Seeking for the help of the Lord, I direct your prayerful attention to the prophet Zechariah. Zechariah chapter 12 and reading for our text, verse 10. And I will pour upon the house of David and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem the spirit of grace and of supplications. And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.

Zechariah chapter 12 and verse 10. A prophecy made 520 years before our Lord came and before he suffered, and that which we read in the gospel according to John, where the evangelist tells us that this scripture was fulfilled at the crucifixion, the piercing of our Lord Jesus Christ. John 19, verse 37. And again, another scripture says, they shall look on me, on him whom they pierced. And that is the prophecy that we have as our text, literally. the Jews would have seen and looked upon the Lord Jesus Christ.

Later on in our text, where they shall mourn and be in bitterness, we think of the day of Pentecost, when Peter preached, when the Spirit was poured out, and then they were pricked in their heart. They said, men and brethren, what shall we do? These things have been fulfilled, you might say, in that day and in that generation.

In the following chapter, chapter 13, again we have the prophecies of the sufferings of our Lord. The wrath of God, awake, O sword, against my shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts. Smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, and I will turn mine hand upon the little ones. And so we have the primary sense, the great confirmation of fulfilled prophecy and fulfilled scripture, putting the seal upon our Lord and Savior, Jesus of Nazareth, as being the Christ, as being the one that the prophet here pointed to.

We notice also in the context, going on further from our text, how that is pointed to families apart, and even in the families, wives apart. This morning, though it was, you might say, a Pentecost, a group or a company that were feeling this at one time, yet the true work of God is a very personal work. A husband cannot save the wife, and the wife cannot save the husband. The revelation of Christ and the work in the heart by the Holy Spirit is a very personal thing. And may we each realize that.

You children here, you can't live upon the religion or faith of your parents or upon a faith of a minister. You need a personal faith. To view personally my faith, the Lord Jesus Christ suffering for your sin. It is that which is in the largest sense prophesied here, because we know that everyone that has been saved and will be saved, they've all been saved by the Lord Jesus Christ shedding his precious blood for them. Everyone, both Old Testament, New Testament, all have been saved in the same way.

When the church gathers around the Lord's table, they show forth the Lord's death till he come. And there might be those that are young at that Lord's table. There might be those that are old. There might be those that have made a profession just being received into the church. Others have been in the church for 45, 50, 60 years. Some might have a deep experience, some not so deep, but where there may be many things of which they are all different, one thing is all the same. Every single one around that table looks to that same blood, the same peer saviour, the same way of salvation. They have not been redeemed in a different way. And I've often found that very precious thing to behold because there's hardly any of the Lord's people to have the same experience of calling or the Lord's dealings with them in their lives. But this, what is set forth here and identifying with the death and sufferings and blood shedding of the Lord is that which is the same.

Yes, the measure of it being seen will be different, but everyone will see and will look upon the Lord Jesus Christ as suffering in their place and for their sin and shedding his blood for them. And so it is a very important prophecy, it's a very important word for the Gospel day, when Jews and Gentiles look to the same source, the same God, The same sacrifice, the same offering, the same dear Redeemer who suffered, bled, and died for them.

Well, I want to look this evening at three points. Firstly, our text begins with, and I will pour upon the house of David. and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and supplications. And I want to notice this, that a spirit of prayer poured out precedes blessing, and here precedes a revelation of Christ.

Secondly, a view of Christ's suffering because of our sin. We read in our text, and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced. The way that these scriptures are written here, we think of our Lord Jesus Christ as the written and incarnate Word. The Spirit breathed the Word of God And really this, through Zachariah, is our Lord Jesus Christ speaking. Zachariah is not saying they shall look on me. No, they shall look upon the Lord Jesus Christ, whom they have pierced.

So a view of Christ suffering because of our sin. But then thirdly, the effect of such a view We may be tried as to whether we've really had a view by faith of Christ's suffering in our place. But there is something that closely follows it, will accompany it, which perhaps is even more lasting and memorable, and that is the effect of such a view. As we read in our text, and they shall mourn for him. as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.

But firstly, a spirit of prayer poured out precedes blessing and deliverance, and especially precedes Christ being revealed. When I looked at this and looked at this text, and I went back in my mind over many blessings that the Lord has been pleased to give me, and I felt, yes, this is true. Before each of those blessings, the Lord did pour out a spirit of prayer and supplication. And some of them, it was praying for months, long time, and some very short time. But when I look at each blessing, what preceded it was that spirit of prayer and supplication.

I don't think I really registered or noticed it before seeing it in this word here. And it's something to really notice and also to be encouraged. If we are consistent in prayer, or shall we say, trying to pray, because most of the time we may feel that we're very, very poor in prayer. We're not consistent, our mind just wanders away, and we feel very poor in our prayers. And yet, if we're consistent, we will notice a time that is different, instead of the heavens being as brass, instead of our hard heart, there'll be a softening, a drawing, a greater pleading, and a longing, and a desire to go that we haven't had before. If we only prayed when we felt like that, we wouldn't pray much. But if we pray consistently, then we'll know those times that are different. If we attend the means of grace consistently and hear the word consistently, we might go for weeks, for months, and you say, there's nothing special for me. But then one time is different. And we do hear. We do have a hearing ear, and the word is special to us. Then we will know that difference.

Very much of the Christian pathway's contrast is differences. Difference from a hard heart, a softened heart. Difference from not being able to see, like the eunuch in the passage, and then being able to see. Not able to believe, then able to believe. Not having any assurance, and then the Lord giving assurance. It is through those contrasts that the Lord makes known. his visits and his blessings.

And what is spoken of here is a pouring out. If we have a jug and we have water in it, we pour it out. And it's not just a trickle, as it were. It's not just part. It's in a much greater measure. than just if we were dipping or just a little trickle. It's poured out, and that is what is here.

Well, you think of some of those characters in the Word. You think of Jonah, Jonah who'd run away from the Lord, and he was found in the whale's belly, and he cried unto the Lord. Chapter two in Jonah, you read of his prayer. Before ever Jonah was delivered, before ever the Lord spoke to the fish, he was praying. The Lord gave him prayer and cast her out of thy sight, yet will I look again toward thy holy temple. My prayer came into his holy temple. Salvation is of the Lord. And the Lord spoke unto the fish and vomited him out onto the dry land.

Jonah, of course, the Lord spoke of as Jonah was three days and three Nights in the whale's belly, so shall the son of man be three nights and three days in the heart of the earth. We think of Hannah. How many times Hannah had gone up to the house of God yearly and nothing. Yearly, she'd been provoked. The other wife, Anina, she had children. She did not have children. And every time going into the house, it made that soul worse. I mean, you might know that, too. You say, I love the house of God. But when I come into the house, it reminds me I still haven't got the blessing that I want, and what I desire, and what I long for. And I see others have it, and I haven't got it. How easy it is that something that should be a blessing to us to behold, it reminds us of what we haven't got as yet.

But Hannah, there came a time that was a different time, a time when she poured out her heart. No voice was heard, just her lips moved, and Eli mistook her. But she said to him, no, I'm not drunk. I'm a sorrowful woman who poured out my soul unto the Lord. And all Eli said, the Lord grant thee thy petition. that thou hast asked of him, he didn't know what it was. But she went away and was no more sad. That's grace, that's the Lord's blessing. She didn't know whether it would be a man-child, she didn't know whether she would conceive, but she was glad before it ever happened, that's faith.

And then when the child was weaned, no doubt several years later, she comes up, I am the woman. that stood before thee praying. For this child I prayed, the Lord hath given me my petition, and I have asked of him." And when you read the second chapter of that first book of Samuel, You see that she praises the Lord, she blesses the Lord as her saviour, and she doesn't even mention Samuel. As if Samuel had piled into significance, insignificance, it wasn't him, it was the blessing of the Lord. It was what the Lord had given her. It was that token, it was the answer to prayer. It was that the Lord was her God. That was what was so precious to her, and it all began with prayer.

May we be really encouraged when we start to feel a softening in prayer, a drawing, or a still small voice when you're going about your work and you can stop, and it says, go and pray. You go and pray. Those times that I have felt that, those times I've felt a little drawing and a little softening, and then the Lord has made it bigger. And it is always that encouragement to go at such a time, expecting this will be the time. that the Lord will bless.

Remember with Elijah, and we'll mention him next, he prayed for rain. We have it mentioned in James, Elijah, a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain. It didn't rain for three years and six months. He prayed again and the rain was brought forth. But when he prayed that second time for rain, seven times, go again, seven times, walk that path. But when it started to be answered, it wasn't a great deluge of rain. It was a cloud like a man's hand, a little cloud.

The beginning of the blessing, beginning of the answer to prayer, is often very small and very gradual. and is often discerned by a softening, a drawing. A little reviving, says Ezra, in our bondage. Praise and bless God for little revivings in our bondage.

We think of Hezekiah, terminally ill, turned his face to the wall and cried unto the Lord. And the Lord then told Isaiah to return, I will add to thy life 15 years. And in that time, Manasseh was born, the line to Christ was carried on, all beginning in prayer.

Never despair for prayer. As a guy might have said, this was the Lord's servant. This was the prophet Isaiah. He's told me it must be right. There's no use praying. It is done. It's settled. No, even if God was to say, you are not one of my children, don't pray, don't come after me anymore for this, you still pray. If we value our souls, do not take no for an answer. Keep pressing and keep pleading.

The devil will try to discourage the people from prayer. But Satan trembles when he sees, says the hymn writer, the weakest saint upon his knees.

You think of the disciples in the upper room when the Lord Jesus Christ had ascended up into heaven, or before that even, how that the Lord came to them in the upper room, but after he'd ascended in Acts chapter one, We read in verse 14, these all continued with one accord in prayer and supplication with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and with his brethren. And we may say that that continued. They continued in prayer right through leading into the day of Pentecost and when the Holy Spirit was given.

We think of times like when Peter was in prison, the prayer was made by the church and Peter was miraculously brought out. Paul and Silas as well, praising God and singing in the prison resulted in the salvation of the jailer's household. And we think of our Lord Jesus Christ who spent whole nights in prayer and often they were times before special miracles, or calling of the apostles, or before his sufferings in the Garden of Gethsemane, and before that one great sacrifice to be offered.

Always, it was preceded by prayer. In the garden, falling down three times, praying the same words, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but thy will be done. And so what encouragement to pray, and encouragement also when we feel a softening in prayer and feel a drawing in prayer, that a blessing is on the way. The Lord is pleased to come.

The blessing of the Lord, it maketh rich and addeth no sorrow within. The blessing of the Lord, where he gives the love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Spirit. The blessing of the Lord where he gives the spirits witness with our spirit that we are the children of God. The blessing of the Lord when he makes us willing to cast away our idols, to take up our cross and to follow him, where he imparts to us what all resolutions could not do, all our efforts could not do, what nothing could do but the power and spirit of God.

We have a living God. is able to hear and answer prayer. And we need to remember that. Blessings are real things, and everyone who has known the blessing of the Lord will know it is so. Covered earnestly, the best gifts and the best blessings, and they are when the Spirit takes the Word of God and makes that Word very precious. Where we read the Word of God or it's preached, And He shines such light on it, we see truths and we see our interest in it.

Remember how the Lord said, that none cometh unto me except the Father which sent me. Draw him, and I'll raise him up at the last day. That is a blessing, to be drawn to the Lord, drawn to Christ. I, if I be lifted up above the earth, will draw all men. This is why, of course, we are to preach the gospel and to lift up the Lord, because men are drawn to that. That's how they are saved.

Those that were bitten by the serpents in the wilderness, Moses had to raise up the brazen serpent. They were drawn to it because if they were dying, they were sin-bitten or bitten by the serpents that were brought because of their sin. And our Lord said, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but should have eternal life.

So let us mark this, a spirit of prayer poured out given by the Lord precedes those times of blessing. We could have added to that, dear Daniel, we think of Daniel in chapter nine, in Daniel, how he began to pray and it resulted in the blessing and the vision of the 70 weeks and leading through to Christ. You'll see it traced right through the scriptures and I trust in our experience as well.

I will for this being quiet of by the house of Israel to do it for them. God determines to bless a soul, and what he does first, he gives them prayer for that blessing, and then he blesses them. Not because they have prayed, but because that blessing is decreed, and he will have it given because he has given them the spirit of prayer, and they've asked for it. And so to notice this, precursor or that which precedes the blessing, I will pour out, I'll pour upon the house of David, God's dear people, upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and her supplications. Supplications are through the spirit and it's the grace of God that gives it.

But I want to look secondly at a view of Christ's suffering because of our sin. They shall look upon me. Not with our literal eyes, of course that is very clear. When this scripture was fulfilled, yes, they did look upon the Lord Jesus. They saw him, pierced hands, pierced feet, here signed, it was fulfilled. But it is by faith that God's children are brought to see this, both before Christ came and after Christ came. If you think about it, that there are very, very few, comparatively, that actually saw Christ in the flesh. There's no pictures of the Lord and not even a word picture as to his physical appearance, but there's so much that speaks about how faith looks to him, as to how he's set forth in a way of suffering, as the man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, and as one who expresses those burdens and the sorrows that he bore

My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? The wrath of God poured out upon him. The Lord knows how to answer prayer. He knows how to answer groans. And he knows how to bring us to see what we otherwise would not see. And often he uses methods or illustrations to bring us to do it.

Our Lord said of Abraham, that Abraham saw my day and rejoiced at it. How did Abraham see Christ's day? In connection with this text, it really struck me and what I passed through in this last week in viewing my own dear wife, and all what she'd been through with the car accident, feeling my own sin as part responsible for what she went through, and then led from that to view the Lord who suffered, bled, and died for me. All my sins laid on Him, with no doubt about it.

We can be mistaken sometimes in thinking that our sins cause the sufferings of another, But we cannot be mistaken when we think our sins cause the sufferings of our Lord Jesus Christ. The wrath of God that fell upon him was due to the sins of each one of God's people. As much as after this text, it speaks of each family apart, husband and wife apart, those individual sins, we mustn't think, well, Christ suffered just as a general suffering for the sins of millions, but you think if there was only one to be saved and that one was me, those sufferings would still, you might say, be the same. The wrath of God poured out for that one sin or one sin of sins.

And so it helps when we see one that we love suffering, that then that leads us, and we've thought to then think of the Lord. And if we love the Lord, and the Lord brings with that love, or brings the sense of his suffering, with also those same feelings of love, why I say that is with Abraham. Abraham went up Mount Moriah, and he said to the servants that we shall go up and worship and come again. And those piercing words of Isaac, my father, the fire, the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering? My son, God will provide himself a lamb. Not provide a lamb, but himself was to be the lamb. He was to be the offerer, and he was to be the lamb as well. And Isaac there was submissive. He laid on that altar.

But Abraham, he would have seen his son, his only son. And this is why the scripture there in Genesis 22, because thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, that in blessing I will bless thee, and in thee, and in thy seed shall all nations be blessed, because thou hast obeyed my voice. But I believe in one sense, he would have seen that he was a father, and he loved his son, and he was about to see his son, and he was gonna plunge the knife in his son, his son was to suffer, and if he was to understand what sacrifices were, it was pointing to Christ. But then to have a substitutionary offering, to have Isaac taken away, and the ram put in his place, and to see that ram then suffer and that lamb's life taken away. Abraham saw Christ's day. The Lord used, you might say, the deep love that Abraham had to his son, to transfer that, to make it so he could see the love of God for him and the sufferings of God for him and what it was for the father to give up his own son, our Heavenly Father, to not withhold his own son, but offer him up for us all.

The Israelites, they had it with the Passover, especially the firstborn, that they would have seen that paschal lamb slain, his blood put upon the doorpost and upon the lintel, and the promise, when I see the blood, I'll pass over you. They would have thought, this is for my life. This lamb for my life. That is what is happening here. They would have seen it.

David would have seen it. When he had sinned in the matter of Uriah and Bathsheba, adultery and murder. And then Nathan comes and he comes with a parable. Nathan knew, God knew, that if he showed David a parable, something that he would understand. And so he showed him this parable of these two, a poor man with a poor man's lamb, a lamb that was brought up in the household and very precious to that family. And then a rich man that had great flocks and he has a, when a traveler come to him and he spares to take of his flock and he takes the poor man's lamb.

David's heart, it wrenched, it moved. Why was this done? How unjust, how unfair this was. That man should surely die. And when he had seen it, when he was convinced of it, when his heart was moved in this natural story, then Nathan says thou art the man and convinces him of his sin, shows him his sin. David falls under it, I have sinned, I have sinned.

And then in the chastening that was to follow, the child that was born, that was to die, not die for David's sin, but I believe David looked past that child to his greatest son, to the Lord Jesus Christ, the seed of the woman, his seed that one day would come to this earth and would die because of his sin. That child was dying because of his sin. But our Lord was to die to put away his sin and to blot out his sin.

But his heart tugged with that. He wouldn't eat anything. He fasted for a week. He prayed, if so be the Lord my change that he might spare the life of that child. It wasn't the Lord's will, but you see again, this prayer, not giving up, not saying, well, the Lord has said it will die, I'm not going to pray, I'm not going to fast. He loved that child. And he didn't want it to die.

But when the Lord showed his will was it to die, then he was completely submissive to it. Then he rose up, then he washed, then he went on his way. He knew the Lord's word was true. I believe he had a sight of this. a view of one's suffering in his place.

The Lord uses many things to draw us to consider him and to lead us from a view of our sins and to view them laid upon the Lord Jesus Christ. It may be that we feel pain in some way, a pain in our hand or a back or a foot or side. And we go from our pain to think and consider upon the Lord's pains.

My bones are all out of joint. I am like poured out as like water.

We might feel a real thirst. Not often we do in this land. Sometimes in Australia, I've really felt it. And then to think of the Lord's words, I thirst.

Maybe we get forsaken by our friends, those that we look to, to comfort, to help us, and they just desert and leave us. And it leads us from that to think of our Lord, they all forsook him and fled. What, his disciples? Yes. Those that were close to him? Yes. No, it is in things like this. The Lord can use simple things to lead us to meditate, to think upon Him, and the Spirit to impress upon us that the sufferings of the Lord is not because of His sin. He was sinless, He was spotless, but for sins not His own. Thou has laid upon him the iniquity of us all.

I preach here, and certainly in other places, going through Isaiah 53, where the sufferings of our Lord are interwoven with the benefits and blessings of those sufferings. Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord had laid on him the iniquity of us all.

How clearly it said, for he was cut off out of the land of the living, for the transgression of my people was he stricken. And the blessings are interwoven, inseparable with his sufferings. If you and I are to be blessed in our souls, it will be through seeing Christ and Him crucified. This is why the Apostle Paul, determined to know nothing among men, saved Jesus Christ and Him crucified. This is why he is lifted up and set forth that sinners might be drawn to the Saviour of sinners and to one that suffered in our face.

And so in this second point, a view of Christ's suffering because of our sin. And we shall sing in our last hymn, sweet the moments rich in blessing, which before the cross I spend. And they are often just moments, just where we get a little glimpse as if the vial is just drawn back and just for a few moments we just get a sight and a view of what the Lord has done and what the Lord has borne for us. And they are sweet, they are precious times and often it will be through the word read or through the word preached As the Lord has said before us, the Holy Spirit will seal that, and seal that on our hearts, to see it as we haven't seen it before, and feel it as we have not felt it before, and it will make the Lord Jesus Christ precious to us, that he should do this for us, that he should bear our sins.

Want to look then, thirdly, at the effect of such a view by faith. Often the blessings of the Lord are more sealed and realised by the effect. I remember years ago when I was in my early 20s, and no doubt I mentioned this before, when for many months I cried and prayed to the Lord that I'd be able to ask a blessing in front of those at work, not audibly, but just bow my head in the lunchroom, and I couldn't do it. The fear of the man, it was too much for me, and resolutions couldn't do it. But then the Lord was pleased to bless my soul, and it was true. After praying before getting into bed, And the Lord showed me just in a moment my own sins, and then Christ is suffering for me, and then repeated that. And I've hesitated sometimes in mentioning, because some would say, well, that's fanciful. Some could say of the apostle Paul, Saul of Tarsus. Well, they did say, thou art mad, the visions that he had on the way. And that view I had was just a moment. But the effect it had in the morning My father was there at the time. The sweet love to the Lord, the fellowship one with another, the sweetness, the softening of that blessing lasted for some three weeks. I went to work. I didn't care what the work people said. I bowed my head. It took away all the fear of man. And it left a sweet savor for weeks. So I feel very much on this, that The effect, what follows, really confirms the reality of what might have been for only a few moments of what we've seen and realized.

God's work in the soul always has a gracious, holy, godly, sanctifying effect. It will never leave to licentiousness or sin, It will bring to sin to be hated and loathed and to be fled from. It will bring that soul to do as here that they will mourn. Our text says, and they shall not mind a sight of the Lord's suffering for our sin. They shall mourn for him as one mourneth for his only son and shall be in bitterness for him. as one that is bitterness for his firstborn.

And again, there's this likeness. As for his only son, think of Abraham. As for his firstborn, think of David. As for those that have been in bitterness for one in natural ties, and we have the comparison, this is how it shall be as they view the Lord Jesus Christ, as they see his suffering.

If we are tempted, it's the reality of a blessing. One of the dear Lord's servants in New Zealand, I asked him once on assurance. And he said, you got assurance? He said, don't look for it 10 minutes later. And it's not that we feel that we have saved one moment and not saved another. As Lord's servants, we know our commission. We know that we are saved. We believe it by faith. But the feeling of it, the, sweet sense of it, the certainty of it, that is only some moment.

There have been some times, I remember one time sitting in my chair at home and just for a few moments I felt if the Lord was to take me then I would go straight to heaven. And no doubt at all that I don't live like that. You live by faith, resting upon the promise and word of God and what the Lord has done. He will have a respect to the work of his own hands. And so if you've had those small blessings, what has the effect been? Because the effect lasts a lot longer.

You think of the Apostle Paul. People could say as much as they like about him fanciful and in the third heavens and what he'd had on that Damascus road, but no one could argue his life was never the same again. He suddenly started preaching the very name he'd been persecuting people for obeying and for praying to. And what a difference, what a change.

You think of those in Acts 2 at Pentecost. They'd been the ones that had literally crucified the Lord. And they were pricked in their hearts. They didn't stay the same. They repented, the Lord gave them repentance. And sorrow, they grieved over what they had done. It's hard for us to comprehend the grief that they would have had, realizing what they had done. But that is to say, we can comprehend it if we ourselves for you, our sins that were laid upon the Lord.

And what did they do? They continued with the apostles in prayer, in breaking bread from house to house, They were baptized. They were made willing. They that received the word, gladly received the word, were baptized. You know, it had a lasting effect. And this is the seal. This is what God does that man cannot do. Change the heart. Renew the will. Turn the feet to Zion's hill. And the Lord has done that. for you, and you trace it to a hearing time, to a blessing time, to a word of scripture that the Lord has made precious.

And you can see these two parts of this text, that which you've seen maybe just for a few moments in the word, but the effect that it's had has been a lasting effect. And it's been one that's made you mourn over your sin. You hate your sin. You feel it perhaps more than you did before. As is described here, they shall mourn for him, looking upon the Lord Jesus Christ, who has suffered, bled, and died for us. A bitterness for the one that we love, who is suffering for us.

Whom having not seen, ye love. Oh, what a blessing. to see him by faith and have that love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost. Dear Peter was asked three times by our Lord, love us thou may, love us thou may. Lord thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee. And the Lord does know the love that he's given his dear children. And like Peter, we're able to Speak to the Lord in that way. Lord, Thou knowest. Thou knowest what has been wrought in my heart because Thou art the author of it. Thou didst give first the spirit of prayer and supplication. Thou didst follow it with a sight, even a small and fleeting sight, but a real sight of the Lord Jesus Christ suffering in our place. And Thou didst follow it with sorrow and mourning. because of our sin.

It's a strange thing, you might say, that when a sight of Christ, we see and feel sin more than we've ever seen it before. And yet at the same time, the burden and condemnation of that sin is taken away. The hymn writer speaks of, we look to find our sins, And we cannot find them. Bunyan speaks of his pilgrim coming to the cross, and he got the burden on his back. He'd had it on his back all the way from the city of destruction. But when he sees the cross, his burden falls off. But does that mean he doesn't mourn for one who suffered, bled and died for him? No, he mourned for him. And so it is in that as well. Godly sorrow for sin, but those sins are blotted out, put away, not held against us.

We may have laboured, struggled, groaned unto sin and the working of an evil heart for months, for years. And yet such a sight of the Lord Jesus Christ, we see sin as we never seen it before. But the guilt and burden of it goes and is gone. If we confess our sins, he is faithful. And just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, as far as the East is from the West, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. And in a moment, the guilt, the condemnation is gone.

We think of The Apostle Paul in Romans 7, and how that he says that the evil that I would not that I do, the good that I would I do not, I wretched man that I am. He said, who shall deliver me from this body of death? I thank God through Jesus Christ, my Lord. And the next chapter, there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. To them that walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. And there is a difference. Right through that chapter is seen the difference. A renewed, a changed character. A sinner still, but a sinner that mourns over their Lord and walks after the Spirit, not after the flesh. One that mourns that their sins cause the sufferings and death of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Well, may the Lord grant us this blessing to look upon him whom we have pierced and to have the effects of it answer to this verse, this text. Amen.