Our text for this Lord's Day is taken from the book of Acts, chapter 2, verses 36 through 41, with special emphasis on verse 39. I will read. This is Peter preaching on the day of Pentecost, and he says, let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.

Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, Brothers, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is for you and for your children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. And with many other words, he bore witness and continued to exhort them saying, save yourselves from this crooked generation. So those who received his word were baptized and there were added that day about 3000 souls.

Let's pray and ask the Lord's blessing. Father, we thank you for your holy word today. Thank you for the recording of these great facts, these great words, great preaching that Luke was able to gather together and faithfully record for the church for all ages. And Lord, open up your word to us today that it might minister to us, strengthen us, and glorify your name. Come Holy Spirit, come to our aid in the preaching and the hearing of your word today. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

I want to call your attention today especially to verse 31. It says, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself. This particular phrase here has been such an encouragement to me the last few weeks as I've thought about it that salvation is really of the Lord and no one is going to be saved unless the Lord calls him or her to himself and this is a sovereign work of God.

We know that we human beings are infected with Adam's sin. We're guilty of Adam's sin and our own sin. And we're spiritually weak and incapable really of coming to God in our own. We don't have the ability. We're dead. The Bible says we're dead in trespasses and sins. And so, a dead man cannot make himself alive. A person spiritually dead cannot bring themselves to life. God must do it. There must be an outside force that comes upon them. And this scripture points us out. It says, everyone who the Lord our God calls to himself. This is where salvation begins. By the Lord's calling. By the Lord's initiative.

Well, we see a lot of examples of God calling people to himself in the scriptures. For example, Israel was the least of those tribal nations two or three thousand years ago, and God called them sovereignly because he loved them. And David was a shepherd out in the fields, Doubt that he ever imagined that he would ever be king, but God called him and sent Samuel to anoint him. And it was God's calling that brought him to the kingship.

Mary was a humble virgin, godly woman, living in Israel. She no doubt knew about the Messiah and his coming, she probably never would have imagined that she would be the one who God called to bear the Messiah, but that's what he did in his sovereign purpose.

Jesus' disciples were at the beach, the lakeside there, mending their nets. And this man comes along and calls them to follow him. And they get up, and they turn their gear over to their helpers, and they follow Jesus. Because God, the Son of God, sovereignly called them to Himself and they answered because of His calling.

Of course, there's the great example of Lazarus, a man who was dead, been dead for four days. And he was beginning to smell; his body was beginning to rot. But something happened, something intervened in his situation. It was a sovereign call of the Lord Jesus Christ, Lazarus, come forth. And so, he gets up out of the tomb, and he struggles out wrapped in the grave clothes and Jesus says, loose him. He was alive again because of the calling, the calling of Almighty God. It was only God's call. That's what made the difference. He never would have gotten up. from that grave and none of us would ever have gotten up from our spiritual sleep and death unless the sovereign Lord comes and calls us to himself. That's right.

There was the Apostle Paul, great persecutor of the church, hated Christians. Something happened. The Lord Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus. And he said, who are you, Lord? He knew this was the Lord who appeared to him. And he said, I'm Jesus whom you are persecuting. And so, Jesus called him to be the great witness, especially to the Gentile peoples. Well, this is the way it's happened throughout the history of the church.

Paul writes to the Colossian believers, Colossians chapter one, He says here, speaking to them, He says in verse 5, You have heard before in the word of truth the gospel which has come to you. They didn't come to the gospel. The gospel came to them. It came to them through the preachers, Paul and his companions, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing. as it also does among you since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God in truth." So, they were minding their own business, going about their lives, but these preachers came in and began to preach about Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, called them to faith, to salvation, and they became new people in Christ.

He says, you were called to walk in a manner worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing Him, bearing fruit in every good work. It says here in verse 13, He has delivered us from the dominion of darkness. Paul says us. He was part of the dominion of darkness too and transferred us. This was a transfer, a sovereign transfer of God, transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son. This is the work of God. How can you transfer a human being who's captured, who's a servant of Satan, into the kingdom of God? It's the sovereign work of God. It's the calling of God.

Well, I want to point out a couple of three things actually in this passage that are very important. First of all, how does a person become a Christian? It's because God loves us first. We did not love Him. It says in verse 39, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to Himself. It's His sovereign love, His calling that is the ground, the basis, the reason that any person ever comes to God. It's a sovereign work of God, but it doesn't mean that we are uninvolved in the process. We're vitally involved because look what Peter says next. It says in verse 40, with many other words he bore witness and continued to exhort them saying, save yourselves from this crooked generation. So, they had to do something. They had to respond to the call. They had to repent. They had to believe. It wasn't like they were just totally passive. No, they were active with all of their being. Save yourselves. Come to Christ. So, there's the call and then there's response. All of this is part of the saving process, the converting process that God works in human beings, but that's not quite the end of the story. Look at verse 41.

So those who received his word were baptized, and they were added that day about 3,000 souls. So, what is a person who's been called by God, who's responded to the gospel, what do they need to do? What kind of action do they need to do? They've responded, they've heard the sovereign call, they've repented, they believe, but they got to do something else. They need to respond with their bodies, with action. They need to be baptized. This is the beginning of their Christian walk. This is the way that they identify with Christ, that they join him in communion and union, not only with the Lord, but with his people.

Well, this is a great sovereign process in which we people are vitally, inextricably involved with all of our human effort, thought, and being with our bodies, minds, and souls. But it all begins with God. Everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself.

Now this is a great comfort to us because You know, we labor sometimes to try to spread the gospel to people, but we need to remember, we need to do that but also take comfort in the fact that God's gonna call. He's gonna call people to himself, and he's gonna bring about salvation. So it's a comfort to us to rest in this, that we do what we need to do, being faithful to spread the word, And God's gonna call, He's gonna call these people out. And we can rest in that and not have to fret, you know, about this. And the glory really goes to Him.

When a person does come to Christ, when they do repent, believe, and they are baptized, we can stand back and realize, you know, this was God's work. We didn't really, we couldn't save this person. Maybe we had something to do with helping them to believe, but it's really God. God decided before the foundation of the world, as it says in Ephesians 1, 4, to call those to himself upon whom he had set his love. So, this calling of God is a great comfort to us as we seek to reach others, that he's gonna do the work. And we can, in a sense, kind of step back and watch and wait and see what he's going to do among the people that we have contact with.

And then, it's not only a comfort to us, but it really places the glory where the glory belongs. The glory belongs with God. Yes, we're involved in the work. We're called to do the work. We're planters, we're pruners, we're helpers. But God must give the increased. He must give the faith. He must give the repentance. So, to Him belongs the glory.

So, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to Himself. We read some scriptures earlier about the calling of the Gentiles. They're Romans 15. So many Gentiles are going to come to Christ. They are coming. They have come, including us in this room. So, most of the people in the world, of course, are Gentiles. So, we can take great comfort in the fact that God is going to continue to do this, to call the Gentile nations to Himself.

So, let's be available to do what we can to preach the gospel to spread the gospel as the Lord may enable us to do. Well, everyone who calls on the Lord, they call on the Lord because the Lord our God, first of all, calls them to himself. He calls and they call. Those who call upon the Lord will be saved in response to his sovereign call.

Let's pray. Thank you, our Father. that this great work of salvation is something above and beyond our human ability. It's a sovereign work of you. And you determine, even before the foundation, Lord, you determine whom you would call to yourself. And in time, you bring that about. You've even done it in our lives, and we see you doing it in the lives of others.

We thank you for those in our own church, Lord, who you've called to yourself, our beloved brothers and sisters, Lord. And we thank you that we will be in fellowship with these brothers and sisters and with all those in your church in the eternity to come in your presence.

Lord, thank you that you call us, you enable us to respond. and then you call us, you command us to be baptized and to follow you in Christian discipleship. Lord, this is such a great salvation. It all begins with you and your sovereign love and work to rescue sinners and bring them into your fellowship.

We thank you and praise you for being members of your body, for being in fellowship with you, our living, loving, and sovereign God, In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.