Seeking for the help of the Lord,
I direct your prayerful attention to the chapter that we read,
the Gospel according to John chapter 14, and reading prayer
text verse 19, just the last part of that verse. The words of our Lord, Because
I live, ye shall live also. The whole verse reads, Yet a
little while, and the world seeth me no more, but ye see me. Because I live, ye shall live
also. Our Lord is preparing his disciples
for that time that he is to be taken from them, crucified, slain
and then risen again. And yet how clearly we can look
at the portion that's before us knowing what later transpired
and we can think well how clearly he did tell them but how little
they really perceived and understood what actually was to happen. And it is a reminder with us
as well that there are many times we might be told things from
the Word of God And yet until we experience it and walk through
it, we really do not know what we are reading and the interpretation
of it. The truths of God are to be experienced
by the people of God. And as our Lord said here, He
tells beforehand that when it comes to pass, ye may know that
I am He. And God is His own interpreter
and He interprets His precious truth in the real work in sinners'
hearts, in salvation, in the evidence of the work that he
has done, in saving sinners from hell, quickening into life and
making that life very evident in their lives. Here the Lord
speaks about a distinction between the world and His people and
when He was to lay down His life and take it again, it was only
those of the disciples that were to see Him. And we may say this
too, that in the day of grace it is only those that are God's
children that really see the Lord by faith, by the Holy Spirit,
and really see Him, who He is. For all others, yes, they may
name His name, they may draw even pictures of Him, they may
be able to describe the doctrines of grace, but unless the Holy
Spirit reveals the Lord Jesus Christ to them, they do not know
Him. And there is then on the other
side of that, where Christ is revealed, there is a scriptural,
a real evidence of being one of his children. Well here he
says, he gives another evidence, another work of fruit that is
bound up with being his people. And he says, because I live,
ye shall live also. Now he's speaking of two lives
here, he's speaking about his life, because I live, and he's
speaking about the lives of his people. What life is that he's
speaking about? We know with the Lord Jesus Christ
He is the Eternal God, with the Father before the world was. I and my Father are one. He says
in this chapter, if you have seen me, you have seen my Father
also. And so when He says that I live
that life that He has as the Divine Person in the Trinity,
the Eternal Son, He has that life, but is that what He is
speaking of here? Certainly that will always be
the case. Jesus Christ, the same yesterday
and today and forever. His divine life, but then He
has the life as truly man. God manifests in the flesh, Immanuel
God with us, a body has thou prepared me, The time when he
came to this world was born of a woman made under the law and
for the express purpose of redeeming his people. And that life then
began with the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit over Mary. And having once been given that
body he will never ever be divested of that body. That body has been
given him and I don't know if we've ever considered what a
condescension and what love it is for the eternal son of God
to always to have a body like unto his brethren, that he should
have this and you know it, in His great is the mystery of godliness,
God manifest in the flesh, but have this time when He should
take upon Him that seed of Abraham, not of angels, not of beasts,
but of Abraham, body and of soul. And so that life, that life He
was living at this time that He was speaking to them here,
Because I live, ye shall live also. In one sense this is true. The very fact that he was manifest
in the flesh, that he lived upon the earth, is absolutely vital
for the people of God that this should happen. But he is pointing
further, he's pointing to when he should lay down that life,
when he should die, they should see him die. He says, I have
power to lay it down, I have power to take it again, this
commandment have I received from my father. And so he's referring
to that time that when he lives then, when he lays down his life
and he takes it again and he is alive from the dead. The God-man,
the same man that hung upon the cross, risen again, appearing
unto his disciples. So the life that is spoken of
here as being his life is that life risen from the dead and
that's what I want to emphasised in the thought here of when we
are asking ourselves what is the life he is referring to because
I live. It is the life that he has risen
from the dead, that once was dead but now is alive and is
alive forevermore. And now we have the other side
of it and we have a life of his people, ye shall live also."
What is that life? They're already living. They
could turn round to him and say, well, our Lord, you are living
and we are living and you are talking to us. We are both living. What do you mean? What is the
message here? In one sense the Apostle Paul
when he preached to those on Mars Hill he said, in him we
live and move and have our being. What our Lord was saying was
true. The life of all that ever lived,
they live because God has given them life and he maintains their
life in a natural way. When he takes away their breath
they die. So in that sense it would have
been true. But let us think of it in the
way that I said with our Lord, the life is that he had from
the dead. So when he speaks about the life
of his people, because I live you shall live also, he's saying
this, you shall have a life from the dead as well. I shall have a life from the
dead. from the cross, from the tomb,
and ye shall have a life from the dead. And that is in two
parts, because we by nature are spiritually dead in trespasses
and sins. We are not capable, a natural
man, of receiving the things of God because they are spiritually
deserved. We wouldn't expect someone that
was dead to respond to words we spoke to them or to be aware
of anything around them. A man in his natural state is
like that. He can sit under hundreds of
servants and never ever that word enter in as a living word
in his soul at all. He remains dead and incapable
of responding or interacting or benefiting at all from that
word that is spoken. So the first thing that is needed
is life. Our Lord says this, I give unto
them eternal life. They shall never perish, neither
shall any man pluck them out of mine hand. and that gift of
eternal life is absolutely vital and it is that which is linked
and is joined to the Lord Jesus Christ. Those that were spiritually
dead are made spiritually alive and it is through the Lord Jesus
Christ. Because I live, you shall live
also. I am to have life from the dead
so that my people can have life from the dead, and that life
comes from me. I give it unto them." So this
is the first speaking of life that he is referring to as from
a people spiritually dead to be quickened. And not only quickened
into life, but kept in that life. fed with spiritual food, kept
alive, maintained right the way through their lives. But then
what happens when it comes to death itself? We must still die. Our bodies must still be brought
to the grave. But our Lord was brought to the
grave and sweetly perfumed that grave and He rose up from the
grave. And so when he's speaking here,
he's speaking also of not only the resurrection of the dead,
which there shall be of the just and the unjust, but those that
are outside of Christ, they shall be resurrected to eternal damnation
in hell, not eternal life, eternal death instead of eternal life. But what the Lord has said, because
I live, ye shall live also, shall partake in that resurrection
from the dead, when the Lord shall come. Paul speaks it very
beautifully in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, when he says of the
Lord's second coming at the end of the world and that those that
are alive and remain of his people. They shall be caught up with
him in the air. But what has happened before
that, the dead in Christ, shall rise first. And we shall then
be caught up with them. Job, he could see and believe
the resurrection. He says, though after my skin
worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I see God. whom I shall see for myself and
not another. He knew that great wonder that
his flesh, his dust, his dust that is still on this earth will
be raised up again and it won't be another person, it will be
Job. It will be Job that sees God. Our Lord Jesus Christ is the
author of that. and bound up with His own resurrection. It is the resurrection of His
people. So in our text, because I live,
ye shall live also. You cannot escape here. There's two mentions of life
and there is a joining together of the two together. If you and I are spiritually
alive and shall be quickened after them, then we will be able
to save the Apostle Paul when Christ who is our life shall
appear, then shall we also appear with him. What is the Lord Jesus
Christ to you, to me? Is he our life? Man shall not
live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the
mouth of God. Do we live upon the word of God? Our Lord said, Except ye eat
the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of Man, ye have no
life in you. Do you feed upon the Word of
God? Do you feed upon Christ's sufferings, His death and all
that Christ has done? Those are those things the angels
desire to look into. How much more should it be those
who have an interest in it, whose life is bound up, the angels'
life is not bound up with the Lord, they are not redeemed,
they are not saved by His blood, but those that are. Surely if
they are partakers of that it'll mean a lot to them. They'll want
to read of it, look into it, know these things, understand
these things, have them opened up to them and feed upon them. How far we've come short of this. But is it the case that we are
spiritually alive and so must live on spiritual food? Those
that are still dead in trespass and sins have no need of spiritual
food. Yeah, they can come to the Lord's
house once in a while, they can come even every week perhaps
on the Lord's day, but the rest of the week they live just as
the heathen do. What is our motto? Give us this
day our daily bread. Not every second day. The children
of Israel had manna every day except for the Sabbath, the day
of rest. I want to look this afternoon
at three main points. Firstly, the importance of the
resurrection of the dead. Secondly, the certainty of Christ's
resurrection that we remember this time of the year. And then thirdly, three messages
that are in the text here and I desire to bring before you. Firstly, the importance of the
resurrection of the dead. Sometimes it's good, rather than
getting enmeshed in the actual truths themselves, is to stand
back and to look at what the importance is. Maybe those of the children or
young people, if you were planning to go to university, then you would understand that
there is an importance in getting a certain grade before you could
get into that university. And without knowing about anything
else, just the importance of that, if that is not attained,
then you won't get that place. There are many things in life
that though we might not understand much about them, Yet we know
their importance and sometimes it's only when things are taken
away that we start to realise how actually important those
things are. The Apostle Paul when he was
writing to the Corinthian church in the 15th chapter of his first
epistle He speaks of the importance of the resurrection of the dead. There were those in that church
that denied it. They said that there was no resurrection
of the dead. He says in verse 12, How say
some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead? And in this part of his letter
He sets forth the importance, the implications, if there is
no resurrection of the dead. Now in our text it is joining
together Christ and his people. In this to the Corinthians the
Apostle is joining together the general resurrection, the fact
of a resurrection from the dead and Christ's resurrection. And
the two are joined together. Now look at how he puts it, how
important it is. He says, if there be no resurrection
of the dead, then is Christ not risen. And if Christ be not risen,
then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain. Just
an empty thing. And he says also, We, that is
the apostles or those that are preaching, we are false witnesses
of God because we have said that God has raised up Christ but
he hasn't raised him up if it is that there is no resurrection
of the dead. And really what is coming across
here are those in this church that seem to say, well there's
no resurrection of the dead, but we'll still believe that
Christ has risen. Or we'll have part truth, but
not join the two together. We'll have blessings from Christ,
but we'll not have that which touches us or requires us to
be raised from the dead. But the Apostle is bringing these
things together, it is one package, it's united, it's joined together. He said, If the dead rise not,
then is not Christ raised. And if Christ be not raised,
your faith is vain, ye are yet in your sins. And also those
that have fallen asleep, those that have died already in Christ,
have perished. And he's setting forth these
things that show how important it is. It's a solemn thing. There are those even with a profession
of religion that deny the resurrection. They deny the reality of it. But here the Apostle, he sets
forth the importance of the resurrection. Now what he's speaking of here
is the literal resurrection from the dead, the bodily rising again
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Remember when we spoke in our
introduction And the idea of life from the dead is not just
concerning the resurrection of the body and after death, but
it is also in this life. And what our Lord speaks of in
John 3 again is emphasising the vital importance of life from
the dead. Ye must be born again. And he emphasises this to Nicodemus. Nicodemus cannot understand it. He wonders how it can be that
one can enter into mother's womb and be born again. But our Lord
keeps on insisting on it. He must be born again. In other
words, he must have life from the dead. He must be spiritually
quickened. He cannot remain dead. This must
happen. Again, there are those that will
minimise or think it to be not a major, vital thing in the life
of any person, that they first be quickened into life, they
first have life. We were talking in the restroom,
speaking of the late Mr Warboy's here and the piece that was in
the standard last month of his call by grace into the ministry
and thinking of the time when we are called by grace and some
are able to put a date or time on it and some not. Well I can't
speak of the exact date but I do know roughly when I was 19 years
of age and know that where the Lord quickened me into life was
on the doorstep of our family home. And no doubt some of you
have heard me say this before but it is such a vital time in
one's life And it was when the Jehovah's Witnesses visited.
And at that time I was trying to get away from the chapel.
I hated it. I didn't want to go to the services
of the Lord's house. But each week I thought, well
I'll go just once more. I won't grieve my parents one
more time. And that's how I was going from
week to week. And when this Jehovah's Witness
came, he came in the middle of the week in one chat with his
son, I think it was, and my mother and I argued with him, disagreed
with him. And as he turned away from the
door, the Lord spoke to me, you don't know anything of what you've
been saying to this man, nothing in your heart. You've been trying
to get away from the chapel, away from the things of God.
You don't like it, you don't believe it, and yet this man
thinks enough and believes enough of what he believes that you
say is error, that he's come to your door to tell you about
it. And you know, I fell under that
conviction. I fell under as guilty though
as ignorant of the truth of God in my heart. And that changed
my whole life. It didn't make me a believer,
it made me a guilty, hell-deserving sinner, convinced of my sin and
ignorance of God. And immediately I wanted to go
to every service I could, Sunday school, prayer meetings, in the
week. When the Mormons came round,
next I opened the door and I let them into that. Anyone that could
tell me the things of God, they would come in and they showed
me a book and they showed me a picture of an old man, a young
man, And then a ray of light and they said, this is God. These
three are God. I said, there's not three Gods,
there's only one God. Get out of the house. And I threw them
out of the house. And afterwards I thought, now there is something
in the Word of God that speaks about a trinity of three and
one. That's how ignorant I was at
19, brought up under the sound of the truth in our churches.
I say it to my shame. Probably kicked them out for
the truth. Well, at that time, just after that, I was coming
to the end of my apprenticeship and my father said, we're going
to leave Victoria, this is in Melbourne, Australia, and we're
going to go to Tasmania. Now, if that hadn't have happened
on that doorstep, I would have said, good, I'm going. I don't
have to stop going to chapel, we're going to go, we're going
to move away. But I said, I'm not going. I said, I'm staying.
I said, I've got enough money to put down on a deposit on a
house, I'm going to buy it and stay here. And I did. And I stayed there for nine years
on my own before I was married. And the Lord so blessed me, just
about every room in that house I could stay, the Lord drew near
and blessed my soul. But you know, it was four years
from that doorstep time to the time I was baptised. And it was
a good, probably a year, year and a half before the Lord started
to really reveal himself to me and show me himself. But it was
at that time I had life. Then I had a hearing ear. Then
I was hearing the Word of God. Then I was receiving that. Then
I had prayer and longing and seeking after the Lord. The life of God does not begin
with assurance. It does not begin with suddenly
one is a Christian, but one knows that they have a soul, a living
soul, an eternal soul. That life that God gives reveals
the death naturally, but the very fact that it reveals it
shows that life is given. Things are being seen now that
were not seen before. And so the importance of the
resurrection from the dead, it begins in the importance of a
spiritual life, a resurrection from the dead, here, before the
grave. And then after the grave that
soul shall be quickened into life. You cannot expect to have
a blessed resurrection and to be in heaven if you have not
had first that quickening here. It is absolutely vital. Well
if it is that vital, Our second point, the certainty
of Christ's resurrection. If the enemy could come in and
unpick that and destroy that, then would not that undermine
everything of our faith? How do we know the certainty
of Christ's resurrection? Well firstly, the scriptures
They do foretell this, we have it in the Psalms. Psalm 16 verse
10, Thou will not suffer Thine Holy One to see corruption. We
have the prophecies of the rising again from the dead of the Christ
that should come, the seed of the woman that should bruise
the serpent's head. Then we have the empty tomb itself. He hath given assurance unto
all men in that he hath raised him from the dead. And in the
providence of God, even his enemies, they said this man, and they
called him an imposter, said that after three days he would
rise again to make the tomb secure. There's a stone over it, you
seal that stone. You set a watch, make sure the
disciples don't come and steal him away. What a blessed thing
for the Church of God to have, even from the enemies, enemies
of the Lord and enemies of truth, to have such a seal and such
evidence that the disciples didn't steal him away. And the other
evidence we have on that first day of the week, the months coming
and going, the disciples themselves were very sad. They weren't walking
around with smug faces and saying we've managed to get him away,
we've unrolled, we've broken the seal, we've overcome the
guards, we've rolled back and we've taken his body away. No,
they were distressed. They've taken away my Lord and
we know not where they have laid him. The very reality of their
distress and then later on their joy, their gladness, all sensed
the reality that Christ not only had risen but had appeared to
them and that they had seen him. We think of the change, not only
in the joy but later on when the Holy Ghost was given and
the power of which the apostles preached, the miracles that they
did, never ascribing them to their own power but to the power
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Because I live, you shall live
also. The Lord said, tarry in Jerusalem
until ye be endued with power from on high. We'd expect that
that power being given them would be an effect of it, and there
was. How many thousands were brought
to believe to have this resurrection, this first resurrection? quickened
into life at the day of Pentecost and after. What a wonderful thing
it would be today to have again thousands brought upon by the
Holy Spirit and quickened into spiritual life. And the reason
why they will, and the reason why any is, is because the Lord
Jesus Christ is alive. Because I live ye shall live
also. The Certainty of Christ's Resurrection
We have the account how our Lord appeared to the disciples. They were terrified at first,
supposed that they had seen a spirit. And our Lord invited them to
handle him and say, The spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye
see me have. And then he said, Have ye any
meat? And he ate before them. These things are set before us
to assurance of the certainty of the very bodily resurrection
of the Lord and in our articles of faith in our churches we state
that the very flesh and bones that hung upon the cross are
glorified in heaven. They are not here. He ascended
up into heaven after rising from the dead. Then we have the witnesses
we refer to Paul's letter to the Corinthians and in the beginning
of that chapter 15 He gives this summary. He says that how Christ
died for our sins according to the scriptures and that he was
buried and that he rose again the third day according to the
scriptures. That he was seen of Cephas, then
of the Twelve, that is Simon Peter. After that he was seen
of above five hundred brethren at once. And he says of those
brethren The greater part, they remain, some have fallen asleep,
but the greater part remain, is one of the proofs of the Word
of God. The Word of God is of those that
were witnesses, they testified of what they had seen, and it
was written in a time when others could have said, we disagree
with that, Any one of those 500 who have said Paul is wrong,
that's not right. Though they testify it is right. These are men chosen of God,
honourable men, good men, right men, witnesses whose testimony
can truly be believed and received. Of course the Word of God itself
testifies of itself. You must always remember that.
Don't ever be deceived when someone says, well how do you know the
Word of God is true and tries to get you to get some philosopher
or some wonderful man to go and pronounce upon it true. You always
go to the highest authority to bear witness to something. But
a Christian should always say that. is the highest authority. You will not get any other men,
any sinful man, any man with a supposed degree or theology
or whatever, should pronounce upon the Word of God. The Lord
gave the Word, great was the company of them that published
Him. If God is good enough to give
us the Word, He's good enough to make sure there are no mistakes
in it. And forever, O God, thy Word
is settled in heaven. And so may we hold fast to the
Word of God and fast to the testimony and the truth that the Lord Jesus
Christ rose again from the dead. We have an empty tomb, a living
Saviour, our dear Saviour who says, Because I live, ye shall
live also. The Lord Jesus Christ in the
work upon the cross put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. He rose again for our justification. He rose again to show that that
sin was put away, the wrath of God was extinguished, and that
the debt was paid. And that is vital for us. Because
God is a just God, a God that cannot from heaven just pronounce
a sinner that we can just forget his sins or just take him to
heaven. The debt must be paid. And the
Lord Jesus Christ did that. And then his life, his perfect
life of obedience, that is imputed to a believer so that it is in
Christ's obedience that we appear in the presence of God. Remember
in the Levitical sacrifices it was the priest that was given
the skin of the sacrifice when Adam and Eve had sinned and they tried to
cover themselves with thick leaves, then our Lord came and He clothed
them with skins. And it's a beautiful time of
the righteousness of Christ. The skins came because of bloodshed. But the High Priest and our Lord
Jesus Christ is our great High Priest. He takes His righteousness,
He takes the covering and covers His people with it. I want to
then look in the third place at the three messages in the
text. And the first message is this,
the message of the Gospel, quickening. Because I live, ye shall live
also. I want to use two examples, one
from the Old Testament and one from the New. One from the Old
Testament is Jonah. Now we know that our Lord referred
to Jonah. He said that Jonah was a sign
unto the Ninevites and that as Jonah was three days and three
nights in the whale's belly, so shall the Son of Man be three
days and three nights in the heart of the earth. Well Jonah,
when he went to Nineveh and he preached to them, we might say,
where was the Gospel in that message? He told them, he proclaimed
that in 40 days that that city would be destroyed. And yet they
said, who can tell? that God will turn and repent.
And they repented, they put on sackcloth and ashes, they turned
every man from their evil womb. You think of our text, because
I live, ye shall live also. I have no doubt for what our
Lord has said to be correct. The Ninevites, they had heard
that God had sent a preacher to preach to them that in 40
days their city would be destroyed, but the preacher had been thrown
into the sea and he'd been destroyed. The preacher was dead. And having heard that, you imagine
how they would have felt when suddenly that preacher that was
dead is now alive and he's coming to them and he's preaching that
message to them. alive from the dead, but the
preacher himself was preaching a hope and a gospel. And those Ninevites would have
thought, if God could spare him, who had run away from God, who
had been thrown into the sea, then shall he not spare us? The preacher himself was really
a messenger of life from the dead. As if his very presence
there was saying God is, like he gives his excuses, the reason
why he ran away in the first place. I knew that there was
a merciful, a gracious, a long-suffering God and here he is before the
Ninevites preaching destruction, but himself is an object of mercy
and grace and the goodness of God. We read of his cries to the Lord
in the Wales Valley, his vows to the Lord in his going, and
he does preach to the message, the message of the Gospel. Because
I live, you shall live also. Really every preacher should
be bringing this message. I should be bringing this message.
The preachers here should be bringing this message. Because
I live, you shall live also. Because the Lord has quickened
men into life and sent them into the ministry and sent them to
preach the word, it is because the Lord has given the commission,
Go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptised
shall be saved. He that believeth not shall be
damned. Teaching all nations, teaching. teaching all nations, that you'd
be the commission of the Church of God, teaching ministry. But what about the Apostle Paul
then in the New Testament? His life was well known, what
he was doing, on the way to Damascus, hailing men and women to prison,
those that were calling on the name of the Lord Jesus. But then
the Lord appeared to him, and what a difference was in his
life before and after that Damascus road. And what is Paul's message? He calls himself the cheapest
of sinners. He says that he has been set
forth as an example, that if God would save him, then he would
save any, that there's hope for any. and he's standing before
them as an example of the grace and mercy and sovereignty of
God. Life from the dead Paul had had
and so he can preach it and so he can set before others that
same way. The God that saved Paul, that
same God is the God that he preached and set before all that would
hear him. And yes, Paul knew, he knew well,
the sovereignty of God. And so when Agrippa says, almost
thou persuadest me to be a Christian, he says, I would that thou and
all that hear me were not only almost but altogether as I am,
except, except this chain. How many of the Lord's people
It may be a test, really, to us who know the Lord. Could we
say to those around us and those that hear us, I would that you'd
be the same as me, you have the same life, the same blessing,
the same faith as me, but not my bonds, not my besetting sins,
not my weaknesses, not my failings, not my cross, Not that, I wouldn't
wish that on you. But the blessings of the Gospel
and the blessings of life in Christ, I would that you'd have
that. Now that we have that more, the
reality in our own soul, and the desiring of others to partake
of the same blessings. It would stir us up much more
to speak to our neighbours and those round about us. Come and
hear, all ye that fear God, and I will tell what he hath done
for my soul, and any that would hear." So the first thing then
is the message, the message of the Gospel of quickening. Jonah
had been quickened. Paul had been quickened. It is
the message of life from the dead. It had pleased God through
the foolishness of preaching to save them, that belief, life
from the dead. The second message is that of
keeping alive or sustaining, sustaining the people of God. And again I give you two examples
run from the Old Testament the other from the new. One from
the Old Testament is Joseph. Now, as far as his father Jacob
was concerned, his son Joseph was dead for 20 years. He was
dead. No doubt he didn't pray for him,
didn't ever think. He said to him, I thought not,
it is thee, thee. And now the Lord has shown me
thy seed. But what does Joseph say? Why
was he alive from the dead? Why was he where he was? That
he preserved their lives by a great deliverance. The famine that
was in the earth. He said, come to me. God sent
me before you. I will sustain thee. The best
of the land of Goshen. And there he gives them that
land. And Joseph is the sustainer and provider of his family, of
his brethren. And our Lord Jesus Christ is
that for his people as well. He doesn't only quicken them
into life but he sustains them and he feeds them and he strengthens
them and he keeps them alive. God that first brings a soul
into concern and brings them to spiritual life will sustain
them through their life, through the ministry, through the word
of God. He'll be like Joseph. He is the heavenly Joseph. God sent me before you to preserve
life because I live, ye shall live also. Joseph could say that
really to his dear brethren. Then in the next chapter to where
our text is, John chapter 15. Our Lord speaks of himself as
the vine. The chapter begins, I am the
true vine and my father is the husband man. And we have this
picture of a vine and the people are the branches of that vine. And the sap is coming up through
the vine and into those branches and they bring forth fruit only
because of their union with the vine. Because I live you shall
live also is beautifully illustrated in this next chapter. And the
Lord says from me is thy fruit found. Another beautiful text,
I'd love to link with that, is when the Lord says of his dear
aged people, they shall still bring forth fruit in old age. Yes, when faculties are impaired,
when the body is being taken down, when they're in the pilgrim
or Bethesda homes and think well their usefulness is gone, there's
no more fruit at all. No, they still show forth fruit
in their patience, in their waiting for the Lord, And I've seen it,
and it's lovely to see it, and you no doubt have seen some of
those DNA stains ripening for glory and testifying how much
they long to be with their Redeemer and with their Saviour. And those
roots, they come from union with Christ. The Lord's still pleased
and still with his people and won't forsake them, even in old
age and all their infirmities and all the troubles that they
have. So the second message is of keeping alive. Because I live,
ye shall live also. The third message, the last one,
is of an eternal refuge. You will remember that the children
of Israel had to appoint three cities of refuge on one side
of Jordan and three on the other side of Jordan. They were the
Levitical cities. And if someone had killed a person
unawares, not premeditated murder, it was killed someone unawares,
they had to flee to that city in case the relatives, the avenger
of blood, should pursue after them and kill them. and they
could go into that city until their case was heard at court
as it were and if it was seen that truly it was killed unawares
then they could stay in that city. In fact they had to stay
in that city until the death of the high priest. And then
when the high priest died then they could return back to their
own inheritance. So you have a picture of a place
of a refuge, a place of safety, a place they could stay while
the high priest was alive. But a place that they could only
have their liberty and freedom to go out and come in when the
high priest had died. But with our Lord Jesus Christ
He has both died and He lives. Our great High Priest not only
is a refuge for His people, He is an eternal refuge. They can
always stay there. They always have that protection
and yet they have liberty. He is like the dead High Priest
and the living High Priest at the same time. It's a beautiful
time. Those cities of refuge, they
set forth the Lord Jesus Christ. The refuge for sinners, the Gospel
makes known. And that preservation is an eternal
refuge. God is an eternal refuge for
his people. And it's bound up in the words
of our text, because I live, you shall live also. Father I
will, we read later on in John 17, Father I will that they whom
thou hast given me be with me where I am, that they may behold
my glory. A living God, a living Saviour
brings a living people to be with Him, to live forever and
ever with Him. May the Lord bless this word
to us then, because I live, ye shall live also. Amen.