It is good to see you all here
on a cold and windy night and it's good for us to contemplate
what I'd like to talk about tonight is what is worship of God all
about. And to worship God you must come
near to Him and I've been very struck in my readings this week
I've been reading through Leviticus and I'm not sure if you're aware
of it, but there is in Leviticus 10, one of the most shocking
events recorded in scripture. In the previous chapters there's
been God, through Moses, anointing and preparing Aaron and his two
sons for ministry. And Nadab and Abihu had been
through this elaborate process again and again and they had
been reminded in all the events that led up to it out of Egypt
and all the events that led up to it on Mount Sinai, they've
been reminded again and again of the character of God and His
holiness and then they've been reminded in the building of the
tabernacle of the way man is to approach God. Because to worship
God is to come into His presence. To worship God is to honour Him
for who He is. Anyway, but in Leviticus Chapter
10 is one of those appalling instances of of man and his disobedience. You don't have to turn there,
we'll look at it. I'm looking at Luke chapter 18,
but it's the same theme that's throughout the scriptures. And
Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them, his
censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and
offered strange fire before the Lord, which he commanded them
not. and there went fire out from
the Lord and devoured them, and they died before the Lord. And then Moses said to Aaron,
Leviticus 10.3, said unto Aaron, This is it that the Lord spake,
saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me, and
before all people I will be glorified. Aaron had just lost two of his
sons. and he wasn't to say a word and
nor was his family to go in mourning to him. You can read the rest
of the story in Leviticus chapter 10. I suppose the point is, isn't
it, that our God is holy and those who come near to him need
to come near to him with reverence and awe and he will be worshipped. But he does make that remarkable
statement, he will be sanctified, he will be seen and set apart
as holy in those that come nigh him. To come nigh him is to have
eternal life. To come nigh him is to be aware
of his holiness. And of course man is compulsively
religious. So if you turn in your scriptures
to Luke 18, And we just want to look briefly
this evening at this story, the story of all humanity. This story
encompasses all human beings. It's the story of two people
coming into the presence of God. It's the story of two men. One goes home justified before
God. The other one goes home in exactly
the same state that he did before. Let's read this story in Luke
chapter 18 verse 9. And he spake this parable unto
certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and
despised others. Two men went up into the temple
to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a Republican. The Pharisee
stood and prayed thus with himself. God, I thank thee that I am not
as other men are, extortioners, unjust adulterers, or even as
this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give
tithes of all that I possess, and the publicans standing afar
off. would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but
smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me, a sinner."
But in fact, you can cross out that word, a, it is the definite
article, God be merciful to me, the sinner. I tell you, this
is the Lord Jesus speaking, I tell you, this man went down to his
house justified. This man went down to his house
having been justified rather than the other. This is the law
of the Kingdom of Heaven, isn't it? For everyone that exalteth
himself shall be abased, and he that humbleth himself shall
be exalted. And so the reality is, isn't
it, we have in this world of ours and in this religious world,
we have many, many people coming supposedly to a house of worship,
supposedly coming into the presence of God, supposedly coming to
the temple of God, supposedly coming to pray. And the simple
lesson, of course, out of all this, isn't it, is that if there's
any religious activity in any religion that allows you To boast
in what you've done and allows you to compare yourself favourably
against others, to despise others, is damning to your soul. God will be seen as holy in the
presence of those who come near Him. And our prayer should be
that the Lord would make us like that public and that He would
cause us to be cleansed from the self-righteous pharisee that
Angus Fisher is all the time. Adam is self-righteous. So here
we have a remarkable description of all of humanity. We have the
natural man and we have the child of God. And the remarkable thing
is, isn't it, as this parable shows us, this extraordinary
message from the Lord Jesus, all the righteous people. All the righteous people in the
world, and there aren't a lot of them, all the righteous people
believe themselves to be wicked. All the righteous people believe
themselves to be wicked, and all the wicked people believe
themselves to be righteous. Even if they're not 100% righteous
now, they believe, just give me enough time, enough time and
the right circumstances, I will be righteous. We're born Pharisees. And I need to remind us yet again,
we need to think deeply and seriously about these things. because it's self-righteousness.
It's self-righteousness that keeps people from coming to Christ. It's self-righteousness that
keeps people from being humbled before God. It's self-righteousness
that keeps people out of the Kingdom of God. It's not our
sins, but it's our self-righteousness. And every self-righteous person
has two very, very serious problems. They have absolutely no idea
of what they are in themselves. and they have absolutely no idea
of the character of God. And as we see in verse 9, self-righteous
religion is always looking at others. All it's doing is always
looking at the flesh and looking at fleshly activities. It's always
comparing itself with another. If your religion allows you to
compare yourself favourably with others, then be very, very fearful
of it. Self-righteous religion is always
judgmental. That's what these people were
doing. It is just the natural product, isn't it, of self-righteousness,
is despising others. The self-righteous people are
thankful, aren't they, as this Pharisee was, that there are
wicked people and he can see them and he can think that he's
better than the others. The word Pharisee means separated
ones. They were separated in their
own mind from the world. They were separated by their
devotion to the law. They were separated by their
zeal for nation Israel. They were separated by their
self-righteousness. The publicans, of course, aren't
just notorious sinners. The publicans were tax collectors
in those days. So there they were. They were
Jewish people who were servants of Rome. And in the tax system
of that day, what they had to do was collect a certain amount
of money and anything above that they could collect, they could
pocket for themselves. And so not only were they polluted
by handling money, they were polluted by being Jewish traitors
to Rome and they were polluted by being extortionate thieves. And so they were just openly
despised and hated. But the Pharisee stood, verse
11. The Pharisee came before God.
He went up to the temple to pray. They both went up there thinking
that they were praying. And we just look at the attitude
of this man. The Pharisee stood. There's no bowing and there's
no reverence. And then he prayed thus with
himself. The Lord's description of the
prayer of this man is remarkable, isn't it? Our God knows the hearts
of people. He thanked God. He used the personal pronoun
I five times, didn't he? He prayed thus to himself, God,
I thank Thee that I'm not as other men are. So he's a Calvinist,
this fellow. He's not attributing his change
and his good behaviour and his righteousness, he's not attributing
it to free will. The Pharisees were Calvinists.
They believed in limited atonement. They believed in election. They
believed that God had a chosen people. They believed that that
chosen people were going to be saved. They believed in the things
that Calvinists believe in. I thank God. I thank God that
I'm not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, even as this
publican." So he looks to his members. So he came to the temple. He came to the temple thinking
that he was praying. He came to the temple to be seen
as men. He came to the temple to tell
God how very good he was. He trusted in his own deeds. He trusted in his own deeds as
his righteousness. He came with no need. He came
needing no favour. He came needing no grace. And
he despised others. He couldn't even pretend to pray
to God without despising others. In fact, the badness, the reality
of the sinner who was there beside him was a cause for him to esteem
himself greatly in his own eyes. He prayed thus with himself. There's no confession of sin.
There's no need of mercy, there's no grace, there is no worship
of God. There's no reference to the character
of God at all. But he makes one true statement,
doesn't he? I'm not as other men are. I'm
not as this publican is. We'll see at the end of the story,
won't we, that there's a remarkable difference between the two of
them. He's ignorant of the character of God, as I said earlier, and
he's ignorant of his own character. In fact, so ignorant that he
is nothing but a liar. Turn with me to Romans chapter
1. I want you to see this in the
scriptures. I'll start in verse 28 of Romans
chapter 1. And even as they did not like to retain God in their
knowledge, God gave them over. What a shocking phrase that is,
God gave them over. God has given this society of
ours over. God has given multitudes of people
over. It is the most shocking sentence,
isn't it? That God allows men to just go
their own way. to harden their hearts against
it. God gave them over to a reprobate
mind to do those things which are not convenient. Being filled
with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness,
full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity, whisperers,
backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of
evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant
breakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful, who,
knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things
are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure
in them that do them. Therefore thou art inexcusable,
O man. Whosoever thou art that judges,
for wherein thou judges another, thou condemnest thyself. For thou that judges does the
same thing. So this Pharisee was a liar.
In God's sight he was a liar. He bragged about the fact, didn't
he, that he's not an extortioner. But God said he is. He bragged
about the fact that he's not unjust. He bragged about the
fact that he's not an adulterer. He bragged about those things
and God said he does them. In his judging, he does them. He does them. The Pharisee is
a wicked man who believes himself righteous. In fact, in reality,
he's an unbeliever. He never vowed to the Lord Jesus
Christ. He never believed the Gospel. Now come to the publican. You
are, I remind you brothers and sisters, you are one of these
two. Every human being on planet earth
is one of these two. The publican, what a contrast
grace makes. One was full of pride and one
humility. One confidence in himself and
the other one dependent. He went to the only place And
he went to the only one who could ease his pain and unburden him. You see, he stood afar off. He
stood afar off. He would have known the thoughts
and he would have known the words of the Pharisees and the others.
He stood afar off, humbled, humbled. He kept the distance. He kept
the distance because his sense of unworthiness, his unfit, He's
unfit, a notorious public sinner. How does he come into the presence
of God? He would not look so much as
lift up his eyes to heaven. He was humbled. His eyes had
seen. He made them look down to the
earth. And he smote upon his breast. He smote upon his breast. His problem was deeper, wasn't
it? His problem was a heart problem
and he smote his heart. He's a sinner. A sinner by birth,
a sinner by nature, a sinner by practice, a sinner in his
heart. It's a real confession. Real
confession of sin is to sigh the same thing as God. That's
what the word confession means, to sigh the same, to have the
same opinion as God has. He cried sighing. He just spoke
Seth spoke simply to God of his need. He had no need to look
to other men in comparison. There was only one issue, wasn't
there, for this man. The issue was him and God. There
was now nothing for him to bring. He calls himself the sinner. The sinner. The sinner is a precious
thing. The Holy Spirit makes them so. Only real sinners are made to
be sinners by God Himself. As David said, against you and
you only have I sinned and done this wickedness, evil in your
sight. He realised that a holy God in
righteous justice must condemn him. But he makes this remarkable
statement, doesn't he? He says, God be merciful, God
be merciful to me, the sinner. So he makes no promise, does
he? Doesn't promise to be good, doesn't
promise to be better. He just comes to God, laying
out his case before him. It's a very, very special, important
thing to do, isn't it? Just come to God as we are, just
lay out our life before him. He knows everything, brothers
and sisters. He knew the hearts of these two men. He knows our
hearts, he knows our ways. We just lay out our life before
him. And I love what he says. He says,
God be merciful. That word merciful is a glorious
word, isn't it? He says, God be propitious to
me. God be propitious to me." See,
maybe he'd heard, as a sinner, maybe he'd heard John the Baptist
say, Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Maybe he'd heard those sermons
and heard those stories. about the Lord Jesus, that sacrifice
for sins, that Lord Jesus who honoured God's holy law and he
magnified it and he kept it and he satisfied the justice of God
in all of its holiness. And he says, God be merciful
to me, God be propitious to me, I can't do anything about my
sin myself. I can't do anything about my
sin myself, but you may." He comes as a beggar. The same word
for propitiation is the word mercy seat. It's that seat that
covered God's broken law, that place where God, on the basis
of bloodshed, meets with sinners and is gracious to them. It is
a place where God has communion with sinners through blood shed. Let's turn over to Romans. It's
mentioned several times in the New Testament Scriptures. We'll
just look at a few of them this evening. They're glorious texts
of Scripture. In Romans 3.25, it speaks of
the Lord Jesus Christ. It speaks of being justified
freely by His grace, verse 24, through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth to be a propitiation. It means whom God foreordained
to be a propitiation, whom God set forth in the Gospel in all
the Old Testament promises of sacrifice and acceptance of sacrifice. God set Him forth to be a propitiation
through faith in His blood, And this propitiation is to declare
His righteousness for the remission of sins that have passed through
the forbearance of God. To declare, I say, at this time,
His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of
him which believeth in Jesus. He looked to God. He looked to
the character of God. He looked to acknowledge the
holiness of God. He looked to acknowledge what
He was. He looked to the One that was
set forth. Our Lord Jesus Christ, His sacrifice
was an offering of a sweet-smelling savour to His Father, and the
Father is well pleased with His sacrifice. He gave him contentment
and satisfaction because his justice was appeased and the
demands of his law were answered. Yea, it was magnified and made
honourable, said Mr Gill. It was set forth, the Lord Jesus
was set forth as this propitiation in the eternal purposes of God.
He's set forth in all the Old Testament promises and prophecies
and pictures. He's set forth in the human nature
of our Lord Jesus Christ, born of a woman, made under the law,
in that body that was prepared for Him by God. And He's set
forth by the Spirit of God in the preaching of the Gospel.
My little children, 1 John 2.2, my little children, these things
write I unto you, that you sin not. And if any man sins, we
have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. And
he is the propitiation for our sins, and not only ours, but
also for the sins of the whole world. Obviously a reference
to all of the elect, both Jew and Gentiles throughout the world.
We have an advocate. We have an Advocate, and He is
the propitiation for our sins. 1 John 14 says, The love of God
is manifest towards us, because God sent His Son into the world,
that we might live through Him, here in His love, not that we
loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the
propitiation for our sins. It is an act of God by which
God removes from all of His people on the basis of the work of the
Lord Jesus any reason whatsoever for any wrath. And all that remains
between God and His people is just love and grace and mercy. Colossians 1.20 speaks of it
so well, doesn't it? And having made peace through
the blood of his cross by him to reconcile all things unto
himself, by him I say whether they be things in earth or things
in heaven, and you that were sometime alienated and enemies
in your mind by wicked works, hath he now reconciled in the
body of his flesh through death to present you. holy, unblameable,
unapprovable in His sight. This is where the sinner was,
wasn't it? The one who was a sinner was
looking. He was looking for God to be
propitious. He was actually looking to God
and going to God saying, will you please look to your son and
find in your son the reason for all the removal of all my sin. Remove my sins from me, is what
he's saying. Remove them from me and make
it so that even though I am wicked in my own sight, that I am not
guilty before you at all. Why? For those whom the Lord
is propitious to, they have no sin, no sin at all before a holy
and righteous God. No sin, no reason for God to
be anything other than merciful and gracious and loving. God
be merciful to me, the sinner. What a great prayer to pray.
Nothing elaborate about it, nothing about I and what I've done, nothing
about the things that I've done and the things that I haven't
done. No bragging about anything, no bragging about fasting, no
bragging about tithing, no bragging about what I possess. All I have
is that I'm a sinner. God be merciful to me, a sinner. And the response of the Lord
Jesus Christ. This is worship, isn't it? This
man actually worshipped God. Only one of these men worshipped
God. I love the Lord's response. Isn't it wonderful when our Lord
Jesus speaks with such remarkable authority. He says, I tell you,
I tell you. When the Lord Jesus Christ speaks,
he speaks all the power and authority and the truth of almighty God.
He says, I tell you, this man went down to his house having
been justified rather than the other. He went down to his house, justified. He acknowledged the character
of God. He acknowledged the faithfulness
of God to his promises in his Son. He acknowledged through
faith in his blood. He's justified. As Romans puts
it so beautifully in Romans 5, 1 and 9, it speaks, doesn't it? Therefore being justified. He was delivered over for our
offences and raised again for our justification. Therefore
being justified. See, justification is not an
offer. Justification is an act of God
on the basis of the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. It's a declaration
of God about who these people are. Therefore being justified
by faith. We have peace with God through
our Lord Jesus Christ, Romans 5.9. Much more than being now
justified by His blood, shall we be saved from wrath through
Him. Justification is an immediate
declaration by God, isn't it? It's not an offer. He does it
in the Lord Jesus Christ and he declares it. Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? I know something of my own conscience
and I know something of yours. There will be a whole lot of
opportunities for you and for other people to lay something
to your charge. And there is one place where
they cannot lay it to your charge, brothers and sisters. They cannot
lay it to your charge in the courts of God. Who shall lay
anything to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifies. He justifies, and as we saw in
Romans 3, he does it with justice and he does it freely. He does
it freely. Romans 3.24, justified freely. That word freely means without
cause. So the cause is not in us, brothers
and sisters. The cause of the Gospel is in
the Lord Jesus Christ. justified freely. That's why
justification is by grace. It's the gift of God. No wonder
people are horrified when scriptures speak in terms as Romans 4 does,
isn't it? But to him that worketh not, but believeth
on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness."
Two necessary requirements of getting into heaven, aren't they? Two simple requirements. You
have to be wicked. You have to be wicked and you
have to be a believer. Believing wicked people go to
heaven. The self-righteous people are
left, left in their self-righteousness. They're justified by His blood. And as I said at the beginning,
there is a simple equation, isn't it? in the mathematics of heaven,
in the courts of heaven. You can read it there at the
end of verse 14. For everyone that exalteth himself
shall be abased. It's one of the things that is
so troubling, isn't it, when we try and witness to people
about the Lord Jesus Christ. What is the issue again and again
and again? that people are exalted in their
own minds, exalted in their own estimation, and they think that
they are too good and too worthy to need the wonderful things
of the Gospel. He that exalteth him, everyone
that exalteth himself shall be abased. and he that humbleth
himself shall be exalted. This is worship, brothers and
sisters. This is the true worship of God. This is coming into the
presence of God. as this publican did, a notorious
public sinner went home to his house, justified, justified by
God. May the Lord cause us to be humbled. One of the interesting things
about the word disciple is that a disciple is a learner. That's
what the word disciple means, to be a learner. I've met so
many religious people who have learnt so much that they're no
longer in need of learning. May the Lord continue to humble
us. May the cry of a publican be
the cry that comes from our hearts in our private time with God.
God, be merciful. God, be propitious to me, the
sinner. My Father in Heaven, will you
look to your Son on my behalf? I have nothing to bring. I simply
want to look to Him. I want to look at the very place
that you find your satisfaction. God is pleased with His Son.
He's pleased with his son in his life. He's pleased to bruise
him. He's pleased to raise him from
the dead. He's pleased to exalt him. May
the Lord cause us to find ourselves pleased in the things that God
the Father is pleased in. Find ourselves pleased in the
one that God the Father is pleased in. Let's pray.