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Grace Baptist Church of Danville

March 18, 2018

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When I think of the sin and fall of our race in Adam, I am compelled to say, “O blessed fall! Had it not been for our fall in Adam, we could never have known redemption and grace in and by our Lord Jesus Christ!”

Daily Readings for the Week of March 18-25, 2018

Sunday Judges 10-12 Thursday Judges 21-Ruth 3

Monday Judges 13-15 Friday Ruth 4-1 Samuel 2

Tuesday Judges 16-18 Saturday 1 Samuel 3-6

Wednesday Judges 19-20 Sunday 1 Samuel 7-9

Happy Birthday! Bobbie Estes-24^th

Nursery Duty This Week

Shante’ Birchum (AM) — Debbie Bartley (PM) Tuesday: Diane Campbell

“Ye Must be Born Again” — Don Fortner

(Tune: #405 — My Soul, Be on Thy Guard —SM)

1. Poor sons of Adam’s race,

Fallen and dead in sin,

Your guilt you never can erase. —

“Ye must be born again.”

2. Your will is bound in sin;

Your legal hopes are vain;

Your righteousnesses all unclean! —

“Ye must be born again.”

3. You never can do good;

You cannot cease from sin;

You cannot do the will of God. —

“Ye must be born again.”

4. Would you escape from hell,

Pardon and peace obtain;

Would you with God in heaven dwell? —

“Ye must be born again.”

5. The heaven-born alone,

Shall with Christ Jesus reign;

If you would join us round His throne, —

“Ye must be born again!”

“A man cannot be thoroughly humbled till he realizes that his salvation is utterly beyond his own powers, counsels, efforts, will, and works, and depends absolutely on the will, counsel, pleasure, and work of another God alone.” — Martin Luther

“Every time I go out to preach, I have two determinations. I am determined that it is every man’s responsibility to give himself entirely to Christ, and I am determined that if no one else does, I will give myself to the Lord.” — Jonathan Edwards

Prevenient Grace and the Salt of the Earth

Matthew 5:13

In God’s prevenient grace his elect remnant are “the salt of the earth.” His elect remnant is the blessing in Adam’s fallen race for which reprobate sinners are temporarily preserved in life (2 Peter 3:9).

A Vine Preserved

Though in ourselves we were but worthless, dead, dried vines, fit only to be cut down and cast into the fire, the God of Glory, the God of all grace saw something else in us, something he alone could produce. He says, concerning a world lost in sin, “Destroy it not; for a blessing is in it” (Isaiah 65:8).

The picture Isaiah gives is of a gardener about to cut down a dried up vine or prune away some of its unfruitful branches. The owner of the vineyard passes by and notices a cluster of new grapes on it. When he does, he cries out to the vine dresser, “Destroy it not; for a blessing is in it!” It looked worthless. It appeared to be needlessly occupying space. Ugly and dried up, the gardener would have cut it down, and would have thought that was the only thing to be done with it. Nothing in the field is uglier than a dried up vine. But the owner saw a blessing in that which appeared to be worthless.

The Parallel

The Holy Spirit gives us the parallel. — “So will I do for my servants’ sakes, that I may not destroy them all.” Both the chosen and the reprobate are referred to as “my servants” because all men, indeed all things are the servants of our God (Proverbs 16:4).

God’s elect in this world are the blessing hidden among the nations of the world for which He preserves them. It is written, “The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

God’s Longsuffering

The only reason God does not destroy this world right now is the fact that there is yet a remnant according to the election of grace who must be saved. Everything God does in this world is for the elect’s sake. Every benefit of providential mercy that reprobate men enjoy in time is because there lives among them God’s elect, of whom he says, “Destroy it not; for a blessing is in it.” This is not my opinion. This is what God says. — “So will I do for my servants’ sakes.”

Once Noah (the blessing) was safely in the ark, God destroyed the rest of the world. Once Lot (the blessing) was delivered unto Zoar, God destroyed Sodom. Joshua and Caleb (the blessings) entered into the land of promise, though all those who came out of Egypt with them perished under the wrath of God. The rest of the world exists and is used by God for his elect, the blessing in it (Isaiah 43:1-6). In a word, as God the Holy Ghost tells us in 2^nd Peter 3:15, the longsuffering of God with the world is the salvation of his elect.

“Preserved in Jesus Christ”

Jude 1:1

Robert Hawker

“Who shall calculate or write down in the history of one child of God, much less the whole Church, the wonders of this preserving grace, in the ten thousand times ten thousand instances of it? Preserved in Jesus Christ, before called to Jesus Christ. Preserved in all the after stages of life, when called by grace, until grace is finished in glory. The church in every individual member, may, and indeed ought, daily to ponder the melting subject; but we must enter eternity, and look back over the everlasting hills through all the path the Lord hath brought us on our way; before that we shall have a becoming sense, and apprehension, of the unspeakable blessings, contained in these four words, “preserved in Jesus Christ.”

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Prevenient Grace — Preparatory Grace

“Thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness.” (Psalm 21:3)

The Lord God precedes the entrance of Christ into the hearts of chosen, redeemed sinners with unknown, secret works of goodness. Prevenient grace is preparatory grace. It is that grace that prepares the chosen, redeemed sinner to receive God’s saving grace. By prevenient grace, and then by the inward, secret work of God the Holy Spirit in the heart, God makes the heart of his chosen good soil to receive the Word sown (Matthew 13:3-9).

Sweet, indescribably sweet is that work of God’s providence and grace that precedes his grace, prepares the way for his grace, and brings his grace! Just ask any who have experienced it. How Bartimaeus must rejoice in his God-sent blindness that put him in the Savior’s path, who brought seeing to his eyes and light to his soul! That woman with an issue of blood for twelve long, miserable years today gives glory and praise to the God of all grace who bowed her body that he might bow her heart. I cannot begin to imagine the praises of that once wild, Gadarene demoniac who now walks the streets of the City of God telling how thankful he is that he once walked in darkness among the dead, possessed of devils, that he might know the liberty of light, and righteousness, and grace in Christ. I can almost see that poor woman taken in adultery in Glory Land. How her face must beam with gratitude, joy, love, and praise, as she worships the God of all grace who brought her to the Savior by her being taken in adultery! See, yonder, the dying thief today with Christ in Paradise! How he must be overwhelmed with the goodness of God that preceded the grace he experienced when he was crucified with his Redeemer on Calvary’s hill! It was the goodness of God in prevenient grace coming before that brought him to be judged, condemned, and crucified, that he might have the Lord Jesus Christ revealed in him as they hung together upon Calvary!

The Grace Bulletin

March 18, 2018

Grace Baptist Church of Danville

2734 Old Stanford Road-Danville, Kentucky 40422-9438

Telephone (859) 576-3400 — E-Mail don@donfortner.com

Donald S. Fortner, Pastor

Schedule of Regular Services

Sunday

10:00 A.M. Bible Classes

10:30 A.M. Morning Worship Service

6:30 P.M. Evening Worship Service

Tuesday