2 this evening, the book of Hebrews
chapter 2. We're looking in Hebrews, the
second chapter. My subject is Jesus tasted death. Jesus tasted death. Beginning the 7th verse. This
is breaking into a quote from the 8th Psalm. Let me read verse 7. Thou madest Christ Jesus, that's
who the word Him refers to, madest him a little lower than the angels,
that for a little while, for a little while. Thou crownest
him with glory and honor, and didst set it over the works of
thy hands. Thou hast put all things in subjection
under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection
under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now
we see not yet all things put under him. But by faith, by faith,
we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than
the angels. Why was he made lower than the
angels? Well, the Holy Spirit tells us
immediately it was for the suffering of death. And by faith we see this one
who was made lower than the angels for the suffering of death, we
see that he is now cramped with glory and honor, that he by the
grace of God should taste death for every man. For it became
him for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing
many sons unto glory to make the captain of their salvation
perfect through sufferings. Our Lord Jesus was made lower
than the angels for a little while. You think about it, He
made the angels. We're instructed back in the
first chapter that He made all things. God made all things by
His Son. Everything that exists. That
means all of the angels. All of the hosts of heaven. They
know God. They know who He is. They've
worshipped Him forever. They bow down. He's their Creator. He's their Sovereign. He's their
Lord. They stand before the face of
our God. They receive all their commands,
all of their instructions directly from God. These angels, He made
them. He governs them. He oversees
them. He sends them on missions of
mercy for folks like us. We read in the last verse of
the first chapter of these angels, they're ministering spirits.
They're sent forth to those who shall be the heirs of God's salvation. All the angels of God May the
Lord open our eyes that we might, like Elisha's servants, see that
we are virtually surrounded by a host of angels. They are all
sent by our Father, commissioned from our God to watch over us,
to provide for us in some way, in a mysterious way that we can't
even begin to understand. All of these angels, they guard
us. You say, you believe we have
a guardian angel? No, not one guardian angel. We have many angels and they
guard us. Don't you believe that? I believe
that for sure. I tell you, I don't have the
least doubt, but what right here in this evening, in this building,
God's angels are here with God's people. And they observe us as we seek
to honor the same one that they honor. But they don't know anything
about redemption. They don't know what it means
to be redeemed from the captivity of the law. They don't know what
it means to be absolutely freed, absolutely delivered from the
bondage as we've been. They know nothing about being
in a sinful condition and being raised by the free and sovereign
grace of our God. They know nothing of that. They
look on us and they look on us with admiration. They look on
us as objects of God's grace and objects of God's mercy. These
angels, when they provide for us, they minister to us in some
way, in mysterious ways. Just like they ministered to
our Lord. Didn't they minister to our Savior? Indeed they did.
They came and ministered to Him. Our Lord made these creatures.
And yet, The scripture says that the blessed redeemer, he was
made lower than the angels. Now, what is lower than the angels? And the answer is man. Man is lower than the angels. That's what he was made. He was made lower than them in
rank for a while. just for a while. This was His
state of humiliation. When He who is God over all,
blessed forever, was made flesh and dwelt among us. He was made
lower than the angels, and He was made lower than the angels,
specifically the Holy Ghost tells us He was made lower than the
angels in order that He might suffer death. You see, angels do not die. Angels, when God made them, He
made them forever. Now, it is a fact that many of
the angels, one third of the angels, is what we suppose, they
fell in Lucifer's rebellion. But though they fell into sin,
they didn't cease to exist. They didn't die. Only man dies. Man dies. And if God is going to redeem
His people, if God is going to save His people, if God is going
to reconcile His people, if God is going to redeem Tobias from
the curse of the law, then the Lord Jesus, He must be made lower
than the angels in order to die. Because that's the penalty for
sin. Death is the penalty. The wages of sin is death. It's always been death. It's
still death. It will always be death. And
our Lord Jesus was made lower than the angels in order to die. Because by His death, by His
death, He reconciled us to God. By His death, He put our sins
away. By His death, He brought in righteousness. Oh, bless His name! He lived
a life of holiness. He lived a life in fulfillment
of God's law, obeying every one of the laws of God. But it was
by His death that He sealed our pardon. It was by His death that
He satisfied God. If He had lived His life, live
that life of perfection, that life of obedience, if He had
lived it and then gone back to glory, there'd be no righteousness
established for us. There would have been no removal
of our sin debt. All of our transgressions would
still have existed. All of our iniquities, they'd
still be on us. His life was glorious, but it's
His death, His substitutionary atonement, the shedding of His
blood that gave remission of sins. He had to die. Our Lord Jesus, He tasted death. And you'll notice it says He
tasted death by the grace of God. By the grace of God. Oh, what is behind all of this?
What's in back of this redemption, this reconciliation, this establishment
of righteousness, this removal of guilt? What's behind it all?
God's grace. God's grace. God in old eternity. In the covenant we call the covenant
of grace. He ordained salvation for a particular
number of people. And in grace He sent His Son. And in grace the Lord Jesus laid
down His life as the price of redemption. It's all because
of the riches of God's grace. Why don't we trace His death
to God's free grace? Sometimes we use grace and mercy
interchangeably, but we know that Well, strictly speaking,
mercy is God not giving us what we deserve. That's what mercy
is. That's God not giving us what
we deserve. And that's why it can accurately
be said, anything this side of hell is mercy. Because God is
not giving us what we deserve. And in that sense, all of the
world are the recipients of God's mercy. Everybody experiences
His mercy. People who are alive on planet
Earth, who rebelled against God, who don't believe the Lord Jesus
Christ, who despise the name of God, they are objects of God's
mercy. He is not giving them what they
deserve. They deserve to be wiped off the face of the earth. But
wait a minute, so do we. So do we. Mercy. God doesn't
give us what we deserve. What is grace? God giving us
what we don't deserve. What we don't deserve. And as
you read the scriptures, the mercy of God is, upon occasion,
said to be universal. Universal mercies. All men partake
of the mercy of God. But God's grace is not universal.
God's grace is specific. It's God's favor toward an elect
people. God's grace isn't to everybody.
There's no such thing as universal grace. There's no such thing
as what they used to call common grace. There's nothing common
about grace at all. Grace is specific. Grace is real. Grace is giving. Grace saves. Grace preserves. Grace redeems. Grace keeps. Grace glorifies. Grace justifies. That's the grace
of God. And the grace of God is back
behind the death of the Lord Jesus. Here is the Son of God. His name is Jesus. He was given
that name for a very specific reason. For He shall save His
people from their sin. And He's made lower than the
angels. He steps out of heaven. Steps
into this world. Joins His everlasting deity to
humanity. A union that will always exist. There will never be a divorce
of that union. He is now and forevermore the
God-man. For always. He wasn't the God-man
before He came. He's God over all, blessed forever. But in that moment when the Holy
Ghost came upon Mary, and the body that our Father,
our Lord Jesus Christ's Father, the body that He had ordained
for Him, when that was formed in the womb of Mary, and our
Lord Jesus stepped into that body, He was once and for all
and forevermore the God-Man. The God-Man. He was a God-man
when He lived. He was a God-man when He died.
He was a God-man when He arose. He is a God-man when He ascended. And sitting on His throne tonight,
bless His name, He is still the God-man. Bone of our bone, flesh of our
flesh. And what did He do? Well, by
the grace of God, He tasted death for everybody. No, not everybody. It doesn't say everybody. It says He tasted death for every
man. And I love the King James Version,
but they got it wrong here. He tasted death for every one
of the sons of God, for every one of His children, for every
one of the brethren. He tasted death. What does it
mean to, he tasted death? Well, he tasted the reality of
it. He tasted the bitterness of it.
He tasted the agony of it. He tasted the awfulness of it.
Why does the Spirit of God use the word, he tasted? You know,
in another passage, our Lord said, Talk about the cup of God's
wrath, shall I not drink it? Shall I not drink it? What's
the difference between drinking and tasting? Well, I would view
it this way. When you taste something, it's
just a brief experience. On the other hand, when you drink
something, like our Lord drank the cup of God's wrath dry, He
consumed it. So in His death, we see the very
consummation, the fulfillment of God's eternal purpose of redemption. And all of the wrath, all of
the wrath that our sins deserved, He consumed it. It didn't consume
Him. Understand, it didn't consume
Him. You see, in all the sacrifices
of the Old Testament, when our God, when He set them on fire,
They were all consumed. They burn up. But when our Lord Jesus was the
sacrifice for sin, wrath didn't consume Him. He consumed wrath. And there is therefore now no
condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus. He consumed
it. Not only did He drink it, but
He tasted it. That's the brevity of it. It
didn't take him long. This wasn't a long, drawn-out
thing. Oh, I know you and me and all
of God's elect, our sins deserved and they required an infinite
payment. Infinite payment. That's why
I've said it before, hell, it's not about somebody paying for
their sins. You can't pay an infinite debt.
We can't even comprehend the word infinite. There's just no
end. There's no way to calculate how
much it is. There is no calculation, because
it's a debt that we owe that cannot be calculated by human
methods. So nobody in hell pays for their
sin. But our Lord Jesus, He paid for
it. And He just tasted death. And
all He had to do was taste it, and in the taste of it, it was
over. It was brief. You say, well how
could one man, how could one man satisfy divine justice for
so many people? It's because of who that man
was. He's the God-man. That's why. And he tasted death
for every one of his people. I said this word man at the end
of verse 9. It's an unfortunate translation,
unfortunate rendering. Who did he taste death for? Well, look down at verse number
10. First of all, he tasted death
for many sons. For it became him for whom are
all things and by whom are all things. in bringing many sons."
That's who He tasted death for. He tasted death for many sons. Watch it. Many sons, not a few. I like that. Many sons, not a
few. I know at any one, at any given
time, at any one given time, there's just a few. A few here
and a few there and a few over yonder and a few up the road
somewhere in another state or commune or wherever. Just little
pockets of believers. But oh, when you get them all
together one day, it'll be many, many sons. How many? more than the stars in the sky,
more than the sands on the seashore. In fact, John, the beloved apostle,
he said, it's a multitude which no man can number. No man can
number them, but God has numbered them. And God has named them. He wrote down the names of every
one of them in the Lamb's Book of Life before the world ever
began. He named us, He called us, He
ordained us, He predestinated us, these many sons, and He ordained
to bring us all, many sons, to glory through Jesus, His Son,
tasting death for us. Many sons. These are those whose
names are written down in the Lamb's book of life before the
world began. These are regenerated by the
Spirit of God. These are brought to believe
Christ Jesus as He's revealed in the Scriptures. These have
the Spirit of adoption given to them. And so being God's children,
they're heirs of God's glory. And there are many of them. Many. These were the many given to
our Lord Jesus Christ in the covenant of grace. these many,
many sons. He's chosen these to glory, and
He's prepared glory for them, and them for glory. We're worthy
of glory. We're fit for glory. Did you
know that? We're fit for glory. We're worthy
of glory. How is that, preacher? I'm such
a vile sinner. Your worthiness is at the right
hand of God right now. Jesus Christ the Lord. He's your
worthiness. He's your fitness. And I tell
you, when you die, the gates of glory are wide open, and God
Himself, God the Son, is going to welcome you home to glory,
and you'll be where you've ordained to be, you'll be where Christ
purchased for you to be, and you'll be where you ought to
be, because you're an object of redeeming grace. You're going home. You're going
home. Who are these? They're brethren.
Secondly, they're brethren. Look at verse 11. They're not
just sons, but they're brethren. Verse 11 says, For both he that
sanctifieth and they who are sanctified are all one, for which
cause he's not ashamed to call them brethren. He said, you're
my brethren. You're my brethren. Look at the
next verse. Saying, I will declare thy name
among my brethren. He says, you are my brethren.
In the midst of the church will I sing praise unto thee. Look
down at verse 17. Wherefore in all things it behooved
him to be made like unto his brethren. He says, you are my
brethren. You are my brethren. You are
born of my Spirit. You're begotten again unto a
lively hope. Our Lord said to Mary, He said,
you go tell my disciples, I go to my God and your God, my Father
and your Father. We're brethren. That's what we
are tonight. We're brethren. We're brethren. Who did Jesus Christ taste death
for? For the brethren. For the brethren. I know we're unworthy sons, but
he's not ashamed to acknowledge that we're members of his family.
And he's never kicked anybody out of his family. Aren't you
thankful for that? You're still in the family. I think I told this story back
in the Bible class, I don't know, several weeks ago, I suppose
it was. There was a young fellow dating a young lady in our church,
and he went to another church. He went out on prom night, and
he got inebriated. And he went home to his dad,
and his dad said, you can't live here anymore. You can't come
to our church anymore. You've brought embarrassment
upon me, and you're out. And his girlfriend asked me,
said, is it OK if he comes to our church? I said, absolutely.
Absolutely. I'm thankful that God doesn't
boot us out of his family when we mess up. And I talked to the boy. I said,
you messed up. He said, I messed up bad. He
said, I'm so sorry. His father was unforgiving. I'm
so thankful we have a forgiving Father. Because we mess up a
bunch of times, don't we? In fact, we just are a mess.
We just are. We're just full of sin. Spurgeon
said, like an egg is full of meat, we're full of sin. Just
up one side and down another. Through and through. It's just
all we are is sin. And we go over and over again. We go back to the Father and
we say, Oh, Father, forgive me. Oh, Father, forgive me. I've
sinned against Thee. I've sinned against Thee. How
many times have you done that? Numberless times. And that most
of the sins that we commit, sins of omission or sins of commission,
we don't even know anything about. They're sins of ignorance. But
He always fully and freely forgives because He sees us in Christ
Jesus. We're His brethren. We're the
brethren. Now, if God forgives us who are
the brethren, let's us be forgiving of one another. Oh, holding grudges
and all of that kind of stuff, they'll just wear you out and
make you miserable. I know some people, they go around
saying, I'll never forgive so-and-so. Oh, what a bitter spirit. That just doesn't reveal the
spirit of Christ Jesus, does it? Our Lord said, forgive as
you've been forgiven. God has, for Christ's sake, forgiven
you everything. Can't you forgive somebody who
wronged you? Hey, we haven't done near to
one another what we've done to God. And He said, I fully and freely
all forgive. Well, I'll forgive, but I'm going
to remember now. I'll get you. No, God doesn't
do that. He doesn't do that. He forgives
freely. We're brethren. We're sons of
God. We're many sons. We're daughters
of the Most High God. Our Father forgives us. We're
many brethren. Those are the ones that Jesus
tasted death. For whom did He taste death?
Look at verse number 12. He tasted death for the church.
That's somebody else. This is another way to express
this. Saying, I will declare thy name among my brethren in
the midst of the church. In the midst of the church. Who
did Christ redeem? He redeemed the church. Look
over at Ephesians chapter 5. The book of Ephesians chapter
5. And look at verse 25. Here the apostle is talking about
the duties of wives and husbands and children and servants. And you notice in the epistles,
no matter what subject the apostle Paul is dealing with, he always
brings it back to the gospel. He always brings it back to Christ
Jesus. He says in verse 25, husbands,
so you husbands listen up now. Love your wives even as Christ
also loved the church. How should I love my wife as
Christ loved the church? You want some practical instruction?
There's nothing more practical than that. That's practical as
it gets. Love your wife. How should I
love my wife? As Christ loved the church. Well,
what'd he do for the church? He gave himself for it. You give
yourself. And I'll tell you, I found this
to be so. Husbands that love their wives
as Christ also loved the church will find, most of the time,
they'll find wives who'll be submissive to them. I said, wow,
you treat me royally. Isn't that how we're treated
as God's church? We're treated royally. Why? Nobody could ever treat us any
better than God's treated us. That's how we treat our wives. He loved the church and gave
himself for it. that he might sanctify and cleanse
it with the washing of water by the word, that he might present
it to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or
any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish.
So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that
loveth his wife loveth himself. For whom did Jesus taste death?
He tasted death for the church. Now listen to me. In the Word
of God, there is not even the slightest, even a hint of universal atonement or universal
redemption. There isn't anything that even
comes close to it. Those for whom the Savior gave
His life are said to be His sheep, His church. He loved His church. He loved His people and He gave
Himself for them. These are a special people. Universal
redemption is a lie. It's a lie. And it seeks to rob
Jesus Christ of the glory of His redemptive work. This idea
that Jesus died for everybody to give you a chance to be saved. What that does, that takes salvation
out of the hands of God Almighty and puts it into the hands of
the sinner. It says that the work isn't really
done until you say it's done. You've got to add your faith
to what Jesus Christ did on the cross. Oh, what heresy. What heresy. You say, well, be
careful you might offend somebody. If you believe in universal redemption,
you need to be offended. Somebody needs to shock you.
Because you're not the Savior. You're not your own Redeemer.
It's not you that taps the knot of salvation. It's not your faith
that cooperates with Jesus Christ and put sin away. He did the
work, He did it all, and He did it all by Himself. And you're
not going to get any glory, and I'm not going to get any glory,
no angel is going to get any glory. He gets all the glory
because He did all the work. He didn't come into this world
to try to save, to endeavor to save, or to put all men in a
savable position. He came to redeem us by the shedding
of His blood to His death to pay our ransom price, and He
paid it in full. It's done. The great transaction's
done. I am my Lord's and He's mine. And I blessed the day when He
died for me. And He sealed my pardon with
His blood. He didn't try to seal it. He
sealed it. He didn't endeavor to put everybody's
sins away. He did put somebody's sins away. And who's ever sins He put away? Guess what? They're put away.
And you can search till the cows come home. And you'll never find
them. Because they're gone. And where
God doesn't see sin, His justice will not inflict any punishment. He cannot. Because justice has
been satisfied in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, you
want to get my dander up, you just start saying, oh, but He
died for everybody to give everybody a chance. When will people learn? Salvation is not by chance. It's
by choice. God's choice. It's by redemption. Our Savior's redemption. He did
the work. And He did it to the satisfaction
of His Father. For whom did Jesus taste death? Number four, all the children
that God gave Him. Many sons and the brethren, the
church, and then the children that God gave Him. Look down
at verse 13. And again I will put my trust in him. And again
behold I and the children which God hath given me. For as much
then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself
likewise took part of the same, that through death he might destroy
him that had the power of death, that is the devil." The children
that God gave him. God gave him some children. When
did God give Him some children? Way back yonder. Before He ever
made the world, He gave Him some children. Many sons, brethren,
the church. Our Lord Jesus came and He tasted
death for them. For whom did Jesus taste death?
Look at verse 16. For verily he took not on him
the nature of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abraham.
For whom did Jesus taste death? The seed of Abraham. He didn't
say the seed of Adam. That would be universal redemption. He didn't say that. He took on
him the seed of Abraham. He passed by multitudes of Adam's
fallen race. And He chose a people in covenant
grace. The seed of Abraham. We're the
spiritual seed of Abraham. Galatians 3, 7, Know ye therefore
that they which are of faith, the same are the children of
Abraham. These are the ones that our Lord
tasted death for. Now when you think of the death,
when you think of the Lord Jesus tasting death, let me just give
you a few words and I'll quit. And the first word is the word
sovereignty. In his death, he showed his sovereignty. You see, When you think about
Jesus tasting death, there wasn't anything that compelled Him to
taste death. There wasn't anything in us to
move Him to redeem us. He voluntarily laid down His
life for us because it was His free and sovereign pleasure to
do so. His death was an act of sovereignty. And when our Lord Jesus was on
the cross, Remember this, He was still the Sovereign. He was
still in charge of everything. Listen, He ordained when He would
die. He ordained how He would die.
He ordained who He would die for. He ordained all the circumstances
of His death. And on the cross, if I could
use this word, He is orchestrating all of it. He ordained who the
betrayer would be. He ordained every single event
surrounding His death just like He has ordained every single
thing that ever will happen in the history of the world. He
is the Sovereign. Think of sovereignty when you
look at His death. This is not a poor victim of
unfortunate circumstances. He arranged all this, don't you
see? He Himself was in charge. He governed all things to bring
this about. They wanted to kill Him at another
time, not at Passover time, but our Lord said, I'll die at Passover
because I'm the Passover Lamb. Man wasn't in charge, man's not
in control, and man's not in charge nor in control of anything
today. They only think they are. He
is. And that'll give your poor soul
a little rest if you believe that. You won't be pulling your
hair out when you see all the things that are going on in this
world of ours. You just pull the covers up at
night, put your head on the pillow and say, my lord, my savior,
my elder brother, he's governing all things. And what's going
on in Russia or in the Middle East or in Israel,
in the United States, wherever. You just name it, He's there.
He's there. Our omnipotent God. Our omnipresent
Savior. He's there governing all things
to fulfill His will and He works all things out for the good of
His elect people. I believe that in my soul, don't
you? I believe that in my heart. If
I didn't believe that, I'd just go nuts. And I'm just about nuts
anyway. But I'd really go crazy if I
didn't believe it. Who amen'd that? I tell you, you'll watch this
amen corner. You know, they get carried away. Doesn't matter what I say, they'll
say amen to it. Even if I say I'm crazy or nuts
or whatever. But this gives us peace. This
gives us joy. He's the sovereign. I'll give
you another word, substitutionary. This death, Jesus hasting death
for his people, substitutionary. He took my place. He took my
place. I ought to have died. I ought
to have been the one that suffered the wrath of God, the Lord Jesus,
He pushed me out of the way gently. He said, I'll take your death
for you. I'll take your punishment for
you. And you say, and I say, but Lord,
why me? Why me? Even so, Father, so it
seemed good in thy sight. Substitutionary. I'll tell you
another word. Successful. Successful. It says in Isaiah, he shall not
fail. He didn't fail to do what he
set out to do. Everyone Christ redeemed, they
belonged to him. He bought us. He didn't buy heaven
for us. He didn't buy the blessings for
us. He bought us. We're His. We're His. And He's ours. And another word
is satisfaction. He satisfied divine justice fully. I owe no debt. All that justice demanded, my
Savior has presented to God on my behalf. Whatever I owed, my
debt was great. So great, I couldn't calculate
that. But whatever it was, Jesus paid
it all, all the debt I owed. He tasted death for His people.
And you know, because He tasted death, we're not going to taste
death. We're not going to taste death.
There is no eternal death for God's people. We've been raised
from spiritual death. You say, yeah, but the body is
going to die. Well, that's referred to in the Scriptures as falling
asleep. We just fall asleep in Jesus.
There's no death for God's people. What death? That's such a harsh
word. Harsh word. He died. A loved one passed away. He died. But if it's a child
of God, he fell asleep in Jesus. Only his body fell asleep too.
It'll be awake in one of these days. But his soul didn't fall
asleep. Why, at the moment of death,
your soul doesn't lose consciousness. It's just absent from the body
and present with the Lord. That's what death is. It just
means a change of residence. It means you get to go home.
And I know the flesh. The flesh fights against death.
The flesh dreads death and all of that. But for those of us
who are God's people, The thought of dying, it ought
to really be precious to us. I get to go home. You mean I
get to see my Savior? You mean I get to be with Him
forever? Like somebody said, they were
dying on their deathbed. Somebody came in to visit them
and said, well, how are you? And they knew the doctor had
said, There's no hope. A person came in and said, well,
how are you? The person in the bed said, almost well. Almost well. Someday we'll be
well. We'll be well. And until then,
we just keep on looking to Christ Jesus who tasted death for us. Let's sing the closing song.
What's the number?