Let's take our Bibles and turn
with me to the book of Joshua. Joshua. I'm gonna be in Joshua
4, but I'm gonna make mention of some things out of Joshua
3. The Lord, in Joshua chapter 3, in
verse 7, had told Joshua, The Lord said unto Joshua, This day
will I begin to magnify thee in the sight of all Israel, that
they may know that as I was with Moses, so I will be with thee. The people knew who Joshua was. He was one of the spies that
was originally sent into Canaan to spy out the land. You remember
they, all these spies came back and they said, 10 of them said,
we can't do this. These people are giants. And
Joshua and Caleb were the two that said, we can take them,
we got them. God said he's gonna give it to
us. So they knew who he was, but when the Lord said, I'm gonna
magnify you, that is, he was going to magnify Joshua in the
eyes of the people as he did Moses through miracles. He was going to, people knew
that God was with Moses whenever they, again, when they came out
of Egypt, when they came across the Red Sea, They knew that Moses
was the man, but this magnifying of Joshua, he was magnified as
the Lord himself. Turn over to Acts, hold your
place, turn to Acts 2. How did the Lord magnify, how
did God the Father, let me say this, how did the Father magnify
the Lord Jesus Christ? Acts 2. 22, Acts 2.22, you men of Israel,
hear these words, Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved, that is declared,
shown, proved, a man approved of God among you, how? By miracles
and wonders and signs which God did by him in the midst of you,
as ye yourselves also know. The Lord Jesus Christ was magnified
eyes of the people according to the scriptures, by miracles,
signs, wonders. How about the apostles? Turn
to Hebrews 2, Hebrews chapter 2. Now there were a lot of people in
that time, a lot of men claiming to be sin of God. The Lord warned us, don't believe
every spirit. That is, don't believe everybody
preaching. You prove, you prove what they're preaching by the
word of God. If you can't back it up with
the word of God, don't believe them. They're liars. Now I didn't
say that, God said it. They're deceivers. They're making
merchandise of men's soul. That's what the Lord said. How
did the Lord prove his disciples to be sin of him? Hebrews chapter
two, verses one through four. Therefore, we ought to give the
more earnest heed to the things which we've heard, lest at any
time we should let them slip. For if the word spoken by angels
was steadfast and every transgression and disobedience received a just
recompensive reward, how shall we escape if we neglect so great
salvation, which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord
and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him. God also bearing them witness
both with signs and wonders and diverse miracles and gifts of
the Holy Ghost according to his own will. So the Lord bestowed
upon his disciples, his apostles, the ability to do things that
man by nature can't do. These miracles and signs and
wonders. God confirmed them. He approved
them. He showed them to be sent of
Him by these ways. So the Lord, back in Joshua,
He told Joshua, I'm gonna begin to magnify thee in the sight
of the people, that they may know that as I was with Moses,
so I will be with them. So the people, they've come through
the wilderness, being led of Moses. held the Lord's hand through
Moses. God doing these things in the
wilderness. But the Lord has taken him. The
Lord's taken Moses and now Joshua is the man of the hour. And God
is going to magnify Joshua so that the people will know. God
has called Joshua now. God took Moses and now he's raised
up Joshua. And he's going to prove. So we
go back now to the Jordan River, this river that's been mentioned
so many times in God's word. And I pray that the spirit of
God show us the wonder, the significance of this blessed crossing. They're getting ready to cross
over the Jordan into the land of promise. But before we look
at this passage right here, I want us to think back on that river,
the Jordan River. In the days of our Lord's ministry,
in the days of his humiliation, when he humbled himself, made
himself of no reputation, in the beginning of his public ministry,
when he was baptized, of John. And then after his baptism, the
Father gave him a testimony from heaven. And the Spirit of God
did too. Hold your place. Turn to Matthew
3. I want us to look at something here that's truly amazing. Matthew chapter 3. The scripture says, Matthew 3,
verse 13 to 17, then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John
to be baptized of him. But John forbade him, saying,
I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?
And Jesus answering, said unto him, suffer it to be so now,
for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness He suffered
him. And Jesus, when he was baptized,
went up straightway out of the water. And, lo, the heavens were
opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like
a dove and lighting upon him. And, lo, a voice from heaven
saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. How the Lord was magnified. Now, let me tell you what When the Lord came to John the
Baptist, John was baptizing in Jordan, in the Jordan River.
And he came to John the Baptist and told him to baptize him. John said, you want me to baptize
you? He said, I need to be baptized
of you. And the Lord said, no. It becometh
us to fulfill all righteousness. Now, I'm going to just be honest
with you. It wasn't until again, seeing
the importance of looking up these words that I think I saw
for the first time. what the Lord actually said to
him. It becometh us to fulfill all
righteousness. Now, you don't have to admit
if you didn't understand it. I'll just tell you that I, I
had failed to see the significance of it. And if you did too, we'll
just kind of learn this together. Here's what he said. He said,
this is the proper or fitting way for us to fulfill all righteousness
or that means to perform that which is right. The Lord was
going to have John the Baptist baptize him for a specific reason
to show how God Almighty is going to fulfill that which he is eternally
purpose concerning the salvation of his people. The Lord was to
be baptized of John. You think, okay, well, when we
are baptized, we're baptized because we're saying that we
trust in the Lord of this Bible, the Lord Jesus Christ. Why was
he baptized? Somebody said it was for example.
No, no, no, no. He said this is the proper way
to show how the righteousness of God is going to be fulfilled. This is the proper way to do
it. Now I want us to look at the remainder of this message
and see what the Lord was setting forth in His baptism. At the very river, at the very
river, and not only the river, at the very place, I'm going
to go ahead and tell you the end of my message right now so
you know where I'm going with this. Not only in the river,
but at the place where Jehovah years before Years before he magnified the
Lord Jesus Christ at his baptism, God Almighty was gonna magnify
a man named Joshua. And he said, back in Joshua,
in Joshua chapter four verse 14, on that day the Lord magnified
Joshua in the sight of all the people, and they feared him as
they feared Moses all the days of his life. Here's what's gonna
happen. In the book of Joshua, hundreds
and hundreds and hundreds of years before the Lord himself
was baptized in the Jordan River. Not only the river, same river,
but the same place, the same place. I'll show you this. Lord
willing, I'll show you the scriptures. Spirit of God shows us, we'll
see it. But I can tell you what the scripture says concerning
it. But at the very place, right? where the Lord himself was baptized. That's where they're going to
cross over. God Almighty, in type, picture,
shadow, accomplished something through the leadership of Joshua
that would gloriously set forth that which he magnificently accomplished
by the Savior himself, the Lord Jesus Christ, to deliver his
people from the penalty of their sin, to deliver them from death,
from hell. That death is what the Jordan
River pictured. Death is that which was set forth. And they're gonna have to get
through it. They're gonna have to go over it. They're gonna
have to get to the other side. They're wanting to go to Canaan.
And Canaan is what pictured life, life in Christ, glory, heaven,
the place of eternal rest. Canaan was that picture, that
which has been prepared, the kingdom prepared for God's people
from before the foundation of the world. And so here's Joshua
now. The Lord Jesus Christ will come
later, but God has directed them to a place, to a certain spot,
where they're gonna go over. And here's the providence of
God has brought them to this spot, and he's gonna have to
go over. And Joshua's gonna have to lead
them. Moses couldn't lead them. Moses was the picture of the
law. Moses couldn't lead the people of God into the promised
land. Why? Because the scripture says
forth in Romans 3.20, by the deeds of the law, shall no man
be justified in his sight. For by the law is the knowledge
of sin. You want to know what the law
does? It reveals what we are. This is God's demand for righteousness,
but the problem is not with the law. God's people love the law
of God. We love it. We just can't keep
it. That's the problem. So here,
the Lord is going to be shown in type here in Joshua, but then
Lord willing, at the end of this message, I'm gonna show you what
happened when the Lord was baptized. But here, scripture sets forth
that Christ, turn with me to Mark 10, while I'm coming up
to this. Christ and Christ alone, Mark
chapter 10. could answer the law's demand
for justice. Mark chapter 10, I said Christ
and Christ alone. Mark 10, listen to this request
that was made by a couple of the disciples of the Lord. Mark
chapter 10, verse 35. James and John, sons of Zebedee,
come unto him saying, we would that thou shouldest do for us
whatsoever we shall desire. And he said unto them, what would
ye that I should do to you? And they said unto him, grant
unto us that we may sit one on thy right hand, the other on
thy left hand in thy glory. But Jesus said unto them, ye
know not what ye ask. Can you drink of the cup that
I drink of? and be baptized with the baptism
that I'm baptized with? And they said unto him, we can.
Jesus said unto them, you shall indeed drink of a cup that I
drink of, and with the baptism that I'm baptized with shall
you be baptized. But to sit on my right hand and
on my left hand is not mine to give, but And I'm going to just ask
you to notice if you have italicized type in your Bible, it shall
be given them is actually added. And I think in this case right
here, it's added to try to make it more understandable. To me,
it's more understandable if I just read what the Spirit of God put
there. I'll start over and I'll just
read what the original says. He was telling, they wanted to
know, Lord, can we sit on your right hand? Can we share in your
glory? He said, you don't know what
you're asking. Can you be baptized with the
baptism that I'm going to be baptized with? Can you? They said, we can. The Lord tells
them. You shall indeed, in verse 39,
drink of the cup that I drink of. What he means is you're going
to suffer. You're going to suffer as I have
suffered. Not to the extent, obviously,
but you're going to suffer for what you believe. And with the
Baptist that I'm baptized with, you shall be baptized. You're
going to pay with your life. But to sit on my right hand and
on my left hand is not mine to give. Who gave him that? The
father, he said, that's not mine to give. The father gave me this
commission. To sit on my right hand or my
left hand is not mine to give, but for whom it is prepared. He told him of himself. He said,
to be able to be baptized with the baptism that I'm gonna be
baptized with. No, no, that was given unto me
of my father. He was telling them that he must
alone suffer. He tread the winepress of God's
wrath alone. Can we sit with you? No, you
don't know what you're asking. The Lord Jesus Christ was going
to suffer the indescribable wrath of the law. administered by the
father who was going to forsake him. My God, my God, why hast
thou forsaken me? It says in the book of Psalms,
because you're holy, you're holy. The Lord was going to be immersed
in the all-consuming judgment of God's law, the law that demands
justice He had to suffer. If they were
gonna be able to get across Jordan, death, to the other side, to
the land of promise, he's gonna have to die. He's gonna have
to be baptized in the wrath of God, in the justice of the law. And this is what's being set
forth in Joshua chapter four. The baptism of our Lord set forth
that he alone was the one prophesied, found to be willing to suffer,
to suffer, suffer. God is just. The law is just,
so that sinneth gonna die. And he who knew no sin, he was
made what we are. He bore our sin in his own body,
we said, and where sin is found, the law is just. This is why
it's so foolish for men to trust in themselves. They think by
a little, one little act of, you know, I'm sorry. I ain't
gonna get it. I ain't gonna get it. If there's
sin there, if there's chargeable sin there, thanks be unto God,
there's no condemnation to them that be in Christ Jesus. No,
why? Christ has borne their guilt and paid the debt I mean, as
they commit them, that sin's been paid for. Is it grieving
to a believer to see what he is? Absolutely. That's such an
amazing thing. We suffer seeing what we are. All the while, thanks be unto
God that he's put away our debt. So here's the Lord. The Lord
is actually the one that had to go in to the Jordan River. and suffer, that's what was being
shown when he was baptized. He was being baptized to set
forth that he was immersed in the judgment of God to show himself
to be the fulfillment of what we're gonna see them do in the
Jordan River, going across. Spirit of God turned to Isaiah
48, Isaiah 48. Holy Spirit moved Isaiah to prophesy
of being the Lord who would lead his people to the place of God's
choosing. Look at Isaiah 48, verse 16,
17. Isaiah 48, 16, come ye near unto
me, hear ye this, I have not spoken in secret from the beginning,
from the time that it was, there am I. And now the Lord God and
His Spirit has sent me. Thus saith the Lord thy Redeemer,
the Holy One of Israel, I am the Lord thy God, which teacheth
thee to profit, which leadeth thee by the way that thou shouldest
go. So it's the Lord. It's the Lord
that's gonna deliver them over Jordan River. Now to enter into
Jordan, okay, the people's gotta go across this river. That river
was deeper. than they could handle. I read
an account where it was at one spot, probably in the middle,
probably around 20 feet. That's a deep river. I mean,
you know, no bigger than it was. It wasn't that wide. Some say
that most figure it was somewhere between 20 and 30 yards wide. But it was a swift river. So to be able to to swim across
it, they ain't going to swim it. They're not going to wade
across. The only way that they're going to get across is God's
going to have to stop it. He's going to actually have to
enter in Himself and stop that flowing river, that river that
pictured the penalty of sin. You try to deal with the Jordan
River yourself, you ain't going to make it. You're
not gonna make it. You try to deal with getting
across to the other side by your choice, by your will, by your
works, you ain't gonna make it. God's gonna have to stop it.
And that's exactly what he did. Joshua chapter three, verses
nine to 17, Joshua said unto the children of Israel, come
hither and hear the words of the Lord your God. And Joshua
said, You shall know that the living God is among you and that
he will, without fail, drive out from before you the Canaanites,
the Hittites, the Hivites, Perizzites, the Girgashites, the Amorites,
the Jebusites, everything that opposes you. He's going to drive them out.
Behold, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth
passes over before you into Jordan. Now, therefore, take you 12 men
out of the tribes of Israel, out of every tribe of man. It
shall come to pass as soon as the soles of the feet of the
priests that bear the ark of the Lord, the Lord of all the
earth, shall rest in the waters, Jordan, waters of Jordan, that
the waters of Jordan shall be cut off from the waters that
come down from above. They shall stand up upon a heap. And it came to pass when the
people were moved from their tents to pass over Jordan and
the priest bearing the ark of the covenant before the people
And as they that bear the ark were come into the Jordan, and
the feet of the priests that bear the ark were dipped in the
brim of the water, for Jordan overflowed with all his banks
all the time of harvest, that the waters which came down from
above stood and rose up upon a heap very far from the city
of Adam, that is, beside Zareton, and those that came down toward
the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, failed. and will cut
off the people passed over ripe against Jericho and the priests
that bear the ark of the covenant of the Lord stood firm on dry
ground in the midst of Jordan and all the Israelites passed
over on dry ground until all the people were passed clean
over Jordan. Now, scripture says as soon the
waters had overflowed their banks during the time of harvest. So
the Banks were wider, it was wider than normal. Only time
of harvest, it flooded. And the scripture says, it says
in verse 13, as soon as it came to pass, and it shall come to
pass, as soon as the souls of the feet of the priest that bear
the ark of the Lord, as soon as they do, as soon as they rest
in, the water's gonna start standing
up. They didn't go very far. Didn't
say how far they went. It said in the midst. I always
figured middle. That was just my, you know. I
looked up the word midst. In the midst. It can mean middle. But it also means to sever, between,
to separate. As soon as the soles of their foot, as soon
as they rest, scripture says, verse 13, that right there means
to settle, to remain, to dwell, to stay. How far did they walk
into the water? Didn't say they went to the middle.
It said as soon as their foot touched and they rested, right
there. All of a sudden I realized Maybe
they didn't go to the middle. What difference did it make?
As soon as the priest's foot touched the water, they rested
right there. They stood right there. And when
those priests that were bearing that ark, when they entered that
water, they weren't alone. According to the word of Joshua,
that ark that they carried was the open manifestation, the physical
declaration that God was there. God was there. God was there
on that day. As soon as they entered, they
were going to see the glory of the precious Redeemer entering
in to the judgment. This is what was being declared. This is the only way that that
water stopped. It magnified the Lord Jesus Christ
who would stand in the stead of the people, answering God's
demand for justice and judgment and righteousness. That water
stopped because Christ answered. That was the only reason. As
he stood there, they walked across dry, dry land. Those priests
entered first, Scripture says. And there's their souls resting. All the people safely are going
to go through. Oh, the surety, surety of the
fact that the Father has given the Lord Jesus Christ to people,
and they're all going to be delivered. All that the Father giveth me.
They're all going to come to me. Joshua chapter four. I'm gonna just read 18 verses
of this, and believe me, it's not gonna be much longer. I'm gonna just show you something
that's so beautiful. Joshua four. It came to pass,
when all the people were clean, passed over Jordan, that the
Lord spake unto Moses, saying, take your 12 men out of the people,
out of every tribe, and command you them saying, take you hence
out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priest's
feet stood firm, 12 stones. And carry them, you shall carry
them over with you, and leave them in the lodging place where
you shall lodge this night. And Joshua called the 12 men
whom he had prepared of the children of Israel out of every tribe.
He had said over in chapter three, verse 12, We see, now take you
12 men out of the tribes of Israel, out of every tribe, a man, now
he had prepared, he got 12 men. I told you, I think last time,
I told you, I said these, the word witness is not there, but
these men, these men knew, they knew. He said, you call these
12 men, verse four, chapter four. Joshua called the 12 men whom
he had prepared, children of Israel, out of every tribe of
men. Joshua said unto them, pass over before the ark of the Lord
your God into the midst of Jordan, and take ye up every man of you
a stone upon his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of
the children of Israel, that this may be a sign among you,
that when your children ask your fathers in time to come, saying,
What mean ye by these stones? And you shall answer them that
the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant
of the Lord, when it passed over Jordan. The waters of Jordan
were cut off and these stones shall be for a memorial unto
the children of Israel forever. And the children of Israel did
so, as Joshua commanded, and took up 12 stones out of the
midst of Jordan, as the Lord spake unto Joshua according to
the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, carried them
over with them into the place where they lodged, and laid them
down there. Joshua set up 12 stones in the
midst of Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests
which bear the ark of the covenant stood, and they are there unto
this day, For the priests which bear the ark stood in the midst
of Jordan until everything was finished, that the Lord commanded
Joshua to speak unto the people according to all that Moses commanded
Joshua. And the people hasted and passed
over. It came to pass when all the people were clean, passed
over, that the ark of the Lord passed over, and the priest in
the presence of the people. And the children of Reuben, children
of Gad, half-tribal Manasseh, passed over, armed before the
children of Israel as Moses spake unto them. About 40,000 prepared
for war passed over before the Lord under battle to the plains
of Jericho. On that day, the Lord magnified
Joshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him, they feared
Moses, as they feared Moses all the days of his life. And the
Lord spake unto Joshua, saying, Command the priests that bear
the ark of the testimony that they come up out of Jordan. Joshua
therefore commanded the priests, saying, Come ye up out of Jordan.
And it came up, it came to pass, I'm sorry, when the priests that
bear the ark of the covenant were come up out of the midst
of Jordan, and the soles of the priest's feet were lifted up
unto dry land, that the waters of Jordan returned unto their
place, and flowed over all his banks as they did before. In that passage right there,
we saw at that crossing, it had two memorials that were set forth,
had two memorials. Each memorial was made of 12
stones. And those two memorials, those
two piles of rocks, they were gonna be a witness. They were
gonna be a witness for something. It was gonna be, a witness, and
these men were told, first of all, by Joshua, I want you to
go to the place where the priests were standing. I want you to
go to that spot right there, that fixed spot, and I want you
to take 12 stones, and I want you to bring them over. Now,
the priest was still standing there. You go to where the priest
was standing, because the priest came out last. You go there,
and you get 12 stones, and you bring them over, and you put
them where you're gonna spend the night tonight, first place.
I want you to build a memorial, take these 12 stones and pile
them up. And I want that to be a proof,
that's a proof, we arrived safely. And then I want you to take 12
more, Joshua chapter four and verse nine, that's where he said,
Joshua set up 12 stones in the midst of Jordan the place where
the feet of the priests which bear the Ark of the Covenant
stood, and they're there until this day. Now remember, I made
a point to tell you what that word midst mean, because the
river was said to be pretty deep. And these 12 stones, he said,
I want you to put them where they were, and it's a memorial.
They were seen, they could be seen. One writer, Mr. Gill, I
think it was John Gill, that said this, the water had overflowed
its banks. And when they stepped into that
water, it was wider because it overflowed banks. It was wider
than normal. So when they entered into the
widened part of it, how far they went, it didn't say. But they
were in the place of separation. That's what that word midst means. They were there in the water.
And that's where they were. Wherever they were, they could
stand there. They were standing there. And
the water backed up. And he said, I want you to put
them right there. Well, scripture says that they
set those 12 stones in the midst of that where the priest stood.
The reason for those 12 stones, first 12 was what? This is going
to say we made it over. These 12 stones are going to
be a place where we lodged tonight. We made it. You know what these
second steps, uh, stones were? This is the reason we made it.
We made it, and this is the reason we made it. The scripture says
that those stones, now I'm gonna show you two passages of scripture.
In Matthew 3, turn back to Matthew 3. Matthew chapter 3. This was a precious understanding for me. Matthew
3, verse 7 to 9. John the Baptist is baptizing. And he's having to deal with
some people. He's having to deal with some Pharisees and Sadducees.
He says in Matthew 3, 7, when he saw many of the Pharisees
and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, O generation
of vipers, Who hath warned you to flee from the wrath to come?
Bring forth therefore fruits, meat, fit, answerable for repentance. And think not to say within yourselves,
we have Abraham to our father. For I say unto you that God is
able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. When I first read that, I thought,
what stones was he talking about? Turn with me to John chapter
1. John chapter 1. John chapter 1. Verse 26, John
1. 26, 28. John 1.26, John answered them,
saying, I baptize with water, but there standeth one among
you whom you know not. He it is who coming after me
is preferred before me, whose shoes latch it. I'm not worthy
to unloose. These things were done in Bethabara,
beyond Jordan, where John was baptized, was baptizing. I looked
up Bethabara to find that. John was at a place called Bethabara. And he had just referred to these
stones. He said, God can raise up out
of these stones right here, sons of Abraham. You're claiming to
call yourselves believers because you're sons of Abraham. God can
make these stones right here. And he was baptizing at a place
called Bethabara. It means the crossing place. Place of the ford, the fording
going over. Thayer's lexicon calls it the
place of the crossing. Here was John at the very place
hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years before God had led the
nation of Israel to a spot that they were going to go over. And Joshua was told by the Lord,
when the priest carrying the ark, when the soles of their
feet touch the water, it's gonna back up. Stand up, rest of it's
gonna flow on there. And after the people were gone
across, Joshua told these 12 men that he had set aside, I
want you to go back to where those priests were standing,
Feet were firmly set where they were standing. I want you to
go back and get 12 stones and I want you to put them where
we spend the night tonight to prove we made it. And then I
want you to take 12 stones. Joshua was to take 12 stones
and he set up a memorial where they were standing. Mr. Gill said, he said, because
it was flooded, When the water would come back, he said, those
stones were there. You can still see them. I mean, it wasn't as
wide after the water had gone back to its original banks. There
was where they were standing right there to prove this was
it. And when those Pharisees and
Sadducees came and John made mention, he said, God could raise
up these stones right here to be sons of Abraham. All of that
significance, all of that truth made sense when I found out that
where he was was the place of the crossing. God Almighty had
caused his people to go across with that ark, those priests
standing there at the very spot where the Lord Jesus Christ would
come one day and come to John and say, I want you to baptize
me. Lord, I need to be baptized. No, this is proper and fitting.
This is proper and fitting that it be fulfilled this way to show
that he was the one. Set forth in tight by that ark,
he was, God was there. That's where God met with him.
That ark pictured Christ and the Lord Jesus Christ. Those,
those two memorials, that's what they were. They had two memorials. One to say, we made it. One to
say, this is why we made it. And we got two. We've got two
memorials. First memorial that we have is
called Baptism. Baptism. Now what is Baptism? What does it signify? I'm gonna
close this up. Baptism. Baptism is something
that we obediently observe. Baptism is the open, outward
manifestation that we believe that we believe. Now this is
what baptism signifies. It sets forth that we believe
that Almighty God from before the foundation of the world chose
us in Christ. That we didn't become his because
we decided to. That's what the Lord told his
disciples. He said, you haven't chosen me. I chose you. You didn't
choose me. I chose you. Baptism, I know everybody and
their brother gets baptized or they get, well they get in the
water, I understand that. Baptism is to confess that salvation
is wrought according to God's will and God's purpose, that
God chose, is to say that whenever the Lord Jesus Christ was on
the cross, as Paul the Apostle said, I was crucified with him,
I'm crucified with Christ. When He died, we were in Him,
miraculously, mysteriously. That when He was buried, when
you go down, what you're saying was He was buried, I was buried
with Him. And when He came up out of that grave, I came up
with Him. That's baptism, that's the confession of our faith.
That's what it is. Confessing that we are the Lord's
and He's died for us. And what it's saying is, We made
it. We made it on the other side
because of His choice, because of His grace. We're here. We're
in the land of rest, regenerated by the grace of God, because
God chose us to that. That's what they did. They had
a memorial saying, we made it. That's what God's people say.
I'm here by the grace of God. But why? Why did we make it? Well, that's the other one that
we're going to observe in just a minute. The Lord's Supper. The Lord's
Supper. This supper that we've been commanded to remember, the
scripture says, the Lord says, as often as you eat this bread
and drink this cup, that's out of 1 Corinthians 11. I'll read
it in just a minute when we observe this. He said, you do show, announce,
declare, publish the Lord's death. This is what you're saying when
you take the Lord's table. Still got a scripture to read,
I'm sorry. When you say that, By baptism, I believe that God
saved me, kept me. Here's the reason why, because
he bore my debt. He died. He shed his blood, his
broken body. It was broken for me. I believe
he died for me. And then I'll just end with reading
these last few verses right here. In Joshua chapter 4, 19, and
the people came up out of Jordan on the 10th day of the first
month and camped in Gilgal. in the east border of Jericho,
and these twelve stones which they took out of Jordan did Joshua
pitch in Gilgal. And he spake unto the children
of Israel, saying, When your children ask their fathers in
time to come, What mean ye these stones? Then ye shall let your children
know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry ground. For
the Lord your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before
you until you were passed over, as the Lord your God did to the
Red Sea, which he dried up from before us until we were gone
over, that all the people of the earth may know the hand of
the Lord, that it is mighty, that ye might fear the Lord your
God forever. Parents, if your kids ask you, why do
you baptize? Tell them, because the Lord has
had mercy upon me and has revealed to me that God Almighty, who
loves his people, that he bore my guilt, he bore my debt, paid
the penalty. I died with him. He put it away.
Whenever you have this Lord's Supper, what does that mean?
The Lord says you do remember, you remember, you show the Lord's
death until he comes. These two memorials, they're
not optional. As often as you do it, you do
it. You do it. It's not optional.
If God's done something for you, then confess him in baptism.
If the Lord's done something for you, remember the Lord's
table. I pray God bless this.