Well, I just can't tell you what
a delight it's been for me and Janet to be here this weekend. I feel like the Lord's blessed
us in worship. And I have so thoroughly enjoyed
our time of fellowship. And it has been a very rich blessing
to me to see your obvious love of the Lord for each other and
for your pastor. It's very encouraging to me. I'm so thankful that the Lord's
enabled us to be here. I thought of something as Art was
talking. This isn't in my notes. It's not part of the message.
You get this for free. But my heart breaks. For those that
don't know the Lord, that feel no hope, I have a word for you. If I was
you, and I was at one time, and I didn't know the Lord, and I
knew it, I'd make it my business, I'd make it my business to be
in this room every time these doors are open, to hear God's
servant preach. Our Lord Himself said where two
or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the
midst of them. If I wanted to know the Lord,
I believe I'd be where He is. It'd be an awful good place to
meet Him, wouldn't it? Maybe He'd be pleased in His
grace to do that. Well, all right, I'll get into
the message. The title of the message this
morning is, And There Shall Be No More Curse. Now that title
is taken from Revelation 22, but I'd like for you to first
open your Bibles to Genesis chapter 3. Before we can get a blessing
from what we read in Revelation 22, there should be no more curse.
We have to go back to the garden in Genesis chapter 3. If we don't
understand what happened in Genesis chapter 3, we'll not understand
another page of the Bible. Brother Henry used to tell us
all the time, if you're wrong on the fall, you're wrong on
it all. So let's understand what happened
in Genesis chapter 3. And then we'll see in all the
pages between Genesis 3 and Revelation 22, something wonderful happened. From the pronouncement of God's
curse upon this earth, till he says, and there shall be no more
curse. Every page of the Bible tells
this one story. how Christ has removed the curse
of sin from his people. So how do we get from the curse
of Genesis 3 to Revelations 22, there shall be no more curse?
Now you know the story here in the garden, the serpent beguiled
Eve to eat of this fruit, the fruit of the tree, the knowledge
of good and evil, the Lord had commanded them not to eat. In
verse 6 in Genesis chapter 3, and when the woman saw that the
tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes,
a tree to be desired to make one wise. She took of the fruit
thereof and did eat, gave also unto her husband with her, and
he did eat. And the eyes of them both were
opened. You notice the eyes of them both weren't open when Eve
ate. Adam was the federal head. When Adam ate, when Adam rebelled,
the eyes of them both were open, and they knew they were naked.
And they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves aprons. And
they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in
the cool of the day. And Adam and his wife hid themselves
from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the
garden. Now, how wicked is it that after Adam and Eve sinned,
Adam ate of that fruit, they saw they were naked, how wicked
is it that they went and found fig leaves to try to cover their
nakedness? Well, it's very wicked, very
wicked. Because what they were trying
to do is cover their sin and cover their shame with their
own works. They were trying to cover their
sin with something that they did. They were trying to find
a solution to this problem by a covering that they made. Now
hold your finger there in Genesis 3. Look over Mark chapter 11.
Let me show you something very interesting
here. In Mark 11 verse 12. And on the morrow, when they
were come from Bethany, he was hungry, our Lord was hungry.
And seeing a fig tree far off having leaves, he came, if happily
he might find anything thereon. And when he came to it, he found
nothing but leaves, for the time of the figs was not yet. And
Jesus answered and said unto it, no man eat fruit of thee
hereafter forever. And his disciples heard it. Now
the only thing our Lord cursed during His earthly ministry was
a fig tree. This fig tree, the very same
tree that Adam and Eve tried to use to cover their sin. There
are leaves on this tree, but there are no fruit on it because
our Lord cursed it. Now look over in verse 20, the
same chapter. And in the morning as they passed
by and saw the fig tree dried up from the roots, And Peter,
calling to remembrance, saith unto him, Master, behold, the
fig tree which thou cursed is withered away. And look at our
Lord's answer here. And Jesus answering, saith unto
them, Have faith in God. See what our Lord's teaching
is here? Don't you trust in the works of your own righteousness.
That's what this fig tree represents. It represents man trying to cover
his sin, cover his shame. Don't put any of your hope, any
confidence at all in any works of your own righteousness. You
have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and His blood to cleanse
from sin and His righteousness to cover you and take away all
of your shame. And Adam and Eve, now they found
these fig leaves. They made themselves aprons.
So I find it very interesting. Those fig leaves must have covered
part of their naked bodies, but their shame wasn't covered. There's
no fruit in what they did trying to cover themselves with their
own works. They were still ashamed. They were wearing those aprons
of fig leaves, but still ashamed. You know how I know they were
still ashamed? When they heard the Lord God walking in the garden,
they ran and hid in the bushes because they knew those fig leaves
gave them no covering. And that's our works. Our works
can never take away the guilt or the shame of our sin. Only
the blood of Christ can do that. Let's read on in verse 9 of Genesis
3. And the Lord God called unto
Adam and said unto him, Where art thou? And he said, I heard
thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid, because I was naked,
and I hid myself. And he said, Who told thee thou
wast naked? Now God knew Adam had eaten that
fruit. God knows everything. God never asks a question for
his own information. God asks this question because
he's going to hear it from Adam. Adam is going to confess who
he is and what he did. And Adam does a very poor job
of confessing. Look here at verse 12. And the
man said, The woman whom thou gavest to be with me, she gave
me of the tree, and I did eat." Boy, this would have been an
awful good time to beg for mercy, wouldn't it? It would have been
such a good time to beg for mercy. But that's not what Adam does.
Adam blames everybody but himself for his sin. And we see the same
thing today. Everybody blames... I mean, they
get to be an adult and they do this awful heinous thing. It's
because something their mother said to them when they were five
years old. Everybody's blaming everything they do and everybody
else. You know why we do that? It's Adam's nature that's in
us. Adam is so dead, he's bold enough
to blame God for his sin. He said, God, if you hadn't given
me this woman to be with me, I never would have sinned in
the first place. Really, it's your fault. That's the deadness of
our nature, blaming sin on God. Well, look at verse 13. And the
Lord God said unto the woman, What is this that thou hast done?
And the woman said, The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat. Eve's
got Adam's nature now, doesn't she? He's her federal head, she's
just like him. Not my fault. Verse 14. And the Lord God said unto the
serpent, you notice he doesn't even ask anything of Satan. He
just says, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above
all cattle and above every beast of the field. Upon thy belly
shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy
life. And I'll put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed and her seed. It shall bruise thy head, And
thou shalt bruise his heel. Now Satan is cursed. And the
form Satan took is cursed. Satan's cursed and that serpent
is cursed. And people hate snakes to this
day because of this curse. Now a lot of the old writers
say that snakes used to be extremely beautiful. They could walk or
maybe they had feathers of some sort and could fly. But no more. Now they're just slithering around
on the ground, eating dust, because of this curse. The form Satan
took is cursed, and Satan is cursed. The Lord prophesies from
the very beginning how Satan is going to be finished off.
He's going to be finished off. His power will be crushed. His
head, that's his power, is going to be crushed by the sacrifice
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And Satan's main desire, his
main purpose, is to keep people from looking to the Lord Jesus
Christ. That's his main purpose. And that desire is crushed at
Calvary's tree. What'd our Lord say? And I, if
I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all unto me. His purpose
is crushed at Calvary. Let's read on, verse 16. And
unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and
thy conception. In sorrow thou shalt bring forth
children, and thy desire shall be to thy husband, and he shall
rule over thee. And unto Adam he said, because thou hast hearkened
unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of the tree, of which
I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt not eat of it. Cursed is
the ground for thy sake. In sorrow shalt thou eat of it
all the days of thy life. Thorns also and thistles shalt
bring forth to thee. and thou should eat the herb
of the field. In the sweat of thy face thou should eat bread,
till thou return unto the ground. For out of it wast thou taken.
For dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return. And Adam called
his wife's name Eve, because she was the mother of all living. Now here's electing love. Adam
and Eve are punished, but you notice God told the serpent,
Satan, you're cursed. He never used those words to
Adam and Eve. He didn't say, you're cursed.
Now, they're punished, but they're not cursed. And even their punishment
is mixed with mercy. Even their punishment is mixed
with the promise of the Savior. Adam was not destroyed for this
reason. In Adam is every one of God's
elect. And Eve, she's not destroyed. Because the Savior himself, who
is going to come and bear this curse away, bear the sin of his
people away, the seed of the Savior is in Eve, the seed of
the woman. Adam called Eve the mother of
all living, because the bread of life is in her seed. The Lord
Jesus Christ is going to come of her seed. In verse 21, unto
Adam also and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skin,
and he clothed them. The very first gospel message
ever preached, the first picture of the Savior ever given to man,
was given by God Himself. This picture of how the sin of
God's elect will be taken away, how the shame of our sin will
be taken away, is through the death of this animal. Adam and
Eve watched as God killed that animal. His blood was spilt on
the ground. And He made them a covering from
the skin of this animal. Their sin and shame is covered
through the death of another, through the covering provided
by another. And sinners are covered by the
covering of another, by the righteousness of another. Our sin is put away
by the death and the blood of another. Adam and Eve witnessed
the first death after sin. There had never been death on
the earth till this moment, when that animal was killed. And that
animal died. to cover their sin and their
shame. And this is such a clear picture from before Adam was
even thrust out of the garden. God gave them this picture of
the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. He will come and shed His blood
to pay for that sin committed in the garden. He's going to
come and bring a righteousness that He imputes to His people
to cover their shame. It's His blood and His righteousness.
Now look at verse 22. And the Lord God said, behold,
the man has become as one of us to know good and evil. And
now lest he put forth his hand and take also of the tree of
life and eat and live forever, therefore the Lord God sent him
forth from the garden of Eden to till the ground from whence
he was taken. So he drove out the man. And he placed at the
east of the garden of Eden cherubims with a flaming sword which turned
every way to keep the way of the tree of life. Now Adam and
Eve are thrust out of the garden. Paradise is lost because of sin. And right to this moment, we
suffer the effects of Adam and Eve's punishment to this day.
Because Adam is our federal head. Just like he was Eve's federal
head, he's our federal head. He's our representative. And
you ladies, you know well this punishment of Eve. You know the
pain and the sorrow of everything it takes to conceive and bear
and raise children. Every month you get a reminder.
of what happened in the garden. All during your pregnancy, you
get strong reminders, that baby kicking and pushing up against
your lungs, you can't hardly breathe, you get a reminder of
what happened here in the garden. You get labor pains, give you
a reminder that lasts a lifetime. I hear ladies say, oh, you get
that baby, it's all forgotten. Well, I hear ladies an awful
lot talking about that. Oh, I went through the valley
of the shadow of death. I don't think you forget it now. It's
worth it, I'm sure, but you do not forget that. God made it
that way. If men had to bear children,
every family just have one. Men cannot do what you ladies
do. And wives are in subjection to
their own husbands. Now, I know in our day that's
very unpopular. But it's so. It'll be forever
so. This is the way God has ordained
it. I mean, you think about this. If Adam had never sinned, wives
would still be in subjection to their husbands. It would just
be that without sin, that submission would be easy. It'd be a joy.
It'd be a delight for you to be in subjection to your husband,
because men would always rule lovingly and wisely. Here's something
else you can get for free, especially you unmarried men. You remember
what I said. When you become married, don't ever let these
words escape your lips. Don't you ever tell your wife,
you're supposed to be a submission to me. She already knows that. What scripture says to the woman
here, says to her. It doesn't say it to you, it
says it to her. Scripture has instruction for
the men. You rule wisely. You rule lovingly. You rule as
Christ rules. She'll have no problem submitting.
Your job is to make it easy for her to be in submission to your
rule. That's just a good piece of advice you can have if you
decide to take it. And men, because of Adam's sin,
we're all out just working, just working, working, working, just
doing our best to make ends meet and support our family. Now,
we're not all farmers, but I guarantee you, whatever business you're
in, whatever occupation you're in, It's hard work, physically,
emotionally, mentally. It's hard to make ends meet in
this life because God's made it that way. It'll always be
that way. Now, you may not be a farmer trying to weed out thorns
and thistles, but you know thorns and thistles. You go to work,
you make plans, you make preparation, you got everything set up, and
up comes problems and obstacles. Well, what are those? Thorns
and thistles, always coming up. And after a difficult life, we
die. These bodies die because these
bodies are carrying around a dead sin nature. Where there's sin,
there must be death. And if you look back at Genesis
chapter 2, it happened just like God said it would happen. This
ought not surprise us. In Genesis 2 verse 16, the Lord
God commanded the man saying, of every tree of the garden thou
mayest freely eat. But of the tree of the knowledge
of good and evil, Thou shalt not eat of it. For in the day
that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die." And literally
translated, that is, dying, thou shalt die. He told Adam, the
moment you eat of that fruit, spiritually, you'll die. Instantly,
you'll be spiritually dead, and sin will slowly begin killing
that body. And Adam, after he ate of that
fruit, we see he's already dead spiritually, isn't he? We see
it in his shame, his fear, his hatred of God, And in a number
of years, his body will die, too. Well, the same thing happens
to us. Because Adam is our federal head,
and what he did, we did in him. And he passed that sinful, dead
nature right on to all of us, and we pass it on to our children.
We suffer the effects of sin to this day because Adam's our
federal head. I'll read you a few scriptures.
Romans 5, verse 12. By one man, sin entered into
the world, and death by sin. So death passed upon all men,
for that all have sinned. All sinned, when? In Adam. We all sinned and death passed
upon us because of that. Verse 17, by one man's offense. Death is reigned by one because
of Adam's sin. Verse 18, by the offense of one. Judgment came upon all men to
condemnation. We're all under the condemnation
of the law because of one man's sin. Our federal head, Adam.
Verse 19. By one man's disobedience, many
were made sinners. Everyone in Adam was made a sinner
when Adam fell. Well, who was in Adam? Everyone. Everyone. Now, I know Eve was
living then, but even Eve came from Adam. She came from his
rib. Every human being was in Adam, and we all became guilty
when he sinned. Now, there was a first paradise,
the Garden of Eden. It was ruined by sin. It was
now put under the curse of sin. But there's a second paradise.
There's heaven. And there, there's no sin and
no more curse. Now look over Revelations 22. Verse 1. And he showed me a pure
river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of
the throne of God and out of the Lamb. Now, there in glory,
John saw a river. You know, there was a river in
the first paradise. You can read about that. There were four heads
that went in every direction of the compass to water the whole
place, the whole garden. Well, in glory, there's a river,
a second river. This river is the river of the
water of life. Now, is that an actual river? I don't know. John describes
it as pure and holy, never defiled by sin. I don't know if that's
an actual river or not, but it sure sounds a whole lot like
our Lord Jesus Christ, doesn't it? This is certainly a picture
of Christ at the minimum. And this water of life, our Lord
called Himself the water of life. It's given sovereignly. Where's
the head of the river? The throne of God. It comes from
God's throne. Life comes to us from King Christ. Now look at verse 2. In the midst
of the street of it, on either side of the river, was there
the tree of life, which bared twelve manner of fruits, and
yielded her fruit every month. And the leaves of the tree were
for the healing of the nations. And in the garden of Eden there
was a tree of life, wasn't it? That's what God was going to
keep Adam from. He put that angel there with
the sword turned every way to keep Adam from coming to that
tree of life. Well, in heaven, John saw the tree of life. I'm
pretty confident this is not an actual tree. This is a picture. He's speaking of our Lord Jesus
Christ. He's the tree of life. And He's
everywhere at once. You know, you read the writers
talk about everyone is under the shade, everyone sees this
tree no matter where they are. That's Christ. Christ is enough
that His fruit satisfies a number no man can number. He's never
barren. Never. This tree doesn't just
bear fruit in the spring or the summer. It's never barren. Well,
that's Christ. He bears fruit for all spiritualists,
for all twelve tribes. And no matter where you are,
you see, you have His presence. Every believer in glory has the
presence of Christ, enjoys the presence of Christ so much. It's
as if they were the only one there. That's this tree of life. And this tree, this leaves, heals
all of our spiritual diseases. Well, that has to be speaking
of Christ. There'll be no sickness there because Christ has removed
all sin. He's removed the curse of sin.
In verse 3 we read, There shall be no more curse. Now, how do we get from the curse
of Genesis 3 But here in Revelations 22, there shall be no more curse. There is no more curse because
Christ Himself bore all of the curse and all of the judgment
that God pronounced in the Garden of Eden. He bore it all and He
took it away through the sacrifice of Himself. Salvation in Christ
is complete. Absolutely complete. Hold your
finger, though. We'll come back to this in just
one second. Look at Galatians chapter 3. How did this curse be borne away? Galatians 3, verse 13. Christ
hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse
for us. For it's written, Cursed is everyone
that hangeth on a tree. When our Lord hung on that tree,
that curse was put on Him and He bore it away. He was made
a curse for His people. And I want you to know this and
understand this. When we leave this morning, that curse is completely,
from beginning to end, borne away in our Lord Jesus Christ. Adam and Eve in the garden saw
they were naked and they were ashamed. The Lord Jesus Christ
was stripped naked. before man and God. I despise
these idols that they make of this hippie hanging on a cross
and he's got this loincloth on and he looks like a pretty handsome
fella. You notice a little bit of blood?
That's not the scene of Calvary. What happened at Calvary was
butchery. They butchered our Lord. He had no loincloth on. They
stripped him naked. They made fun of They hung him
there to die naked, hanging between heaven and earth. He didn't look
like a man. He looked like a piece of meat
hanging there, butchered him. And he was stripped naked before
God. And he suffered that so that his people would be clothed
in his righteousness. Nakedness means more than being
without clothes. Nakedness means the shame of
being seen as you really are. Christ bore the shame of His
people. He took our shame because He
was made to be what we are. He was made to be sin for His
people, and Christ bore that sin and that shame away so that
His people will never bear it again. He stripped naked so we'd
be clothed in His righteousness. Then God told Eve, your husband's
going to rule over you. He'll have the rule over you.
God the Son is equal with the Father in every way. But He was
made subject to His Father. He was made subject to His own
law. He's the lawgiver. He was made subject to His own
law. He was made subject to men even for a time. And now, because
He was made subject, His people are set free. Free to serve God. Then God told Eve he'll greatly
multiply her sorrow and conception. We read of the Lord Jesus Christ
being a man of sorrows. He was acquainted with grief.
He was well acquainted with grief. Can you imagine the grief that
he suffered living among people like us? What grief he endured. And then he went to the cross
and he endured travail pains, birth pains for his children.
He suffered all those pains so that his children would be born
again. His sorrow was greatly multiplied
so that his people could be given life in the new birth. Then God
told Adam, cursed is the ground for your sake. It will bring
forth thorns and thistles to you. When our Lord went to Calvary,
what did they put on his head? crown of thorns. Bearing the
curse that came from that cursed ground, he bore the curse of
sin and took it away. Then God told Adam, in the sweat
of your face, you're going to eat bread. Christ went to Gethsemane's
garden. There he was made to be sin for
his people. And what did he do? He sweat,
as it were, great drops of blood. I don't know how that happened.
Some of the writers talk about his blood would flow backwards
and come out of his pores. I don't know how it happened,
but you know that was a horrible experience. He sweat, as it were,
great drops of blood as he prepared to be made a sacrifice for the
sin of his people. So that there, his people will
sweat no more. They're not going to eat bread
in the sweat of your face there. It's all be provided. You don't
earn this bread of life. Christ is the bread of life.
You don't earn that bread. It's given to you freely. because
Christ sweat as it were great drops of blood. Then when God
thrust the man out of the garden, he placed that cherubim there
with a flaming sword that turned every way so that man couldn't
come back to the tree of life. Well, how can we come to the
tree of life freely and not take that sword of justice into our
soul? Look at Zechariah chapter 3.
I'm sorry, Zechariah 13, Zechariah 13. We can come to the tree of life
and not fear that sword because Christ took that sword himself
into his own soul. Zechariah 13, verse 7. against my shepherd, and against
the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts. Smite the
shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered, and I will turn
mine hand upon the little ones. Awake, O sword, against my shepherd,
against the man that is my fellow, my equal. That sword was plunged
into the soul of the Lord Jesus Christ by the Father himself.
The sword of God's justice has already been satisfied in our
substitute, so that his people can come to the tree of life
freely. Then God told Adam, in the day you eat of the fruit
of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, dying thou
shalt die, thou shalt surely die. And just like God said,
Adam began to die physically, didn't he? And he immediately
died spiritually. Arthur Pink said this, this is
really good. He said physical death is the
separation of the soul from the body. Spiritual death is the
separation of the soul from God. That's what happened to Adam.
And that is exactly what Christ, our substitute, suffered for
his people. His soul was separated from his
body. He gave up the ghost. He said,
Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. He gave up the ghost,
his soul separated from his body. And his soul was separated from
God. He cried, my God, my God, why
hast thou forsaken me? Now remember, God doesn't ask
questions for his own information. He asked this question so you
and I would know. He was separated from the Father,
bearing the curse of sin that we deserve, so that now we can
come boldly, confidently before the throne, crying, Abba Father. Do you see here how Christ died
bearing the curse of sin so that his people would live? The death
of Christ, what we're going to remember here in just a few moments,
the death of Christ is the only way there could be no more curse. He bore it all away. Now one
more phrase I want you to look at, Revelation 22. Adam was thrust
out of the garden. Adam no longer could walk with
God in the cool of the evening. He couldn't see the face of God
anymore. But look at verse four, Revelations
22, and they shall see his face. They shall see his face. There's no language, there's
no language to express the joy of seeing his face. These folks
talk about streets of gold and mansions and pearly gates. How will you know? How would
you know? It's hard for me to imagine seeing
the face of the Lord Jesus Christ, that face that was slapped and
beaten for me, that face they plucked out the beard. For me,
for my sake, that face that had that crown of thorns pushed down
on his head, to see him face to face, how could you take your
eyes off him? Who cares if they're streets
of gold? Who cares if it's a big mansion?
To see him face to face, because he bore the curse away.
There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus,
because Christ bore the curse away. Where sin abounded, grace
did much more abound. And I don't think we do harm
to scripture to say where the curse abounded, Christ did much
more abound. He bore the curse away. And no believer, right now, is
under the curse, because Christ bore it away. We're not under
the curse, but we are living with the effects of it, aren't
we? We live with the effects of it every day, but not forever. Not forever. In that day, there
shall be no more curse. What a day. What a day that will
be. And here in a few moments, as
we observe the Lord's table, remember His broken body. Remember His blood shed for us. How thankfully we can do it,
knowing in that sacrifice He bore the curse away. And one
day, we'll not be meeting here looking through a glass darkly
anymore. It'll be face to face. What a day. Well, I hope the
Lord bless that to you.