Isaiah chapter 53, if you would
please. Isaiah 53. Is that going to be a hindrance
to anybody? If so, we can shut the windows down. Isaiah 53, we are continuing
in our series on the doctrine of grace. And I don't know if
you've noticed, but since we began this, I've called it the
doctrine of grace instead of the doctrines of grace. I sometimes default to doctrines
of grace, but really the doctrine of grace entails all five of
these areas that we're speaking of. The grace of election, the
grace of atonement, the grace of irresistible grace or overcoming
grace, the grace of preservation or perseverance. uh... these
are all graces uh... of course uh... the t the two
of two of would be told the prairie depravity and the fact that uh...
god in grace has brought us out of uh... that state of uh... spiritual death uh... is all
part of the doctrine of grace grace covers and is in part of
every bit of everything that we are talking about. And so
I use the term the doctrine of grace because there aren't many
doctrines of grace. There's only one doctrine of
grace and that's what Christ has done. What God is doing in
His work and His purpose in the everlasting covenant. Now we
finished up last week looking at our topic of of unconditional election. A
very wonderful teaching on God's mercy and grace. We've seen that
in depravity we were totally and completely unable to come
to God. We've seen that we have a spiritual
deadness that we're all born into because of our father Adam.
that when Adam sinned, that sin then passed on, that sin whenever
it came into the world, it passed on to all men, and death by sin. So we all became sinners by the
one man, Adam. But today we're going to look
how God's people all become righteous because of the one man, Jesus
Christ. Just as Adam was the head, the
natural head for all his posterity, Christ is the spiritual head
for all of his posterity. And so we will begin looking
this morning at that. But in depravity, we've seen
that there is grace in the fact that we can do nothing of ourself. In election, we've seen that we can't do anything. And so since we can't do anything,
God has to do something for us. And that before the foundation
of the world, he chose to do something for a group of people. And so we've seen that in election. And now we're gonna see in atonement
that exactly what Christ did for that special group of people.
I'm well aware that this topic is not a very popular topic.
Again, as I've mentioned before, very hated topic that I despised
for many years. The fact that Christ would only
die for some people and not for all people. But if we are given
to trust that these are the words of God and that is what He has
said about His salvation, then we should look at those and we
should take those things and believe them because that's the
Word of God. and not the traditions of men
or the words of men. The words of men say that God
has given a love to every man and that Christ has died for
every man, but yet not every man will be saved. And so that
is contrary to what the scriptures say and we want to preach and
teach the scriptures. I also want to reiterate this
fact in case others have not listened to the messages that
we've done before and the times that I've made this mention,
but the Bible is our only rule of faith. We don't look to confessions
of faith. We don't look to commentaries. We don't look to theologians.
We don't look to all these things that men have written, these
theologies. We're not Calvinist. We're not
Reformed. We're not any of those things.
We are children of God that believe the Word of God and follow after
the Word of God. And whatever group that that
may put us into, let it put us in there, but we don't go by
any of those monikers. We don't look to those things.
I don't hold to Calvin. I am a hyper-Calvinist. People
use that term derogatory, but I am a hyper-Calvinist. I believe
a lot more of what the scriptures say about Salvation and Calvin
believes hyper meaning more or above. I believe more than he
does. I believe a lot more than what
Calvin believed. Larry probably attested this,
but Calvin didn't even believe the very thing that we're going
to start talking about today. And that's the particular redemption
or the overcoming or the efficacious atonement, limited atonement. He didn't believe those things.
So yeah, do I believe more than what Calvin believed? Absolutely.
But I also believe a lot of things that Calvin didn't believe either.
I think that we ought to be water baptized by believing adults
and not children. So there's a lot of things that
I don't agree with Calvin. The doctrine of grace, the five
points, are not a Calvinistic doctrine. They are a biblical
doctrine. They are the doctrine of Jesus Christ. Jesus taught
these doctrines. Jesus is the one who give these
things. The Word of God has declared
these doctrines from all time. And so we don't look to any man,
creed or confession. I'm not looking to be in line
with any any sin on any confession, even the Baptist confessions,
brethren. While there are some that I can agree to and love
in some points, I don't agree with all of them and I don't
want them to be my statement of faith. This is my statement
of faith. I know a lot of people say, well,
anybody can say that, but I truly not only say that, but mean that
if it's not here, let's not hold to it. If it's not found in God's
Word, let's not hold to it. If it is, let's hold to it and
let's believe it. And if that cuts us out from
a lot of groups, then let it cut us out from a lot of groups.
It doesn't matter what's over our door. The name, that's not
important. And I'm sure as many of you have
found out that you just can't pigeonhole yourself into any
group, because as God is teaching us and giving us light of Scripture,
we're going to find that we're not going to be in 100% agreement
with anybody. Anybody. Even among all of us
here that worship together, we're not in 100% agreement on everything.
If that's what you're looking for, you're never going to find
anybody to fellowship with, to worship with. You're always going
to be by yourself because you're going to be the only person that
you agree with. And listen, I found out that I disagree with myself
many times, not only now, but in days past. I disagree with
myself on a lot of things that the Lord has taught me on. And
so if I did that, I wouldn't even be able to fellowship with
myself. So that being said, we want to look to the scriptures.
Is the scriptures a book that teaches that Christ atonement
was specific? And when I say specific, directed
to a group of people that we just talked about called the
elect. Is the Bible a book that teaches that Christ's atonement
was efficacious? That's a big word. That word
means effectual. It means that it actually accomplished
what it was intended to accomplish. It had an effect. It effected something. Is the Bible a book that teaches
that Christ's atonement is particular? Absolutely, it does. And I pray
that over the course of the next few weeks, we'll look and see
throughout Scripture that this is very evident. If we will let
the Scriptures just say what they say, instead of looking
to man's philosophies and let heart strings be tugged, if we'll
just let the Scriptures speak, then we will be able to Determine that this is the truth
of God's Word and being the truth Sister are you looking for something
to write on? Sister Louise, you need something to write on? Hey,
take that back to Sister Louise. Here, here's the pen. So the place we go to look for
these things is God's Word. If I look through a lot of confessions
of faith, you're not going to find that this is a part of God's
Word. So if I look to men, I'm not
going to find this. Matter of fact, if I look to
even myself, as I said, you know, years ago, I would find that
this is not the doctrine that Mike Smith loves, loved, or cherished. Now I do, but it isn't. So we can't let our heart be
our guide. We can't let what we think or
feel about God be our guide. We have to let the scriptures
determine these things. But I was thinking about the
atonement this week and some verses that I was looking at. How precious it is what Christ
has done in his atonement. What a horrible thing happened
to him in what he did for us But what a beautiful thing it
is nonetheless And we'll read these verses here in a minute,
but the Bible said it pleased the Lord to bruise him it was
the pleasure of God to Have Christ to be the atonement for his people
and There is a joy Jesus even himself said for the joy that
was set before him. He endured the cross despising
the shame. There is a blessedness about
what Christ did for us in the atonement. And whenever we think
about that, you know, that's one of the reasons why Christ
give the Lord's Supper. for the church to participate
in that ordinance to be able to visually see as a reminder
or a memorial of His death for us. Whenever we take of the bread
and we take of the wine and we break that bread and we drink
that cup, we show forth the Lord's death until He comes. And that's
a visual picture and a reminder of the brokenness that Christ
experienced, the blood shedding that He did for us so that this
atonement would take place. And I begin to think about those.
And you don't have to turn here. I'm going to read these two verses
before we get into Isaiah 53. But the Scriptures say, But thou,
Israel, art my servant. Jacob whom I have chosen, the
seed of Abraham, my friend." Abraham was called a friend of
God. His son was a friend of God. And his seed was a friend of
God. And I'm talking about a spiritual
seed. I'm not talking about the physical
seed because we know that there were physical seeds that were
not. Matter of fact, Esau was a physical
seed of Abraham and he was not a friend of God. God said that he hated Esau.
That I don't care how you twist and turn that does not mean he
was a Less of a friend. Okay. I've heard in reformed
circles that hated Esau meant he loved him less Hated does
not mean loved less Okay, it means that he has no knowledge
of Esau in an intimate way. He has no love. Esau is not a
beloved. He is not loved. He is hated. And he is hated
with a perfect hatred. He is hated with a holy hatred.
He is hated by a hatred that we cannot fathom, that we cannot
even express as fallen humans. We can't express that kind of
hatred in such a way. All of our hatred stems from
selfishness, from greed, from sin. We don't know how to perfectly
hate like God perfectly hates. And so that's why God tells us
that we are to love our neighbors, to love our enemies, because
we can't hate with a rightful hatred unless the Holy Spirit
gives us a holy hatred, which we also know that the Bible gives,
that there's an anger that can come from a holy viewpoint, but
only the Spirit can give us that. So we see here that Israel Jacob,
Abraham's seed, is a friend of God. And I got to thinking what
Jesus said in John 15. He says, greater love hath no
man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
Now, that verse is used in all kinds, you know, the military
uses that verse, you know, that no greater love of any man than
he lay down his life for his friends and we got all these,
we're going into Memorial Day tomorrow and there's going to
be a lot of Remembrance of all the things that the men in uniform
have done to keep our country safe and all that kind of stuff
and that they've died. And, you know, hey, I'm not against
all that stuff that, you know, if that's what you want to do
and everything like that. I don't necessarily make, I'm
not big on remembering dead people. even my own family. I don't go
visit graves and lay flowers. If you want to do that, I'm not
saying that's anything wrong with that. Personally, I'm saying
that I don't do that. I remember my family the way
that they were when they were living, and especially the ones
who have professed Christ. That's just an old rotting carcass
there. They're gone to be with the Lord.
and uh... you know i'm not going to go
and and and uh... and and talk to somebody's not
there but uh... you know it and i'm not making
fun of anybody that does that's just my my thoughts on that it
says here no greater love has any man than to lay down his
life for his friends jesus here was talking to his friends He
wasn't saying everybody. He was talking to His friends.
He was talking to His disciples there. He says, Ye are my friends,
if ye do whatsoever, I command you. Now, we know that the natural
man doesn't do the things that God commands. He can't do the
things that God commands. He's spiritually unable to do
those things. The only one who can do the commands
of God, you say, well, wait a minute, I know people that aren't Christians
who they don't steal, they don't commit adultery, and they don't
kill. They don't covet. They don't, you know, they don't
do all the, you know, whatever, you know, whatever your mosaic
list is that you want to put out there. They don't do those
things. Do they do it in their heart?
If they do it in their heart, then they've done it. And if
they've done it in one area, they've done it in every area. If you've broken one, you've
broken them all. But who are the ones who keeps
the commands of God? Has anybody kept the commands
of God? No one has kept the commands of God. You say, well, he wasn't
talking about 100% all the time. Well, ain't that what the Bible
says? He said those who keep his commands. He didn't say,
if you keep most of my commands. He said, if you do whatsoever
I command you, So can Jesus call anybody a friend? I mean, let's just look at the
guys that he's talking about. Did Peter keep his commands? Did Thomas keep his commands? I mean, did Judas keep his commands? Judas was among these men whenever
he was talking at this point. See, who are the ones who keeps
Jesus' commands? Those who have the imputed righteousness
of Jesus Christ are the ones who keeps His commands. Now that
doesn't mean that we shouldn't want to keep the commands of
Christ. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't desire holiness,
you know, While I believe that we are not under the law anymore,
that doesn't mean that we are lawless people. That doesn't
mean that we just do whatever we want to do. We still follow
the things that Christ has commanded. But the ones who do whatsoever
he commands are those who have his imputed righteousness. those
who have the Spirit of God in them that overcomes the world,
that overcomes temptation, that does the works that God has ordained
for them to do, those are the ones who does the things that
Christ has commanded. So this can't be talking about everybody. But he's talking specifically
here to his disciples and he says, Ye are my friends, if ye
do whatsoever I command you. Henceforth I call you not servants,
for the servant knoweth not what the Lord doeth. But I have called
you friends, for all things that I have heard of my Father I have
made known unto you. And what a blessed thing for
Christ to call us friend. I was thinking about that, to
be called the friend of God. is an amazing thing. You who
were dead in trespasses and sin hath He quickened. You who by
nature were children of wrath, you who were enemies of God,
you who did not desire the things of the Spirit of God, you who
were alienated, you who despised and rejected, you have been called
a friend of God. But did you realize that you
were called a friend of God before you knew you were a friend of
God? He called us friends. And while we were yet sinners,
Christ died for us. And He says here that He dies,
or He laid down His life for His friends. Christ died for
us today here in Joplin. Those who are children of grace,
He died for us as friends before we ever knew we were His friend.
We were enemies of God in our own mind. Our nature was a nature
that hated God and despised everything about God and didn't want Him.
But yet He died for us anyway. Now, the Bible is very clear. As a matter of fact, if you go
on past what Jesus said for that, He said, you know, someone might
die for a good guy, But for someone that you despise or you hate,
not hardly anybody is going to do that. I might die for one
of my children or for one of you because I love you guys.
I would take your place, at least I would hope that would be the
case if that would come up. But somebody that just despise
me. You know, some of the guys that
I worked for in Mary X-Ray that persecuted me for what I believed
and for coming to pastor this church and you know, all that
kind of stuff that you think I'd die for them? Probably not. In my flesh, I would say absolutely
not. As a child of grace, I hope that
God would allow me to look past those things and everything. I don't know what I'd do in that
situation. But I know one thing, whenever Jesus died, he died
a determined death with a determinate end from a determinate counsel
that determined the fate of everyone it was determined for. I hope you got that because I probably
wouldn't remember that to say it back again you'll have to
get the recording. His determinant end was to die and that was for
a purpose. You shall call his name Jesus
for he shall save his people from their sin. And we're going to read several
other verses that pertain to that. But what a blessing to
know that we were called his friend, that he might lay down
his life for that. He didn't lay down his life for
anyone else, but his friends. Now, that's a little vague. You say, I don't think I would
build a whole doctrine called particular redemption after that.
But I will say this. There is more to it than that.
While on the onset that may not seem like a solid proof that there is particular
redemption in the Scriptures, I will say this, Jesus said that
he laid down his life for his friends, but yet throughout Scripture
he talks about everyone else being his enemies. His beloved
are his friends, but everybody that is not are his enemies.
Until all of his enemies have been put down, he has enemies. Now, I will say we were enemies,
right? And even that being made his footstool, I think that means
a little more than we think it does. As a matter of fact, a
good friend and brother that I know, Brother Herb Hatfield,
preached a message called the footstool of Christ. And it was
a very enlightening message. But the children of grace are
his footstool. We are the enemies that have
been made his footstool. And he shall do all these things
until all of his enemies are made his footstool. And isn't
that what 2 Peter said? That it isn't until all have
come to repentance before he comes again and then gives that
kingdom up to God. Anyway, we're going to look at
Isaiah 53. We'll take a quick break. I know we haven't really got
into much. We talked a little bit too long at the beginning,
but we will stop here before I actually get into anything
so we don't have to make a weird break. But if anybody needs to
get a drink, refresh your coffee, go to the bathroom or anything
like that, we'll do that. But I just wanted on the onset
to remind you that if Christ has died for you, you're His
friend. and that means that you're a friend of God. See, it's one
thing to be Mike's friend, okay? That's one thing. But to be a
friend of God, that's a whole different realm of friendship.
And to even think that a holy and righteous God would call
us friends is just beyond me. And as I thought of that throughout
this week, and then looked into the atonement, I thought, how
amazing is this grace that has been given to us. It truly is
amazing. All right, let's take a break
and we'll come back in here and we'll finish up here in a moment.