16 first Timothy 3 16 Without controversy great is
the mystery of godliness God was manifest in the flesh Justified
in the spirit seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed
on in the world, received up into glory. The mystery of godliness is a
person. And that's not just something
that I say because it's true. I do say it because it's true,
but it's clearly revealed right there in that verse. Great is
the mystery of godliness. What is the mystery of godliness?
God manifests in the flesh. The Son of God, the Lord Jesus
Christ. So the mystery of godliness is
the Lord Jesus himself. God manifests in the flesh. Now God was manifest in creation. That's clearly Shown in the scriptures
and especially in Romans chapter 1 that's expounded upon to the
to the Point where man has no excuse because of it. It's clear
that God has made the heavens and the earth and so he's worthy
of our worship His Godhead and power are seen in the things
that are created Psalm 19, one, the heavens declare the glory
of God. And the firmament showeth his
handiwork. And as I said, in Romans chapter
one, it's clearly laid out how that leaves
man unexcusable in itself. But this is of course not talking
about that. God was manifest in creation. But this is not, our text is
not talking about that. God was manifest in his word,
he's manifest in the Bible. If you read the word of God,
you're without excuse there too. Of course, natural man can't
understand what he's reading, but that's not God's fault, that's
our fault, that's our sin. That's our foolishness, that's
our inability self-imposed But God's manifest in the Holy Bible,
but our text is not talking about that Romans 1 16 I'm not ashamed
of the gospel of Christ Paul wrote For it is the power of
God unto salvation that ever to everyone that believeth to
the Jew first and also to the Greek God is manifest by the
Holy Spirit and But our text is not talking about that. 1
Corinthians 2, 10, God hath revealed them, the truths of God, the
deep things of God, unto us by his spirit. Of course, that's
in the preaching of the gospel that he does that. For the spirit
searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. But our text
is not that. God manifests in creation. He's
manifest in his word. He's manifest by the Holy Spirit
in the hearts of sinners. But this is talking about God
manifest in the flesh. What a great mystery that is.
That God is a man. Colossians 2.8. Beware lest any
man should spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit after
the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not
after Christ. Beware lest anybody should deceive
you with anything that's not Christ.
For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead, in a body. The Lord said, a body thou has
prepared for me and you are complete in him which
is the head of all principality and power. The fullness of the
Godhead in a human body. On that night a couple of millennia
ago when the Angels appeared to those shepherds by night and
God was born into this world on that night And the angels
cried a heavenly multitude of the heavenly hosts Said glory
to God in the highest and on earth peace Goodwill toward men Luke chapter 24 if you would
turn over there with me to Luke 24 verse 36 and Glory to God. Think about that. A little baby is laying in a
manger and the angels of heaven, perfect, powerful, God-honoring
creatures of heaven said, glory to God, glory to God, and goodwill
toward men. Luke 24, 36, and as they thus
spake, Jesus himself stood in the midst of them, of his disciples,
as they had gathered together, and saith unto them, peace be
unto you. But they were terrified, and
affrighted, and supposed that they had seen a spirit. And he
said unto them, why are you troubled, and why do thoughts arise in
your hearts? Behold my hands. This is a comfort
And listen, there's a spiritual aspect to this too. I can imagine
that when he appeared to them, and of course, at first they
were scared, but here's how he comforted them. Behold my hands
and my feet, that it is I myself, handle me and see. For a spirit
hath not flesh and bones as you see me have, That was a comfort
to them. They were able to take his hand
in theirs and feel that it was him. It was their brother, their
master, their Lord. But think about this spiritual
aspect of that. What is it that comforts our
hearts about the idea of us meeting God, about the idea of us coming
before God and presenting ourselves before the God of heaven and
earth, when the Lord Jesus says, I've got hands just like yours.
I've got flesh and bone just like you do. Now we can come. Because he went in for us as
our forerunner, a man, a human being into the presence of God.
And therefore all who are in him now are accepted of God. or welcome in his presence and
in his fellowship, in his blessing. Behold my hands and my feet. And of course the added visual aspect of that to them,
they could see the nail prints in his hands and his feet and
knew what he had done for them. And that is our comfort spiritually
too. It wasn't just a physical sight
of that, that comforted them to be able to handle him, to
touch him and to know that it's their Lord. It's the one that
taught them those years and comforted them and assured them, made precious
promises to them. But also the spiritual aspect
of that, look what he did for me. Now, I don't need to fear
because he shed his blood for me. I don't need to fear being
in the very presence of God. He showed them his hands and
his feet. When he had thus spoken, he showed them his hands and
his feet. And while they yet believed not for joy and wondered,
he said unto them, you got anything to eat? Isn't that beautiful? God in human flesh. He appeared
to them and he was hungry. I thought about this, and this
is just me thinking, so you take it like that. But I thought about
when they arrested him and when they put him through the mock
trials and just accused him and treated him worse than anybody
would even treat an animal. I don't suspect they put a lot
of food in front of him during that time, you reckon? I doubt
if they fed him very well during those however many days it was.
And so now he's raised from the dead. He's a man. He's a human
being. He's hungry. You got any meat?
And they gave him a piece of broiled fish. I bet that tasted
good, didn't it? And a honeycomb. And he took it and did eat before
them. There's a reason why the scriptures
are explicit about that. So descriptive about that. He
did eat before them. Flesh and bones. You see me have
flesh and bones. And in that flesh, in that body
that was prepared for him, he opened his hand to the nails to save our souls. to redeem
us from our sins. That's our comfort. That's our
comfort. God was manifest in the flesh.
It's a great mystery. And yet we have the mind of Christ. We discern all things by God's
grace. It's important to understand
now, and I don't know how to say this right, but as I explain
it, you'll know what I'm saying. It's important to understand
that our Lord was not just God, and I say just God. He was not
just God walking around in a human body. He was God and man walking around
in a human body. The body that you live in is
not what makes you a human being. It's your soul. It's what you
are. It's your nature that makes you
a human being. And the Lord Jesus Christ was
God by nature and man by nature. And he wasn't, he was just as
much God as man and just as much man as God, but he wasn't half
God, half man. He was all God and all man. Hebrews 4.15, yet without sin,
without sin. A human nature is a sinful nature. It's a synonym for sin, human
nature, sin. Except in the Lord Jesus Christ.
He was not born of the seed of Adam, but of the Holy Ghost.
Son of man, yet son of God. Isaiah talked about it in chapter
nine, verse six of Isaiah, for unto us a child is born. You ever wonder why it says it
two ways? Unto us a son is given. Well, that was Mary's son in
a sense. She bore the Lord Jesus Christ
and he was born of Mary. But this is not being repetitive. A child is born, a child just
like any other child in the sense of how it happened, how he was
developed in the womb and how he was brought forth into this
world, except Mary had known no man. There
was no sinful seed of Adam in him. but also a son is given. That's not talking about Mary's
son. That's talking about God's son
was given to us. Thanks be unto God, Paul wrote,
for his unspeakable gift. That's what Isaiah is talking
about in the second phrase there. A child is born into this world
and everybody thought, well, another baby. Not just another
baby. It was the son of God given for
his people. We were given to him, and then
he was given to us. In his name, the government shall
be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful,
Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince
of Peace. The Lord Jesus Christ has two
natures. And because of his grace, so
do we. He is God born of mankind and
we are men born of God. We both have two, we all have
two natures. We must be born of the spirit
of God in order to see and enter the kingdom of God. Must be born
again, born from above, born of the spirit. The Lord Jesus
Christ had to be born a man in order to save us. We have to
be born of God in order to be saved Now this is a great mystery
not because it's complicated But because the natural man receiveth
not the things of the Spirit of God He just don't he can't
know them Their foolishness to him and
he cannot know them the truth of God is to be believed not
reasoned out and People, instead of just simply believing the
word of God, they think, well, how could that be? And they start
applying human reasoning to the things of God. How can God be
three persons? You know, how can, when it says
Christ is in the image of God, that just means he's, he looks
like God, he wasn't really a man, though. No, that's not right. The scriptures teach otherwise.
He was the son of man and the son of God. You can't apply human
reasoning to things that are beyond our human capacity to
understand, but you can believe them. If God says God was born in human
flesh, I can believe that. I can't figure that out, how
that works. I can believe it by his grace,
I do. John three, verses one through
11. I won't have you turn there this morning, but you remember
that the Lord Jesus Christ took earthly illustrations and taught
Nicodemus concerning the new birth, concerning how sinners
are saved by the power of God, by the teaching of the Holy Spirit,
by the Spirit revealing Christ to them and in them. That's what
the Lord is explaining in simple terms. You remember he said,
if I speak to you of earthly things and you don't understand,
how can you understand if I speak to you of heavenly things? He
was talking about earthly, being born. Everybody knows about that,
something about that. And he used that to illustrate
what it is to be saved of God. What is it being born? Well,
we know this about it. It has to do with your nature,
doesn't it? It has to do, if a dog gives birth to something,
it gives birth to a dog. It can't give birth to anything
else. And that's what he's talking about there. You've got to have
the spirit. You've got to have the nature
of God in order to see God and enter into his kingdom. If you
just have the nature of man, you can't enter into God's kingdom.
You've got to be born of him. You've got to have his nature. And look, again, it's not complicated. That makes sense, doesn't it?
And yet if you start trying to figure that out, you can forget
it. You're not big enough. And I'm not either. But Nicodemus
kept saying, how can these things be? How can a man be born? How,
how, how, instead of who? And what? What he did, who he
is and what he did, how? You're not gonna understand it.
That's what our Lord, I believe, was saying. Part of what he was
saying was, if you can't understand when I'm using earthly illustrations,
How are you gonna understand that? If I start explaining it
to you in heavenly terms, you're not gonna figure it out in other
words. Just believe him, believe him. Nicodemus himself was a
living example of what our Lord was teaching him. You can't get
it unless you're born from above. It's understood by faith. a faith
in the Son of God. And sure enough, he wasn't getting
it. So he was a living example of
what the Lord was teaching him at that very time. You must be
born of God. And then the mystery's clear.
It's not explainable. Not to the satisfaction of those
that don't believe, And it's not that we become smart
enough to understand the depths of God's truth. He doesn't do
that. He doesn't just make us super
smart so that we can figure things out. He gives us faith to just
simply believe like a little child what God said. So what a mystery God was manifest
in the flesh. And then he, it says he's justified
in the spirit. Now, one of the important things
about understanding this verse is to see the language that Paul
is using here and the contrast that he is employing here to
declare who Christ is and what he did, what he came to do, what
he accomplished, justified in the spirit, manifest
in the flesh, but justified in the spirit. You see the contract,
flesh, spirit. And that's important to understanding
this. The word justify means to render righteous, or to declare,
pronounce, show, exhibit one to be righteous. So he was manifesting the flesh. He could say, look, I've got
flesh and bones just like you, but everybody knew, that knew
him at all, knew he was the righteous holy son of God. How? Because
of his spirit. His spirit, flesh, but spirit,
the very spirit of God without measure. So manifest, he was declared,
pronounced, shown, and exhibited to be righteous. Now these two
things are inseparable. Manifest in the likeness of sinful
flesh, but by the spirit, his spirit shown, manifest to be
perfectly righteous, holy, God, in other words. Just as clearly
as he showed himself to be a man when he said, take my hand and
feel that I'm just like you. just as clearly as he manifest
himself to be flesh, he that clearly showed himself to be
the holy righteous God, the sinless Christ of God, the spotless son
of God, our savior by the spirit, by his spirit, the Holy Spirit. He must be flesh and this is
vital to our salvation now that these are inseparable. Two natures, but inseparable, one person.
He's got to be flesh in order to save us. He that took not on him the nature
of angels, and no angels were saved because of that. His elect were kept from falling,
his elect angels were kept from falling, but they weren't redeemed
by Christ. He's got to be flesh to represent
flesh. And he must be holy, he must
be righteous, justified, seen to be, exhibited to be, holy,
righteous, spotless, without sin, if we're going to be able
to rest in him as our savior. in order to save us now, in order
to redeem us, in order to satisfy God for us, because of what it
is we need to be saved from, he's got to be God. He's seen
to be both. You see the contrast, the beautiful. He was justified in the spirit
by the miracles that he did. They said, no man can do this,
only God can do that. Bingo. He was justified in the spirit
by the word which he spoke. Nobody ever spoke like this man.
He speaks with authority, not as the scribes. He was justified in the spirit
as the spirit himself descended like a dove upon him. And God
spoke from heaven and said, this is my son. This is my beloved
son in whom I'm well pleased. And our text is, what's the word? Justified. There is no better
definition of justified than when God says, I'm well pleased
with him. And that happened with the spirit
descending upon him. He was justified in the spirit.
It's one thing for Pilate to say, I find no fault in it. For God to say that is a whole
other thing. And God didn't just say that.
He didn't just say there's nothing wrong with him. He said everything's
right with him. There's a big difference. He
didn't just not displease God. He was able to say, in sincerity
and truth, I do always those things that please my Father. Most of all, our redeemer was
justified in the spirit, justified simply by who he was, flesh,
but the spirit of God on Calvary, of course, at the
cross. As he died for our sins, according
to the scriptures, as he hung there and said what he said, Listen to Mark 15, 39, when the
centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out
and gave up the ghost, he said, truly this man, manifest in the
flesh, but seemed to be righteous in the spirit. Truly this man
was the son of God. And the Lord Jesus Christ was
shown to be righteous in that God raised him from the dead. Christ Jesus, having put away
all of the sins of all of his elect, dieth no more, the scripture
says. Death hath no more dominion over
him. He is justified in that he rose
and he was raised for our justification. Then our verse says he was seen
of angels So keep those two in my flesh and spirit Who was Christ? me and God He was you he came
down here as you rep to represent you before God But God Almighty in a body God
and man in a body And then it says, seen of angels and preached
unto the Gentiles. These two go together also, angels
and Gentiles. The most wonderful, the highest
created being and the lowest, the worst of
the worst. The angels announced his birth. And they first brought the good
tidings of great joy. There's a savior born unto you
this day in the city of David is a savior. Angels came and
ministered unto the Lord when he was tempted of Satan in the
desert. He was seen of angels. He was attended by angels. He was accompanied by angels.
When Satan tempted him, it says they came and ministered unto
him when that was all over. They do that for us too, by the
way. God sends them. It's God, but he sends his angels. The angel stood ready to defend
the Lord in Gethsemane. I love that. He said, they're
just waiting for the word. You know what he said? Don't
you think I could call on my father and he could give me more
than 12 legions of angels? The angels ministered unto our
savior in Gethsemane when he bore my sins in his own body
and took them to the tree. The angel stood at the tomb and
declared there that the Lord is not here, he's risen. When our Lord ascended, the angels
appeared as they had declared in the beginning, the Lord has
come. He's born unto you this day. Now they said this, you
men of Galilee, why are you standing there gazing into heaven? This
same Jesus shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven. Even now the
angels in heaven worship him. around his throne Scene of angels the angels are
said in first Peter 112 to have a desire That word is passion
The angels have a passion to look into the things of the gospel
of Christ It's foreign to them in the sense
that they they've never experienced that and They don't experience
what a sinner does when he's saved by the Lord Jesus Christ. The angels beheld him though,
they declared him, they ministered unto him, they gave him glory.
But that same Jesus who is the wonder and the subject of the
angel song was preached to the Gentiles. You see what he's saying? He was seen of angels before
he even came. And worshiped by them. But he
was preached unto the Gentiles, not the angels. He took not on him the nature,
there's no gospel for angels. But there is for the scum of
the earth. You see what he's talking about? The scum of the
earth. In the first pair, flesh and
spirit. You have flesh and spirit. Here in the second contrast,
in the second pair, you have the highest created beings and
the lowest. I'm talking literally now. You
might say, well, animals are lower than people. Animals didn't
nail God's son to a cross. You did, and I did. The Gentiles, the worst of all
sinners now. When it's talking about Gentiles
here, that word is also translated heathen. I think five times in
the scriptures, heathen. Idol-worshipping, child-sacrificing,
God-hating, barbaric, worse than animals. But there's good news for them.
Christ is preached unto them. Without God, without hope in
this world, the Gentiles Hope is preached to the hopeless. Lord Jesus Christ, God in human
flesh is preached to sinners, sinners. That's what the Gentiles
here represent. It doesn't matter what you are,
but can you imagine the reason it uses the word Gentiles here?
Can you imagine? People living in this world with
no influence of God at all, other than nature. Not a pretty thought. Even as
wretched as this world is now, there's a lot of religion. There
are things that restrain people, especially in this country. That's
why this country is not the disaster that most other countries are
yet. And I pray never will be. Because
there's an influence of God over those who don't even know God.
There's law, there's consequences for evil. And then, There's restraint,
just a simple restraint of God's spirit. But you see what I'm
talking about. The Jews, they had constant reminders
that God, you don't travel with him. The Gentiles didn't have
that. They had no outward advantage
of God whatsoever. So you can imagine, what happens
to a man with no influence from God, with no, restraint whatsoever He kills his own children to
try to please the God he made up Can you think of anything
more horrible than that that's what they did But listen to that what a great mystery
that God would speak to a sinner What a great mystery. That it pleased God by the foolishness
of preaching to save them that believe on Him. Psalm 8, three, when I consider
thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars,
which thou hast ordained, what is man, that thou art mindful
of him? and the son of man that thou
visitest him, why would God even bother to speak to us? What is a sinner that God would
send his only begotten son and arrange all of this that we might
know about it and come to know him if it pleases
him? I don't think we have much of
an idea of what this is. What a great mystery it is that
God would allow us and cause us. That's two different things. He allows it, that he doesn't
shut this down. But also it's not just God, you
know, letting what will be, will be. He causes us to come here.
He not only allows it, he causes it. And I'm not sure we understand
that. What a privilege. What an honor, what a blessing.
What a condescension of his grace that he would do this right here.
The preaching of the gospel to a bunch of heathens. Regeneration is just the beginning
of the glory of that. When God saved you, that's just
the beginning of the glory of what he's doing for you in the
preaching of the gospel. As a believer, the gospel is our meat and our
drink. Well, what is it exactly that's
preached to the Gentiles? God was manifest in the flesh.
Christ, Christ is preached to the Gentiles. Christ, our righteousness
in the flesh. Christ, the second Adam. Christ, our representative in
the flesh. But God, manifest as our representative
in the flesh. Christ, our sin offering in the
flesh. God can't die. but Christ, the
son of God, son of man, was sacrificed for our sins according to the
scriptures. Christ our Lord and our God in
the flesh. And I add those words in the
flesh, that's what we're talking about. When Thomas, he said,
reach hither, reach hither. You said I will not believe,
reach hither. See my hands and my feet and
my side, thrust your hand into my side and be not faithless,
but believing. God in the flesh and my God in
the flesh. When he reveals who he is, God
manifest in the flesh, I say, I confess my Lord and my God. Flesh spirit angels Gentiles
and now the world and glory Believed on in the world As much of a
mystery as it is that God would even send the gospel to us What
a wonderful mystery it is that he would give us faith to believe
on God Believed on the world You look at this world and think
about what a miracle is that Christ is believed on in this
world That don't just happen does it
that don't happen by human nature you don't figure that out The pillar and the ground of
the truth is context of this The church Christ's true church
in this world the pillar and ground of the truth and The truth of which we are
the platform and support that's what that mean in this world
is Christ God manifest in the flesh that's a person and who
he is, what he did, righteousness, justified, shown to be righteous
in all that he did. And God has been pleased at sundry
times and in different manners to speak in time past under the
fathers by the prophets he hath in these last days spoken unto
us by his son, declared unto the Gentiles, and as many as were ordained
to eternal life believed on in the world. This is still true. Our Lord
said, all that the father has given me shall come to me. He's still adding to the church
daily such as should be saved. Those who are ordained by God
in eternity to eternal life believe sooner or later Believe on Christ. And it's by this same preaching
to sinners, by that that sinners are saved and that believing
sinners are sustained, are meet and drink. Christ is believed
on in this church. Lord help our unbelief. And listen, here's what we preach
to where he is now. He's received up into glory. Received up into glory. That's
essential to salvation also. Is it not? The Lord Jesus said
to his disciples in John 16, it is expedient for you that
I go away. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter
9, we'll close with this. Hebrews 9.24 Hebrews 9.24 For Christ is not entered into the
holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the
true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence
of God for us." That's what he said. It's expedient for you
that I go away. He's the high priest. He's our
true high priest who enters into the very presence of God, the
very glory of God, for somebody as representative. And he's got
to have something to offer. It said the high priest entered
into the Holy of Holies once a year. You remember the next
phrase, not without blood. And when our Lord entered into
glory, when he went to his father, having given himself for our
sins, he entered not without blood. It wasn't the blood of
bulls and goats, but his own precious sin atoning blood. He
entered into the presence of the Father for us. Nor yet that he should offer
himself often, verse 25, as the high priest entereth into the
holy place every year with the blood of others. You see there
are similarities, it's a picture, it's an illustration, but there
are contrasts too. The Lord didn't offer himself
often. He's our high priest. He represented us before God.
He had to have an offering, but not every year. Verse 26, for then must he often
have suffered since the foundation of the world, but now once in
the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin. What did Paul say about all the
blood of bulls and goats? They can never take away sin.
But as John the Baptist said, there's the one who does. There's
the lamb that takes sin away. to put away sin by the sacrifice
of himself. You see why we preach a person,
himself. Himself is our salvation. Himself
is our righteousness. Himself is our sin offering. And as it is appointed, verse
27, unto men once to die, but after this, the judgment, so
Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. And unto them
that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto
salvation, unto plumb-saved salvation. Now remember the context of chapter
three in closing. This is why we ought to say what
we say Everywhere but especially in the church And the church
is not a building. It's us This is why we ought
to say what we say do what we do and think the way that we
think we reckon this way That if he died for us we ought to
live not for ourselves but for him That's why because of who
Christ is and what He did, why He did it, and where He is now,
received up into glory. And what He's doing right here,
because of what He's doing right here. We are stewards of His grace,
and may He make us faithful and careful to glorify Him in everything. Amen, let's pray.