Colossians 1, and we'll read
15 through 20. Colossians 1, verses 15 through
20. He is the image of the invisible
God. the firstborn over all creation.
For by him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth,
visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or
authorities. All things were created by him
and for him. He is before all things, and
in him all things hold together. and he is the head of the body,
the church. He's the beginning and the firstborn from among
the dead so that in everything he might have supremacy. For
God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him. and through him to reconcile
to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in
heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. So I came to this scripture,
I actually just was looking for specific pieces of scripture
that described who Christ is. I came there because I had seen
some silly video online about if you have 30 seconds to live,
what are you gonna do? And I thought about that. And
of course Christ came to my mind. And I'm gonna talk a little bit
about that later too. But then the idea of who is Christ Jesus,
that question kept coming to my mind. So I was looking up
scriptures that described him. And this was one that I really
enjoyed. It was a blessing to me. It's really hard to put in to
human language the definition or the answer to the question,
who is Jesus Christ? So you go to the scriptures.
But that question itself, who is Jesus Christ, is a huge question. It is a big, big question on
a couple different levels. First of all, how do you answer
that question with our limited abilities? The answer is too
big for us. We can't fully describe who Christ
Jesus is. I can't. No, I can't. But it's also big, not only in
its difficulty for us to espouse, but also in its importance. There is no more important question
on earth. Who is Jesus Christ? And there are a lot of ways you
can come at this and approach this. Obviously there are many
ways to describe Christ. There are worldly descriptors,
physical attributes, circumstances of his life. And these are good
things to learn. I'm just gonna run through some
of these physical attributes and these characteristics and
circumstances of his life. He was born in Bethlehem to a
Virgin Mary, a miraculous birth. He was a child raised in Nazareth. He was a carpenter, he worked
with his hands. He began to preach of a new covenant, one that fulfilled the old covenant,
which had been around for thousands of years, rendering that covenant
useless to man. This caused quite a stir, upsetting those that held tightly
to that old covenant. To their own abilities is what
they held on to, to their own stature, and that's what the
old covenant was. That's the biggest difference
between the old and the new covenant. The old covenant pointed to you.
This is what you have to do. This is what's expected of you.
The new covenant pointed to Christ. Well, those that held tightly
to that old covenant did not appreciate that change. It took
them out of the equation. And they want desperately to
be a part of the equation. Especially the religious leaders of those
days, and it's still true now. But the religious leaders of
those days really held hard and tightly to their stature. according to the old covenant.
They didn't realize that the old covenant is a death sentence. No one can fulfill it. One. One man can fulfill it. But they
thought they were doing a pretty good job. They would dress special,
wear scripture on their head, make sure that they were very
noticeable, and make sure everyone knew who they were. So when they
got this new message from this random man, saying everything
you believe in, everything you hold tightly to is no longer
valid. They did not like that. Jesus tore away the old. He fulfilled it in himself, but
tore away what they held onto, showing them that they have nothing
good in them, nothing good to give or offer, or certainly to
boast in. Nothing to offer God that could
justify even one sin. And this is coming towards men
who really felt good about who they were. He told them that they only needed
him. He said it, I am the way. And
he couldn't be more plain about it. I am the way. The only way
to my father is through me. They did not like that. Many
saw Christ back then as a prophet. Many saw him as a blasphemer
against the Old Testament. In John 10, it says, we are not
stoning you. They were about to stone Christ,
who had been preaching the new gospel. He said, we are not stoning
you for any good work, they replied, but for blasphemy, because you,
a mere man, claim to be God. Others, in his day, solely by
the work of the Spirit of God, were blessed with a softened
heart to see Christ for who he really was. and they saw him for who he said
he was, the son of God. It says in Matthew 16, Simon Peter
answered, you are the Messiah, the son of the living God. And
Jesus answered, blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this
was not revealed to you by flesh and blood. This is not something
you learned from a book. This is not something you learned
from one of my parables. It was by my Father in heaven. The only way anyone back then
and the only way anybody now can see Christ for who he truly
is is by the work of the Father and the Spirit. There's no other
way to do it. He performed miracles. He healed
the sick. He taught through preaching and
parables. He loved. He prayed. He cried. He hurt. And eventually,
the religious leaders of that day still clung to that law of
Moses and what it meant for them, to their own righteousness, carried
out a plan to put an end to this man that was stripping away their
power, that was exposing their righteousness
for what it truly was, filthy rags. With the help of Rome,
these leaders sentenced Jesus to death, crucified on the cross
without being convicted of guilt of one singular offense. They
even went so far as to release a murderer so they could crucify
the innocent. Christ was crucified and died
on that cross. He was raised again three days
later, appeared to many of his people, and then ascended into
heaven. This is a very quick overview of the circumstantial
truth of Christ. And to some people, this would
be an answer to the question, who is Jesus Christ? This answer
will get you nothing. This answer will get you nowhere. Knowing these circumstantial
truths about Christ will only get you one thing, a little knowledge
of history. Even knowing the glories of what
the scriptures say about Christ, like what we read earlier in
Colossians. beautiful truths about the glories
of Christ, as best as the English language can do it. It says,
for in him all things were created, things in heaven and on earth,
visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or
authorities, all things have been created through him and
in him. Everything was created by him
and for him. He is the subject of everything
and the head above all things. But even reading this and having
that knowledge enter your mind of what the Bible says about
Christ does nothing for you. It's not bad, it's a good thing
to learn about Jesus. But knowing biblical truths does
nothing for one's soul. Knowing the details of who Christ
was does nothing for one's salvation. It says in James, you believe
that there is one God. Good, even the demons believe
that and they shudder. Knowledge alone gets you nowhere. And what do I mean when I say
gets you nowhere? First, we must know that we are
in a place that we cannot remain, that we don't want to remain.
Every person born in this world is born in a place of condemnation
and judgment. a place that if we remain there,
guarantees us eternal punishment and judgment and wrath. It says in Romans, for the wages
of sin or death is death, and we are all guilty of sin. So fully justified, Eternal punishment
is what we start with. That's where we begin. As we were born into sin and
we have done nothing good since, we are only sinful. Our goodness,
anything you can imagine about yourself that you feel is good,
is bad. Paul talks about his righteousness
as filthy rags. His righteousness, that's a biblical
way of saying the best things he can think of about himself
are filthy rags. Your goodness is bad. So when I say that the knowledge
of the scriptures or knowledge alone of Christ gets you nowhere,
that's exactly what I mean. Knowledge alone leaves you exactly
where you started. Completely sinful and fully deserving
of the death which are the wages of sin. So in order to answer the question
who is Jesus Christ in a way that will actually do you good,
Real good. Spiritual, eternal good. The only real good. Anything
beyond that is just temporal. It's just temporary. It's part
of this world and it will come to an end. So the good we know
here really isn't. There is one good thing for you. And that is to be saved by the
blood of Jesus Christ. That is the only good thing for
you. everything else will fall away.
So to get real good, spiritual good, good in the sight of God,
good in the sight of the judge, we must add two words to that
question. Who is Jesus Christ to you? Not the circumstantial details,
of his time here. Not even what you've learned
of who he is in the scriptures. Who is he to you? I said that I'd seen this silly
video about you have 30 seconds to live. Think about that. Something
happens and you've got 30 seconds left. And you know it. You have 30 seconds left. Who
is Jesus Christ to you? It's a real question. It can
be a sobering question, or it can be one that's full of hope.
But it's a real question that you have to ask. Who is Jesus
Christ to me? You have 30 seconds before meeting
eternal judgment. Are you pulling out your moral
scorecard? Are you preparing your good and
your bad to place on the scale? Well, I did covet my neighbor
that one time, but I also held the door open for the lady the
same day. So those two kind of cancel each
other out. So I just keep doing that. I've been going to church for
40 years. I've read the Bible through five times. Prayed five
times a day. I sing the songs with gusto.
I help the needy. You know, I think I'll be okay. If you walk up to the scale,
I'm not saying there's actually a scale, but for an analogy. And start placing the good on
one side and your bad on the other. Everything good you place on
the good side will appear on the bad side. Nothing you do is good. Your righteousness is filthy
rags. Place all those things on the
good side and the bad side still drops every time. It says in
Matthew 7, many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, did
we not prophesy in your name? Did we not preach in your name?
And in your name drive out demons and in your name perform miracles,
begging their case. Lord, look at the good things
I did in your name. And what did the Lord say? I
will tell them plainly, I never knew you. Away from me, evil
doers. I was listening to Joe yesterday.
Katie actually sent me a link to one of his messages and he
brought this up. He said, I find it very interesting that God
doesn't say, doesn't say you're, call him a liar. He doesn't say,
you didn't do any of that. He said, yeah, you're right,
you did all of that. And you did it for yourself. You did it because you thought
you were adding to your good pile. Did we not prophecy in your name? Did we not drive out demons?
And you can take we and make it I, it's the exact same thing
and that's the problem. If you're coming to Christ, if
you're coming to the judge with the word I on your lips, you're
in trouble. And that's the stumbling block
for all unbelievers. the word I. We were talking this morning,
one of the things that so much of modern Christianity misses
is that when Christ was made an offering for sin, no one remembers
the fact that the offering was not made to anyone besides his
father. The offering of Christ was to
his father. Not to us. There is nothing for
us to accept. How could he offer us anything?
All we did in the entire equation of salvation. There's sin, there's
a savior, he paid for the sins, gave the righteousness to his
people, and God could be just and loving at the same time.
All we had to do of that is the sin. That's our only part. And the world hates that. Natural
man hates that. We don't wanna be just sin. We
wanna have a little bit of a salvation aspect as well. That's why you
hear so often that Christ is offering, Christ is begging,
Christ is knocking at the door. That is not true. Christ made
the perfect sin offering to his Father, which was fully accepted
on that day. It's over. God's people are just blessed
by it. That's it. We have done nothing
to deserve it and nothing to make it happen. So again, you have 30 seconds
before eternal damnation. Who is Jesus to you? Was he this
list of factual, circumstantial truths about his life? Yeah,
I know all about Jesus, God. I read the Bible a bunch of times.
I mean, I have all this stuff memorized. That will do nothing
for you. In Matthew, it says, was he just
this baby born in Bethlehem? Is that just the truth of the
Lord back on that day? No, it says, she will give birth
to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus. But then
it continues to say, he will save his people from their sins.
That's who Christ is. From the very beginning, he is
being born and what's the first sentence they include? His name
will be Jesus and he will save his people from their sins. He wasn't just a man that began
to preach this new covenant that upset all the old covenant followers. He preached one that fulfilled
the old covenant, rendering it useless to man. and not only
preached it, he lived it. His life, his death, and his
resurrection were the fulfillment of the old covenant. He didn't
come and just tell everyone there's a new covenant. He is the new
covenant. Going back to our Colossians,
he is all things. All things were created by Him
and for Him. To the world, to natural man,
they see Him as taking away their opportunity of self-righteousness. But to God's people, only by the Spirit of God that
we have a heart that can see this, because we are naturally
incapable of seeing this. We would see it the exact same
way. You're taking away my shot, my opportunity to be part of
my own salvation. But to God's people, by the blessing
of the Spirit of God, we can see it as grace. The ultimate
unmerited gift of the only righteousness we could ever know. There is no other righteousness.
The only righteousness that this world has ever seen, the righteousness
of Christ. That is the gift given to you
as God's people. The only good that has ever been,
the only pure righteousness that has ever existed is given to
you freely. And not even that you don't deserve
it, you've done the opposite to deserve it. We deserve the opposite. And again, knowing who Christ
is. Eventually, back then, the religious leaders of that day,
they clung to the law of Moses, to their own righteousness, and
with the help of Rome, these leaders sentenced Jesus to death.
That's the way the world saw it. That is not the true story
of that day. Christ was carrying out the will
of his Father. That's the truth. to natural man back in that day,
and even now. I mean, if I was there back then,
I would have seen it this way too, unless God would have opened
my eyes. It was all about the religious leaders of that day,
and the Romans, and the flogging, and the pain, and the punishment,
and the suffering that the Lord went through. All that really was was the Lord
carrying out the will of His Father, who He loved. He said it in his prayer. This
cup can be taken anywhere but me, but it's your will, Lord. They knew what was happening. Christ was carrying out the will
of his Father. It says, this man was handed over to you by
God's deliberate plan in acts and foreknowledge. and you, with
the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to a
cross. He was handed over to you by God's deliberate plan
and foreknowledge. The providence in place before
the world began to save his people through Christ. Christ was crucified and died
on that cross in a way that no man can fully describe. not by the hands of soldiers, not by the demand of the religious
leaders, but by the almighty hand of his Father. Christ suffered in a way that
only he could. No one else could suffer the
wrath deserved by the sins of all believers. No one else could suffer that
wrath. And certainly no one else other than Christ could suffer
that wrath and satisfy it. Which is exactly what he did.
says in Hebrews, for by one sacrifice, he has made perfect forever those
who are being made holy. Not only could he suffer that
wrath, he could complete it, and he did. And by doing that,
he made all of his people holy forever. So the question again, you have
five seconds left, who is Christ to you? He is the savior of his people. He is many wonderful things,
far beyond description. And it almost feels weird to
simplify it so much, but it truly is this simple. Think of all
the names that are given to our Lord. The Prince of Peace, the
High Priest, the Alpha, the Omega, the King of Kings, the Lord of
Lords, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah, the Bread of Life,
the Living Water, the Lamb of God. All of them. He is all of these. to carry
out the will of his father. And what is that will? What does it mean to be called
the lamb of God? Because he was slain. Why is
he the prince of peace? Because he brought peace between
God and his people. Why is he the living water? Because
he is the only source of eternal life for his people, do you see? The pattern here, all of these
names point to for my father's will, it says in John, that everyone
who looks to the son and believes in him shall have eternal life. Christ is the savior of his people. He's more than that in his full
definition, but to you and to me, the answer is he is my savior. We are, I talked about this earlier,
about where we begin. We are born into judgment. And
there is only one way to not remain in eternal judgment. I
am the way, he says. So when that question is truly
asked of yourself, who is Jesus Christ? He is your Savior. Some days the realization of
what that means hits harder than others, because we're fleshly,
we change all the time. But what an immense amount of
weight is carried in that word, or in that sentence. I have a
savior, and he's perfect. And his plan was perfect, and
he did it out of love, and grace, and mercy, Completely undeserved. That's who Jesus Christ is. You've been shown mercy upon
mercy. If that is your answer. If your
answer is he is my savior, you have been shown mercy beyond
words. The grace given to you is unmatched
among all creation. The Son of God took your sins
upon Himself and all the wrath that comes with them, and in
order to give you His perfect righteousness, the only perfect
righteousness. There is nothing greater than
this. Nothing close. And if you're not sure with that
question, who is Christ to me? Who is Jesus Christ to me? Go
to him. Go to Christ right now. Don't
wait. We talk about having only 30
seconds left in life. We, first of all, don't know.
That could be true. And secondly, whether you have
30 seconds or 30 years, the question is just as important right now. Don't wait. Go to Christ. Plead to Him. Call His name. Do it in your heart. Do it with
your mouth. Just do it. Go to Christ. It is the most important thing
you will ever do in your entire life. And He has promised So many wonderful
promises, and this is just an incredible promise. He has promised
that he will turn no one away. John 6, 37, all those the Father
gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me, I will never
drive away. Go to Christ, and he will never
say no. And when your time runs out,
When those 30 seconds hit zero, and you're faced with eternal
judgment, and you start to walk up to that scale, empty-handed, I think about that moment. I
don't know what it's actually gonna look like, but I think about
these things, and I would imagine that the reality of the situation
at that moment is way more than we can even think about. Because
we're gonna see the judge. We're gonna see the glory of
eternal life and probably see the damnation of God's wrath. All at once, maybe, I don't know. But think about that feeling
of walking up to the eternal judge. It's a sobering moment. But as you walk up, and if Christ
is your savior, you walk up to that scale, Christ will actually take your
place. And the father will see Christ, and in him he will see you, and
it will be a joyous moment. You will be judged according
to the righteousness of the perfect one, the perfect son of God, Jesus
Christ. His righteousness will be yours at the moment of judgment. It says in 2 Corinthians, God
made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we
might become the righteousness of God. There is no need to stack
up your good and bad. There's no need for this scale. You will be seen in Christ and
his righteousness will be yours. What a wonderful God we have.
What a wonderful Father we have. To orchestrate something with
so much love and mercy. To give freely something so great
to those who are so undeserving. Go to Him. No matter what your answer is,
go to Him over and over and over. Go to the Father who loves you
this much. That's who Jesus Christ is. He's the one that makes all of
this work. He is the one on whom the righteousness
of all of God's people hinges. He is the one who did all the
work. And he is the one who was completely
and utterly victorious. Praise God. Our Father, we thank you. We
thank you for so much. We thank you for Christ. We thank
you for Jesus and everything he's done. Everything he is.
Everything he is for us. We pray this in his name. Amen.