Brother Gene Harmon is pastor of the Rescue Baptist Church in Rescue, California. He and his wife, Judy, are just dear, dear friends and have been for a long time. I hope you will get to know them if you haven't already. Gene will be bringing the message now and pray that God will be pleased to speak by you, my brother, to our hearts. Thank you, Brother Don. That last song was for me. My daughter asked me if I was ready, and I said, I don't ever feel like I'm ready. And I pray and pray and pray that my Lord will never allow me to stand before His people to preach His gospel without Him being with me. I can't do anything without the Lord Jesus, and I'm thankful He's made me aware of that. So I pray He will allow me his grace to declare his gospel truth for his glory, for the good of his people. And I do want to take this opportunity to thank Don and Shelby and the members of this church for your labor of love in hosting these conferences. A lot of labor goes in to prepare for them. A lot of labor goes in during the conference. And there's a lot of labor after the conference is over. And I'm so very thankful that I've been invited to be a part of this. It's just too wonderful to put into words. I want to bring some greetings from some of our folks back home. Several of them have been here. And they said, please give our love and our greetings to Don and Shelby, the members here and others. One particular couple, Lamar and Carol Garner, some of you may have met them years ago. They sold their home and their horses, bought a couple of guitars and a brand new Chevrolet truck and a fifth wheel, and decided they wanted to tour this Bible Belt and visit some Sovereign Grace conferences. So they've met a lot of you. And they came to me and said, please give those folks our love and our greetings. And so I wanted to convey that. Now, if you will, please turn to the book of Romans, chapter 2. Romans chapter 2, I've titled this message, Israel's Advantage. And as an introduction to this message, let me make a statement that false religionists who believe in universal atonement absolutely hate. But it's the truth, even though they hate it. The Word of God plainly declares God's sovereign, distinguishing grace that he bestows upon a particular people through the merits of Jesus Christ, our Lord and our Savior, his chosen people, his elect, those he purchased with his own precious blood. And that's found all through the Bible. But one of my favorite passages of scripture on this subject of God's distinguishing grace is found in John chapter 10. You don't have to turn there. Most of you are familiar with this passage of scripture. Our Lord Jesus was dealing with some unbelieving Jews who insisted that if he was the Christ of God to tell them plainly, he said, I have told you, and you didn't believe it, the words, the works that I do bear witness of the truth. If you don't believe me for my word's sake, believe me for the work's sake. Then he said this to them. He said, ye believe not because you're not my sheep. He didn't say you're not my sheep because you don't believe. He said, ye believe not because you're not my sheep. Then he said, my sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish. My Father which gave them is greater than all. No man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand. I and my Father are one. If that doesn't teach God's people distinguishing grace, nothing will. I've heard His voice. Have you? Well, that's a pretty bold statement. How do you know you've heard His voice? Because He told me I'm no good. He told me I don't have any good in me. He told me I'm spiritually bankrupt. I have nothing to offer Him in exchange for my eternal soul. He told me that I was in a lost, helpless, hopeless, spiritually dead condition, and there's nothing I can do to get myself out of that condition. And I believed Him. I did. I believed Him. That's not by my doings. That's the Spirit of Christ dwelling in us. No man, no woman, will come to that understanding and agree with God, with what His Word says about a lost, condemned sinner, unless the Spirit of God reveals that to us. But He didn't stop there. He told me I was one of His chosen people. That I was chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world. That all of this concerning the salvation of His people was purposed by God before a star twinkled in the sky. That He saved me and called me with a holy calling, not according to my works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given me in Christ Jesus before the world began. And I believed Him. Then He told me that He's my Creator, that He spoke everything into existence by the word of His mouth. Just said, let it be. And our great Creator told me that He humbled Himself and became a man and walked on this earth for me. I don't have any righteousness of my own, but He said, I provided one for you. I walked perfect in obedience to my Heavenly Father, establishing a perfect righteousness for you, a righteousness that God accepts. That's yours. I did that for you. Then he said, and I also went to that cruel cross and endured the unmitigated wrath of God as your substitute to the point that nothing could be laid to your charge. I obtained eternal redemption for He told me that. He told me that He by Himself purged my sins. And I believe that. I believe that I'm complete in Christ my Savior, that all of my sins were laid on Him. And they were removed from God's sight forever by his perfect redeeming work for this hell-deserving sinner that stands before you. I believe that. The light came on. He didn't stop there either. He told me, he said, I've come out of the grave. I've been raised from the dead. I was delivered for your offenses. I was raised again for your justification. I am now seated on my throne in glory as a glorified God-man. All power on heaven and earth has been given to me. I'm your blessed surety. I'm your great high priest who's making intercession for you. I'm your Lord and your God, and I believe Him. And He brought me out of darkness into His marvelous light with a joy in my heart that I can't even begin to put into words. And I don't have to. If you've experienced that, you know exactly what I'm saying. And that's God's distinguishing grace. For I found out right from the start, a brand new Christian, I thought everybody believed that, who professed Christ, my own brother, and a man his age that we grew up with. was in an Armenian free will church. And when I started telling them the great news about being chosen in Christ and redeemed by Christ and my free will had nothing to do with it, I found out right then God's distinguishing grace is manifested to some and not to others. A man is not a Christian just because he claims to be a follower of Christ. And they went to their pastor. Both of them belonged to the same church. They went to their pastor and told him what I had been telling them. And their pastor said, he's got to come away from that doctrine. That will destroy his zeal in just a little while. That was back in 1970. And they said to their pastor, well, we'll go straighten his pastor out. And he said, I don't recommend that you do that. He'll tie you up with scripture. What a wonderful way to be tied up. So my subject this morning has to do with God's distinguishing grace. And in Romans chapter 2, verses 28 and 29, We read these holy inspired words, for he is not a Jew which is one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh, but he is a Jew which is one inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart and the spirit and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of God. Now from those two verses of holy scripture, Our dear brother and pastor friend Henry Mahan said, a man is not a child of God, righteous before God, and justified by mere name, nationality, profession, and ceremony. True circumcision is not something outward, but it is an inward work of grace in the heart. A man is a true Jew or redeemed person who has a work of grace in the heart, who has renounced his works and looked to Christ, who worships God in spirit and truth, who has the law of God written on his heart and not in his hand, and whose praise is from God and not from men." Really, let me just make an interesting statement that I believe is very true. As much as I love the work that went into putting these chapter divisions and numbering the verses, sometimes a chapter division does more harm than it does good. These first two verses of Romans 3 go right along with what we just read in the last two verses of chapter 2. Then we read in verses 1 and 2, What advantage, then, hath the Jew, or what profit is there of circumcision? Much every way, chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. These two verses of Holy Scripture tells us that the Jews had an advantage over the Gentile nations. If true circumcision was not of the flesh, but of the heart, How did that Old Testament law profit the Jews? Well, that circumcision, the circumcision of the flesh, was a sign of the covenant God made with Abraham. And Moses, writing under divine inspiration, wrote these words from God to his people. He said, thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God. The Lord thy God hath chosen thee to be a special people unto himself above all people that are upon the face of the earth. The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you because ye were more in number than any people. For ye were the fewest of all people, but because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he hath sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen from the hand of Pharaoh, king of Egypt." Now those words were written for our learning. And I was just sharing with a man I just met earlier that when the early New Testament apostles and preachers preached, that's all they had was the Old Testament. And they preached Christ from the Old Testament. They were given an understanding of what the Old Testament writers were writing about. And every message they preached was Christ and Him crucified, right from the Old Testament. The circumcision of the flesh was a sign of the old covenant of works. That circumcision did not make an Israelite a chosen blood-bought child of God. Circumcision of the heart is a sign of the eternal covenant of grace. And those Old Testament Jews, folks, listen to me, those Old Testament Jews had to be saved by the same way that God saves his people in any generation. They had to be given faith to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Under those Old Testament teachings, the oracles of God, those Old Testament saints saw Christ through the eye of God-given faith. They looked forward to that fountain that would be opened when our Messiah, our Lord Jesus, came into this world. We look back to that same event that took place at Calvary 2,000 years ago. Abraham believed God. He saw Christ. Our Lord said so. And so did every Jew who saw Christ in those oracles. They believed God. They heard the voice of Jesus Christ. Our text asks this question, what advantage then have the Jews, and answers that question with these words, much every way, chiefly because that unto them were committed the oracles of God. Now the word oracles in our text means utterance from God. It means utterance in any language, but in our text it means utterance from God. John Gill gave this definition of the oracles of God. He said, and I quote, unto them were committed the oracles of God, by which are meant the law of Moses, and the writings of the prophets, the institutions of the ceremonial law, and the prophecies of the Messiah, and the gospel church state, and in a word, all the books of the Old Testament, and whatsoever is contained in them, which are called so, because they are of divine, infallible, and authoritative And they are of divine inspiration and contain the mind and will of God and are infallible and authoritative. And it was the privilege and profit of the Jews that they were entrusted with them. When other nations were not, and so had the advantage of them, they had them for their own use. For hereby they had a more clear and distinct knowledge of God than the Gentiles could have by the light of nature, and besides, became acquainted with the doctrines of a trinity of persons in the Godhead, of the sonship and deity of the Messiah, of the sacrifice, satisfaction, and righteousness of the Redeemer, and of salvation by Him." End of quote. So the oracles of God are extensive. It would take a thousand lifetimes from a thousand God-ordained preachers to deal with the subject of the world of God, and you would not be able to exhaust that subject. So let me just mention a few of those oracles. that those Old Testament Jews who believed God had committed unto them and revealed unto them by God the Holy Spirit. The nation of Israel had a God-ordained high priest to represent them. The Gentiles did not. They might have had a priest. But it wasn't an ordained priest from God. They didn't have God's ordained priest to represent them. The nation of Israel had God's annual appointed day of atonement. The Gentiles did not. The nation of Israel had the substitutionary death and the blood of an animal sacrifice that made atonement for their sins for that year. The Gentile nations did not. The nation of Israel had a place where God would meet with the high priest on that day of atonement in a place called the holiest of holies, that innermost sanctuary. And when he entered in, when the high priest entered into the holiest of holies, He had the names of the 12 tribes of Israel written on his breastplate and on his hands. He had those names to show that he represented a particular people, the nation of Israel. And in that innermost sanctuary, with other things as well, there was a mercy seat. And the blood of that animal sacrifice was sprinkled on that mercy seat, making atonement for the sins of Israel for that year. The Gentiles did not have that. Now, all of that, folks, all of that and so much more typified Jesus Christ, our great high priest, who has entered into heaven itself there, there to represent a particular people, his elect. And right there on his heart, he had the names of all of his chosen people written. He represented all of those who were given to him in the eternal covenant of grace. by God the Father way back before time began, and only them. And he made atonement when he offered himself as a supreme sacrifice for the sins of his people. He made atonement not for a year, but for all eternity for those he represented. Now, why did God do that? Why did God choose a particular people? Why did He commit unto them His oracles and pass by that whole world of Gentiles? We heard it last night from the words of David, whom God inspired to write these words. My God is in the heaven. He has done whatsoever He hath pleased. It pleased God to do that. And if it pleased God to do that, it ought to please me that he did that. Our Lord Jesus, while he was here on this earth, in one of his prayers, he said, I thank thee, Father, that thou hast revealed these things. He has not revealed them unto the wise and the prudent. I can't quote it. I've quoted that a hundred times. But he's revealed that to us. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Thy sight. I delight in my God. Do you? Have you heard His voice? Do you know that God Himself represented you when He became a man and walked on this earth? When He honored God's law perfectly? When He satisfied the holy justice of God? and delivered his people from that wrath that's coming. You all believe that? Well, if you don't, shame on you! Because the Word of God clearly declares that. Now, if God moved David to write those words, My God is in the heaven, he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased, then God is telling us that. Those are holy inspired words. God is seated on his sovereign throne of power as a sovereign monarch over this whole universe. And he's working all things after the counsel of his own will. And none can stay his hand or say unto him, what doest thou? That's the God I worship. And I've heard his voice. And I've heard it ever since that day he spoke to me under the preaching of his gospel. Every time I hear the gospel, I hear the voice of Jesus Christ speaking to me. And I never get tired of hearing that. I never get tired of hearing that Jesus Christ is my Lord and my God, my great high priest, my blessed surety. I never get tired of hearing, quoting Pastor Mahan again, I'm as sure of heaven as if I'm already there, all because of Christ and what he's done for me. Now would you please turn to 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. 2 Thessalonians chapter 2. Those Gentile nations worshipped gods of their own imagination. Those men and women came into this world in spiritual darkness, loving that spiritual darkness, went through life. teaching their children to worship false gods, teaching them their foolish, sinful way of belief, came into this world, left this world, and went right into eternal torment. And if it wasn't for the grace of God, that's where every one of us would be, still dead in trespasses and sins, running from God, hating God, refusing to bow down to the Lordship of Jesus Christ, embracing a doctrine that is so false and dishonors God so much, you wonder how people could be so deceived. But there we were. We don't have to turn there, but in Romans chapter 1, verses 18 through 20, we read, For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness, because that which may be known of God is manifest in them. For God has shown it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead so that they are without excuse. I don't understand where the sovereign grace of God and the responsibility of man comes together. I don't think anyone can. Some foolish man told me years ago, it's like a railroad track. They're side by side. You look way down there, way down there, they come together. No, they don't. You walk down there where they come together and they're still just as far apart as they were when you get there. And so they never come together. But I'll tell you this, I believe it. I believe it's the responsibility of every human being to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. Well, how are they going to call on him whom they have not believed? And how are they going to believe on him of whom they've not heard? And how are they going to hear without a preacher? And how are they going to preach except they be sent? So God has a people that he intends to save. He saves us and calls us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began. So salvation is of the Lord from start to finish. And if we believe on our Lord Jesus Christ as He is set forth on the pages of Holy Scripture, we won't be patting ourselves on the back saying, oh, I'm so thankful I was smart enough to make a decision for Jesus. We'll thank God for His grace and His mercy that we just heard from that 136th Psalm. And it endures forever. And He bestows His grace and His mercy on those who were chosen in Christ before the world began, on those who were redeemed by Jesus Christ when He went to that cruel cross and laid down His life for us, on those who are enlightened by God the Holy Spirit, we have an understanding of our great, wonderful, majestic God who saved us by His amazing grace. And we give him all the praise and all the glory. You can amen that if you want to. It's true. Now those Gentile nations, like I said, they believe in gods of their own imaginations. And I believe those Gentile nations represent, typify, all of free will works religionists. And there's a lot of them out there, going right across the street, meeting in a goat barn. And they're giving themselves the glory, patting themselves on the back. And we were in that same camp, folks. False religionists do not have a sin-atoning sacrifice. If they did, they wouldn't be false religionists. They do not believe the blood of Jesus Christ has cleansed them from all sin. If they did, they wouldn't be false religionists. They do not believe Jesus Christ is their high priest who represents them before a holy God who cannot even look upon sin. If they believed Jesus Christ was their high priest representing them, they wouldn't be false religionists. They do not believe Jesus Christ is their mercy seat. If they did, they wouldn't be false religionists. Armenian free will false religionists blatantly declare They do not need Jesus Christ to be their great high priest to represent them. From their own sinful, polluted lips, they say they can approach God by their own free will. But our Lord Jesus said, no man can come unto me except the Father which sent me draw him, and I will raise him up at the last day. He said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father but by me, and I happen to believe that. They do not believe the blood of Jesus Christ did anything for them. Those who believe in universal atonement trample underfoot the blood of the everlasting covenant, calling that blood an unholy thing. just a common thing. They refuse to bow down to the lordship of the risen, exalted Christ of God, denying his absolute power over them. They believe they're more powerful than God. We don't have to be a theologian to see the falseness of that if the Holy Spirit has enlightened our minds. And once again, we were just like them, but Jesus Christ has redeemed us with His own precious blood. We've been delivered from the power of darkness, the power of sin, the power of Satan. We've been translated into the eternal kingdom of Jesus Christ, our Savior. And by the supreme sacrifice of Himself, Jesus Christ has delivered us from the wrath that's coming. And I'm so thankful, aren't you? In this passage of Holy Scripture in 2 Thessalonians chapter 2, our Lord tells us that false religionists receive not the love of the truth that they might be saved. Then we read these holy inspired words from verse 11 down through verse 14, and for this cause, God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie. For this cause, because they have no love for the truth that they might be saved, God shall send them strong delusion that they should believe a lie. God shall send them strong delusion. God does that. God sends them strong delusion that they should believe a lie, that they all might be damned who believe not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. There's no difference between them and those Gentile nations who believe those lies that they taught their children and went to hell believing. Then we read, and Paul was moved by the Holy Spirit to write these words, But we are bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord. Stop right there. My subject this morning is God's distinguishing grace. Do you see the distinction between those who God sends a strong delusion to that they might believe a lie and those that Paul is talking about in these verses? He refers to God's chosen people, beloved of the Lord. You don't read that in the passages of Scripture before us. God didn't set His love upon them. He set His love upon a particular people. He loves us with an everlasting love. Therefore, with loving kindness, He draws us unto Himself. Well, how does He do that? I'm glad you asked. Read on. We are bound to give thanks always to God for you, brethren, beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the spirit and belief of the truth, whereunto he called you by our gospel to the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. It's under the preaching of his gospel, under the preaching of the glorious gospel of God's amazing grace through the merits of Jesus Christ our Savior, that he turns the light on. God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. And we have this treasure in earthen vessels that the excellency of the power may be of God and not of us. And I hear preachers, and I'm one of them, I say that applies to God's preachers, but it applies to all of us. God commands the light to shine in the hearts of all of his chosen people at a particular time that he himself appointed under the preaching of His gospel to give us this understanding. Under the preaching of His gospel, we're made partakers of His divine nature. We, God's chosen people, are brought into a living union with Jesus Christ to the obtaining of His glory. That's what our text says. And it's the work of God the Holy Spirit to sanctify us. That's His ministry. to take the things of Christ and reveal them to God's chosen blood-bought children. He sanctifies us. He sets us apart. Not under the preaching of lies. Under the preaching of truth and belief of the truth is what verse 13 says. So brethren, like Israel of old who had the oracles of God committed unto them, God has committed His gospel his divine utterances to his ordained preachers and his local assemblies. What a privilege and what an honor to be a part of a church that declares the truths of the gospel as they are set forth on the holy pages of scripture. We heard it last night, the simplicity of the gospel. Why make it difficult to understand? The Gospel points to Jesus Christ, who He is. He's God Almighty. What He has done, He became a man so He could redeem us from the curse of the law. And He did that. He didn't try to redeem us. He redeemed His people. The Gospel points to the glorified God-man who has come out of the grave, is now seated on his sovereign throne of power, making sure that all those he represented are brought to him by saving faith, to believe on him, to give him all the glory, to bow down to the risen, exalted God-man. Jesus Christ, our Lord and our Savior. So folks, if we want our unsaved loved ones, if we want them to be saved, delivered, actually, if they're God's chosen, we were saved at Calvary 2,000 years ago, but we still have to experience the miracle of the new birth. Is that not right? And if we want that to happen, we need to get them under the preaching of the gospel. or at least try. There's no guarantee that God will speak to the hearts of our unsaved loved ones if we do get them under the preaching of the gospel. But on the authority of God's Word, I can guarantee you if they don't hear the gospel, they're not going to be saved. So this should be our desire, our earnest, sincere desire to get our unsaved loved ones to a place where the gospel is preached. Now let me share one more thought in closing. Under that old mosaic economy, under those oracles that God committed to national Israel, multitudes, more than not, went right into eternal torment. They had the oracles of God committed unto them, but they did not see Christ in those things that typified Him. Some did. A remnant, a very small remnant. Elijah cried out to God, I'm all alone. And God said, no, you're not. I have reserved unto myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. Paul was moved by God the Holy Spirit to write those words in Romans chapter 11. And he said this, even so, then, brethren, at this present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace. National Israel, the gospel is committed to God's preachers and local assemblies. But many come who think they're going to heaven because they believe in the five points of Calvinism. Many believe that because they belong to a gospel preaching church, they're OK. Some come because their spouse comes. but have never heard the voice of Jesus Christ. This is a personal thing between you and God Almighty. Is your trust in Jesus Christ and only in Him? Are you holding on to something that you might add to the finished work of Christ? If you are, you better get rid of it as fast as you possibly can. Because my God will not share His glory with another. It's either all of Christ or none. You either put your faith in Him and only in Him, believing that He accomplished what He was sent here to do, that you have redemption through His precious blood that makes you acceptable in God's sight, or you don't believe that. So we have this privilege of having his gospel entrusted to us. What an honor. What an honor. We heard it last night. I echo those words. Christ must be all in all. And if you believe that, you have the privilege and the honor of supporting His glorious gospel with your time, with your prayers, with your gifts and your talents and your monies, make that your priority, allowing nothing to interfere with the privilege of meeting with God's people on a regular basis, to hear about Jesus Christ, who He is, and what he has done for us. God bless you. Thank you all.