Rescue Baptist Church
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Preaching God's Sovereign, Electing Grace

   

 

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WELCOME TO RESCUE BAPTIST CHURCH

Sunday Morning, June 28, 2015

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SCHEDULED MEETINGS

      Sunday Morning Bible Study      . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   10:00 AM

      Sunday Morning Worship           . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   11:00 AM

      Sunday Evening Worship            . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .     6:30 PM

      Friday Night Bible  Study           . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  .    7:30 PM

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OPENING HYMN

   “Amazing Grace”                                                             Page 202

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SCRIPTURE READING

     Psalm 105

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OFFERTORY

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WORSHIP HYMN

   “How Great Thou Art”                                                         Page 4

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SPECIAL MUSIC

     To be announced.      

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Message Title

   “Strong Meat”  (Hebrews 5:14) 

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CLOSING HYMN 

   “His Name Is Wonderful”                                                Page 101

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‘Don’t ever forget’
--Isaiah 51:1--

 “Hearken unto me, ye that follow after righteousness, ye that seek the Lord: look unto the rock whence ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit whence ye are digged.”  Believer, I say, don’t forget what you are by nature, and what you were when God called you to life in Christ.  Though God has so freely forgiven us of our sins that they will never be remembered against us any more for ever, the prophet here teaches us that we must not forget them, lest we forget what the Lord has done for us by his loving grace. 

Let us always remember who we were, where we were, and what we were when God saved us by his grace.  We were ourselves the fallen sons of Adam, rebels before God.  We were lost and ruined in this perishing world.  Like Ezekiel’s deserted infant, we were helpless, polluted and perishing. We were dead in trespasses and sins. Physically, we were alive, alive to our lusts, alive to the world, alive to Satan, alive to sin.  But spiritually, we were dead, dead to righteousness, dead to truth, dead to Christ, dead to God.  In a word, by nature, we were sinners.  Sinners by birth, sinners by choice, sinners in heart, sinners in practice, sinners against God, sinners against men, we were nothing but perishing, hell-deserving sinners.

 Remember also your merciful Deliverer.  We could never deliver ourselves.  No man or angel could deliver us.   But the God-man, Jesus Christ, has delivered us.  There came the Deliverer out of Zion, and he turned away all our transgressions.  He delivered us from the curse of the law by his sacrifice of blood in our place.  And he delivered us from the powerful bondage of sin by his sovereign power in regeneration.  Blessed be God, he did not leave us to our own free will. ‘But God’, in loving, merciful, sovereign and saving power intervened in our lives.  He stopped us in our mad race towards hell and arrested us by his grace!  ‘By grace ye are saved!’ 

Now, child of God, don’t ever forget: ‘salvation is of the Lord.’ To the triune God alone we ascribe all honor, majesty, praise and dominion. 

Pastor Don Fortner

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“IT IS FINISHED”

 “When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, IT IS FINISHED, and He bowed His head, and gave up the ghost.”
--John 19:30--

   “When our Lord hung in agonies and blood on the cursed tree, He cried with a loud voice, “IT IS FINISHED”.  One would think that such a statement made by the very Son of God would carry a reasonable weight.  Yet, there are those who proclaim that the work is not truly finished unless they give their nod of faith which miraculously makes the work really effectual.  Setting aside that such thinking is utterly foolish, consider, for a moment, the arrogant presumption of such an incredible notion.  Apply this convoluted musing to any other finished work.  Go to a contractor after he has finished a building and is getting ready to turn the key ... stand before him, and in your most audacious voice, say, ‘Wait a minute, it is not finished unless I believe it is finished!’  Go to the composer who has spent his life in pursuit of the classic score.  After he has signed his masterpiece and the conductor is about to wave his baton ... stand up in the audience and cry in your pompous voice, ‘I have something to say about this so-called symphony.  It is not finished until I believe it is finished!’  It’s laughable, isn’t it?  No one in his right mind would do such a patently stupid thing!  How utterly foolish.  How much more conceited is anyone who, in the most haughty moment of dementia, think that anything they believe or do can make the finished work of Almighty God ‘unfinished’ by their lack of affirmative assent.  Finished means finished!  Done means done!  Our Lord really, freely, fully and forever redeemed His elect by His substitutionary sacrifice on Calvary’s tree.  ‘By one offering He hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified’ (Hebrews 10:14).  ‘By His own blood He entered once into the Holy Place, having obtained eternal redemption for us’ (Hebrews 9:12).  ‘But now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself’ (Hebrews 9:26).

 

Pastor Tim James

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ANNOUNCEMENTS

In honor of June Birthday Celebrants, Birthday Cake will be served in the fellowship hall following this morning’s worship service.  Please join us.

We will come to The Lord’s Table during our worship service this evening, God willing.

Our 30th Annual Sovereign Grace Summer Conference will commence this Friday evening at 7:00 PM.

 

Conference Schedule

Friday Evening:

              Missionary Daniel Parks         7:00 PM

              Pastor Don Fortner                8:00 PM

Saturday Morning

              Brother John Reeves             11:00 AM

              Brother Michael Smith          12:00 Noon

Saturday Evening

              Missionary Daniel Parks         6:30 PM

              Pastor Don Fortner                7:30 PM

Sunday Morning

              Missionary Daniel Parks        10:00 AM

              Pastor Don Fortner               11:00 AM

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SUGGESTED BIBLE READINGS FOR THIS WEEK

Monday                         Wednesday                    Friday

Genesis 7                        Psalm 1                           Matthew 4

Genesis 8                        Psalm 2                           Matthew 5

Genesis 9                        Psalm 3                           Matthew 6

Acts 1                             Acts 2                              Acts 3

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FOOD FOR THOUGHT

    “WEAK faith is TRUE faith; for the Author and Finisher is the same as is the Object - OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST!

     A weak and frail hand can put food in the mouth as well as if it were a strong hand, seeing the body is not nourished by the hand at all but by the meat.  It is not faith that justifies, sanctifies, and redeems; IT IS CHRIST!”                           

   --John Rogers (1634)

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Our Assemblies

   “By God’s all-wise appointment, our assemblies are the life, the food, and the nourishment of our souls.  It is the main way whereby we publicly identify with Christ and His Gospel.  We evidence our love for Christ by our loyalty and support of one another in opposition to all false worship.  Many things will rise up in competition to the diligent attendance of our assemblies.  We must recognize and refuse to give in to anything that is opposed to what Christ commands.  The total falling away of a graceless professor always begins with this neglect, this disassociation with God’s people (Heb. 10:25). 

-- John Owen 1616-1683

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Without Truth

   “Without truth there is no regeneration; for it is by ‘the word of truth’ that we are begotten and born again (James 1:18; 1 Pet. 1:23). Without truth there is no justification; for we are justified by faith, which faith consists in crediting God's truth, and so, gives peace with God (Rom. 4:20-24; 5:1).  Without the truth there is no sanctification; for the Lord himself says, ‘Sanctify them through your truth: your word is truth.’   And without the truth there is no salvation; for ‘God has chosen us to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth’ (2 Thess. 2:13).  And as the truth is the instrumental cause of all these blessings, the divinely appointed means whereby they become manifested mercies, so truth enters into and is received by all the graces of the Spirit as they come forth into living exercise.  Thus, without the truth, there is no faith; for the work of faith is to believe the truth.  What is all the difference between faith and delusion?  That faith believes God's truth, and delusion credits Satan's lies. ‘And for this cause God shall send 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’ (2 Thess. 2:11 - 12).”

--J. C. Philpot

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    How could anyone possibly believe that God loves those He sends a strong delusion to, that they should believe a lie that they all might be damned?    (2 Thess. 2:11 - 12).                                                   Pastor

   “The sovereignty of God may be defined as the exercise of His supremacy.  Being infinitely elevated above the highest creature, He is the Most High, Lord of heaven and earth.  Subject to none, influenced by none, absolutely independent; God does as He pleases, only as He pleases, always as He pleases.  None can thwart Him, none can hinder Him.  So His own Word expressly declares:My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure’ (Isaiah 46:10); ‘He doeth according to His will in the army of heaven, and the inhabitants of the earth: and none can stay His hand(Daniel 4:35).  Divine sovereignty means that God is God in fact, as well as in name, that He is on the Throne of the universe, directing all things, working all things ‘after the counsel of His own will’ (Ephesians 1:11).

--A. W. Pink

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   “... Even those who are supposed to know something about salvation by grace have to remind themselves again and again that salvation is not by the works of the flesh, not at all, in any way!  Salvation is not by reformation; salvation does not come by decision; salvation does not come through church ordinances; salvation is not ours by church membership; SALVATION IS IN CHRIST THE LORD.  That’s where salvation is - not in man’s purpose, not in man’s plan - it’s in a person.  It’s not in a proposition, it’s not in walking an aisle, it’s not in a church ordinance.  IT’S IN CHRIST!  It’s not in a law; it’s not in the deeds of the flesh: SALVATION IS IN CHRIST.  A man does not have salvation until he comes by the power of God’s Spirit through faith to a living, personal, vital, intimate union with Christ as the Lord.  A man is not a Christian until he is inseparably joined - personally joined to Jesus Christ.  A man is not a Christian until Christ becomes his life.  ...  CHRIST IN YOU, THAT’S THE HOPE OF GLORY.”

Pastor Henry Mahan

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   “God’s love for us in Christ; God’s righteousness fulfilled for us in Christ; God’s acceptance of us in Christ IS ALL OUR SALVATION -- not our works, feelings, nor our righteousness.  ‘My God, when I approach Thy throne and all Thy glory see, this is my stay and this alone, that Jesus died for me’.”

Pastor Henry Mahan