Let's all stand and sing 125.
Jesus paid it all, 125. I hear the Savior say, thy strength
indeed is small. Child of weakness, watch and
pray, find in me thine all in all. Jesus paid it all, all to
Him I owe. Sin hath left a crimson stain
he washed in white as snow. For now, indeed, I find thy power
and thine alone. and change the leopard's spots
and melt the heart of stone. Jesus paid it all, all to him
I owe. Sin hath left a crimson stain,
he washed it white as snow. ? For nothing good I have ? Whereby
thy grace to claim ? I'll wash my garments white ? In the blood
of Calvary's flame ? Jesus paid it all ? All to Him I owe ? Sin hath left
a crimson stain ? He washed it white as snow ? And when before
the throne ? I stand in incomplete ? Jesus died my soul to save
My lips shall still repeat Jesus paid it all All to Him I owe
Sin hath left a crimson stain He washed it white as snow Thank
you. I think I had the speed a little
low on that slope, so I apologize. Morning. I'm going to read Psalm
138. Psalm 138. I will praise thee with my whole
heart before the gods while I sing praise unto thee. I will worship
toward thy holy temple and praise thy name for thy loving kindness
and for thy truth, for thou hast magnified the word above all
thy name. In the day when I cried, thou
answerest me and strengthenest me with strength in my soul. All the kings of the earth shall
praise thee, O Lord, when they hear the words of thy mouth.
Yea, they shall sing in the ways of the Lord, for great is the
glory of the Lord. Though the Lord be high, yet
hath he respect unto the lowly, but the proud he knoweth afar
off. Though I walk in the midst of
trouble, thou wilt revive me. Thou shalt stretch forth thine
hand against the wrath of mine enemies, and thy right hand shalt
save me. The Lord will perfect that which
concerneth me. Thy mercy, O Lord, endureth for
ever. Forsake not the works of thine
own hands. Let's pray. Father, we come to you thankful
for this verse, chapter of Scripture. Father, we ask that you please
do have respect unto the lowly. We are the lowly and don't let
us be proud, Father. Please just let us know our place.
Let us know that you are high and we are low and that we need
you and must have you. Father, we're thankful that you
strengthen us against our enemies. And Father, we just ask that
you continue to watch over this church. And Father, watch over
the one that you've sent to be our pastor. And if you would
see to it that if it be your will for it to grow, Father,
we ask that you bring anybody and everybody from all around
to hear the word. Father, we just again ask that you watch
over the man that you've sent to bring the messages. And Lord,
we just ask that you watch over and care for us in Christ's name. As you remain sitting, let's
sing 145, Hail Thou Once Despised Jesus. I don't think we've sung
this together. It is a familiar tune, but I'll
do my best. Thou that once despised Jesus,
Thou the Galilean King, Thou didst suffer to release us, Thou
didst say, Salvation brings. Hail Thou agonizing Savior, bearer
of our sin and shame. By Thy merits we find favor. Life is given through Thy name. Ask, O Lamb, by God appointed,
all our sins on Thee were laid. Thy almighty love anointed, now
has full atonement made. All thy people are forgiven through
the virtue of thy blood. Opened is the gate of heaven,
peace be made between man and God. Jesus, hail, enthroned in
glory, there forever to abide. ? All the heavenly hosts adore
thee ? ? Seated at thy father's side ? ? Here for sinners thou
art pleading ? ? There thou dost our place prepare ? ? Ever for
us interceding ? ? Till in glory we appear ? ? Worship honor,
power, and blessing ? ? Thou art worthy to receive ? ? Loudest
praises without ceasing ? ? Meet it is for us to give ? ? Healthy,
bright, angelic spirits ? ? Bring your sweetest, noblest lays ?
Thank you. Nice work. Thank you, Scott and Joe. It's
a blessing to me. I do like that song, too. I'll have to definitely sing
it again a few more times. It's really nice. Okay, turn with me to John, chapter
7. I want to look at verses 19 through
27 with you this morning. Now, in this text, our Lord,
He reproves these Jews. They were trusting in the Law
of Moses, and they were trusting that they had a righteousness
by the Law. But the reality is, while they
were trusting in it, they were actually guilty of breaking it,
and so condemned themselves. And that's because there's not
a man on the earth that has ever been on this earth who's not
guilty of breaking the whole law of God, with one exception,
the Lord Jesus Christ. He alone kept the law perfectly,
perfectly. And so what the Lord does here
for his people is, He teaches his people. He turns our hearts
from trusting in our own works and trusting the things that
we do and brings us to see that he's all our salvation. And so what we find the Lord
showing us is that throughout scripture, we see that there's
no man accepted by God according to his works and what he himself
has done to make himself righteous. God's not going to receive or
accept that which man manufactures and brings to God, saying, here,
this is my goodness and my righteousness. Receive me in this. God won't do it. But happy is
that man to whom the Lord reveals himself to. That sinner. is happy, whom the Lord rebukes
and turns them from trusting their own works and their own
strength and their own goodness and puts their hope and faith
and confidence in nothing but the Lord Jesus Christ alone. Happy is that man who is turned
to Jesus Christ instead. And so what the Lord does as
he's teaching us, and really, he reveals this to all. He's declaring the truth throughout
his word. And what he does is he reveals
what's in the heart of man. He makes known what's in our
hearts. It says in Hebrews 4, verses
12 and 13, that the word of God is quick. It's alive, and it's
powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even
to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints
and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of
the heart. Neither is there any creature that is not manifest
in his sight, but all things are naked and opened unto the
eyes of him with whom we have to do." And so, What a mercy
it is if the Lord in grace lays our heart bare, opens it up,
makes us to see what we are and to see our need of Him, that
we might behold the glorious light of His salvation in His
Son, Jesus Christ. I've titled this message, A Faithful
Reproof. A Faithful Reproof. And I want
to begin with a little background. We're going to begin in verse
14 and go through a few verses here to work our way up to verse
19. Now about the midst of the feast,
Jesus went up into the temple and taught. And the Jews marveled,
saying, how knoweth this man letters? Where did he get this
learning, having never learned? He didn't train with us. Jesus
answered them and said, my doctrine, my teaching, my word is not mine,
but his that sent me. And the doctrine that the Lord
is speaking of here is the doctrine of Christ. It's the doctrine
of Christ. And the doctrine of Christ turns
us from our own works. It turns us from self-confidence. It turns us from self-righteousness
and the idea that God is just looking for us to be Moral or
more religious just to believe in something as though God just
is looking for us to be of a higher moral Caliber than what we are
and he just wants us to do the best we can and to do better
That's a lie. That's not true. God is righteous
and holy and no sinner shall stand in his presence And by
our works, we cannot rid ourselves. We cannot remove the stain of
sin and the guilt of those things which we've done in rebellion
and against the word of our God. And so our Lord is bringing us
to see that it's not us. It's not what we do or don't
do. It's not what we say or don't
say. He brings his children to see that Christ is all. Christ is all. And the doctrine
of Christ is the revelation that Christ is all. He is our salvation. And the doctrine of Christ is
the whole of Scripture. It's God declaring redemption
in His Son. The redemption of a people, the
purchase of a people, to secure them unto His salvation by the
death and resurrection of His Son, whom He sent to save His
people from their sins. He was delivered for our offenses
and raised again for our justification. It's why He came. This is why
the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, that He should be the
fit sacrifice, the shorty, the one who would come and pay the
debt of His people who obtained eternal redemption for us by
Himself. Glory be to His name. And so
to preach and to teach the doctrine of Christ It's to put man in
the dust. It's to send him back to where
he came from. To put our faces in the dirt
before holy God. It's to exalt our God in salvation. It's to speak of His glorious
redemption. It's to speak of His Christ,
our King, our Lord, our Savior, the one whom we need. and whom
God graciously sent and spared him not. He didn't withhold his
son from us. He delivered him up for us all,
all his people. And so the preaching of the doctrine
of Christ declares that there is one hope of salvation given
to men, and it's to God's glory. It points us to Christ. It shows
us our need of him and his grace and mercy and sending him. And so our Lord then says to
these Jews in verse 17, if any man will do his will, he shall
know of the doctrine. He'll know of the doctrine, whether
it be of God or whether I speak of myself. Is God receiving the
glory or is man receiving the glory? Is the glory going to
Christ? Or is it going to man and what
he's done for Christ? Because that's how man talks.
It's about what we do for God. But the reality is we can do
nothing for God. We're dependent entirely upon
the will and the grace of our God. To do the will of God is
to believe on the one whom he has sent. It's to believe on
Christ. And our Lord tells us this is
the work of God. This is his work in you that
you believe on him whom he has sent, John 6, 29. And he that
believes Christ, our Lord says, he shall know of the doctrine. He's going to know of the doctrine
because the Holy Spirit is the one that's leading him to Christ,
to be whole. the glory of our God in the face
of Jesus Christ, to behold His light, His salvation, His deliverance
from our sins, so that we know this Jesus of Nazareth is the
Son of God. He is the Christ, the one whom
the Father sent to put away the sins of His people, and we know
this because we're born of Him. Those whom He gives life to,
gives a regeneration, a new birth to by His Spirit, they know that
this is the Christ. And they believe Him whom God
sent. Second John, verse 9, he that
abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he that continues in the doctrine
of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. He has it all. He has everything necessary to
stand before God in the Day of Judgment. Perfect, spotless,
received of Him. He's received of the Father.
He has everything. Alright, now this brings us to
our Lord's reproof of these Jews. The reality is that since none
of us has a righteousness of our own, none of us is walking
in the light when Christ comes to us in salvation. It's not
because of what we've done, it's entirely of His grace. And since
none of us knows the truth and is in darkness, we all are reproved
by the Lord. We all see that everything I
thought and trusted in is a lie, but here is salvation. This is
the Savior whom God has sent. And so the preaching of the doctrine
of Christ, it condemns all other hopes of men. The preaching of
the doctrine of Christ, the doctrine of Christ itself condemns all
the hopes that we have in self. and in religion, and in doing
the things that we did. All that is condemned before
Christ. And so the wicked who hear that
being cut to the heart, they gnash with their teeth against
the true and living God. They despise God's salvation. They despise his word. And so
they gnash against God. They gnash against his Christ.
They gnash against his gospel. They gnash their teeth against
the one whom God sent because they hate the true and living
God. But his people, being pricked in their heart, they shall know
of the doctrine, and believing by His grace shall continue in
the doctrine of Christ." They shall abide in Christ, looking
ever to the Lord Jesus Christ and Him alone. In Revelation
2.17, there's a sweet word there which says, He that hath an ear,
let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches. To him
that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna. The hidden manna. Which means
we're going to see and know the salvation of God and the questions
of our heart He answers and He teaches us and He grows us and
keeps us and leads us ever to the fountain of life, the blood
of our Savior to behold Him. who loved us and gave himself
for us. And so he that believes Christ,
though his faith be the size of a grain of a mustard seed,
that little teeny weeny tiny seed, the mustard seed, he that
has faith in Christ, he has everything. He has everything. And as long
as the Lord is pleased to leave him on this earth serving him,
he'll grow him and feed him and nourish him strengthen him and
keep him all his days looking to our Lord. And so the Lord
here, he demonstrates that man's trust and confidence is our vain
and that they cannot save us. That's what he's showing here
in this passage. Because the Jews, they were trusting
in the law of Moses. They were trusting that, looking
to that law, this is my righteousness, this is my acceptance whereby
God will justify me in that day. He'll say, well done, you're
righteous, you kept the law of Moses faithfully, well done. And because they believed that
they were keeping it, they didn't realize that they weren't keeping
it. And the reality is the law doesn't
fix the heart. The law doesn't cure the ills
of the heart. The law gives no grace. It gives
no power to the sinner to improve and to do that which is contained
in the law. We either keep the law perfectly
or we don't. We've either kept it perfectly,
or we've broken it in every point. And so Christ here, he strips
down what they're believing in. He lays their heart bare in verse
19. Let's look at that. John 7, verse
19. Did not Moses give you the law?
And yet none of you keepeth the law. Why go ye about to kill
me? So what's our Lord getting at
here when he says, did not Moses give you the law? He's pointing
out, he's saying, this is your trust right here, isn't it? Is
it not? Are you not trusting in the law
of Moses? You're looking to that law which
he gave, and that's your confidence, that that is your righteousness,
is it not? And yet, he says, none of you keepeth the law. none of you keepeth the law."
And when he said that, he condemned their hope. He's saying, you're
trusting in the law, and yet you're not keeping the law. You don't keep it, and you cannot
keep it, because those who are born of Adam's seed can never
keep that law. We're guilty of breaking the
whole law. And so those who trust that the
law is a righteousness are condemned by the law, because they're not
keeping the law perfectly. And Christ shows them this truth
immediately. He said, none of you keepeth
the law, why go ye about to kill me? And that's because he knows
what's in man's heart. When he condemned their hope
in the law, they hated him for it. And they murdered him in
their heart. And they broke the sixth commandment,
thou shalt not kill. They broke that law immediately. And the Lord is showing that
the confidences of man, are vain. They're false hopes. They're
vanity. They cannot save you. There's
one salvation and it's the Lord Jesus Christ alone. And if it's not the law, it's
other things that man are trusting. It's not just the law of Moses.
Man puts a lot of confidences in what he does because he doesn't
know what God is saying. He has no ear to hear what the
Lord is saying. And so He'll even give of his
life to the church. He'll give of his resources,
both his time and his money. He'll build a church if he has
to. And he'll partake of the activities. And he'll get involved. He'll sing the hymns. And he'll
read the Bible if asked to. And he might even lead. some
teaching and be the pastor even. Man can do, there's no limit
to what man will do in the name of trying to earn acceptance
with God. And so people doing these things
and being members and getting baptized and whatever it is that
they're doing, they have a confidence, a hope that this is what God's
looking for. He's just looking for us to be
faithful in something and something religiously related and that
we're good people. And that's why a lot of people
will learn and subject themselves under confessions of churches,
because they don't really know what the Lord's looking for,
but they figure if I just submit to this confession and put myself
under the umbrella of a confession, I'm bound to earn God's favor
to some degree. Something there's got to help
me out. But what is the true hope? and confidence of the child of
God. It's Christ. And the Spirit who
has come upon one of God's children in darkness delivers them out
of that darkness into the arms of Christ to behold that He is
light and salvation, that He is all. Christ is all, and that
He brings us to Him, to look to Him, to trust Him, to find
all our hope and confidence in none but the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, that's where the Lord
brings us, because all have sinned and come short of the glory of
God. All the other confidences of man come short of that which
He seeks. And so I know this to be true
because none of what man's flesh trusts in is the doctrine of
Christ. It's the doctrine of man. It's
the doctrine of religion. It's the doctrine of the flesh.
It's the doctrine of the Sadducees and the Pharisees. It's doctrine
that cannot save. Whosoever transgresseth and abideth
not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God. is what we're told in 2 John,
verse 9. So the doctrine declares, the doctrine of Christ declares,
we cannot save ourselves. God's not pleased with us just
because we're religious and because we're doing the best that we
can. He's pleased with the one whom he sent. And to look anywhere
else is to say, no, thank you, Lord. I don't trust you. I'm
not hearing what you're saying. I'm not looking to your son and
your salvation. I'm looking here, and this will
be good enough. This will be what you really
want. The way Cain did it. The way Cain did it. Cain didn't
hear, and he was upset about it. He got angry and murdered
his brother because Abel came in in the blood. He came trusting
in the blood as God had done back in the garden when he slew
an animal and covered Adam and Eve and and Adam understood this
is looking to Christ the salvation and he taught his sons and one
heard it one had an ear and one did it and he built his own the
other one came built his own altar made it look nice decorated
it beautifully with with colorful fruits and vegetables and was
angry when God did not receive it. Because God receives those
who come in the blood of the Lamb, His Son, Jesus Christ. And so, look to Him. Believe Christ. Believe Christ,
and you have everything. He says, he that abideth in the
doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. You have
everything. You trust in Christ. Alright,
now we come to our third and final point. What I want us to
see here is that God's work of salvation is a work of grace. It's his grace. It's his mercy
for sinners who cannot save themselves. Unlike the law that man trusts
in, which actually condemns him and cannot make him perfect,
God comes and does all that is necessary for his children. Now,
when they heard Christ say that they're guilty of breaking the
law, they're not keeping it, they went to defending themselves.
Verse 20, John 7, 20. The people answered and said,
thou hast a devil. Who goes about to kill thee? But the Lord here, he proceeds
to teach the people and to give them, to give us a right understanding
of the salvation of God. And the Lord does this by revealing
the doctrine of Christ in the heart of his people. Now verse
21, Jesus answered and said unto them, I have done one work, and
ye all marvel. He's referring to the healing
of that man at Bethesda's pool. When he healed that invalid man
who couldn't get to the pool, when he healed him at Bethesda's
pool, that's what he's talking about, that work there. It was
on the Sabbath day. God purposed it to be so. He put it there on the Sabbath
day. And they thought, the Pharisees
and the Sadducees thought, aha, we've got him. He's messed up
now. They couldn't get him any other way, but they thought,
oh, here he is. He's broken the law and done
that, which is wicked and evil. But the reality is he was faithful. And he did that which was right,
in healing that man on the Sabbath day. And he says, verse 22, he
makes us know, Moses therefore gave unto you circumcision, not
because it's of Moses, but of the fathers, and ye on the Sabbath
day circumcise a man. If a man on the Sabbath day receives
circumcision, that the law of Moses should not be broken, are
ye angry at me, because I have made a man every whit whole on
the Sabbath day?" And what he's pointing out to these Jews here
is he's saying, you on the Sabbath day, because it's supposed to,
circumcision was commanded to be done on the eighth day, regardless
of whether or not it was the Sabbath day, it had to be the
eighth That took priority over the Sabbath day there. And he's
saying, you pick up, you do a work, you take up a scalpel or a knife,
and you cut that flesh, and you take it off, and then you take
plaster, you continue that work, and you put plaster on the wound
that you just made to heal it so it doesn't get infected, but
heals properly. And you're angry with me, he
says, for healing a man every whit hole, both body and soul. I circumcised this man's heart.
is what the Lord's saying, and he's just pointing out to them
their own hypocrisy, because they do a work on the Sabbath
day, pictured there in circumcision. I realize that some, you brethren
I don't believe will have a problem with this, but there's some that
would argue with me on this point. But the scripture makes the point
here of what the Lord did here, how it pictures his salvation
in circumcising the heart there. Turn over to Romans 2. Romans
2. What Christ did for this man
was greater than circumcision of the flesh, because he gave
the man a new heart. Romans 2. Circumcision, according to the
scripture here in Romans 2, it pictures the Lord's work of circumcising
the heart of His children, of His people. Romans 2, 28 and
29. For he is not a Jew which is
one outwardly, neither is that circumcision which is outward
in the flesh. But he is a Jew which is one
inwardly, and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit,
and not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but of
God." What the Lord does is He removes
that confidence that we have in self. When He delivers us
from death, He's removing the vain confidences that we had
in religion. And He's setting our hope, our
confidence, the faith that He's given us, He sets it on the Lord
Jesus Christ because He circumcised the heart. He's removed the deadness
of our the deadness that is in us. He's given us spiritual life
whereby we believe and hear Him. He gives us a new heart to hear
Him and believe Him. It's the regeneration of His
child. Now I know some people will say that circumcision was
replaced by baptism but really you just go to Romans chapter
6 and you see that baptism is the believers identification
with Christ, who died for us, was buried, and rose again, and
that we were in Him. It's just picturing that we believe
Him. It's a public declaration that
the Lord has saved us. And for these Jews, though, there's
one that's standing in their midst that is greater than all
the hopes and confidences that man trusts in. And he's standing
there in their midst. As you go through the scriptures,
you see that Christ is, we're told Christ is greater. He's
greater than John the Baptist. Christ is greater than the temple. Christ is greater than the prophet
Jonah. Christ is greater than Solomon. He's greater than Jacob. He's
greater than Abraham. And He's standing there in the
temple teaching these people the doctrine of Christ. And we're
benefiting it to this day were benefiting his teaching of the
doctrine of Christ. And all those people that were
there that knew the scriptures and were so learned, these doctors
of the scriptures, these scribes and Pharisees and lawyers are
standing there and none of them would hear him. None of them
could hear what he's saying to them. In fact, later when they
would take him according to the will of God, and they had him
in their mock trial. And they asked him, are you the
Christ? And he said, if I tell you, ye will not believe. You won't believe me. And that's
the heart of every man, every sinner, who is left to themselves
without the grace of God. Because it's only by the grace
of God that we are given an ear to hear the voice of our Savior. And so man left to himself is
enmity against God. That's why we cannot come to
God outside of Christ. All we are is enmity. Trying
to come to God outside of Christ is enmity and hatred against
the revealed will of God who determined and purposed to save
his people and his son and give him all the glory, praise, and
honor of his people. All of creation worships the
sun and bows down before him, and that's the way God purposed
it. So any other attempt to come
to God is enmity, rebellion. It's just the manifest hatred
of what's in the heart of man. And our God, what we see here
in this is that our God is always graciously working to save His
people. It doesn't matter what day it
is, He's always working to save His people in the time of their
appointed love to be revealed in their heart. It doesn't matter
if it's Sunday or Saturday. It doesn't matter if it's Monday
or Friday or Thursday or Tuesday or Wednesday, whenever God is
pleased to save one of his children, he does it in Christ. It's always
the Sabbath in Christ. It's always the rest and the
peace of the believer because the Sabbath rest of the believer
is kept in Jesus Christ. In Him we rest from all our labors,
all our striving, all our struggling under the law and trying to work
a righteousness for ourselves It's all kept perfectly in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And in him, we do keep the righteousness
of the law. Look there if you're still in
Romans 2. Romans 2, verse 26 and 27. Therefore, if the uncircumcision,
those not circumcised in the flesh, if they keep the righteousness
of the law, shall not his uncircumcision be counted for circumcision?
And shall not uncircumcision, which is by nature, if it fulfill
the law, which we have fully fulfilled, kept the law in Christ,
shall it not judge thee, who by the letter and circumcision
does transgress the law? You know, for I'd say all my adult life,
as I went to various churches, so-called, I've heard just men
arguing and debating over the Sabbath, whether it's Sunday
and whether it's Saturday, and they despise people who don't
agree with them if it's the right day or if they're not looking
to an actual physical Sabbath day at all. They're despised
by all of them, but the reality is there's not a man who will
come short of that which he seeks, who has rested from all his labors
and looks to the Lord Jesus Christ. There's not a man trusting Christ
alone who will come short of that hope, that glory which he
seeks with the Father. because He has everything in
the Lord Jesus Christ. That's the doctrine of Christ.
That's what our God is teaching us, is that He is all our salvation. And so the Sabbath rest for the
believer is the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen to John 3.36, and this
testifies to that very thing. He says, He that believeth on
the Son hath everlasting life. And he that believeth not the
sun shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him. It's not the observance of a
law that saves a believer or not, because none of you keepeth
the law, our Lord says to all of us. None of us keepeth the
law. That cannot be our hope and confidence
and us expect to stand before God justified by him. But that
one, you that have no righteousness, you that have nothing but darkness
and no light, who look to the Lord Jesus Christ, walk by faith,
looking to Him, trusting Him for all your righteousness and
acceptance with God, you have the Father and the Son. You have
life eternal. You have everything. You abide
right there and continue in Him, rest in Him. And so that's what
the doctrine of Christ is teaching us. Christ is all. The observance
of religious works, as these Jews were doing, it cannot save.
But our God sent His Son into the world and spared Him not
that we should be saved, that we would have life in Him alone. He offered Him up a bloody sacrifice
to the Father to make His people free of that deadly wound of
sin, healed our bodies, healed our hearts, healed our minds,
delivered us from that death, and brought us into the glorious
light of our Lord and Savior. He's made us every wit whole
by himself. He is our Sabbath. And he says,
verse 24, judge not according to the appearance. We condemn
somebody because they're not acting in the way that we think
that they ought to do it. He says, but judge righteous
judgment. Judge righteous judgment. You
that have fled to Jesus have everything. everything to stand
whole before the Father, because you have been made whole and
complete in Him. So Christ has made us every whit
whole by His grace. Now turn over to Colossians 2. Colossians 2. I think we should
read this. Colossians 2 verse 13 through
17. Let's just read it. And you, being dead in your sins
and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened, made
alive, together with him having forgiven you all trespasses,
blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against
us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing
it to his cross. It has nothing more to say to
us, and we're dead, we're dead to the law, that we might be
married to another, our Savior. And having spoiled principalities
and powers, He made a show of them openly, triumphing over
them in it. Let no man therefore judge you
in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of the new
moon, or of the Sabbath days, which are a shadow of things
to come, but the body of Christ. And the Sabbath days include
the Sabbath day, the physical observance of the Sabbath day,
because Christ has fulfilled all the law perfectly. He's our
Sabbath rest. And so He's our rest, brethren,
and we keep resting in Him by His grace. We're delivered from
the law for righteousness, and it has nothing more to say to
us. We listen to our Savior, the voice of our husband. We
follow His voice and trust Him. And the Spirit His Spirit keeps
our hearts, ever leading us to Him, to know Him more and more,
and to trust Him and grow in that grace. And so, from there,
as He settles us in Christ and grows us in Him, we're given
grace to stay upon Him. And He'll keep teaching us and
growing us in the Lord. He keeps teaching us and feeding
us with the hidden manna to see more and more how Christ is all. He shows us more and more how
Christ is all. Now, the Jews, they didn't believe
Christ. And we see that they were stumbling
over things. And they had questions. And before
they could believe, they needed these questions answered. And
it says in verse 25 through 27, then said some of them of Jerusalem,
is not this he whom they seek to kill? They knew it. They knew
that they hated Christ for what he did. But lo, he speaketh boldly,
and they say nothing unto him. Do the rulers know indeed that
this is the very Christ? How be it we know this man whence
he is, but when Christ cometh, no man knoweth whence he is."
And we see there that they were stumbling over questions that
they had about whether this was Christ or no, because they said,
well, he's from Galilee, and we know his parents. He can't
be the Christ because Christ comes from the lineage of David
and he's born in the city of Bethlehem. But you that have
been grown by the Lord and see his word and hear his voice,
you know this is, he is of the lineage of David and he was born
in Bethlehem just as the scriptures promised. He feeds you. Don't stumble over things because
you have questions that you want answered. Look to Christ. Look
to Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. Believe on the One whom the Father
has sent to save His people. And as He grows you, He'll feed
you with that hidden man. He answers all the questions
of your heart. Many questions just become foolish
to us and we don't even need them answered, but that which
is necessary, He'll teach you and grow you and comfort you
in His Savior. So you keep walking in the light
of Christ, trusting Him because He's everything, brethren. He's
all. So I pray the Lord bless that
word to your heart. Amen. All right, let's close
in prayer. Our gracious Lord, we thank you.
for your grace. We thank you for your gracious
reproof, Lord, and that by your grace, rather than being cut
in the heart and offended and gnashing against you with our
teeth, Lord, we thank you for your mercy and grace. We thank
you for delivering us from dead works, empty religion, and vain
things that cannot save. and You set our heart wholly,
completely on the Lord Jesus Christ and caused us to look
to Him alone. Father, we pray that You would
cause us, keep us, and cause us to abide in the doctrine of
Christ. That we would be taught by Your
Spirit to faithfully preach and declare Him always. Lord, we
have nothing but our Savior and we thank You for Him. that He
is everything. Lord, we pray that You would
continue to bless Your people and grow us in the faith and
the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
It's in His name we pray and give thanks. Amen. Let's all stand and sing a closing
hymn, 472 Heavenly Sunlight. 472. On my journey over the mountains,
through the deep vale, Jesus has said, I'll never forsake
thee, promise divine that never can fail. Heavenly sunlight,
heavenly sunlight, flooding my soul with glory divine. Hallelujah, I am rejoicing, singing
His praises, Jesus is mine. Shadows around me, shadows above
me, never conceal my Savior and God. He is the light, in Him
is no darkness, ever I'm walking close to His side. Heavenly sunlight,
heavenly sunlight, flooding my soul with glory divine. Alleluia, I am rejoicing, singing
His praises, Jesus is mine. In the bright sunlight, ever
rejoicing, pressing my way to mansions above. Singing His praises,
gladly I'm walking, walking in sunlight, sunlight above. Heavenly sunlight, heavenly sunlight,
flooding my soul with glory divine. Alleluia, I am rejoicing, singing
His praises, Jesus is mine. Thank you.