My father is a Libertan. and that you can deny. A God of light and miracles is
written in the sky. It took a miracle to put the
stars in space. It took a miracle to hang the
world in space. But when He saved my soul, cleansed
and made me whole. It took a miracle of love and
grace. Though here His glory has been
shown, we still can't fully see the wonders of His mighty throne. will take eternity. It took a miracle to put the
stars in place. It took a miracle to hang the
world in space. But when he saved my soul, cleansed
and made me whole. He took a miracle of love and
grace. The Bible tells me of his power
and wisdom all the way through. And every little bird and fly
our testimony stood. It took a miracle. to hang the stars in place. It took a miracle to hang the
world in space. But when he saved my soul, glimpsed
and made me whole. It took a miracle of love and
grace. Now let's turn in our Bibles
to Matthew chapter 4. My text this morning is going
to be verse 17. Those of you who attend here
know that we've been studying in this chapter several weeks.
And this morning, I want to concentrate on this one verse. From that
time, Jesus began to preach and to say, repent, for the kingdom
of heaven is at hand. At this point in the life of
the Lord Jesus Christ, we are told he began to preach We have
studied about his baptism, about his temptation in the wilderness,
and about his removal to Capernaum. And now we read, he began to
preach. He was a preacher. The Lord Jesus Christ, he was
a preacher. And I prepared my message today
around that statement. he began to preach. Three points. First, what does it mean to preach? In the King James translation,
the English word preach is found three times in the Old Testament. And one of those texts is a prophecy
concerning the Lord Jesus Christ, and another concerns Jonah. He was commanded to go unto Nineveh,
and the text says, that great city, and preach unto it the
preaching that I bid thee. And that text there in Jonah
is a good example of what it means to preach. It means to
proclaim, to proclaim. Jonah was sent there to proclaim
this one message, yet 40 days. and none of us shall be destroyed. There's a lot of emphasis today
on apologetics, and I know that has its place, but preaching
is proclaiming. It's not explaining everything
that men might want to have explained to tickle their intellectual
ability or their intellectual interest. Preaching is proclaiming
the message. This word which is translated,
this Greek word which is here translated preach in our text,
it is translated every time except once in the New Testament by
either preach, preaching, preached, preacheth, preacher, and the
one exception is found in the book of Revelation, and there
it is translated proclaiming. The Lord Jesus Christ now began
to preach. He began to proclaim. And the
second part of my message is what did the Lord Jesus Christ
preach? Well, our text tells us From
that time, Jesus began to preach and to say, repent, for the kingdom
of heaven is at hand. I mentioned in the message last
Sunday morning, a harmony of the gospels, a harmony of the
gospels. And if we were reading from one
at that time, I mentioned the fact that we would see that what
took place with him going to Galilee is covered in John Chapter
4 when he went through Samaria. But I want us to look also this
morning in Mark's Gospel at the same statement, only it is a
little bit larger, in Mark Chapter 1, but both of these Statements
are speaking of the same thing. At that time, Jesus began to
preach and to say, repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And here in chapter one of Mark,
verses 14 and 15, we read, now after that John was put in prison,
Jesus came into Galilee preaching the gospel of the kingdom of
God and saying, the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at
hand. Repent ye and believe the gospel. What did the Lord Jesus Christ
preach? He preached repentance and faith. That's what he preached. He preached
the gospel. He preached repentance and faith. In Acts chapter 20 and verse
21, the apostle Paul testifies as to what his ministry had been
in the city of Ephesus. And he said this, testifying
both to the Jews and also to the Greeks. Now listen, this
is Paul's message and it's the same as the Lord Jesus Christ.
Paul said, testifying both to the Jews and also to the Greeks,
Number one, repentance toward God. And number two, faith toward
our Lord Jesus Christ. Preaching the gospel is preaching
repentance toward God and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. Now,
repentance is often defined, and it's a very simple definition,
as a change of mind. but it includes more than that.
That is a good definition, no doubt, but it includes more than
that. If you will look in chapter 21
of Matthew, when our Lord speaks about repentance here in this
parable, Matthew 21, verse 28, he said, but what think ye? A certain man had two sons and
he came to the first and said, son, go work today in my vineyard. He answered and said, I will
not. Now that's his answer. No, no,
I will not. But notice afterward, he repented
and went. There's a good explanation or
example, I should say, of repentance. First of all, he said, no, I
will not go. But then he went. Why is repentance
toward God? That's what Paul said. He testified
repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.
Repentance is toward God because it was from God we turned away. It was from God we fell in the
Garden of Eden. Our representative, yes. The
scripture says in Isaiah, all we like sheep have gone astray.
That is all of mankind at one time, we all went astray. But
he didn't stop there, did he? We have turned everyone to his
own way. Every one of us we turned away
from God. First of all, yes, in our representative,
but when we come into this world, we might say it like this. We
will not, I will not have this man to rule over me. That's the
statement we make. Maybe not verbally, but by our
actions, our allegiance, As Adam was created, his allegiance was
to God and to God alone. When he sinned, he took that
allegiance that had been to God and he really placed it on his
wife Eve. He chose her over God. Now men are to love their wives,
even as Christ loved the church, But we are to love God supremely. Yes, Adam loved Eve. She was bone of his bone, flesh
of his flesh. He knew she was the only other
living individual on the face of the earth. And when she disobeyed
God, what did he do? He chose to follow her. He chose
her, that is Eve, over God. His allegiance now was not any
longer to God. And that's the way all of us
are when we come into this world. We have turned away from God
and repentance is a change of mind. A change of mind. We've turned away from God and
we've sought our happiness. And everyone wants to be happy.
We all have that in us, don't we? We want to be happy. But we've turned away from God
and we think that our happiness is going to be found in something
or someone other than God. Men are seeking for happiness
in many different ways. Some seek for it in riches. But
he that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with it. Men seek
happiness in fame. Isn't it amazing to you as you
read? How many people do we read about
who become very famous? They're entertainers or something
like that. And then all of a sudden you
read that they've harmed themselves through drugs or something like
that. They can't handle the fame. There's no satisfaction there.
It promises a lot. But man has been so created by
God Almighty. He's our maker. He's our creator. And man will never find happiness
until he finds it in his maker, in God. We turned away from God. And repentance is turning to
God. recognizing that our happiness
will be found in him and seeking him above everything else. And then we read not only repentance
toward God, but faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only way to God. I said
repentance is we've turned away from God. Repentance is turning
back to God. And the only way back to God
is through His Son, Jesus Christ. There is no other way. He said
that, and the scriptures proclaim that. If God has opened your
eyes spiritually today, you recognize that beyond a shadow of a doubt. There's no way that you will
ever be right with God. except through the person and
work of Jesus Christ. And you know that if the Lord's
opened your eyes. That's what faith is, isn't it? Seeing the glory of God in the
face of Jesus Christ. Men can't see that. The natural
man, and you may be here today, you can't see that. And all of
us at one time, we couldn't see that. We couldn't see God's glory
in the person of Jesus Christ. Faith toward Christ, rather. Repentance toward God and faith
toward our Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only way by which you
may return to God. I hear people talking about the
Virgin Mary. You're not going to come to God
through the Virgin Mary. People talking about the saints.
You're not going to come to God through the saints, through religion. There's no way to God except
through his son, Jesus Christ. Faith toward the Lord Jesus Christ. For Christ, the apostle Peter
tells us, hath once suffered for sins. The just, he had no
sin of his own. the perfect son of God, the just
for the unjust, that he might bring us to God. He's the only
way that any sinner comes to God is through his son, Jesus
Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ.
That was the message the apostles preached, wasn't it? Believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Now, William
Mason, one of the old writers, he gave two tests, two tests
by which men may determine, am I a believer in the Lord Jesus
Christ? Do I really believe in the Lord
Jesus Christ? This man gave, I think, two very
excellent tests. First of all, a believer has
the same view of himself as is set forth in the word of God. A believer, I'm talking about
someone who truly believes in the Lord Jesus Christ, has the
same view of himself as is set forth in the scriptures. I am
a sinner. I am a sinner and know that in
my flesh dwelleth no good thing. The scripture says I have a heart
that is desperately wicked and deceitful above all things. I say amen. That's my experience. That's who I am. I have a heart
that is desperately wicked and deceitful above all things. I come short in everything that
I might attempt to do to glorify God, if it's praying, if it's
preaching, if it's witnessing, if it's giving, no matter what
it is, if it's singing, I come short of the glory of God in
everything. I might attempt to do. Why? Because
I am sin. I am sin. Just like when God
gave the law to the nation of Israel. God told them, now if
you build an altar, you just take some stones and stack them
up there. Just stack those stones up, just like you find them there.
Pull them out of the dirt and stack them up. And whatever you
do, Don't you put a chisel. Don't you put a hammer on those
stones. Why? Oh, we could shape them
up. We could make them look so pretty.
All of them fit into place. What a beautiful altar we could
bring forth. No, no, no. Because when you
lift your hand to do anything, you've polluted that work. Why? because of what we are by nature. That's why. And a true believer
recognizes this, confesses this, says, Amen. Yes, that's true
of me. That's true. That's exactly what
I am. Just as the word of God declares
that I am. I have nothing, nothing, nothing. I have nothing. to commend me
to God. If God gives me what I deserve,
it has to be hell. It has to be eternal separation
from God. Why? Because He's a holy God
and I'm a sinful individual. I have nothing to commend me
unto God and to His grace. And number two, not only Do we
say amen to what the scripture says about us? If we are a true
believer, we say amen to what the scripture says about Christ
as he is set forth in the scriptures. He's God. He's God. He's God come down in the flesh.
One person, but two natures, both God and man. Yes. And he's the one mediator between
God and men. Don't try to go to God in any
other way. You know, sometimes people make
an issue. Well, they won't let us say in
Christ's name. We're at this public event, and
you can pray. And I've been invited to pray
at commissioners' courts. But they want to tell you what
you can say and how long you can say. And whatever you do,
don't say, in the name of Christ. Why? Because most people believe
that you can pray, you don't have to go to God through Christ.
There's many ways. Oh no, no. There's one way. There's one mediator between
God and man, the man, Christ Jesus. A true believer recognizes
this and confesses this and says, yes, amen, I know that. Not only
that, but that he was made a curse. He was made a curse. He was hanged
upon a tree and shed his blood and gave his life. He was made
a curse by the law that he might redeem us from the curse of the
law. The law curses everyone that
is not perfect in its obedience in everything. And the Lord Jesus Christ was
made a curse that he might redeem us from the curse of the law.
He's the one great high priest who ever lives to make intercession
for all who come unto God by him. Amen. A true believer confesses
these things. Notice the second thing. The
Lord Jesus Christ preached repentance and faith, but also he preached
the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And it's interesting, if you
look at the word in Matthew and the same word in Mark, in Matthew's
gospel, it is the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And in Mark's
gospel, the kingdom of God is at hand. And you know, some people
try to make those two things mean something different. They
don't. They're used interchangeably. And people would just use their
concordance in the scripture. They would say they're used in
the same way. What was it that was at hand?
The kingdom of heaven, the kingdom of God is at hand. was this new
dispensation. Sometimes we call it the gospel
dispensation, as opposed to that legal dispensation. It's a new
dispensation in the sense the gospel's the same. There's only
one everlasting covenant. The gospel's the same, but the
gospel has been administered in two different ministrations,
that is, a legal ministration in the Old Testament, and I'm
going to say a gracious ministration. Now, the kingdom of heaven is
at hand. I want you to turn with me to
Romans 14. I think Paul here shows us the
difference. Romans chapter 14 and verse 17, Paul said, for the kingdom of
God is not meat and drink. Now that old dispensation administered
through the law that was given to Israel at Mount Sinai. It
had a lot to say about meat. I don't know so much about drink,
but knowing the traditions of the Jews, they had probably added
some traditions about what you could drink and what you couldn't
drink. But the law clearly prescribed certain meats you could eat and
certain meats you couldn't eat. That whole dispensation was a
dispensation of ceremonies, of ceremonies. The new dispensation
is entered into by repentance and faith in Christ. And all
three of these things, notice righteousness and peace and joy
in the Holy Ghost. For the kingdom of God is not
meat and drink, but here it is, righteousness. Now, how is a
person made righteous? through Christ. His righteousness,
His perfect obedience, is charged or imputed unto every one that
believeth, and therefore we are justified. The kingdom of God
is righteousness, and it's peace. We have peace with God. He made
peace for us through the blood of His cross. Therefore, being
justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus
Christ and joy in the Holy Ghost. This dispensation is so different
from that old dispensation where you had to watch everything.
Your clothes had to meet a certain criteria, the robes that you
wore. Three times a year, you had to
go up to Jerusalem. I mean, just on and on. You couldn't
plant your field with two different types of seed. You couldn't plow
with a horse and an ass, I believe it was, pulling the plow. I mean, there's all kinds of
regulations in that old dispensation. It was full of ceremony and rules Couldn't be much joy because
you could be going outside and just walk over a ground and step
on a bone and that bone was a bone of some man and now you're defiled. Now you're outside the camp until
you go through the ceremony to get back in. All these rules. You say, why would God do that?
Well, I can't answer that. But I'll tell you one thing it
did. It kept the nation of Israel separate until the promised seed
came. The promised seed. Abraham's
seed. In thy seed shall all the nations
of the earth be blessed. That's Christ. Here's the third
point. What kind of a preacher was the
Lord Jesus? What does it mean to preach?
It means to proclaim. What did the Lord Jesus Christ
proclaim? Repentance and faith. And let
me say this. Repentance and faith are graces
and they're conjoined graces. In other words, they're two sides
of one coin. Regeneration being the coin and
the fruit of regeneration, faith and repentance, of repentance
and faith. Repentance toward God and faith
toward our Lord Jesus Christ. I think I'll say this, that in
some people, some believers, repentance may be more displayed
than in others, and in others, faith may be more displayed than
repentance. But every child of God has both,
has been given both repentance and faith. What kind of a preacher
was the Lord Jesus? I have seven things here I'll
go through quickly. Number one, he was a preacher
who was anointed with the Holy Spirit. Each one of the gospels,
Each one of the Gospels record at his baptism that the Spirit
of God descended upon him in the form of a dove. And John,
it is, tells us that he was given the Spirit without measure and
the Spirit remained upon him. One of those three texts in the
Old Testament that I mentioned was a prophecy of Christ. It
said, the Spirit of the Lord is upon me. because he hath anointed
me to preach good tidings unto the meek. And I believe it was
his first message, his first public message that is recorded,
he found the place in the scripture there in Isaiah where it is written,
the spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he hath anointed me to
preach good tidings unto the meek. This day, he said, This
day is this scripture fulfilled in your presence. In the early church, as recorded
in Acts, they had some problems because of charity, benevolent
work, taking care of widows who needed help, and the apostles
They came to the apostles first and said, help us out here. They
said, we'll seek out seven men to do that work. But here's the
point, that we might give ourselves to prayer and to the word of
God. Christ was anointed of the Holy
Spirit. And every man who would preach
the gospel, he spent nights in prayer. Every man who would preach
the gospel must be a man who prays, who prays and who asks
for God's blessings, for God's help. If a man had the greatest of
talents to speak and to teach and and entertain people, and
people were just fascinated by his diction and all of that. Only God can take the message,
the gospel, and quicken a person. He's the only one who can do
that. I can stand up here week after week and preach. But I have to be dependent not
by power nor by might, but by my spirit, saith the Lord. And
the Lord Jesus Christ, he was a preacher who was filled with
the spirit, filled with the spirit, a spirit-anointed preacher. Number
two, he was a preacher who preached with authority. This is what
we read in Matthew chapter seven. The people heard him and they
said, my, My, how different, how different is he from the
scribes and the Pharisees we've been listening to all these years? What's different about him? He
preaches with authority. How many times in the Gospel
of John do we read over and over, truly, truly, verily, verily,
I say unto thee, except a man be born again, he cannot see
the kingdom of God. Verily, verily, I say unto you,
he that heareth my word and believeth on him that sent me hath everlasting
life and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from
death unto life. He didn't say on the one hand.
Reminds me of a story I heard many years ago. The church needed
a pastor and they were praying for a pastor and one man prayed
and he said, Lord, send us a one-armed preacher. After the prayer was ended, one
of the deacons said, what do you mean a one-armed preacher?
He said, I am so tired of hearing the preacher say on the one hand
it may be this or on the other hand it may be this. He said,
send us a one-armed preacher. God, the Lord Jesus Christ, he
spoke with authority. He knew who he was. He knew why
he was here. He knew what he was going to
accomplish. He spoke with authority. The
third thing, he was a preacher who believed the word of God.
If you could run all the so-called preachers out of the pulpits
in America today who don't believe the Word of God, what a blessing
that would be. What a blessing that would be.
The Lord Jesus Christ was a preacher who believed the Word of God.
He spoke about in the beginning, God made them male and female. In other words, the creation,
just as it's recorded to us in the Word of God. He spoke about
Abraham seeing his day and rejoicing. He was a real person. He spoke
about the flood, about Noah going into the ark, and all those on
the outside of the ark were washed away, were destroyed. He spoke
about David calling his Lord, or his son is Lord, and asked
the religious leaders, how was that possible? How could David
call his son his Lord? Because who his son came to be,
the God man. He spoke about Solomon and all
of his glory. He spoke about Jonah. People
say, well, do you believe Jonah was actually in the fish's belly
for three days? The Lord Jesus Christ did. He was a preacher who believed
the word of God. Fourth, he was a preacher who
preached the doctrine of God. Now that could go, that could
take us a while. But this is what he said in John
7, my doctrine is not mine, but his that sent me. Think of all
that might be included in that, the doctrine of God. There's one God. He exists in
a trinity of person. He's omnipotent, omniscient. Immutable. Everywhere at the
same time. I'm not present. The doctrine
of God. He preached the doctrine of God.
He said, my doctrine is not mine, but his it sent me. And listen,
number five, he was a preacher who rejoiced in the sovereign
grace of God. Look with me in Matthew chapter
11. He rejoiced in the sovereign
grace of God. Here in Matthew chapter 11, beginning
in verse 25, we read, at that time, Jesus answered and said,
I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because
thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast
revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed
good in thy sight. Hid these things from the wise
and the prudent, those who knew everything. You couldn't teach
them anything because they knew everything. Talking about the
religious leaders. They knew everything already. He rejoiced that God had hidden
these things from some, but had revealed them unto babes." Don't
you want to be a babe? Don't you? Teach me. Teach me. He revealed these things unto
babes. Lord, I don't know. I don't know. Teach me. Teach me. And number six, he was a preacher
that the common people heard gladly. We read that in Mark
12, and the common people heard him gladly. I'll tell you who
didn't hear him gladly, the religious people. The religious people
who knew everything, who were so proud of themselves, who were
so righteous in their own eyes, they didn't hear him gladly.
But I tell you, the common people, people who knew something of
what they were, he receiveth sinners and eateth with them. The religious people, they were
offended. He receiveth sinners. Don't you
know he came here to save sinners? Don't you realize that? Number
seven, lastly, he was a preacher. who showed compassion. He showed
compassion. How many times in the Gospels
do we read a multitude of people were following him and the disciples
would come to the Lord and they would say, Lord, send them away,
send them away, let them go somewhere and buy some food. And the Lord
said, but I have compassion on them. You feed them. How would you like to hear that?
Here you are, 12 men, and one of them was the devil. And you've
got 4,000 men here, plus women and children. You've got two
fish, small fish, and four loaves of bread. And the Lord says,
you feed them. You feed them. Why would he do that? Because
he had compassion on people. He took the bread, he took the
fish, and he began to break it, give it out to the disciples,
and they gave it out to the people. And at the end, when everyone
was full, everyone was satisfied, gathering up baskets full of
bread, he was a man of compassion. Let me tell you this story, and
I'll quit. A church was looking for a pastor,
and they had two candidates. They had two men they were listening
to, to consider to be the pastor. And both men preached, and they
both preached from the same text, and they both preached on hell. And they called one man out of
the two. They were asked later, why did
you call that man? They both preached the same text,
the same message they both preached on hell. They said, yes, but
that man preached like he wanted all of us to go to hell. This
man preached like he didn't want anyone to go to hell. I heard
that story and I thought, isn't that compassion? Yes, the Bible
does teach. that there is everlasting destruction,
that there is a place called hell, a place of punishment. And everyone, everyone who does
not know Christ is going to end up there and spend eternity there. But all to preach with compassion and to let sinners
know there's a savior. Why would you die? Why would
you go on in your sin? Why? The Lord Jesus Christ was
the preacher. You know, people talked about
Charles Spurgeon. They called him the Prince of
Preachers. No, no. No doubt he was a great preacher.
No doubt. But he wasn't the prince of preachers.
Jesus Christ, the preacher, the prince of all preachers.