Welcome to SuccessfulSavior.org, the ministry of Harmony Primitive Baptist Church in Donaldson, Arkansas. This is Elder Neal Phelan Jr. preaching in our regular Sunday morning service. If you have your Bibles, let's turn to the fifth chapter of the Gospel of John. John chapter 5, this is one of the miracles of Jesus Christ. I love to read about the miracles of Jesus Christ. When we look deeper into the waters of these miracles, there's a lot that we can learn from them about ourselves. about our salvation and our relationship with God. So this morning I want to draw some points from this miracle that Jesus Christ performed. We're going to just read the first few verses of this chapter. After this there was a feast of the Jews and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. Now there is at Jerusalem by the sheep market a pool, which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches. In these lay a great multitude of impotent folk of blind, halt, withered, waiting for the moving of the water. For an angel went down at a certain season into the pool and troubled the water. Whosoever then first after the troubling of the water stepped in was made whole of whatsoever disease he had. And a certain man was there which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. When Jesus saw him lie and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he said unto him, wilt thou be made whole? The impotent man answered him, sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool, but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me. Jesus said unto him, rise, take up thy bed, and walk, and immediately The man was made whole and took up his bed and walked. And on the same day was the Sabbath." So here is one of the many miracles that Jesus Christ performed. And of course, when we read about his miracles, we all recognize that Jesus Christ had the power to do anything you wanted to do. But there's a lot of different miracles that Jesus performed, and he performed them in a lot of different ways. Some of them he put clay on a man's eyes and told him to go wash in the pool that he would be able to see again. Other things that he did that are different, his miracles are all different. And from every miracle, we can learn something different from the Lord Jesus Christ and these miracles. So we've got this miracle performed at Bethesda, a place where there's five porches. There's a multitude of impotent and sick people gathered around these porches. And some of them, I'm sure, were blind, maybe had leprosy. Some of them probably had broken limbs. Who knows what all was wrong with all of these people. So we have these five porches. So this morning, I want to get five points from these porches. I want to get a point from every porch. So I think Jesus would have us to learn five things in this lesson. The first one I want us to learn is I want us to see what we speak of when we refer to the term total depravity. That man is unable to save himself from his fallen condition. Because in this miracle, Jesus has given us a perfect picture of our sinful estate. of the sinful state of all of humanity before Christ died for us upon the cross. We've got a man here and he is unable to help himself. And Jesus actually comes to him and says, will you be made whole? And the man says, I have no one to put me into the water. The man is there and he's hoping somehow to get into this water, but he is totally unable. to get himself into the position that he can heal himself. And if you don't mind me using this allegory here, there's a multitude of people, and I'm going to refer that to all of the human race when Adam fell in the morning of time. A multitude of people. When Adam sinned in the morning of time, a multitude of people are going to become dead in trespasses and in sins. This is one of the cardinal principles and doctrines of the Christian church, which has been taught from the very beginning of the church. It's in Romans 5 and 12. And here what the apostle writes, wherefore, as by one man, sin entered into the world and death by sin. And so death passed upon all men, for all have sinned. So here's Adam's transgression in the morning of time, and when he's sinned, his posture. His fallen condition was passed down to all of his humanity. And then he gives the evidence of it in case anybody would doubt it. He said, for all have sinned. Somebody might say, well, you know, I don't believe I'm responsible for something that Adam did. Adam did it. Why am I responsible for it? Why does that place me in that condition? Well, that's the legal transaction and that's what happened. And we have the evidence. All have sinned. If we find anybody who has not sinned, we're going to say, well, you know, Adam's transgression had no effect upon you. But the Bible says for all have sin, there is not a person that has never sinned in their life, and that's the evidence. Sometimes people would say, well, you know, I don't really believe the Bible is true. There's things in the Bible that, you know, don't make sense, and, you know, the Bible just can't be true. But there's so many things in the Bible like this verse. If I were to question whether God's word was true or whether my relationship with God was true, I can read this one verse, for all have sinned, and I can say, yes, Lord, you're talking about me. I'm one of these people. I'm one of Adam's descendants, and I know so because I have sinned. All have sinned. Notice the word that the apostle uses there that sometimes people don't really understand. It says, and death, by sin. Do you understand the implications of that? That means that all of Adam's posterity became dead in trespasses and in sin. Now when we talk about death, we understand a dead person can't do anything, right? Dead people can't do anything. So we have an idea sometimes in Christian circles that, well, we've got dead people out here and we wanna make them alive. We wanna give them spiritual life. So the way we're gonna do that is we're gonna take this Bible and we're gonna preach the gospel, which we should do, to people, and we're gonna throw this gospel rope out, and they're down in this pit, and if we can throw this gospel rope out down in that pit and we can get the dead sinner to lay hold upon this rope, we can pull him out and we can give him life. We got a problem with that. Can a dead person lay hold of a rope? No. How in the world is a dead person gonna lay hold of a rope so that he can get out of the pit? You know, a long time in my experience, I wondered about spiritual life. But you know, it came to the understanding that the only person that's gonna lay hold of that rope is an alive person. When we preach the Gospel and it means something to somebody and they rejoice in the person of Jesus Christ, we understand that person already has spiritual life. That's the only kind of person that's going to lay hold of that rope is a person who is already alive. We could go to the cemetery this morning, and I have a lot of wonderful friends and some people that I love dearly, relatives, that are in the cemetery this morning. And if we went to the cemetery today, And we opened the caskets, dug them up, opened their caskets, and we asked them, will you grab hold of the gospel rope? Will you receive what I'm asking you? Will you make a decision today to be alive again? And come back and rejoice with us in the church. Will you make a decision to do that? Do you believe that there's anybody in the cemetery that's going to respond to that message? And why are they not going to respond? Because they're dead. A dead person cannot respond to anything. It takes somebody outside, apart from the dead people, somebody who has the power over death to give them life that now they can respond to the gospel, and we know who that person is. It's Jesus Christ. At the end of time, my friends, Jesus Christ is going to come back. And He is going to that cemetery. And those graves are going to open up. And He is going to speak with the voice that raises the dead. And He is going to raise the dead, and we're going to live with Him forever. But I'm going to make you a promise this morning. There's not going to be any preachers standing around the graveside helping Him. The preachers aren't going to be the ones that are going to say, well, you received this so that you can have life again. My friends, it's the same thing in our regeneration when we're born again. It is the life-giving voice of the Son of God that gives us spiritual life. And there is a man that is in the condition that we were all in before Christ. He is an impotent man. He is unable to help himself and get himself out of this fallen condition. Jesus even gave him the opportunity. Will you be made whole? You know, here you go. If you want to give Him a choice or give Him a chance, here He has. He has the opportunity. Does He have the power, my friends, this morning to make a choice to give Himself life or to heal Himself? Not any more than we do when it comes to our spiritual life. So here we have point number one. which Jesus is trying to show us that here is a man that is unable to save himself from his fallen condition. He had been in this for 38 years. And his answer is, Sir, I have no man when the water is troubled to put me into the pool. You know, when I see this man, I believe that he has a little hope. He's there by the water, but he can't get in. But he's hoping somehow he's gonna get in. And he kinda reminds me of Job. Remember what Job wrote in the Old Testament? He said, I know it's so of a truth, but how can man be just with God? Job said, I know it's gonna happen, but I don't know how it's gonna happen. He had an idea, some of an idea of who Jesus Christ was. God's family, the elect family of God, they needed an outside source to get to heal them, to rescue them from the fall. So we have the first point here of our, I hope a beautiful picture of our inability to save ourself from our fallen condition. And the only person that can do that is Jesus Christ. But there's something else in this I want you to see. This is a beautiful picture, beautiful picture of God's unconditional election. Now some people don't like election. If you mention the term election, they're going to call you a Calvinist. But I want to remind you that John Calvin didn't come along until about 1500 years after the Bible was written. We find election all in the Bible that was written before John Calvin ever appeared. There is a Calvinistic election, my friends, but there is a biblical election. And anybody that loves the Lord and loves His Word should say, well, election is in the Bible. So I want to know what election is. What is it really? Well, election is pretty simple. It just says in Ephesians 1 and 4 that God chose His people in Christ before the foundation of the world. That's pretty simple. That God is a sovereign God and He chose His people before the world began. And if you love Him today, well, that's evidence that you're one of His people. But here we have a man here that's at the pool and he's impotent. He can't help himself. And here comes Jesus Christ to the pool. And remember, there is a multitude of people here. And Jesus Christ chooses one person and heals one person. Now Jesus could have healed everybody. Let me ask you a question this morning. I want you to really think about this. If you've opposed the doctrine of election, if you think there's something wrong with this, did Jesus Christ commit a sin? Is election unfair? Was it unfair that Jesus healed one person? You see, those are all of the arguments against election. They say, well, everybody doesn't have a chance if election is true. You know, my friend, salvation is not a chance. Jesus Christ didn't give this man a chance. He healed him immediately. He comes to this man and, you know, we can make all kinds of thoughts about why he picked this man. I don't know why he picked this man. When you think about election, that God chose a people for the foundation of the world, not based upon any human merits that he foresaw in them, but not because you're so good. Some people say, well, you know, election's true, but God chose those people. He looked down through time and he knew who was going to accept him. Is that the reason he chose this man? My friends, you'd never accept Jesus Christ if He didn't change you first. You've got to have some spiritual life before you're going to accept Jesus Christ, love Him, or want to even come to His church, or be a part of His family. Yeah, the Lord is coming over here to this man, and He's going to heal a man, and we don't even know why He chose this man. Maybe he chose him because he was the worst case that was there. I doubt it. He didn't choose him because he looked down through time and saw that this man was going to be sitting by this pool reading his Bible. No, he didn't do that. He chose this man sovereignly. Sovereignly. And if he chose you, he chose you sovereignly. He didn't look down through time and see what a good person you were going to be. Isn't that a little pharisaical? You know, God looked down through time and he saw who was going to accept them and who was going to do all these good works. That's so pharisaical when you think about it. You're not that good. I'm not either. There's not anybody here that's good enough for Jesus to choose. Unconditional election. So God is sovereign in his choice. It's fair, whatever God wants to do. God does not have to heal anybody. He doesn't have to choose anybody. He could have chosen one person out of the whole human race and saved one person, and that would have been fair. Because He didn't have to save anybody. He didn't have to love anybody. He didn't have to do anything, but yet He was kind and gracious. The loving kindness of our Lord appeared unto man and sent His Son to die upon the cross for His people. You know, we love Romans 9 and 8 when it comes to election, don't we? Paul writes, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God. Somebody says, oh my gosh, there are some people that are not God's children. Well, I'm just reading you the Bible. There are some people that do not belong to God. God did not choose them. He didn't choose them. He didn't choose them because they were the worst people. He just didn't choose them. He didn't choose His people because they were the best, and He didn't leave the others alone because they were the worst. God is so sovereign in this. He's sovereign in when He created all things. He's sovereign in the color of the sky. He's sovereign in the color of the trees and the flowers. He's sovereign in every insect that He ever made. He's sovereign in everything that He did. He's sovereign in every thought and every move that God makes. He's sovereign. Who can say unto Him, what doest thou? No one can speak unto God and question anything that He has ever done or ever will do. And He doesn't have to do anything because we think He should. That's the problem with us. That's the problem with people rejecting the sovereignty of God and the election of God, is in their own mind, they think this is what God should do. God's not right if He doesn't do it this way. You see how great sinners we are when we question the sovereignty of God and His holiness and the things that He does? God is sovereign in everything that He does. They which are the children of flesh, these are not the children of God. The children of the flesh hate God, my friends. You can look around in our society today and you see people that hate God. They hate Christians. They hate the Bible. They murder people. They murder babies. They are not the children of God. They have no consciousness. They have no feeling, no love for God. These are not the children of God. That's something that a lot of Christians need to understand. They look out and they see people in the world, and they see them doing these atrocious things. They need to understand that these are not the children of God. These are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. That's you and I, my friends, the ones that Christ chose. For this is the word of promise. And here's an allegory. At this time, I will come and Sarah shall have a son. And not only this, but when Rebecca also has conceived by one, even our father Isaac, for the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or any evil that the purpose of God according to election might stand." Here's a beautiful picture of election concerning Jacob and Esau. As it is written, Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated. God is sovereign in that. That is so simple when we understand election. That God had chosen Jacob before he was ever born. And my friends, if you're a child of God this morning, God chose you before you were ever born. God did a lot of things before you knew Him. Jesus Christ has done a lot of things for you before you knew Him. Jesus healed this man and this man did not even know who Jesus was. That tells me that you don't have to know who Jesus is before He'll do a miracle for you, right? Jesus was willing to die for you before the world was spoken into existence in the everlasting covenant the father chose the people chose you before you knew him Jesus Christ agreed to go to the cross before you knew him you see my friends Jesus introduces himself to you when you're born again But he's already done a lot of stuff for you before you knew him you don't have to know him for Jesus to do stuff I remember one time we were swimming in a river, and it was the Caddo River before they dammed it up and made Lake Degray. And a little boy was swimming out there. There was a big current and went right under this bridge and through a tunnel. And this little boy was going down the stream and he was about to drown. My dad swam out there and saved the little boy and brought him to his parents. They were very glad. Little boy didn't know my dad's name. But was he still saved? Did he have to know my dad's name to be saved? Did he have to accept my dad as his personal Savior to be saved? No, he was saved. He was saved. He didn't have to know my dad, didn't have to accept him, didn't have to recite anything, read any words or say a prayer or anything. Saved him. Jacob have I loved, Esau have I hated. If you're one of God's children this morning, you're a Jacobite. Jacobite, that's what we are, God's people. We're a figure of that chosen seed of Jacob. And then the next verse is what some people are probably thinking right now. Is there unrighteousness with God? Is God unrighteous because he loved Jacob and hated Esau? You see, he knew what you were gonna be thinking. You're carnal mind, you wanna reject it. It's not fair. God's sovereignty is not fair. Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. God forbid that there be unrighteousness. God forbid that anybody would even think that God's unrighteous and that it's not fair that God chose His own people. Can't Jesus choose His own bride? We choose our own brides, I think. God has the right to choose the bride of Christ. It's His sovereign will. For He said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. The man Christ chose to heal was not based upon any merits. Unconditional election. That's the second porch. Unconditional election. Well, let's get the next point, the third point. We refer to it in two ways. It's called limited atonement. that the atonement of Jesus Christ was limited to the elect. We also refer to it as particular redemption. That the redemption in Christ was particular for a chosen people. That's the sovereignty of God. That's what we see here. This miracle was limited. And it was limited to this man alone. Okay? Go back to the water. Go back to the pool. And see the multitude of people. And see the healing power of Jesus Christ. Rise, take up thy bed and walk. Immediate. All Jesus had to do was speak. This was immediate. It was the miracle. He was completely healed. And it was limited to this one person. You know, Jesus Christ had the power, as I've already said, to heal every one of them. And we read in the book of Acts where Peter would walk around and if people just touched him, they were healed, that kind of power. But here Jesus Christ wants to teach us something. He wants to show us that when we say limited, we don't mean that the power of Jesus was limited, right? No, the power of Jesus is not limited. But the power of Jesus on this occasion was particular to one specific person. And I can tell you something, my friends, the atonement of Jesus Christ upon the cross was particular. It was particular. On the day of atonement, when Israel offered that lamb as an atonement, was it made for anybody but Israel? Now, that atonement was made for one chosen nation, the nation of Israel. It wasn't for the Canaanites or the Hittites or the Jebusites or any other people. That atonement was only for the children of Israel. And that's the way that God received it. When Christ died upon the cross, my friends, it wasn't for the whole human race as some people think. It was specific for the elect family of God. If Jesus Christ died upon the cross for every person in the universe, every person in the universe is going to see God in heaven. Because I want to tell you, Jesus Christ is a successful Savior. And whoever He died for is going to live with Him in glory one day. If you're one of His children this morning, He died for you. You need to be rejoicing in that, that you're somebody particular this morning. That you're somebody that He loved in a particular way before the world was spoken into existence. That you're an object of His grace, and that Jesus Christ suffered for you. That all of His suffering was for your particular sins, not for just a general sin out there. It was for your particular sins that He died for. This was limited to a certain man. You know, there's three basic possibilities of the death of Jesus Christ upon the cross. One of them is that he died for everyone, and everyone's going to heaven. That's universalism, basically. Right? Nobody's going to heaven. There is no hell. Jesus died for everybody. The second one is that Jesus died for everyone and they all have a chance to get to heaven. That's Arminianism or free willism. But the third is biblical. Jesus died for some, referred to as the elect in the Bible, and they're going to heaven. That's very, very biblical. I want to know where you find yourself in those three. Are you one of those people that you think you made a choice and you're going to get to heaven because you made a choice? You just robbed Jesus Christ of his glory. You just took part of the suffering of Jesus Christ for you, and you took it on yourself, and you said, Jesus did his part, I did my part. I did part of it. If you paid for somebody's house, would you want somebody else taking credit for part of it? If you did some great thing and you won a trophy, would you want somebody else saying, well, they got the trophy, but I'm really the one that did everything. Would you want some, you see how we throw Jesus Christ in the trash when we start saying we did part of our salvation and he did his part? My friends, Jesus did it all. Jesus paid it all, isn't that the song we sing? Jesus paid it all. Some people sing that song, Jesus paid it all, but I'm the one that did the last payment. When I did my thing, I came up there and I did my thing and I made it right. No, my friends, you didn't make anything right. You just robbed Jesus Christ of his glory if you took any to yourself. So we see this salvation, this point. that it's a beautiful picture of unconditional election, of limited atonement. And another thing is a picture of His irresistible grace. That would be the eye in the tulip, right? That's the next porch, the fourth porch, irresistible grace. Here's a beautiful picture of us when Jesus Christ gives us spiritual life or when we're born again. It is the sovereign work of God, something that is irresistible that we cannot turn down. This man, Jesus didn't come up to this man, said, I know you've been a long time in this condition, and I'm gonna offer you something today, and if you'll accept it, you'll be made whole. Did it read that way? It says that immediately Jesus said, rise, take up thy bed and walk. That was immediate. The man wasn't even offered an opportunity. You see my friends, when we're born of God, it is by the sovereign work of the Holy Spirit, it is immediate regeneration. We're immediately born again. When you received your natural life, it was immediate. When you were conceived in your mother's womb, you had nothing to do with it. It was immediate. You received life from God. All life comes from God. Sovereignly from God. The creature has nothing to do with it. We don't accept it. And the same thing with our spiritual life. It's irresistible. Irresistible. How would it be if I went to the grave today and went out and opened the casket up, as I said, and said, would you like to have some life today? Is anybody going to respond? They can't because they're dead. A dead sinner cannot respond to the Gospel and become alive. You must be alive before you want to respond to it. And if you respond to it, if it means something to you, my friends, you have life. If you love the Lord Jesus Christ and His message means something to you, you have life given to you sovereignly by God. Jesus said, rise, take up thy bed, and walk. And immediately the man was made. Immediately. I love that word. Immediately. When we're born again, it's immediate. Immediate. It's immediate. Romans 8.29 says, for whom he did foreknow. There's your foreknowledge. He did predetermine or predestinate to be conformed to the image of his son. Jesus determined that we were gonna be born again, that we might be the firstborn among many brethren. There's that predestination word that a lot of people don't like, but I'm glad that God predetermined to save us, because we couldn't have saved ourselves. I think Jesus predetermined to go help this man. I don't think it was an accident. Jesus wasn't stumbling around one day and saying, you know, I'm at this pool, I guess I'll heal somebody. Do you think that's the way it happened? No, he knew where he was going, he knew who he was going to heal. He knew the man. And he knew you. Well, my final porch, the fifth porch, is how that we are preserved in Christ. Some people spend countless hours worrying about their salvation. Did it stick? I've known people that were baptized many times because they worried about their salvation. But my friends, when Jesus Christ heals us, it's permanent. It's permanent. This man was healed immediately, and his healing was permanent. Jesus didn't say, and Jesus didn't partially heal him either. He didn't say, well, I'm gonna give you some medication, and I want you to take this for the next week. You're gonna feel a lot better in a couple of weeks, and you'll have your full healing next week. He didn't do part of the job. He didn't give the man. He was healed immediately and He was healed completely and it was for the rest of His life. And my friends, when Jesus Christ died upon the cross for you, that's permanent. There ain't nothing you can do to change it. Now you can go out there and make a lot of mistakes in your life and find some sorrows from your sin. And the Lord can chastise you as a child. He will. But he'll never cast you away. Never cast you away. Because you're his child. Just like our children. Our children mess up a lot. We get sick of them sometimes. They make us mad. But we're gonna continue to love them. We'll always love them. They'll always be our child. You can't have a child and then it become an un-child. I have a child, but it's an un-child now. And I've known parents that disown their children. I don't want anything to do with you anymore. That might be a time come that you have to do that. But they'll still be your child, right? Still your genetic offspring, still your child. And so that's what we are. This man was healed permanently. All for whom Christ died, the elect, are preserved in Christ and can never be lost eternally to Satan or hell. That's a very comforting doctrine, my friends. You see, my friends, the gospel of Jesus Christ is to give us comfort. It's not to scare people. I've been in churches before where they preach the gospel to scare people to death so that they could get another member of their church, so they could get a little note in their Bible saying they saved somebody. But you know, my friends, they didn't save anybody. Jesus Christ saved His people. He's the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is the captain of our salvation. That's Jesus Christ. The Gospel is supposed to bring you comfort. It's supposed to bring life and immortality to light through the Gospel. The Gospel gives you light of your salvation. It doesn't give you life. Light, that's what the Bible says, light. You can be out on a dark night and there may be a lot of things in front of your car that you don't see and you turn the light on and now you see them. You didn't invent those things or create those things. All you got was light on something that was already there. And that's what the Gospel does. It gives light upon the Christ that dwells in your heart already. You didn't have to let Him in. He's not knocking on your heart. Jesus can go anywhere He wants to go. There are some people who say, well, Jesus is knocking on your heart and He's trying to get in there. Poor Jesus. He just doesn't have enough strength to get into the heart of the sinner. What kind of Jesus is that? Jesus goes where He wants to go. He enters the hearts of His people. He changes us, causes us to love Him, and the Gospel brings light upon that Christ that dwells in our heart. And Jude 1 and 1 will read, Jude, the servant of Jesus Christ and brother of James, to them that are sanctified by God the Father and preserved in Christ and called. Brother Dan's been preaching on sanctification. You were sanctified. You were set apart. before the world began from a fallen family. The fallen family of Adam, Jesus Christ chose the people, sanctified them, which means he set them apart for a holy use, and he sent his son to die for those very people. Preservation of the sanctuary, preserved in Christ, and called, by the way, he called you by his Holy Spirit and gave you spiritual life. Five porches, five points, one miracle. I pray this has been a blessing for you this morning. Well, I appreciate those observations. You know, you find things like this in the scriptures that depict a certain narrative and you can see how they parallel or, you know, are very similar to aspects of our eternal salvation. And I really enjoy finding those things in the scripture. If you follow that passage a little farther down, verse 15, here you get a little bit of the reaction of the world to what just transpired here. I reckon you probably studied this this week. The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus which had made him whole. And therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus and sought to slay him because he had done these things on the Sabbath day. But Jesus answered him, my father worketh hitherto and I work. Whose work is going on here? It's God's work, right? Therefore, the Jews sought the more to kill him because he not only had broken the Sabbath, but said also that God was his father, making himself equal with God. The Jews clearly understood Jesus Christ's claim to be equal with God. That is a claim to be God. You oftentimes hear people say, Jesus never claimed to be God. Well, he made himself equal with God. The Jews who were listening to him clearly understood that and wanted to kill him for it. So that objection fails. It goes on to say, then Jesus answered and said unto them, verily, verily, I say unto you, the Son can do nothing of himself, but what he seeth the Father do. For what things soever he doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise. Jesus Christ and the Father were in total agreement about what he was doing here. For as the Father raiseth up the dead and quickeneth them, even so the Son quickeneth whom he will. I've often made this point that it's a very common notion in Christianity that salvation is a matter of free will, and there are free will Baptist churches. And I've said we ought to be a he will Baptist church. And here's one of the verses I would use to substantiate this. See, the son quickeneth whom he will. That's it in a nutshell right there. Here we see it in the instance of a physical healing. There were all these people around, but he healed whom he will, right? He'll have mercy on whom he will have mercy, right? That's an offensive notion of the world. It was offensive to this audience in that day, but it's the declaration of a sovereign God who saves people according to his will, not according to their will. The truth of it is, If it was according to our will, none of us would ever have been saved. It's only His will that brings the mercy towards someone totally opposed to God were it not for Him quickening them. So I love that lesson. I appreciate Elder Phelan's efforts in putting it before us. I extend an open door to the church. Would you like to join by letter of baptism? Thank you for listening to SuccessfulSavior.org, the ministry of Harmony Primitive Baptist Church. This has been Elder Neal Phelan, Jr. preaching from one of our regular meetings. Come and join us as we worship God in the simplicity of Christ every Sunday morning at 416 North Hall Street in Donaldson, Arkansas. At Harmony, we don't have many things that are so common in the religion of our day, but we do have a successful Savior. We invite you to come and see.