A couple of announcements. Most
of you know that Carl Bourne has suffered with many strokes
for a couple of years now. Well, he had a real bad seizure
on Thursday and he's in the hospital. in Morgantown. So we told Ivalu
yesterday that we would let you all know and ask you to pray
for Carl and Ivalu. Also next Sunday we have some
brethren here from Crossville, Tennessee with us and they have
their meeting next weekend and I'm going to be privileged to
be able to preach at that meeting. So I'll be up there with them
next weekend and Michael and Robert will be bringing messages
here for you next Sunday. You have your bulletin? If you'll
look at the hymn on the back. Upon the cross of Calvary the
Savior bled and died and by all his sacrificial death The law
was magnified. Without comparison, without comparison,
the absolute most important thing that's ever happened in the history
of the human race is the cross. You see, nothing else comes close. The load of our iniquity on Christ
the Lord was laid, and by his stripes, our souls are healed. Our ransom price, he paid. It's finished. Everything God
requires of his people, the Lord Jesus Christ provided. God Almighty is looking to Christ
for everything. Might He be pleased to give us
the faith to do the same? Let's stand together, take your
bulletin please. Tom's going to come lead us in that hymn. Repeat the last line in each
verse. Upon the cross of Calvary, the
Savior bled and died. And by his sacrificial death,
the law was magnified. The law was magnified. The load of our iniquity on Christ
the Lord was laid, and with His stripes our souls are healed,
our ransom price He paid, our ransom price He paid. Who can condemn the sheep of
Christ, whom God has justified? The risen shepherd reigns above,
the Lord is satisfied, the Lord is satisfied. Give glory to the Lamb of God
who took our guilt and blame. Let songs of praise as ever rise
unto His precious name, unto His precious name. Please be seated. Good morning. Our scripture reading
is found this morning in Psalm 47. Psalm 47. All clap your hands, all you
people, shout unto God with the voice of triumph. For the Lord
Most High is terrible. He is a great king over all the
earth. He shall subdue the people unto
us and all the nations under his feet. he shall choose our
inheritance for us, the excellency of Jacob, whom he loved." Jacob
is us, and our inheritance, of course, is the Lord Jesus Christ
himself. God is gone up with a shout,
the Lord with the sound of a trumpet. Sing praises to God, sing praises,
sing praises unto our King, sing praises. For God is the King
of all the earth, sing ye praises with understanding. This is Only
the believers could do this. Only the believers can sing praises
with understanding of why we're doing it and who we are worshipping. God reigneth over the heathen.
God reigneth over the heathen. I like to repeat that because
sometimes we forget that God is also reigning the whole entire
world, everything that happens. He's reigning over them. God
sitth upon the throne of His holiness. The princes of the
people are gathered together, even the people of God, of the
God of Abraham, for the shields of the earth belong unto God. He is greatly exalted. Father God, we come before you
with praises and thanks that you have given us Christ, who
in him is that we come to you only by his righteousness, only
by his death on the cross can we come before you and give you
thanks for that. We thank you for giving us a place where we
can worship, where we can come and hear the gospel and learn
of Christ, Father God. We now are requiring Your Holy
Spirit to come upon us, come upon Pastor Greg, come upon us,
Father. We are in great need of Your
Holy Spirit, that Your Holy Spirit might shine the face of the Lord
Jesus Christ upon us, and we might see Him more clearly, Father
God. We pray this also for all the other churches that are preaching
the Lord Jesus Christ and his gospel. We pray for Carl and
Ivory and the situation they're going through. May you give them
the grace necessary for them to look to Christ and that this
might be to your glory, Father. We also remind you of Pastor
Greg's trip to Crossville. We pray for the blessings on
those messages as well. May Christ be glorified in them,
Father. Once again, we remind you that
you may pour your Holy Spirit on us now. This is our greatest
need now, is your Holy Spirit to point us to Christ. In Jesus'
name we pray, amen. Let's all stand together again.
We'll sing hymn number 23 in the Spiral Gospel Hymns hymn
book, number 23. Pass me not, O gracious Father,
Sinful, wretched though I be. Though you might in truth condemn
me, Let your mercy fall on me. Love of God so everlasting, ?
Christ so rich and free ? Grace of God so strong and saving ?
Magnify them all in me ? Pass me not, O blessed Savior ? Let
me hear your gracious call ? I'm a guilty, helpless sinner Savior,
at your feet I fall, Love of God so everlasting, Blood of
Christ so rich and free, Grace of God so strong and saving,
Magnify them all in me. Pass me not, O mighty Spirit. You can cause the dead to live. Speak the word of saving power. Give me faith and make me live. Love of God so everlasting, Blood
of Christ so rich and free, Grace of God so strong and saving,
Magnify them all in me. Pass me not a poor lost sinner. If you will, you can save me. Reach down with your hand of
mercy. Saving others, Lord, save me. Love of God so everlasting. Blood of Christ so rich and free. Grace of God so strong and saving. Magnify them all in me. Please be seated. I'd like to open by Adding a
statement to the one I made earlier, yes, the cross of Christ is,
without comparison, the most important thing that ever happened
in the history of the human race. But the history of the human
race exists for the cross. Everything that happened before
the cross and everything that's happened since the cross was
for the purpose of the cross. How glorious is that? The Lord's
given us the great joy, the blessing, the privilege of being able to
gather together with the promise of His presence, with the truth
of His Word, to look to that one upon that cross for the hope
of our life, the hope of our salvation. Would you turn with
me in your Bibles please to Isaiah chapter 50. Psalm 69, there's a statement
speaking prophetically of the Lord that says, I restored that
which I took not away. Now that's what the Lord Jesus
Christ came into the world to do, to restore that which He
took not away. We bear the full responsibility
for having lost fellowship with God as a result of our sin. We broke it. He fixed it. We broke it. He fixed it. That's what this chapter is declaring. That we bear all the responsibility
for having lost fellowship with God. And he bears the full responsibility
of restoring that fellowship for his people. Look how he begins in chapter
50 at verse 1, Thus saith the Lord. Don't you love that? I don't want to know what you
think. I don't want to know what I think. I don't want to know
what some dead theologian thinks. I want to know what God says.
And how often times this is repeated, thus saith the Lord. Faith believes
God. And faith's ears are perked up
when faith hears thus saith the Lord. This is what God says. I just want to know what God
says. I believe it already before I hear it. I don't have to hear
it to believe it. If God said it, it's true. Look
what he says. For thus saith the Lord, where
is the bill of your mother's divorcement whom I have put away? You've lost fellowship with God?
And we have by nature in our father Adam, we're born into
this world at enmity with God. We were in the loins of our father
Adam so that when he fell the scripture says in one man in
one man all died all died born spiritually dead God says I I
didn't that You you have you have a broken relationship with
God not because I divorced you I or which of my creditors is it
to whom I have sold you? I didn't sell you. I didn't sell
you out. You owed me. You owe me a debt
you can't pay. But the reason that you don't
have fellowship with me is not because I forsook you or I sold
you to someone else or I divorced you. No. Behold, this is as powerful as
thus saith the Lord, behold, look, give your undivided attention
to this truth, for your iniquities have you sold yourselves, and
for your transgressions is your mother put away. Now the scripture
speaks of sin, transgression, and iniquity. Those are three
words that God uses to describe this problem that causes us to
have a divorced, broken relationship with God. And here's a simple
way to understand it. Sin is what we are. Sin is what
we are. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came into the world
to save sinners. David said, I was conceived in
sin. In sin did my mother conceive
me. I was born a sinner. I came into
this world speaking lies and drinking iniquity like water.
I'm just, I'm a sinner. That's what I am. Because I do
it. It's sinful. Sin, the definition of sin is
missing the mark. Missing the mark. There's a brother
in Cottageville, Tennessee. Cottageville,
West Virginia, excuse me. His name is Jim Dodson. And Jim
is an expert archer. And if you meet Jim, you'll see
he's got a little lapel pin. And it's a triple William Tell
award that he got in competition. And I asked him, I said, Jim,
how many of those? Oh, I got a whole bunch of them. A triple William Tell is when
you shoot an arrow and you center it on the bullseye of the target. And then you shoot another arrow
and split the first arrow. And then you shoot another arrow
and split the second arrow. Now, that is what God requires
of you and me all the time. hit the bullseye, and split the
next arrow. With every arrow you shoot, every
thought you have, every word you speak, every deed you perform,
everything you do, you've got to hit the center of the bullseye. How you doing with that? Now
that's exactly what the Lord Jesus Christ did. He didn't miss
the mark for a moment. Not only are we missing the bullseye,
we're missing a whole target. You can't hit the target if you're
shooting in the opposite direction, can you? And that's what we're
doing. That's what we're doing. And
God says, you have sinned, you have missed the mark, you drink
sin like water, you came forth from your mother's womb speaking
lies in sin your mother did conceive you, all have sinned and fallen
short of the glory of God. God says, is that your problem?
Your sin has separated you from your God. You broke it. And faith says truth, Lord. Truth. That's my problem. Now the next word that the Lord
uses for sin is transgression. And transgression is to disobey
the law of God. And as I mentioned in the previous
hour, I was speaking with a man on Friday and he was asking me
about, the conversation started by him asking me about prophecy.
He said, what do you know about prophecy? And I said, about the
end times. I said, well, I know we're in
the end times. We've been in them for 2,000 years now. I know
Christ is coming again. I know no man knows when he's
coming. And I know that I have a hope in my heart to be found
perfect in him when he does come. Anyway, the conversation went
on and I finally asked him, I said, well, Tony, I said, what do you
think God requires of you? And he said, well, to keep the
commandments. And I said, well, how are you doing with that?
And he said, well, I'm trying. I'm doing my best. And no, it's
not good enough. It's not good enough. You've
transgressed the law of God, never having been able to keep
one of God's laws one time. Now God says, You have a broken
relationship with God. It's because of your sins because
of your transgression and then notice he says it's because of
your iniquity Now iniquity is what we do to try to fix the
problem and God says it doesn't measure
up All you're doing is making it worse. I You try to offer
God anything to make up for what you've done and all you're doing
is piling on more sin to to your to your problem Laura says that's the reason
That's the reason that you're divorced. That's the reason you've
been sold into sin have been been sold Not because I did it
you did it Now John put it like this, he
said, if we confess our sin. Had someone tell me this past
week, they said, well I've just got something horrible in my
life that I'm just hoping God's going to forgive me for. And
I said, I'll tell you what, I want you to think about the best thing
you've ever done in your life. The absolute very best thing
you've ever done in your life. He said, well what's that? I
said, I don't know, just pick something. Pick something. I
said, you gotta be forgiven of that. Don't worry about, you know,
confessing your sin is not trying to figure out what I've done
to sin against God. Confessing your sin is agreeing
with God that you're a sinner. And so, thus saith the Lord,
behold, your iniquity, your sin, your transgressions, that's where
the problem is. faith says Yes, Lord Amen, I
Can't blame anybody else. I can't point my finger to anybody
else. I can't blame God. I bear the full responsibility
for my broken relationship with God Wherefore Look at verse 2 wherefore
when I came Was there no man? Oh yes, when He came, He came
as the God-man. He came as a man, born of a woman,
born under the law to redeem those who are cursed by the law. We have a man interceding between
us and God. He said, because you broke it,
I came as God's man to do what you could not do for yourself. Now the whole world's trying
to fix their sin problem. And what the Lord's telling us,
and all throughout this book, and particularly clearly here,
you can't fix it. And the more you try to fix it,
the worse you make it. You ever done that before? We
do that all the time, don't you? You break something, you try
to fix it, or something's wrong and you try to, and it just gets
worse. The older I get, the more I try
to stay out of folks' problems, because usually it just gets
worse, you know? It just... Was there not a man? And when
I called, was there none to answer? Now this is a reference to the
Lord Jesus Christ calling upon His Father. And He's saying,
when I called, you cry out to God, trying to fix your problem. When I called, was there none
to answer? No, He heard me. He answered me. Look, this is
so clear. Is my hand shortened that it cannot redeem? Or have
I no power to deliver? Do I need your help? Can I not
save you all by myself? Am I not the man that God's looking
to? Am I not the man that God heard
from? When I cried out unto Him and
said, Father, into Thy hands I commend my spirit. Father,
I thank Thee. I thank Thee that Thou hast always
heard me. You and I pray, we have to conclude
our prayers with, Lord, if it be thy will, don't we? Because
oftentimes we pray amiss that we might consume it upon our
own lust, as James says. The Lord Jesus Christ never had
to do that. Every prayer he offered up to the Father was heard. Father, I pray not for the world. I pray for them which thou hast
given me out of the world. Thine they were. Thou gavest
them unto me. I pray that thou would keep them
from the world. Oh, God hears the prayers of
his son. And that's the reason why when
we pray, we have to pray in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, you're going to have to
make this prayer acceptable. You're going to have to make
it pleasing. You know, we're like the little child out in
the yard gathering up wildflowers and got all kinds of weeds and
trash and everything else in it. What's mom do? Oh, she loves
those flowers, but she has to take them and separate them out
and fix them up and put them in a nice vase in order for them
to be a display, doesn't she? And that's what the Lord does.
We bring to him our prayers that he's got to fix them to present
them to the father. Why? Because the Father hears
him. Was there not a man? Can I not
save? Is my hand short that I cannot
redeem? Why are you trying to fix it? Don't you think I'm capable? When I cried out, was there not
one to hear me? Behold at my rebuke, I dry up
the sea, I make the rivers of wilderness, their fish stinketh
because there is no water, and dieth for thirst. Has God made
your water to dry up? Has he made free will, works
religion, a stench in your nostrils? Has He caused you to cast all
your care upon the One who careth for you? I clothed the heavens with blackness. The Lord Jesus Christ had to
be forsaken of God. For three hours on Calvary's
cross, there was a dark shroud of blackness over the earth.
As God was doing business with His Father, the Lord Jesus Christ
offering Himself up to God, but bearing our sins in His body,
the Father had no choice but to forsake Him. He was forsaken so that His people
would not have to be forsaken. I clothe the heavens with blackness,
I make sackcloth their covering. The Lord God hath given me the
tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season
to them that are weary." Has He spoken a word in season to
you? What kind of words does He speak?
Tell them they're grass. Tell them they can't do anything.
Tell them they have no righteousness. Tell them their righteousness
is as a filthy rags. Tell them like sheep they've
all gone astray, each into his own way, but that God has laid
on me the iniquity of them all. Tell them. That man at his very
best state is altogether vanity. That'll be an encouragement to
them. That'll be a comfort to them. That'll cause them to realize
that they can't fix it. They can't fix it. Tell them
that they're poor, they're poverty stricken, they're naked. Tell them they're needy. And they'll become mercy beggars.
And I'll save them. My hand's not short. Tell them that I've loved my
people with an everlasting love. Tell them there's never been
a time that they haven't been viewed by God in Christ. Tell them that whatever enmity
they have, it's only on their part, it's not on mine. Tell them that I've chosen a
particular people in a covenant that cannot be disannulled, that
cannot be changed. Tell them that. Tell them that the work of redemption
is finished. Nothing to be added to it, nothing
to be taken away from it. Tell them that God has laid on
me the iniquity of them all. Tell them that the Father saw
the travail of my soul and was satisfied. Tell them that I'm
their surety. I'm their substitute. I'm their
one and only advocate with the Father. The Lord Jesus Christ
speaks to his people a word in season to him that is weary. Here's what he said, come unto
me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. Take my yoke upon
you and learn of me. I am meek and lowly of heart. My burden's light. Come, learn
of me, and you'll have rest for your soul. The Lord Jesus Christ
speaks a word to the weary when he says, all that the Father
hath given to me will come unto me, and all that come unto me
I will in no wise cast him out. And faith believes God, just
believes God. I keep them from falling. I present
them faultless before the throne of God with great joy. Not one
of my sheep will be lost and no man, no man can snatch them
out of my hand. Not going to happen. The Lord hath opened mine ear.
Look at verse five. He wakeneth morning by morning,
verse four, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned. The Lord hath opened my ear and
I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. Now, how many
times has God spoken to you and you've rebelled, you've forgotten, To some degree or another, we're
constantly rebelling against God, aren't we? The Lord said,
the Father opened my ear, and I rebelled not. Now in Exodus
chapter 21, turn with me there. This is interesting to me, that
right after the 10 commandments are given in chapter 20, Now
the Lord's going to spend a good bit of time defining the commandments
of God, giving more details as to how the children of Israel
were to function as a nation. And the very first thing that
he deals with is indentured servitude. Look what he says in chapter
21. Now these are the judgments which thou shalt set before them.
If thou buy a Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve, and
in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing. You cannot
keep a Hebrew servant into the seventh year. Once he's worked
six years, whatever debt he owed you, it's paid, and he goes out
free. If he come in by himself, he
shall go out by himself. If he were married, then his
wife shall go out with him. But if his master hath given
him a wife, and she hath born him sons and daughters, the wife
and her children shall be her masters, and he shall go out
by himself. So you bought that you you this
man owed you he couldn't pay it so he indentured himself to
your service For six years to pay off the debt While he's serving
you You give him a wife His wife bears children now the six years
are over he gets to go free, but his wife and children have
to stay behind with the master and Verse 5, if the servant shall
say plainly, I love my master, my wife, and my children, I will
not go out free, then his master shall bring him unto the judges. He shall also bring him to the
door, unto the doorpost, and the master shall bore his ear
through with an awl, and he shall serve him for Ever. Can you see the gospel in that? That's exactly what happened
on Calvary's cross. The Lord Jesus Christ was bore
through with an awe. His ear was opened, he says in
Isaiah chapter 50, so that he heard the voice of God and rebelled
not against Him. He did everything God told him
to do perfectly. Perfectly. Why? Because he loved his father,
he loved his bride, the church, and he loved his children, every
single one of them. And he would not go out. The Lord hath opened my ear. The Lord opens our ears all the
time, doesn't He? Tells us things, speaks to us,
and then we just turn right around, we forget, we do the opposite,
we... Not Christ. Every arrow He shot
hit the bullseye, and the next arrow split the next one. He never missed the mark. He obligated God. He never had
iniquity. because the Father was pleased
with everything he did. He satisfied the demands of God's
law. The Lord hath opened my ear,
and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back. I gave my back
to the smiters, and my cheek to them that plucked off the
hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting. This is 650
years before the cross. And the Holy Spirit has given
the prophet Isaiah very specific prophecies about what the Lord
Jesus Christ would fulfill. And what God's saying is, you
broke it, I fixed it. You tried, and in your attempts
to fix it, you only made it worse. So I came. God opened my ear. I heard every word God said.
I was not rebellious unto Him. I did what He told me to do. I satisfied the demands of God's
justice by giving my back to the smiters and allowing them
to pull the hair out of my cheeks and to suffer the shame of them
spitting in my face. This is the Son of God. You say, don't look back 2,000
years and think, well, those evil Romans, those evil Jews.
When the Spirit of God is sent on Jerusalem, they shall look upon him whom
they have pierced, and they shall mourn after him as one mourneth
for his only son. How do I know if the Spirit of
God's been poured out on me? Because when I hear about what
the Lord Jesus Christ did, I know that I was the cause of that. I was the cause of that. Nobody
else. I'm not looking at anybody else.
I know He died for all of His people, but had I been the only
one, He would have had to do everything He did just for me.
As far as I'm concerned, this is my fault. This is my fault. Oh, what a glorious Savior, that
He was willing to do it. For the Lord God will help me,
therefore I shall not be confounded. Now in Matthew chapter 22, the
Lord asked the Pharisees, whom say ye Christ is? Whose son is he? And they said,
well, he's the son of David. And the Lord said, if he be the
son of David, then why did David in the spirit say, the Lord,
that's the father, said unto my Lord, that's the Christ, my
son, sit thou here at my right hand until I make thine enemies
thy footstool. And the scripture says that no
man ever ask him another question after that. The Lord Jesus Christ is being
spoken to by the Father as David's Lord. And the Father is promising
him to make all of his enemies his footstool. And the Lord heard the promise
of the Father He obeyed look what he says For the Lord God
will help me Therefore shall I not be confounded therefore
have I set my face like a flint and I know that I shall not be
ashamed He is near God is near he's gonna
justify me. Oh Don't justify yourself before
God. I Admit your fault take sides
with God against yourself Agree that you're the problem That's
what sinners do that's what faith does The Lord Jesus Christ is saying
he is near that justifies me Who will contend with me? Let
us stand together. Who is my adversary? Let him
come near to me. I You're going to stand in the
presence of a holy God and be compared to the Lord Jesus Christ? That's what he's saying. You're
not. Behold, the Lord God will help
me. Who is he that shall condemn
me? Lo, they shall all wax old as a garment. The moth shall
eat them up. The scripture tells us that the
Lord Jesus Christ is the plumb line. He's the standard of righteousness. He's the one that God's comparing
everything to. And you and I have nothing that
measures up to that standard. Nothing. The best thing you've
ever done falls short of that standard. The only hope that
a sinner has is to look to Christ for all their righteousness before
God, for all their justification before God, and believe what
God says, as He is, so are we, to be found in Him. There's my
hope. I've got to be found in Christ. I mentioned this in the first
hour, and I know there's a few folks came in late, but we're
not walking around here in the world with a halo around our
head. People are looking at your life and saying, oh, there's
a child of God, look at the way they live. A believer doesn't want to dishonor
the Lord. He just doesn't. That's his fear every day. He
knows his flesh. He knows his... And he cries
out, Oh Lord, lead me not into temptation, deliver me from evil.
I don't want my life to be dishonoring to grace. But we're not looking to our
lives or anything we do in our lives for the hope of our salvation. Truth is, your life doesn't look
a whole lot different from the life of everybody else in the
world. Oh, you can point out a few people that are living,
you know, and say, well, I'm not doing that. Well, maybe you're
not. But you know this, if you're
a child of God, that when you do sin, you're sinning against
light. You're sinning against love.
You're sinning against grace. You're without excuse, aren't
you? Without excuse. Oh, I need a savior. The Lord
Jesus Christ came to fix what we broke. And he fixed it. And God's pleased with him. Look
what he says. Verse nine, behold, the Lord
God will help me. Who is he that condemned me?
Lo, they shall all wax old as a garment. The moth shall eat
them up. Who is among you that feareth
the Lord? What is it to fear God? It's
to believe him. It's to believe the gospel, to
obey the gospel. Who is among you that feareth
the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant? that walketh
in darkness and hath no light." I've got no light anywhere else.
Everywhere else I look for, it's just darkness. Let him trust in the name of
the Lord and stay upon his God. Let him trust in the name of
the Lord and stay upon his God. Rest all his hope and all his
salvation on the perfect man. Behold, all ye that kindle a
fire, that compass yourself about with sparks. Walk in the light
of your fire and in the sparks that you have kindled. This shall
you have of my hand and you shall lie down in sorrow. That's all our, all our attempts are, all our
righteousness is, just sparks. Yeah, walk in the light of that. Sparks coming from a going out
fire in the black of night compared to the rising of the sun. Where's
your light? Most men are walking by the light
of the sparks that they have kindled. The Lord says, you walk
by that light, you're going to be sorry. The sun of righteousness
has risen. He's risen from the dead. He's
the light of truth. He's the light of salvation.
He's the light of the world. I shall not be confounded, he
said. God's gonna reward me. I've done what he told me to
do. He opened up my ear. He enabled me to hear his voice.
I was not disobedient. I pleased Him. And the Father
speaks to you and me, and He said, This is My beloved Son. Hear ye Him. Hear Him. Our Heavenly Father, we're so
very thankful for the revelation that You have given us in Your
Word of Thy dear Son. And oh, how we hope and pray
that your Holy Spirit would speak to our hearts and reveal to us His glorious person and His finished,
accomplished work. Give us faith, Lord, to rest
our hope in Him. For it's in Christ's name we
pray. Let's stand together. Number 125. I hear the Savior say, Thy strength
indeed is small. Child of weakness, watch and
pray. Find in me thine all in all. Jesus paid it all. All to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow. Lord, now indeed I find Thy power
and Thine alone Can change the leper's spots And melt the heart
of stone. Jesus paid it all, all to Him
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow. For nothing good have I, whereby
thy grace to claim, I'll wash my garments white in the blood
of Calvary's Lamb. Jesus paid it all, all to Him
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as stone. And when before the throne I
stand in Him complete, Jesus died my soul to save, my lips
shall still repeat, Jesus paid it all, All to Him I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
He washed it white as snow.