This evening is who, what, and
why. Probably I should call it the
who, what, and why of the covenant, but I don't think that will all
fit, so we'll call it who, what, and why. Now we know Scripture
plainly, plainly teaches us that salvation is not by works. Salvation is not something that
we can earn from God. Salvation is by grace. Salvation
is a free gift of God from God to sinners. The scripture also
teaches that that salvation, that gift, is not given to people
by chance or randomly. Salvation is by the promise of
God. An eternity passed when only
the father and the son existed. Father made a promise to his
son that he would save a specific people that the father would
give him. Scripture teaches that all the way through. Let me just
read a few of them to you. The salvation, this tells us
salvation by promise. Acts 2.39. For the promise is
unto you and to your children and all that are far off, even
as many as the Lord our God shall call. Acts 13.23. Of this man's
seed, of David's seed, hath God, according to his promise, raised
unto Israel a Savior, Jesus. Romans 4.16. Therefore it is
of faith that it might be by grace to the end that the promise
might be sure to all the seed. 2 Timothy 1.1. Paul, an apostle
of Jesus Christ by the will of God, according to the promise
of life, which is in Christ Jesus. And Titus 1 verse 2, in hope
of eternal life, which God that cannot lie promised before the
world began. Now that makes it pretty clear,
doesn't it? Salvation is by promise. The
promise of God is by God's covenant. That's what the word covenant
means, promise. Now the covenant of grace, that's
a covenant or promise between God the Father and God the Son.
The covenant of salvation is not between God and men. Salvation,
this covenant, doesn't mean, well, you do something and God
will save you. No, that would be salvation by
works. The covenant of grace is a covenant
that exists between the Father and the Son. And that covenant
is concerning God's elect. That covenant's not between us
and God. It just concerns God's people. This covenant tells us
how those elect will be saved by what Christ will do for them.
And believe me, that is the best way of salvation because that's
the only way salvation can be sure. It's by God's covenant. Now, like I said, I want us to
look at who, what, and why of this covenant. First, I want
us to see the who of the covenant. If we're gonna look at the who
of the covenant, we need to look where that covenant began, don't
we? It began with God the Father. Verse 5 of Isaiah 42. Thus saith
God the Lord, he that created the heavens and stretched them
out, he that spread forth the earth and that which cometh out
of it, he that giveth breath unto the people upon it, and
spirit to them that walk therein. Now this is God the creator.
And the Old Testament prophets frequently speak of God. They
identify him as the creator, because whoever created all this
is God. Whoever created all this is in
charge. And all of our world came into
being simply because God said. That's how God created this world.
He just spoke it into existence. God said, let there be light,
and it was so. God said, let the firmament appear,
and it was so. God said, let the dry land appear,
and it was so. God said, let the sun and the
moon and the stars and the animals and the plants, let them appear,
and it was so. And when God saw what he said
come happen, he said, it's good. All this happened just because
God said for it. That's how he created this world.
And this God, the one who created everything, is the very one who
purposed this covenant of grace. It's God's purpose to save a
people that he chose from Adam's fallen race. Well, now here's
the question. Can he do it? I mean, I've purposed
to do a lot of things I didn't do, like I'm not able. God purposed
to save a people. Was he able to save them? Does
God have the power to bring his purpose to pass? Well, just consider
for a minute God's power in creation Isaiah describes here. You know,
creation was not difficult work for God. Isaiah describes God
creating space as Him just stretching them out. Just like we open the
curtains in the morning, close them in the evening. That's how
difficult it was for God to create this massive outer space that
man cannot find the end of. That's God just pulling a curtain
across. And when Isaiah talks about dry
land appearing, God just spread it out. Just like you smooth
out the sheets or smooth out a tablecloth. That's as difficult
as it was for God to say, let the dry land appear. And it was
so. Well, I believe God who has that kind of power has the power
to bring his purpose to pass. Don't you reckon? There's nothing
too hard for God. Of course, he'll bring his will
to pass. And you can depend on this covenant of grace. You can
depend upon this promise of salvation because God does indeed have
the power to bring his purpose to pass. Then you can also depend
on the promise of God because of God's wisdom. This is a good
covenant. I remember when I was working
at the warehouse, we entered into some covenants. I kept telling
my boss, this is not a good idea. This is not a good covenant.
We entered into them anyway. This covenant, you can depend
on it. It's devised in untold wisdom. And again, we see that wisdom.
We get a hint of that God's wisdom in creation. Now creation seems
so fragile to us. I mean just the littlest thing
happening just wreaks havoc in creation. One little thing goes
wrong in one part of the world and the effects of it, I'm told,
are felt all throughout the world, you know. Who but God can hold
all this together? Most of us hate bugs and insects. Some of us hate those insects
more than others, but we hate those things, you know. But you
know what? People who know about bugs, I
don't know what you call them, but you know what they tell me?
All those little insects we hate so much, every one of them is
necessary to nature. They've got some little function
that they form and nature would go haywire if some specific kind
of ant was suddenly extinct. They all have a role to fulfill.
That's God's wisdom in creation, manifold wisdom and all these
minute details. God just works all these moving
parts and puts them in place and keeps them working for the
good of his creation. And if you think that's something,
you think about God's wisdom in salvation. In his wisdom,
God provided the perfect representative. God provided the sinless substitute. No one else could be that wise.
Only God is wise enough to be both just and justifier. Only God is wise enough to find
a way to forgive sin and yet at the same time punish every
sin. Only God's wise enough to do that. You can depend on this
covenant, this promise of salvation, because it's devised in the wisdom
of God. It's foolproof. You can also
depend on this promise, this covenant of salvation, because
of the goodness of God. Isaiah says God gives breath
to all people who walk in his creation. Now we know that's
so, and we can't draw breath without God giving it to us.
But now think about that. God gives breath. He sustains
life of millions of people on the planet at the same time.
But now here's God's goodness. God does that. He gives life.
He gives food. He gives spirit to people who
are constantly sinning against him. Everyone on this planet
is right now sinning against the creator. And yet everyone
of us is through breath. This is God's goodness. God's
not going to change his mind and renege on this promise. He's
not going to renege on this covenant of salvation. He's too good to
do that. God gives life to rebels. He
continues to feed rebels. And you know why? So he can be
merciful to his elect. God keeps giving physical life
to rebels and sustaining their life and making them have profit
and all these things for this reason. so that he can save his
people in his time. Wayne, some of them might not
be born yet. So he keeps this thing spinning around. That's
why he does it. That's God's goodness. Now that's the first
who of this covenant, God the Father. Well, here's the second
who in the covenant. This covenant of grace is God
the Son. The Father's the one that purposed
and planned this covenant, but the Son, he's the surety of the
covenant. He's the mediator of the covenant,
and all that means is this, the son is the one who's gonna carry
the covenant out. Verse six in our text. I, the
Lord, have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and
will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people
for a light of the Gentiles. Now this is the father speaking
to the son. When they entered into this covenant
to save God's elect, this is what the father told his son.
And we get to listen in on this conversation. And as we listen,
we hear the qualifications of Christ to be the one who's entrusted
with this covenant. We hear the qualifications of
Christ to be the one who will carry this covenant out. And
the father tells his son, I've called you in righteousness.
You're mine elect. You're the one I've chosen. I've
called you in righteousness. Now that means the father, he
called his son in a righteous way. It's only right that the
father call the son to be the surety of this covenant because
he's the only one able to do it. It's right that he called
him. And secondly, the father called the son to make his people
righteous. Now God did indeed choose a people.
He elected a people to save. But He cannot accept those people
as they are by nature in Adam. He can't do it. Those people
God chose, they're nothing but sin. And God is so holy, He can't
even look on sin. So in His wisdom, the Father
sent His Son. And Christ came to make His people
righteous. He came to make them righteous
by coming as their representative. to keep the law for them, to
obey it perfectly. And he makes his people righteous
by giving them his obedience, by imputing his righteousness
to them. And they're righteous. Now the father can accept them
because they've been made righteous in Christ. And you can depend
on Christ to carry out this covenant because the whole thing is done
in righteousness. It's right. Every bit of it,
it's right. Christ did it all right. So it
can't be undone. It's all been done in a way that's
consistent with the character of God. So you can count on it. And you can depend on this covenant
because Christ, the surety of the covenant, cannot fail. He can't fail because the Father
says, I'm going to hold your hand. I'm going to hold you up
and keep you. Now we looked at this last week.
as God. The Lord Jesus needed no help,
did he? He's God. I mean, this man is God. So he needed no help. But he's
also man. And as a man, he needed to be
upheld by his father so he could bear up under the weight of all
the sin of his people. And the father promised in this
covenant, it's a promise, he promised He'll hold His Son by
His right hand. He'll hold Him up as a man so
He can do all the work of this covenant. Christ can't fail because
He's God. And He can't fail because He's
upheld by the righteousness and the strength and the might of
God Almighty. You can depend on it. Now He
can't fail. People want a sure thing. This
is a sure thing. Christ can't fail. And then the
father says this, he says, I'm gonna give you, my son, to my
people. I'm gonna give you to be the
covenant for my people. Now, what a gift. The father
says, I'm gonna give my son to my people. He's gonna be the
covenant for them. This is the unspeakable gift
of Christ. It's been given to God's elect.
And the free gift of Christ, the free gift of life in Christ,
the free gift of righteousness in Christ, the free gift of the
forgiveness of our sin is given to who? To sinners. He says to the Gentiles. Even the Gentiles who are considered
to be the worst of the worst. That's who God has given His
Son to. That's who this covenant is concerning. These people who are the worst
of the worst. Now, who's given to those sinners?
You'll notice it's not a what is given to those sinners. It's
a who. Christ himself is given to them.
The gospel is a person. This covenant of grace is a person. We're not talking about things
God gives. It's all a person. The Father
gave Christ to his people. He gave Christ to be the surety
of the covenant. All the covenant depends upon
his obedience, upon his suffering and his dying. Christ is the
ratifier of the covenant. His blood is the blood of the
everlasting covenant. Christ is the mediator of the
covenant. That's such good news. He's the only mediator between
God and men. Since Christ is the mediator
of the covenant, Eric, we can't mess it up. Christ is, it's all
in his hand. Oh, I want that in his hand,
don't you? Christ guarantees all the mercies of the covenant.
Christ himself is the sure mercies of David. You can depend on this
covenant of grace, this promise of salvation. Because of who
promised it? God the Father. And who carried
it out? God the Son, our Lord Jesus Christ.
But now there's a third who of the covenant. And that's God's
elect. This is who the covenant is concerning,
God's elect. And Isaiah gives us a description
of them. Now these are the people that
Christ came to save. He says here at the end of verse
six, for a light of the Gentiles. Now this is who Christ came to
save, Gentiles. And everyone living in Isaiah's
day understood when Isaiah wrote to the Gentiles, he means sinners. He means wretched, vile people. He means people that offer their
babies to idols, kill them, you know, trying to please an idol.
People, he's talking about people that eat their children, to eat
other people. The worst people on this planet. That's who Christ came to save,
sinners. Sinners who are far away from
God because our sin has separated us from God. Even us here tonight. Gentiles. That's who Christ came
to save. Secondly, Isaiah says Christ
came to save the blind. Look at verse 7. To open the
blind eyes. To bring out the prisoners from
the prison and them that sit in darkness out of the prison
house. Christ came to save the spiritually blind. Now, all of
us are born spiritually blind. And you know, we don't know it.
We do not know we're spiritually blind. We're in darkness that's
so thick, we don't even know we're blind. We can't see our
need of Christ and don't even know it. We can't see Christ,
the light of the world, when he's standing right in front
of us. You ever wonder why John the Baptist had to say, behold,
the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world. Why do
you have to say that? because men are blind. There he is, the
light of the world, the lamb of God. Nobody can see it because
we're blind by nature. We hear him through the preaching
of the gospel. We hear Christ proclaimed as
clearly as he can be proclaimed. How many years? And unless God
reveals Him to us, we don't see. We just don't see because we're
blind. Somebody's got to tell us He's
here. Here He is. Look to Him. Here's
what He's done for His people. Here's who He is. Now look, we're
in such darkness. We can't see the very glory of
God in the face of Jesus Christ unless God reveals Him to us.
Now those blind people, that's who Christ came to save. And
third, Isaiah describes God's elect as prisoners. They're in the prison house of
sin. They're in bondage to the law. They're under the dominion
of Satan. Now remember who Isaiah is writing
this to. Isaiah has told the people, after
King Hezekiah dies, the Babylonians are gonna come and carry everyone
off into captivity. But before you go into captivity,
now you listen to God's promise, His covenant. God has made a
covenant, a promise to these helpless people. It's a promise
of grace. It's a promise to send somebody
to set them free. Now I love the message of grace. And I understand the flesh wants
a message of free will. But nobody in prison, nobody
who's truly in prison wants a message of free will. There's no hope
for somebody like me and this message of free will. The free
will message says this, God will save you if you do this. And they all got something different,
you know, just fill in the blank. That's not good news to me because
I can't do it. I'm just unable. Then they tell
you, well, God will save you if you're good enough. If you're
good outweighs your bad. Hopefully there. My good does
not outweigh my bad. So then they say, well, God will
save you if you're sincere enough. See how it's always dependent
upon you if you're sincere enough. Well, that's no good. I mean,
that doesn't help me any. If we're really honest, you know,
we do good work at what we call a good work for someone. What's your sincere motive? It's
not to help somebody else. It's not to do something nice
for somebody else. We either want God to be impressed with me or
you to be impressed with me. That's what we want. That's not
genuinely sincere. There's no hope for me in this
message. Well, if you're just sincere,
you know, God will save you. No, he won't. No, he won't. But now there's hope. There's
a good hope of forgiveness of our sins in the covenant of God's
grace, His promise of grace to His people through the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now, are you a sinner? Are you a sinner that lives in
God's creation? That everything you have, He
gave you. He gives you life. He gives you breath. He gives
you food. He gives you the roof over your head. Is that you?
Are you someone who's helpless? You're spiritually blind and
you can't see? You can't see Christ. It doesn't
matter how hard you look, you can't see him. Are you a prisoner
to your sin? So here's how to tell if you're
in the prison house of sin. Try to quit sinning. If you can't,
you're a prisoner to sin. Do you have a sin debt that you
can't pay? I hope so, because if that describes you, you have
a good hope through grace because those are the people that Christ
came to save. That's the who of the covenant.
God the father, he purposed it. God the son, he's the one who
carried it out. And it's concerning God's elect,
sinful men and women. Well, here's the what of the
covenant. What did Christ accomplish for his people when he came and
he ratified this covenant of grace, the covenant between the
father and the son? Well, first, he saved sinners
from their sin. Even the sinful Gentiles, Christ
saved them from their sin, put their sin away. Now these sinners,
they're far away from God because their sin has separated them
from God, but Christ came and he saved them. And He saved them
from their sin by taking their sin in His own body on the tree
and putting their sin away through the blood of His sacrifice. And
once sin's been removed, once Christ has removed the sin of
His people under His blood, He can bring them back to God because
their sin is gone. No longer are they far away from
God, He's brought them back. Second, what did Christ do when
He ratified this covenant of grace? He gave the blind light. Isn't that what he says here
in verse 7? To open the blind eyes. He gave
them light. Now God's elect, they're all
born in darkness just like every son of Adam. Spiritually blind
as a bat. They can't see, they can't know,
and they can't love Christ. Christ has got to be revealed
to them or they'll never see Him. Well, Christ came to reveal
Himself to His people. He came to open blind eyes by
giving them new eyes, giving them spiritual eyes that do see
Christ and that do love Him. Christ came to give His people
light. Now, when we talk about this
light, what that means is light to see and understand. Once we
see Christ, now we say, oh, now I understand. Not only do I understand
how God can save sinners, now I understand how God can save
somebody as sinful as me. Now I see, now I understand. And you know why those people
have light? Because Christ is formed in them. Christ is formed
in them in the new birth. And they have light because they
have Christ. Third, the what of the covenant. What did Christ do when he came
to ratify this covenant? He came to set the prisoner free.
Now remember, Isaiah told the people they're gonna go off into
captivity. But even before they go into captivity, well, Hezekiah's
still living. God promises them deliverance. And He promises them deliverance
by a specific person at a specific time. And you know that's how
salvation works too. Before Adam ever condemned his
race to be in captivity to sin, God promised, in this covenant,
he promised a savior. God promised salvation through
a specific savior to a specific people at a specific time. And he promised it before man
was ever created. Before man ever fell, before
there was a need of a savior, God promised him. Now Adam, he
put his whole race in that prison house of sin. And I'm telling
you, they're locked away deep in that prison. This fella, remember
those two guys that escaped from this prison up there in New York? They killed one and caught the
other one. That one they caught, where do you reckon he is? I
mean, he deep, he is deep into prison. I mean, he's not going
to see the light of day. They're not giving him another
chance to escape. That's you and me by nature,
deep in the prison house of sin. But Christ came to set those
prisoners free. God's elect are in captivity
to sin. Our nature is a sin nature, so
we can't stop sinning. Like I said, that's the definition
of captivity. We can't stop sinning. Christ
sets his people free from their sin. First of all, he set them
free from their sin by paying for it. He paid for their sin
with his blood. He put it away. And then he sets
them free from that sin by giving them a new nature that can't
sin. They can never sin and they're
free from the condemnation, the ruling power of sin. God's elect
are in the prison house of the law. The law demands obedience
from us and we're in the prison house. We're kept in bondage
to a law we can't keep. It's not going to let us go.
But Christ came as the representative of his people and he kept the
law for them and set them free from the law. Now brethren, don't
look to the law. For anything. Don't look to the
law as your rule of life. Don't look to the law for something
you could do to make God happy. It's not found in the law. You
have no relationship to the law if you believe Christ. You're
free from the law. Songwriter said free from the
law, oh, happy condition. What do you want to go back to
it for? Christ sets you free. And then God's elect are in captivity
to Satan. We're under the dominion of the
prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in
the children of disobedience. Look in Luke chapter 11. I'll
show you how Christ sets his people free from the dominion
of Satan. Here in Luke 11, Satan is described
as the strong man armed. You and I can't set ourselves
free from him, but Christ can. Luke 11 verse 14. And he was
casting out a devil and it was dumb and it came to pass when
the devil was gone out, the dumb spake and the people wondered. Now when this poor man was possessed
by this devil, he could not speak. He could not set himself free. He was overpowered by this devil. And all Christ did is told him
to leave. And he left and he set this man free. But now look
at the accusation thrown at our Savior, verse 15. But some of
them said, he casteth out devils through Beelzebub, the chief
of the devils. What an absurd accusation. Now look at down verse 21, our
Lord's answer to this accusation. When a strong man armed keepeth
his palace, his goods are at peace. This is Satan before Christ
comes on the scene, he's armed, he's strong, we can't, everything's
at peace, we cannot, set ourselves free from his palace. But, verse
22, when a stronger than he shall come upon him and overcome him,
he taketh from him all his armor wherein he trusted, and he divided
his spoils. And that's what Christ did at
Calvary. One stronger came, and he overpowered
Satan. He crushed his head. He crushed
the controlling power of Satan over his people and set his people
free. Christ set his people free from
the prison house by becoming a prisoner for them, by taking
their place as their substitute. And once he was in the prison
house, he did what his people could never do. He satisfied
God's justice by dying for them. And now they're free. The law
has no more claim on them. Satan has no more power over
them. Sin has no more power over them. They're free. If the Son shall
make you free, You're free indeed. Now that's God's covenant. It's
God's covenant of grace. And to prove this is God's covenant
of grace, let me ask you this question. All this that Christ
did, who did He do it for? He did it for sinners. He did
it for those Gentile sinners. He did it for the blind, those
who are in prison, those who are so weak they can't help themselves,
much less do anything for Him. He did it by grace. That blind
prisoner, he doesn't have any hope in a free will message.
He can't make himself see. He can't set himself free. He's
unable to do anything. But oh, you give that blind sinner,
you give that prisoner the message of grace that the Lord Jesus
Christ did everything for them and made them free. Now that's grace. He didn't do
it because they did anything. Just because He would. That's
grace. That will give a sinner a good
hope through grace. Now that's the who and the what
of the covenant. But let me give you this quickly.
The why of the covenant. Why would the Father purpose
such a covenant of grace? The Son would agree to it. And
they entered into this covenant knowing it's going to cost the
son something. It's going to cost him everything. It's going
to cost him his life. It's going to cost him to be
humiliated to become a man. And as a man, it's going to cost
him to be humiliated, stripped naked and suffer and die while
his sinful creatures mock him and make fun of him and spit
in his face and pull his beard out and laugh as he dies. Why
would God agree to do that? Why would He promise to do that?
There's only one reason. And it's for God's glory. Look
at verse 8. This is the why of the covenant.
It's for God's glory. I am the Lord. That's my name. And my glory will I not give
to another, neither my praise to graven images. No idol a man
made up could ever do this. they get no glory. The only glory
an idol gets is what you decide to hang on him, how much gold
or silver or jewels you decide to put on him. An idol can't
do this, he gets no glory. But the Lord Jesus Christ, as
the surety of the covenant, as the mediator of the covenant,
he did everything that was required of him. And this covenant that
was between him and the Father, he did it so perfectly The Father
gave Him all glory, gave Him a name which is above every name,
seated Him at His right hand and gave Him all glory. And you know, one day we will
too. Everybody in this room, everybody who's ever lived on
God's creation one day will give Christ all the glory. They'll
either do it praising His grace or they'll do it praising His
justice. But one way or another, Everybody's gonna give Christ
all the glory. I'm not a real patient man. So I say, let's not wait till
then. Let's start right now. Why don't
we start right now? Look at 1 Corinthians 1. God saved sinners. through His
promise, through His covenant of grace, so that no flesh will
get any glory. Let's quit seeking glory. Let's
quit seeking any glory for this flesh. God has purposed that
no flesh will get any glory, but that Christ will get it all.
1 Corinthians 1 verse 29. This is why God's done it all.
That no flesh should glory in His presence, but of Him are
ye in Christ Jesus, who of God has made unto us wisdom. and
righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption. He's made everything
we need. That according as it's written,
he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. So I say again,
let's start giving Christ all the glory right now. He's worthy
of it, isn't he? He is. All right, let's bow in
prayer.