fathered in at my funeral, among
others. Okay, so let's turn back in our
scripture, if you think, to John chapter 13 and this verse 20. Verily, verily, truly, truly,
I say unto you, He that receiveth whomsoever I send receiveth me. And he that receiveth me, receiveth
him that sent me. I want to be one of those people. I want to be one that I get to
speak to. And others that I don't get to
speak to, I want that to be our prayer and the blessing from
God for us. The Lord Jesus Christ here is is
quoting and referring to the fact that he came as a sent one
from the Father. And I wanted us to spend some
time, I trust you have your Bibles with you, I want us to spend
some time looking at what it is for the Father to be the sending
one, for the Son to be the sent one. for the message of the sent
ones from Him and what it is to be a receiver. To receive
one is to receive all three, isn't it? And all of God's children.
All of God's children will be taught of God and they will be
receivers. Receiving, let's have a look
at what that word means, and I love these words. It means
to lay hold of. I want to lay hold of the message
of the apostles. I want to lay hold of the Lord
Jesus Christ. I want to lay hold of them laying
hold of the Father. It means to take possession of.
It's to take and to not let go. It's to seize. It's to take and
have a part of. It's very interesting, isn't
it? Peter says, you're not going to wash my feet. No one tells
God what to do. The Lord Jesus turns to Peter
and says, if I don't wash you, you have no part of me. If I
don't wash you, you have no part of me. This is, receiving is
to have a part of it means to strive, to attain. It means to
associate with as a And all of the flavor of all
of those words are incredibly, incredibly important. The Lord
Jesus Christ has, in His glorious ascension, turn with me to Ephesians
chapter 4, and just read these verses that are well known. They
are a quotation, in a sense, from Psalm 68. But He's ascended,
verse 8. He's ascended up on high and
he led captivity captive and he gave gifts to men. These are
the gifts of the Lord Jesus Christ. Now he that ascended, what is
it but that he also descended first to the lower parts of the
earth. He that descended is the same also that ascended up far
above all heavens that he might fill all things. He gave, love
what is to his people in this world. He gave some apostles
and some prophets and some evangelists and some pastors and teachers. They're linked together, those
two. And this is the reason for sending it, isn't it? For the
perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for
the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come in the unity
of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God unto a perfect
man, unto the measure of the stature and the fullness of Christ,
that henceforth, that we henceforth be no more children tossed to
and fro with every wind of doctrine by
the slight of men and the cunning craftiness whereby they lay in
wait to deceive. But speaking the truth in love,
they may grow up unto him in all things which use the head.
even Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together, and
compacted by that which every joint supplies, according to
the effects of working in the measure of every part, make an
increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love."
The whole purpose of these gifts is that the Church of God would
grow, the Church of God would be built up, the Church of God
would have its eyes fixed He gives them. He sends them.
He gives them. Faith comes by hearing. Romans 10, 15. Faith comes by
hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. And that Word of God
is the preached Word of God. Faith comes from hearing the
Lord Jesus Christ preached. Faith comes. And how can they
preach unless they're sent? So receiving the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive His words. How do we know about
the Lord Jesus Christ? How do we know about Heaven?
How do we know about Isn't it? The Scriptures must
be fulfilled. The only way we know about heaven
is because the Bible talks about heaven. The only way we know
about hell is because the Bible talks about hell. The only way
we know about the Lord Jesus Christ is that he's written.
And obviously the written word has to be enlightened by the
Spirit of God and the words, as the Lord Jesus Christ says
in John 6, they become spirit and life to God's people. So to receive him is to receive
his words. Listen to what he says in the
previous chapter of John, chapter 12. He says, in verse 48, he
said, he that rejecteth me and receiveth not my words, hath
one that judges him. The word that I have spoken,
the same shall judge him in the last day. The words that the
Lord Jesus Christ sends his sent ones to proclaim So to receive the Lord Jesus
Christ is to receive His words. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive His set messages. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive all Him, as He declares Himself to be, and nothing
rejected. Nothing rejected. Is there one
attribute of the Lord Jesus Christ revealed in the Scriptures that
you find offensive? There's not one, is there? It's
a child of God. I just love to magnify the Lord
together. Let's see them more gloriously.
Let's see them more fulsomely. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive all of Him. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive all of His attributes. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive all of His works and all of His words. To receive the Lord Jesus Christ
is to receive him as sent from the Father. Where was he before
he came? He was in the bosom of the Father. How delightful was that relationship. How beautiful and glorious is
Christ to his Father. chapter 13 we have, while this
event is going on, the Pharisees and the others are planning and
plotting the murder of the Lord Jesus Christ in the most gruesome
way possible. And how they must have delighted
that the Romans, not so many years beforehand, had introduced
crucifixion by nailing it. For hundreds of years they had
crucified people and they had tied them up. But they wanted
the Lord Jesus Christ to die, not only by curse and death,
Deuteronomy is not a neutral activity. There are countless multitudes
People are very happy with the Jesus of their manufacturing.
They're very happy to worship a God made in their own image.
But the real God, when he turns up, turns up in that religious
world where there were millions of people so-called worshipping
God, and he doesn't come along to that religious world and say,
well, you Pharisees are a bit better off than you Sadducees,
and you Zealots are a little bit better off, and you ones
hiding down in the deserts in caves and living like sort of
monks are a little bit better off than all those. Or you Herodians
who are mixing your politics with your religion are a bit
worse off than some of the others. What did he say? The whole lot,
the whole lot of the religious world of his day didn't know
who God was and wouldn't submit to him. So to not receive him, According
to God, in Luke 10, he pronounces a serious judgment upon the towns
where he had performed miracles. He says in Luke 10 and in Matthew
and other places, the people of Sodom and Gomorrah burnt to
ashes in a heartbeat by God Almighty, are better off in the Day of
Judgment than the people in Decider and Coruscant. It says, woe to
thee, Bersilene, woe to thee, Chorazin, woe to thee, Bersida,
if the mighty works had been done in Tyre and Sidon, which
have been done in you, that they had a great while repented, sitting
in sackcloth and ashes. But it'd be more tolerable for
Tyre and Sidon in the judgment than for you, and thou, Capernaum,
which are exalted to heaven, shall be thrust down to hell.
Listen to what he says in verse 16. He that heareth you, he's
speaking of these apostles being sent out, these seventy laborers
being sent forth. He that heareth you, heareth
me. And he that despises you, despises
me. And he that despises me, May the Lord cause us to be receiving
ones. May the Lord protect us from
being despising ones. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
sent one of the Father. John has written this The words
which offended the religious men 2000 years ago are the words
that offend the religious people today. If we are God's messengers
and we are choice about what to say. We just have to declare what
God says. We're ambassadors, 2 Corinthians 5. God's servants
are ambassadors. An ambassador is someone who
represents a king. An ambassador is someone who
represents a king in a far country. An ambassador is someone who
is sent with a message from a king from a far country. And when
the ambassador is sent, who is responsible for the care of the
ambassador? The one who sends him. We are
ambassadors. You listen to what 2 Corinthians
5. Now then, we are ambassadors
for Christ, as though God did beseech you by us. We pray you
in Christ's name, be ye reconciled to God. And then he quotes what it is
to be reconciled for because he hath made him sin for us who
knew no sin that we might be made the very righteousness of
God. To be made the righteousness
of God and to have your sins completely taken away by the
work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so given all the opposition
that the Lord Jesus Christ has had, and given the nature of
what's happened in these last 2,000 years, the New Testament,
I remind you, was written in the context of opposition to
the message of the apostles. Of again and again and again,
they're correcting what people... People came to the Galatia, where
Paul had pastored and planted those churches. And they came
to their churches and they looked for every little bit like Paul,
and they preached in every little way like Paul, and they morally
looked like Paul, and they were zealous people. They weren't
sitting back in Jerusalem, these people. They'd come all the way
from Jerusalem to western Turkey. There's no mean feet in those
days. What were they doing? The sentence is horrific, isn't
it? Their purpose was to divert people
in Galatia away from worshipping the Lord Jesus Christ, to turn
people away from receiving the sent one. Isn't it extraordinary
that an apostle like Paul, again and again and again, is called
on to defend his ministry. Three times he gives his testimony
in the Book of Acts. to show that he was called the
God and you were sent a God. And the mighty works were done
and the churches were raised up. But listen to what he says. He says, I marvel, this is so
early on in the church's history, I marvel that you are so soon
removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ
unto another gospel, which is not another, but there be some
that trouble you and that pervert the gospel of Christ. But though
we or an angel from heaven preach any other gospel unto you than
which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. Let him
be anathema. Let him go to hell. It's a strong,
strong statement, isn't it? As we said before, so say I now
again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that
which I have received, let him be accursed. And this is the
words of an ambassador. For do I now persuade men of
God, or do I seek to please men? For if I yet pleased men, I should
not be the servant of Christ. God's servants aren't here to
please men. God's servants are here to declare
the glory of God. But at the beginning of that
sentence, what were they doing? I marvel that you're so soon
removed from Him. What's the false gospel do? It
removes people from Him. It removes people from Him. We
are commanded of God to test the spirits. I repeat these verses
out, 1 John. You can turn with me there, 1
John chapter four. The question is, who speaks for
God? Who is the sent one? Because you're listening to someone,
every time you listen to someone who stands up behind a pulpit,
they are declaring that they are sent from God to declare
who the Lord Jesus Christ is, and they are sent from God to
declare how God saves sinners, and they're sent from God to
tell you what to do. And you are commanded, I am commanded,
to test the spirits. Listen to what he says in 1 John
4. Beloved, believe not every spirit. You are not to believe
people preaching to you. You're not necessary to believe
them. You believe them after you've tested them, and the test
is here in the context. It's so clear. Because many false
prophets are gone out in the world, many antichrists are out
in the world. The word anti can mean in opposition
to, but most of the time in the scriptures, it means someone
who masks a rave. In 2 Corinthians 11, Satan sends
his ministers into this world, and they stand behind pulpits
and mask a rave as servants of God. So we have to test them,
and we have the test, the test, the glorious test. Because the
test points us to the Lord Jesus Christ. Hereby we know the Spirit
of God. Every spirit that confesses that
Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God. Is that simply meaning
that everyone that stands up and says there was a man 2000
years ago called Jesus, and he died, and he rose? Is that what that means? It cannot
possibly be that. Can you imagine a false teacher
going to the church in Galatia or anywhere else and denying
the very existence of God? We are told to go on. Every spirit
that confesses not that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh
is not of God. Ye are of God, little children,
and have overcome them, because greater is he that is in you
than he that is in the world. They are of the world, therefore
they speak of the world, and the world heareth them. We are
of God. He that knoweth God heareth us. That's exactly what our text
is saying, isn't it? John chapter seven, verse 20. Those who are of God, he that
knows God, they hear the apostles. who have no origin from God,
they don't hear the apostles. Hereby we know the spirit of
truth and the spirit of error. It's receding again, isn't it?
Let's go back to our text in John 13. Verse seven, beloved,
let us love one another, for love is of God, and everyone
that loveth is born of God and knoweth God. He that loveth not
knoweth not God, for God is love. In this was manifested the love
of God toward us, because that God sent his only begotten Son
into the world that we might live through him. Herein is love. Herein is love. Not that we love
God. Not that we love God, but that
He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our
sins. That's the flesh. That's what
it is to confess that the Lord Jesus Christ came in the flesh. That He came as the propitiatory
offering, the sacrifice, Did he propitiate, did he absorb
the wrath of God in his body on the tree for every single
one who is united to him? Did he do it? God says he did. He declared that he did. It is
finished, the resurrection declares that he did. He was put to death
because of our sins and he was raised. It all comes back, doesn't it? It all comes back. Receiving
His sent ones, He's receiving the Lord Jesus Christ, He's being
crucified as the Scriptures declare. That is salvation, isn't it?
That's the gospel that is declared by all God's servants. This is
the gospel that's declared by all these messengers. 1 Corinthians
15, I declare, brethren, I declare the gospel. It's the gospel of all of his
sent ones. They only have one gospel. Wherever they go throughout
this world, all of God's servants, all of God's sent ones, have
exactly the same gospel. Exactly the same gospel. They've
always had the same gospel. We have the gospel and preach
it to them. We have the gospel that Enoch
believed. We have the gospel that Noah
believed. We have the gospel that Abraham believed. We have
the gospel that all of the children of God throughout history. There
is only one gospel. In Revelation, it's called the
everlasting gospel. And all other gospels aren't
gospels. So we declare unto you the gospel which I preach, 1
Corinthians 15.1. Which you also have received,
to go back to this, isn't it? The believing people have received
They receive wherein you stand. God's children receive it and
they stand in it. By which also you are saved if
you keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless you have believed
in vain. May it never be us. For I delivered unto you, first
of all, which I also received. Paul was only an ambassador.
He received a message from the Lord Jesus Christ and he just
delivered that message. How that Christ died for our
sins according to the Scriptures. And you just read in 1 John 4
what it was for him to die for our sins according to the Scriptures.
And that he was buried and that he rose again the third day according
to the Scriptures. And he was seen of a theist and
all of those witnesses. As Isaiah 8 says, if they don't
speak according to this word, there is no light in them. Jeremiah
was told by God, And he was speaking at a time
that was so much like us. Diminish not the word, and Revelation
finishes with that sobering warning. We're not to take any words out
of this book. We're not to change any of the
words in this book. Why would you want to? I love them. I love them. So let's briefly
have a look at what the scriptures say about the Father being the
sending one, and then after the break we can have a look at what
it is for Christ to be the sent one, and these obviously overlap.
But He's the sent one. In the beginning of John's Gospel,
if you turn back to John, we'll just stay in John's Gospel and
I'll go through it briefly. This marks, this 13th chapter
marks the end of the Lord's public ministry. He departed from the
Jews and he hid himself from them. What a horrible thing to
contemplate. But here this is the Father of the Sending One
to receive. of the Father. You'll receive
everything about the Father. You'll receive the Father in
all of his glory. At the beginning, of course,
he and the Son are declared to be in this extraordinary eternal
union. Verse 14, he's the only begotten
of the Father. Verse 18, he's in the bosom of
the Father. And he declares the Father. In
chapter two, in his first visit to Jerusalem, he walks into that
temple, that huge temple amongst a million people, and he says,
this is mine. I have the right to rule and reign over this place. This is my father's house, which
means it's my house. I make orders here. This is about
me, this house. Verse 35 of chapter three, I
want to go briefly through some of these. He says in verse 35,
the father loveth the son and hath given all things into his
hand. Chapter four is that glorious
chapter of the Lord meeting that woman at the well. The most despised
person you could possibly imagine in the sight of all the Jews
was a Samaritan. The most despised person in the
Samaritan village was a woman who had five husbands and was
shacked up with someone else. And the Lord goes to her and
loves her. And he says in verse 21, he says,
the Father has worshipped in spirit and in truth. True worshippers shall worship
the Father in spirit and truth. And then he says his glorious
sentence, doesn't he? For the Father seeketh such to
worship him. Do you reckon he finds them?
Do you reckon he finds them? I think he does. I think he finds
them. They worship him in spirit and
truth. The Father seeketh Over in chapter 5 we have the healing
of the crippled man. In verse 17 the Lord Jesus Christ
is speaking of his Father and says, My Father worketh hitherto
and I work. They're always about the work
of glorifying God in the redemption of his people. In verse 23 he
says, He says, The Father judges no
man. He has committed all judgment unto the Son, that all men should
honour the Son, even as they honour the Father. He that honoured
not the Son honoured not the Father which has sent him. There
is no honour to God unless there is honour to the Lord Jesus Christ,
and anyone who talks about God and doesn't talk about the Lord
Jesus Christ in the same verse is not talking about this God
here, ever. No matter what name they give
him, no matter how many people follow him. Verse 36, he says, I have greater witness than that
of John, for the works which the Father has given me to finish,
the same works that I do, they bear witness of me that the Father
sent me. All the works of the Lord Jesus
Christ are bearing witness that the Father has sent him. And chapter six is a glorious
chapter where the Lord Jesus Christ feeds that multitude of
people And he says in verse 27, he says, don't labor for the
food which perishes. Don't labor for the things of
this world. They're just gone in a heartbeat. They can be taken,
they can take wings and fly away in a heartbeat, don't they? God
can take them away, or he can take your ability to enjoy them
away. They've gone, aren't they? They don't hold anything in this
world. He says, labor not for that meat, but for the meat which
endureth unto everlasting life, which the Son of Man shall give
you. For him, the Father, the God,
the Father, of the Father, verse 32, the
Father has given you the true bread from heaven, this is life
itself. And here in John chapter 6 we
hear clearly what God's will is. What's the Father's will?
The Father sent the Son. What's the purpose of it? What
was His will? It says, All that the Father
giveth me shall come to me, and him that cometh to me I will
in no wise cast out. For I came, because I came down
from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that
sent me. And here we have the will of
God. in sending the Son. And this is the Father's will
which has set me, that all of which He has given me, I should
lose nothing, but should raise it up again at the last day."
That's the Father's will. all of his attributes and all
of what he declares about himself. Rejecting nothing. Rejecting
nothing. Verse 44. And they were murmuring. He said, No man can come to me,
except the Father which hath sent me draw him, and I will
raise him up at the last day. No man can come. Chapter 5, he says, no man will
come, no man can come unless the Father which has sent me
draw him. And I'll raise him up, I'll raise
him up at the last day. It is written in the prophets,
verse 45, and they shall all be taught of God. The Father
will be a teacher as well. And every man therefore that
has heard and learned of the Father so here we have a father loving
the son Here we have the Father honouring
the Son. Here we have the Father sending
the Son for a work to be done. Here we have the Father bearing
witness to the Son, and He seals the Son, and He gives the Son
as a true gift from heaven. And the Father gives the people
into the hands of God the Son. He's given the people into the
hands of God the Son, and He gave them into the hands of God
the Son To know the Father, John 8, 19,
to know the Father is to know the Son. To know the Son is to
know the Father. The father's son, verse 28 of
John 8, the father taught the son words to speak, and the father
was pleased with the things the son does. In verse 42, he says
to those people who had murder in their hearts and hatred on
their lips to him, he said, if God were your father, you'd love
me. If God were your father, you'd love me. He says you're
children of your father, the devil. He honours the Father. In John
chapter 10 we hear him declaring himself to be the Good Shepherd,
and the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. He's the door. He's the Good
Shepherd. He calls his sheep by name, and
they come and follow him. Therefore doth my Father love
me, because I lay down my life, that I may take it again. I am
the Good Shepherd, and the Good Shepherd giveth his life for
the sheep. And he says to these people in
John 10, the same people that he was speaking about in John
8, he says, you believe not. You don't believe, John 10, 26. You don't believe because you're
not my sheep. As I said, my sheep hear my voice,
and I know them, and they follow me, and I give unto them eternal
life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them
out of my hand. The Father which gave them me
is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of
my Father's hand. We're in the hands of the Lord
Jesus Christ. His hands are wrapped in the
hands of God the Father for want of a better picture. Who's going
to take me out of there? Can you take yourself out of
there? Can Satan take you out of there? come to me. The father gave a
brother to his son, and you can't lose anyone, and he says the
father and I are one. The son prays at the tomb of
Lazarus. He says he thanks his father
that you always hear him. The Father has given the Son a work to do
and done it. We are in this age the glorious,
glorious recipients of a work that was done long, long ago.
Long, long ago. The Lord Jesus showed in that
work that he did as he moved through that nation of Galilee,
every single person that came to him, begging for mercy, with
nothing in their hands, with no righteousness that they had
and no righteousness like as before, they just turned up like
a leper and the leper said, And the Lord Jesus Christ did
something remarkable. That man had walked around that
nation for years probably, going unclean, unclean, you stay away
from me. When was the last time someone
had touched him? And what would have happened
if you did touch him? You were unclean. What happened
when the Lord Jesus Christ touched him? You can go on through John's
Gospel and say that the Father sins a capita in the name of
the Lord. And he prays that glorious high
priestly prayer, and I'll just read the petitions out, but I
want you to see if these all get an amen from you, because
that's what it is, isn't it? That's to receive him, is to
lay hold of what he's saying, to lay hold of who he is, and
lay hold of what he's saying. He says, Father, glorify thy
Son. The hours come, glorify thy Son,
that thy Son may glorify thee. And now, Father, glorify Thou
me with Thine own self for the glory which I had with Thee before
the world." That's all about the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, I'm not praying for
the world. I'm praying for my people. I'm not praying for them. I pray not to the world. I pray
for them which Thou hast given me, for they are Thine. This
is eternal life. This is eternal life that they
may know you, the only true God in Jesus Christ whom thou hast
sent." He says, I pray not that you should take them out of the
world, that you should keep them from the evil one. He says, sanctify
them through thy truth. He prays for us at the end of
this, doesn't he, before he goes to the cross. He says, Neither
pray I for these alone, but for them also which shall believe
on me through their word. These are the sent ones, bringing
the message of the sent one Saviour from the sent one the Father.
that they may all be one, as thou, Father, in me, and I in
thee, that they may also be one in us, that the world may believe
that thou hast sent me, and the glory which thou gavest me I
have given them, that they may be one, even as that we are one,
I in them, and thou in me. Do you see how it's all linked
up? I in them and thou in me, that
they may be made perfect in one another, that the world may know
that thou hast sent me and hast loved them as thou hast loved
me. Father, I will that they also
whom thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may
behold my glory which thou hast given me, for thou lovest me
before the foundation of the world. Thou righteous Father
of the world has not known thee, but I have known thee, and these
have known that thou hast sent me, and I have declared thy name."
All of the character of God is declared in the personal work
of the Lord Jesus Christ. All of the character of God is
revealed in the Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified. The most God-like
thing God ever did was put His Son to death on Calvary's tree. And I have declared unto them
thy name, thy character, and will declare it, that the love
wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them. That's what it is to be justified.
Absolutely not. It's finished. It's finished.