He's been introducing everybody,
so our first preacher this morning is Brother Fred Evans from Redeemer's
Grace Church in Sellersburg, Indiana. Well, nobody is more surprised than
me that I'm here to preach this morning. I did not plan it this
way. There were supposed to be other
men, but the Lord just hindered, and so you're stuck with me. I'm delighted to be able to preach
the gospel. I always love to preach the gospel to you, but
I sure love sitting where you are. It was amazing these last
couple of days to actually feed on the Word of God. I know your struggles as you sit
there. I sat there for many years under
a pastor and listening to the gospel. And I know you'll struggle
this morning. Obviously, the rain is going
to give you a little bit of a... You have to lean forward, maybe. And I pray God would give us
grace set ourselves completely on this. I'm going to be talking
this morning to you about the humanity of our Lord Jesus Christ. It's an astounding thing. It's
an astounding thing. Take your Bibles and turn with
me to Psalm 16. Psalm 16. Entitle this message, Preservation. Christ's preservation. I intended to go through the
whole psalm. That's not going to happen. I'm going to get to
the first three verses, the Lord willing, this morning. But I'm
going to... As I've read this to you before,
I want you to see that this is all about Christ. This psalm
is entitled, A Golden Psalm. That's the title of it. A golden
psalm, and the reason for this is because this psalm being about
Jesus Christ is of pure gold. Pure gold. To the believer in
Jesus Christ, this psalm is more precious than gold. Because it speaks of one to us
who is precious. You the believers, you're not
precious. Is He not precious? I pray God be gracious by the
Spirit to set Him before you as He is precious, not just in
His deity, but also in His humanity. As we read this psalm, and I
want you to see these things, every believer can relate to
every verse in this psalm. Now you take this psalm and you
can and you are most surely welcome to apply this to you because
it is true of these things here are true of you. When he says
preserve me, oh God, is this not the prayer of every believer?
Who does not need to be preserved? The psalmist says here, verse
2, My goodness extendeth not to thee. Can you relate to that?
My goodness doesn't extend to God. Period. None of my works
contribute anything whatsoever to the salvation of Jesus Christ.
My goodness extends not to you. But it does extend to other believers,
to the saints. Doesn't it? It does. And so we can see that. Verse
4 says about our enemies. Don't we want our enemies destroyed?
Yes, we want our enemies. Their sorrow to be multiplied
to them because they oppress this gospel. They defame our
God. They despise Him. They reject
Him. And they hate you. And one day
soon they will be destroyed. Verses 5 and 6 speak about our
lot in providence and our inheritance, how sure it is in Christ. Isn't
this wonderful that our lot is sure? Our providence is sure. Nothing happens to us that is
not laid out by God. Verses 7 through 8, we bless
the Lord and set Him before our eyes, don't we? We believe in
Him. We set Him always before our face. By faith, Verse 9,
we rejoice in His salvation, don't you? Don't you rejoice
in His salvation? A joy in His salvation. And the
last thing is, we know this, we'll be raised from the dead.
Isn't this a glorious thing? That He will not leave us in
the grave, He will raise us from the dead. Now if you do that, you're not
really digging for gold, you're digging for gold dust. You're
just getting the surface stuff. I don't want just the surface
stuff. I want real gold. So you're going to have to dig
deeper than that to get the gold out of this psalm. This psalm
does speak of the saints. But I'll tell you, the way this
psalm is more comforting to me is to see it of Christ. Because
that's how the Holy Spirit intended it. I'm not going to spend much
time proving this. I'm just going to give you the
verses because I've got a lot of things that I want to tell
you this morning that are more precious than trying to prove
this about Christ. In Acts chapter 2, the Apostle Peter says this,
David speaketh concerning Christ. You know what he quotes? He quotes
this psalm. Is that proof enough for you? The resurrection of our Lord
Jesus Christ. He shall not suffer. You know David, he's corrupted,
he's dead. That's not speaking about him. It's not talking about David.
It's talking about Christ. And Paul, later on, David is
speaking concerning Christ. And you know how in the world
could David do that? How could he speak of Christ?
Because God already promised David. He promised David that
Christ would come. He promised David, and David
was a prophet. David didn't understand completely
everything he wrote, but he knew this, that Christ should come,
that Christ should die, that he should be raised. And David
wrote it down for us. That's what the Holy Spirit intends
by this psalm, and so I think we should see this. Now I had
three points, but again, you're not gonna get these three points.
You don't get one, you get one point. And this is it, Christ
faith. Christ faith. Christ faith concerning
his preservation. Now look at this, his prayer.
Now as we see this prayer, I want you to set in your mind this
is Jesus Christ praying. This is Christ praying. And this
is what he said. Preserve me, oh God. for in thee do I put my trust."
Again, I can surely understand my need of preservation. You
as a believer, you understand your need of preservation. You
can definitely see yourself praying this. You do pray this every
day. Keep me, keep me, keep me. I trust that you will keep me.
Why? Because in my flesh dwelleth
no good thing. In my flesh dwelleth no good.
Though God has preserved me in Christ from eternity, though
God has called me to spiritual life and faith, though He has
given me a new creation. You know, that's the nature crying
out, preserve me, isn't it? The old nature doesn't even know
its need of preservation. The new nature does. Yeah, the
old man don't know anything about that. Today, if you don't have
any understanding of what I'm saying, preserve me, it's because
you only got one nature. The old nature, and it don't
care. It don't need preservation. The new man understands it does. Why? Because he understands he
still has the old one attached to him. That's why he needs preservation. Because that rotting corpse of
our flesh is daily about our neck, pulling us to the earth.
When the new man desires to ascend to heaven, the old man pulls
us down. And we need preservation. We
need God to preserve us. And so we are still prone to
every sin, tempted, tried by the things of the world, by the
enemies of our soul. Philpott said, we're surrounded
by enemies. The world is our enemy, Satan
is our enemy, but the greatest enemy is Elf. He never leaves me! I can isolate
myself from the world, and I can isolate, and Satan is not omnipresent. So I know this, the only person
that's giving me trouble is me. And so what do we need daily?
Preservation. We know that if God were to remove
his hand of preservation from us, the depths of sin that we
are capable of committing cannot be fully known. Do you suppose David, when he was
young, thought he would commit adultery and murder when he was
old? Do you think, oh no, I'm too old for that. God remove his hand from you
for one minute, and there is nothing you're not capable of
doing. Now, if you don't believe that,
I feel for you. God will maybe show you. And
what I say, no, Lord, keep me. Keep me. So when we pray, Lord,
preserve me, we find solace in this. Paul said this in 2 Timothy
4, 18. He said, the Lord shall deliver
me to his heavenly kingdom. And notice this, and will preserve
me. In other words, he's gonna deliver
me to the kingdom. But until then, He's going to
preserve me. Now you have every right to know that, you as believers.
He will preserve you. He will. Peter said we are kept. What are you kept by? What keeps
you believing? What keeps you seeking Christ
to be found in Him and not in your righteousness? We are kept
by the power of God, not by the power of will, not by the power
of determination, not by the spirit of positive thinking.
We are kept by the power of God under salvation ready to be revealed.
But now when it comes to mind what I read when I see Christ
saying this, I'm confused. That's the first thing I read.
I mean, I just, it baffled my mind. Why in the world would
Jesus Christ ask to be preserved. Consider who He is. Consider
the one. He's the Son of God. The Son
of God. How could this prayer, and listen,
this was no platitude. We do that often. We say, Oh
Lord, help me. We really don't mean it. We're
just platitude. You know, you throw it out there
and feel religious when you say it. We do that all the time.
When Christ prayed, He never had any platitudes. It was really
He needed to be preserved. He wouldn't ask to be preserved
if He didn't need it. It's not pretend. I want you
to get that. This is not a pretend preservation. He really needed God to preserve
Him. Now, why in the world would the
Son of God need God, the Father, to preserve Him? So consider
this. How could it be? He who made
the worlds needs to be preserved. He who is the author and sustainer
of all life, why would he ask the Father to be preserved? Consider
the greatness of his power. John says this, In the beginning
was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God, and all things that were made were made by Him, and
there wasn't anything made that was made that wasn't made by
Him. There He is, He who made all the worlds and all in it.
Every enemy He had, He was the one that sustained their life
and breath. And yet, He really needed to be preserved from them. John the Baptist said, he that
came after me was preferred before me. And listen, I'm not worthy
to bend down and touch his shoelaces. I'm not worthy. This is the one
who's praying to be preserved. The Son of God. You remember,
the Son of God was asleep on that boat because he was exhausted.
No telling when he slept last. praying all night, constantly
in prayer with God. And he fell asleep in that boat,
and he was tired. He was so tired that that storm,
it raged around those disciples. He didn't pay any attention.
He was asleep. And the disciples came to him and said, carest
thou not that we perish? And he got up out of his sleep,
and he stood there, and he said, peace, be still. The power of this man prayed
that he could calm the waves and the winds by just a simple
word of his power. He healed the sick. He gave sight
to the blind. He did something only God could
do. He healed lepers. Only God could
heal lepers. No leper was ever healed except
by God. And so when Jesus Christ healed
a leper, it was still God healing the leper. He was God. Demons. Consider those demons that demoniac. They said, will you please give
us permission to go to the hogs? They could not leave that body
and go to the pigs without his permission. Art thou come to
torment us before the time? I know you're the judge. I know
you're God. Can we just go to the pigs? Go. At His command, the dead were
raised. And so then, as we see the greatness
of His power, we see what? We see He is God. Jesus Christ
is God. Anybody that doesn't believe
that is lost. He that believeth not that I
am shall die in his sins. So we know this, that He is God. So then why would He, who is
God, who controls all things, sustains all things, knows all
things, why then would He be so constrained to ask the Father
to preserve him. Such a prayer as this testifies
then of the greatness of his condescension to become our federal
head. Now please don't let that word
trouble you, federal head. We say it all the time. It's
not a complicated, it's like a high priest. A high priest
was a federal head. He was somebody that represented
the people before God. The nation of Israel, God gave
them a high priest and he offered the sacrifices, God told him
to, for the people. We do this in our own government,
representatives. So it's what I mean by federal
head. He represented us before God. He came to be the second
Adam, our high priest of his elect people. Therefore, in order
to do that, in order to represent you and me, to be our high priest,
he himself must become a man. A man. He must, and as a man,
he must have surrendered all his right and authority and power
in submission to God. And so when I say this, Jesus
Christ was made a man as we see him ask, preserve me, oh God,
for I do put my trust in thee. David wrote this promise of Christ
coming from his earthly line. God swore to David that a man
would come and establish his throne forever. He said that of His seed He would
have no end to His reign. In this we have other promises
of His coming into the world as a man. The seed of the woman
shall crush the head of the serpent. Very first promise, isn't it?
The seed of the woman. Testifies this, He's not going
to be the seed of Adam. He's going to be the seed of the woman,
but He's going to be a man. And a man is going to crush the
head of the serpent. And the serpent, by virtue of
him being a man, is able then to bruise his heel. We have the promise of Moses
in Deuteronomy 18 verse 15. He said, God shall raise up a
prophet from among you. A man from your brethren. He's gonna be like me. I am a
prophet. I am a mediator of a covenant.
He's going to be a prophet and a mediator of a better covenant.
He'll be like me in that way. And you need to listen to Him.
When He comes, you listen to Him. And anybody that doesn't
listen to Him, God's going to judge them. They'll be condemned.
Isaiah 7, 14, Behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. and I shall call his name Immanuel. What does that mean? God with
us. God with us. And so John wrote
those words and after he had wrote he was deity, what did
he say? And the word was made flesh and
dwelt among So yes, Jesus is God, very God, yet in order to
save his people, to save those he represented as high priest,
he himself of necessity must be made a man, listen to this,
in every way, excluding sin, in every way a man. In every
way. There's a lot of things about
being a man I don't like. It's humiliating. There's a lot of things we don't
like to discuss about even being human. A lot of things we wish that
we didn't have to endure as humans. But our Lord willingly took this. in great love, we're going to
see why in a little bit, in love. He willingly condescended from an eternal, an eternal throne of praise and
glory and adoration and condescended to be a man of low degree, the
lowest degree. Now how I want to ask you this,
we need to know why he would condescend to do such a thing.
Well, to answer that we got to know, how did sin come into the
world? How did death come into the world? Paul is playing in Romans 5,
12, wherefore as by one, what? Man. Sin entered into the world. Satan
didn't bring sin into the world. Now Satan is the father of sin.
He was on the planet, but he didn't bring sin into the world.
He had no power to bring sin into the world. He didn't represent
anybody. Adam did. Wherefore, as by one
man's sin entered into the world, result death by sin. What does this have to do with
me? So death passed upon all men for all have sinned. When
that one man sinned, you listen and pay attention, you sinned.
You sinned. I don't like it. I don't care.
It doesn't matter. This is how God deals with men.
He deals with men in a representative. And you were dealt with in Adam.
And don't think you could have done much better. Don't think
that Adam was perfect. You're not. What do you think
you would have done? You wouldn't have lasted longer
than him. Why was this necessary? And I
want you to get this. This was not accidental. The
fall of man was not accidental. It was ordained. Adam did not accidentally sin. He was ordained. Why did God
allow the fall? Permit? Okay, I use those stupid
words. I use them all the time. And
he stopped doing it. Why did God decree the fall?
He did. He decreed it. Religion has you
believe it snuck up on him. And he had to come up with another
way to save man. No, the reason the fall was by
one man was because God had before ordained salvation by one man. You see, God had already determined
to save an elect people by a representative. But in order to show this, what
did He do? He showed it by the fall, that
we fail by a representative. And so he ordained by this federal
head for the purpose of testifying of his salvation that he before
determined to do by a representative man, Jesus Christ, a federal
head. So to be our federal head, what
did it take? What was God's purpose? God's
purpose was that Jesus Christ should be made a man. Go to Hebrews chapter 2. Hebrews
is going to talk about this matter of a high priest, which again
is a federal head, a representative of the people and the things
pertaining to God. Now Hebrews chapter 2 and look
at verse 9. He said, but we see Jesus, who is made a little lower than
the angels. Why? For the suffering of death. Then what? Crowned with glory
and honor, that he by grace, the grace of God should taste
death For every man, that's not every man in the world without
exception, every type of man, Jew and Greek, bond and free,
male and female, for it became him for whom are
all things and by whom are all things in bringing many sons
to glory to make the captain of their salvation perfect through
suffering. It behooved Him who made all
things. I just told you about He made
all things. He's got all power. It behooved Him. Why? So that
He should be the captain of their salvation and make it perfect.
That's why He became a man. To make our salvation perfect. If something's perfect, do you
need to add anything to it? You know, Sistine Chapel, what
if they gave me some crayons? and allow me to go up there and
put a ladder and get up there and start trying to help him
out. You know? Oh, Michelangelo, boy, he needs
some help. I can put a few stick figures in here is what it needs. Captain of our salvation is perfect.
Why? He behooved him and he made a
man so that he should make it perfect. How? Through suffering. For both he that sanctifyeth
and they who are sanctified are all of one. God sanctified us
in election. Christ sanctified us. How? Through his condescension, through
his sufferings, through his offerings. He sanctified us. He made us
holy. For which cause he is not ashamed to call us brethren.
Go down to verse 14. For as much then as the children
are partakers of flesh, How's he gonna do this? For as much
as then the children of the partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself,
he also himself, likewise took part of the same,
that through death he might destroy him that hath the power of death,
that is the devil, and deliver them who through fear of death
were their lifetime subject to bondage, for verily he took not
on him the nature of angels, But he took on him the seed of
Abraham. Wherefore, in all things it behooved
him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a
merciful and faithful, what? Federal head, high priest. High
priest. And what is he going to do as
our high priest? In things pertaining to God. See, when he became a
man, he was doing things that pertained to God. Things you
and I couldn't do. We couldn't do anything pertaining
to God. We couldn't offer anything pertaining to God. Couldn't do
anything to satisfy God's justice. Couldn't do anything to satisfy
God's law or righteousness. Couldn't do anything. We needed
someone else to step in and do for us what we could not do ourselves. And here he is. He became a man
in things pertaining to God to make reconciliation for the sins
of the people. When that he himself hath suffered
being tempted, he is also able to succor them that are tempted. So in our text, I want you to
see our federal head, our high priest, as he is kneeled in prayer,
pleading with God in reality to preserve him. Why? To make
our salvation perfect is what he was doing. He humbled himself. He became obedient even to death. that through his sufferings as a man, through his sufferings
as a man, he might obtain for us salvation. And see then by
this text that the Son of God pleading for preservation is
really touched with the feelings of our infirmities. As God, he knew our infirmities. As man, he experienced them. Learned he obedience by the things
he suffered. It just blew my mind. He learned obedience through
the things he suffered. He learned by experience. Therefore, Believer consider
as he prayed for preservation you pray for preservation you
have sorrows You not see he is able then to be touched with
the feelings of your sorrows He was tired You've been tired
Sometimes you get so tired you have a despair of life I Know that I understand that
He was hungry, thirsty. He felt the limitations of a
man. He was poor, homeless. He felt sorrow over the sins
of others. He felt it more than you feel
the sorrow over your own sin. He even wept for it. You remember
at Lazarus' grave? He wasn't weeping for Lazarus.
He was weeping at the unbelief of man. And though he had all power to
stop these sorrows, all power to satisfy his bodily needs,
yet he yielded to God and trusted him for everything. Somebody once said, if we had
all power, we would change everything. Is that not right? If you just
be honest with yourself, if you could change things, you would. If you felt hungry, you'd get
yourself some food. If you saw your people suffering,
your family suffering, you would heal them. And you wouldn't think twice
about what God wanted. But consider Christ who had all
power, did nothing of his own self. Everything he did was according
to the will of God. Remember Satan's temptation?
He said, hey, if you be the son of God, throw yourself off this
mountain. The scripture says, if you dash your foot against
a stone, they'll bear you up. In other words, prove it. Show
yourself. If you and I had power, we'd
jump off. We'd try to prove ourselves.
You do that, and you have no power at all. Still try to prove
you're right. 40 days without food. He said, if you'd be the Son
of God, make this stone into bread, what would you do? I wouldn't ask God. I would reason
myself, well, God gave me the power, so I guess that's His
will. What'd Christ say? Man shall
not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth
out. He trusted God for his... You took a drink of that? You
trust God for that? Nope. We just did it. We had
it. It's in our hands. We did it.
We don't think about that. But Christ in every action and
every intent, He literally trusted God for everything. Why? Because this is what we
need to do to be accepted of God. He did this so that we should
be accepted. He trusted God for everything.
Behold our Savior being found in fashion as a man. That's what
Paul said. He humbled himself. That's just a total blanket statement. But just in every aspect, he
humbled himself. So when he needed to be preserved,
what'd he say? Preserve me. Could he preserve
himself? Sure. He would not preserve himself. He totally depended upon the
Father to preserve him. Why? He was a man. He was a man. He put his faith, and that's
when he says, for I, back in our text, he said, preserve me,
oh God. Why? I put my trust in you. Let this then be the confidence
that God will preserve us. because Christ's faith in God
preserved him. He has merited by this faith. He has merited the righteousness
of God for us. Go to Romans chapter 3. Romans
chapter 3. Two places here. I know a brother
mentioned this just yesterday. It can't be overstated. Romans chapter 3 and verse 21,
it says, but now the righteousness of God without the law is manifest.
Praise God for that. Have you ever read the law? He
just mentioned it the other day. How many laws are there? Anybody
know? 600 and more. There's more than
600. 640. 615, 600. OK. What's law 515? Anybody? I stole that from you,
Clayton. Clayton, that's it. What's law 515? I have no clue. Neither do you. There's one in
there. Yeah, there's one in there. I know that one. Yeah. You may
get 10, so you've still got, what, 605 more you missed. The law, praise God for this,
there's righteousness without the law? Where's that found? It's manifest. Where? In the
law and the prophets. That's where it was manifest
first. It was in the Old Testament. Even, listen, the righteousness
of God. That's a redundant statement,
isn't it? Righteousness of God, because
there is no other righteousness but the righteousness of God.
Would you count your righteousness, righteousness? You can't. You can't count your rights.
But he's over-infestating this. The righteousness of God. And
how in the world is the righteousness of God merited if it's not merited
by the law? By the faith of Jesus Christ. So as we see Christ praying,
as we see Him entrusting everything to God, believing God for everything,
we see how then the righteousness of God was made. It was made
by Him. It was made by Himself alone. What did we contribute to that
righteousness? What have you ever done? Again,
you're putting the stick figures on something made perfect. When
you try to add your works to it, your works are trash. Your works are menstrual cloths. Scott Richardson used to say
it very well. Your righteousness is as worthless
as a warm bucket of spit. That's it. Good. I had a warm bucket of spit.
Pour it out. It's no good. Throw it away! I don't want it! I want His. I want His. I want the one who prayed and
trusted God for righteousness. I want His righteousness. I don't
want mine. It's by the faith of Jesus Christ. Yes, it is received by faith
in Jesus Christ. But that faith is not yours. You didn't come up with that
faith. You couldn't come up with that faith. Even the faith by
which we receive the righteousness of God is itself of God. I hope that in every message
you've got this picture that salvation has nothing to do with
you. It has everything to do with
God in Christ. Yes, God applies it to you. But even in the application,
you get no glory. And definitely not in the preservation. Go to Galatians 3. Galatians 3 and look at verse
16. I hope I got that right. Did I
get that right, Clay? I don't think I did. Oh, two. Well, if I write the
right number down, then that would be helpful. Knowing. that a man is not justified
by the works of the law, but how is a man justified? Tell
me how a man is justified. What does it tell you? By the faith of Jesus Christ. The word there is not in. Don't
ever put that word in there. It doesn't belong. Your faith
in Christ did not justify you. This does it. The faith of Christ
justifies you. So as Christ was pleading for
preservation, as Christ was trusting in God, what was he doing? He
was justifying you. He was being our justification
by the faith of Christ. Even, then how do we receive
this? Even we have believed in Jesus Christ. that we might be justified by
the faith of Christ. See, he says it twice. So how is a man justified? How
does a man receive righteousness? By the faith of Jesus Christ.
And see, faith is impossible. It's without faith it's impossible
to please God. God won't be pleased in a man
that doesn't believe, trust in him. But our faith in God, surely
we confess, is not worthy to be accepted. Our faith at best
is mixed with unbelief fear and doubt. Our faith cannot justify
us or make us righteous, but the faith by which we receive
Christ and his righteousness, his justification, his sanctification, his redemption
as our federal head, it is his faith that is given to us. The
faith you have was his faith and it's given to you. It's given
to you. I know this, my faith is mine,
but it is a gift of God's grace. Why? Because Jesus Christ is
the author and what? Finisher of what? Our faith. He's the author and finisher
of our faith. So Jesus lived. He trusted God to give him strength,
even for his necessary food. Every word proceeded out of his
mouth. He was faithful to God. And when Jesus Christ was crucified,
hated of men, and even at that moment when he was forsaken of
God, he still trusted God. He still trusted God. Why? Because God had given him
a promise. God said, He will not leave my
soul in hell, nor allow His Holy One to see corruption. He knew
that. And even when the wrath of God poured out on Him as He
was made sin for us, the wrath of God poured out. God forsook
God. I don't understand. And yet it was so. And in that
moment, He still trusted God. still believed God would raise
him from the dead. So considered all the outward
providence seemed against him, his soul was brought down to
the dust, and yet he would not forsake God. Can you say that
about yourself? Can you say that about your faith? The slightest wind blows and
our faith is gone. We're like those disciples. He
said, I marvel that you have no faith. That's what he told
him. He said, I marvel you have no faith. How often do we have no faith? Yet because I know this, I am
saved because of his faith. I am saved because of his humiliation. And so I know that God will hear
me when I cry this, preserve me, oh God. He will preserve
me because of my union with his son, my federal head, because
Christ is my high priest. He has obtained my righteousness
by his faithfulness. He has obtained my atonement
by his offering. The scripture says, but this
man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sin, he sat down
on the right hand of the majesty on high. That's how good his
faith was. That God said, you deserve this,
sit on my throat. Now you grab ahold, there is
a man sitting in heaven. There's a man there. my representative man, Jesus
Christ. He hath perfected forever them
that are sanctified. And notice this, I told you I
wouldn't get past the one. Now then, go back to your text
real quickly. I want you to see this. He said, oh my soul, Thou
hast said to the Lord, Thou art my Lord." And again, testifies
of his humanity because he bowed to God as God. He said, I ascend
unto my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. He bows to him as God. And notice
what he says. He says, My goodness extendeth not to
thee. My goodness Now consider the
goodness of Christ. How good was Christ? How good
was He? Righteousness of God. As a man, He did everything as
God. Perfect. And yet He says to God,
My righteousness doesn't add anything to you. Yet this is what religion tells
you. Legend tells you that your righteousness adds something
to God. That Christ's salvation is not yet fully complete, you
need to add something. Jesus said, my righteousness
doesn't add anything to you. How in the world do you think
your righteousness is going to add anything to God, if his righteousness
doesn't? My righteousness doesn't do anything because my righteousness
is your righteousness. It's the same, Jesus said. But Jesus' faith and obedience
as a man, he did that which was only natural to him, which was
righteousness. But where does it go? Why then
did he humble himself to such a low
degree? That this righteousness does
extend to someone. It was intended for someone. Who it is, look at that verse
3, to the sanctified ones, the saints, to the saints. This righteousness of Christ
extends to the saints. Just as I told you, the sin of
Adam extended to all of his seed, even so, listen, the righteousness
of Christ extends to all his seed, to all his people. So Jesus Christ condescended
to be a man. He humbled himself. He obeyed
the law of God. He suffered in the stead of his
people. And what? That righteousness
now belongs to them. It's theirs. It extends to them.
Only to them. To the saints. The elect. Who are they? I don't know. I
know they're out there. I know this. I'm one of them. And so I preach to everyone,
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. And
that's just true, that's a faithful saying, worthy of all acceptation.
Jesus Christ came into the world to save sinners. Any sinners,
anybody need mercy, anybody need a righteousness that you can
provide. I just showed you one that provided
it. Believe on him. That's the evidence
of my election. Don't follow me around and try
to see if I'm an elect. I'll probably prove in every way that
I don't appear to have any grace at all. But see, my righteousness
is not from me. It's from Him. My salvation extends
to me from Christ, and I don't add anything to it. Now notice
this. Notice what He calls you who
believe. To the excellence. All right, believer, which one
of you is excellent? Go ahead, raise your hand. Excellent
people. The word means famous. Joanne, you suppose you're famous. Gallant, brave, glorious, mighty. Noble. This is the last one. Worthy. I am infamous. I'm a coward, not gallant. I'm weak and I'm not mighty.
I'm dishonorable, not noble. I'm unworthy. and not worthy. That's what every believer knows
about themselves. And yet, according to the Son
of God, you are famous. Listen, I don't care if anybody
ever knew I existed except Him. If He knows you, you're famous. One day he's going to lay out
all the trophies of his grace in front of all his creation.
Say, behold the famous. And then what he told Gideon,
he said, you are a mighty man, full of valor. Gideon over there
hiding in the corner. You are noble, and listen to
me, because of Christ you're worthy. You're worthy. When you stand before God, no one's going to make it by
the skin of their teeth. You will be ushered into the
very presence of God, accepted because you are as holy as Jesus
Christ. Who made you that way? Who made
you holy? What have you ever done to contribute
to that? What will you ever do to contribute
to that? Nothing. I was made holy the
same way I was made a sinner. By a representative man. And notice this. in whom is all
my delight." Do you know what Christ delights
in? You. Do you know what He loves? He
loves you. And listen, he said, in them
is all my delight. I have loved you with an everlasting
love. I don't know anything about that.
I don't know. I don't have any experience in a love like that. I can only swim in this ocean. I can't really find the bottom. I know this, God don't love everybody. In them is all my delight. What's the evidence he has this
love for me? That that righteousness he made
is mine. Therefore, with loving kindness
have I drawn thee. I want to sit at the feet of
the one who sat at the foot of God. I want to sit at his feet.
He's all my righteousness. And I'm going to be preserved
because God preserved him. I'm going to be saved because
he trusted God. God help me and give me faith
to continually trust in him. And I have a promise. He'll keep
me. He'll keep me. just as surely
as he kept Christ. May God help us. Let's go to
God in prayer for a minute. Gracious Father, I beg you to
be merciful. Pour out your heart and mercy and grace upon us. Oh, that you'd be merciful to
so many dead sinners. Oh, that you'd be merciful. to
us who trust in Christ, to keep us looking to Him who trusted
you, who died in our stead, who sits upon the throne of heaven,
delighting in His people. I pray you be merciful to Clay
as he comes to preach to us in just a minute. Be gracious to
him. Give us the same heart and love and message, I ask in Jesus'
name, amen.