t                   oPastor John and wife Kathy  
 

 
 

Preaching God's Sovereign, Electing Grace   

 

RESCUE BAPTIST CHURCH

Sunday June 7, 2020

“Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for He is faithful that promised;)  And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works: Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.”

                                                                            --Hebrews 10:23 - 25

SCHEDULED MEETINGS

Sunday Morning Bible Study              10:00 AM  Simon Peter an Apsotal of Christ

Sunday Morning Worship                    11:00 AM

Friday Night Bible Study                        7:30 PM
 

OPENING HYMN         PAGE 521

REDEEMED

 

SCRIPTURE READING

PSALMS 34

 

WORSHIP HYMN        PAGE 496

HE HIDETH MY SOUL

 

DEVOTIONAL

 

MESSAGE

A GOOD WORK IN YOU   

 

CLOSING HYMN        PAGE 345

BLESSED ASSURANCE

 

SUGGESTED SCRIPTURE READING FOR THE WEEK

Sunday Gal 4-6     Monday Ex 37-40     Tuesday 1Ki 5-9

Wednesday Ps 66-68     Thursday Prov 2-3

                      Friday Lamentations      Saturday Luke 9-10
 

“I have purposed it, I will also do it”

--Isaiah 46:11—

 “To declare, as many do, that God’s plan has been frustrated by the entrance of sin into the world is to dethrone God.  Some would have us to believe that God was taken by surprise when Adam sinned in the garden and that he is now trying to remedy and correct this unforeseen calamity in his creation.  Such a notion is degrading to the character of God.  It brings the Most High God down to the level of erring mortals.  We are told that man is a free moral agent, that he is the determiner of his own destiny and that he has the power to resist God and hold the Almighty in check. Such a blasphemous notion would strip God of his attribute of omnipotence.  Men would have us to believe that man has burst the bounds originally set by God and that God is now a spectator, more or less without power over the sin and suffering brought into the world by the fall of Adam. But such doctrine is in direct contradiction of Holy Scripture. It is written in the Word of God: ‘Surely the wrath of man shall praise thee: the remainder of wrath shalt thou restrain’ (Ps. 76: 10).  To put it very plainly, to deny the sovereignty of God in all things is either to make God what you want him to be, which is idolatry, or it is to enter upon a path which, if logically followed, must bring you to atheism. 

My friend, the sovereignty of the God of the Bible is absolute, irresistible and infinite. In declaring God’s sovereignty, I am simply affirming his right as God to govern this universe, which he has created for his own glory, just as he pleases.  He is the Potter; we are the clay.  We have no more power over God than clay has over the potter.  God molds the clay of Adam’s race into whatever form he chooses.  From the lump of fallen humanity, he makes one vessel unto honor and another into dishonor.  This is his right.  He is God. He is under no law, rule, or power beyond his own sovereign will and holy nature.  He is God.”

                                                                                     Pastor Don Fortner

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Someone once said, “Pharisees and Publicans both pour out their hearts before God; the one is bragging, the other is begging.”  Lord, make us to be beggars.

                                                                                      Copied

There is nothing more comforting to believers than God’s sovereignty over all things. Under the most adverse circumstances, in the most severe trials, we believe that God has ordained our afflictions, that God overrules them, and that God will sanctify them for our good and His glory. There is nothing for which we ought to contend more earnestly than the truth of God’s rule and reign over all things, all creatures, and all their actions. The Throne of God, His right to sit on that Throne, and His right to do with His own what He will is what we believe and what we preach. Let us be accused of over-emphasizing the majesty and power of the living God, but never let it be said that we underestimate His glory.

                                                                                              Henry Mahan

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TRUE FAITH

  “It is not true faith to trust Christ only when you feel you are saved.  True faith is to trust Christ at all times, whether you feel like you are saved or not; when you have a deep consciousness of your sin and when you don’t; when you have assurance of faith and when your faith is so weak you wonder if you have faith at all.  A person is not saved because he feels saved nor because he is aware of his sinfulness.  A person is saved when he trusts Christ--His blood for redemption and forgiveness of sin, His righteousness for acceptance with God; when he commits all to Him as the ‘Author and finisher of our faith.   Our feelings may change by the hour, but our salvation is not dependent on our feelings; it is dependent  solely on Him who never changes--‘Jesus Christ the same yesterday, today and forever!’”

                                                                       Pastor Charles Pennington

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SALVATION IS RECEIVED - NOT BOUGHT, EARNED, OR MERITED

  “If you buy something, you purchased it.  If you earn something, you worked for it.  If you deserve something, then you merited it.  But when you receive something, it was a free gift.  Our free gift is grace and faith in Christ, even the salvation of our souls.”

                                                                            Pastor David Eddmenson

ANNOUNCEMENTS

·       We will come to THE LORD’S TABLE right after today’s message

·       Friday Night Bible Study is canceled for this coming Friday

·       Saturday June 20th is our scheduled workday


THE GREATEST


                 Luke 22:24 "... Who is accounted the greatest"?
When men ask this question they can't see their own hearts let along others. So then our works, in the flesh, are judged by one another and a competition of who is better begins. The Lord Jesus answers the question in verse 26 "...and he that is chief, as he that doth serve". The Lord Jesus Christ is Chief and in his person He served his people unto death on that cruel cross. Why even ask "which of them should be accounted the greatest". Put your eyes upon Jesus and take them away from yourself.

                                                                                               Elder Bill Silva

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“The Scriptures distinctly teaches us that we are not justified by the law, nor is the law a rule of life.  That which can only curse can never justify; and that which can only kill can never be a rule of life (Romans 3:20).

Both the Jews who had received the law and the Gentiles who had never had the law were now to be ‘saved through grace’ (Acts 15:11).  Not only were they to be saved by grace, but they were to ‘stand in grace’ (Romans 5:2), and to ‘grow in grace’ (2 Peter 3:18).  All who seek to put believers under the law are tearing down the very foundations of the Christian faith.

Listen to the strong words which came from the Holy Spirit in Galatians 5:12: ‘I would they were even cut off which trouble you.’  It is as clear as the noonday sun that the law is neither the ground of life to the sinner nor the rule of life to the Christian.  The Lord Jesus Christ is both the one and the other.  He is our life and our rule of life.  The law can only curse and kill.  Christ is our life and righteousness.  He became our curse by hanging on a tree.  He went down into the place of death and judgment, and by his death completely discharged all that was or could be against us.”  ‘Bless the Lord, O my soul!’

                                                                             Pastor Scott Richardson

“Is Believing a Work?”

    All of God’s enlightened children, and the majority of all professing Christians, know that God plainly declares in His Word that His sovereign grace in the salvation of His people and the works of man cannot mix Rom. 11:5 - 6).  But ungodly self-righteous preachers, in an attempt to deceive their hearers into believing in the lie of universal redemption, tell them that believing is not a work.  But God says it is!  During His public ministry while here on this earth, some unbelieving Jews asked our Lord Jesus this question: “What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?  Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God that ye believe on him whom he hath sent” (John 6:28 - 29).  Our Lord did not say, This is the work man must do.  NO!  He said: “This is the work of God that ye believe on him whom he hath sent”  He did not say, This is what God is trying to get man to do (God never tried to do anything).  NO!  He said: “This is the work of God that ye believe on him whom he hath sent”.  Brethren, 

Unregenerate men and women do not want to believe that Jesus Christ the God-man established a perfect righteousness for His chosen people by His perfect obedience to the sovereign will of God the Father (Heb. 10:9 - 14).

They do not want to believe that Jesus Christ, by Himself, purged the sins of His promised children, obtaining eternal redemption for them (Heb. 1:3; 9:12).

They do not want to believe that by His death Jesus Christ reconciled His people to God the Father while we were yet His enemies, and that we shall be saved y His life (Rom. 5:10).

They do not want to believe that Jesus Christ is on His sovereign throne of power giving eternal life to as many as God the Father gave Him (John 17:1 - 2).

WHY?  Because in our unregenerate state, all of Adam’s posterity hate the Christ of Holy Scripture and those who love and worship the Christ of Holy Scripture (John 15:18 - 19).  Brethren, Jesus Christ is the true and living God, the exalted God-man Who is Lord over all, Who works all things after the counsel of His own will.  I beg my readers to lay these words of our Master to heart:  This is the work of God that ye believe on him whom he hath sent”                  

                                         Gene Harmon

WHY DID GOD DO IT?

“All things are for your sakes” (2 Cor 4:15).

  “The great and glorious God, when there was only He in the Trinity of His sacred persons, decreed to create a universe, and in this universe there would be one spot where He would put some creatures He would call man.  These creatures would rebel against His authority and die to any fellowship with their Creator.  Now God, foreseeing this rebellion purposed to give new life to a portion of mankind, called the elect.  God the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, gave Himself to purchase that life.  He gave His life for them by the shedding of His blood.  He redeemed all those whom the Father gave Him.

    The great mystery of all this is that God planned the whole thing and ordered ‘all things for your sakes.’  Yes, if you are God's own, purchased by blood, all things in this world are for your sake.  Every marriage, every child born, every war, every sickness, every germ, every death, every invention, every raindrop, every disappointment, every trial, every persecution, every blessing, ‘All things are for your sakes.’  This causes profound worship in my heart to think that the majestic Sovereign of all should plan the whole thing for me.  In our scripture all things for us leads to the highest purpose. ‘. . . the more thanksgiving may increase and redound to the glory of God’ (AMP).  He raised us up and gave us all things for His eternal glory. ‘That in the ages to come he might show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus’ (Eph. 2:7).  Oh, eternal wonderful truth of the great God. We are overwhelmed to the point of sitting mute before Him. Believe it, saints, and rejoice in all things because ‘All things are for your sakes’.”

                                                                                     Pastor Jack Shanks

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 “Christ stands in the gospel-ministry, at the door of men’s hearts, and knocks and calls. Having the key of the house of David, he opens the heart by the power of his grace, and lets himself in.  In this way, and by this means, the Spirit and his graces are received. Men are called both to grace and glory by the gospel.”

                                                                                           John Gill

 

Sunday June 14, 2020

Isaiah 32:6 

For the vile person will speak villany, and his heart will work iniquity, to practise hypocrisy, and to utter error against the LORD, to make empty the soul of the hungry, and he will cause the drink of the thirsty to fail. 

 

SCHEDULED MEETINGS

Sunday Morning Bible Study                 10:00 AM  Simon Peter an Apsotal of Christ

Sunday Morning Worship                       11:00 AM

Friday Night Bible Study                           7:30 PM
 

 

OPENING HYMN                      PAGE 188

AT THE CROSS

SCRIPTURE READING

PSALMS 35

WORSHIP HYMN                      PAGE 389

MORE ABOUT JESUS

SPECIAL MUSIC        

MIKE LOVELESS

DEVOTIONAL

MESSAGE

DEFENCE OF THE GOSPEL

CLOSING HYMN                      PAGE 479

ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOLDIERS

 

SUGGESTED SCRIPTURE READING FOR THE WEEK

Sunday Phil 1-2     Monday Lev 7-9     Tuesday 1Ki 19-22

Wednesday Ps 75-77           Thursday Prov 7

Friday Ezek 13-18                Saturday Luke 15-16

THE CASE MAY BE BAD BUT NOT HOPELESS

We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed (2Cor. 4:8-9).

  “We are troubled" and oppressed in every way. We are never free from one trial or another.  We are in the world and expect tribulations (John 16:1-4, 33; 15:19, 20), yet we are "not distressed."  We have the peace of God, the manifestations of his love and care, a freedom to the throne and sufficient for every trial (2 Cor. 12:9).  "We are perplexed;" the word signifies doubting and uncertainty.  We are often uncertain and in doubt about what will happen to us; and sometimes we know not what to do, which way to take, nor how our needs shall he supplied, but we are "not in despair."  We do not despair of the leadership, help, presence and support of our Lord.  We are "persecuted" of men, cursed, threatened and despised because we profess Christ and preach Christ crucified, risen and exalted.  But we are "not forsaken" of our Lord, who owns us and causes us always to triumph in Christ (2 Cor. 2:14).  Neither are we forsaken by those who love Christ, for they support us in prayer and provisions.  We are "cast down" like an earthen vessel is sometimes cast out or thrown to the earth, seemingly forgotten and deserted. But we are "not destroyed."  We live by the mighty power of God and are immortal until his work in us, through us and by us is done. Whatever the condition of God's children in this world, they have a "but not" to comfort them.  Their case may be bad, but not hopeless; for He is their hope!    

                                                                               Pastor Henry Mahan

Joy and Peace Through Believing

  “I think that very often unbelievers sit under the preaching of the gospel, waiting and hoping for some kind of experience or feeling of peace and joy before believing the testimony of God concerning His Son (1 John 5:9 - 13; John 3:21 - 36, 8:24).  If you are doing this, then you have, to use an old proverb, ‘Put the cart before the horse’, and are actually looking to yourself rather than to Christ for your soul’s salvation!  Believing is the key which opens the door (Christ) through which sinners enter in ‘rejoicing’.  Thus, the great apostle to the Gentiles writes, we obtain ‘joy and peace through believing’.”

                                                                   Pastor Maurice Montgomery

Sunday June 21, 2020

Ephesians 4:13 

Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ: 

Philippians 1:9 And this I pray, that your love may abound yet more and more in knowledge and in all judgment; 

 

SCHEDULED MEETINGS

 

Sunday Morning Bible Study                      10:00 AM  simon Peter an Apsotal of Christ

Sunday Morning Worship                           11:00 AM

Friday Night Bible Study                                 7:30 PM
 

OPENING HYMN                      PAGE  262

HOLY, HOLY, HOLY

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SCRIPTURE READING

PSALMS 36

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WORSHIP HYMN                      PAGE  191

THERE IS POWER IN THE BLOOD

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DEVOTIONAL

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MESSAGE

DENFENCE, CONFIRMATION, FURTHERANCE

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CLOSING HYMN                      PAGE  234

CROWN HIM WITH MANY CROWNS

 

SUGGESTED SCRIPTURE READING FOR THE WEEK

Sunday Eph 4-6     Monday Lev 4-6     Tuesday 1Ki 14-18

Wednesday Ps 72-74     Thursday Prov 7

                      Friday Ezek 7-12      Saturday Luke 13-14
 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

·       A hearty WELL DONE, and a sincere THANK YOU, to all who were able to participate in yesterday’s workday (Hebrews 6:10).

·       Our conference begins in two short weeks, Lord Willing

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                  HAPPY FATHER,S DAY

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“Although I am a sinner, yet I despair not; for Christ, who is my Redeemer and my righteousness, liveth.  In Him I have no sin, no fear, no sting of conscience, and no fear of judgment; for in Him there is no condemnation.  I am indeed a sinner as touching this present life; but I have a righteousness of God which is above this life, who is Christ my Lord. In Him I rejoice!

                                                                      Martin Luther (1483-1546)

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I DON’T WANT WEEDS

“What then? shall we sin, because we are not under the law, but under grace? God forbid.” – Romans 6v15

     As I worked in my garden this past week and picked out the weeds, I was brought to remember what Paul wrote to the church at Rome. So many people accuse true believers, saved by Grace alone, of wanting to sin. Living a life of licentious, without moral discipline, without regard to the rules. In my garden, I want fruit and not weeds. I attempt to remove and prevent all the weeds that pop up, but they keep coming. They rob nutrients from the fruit bearing plants and I cannot eat the weeds. There is no joy or life for me in those weeds. They are nothing but an unavoidable hindrance!

     My sin is unavoidable, unwanted, and contains no nutrients or benefit to my soul. It attempts to take precious time and attention from the fruit of the spirit. It may sound simple- but I do not desire weeds in my fruit garden any more than I desire to have sin in this flesh.

                                                                                             Kevin Thacker

Sunday June 28, 2020

“These words spake Jesus, and lifted up his eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come; glorify thy Son, that thy Son also may glorify thee: As thou hast given him power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many as thou hast given him” (John 17:1-2)

 

SCHEDULED MEETINGS

Sunday Morning Bible Study         10:00 AM Simon Peter an Apsotle of Christ 

Sunday Morning Worship               11:00 AM

Friday Night Bible Study                   7:30 PM

 

OPENING HYMN                      PAGE 189

CALVARY COVERS IT ALL

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SCRIPTURE READING

PSALMS 37

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WORSHIP HYMN                      PAGE 81

WHAT A WONDERFUL SAVIOUR

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DEVOTIONAL

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MESSAGE

TO SPEAK THE WORD WITH OUT FEAR

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CLOSING HYMN                      PAGE 43

GREAT IS THY FAITHFULNESS

 

SUGGESTED SCRIPTURE READING FOR THE WEEK

 

Sunday Phil 3-4     Monday Lev 10-12     Tuesday 1Ki 1-5

Wednesday Ps 78-80        Thursday Prov 8-9

                      Friday Ezek 19-24              Saturday Luke 17-18
 

‘Lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect’

--1 Corinthians 1:17—

 

  “Whenever believers come to consider any doctrine, we should always ask three questions: ‘Is this doctrine plainly stated in the Word of God? Does this doctrine glorify God?  Will this doctrine give man room and cause to boast before God?’  You can be sure of this: any doctrine taught in the Word of God will both glorify God and remove all ground of boasting from man. God has determined ‘that no flesh should glory in his presence ... That according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord’ (I Cor. 1:29-31).

    On that basis alone, the theory of universal redemption, the doctrine which says Christ died for and made an atonement for the sins of all men, as much so for those who perish under the wrath of God as for those who are saved, must be rejected as heresy.  This doctrine makes the cross of Christ of none effect and declares that the determining factor in man’s salvation is not the work of Christ but rather the free will of man!  Such a doctrine as this must be exposed and denounced for what it is, the most hideous doctrine that has ever been perpetrated in the world.  It is more harmful to the souls of men than any other.  It treads under foot the Son of God, counts the blood of the covenant a useless thing and does despite to the Spirit of grace.

    I know that I am using strong language, but where the souls of men and the glory of God are at stake there is no room for pretty words and accommodating speech.  Either the Lord Jesus Christ effectually accomplished the redemption of those people for whom he died, or he failed in his work!  If a building contractor makes a bid and agrees to build a specifically designed building within a certain amount of time for a specified price, but only gets the building 90% complete, he is a failure.  The part that he did may look beautiful, but if someone else has to finish the job, the original contractor is a failure.  He must hang his head in shameful reproach and forfeit all honor and reward. My friend, the Lord Jesus Christ is no failure! ‘He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied’ (Isa. 53:11).”

Pastor Don Fortner