Let's turn in our Bibles to Isaiah
61. Isaiah 61. This may be one of
those mornings where our first message runs a little longer
than the second message. But I believe this would be the
best order to preach these in, and I'll show you why in the
second hour. The title of our message is,
Christ Declares His Work. Christ Declares His Work. Our text is verses 1 through
3, and this is the Lord Jesus declaring His work. This is Him
declaring what God the Father sent Him to do. Sent Him to do,
and how He sent Him to do it. And the text begins with, the
Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. And it ends in verse 3 with,
that He might be glorified. Now that's the reason God sent
Christ, that's the reason God gave Christ His work, and that's
the purpose for which Christ is doing everything He's doing
in the earth right now. That God might be glorified.
That God might be glorified. Now here's what I want us to
get. Christ Jesus was anointed of God His Father, not only to
be the gospel, not only to accomplish the work of the gospel for His
people, but to be the preacher of his gospel and to be the one
who makes the gospel effectual in his people. That's what we
see here. God called him to be the gospel,
to preach the gospel, and to make it effectual. That's who
Christ is. Now look, first of all, Christ
declares He's the preacher. He declares He is the preacher.
Verse 1, The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. Because the Lord
hath anointed me to preach good tidings." The Lord hath anointed
me to preach good tidings. He declares here, the Holy Spirit
of God is upon me. Now, you know that Christ is
God. He's the Son of God. And as the
Son of God, He's one with God the Father. He's one with God
the Holy Spirit. He's called in Scripture the
Everlasting Father. He's called in Scripture the
Holy Spirit of Christ. That's who He's called. He's
one with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit. But He really
became a man. Christ really became a man. He
became a man. The God-man. Never ceased being
God. But He became a man. The God-man
to represent His chosen people. That's what he came forth for.
And as the mediator, God anointed him, pouring out the Holy Spirit
upon him. And he did so without measure. When the Lord came up out of
the water at his baptism, John saw the Holy Spirit descend upon
Christ like a dove, in the form of a dove. And it says in John
1.32, John bear record, saying, I saw the Spirit descending
from heaven like a dove in a boat upon him. And I knew him not,
but he that sent me to baptize with water, the same said unto
me, upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining
on him. The same is he which baptizes
with the Holy Spirit, with the Holy Ghost. And I saw, John said,
and I bear record that this is the Son of God. This is how he
was to know this was the Messiah. In fact, that's what Christ means.
That's what Messiah means. God anointed Him. And He anointed
Him with this visible appearance of the Holy Spirit.
And it abode upon Him. So He has the Holy Spirit to
baptize with the Holy Spirit. Now, Christ Himself sent forth
prophets, and He gave them the Holy Spirit so that they would
know what to speak and what to prophesy. And Christ sent forth
His preachers. He's still sending forth His
preachers. And He gives them the Holy Spirit, teaching them
what to preach, and when, and to who, and what have you. But
Christ is saying here, God sent Him. God the Father sent Him. The Holy God sent Christ to preach. He sent Him. No man taketh this
honor to himself. That's what the Hebrew writers
said. No man takes this honor to himself, but he that's called
of God, as was Aaron. Those Old Testament priests and
prophets, they didn't take this honor to themselves. God called
them. And God anointed them. And He
says here, So also Christ glorified not Himself to be made a high
priest. That's what the Hebrew writer
said. And that's what Christ is declaring. He didn't put Himself
in this office. God the Father chose Him. God
the Father sent Him. God the Father anointed Him to
come forth. He said unto Him, Thou art my
Son, today have I begotten Thee. And so Christ was sent. And He
was sent to preach the gospel. He came forth to preach the gospel. The gospel of Christ crucified.
Now Christ is the gospel. Christ is the gospel. Christ
is the truth. He's the truth. He's the gospel.
He's the light. He's the gospel. Christ is also
the preacher of the gospel. Just as much glory in being the
gospel as he has in being the preacher of the gospel. That's
why it's foolish to imagine that preachers that are preaching
a lie on God are preaching by the Spirit of Christ. Because
He's truth. And He calls His people through
the Spirit of truth. And He guides His people into
all truth. So he's not, no lies of a truth. He's not speaking
lies. Now this is what we declare when
we're preaching and we're saying that God's anointed, Christ is
God's anointed prophet, priest, and king. You've heard that priest. He's the prophet, priest, and
king. That's who Christ is. What does
that mean? Now I want you to think about
the glory of this. All the glory goes to Him. As
the high priest, he entered in once into the holy place, in
God's presence, and he obtained eternal redemption for all his
people. That's his glory, as the high
priest, to go to that cross, to be the lamb slain, and to
be the high priest that goes in to the holy place with his
own blood and makes atonement for the sins of his people. That's
his glory. And Christ is also the prophet. He's the prophet. That's what
He's declared in our text. It means He's the preacher. He's
the preacher. He has the glory to preach the
gospel to His people. That's His glory. To preach the
gospel to His people. He's going to use earthen vessels
to do it. That's what He's doing now. He
did it in person when He walked this earth. But He's using earthen
vessels to do it now. But it's Christ who really preaches. It's Christ, when a man hears,
it's Christ who preaches that gospel to him. That's his glory
as the prophet. And then it says Christ is the
king. And as the king, what is a king?
A king is sovereign. And as the sovereign king, all
power in heaven and earth is his, and that's why he said to
his preachers, go forth and preach this gospel. because He's going
to rule everything in heaven and in earth. Everything. Everything. Not anything is out
of His control. So that He can bring His preacher
to His people and His people to His preacher. And He can do
that. He never, ever has failed to
do that. And not only this, as He preaches
that gospel through His preacher, as the King, Sovereign, He makes
the Word effectual in the hearts of His people. and the hearts
of His people. Now, we don't deny His glory.
It's not only so when He walked this earth, it's so right now
from glory. Remember what Peter said on the
day of Pentecost? He said, He, know for certain
that God has made that same Jesus both Lord and Christ. He's raised
Him up. And He has shed forth this which
you now see and hear. He's the one doing this. Peter
said. And he's doing this right now,
right here, and wherever his gospel is being preached. It's
him doing this. That's why he says, go into all
the world and preach the gospel. Now, you wouldn't deny his glory
as being the God-man who accomplished redemption at the cross, would
you? Well, if we say we were saved any other way than through
the preaching of his gospel, we're denying his glory as the
prophet and the king. That's true. We don't deny His
glory. He is prophet, priest, and king. Alright, now secondly, Christ
declares who God sent Him to preach unto. He declares who
God sent Him to preach unto. I want to know that. I want to
know that. You want to know that? I want
to know who did He send Christ to preach unto. Alright, verse
1. He said, The Lord hath anointed
me to preach good tidings unto the meek. Unto the meek. In Luke's gospel it reads, unto
the poor, unto the poor. And our text tells us who these
poor, lowly, meek folks are. He says they're broken hearted.
He says they're captives. He says they're bound. He says
they mourn with the spirit of heaviness. Over what? Sin. Our sin. That's who the meek
are. A meek person is somebody who's
been brought low, he's been humbled, he's been brought down to the
feet of Christ so he can be taught by Christ. Christ brought him
there. That's what we're going to see in our second hour. And
Christ teaches him there. That's who he came to preach
to. You remember he said there won't be any flesh or glory in
his presence. He's going to seek to it through this means of preaching
that no flesh or glory in his presence. Now, you might sit
there in glory and say, I don't believe this and blah, blah,
blah, blah, blah, or some preacher might get up in glory and preach
man's works. But when Christ is the one preaching
through His preacher and He's preaching into the heart of one
of His children, He's going to bring you down so that there
He is in your presence and you will not glory in His presence.
You just won't. That's going to happen every
time now. Now look, the meek, that's who they are. They're
brought low. You know, last week we saw, he said, I came not to
call the righteous to repentance, but sinners. I came to call sinners
to repentance. True preaching is not persuading
men what they have to do for God. True preaching is declaring
what God has done for men. And that's the difference between
the true gospel and the false gospel we hear so much of in
this world. We got to be brought love. Do we have any lowly, needy
sinners here? There's good news for lowly,
needy sinners. The preaching is not persuading men what they
need to do for God. The preaching of God's gospel
is declaring life for the lifeless. It's declaring there's forgiveness
for sinners. It's declaring there's mercy
for those who are Rebels against God he's declaring that there's
their salvation for sinners And he's not gonna take anything
from you and me Listen to what God this is God. This is God. This is God speaking listen.
He says if I were hungry I Would not tell you For the world is
mine and the fullness thereof Now what should I do with that
information? He says, will I eat the flesh of bulls? Will I drink
the blood of goats? There's nothing you can sacrifice
to God that's going to please Him. Nothing I can sacrifice
to God that will please Him. So what do I do with that? Offer
unto God thanksgiving. Thanksgiving. pay thy vows unto
the Most High, and call upon Me in the day of trouble, He
said, I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify Me." That's
what God said. You see, this is what the Gospel
declared. God's not a beggar. God's not a beggar. He's going
to bring you to be meek so you can be teachable. Well, you can't
teach us nothing by nature. We don't listen to anybody by
nature. The other person's talking and we're thinking about what
we're going to say, how we're going to answer them and teach
them something. We don't listen by nature. When Christ comes,
we will because He's going to make us listen. All right now,
Christ declares what God sent Him to do for these real sinners.
This is what He sent Him to do for these real sinners. Verse
1. He hath sent Me to bind up the broken hearted. To bind up
the broken hearted. Now, I'm told by folks that know
a lot better than I know that in Luke's Gospel, you remember
when the Lord stood up at Nazareth? He was at His own country. He
stood up and He read this text. These first three verses. He
read them. He said, this day is the Scripture fulfilled in
your ears. That's how we know this is speaking of Christ. But
I'm told that it's in our translation. Our translators put this phrase
right here, this sentence in our translation. But I'm told
it's not in the original. Christ left it out when He stood
up in the synagogue that day and read this passage. Why did
He do that? Why did He do that? Because Carnal
man just hears the carnal. Carnal man just looks for the
carnal. Carnal man wants nothing more, nothing above this life
and this world right here. He wants to serve his belly.
And you see, when Christ stood up and he read that in the synagogue,
Christ had already preached a bunch of times. And Christ had already
healed a bunch of people. He had healed the man with the
withered hand, the man sick with the palsy. He had healed the
Gadarene. He had healed Peter's mother. He had healed the woman
with the issue of blood. He had healed a bunch of people.
But the people followed him not because of the gospel he preached,
not because of the good tidings of the gospel. They followed
him for those physical miracles. And so when he came to Nazareth,
his kinsmen were sitting there thinking, well now you've done
all those miracles in all those other countries now. We raised
you. I know his father and his mother.
I babysat him when he was a baby. So you owe us. You ought to do
those physical miracles. Here, my daddy's home and he's
got heart disease. His arteries are clogged and
I'm afraid that you're going to heal the broken hearted. And
Christ said that. He said, you're going to say
this, prophet, heal thyself. And He says what that means.
He says, this is what that means. Whatsoever we've heard done in
those other countries, do it here in your own country. And
so Christ left that part out of it. He left that part out
of it. And you know what He turned around
and told them? After He read it, He told them, He said, remember
what He talked about? He talked about all those folks
in Israel that were lepers, that needed healing. Widows that needed
healing. But he said, none of them did
God send His preacher to. He said, but He sent them to
some Gentiles. What he was telling them was,
number one, this is a heart work. And number two, it's just for
His people that are truly spiritually broken hearted in the Spirit. That's what this is. This is
a heart brokenness. A heart brokenness over sin.
Not a physical heart brokenness. This is not, oh, my loved one
left me and it broke my heart. No, this is, I'm a dead dog sinner. That's what this is about. That's
what this is about. He said this, I'll give them
one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you, and I will
take the stony heart out of their flesh, and I will give them a
heart of flesh. And they shall walk in my statutes
and keep mine ordinances and do them and they shall be my
people and I will be their God. See, the first thing that happens
in this process of salvation is God's got to break your heart.
He's got to break my heart. He's got to take that stony,
rebellious, hard heart out and give us a heart of flesh that
can be molded and taught and pressed upon and urged upon. He's got to give us a feeling
heart. So that's what He's going to
do first of all. Remember whenever God sent His preacher to David?
He sent His preacher to David, and He said, David, thou art
the man. That's what all true preaching is, is to bring you
down to the place. You hear preaching, just like
David heard it. Who is the man that's done these
things? Ah, he needs to be put to death. And then finally, Christ
brings the gospel to you, and He says, you're the one. You've
done it. This ain't to anybody else. It's
to you. Preacher, I think you're preaching
just to me this morning. I sure am. It's to you. It's
not to your neighbor. It's to you personally. And that's
where Christ brings it to. And when you brought that part,
you say what David said in Psalm 51. He said, Lord, have mercy
on me. He said, Lord, create in me a
clean heart. Give me a new heart. Put a new
spirit within me. Forgive me of my sin by your
grace. That's where we've got to be
brought to. And then the Lord heals those. He heals those that
have a broken heart. The Lord's nigh unto them that
are of a broken heart. Why? He gave them the broken
heart. They wouldn't have it if He wasn't near them. And once
He gives it to them, He stays near them. And He saves such
that they'll be of a contrite heart. And not only this, look
what Christ says God sent Him to do. Now He broke our heart.
He got us heartbroken. Now what's He going to do? Verse
1. He sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives, to proclaim
liberty to the captives, and to proclaim the opening of the
prison to them that are bound. Well, preacher, see there, I'm
not a captive. I live in a free country. I'm
free to do whatever I want to. That's what the Pharisees said
to Christ. We're not bound. We're not captives. We're free. We're children of
Abraham. We've always been free. Captivity that this is talking
about is captivity under the curse of God's law. Captivity
under the curse of God's law. That means justice demands a
payment from you. That means you can't free yourself
to believe God because of your flesh. You're under the curse.
And if you don't know Christ, you're under the curse. I'm telling
you. If you're not being brought to believe on Christ, you're
under the curse of God. In yourself, you're under the curse. And you
can't free yourself, you can't set yourself free. The wages
of sin is death and it's going to demand a full payment. You won't believe that until
God breaks your heart now and makes you teachable. You won't
believe that. That's so, it demands full payment. And you're going to pay it one
way or the other. Either in a substitute or in yourself, but you're going
to pay that wage. Because God's just, that's why.
And that's what this gospel is about. How God can be just and
still save a sinner. Still justify a sinner. How can
He do that? Turn to Galatians 3.13. Galatians
3.13. Scripture says, He hath made Him sin for us who knew no sin, that
we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. And when He made
Him sin for us, when He laid on Him the iniquity of all His
people, He made Him a curse. Men get all twisted over 2 Corinthians
5.21 when it says Christ was made sin. It's worse to be made
a curse. And when he was made sin, then
he was made a curse. God poured out vengeance on Christ. He poured out His wrath on Christ. Look here, Galatians 3.13. Christ
had redeemed us. That means He paid the debt in
full. He paid the wages of sin. He
paid justice. It's full payment. He paid eternal
death. How did He do that? He did it
from the curse of the law being made a curse for us. That we, for it's written, cursed
is everyone that hangeth on a tree. That's what Christ did for His
people. He did it for His people, and we say that because He accomplished
it. Now, remember I said Christ is the prophet and Christ is
the king? Well, when He sends this gospel, He sends this gospel,
He's broken the heart of His child. He's made you meek. He's
broken your heart. He's brought you down. It says
here, He proclaims this good news. He proclaims this good
news. He proclaims this good news. He proclaims liberty to the captives
and the opening of the prison to them that are bound. Now,
a proclamation is not a suggestion. A proclamation is not up for
debate. A proclamation is not up for
a vote. A proclamation saying it's done. It's done. And what our text is saying here
is when Christ proclaims, He's telling you it's done. Remember
the Emancipation Proclamation? That wasn't a suggestion. The
President of the United States proclaimed every slave emancipated. And they were. It wasn't up for
debate. It was done. And this is what
Christ is sent to preach in the heart of his child, and he preaches
it in our hearts and proclaims liberty to the captive. And when
he does that, you know what happens? You're going to believe. You
know why? He opens the prison. He not only proclaims the liberty,
Lincoln stayed in the White House just to proclaim liberty. Not
this king. He comes to where his child is,
where his slave is, and he opens the prison. and brings you out. That's who He is and that's what
He does. Now, He says this, He comes to proclaim to us the acceptable
year of the Lord. Verse 2, to proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord. What does that mean when He proclaims
the acceptable year of the Lord? It goes right along with this
proclamation of liberty. It goes right along with Him
setting us free. Under the Old Testament, God said on the 50th
year, there'd be 7 years was a Sabbath year. After 7 years
it was a Sabbath year. He said 7, 7 Sabbath years. 49 years. And He's showing perfection,
perfection. And when it turned and it's that
50th year, on the Day of Atonement, on the Day of Atonement, A trumpet
was to be blown loud for everybody to hear. And it was the declaration,
the proclamation of Jubilee. Jubilee! Jubilee. You know what Jubilee meant?
It meant this is the acceptable year of the Lord. This is the
year of Jubilee. And it meant this. Every slave
has all his debts cleared. Not only is he set free, all
his debts are cleared. Cleared. They're off the record
books. They never existed. They never existed. Not only
that, all the possessions he'd lost are restored in full to
him. Not only that, the whole land
in Israel was to rest and not have to do any more work. That's
what he declared. Isn't that a beautiful picture?
Christ said, He sent me forth to blow that jubilee trumpet.
I'm sending my preachers forth, Christ said, and in the hearts
of my people that I've broken, in the hearts of my people where
I've proclaimed liberty, in the hearts of my people where I've
opened the prison doors, I'm proclaiming in their hearts,
atonement has been made! This is the day of jubilee! And
he blows that trumpet and he says, all your debts are paid.
All your possessions have been restored to you even better than
what you lost. Eternal righteousness and eternal
forgiveness and eternal redemption so that you can never fall away
out of God's grace again. And he says, and now you can
rest from all your works. The work's finished. It's done.
That's what Christ teaches you in your heart. Do you think a
man's going to reject that? Oh, they say, well, he comes
and he tells you the good news of the gospel and then he gives
you an opportunity to choose him or reject him. Get out of
here. You go open a prison door to
any man on death row and tell him that all his debts are forgiven
and he's restored all his possessions and he don't ever have to work
a day in his life and see how long he stays in that cell. People come up with some stupid
things, can't they? Look here. Alright, then he tells
this too. Now, you better hear this warning.
When this gospel is being preached, he says he's proclaiming also,
verse 2, the day of vengeance of our God. See, when Christ
was on the cross, it was a day of vengeance. Christ was on that
cross, standing there in the place of His people, And when
he conquered sin and death and hell and Satan himself, that
was the day of God's vengeance upon all his enemies for everything
they had done and all the harm they had inflicted. That was
God's day of vengeance upon them. It settled right there. It settled
right there because he saved his people. It settled. And so
now for all his people, We're delivered, and the Scripture
says there's now no condemnation to them who believe Jesus Christ,
who rest in Christ, who are in Christ. There's no condemnation
to us. There's going to be no day of vengeance for us, brethren.
But we've got so many enemies in this world, don't we? So many
enemies in this world. So many people that reject the
Gospel and hate the Gospel and will not hear the Gospel. Well,
He's declaring through this Gospel to you and me. He's going to
comfort you with this. The day of vengeance is His.
Vengeance is His. Don't you lift your hand. Don't
you drink. Vengeance is His. Now you hear
this sinner. You hear this. You who have rejected
my gospel and called my gospel foolish and calling my God foolish.
You hear this. And don't you forget this. You're going to meet God. And
God's going to take out full vengeance on you. full vengeance
on you. The one I'm preaching to you
right here, Scripture says, to you who are troubled, rest with
us. Are you troubled about the day
of vengeance? Rest with us in Christ. And He's telling you
that to you who are troubled, there is rest with us in Christ.
But now listen, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from
heaven with His mighty angels, one day, I'm telling you, Everybody
that hates him and doesn't believe on him and thinks this is just
a bunch of made up foolishness. One day you're going to look
up and there he's going to be. You're going to know it's real
then. There he's going to be. And it
says he's going to come in flaming fire taking vengeance on them
that know not God and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ. Those that will not obey the
gospel. What does the gospel tell you
to do to obey? Believe Christ. And those that won't, He's going
to come and they're going to be punished with everlasting
destruction from the presence of the Lord and from the glory
of His power. That's Christ's glory to do that.
He's going to do that. And that's what He's preaching
every time. He said, you go preach to them. And He said, he that
believes shall be saved and he that believes not shall be damned.
No middle ground. Alright? Christ declares that
through the Gospel, He's going to make all of this effectual
in the heart of His people. He's going to make it effectual
in the heart of His people. Now look at verse 2 at the end.
He says He's doing all this, preaching this through His Gospel,
to comfort all that mourn. Verse 3, to appoint unto them
that mourn in Zion, to give unto them. This is for His people. to them that mourn in Zion. That's who this is for. That's
His church. You know what His charge to His preachers is? You
can look back there in Isaiah 40 and you can see it. Isaiah
40, verse 1. It's this. Comfort ye, comfort
ye my people, saith your God. That's my job. That's my charge. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
saith your God. That's what I'm sent to do. What
am I sent to declare? What's the comfort? Speak ye
comfortably to Jerusalem, to Zion, and 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 sins. You see, this is to the Lord's
church. This is comfort to His church. And then through the
preaching He says, Christ is going to comfort, Christ is going
to appoint unto us. Christ is going to give unto
us. Anybody going to stop Him? Anybody
going to stop the sovereign King of glory from doing what He will
in the hearts of His people? Not anybody. Now understand me,
this is a heart work. This is a heart work. Faith and
repentance and joy and rejoicing and obedience. This is a heart
work, brethren. It's a heart work. What's He
going to do? I'm going to give you beauty
for ashes. Remember how we saw in the last
chapter Christ is better, better, better. Everything He gives is
better, better, better than what you had. You ever look at ashes? Look real good at ashes. Ashes
means the fire and the energy, the life is totally gone. It's
just death. Just death. In the Old Testament,
they put ashes on themselves, on their heads, and on their
face, and on their body, to symbolize mourning. We're so dignified
now, we just wear black. But they put sackcloth on, and
they put ashes on them, because it symbolized death. Christ said,
for your death, I'm going to give you beauty. Eternal life. Eternal life. And then look here. For the oil,
I'm going to give you the oil of joy for your mourning. Broken
your heart, you mourn over sin. He said, I'm going to give you
the Holy Spirit. The oil of the Holy Spirit is
going to anoint you and make you rejoice because of everything
Christ has done for you. The psalmist said, Thou preparest
a table before me in the presence of my enemies. Thou anointest
my head with oil and my cup runs over. I got more than plenty. More than plenty. I got an abundance
of grace. That's what He comforts you with.
That's the joy He gives you. And then He says, I'm going to
give you the garment of praise for the Spirit of heaviness. When He does this work in you,
you see you're not righteous. You see you've never kept the
law. And you see you're not holy. If He just removed His presence
for a moment, All we are is unrighteous lawbreakers and unholy, ungodly
riches. Everything we have that's life
and eternal is Christ in you. That's what it is. And Christ
on you. That's what it is. He says, I'm
going to give you the garment of my righteousness and I'm going
to give you the garment of my holiness so that the king's daughter
is going to be beautiful within and without. No spot in you whatsoever. That's what makes us rejoice.
You sure that's what it means, preacher? Look over at verse
10. I will greatly rejoice in the
Lord, and my soul shall be joyful in my God, for He's clothed me
with the garments of salvation. He's covered me with the robe
of righteousness, as a bride groomed decketh himself with
ornaments, and a bride adorneth herself with her jewels. That's
the robe He puts on His people and in His people. Alright then,
how does he do all this? Remember what our whole point
is. He's the gospel. And he's the preacher of the
gospel. And he makes the gospel effectual. He does this through
the preaching of the gospel. Because it pleased God by the
foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. Through the
foolishness of preaching. Why? Why? If I can show you why, will you
bow to this? If I can show you why this is the one and only
way God will ever save a single sinner, will you quit glorying
in your self-knowledge and self-seeking and self-teaching and bow to
God? Listen to this. Verse 3. That they may be called
trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord. that He might be
glorified. God did it this way that He might
get all the glory. And He will. He will. Alright,
let's pray. Our gracious Father, we thank
You for this day. We thank You that You haven't
left one thing in the hands of Your people, not the work on
the cross, not the work in the pulpit, not the work in the pew,
But Christ is our High Priest, He's our Prophet, and He's our
King. Lord, we'd sooner stop the sun
from rising in the morning than we'd stop Christ from sending
His preacher with His gospel and saving His child. Let men
shut their self-glorian mouths and bow to God. Let the deceitful
hearts that fool men into a false profession of faith bow down
and be broken by your power. Make them, Lord, make them. Proclaim
liberty to them and bring them out of bondage. Make them rejoice
that you did this, that you did this work, that you are the glory
of this work, Lord, that you might be glorified. and your
people might be truly trees of righteousness planted by your
hand. We ask it, Lord, in Christ's
name, for your glory. Amen.