formed as a baby in the virgin womb of Mary. John Gill emphasized that strongly. He said, consider the humility of God dwelling in the womb of one he had created. He was in need of the tender care of Mary, his mother. She had to bathe him, change him, He needed the milk that came from the breast that he himself formed to put that milk in. What a humble man our Lord was. And every step he took, every thought he had, every word he spoke, and I know I'm repeating what I said earlier, but it's so important to embrace this. There was a voice that came from heaven while he was here on this earth that said, this is my beloved son, in whom I am well pleased, hear ye him. God was pleased with everything the Lord Jesus Christ did. He sat down in the temple, made a whip, and he intended to use it. Those evil religious men had made his father's house a den of thieves. Do you think our Lord was a little angry when he stood up with that whip in his hand and drove those money changers out of the temple? I believe he was. I believe it was righteous indignation that moved him to do what he did and That was pleasing in the sight of God the Father. Everything Jesus Christ did was pleasing in the sight of God the Father. And our text says, when a man's ways please the Lord, he maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him. Not the reprobates, not the goats. There's no peace, saith my God, unto the wicked. But to His chosen blood-bought children at the appointed time of love, He brings them unto the preaching of His gospel, gives us His Spirit, and though we were enemies full of wicked works, God makes us to be at peace with Him. What peace! It passes all understanding. It's a peace that our Lord Jesus Christ gives to us, knowing whatever happens is for our eternal good and for His glory. We had a man up in Northern California by the name of Larrick Kent. I grew up with him, really, he's a little older than me, he just turned 85, so he's about four years older than me. And him and his wife love the gospel, they love the Lord Jesus Christ. We had a conference at our church twice a year, and they came down, they had a little camp trailer, they parked it on the church property, helped us get ready for the conferences, and wouldn't miss one of those conferences, and even came to worship with us as often as he could when we weren't having a conference. They just love Christ. They just love his gospel. Well, he fell not too long ago and he wrenched himself as he grabbed for something to hold on to and fractured his back. And I called him a couple of weeks ago just to encourage him and see how he's doing. And I shared this with him. I said, Larry, isn't it wonderful to know that one of these days we're going to be delivered from this body of death and we'll be in the presence of the King, absent from the body as present with the Lord. And we'll see him in all of his glory. What a sight. That must be. I long for that day. But also, along with the joy of being in the presence of the one who loved us and gave himself for us, there'll be no more sorrow, no more heartache, no more pain. But more than that, we'll be just like our Savior. faultless, and will never, ever sin against Him again. And Larry said to me, I never thought about it that way. Oh, he thought about seeing Christ in His glory, and he thought about being without pain, without sorrow, but he never, ever thought about never ever again sinning against our God. And for all eternity, we'll be in eternal bliss with our Savior, faultless, spotless, no sin, no desire to sin, just a desire to worship the King and all of His beauty, giving Him all the glory. for this unspeakable gift, eternal life through Jesus Christ, our Lord and our Savior. Thank you.