The following sermon was delivered
on Sunday evening, August 27, 2000, at the Trinity Baptist
Church in Montville, New Jersey. Now those of you who were with
us when we gathered to worship and to look into God's Word together
this morning already know that our consideration of the Word
of God tonight will be comprised of a continuation and a completion
of the message which I was unable to complete this morning due
to the constraints of time. And if any of you think that
by now, after preaching for, well, 47, 48 years, I ought to
know how much material on paper will translate into how much
utterance, you just don't understand preaching. I don't say that to
fault you, but it's a fact. You just don't understand preaching. So you bear with me when I come
to these times when I don't make a good assessment and feel it
necessary to complete the morning message in the evening. Well,
for those who were here, you know that we were looking into
Ephesians chapter five with respect to Christ relationship to his
church as his bride, and I began our study this morning, and I'm
going to attempt to squeeze into 10 minutes and hours worth of
exposition. I began by highlighting the fact
that in the New Testament, especially in the epistles, we see the constant
interrelatedness and interpenetration of doctrine and practice of truth
and of life. And because this is so, some
of the most lofty doctrinal passages drop down upon us immediately
on the heels of the most practical implications or giving birth
to the most practical implications. And some of the most mundane
duties take us up into the stratosphere of some of the Bible's most lofty
doctrines. And nowhere is this more true
than in Ephesians 5 verses 22 to 33. What begins as a very
practical word of directive concerning Christian husbands and wives
and their mutual duties one to another gives birth to one of
the most glorious passages in all of scripture concerning Christ's
relationship to the church as his bride. And we must not think
that marriage is the substantial matter and that the church somehow
draws some light and some analogies from that substantial relationship
of a husband and wife, for just the opposite is true. And Paul
was conscious of this, for he says in verse 32 of Ephesians
5, this mystery is great. That is the mystery of the two
becoming one flesh in marriage, but I speak in regard to Christ
and of the Church, and it is the relationship of Christ to
His Church as His bride from which marriage is to take its
shape and to derive its contours. That's the picture that is Christ
and His Church that is the reality, the living reality. And so in
the light of the fact that I will be beginning a series of at least
15 messages dealing with various aspects of church life, I felt
it would be healthy to our souls to get a fresh vision of the
glory and the privileges of the church in her identity as the
bride of Christ. Then we began to look at verses
25 to 27 in this passage. Husbands, Love your wives even as and here
are the statements which stand on their own feet. They would
be in place and they would be true no matter where they were
found in scripture. Christ loved the church and gave
himself up for it that he might sanctify it or better rendered
her having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word.
that he might present the church to himself a glorious church,
not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that it should
be holy and without blemish. We began to look at this passage,
first of all, under the heading the church is the object of the
special love and redemptive sacrifice of Christ. The church is the
object of the special love and redemptive activity of Christ. The heart of the affirmation
in this passage is Christ loved and gave. It was the love of
intelligence and commitment to will and to seek the good of
its object at great personal cost. These words, in the form
in which they come in the original point, not to Christ's general
and ongoing love, but to a specific, definitive act of loving and
of giving. And we find in chapter 5, verses
1 and 2, what that love and that giving were. The imitators of
God as beloved children, and walk in love, and now the same
construction even as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up
for you, an offering and a sacrifice to God for an odor of a sweet
smell. Christ's love demanded the sacrifice
of Himself, and this being so, the bride was not lovely, but
guilty, polluted, and wrath-deserving, and Christ loved the church and
gave Himself for the church. And then we noted that since
the church is comprised of the whole totality of those whom
He loved and for whom He gave Himself, each of them can say
with Paul in the language of Galatians 2 and verse 20, the
Son of God who loved me and gave Himself for me. And in the application, I sought
to show in five or six ways from specific text of scripture why
the individual members of the church, the bride, must live
in the consciousness of the fact that they are the objects of
the special love and the redemptive sacrifice of Christ. Then, having
considered the assertion of 525 B that the church is the object
of the special love and redemptive sacrifice of Christ, we began
to take up the second heading as we looked into verse 26 and
27. And that is this. The church
is the recipient of the purifying, perfecting and nurturing grace
of Christ, not only the object of his special love, and of his
sacrifice, but the church is the recipient of the purifying,
perfecting and nurturing grace of Christ. What were the ends
for which Christ loved and gave himself as a sacrifice? The two
purpose clauses here in these verses tell us. We learn, first
of all, that there was the initial sanctifying and purifying grace
that He would impart to each one who becomes a part of His
Church, His Bride. Look at the language of the text.
Christ loved, Christ gave, in order that He might sanctify
it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the Word. That is a description of the
initial sanctifying and purifying grace that Christ would infallibly
impart to everyone who becomes a part of His Church, His Bride. The tenses of the Greek words
again point to a sanctifying and a purifying that are not
continuous, but are definitive. not progressive, but they come
on the threshold of ones being brought into union with Christ. They are set apart unto Christ. They are purified by these means,
the washing of water in connection with the Word. And whatever place
there may be for a reference to baptism, and we saw that we
could not solve that debate, this much is clear. This cleansing
occurs in conjunction with the word, the spoken word, the proclamation
of the gospel of our Lord Jesus. Now, sticking my head in my notes,
which I am loath to do, everything in me says I shouldn't do that. I'm talking to people, not to
my desk. But I've completed my review
in 10 minutes. And so now we come to further
consider what does this passage teach us? Not only about the
church as the object of the special love and redemptive sacrifice
of Christ, but the church as the recipient of the purifying
perfecting and nurturing grace of Christ. Well, we've seen what
it says about the church as recipient of the purifying grace of Christ. Now notice under this second
heading, the church as recipient of the perfecting, the consummate
perfecting work of Christ. Look at verse 27. He gave himself,
he loved and gave himself, that he might sanctify it, having
cleansed it, in order that, here is the second clause of purpose,
to this end, that he might present the church to himself, better
rendered, that he himself, there is an additional pronoun, It's
not necessary for the sense of the meaning, but for the underscoring
that it is the heavenly bridegroom, that he himself might present
the church to himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle
or any such thing, but that it should be holy and without blemish. The Christ who loved the church
while she was yet filthy defiled, polluted and guilty, who gave
himself for her while she was defiled, polluted and guilty,
who, when he brings each one into that church to be part of
his bride, he sanctifies and purifies with the washing of
water in connection with the spoken word. that Christ is determined
to bring His work to its consummate perfection in all who are part
of His Church, His Bride. He will not be satisfied until
He Himself presents to Himself His Church, a glorious Church. a more literal rendering of the
original would say, present to himself, endoksa, present to
himself in glory the church without spot or wrinkle or any such thing,
but that it should be holy and without blemish. Well, let's
unpack those words for a few moments. He died that he might
present the church to himself a glorious church, an en doxa
church, the preposition en, in, doxa, glory, that he might present
to himself a church that is enveloped in glory. Glory is the outshining
of the perfection that the church will know when the Lord Jesus
has brought her to her consummate perfection by His grace. That's the general term. He will
present it to Himself enveloped in glory. Now, what does that
mean specifically? Well, the Apostle tells us negatively
and positively. Negatively, that will mean a
church enveloped in glory, that is, not having spot or wrinkle
or any such thing. That's the negative. Not having. Not having spot. No blemish. No mole will be found distracting
our eyes from the symmetrical beauty of the bride. How often
people will say, well, she would be a beautiful woman if... And
what follows the if is the blemish that is pronounced, that mars
the symmetry of that beauty, so that instead of being all
beautiful, she is beautiful if she did not, if this were not. But the bride that Christ presents
to himself will be enfolded in nothing but glory. What does
that mean? Without spot and without wrinkle. This is the term you would use
to describe what happens when the flesh begins to hang behind
the triceps. And proceeds come in here, and
the wattle here gets a bit more pronounced. Wrinkles, folds in
the skin, the mark of advancing age. And advancing age is nothing
but a preview to the grave and to the words and to dissolution
in the grave. But now when he presents his
bride to himself, she will be without any spot, no blemish,
no wrinkles, and Paul says anything that fits in that category. There
will be no moral blemish or defect of any kind whatsoever. He himself will present to himself
a church enveloped in glory, that is, Not having spot or wrinkle
or anything in that category of defect or of imperfection. Now positively dropping all figurative
language, but look at the contrast. Having no such thing, but that
it should be holy and without blemish. That it should be holy
and without blemish. And here the holiness is not
merely set-apartness unto God. That is the sanctification that
occurs on the threshold of Christian experience, when there is that
radical, definitive break with the dominion and power and pollution
of sin. But here is a holiness imparted. He himself shall present to himself
a bride that will be holy. and utterly without any moral
blemish whatsoever. And it's interesting that this
is precisely the couplet of words the Apostle was guided to use
way back in chapter 1, when he writes in verse 3 of chapter
1, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenlies in
Christ, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of
the world in order that we should be, and here's our two words,
holy and without blemish before Him. And I take the position
that the in love belongs with the next verse, in love having
predestinated us. Chose us in order that we should
be holy and without blemish before Him. The eye of God himself will
not be able to find anything that can be called a contradiction
of holiness through and through the entirety of our redeemed
being. The eye of God will find nothing
that is contrary to his own holiness. We shall be before him holy and
utterly without blemish. Then from the Father's perspective,
what He has predestined us to be, Romans 8, 29, whom He, the
Father, foreknew, then He also predestined to be conformed to
the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among
many brethren. But from the standpoint of God
the Son and the imagery of the Bride, He shall present to Himself
a Bride that is utterly without spot, wrinkle, any such thing,
but in reality shall be holy and without blemish." Now note,
please, from the passage in Ephesians 5, how all of this is tied together. He loved the church, gave himself
up for the church in order that He might impart the initial work
of sanctifying and purifying in order that He might bring
the church's bride to the consummate perfection of His grace. And what He died to have, He
shall have. God has promised to His Son that
His death shall not be in vain. He shall see of the travail of
His soul and he shall be satisfied. And when he voluntarily submitted
himself to everything bound up in the loving and giving of himself,
a sacrifice for an odor of a sweet smell, in all the agony of Gethsemane,
in all the travail of Golgotha and the darkness and the forsakenness
and the shame and the rejection, his heart was set upon his wedding
day. when He might Himself present
to Himself a bride in whom the eye of His Father in His eye
can find no moral stain or imperfection, they will all be without blemish
and holy before Him. Now, in struggling with trying
to find some human illustration and any analogy has a limp foot,
but I've allowed my mind to do a little fantasizing, and I want
you to fantasize with me. Imagine a relatively young woman. She was reared in a home with
nothing but love, principle, biblical love, kindness, consideration,
every effort to see her brought to maturity, loving God and his
ways, and serving the God who made her. that she's a female
prodigal. She's thrown it all over. She's
abandoned herself to sin. And as she abandons herself to
sin, throws over the traces of decency and morality and responsibility,
she becomes the plaything of any man that wants her. She begins
to seek instant gratification with her dope and her drugs,
and she's got arms with needle tracks up and down, left and
right arm. She's now a homeless street person. She's dressed in rags. She gives
off a repulsive odor. Her body is covered with sores. She's malnourished. The skin
hangs on her bones. With no subcutaneous fat it's
all been eaten up and she cannot feed upon the absence of nourishing
food and so her body feeds upon itself. Her skin is wrinkled
because of this condition. She's an old woman before her
time. One day a man passes by her who's
independently and truly wealthy. I mean filthy rich. He has his
own servants and handmaidens, his own private physician, his
own private plastic surgeon, reconstructive surgeon, his own
beautician. He has his own tailor, seamstress,
nutritionist. I mean, this guy is filthy rich.
He's got everything possible to make life as easy and pleasurable
as it can be. And he passes by where that woman
has most recently parked. in some side street, in some
large city, in all of that condition that I've described. And he looks
at her, and his heart is moved with compassion. And the compassion
then turns into agape love. And he sets his heart upon her. And there is born in his heart
a will and a determination to do for her what she cannot do
for herself. And in order to accomplish the
purpose and will of his love, at great cost to himself, he
knows it will be, he says to this woman, if you will become
my wife, I will commit myself to the meeting of all of your
needs. And then he tells her what he
has. about his nutritionist and about his seamstress and his
tailor and his private doctor and all the rest and says, if
you will commit myself to me and to all that is my disposal
with this end in view, that one year from now you will stand
at the back of my church and walk down the aisle to be my
bride. A monument of what I will do
to make you glorious on your wedding day. And she says, you
mean all I have to do is commit myself to be your bride and put
myself into your hands with your resources. And that's what you'll
do for me. He says, yes, I pledge all that
I am to do that and to be that to you. And overwhelmed with
a sense of wonder, why in the world would this man who could
have humanly speaking any woman he wanted and have them line
up by droves wanting to become his wife. Why? Why would he ever
set his love upon me? She doesn't fool herself anymore.
When the wrinkles first began to come and the needle tracks
first began to show, she tried to fool herself like some of
you do with your sin. Not as bad as it appears. And she could
fill in some of the cracks with pancake makeup and she could
rub away with oil of a lay some of the beginnings of the crow's
feet. But the time has come when she
sees herself. She sees what she really is.
She's an absolute wreck, a disgusting wreck of humanity. Why would
he set his love upon me? Why would he commit himself to
do that for me? But she responds and says, I
will. And the first thing he does,
he takes her to his home and he assigns the task immediately
to his maidservants. Give her a bath and change her
smell. And so he sanctifies her unto
himself and he purifies her. And she now smells sweet and
she has decent clothing put upon her. There's a radical and an
immediate transfer from being a street person a homeless wreck
there on the street to someone who's in a context of dignity
and care. There is a radical, definitive
transformation from this to that. But she's a long way from being
the bride he envisioned. And so the nutritionist sits
down with her, and the doctor examines her, and then the tailor
and the seamstress go to work on her. And they begin to administer
medicines and foods to begin to give her some subcutaneous
flesh to fill out her face, smooth out her wrinkles. The ones that
can't be smoothed, He hands her over to the plastic surgeon and
says, you'll take good care of them. And then she begins to
eat and be nourished and the doctor administers medicine and
her open sores and all of the physical maladies begin to leave
one by one. And then the year is up and the
wedding day comes. There she stands at the back
of his church. The only way you would know she
was the same woman that he found in the street is if you had taken
her fingerprints and you matched them. From a wreck of humanity,
vile and polluted, with no morals and now her health gone and her
beauty gone, he set his love upon her. He took her to himself
and he himself now presents to himself a glorious bride with
no spots, no wrinkles, or any such thing. Now that's just a
little human parable of what Paul says Jesus does, and the
fundamental difference is he doesn't die and rise again from
the dead on her behalf. All human illustrations break
down, but do you catch something of the incongruity of the whole
arrangement? Why would He set His love upon
such a wreck? He loved her because He loved
her, because He willed to love her, and there is no further
explanation. Christ loved the church. And if you think my illustration
stretches it, I have not begun to be as grossly disgusting and
revolting as God is in Ezekiel chapter 16. where he likens his
relationship to Israel, to one who goes to take a bride and
starts with a baby thrown in a dumpster whose navel has not
even been cut and not washed from its birthblood. That's what
God says we look like. A baby in a dumpster with an
uncut navel and unwashed. That's what we looked like. Now,
my imagery is soft compared to God's. And in that Ezekiel passage,
you have the picture of God nurturing that outcast, disgusting, filthy
outcast to be His bride. And that's something of a foreshadowing
of Ephesians chapter 5. Christ loved the church. and
gave himself up for it, to do what? Merely to get her off the
street, and a good bath, and perfumed, and some deodorant,
and her hair done, and then to leave her radically changed from
what she was, but still open sores upon her face, ugly wrinkles
placed before her ears because of her... No. He is committed,
not merely, not only, to sanctify her, to set her apart from a
streetlight to Himself, and to wash her. He is committed to
the wedding day, to present her to Himself, glorious, no spot,
no wrinkle, not any such thing. That's what Paul says. Here,
by the Spirit of God, Christ loved the church, ugly, defiled,
stinking, in rags, in tatters, starving, open wounds and sores. He loved the church, gave himself
for it, that he might what? That he might impart that initial
sanctifying and purifying grace. But secondly, that he might impart
that consummating, perfecting work of grace. But then, here
in the passage, we have a third dimension of the Church being
a recipient of Christ's grace, not only of His purifying and
perfecting grace, but also of His nurturing grace. Look at
verses 28 and 29. What happens between the initial
sanctifying and purifying and the consummate perfecting of
grace? What happens in between? Well,
we find out here in verses 28 and 29. Even so ought husbands
to love their own wives as their own bodies. There's the practical
directive. He that loves his own wife loves
himself. Practical directive. For no man
ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it. Common
observation. But now notice the rich theological,
rich biblical reality. Even as Christ also the church. Christ also what the church Christ
also nourishes and cherishes it as his own body. And both are present tense verbs. He is continuously nourishing. And what does this word nourish
mean? Well, the only place it's found in the New Testament is
later on in chapter six in verse four. And you fathers do not
provoke your children to wrath. But here we are. Nurture them.
Nourish them. Do all that is necessary to see
them brought to full maturity, healthy, intelligent, Useful,
responsible citizens of two worlds. Nurture them. That's our word. And Christ is continually nurturing,
nourishing. He is bringing His bride to maturity. In the image of chapter 4, He's
bringing His body to maturity. The body is growing up into Christ. In all things, whether image
of bride or body, Christ is nourishing, continually nourishing. But not
only nourishing, look at the next verb, cherishing. Another
present tense verb. Cherishing. It means to show
affection. It's TLC. Tender love and care. The other usage is 1 Thessalonians
2 and verse 7. Look at the setting of it. The
same apostle uses this word. when describing the nature and
spirit of his own labors among the Thessalonians. Verse 7 of
chapter 2. We were gentle in the midst of
you as when a nurse, here's our word, cherishes her own children. And I remember when preaching
through Thessalonians, coming to the conviction that many of
the commentators share, that Paul is saying we were as gentle,
we were as tender in the midst of you as a wet nurse, when she's
got the child of her own womb at her own breast? Is a woman
that loves children enough to give of herself and her nourishment
to someone else's child? What is she like when she has
the fruit of her own womb nestled against her own breast? And Paul
says, that's the way we were among you. Paul says in Ephesians,
that's what Christ is continually doing with His bride. From the
time He takes her off the street, Until the wedding day, he's continually
nourishing and cherishing her. You see, there are sermons in
tenses, nourishing, continuous, cherishing, continuous. And if
you ask, well, how does he nourish and how does he cherish? That's
not explicitly explained right here in Ephesians 5, but from
the analogy of scripture, we are given abundant answers to
that question. Christ nourishes and cherishes
his church, Paul has said in chapter 4, by giving to his church. those with gifts to help and
to nourish and to feed and to guide His church. For eleven,
He gave some apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors
and teachers for the perfecting of the saints unto work of ministry,
unto the building up of the body of Christ. He nourishes His bride,
the church, by continuously furnishing her with men as gifts to His
church, that they might teach His word and shepherd His people,
that they might come to maturity and into their sphere of God-appointed
usefulness. He does this as the body itself,
the various members of the church who constitute the bride collectively
as they minister one to another. Verse 16 of chapter four, from
whom all the body fitly framed and knit together through that
which every joint supply, according to the working in due measure
of each several parts makes the increase of the body unto the
building up of itself in love? How does he nourish and cherish,
not only by furnishing his church with gifts to teach and to instruct
and to shepherd, but by his life in the members of the body, ministering
one to another in a whole multitude of ways as determined by the
Scriptures? He nourishes and cherishes by
His constant intercession. Hebrews 7.25, He is able to save
to the uttermost all who come unto God by Him. Why? Seeing
He ever lives to make intercession for them. Paul asked the question,
who is he that condemneth? It is God that justifies. Who
is going to lay a charge to God's elect? It is Christ that died,
yea, rather that is risen from the dead, who is also at the
right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. And then he nourishes and cherishes
by communicating his own life to us. Here is the mystery of
being a true Christian. I am so united to Christ that
Christ can say in another image, John 15, I am the vine. You are
branches. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit
of itself, so neither can you, except you abide in me. Without
me, you can do nothing. But with Paul we can say, I can
do all things in him who strengthens me. Galatians 2.20 I live, yet
not I, but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live
in the flesh, I live it in the flesh as a thinking, rational,
choosing being. But wonder of wonders, it's not
the me that was there in the street. In my vileness and my
pollution, it is me united to Christ in such a way that He
dwells in my heart by faith. And the life that I now live
is Christ living in me. Paul says the great mystery that
he preaches among the Gentiles is Christ in you, the hope of
glory. He can say in Colossians 3, when
Christ who is our life. Now, that's a whole series of
terms. How does Christ nourish and cherish us? I've just thrown
out a few pieces, but he goes on doing that because between
the time he finds us in our polluted, condemned, defiled state, and
presents us in perfection to Himself. Here we must live out
our days with the remains of that in us which originally took
us to the street. It's still in us. Prone to wander. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. Do you know what that is? The
proneness to what? looking back, marveling at what
God did when He set His love upon us in Christ. And when that
love that led Him to give Himself a sacrifice goes forth in the
person and ministry of the Spirit to come to us in our street condition,
though He has taken us, put us in His household, and begun to
perfect us, We need His constant nourishing, cherishing work,
or those things yet within us that have an affinity for the
streetlight would take us right back there and send us to hell. We are not automatically kept
from conversion to glorification. It is Christ nourishing and cherishing
that keeps us as much as it was His loving and His giving of
Himself that enabled us to get in in the first place. And He
nourishes and He cherishes and He will continue so that the
Apostle is unafraid to say that we have in Christ completeness. You are complete in Him. As you have received Christ Jesus
the Lord, so walk in Him. Root it and build it up in Him. He nourishes and cherishes us.
by His own life imparted to us by the Holy Spirit. Well, that's
my second head that I knew I couldn't complete this morning. That the
grace that moved Him to love us and to give Himself for us
will not only bring us to that initial experience of His grace
by which we are sanctified and purified But there will be the
consummate perfecting of his grace. He will himself present
us to himself without spot or wrinkle. And in between, there
will be the continuing nourishing and cherishing grace of Christ. And when I came to this point
in my preparation, the only words that came to my mind were the
words of Paul. What then should we say to these
things? What then should we say to these things? Well, I want
to say several things. I said one of them this morning.
I tacked on one application. I want to just mention it tonight.
In this passage, there are many doctrinal realities, but I want
to underscore again tonight one vital doctrinal reality, and
it is this. The death of Christ is inseparable
from the application of its benefits towards those for whom he died.
Christ loved us, gave himself for us in order that, hopefully,
some or a few or many would be willing that he should sanctify
and cleanse and purify and present. No, it is absolutely certain
that all whom he loved and for whom he died shall be sanctified. purified with the washing of
water in connection with the Word, and He Himself will present
to Himself every single one without blemish and without spot or any
such thing. Someone may sit here and say,
Pastor, that sounds like a particular redemption. That sounds like
what I've heard people talk about, limited atonement. Oh, you may
call it what you want. I like to call it simple, straightforward
Bible instruction. Christ loved and gave in order
that. Don't change God's in order that. He loved, He gave in order that. And the in order that's of Christ
shall be realized. He Himself shall present to Himself
that which he envisioned when he loved and gave himself. But then you say, if that's so,
and we can't come up to every single individual and say, Christ
loved you, Christ gave himself for you. What gospel do we have?
I tell you, my friend, we've got a gospel that's far more
glorious than saying, you know, Christ loved you and died for
you, but it's not certain whether or not whom he loved and what
he meant when he died will really be accomplished. It's up to you.
Well, a person who's thinking, say, well, if it's up to me to
get in and get the benefits, then it must be up to me whether
or not those benefits will continue and come to their consummation.
No, the gospel we preach is this and no tongue in cheek. I do
not know if I can say to any one of you indiscriminate, Christ
loved you and gave himself for you. I know that he loved his
church. That's what the text says. Gave
himself for her. In order that he might sanctify,
having cleansed her with the washing of water by the word,
that he himself might present her to himself a glorious church. No spot, no wrinkle, any such
thing, but holy and without blemish. But here is my gospel. That Christ
who loved and gave, and is determined to sanctify and present to himself
and nourish and cherish in between, that Christ, in the Word, stands
before you in the Word and truth of the Gospel and says to you
personally, individually, come to me and I will give you rest. Him that comes to me I will in
no wise cast out. Oh, everyone who thirsts, come
to the water. And he who hath no money, come,
buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore
do you spend your money for that which is not bread, and your
toil for that which satisfies not? Hearken unto Me. You see,
the gospel is not coming to people and saying, Christ died for you,
Christ loved you. It is coming to men and saying,
Christ in His love to sinners, stands before you in the gospel
and says, I am the one who can take you from the street. I am
the one who can cleanse you of your diseases. I am the one who
can take away your wrinkles, rub away your blemishes, put
flesh on your bones and make you beautiful in the eye of God. Put yourself in My hands and
I will do that for you. You talk about a gospel worth
preaching. One of the girls asked me last
Sunday night, we're sitting talking, they said something and I got
thrilled. I said, oh, I've got the goosebumps. They said, Pastor,
why do you always talk about getting the goosebumps? Well, because
I get the goosebumps. And preaching a gospel like that
is a wonderful thing. I can look out and I know the
history of some of you. I don't know it fully as God
knows, but I know enough to be able to say, No matter
how deeply you've sunk into sin, no matter how much you've spurned
previous overtures of grace, Christ comes to you tonight in
the word and promise of the gospel as though you were the only one
in this building and says, look, I'll take you from the street.
But you say, oh, I'm not that bad, vile, polluted, stinking,
obnoxious. My friend, He has no wedding
vows for those who don't see themselves polluted and vile. For He said, I came not to call
the righteous, but sinners to repentance. See yourself as God
sees you. Stop playing head games on yourself. Say, God, I am that baby thrown
into a trash bin, thrown into a dumpster. There I am, Lord.
I know what I am. Lord Jesus, do you mean it when
you say, come to me? You will not cast me out. Prove
Him. Go to Him. Find Him true to His Word. You see, dear people, when you
young people have yet to lock horns with someone who called
you against evangelism, and no heart for sinners, because you
won't run around and tell every Tom, Dick and Harry Christ died
for you. And Christ will love you individually and particularly.
When I find a verse in my Bible that tells me I can do that,
I'll do it. But I have many verses that say
I can come to you individually and particularly and specifically
and say, Christ invites you, Christ will welcome you, Christ
will confer upon you everything He's promised to confer upon
sinners. That's a vital doctrinal reality.
Now, I want to underscore by way of application two crucial
practical implications from this passage. And the first is this. Where Christ is Husband and Savior,
He is also Head and Lord. Look back at the passage. Verse
24. Or verse 23. The husband is the
head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church himself,
the Savior of the body, as the church is subject to Christ. Christ is head of the church,
the Savior of the body, as the church is subject to Christ. Now, friends, words could not
be plainer. Where Christ is Savior, He is head. Where Christ is Savior,
He is Lord. Where the sinner believes, Jesus
has a subject. The only way the church is subject
to Christ is when each one incorporated into the church is bribed, joyfully
owns His Lordship. And in casting their guilty,
hell-deserving selves upon Him, they embrace Him from the heart. as their sovereign and their
Lord. Do you see how stupid and unbiblical? And I'm ready to say it is even
heretical to say that people can consciously be trusting Christ
as Savior while consciously deliberately refusing him as Lord, not in
a specific issue here, there, that, or the other, but as the
fundamental disposition of the heart. It is a damnable heresy. Some things are errors, and they
are crippling and hindering, but they are not damnable. That
is, heresies which, if believed, which, if regulating the life,
will result in damnation. And everyone who thinks that
he can take to himself the privileges of Christ as Savior while not
submitting to him as Lord, has believed a lie. All we need to
do is move on in the second place to this second practical implication
where Christ is Husband and Savior. He actually saves in the threefold
way described in this passage. where Christ is husband and Savior,
He actually saves in the threefold way described in this passage.
How does He save the body? How does He save the bride? He saves, according to the text,
by sanctifying, cleansing it with the washing of water with
the Word. He brings them into union with Himself, and there
is a radical, fundamental break with the dominion of sin, with
the pollution of sin. They are set apart unto God,
having been washed with water in connection with the Word.
And then He continues to nourish them and to cherish them. And
then He will infallibly Himself present them to Himself as His
bride. spotless, pure, enveloped in
glory. Wherever Christ is husband and
Savior, He actually saves in this threefold way described
in this passage. Do not say you are part of His
bride if He has not sanctified and purified you. If your deliberate,
willful subjection to the dominion of sin has not been radically
changed, dismantled, and become a fundamental commitment to the
dominion of God and Christ and righteousness, you delude yourself
that you're a Christian. Do not entertain hopes that you'll
be presented to him in the perfection of holiness if there is no evidence
that he's presently nurturing and cherishing you unto a pattern
of holiness. The perfection of holiness is
the consummate work of the one who initiates and continues to
make us holy. I love old Bishop Ryle's words,
say not that thou art a child of God and has royal blood in
thy veins unless thou can show thy pedigree by daring to be
holy. And I think he was quoting an
old Puritan when he used that language. Are you sitting here
tonight thinking you're a Christian because you've tipped your hat
to Jesus somewhere along the way, and you and Jesus have been
sort of remote buddies? But where you live and where
you think and where you spend your money and where you go and
what you watch and who you develop friendships with, Christ has
nothing to say about any of those things that comprise the pattern
of your life. No, my friend. What monument
are you of Christ's determination to present to Himself a church
that is glorious in holiness, and he doesn't begin it at the
last day. He begins it when he takes you off the street and
gives you a good plunge, takes away the stench and the stink
of living for yourself and living by the standards of the world
and living by the impulses of your own depraved flesh. And
he puts within you a yearning to be part of the counterculture
to the world. to bear the reproach of Christ,
to be identified with Him in His shame and in His rejection,
and to track down into every rat hole of the mind and heart
your filthy thoughts. As much as you do, by God's grace,
keep yourself from filthy deeds, to track down into the dark sinkholes
of the soul the sins of jealousy and envy, not merely content
to be kept free from the open sins of blasphemy and murder,
and adultery and thievery, where Christ is Husband and Savior,
He actually saves in this threefold way. And the real proof that
He took me off the street and He's going to present me at the
back door is that He's nourishing and cherishing me right now.
And that nourishing and cherishing is known in the context and in
the setting of an ongoing progressive struggle against remaining sin
in the world. an ongoing life of communion
with Christ. We cherish him. We long to be
more like him. We're at times utterly not only
ashamed but disgusted with ourselves that we make such little progress
and that we would ever long to be back on the street even for
an hour. But we have to be honest and say, Lord, that's what's
in me. Have mercy upon me. Well then, having made that one
doctrinal observation, these two crucial practical implications,
I want to close with one very immediate exhortation. And that
is this. As we approach this series, you
who are members and friends know what I'm talking about. Our Constitution
requires that every five years from the time the newly revised
Constitution was adopted in October of 1995, that the elders secure
that at least 15 consecutive Lord's Days be given in the adult
class and in the morning preaching to an opening up of the biblical
truths that cluster around and grow out of and are at the foundation
of our confession of faith and are found in our Constitution.
And we receive your unanimous approval to invert that. Pastor
Lamar continues his studies right through the confession. And I
will begin a series of at least 15 messages God willing, next
Lord's Day morning, dealing with church life. That's what our
Constitution is all about. How we've agreed to walk together
by our present understanding of how the Bible says we ought
to walk. Now let me ask you, are you looking forward to this?
Are you saying, oh boy, let's get to the exciting stuff. Let's
get into second Peter, or let's get into the attributes of God.
Well, let's go back to preaching through the Ten Commandments.
Well, let's go back to Old Testament characters. Those are the four
or five things some of you have said you want me to preach now
that we're done. First Peter, almost done. Well, dear friends,
if we have this view of the Church, we'll look forward to this series.
Because it's not only the Church in her eschatological, the final
presentation, when we're at the back door and He Himself shall
take us to Himself in His second coming. And we are ushered into
the marriage supper of the Lamb. But I want you to look at Ephesians
3 and verse 10 as we close. Paul has been speaking of this
amazing thing that God has done in his church in this present
gospel age. breaking down the middle wall
of partition, making of Jew and Gentile one new man in Christ,
another image of the church, the new humanity. But now then,
notice what his great purpose is in all of this. His great
purpose start in verse eight of chapter three. Unto me, who
am less than the least of all saints, was this grace given
to preach unto the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ.
and to make all men see what is the dispensation of the mystery
which for ages has been hid in God, who created all things,
to the intent that now, that's the present, to the intent that
now, not just at the consummation, but now, unto the principalities
and the powers in the heavenly places, might be made known through
the church, the manifold wisdom of God according to the eternal
purpose which He purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord. Remember
that summary statement I read to you this morning where one
commentator said the letter to the Ephesians is a marvelous,
comprehensive sermon focusing on three things. The eternal
purpose of God, which focuses in the Lord Jesus Christ, and
is worked out in and through the church. God's purpose, Jesus
Christ, the church, what God has joined together, let no man
put asunder. And we need to come afresh as
we seek to shore up our thinking about how we order our life together. to the realization that this
is not just a review of the corporate rules or the club rules so that
we don't bump into one another and get in each other's way.
It's to the intent that now unto unseen spiritual beings something
of the wisdom and the glory of God will be seen in the church.
And we will then be jealous as Paul was that men may know how
they ought to behave themselves in the church of the living God,
the pillar and the ground of the truth. Let's pray. Our father, how we thank you
for the disclosure of your heart and your mind to us in the scriptures,
and we confess as we have sought this day to focus our minds upon
the wonder and the magnitude of the love of Christ, who so
loved us that he was willing to give himself up a sacrifice
and an offering unto you to be consumed by the righteous fury
of your wrath, that we might be his bride. Oh, our God, we
ask you to break down all of the barriers of reserve and unbelief
in our hearts. that we may respond to your love
in love, that we may have a new passion as the Apostle prayed,
that we might know the love of Christ that passes knowledge,
that we might be filled unto all the fullness of yourself.
We pray for those who sit here who are still on the street. Oh, God, Show them what a pathetic
and pitiful state they are in, and that more pathetic state
to which it will lead. And reveal your Son standing
before them in all the glory of his saving power and grace,
asking, Will you have me? O Spirit of God, woo sinners
to Jesus. Woo them to Jesus. We pray that
your spirit will seal to our hearts the things we have contemplated
this day, and may they bear fruit in each of our lives as the Lord
Jesus continues not only to nourish and cherish us individually,
but collectively in our life together as a part of his church
and of his bride. And we pray in the words of John
as we anticipate that great day of consummation, the marriage
supper of the Lamb, even so come, Lord Jesus. Amen.