What Crossroad Should I Take?

Introduction

Indeed, what a beautiful thought. I’m happy in my soul that his grace reaches me. If in fact you’re not washed in the blood of Jesus Christ and have that assurance of eternal life by the grace of God through faith. And I hope this hour will be the hour in which you’ll make up your mind to change your way of life, to give your heart to the Lord to obey him and become a child of God. This is the day the Lord has made, and what a wonderful privilege to gather together in the assembly with others of like precious faith to worship him and to honor him as our Lord. We’re thankful for visitors. I notice there are several in the audience. Perhaps there are some from out of town, and we certainly wish you safe journeys.

Those maybe from this area, we hope that you’ll come again and again, help us get to know you and be involved with the work and the worship of the Lord in this place. Prominent in the news this week, no doubt you have heard about the death of a famous baseball player, Yogi Berra. You don’t have to know anything about baseball to have known something about Yogi Berra. Perhaps you saw him in some commercials, or perhaps you are aware that he was one of the greats of the Yankees back in the 50s and the 60s, and was uh indeed the most valuable player on more than one year. In fact, what a what a great uh Yankee that he was. But probably he’s remembered more by at least modern times, people who may not have known his baseball career, or some of the sayings.

It’s Yogi Barra who said, uh, it ain’t over till it’s over. And people understood really what he meant by that. Or he said, you know, nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded. Or when you come to a fork in the road, take it. It’s this last one that I want you to think about for a moment because I’m afraid that’s exactly what many people do. Come to a fork in the road and they take it in the sense whatever comes easiest. The road that is the easiest to take. Maybe take it without forethought. Take it without any investigation of where it will lead. There are many in our generation of time who do what pleases them for momentary pleasure without any forethought of what the road will lead to.

Indeed, from that I want to raise this as a question for our lesson. Which crossroads should I take? Life is full of forks in the road. In fact, there’s an excellent article in our bulletin today. I hope that you’ll read. That really, from Brother Gary Henry, an article that says that, you know, life is made up of choices, but where we reach or the destiny we reach is not determined by our circumstances, but by the choices that we make. We might want to blame our circumstances as the reason where we are in our lives. We all seek happiness, and maybe we haven’t found that kind of deep sense of understanding and happiness that no matter what comes our way, we have a sense of joy. As the Apostle Peter spoke about a sense of joy that cannot be put into words.

Do you have that sense of what you’re looking forward to? Because you’ve taken the kind of road that leads to the pleasing of God and the promise of life everlasting. Oh, there are all of us who want that kind of happiness, and many human beings on that quest have sought out various ways. You know, you know. There are those who think I can be happy if I could just be wealthy. And that’s been their goal in life. And maybe some have gotten wealthy, only to find out that it was such that really brought problems with it, and in fact didn’t really satisfy that inner longing and hunger of the soul. There are others who thought, well, you know, if if I could, if I could just uh maybe do something that would help me pass by the problems of life, and there are those who thought, well, alcohol or drugs would help them through.

1. Blessed Is the Man Whose Delight Is the Law

There are those who thought sexual arrangements or relationships or buying bigger houses or driving nicer cars, all to find out that whatever pleasures they’re reaching, we’re only temporary. How do we really know the way to go? Which crossroad should I take? If you have your Bible, I’d like for you to open with me to the book of Psalms. In the very first Psalm, we have inspiration from the Lord, really, an answer to the question, which crossroad should I take? Where the psalmist begins by saying, Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law, he meditates day and night.

He should be like a tree planted by the rivers of water that brings forth its fruit in its season, whose leaves also shall not wither, and whatever he does shall prosper. When you look at this psalm to start off with, he’s talking about the man who really is blessed. But notice while he talks about this man who finds really success, you might say in life. He starts off by saying, Don’t go this direction. You were to ask me which way to go to Tampa. You’re visiting an audience today. I’d tell you that, well, when you get out of here and you go and you finally come to I4. Don’t go I4 east. That’ll take you to Daytona. Go I4 West if you want to go to Tampa.

It’s sort of like you want to be successful in arriving at your destination. Don’t go this way. The psalmist, the sweet singer of Israel, said, Don’t walk in the counsel of the ungodly. Don’t stand in the path of sinners. Don’t sit in the seat of the scornful. You know, there’s a progression in this. First of all, he he walks in the counsel. He begins to listen to. He begins to hear the ungodly who really set forth some tempting things and you know, come join us in this. Why would anybody ever get involved with the drug? That really can ruin his life. I say, well, first of all, he’s listened to others who said, you know, this will expand your mind. This will bring you whatever happiness he might bring at that moment at the time or talk about.

Don’t listen to them. In fact, don’t even stand in the path. Guard yourself against going a little farther. Don’t see how close you can get to that which is evil without falling in. Indeed, guard your heart to stay away from it. But finally, don’t sit in the seat of the scornful. Instead, what is your delight? The psalmist said his delight is in the law of the Lord. The law of the Lord, the reading of God’s word and the meditation of God’s word is not a burden. It’s not a chore. I hope you didn’t come here today, for example, because you just felt like you had to. You were compelled, and you came with a sense of resistance because, you know, it’s Sunday morning and I need to go.

But rather that there was a sense of joy. I’ve come to praise the Lord. I’ve come to worship him. I’ve curned to grow in the knowledge of his word and to be lifted up by it. Have delight in it. In fact, I’ll think about it. I’ll meditate on them. And he said, This is the kind of man who shall be like a tree. A tree planted by the rivers of water, that brings forth its fruit in its season. Its leaves shall not wither. Whatever he does shall prosper. As the river indeed waters the tree, and it continues to grow. No matter what storms may come in life, because they will. There are trials that all of us face so long as we walk in the flesh.

There’ll be trials sometimes of sickness. There’ll be trials sometimes of a dear loved one who’s departed and died. There may be financial problems. There may be you got fired from a job. Sometimes even just because you are a Christian or trying to do right. Oh, there will be trials, all right. But the kind of man or woman whose delight is in the law of the Lord, who meditates upon his word, is that kind of tree that maybe even time of storm where the tree may be bent and the leaves indeed may look like they’re going to branches may break. But because it has a strong foundation, it comes right back up. His delight is in the law of the Lord. But notice the rest of the Psalm.

The scripture in verses 4 through 6 says, The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous. But the Lord knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish. The chaff. The chaff is like as you take the wheat and you take the seed and you rub it in your hand, and what happens, the part of that dry, useless part that blows away. Completely worthless. That’s what the ungodly are like. Those who do not come to God, those who don’t come to the Word of God, they are like that chaff that just is blown away with a worthless or useless kind of a life.

When you face the end of time, when you face your own death, or when you face the judgment of the Lord, what kind of choice will you have made? What kind of crossroads have you taken in your life? Now I know there are them who say, well, okay, the psalmist says that, and that’s that’s written long, long time ago. But you know the Bible, really. You can’t depend upon the Bible. It’s just a book that really is by the thinking of man. It’s kind of like a good philosophical book. It’s like a good book for psychology. Oh, it may make you feel, and so on goes the kind of reasoning that wants to degrade and cause disbelief. How many are there who say the Bible is just a book of myths, written by man, thought of by man.

2. Man Would Not Have Written It If He Could Have

I say people who make that kind of argument prove their ignorance of the Bible itself. Let me quickly just say to you that when you think about the Bible, why believe it? First of all, I would say to this, and I usually with people who really are challenged by whether it’s the word of God, simply say, you know, really, if you look at the Bible, man would not have written it if he could have. Man could not have written it if he would have. Those two statements, just think about them for a moment. And see if they do not fit the fact. There’s a reason to believe that the Bible is the source, that our delight ought to be in the word of God. In fact, it is the book that guides us in the right direction.

When we come to the fork in the road, what choice should I make? Turn to the Word of God. Why? Well, first of all, it is the Word that man would not have written if he could have. I say to you, man wouldn’t have written it because. It is a book that is too narrow about God to start with. It is a book that says there is only one God. That is not really like the world through the years. Men have worshipped different gods, the sun god, the moon God, and even in prominent the world today, worshiping Allah. Allah is not the one God of heaven. Allah does not believe that Jesus is the Son of God, crucified and raised the third day. He is not the same as the Bible speaks of Jehovah as the Lord God.

Before him, none other God existed, nor should there be one after him. It’s too narrow the Bible is about God. It’s too narrow about morality. You think today, you think our society would have written the Bible that condemns homosexuality? You think the Bible that we understand was written by man today, would man write about how illicit sexual relationships described as fornication? That marriage is honorable in all, but the bed is undefiled in marriage. But whoremongers and idolaters, God will judge or condemn. It’s too narrow, I say to you, about morality for that matter. Man would not have written it if he could have. But frankly, the reason I believe the Bible to be the word of God is because man could not have written it if he would have.

3. Man Could Not Have Written It If He Would Have

Man wouldn’t have written it. He couldn’t have written it. The fact is, you look at the Bible and his makeup, just quickly you think about it. Forty men over a period of about 1,600 years who spoke different languages. You start with the first five books believed to have been written by Moses 1,500 years before the cross. And the book of Revelation, about 95 or 100 years, you may say, after the cross. Sixteen hundred years. And altogether, these men who didn’t speak the same language even, the Old Testament basically written in Hebrew, the New Testament basically written in Greek. And these men who had different backgrounds. From a fisherman like Peter, not an educated man. But on the other hand, there may have been Luke, who himself was a doctor.

Educated. You find those who have different backgrounds, even Isaiah and Amos, who were about the same period of time, contemporary. Isaiah was a prophet who lived, you might say, among the royalty. He was a nephew of one of the kings. In fact, Amos, on the other hand, was simply a shepherd out in the field. And yet they spoke the word of God. They did not contradict. In fact, they agreed with each other. Men who from different backgrounds spoke a book made up of 66 individual books by 40 different men. How could it be that it’s not filled with contradiction? The fact is it speaks one united message. I said you man couldn’t have done that if he tried. But not only that, it’s fulfilled with prophecy.

One of the strongest proofs that the Bible really is from the Word of God is the fact that there were messages spoken hundreds of years before they occurred. Such a prophecy, for example, even the birth of Jesus Christ. In Micah chapter 5 and in verse 2, the prophet spoke how that he would be born in Bethlehem of Ephrata. I said, You that’s that’s almost unthought of. How could it be that over 700 years before it occurred, that this prophet could say, here’s where he will be born. When you come to the New Testament, you come to the fact that Joseph and Mary lived north of Bethlehem, at least some 60 miles and perhaps even a little farther, depending on how they traveled. And that Mary came down in her ninth month.

She was due for childbirth. For we read the story in Matthew chapter 2, how that she gave birth to Jesus in Bethlehem. The fact is, why did they even come to Bethlehem? I know more, usually mothers wouldn’t want to travel that period of time, certainly not in a day that Mary traveled because it had to be either by foot or maybe riding the donkey or a car. It wasn’t on a super highway with air conditioned car. Why did they come? Well, the reason they came is because Caesar Augustus, the Roman emperor who ruled over the world and over Judea, would also want there to be a registration or a census taking. It’s amazing when you think about, even as Luke chapter 1 and 2 describes that period of time where when Jesus was born, they were following the edict.

They had to go to the place of their family. Bethlehem was the family of David. And both Joseph and Mary and their heritage had to come back to that particular place at that point in time. The time of Caesar’s edict, though, probably was some three to four years before the birth of Christ. It wasn’t just that year and that now they’re obeying Caesar. The Jews resisted the Romans. They didn’t want to obey the Romans. They resisted them at every hand. Herod, the king of the Jews of the time, had no doubt delayed. History records that he had delayed following the edict. Yeah, he was going to do it, but he stalled and stalled until finally he could convince the Jews that they would indeed obey the edict of this Roman Caesar.

It may have been some three to four years or five years after the edict of Caesar was given. But it just so happened at the very time that they now obey. And they make this tribal come down to Bethlehem to obey really a Roman Caesar’s edict for a registration. But it fulfilled a prophecy some 700 years prior. How could it be except God could know before they spring forth, I tell you then. God, in giving prophecy, made certain that man would know it had to come not from the mind of Micah, but from the mind of God himself. Or even as the psalmist spoke about his crucifixion, as in Psalm 22, verses 16 through 18, that they drove nails through his hands. They pierced his hands and his feet.

And the fact that they also would even cast lots for his clothing. We can read the story in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and recognize that all that had to do with the crucifixion, with the birth, the life and the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ had been and was foretold. I say to you, man could not have written it if he would have. But even more than that, it claims to be the word of God. It says that it is. In fact, in 1 Corinthians chapter 2, where there the apostle writes, who knoweth the mind of a man, save the spirit of man that’s within him. Just like you cannot read the mind of the person sitting next to you. You know that you’re not a mind reader, so to speak, or someone across the building from you.

And if you cannot read the mind of someone else, who would you think we can read the mind of God? But there are those today who would say, Well, I just think God likes this. They go on the basis of what pleases me. Surely if I like it, I think God would like it. Wrong, wrong kind of thinking. The Bible came from the mind of God. It was given, as 1 Corinthians 2 says, that we might know the mind of God. Just as no man can know the mind of another man, even so no man can know the mind of God except the Spirit of God. And Paul said, We’ve received the Spirit, not the Spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things given to us freely of God.

And he said, These are the things we’ve written, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teacheth. I believe it when you take the Bible, the Word of God, you recognize it to be simply that. The Word of God Almighty, man couldn’t have written it if he wanted to. But while there may be some who say, Well, you know, it’s it’s a book that is good. Well, I’ll tell you, if you believe it’s good, then accept it as truth. Because if it is a book of lies, and that’s the way sometimes people say, Well, I believe the Bible’s a good book, but it’s really full of it’s really from man. But that would make it a book of lies. The Bible itself says it is from God.

In fact, in 1 Timothy 3, 16 and 17, all scripture is given by inspiration of God. Profitable for doctrine, reproof, correction, instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete or perfect, completely or thoroughly furnished, equipped for every good work. Now that’s quite a statement. If that’s not true, then the Bible is a book of lies. If that’s not so, and it claims to be not only these passages but others, that it is from the mind of God, and if that’s a lie, you can’t say it’s a good book. Which way is it? I believe the Bible is indeed to be trusted. It is the kind of book that the man is blessed who walks not in the council of the ungodly, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful.

4. God’s Word Is Light and Food

His delight is in the law of the Lord. And he’s like that tree planted by the river, that he’ll prosper wherever he goes. The Bible, because it is from God who created the heavens and the earth. In his image, we indeed are created. And if indeed God was able to make us, don’t you believe that he’s able to provide for us the wisdom of how to live this life? The Bible gives us the guide of how to live this life to the fullest. Not only how to go to heaven, but how to live even now. In fact, when you take a look at the Bible, think about how many times it describes its greatness for us. What it provides for us. There’s several different illustrations, I think, that are unique when you stop and think about them.

For example, if it’s a book that is equipped for every good work, it is described as light. In Psalm 119, verse 105 Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Think about it. Have you ever been in darkness? A few years ago I was preaching in Beckley, West Virginia, and discovered through that week’s time that there was a former coal mine, dug down with workers one inch or foot at a time. And it now no longer is an active mine. In fact, they’ve made it sort of like a museum. And so as a tourist, I took the trip. And as we go down further and further, and we got to a point where the guide was saying, Well, we’re about two miles underneath the very center of Beckley, West Virginia.

And along the way he had pointed out different things about coal mining. But at that point in time, he began talking about the kind of light. As a miner goes down and he works step by step, foot by foot, and he was saying, you know, in times past, before we had batteries, they used oil lamp, and of course there would be a way they’d work this up down. And then to sort of illustrate the need and importance of light, he cut off all the lights we had there. I suppose now they were probably electric at that point of time. But you know, it was so startling to me how dark it was. I’d literally put my face, my hand up to my face, and I could not see.

I did not know which direction to go. I could not have gotten out of that mind by knowing which way to go. That illustrates what sin is like. The area of the devil is described as darkness. In 1 John 1, the Bible speaks about God is light in him, is no darkness at all. In verse 7, if we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another. And the blood of Jesus Christ, his son cleanseth us from all sin. You want to know the answers to how to live life to the fullest? Don’t go to the pages of the manual of Satan. Don’t just walk in darkness where you can’t see which way to go. Light. The Bible is light.

It is that which helps guide us. I said you try this. Take the book of Proverbs. You’d be surprised if you were to read one chapter every day just from the book of Proverbs and stop and meditate. What is it really saying? It is amazing. It is amazing how relevant. A book written really nearly 3,000 years ago. And man really finds guidance really because it’s inspired of the Lord, number one. But attitudes.

If you want to know how to really how really to live life with a sense of well-being, try the light. It comes from God’s word. But more than ever, if you want to know how to prepare for death and for judgment, the world yet to come. Come to the light. Don’t walk in darkness, groping for which way to go. That’s the world. That’s the people who reject the wisdom from God’s Word. Not only, though, is the Bible described as light, it is also described as food. Now I know it’s getting near noontime. And when you leave the building here, maybe you’re already hungry. But if you’re not hungry now, it won’t be long, you want to go get something to eat. And that’s good. We know food is energy for our bodies.

It’s necessary, isn’t it? To life. What if you didn’t have any more until next Sunday at this same hour? Boy, by then you’d be struggling. You’d be so weak and so hungry. You’d think, man, I just can’t go without food. Do you know how sometimes there are people who deal with God’s word that way? Oh, they come to a service like this on Sunday and then they wait a whole week before they try it again. That’s not the way. If you really want to be like that tree planted by the river of water, take the word of God. The Bible speaks about how maybe at first we might be like babes in Christ. An illustration, the physical to the spiritual. First Peter 2 and verses 2 and 3, as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word that you may grow thereby.

5. God’s Word Cleanses and Is a Mirror

If indeed you have tasted that the Lord is gracious. Read your Bible. Think about the words. Meditate. Your desire is the word of God and to meditate on it day and night. Give the food for your spiritual body, just as you do for your physical body. Think about the value of God’s word. But not only is it like light or like food, it’s also like a detergent. You mean it? You mean we need to be clean? Yeah. We need to be clean as well. You mothers probably, if you had a little boy out playing in the dirt, you call him in for dinner, you tell him first of all, do what? Go wash your hands. And many are they who’ve little boys have come and said, Yeah, I washed, and you took a look and you notice there was no soap used.

You send them back a second time. There’s a reason for the detergent or for the cleansing power, the soap. And so it is with God’s word. It is that source by which we may be made clean. In John 15 and 3, Jesus said, You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. In chapter 5 of Ephesians, in verses 25 and 26, where it speaks about how the Lord gave himself for the church that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word. The word of God teaches us how to be cleansed. That is sin, washed away. In fact, in Revelation chapter 1 and verse 5, that’s the very language in introducing the book of Revelation, which speaks about Jesus Christ, who he is, that we can be washed from our sins in his blood.

Isn’t that an interesting way of putting it? We’re washed by the blood of Christ, who gave himself that we might have forgiveness of sins.

Because he gave his life. Death was the penalty for sin. And so death, the penalty of sin, is paid. Washed from our sins in his blood. In Acts chapter 22. You remember where the apostle Paul, who then was known as simply as Saul of Tarsus, had been persecuting the Lord’s church before he saw the vision of the Lord. And he went into the city of Damascus and there prayed three days and nights, fasted and prayed. And when Ananias came to him in Saul’s own words, Acts 22, now as an apostle recurring re recounting that event, he said, Ananias told him, Now why tarest thou? Arise and be baptized and wash away your sins, calling on the name of the Lord. I said to you that the Bible, the Word of God, in obedience to it, as an act of faith, understanding who God is, understanding who Jesus is, the Son of God, how that he died and was raised for you and for me.

What we do upon belief, repenting of our sins, we confess our faith in him and are immersed, baptized, washed away our sins, cleansed by the word of God, in the sense of obeying the instructions that God has delivered to us. But not only is the Bible, the Word of God described as light and as food, as a cleansing agent, it’s also described as a mirror. You think about it. I know that every person in this audience, I know something you did this morning. Am I right? You looked into a mirror. Every one of us did that. I mean, when we get to be adults, you want to make sure your hair is parted, right? I don’t have any problem with that anymore. But you you want to make sure that your lipstick is on straight and you’ve got everything in order.

Even the men will go and do that. And you take a look, maybe when you’re ties straight or whatever. What’s the mirror for? It gives you a way of examining yourself. You ever ask yourself, I wonder how God sees me. I know how I’m thinking. I wonder how God thinks about me. I wonder how I’m looking before Him. The Bible is really the mirror of God’s word. Listen to it in James chapter one. Be doers of the word, not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he’s like a man observing his natural face in a mirror. For he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. Have you ever done that?

Maybe you notice it early in the morning, you get up and and and you’ve noticed that, well, maybe I’ve got a little smudge right here, and for some whatever reason, got maybe the telephone ranger or whatever it was, and you turned away and you didn’t take care of it. And sure enough, you didn’t go back to the mirror, you forgot all about it. Maybe you get to work and someone says, What’s what’s that on your chin right there? You’ve forgotten what manner of person you were in a physical way. He says that’s the way it is spiritually. If you look at the word of God, he says, you know, someday I’m going to obey the gospel someday. And I know I need to. Perhaps there are those in this audience this morning who can say, Yeah, I I need to choose the right course or the road.

And I need to obey the gospel. Or I I’ve once done that and I’ve kind of fallen away, and I need to get back with the Lord. But you keep putting it off later, sometime other, not now. Here, the writer says, You’re like that person who’s deceiving yourself. Verse 22. What do you mean, James? Well, deceiving yourself is you think you are right. It’s easy to forget and go your way. But in verse 25, and it’s not on this, but reading verse 25, the scripture says, He who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, is not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work. This one will be blessed in what he does. So I say to you, my beloved, the word of God is of great value.

6. A Sword, a Fire and Hammer, a Blueprint

Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the ungodly. He does not stand in the way of sinners. He does not sit in the seat of the scornful, but his delight is in the law of the Lord. In his law does he meditate day and night. Look at what great value the Bible is. Come to it, study it. Give time and thought to it. Fact is it not only will help you know how God views you, but it’ll help you in fighting against the devil. You ever thought about it that way? In Ephesians chapter 6, where there the apostle says, We’re in a battle. We’re fighting against the wiles of the devil. We’re not just in a war like man would say of flesh and blood, but we’re fighting about here those who are the prince of the air, evil ones.

And the devil is always seeking whom he may devour. How are you going to answer him? How are you going to fight against the devil? How about, as in Ephesians 6, where he talks about the soldier of the Lord putting on the whole armor of God. And finally, after talking about the kind of breastplate and the kind of shoes and the kind of helmet, he says, Take the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. How did Jesus answer when the devil tempted him? Every time he gave him the answer, it is written. It is written. Why don’t you turn these stones into bread? If you’re really the Son of God. Well, Jesus said it is written, man shall not live by bread alone.

And he takes him to the pinnacle of the temple and says, Why don’t you cast yourself down? You know the scriptures have said the devil knew how to quote Scripture.

Jesus answered, It is written. Thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God. He takes him to the highest of mountain and shows him the kingdoms of the world and the glories of the kingdom and the prince of this world who appeals to man to live only for now and all that this world can give you. And that’s the appeal to Jesus. Just think how you’ll be honored. The whole world will bow down to you if you will bow down to me. And what does Jesus say? It is written again. Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shall thou serve. The word of God, like a sword, answers evil and the temptations of evil. Turn to the value. This great book that God has given us by his inspiration.

In fact, it is like a fire and a hammer in Jeremiah 23. Is not my word like a fire, says the Lord? And like a hammer that breaks the rock in pieces. In that sense, in Jeremiah 23, the prophet was speaking about how that there were some false prophets who would say, I have dreamed. I have dreamed. And the prophet said they they really were claiming something that really had not occurred. They didn’t really have the word of God. You know there are false teachers today like that. There are teachers today who would say, Well, the Lord guided me. The Lord told me this, the Lord told me that, and I’m telling you, well, wait a minute. If the Lord told you, you know where you ought to be able to read it?

Somewhere in here. Somewhere in here. But the word of God, like a fire, like a hammer, can answer even those false prophets. That’s the way Jeremiah was using the scripture in that particular passage. It is a fire and a hammer can be for good things, but it also can overcome that which is evil and wrong. But finally, the word of God is described as a blueprint. You want to know the pathway of right. Look to the print of God’s word. In Hebrews chapter 8 and verse 5, spoke about even Moses and those who serve the copy and shadow of the heavenly things, as Moses was divinely instructed when he was about to make the tabernacle. For he said, See that you make all things according to the pattern shown you on the mountain.

There’s a pattern. Even as Moses was about to build the tabernacle, God gave him instructions. Here’s the length of it. Here’s what to use in it. God did not leave Moses and the children of Israel without any kind of instruction. He gave them a pattern. He’s given us a pattern. I talked a moment ago about how to wash away your sins through the blood of Christ. Don’t just say, well, you know, God loves me and it doesn’t matter what it does matter what you do. You need to come to the Word of God, and if God, through His Word has instructed us as hearers of His Word, believing Jesus to be the Son of God. It doesn’t end with just, oh, I believe. But that same book that teaches us that we believe even unto salvation, confess unto salvation, so it is that it teaches us repenting of our sins.

That I turn my life around. That I confess my faith. I’m not ashamed of the Lord. But I’m willing to arise and be immersed, baptized into the death of Christ that his blood may wash away my sins. Indeed, there’s a pattern, what to do to be saved. There’s a pattern. What is the church like? What is the organization of the church? We’ve got all kind of denominations in the religious world today. And some that have different kinds of leaders that you don’t even read about in the Bible, the Word of God. Indeed, when we come to passages like 1 Timothy tells us about the qualifications for an elder or qualifications for a deacon, do we pay any attention to it? There’s a pattern. God has given us instruction.

Conclusion

And it matters whether we speak where the Bible speaks and are silent, where the Bible is silent. It matters whether or not we preach sound doctrine, the blueprint, the pattern. Whenever the man was building this building, you wanted him to have a blueprint. And you wanted him to wear out the pages of it. That every facet of it, the design of the auditorium, the design of even our ceiling, the design, every part of it was laid out. And he had a print to follow. You and I are given by the inspiration of God a print to follow. Blessed is the man whose delight is in the law of the Lord. Maybe there’s one here this morning, though, who is not a child of God. Before we close, we sing a song.

We call it a song of invitation. We mean by that simply that we’re giving you an opportunity to change your life. If indeed you need to walk differently. If you’ve not been faithful as a Christian, think about it. What would you say if Christ were to come this very day? Have you taken the right crossroad in life? Or have you just taken the path of least resistance? Have you fallen away? If so, turn back to him. Make your life right with others over the Lord. Repent of your sins. Pray that God will forgive. Or if you’ve never obeyed the gospel, why not today? Why not this very hour? Why not come right now? As together we stand while we sing.