Gooding, David: 2 - God’s Longsuffering Power

And now shall we listen while God speaks to us through his holy word, and we read together in the epistle of Paul to the Romans and chapter nine. The epistle of Paul to the Romans and chapter nine. And we begin to read there in verse fourteen. What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. For he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion. So then, it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that has mercy. For the scripture says to Pharaoh, for this very purpose did I raise thee up, that I might show in thee my power, and that my name might be published abroad in all the earth. So then, he has mercy on whom he will, and whom he will, he hardens. You will say then unto me, why does he still find fault then? For who is it that is withstanding his will? No, but, oh man, who are you that replies against God. Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, why did you make me like that? Or has not the pa- potter a right over the clay, on the same lump to make one part a vessel unto honor and another a vessel unto dishonor. What if God, willing to show his wrath and to make his power known, endured with much long suffering vessels of wrath fitted unto destruction? And that he might make known the riches of his glory upon vessels of mercy, which he afore prepared unto glory, even us, whom he also called, not from the Jews only, but also from the Gentiles. As he says also in Hosea, I will call that my people which was not my people, and her beloved which was not beloved. And it shall be that in the place where it was said unto them, you are not my people, there shall they be called sons of the living God. And may God cause us all to hear his voice through his word this evening. The first message that God would have us draw from his holy word this evening is, I suspect, a loving and kindly, but exceedingly serious warning. A warning stark in its realism and unspeakable in its solemnity. It tells us, to put it briefly, that it is possible for people to say no to God one time too many. It reminds us that it is possible for men and women to hear the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, to listen to the love of God and the appeal of God, to hear God calling them to take with both hands the gospel of forgiveness that he offers them. It is possible for men and women to hear it all and say no, and say no again, and say no a third time, and to say no at last. One time too many. And in doing that, to pass beyond the point of no return, to find themselves in a position when they no longer have the power to change their minds, but are fixed. And fixed forever. This, as I say, is an exceedingly solemn matter. But then all of us tonight are grown up people, and surely admire the frankness of God that he dare in his kindness tell us of this thing. It is a subject, of course, that many people have taken up from the Bible, and poets and prophets and preachers and authors, hundreds of them have taken up if they have caught the seriousness of the matter and reminded us of it. That famous Irishman that one hears quoted so many times these days, Professor C. S. Lewis, in his famous book entitled The Pilgrim's Regress, wrote in the end a poem on this very topic, and I read it now in your hearing. Nearly they stood, who fall, themselves as they look back, see always in the track that one false step. Where all even yet, by the lightest swerve of foot that wasn't yet enslaved, by the smallest tremor of the smallest nerve, might have been saved. And now too late. Therefore, O man, have fear, lest oldest fears be true. Lest thou too far pursue the road that seems so clear, and step secure, that is unthinking and carelessly, and step secure a hairbreadth past the hairbreadth born, which being once crossed, forever unawares, denies return. And that is the professor giving way to poetry, but what he is saying is all too true. There is a line over which, if we pass, there is no return. That is such a serious matter that God, in his loving kindness, has gone to great pains to explain to us in his word how it happens. Let me read you a passage. I read it from another part of the New Testament, and it run- runs like this. It is talking not about everybody, this passage that I'm about to read. It's talking about certain people who have heard God's gospel. They have discovered themselves to be out of line with God, to be sinners and guilty before God. And they have heard the delightful story of the love of God, how he sent the Savior, our Lord Jesus Christ, to die for us. And many times they have heard in their inmost hearts the voice of God's Holy Spirit pleading with them to be saved now, now, now, this time. Trust the Savior and be saved. These people have said, no, no, no, not this time, no. Now listen what God says about them in his word. There will come a time, says God, when God will send them a strong delusion, that they shall believe the lie. That they all might be judged, who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. You say to me, I can't believe it, Mr. Preacher. Why would God ever send anybody a strong delusion that they should believe the lie? Why would God deceive anybody? Ah, but let's go carefully. God isn't going to deceive anybody. All God will do is this. These people who have known his truth, have known his gospel in all the delightful love of God, and God has pleaded with them to receive his truth, and they wouldn't face the truth, and they wouldn't receive the truth, and they wouldn't love the truth. And there will come a point, says God, when God shall say, then have it your way, friend. If you don't like my truth, then have your choice. Have the lie. That isn't God being unfair. That isn't even God being unkind. That is God being kind and loving and merciful. For he has given us a free will, and he respects our free will. He will plead with us and plead with us and plead with us. But if in the end we say no, then though it break his heart to do it, God will say, well, you must have your own way. How solemn that is, we can best perhaps illustrate to us, uh, to ourselves by a story that God tells us in his word. These people, you see, these people that won't have the truth, and in the end God sends them a strong delusion, and they believe the lie. The eternal torture of it will be this, that they know it's a lie. It isn't that God has deceived them. They will exist for all eternity, knowing it is a lie. Unable to receive or believe the truth. Are not willing to accept the truth. Let me tell you a story, perhaps you may even know it already. It comes from a long, long time ago in history, and it concerns an Israelite king, and his name was Ahab. And Ahab went according to a beautiful Syrian lady. At least she was one of the most colorful ladies in all of antiquity, colorful in many senses. Alas, she was a pagan woman, and when Ahab married his delightful Jezebel, she brought with her into Israel the worship of the false god Baal. And Israel were led astray into many a miserable, foolish, lying old idolatry. And God, in his mercy, followed Ahab still. At length, God determined to try and get the truth across to Ahab and his people. And God staged an enormous demonstration. He had the priests of Baal with all their mumbo jumbo ascend- uh, assemble on Mount Carmel. And there he told them to offer a sacrifice on the altar and cry to their God. And if their God was real, let their God send fire down from heaven and consume the altar in front of everybody eye- everybody's eyes. And so the old priests gathered together, and they built their altar, and they put the wood on it, and they put the animals on it, and they called on their God, oh Baal, Baal, hear us, Baal. But there was no voice or anybody that answered. And the prophet of God, whose name was Elijah, began to provoke them a little sarcastically. Go on, he said, shout, shout a bit louder. Perhaps your God, old Baal, has gone on holiday, or perhaps he's even gone to the toilet. Perhaps he doesn't hear you. Shout a bit louder, I should. And they cried in their frenzy, oh Baal, hear us. But there was no voice and none that answered. It was a lie from start to finish. And they saw it was. Then the true prophet of the Lord came near, and he built his altar, and he put on it the sacrifice, and he told his servants to get barrels full of cold water and pour it over the sacrifice till the whole thing was running, drenched in water. There before Israel, he lifted up his eyes to heaven and called upon the living God. O God, tell your people, show your people that you are the real God. Turn their hearts back again to you, that they might get undeceived and know the truth. And as he called on God, there came down fire from heaven, we're told, and consumed the sacrifice and consumed the wood and consumed the very stones of which the altar was built. A vivid, clear, indisputable demonstration that God was the true God. And Ahab did what? And Jezebel did what? They couldn't deny the evidence, but they just clenched their fists and gritted their teeth, and they said no to God and rejected his prophet. You say, what did God do then? Did he destroy the man? Oh no, friend, not destroy him. Patiently, mercifully, long-sufferingly, God continued to plead with Ahab, and I haven't time now to tell you the many times God preached to that man his gospel message and implored Ahab to turn round as a man and face the truth and face the reality and seek the Lord and trust the Lord and be saved. But Ahab continued to say no. And then it happened. He said no one too many times. And he passed the line. This is how he came to his end. The Syrians, so we are told, had taken a city that belonged to Israel, and Ahab got it into his head that he ought to go and recapture that city from the Syrians. So off he went and persuaded the king of Judah, whose name was Jehoshaphat, to come and accompany him. And there, before the battle, they sat themselves on their royal thrones, all dressed up in their robes. You never saw such a side. And there they had in front of them a whole menagerie of false prophets to encourage the king to go up in his battle and take this city and recover it. Here came the false prophets and said the king to the false prophets, gentlemen, said he, now tell me, shall I go up and take this city, and will God prosper me and give me victory? And they said, yes, your majesty, you go up and the Lord will deliver it into your hand. When they had had their say, these false prophets, the king of Judah, we are told, had a word in the ear of Ahab. Ahab, old boy, he said, I've heard what these prophets say, but haven't you got a real prophet here, a prophet of the Lord? Said Ahab, oh, Jehoshaphat, my good chap, said he, you are old fashioned. All those chaps, well, we used to have gospel meetings by old pro- fashioned prophets like that, but they've long since gone out of fashion, Jehoshaphat. Where have you been these years? We have one, but he's an objectionable fellow, and he's imprisoned, Jehoshaphat. But if you must, well, I can get him out, but I warn you, he won't say anything decent. So they sent the jailer, and he brought the prisoner, the prophet Micah, the true prophet of the Lord. As he was coming along to meet the king, the jailer had a little word in his ear. He said, my chire old chap, allow me to give you some advice. No, I'm not telling you what to say, but all the other prophets have encouraged the king that he's beautiful, he's glorious, he will prosper, and God will bless him in spite of his sin. So I should advise you to say something pleasant if I were you when he questions you, because if you say something unpleasant, you might find yourself back in jail here, and bread and water isn't very nice stuff, you know. So the prophet stood before the king and said the king to the prophet Micah, tell me, Micah, he said, what is the word of the Lord? Shall I go up and fight against this city, and will the Lord give me victory? Oh yes, your majesty, said Micaiah. Yes, yes, yes, yes. You go up and the Lord will give you victory. And the king looked him in the face. He said, you stop that, you liar. I didn't bring you here to tell me lies. No, no, you stop it, old chap. You tell me the truth. You say, that's a funny thing, isn't it? How long has Ahab been interested in the truth? Ah, yes. When the false prophet said it, that he could go on in his sin and it wouldn't matter and everything would be all right, he was glad to listen to them. When the true prophet of God came along and said, no, no, Ahab, you go up and the Lord will bless you. Ahab knew it was a lie. How can a man live a godless life and put his thumbs up to God and think in the end he shall be saved? Ahab knew it was a lie. All right, said Micaiah, if you want to know the truth, your majesty, I'll tell you the truth. Because you have rejected God's word times without number. God allows this lying spirit in the mouth of your prophets to come and deceive you. To tell you that you're going to be all right, even though you carry on in sin. It's a lying spirit, Ahab. Then the sorry story comes to its end. Ahab knew it was a lie, and he knew what the truth was, and found he couldn't change, and rejected the truth, and believed the lie. He had gone past the point of no return. Perhaps as you hear these ancient stories, you feel that somehow God must have become unkind. But he's not unkind, is he? What we should be wondering at tonight is the marvelous endurance of God. How long God waits, how often he calls. As we think of these things, we remember the words of our blessed Lord Jesus. As he stood outside of the city of Jerusalem that he loved so much, with tears in his voice, he said it, O Jerusalem, how many times would I have gathered you as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and saved you from the coming disaster that must come upon you? How often I would have done it. And you would not. What then? Then he left them. And his voice was silent. And they didn't hear him again. As we listen to the story that we read in Romans nine, the thing that surely must strike us is the tremendous lengths that God will, in his patience, go, how long he will wait with mankind. The story of which that chapter reminded us is the story of Pharaoh, ancient king of Egypt. And the story tells how God on one occasion sent Moses, his prophet, to talk to Pharaoh and to say to Pharaoh, now look, Israel that you hold in slavery, Israel is my people, please, please let my people go that they may serve me. The Pharaoh wouldn't. Said he to Moses, look here, Moses, I don't believe your God. Why should I listen to the voice of your God? I don't believe your God. Oh, you don't, said Moses. Well, then God has given me a miracle to do, and I'll do it in front of you, Pharaoh, so that you can see this miracle, and you'll know it is true. So, as God had told him, Moses took hold of the rod he had in his hand, and he flung it down on the ground, and hey, presto, it became a serpent, a live, deadly serpent. When Pharaoh saw that, he grinned all over his face. He said, come off it, Moses. You don't suppose I'm going to be impressed by that, do you, old chap? He said, there's no miracle. My scientists can do that in the laboratory. That's no miracle, old chap. And he pressed a button, and in came the scientists all in their white coats, like scientists wear. And he said to the scientists, gentlemen, he said, this Moses here is going to convince me, he's going to convert me, you know. He tells me there's a God called Jehovah, who is the supreme God, and I am to listen to him, and I am to obey him. And he's tried to do a miracle to prove that there's a God. Ain't a miracle, is it, gentlemen? Now show this, Moses, says Pharaoh. You scientists, you could do the same thing, couldn't you, by your scientific techniques? And lo and behold, they did it. They got some rods and they put them on the ground, and the rods turned into serpents. And Pharaoh said, that's what I told you, see. You'll have to do better than that, old chap Moses, before I'm prepared to believe you. You say, what did God do to him then? You say, I think God just struck him out. No, he didn't. For God is fair. Let me put it to you. What is your difficulty? Why aren't you a Christian? Is it that you've heard Christians preach and they've tried to persuade you that the gospel is true and persuade you to receive the Savior, and you're standing back and you say, but it doesn't make sense to me in this modern scientific world. Where is the evidence? They don't give me evidence enough. Oh friend, God loves to hear you talk like that. Do you want evidence? Well, God will give you evidence. He's not asking you to shut your mind and believe in the dark and bury your head in the sand. If your difficulty is that you haven't got the evidence, you would like it demonstrated that Jesus Christ is true, then be bold and come to God and ask him for the evidence. Ask him to show you the evidence, and God will wait ages for you while he demonstrates to you the evidence, and God will wait ages for you while he demonstrates to you the evidence that God is true. He did it with Pharaoh. We read how that, uh, Moses was told to take his rod and to take water out of the river and put it on the dry land, and when he did that, the water turned to blood. Then the magicians came along, the scientists came along, and they did the same, and they turned the water into blood. There you are, said Pharaoh, it ain't, that ain't a miracle after all, is it? It was a case of what we would call pollution. It was a very bad case of pollution. But there you are, yes, I suppose man can produce pollution if he wants to, can't he? Our modern scientists have shown us that it's one of our problems on our planet, and if we're not careful, one of these days man will make the planet unworkable by his polluting of the natural sources of life on Earth. Be warned. But all right, man can produce pollution. All right, says God, that doesn't satisfy you as a piece of evidence, Pharaoh. Well, let me give you another piece of evidence, and another piece of evidence, and another piece of evidence, and six times over God gave him evidence. For God is long suffering, not willing that any should perish. Oh friend, I say it again, you're not saved tonight because you're not convinced that Christianity is true and you're asking for evidence. Oh, please carry on. Only be sincere. Ask God for the evidence. He'll be delighted to give you the evidence, and he'll wait while you think it through. God gave evidence to Pharaoh such that in the end his scientists came to him and they said, Your Majesty, now this has gone beyond us. This is a something, Your Majesty, we couldn't possibly explain by our science. This is a miracle, Your Majesty. What did Pharaoh then? Well, then the very Pharaoh who'd said he wanted the evidence wouldn't listen to the evidence, for he was not prepared to repent. My friend, that is our danger tonight, isn't it? It could be that some of us are not yet saved because we haven't been convinced by the evidence. Ah, but there might be others of us, and we're not saved. Why not? Well, it isn't really because we've not been convinced by the evidence. The evidence is there. We know we ought to give in to God, ought to receive the Savior, but we're not prepared to repent. It is to such people's hearts that the Word of God talks tonight, and talks directly, and talks very clearly. Oh friend, if you're there, be careful. There could happen to you. What happened to Pharaoh? He said no. Once too many times. And then God fixed him. Hardened his heart. Pharaoh found it possible, impossible to change. Or if you read the story, you will find sad things indeed. When next the plagues came in all their fury, and Pharaoh began to feel the consequences of his folly, he cried out to Moses. Oh, I have sinned, Moses, he said. What a fool I have been. I have sinned, Moses. And you say, will God then hear a man confessing himself a sinner and not take any notice. No, it isn't that, friend. Pharaoh knew he had sinned. Said God, all right, I'll take the plague away, Pharaoh, and then you repent. Ah, but when God took away the plague, Pharaoh didn't repent. He couldn't change his mind. He stands as a beacon light. Why did God do it? Why did God tell us about it? God puts it like this. God was willing to make known his wrath. For God is a holy God. We cannot forever trifle with God. What would you have God do with a man like Pharaoh, who for years had persecuted the Israelites and ground them down in his slave labor camps, and was called upon by God to repent and be saved and forgiven and let Israel go. What would you have God do? When a man of six feet of clay turns round to Almighty God and persistently says no. Would you have God turn round and say it doesn't matter, and in the end, well, do as you like? Of course you wouldn't. You wouldn't respect a God like that, would you? A God who in the end said sin didn't matter. You can blast out somebody's brains with drugs, you can do what you like, you can destroy somebody's home with your immorality, and it doesn't matter. You wouldn't respect a God like that. Nor would a God like that have a heaven for anybody to go to. When Pharaoh refused God's gospel, God moved in, fixed him there, made him a beacon light to us all. Of the judgment that must follow rejection of sin. Oh, but my good friend, God not only did it that we might have a warning of judgment, he gave it, didn't he, as a superlative evidence of God's compassion and his tolerance and his long suffering and his waiting? What if God, willing to show these lessons, endured the treatment he got at the hand of Pharaoh? Since those days, history has gone on. Time and time again, God has given examples to us of his mercy, of his incredible long suffering. And tonight, as we sit here, we think supremely of that great exhibition of God's endurance that we call the cross of Jesus Christ, our Lord. For in the end, God said, having sent generation after generation after generation of prophets into this world to call on men to repent, and almost without exception, men in the end had rejected those prophets. Then God, instead of deluging our world with judgment, oh, see what God did. He said, I've yet one son, one only son, one darling son. If they won't listen to the prophets, then I'll send my son for them. Surely they'll reverence him. The story is that as they saw him coming, the wicked husbandman took him, killed him, and slung him out of the vineyard, nailed him to a cross. Oh, then let me tell you the story again, if I can find words to sketch it. In those moments, Jesus endured the cross. Oh, why didn't the world turn black? Why was our planet not eliminated? And God's own son hung on a cross at Calvary, and God endured the cross, not willing that any should perish. Since then, how many times God has talked to our hearts, how many times his spirit has pleaded with us to bow down and receive the Savior and accept the love of God in Christ. Tonight Tonight he he pleads again. Tonight he waits still. Shall we not receive him? Did I hear somebody say, I would love to receive him, but the fear that torments me is this, that I may already have gone beyond that line that you speak of, and God won't any longer receive me. Oh no, friend. If you would like to be saved, if you would be willing to repent and repent of anything and trust the Savior, you would love to receive the Savior and have him as your Savior. The thing that torments you is that you think you may have gone beyond the line of no return. Then, friend, let me tell you, the very fact that you would love to be saved right now is evidence that God waits for you still. Oh, put those fears behind you. The Savior is. Listen to his word. Come unto me, all you that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And him that cometh to me, I will in no wise cast out. Come then, and Christ will receive you and make you a vessel of his immeasurable grace and his eternal love. But to us all, I repeat, tonight the Savior waits. Oh friend, if ever you have said no to him before, as you love your soul, don't say no again now. For it is possible to say no to God one time too many. Shall we pray? O blessed God, we thank thee that today is still the acceptable year of the Lord. Now is the day of salvation. And we thank thee for thine infinite mercy and thy patience. We thank thee for speaking to us again here this evening. We thank thee for the sincerity of thy offer, that whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be. O Lord, grant we do beseech thee that if never before, then tonight in these moments as we wait before thee, all of us may rise up in our hearts and deliberately come to the Savior and call upon him in repentance and faith. And we bless thee for his assurance that tells us, him that cometh I will in no wise cast out. Whosoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. And so we commit ourselves to thee that we may hear thy word, and hearing it, do it, and doing it, be blessed through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.