Gospel—R. Thonney
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Chapter One.
In verse 18.
Isaiah 118.
Come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord.
Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.
Though they be red like Crimson, they shall be as wool.
I'm going to read that again.
Come now.
And let us reason together, saith the Lord.
Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.
Though they be red like Crimson, they shall be as wool.
One of the most wonderful words in the Gospel is this first word of verse 18.
Come. It's a wonderful word, and it means that God wants to bless.
And he's calling for sinners to come to him.
To receive that blessing.
I really desire this evening that you open your heart's door and let his voice penetrate into your heart tonight.
I really am concerned because I feel that there are many perhaps here this evening.
Who know all about the gospel, they know all about Jesus, but they have never.
Come at an interesting experience this last time.
In Bolivia we were at the conference in Montero.
At the beginning of this month.
And a boy who is now a young man was present. He is now married and has two little children. But he was raised in that meeting. And during those years when we lived in that area of Bolivia, almost 10 years, we lived there in Montero area. He heard the gospel. And while we lived there, he actually was baptized and was breaking bread at the Lord's Table.
But after the last evening of the conference there in Montero, he asked me.
To come over, have a visit with he and his wife in the place where he was staying.
At his father's house. So we had a visit and he told me, I want you to know sincerely that even though I was breaking bread, I was doing it all under the influence of what people told me. I don't think I was ever truly saved, and I want to be saved now, he said to me.
And so we talked for a good while, reading some of the scriptures, answering some of his questions.
And then finally he said to me.
Well, brother, he said.
I hope next time you come, you'll find me saved.
I said, what is hindering you from doing it right now?
And he just put his head down and didn't say anything.
I said before I go because it's late at night, before I go, I'm going to bow my knees here and I'm going to ask God to work in your heart that you would do it now.
And if you really want to do it now, you'll have a moment at the end. I'm not going to get right up off my knees.
We bowed our knees there, myself, the young man and his wife, and I prayed. After I prayed, I just waited silently. And then he began to pray, and he asked the Lord to save him and then his wife after him. It was a real joy to me. But what really hit me strong was how many.
Who are brought up in Christian homes, who were brought up sitting in the meetings, each and every meeting. They're there. They know their verses for Sunday school. They know the answers when you ask them, but there's no living relationship between them and the Lord Jesus Christ. They have never simply.
00:05:19
Obeyed. What this verse says. Come now.
And let us reason together, dear young boy and girl.
And young person here, and maybe older person too, who is baptized and perhaps at the Lord's Table.
I want to challenge you in the presence of a God who knows every single detail of your life.
And from whom you cannot hide, for all things are naked and open.
Before the eyes of him with whom we have to do. I want to challenge you. How is it between your soul and God? Have you come? Have you come to Jesus? That's just exactly what he says. Come. How do you come to Jesus? How do you do it? I still remember in the Sunday school back home where I was raised when I was a boy.
That the size of this boy sitting down here in the front seat.
Why, the verse that we had to learn that Sunday was Matthew 18. Matthew 1128 Come unto me, all ye that labor in our heavy laden, and I will give you rest. There is one of the brothers standing up in front and asking the kids to recite their verses. And they went around the circle. And then finally it came to his little grandson, and the little grandson got off his chair and.
He didn't remember exactly what the verse was.
End So his grandfather had to help him, and so his grandfather says.
Coming to me.
And the little boy, a little bit confused, he didn't exactly remember his grandfather talking to him that way before, and he just hesitated. And finally his grandfather had to repeat it again. Coming to me. And the little boy, instead of repeating it, ran right across the room to his grandpa.
That's just exactly what it means.
Come, But how do you come to Jesus?
If Jesus is in heaven, how do you come to him? Oh, I tell you, it isn't a matter of the feet. It isn't a matter of the hands. It's just a matter of the heart. Open that heart to Jesus. Have you ever seen a little baby, a helpless little baby in its crib? And his mother stands over the crib and the mother says, come, You think that baby can get up and come to his mother? No, the mother well knows he can't do that.
But off times the little arms will go right out and then the mother picks it up. That's all the coming that's necessary to do for you.
Right where you are sitting in your seats. I want to ask you to open up that heart to Jesus tonight.
Accept them as your savior. That is what it means to come.
Don't resist any longer. Come now.
Oh, it's a joy to me to see that young man come to Jesus that night. He didn't wait any longer. He came and he came now.
Dear young person, this is the voice of God speaking to you. Come now, don't delay. If the president of the United States, to put an example, would call you personally on the phone and say I want to see you in the White House, come right away.
I think each and everyone of us would consider it a great enough privilege that we would put away our schoolwork, we would put away.
Our jobs for the moment and go to Washington, DC to interview the President of the United States.
But I'm telling you tonight, friends, that we're not talking about the president of the United States. We're talking about the God of the universe.
And he's saying come now. And he means just that. Come.
Have you come to Jesus? I really fear that there's some who haven't let the voice of Jesus penetrate their hearts yet. And if there are those here tonight, I don't know who you are because I cannot see the inside. The Lord Jesus is looking at you, and He can see just exactly which ones of you it is. You know yourself too.
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Who haven't really come to Jesus yet.
This voice is for you.
Come now.
What is he saying here? Come now and let us reason together.
He wants to talk to you about something. He wants to talk to you about a serious matter.
A matter that you cannot avoid. It's the question of your sins.
You have sinned before God, You say, oh, I haven't ever done that much. That's bad.
Yeah, you may not have done a lot whatever other people are doing in the world, but still the Word of God says there is no difference. For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Like it or not, that's God's testimony. All have sinned and come short of the glory of God, and God wants to reason together with you about this matter of your sins. Your sins are scarlet before Him.
He sees him from afar. He knows every detail of your life.
Every detail of those sins that you have committed, every word that you have spoken is written in His book. Every act that you have done, every thought that you have entertained in your mind is written by the finger of God in that book. It's scarlet in front of Him. It's so brazenly read that he cannot forget it. You must.
Deal with the question of your sins.
You cannot avoid it. But what is it that He says about these sins of yours? Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. How in the world can this be something that is scarlet before the eye of God be wiped away, so that the slate is circling, that it is as white as snow?
How can it be? Oh my friend, I want to tell you again this evening, even though I do not believe.
There's anyone here who has not heard the story before. I want to tell you of the way God can cleanse in God had a son, and he sent that son from heaven. The Lord Jesus came into this world through the same channel that you and I have come into this world. The Lord Jesus was born in Bethlehem by a virgin, the Virgin Mary. He had no human father.
Because God was his Father, He was born miraculously through the power of the Holy Spirit.
And came into this world a little baby.
And he grew up. He was the same size you were at one time. He grew up to be an adult.
And every way he went through this world without sin, perfect he was. There was no sin in him. He could not sin because he was the holy Son of God.
You and I through our fathers have received a sinful nature, but the Lord Jesus didn't have that. He was the holy, spotless Son of God, and through all his life here as the sent one of God, He showed the love of God on every side. But at the end of his life he was taken.
By those religious people, the Pharisees and scribes, and delivered to 1St the high priest to condemned him, and then Pontius Pilate the Roman governor and taken out.
Sight of Jerusalem and nailed. Actually nailed to a cross.
They lifted up that cross. They left the blessed Son of God.
Hang there for six hours he hung there. The first three hours. He suffered at the hands of men. All the insults that their hearts could think about, they heaped on the blessed Son of God.
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And the last three hours from 12:00 noon to 3:00 in the afternoon.
He suffered there for our sins at the hand.
Of a holy God, God cannot overlook sin. His holy nature demands that every sin that has ever been committed committed in this world receive its full judgment from his hand, and every sin will receive its full judgment. But when Jesus hung on that cross, it says in the in a verse in the 53rd of this same book.
It says he was wounded for our transgressions.
He was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. I'm the guilty one, Jesus, the holy Son of God. My sins were laid on him. He suffered the penalty of my sins because God, if he's going to forgive me as a.
As a Sinner, as a guilty Sinner, he must have a righteous basis for doing it. And when Jesus paid the price, God now has that righteous basis for forgiving my sins. And he's done it because I've accepted him as my own Savior.
After Jesus died at 3:00 approximately in the afternoon.
The Scripture tells us in John's Gospel that a soldier came up that hill.
He was commissioned to dispatch those three that had been crucified there.
On that hill of Calvary, and he went up to the first malefactor that was there on one side of Jesus and broke his legs and he died. He went over to the other side to the other malefactor that was crucified of Jesus and broke his legs. And when he came to Jesus, the cross in the middle, Jesus had already given up his life and he took his spear just to make sure that Jesus was dead and thrust it into his side.
And out of his side came blood and water, Awful, awful cost that God himself paid, that you could enjoy the forgiveness of sins. Jesus, look at him tonight, friend, in your mind's eye. Look at him hanging there on that cross, dead, the Son of God dead, and that soldier plunging his spear into his side.
And out flowing blood and water, the scripture tells us.
The blood of Jesus Christ, God's Son.
Cleanses us from all sin. Oh a tremendous news. This is the only way.
That you and I can become can be made white as snow.
Oh friend, tonight, perhaps you feel your guilt, perhaps you feel that you are stained in the sight of God with those sins that you've committed.
I pray God that you will feel it.
Because if you turn to Jesus.
In true repentance He will wish you whiter than snow with His precious blood. Oh, what a wonderful invitation this is, and that it's God Himself who's inviting you. He is, It is that is saying, Come now and let us reason together. Now is the time.
That he wants to reason. Later on there will be no more reasoning.
There will be judgment for sin, for those sins of yours must be dealt with one way or another through the cross of Jesus. They can be dealt with for your eternal salvation, but if you refuse to know the Savior in this way, then God.
Will deal with your sins in a future day in awful awful.
Unremitting judgment.
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I ask you seriously to let the voice of Jesus penetrate your heart tonight. Come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow. Though they be red like Crimson, they shall be as wool. I have to go over now to the 55th chapter of Isaiah.
Where we get another invitation from God Himself.
Another invitation using that wonderful word COM.
Isaiah 55 verse one.
Ho everyone that thirsteth.
Come into the waters, and he that hath no money, come ye bye and eat ye. Come by wine and milk, without money and without price. Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which satisfieth not? Hearken diligently and to me, and eat ye that which is good.
And let your soul delight itself, in fact.
Here's a call of God to the thirsty soul, and if you do not know Jesus, in the depths of your heart you are a thirsty soul. There is only one who can satisfy the thirsty soul.
It's Jesus.
Dear young person here tonight, I want to ask you to open that heart and let him satisfy you. The enemy has successfully propagated a lie that when you come to Jesus, you have to deprive yourself of a whole lot of things that we could really make you happy. Let me tell you, that's one of the biggest lies that Satan has ever perpetrated. Don't believe it, don't believe it.
Sometimes people say that to me.
You poor Christians, you don't have any fun at all.
You have to stay away from the movies. You can't do this and you can't do that. We can do anything we like.
I say to them when they talk that way to me, I say look, friend.
You know the truth of the matter. When I came to Jesus, He so completely satisfied this heart of mine.
That really and truly are not interested in those places you're talking about.
I'm not interested. He's satisfied me, and that's exactly what he's saying here. Come.
To the waters, and he that hath no money. It's not a question.