Bibles and turn with me to the
book of Colossians chapter 1. Colossians chapter 1. I would like to read one verse
of Scripture, verse 17. Colossians 1 verse 17. The Scripture says, is before
all things, and by Him all things consist. Let's pray together. Our Father, how wonderful it
is to call upon You and to know that, Lord, You hear and You
care. and you are able to do exceedingly
and abundantly more than we ask or think. Lord, would you bless
the services tonight for the honor of our blessed Savior and
the good and comfort and salvation of your people. For it is in
Christ's name we ask. Amen. We've come together to honor
our blessed Lord in the hearing of His gospel and in His remembrance
by partaking of His table. Yesterday morning I got up and
I providentially I'm convinced, was brought to cross paths with
this passage of Scripture that I just read. And He is before
all things, and by Him all things consist. Now, I know that there is, in
the looking at that Word, He is before. It does mean in preeminence. No doubt about that. He is preeminently
before all things. He has a name, been given a name
which is above every name. That name before which every
knee is going to bow and every tongue is going to confess that
He is Lord. But there's another sense of
the word, and it has to do with beforehand, prior to. And I'd like to look for just
a few minutes at the thought of our Lord being before, prior
to all things. His disciples at that Last Supper
had been with Him for probably about three and a half years. And about thirty years before
His open ministry began, He was born of a virgin. But that was
not where our blessed Mediator started. He is before all things. He was prior to, ever before, for Abraham to have seen his
day and to have rejoiced in seeing his day by faith. That's what the Scripture says.
Abraham, the Lord said, saw my day." He was glad. He saw by faith the God-Man Mediator. He saw God's Lamb. For Adam to have walked in the
cool of the day with God Almighty, and there has only been one way
that Almighty God has ever been seen, beheld, manifest, That's
Christ, the Mediator. Now I know as far as being openly
revealed, actually being made flesh, it was not until His incarnation,
it was not until He actually, the Word Himself, was made flesh
that He openly took unto Himself the form, the likeness of sinful
flesh. But He secretly, mysteriously,
wonderfully, in all of the divine counsels of Almighty God, He
is before all things. In His being, He was ever before
the Father Now I want us to just muse upon that glorious thought
just for a few minutes and think about this. When the Scripture
says that I was by Him as one brought up with Him, I was daily
His delight, rejoicing always before Him, set up from everlasting,
from the beginning, wherever the earth was in His being. man. He took flesh in time, but
He's always been. There was always a Mediator. The Father saw the Lamb slain
from before the foundation of the world. He always has. You stop for just a minute because,
Lord willing, in a few minutes we're going to remember Him in
the taking of supper. This do in remembrance of me.
I wanted us just for a few minutes to just take that Scripture right
there, He is before all things, and think here in the eternal
covenant of grace when Almighty God, and I know that I try to
speak of eternity in the eternal covenant of grace. Because of
the frailty of our flesh and our little fickle minds, enter
in and we think about a meeting when they got together. That
would insinuate time. And God is eternal. And I can't
even speak. I don't know how to speak in
eternal matters like this. But just using the words of Scripture
in that eternal, everlasting covenant of grace when God the
Father who purposed and chose and gave to the Son, the Son
who in His being was the mediator, was the surety, was the priest. There was always a priest. We needed a priest, a mediator,
an advocate that could touch both parties, God and man. He
was ever. a priest after the order of Melchizedek. No beginning of days. No ending
of days. No father. No mother. There was
no record, no pedigree they could go back and find. Where did he
come from? Where did he go? In that eternal
covenant of grace. He was there. There was our substitute. There was our mediator. There
was our advocate. in the very being. He would in
time take upon Him flesh. But He was there. I was ever
before Him. And our delights were with the
sons of men. Ever-purposing, ever-willing,
ever-mindful of the redemption of His people
who in time would be brought forth and created, made. Let's make man in our image.
So created He, male and female. And there He was. He was there. He who would walk upon this earth,
who the apostles said, our eyes have looked upon, our hands have
handled of the Word of life. He was there in His being when Almighty God did predestinate
for His people to be conformed to the image of His Son that
He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, in that
eternal covenant of grace, at that time, at that period, in
that covenant whom He did predestinate, them He called. He named to be
His. set Him apart. And the God-man Mediator was
there. He is before all things. And
whom He called, named, set apart, them He also justified in beholding
that Lamb slain from before the foundation of the world. And
whom He justified, them He also glorified In the eternal covenant of God's
grace, all things that God declared in that everlasting covenant
were declared according to those scriptures in the past tense. This is what He did. Done. Declaring the end from the beginning. For Almighty God to everlastingly
love His people, they must be found in the One. that pleases
the Father. They must be found in the One
who of Himself is able and willing to answer before God's law. For
God to everlastingly love a people, God's got to be satisfied. For
Him to show mercy and compassion, Christ must be before all things. Jeremiah 1.5 says, Before I formed
thee in the belly, I knew thee. And before thou camest forth
out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet
unto the nations. Acts 15.18 says, Known unto God
are all his works from the beginning of the world. Yes, Adam was the
first man openly. openly saying, but He was not
the first man. Colossians 1.16 says, For by
Him were all things created that are in heaven, that are in earth,
visible and invisible, whether they be thrones or dominions
or principalities or powers, all things were created by Him
and for Him. In the beginning, God, God, man, mediator, created the
heaven and the earth. All power, Matthew 28, 18, is
given unto me in heaven and earth. In him dwelleth all the fullness
of the Godhead bodily. John 17 says, "...as thou hast
given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life
to as many as thou hast given Him." Almighty God eternally purposed
to show mercy and compassion. All things were put into the
hands of Him who is before all things. A people. were given Him, chosen in Him
before the foundation of the world. They were His. They were His bride. They were
His beloved. They were His. It was His body.
And those people that were given Him by the Father before the
foundation of the world have a place to be with Him eternally. Therefore, He created heaven. He had a people before there
was a foundation of the world. It was by Him and it was for
Him. For Himself, He needed no place
For He is God Almighty, Spirit, omnipresent. But for His people,
He made heaven. He is before all things. A race given Him out of every
nation and kindred and tribe and tongue that would possess
a material body, flesh, glorified flesh, but flesh in which they
would ever behold Him and His glory, these that would be redeemed
from the fall that would be with Him. And He made Himself in time
in their likeness, but He created a place after they were given
Him for them. Come, ye blessed of my Father,
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of
the world. He made heaven for them, for
His people. He created the angels. Those
angels that would be ministering spirits sent forth to minister
for them who shall be heirs of salvation. He made everything for His honor,
for His glory. in the redemption of His people. And tonight as we remember Him, we remember that He who everlastingly
loved us, who is before all things, and by Him all things consist. He holds them together, keeps
them, ordered all things providentially for His Beloved. Let us remember
Him and look unto Him, praising Him, blessing Him who has ever
stood for us, ever answered for us. Oh, may the Spirit of God bless
our hearts tonight as we consider and just muse for just a moment. And He is before all things. And by Him all things consist. Lord, grant that we might be
able with a heart that longs for and strives after to remember
You in the way that You've ordained, that we remember You. In His
broken body and His shed blood. And He who created, made all
things for Him, by Him. And that, Lord,
very soon we shall stand in Your very presence and see You as
You are and be like You, made like unto Him. May the Lord bless
these words to our heart, to our comfort, for Christ's sake. Amen.