This is a time of the year when
the world over stops and is at least forced to think about our
Lord Jesus Christ. It's a busy time, a very busy
time of the year. We get caught up in all the things
that go on this time of the year. Have we taken time to stop and
think about what it means that Jesus Christ
came into this earth. The birth, the incarnation of God in human flesh. The birth
of the Lord Jesus Christ. Who is this Jesus? Who is He? This one who we see in our text
is but an infant. Who is He? Why did He come? Simeon, in verse 25, we're told,
there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And the
same man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of
Israel, the comfort of Israel. And the Holy Ghost was upon him.
Simeon is described here as somebody that was waiting for the Lord. He was waiting for Jesus Christ.
He was waiting for the Lord's Christ. He's described here as
a just man. He's described here as a devout
man. May every believer here be just towards one another.
Just in our dealings with one another. Just in our dealings
in this world with men. And be devout to God. Ever devoted
to the means that God has graciously given us. the means of worshiping
Him, a place to come to, songs to sing, a scripture to read,
hearts to rejoice in Him. May we always come and give ourselves
to the means of grace He's provided, but may we never, ever rest in
those things. May we never ever rest in buildings,
in our actions, in our character, and in any of those things. Simeon
had those things, but he's waiting for something he didn't have.
He was waiting for something he didn't have. And when he saw
the Lord Jesus Christ, this is what he cried out. This is what
he was waiting for. In verse 30, he said, Mine eyes
have seen thy salvation. mine eyes have seen thy salvation. That's who Jesus Christ is. He
is the Lord's salvation. He is God's salvation. He says, verse 31, which thou
hast prepared before the face of all people, which thou hast
prepared, a light to lighten the Gentiles, the glory of your
people Israel, the light and the glory of his people. First
thing I want you to direct your attention to here, and the first
thing we need to remember is this. Scriptures declare to us
salvation is of the Lord. Salvation. Salvation is of the
Lord. And don't let us ever forget
what our text is telling us here this morning is the Lord Jesus
Christ is that salvation. He is salvation. He's God's salvation. Simeon saw what every child of
God sees when the Spirit of God makes us alive and makes us to
behold the Lord Jesus Christ by faith. He saw God's chosen
salvation. The Lord's Christ means he's
chosen of God. He's God's own salvation. Simeon saw God's predestinated
salvation. God chose Christ and God, striking
hands with God the Father, Christ Himself, God the Son, He predestinated
Him to come into this earth in the fullness of time, at the
appointed time. This is who he is. Simeon saw
God's promised salvation. This is the one who all the prophets
gave witness to. You can start in Genesis chapter
3, and he's the seed of woman of whom God said would come forth
and bruise the serpent's head. You go through and you find in
Isaiah 7, he's the one Isaiah came forth and said, here is
the sign, a virgin shall conceive. He cannot be born of a man's
seed. He cannot come forth in the natural
way of generation or else he would be just like any other
man, a desperate, ungodly, God-hating rebel. It couldn't be born that
way. This is that holy thing formed
in the womb of the Holy Ghost. This is God's own son, promised
throughout the scriptures. He's Abraham's lamb that was
slain, provided by God and slain. This is the one who all the prophets
spoke and who all the prophets gave witness. God's promised
salvation. This is God's salvation pictured
in all the types and all the shadows throughout all the scriptures.
He's God's lamb. This is who he is, the lamb that
was typified. This is God's mercy seat. This is that one who is the ark
in whom God's covenant is fulfilled. This is that one who himself
has made atonement. This is that one who is the high
priest of his people. This is that one who is indeed
the satisfaction God has made by himself and for himself and
for his people. God's salvation is who he is,
this one who was born king, always was and was born king, king of
the Jews. Those who came from the east
said, where is he that's born king of the Jews? That's who
he is. God's salvation prepared. That
one who came himself to work out, to accomplish by his own
hand the redemption of his people. And he didn't come and do it
in a corner. He did it before the face of all men. He's come
and he's done that which he promised from the foundation of the world.
God has brought that which he said he would and accomplished
that which he said he would. He's God's salvation who glorified
God. That's who this one is. You say,
well, I just look there and when I see, according to what the
Scriptures say, all I can picture in my mind is just an infant
baby. That's how He came forth. God's
ways are not our ways. He didn't come forth like everybody
thought He would. The Kingdom of God came without
observation. And it always does. It doesn't
go forth triumphant and making a big noise and getting all the
world to look at us. That's not how God's kingdom
comes forth. God's kingdom comes forth without observation in
this world. God will have done his work and
saved his people out of this work and be done with this world
while this whole world is going to hell, hanging on to their
religion and boasting about what they've done and not even recognize
what God's done in their midst. Look at verse 11. Unto you is born this day in
the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the Lord. Have you
ever stopped to truly think, really give thought to why the
Lord Jesus Christ came into this earth? He didn't come into this
earth because He felt sorry for sinners. He didn't come into
this earth because He just wanted to pity men. He didn't come into
this earth just so He could try to aid in some way and help out
a little bit men who were messed up just a little bit. He didn't
come into this earth so He could make a way possible and then
stand back just saying, now will you take the way and come and
let God save you. That's not why He came into this
earth. That's not why he came into this earth at all. Joe just
read from Isaiah 42 that he came to this earth on a mission. He
came into this earth for a particular people because he was chosen
of God and sent of God. He came into this world to do
a particular work for a particular people. The Holy Ghost said,
call His name Jesus. Matthew 1.21. Call His name Jesus. That means Savior. It means salvation. Why is He Savior and salvation?
How could His name be called Jesus when as yet He's in the
womb of a virgin and He hasn't done anything yet? He hasn't
come forth and done anything yet. Now how could we possibly
call His name that? There might be a possibility
He won't save His people. There's no possibility He wouldn't
save His people. He was named Jesus from the womb
because it means Savior, it means salvation. For He shall save
His people from their sin. He shall not fail and He did
not fail. He did not fail and He is not
failing now. You see this one who came forth
is God. He's God. That infant you behold,
in these scriptures is God in the flesh of an infant. That's
who He is. He is the infant baby, is the
infinite God. God the Son together in holy
humanity. He's holy omnipotent God and
holy man together in one body. You can see why the angels burst
forth and sang and said, Glory to God in the highest. They're
singing to this infant and bowing down to Him and saying, Glory
to God in the highest. That's who He is. That's who
He is. The whole purpose of the triune
God in sending forth His Son in this world was the redemption
of chosen sinners, His people. He shall save His people from
their sin. He didn't come down here and
lay down His life without knowing who He laid down His life for.
You can't randomly have sin put upon you. You can't randomly
just have sin. That sin was somebody's sin.
It was his elect people's sin. That sin was put upon him. It
was his people's sin. And he put that sin away. And
it's there no more. It does not exist anymore. The
sin of a particular people is gone because he put it away.
He is himself the firstborn. They were there in that temple
that day because He was, all the firstborn children, according
to the law of God, all the firstborn children who opened the matrix,
who opened the womb, were to be holy to the Lord. They were
to be redeemed and to be given to the Lord for the Lord's service.
This one, the womb is opened at conception, when the seed
is planted. That's when the womb's open.
So there never ever will ever, I've told you this repeatedly,
no man has ever fulfilled the law of God, except the God man,
Christ Jesus. Though there were many firstborn
children, that were born first in order from their brothers
and sisters and they were brought forth and given to God and redeemed
with that offering that God demanded. There was never ever truly a
child who opened the womb at birth. but Christ, because He
was conceived in the womb of the Holy Ghost, so that when
He came forth, He opened the womb, He opened the matrix. He's
the only firstborn Son of God. And He came forth that day, and
He's in that temple. He's in that temple, in the arms
of Mary, who's brought Him there, under the protection of Joseph,
who's there with her. But the Lord God, who is that
one there, is ruling and ordering all things. He has come forth
in the earth, born by His own will, by His own Word, according
to everything He's written, under the law. to redeem his people
who had broken the law and were under the law. And so there he
is in the temple at eight days old being circumcised according
to the law to free his people from the law. There he is, the
one who is the redemption pictured in all those gifts that were
offered to redeem him to the Lord. There he is being consecrated
to the Lord, himself doing it and fulfilling all righteousness
and saying to the Lord himself, I am your holy servant. I'm here
dedicated to serve you, to do that for my people, which my
people cannot do, to fulfill all the righteousness of the
law, to declare before all the face of all people the righteousness
of God. We love, we love, we love. We
like to talk about our love. Herein is love. Not that we love
God, but that he loved us and sent forth his only begotten
son to be the mercy seed, propitiation for our sins. This is love, one
that comes forth and loving God as himself and loving his brethren
as himself completely denies himself to the point of being
made sin upon a cursed tree. and bearing the wrath of God,
bearing hell in his own body on the tree and laying down his
life and giving up the ghost so that he might declare God
just and justify his people from their sins. Do we really want
to talk about our love? Do we really want to talk about
our service? Do we really want to talk about
how we've kept the law? That's the keeping of the law.
That's who this infant is. He's the law giver. He's the
law keeper. He's the very righteousness of
God. We were not redeemed with corruptible things. Your preacher
or priest or whatever he is may tell you if you bring such and
such coin and jump up and down ten times and and rub this statue
and rub these beads and flip over backwards and do this thing
and stack grease BBs or whatever it is he tells you to do, then
I'll give you forgiveness. A man can't give forgiveness.
That man's going to take advantage of you and make merchandise of
your souls, what he's doing. He's buying himself freedom from
having to do anything in this life. So he can go through this
life with ease and serve the God called his belly. He'll give
you whatever you want, whatever you think you need, whatever
it takes to get you to keep coming and giving Him what He wants.
That's how to worship. worship of man. This worship
we're talking about, this one is God's salvation. He's the
wisdom of God, who alone had the wisdom to work out all the
purpose of salvation from before the world began. Who come and
orchestrated it before us all on this great stage called the
world and show us how he would do it throughout all the scriptures
and then come forth and do it himself. He's the wisdom that
could do that. Wisdom that could say, how can
a guilty, hell-deserving people be justified from all their sins
and yet God remain just and His law be upheld? Wisdom that determined
that from before the world began. How could he do it? By God himself
coming forth and taking the human nature of the very ones for whom
he's dying. So that God in his infinite power
is able to eternally, his death has effectual power and effectual
saving efficacy and that man, as man, he could die and bear
the sin of his people and put it away in his own body. Who
but wisdom could come up with that? And then create the world. and uphold all things, and bring
everything to pass exactly according to his purpose, and come through
the womb of a virgin. How are you going to do all this
and come in human nature and yet not be polluted as a man?
A body hast thou made me, he said. Lo, I've come to do thy
will. A body hast thou prepared me.
of the Holy Spirit in that room so that he could come forth that
spotless, sinless, perfect one and do for his people what they
couldn't do for themselves. Wisdom. And he's the very righteousness
of God, the righteousness that God sent forth, the righteousness
who accomplished the righteousness of the law, the righteousness
who satisfied all righteousness, the righteousness who comes and
robes his children in that very righteousness so that we can
stand with God, right with God, righteous before God. He's the
one who comes forth and is the sanctifier who by His one offering
has perfected forever all them that are sanctified. Made them
holy by His one offering. So then He comes in the Spirit
and creates a new man created in righteousness and true holiness.
And in that new man, He is our sanctification. So that we know
tis done. And we grow in Him and knowledge
of Him. And he is to everyone that he
works this work in and for their bad, he's their redemption. Freedom. Do you want to be freed from
this earth's sin? Do you want to be freed from your flesh?
Do you want to be freed from your vain ideas? Do you want
to be freed from your vain works? Do you want to be freed from
constantly tormenting and toiling and trying to know how you can
come to God? Do you want to be freed from working and working
and working and never yet being truly satisfied so that you can
stop working and rest in the Redeemer and rejoice in His salvation? You want that? This is where
it's to be found in Christ Jesus. He's the salvation of God. And
when He's wrought this work, we'll say with Jonah, I'll sacrifice
unto thee with a voice of thanksgiving. That's the sacrifice God's well
pleased with, the voice of thanksgiving. And I'll pay that I vowed. Salvation
is of the Lord because He's made you to see. He is salvation. Do you see that? Salvation's
not you, it's not me. He is salvation. God is salvation. If we could just get that. God
is salvation. Christ our Lord is salvation. Well, how are we going to be
brought to see that? How are we going to be brought to rest there
and know He is salvation? Well, Simeon already believed
the Lord. He already believed the Lord by the Holy Spirit.
It says he was a just and devout man waiting on Christ to come.
But in the manner that Simeon was brought to see Christ that
day, we have an example of how every elect child of God is brought
to behold the Lord Jesus Christ and believe on Him. It's first
of all by the work of the Holy Spirit. Look at verse 25. It
says there, the Holy Ghost was upon him. You see the last word
there? The Holy Ghost was upon him.
You see, the Holy Spirit of God didn't come into this earth on
the day of Pentecost when the church was baptized in the Holy
Spirit. He already was in the earth.
All of the scriptures were God breathed by the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit is the one way by which all of God's people
have been made alive. been made new creatures, been
made to behold Christ and begin giving faith to believe. Just
as Simeon here had the Holy Ghost upon him before as yet the Holy
Spirit had been poured out on the day of Pentecost. The Spirit
of God, God the Holy Spirit, is the way sinners are going
to be brought to life and given faith and repentance to believe
on Him. It has to be so, brethren, because God is salvation. God
is salvation. the Lord alone saves and you
and I born into this world are dead in trespasses and sins.
We have no problem whatsoever with Jesus being the infant Jesus. We have no problem whatsoever
with Jesus being somebody who came to try to save his people
from their sin. By nature we have no problem
doing all of the things religion tells us to do as long as Ultimately,
we can be the one who made the final decision. We can be the
one who made it effectually, finally, by our will, by what
we did. That's being under the law. You
understand that? Telling somebody you've got to
be circumcised, telling somebody you've got to do something, it
all amounts to this one thing, telling somebody they can be
saved by their will, by their work. We don't mind a Jesus that
will allow us to be saved that way. We find out we're dead in
trespasses and sins when we hear about the God of this Bible,
the Jesus of this Bible, who is Lord and Savior, who's not
waiting on anybody, who penetrates the dark depths of a hellacious,
ungodly, stinking, wretched man called a sinner, and creates
light where there was no light, and life where there was no life,
and makes him alive under God to rejoice and behold him. That's
when we find out we're dead in trespasses and sin. When we hear
that message and say, I can't go for that. Look at the next thing, it was
by the Holy Spirit revealing divinely in him. Verse 26, it
was revealed unto him by the Holy Ghost. You see salvations
by divine revelation. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel of Christ for therein is the righteousness of God revealed. from faith to faith. We have to have a revelation
made in our hearts. We have to have light shed abroad,
love shed abroad, revelation to know God is. We think we can
teach ourselves. We think we can pick this book
up and find out God. We think by searching we can
know him. We've been going into space ever since we've been working
to try to If you look back over time at all the progress that
this world has made, and think about it really, what we've done
in that progress is try to go to space and go to space and
go further out. It took the steel industry to
get to that point. It's taken computer industry
to get to that point. It's taken going from working
with sticks and dirt all the way to metals, to steel, all
the way to combustive engines, all of those things to finally
get and start sending men out into space. And if you look at
the whole thing, really what we've been doing, what natural
man has been doing from the beginning is just trying to build a tower
to get to God and find out who He is by our own work. The whole
of our civilization has been trying to build a tower like
they did in the Bible to get to Him. But we can't find out
God that way. It's going to be only by divine
revelation, by God coming to us and revealing it in our heart,
in here, who He is. It's by the Spirit drawing us
to Christ. Look at verse 27. He came by
the Spirit into the temple. He came by the Spirit into the
temple. And when the parents brought
in the child Jesus to do for Him after the custom of the law,
there He is. The Holy Spirit drew Simeon,
and there's Joseph and Mary drawn there. And there's Christ in
the middle of it all. You see the picture there? That's
how sinners... It doesn't matter where you are
in this world. It doesn't matter where God's
sheep is in this pasture. The God who is infinite, the
God who is holy, the God who is sovereign and omnipotent to
work all things, He will draw His child. You won't know how
you're being drawn or why you're being drawn there. You came this
day thinking, I just came this day because this is what I ought
to do. If you've been brought to hear
God and God's going to speak in your heart, it wasn't by accident.
And I can assure you that it wasn't by accident. God draws
his people and makes us cross headlong with Christ Jesus. He brings us, brings the one
who's going to declare the gospel, just as here they come with Christ
in their arms. And he brings the one who Christ
is going to be revealed unto, just like Simeon came there.
And it's God who is Christ who is working the whole thing. And
it's by the Word. Verse 29, when Simeon spoke,
he said, everything was according to thy Word. This book's the
Word of the Lord. This book declares the Lord's
salvation. The message you're hearing today
It's the message of this book. It is the gospel we preach every
time we meet together. It's the gospel we delight in.
It's the gospel we go home and study in this work. It's the
gospel we try to tell other men about, other sinners about. It's
the good news. These are the glad tidings. It
doesn't change. It doesn't get old. It's forever
new in the heart that God's made new. This is the gospel we preach. Today, some folks talk about
Jesus. Comes around to to the day when
everybody's hiding Easter eggs and chasing bunnies around and
they'll talk about Him on a cross a little bit. And in between,
it'll be all about man, man, man, man. We're going to talk
about Christ today. We're going to talk about Him
Next time we come together, we're going to talk about Him next
time we come together, because He is the Word. He is the Word. And it's through faith, and we
see here verse 25, that He was waiting on the consolation of
Israel. That's how He believed God. And
He was waiting on the Lord, and He saw the Lord. Just as Simeon
was waiting for Christ to come, every believer that's been called
by the Holy Spirit, He's come, and He's accomplished salvation,
and we're waiting now on Him to return. And He's coming back,
and we're just waiting on Him, just like Simeon was there, Job.
We're just waiting on Him. Can you say, He's my salvation?
Can you say, He's my salvation? He is the Lord's salvation. He
is salvation. Can you say, He's my salvation?
Moses said that. He said, He's become my salvation. David said, The Lord is my light
and my salvation. Isaiah was brought to behold
Him and he said, behold God is my salvation. Can you say He's
my salvation? I pray the Spirit of God make
it so today that you can say He's my salvation. Well, what's
going to happen? We've seen the salvation is Christ. He is the Lord's salvation. We've
seen that you can't come to Him except by the Spirit of God.
God's going to get all the glory for this. What's going to happen
when all this happens? When all this takes place, what's
the third thing, the effectual result that's going to take place?
The believer called, the sinner called by the Spirit of God is
going to lay hold of Christ. Look at verse 28. Then took Him
up in His arms, He took him up. Every regenerated soul who sees
the Lord Jesus Christ, he can't help. But by God's grace, he
can't help. It's impossible. But for him
to do just this one thing, he has to take hold of Christ. He
has to. He has to lay hold of Him. And
that's what he'll do. That's what every sinner called
of God will do, take hold of Him. Can't you just see, see
me that day? I can just picture Mary and Joseph
walking in there and they got this babe in their arms. And
it hadn't entered into their heart really the fullness of
what's taking place. And all of a sudden here's this
stranger in the temple and he grabs him and just takes hold
of him out of her arms. That's what That's what the believer
does. We lay hold of it. Like that
woman that came and said, if I could just touch the hem of
his garment, I can be whole. Like John who sat there at the
supper and he just laid upon his breast. Like he draws those
who doubt him. And he makes us to like Thomas
and he says, come here and touch me. Come here, put your finger
in the holes in my hands. Come here and thrust your hand
into my side. Come here and feel that it's
I, it's me, I'm your salvation. All this is done through faith.
And I'll tell you what happens too. When us believers made the
lay hold of Christ, we bless God. Look at verse 28. Then took
he up in his arms, him up in his arms, and he blessed God.
You know what that means? It means he gave all the glory
to God. We come into this world and we're
just hound dogs. That's what we are. We're hounds.
Glory hounds. We come into this world looking
for glory. We come into this world looking
for praise. We come into this world on one
track. We got one track we're sniffing
out. It's glory and it's praise. We
come into this world, want somebody to clap their hands for us, to
say good things about us, to exalt us, to put us up on a pedestal,
to make us feel like somebody. That's what we come into this
world wanting. It's... I was thinking about
this when we went over there to serve that night and watched
you play guitar. I think I've told you this before
about a friend of mine who... I was thinking about everybody
clapping, you know, and all that. That is so dangerous to us. So we don't realize it. But it
just... Man, it just puffs up the flesh,
and it makes you feel so good, and it makes you feel so... And
other men are applauding us. Applauding us. But when God calls
a sinner, you know what we stop doing? We stop wanting men to
applaud us. We see now that there's no good
thing in our flesh. Now our desire is we want God
to be blessed. We want Him to be glorified.
This is the common denominator among all God's people. Wherever
you find them, this is what you're going to find. You're going to
find a people who want Christ Jesus to have all the preeminence.
They want God to have all the glory. That's the difference
between the way that one sinner hears the gospel and knows this
is the voice of my Savior and hears a voice that is not the
voice of his Savior. Because one's giving all the
glory to God and the other one's giving glory to man. And a sinner,
that makes a sinner nauseous now, a believer nauseous now.
He don't want man having the glory, he wants God having the
glory. Ah, grace, that's what we glorify
Him for, grace. Grace that chose His Son, grace
that sent His Son, grace that provided a lamb, grace that came
and showed us that salvation's been accomplished. And when the
believer's made to lay hold of Christ, he blesses God, glorifies
God, and this is something else he does, he confesses Him with
the mouth. Look, verse 28. Then took he
Him up in his arms and blessed God and said, He went to talking. He said, Lord, now let us, thou
servant, depart in peace according to thy word, for mine eyes have
seen thy salvation. Can you imagine everybody in
that temple? Everybody's there that day and they're there because
they're doing their same old thing, going through their same
old routine. They've done hundreds and hundreds of times. And all
of a sudden, they hear a man and this man goes to talk about,
they can hear him saying, talking about seeing God's salvation.
They can hear him saying that he's seen the Lord's Christ.
Here's the comfort of Israel. He's here! I see him! Here he
is! What in the world got into that
fellow? What in the world's got a hold of that man? Oh, that
old sin man. He done got so old now he's lost
it. No, he got it. He got it. That's what happened to him.
God got him. With the heart man believes unto righteousness,
and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation. Whoever
believes and confesses Him, because the Spirit of God dwells in him,
and he in God. You believe the Lord Jesus in
your heart. Have you confessed Him before men? You know, when
everybody's singing, joy to the world, everybody's singing Hark
the Herald Angels, and you join in with singing with everybody,
as long as everybody else is singing, that ain't confessing
Him. I ain't confessin' him, you know
that? Everybody right now join in with singin' and mumblin'
along while everybody else is singin', but when all those other
voices stop singin', they'll stop singin' too. When all the
other voices stop singin', will you be found singin' about him
alone? Will you still be found declaring his name? When all
this season, when the last note of this season waves through
the air and it falls into nothing and you can't hear it anymore,
will your voice still be saying to Mara, here's all my salvation,
Christ the Lord? Will the next day, will you be
waking up saying, oh, He's all my salvation? When you come in
contact with anyone who asks you, what's the hope in you?
Let me tell you about my hope, it's the Lord who's my salvation.
Oh, confess Him before me. The believer says, I want to
follow Him in believer's baptism. I want to join the church. I
want to be identified with His people. I want to come to His
table and feast upon the bread and the wine remembering Him.
I want to come and hear Him and delight in Him and sing of Him.
That's the believer's heart. peace that lasts. And that's
the other thing. He's given peace. Look at verse
29. He said, Lord, now let us, thou
servant, depart in peace according to thy word. Can you say that?
Can you say, Lord, now I can depart. I can leave this world
in peace. Can you say that? Most people
would say, Not quite. There's just something
else I've got to do. Simeon said, now I can depart
in peace. He had the peace of knowing God
is at peace with him. Do you have the peace of knowing
that all your sin has been put away? All of it. The peace of knowing that Christ
has reconciled you to God. The peace of being made the righteousness
of God. The peace of full acceptance
with God. The peace of believing God. The peace that comes peace with
ceasing. Peace that comes by believing,
by ceasing to try to merit and make yourself acceptable, God.
Peace and resting in Christ. Do you have that peace? Christ
our peace. Peace of youth is fading. It
won't last. Remember now that creator in
the days of thy youth before the evil days come. The peace
of youth is fading. The peace of your eyes is fading.
It's going to grow dim. The light's going to still be
shining. The sun will still be shining. You just won't be able
to see it. Simeon, this old, old man, he had the light that
is Christ. He had the light that will never
be dimmed. He had the light of the heart that's made eternally
young by God Almighty. Soon you'll be so feeble that
the voice of a bird will frighten you, and you won't be able to
sleep through the night because of it. And having Christ, we
have the shield and defender, the one who said, I give my sheep
eternal life, and they'll never perish, and neither shall any
man pluck them out of my hand. Oh, that's peace. That's peace. This salvation's been prepared
by God for His elect out of the four corners of the earth. That's
what he said there in verses 31 and 32. Which thou hast prepared
before the face of all people alike to lighten the Gentiles
and the glory of thy people Israel. I'm going to be brief here, but
it quite simply means this. This is where God brings us to
rejoice that God chose a people. He brings us not to hate the
doctrine of election. He brings us to rejoice that
God did elect a people. To sum it up here, He's the light
of the Gentiles, He's the light and glory of Israel. Whether
you're a Jew or a Gentile, this salvation it says here up in
verse 10, it's glad tidings of good things, great joy which
shall be to all people. That means it takes in all kinds
of people. God's elect are found in all
kinds of people from all races and all places and all faces.
Election opens the door for sinners who otherwise had no hope because
God chose a people before as yet the people knew they needed
God. Lowly shepherds came, men from
the east came, Simeon's an old man, Mary and Joseph are young,
lame, deaf, sick, withered. This is a faithful saying and
worthy of all acceptation. Christ Jesus came in the world
to save sinners of whom I am cheap. That's the issue. Do you
rejoice that God chose you who are yet just a wretched sinner? Can you rejoice in God's salvation? Are you lame? Are you deaf? Are
you sick? Are you rich? Are you poor? Are
you unable? It doesn't matter where you are.
It doesn't matter where you come from. It doesn't matter. This
is what matters. Don't try to work out some kind
of righteousness to make yourself presentable to come to Him. Come
to Him without anything that you've done at all. He's the fitness. He didn't come
to save sinners. I mean, the righteous. He came
to save sinners. He won't receive you if you're
righteous. He won't receive you if you've got something to come
to Him with. This way is too narrow for you
to get into it with any other thing, any other baggage. You
can't come with anything but just your sin. That's it. I got
this last thing and I think you'll rejoice. He blessed them too. Look at verse 33 and 34. Joseph and his mother marveled
at those things which were spoken of him. And Simeon blessed them. He blessed them. That means that
just as the believer is brought to give glory to God, the believer
rejoices in those God uses to bring the good news of Christ
to them. They were the ones God used to
bring Christ to him so he could see Christ. It's not that we're
glorying in men. We don't glory in men. We glory
in God. We rejoice in our brethren, though,
that God used to bring Christ to us so that we know Him and
can worship Him and rejoice in Him. Because it took God calling
out of people and making them sacrificially give of themselves
to put this gospel in our face and make us hear it. And we thank
Him and rejoice in Him. He's the tie that binds us. When
we pour out ointment on the feet of those that He's called, we're
pouring out ointment on the feet of our Lord Jesus Christ. Just
like when she came and that box of ointment was busted open and
poured out on Christ's feet. Love to God and love to brethren.
But here's the last thing. I want you to see this because
this was a great blessing to me. The believer's peace in this
world is not like the peace that men speak of. It's not like the
peace this world gives. Read verses 34 with me and 35. And let's just skip the parentheses
just for a moment. Simon blessed them and he said
unto Mary his mother, Behold this, and the child is added. I'm just amazed at this holy
thing. Behold, this one is set for the
fall and rising again of many in Israel, and for a sign which
shall be spoken against, verse 35, that the thoughts of many
hearts may be revealed. You see, Christ is the sign and
He's the sword. That's what He's referred to
here as a sign and as a sword. He's for the falling of meaning.
See, Christ is going to be a stumbling block to meaning, foolishness
to meaning. And everybody's going to be saved
by Him. Some's going to stumble and say, I'll be saved, but not
that way. but He's going to be for the
rising of many, for the saving of many. To those who shall be
saved, Christ is the sign. He's the sign that God gave to
Ahaz, Emmanuel, God with us, born of the Virgin. He's the
sign that was given to those shepherds. They would find an
infinite swaddling clothes. No form nor comeliness about
Him that when we should see Him, we should desire Him. He's the
sign of the prophet Jonah. Crucified. Went into the earth. Three days he came out and the
sea has stopped her raging. Acceptance with God for his people. To others, he's the sign which
shall be spoken against. When he came into this earth,
not everybody was happy. Not everybody was singing joy
to the world. Herod was very troubled and all Jerusalem was
troubled with him. Because Herod thought himself
a king and all Jerusalem thought they had their whole little religious
playhouse going on and they didn't want it to be broken up. They
didn't want Christ to come and tear it down, but he will. They
get feisty and mean when that happens. They get ornery and
mean when they hear Christ accomplishing His word. And that sword, brethren,
is the sword of Christ that separates. The gospel of Christ is sure
to have some effect upon those who hear it. They either rejoice
with Simeon or they become angry as did Herod. You may not see
it outwardly. Men don't usually outwardly try
to appear angry. It's in the heart where it's
at. It's in the heart. But Christ separates. But I want
you to see this. Because that happens, that causes
the believer great trouble, great sorrow, great suffering in this
earth. It's amazing how we have such peace in our heart and yet
by the very one, because of the very one by whom we have that
peace, we have great, great suffering. Suffering we didn't know before
we knew Christ. Look at the parenthesis now,
verse 35. Yea, a sword shall pierce through
thine own soul also. We don't worship Mary. We don't
worship Mary. She's a sinner saved by grace
just like everybody else. But I want you to hear something.
I want you to think about this and you'll find great peace and
comfort for your own heart. Brethren, you think about how
much the love of God overflows in your own heart. The love of
Christ, how what He's done, what He's fulfilled just makes your
heart just overflow with rejoicing over what He's done. and how
feebly you love Him. You do love Him, but it's a feeble
love, but you love Him. You have that communion in your
heart with Him. Think about if you were Mary. She had that because He's her
Savior. Christine, that was her son.
She carried him in her womb. There was a filial, natural attachment
to him just like a mother has to any child. He's her Lord and
her Savior. And at the same time, he was
the one she carried in her womb and gave birth to and nursed
on her breast and cared for and carried all throughout his time
growing up. So that every bit of suffering
that he endured struck her in her heart like
a sword because it was both her Lord, her God, her Savior who
was suffering, and her child who was suffering. No sooner she declared blessed
of God, but she's told that the pain she's gonna bear in her
own bosom, her own heart because of his suffering, Now get this,
this is what I want you to get from all that. The rejection
of Christ is as personal to a believer as it is to a mother whose own
child is rejected and suffers. It's just that real. The rejection
of our Savior is the suffering of our own flesh and blood. That's what we say about our
children, that's my flesh and blood. The suffering that we
endure, the rejection of Christ by sinners is just that personal.
It's our own flesh and blood. But there's something else peaceful
in this. The suffering of a believer,
that child who is Christ's own, it touches God our Savior just
like a Son is touched when his mother
suffers. We're members of his body. You
see what I'm getting at here? It's that real. But that touch,
that he's touched with a feeling of our infirmities, it's more
so with him towards us than us toward him. But here's the piece.
I want you to turn to John 19, 26. We see here how Christ is our
peace and our full provision when we see how He provided for
Mary before He gave up the ghost on the cross. Look at verse 25. Now there stood by the cross
of Jesus His mother and His mother's sister Mary, the wife of Cleophas,
and Mary Magdalene. And when Jesus therefore saw
His mother and the disciple standing by whom He loved, there was John
and there's His mother. He saith unto his mother, Woman,
behold thy son. He said to her, from now on,
John's your son. He's going to take care of you.
And he said to the disciple, to John, behold your mother.
And from that hour, that disciple took her into his own home. Do
you see he provided for her? Can you think how her heart was
pierced through there? Just doubly pierced through.
But you see how He was doubly pierced in His longing for her
to be provided for? That's how it is for every believer
for whom Christ died. So that He who laid down His
life, who bore away our sin, who justified us, who made us
the righteousness of God in Him, promises to provide all for us,
to protect us and to love us to the end. We're members of
His own body, as real as a mother and a son. So that's how we suffer
for His name's sake. That's our peace. That's our
peace. So like Simeon, we can live out
the rest of our days and say, Lord, I can depart in peace. I've seen Your salvation. Some of you here have never seen
His salvation. You've heard it preached. You've
heard it preached multiple times now. Never called on Him, never
believed on Him, never let go of everything else. When Simeon
lifted Him up, took hold of Him, He couldn't be holding on to
anything else. He laid hold on Him, let go of
everything else. I pray that the Lord, the Holy
Spirit, will be pleased to cause you to come to Him, cause you
to have life that you may see Him with the eye of faith and
lay hold of Him with everything and find this comfort, this peace
that passes all understanding and know that you'll be kept
and are able to depart in peace now and be with the Lord forever.
Salvation is God. God is salvation. Christ is salvation. There is salvation in no other.
Amen.