Good evening. Let's open tonight's
service with hymn number four in your spiral, gospel hymns,
hymnal number four, Hail Sovereign Love. Let's all stand together. Hail, sovereign love that first
began the scheme to rescue fallen men. Hail, matchless, free, eternal
grace that gave my soul a hiding place. Against the God who rules
the sky, I fought with hand up, lifted high. Despise the mention
of His grace, too proud to seek a hiding place. And wrapped in thick Egyptian
night, And fond of darkness more than light, Madly I ran the sinful
race, Secure without a hiding place. But thus the eternal counsel
ran, Almighty love, arrest that man. I felt the arrows of distress
and found I had no hiding place. Indignant justice stood in view,
to Sinai's fiery mount I flew. face, this mountain is no hiding
place. Ere long the heavenly voice I
heard, and mercy's angel form appeared, who who led me on with
gentle pace to Jesus Christ, my hiding place. On him almighty vengeance fell
that must have sunk the world to hell. He bore it for a chosen
race and thus became their hiding place. A few more rolling suns
at most shall land me safe on heaven's coast. There I shall
sing the song of grace to Jesus Christ, my hiding place. Please be seated. Good evening. Let's open our
Bibles to 1 Corinthians. 1 Corinthians, I just wanna read
two verses. 1 Corinthians chapter one. God is faithful. Verse nine. God is faithful. by whom you
were called unto the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ, our
Lord. Now I beseech you, brethren,
by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all speak the
same thing and that there be no divisions among you, but that
you be perfectly joined together in the same mind and in the same
judgment. Same judgment. We make our judgments according
to what God has judged. And what a blessing it is not
to have to figure out on our own what we're supposed to believe. We believe what God believes. We are of the same judgment because
he's faithful to teach us all the same thing. Paul goes on in verse 13 to ask
the question, is Christ divided? He's not. Well, he's one. His church is one. Let's pray
together. Our heavenly father, thank you
for your faithfulness Lord, we can be so unfaithful, but Lord,
we are grateful that when we believe not that you remain faithful
for you cannot deny yourself, that your church is your body
and that you give each of us your spirit and you teach us
your judgments. Lord, tonight we need your Holy
Spirit to reveal to us once again what your judgments are and to
unite our hearts together in one in Christ. Lord, we we ask that you would
do it for your glory and for our salvation and our good. We
ask it in Christ's name, amen. Just turn over one page, we'll
sing number five in the gospel hymn, spiral hymnal, number five,
and let's stand again together. ? Come ye sinners poor and wretched
? ? Weak and wounded, sick and sore ? ? Jesus ready stands to
save you ? ? Full of pity joined with power ? He is able, He is
able, He is willing, doubt no more. He is able, He is able,
He is willing, doubt no more. Come ye needy, come and welcome. God's free bounty glorify. True belief and true repentance,
every grace that brings us nigh. Without money, without money,
come to Jesus Christ and buy. Without money, without money,
come to Jesus Christ and buy. ? Let not conscience make you
linger ? Nor a fitness fondly dream ? All the fitness he requireth
? Is to have a need of him ? This he gives you, this he gives you
Tis the Spirit's glimmering beam. This He gives you, this He gives
you. Tis the Spirit's glimmering beam. Come ye weary, heavy laden, bruised
and broken by the fall. If you tarry till you're better,
you will never come at all. Not the righteous, not the righteous,
sinners Jesus came to call. Not the righteous, not the righteous,
sinners Jesus came to call. Please be seated. We're going to be finishing up
the ninth chapter of John, if you'd like to turn with me there
in your Bibles, the end of John, chapter nine. What a blessing
this whole story of this man born blind has been. I meant to announce earlier that
Monday, I think it was Monday, The Lord took Jimmy Ray Bailey
home. Maybe you already knew about
that, but some of you were here when Jimmy Ray used to come here. He passed away this past Monday. I was thinking about that when
we were singing that hymn. How does that line go towards
the end? A few more sunsets or a few more, yeah. That's all we have, just a few
more, a few more. All right, you have your Bibles
open to John chapter nine. And this dear brother who has no
fear of the Pharisees and God has given him not just physical
sight, but spiritual sight. And in verse 38, the Lord reveals himself to him,
and the scripture says that his response is, I believe, and he
worshiped him. Faith always worships. And when
the Lord makes himself known, the response of faith is, I believe,
and we worship him. And now the Lord's going to speak a word of condemnation
and judgment against the Pharisees who are all there, they're the
ones that are objecting to everything that our Lord's doing. And Jesus
said in verse 39, for judgment I came into this world that they
which see might not see. Or I'm sorry, they would see
not might see. and that they which see might
be made blind. And some of the Pharisees who
were with him heard these words and said unto him, are we blind
also? And Jesus said unto them, if you were blind, you should
have no sin. But now you say we sin, therefore
your sin remains. I've titled this message, Once
I Was Blind, But Now I See. And the Lord tells us at the
end of this chapter that it was for judgment that he came into
the world. And we're gonna look at a few
other places where the Lord tells us exactly why he came into the
world. But in this place, he tells us
that it is to make a judgment. Now, judgment is the act of a
judge. And when God makes a judgment,
his judgments are true, the scripture says, and they are righteous. A judgment is to make a distinction,
to make a difference. It's not like we would have in
a court of law where you might say, well, that's the judge's
opinion. No, with God, it's not an opinion, it's a decree. And
he makes a judgment. And faith believes what God believes. Our judgments are the same as
his judgments. That's why I wanted to read that
verse over there in 1 Corinthians 1. Let your judgments be the same.
Our judgments are the same because we make the same judgments that
God makes. We love what he loves, we hate what he hates, we believe
what he believes. His gavel has fallen. There are
no appeals to his judgments, and there are no reversals to
his judgments. There's no higher court to appeal
to, to find a different judgment. And the Lord Jesus says, for
judgment, I came into the world. Isaiah chapter 46, the Lord tells
us, my counsel shall stand, my counsel shall stand, and I shall
do all my pleasure. What a blessing it is to have
a God whose judgments are true and righteous, they are sure,
they're steadfast, and to stand with him is to judge right. To judge right. We have in this
chapter two opposite confessions. The blind man who says, I believe,
and he worshiped him. The blind man who says, I was
once blind, but now I see. And the Pharisees who say, are
we blind also? They didn't make personal application
to what the Lord was saying, except that they knew that he
was talking about them. Are you suggesting that we're
blind? Us? Oh, and the Lord said, oh, if
you were blind, you'd have no sin. You'd have no sin. If you could make judgments the
way I make judgments, if you could see that you came into
this world blind and that you're completely dependent upon me
for any spiritual sight whatsoever, your sin would be forgiven you.
But since you say you can see, therefore your sin remains. They said of this blind man,
thou wast altogether born in sin. They stood in judgment against
him, but they didn't judge righteously. They didn't judge according to
God's judgments. They didn't understand what the
Lord was saying. For judgment I came into the
world. The Lord judged this blind man and gave him spiritual
eyes that he was able to make righteous judgments about who
the Lord Jesus was As I said, he didn't just enjoy the miracle
of physical sight, he was blessed with the eternal blessing of
spiritual sight. These men were making judgments
based upon their physical eyes only, their outward appearances. And they looked at themselves
and they looked at the law And they made the judgment that they
were disciples of God, that they were following the truth, that
they were saved, they were law-keeping. The one stood in judgment of
God, even at one point calling him a sinner, and the other judged
himself to be a sinner and worshiped God. For judgment, I came into
the world. The Pharisees walked by sight.
They made their judgments based on what they could see in outward
appearances. This blind man walked by faith. He believed what the Lord said. And that's all faith is. Faith
is believing God. And when the Lord Jesus said,
I that talketh unto thee am he, he believed. He believed. The Pharisees had nothing but
their natural mind of their fallen nature to discern truth from
error. The blind man had the mind of
Christ. and bowed and rejoiced in the
judgments of God. See the difference here? The
Lord's making a difference. He's showing us by these Pharisees
and this blind man the exact consequences of the judgments
that he's made, the discernment and the distinction that he's
made. The one was blind, but now he
sees, and those who thought they could see were spiritually blind. Once we could not see that we
were a sinner. We could not understand that
everything about us was sinful. Now nothing could be more clear.
The Lord gives you eyes to see Christ, He gives you a proper
judgment about yourself and you come to this simple conclusion,
there's nothing in me like him. Everything in me falls short
of his glory. I'm a sinner. There was a time once when we
could not see that God was absolutely sovereign in salvation. We thought
that there was some contribution, perhaps, that we could make.
But now nothing could be more clear. The judgment of God has
shown us that he is sovereign. And he has the right and the
purpose to have mercy upon whom he will have mercy. And we bow
to that. There was a time when we could
not see why God would not save us. Now, we cannot see any reason
why he would, apart from the Lord Jesus Christ standing in
our stead before God. For judgment I came into the
world, that they which are blind might see, and they which see
might be made blind. Turn back with me just a few
pages to John chapter seven. John chapter seven, verse 24. Judge not according to the appearance,
but judge righteous judgments. Judging righteous judgments is
coming to the same judgment that God has come to. or that God
has, he doesn't come to a judgment. God speaks the truth and that
makes it judgment. And we don't go to God's word
to confirm the judgments that we've made. We go to God's word
to find out what judgments we are supposed to make. We go to
God's word to find out what we're supposed to believe. not to confirm
what we already believe. Lord, give me your judgments. We make
righteous judgments when our judgments are God's judgments.
We simply and willingly and gladly agree with God. This is the evidence of salvation.
If this is our experiences, if this is the basis of our faith,
then we have a good hope that the Lord has made a distinction. He's made a judgment. He's made
us to differ. And we're brought to that question,
who maketh thee to differ? What do you have that you did
not receive? It was the Lord who made the judgment. I love
it when the children of Israel being brought out of Egypt after
the Passover and the scripture says that not a dog wagged its
tongue and that God made a distinction, a difference between the Egyptians
and the Israelites. Now someone might be thinking,
doesn't the Bible say, judge not that you be not judged? Yes,
it does. In Matthew chapter seven, the
Sermon on the Mount. But the Lord there is clearly,
because he goes on to say, you know, don't try to take the beam
out of your brother's eye while you have a mote in your own eye.
Don't, you know, get the mote out of your eye before you take
the beam out of your brother's eye. And the judgment that he's
talking about there is that critical, intolerant, self-righteous, condescending
spirit that causes one to think, well, I'm better than you are,
or I wouldn't do what you do. That's the kind of judgment that
the Lord says, judge not that you be not judged. In other words,
the same standard by which you judge another will be the standard
by which you're judged. But at the same time, we are,
Clearly, as we just saw in John chapter 7, commanded to make
righteous judgments. To ask God, Lord, what am I supposed
to believe and how am I supposed to judge? For judgment, I came into the
world. What a... What a miracle of grace
it is because the only way to be able to believe what God believes
is if he gives us the mind of Christ and gives us a new heart
and gives us faith to believe what he believes. And to say,
with the Syrophoenician woman, when the Lord calls us a dog,
we just, truth, Lord, truth. Lord, whatever you say, your
judgments are right and true. For judgment, I came into the
world. And the Lord in another place
said, I did not come to bring peace, I came to bring a sword.
And that's what judgment is. Judgment is a sword. It makes
a distinction, it makes a difference, it divides, it separates. I did not come to bring peace,
but I came to bring a sword that a man's own enemies would be
of his own household. Why? Why did we find contention? Why do we find such unity as
we just read in 1 Corinthians 1 among our brethren? Well, because
we believe the same thing. We believe God. We believe his
word. We have the same spirit. We have
the same gospel. We have the same Bible. And we
find ourselves rejoicing together in unity. And that same That
same judgment that the Lord gives us together causes distinct dissension
with those who don't believe God. David said in Psalm 119 verse
seven, I will praise thee with an upright heart when I shall
have learned thy judgments. So every time God teaches us
a judgment, we rejoice. That's the word I believe. We just rejoice in what God has
made as a judgment. For judgment, I came into the
world. What a great evidence of salvation
that God would cause me to have the same judgments that he has. Revelation 16 verse 7 says, true
and righteous are thy judgments. We just bow. Why do we see his judgments as
true and righteous? Well, because of the miracle
of faith that the Lord gives us and everything the Lord has done,
we rejoice in. You remember the conversation
our Lord had with Pilate in John chapter 18. Let's turn to those
verses, John chapter 18. Verse 33, then Pilate entered
into the judgment hall again. You see the picture here. Pilate standing in judgment of
the Lord Jesus. That's what unbelief does. It
questions God, it stands in judgment of God, it disagrees with God. It does as we As we saw Sunday
with Absalom, if I were king, I would do it this way. I don't
agree with the way God's doing it. I think I could do a better
job. And Pilate is standing in the
judgment hall, and he calls the Lord Jesus, and said unto him,
Art thou the king of the Jews? And Jesus answered him, Sayest
thou this thing of thyself, or did others tell it thee of me? Why are you asking me this question?
Are you interested in the truth? Are you wanting to know the answer
to this question or you just heard it from somebody else? And Pilate becomes indignant
and he says, am I a Jew? In verse 35, thine own nation
chief priests have delivered thee unto me. What hast thou
done? And Jesus said, my kingdom is
not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world,
then would my servants fight that I should not be delivered
to the Jews. But now is my kingdom not from hence. As we saw Sunday, our mandate
from God is not to try to bring about social reform or political
reform in this world. We have a, there's a spiritual
kingdom that we're a part of. And our mandate is to preach
the gospel and to promote the gospel and support the gospel
and believe the gospel. Pilate therefore said unto him,
art thou a king then? And Jesus answered, thou sayest
that I am a king. And now the Lord is gonna tell
us once again, why he came into the world. He tells us in John chapter nine,
For this cause, this why I came into the world, to bring judgment,
to bring distinction, to bring a difference. To this end was I born and for
this cause came I into the world that I should bear witness unto
the truth and everyone that is of the truth heareth my voice. This is the evidence of our salvation.
How do I know that I'm a child of God? I believe what God says. I believe every word of it. And what I don't understand,
I want to believe. I want to understand. I believe
it if I don't understand it. In fact, I don't really fully
understand anything I believe, but I believe it because God
said it. for this cause came unto the
world, to bear witness unto the truth. 1 Timothy 1, you're familiar with
this verse, verse 15, the Lord tells us another reason why he
came into the world, and they all fit together. He's telling
us why I came. I came to make judgment and give
those who cannot see, those who are spiritually blind eyes to
see, and those who think they can see, I'm gonna make them
blind. I'm gonna send them a strong delusion. They're gonna make
their judgments based on outward appearances. They're gonna see
their obedience to the law. They're gonna look to what they're
doing and they're gonna find comfort in a false hope and false
peace. But those who can't make their judgments based
on outward appearances but must make righteous judgments, they're
gonna bow before me and just say, Lord, I believe. And in 1 Timothy 1, verse 15,
this is a faithful saying. This is a faithful saying. This
is the word of God. And it's worthy of all acceptation.
It's worthy. It ought to be believed by everybody. And every word of it is believed
by God's people. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners of whom I am chief. He tells us again why
he came. Why he came. He came to accomplish
the salvation of his people. And that's exactly what he did. You shall call his name Jesus,
for he shall, he shall save his people from their sins. He actually
accomplished the salvation of his people when he bowed his
head and said, it is finished. Everything that God required
for the salvation of all of God's elect was satisfied, fulfilled. That's what surety is. He made
sure, he made sure the salvation of his people. Psalm 97 verse two says, righteousness
and judgment are the habitation of his throne. Righteousness
and judgment. or the habitation of his throne. And I believe this has something
to do with what the Lord meant when he was talking about the
coming of the Comforter and he said, I'll go to my father and
I will convince the world of sin because
they believe not on me. And we're convinced, we're brought
to the same judgments that God has given to us about our own
sinfulness. and of judgment, of righteousness
because I go to my father. We only have one righteousness
before God and that's in the person of the Lord Jesus. We
have no righteousness outside of him. And of judgment because
the prince of this world has been judged. The gavel has fallen. God has declared him and his
work to be defeated and God's elect to be delivered. Righteousness and judgment are
the habitation of his throne. Righteousness is established
in heaven. It's established in the person
of the Lord Jesus who himself is our righteousness and who
himself satisfied all the demands of God's law. That's what righteousness
is. Righteousness is that the law
has been fulfilled, it's been kept. And justice, justice is the finished payment
for sin, been fully made. Everything that
God requires to atone for our sins, to redeem us, to pay for
our sins has been made. through the sacrifice that the
Lord Jesus made on Calvary's cross. 1 John 1, verse 5 says
he was manifested to take away our sins. And that's what he
did. He took them away. He bore them
in his body upon the tree. He separated them from us as
far as the east is from the west. He buried them in the depths
of the sea. He said, I remember them no more. They've been put
away. away and we make that judgment
and we have this boldness in the day of judgment the Bible
speaks of that day when men stand before God as the day of judgment
when God will decide and declare his judgments and we have this
boldness in the day of judgment that as he is so are we in this
world so that we have his righteousness and he's taken away our sin. God manifested his love toward
us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
Here's the reason why he came. He manifested his love. This
is the judgment of God. And we rejoice in that judgment. We delight in being able to make
God's judgments our judgments. And we do not make void the law
by faith. God forbid, God forbid, we establish
the law by faith. How is it that we establish the
law by faith? Because we've come to this judgment,
we have no ability to satisfy any of the demands of God's holy
law and the Lord Jesus fulfilled them all. And so our faith in
him is the establishment of the law. Think not that I came to
destroy the law and the prophets, I came not to destroy them, I
came to fulfill them. That's our judgment. the Lord
Jesus fulfilled all that God required. And all the promises
of God that are given throughout all the Old Testament, all the
prophets of the Old Testament were declaring, look who's coming,
look who's coming. And then when the Lord Jesus
came, scripture says that the testimony
of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy and to him, to him give all the
prophets witness. That's what Peter said in Acts
chapter 10, when he went to talk to Cornelius, that first Gentile
convert. Peter said to him, after he spoke
of Christ, he said, he's the one to whom all the prophets
give witness. And when Nathanael, When God,
his brother, he said, he said, we have found the one that Moses
and the prophets speak of. He came to fulfill all the promises
of God. The scripture says the promises
of God, all the promises of God are yea and amen. They are yes and fulfilled, complete
in him. And we make that judgment gladly,
we rejoice in that judgment. We're thankful that the Lord
Jesus came into the world to make judgment, to make his judgments
known to the hearts of his people. And we find the comfort of our
salvation in believing what his judgments are. Don't you love it when our Lord
goes up on the Mount of Transfiguration and Peter, James, and John are
there with him and scripture says that the voice of God spoke
audibly from heaven, this is my beloved son in whom I'm well
pleased, hear ye him. And the radiance of his deity
shined forth out of his humanity so bright that it was like the
noonday sun and the men were forced to the ground. Their faces
were in the dust. And Elijah and Moses appeared. And the scripture says that these
two men, Elijah representing all of the Old Testament prophets
and Moses representing all the law of God. And here's what the
Bible says. They spake of the decease that
he should accomplish in Jerusalem. We don't usually think about
a death as an accomplishment, but that's exactly what the Lord
Jesus' death was. It was an accomplishment. I did
not come to destroy the law and the prophets, I came to fulfill
them. And they spake of those things
that he would accomplish in his decease in
Jerusalem. For judgment came I into the world. Turn with me to Romans chapter
14. Romans 14. Look at verse 9. And for this
end, the Lord's telling us again. He came to make judgments. He came to save sinners. He came to glorify his heavenly
Father. He came to fulfill the law and
the prophets. And now he tells us in verse
nine, for this end, Christ both died and rose and revived that
he might be Lord both of the dead and the living. Now the
Lord Jesus has always been Lord. He's always reigned Lord over
all men. But by through and because of
his redemptive work and his perfect obedience. Because of his sacrificial. Mediatorial work of redemption
on Calvary's cross. Now he becomes. Now he becomes
as the God man, he becomes the standard by which all things
are judged. You're either found in him perfectly
righteous or we are under the condemnation of the law. All
mankind is divided now. This is what this miracle in
John chapter nine is all about and this is the distinction that
the Lord made between the Pharisees and this blind man. The Lord give us faith to see
ourselves in this blind man. Lord, I believe. Lord, once I
was blind, I couldn't see myself as a sinner. I couldn't see Christ
in the glory and the success that he had in saving his people. I couldn't see your word as As as perfect and righteous and
true and I could I couldn't make the judgments that you make.
But now every time I hear one of your judgments, I, I see I'm,
I'm brought to to bow and to believe and to worship. Are we blind also? If you were blind, you should have no sin. Because you say you can see. You know what the Lord's talking
about there. We are able to see, but only because the Lord has
made a judgment and a distinction for us and given us eyes to see.
Lord, and I would forget everything that you've taught me and everything
that I believe. I would lose it all. We have
enough experience in our daily walk to see how easy it is for
us to lose sight of the things that we hold so dear. And if
the Lord withdrew his grace from us, we would fall headlong into
darkness Are we blind? If you were, if
you were, you'd have no sin. But because you say you can see,
therefore your sins remain. I came to make a judgment, a
distinction, to give those who can't see sight. and to take those who can see
and make them blind. Let's pray. Our heavenly father, thank you for your mercy. Lord, surely if you did not make
us to differ, If you did not make a distinction between the
Israelites and the Egyptians, if you left us to ourselves,
we would deceive ourselves in believing that we could see when
we were blind. Or give us sight. Cause us to make righteous judgments. Cause us to bow and to believe
and to rejoice. gladly and willingly in all the
revelations that you've made of thyself. We ask it in Christ's name, amen. 199 in the hard back temple,
now let's stand together. sinners Jesus will receive sound
this word of grace to all who the heavenly pathway leave ?
All who linger, all who fall ? Sing it o'er and o'er again
? Christ, receive a sinful man ? Make the message clear and
plain ? Christ, receive a sinful man Come and He will give you
rest. Trust Him for His word is plain. He will take the sinful last. Christ, receive His sinful man. Sing it o'er and o'er again. Christ, receive His sinful man. Make the message clear and plain. Christ, receive His sinful man.