Alright brethren, Isaiah 55. Now we were here last week and
we saw how that from Isaiah 53 the Lord came, He laid down His
life, He saved His people, justified His people. In Isaiah 54 He begins
declaring all His covenant promises to the church. And in Isaiah
55, the Lord called His people to come to Him, come to Christ. And at the end of verse 3, He
says, And I will make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure
mercies of David. Now, God made a covenant with
David when the pre-incarnate Lord Jesus called David. The
Lord really made a covenant with David. But David, he's a type
of Christ here. And it's Christ who made the
covenant with God the Father. And Christ came and fulfilled
every covenant promise. And his promises now for his
people, they're yes and they're amen. They're absolutely sure
and certain because of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's what
God's declaring here. He's declaring here, you come
to me, I'll make an everlasting covenant with you, even the sure
mercies of David. Behold, I've given him, and speaking
of Christ here, I've given him for a witness to the people,
a leader and commander to the people. Behold, now listen, this
speaks of Christ. Thou shalt call a nation that
thou knowest not. and nations that knew not thee
shall run unto thee, because of the Lord thy God, and for
the Holy One of Israel, for he hath glorified thee. He raised
Christ to his right hand, gave him all power, and he said, these
people are going to flee to him. So he says to his people now,
seek ye the Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while
he's near, let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous
man his thoughts, and let him return unto the Lord, and he
will have mercy upon him and to our God for he will abundantly
pardon. Brethren, Christ is salvation. He is salvation. When you read
this book, you'll find out from cover to cover, this is the word
of God. It's the word of Christ and it's
the word concerning Christ. He's the incarnate word, he's
the word that gave this word, and this word is all about him. He is salvation. He is, he's
the covenant itself. He's the messenger of it. He's
the one that fulfilled everything written in the covenant, and
he is himself the covenant of his people. And brethren, God
gave him. God gave his only begotten son. That's how our text begins. Behold,
I have given him. I've given him. God has given
his son, and because he's well pleased with the finished work
of his son, he exalted him to his right hand. That's what the
end of verse five said. For he has glorified thee. He
raised him up to his right hand, gave him all power over all things. Let me show you that. Let's go
to Ephesians 1. Ephesians 1. He says in verse 19, he's praying
that the Lord's saints would know the exceeding greatness
of His power to us who believe. How much power did it take to
give you faith to trust Christ, to make you alive spiritually
and give you faith? He said, according to the working
of His mighty power which He wrought in Christ when He raised
Him from the dead and set Him at His own right hand in heavenly
places. It took the same power of God
to regenerate you and me who were dead sinners as it did to
raise Christ from the dead. But look where he is now, look
how God glorified him. He's far above all principality
and power and might and dominion and every name that's named not
only in this world but also in that which is to come. And he
has put all things under his feet and gave him to be head
over all things to the church, which is his body, the fullness
of him that filleth all in all. And because he has that glory,
and you hath he quickened who were dead in trespassing and
sin. You see, this is our Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the head of the church. He is everything his people need,
and he's the one that will fill all. He filleth all in all. First off, I want you to really
get this point that the Lord Jesus Christ is the gift of God. He is the gift of God to his
people. Behold, I have given him. 2 Corinthians
9.15 says, thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift. And the Lord Jesus is God's unspeakable
gift. Why did the Son of God have to
come down and take flesh? Why did he have to, why was it
a must that God come down and take flesh and live under the
law and then go to the cross and lay down his life? Why did
he do that? Because when Adam sinned in the
garden, we became totally, completely ruined. Totally, completely ruined. Guilty before the law of God.
guilty before holy God. We became, being born of Adam,
we came from our mother's womb speaking lies. We were sinners
in our nature, therefore we sin. There's only two men in this
world who sinned to become sinners. I mean, one man. Only one man
in this world that sinned to become a sinner. That's Adam.
Adam. He was made upright, but when
he transgressed the law God gave him, He became a sinner. You
and me don't sin to become sinners. You and me sin because that's
what we are. We come forth sinners. The Lord
Jesus Christ, now you think about this. If you want to try to come
to God in the law, think of this. Adam was upright. He had no sin
in his heart. He's in a perfect world where
there was no sin. He had one law, that's all. The Lord said, you can eat of
all these trees I've given, but in the day you eat of the tree
of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt surely die.
And yet Adam sinned. How do you think you're gonna
do? You already come into the world guilty. You come into the
world with a corrupt nature. There's over 600 laws that God
gave at Mount Sinai. The world's full of sin and corruption. Scripture says every thought
of the imagination of our heart is only evil continually. So do we imagine we could keep
the law? Do we imagine we can fulfill
the law? Not at all. That's why God had
to come in human flesh. He came to honor his law, to
magnify his law, to declare his holy character, how he's holy
and he's just, and will by no means clear the guilty. And he
came to justify his people. That's why he came. So God gave
his son. Christ Jesus is God providing
himself a lamb. Just like Abraham declared to
Isaac when they're going up that mountain, and they had the wood,
they had the fire, but they didn't have the lamb. And Isaac, he's
not a, Little fella, he's big enough, he's a man, he knows
we have to have a lamb to come to God. He said, Father, here's
the wood, here's the fire, where's the lamb? And Abraham said, my
son, God will provide himself a lamb. And one day John the
Baptist was preaching and Christ comes walking up and John the
Baptist pointed at him and said, behold the lamb of God, here
he is. The Lord Jesus came into this
world to declare God's righteousness. Go with me to Romans chapter
3. He came to declare God is righteous. Look here now. Romans 3. Now just to be sure you see this,
look at here. Let's just see what the book
says about you and me by nature. Verse 12. I'm sorry, let's go
on back up here to verse 10. There is none righteous, no not
one. You see that? God says there's
none righteous, no not one. There's none that understandeth,
there's none that seeketh after God. He says they're all gone
out of the way. They're together become unprofitable.
There's none that doeth good, no not one. And then, look down here. In
verse 17, the way of peace have they not known? There's no fear
of God before their eyes. You can read the rest later,
but he talks about what we are, what we do, nothing but sin.
So, verse 19 says, we know what things whoever the law saith,
it saith to them who are under the law, that every mouth may
be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God.
Therefore, by the deeds of the law, there shall no flesh be
justified in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin.
But here's the righteousness of God, verse 22. He said, verse
21, now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested,
being witnessed by the law and the prophets. The law and the
prophets declare the righteousness of God. They declare Christ,
even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ. He's the righteousness of God.
It's by his faith. It's by his obedience. unto all
and upon all them that believe. There's no different. All have
sinned and come short of the glory of God. He were justified
freely by His grace to the redemption that's in Christ Jesus, whom
God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood to
declare His righteousness. That's what God was doing with
Christ, declaring His righteousness. He's showing here how that God
was righteous to forbear with us from Adam until Christ came. To forbear and defer His anger
until Christ came. Because Christ came, verse 26,
to declare, I'll say it this time, His righteousness, that
God might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. That's why Christ came. That's
the first reason for the cross is for God. God is fulfilling
His law. The law said the soul that sins
shall die. It shall die. And so for God
to save a sinner, that sinner's got to die under the law. And
Christ Jesus, the Son of God, came and laid down His life in
the place of chosen sinners. Sinners God trusted to Him. He
came and laid down His life and He declared the righteousness
of God. How righteous is God? How just
is God? How holy is God? When He made
Him sin for us, and sin was found in His Son, God spared not His
own Son. He delivered Him up for His people.
That's how just God is. But when He did that, He finished
the work, brethren. Christ said, it is finished.
And He justified His people from our sin. He justified His people
from our sin. Now, because God raised Him,
and gave him this glory. Now what Christ is doing is he's
calling his people and telling us this good news and making
us to rest in him through faith and trust him to carry us all
the way into glory. That's why this is the record. This is God's record. This is
the record. God hath given to us eternal
life and this life is in his son. He that hath the son hath
life. He that hath not the son hath
not death. Do you have Christ? Do you trust
Christ? Is He the only hope you have
of being accepted of God? Not anything you added, not anything
you've done, Him alone. Are you persuaded that even though
you still see sin in yourself, it doesn't change what Christ
has accomplished for His people? We're righteous in Christ. We
don't add to what He did and we can't take away from what
He did. He made His people righteous. And if you have the Son, you
have life. I pray God today would make somebody know for the first
time that Christ Jesus is their righteousness. I pray the Lord
would do that for somebody today. He's saving somebody. Somewhere
in this world, our Lord's gonna save somebody. Oh, I pray you believe Him. Look
here now. Secondly, let's go back to our text. The purpose
for which God gave Christ was to be a witness to the people.
He said in verse 4, I gave him for a witness to the people.
You know, somebody might argue and say, no, but I believe that's
speaking to David. Well, if it is speaking to David,
he's a witness. He made him a witness. You'd
see in David a man who was saved entirely by God, by the Lord
Jesus Christ alone. Because David was a sinner. David
couldn't have saved himself, but let me show you. I want to
make sure you see this as speaking of Christ. Go with me again to Acts 13. We looked at this last week,
but I want you to see it again. Acts 13. You remember when Peter
preached on the day of Pentecost, he quoted some Psalms where the
Lord said, promised you'll not suffer your holy one to seek
corruption, and then he said, That's speaking of Christ. And
he said David knew it was speaking of Christ. Well, that's so in
our text. When he speaks of the sure mercies
of David, he's speaking of the Lord Jesus. Let me show you that
again. Peter's preaching almost the
same message. Try to see where to begin. It says in verse 30, God raised
him from the dead, speaking of Christ, and he was seen Many
days of them which came up with him from Galilee to Jerusalem,
who are his witnesses unto the people, and we declare unto you
glad tidings, how that the promise which was made unto the fathers,
God hath fulfilled the same unto us, their children, in that he
hath raised up Jesus again, as it's also written in the second
Psalm, thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee. And
as concerning that he raised him up from the dead, now no
more to return to corruption, he said on this wise, I will
give you the sure mercies of David. Wherefore, he saith also
in another psalm, Thou shalt not suffer thine holy one to
see corruption. For David, after he had served
his own generation by the will of God, fell on sleep, and was
laid unto his fathers, and saw corruption. But he whom God raised
again saw no corruption. Be it known unto you therefore,
men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you
the forgiveness of sins, and by him all that believe are justified
from all things from which could not be justified by the law of
Moses. I pray the Lord today would make
you really truly believe on the Lord Jesus. That's the only way
a sinner can be saved. God received none else, but he
gave him for a witness. Do you see that? You see that
we're talking here about the Lord Jesus. God raised him up. God glorified him. And he's the
witness. He's the, in scripture, he's
called the Bishop of our souls. That's a preacher. He's called
the prophet. That's a preacher. He's called
the shepherd, which in the original language means pastor. That's
who Christ is. He's the witness. He sends the
gospel to his people. God is invisible. He's the invisible
God. You can't see God. He's spirit.
Scripture says, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom he
has sent, he is sent to reveal God to us. Christ said, if you've
seen me, you've seen the Father. He's the witness. Everything
God has to say about himself, he's saying it through his son.
He said, all things are delivered unto me of my Father, and no
man knoweth the Son, but the Father neither knoweth any man.
The Father saved the Son, and He to whomsoever the Son will
reveal Him. He has to come to us and bear
witness in our hearts. He has to create a new heart
in us, and He has to bear witness in our heart that He's the Son
of God. He has to reveal Himself in our heart, or we can't know
Him. He's the witness to His people of the holiness of God.
We see in Christ crucified how holy God is. He wouldn't spare
his son. He's not going to spare anybody
else. And the reason it's so dishonoring to God and such an
offense to God for men to try to come by their works rather
than trusting Christ is because Christ is God's son and he laid
down his life and he magnified God's love. He honored it so
fully. He so pleased God. That's His
Son and He will not take any sinner, like you and me, a rotten
sinner, trying to steal that glory that belongs to Christ.
He won't have that. He'll only receive us in His
Son. And it's only by Christ that
we truly have the witness. Look with me at John 1. Look
here. John 1, you're not going to get
this witness in the letter of the law. The people that crucified
our Savior, they did what they did. They were very religious. They did what they did, calling
on God and saying they were doing what they were doing for the
glory of God. Because without the Spirit of
God being our teacher, without Christ being the witness in our
heart, we can't know Him. but grace and truth came by Christ. Look at this, John 1.14 says,
the word, Christ the word was made flesh and dwelt among us,
and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten
of the Father, full of grace and truth. For the law was given
by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. Now, no
man has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son, which
is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. You see,
He's the witness. He's the witness. God gave Him
to be a witness. Look at the next thing in our
text. God said, I've given Him for a witness to the people,
a leader to the people. A leader, the original is a prince. He's a prince, he's the one who
leads his people in the way we must go in order to be saved.
See, if God's gonna get all the glory, that means he has to do
all the saving. And it begins for us, our experience
of it begins with him coming to us. And this is how he's gonna
come, right here. He's gonna come through the preaching
of the word. He's gonna say through the preaching of the gospel,
faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the word of God. But it's
gonna be more than me speaking the word of God, it's gonna be
Christ speaking the word of God into the heart. Look at Isaiah
48, this will show it. It gave him to be a leader of
the people, Isaiah 48, 17. 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. That's the only way we know the
way, is by Christ leading us. Again, go to John 3.16. This
is so familiar, and everybody wants to quote this, but most
people don't read past John 3.16. I want you to see what it says. For God so loved the world. The word so means after this
manner. And why is that important? Because
he told Nicodemus, you must be born again. That's the manner
in which God's love. He must cause us to be born of
the water of the word and of the Holy Spirit. Christ said,
we speak that we do know. That's the manner in which God
saves. He saves through the preaching of the gospel. Christ said, as
Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must
the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever looketh on him
will be saved. That's the manner in which God
loved. Christ had to go to the cross and be crucified, and it's
through faith in him. And so he says, for God, after
this manner, loved the world. that he gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but
have everlasting life. Faith in Christ is opposite to
you doing anything. That's what he's saying. It's
not by you doing, it's by Christ. Trust Christ alone. But here's
the problem. Here's where people never read
to. Look, for God sent not his Son into the world to condemn
the world, but that the world through him might be saved. He
that believeth on him is not condemned. But he that believeth
not is condemned already because he hath not believed in the name
of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation.
Here it is. That light is coming to the world. And men loved darkness rather
than light because their deeds were evil. Everyone that doeth
evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his
deeds should be reproved. Now that's where we are, that's
it, that's the condition we're in. By nature we love darkness
and we hate the light. Christ is that light, we hate
him. We won't come to Christ in the light because we don't
want our deeds to be reproved. And the deeds here, it's not
only all our sinful, wretched works that we've done, but it's
our good works that by nature we think God will receive us
because of our good works. And a sinner by nature does not
want to be told by God that God will not receive your works.
He won't receive you and save you by your works. Men hate that
message. They want to be told they can
do something to save themselves. So there we are, hating the light,
in darkness, trusting in our own works, and thinking God's
going to receive us. That's where we would stay if
it wasn't for Christ being the witness to his people. But look at the next verse. But
he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may
be made manifest, that they're worked in God. their work in
God. Christ worked the deeds by which
we're saved. So Christ comes and he calls
that sinner that's in darkness to himself and brings him out
of the light. I mean out of the darkness. He
brings him into the light. Look at Isaiah 49. Look at verse 9. God said, well let's read verse
eight. Thus saith the Lord in an acceptable
time, have I heard thee in a day of salvation, have I helped thee?
He's speaking to Christ. He said, and I will preserve
thee and give thee for a covenant of the people. That's pretty
much what he's saying in our text. He gave Christ to be a
witness. He said, I'll give you to be a covenant of the people,
to establish the earth, to cause to inherit the desolate heritages
that thou, now listen, that thou mayest say to the prisoners,
to you and me, in the prison of our dead sin nature, in darkness,
hiding from Him, unwilling, unable to come to the light, that thou
mayest say to the prisoners, go forth. To them that are in
darkness, show yourselves. That's how we're brought to the
light. He's a witness and a leader. He comes and bears witness of
the gospel, that He's the gospel, that He's the covenant, He's
the righteousness, He's the wisdom, He's salvation, and He leads
us out of that darkness to Him, to trust Him. That's how we're
saved. That's the manner in which God
loves His people scattered all over this world. And He keeps leading us, and
keeps leading us, and He'll never let us go. He keeps leading us,
and keeps leading us, and he will never let his people go. But listen to this now, he's
also a commander. God gave him to be a witness,
and a leader, and a commander. A commander is somebody who,
when he commands, it's effectual. When the king says come, the
servants come. Christ's word, when he speaks,
When he says, let there be light, there's light. When he speaks
to the heart of a sinner and says, let there be life, there's
gonna be life. And when he says, let there be
light, there's gonna be light. And when he says, believe on
me, they're gonna believe on him. When he says, come to me,
they're coming to him. He is the power of God. Look with me in Psalm 110. Very
familiar, but I want you to see it. Psalm 110. And look at verse three. Speaking of the Lord, let's read
verse one. The Lord said unto my Lord, sit
thou at my right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool.
The Lord said unto my Lord. That's what David wrote to him.
He said, The Lord said unto my Lord. Sit thou at my right hand
till I make thine enemies thy footstool. The Lord shall send
the rod of thy strength out of Zion. That's the gospel. Rule
thou in the midst of thine enemies. Now listen to what God says to
his son. Thy people, thy people. He does this for his people.
Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, from the
womb of the morning thou hast to do of thy youth. When he says,
come to me, he makes you willing. He gives you a heart to come
to him. He's the commander of his people,
the commander. So then, Romans 9, 16, so then
it's not of him that willeth, it's not of our will that we're
saved. We didn't have a will. You search these scriptures,
you think in them you have life, and you will, you will, you will
not come to me that you might have life. Christ, it's not of
him that willeth, not of him that runneth, it's not of him
that's doing his works, it's of God that shows mercy. And look, go with me to Isaiah
40. Isaiah 40, a man is, he's, He's trying to please God. He's
trying to do all these works. And when the Lord speaks and
the Spirit of the Lord bears witness in the heart, He makes
you to know the works are finished. Christ perfected His people.
The works are finished. Those enemies, when we just read
that psalm, sit here till your enemies be made your foes too.
That's all His people by nature. We thought He was our enemy and
we counted Him an enemy. but he brought us to his footstool
to bow to Christ because he commanded us. But when he shows you that,
he bears witness that the works are done. Look, verse one. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith your God. That's what he says to me, his
preacher. Preach this to you. Comfort ye,
comfort ye my people, saith your God. Speak ye comfortably to
Jerusalem. Cry unto her that her warfare
is accomplished. that her iniquity is pardoned
for she hath received of the Lord's hand double for all her
sin. Christ made us righteous and
holy and it can never be undone. We can never be lost again because
he did the work and he'll keep us. But go back now, look at
Isaiah 55 and notice who it's to now. He said, behold, thou
shalt call a nation, no, I'm sorry, verse four, I've given
him for a witness to the people, a leader and commander to the
people. Now let me ask you this, just
think about this with me for a minute. If the people we just
saw in John three, they're in darkness, they hate the light,
will not come to the light, And that's the end of the story if
they're just left to themselves. That's so of everybody. Is that
so of you? I hope so of me. It still is. I mean, we're still
that dependent upon Christ to call us. But you take these people. There they are. They're in darkness. They hate the light. They won't
come to the light. And Christ has command and make
them come. Does that tell you that He comes
to those He is going to call on purpose? Isn't that what that
says? If they are in darkness and no man has come to Him except
He calls them and quickens them and gives them life and gives
them faith, if no man has come to Him otherwise, that means
Christ goes to whoever He brings to Him. He goes to them and He
calls them and He gives them life and He makes them come to
the light. He makes them confess all their works were worked in
God. That means he goes to a particular people. He goes to, he knows
who are his and he goes to them and he calls them, doesn't he?
That's exactly right. That means there is a particular
people. This people is a people God chose
to save. We read in Romans 3, they're
just sinners like everybody else. There's no difference in them.
Everybody sin and comes short of the glory of God. We were
all dead by nature. So you got a bunch of dead bones. How they gonna live? Christ commands
us and draws us. Blessed is the man whom thou
choosest and calls us to approach unto thee. Then we'll be satisfied
with the fatness of your house. See, he does this for a people.
It's a people God chose. It's a people he's loved in Christ
from eternity. It's the people Christ laid down
his life for. It's the people that he justified.
It's the people that were in him when he arose and sat down
at God's right hand. It's the people for whom he intercedes
with God. Lord, they don't know me. They're sinners. They're rebels.
They're in darkness. But Lord, I've justified them.
I made them righteous. Don't destroy them. I'm going
to call them. I'm going to quicken them. I'm
going to bring them to you. That's who these people are. It's the
people that He sends the gospel to them because He knows where
they are and He knows He must call them because He justified
them. You see what I'm saying? This is a chosen people. This
is a people God loves. If God doesn't save who He loves,
why even talk about the love of God? He saves those He's loved. Who
shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus? If nothing's going to separate
us from His love, If God said I loved you with an everlasting
love, that's why in loving kindness I drew you to myself. That means
if God set his love on you, he's going to save you. It doesn't
matter who they are, what nation they're from, it doesn't matter
what family they're from, who their mother and their father
is, it doesn't matter how badly they've sinned, it don't matter
if they're educated or uneducated, rich or poor, male or female,
There's nothing about them that's going to have anything to do
with this. It's called grace. Grace. Saving by grace. Doing
everything for His people by grace. The people. You know what we
have in common? You know what the people have
in common that He saves? We're sinners. What does it mean
to be a sinner? It means you cannot save yourself. It means you must have another
to do all the work for you. Is anybody here a sinner? I'll
tell you what God's people say. Yes, sir, I have to have Christ. I couldn't be saved any other
way. All right, let me get on. We'll go back to our text, verse
five. Behold, thou shalt call a nation that knowest not, that
thou knowest not, and nations that knew not, they shall run
to thee. What does that mean? God's not
calling nations, whole nations. The Lord's calling his people
out of the nations. But he has a people in all the
nations. make us just rejoice because
the Lord didn't only save his people in Israel, he has a people
outside of Israel. And he wrote our names in the
Lamb's Book of Life from eternity, and Christ died for us and he's
gonna call us. But look, there are nations that
knew not thee. We didn't know him, couldn't
know him. Look here, Ephesians 2, I'll
just read this to you, you don't have to turn, but Ephesians 2,
here's what we were, here's what we were right here. This was
our condition. At that time you were without
Christ, you were aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, strangers
from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God
in the world. We didn't know Him. And He came
to us and revealed Himself in us and made us know Him. And
we ran to Him. He said, they'll run to thee.
We ran to Christ. By His effectual call, we ran
to Him. Look at the next thing. How do
we know He's going to accomplish this work? Verse 5 says, because
of the Lord thy God and for the Holy One of Israel, because He's
glorified thee. This is Christ's glory. God raised
Him and glorified Him as the God-man mediator, and it's His
glory to do all the saving. It's not just His glory to justify
us at the cross, although that is, but it's His glory to call
us. It's His glory to keep us. It's His glory to preserve us.
It's His glory to present us faultless to God. It's all His
glory. He's going to have the preeminence.
He's going to have the glory. He's going to have the praise
for doing the whole work. And so God, that's a guarantee
to us, brethren, that he's gonna save us to the end. He promises
this. If you confess your sins, you
come to him and confess your sin, confess you're nothing but
a sinner, confess you have no ability, no hope, no way of saving
yourself. If we confess our sin, he is
faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to cleanse us
from all unrighteousness. If we say we have no sins, we
call Him a liar. You know what we do? Now this
fix the sting a little bit. You know what we do when we don't
fall down, when we hear this gospel and we don't hit our face
and believe on Christ and confess to Him we're nothing but a sinner,
we need Him to be all our salvation. When we don't do that, we're
saying we're not sinners and we're calling Him a liar. That's so. When we don't fall
down and confess our sin to Christ and ask Him to have mercy on
us, we are manifesting what we saw in John 3, that we hate the
light and we will not come to the light. Is that too strong? It's so. It's so. That's why he says, to us, seek
ye the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him while he's near.
He says there, let the wicked forsake his way. That's just
a wicked sinner. And the unrighteous man, his
thought, that's the religious man that thinks he's righteous.
And we all fit into one of those two, and all of us fit into both
of them. We're both the wicked and the
unrighteous. He says forsake your thoughts,
forsake your ways, forsake you, forsake everything about you
and return unto the Lord. Go to Christ and He'll have mercy
upon Him and to our God for He will abundantly pardon. Do you
need abundant pardon? I have abundant sins and I need
to be abundantly pardoned. And that's what you'll find in
the Lord Jesus. Abundant pardon. God will abundantly
pardon for Christ's sake. And listen to me, brethren. This
is not just for when you first were called by Christ. This is
for me and you who've been in the faith a while. He keeps calling
you to Him. And He says, unto whom coming. We keep coming to Christ. Coming
to Christ. Every day. God's people have
come to Christ by His grace, by His calling us to Himself,
and we confess our sin to Him, and we ask Him, Lord, please
have mercy on me. And He keeps having mercy on
you. He keeps washing your feet. He keeps keeping you walking
after Him. He keeps leading you. He keeps bearing witness in your
heart. He keeps commanding you the way to go in Him, trusting
Him, looking to Him, and He'll never stop, and He'll never lose
one. What we're about to do here is we're about to observe the
Lord's table. And he commanded his people.
He said, this do. This is not an option for his
people. He said, this do. And what a gracious thing to
give us something so simple. He said, this do in remembrance
of me. We're coming to his table to
dine. We're coming to his table to
feast. And what is it? It's a piece
of unleavened bread. Leavened represents sin. Sin
and self-righteousness. It's a piece of unleavened bread.
There was no sin in our Redeemer. None at all. He said, this piece
of unleavened bread that's broken is a picture of my body broken
for you who He justified. He said, this wine, and it was
wine, brethren. You couldn't know. In that climate,
in those days, no refrigeration, this was wine. And he said, and
this wine is a picture of my blood that was shed for you.
He said, this wine is the New Testament in my blood. That's
why the sure mercies of David, that's why they're sure. These
mercies are sealed in Christ's blood. Amen, in Christ's blood,
finished, the work is finished. There's no more offering for
sin. Believe on Christ and thou shalt be saved. What a light
and easy yoke. But our Lord gave us this table.
He said, as often as you eat this bread and drink this wine,
you do this in remembrance of me. And we're remembering him. And he said, and do this in remembrance
of me till I come again. You're showing my death, he said,
till I come again. He's coming again. When he comes
again, you know how he's coming the second time? He's coming
like the children of Israel thought he was coming the first time.
They thought he was coming in glory, on a big majestic steed,
as a mighty king, to bring them out of the bondage they were
in. And he came lowly riding on an
ass's coat. But he finished the work, and
the next time he's coming, he's coming without sin, And he's
coming on a mighty steed, majestic, as the glorified God-man, king
of glory. And he's carrying his people
home with him. So brethren, we're going to observe this table and
remember him. Now, if you believe the gospel,
you believe Christ, he's all your hope, you believe you are
the ruined sinner that can add nothing to his work, he says,
do this in remembrance of me. But if you don't believe him,
if you don't know him, if he's never revealed himself to you,
you can't remember somebody you have not met. He has to make
you know him. And that's why we remember him
through this. All right, I'm going to ask Brother
Adam and Brother Jeff to pass out the bread and the wine.