OK, if you would turn back to
the 24th chapter of Luke. And while you're turning, let
me say. That it is indeed an honor to be here. I don't just
say that because I feel like that's what I ought to say. It
is indeed an honor. I always look forward to coming
to Kingsport. It's such an encouragement to
see what the Lord is doing here. As I've mentioned before, it
reminds me of Grace Baptist Church in Danville about 40 years ago.
A lot of young people, a lot of kids, a growing work that
the Lord has blessed tremendously. And as so many gospel churches,
including ours in Danville, are seemingly diminishing, and shrinking,
the Lord is not going to be without a voice, and it appears from
all the signs that I see in this place that the Lord is indeed
blessing his work here. I think the world of your pastor,
and I know that you cherish him, he is a gem, if there ever was
one. He and I have become good friends
over the years. And I hold him in the highest
esteem. We actually listened to some of his messages, Debbie
and I did, on our way down here. And we listened to one, probably
it was when you were in the old building, so it was from a few
years ago. And Gabe was talking about how that You all should
relish this time that the Lord is growing this work, blessing
this work, and I would definitely second that motion because many
of you that are fairly young are going to look back years
from now, if the Lord tarries, and realize just how blessed
this time was. We live through times, you know,
and at the time we don't give it a lot of thought of how blessed
things are. I know, I look back now that
we have grandchildren, and actually three great-grandchildren, You
get to spend some time with them and it reminds you of how you
took for granted those times with your own children and now
they're gone and they're not coming back. So I would encourage
you to never take for granted what the Lord has given you in
this place. It's a rare thing. Okay, I asked Luke to read these
verses. because I want to speak to you
this morning from these verses. So if you'll turn back, which
I think you've already, I've already asked you to. This text
tells us that the two men who were met
by the Lord Jesus on the road to Emmaus were Peter and one
called Cleophas. And verse 13 tells us that the
journey from Jerusalem to Emmaus was about 60 furlongs, or roughly
7 1/2 miles. So it would have taken them,
depending on their pace, 2 1/2 to 3 1/2 hours to have covered
this distance. And shortly after they began
this journey, verse 15 tells us that Jesus himself drew near
and went with them, but their eyes were holding that they should
not know him. And the Lord asked them what they were talking about,
which brought forth a response of amazement. They said, are
you new in town? How can you not know of the things
that have occurred here in the last few days? So they filled the Lord in, as
if they needed to, on all that had happened, and how they thought
that this one named Jesus was going to be the Redeemer of Israel,
physical Israel. And they also mention how that
a couple of the women who they knew and were followers of this
one called Jesus had gone to the sepulcher where they found
it empty. And they had seen a vision of angels and told them, the
angels did, that this Jesus was now alive again, risen from the
dead. Then in verse 25, we find our
Lord rebuking these two men over their unbelief, after which he
gives them a lesson about how the Old Testament scriptures
were all about him. all about him and his coming
to redeem his people. Now, this must have been the
most incredible conversation that has ever taken place. God
Almighty, now risen from the dead in a glorified body, expounding
to these two men all the scriptures of the things
concerning himself. I was talking to someone years
ago, and you know how sometimes you just wander on to silly subjects. I think maybe we were talking
about the movie Back to the Future. Anyway, we got on the subject
of time travel. Where would you go if you had
a time machine? This is where I would go. To hear from the very mouth of
the God-man himself all things concerning him in the Old Testament
scriptures. So at the end of this journey,
they asked the Lord, who they still did not recognize, to stay
and eat with them. They said, it's getting late.
And we read in verse 30, it says, and it came to pass, as he sat
at meat with them, he took bread, and blessed it, and break it,
and gave it to them. And their eyes were opened, and
they knew him, and he vanished out of their sight, poof, gone. Now it would seem to me that
if this happened, I would say, I don't know, did you just see
what happened? I can't believe what just occurred. Not so with these men. Because we read in verse 32,
they said one to another, they didn't even mention that Jesus
had disappeared from their sight, but they said to one another,
did not our heart burn within us? while he talked with us by
the way and while he opened unto us the scriptures. The fact that
he disappeared right before their eyes seemed to pale in comparison
to what he told them on this Emmaus road. So they were excited, turned
around, walked another seven and a half miles back to Jerusalem
so they could tell the other disciples what had happened.
But they were not quite concluded with the story when in verse
36 it says, but as they thus spake, Jesus himself stood in
the midst of them and said unto them, peace be unto you. And as quickly as he had disappeared
before Peter and Cleophas, in Emmaus he now reappears standing
in the midst of his disciples. And now the expected reaction
takes place. And in verse 37 it says, but
they were terrified and affrighted, and suppose they had seen a spirit.
Now of all the wonders and miracles that these men had witnessed
as they walked three and a half years with our Lord Jesus Christ
as he walked this earth, they had never seen anything to compare
with this. Seemingly out of thin air, a
man is standing before them, and that man is the Lord Jesus
Christ himself. who three days earlier they saw
murdered. But our compassionate Lord calms
him, and in verse 38 he says, why are you troubled? And why
do thoughts arise in your heart? 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. Behold the hands
and feet that you saw with your own eyes being pierced three
days ago Now I've taken my title for this message from this verse,
behold my hands and my feet. And I thought on these six words
for a long time, behold my hands and my feet. And we know from
the accounts in the four gospels of the abuse and the resulting
injuries that our Lord was made to endure. He was mocked and
beaten by battle-hardened Roman soldiers. Now you have to understand
that these men had seen so much gore in hand-to-hand combat that
they were completely void of anything resembling human goodness
or mercy. These soldiers witnessed heads
being lopped off, limbs being chopped off, men's intestines
spilled out as they were sliced open. And many of these men were
wearing the blood of their victims at the end of the battles. These were the days that unless
maybe you were an archer, you had to look a man in the eye
before you killed him. You didn't sit at a console in
Langley, Virginia and launch a Hellfire missile from a Predator
drone and kill a bunch of insurgents on the other side of the world
and watch what you had just done on the monitor screen. No, these
men had seen death and gore up close, and they were so hardened
that they were not moved in the least by the sufferings and the
abuse they were heaping on this Jew. Didn't begin to affect them. They actually enjoyed it. They
made sport of it, as hard as that is to imagine. There were
no restraints placed on them as to how much punishment they
can inflict on this Jew. They were free to administer
as much abuse as they could possibly muster. were told that they blindfolded
him and struck him in the face and said, prophesy, who is it
that smote thee? Now you have to understand, they
didn't just lightly hit him. These men were men with some
strength and I would imagine they maybe loosened or knocked
out some of our Lord's teeth as they struck him. They put
a purple robe on him and mockingly said, hail, king of the Jews. no doubt laughing uproariously
as they heaped abuse on this man and beat him to a bloody
pulp. There was no one there to say,
okay, that's enough, you've had your fun, now back off. Later
we're told that they made a crown of thorns and placed it on his
head and beat it into his head with a rod. Now I can't imagine
the pain that would cause. If you've ever been in the woods,
on a hike maybe, and been stuck with a thorn or two, you know
that it's not a pleasant experience. It usually stays sore for several
days. So I cannot imagine the pain
that our Lord suffered as they beat this crown of thorns into
His head. And what about the other wounds that He suffered?
The scourging that turned His back into a mass of mangled flesh. Now, so many times as we're reading
Scripture, We'll read a portion and read right over it. One such
place might be Matthew 26 or 27, 26, where we read this. It says, Then released he Barabbas,
speaking of Pilate, Then released he Barabbas unto them, and when
they had scourged Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. Now this
scourging was much more than just a mere whipping. This scourge was a wooden handle
to which were attached several braided strands of leather, and
into this braided leather were woven lead balls and pieces of
jagged bone and metal. And this scourging was either
administered with the victim tied to a post or on their hands
and knees. And each blow with his scourge,
the lead balls would cause deep bruising and the jagged metal
and bone would rip open the flesh of this victim as if a plow was
ripping open the soil. And as his scourge was dragged
across the prisoner's back after a few lashes, The very bones of his ribs and
spine were exposed to view. Back was completely shredded
into a mass of bloody flesh. Many times, from what I've read,
the blood loss and the shock were enough to kill the victim
before they were ever led away to be crucified. But not so with
our blessed Lord. He must stay alive for a few
more hours in order to accomplish the redemption of his chosen
people. In Isaiah 50, verse 6, it foretold
of the sufferings of our Lord. It says this, I gave my back
to the smiters. and my cheeks to them that plucked
off the hair. Now this is not talking about
plucking a few hairs at a time like you ladies sometimes do
your eyebrows. No, these soldiers would grab
entire pieces of our Lord's beard, rip that beard out along with
chunks of flesh. And all of these combined with
the beating of his face by the fist of these men, resulted in what we read in Isaiah
52, 14, which tells us that his visage, his face was marred more
than any man, more than the sons of men, to the point that he
was unrecognizable as a human being. He was literally butchered. And so I spent hours contemplating
why the only scars that remained to be seen on our risen Lord
were those in his hands and his feet and his side. How was it, or more importantly,
why was it that the only scars that we see from the five wounds,
which were so much less severe, than the other injuries he suffered.
How was it that they were the only scars that remained on our
Lord after he had risen from the dead? From all indications
of what we read of the appearance of our resurrected Lord, he was
completely recognizable by his disciples. There were no indications on
his face or his back from what we read of the injuries that
he had suffered. They were completely healed.
He looked like he did before he was crucified. And I prayed that the Lord would
give me some understanding as to why this happened, and I believe
maybe the Lord has given me some insight as to why. All of the wounds that were inflected
by man as a precursor to crucifixion were completely healed on the
risen Christ. These wounds, it all happened
before he was nailed to the cross. These wounds were the result
of the wrath of man, and as God does so often, he completely
negated these acts of men. Completely nullified what they
had done to our Lord's face and his back. But we read that he had not yet
begun to endure the wrath of the Father, not until his promise
that is found in John 12, 32 came to pass. And I, if I be
lifted up, shall draw all men unto me. Not until that occurred
did the pouring out of God's wrath begin to be poured upon
our Savior. When our precious Lord in three
hours time suffered the equivalent of an eternity in hell for his
people. Now many men, both before and after the death of our Lord,
suffered crucifixion. He was not any different than
a multitude of other men that the Romans crucified. But we
need to remember that none ever endured the punishment of being made to suffer the unmitigated
wrath of an angry God while they were still alive. The suffering of the wrath of
God did not begin for other men until they had died. Not so with
our Lord and Savior. As unimaginable as it is, it
occurred to me one day that our blessed Lord and the damned in
hell have something in common. They both know, firsthand, what it is to suffer the wrath
of an angry God. And our Lord is the only man
who ever lived who experienced the sufferings of the damned
in hell while he was still a man here alive on earth. We use the term to describe horrible
situations. Sometimes we say it was hell
on earth. And we as believers should never
use such a term. It diminishes the sufferings
of our Lord. Our pastor used to tell us that
anything this side of hell was mercy. And I used to think, that's
a strange statement. The torture chambers of old are
mercy. The concentration camps of the
Nazis were mercy. But so severe is the suffering
of the damned in hell that anything that happens to men in this life
pales in comparison. There's only one time in all
of human history that hell came to earth. It was those three hours. when
our Savior hung suspended between heaven and earth, between God
and man, and suffered as no man has ever suffered. The wounds
in his hand and feet were the wounds he received on the cross,
as was the wound from the spear in his side. Those wounds happened.
as he was being made a bloody sacrifice for the sins of his
elect chosen people when he offered himself up to be the sacrifice
to atone for their sins. This moment was a fulfillment
of what Abraham promised to his son Isaac in Genesis. He said,
my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. provide a lamb for himself, and
provide himself as that sacrificial lamb, making himself to become
a curse to free us from the curse of the law, being hung by his
hands and his feet upon the tree. The scripture tells us, cursed
is everyone that hangeth on a tree. Now, the Old Testament scripture
that Paul quotes there in Romans, It's found in Deuteronomy 21,
verses 22 and 23. It says, if a man have committed
a sin worthy of death and be put to death, and thou hang him
on a tree, his body shall not remain all night upon the tree,
but thou shall in any wise bury him that day. For he that is
hanged is accursed of God, that thy land be not defiled, which
the Lord thy God hath given thee for an inheritance. But when
our Lord was hung upon a tree, he was not hung by his neck,
he was hung by his hands and his feet. We've all heard a description
of how the Lord was nailed to the cross on the ground and it
was stood up and dropped into a hole. But I did much research
on this thing of crucifixion. If you ever want to get into a gut-wrenching
study, look into this thing of crucifixion. And I found that many times a
victim was nailed only to the horizontal member of the cross
while on the ground, and then a rope and pulley were used to
raise that victim up onto the cross, up onto the vertical member
that was already buried in the ground. And this method also
caused more unbearable pain as his back had been scourged already. It was dragged up this post. The horizontal member to which
that victim was nailed was referred to as a cross or the cross member. The member that was already planted
in the ground many times was referred to as a tree. Cursed
is everyone that hangeth on a tree. The nails which were used were
actually large spikes. They were used to secure the
victim's hands and feet to the cross. They were not driven into
the palms of the hands. They were driven rather into
this joint at the wrist. And at this junction, I looked
into this, there is a nerve called the ulnar nerve, which runs from
the hand up into the shoulder, into the body. And I read that
when that nerve is pierced, it causes excruciating pain to be
felt both in the arm and throughout the body. And when the victim was lifted
high enough, his feet were also secured to the cross, either
on a foot rest or sometimes on the side of the cross and nailed
through the feet into the side of the cross. And as that victim hung there,
there would be extreme difficulty in breathing. As they hung there,
it made it almost impossible for the diaphragm to be inflated
and to inhale a breath. So the victim, in all their pain,
also slowly died of suffocation. And as I read, it also said that
the person being crucified was stripped completely naked. It
only added to the humiliation. We see the paintings most times
made by someone who is affiliated with the Catholic Church with
the Lord hanging there with a little bit of blood and a loincloth. It was not so. The victim was
stripped completely naked and it's horrible. As all the sufferings
are that I have pointed out to this point, it was a pleasant
day in the park compared to what our savior was about
to experience. Many of us have been hurt physically.
We've been cut, we've had broken bones, other things, so we can
tiny bit relate to the pain that our Lord endured. But in our worst nightmares,
we cannot begin to understand the sufferings of those in the
pit of the damned. And our Lord was about to suffer
that very thing as a wrath of an angry God was poured out upon
him. Now the cruelty of all this seems almost unthinkable to civilized
people. But as hard as it might be to
imagine, many among the thousands who witnessed his execution that
day actually relished in the scene, in the suffering of the
victims. It says, nobody that we read said, this
is terrible, this is just too much cruelty. Matthew tells us,
and they that pass by reviled him, wagging their heads and
saying, thou that destroyest the temple and builded it in
three days, save thyself. If thou be the son of God, come
down from the cross. Likewise also the chief priest
mocking him with the scribes and elders saying, he saved others,
himself he cannot save. He trusted in God that he would
deliver him if he will have him. For he said, I am the son of
God. When they mocked and said he saved others, himself he cannot
save, they were describing exactly what was taking place. God's
holy law demands punishment for sin. Either the sinner pays it
or Christ pays it. That is the reason that he could
not save himself. He was there not to save himself,
but to save others. Now in Revelation 5, 6, John
sees a lamb as it has been slain 17 times. In the book of Revelation,
we read the word lamb, capital L, to describe our Lord and Savior,
our blessed, glorified Lord and Savior. This is how we will see
Christ throughout the endless ages of eternity, as a lamb slain. We will forever be reminded of
his sacrifice by the scars in his hands, his feet, and his
side. We will then see by sight and
not by faith. We will be like Thomas after
he saw the risen Lord. We all know the story of Thomas
found in the 20th chapter of the Gospel of John, how that
when the Lord first appeared to the disciples, Thomas was
not there and the disciples told him about it. And Thomas didn't
believe him. He said, except I see in his
hands the print of the nails and put my finger into the print
of the nails and thrust my hand into his side, I will not believe. So eight days later, we find
Thomas now with the other disciples and our Lord appears to them
again. And the Lord Jesus says to Thomas, reach hither thy finger
and behold my hands. and reach hither thy hand and
thrust it into my side. And be not faithless, but believing. Thrust it into my side." The
Lord knew what Thomas had said. He knew the exact words that
he had spoken eight days earlier. And he purposely used that same
term that Thomas used. And he told Thomas, thrust your
hand into my side. And I've always heard the term,
as we all have, doubting Thomas to describe this man. But a better
term would be faithless, Thomas. Our Lord told him, be not faithless. He didn't say,
be not doubting. He said, be not faithless. Faithless
Thomas, a lot like us most of the time. Behold my hands, the
Lord told them, those hands that had given life to the dead, sight
to the blind, healing to lepers, strength to the lame. Those hands
that had washed the feet of his disciples and gave us a sample,
an example to serve one another. Those hands that were never used
to strike a blow in his defense. Those hands that were told hold
us firmly and safely so that it is impossible for us to be
lost. Our Lord told us this in John
10, 28, and I give unto them eternal life and they shall never
perish. Neither shall any man plucked
him out of my hand. Those hands that created all
things in heaven and earth, Isaiah 66 one. Thus saith the Lord,
the heaven is my throne and the earth is my footstool. Where
is the house that you shall build unto me? And where is the place
of my rest? He said, for all those things
have my hand made. And John one, of course, tells
us that we're all things that were made were made by him, made
by his hands. those same hands that would later
be pierced at Calvary. Our pastor, from time to time,
used to read us a poem, speaking of the hands of the Savior. Many
of you, no doubt, have heard it before. It's titled, The Touch
of the Master's Hand. It was battered and scarred,
and the auctioneer thought it scarcely worth his while. to
waste much time on the old violin, but he held it up with a smile.
When am I bidding, good folks, he cried, who will start the
bidding for me? A dollar, a dollar, then two, only two, two dollars,
and who will make it three? Three dollars once, three dollars
twice, going for three, but no. From the room far back, a gray-haired
man came forward and picked up the bow. Then wiping the dust
from the old violin and tightening the loosened strings, he played
a melody, pure and sweet, as caroling angels sing. The music
ceased, and the auctioneer, with a voice that was quiet and low,
said, what am I bid for the old violin? And he held it up with
a bow. $1,000, and who'll make it two? $2,000, and who'll make it three?
$3,000 once, $3,000 twice. And going and gone, said he.
The people cheered, but some of them cried. We do not quite
understand what change is worth. Swift came the reply, the touch
of the master's hand. And many a man with life out
of tune and battered and scarred with sin is auctioned cheap or
auction cheap to the thoughtless crowd, much like the old violin. A mess of pottage, a glass of
wine, a game, and he travels on. He is going once and going
twice. He is going and almost gone. But the master comes, and the
foolish crowd can never quite understand the worth of a soul. and the chains that is wrought
by the touch of the master's hand. These same hands that were pierced
for us. And he told his disciples, behold
my feet, those feet that walked thousands of miles seeking out
his lost sheep, those that needed to be found. I'm amazed at the
patience of our God toward his lost sheep. Never once do we
ever read in God's word anything that would indicate his getting
weary of seeking out his lost sheep. If it was me, my wife
would tell you, I'm not the most patient person in the world.
And if it were me, after a while, I'd be thinking, you know what,
I am getting so sick of having to seek out these stupid wandering
lost sheep that I can't hardly stand it. Not so with our precious
Savior. There's no impatience on his
part only delight as he seeks and finds those lost sheep, those
that were given unto him of the Father. The word tells us that
there is joy in the presence of angels over one sinner that
repents. And every time I read that verse,
I am amazed that an occurrence here on earth has an effect on things in heaven. But we can believe it because
our God says in his word that it is indeed true. Behold my feet. Those feet that
wore the sandals whose latch at John the Baptist said he was
not worthy to stoop down and loosen. Those feet that were
washed by the tears of the woman in the house of Simon the Pharisee
as our Lord sat at meat. Those feet which the women held
to in worship when they met the resurrected Christ in Matthew
28, 9, while they were on their way to tell the disciples of
his rising. Those feet that Isaiah 63.3 tells
us have trodden the winepress alone, and of the people there
was none to help. Those feet that John speaks of
in Revelation 1.17, he says, when I saw him, speaking of Christ,
when I saw him, I fell at his feet as dead. And he laid his
right hand upon me, saying unto me, fear not, for I am the first
and the last. I am he that liveth. and was
dead, and behold, I am alive evermore. Alive evermore in a
glorified body, but a glorified body that will eternally carry
those scars in his hand and his feet. Those scars as a result
of him being made a sacrifice for his people. Now throughout
the untold ages to come as God's people stand and sing the praises
of this lamb, as we look upon him, we will see those wounds
in his hands and his feet to remind us that he is indeed that
lamb slain from the foundation of the world. That lamb slaughtered
for the sins of those very people who will forever be singing his
praises. That spotless lamb that will
forever carry these wounds that he was given as he poured out
his blood, gave his body to be broken and made his very soul
an offering for sin. We shall indeed forevermore obey
our Savior's command to behold my hands and my feet. I thank
you for your attention. I appreciate the privilege to
stand here and attempt to exalt our Lord before you. Pray for
us in Danville that our Lord will send us a pastor at some
point in time. Let's be dismissed