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Caleb Hickman

The Throne and the Sceptre (part 1)

Hebrews 1:7-9
Caleb Hickman February, 18 2024 Video & Audio
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Caleb Hickman
Caleb Hickman February, 18 2024

In "The Throne and the Sceptre (part 1)," Caleb Hickman delves into the theological significance of Christ's kingship as presented in Hebrews 1:7-9, emphasizing the eternal authority of Jesus over all creation, particularly in contrast to angels. Key arguments center on the nature of Christ’s throne, characterized as one of righteousness and sovereignty, which is set forever, underscoring His preeminence and role in salvation. Hickman supports these assertions with references to Psalms and the prophetic declarations about Christ's anointed status, illustrating His unique redemptive work. The sermon significantly conveys that the believer's hope and security rest upon Christ's unchallenged authority, providing a rich exhortation to approach this throne of grace by faith, acknowledging human insufficiency and Christ’s sufficiency.

Key Quotes

“His throne is forever and it's a throne of righteousness. It's a throne of sovereignty. It's a throne of judgment. It's a throne of wrath. But it's a throne of grace as well.”

“The good news to the sinner, the good news to the elect, the good news to the believer is this, Thy throne is forever.”

“When we see him seated, we realize He is God, and I am not.”

“Only mercy begging sinners come to Christ. God has made them thus.”

Sermon Transcript

Auto-generated transcript • May contain errors

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in the book of Hebrews chapter
one, if you would like to turn there. Hebrews chapter one. We finished our seven distinct
truths found in the first five or six verses, and I realized
that everything we had spoken of before continues through the
rest of chapter one. And then I realized that everything
we spoke on, the seven distinct truths, continues through every
single chapter in the book of Hebrews. And then I realized
that every single thing that we spoke on is from Genesis to
Revelation. It's all about these seven distinct
truths, and I'll remind us what they were, the message and the
messenger, that Christ is the appointed heir, appointed heir
of the father for his people, for their righteousness, He is
the creator. He even made the angels. There
was nothing without him that was made. He didn't make. Fourth
thing was here. It's all by the word of his power.
It's all by the word of his power. He's the only one that has power
in his words. You and I don't. He's the only one that could
speak light into existence out of darkness. We see that he is
the brightness of his glory and the express image of his person.
We see that he's so much better than angels, so much better than
angels. And number seven was when he
had by himself purged our sins, he sat down. That ain't just
in Hebrews chapter one, verse one through five, that's Genesis
to Revelation. It's all about him and his glorious
work for his people. This morning, there's two things
that I took note of that the Lord brought to my attention
between verse seven and nine. And it's the throne of the Lord
and the scepter of the Lord. And as I begin to try to preach
both at the same time, or as I begin to try to get a message
of both at the same time, I realized that I was almost finished with
just speaking of the throne and I had enough notes. I was, well,
that's one message I have to do. Now we have to break it up.
So this morning, we're going to be looking at the throne and the scepter
part one and part two. So here in Hebrews chapter one,
let's read our text in verse seven. And of the angels, he
saith, who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a
flame of fire. But unto the sun, he saith, thy
throne, O God, is forever and ever. A scepter of righteousness
is the scepter of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness
and hated iniquity. Therefore, God, even thy God,
hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. Among other glorious truths,
the Lord, those seven truths that we've heard of, the Lord
continues to just repeat the same thing over and over again.
One time I heard a preacher was speaking, overheard the conversation,
a preacher was, a pastor was speaking to one of the congregants.
And the congregants said to him, you just preach the same thing
over and over again. But I think I'm finally beginning
to hear it. Finally beginning to hear it. The man had been
going there for many years. He says, I'm finally beginning
to hear it. We don't preach something new. We preach the same thing.
But we do get to see the glorious splendor of our Savior. from
so many different angles, if I can say it that way, or viewpoints.
And he's just more glorious each time we see him. That's the beauty
of the gospel is it's inexhaustible. Here in this gospel message,
the Lord is bringing to our attention two particular items, if you
will, the throne and a scepter, and they both belong to the Lord
Jesus Christ. Here in The first thing I guess
we need to notice though is found in verse seven where he says,
of the angels he saith who maketh his angels spirits and his ministers
a flame of fire. That's a direct quote from Psalm
chapter 104 if you want to turn there. Psalm 104. We looked at how the Lord is
better than angels last Sunday and this could have been included
in that But this particular thought is
given right before he says, but unto the son, he talks, he says
unto the angels, he say it this, but unto the son, he say it this.
And so this is what's said in Psalm 104, verse one through
five. Bless the Lord, oh my soul. Oh
Lord, my God, thou art very great. Thou art clothed with honor and
majesty, who coverest thyself. I love that. He says, you're
clothed. And then he says, you covered thyself. With light as
with a garment, who stretches out the heavens like a curtain,
who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters, who maketh the
clouds his chariot, who walketh upon the wings of the wind, who
maketh his angel spirits his ministers of flaming fire, who
laid the foundation of the earth that it should not be removed
forever. Here, In Psalm 104 we see a distinct
contrast between the Lord Jesus Christ and all things created. We see the foundation laid where
he is the exalted one and who the angels are. He calls them
a flame of fire as his ministers and he calls them spirits prior
right before that. tells us that all things were
created by Him. Even the angels, even though
they are spiritual beings, they're still subject to their nature.
And what is that nature? To be the servants of God. They
were created unto Him. If it had not been for the Lord,
and I'm reiterating a little bit what we said last week, but
if the Lord had not elected angels, then they would have all fallen.
They would have all perished. but because the Lord elected
some and kept some by his power, the same way he keeps his people,
they were saved from the fall whenever Lucifer was cast out
of heaven. This is interesting because to the natural man, we
believe we have power to do things. We have power to keep ourselves.
We have power to, but to the believer, we know we're kept
by the power of God. It's all about him and what he's
done. Angels are created beings, therefore
we do not give any worship to angels. I said this last Sunday,
but as we go through verse by verse, we must go through verse
by verse. We're talking about the angels here. We don't worship
the angels, do we? They're created beings. Well,
who created them? Well, that's the one we worship.
We worship the creator, the creator. These angels behold his face
and they do his bidding. This is all the angels do. We
don't look for signs and wonders and mysterious things. We just
declare the truth and we believe it. These angels behold the face
of God and they do his bidding. They worship him. This is what
the responsibilities are. They do this. They work invisibly.
They work invisibly on behalf of God. for those who he has
purpose to save. They do whatever he tells them
to do. They can't see them, don't know what they're doing, but
we don't worry about those things. We don't try to enter into what's
the angels doing. No, we look to Christ. We see
Jesus who was made a little lower than the angels. That's who we
look to. Here they are likened. And I guess I could have used
this as part of the intro. I don't know how to, I'm determined,
I don't know how to preach. You'd be surprised, wouldn't
you? But I don't have a clue. I'm just begging the Lord, give me
the words to say, and pray that he causes me to do so. If a man
gets up and tells you, I know exactly how to preach, I know
what I'm doing, either he's really seasoned and he is confident,
he knows what he's doing, or he really doesn't know, probably,
does he? No, it's impossible to declare the truth without
the Lord giving his spirit. Something I want us to notice,
is that these angels are likened to the wind and fire right here.
Now both wind and fire can be used for destruction and they
can be used as help, as help, but both are created. encouragement
that Paul, or not Paul, the writer of Hebrews, maybe it is Paul,
maybe it is whoever it is, it doesn't matter does it? The reason
Hebrews is being written is to clarify, clarify the Gospel. It is to set forth the seven
distinct truths we talked about. It is to clarify who God is and
what He has done for His people. And what the issue was is these
Jews were looking to these angels and they were worshiping these
beings, they were exalting them and they were They had had some
experiences where they needed something else to see. They were
looking for signs and wonders. Don't be deceived. The Lord's
not going to give any signs or wonders. He's not going to call
something to come into your life where you're going to have a
big revelation of something you never saw because a light shown
with something you could physically see. It's not going to happen.
No, the light shines in the heart. The light shines in the heart.
You don't see it with the physical. If you're waiting to come to
Christ because you've never seen something miraculous, you'll
never come to Christ. He is the miraculous one. He
is the one we come to. He is the light. He is the light. We don't look to what we see.
Paul said it this way in 2 Corinthians, while we look not at things which
are seen, but at things which are not seen. For the things
which are seen are temporal. But the things which are not
seen are eternal. What are we looking to, the temporal
or the eternal? Yes, angels are spiritual beings,
they're eternal, but we don't look to them. We don't look for
signs and wonders, we look to Christ. We look to the singular
source of rest, the singular source of hope, the singular
source of peace. It's only found in the Lord Jesus
Christ. That brings us to the point of the message. He's seated
as the successful redeemer of his people. And what is he seated
on? He's seated on his throne. A throne denotes that it's a
place of power. It's a place of authority. It's
a sovereign place of rule. Any king in the Old Testament,
any king alive today has a throne that they sit on. Who else occupies
that throne other than the king? And I understand it could be
a queen because the king has passed, but you understand she's
ruling in the stead of the king. The king sits there, doesn't
he? The king sits there. He is in all authority over the
kingdom. His word is law. Whatever he
says is what's done. No one can change the law that
the king speaks. No one can trump him. No one
can overpower him. No one can thwart him. And somebody
could try to challenge, but that would be futile, wouldn't it?
He has the kingdom on his side. He is the king that sits on his
throne. How much more so our heavenly
father? How much more so the Lord Jesus Christ who is seated
on his eternal throne? His throne never had a beginning
and it will never have an end. His throne is forever and it's
a throne of righteousness. It's a throne of sovereignty.
It's a throne of judgment. It's a throne of wrath. But it's
a throne of grace as well. It's a throne of mercy. He doesn't
have one throne that he sits on at one time, and then another
throne that he sits on at another time. He sits on one throne. And one way or another, we're
gonna have to face that throne, either by grace, in mercy, or
in wrath. There's no other way. We have
to approach the throne, whether in this life or in death. Oh,
for the grace of the Lord to be given that we could approach
now by grace. By grace through faith and bow
with the heart of faith saying you are Lord Jesus Christ is
Lord he is King. The angels serve him as he seated. The angels. That's their purpose. That's their job to serve the
Creator. I love the thought that even the fallen angels serve
God. Think about that. Satan can't do anything without
God's permission, without God's purpose. He's completely limited
by God. So even in his desperate attempts
to get glory, his desperate attempts to take you away from God, his
desperate attempts to steal you away, Christ is still seated. He can't do it. He's a lion that
roars with no teeth and no claws and he's on a short chain. He
has no power. He has no power because of who
holds him at bay, who keeps him from us. It's the Lord, the one
that's seated on the throne. I love the thought that every
time he does try to do something against the child of God, every
accusation that he makes in heaven against the child of God, Lord
says, there is no sin there. It's been put away by my son.
All that Satan can do is glorify the son in that false accusation.
Think about that. I love that. Even though you
and I see the sin, the Lord doesn't see the sin that's been put away. Angels of the Lord have but one
purpose. Those that elect angels of the Lord have but one purpose,
and it's to be the ministers of the Lord, to declare his truth,
to declare his sovereignty, to declare he is seated and he's
God. All glory and praise and honor
to him. That's what it says in Revelation. That's what they
declare. Now, you call that an intro, I guess, if you want to,
but that's the messengers. That's who is talking about here
in our text. If you want to turn back there,
Hebrews chapter one. But it's important that we understand
now that we see them, who they are, what their purpose is, he
saith unto the angels, he makes them, he makes his angels spirits
and his ministers a flaming fire, but that's an interjection. This
is the point. They may be ministers. They may
be spiritual beings, uh, ministers of flame of fire, the wind, but
they're like the wind and the fire. The Lord is the one that's
purposed them to do whatever they do. Here's the focal point,
but under the sun, he say at that throne, Oh God is forever
and ever a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom.
The angels, he said, that you're ministers, that you're flame,
that they're flame of fire, that they're spirits, he said, but
under the sun. You're not talking to the angels. Now, we've seen
that so much throughout this chapter is who went at the angels
at any time that he say, thou art my son, sit thou here at
my right hand. That's just a few verses back. No, he didn't exalt
the angels to the place of sonship. It's one. There's only one that
has that place that has by inheritance obtained, he's, Obtaining a better
inheritance because of who he is. For complete clarification, the
writer of Hebrew says unto us, unto the son, not unto man, not
unto angels, not unto anything else, but unto the son. Unto
the Lord Jesus Christ, thy throne is forever and ever. What a glorious
thought. The glorious thought of the Father
exalting the Son. It's a worshipful type praise
that's being given here. Unto the Son, thy throne is forever,
O God. This is how far the Lord has
exalted His Son and given Him a name which is above every name,
that at the name of Jesus, every knee should bow and every tongue
should confess. Every judgment's been given to the son. That's
what the Lord said about, he said, my father hath given me,
made me the judge of all. I'm gonna judge every man, every
woman. This is who the son is. Seated
on his throne, he says, the father judges no man, but hath committed
all judgment unto the son. All judgment, all judgment. What does the word all mean?
It means all. I never say that in a condescending
manner, it just simplifies it so much, doesn't it? Just to
hear all. All judgment given to the Son. I can wrap my little
pea brain around the word all, can't you? I can wrap my mind
around that. All judgment's been given to
the Son. What does that mean? There's no judgment left for
anybody else to make because it's all given to the Son. He's
gonna do whatsoever He hath purpose to do. And we found out why all
judgment's given to Him in verse nine. Thou hast loved righteousness
and hated iniquity, therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed
thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. What does
he mean anointed? You remember one of the, there's several examples
we could have went with this morning, but David, King David,
whenever he was anointed. The prophet had went down to
Jesse's house and said, Jesse, one of your sons is going to
be king. So he lined up his sons, and you remember the 10 sons
that were there, I believe it was 10, and from the oldest to
the youngest. And as you all know, the oldest
would have been probably the strongest, the biggest, the most
mature, therefore he'd have been the most developed. He had the
muscles, had the muscles. He would have been the strongest
looking one. Now to the eye, you and I would have said, that's
gotta be him. but the Lord doesn't look on what can be seen. The
Lord looks at the heart and the Lord's people don't look at what
can be seen. We look through the eye of faith that he's given.
We look to the things which are not seen. Well, you know, the
account, he goes down the line one, one young man after the
other and gets to the end and there's none left. And the prophet
looks and says, is there not another another son that you
have. Is there not another son that
is not here?" And he said, well, there's one more, but he's a
boy. He's out there tending to the sheep. And he said, fetch
him. And when he came, what did the prophet say? That's him.
That is the Lord's elect. That is the Lord's anointed. Now, don't misunderstand those
words. That's exactly who Christ is, the Lord's elect, the Lord's
anointed, the only one who was purposed to put away the sin
of his people, the one ordained before time to do so. That's
the Lord's anointed. He's the only one that's been
anointed with this oil of gladness. And that's exactly what the prophet
did to David. He anointed his head with oil.
That's a picture of the spirit, the Holy Spirit being given.
Do you remember whenever in Psalm 23, David was the one that wrote
it? He said, thou anointest my head with oil, my cup runneth
over. That's the anointing of the Holy Spirit on the Lord's
people. That's how he speaks to his people, is through and
by his spirit, through and by his word. This is how he speaks. He doesn't speak any other way.
And what does he always speak? It's the same message. The Lord
Jesus Christ is all. This is the anointing. This is
the anointing, and he tells us here that he anointed the Lord
with the oil of gladness above thy fellows, above thy fellows. Jesus Christ was the one chosen
to redeem. For how much did the father trust
the son? The Lord ordained, the Lord elected,
the Lord chose him from the foundation of the world. How much did he
trust him to do it? Now you and I, most of us have
children, Some of us have pets if we don't have children, so
you'll understand what I'm saying with that. You tell a dog to sit, and you
have some confidence maybe the dog will sit. You tell your children
to go clean their room, and you have some confidence they'll
clean their room. How much confidence do you have? Do you sit down
and rest and never go look at the room? Do you ever look at
the dog again and see if it's still seated? See, the confidence
we have is based upon what we can see. The confidence the father
had in Jesus Christ was who he was. He couldn't lie. He said,
I will redeem. I will redeem, I will become
a man, I will become surety for them, the elect. And what did
the father do? Did the father check in to see
how the son was doing? No. It's blasphemous to even
think that way. The father sat down and rested
upon the Sabbath and gave the creation of the world to the
son. Everything was finished from the foundation of the world.
That's how much he trusted the son. That's how much we are to
trust the son. And that's how much we do trust
the son by the faith that he gives. That's what faith does.
It just believes him. Doesn't matter what we see. Doesn't
matter what we go through. Doesn't matter what we think.
Faith believes God. Faith does not believe what we
see, but we see Jesus. That's who we believe. Father
trusted the son and rested on the Sabbath from the foundation
of the earth. The amazing part is, is Christ is that foundation,
isn't he? He is the chief cornerstone. Everything's built upon him.
Everything's focused upon him and the glorious work of salvation
on the cross. He's well-pleasing to his father,
even his love for the father. Boy, my love's cold. My love's
cold. It changes. Sometimes I don't
seem very loving even. Boy, he never changed his love
for his father never changed and the father was pleased with
his love. And did you know that's the love that he gives to his
people? The love that he's pleased with? That's the joy that he
gives to his people. The joy that he's pleased with.
The peace that he gives his people is the peace that he's pleased
with. Everything he requires, he gives to his people. We're like Peter, when the Lord
said, do you love me, Peter? Lord, I love you. You know, I
do. I don't love you as I should. I don't love you as I want to. Isn't that the truth? It's not
even that I, it's not even that I should, it's that I want to
love you more and I can't love you like I want to. Or the Lord
tell him, feed my sheep. And what do we do? We just tell
of him. That's the point. Don't look
at your love. Don't put it in a balance and see if it's good
enough for God. It's not. It's not. Look to Christ. His
love was good enough. And if you're his, he gives you
exactly what you need to please God. Everything. Everything he
required. He provided. God established
the only throne whereby sinners can be made whole, the only throne,
the throne of grace, the throne of grace. Sinners can be made
the very righteousness of God at this throne. This is the throne
of the Lord Jesus Christ. This is our hope, his everlasting
throne of grace, his eternal throne of mercy. That's where
we approach. And the good news to the sinner,
the good news to the elect, the good news to the believer is
this, Thy throne is forever. That throne of grace is never
going to expire. You can't exhaust it, and I can't either. That
throne of mercy is always there with open supply. You can't diminish
it. You can't relinquish it. We can't
mess it up. We don't have that power. Even
the angels can't mess it up. No one can. It's the eternal
throne of grace for the Lord's people, purchased by the blood
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Our throne is forever, oh God,
because of who he is and what he has done. Listen to what Luke
tells us, Luke chapter one, whenever the declaration was coming of
the Lord's birth, he shall be great. The Lord Jesus Christ,
he shall be great and shall be called the son of the highest.
And the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father,
David, and he shall reign over the house of Jacob forever and
his kingdom. There shall be no end. No, his
kingdom's forever. His throne is forever. Now, we
can't enter into the word forever. Everything about us is constrained
by time. Everything about us is limited
by time. If you knew you had all the time, that you needed
for anything, we would never really stress out, would we?
If you had enough time, you could make enough money to do whatever
you needed to do. If we had enough time, we wouldn't have to worry
about death as much. Am I wrong? If we had all, if I just never
had, you see what I mean? Nothing would bother us, but
we're constrained by time. He's not. He's not. He's not limited in anything.
He's not limited in anything. His throne is forever. Never
had a beginning. Will never have an end. He is the eternal seated King
of Kings and Lord of Lords. I love what David said in Psalm
93, and I like the old English for this reason, the way that
the King James is written, because it has the ETHs on the end. It
annoys some people. Somebody told me that's annoying.
Well, to me, I love it because it's continual. ETH is just,
it says, I'll read it to you, the Lord reigneth. I like that. He reigneth right now, and he
reigneth right now. And it could say reigns, and
it would, you know, mean the same thing to some degree, but
reigneth means continual. It'll never end. It'll never
end. It'll never say, and the Lord
reigned from such and such time to such and such time. Every
king that's ever been that had a throne, king this and that,
king so and so, reigned from this time and then. It ended,
not this king. King reigned, this king, the
Lord Jesus Christ reigned from everlasting to everlasting. Thou art God. Thou art God, the
Lord of lords and the king of kings. He's clothed with majesty. The Lord is clothed with strength,
wherewith he hath girded himself. And the world also established
that it under because of his sovereignty, his holiness, he
hung the world on nothing for the singular purpose to save
a bunch of nothings. Tell me how, how more glorious
can you get? We're the bunch of nothings.
That's the hope, isn't it? He made us into something. It wasn't
that he left us in that state. And he said, well, try your best.
He made us the very righteousness of God in him. We're seated in
him right now on his throne. That's what he did. This is what
his throne represents is his finished work. The throne is
for seating. He's the seated king. This is the Lord of hosts, the
ancient of days, his throne is forever. Who can challenge that? Who can challenge his throne?
Who can who can try to change his truth? No one. No one. He's the sovereign ruler. It's
amazing when we see him. When we see him, it stops all
the murmuring that we have, all the complaining that we have,
all the fears that we have, all the doubts that we have. When
we see him seated, we're just, well, turn with me to Isaiah
chapter six. I was going to quote that, but I, This is what Isaiah saw when
he saw the Lord. How did he respond? This is how
we all respond as sinners. When the Lord makes us sinners
and shows us Christ, the need is given. This is how we see
the Lord. Isaiah six, verse one. In the
year King Uzziah died, I also saw the Lord sitting upon a throne,
high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. He saw him
howl. There's three things given. Saw
him seated. He saw him high and lifted up,
and his train filled the temple. Now I've said this before, but
I would remind us in case some may not have been present or
some may not know this. Back in ancient times, when a king
would conquer another king, he would take the train from that
king and put it upon his train. So that if the king had a really
long train, you knew that he was a conquering king. It was
his glory. Look at the train on that king.
That king's fought many battles and been very victorious, conquered
many nations, conquered many kings. This is the king of kings
because of all he's done. The Lord's train filled the temple. That means there was no room
for anything else. This is his glory. And where
do you think you and I hide under? That very glory, that very train
of the conquering King, where he conquered death, hell, and
the grave on the cross of Calvary. He hides us under the shadow
of his wing right there. And that's where we, that's where
we are. We're under that train. That's his glory. That's his
glory. Here we have the eternal throne
of God, the eternal glory of God. I want us to notice that
the occupant seated. The occupant seated, to be seen
this way, when you see him as high and lifted up, as he calls
him, he must have the authority. He must have the power. He must
have all the right. He must have the sovereignty.
You and I could sit down on the throne. What good is that going
to do? We don't have the authority.
We don't have the power. We don't have the sovereignty
and we don't have the right. But when Isaiah saw him and when
you and I see the Lord Jesus Christ, we see he has all the
authority. He's high, higher than the heavens. He's exalted.
He's been exalted of his father, as I've already mentioned. You
and I see him as seated, meaning he successfully redeemed his
people. His work is finished. This is
how we see him. The only one that has these qualifications
is the Lord Jesus Christ. That's why he said in our text,
and we're going to read a little bit more here in Isaiah, so don't
turn back, but I'm going to remind us, he said, but under the sun,
under the sun, the Lord said, under the sun, he said, thy throne,
O God is forever and ever. This is who the Lord reveals.
He never reveals anything else. He reveals his son and seeing
his son is salvation. If he gives you the ability to
see the sun, you're saved. You're saved if you see him by
faith. Now, I mean in this life, if you see him by, everybody's
going to see him. Either we're going to see him in mercy as
we started out saying, or we're going to see him in wrath as
we said earlier. The grace, that's where grace comes in that we
need so desperately. We need to be like Isaiah who
was murmuring before and complaining about the nation Israel, Lord,
they're unclean, they have unclean lips, they're doing all these
abominable things, they're doing all these horrid acts, and I
don't wanna speak to them anymore, I don't have any good news to
tell them, all it is is wrath and judgment. But in the year
King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord. I saw the Lord. There's the good
news of the gospel. Lord, cause me to see you. Cause me to see you. This is
who God reveals either by faith unto life or in judgment unto
death. Now let's read verse one through seven here. In the year
that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne
high and lifted up and his train filled the temple. Above it stood
the seraphims. One had six wings. With twain
he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and
with twain he did fly. And one cried unto the other
and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole
earth is full of his glory. The post of the door moved at
the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with
smoke. There's those angels we spoke
of. The Lord didn't say unto those angels, thy throne is forever.
No, he said that unto the son. What was their job? To cry, holy,
holy, holy is the Lord God of hosts. And what does Isaiah say
when he sees all of this? Verse five, then said I, woe
is me. Not woe is Israel. Not woe is
this man over here who's a bad person. Not woe, woe is me. Woe is me, I am undone, because
I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people
of unclean lips. Here's the reason why. For mine
eyes have seen the King and the Lord of hosts. Then flew one
of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which
he had taken with the tongs from off the altar. And he laid it
upon my mouth and said, lo, this hath touched thy lips, and that
iniquity is taken away. and thy sin is purged. Also I
heard a voice of the Lord saying, whom shall I sin and who will
go for us? Then said I, here am I, send me. Changed his mind
about not wanting to talk to Israel anymore. And the Lord
shows us himself. Is it not true that that's who
you want to talk about? I got to tell somebody about
this seated Lord, about his glory. He saved a wretched, vile sinner
like me. I want to tell somebody about
that. Not, not for righteousness, but because he's shown what righteousness
is. It's in the Lord Jesus Christ.
No, when God's revealed brethren, we are, we say with Job, I am
vile. We say with Isaiah, I'm the man of unclean lips. I'm
undone. He's seated on his everlasting
throne. He's God. And I am not. Isaiah saw the
Lord Jesus Christ, that's who he saw. That's the only thing
that the Lord reveals. That's the only person, you'll
never see the Spirit, you'll never see the Father. What did
the disciples say? Lord, show us the Father and it sufficeth
us. What did the Lord say? I've been with you so long, how
do you not, when you've seen me, you've seen the Father. He's
not gonna reveal anything else of himself or his character till
we get to glory and be made in his likeness. We'll see him as
he is, we'll see his full glory there. We'll see him seated then,
not just with the eyes of faith, but faith will end in sight.
We'll know the half's not been told. We've been looking through
a glass darkly this whole entire time. Lord, I believe this now,
help my unbelief. Cause me to see the express image
of your person. I've said this multiple times,
but in closing, I want to say this. Either we will see him
in wrath or we'll see him in mercy. He makes the difference. He makes the difference. I must
preface what I'm about to say with that. He's the one that
does the calling. He's the one that does the saving. He's the
one that does the keeping. He does it all. He does it all. Either he causes us to confess
he is Lord in judgment. When we stand before him in judgment,
every knee is going to bow. You're the Lord. You're God,
and I'm not. They're gonna confess that. Either
he does it in judgment or by his grace, we are made to bow
right now. We cannot come to him unless
he makes us to. But when we come to him, he said,
I will in no wise cast you out. See, the call goes forth, come. This is not this throne, and
we're gonna hear this the second hour, and this is where This
is with the point where I said, okay, I've got to stop because
I'm going into something else here. But how do we approach
the throne? If we are to approach this glorious throne, how are
we to approach God? The answer is through and by
the scepter. It's the acceptance with the Lord, which is what
I hope to hear the second hour. Remember this, if the Lord's
made you a beggar, he only saves beggars. Come to him, come to
Christ. Don't come bragging about your
begging. Come to Christ begging for Christ
alone. Don't offer anything. Come to the throne of grace boldly
with complete confidence. Christ hath put away the sin
of his people. Come to Christ through the eyes of faith. Only
mercy begging sinners come to Christ. God has made them thus. And he says, I will not cast
you out. Only those that are sinners can
approach this glorious throne because they have nothing to
offer. That's what being made a sinner is. I have nothing to
offer. I'm just a sinner, completely
undone. If that's your confession, you
can approach the throne pleading for Christ alone. Let's take
a break.
Caleb Hickman
About Caleb Hickman
Caleb Hickman is the pastor of Oley Grace Church, at 761 Main St. Oley, PA 19547. You may contact him by writing to: 123 Nickel Dr. Bechtelsville, PA 19505, Calling or texting (484) 624-2091, or Email: calebhickman1234@gmail.com. Our services are Sundays 10 a.m. & 11 a.m., and in Wednesdays at 7. The church website is: www.oleygracechurch.net
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