I like that hymn. The writer
of Hebrews tells us that we are to come boldly to the throne
of grace. That's not with cockiness, but
it is with confidence, knowing that the way has been paved,
that we have an advocate, we have a representative before
God, Jesus Christ, the righteous one. You all know there's several
families around the country and actually the world now that watch
our services regularly. They watch every Wednesday night
and every Sunday. And one of those families is
the Moore family that live in Wisconsin. And Laura is here
with us this morning. We're glad you're here, Laura.
She knew me, having watched our services on a regular basis,
but I didn't know her until today. So we're glad you're here, Laura. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we're thankful
that there is a throne of grace, that the law has been satisfied,
and that we have acceptance and love before Thee in the person
of our Savior, Your Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Lord, you've
promised that when he's lifted up, that you would draw us to
him. We ask that you'd bless your
word now by your spirit, and that you would cause Christ to
be exalted in our hearts, and that we would find all our salvation
finished, complete, and accomplished in his perfect work. We ask it in Christ's name. Amen. My text this morning for our
Bible study hour comes from Revelation chapter 19. Revelation chapter
19. And we'll begin reading in verse
11. And I saw heaven opened. And
that's My prayer, and I hope that it's your prayer this morning,
that the Lord would be pleased to open the windows of heaven
and enable us to see our Savior seated at the right hand of the
majesty on high, ever living to make intercession for us,
having accomplished the salvation of his people. If the Lord's
pleased to bless his word, that's what'll happen. He'll open our
hearts. He'll open the windows of heaven.
and what he opens no man can shut." John said, I saw heaven opened
and behold a white horse. He that sat upon him was called
faithful and true. Oh, I'm so thankful. I'm so thankful
that there is one who is perfectly faithful and in all ways perfectly
true before God. And in righteousness he doth
judge and make war. He exercises his judgment in
righteousness. The righteousness of God must
be satisfied. And the judgment of God was satisfied
when he sacrificed his dear son on Calvary's cross for the sins
of his people. And the Lord will make war in
righteousness against all those outside of Christ. His eyes were as a flame of fire,
and on His head were many crowns." Oh, crown Him with many crowns. Here's the crowns that His children
cast to Him, exalting Him, glorifying Him. We don't make Him king.
He's been made king by God, but we acknowledge Him as king. and with eyes of fire he sees
everything, and he had a name written that no one knew but
he himself." No one knew but he himself. No one can comprehend the full
glory of who he is by any of his names. We get glimpses of
his glory. But to understand him in his
fullness, Oh, we'll spend all eternity doing that. All eternity. Someone might hear us say comments
like this and they say, well then, how do you know for sure
that what you know is sure? I thought someone might say Miami,
Florida is too large of a city for anyone to fully comprehend
or understand in all of its detail and all of its inhabitants. And
so, therefore, we can't be sure that it's in the state of Florida.
You know, it's ridiculous, isn't it? What we know about God is
not in question, even though there's so much more about Him
that we don't know. He's infinite in His glory. No
man knew Him but He Himself, and He was clothed with vesture
dipped in blood. This is the blood of his sacrifice
for the sins of his people. This is the wine press that he
pressed out in order to satisfy the demands of God's holy justice
and put away our sins once and for all. And his vesture was
dipped in blood. And his name is called the Word
of God. The Word of God. Now we've been
since May looking at different names and titles of the Lord
Jesus Christ given to us in the scriptures. And each one of them
reveals a different facet of his character or of his attributes
and of his glory. And yet this name, This name
that no one can fully apprehend, that fully comprehend, encompasses
everything else. All that we know about Him, we
know from Him as the Word of God. As the Word of God. Now, what I mean by that is that
the Lord reveals Himself to His people by His Word. And we are careful and conscious
not to separate the written word from the living word. They are
one in the same. We search the word looking for
the word. I like what Mr. Spurgeon said
one time, they asked him, how do you prepare a message? He
said, well, I take my text and I make a beeline to the cross,
wherever I'm preaching from in the word of God. I get to the
cross of Christ as quickly as I possibly can, because that's
what that text is really about. All the scripture is about the
Lord Jesus Christ. In Revelation chapter 19 verse
10, God says that the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy. Now we could put a sign out on
the street out front here and say, in time prophecy, and fill
this place up. I mean, we'd be like Danville
last weekend, you know, standing room only. Some of you all were
there. Why? Because everybody's interested
in the when and the how. God's people are interested in
the who. In the who. Tell me about who's
coming. Tell me about who has come. Tell
me about what he has accomplished. Tell me about the one whose voice
is going to thunder like many waters. Tell me about the fine
linen white and clean in which he is clothed with. Tell me about
what it is that comes out of his mouth. as a double-edged
sword. Tell me about the one whose name
is King of Kings and Lord of Lords. Tell me about the marriage
supper of the Lamb, the one that is already prepared for us. Tell me about that. Tell me about
sitting at His table and feasting on His Word. I don't know about the when or
the how the coming of Christ is going to happen, but I pray
the Lord will put it in our hearts to anticipate with excitement
and joy the who, that we'll be in such love with Him that we
cannot wait to see him and to be made like him, the one who
is called faithful and true, the Alpha and the Omega, the
beginning and the end, the first and the last, the first cause
of our salvation and the completer of our salvation, the mighty
God, the Prince of Peace, the wonderful Counselor, the Rock,
the Nazarene, the Righteous One, Jehovah Jireh. These are all
names that we've already looked at about the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Holy One of Israel, our Mediator. Tell me about the One in whom
I have perfect righteousness, the One in whom I am accepted
and loved before God. Tell me about the One who's going
to command a legion of angels, to blow the trump of God. And
those that have already died and been buried are going to
rise. And those of us that are left
upon the earth will be caught up together with them in the
air, and so shall it ever be. Tell me about Him. Tell me about
the passing away of this world. I need to know how temporal and
how vain this world really, really is. Tell me about the creation
of a new heaven and a new earth where in dwelleth righteousness."
I want to hear about Him. He's the Word. We don't study
the Bible in order to discover some nugget of prophetic truth. We study the Bible looking for
the pearl of great price. We study the Bible looking for
Christ, and we don't separate the written word from the living
word. We don't study the Bible for
the sake of getting an advantage over our fellow man. We don't
study the Bible just in order to be able to win a theological
argument with someone else or to impress men with our knowledge.
We say often with that blind man that was healed, you know,
those of you that want to debate theology, those of you that want
to argue the Bible, Let the potsherds of the earth contend with the
potsherds of the earth. All I know is that once I was
blind, and now I see." The one who is able to give sight,
the one who gives eternal life, oh, to have knowledge of Him,
to have knowledge of Him. A lot of folks have Bible knowledge,
a lot of folks have theological knowledge, and they're impressed
with themselves and they've impressed their peers, but they don't know
Christ. They don't know Christ. The Lord
Jesus Christ said in John chapter 17, this is life eternal, that
they might know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom
Thou hast sent. Paul said, I've not yet apprehended
Him. He's apprehended me, but I have not yet apprehended him.
But this one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind,
I press towards the mark for the prize of the high calling.
What's the prize? He is the prize. He's the prize. He's the pearl of great price.
We study the Word of God in order to know the Word of God. In order to know the Word of
God. Turn with me to John chapter 1, a very familiar passage. John chapter 1. There are several things in these
few verses that we learn about the Lord Jesus Christ, who here
is called the Word of God. And the first thing we learn
about Him is something of His eternal nature. Notice in verse
1, in the beginning. Now don't misunderstand that.
That doesn't mean that the Lord Jesus Christ had a beginning.
It means just the opposite. It means that when time began,
He already was. It means that when Adam was created
from the dust of the earth, he already is. It means that when
the earth was without form and void, he is, he was from the
beginning. It means that before the stars
and the moon and the sun shine forth in the galaxies, he already
is from the time that the angels were first created. and a place
of habitation was made for them, He already is. He's in the beginning. It's the same thing that we read
in Genesis chapter 1, in the beginning God. So before time
began, it doesn't mean that He had a beginning, it means just
the opposite. It means that He is uncreated.
It means that He is the infinite self-sustaining I am. It means that He doesn't That's
incomprehensible for us. We live in time and space and
we can't comprehend something without a beginning. But through
faith we believe it. We believe it. It's the one glorious truth about
the Lord Jesus Christ that blows the theory of evolution completely
out of the water. And it's the one thing men won't
believe. They won't believe that there is a God who is self-existent
and in Himself absolutely eternal. Never having a beginning and
never having an end. And He created all things. In
the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word
was God. And look at verse 3. All things were made by Him.
And without Him was not anything made that was made. He is the Creator and Sustainer
of all things. Here's the Word, the Word of
God, who creates and sustains everything out of Himself. And
when we talk about a person being creative, what we mean is that
they take one thing and form it into something else. And we've
said before that the literal meaning here of being a creator
is that you make something out of nothing, but in fact that's
not exactly true. It's not exactly true. Because
everything he made, he made out of himself. Out of himself. I heard a preacher recently saying
that God loves us unconditionally, and I understood what he meant,
but it wasn't exactly accurate. He can't love us outside of Christ.
Without imputing us with the righteousness of the Lord Jesus
Christ, we can't... There's no... God creates us,
and all things, out of Himself. In the first verse here, we learn
something of the Word's eternal nature. He's without mother,
without father, without cause, without beginning. He is the
eternal, infinite, glorious I am. We learned something of his relationship
with the Father. Notice in verse one, in the beginning
was the word and the word was with God. Now here again, We're
brought to an incomprehensible, glorious truth that can only
be believed and understood in faith. That God Almighty would
be three persons in one God. And that the Lord Jesus Christ
here is being spoken of, of His relationship with the Father. Deuteronomy, the scripture says,
Here, O Israel, for the Lord our God is one God. One in nature. God the Father,
God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit having all the same nature
and yet three individual distinct persons. We worship a triune
God who is one. And this sheds some light on
another incomprehensible truth, and that is what the Lord Jesus
Christ suffered on Calvary's cross when he drank the bitter
dregs of the wrath of God and suffered separation from God. It's the first time in all eternity
that the Son had been separated from the Father. And when he
cried on Calvary's cross, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken
me? We can't comprehend the horrors
that he experienced in that. When he prayed in the Garden
of Gethsemane for the cup to pass from him, he wasn't just
speaking of the physical agony of crucifixion, as horrible as
that would have been. He was speaking of that separation
that he was about to have with the Father. when sin was charged
to Him, imputed to Him, laid on Him, and when God the Father
in His pure holiness saw our sin on His Son, had no choice
but to turn His back on Him. We're so accustomed to living
minutes, hours, days without giving a thought to God. A moment for all eternity was
the Son not in perfect union with the Father. Why would He
suffer such indignation, such wrath? Scripture tells us why. God so loved worldlings that
He gave His only begotten Son. that whosoever believeth in him
should not perish but have everlasting life. It pleased the Father to
bruise him. The Lord Jesus Christ and God
the Father entered into a covenant of redemption before the world
began and agreed together that this is what they would do in
order to maintain their holiness and at the same time justify
sinners. What a glorious purpose. What a glorious gospel. In the
beginning, before time began, was the Word. The very express
image of God. The fullness of the Godhead bodily. And He was with God. He was with
God. There's no question. of his relationship
with the Father. He's called the Son of God, even
by his enemies. Satan, when the Lord Jesus Christ
went into the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights, and fasted
after his baptism before his public ministry began Satan approached
him and said if thou be the Son of God command these stones that
they be made into bread if thou be the Son of God cast thyself
off the temple if thou be the Son of God the malfactors on
the cross they chided him when they said, if thou be the Son
of God, save thyself and us. Even the demons in Matthew chapter
8, when the Lord approached them, they declared, Jesus, thou Son
of God, art thou come here to torment us before the appointed
time? The Pharisees said, this man
blasphemes. for he being a man makes himself
out to be God." And when that Ethiopian eunuch
heard the gospel preached by Philip from the book of Isaiah,
And Philip said, if thou believest with all thine heart, thou mayest
be baptized. And what did that Ethiopian say?
I believe that that Jesus you just preached to me, that suffering
servant from Isaiah chapter 53, I believe that he is the son
of God. I believe he's the word, the
one that was with God and the one who is God. The priest at
his trial said, tell us whether thou be the Son of God. And on the cross they said, thou that destroyest
the temple and build it again in three days, save thyself if
thou be the Son of God. They didn't believe that He was.
Do you believe? Do you believe that this One
spoken of here, Jesus of Nazareth, the Word, do you believe that
He is the fullness of the Godhead bodily, that He is the Son of
God, that He was God and is God? The brightness of His glory,
the express image of His person, The truth is that everything
that we will ever know about God, we will find it only in
the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. Here's how God makes
Himself known to us. There's lots of folks in this
world in a pursuit to know God. What greater thing is there in
this life to know than to know God, to know Him? If we're going
to know Him, He's going to have to make Himself known, and if
He does, He'll do it. Not in the Jesus that's been
perverted by men, but the Lord Jesus Christ revealed in His
Word. And He will use His Word. Of
his own will, James said, of God's own will, it is not of
him that willeth nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth
mercy, of his own will begat he us, he birthed us into the
kingdom of God, made himself known to us, how? With the word
of truth. And this is the word, Peter said,
which by the gospel is preached unto you. When the gospel of
God's free grace is preached in the person and work of the
Lord Jesus Christ, this is the means by which God is pleased
to make himself known to his people. Did y'all see that movie, Life
of Pi? I watched it the other night. And it's so typical of of this
whole world. I notice more and more these
bumper stickers. You've seen them coexist. It's
got all the religious symbols written on a bumper sticker.
Coexist. Let's just all get along, you know. And in the movie, The
Life of Pi, this Indian man set out to know God. I mean, that
was his pursuit. He just wanted to know God. And
he started out as a Hindu, and he took a little bit of Hinduism,
and then he became a Muslim, and he took a little bit of Islam,
and then he became a Christian, and he took a little bit of Christianity,
and he took the best parts of all religion and made them all
up, and he succeeded in his pursuit of knowing God. You know, that's
where our world is. That's where our world is. You
know, you just pick and choose the things you like. It's kind
of like the billboard that used to be down the street here. Jesus
is with a straight line and a period. You fill in the blank and make
him out, you know, he'll be whatever you want him to be. That's just
man's... No! The Lord said, I am the way,
the truth and the life. No man can come to the Father
but by me. No other name has been given among men whereby
we must be saved. Now that's a claim that the Lord
Jesus Christ made of himself. And the glorious truth is that
we can know God if he's pleased in the person of Christ to make
himself known to our hearts by his word. What hope. And there's no knowing God outside
of that, outside of him. No, there's nothing. In the beginning was the Word.
The Word was with God and the Word was God. He said, if you've seen me, you've
seen the Father. Now, as I mentioned in the introduction,
he is past finding out in the fullness of his glory. But don't
conclude from that that what we do know about him is fallible
or questionable. Oh, no, it's not. Little Logan, I mean, there's
so much about his dad that he doesn't know. He doesn't know
that his father fought in Afghanistan. He doesn't know what he's been
through in his life. There's so many things he doesn't
know about you, Logan. But he knows you're his dad,
doesn't he? No question about that. And if I'm holding him
and he sees you, he's going to want to get out of my hands into
yours, isn't he? Just because there's an infinite
amount of glory that we don't know about God doesn't mean that
what we do know is questionable. who shall declare His generation. His infinite nature will leave
us in awe for all eternity, sitting at His feet, ever receiving new
vistas of His glory, and never able to apprehend or comprehend
the fullness of who He is." You're going to captivate our hearts
forever. Forever. That's who He is. The Lord said in John chapter
11, No man knoweth the Son, but the Father, neither knoweth any
man the Father, but the Son, and them to whom he is pleased
to make himself known. He to whom the Son will reveal
him. In the beginning was the Word,
the Word of God. Speaking of Christ, everything
we'll ever know about, how do people know who you are? You know, being quiet's a good
thing. But if you're too quiet, nobody's
gonna know you. Nobody's gonna know you. If you
never speak, if you never share what's in your heart with other
people, nobody's gonna know who you are. Some people are loners
and they're just too quiet. You know them for years but you
don't know them. Why? Because you never heard
what they had to say out of the heart precedes the issues of
life. Men speak and you hear what they have to say. Here's how we know God. By what
He says. By His Word. In the beginning was the Word.
The Word was with God. The Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God. All things were made by Him. Without Him was not anything
made that was made. He's the first cause of all things. All things. John put it like
this in Revelation, where he is worthy to receive glory and
honor and power for he has created all things and for his good pleasure
they are and were created. He creates everything for his
glory, everything's for his pleasure. All things were created by him.
He holds all things together by the word of his power He's
not limited. He's not limited by time and
space like we are. He created the laws of physics
and he can move in and out of a physical place as easily as
we can move in and out. He can move in and out from the
physical just as easy as we move in and out of a doorway. He created
all things. He sustains all things. When he speaks, when he speaks, oh Lord, would
you open the windows of heaven? Would you speak to my heart?
Would you cause manna to fall from heaven and feed my soul? Would you cause the rock that
has been smitten to bring forth water to satisfy my thirst? There's nothing else in this
life. There's nothing else. He's everything. You don't just add Him to the
rest of your life. He is our life and there's nothing
else in this world but Him. Lord, would You speak? Would You cause Your Word to
be heard by my ears? Would you cause this blind man
to see? Would you cause this lame man
to walk? Would you cause this dead man to be raised from the
dead? Would you say to me like you
said to Matthew, follow me and cause me to get up from my money
changing and follow after thee. Lord, would you do that? You're
the word. You created all things. You not
only created the physical world, you create the spiritual world.
Lord, if there's any hope of me having any life at all, you're
going to have to create that in me. Now I mentioned earlier
that creating is making something out of nothing, and in one sense
that's true. The Lord makes us children of
God out of sinners, out of being at enmity with God, and in a
sense He's making something out of nothing. But He creates us
anew, out of Himself. He makes us a new creature in
Christ. He puts his spirit in us. He
gives us the mind of Christ. He gives us his life. Look at the next verse. In him
was life, and the life was the light of men. You know, if you go back to Genesis,
you'll find that there was light before there were illuminaries. There was light before the sun
and the moon and the stars were created. And that light is the
Lord Jesus Christ. But that light emanates from
His life. And we think of in our physical
world, we think, well, light is necessary to have life. You
know, you plant something in the dark, it's not going to grow.
It's got to have sunlight to grow, doesn't it? But here he
says, the life is the light of men. I am the life. I'm the way,
the truth, and the life. No man can come to the Father
but by me. And my life, my life is your light. The only hope
you have of understanding God, the only hope you have of understanding
yourself is through the light of the gospel that sheds forth
in my person and in my work. I'm the light, the light of the
world. And then when he makes us to
be his own, what does he say? You're the light of the world.
What are we doing right now? We're trying to shine the light
of the gospel in the person and face of the Lord Jesus Christ
in hopes that he will shine that light in our hearts. It's the spirit that quickeneth,
the flesh profiteth nothing. The words that I speak unto you,
they are spirit and they are life. Life. This is the word
of God. This is our life. Peter said,
when the Lord said, Aren't you going to leave me? Remember what
Peter said? Lord, where should we go? What did he say? Thou alone hast the words of
eternal life. Where else are we going to go
and hear a message of hope? A message of forgiveness? A message
of life? Where else are we going to go?
Are we going to be like pie? Are we going to take a little
bit of all the religions of the world and deceive ourselves in
thinking that we know God? You alone have the words of eternal
life. Lord, would you speak to me?
Would you speak to me? Don't let me deceive myself. John 5, 24, the Lord said, Verily,
verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth
on him that hath sent me, hath half everlasting life. Don't
think that your believing is what rewards you with everlasting
life. That's not what it says at all.
Matter of fact, it goes on to say, it is not of him that willeth. It's not a man's will. It's not
of his... Turn with me. You're almost there.
Turn with me there. Well actually, I was thinking
about this passage in John chapter 1. Go back to John chapter 1. Verse 10. He was in the world,
and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He
came unto his own, speaking of Israel, the Jews, and his own
received him not. But as many as received him,
To them gave he power to become the sons of God. Well if I just
receive, if I'll make a decision and receive Christ, then God
will give me the power to become the sons of God, to become a
child of God. Is that what that means? No. To as many as received him,
to them gave he the power to become the sons of God. Look
at the very next verse. Look at the very next verse.
Which were born, born of God, not of blood, nor of the will
of man. This receiving the Lord Jesus Christ is not something
that I decided to do and now I'm born again because of my
decision. It's not of blood, nor of the
will of man, nor the will of flesh. It's of God. That's why it's
called eternal life. I've made this point before,
I'm going to make it again. If eternal life is something
that you received, that started at the moment that you believed,
then it wasn't eternal. John 5.24, I was trying to quote
it a minute ago, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Well, turn with
me there, now I can't remember. He that heareth my word, and
believeth on him that hath sent me, hath everlasting life, and
shall not come into condemnation. He's passed from death unto life. Do you understand? that hell
is real. I heard someone say recently,
well I don't believe in hell. You think that doesn't make it
so? I mean you talk about putting
yourself on the throne of God. for a person to believe that
because they believe something or don't believe something it
makes it so or doesn't make it so? That they can create or uncreate
a place by their own belief system? That's what God does. What God
believes is the truth. The Lord gives us everlasting
life. If He reveals to us our everlasting life, we never have
to worry about coming into condemnation. There is now, Romans chapter
8 verse 1, no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. I don't want to just escape hell. Although
I... I don't even like to think about
that. I want to know God. I want to know Him. If we're
going to know Him, we're going to know Him by His Word. By His
Word. And we don't separate the written
Word from the living Word. This book is about the Lord Jesus
Christ. We study the Word to know the
Word. Alright, let's take a break.