Jeremiah chapter three. Now,
Jeremiah, I'm sorry, I said Jeremiah, I meant Lamentations, but Lamentations
was written by Jeremiah. That's the reason I said that.
And that's exactly what Lamentations is describing as Jeremiah weeping
over the city of Jerusalem. They are in shambles. It's in
ashes compared to what it used to be. It's literally left desolate.
And we see that we have Jeremiah looking over Jerusalem being
destroyed by Babylon. It was the wrath of God that
caused this to come to pass. All of his word that was given
in Jeremiah, now it's all happened and he's looking over the city.
We see that the Lord causes him to be lamenting. And that means
to grieve or to be in sorrow passionately, not just a little
bit, but every fiber of his being, he was grieving because he had
saw so much destruction and desolation. As we look through Lamentations,
the city is described as now being solitary, as desolate,
as afflicted. He also uses the words overtaken. Its grief had turned, its gladness
had turned to mourning and it's now the city of weeping rather
than the city of happiness. Its joy had turned to sorrow.
Then he tells us why, why all this came to pass. Why did everything
become grievous now? Why did everything become sorrowful
rather than being happy? And it's because of their sin.
It's because they had turned their back on the Lord. They
didn't return it to the Lord. Jeremiah preached unto them and
told them that this was going to come to pass, and now it's
came to pass. And her nakedness is exposed, is what Jeremiah
said. Everything about you now is filthy. This is how he's describing
the city. He says, you're no longer a sanctuary. You've been broken in pieces.
See, Jerusalem represents Zion, the city of God. It represents
the Lord's people. And we see, we have a picture
here of what we would be without Christ. This is what the picture
is. We see that we would be desolate.
We would be in misery. We would be afflicted in mourning.
We see that it's the Lord that had done this to Jerusalem because
of their unbelief. The Lord had left them to their
selves and trodden them under the foot. The Lord hath destroyed
them. And the Lord used Babylon to
do it. He raised up Babylon to accomplish his wrath. Jerusalem
is now called the unclean thing. There are dead corpses in the
streets that no one is burying. They don't have enough people
to bury the dead people that are present. So the streets are
riddled with corpses. You can imagine the stink that's
transpiring from that. This is us without Christ. We must see that. Our hope is that we are in Christ
and that he keeps us and that he endured the wrath of God.
Otherwise, this is us. We're empty. We're desolate.
We're dismayed. We're utterly sinful. Our nakedness
is exposed. This shows us everyone outside
of Christ. This is what the picture is here.
Jerusalem represents everyone left to themselves in their own
self-righteousness, believing that they're good enough for
God. The Lord leaving men to their iniquity to try to fix
it. We're shown our inability to please God. This shows us
that we are sin. If this is us without Christ,
it shows us how bad we are. We are sin, we're utterly sinful.
The scripture tells us all have sinned and come short of the
glory of God. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. John chapter one tells us if
we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourself and the truth
is not in us. But the good news is if we confess our sin, he
is faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned,
we make him a liar and his word is not in us. Because of their
sin and because of our sin, we deserve hell. And Jerusalem at
this time deserved everything that happened to them, all the
wrath of God being poured out upon them. That's what we deserve.
That's our birthright by nature because of what we are. Not just
because of what we do. Sin is not just a condition of
do and don't. Sin is what we are. It's a sickness
down to the marrow of the bones. It's a soul problem, isn't it?
It's a spiritual issue. The physical aspect here is that
they deserved everything that happened to them. Why did they
deserve it? Well, God will not acquit. The
guilty, he will not let one sin slide. It must be punished. It
must be punished. Do you know how much sin it takes
in order for the wrath of God, for the cup of his wrath to be
full up? just one sin. One sin and his
wrath is full and must be. It must be taken. It must be
absorbed in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he did for his people,
not just one sin, but all the sin that we are. He took all
of our iniquity, all of our transgression, all of our everything that we
are that is contrary to the Lord. He didn't leave us as Jerusalem,
desolate and naked. He didn't leave us as empty and
stinking and rotten. He left us his righteousness
and took all of that, our unrighteousness unto himself. This is the good
news. Jerusalem had endured the wrath
of God because no remedy was found. Our only hope is that
there is a remedy found for us. And that remedy is in the person
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Look with me in Lamentations
3. In verse 37, this is where we've come to now. This is where
everything that I've told you before. This is all that everything
that he's described about Jerusalem. This is where we're at now. Limitations
Chapter 3. In verse 37 says, who is he that
sayeth and it cometh to pass when the Lord commandeth it not? Out of the mouth of the Most
High proceedeth not evil and good. Wherefore doth the living
man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins? Let us search and
try our ways and turn again to the Lord. Let us lift up our
heart with our hands unto God in the heavens. We have transgressed
and have rebelled. Thou hast not pardoned. Thou
hast covered with anger and persecuted us. Prayer should not pass through. God has turned his back on Jerusalem
here. And we see the picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ being left in darkness by his father because
he was bearing our sin. This is the wrath that's being
described here. This is the contrast that's being
given here. God had turned his back on Jerusalem
That's as bad as it can get, isn't it? That's as bad. If you
want to talk about bad, that's as bad as it can get as a person.
The Lord turning his back upon us. Is that your fear? Is that
the Lord would leave you to yourself? That he would leave you to your
enemy, yourself? That's my greatest fear. Lord,
don't leave me to myself or I will be utterly desolate like Jerusalem. I know myself. We don't know
how bad we truly are, but we know a little bit of the sin
that we are by nature. The Lord reveals unto us our
sin and he gives us his law to expose that sin, does he not?
That's why they hated Christ. We read in the men's study from
John chapter 16, I believe it is, where the Lord said, you
hated me because the light that I've given has shown and exposed
your sin. This is why they hated Jeremiah.
He says, turn back to God or it's going to be judgment. It's
going to be wrath. And they would not. Only two
people believed Jeremiah, only two. Now we see here that it's
as bad as it can get. They're utterly destroyed completely.
They hated God's word and they endured God's wrath because of
it. This is every man and woman born
outside of Christ. This is those who are left to
themselves having no hope. This is the picture here. The
word we just read. The last verse that we read in
45, thou hast made us the offscoring and refuse in the midst of the
people. That offscoring and refuse, it's
the trash, it's the waste, it's the sewage. This is what we're
being compared to here by nature. This is what we would be in the
eyes of God. This is what every man and woman
is in the eyes of God and all that we can produce. And this
left to ourself is, it's the by-product of his wrath. That's
all that's left. We're nothing but the trash,
the sewage. That's what he's describing.
That's how bad Jerusalem was cast down. He's left us to that
as our portion. And it's, oh, it's by his grace,
isn't it? That we're not left in that state.
We see that it's by grace alone, don't we? We see that if it hadn't
been for him doing something, for him condescending and becoming
a man, for him, taking our sin into himself and putting it away,
that this would be our portion. This would be our end, his eternal
darkness, eternal separation. But yet he took that separation
for us, didn't he? He took that darkness and endured
it on the cross, didn't he? He absorbed the fire of God's
wrath and he extinguished it for his people. That's our hope. He endured our eternal hell. Most men don't realize that they
are either in Christ or they're out of Christ, and it's all His
doing. Does that give you comfort to
know that it's all His doing? It does me, because I know that
if left to myself, I would be just like Jerusalem. I would go after the things I
wanted to go after in the flesh. But because of the grace that
He gives to His people, He gives us repentance to see him high
and holy and lifted up. And he gives us his faith that
never fails to look to Christ as all in salvation. This is what he does for his
people. But for others, they believe that they're going to
stand before a judge, the judge of this world. They're gonna
stand before the judge and he's going to say guilty. And they
believe that they perhaps are guilty to some degree, but they'll
say, well, I'm not as bad as him, or I'm not as bad as her.
I've cast out demons in thy name. I've done all these wonderful
works in thy name. Do we see that this is what we would do
if left to ourself? We would try to offer up what
we've done unto the Lord. See, the Lord in judgment doesn't
look at our work. and give us righteousness, it's
impossible. He looks at the work of Christ
and that work must be imputed unto us. His work must be seen
as our work in order for us to be found in the righteousness
of Christ. So what is the remedy? What is
the remedy for this judgment? What is the remedy for this wrath?
That's what I need to know. I don't want to endure this wrath.
I don't want to be left desolate like Jerusalem. I don't want
to be left empty and torn down. I know that's what I deserve.
So what's the remedy? That Christ would be made our wisdom. Christ
would, meaning I don't know anything. He's all that I know. He's my
only confession. And His righteousness, that He
would be made my righteousness. He would be made my wisdom. my
righteousness, my sanctification before God, that means our holiness,
that we would be made holy as he is, that he is our sanctification
and our redemption. That's the only remedy, isn't
it? Christ Jesus himself. Not one thing in us. We cannot
look at one thing in us in order to see or in order to have righteousness
or justification with God. There can't be one thing that
we look at in ourselves. We must look to Christ. Now this morning in verse 40,
I wanna read it to us again. Let us search and try our ways
and turn again to the Lord. I mentioned Wednesday night.
Well, I'll tell you my title today is Examine Yourself. Examine
Yourself. And we're gonna turn to Romans.
I'm sorry, 2 Corinthians 13, if you'd like to be turning there,
2 Corinthians 13. On Wednesday night, I preached
a message on the look of mercy, the look that the Lord gave Peter
whenever Peter had denied him three times. That's our only
hope is that the Lord would look at us in mercy. But during that
message, I brought a point out that we do not look to ourselves
for evidence of our salvation. That's unbelief. We don't look
to see what we're producing because nothing we produce is good enough
for God. That means we don't look to our
good works. And somebody asked me, what about the verse that
says, examine yourself in second Corinthians? And that's where
the message came from this morning. I studied that and I was studying
lamentations and I thought, I know exactly what Paul is saying to
us. I know what the Lord is is declaring
unto us. Look in Second Corinthians 13.
In verse five, examine yourself, whether ye be in the faith, prove
your own selves, know you not that your own selves, how that
Jesus Christ is in you, except you be reprobates. But I trust
that you shall know that you are not reprobates. Now I pray
to God that ye do no evil, not that we should appear approved,
but that ye should do that which is honest, though we be as reprobates. For we can do nothing against
the truth, but for the truth. For we are glad when we are weak
and ye are strong. In this also, we wish even your
perfection. He says, examine yourself. See
if you be in the faith. What does that mean? Does that
mean I need to look and see what good deeds I am doing? Does it
mean I need to look and see what I am producing or my lifestyle? Is this what it means to examine
yourself? No. No, we don't look to ourself
for evidence of our salvation. We don't look to our good works
in order to prove that we're a believer. This is not what
he's saying. We're not looking to see if we're living the good
Christian life. I had a man stop by and I may
use this story several times. I know I've used it in the past.
A man stopped by and he says, does your congregation live a
good Christian life? That was his question to me.
And I didn't respond. I just stood there. I'm like,
I knew the man wasn't interested in learning anything. And he
said, well, what does it look like to live a good Christian
life? I just let him keep talking. But boy, that question sunk into
me really deep. What does that look like? I thought
to myself, it looks like a bunch of dead dog sinners seeking the
Lord's face, crying out for mercy all the time. That's what it
looks like. It doesn't look like that we got our act cleaned up.
We don't do this anymore and we don't do that anymore. It
looks like a bunch of dead dog sinners that are crying out,
Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. That's what the Christian life
looks like. If you can see good works in yourself, you have not
been made the chief of centers. If you can see and I can see
good works in myself, when I examine myself, yes, I'm doing this right
and I'm doing this right. I've got good works. We've not
been made the chief of center then. See, the chief of sinner
doesn't see any goodness in himself or herself. The chief of sinner
realizes, I am utterly sinful. I'm as Jerusalem. I am empty. I'm desolate. I'm nothing but
the trash of this world. I'm nothing but sewage. And yet
the Lord condescended to save a bunch of trash. Don't you love
that? He did it for his people. This is what he became for us
so that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
That's what he done for his people. Sinners can't do good. And only
the elect of God know this, because we're completely sin. From the top of our head to the
bottom of our feet, we're leprous. It is amazing that we can see
grace in our brethren, though, isn't it? We can see love in
our brethren. We can see good works in our brethren. We can.
The good work is the confession. the confession that you and I,
whenever me and you're having a conversation and you start
speaking on the grace of God and you start talking about your
hope is His righteousness alone, that's good works. That's what
that is. Now, we don't look to that for our righteousness, but
your brethren, me included, I hope, me included, the ones that are
the Lord's, we can, the spirit bears witness, doesn't he? He
says that between one another, we have sweet fellowship, why?
because the Lord's given us the same spirit unto him. It's not
that we examine ourself and we see that we're not what we used
to be, that we're getting better. We examine ourself and see that
we're getting worse. We see that he's getting better.
He doesn't change, but we just see a little bit more and more
of him, don't we? When you tell somebody that you
don't see good works in yourself, that you can't see good works
in yourself, people would say, well, what's the point of trying
then? What's the point of trying? I'll just live however I want
to. If you've been shown the grace of God, you know that the
truth of that is, is you wish that you could live the way you
want to. You wish that you could live perfectly unto Him. You wish that you could live
honorably unto Him, constantly looking unto Him, never having
unbelief, but trusting in Him always. That's how you want to
live, isn't it? If you're a believer, that's exactly how you want to
live. What men are saying is, is we'll just live however we
want to. And they mean they'll just live a frivolous lifestyle
doing this and that. And Paul tells us here, don't
do evil. This is how we live. Do no evil.
Well, that's impossible. Yes, I know. But Paul said, do
no evil, but not for approval. We don't do it for our righteousness,
do we? We have the law of God written
upon our heart. We know how to live. You don't need me to tell
you how to live. And you don't need to tell me how to live.
We know how to live, don't we? The Lord revealed that to us
in the law that's been given on our heart. And we do not keep
the law for salvation. We try our best to do that, which
is pleasing unto the Lord, knowing that we're going to utterly fail,
knowing that our righteousness is filthy rags, knowing that
we have no good works. And we look to Christ for his
righteousness. This is how he's designed it.
That's what he means by do honest. When he said do honestly, the
Lord says live peaceably among all men as much as within you
live peaceably. That's what he's saying as being
honest. Look to Christ. This is honesty. Christ is truth. Look unto Him as all your righteousness,
as all your wisdom, your sanctification and your redemption. This is
our only hope. Otherwise, we're desolate like Jerusalem. He's
not saying, see if you have any good works in you and the Lord
will spare you. That's not what he's saying. He's not saying,
look and see if you have any good works in you and you're
going to get another jewel in your crown. That's not what he's
saying. Christ is our crown of righteousness. Christ is the
prize, brethren. Christ is the end goal. It's not that we're going to
get a nice robe and crown and dance all over heaven. It's that
we are going to be robed in his righteousness, crowned with his
glory. That's what he said. He is our
hope. He is our eternal rest. He is
our eternal peace. His righteousness alone. He tells us to be perfect here.
Boy, I know some people that really think they live a perfect
life. They really believe they live
a perfect life. But do you know how you live
a perfect life? You know how you're perfect?
Examine yourself and see if there be anything in you that you see
good. If there is, you're not perfect. but looking unto Jesus
Christ as all of your perfection before the Lord. Looking at Jesus
Christ, looking to Him for all of your righteousness. If you
have any righteousness outside of Christ, you are not perfect,
but if God has made Christ unto you, your wisdom, your righteousness,
your sanctification and redemption, He has made you perfect in His
eyes by His own blood. When he says, Christ said, be
you therefore perfect even as your father, which is in heaven
is perfect. But we know holiness is only by Christ. We know that
perfection is only by Christ and faith is of the Lord. It's
what he merits and it's not what we merit. So how can I be perfect? Look to Christ. Do not look to
yourself for evidence of salvation. Do not look to yourself for good
works. Do not look to yourself at all.
Look to Christ. The Lord will order and provide
your steps. The Lord will show us when we don't do right. Our
conscience convicts us, don't it? And we're constantly brought
back to the place. Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner.
Lord, have mercy upon me, the sinner. This is the believer's
life. One minute, we may see a glimpse of the Lord and be
resting in his finished work. The next minute, we're crying
out again. Lord, have mercy upon me, the sinner. This is how he's
designed it. holiness, perfection, and faith
is by one name alone, the Lord Jesus Christ. We, by nature, do believe that
there's something we must do. If we're left to ourselves for
a moment, we'll think, okay, there's something I must do to
be pleasing unto the Lord. There must be some evidence for
salvation. There must be some good work that we see. And the
answer to that is no. We see Jesus, the author and finisher
of faith, We see Jesus, that's who we look to. And when we see Christ, we see
it is finished, salvation accomplished, and we rest. We rest in his finished
work. Now, either this is our hope,
or we're examining ourself to see good in ourself, and it's
unbelief. It's unbelief. Faith looks to
Christ alone. So if we're looking at anything
else other than Christ, we are not looking to the faith that
he's given us. Upon examination, a sinner will
always say, have mercy upon me. I've examined myself, Lord, and
I am completely leprous from the top of my head to the bottom
of my feet. There is not a clean spot in me. And the Lord says,
clean. That's exactly how he does it,
isn't it? This is what the lepers would do back in the Old Testament.
They would appear before the priests and whenever they were
covered from the top of their head to the bottom of their feet,
the priests would say, now you're clean. It's a picture of us being
completely sinful to being utterly sinners. And the Lord taking
all of that and making us clean, washing us in his own blood.
The Lord only saves those who see themselves as complete sinners,
not 99.9%, not 99.99%, 100% sinners. That's who the Lord came to save.
Does that comfort your heart? That comforts my heart whenever
I examine myself and see the sinner that I am. By grace, the
sinner that he's revealed that we are, if that's what you see,
then he came to save sinners. Well, that gives me hope. Lord,
have mercy upon me, the sinner. It's all of grace, isn't it? Now, I want to make a statement
this morning that some people would say is controversial. I
don't know if it's controversial or not, but I know it's the truth.
If a preacher says you must look to yourself, you must look to
your works, or you must look to your deeds as evidence for
salvation or for salvation, he is not preaching the gospel of
God's free and sovereign grace. If a preacher says you need to
look to yourself, you need to examine yourself for good works,
you need to examine yourself for your deeds, if they are pleasing
unto the Lord, if you're to look to yourself for anything, if
a preacher preaches that, he is not preaching the gospel of
grace. He's preaching works. My hope
is that the Lord keeps us from that. Christ is our hope in all
the work that he did, not our works. Christ's life is our hope,
not the life we live. Christ is our only period. Not
what we do, not what we think, not what we say, what he did,
what he thought, what he said, what he accomplished. That's
our hope. We do not preach salvation by
work, so we are looking at what we produce. We preach Christ,
don't we? And that is the hope that we
have that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners of
whom I am chief. This is our hope. Pharisees were the ones that
said, show us a sign. They're the ones that said, we
want to see evidence, didn't they? Show us a sign. What did
Christ say? There'll be no sign given. And
we could, in an adulterous generation, seek after a sign. There'll be
no sign given except of the prophet Jonah. What was the sign of the
prophet Jonah? For three days and three nights,
he was in the belly of the fish. It's the sign of the Lord Jesus
Christ's finished work. It's the death burial and resurrection
of the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the sign of Jonah. That's
the only sign that we get is that Christ Jesus has been resurrected. The father was pleased with his
son. That's what we look to for all
of our righteousness before the Lord. Pharisee said, well, we
want to see something. They saw him do all the miracles
already. The whole point is, is a man will not see Christ
in and of themselves. A woman will not see Christ. And who does that faith look
to? Aren't you glad he provided everything, everything for the
salvation of his people, everything required. The Lord Jesus Christ
supplied, he provided. Is that your hope? That's my
hope. Is that all your salvation? That's
all my salvation. He provided everything. Is this
your righteousness before God? Then you're a believer if you
can say yes to that. If you say that Christ is my only hope,
His finished work alone, His blood alone, His righteousness
alone, His life, His death, His burial, His resurrection, I see
myself as a sinner and Him the saver. If you can say that, you're
a believer. If you believe that Jesus Christ is God and He successfully
redeemed His people, you're a believer. That's the good news of the gospel.
He's given you faith to believe Him. Faith just looks to Christ. Paul and Jeremiah are saying
the exact same thing. They're saying, examine yourself,
meaning look at yourself. and turn to the Lord. See the
sinner that you are. That's what Paul's saying here.
This is what Jeremiah is saying in Lamentations. Look unto yourself,
not for salvation. Look at you, Jerusalem. Look
at your desolation, your pollution, your utter sinfulness, and turn
to Christ. This is the gospel call that
goes forth. We see ourself as the sinner, and we present Jesus
Christ as the Savior, and the Lord's people flee to Him, don't
they? Lord, all we see is this city
of self-destruction, decay, and sin. Turn us and we shall be
turned. Actually, that's the title of
the message that I'm going to be preaching the second hour is Turn Us and
We Shall Be Turned. Readily sinful, utterly polluted. You know, I
got to thinking about us exhaling. We exhale CO2. I'm pretty sure
everybody probably already knows that. But you know, that's a
poisonous gas to humans. Everything we produce is poison,
isn't it? Everything. We can't produce
anything good. Everything we produce, even the
breath that comes forth of our mouth, produces poisonous gas. Think about that. The Lord Jesus
Christ produced everything perfect, didn't he? Everything. He had
no sin. He had no sin whatsoever. He
was perfect. This is our hope. What does this
make us cry out? Lord, turn us back to you. Turn
us back to you. If this is your plea, I have
good news. This is exactly what Paul is
saying in verse 11. Finally, brethren, farewell,
be perfect, be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace,
and the God of love and peace shall be with you. Be perfect,
he says. How are we going to be perfect?
The Lord Jesus Christ told us in John 17, verse 23, I in them,
talking to his father, I in them and thou in me, that they may
be perfect in one and that the world may know that thou has
sent me and has loved them as thou has loved me. See, he's
saying the same thing when he says, be perfect, be comforted,
be in one mind, have peace with God. It's the exact same thing
as saying, look to Christ. That's our comfort, isn't it?
That's our peace, isn't it? That's how we are perfect in
the Lord's eyes is looking unto Christ, looking to his righteousness,
not our own. This is how we examine ourself.
We see ourselves as not being perfect and look to Christ as
our perfection. We see ourself as unrighteous
and look to Christ as our righteousness. That's our only comfort and that's
our only peace. If Christ is all, if Christ has
been made all to us, then Jerusalem does not represent us, but it
represents what Christ endured for his people. Look back with
me at Lamentations chapter three, in closing. Lamentations chapter three. Who else but our Lord can say
this? Now I understand that Jeremiah is saying this, but prophetically
he's talking about what the Lord Jesus Christ endured. Look, Lamentations
chapter three, verse one. I am the man that has seen affliction
by the rod of his wrath. He hath led me and brought me
into darkness, but not into light. Surely against me as he turned,
he turned his hand against me all the day. My flesh and my
skin hath he made old. He hath broken my bones. He hath
builded against me and compassed me with gall and travail. That's
bitterness and travail. He hath set me in dark places
as they that be dead of old. He hath hedged me about that
I cannot get out. He hath made my chain heavy.
Also, when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer. Who else says that but the Lord
Jesus Christ? Who else? The child of God can
never say these words and they'd be true. Did you know that? The
Lord won't shout out the prayer of his elect. You know why? Because the Lord would not hear
his son upon the cross. He was bearing their sin. See,
his son was not heard so that you and I will be heard. Every
time that we pray, every time that we approach the throne of
grace to obtain mercy, there is plenteous grace and mercy.
And he bows his ear down, and he hears our prayer. This is
the Lord Jesus Christ and what he endured for his people on
the cross. He's the one that's seen affliction.
He's the one that was set in darkness of the wrath of God
to redeem us. He was the one made solitary.
He was the one that was made a desolate, afflicted, overtaken
because of the sin of his people to redeem them back to God. We're reminded in Psalm, he says,
innumerable evils have come past me about. This is the Lord speaking
on the cross. Innumerable evils have come past
me about. All the sin that we are, everything,
he took every thought that we think into himself and owned
it as his own. And the Lord executed his darling
son for it. Now, when he looks at us, all
the thoughts that we have are perfect. They're holy. Why? Because they're the Lord Jesus
Christ thoughts. This is the glorious news of
substitution for the sinner. Every work that we do now is
perfect in the eyes of God because of Jesus Christ's imputation
of his perfect work for his people. He took our righteousness, which
is filthy rags, and gave us his righteousness, which is perfect. As he was forsaken on the cross
for his people, the wrath of God poured out upon him when
it was finally done. when it was finally over, when
justice was satisfied once and for all, he cried, it is finished. You will no longer have to be
as Jerusalem is here. What waits upon us when we die
is to see him face to face and be made like him. That's the
glorious news of the gospel. And he did it all. He did every
single bit of it. So examine yourself and ask yourself,
what is my hope? The believer would say when he
lived, I lived in him. When he died, I died in him. This is my only hope. When he
was resurrected, he brought me back with him and presented me
as perfectly righteous before his father. That's my hope. He
took our sin and put them away, burying them in his own body.
And by one offering, he hath perfected forever. them that are sanctified. You
know what the word sanctified means? It means set apart. It means holy. He sanctified
his people. He is our sanctification, isn't
he? When he causes us to examine ourselves, now understand what
I'm saying. When he causes us to examine, not whenever we just
examine ourselves, when he causes us to examine ourselves, he gives
repentance and he gives faith by his gospel, doesn't he? And
in doing so, we say with Jeremiah, look at Lamentations 3 verse
21. This I recall to mind. Therefore have I hope. It is
of the Lord's mercies that we are not consumed because his
compassions fell not. They are new every morning. Great
is thy faithfulness. The Lord is my portion, saith
my soul. Therefore will I hope in him. The Lord is good unto them that
wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him. The Lord has said
unto his people, seek ye my face, wait on the Lord, look unto Christ,
is what he's saying. The Lord is our portion, delighting
in mercy for his people. That's our hope, isn't it? That's
our only hope. Examine yourself. Examine yourself. Say, Lord, cause me to flee to
Christ. Cause me to flee unto your son, which you were pleased
with. Cause him to be everything that I'm pleased with. Cause
me to see no good thing within myself. Cause me to have Christ. Cause him to draw me. Cause him
to keep me. Cause him to reveal himself that
I may know him and the pardon for my sin. Keep us looking unto
Christ.