If you would please turn in the
Word of God to Hebrews chapter 10. Hebrews chapter 10. I thought
if there was one message that I would desire preached to my
lost friends and loved ones in religion, this would be it. And
we'll start at verse 22. Let us draw near with a true
heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from
an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. Let us
hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering, for He
is faithful, the promised, that is Christ. and let us consider
one another to provoke unto love and to good works, not forsaking
the assembling of ourselves as the manner of some is, but exhorting
one another. And so much the more as ye see
the day approaching, the day of judgment. I need to be here this morning.
I'm glad to be here, but I need to be here. We pray for those who don't have
a pastor. Verse 26, For if we sin willfully
after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth
no more sacrifice for sins. If you've heard the gospel of
God's grace in Christ and refuse to believe, there remaineth no
more sacrifice for sins." I don't know there could be a greater
judgment. Here's what happens when you do that. But a certain
fearful looking for the judgment and fiery indignation which shall
devour the adversaries. He that despised Moses' law died
without mercy two or three witnesses. This is the verse I wish would
be preached to them. O of how much sore punishment,
suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under
foot the Son of God? Christ was nothing more than
the dirt on the ground to them, and hath counted the blood of
the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified an unholy thing. and hath done despite unto the
Spirit of grace." The writer of Hebrews is saying that there
are some who have taken the blood of Christ and called it a unholy. Holy means to be set apart. They're
saying that the blood of Christ does not set anybody apart. It
doesn't separate them out. And it's an unholy or a common
thing. most of my most people they believe
that the Lord Jesus Christ came to his earth and he shed his
blood for all of mankind that his precious blood was spilled
as much as Esau as it was for Jacob his blood was spilled for
those in hell just as much as it was for those in glory and
they take the blood of our Savior as a common an unholy thing. It didn't save a single soul
is what they say. And God has said in His Word
what great judgment and wrath will fall upon them. And I'm so thankful to this day
that if you can read this and understand with God's ways, there
was a time that was me and it was you. But God revealed His
ways to us. And the blood of Christ became
so precious, didn't it? And we know that it set us apart. And because of His blood and
His blood and life only, we can say, Oh God, glory be to You. You've made this to differ. Let us try to approach the Lord
in prayer. Lord, I wish, I pray that you
would speak to the hearts of your people and to everyone's
here. What a great blessing and privilege it is to gather with
the people of God and to hear about Christ and to see what
you have done for us, Lord, and to give you all the glory. Let
us not take it lightly. We pray wherever your people
gather, Lord, that you will be pleased to speak to their hearts.
And we pray for your ministers and their wives that you would
bless them, encourage them, put your word upon their hearts this
morning and give them the ability to speak clearly and concisely
with your spirit. Lord, continue to show us our
total dependence upon You for all things. We ask this for Your
glory and Your glory alone. Amen. Well, there's a perfect example
of not being able to see. We used to sing this hymn in
religion. I don't know how we sang it,
Because it's a great hymn. We put all the emphasis on that
one personal pronoun, I, didn't we? Now it's the emphasis is
on the Lamb of God and the I is little i. But we do come. We do come. And all the things
that we just sang are so true to the gospel. Would you open your Bibles again
to Colossians chapter 1. Colossians chapter 1. My prayer this morning is that
the Lord will comfort the hearts of his children by showing them
how inseparable is the body of Christ to Christ. Everything that was done by the
head was reckoned by the father as being done by the body. Did you get that? Everything
that the head did, the father reckoned it to be done by the
body. Otherwise, you have a decapitated
Christ. And one thing I know for sure
about a decapitated body is that neither the head nor the body
has life. This is one union that Christ
has with His body. And there's no division. There's
no separation between the two. And the body of Christ is not
deformed. It's not missing any parts. it's
whole, it's perfect. This is where we began the first
hour and I wanna pick up, you see in verse 18, and he is the
head of the body, the church. Christ is the head of the body,
the body is the church. Let's go back and understand
this in the context of what we were just looking at in verse
16, the invisible as well as the visible, those things that
are on the earth as well as those things that are in heaven. May
God give us sight to see beyond the earthy, to see beyond the
physical, to see beyond the visible, and to see the heavenly, the
spiritual truth of the gospel. Now the Lord Jesus Christ is
said to be the creator of all things. He created them, both
the physical and the spiritual, and He created them for Himself. And so in verse 16, after He
speaks of that which is heavenly, that which is earthly, the visible
and invisible, you understand those phrases are just repetition. that which is earthly is visible,
that which is heavenly is invisible. Whether they be thrones, thrones,
those are seats of power. Now in the physical world, that's
a picture of governing authorities. And the natural man can understand
that, that God sets up Men, he sets up kingdoms, he takes down
kingdoms, and the Lord has been very clear in instructing us
in Romans chapter 13, let every soul, let every believer, be
subject to the higher powers. For there is no power but of
God, and the powers that are, are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth
the power, resisteth the ordinance of God. That's the truth of the
physical world that the Lord has set up and believers are
to be subject to those powers. The spiritual truth of that is
that what the Lord Jesus Christ said when he ascended back into
glory from the Mount of Olives, when the disciples said, is it
time now for you to set up your kingdom? They were still thinking
of the kingdom of God as a earthly kingdom. They were still thinking
of the throne of David. They were still thinking of a
power that could be seen and touched with the physical eye
and hand. And what'd the Lord say? It's
not for you to know the times nor the season but you go back
into Jerusalem and the Holy Spirit will come upon you and you'll
be my witnesses both in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria and under
the uttermost parts of the world. And he goes on in Matthew 28
to say all power and authority is given unto me. So he possesses
all power. He's that throne that is set
up above all thrones. He's the king of all kings. He's the Lord of all lords. And then in John chapter 17,
when the Lord Jesus Christ is offering his high priestly prayer
on behalf of his church, the body of Christ, he says, thou,
speaking to the father, The Lord Jesus Christ says, Thou hast
given Him, speaking of the Son, all power over all flesh, that
He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him.
So this throne now that's been set up isn't just earthly thrones.
It's the throne of Christ. It's the rule and reign of the
Lord Jesus Christ in the Kingdom of God. in the hearts of his
people. He has all power to give eternal
life to as many as the Father has given him. Notice the next
word that he speaks of, and these things can be seen physically,
visibly, and invisibly. Each one of these has an earthly
application and it has a spiritual application, a heavenly application.
You see the word dominions. That's the word for governments. And we know that all governments
are on his shoulders. Whether they be dictatorships,
whether they be monarchies, whether they be communism, whether they
be what we just experienced this past week in Mexico, socialism. whether they be republics or
democracies, all governments, He created them. He created them. And they were created for His
glory. And then Daniel tells us in Daniel
chapter 4, His dominion is an everlasting dominion. He rules
and reigns over the affairs of men, but His kingdom is an everlasting
kingdom. These kingdoms come and go, and
this whole world will be done away with one day. But the kingdom
of God, he goes on to say, the nations, Daniel chapter four,
the nations are reputed by God as nothing. And Isaiah tells
us that the nations of the world are a drop in the bucket to him. It's his kingdom, it's his dominion,
it's his reign that is eternal. And then he speaks of principalities. Principalities. Let me say this
about thrones and dominions. Don't get caught up in the politics
of this world. Just don't do it. It's not worth
it. God's got that under... I can
tell you right now with absolute certainty who's going to be the
next president of the United States. I can tell you who it's going
to be. It's going to be the one that God chooses. It's going to be one that He's
ordained to be in that seat of power, and there's nothing you
and I are going to do about it. Just don't lose any sleep over
it. It'll be to our benefit or to
be to our judgment, but it'll be by God's ordained purpose,
and we're to submit to those authorities. Principalities,
that word means the first cause, the principal cause of all things,
the beginning of all things. And we know that the Lord Jesus
Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. Solomon
tells us, that wise man Solomon, the wisest of all men, tells
us in Ecclesiastes chapter 3, he, the Lord Jesus Christ, hath
made everything beautiful in his time. The details of your
life and my life and the big events of the world, he makes
them all beautiful in his time also. He has set the world in
our hearts so that no man can find out what God's doing. We don't know what's going to
happen tomorrow. We know that He is the first cause of
all things that happen in this world and that He's made these
things for Him and by Him And that the spiritual truth of that
is that He's the first cause of our salvation. The first cause
of our salvation. The first and the last. And everything
in between. He's the Alpha and the Omega,
the beginning and the end. The first and the last. In religion,
some groups like having their Jesus as the Omega. And you'll hear them make statements
like, once saved, always saved, but you've got to take the first
step. He's not the alpha, but he is the omega. You just take
the first step and he'll make sure he gets you in. And then
there's other groups that say, oh no. Coming to Christ is a
work of sovereign grace. You've got to be chosen. You've
got to be elected. It's a unilateral work of God
the Spirit who breathes life into your heart. But now that
you're a Christian, they take you back to the law. And you've
got to prove your salvation by your obedience to the law. And
you've got to monitor your salvation by your obedience to the law.
And you've got to motivate one another's salvation by your obedience
to the law. And so they have Jesus as the
Alpha but not the Omega. The scripture says He's both.
He's the Alpha and the Omega. He's the first step and He's
the last step. That's what I need. If He leaves
any of the steps up to me I'm in trouble. I'm in trouble. Here's His body. This is the
body of Christ. The body of Christ is inseparably
linked to the head. And the head gets all the glory,
doesn't it? What a beautiful picture of our physical bodies. There's not a member of your
body that can function without the head telling it exactly what
to do. Not a member of your body. Everything
is determined by the impulses of your mind, are they not? I
mean, even what we call involuntary actions. There's something in
your brain that's causing those involuntary actions. And your
whole body is controlled by your head. And when the body does
something, we don't glorify the members of the body, we glorify
the head. We are His workmanship created
in Christ Jesus unto good works, which He's ordained that we should
walk in them. Now, Bert just painted this church. What if, right after he painted
this church, you walked up to Bert, you grabbed one of his
hands, and you started talking to his hand? And you said, man,
that is a really gifted hand. I've had people tell me what
a good job this was. We had a painter here a couple
weeks ago, and he took notice of it. And he said, man, somebody
did a good job in here. If I walked up to Bert and took
one of his hands and said, boy, that is a really gifted hand,
you did a good job, and I start talking to his hand, he'd probably
slap me with his other one. We don't do that, do we? No,
we look at the man that did the work and we give him the glory
for it. And so it is with the body of
Christ. The members of the body function. They serve the Lord
in obedience. But they do it only as they're
connected to the head. The impulses of the head. And
the head gets all the glory. He's the one we look to. We don't
go around boasting in the functions of the body. All these things were created
by Him and for Him, whether they be dominions or principalities
or powers. And He, verse 17, is before all
things, and by Him all things consist. We're not talking about
the physical here. This is a great mystery. This
is Christ and His church. Paul tells us in Ephesians chapter
5, no man ever hated his own body, but he nourishes it. And then he goes on to say that
this is a picture. Christ loves His body. He takes
care of His body. He provides for His body. And
everything the Lord Jesus Christ did is reckoned by the Father
as being done by the body. He is not a decapitated Savior. He's one. The head and the body
are one. Look, and He is the head. Now we're getting to the real
meat of the matter, aren't we? All these other things are just
sort of preparation for the real glorious truth. And this is where
I hope we can find our comfort. This is where I hope the Lord
will enable us to sit and rest in knowing that the head is going
to take care of the body. You're not gonna throw members
of your body into places that are dangerous. Your head's got
more sense than that. Your head takes care of your
body. And one member of the body hurts, other members of the body
take care of it. 1 Corinthians chapter 12 is clear on that,
isn't it? And so it is, the church functions together as the body
of Christ. But it's His body. Look what
He says, and He is the head of the body, the church. who is
the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things
he might have the what? Preeminence. Preeminence. In other words, his eminence
is before. That word pre is before, isn't
it? It's before all things. And so the Lord gets eminence
before anything else. He gets all the glory. But it's
not just that He gets eminence in preference, but He actually
gets eminence in time. If you prepay a bill, you pay
it ahead of time, don't you? And what the Lord Jesus Christ
did in His preeminence is that He had eminence before time ever
began. The scripture speaks of the Lord
Jesus Christ having, that I can think of, three bodies before
his incarnation. One of the bodies that it speaks
of him having is the body of the angel of the Lord, also referred
to as Michael the archangel, the messenger of God. And Jude
tells us that when Michael the archangel He refused to contend with the
devil over the body of Moses, but said to him, the Lord rebuke
you. Now did Michael the Archangel
as a type of Christ, as a pre-incarnate picture of the Lord Jesus Christ
not have authority over the devil? Sure he did. What was the body
of Moses? It wasn't just the physical body.
You say, well, they had to bury, God had to do away with the physical
body of Moses to keep the children of Israel from worshiping his
grave. Well, they probably would have. They worshiped the golden
serpent that was on a pole. They made an idol out of that.
They would have made an idol out of the bones of Moses. And
so I'm sure that was part of it, but that's not the picture
there. Moses is a picture of the law. Moses couldn't lead
the children of Israel into the promised land. Joshua had to
do that. Moses had to be put away in a place where nobody
could find him. What has the Lord done? He has
separated our sin from us as far as the east is from the west.
He's buried them in the depths of the sea and remembers them
no more. And the law has been satisfied. Christ is the end
of the law for righteousness. And so when Michael contends
with the devil over the body of Moses, what the devil's doing
as the accuser of the brethren, he's called that, isn't he? He's
bringing up the law to Christ. And what does the Lord Jesus
Christ say? I refuse to contend with you, not that I can't, but
in my keeping the law, I've got another. I've got another that
I kept the law for, and that's the Lord. He rebuke you. You
take that charge. You take those accusations of
the law to God and see what he says. You know what he's going
to say? The law's been silenced. The
law has no accusation. There's no charge left in the
law. My son satisfied the law. So we see the Lord Jesus Christ
as that angel of the Lord, don't we? We see him also as Melchizedek. And Abraham paid tithes to Melchizedek. And what's Melchizedek called?
He's called the the King of Salem, the King of
Salem, and the priest of the Most High God. That's what he's
called. He's called the King of Salem and the priest of the
Most High God. So we see the Lord Jesus Christ
there reigning over his kingdom, and Abraham, who's the father
of the faithful, paying tithes to Melchizedek, showing his deference
to him, And he's also what? He's also the high priest of
the Most High God. So he's interceded. What do we
see in those three pictures? In Michael, we see the prophet
of God, the angel of the Lord, bringing the message of salvation,
which is that the law has been satisfied. We see Melchizedek as our priest, and
we see him as our king. Prophet, priest, and king. There
he is. But there's one other body we
see the Lord Jesus Christ pictured at in the Old Testament. John
saw it in the book of Revelation when he looked into glory and
he saw the church surrounding the throne of God and he said,
I saw one as a lamb that was slain before the foundation of
the world. The justice of God had to be
satisfied. Blood had to be shed. A propitiation
for our sins had to be made. And the Lord Jesus Christ is
seen in the body of a lamb, a spotless lamb, making that sacrifice on
behalf of His people. Now, can there be any doubt that
those pictures of the body of Christ are true of Him? That's
who he is. He's our prophet. He's our priest.
He's our king. He's the angel of the Lord. He's
the one that kept the law and he's the one that satisfied divine
justice. Now, how do we see him in his
incarnation? The church is his body. The church is his body. Look,
look at Hebrews chapter 10 verse 5, the
Lord said, A body thou hast prepared for me. Now that's more than his physical
body. Yes, the Lord had to be born of a virgin. He had to come
into this world sinless in order to make the sacrifice that was
necessary for our sins. But there's more to it. A body
thou hast prepared for me. God the Father gave to the Lord
Jesus Christ a body. It's called the church. And in
Ephesians chapter three, turn with me there. I want you to
see this. Chapter four. Look at verse four. I just noticed
this, this week, in preparing for this morning. But, we see, we read verse 6,
one God and father of us all. We read in verse 5, one Lord,
one faith, one baptism. And we read in verse 3, or verse
4, one body. The body is mentioned first,
before the spirit. Before baptism? Before the Father
is mentioned? Before anything else is mentioned?
The body is mentioned first. Why? Because the body of Christ
is inseparable from the head of Christ. He's the head of the
body, which is the church. So Christ is being mentioned
first here. He said to Saul, Saul, Saul, why persecutes thou
me? What does Saul say? Who art thou
Lord? I'm Jesus whom thou persecutest. There's no separation between
the Lord Jesus Christ and His body. And he mentions, the body is
mentioned first here. went in 1 Peter chapter 2 where
the scripture says that he bore our sins in his body upon the
tree. That body that hung there on
Calvary's cross, that's the body of Christ. That's the church. That's what Paul said, I'm crucified
with Christ. When he was crucified on Calvary's
cross, I was crucified in him. Here's the invisible, here's
the spiritual that the natural man can't see. He can look back
to a historical event and say, oh yes, Jesus of Nazareth, the
Son of God, died on a cross. But to see himself dying in Christ? To know that His body is inseparable
from His head and that everything that the Lord Jesus Christ did,
the Father reckoned it to be done by the body. He bore in His body the sins
of His people and suffered the full wrath of God's judgment.
So, everything He went through, everything He went through on
Calvary's cross, The drinking of the cup of God's wrath. The sword of justice that was
plunged into His heart. The forsaking of the Father.
The taste of hell. Everything that He experienced
on Calvary's cross, His body experienced it. I experienced
it. You experienced it. It's the
only hope we have. All sin must be punished. It
wasn't just punished in the person of our substitute. We were in
Him before the foundations of the world. Always been seen in
Him. God punished you when He punished
Christ. And He's satisfied. He's just
satisfied. The body of Christ. Look at verse 22. Verse 21 says, And you that were
sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works,
yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through
death. the body of Christ, the body
that God had prepared for him, the body that he bore the sins
of his people with on Calvary's cross. That's his church. That's
his church. Everything he did was reckoned
to be done by his church. To present you how? Unblameable. You see, here's the glorious
truth of union. Here's the glorious truth of
eternal justification, eternal righteousness, eternal salvation,
eternal life, is that God has never ever seen any of his people
outside of the body of Christ. so that everything the Lord Jesus
Christ did, the body did. What did he tell John? He said,
John, suffer to be so. John said, I need to be baptized
by you. And the Lord said, John, suffer
to be so, for this is necessary that we might fulfill all righteousness. We're in this together, John. We're in this together. Are you
in this together with Christ? Is Christ your life? Is He all
to you? Is His life, His eternal covenant,
His eternal redemption as the Lamb slain before the foundation
of the world, everything He did in the body that God had prepared
for Him, and His death on Calvary's cross, His resurrection as the
firstborn among many brethren, His ascension into glory. He
is seated at the right hand of God. That's why the scripture
says that all the blessings of God for His people are in the
heavenlies in Christ right now. Right now. That's the gospel. That means that this matter of
salvation has nothing to do with you. It means you can't make any contribution
to it. He's going to do it all or He
won't do it at all. That's just the bottom line. And God's people say, Amen, I
want him to do it all. Don't leave any of it up to me.
You leave any of it up to me, I'm going to mess it up. And what's the end result? He
presented his body. He went back into glory. He said,
I go and prepare a place for you. I'll come again and receive
you unto myself, unto myself. He was successful, wasn't he?
When he went before the Father, he took the names. He took his
body with him. He bodily ascended into glory,
didn't he? The head didn't leave the body.
The disciples ate with the body of Christ. It was a different
body. It was a resurrected body. It
was an immortal body. It was no longer a mortal body.
But 1 Corinthians 15 says that our mortal is going to be changed
to immortal. Our corruptible is going to be
changed to incorruptible. We're going to experience the
body of Christ. Right now we have it in Christ. And how does he present us before
God? Look. Holy! Holy! Separate from sinners. Perfect before God. Holy. The only hope that you have of
standing in the presence of a holy God is to be holy. The only way
you're going to be holy is to be found in the body of Christ. Unblameable. That's what I need. You talk to my wife, I got plenty
of stuff you can blame me for. I need God to find me unblameable. How's he going to find you unblameable,
Adam? That's it. An unreprovable. That means a
charge can't even... Accusations of Satan, they fall
on deaf ears. Satan says, what about the body
of Moses? What about the law? What do we
say? The Lord rebuke you. Why? Because we're in the body
of Christ. And notice the last three words
of verse 22. You say, well, I don't see it
that way. If God gives you faith, you will
believe what He has said about what He sees. And that will be
the hope of your salvation. Not what you see. In His sight. In His sight. That's the only
thing that may say, well, that's how God sees it. Well, that's
the way it is. How you see it is not the way it is. How God
sees it is the way it is. in his sight. Unreprovable, holy,
unblameable. I have to show you this verse.
Look at verse 17 of chapter 2 of Colossians. Verse 16, let no man therefore
judge you in meat or in drink and respect a holy day or new
moons or Sabbath days. That's all religious stuff. Every
religion's got their traditions. Don't be judged. Don't be put
under that. Touch not, taste not, handle not. Don't let men
put you under their rules and regulations. Why? Because these things are only
a shadow of the things to come. But the body is of Christ. It's His body. It's His body. Read on. Let no man beguile you
of your reward in a voluntary humility and worshiping of angels.
I was talking to somebody in Mexico last week. They tell me
about a preacher who spent two years every Sunday preaching
sermons on angels. If I preach one sermon on angels,
y'all be sure to say something to me. Well, what's he doing? He's acting like he's got insight
into something that nobody else knows. He's just puffed up in
his pride and knowledge. He's intruding into things he
doesn't know what he's talking about, but everybody's impressed
by it. intruding into those things which
he has not seen, vainly puffed up in his fleshly mind. There's
the natural man. He puffs himself up in his natural
mind because he thinks he's seen something nobody else has seen.
And not holding the head. Oh, don't be separated from the head.
Not holding the head. from which all the body, by joints
and bands having nourishment, ministered and knit together,
increased with the increase of God." The body, if it's attached
to the head, it's going to do what the head tells it to do.
It's going to function according to the head. Hold on to the head. Look to the head. Trust Christ. Come to Christ. He's the head of the body. And
the body's the church. And no man ever hated his own
body. But he nourishes it. We'll close with that. Turn with
me to Ephesians chapter 5. Just over a couple pages. Ephesians
chapter 5. Verse 29. For no man ever hated his own
flesh, but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church." You wake up in the morning, the
first thing you think about is yourself. Don't tell me you don't.
I've got to eat, I've got to shower, I've got to dress, I've
got to take care. Everybody nourishes in their own bodies. All during the day. We just need
to fall out of love with ourselves, don't we? For we are members of His body,
of His flesh." That body that the Lord Jesus Christ was given
by God, that He lived a perfect life in, and that He died a substitutionary
death in, that body that was raised from the dead and ascended
into glory, that's His church. of His flesh and of His bones. For this cause shall a man leave
his father and his mother, and shall be joined unto his wife,
and the two shall be one flesh." And I speak to you of a great
mystery. This is the invisible. This is
what the natural man can't see concerning Christ and His church. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father,
we ask that You would minister grace to our hearts by Your Spirit
and enable us to find our head to be the life of the body of
Christ. For it's in His name we ask.
Amen. We'll stand together and read.
Number 111 in the soft back temple. Let's stand.