Hebrews chapter 2, and we'll
be looking at verses 16 and 17. Actually, I'm sorry, verse 17
and verse 18. The Scripture says, ''Wherefore,
in all things it behooved him to be made like unto his brethren,
that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people, for
in that he himself hath suffered being tempted, he is able to
succor them that are tempted." The title of the message is,
The Suffering, Sufficient and Succoring Savior. the suffering
sufficient and succoring Savior. Now, the gospel of salvation
by the grace of God through faith in Christ is centered, anchored
in the suffering of Jesus Christ. Anchored. As we read this portion
of Scripture together, I hope that you noticed how many times
he had mentioned suffering, suffering, his suffering, his suffering. In verse 9 it says, but we see
Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels, why? For suffering. For the suffering
of death, crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace
of God he should taste Death for every man. The suffering
of this life, the troubles, the misery, the tears, the pain,
and even the death in this life can be traced back to one. Traced back all the way to your
father and my father, Adam. The scripture says, wherefore,
as by one man, sin entered into the world, and
death by sin, so death, passed upon all men, for all have sinned, that suffering is from the original
sin of our father. Now, truly, Satan is the father
of sin, but Satan did not represent us. Adam did. Adam was our federal
head, and in him we all died. We all died. God said unto Adam,
Because thou hast hearkened to the voice of thy wife, and eaten
of the tree that I commanded you not to, cursed is the ground
for thy sake." This is the sentence that is
passed upon all men. Cursed. Cursed. Cursed. Cursed. Friends, we are born like every
other man. under the curse. We are born
under sin, and all we do, all we labor to do, is cursed. He said, cursed is the ground.
What happened to you? What do you suppose was wrong
with Cain's sacrifice? It came from a cursed earth. And God rejected his sacrifice. And because men would try to
earn God's favor, because men would try to obtain righteousness
by their own hands, their righteousness is cursed. Jesus said, An evil
tree, a corrupt tree, will only produce corrupt fruit. Now, you
may hope, you may be sincere, and you may really, really want
that tree to do good. But if it is corrupt, it will
yield corrupt fruit. And that's our hearts. Our hearts
can only yield sin. That's all we can yield. is because of sin, then, we suffer
in this life. Now, I'm not telling us that
every suffering we do is because we have committed some sin. Sometimes
suffering is just because God said so. But I'll tell you what,
there would be no suffering had there been no sin. There would
be no suffering. But friends, we do sorrow because
of the curse of God. The justice of God struck down
Adam in his spiritual life and understanding, and so Adam died
spiritually, that he could not and would not come to God. It is such a simple picture that
every child can understand. When God came into the garden,
where did Adam go? He hid himself. And every time the gospel is
preached, every time sin is mentioned, every time depravity is preached,
the first thing the self-righteous man does is run. Run away. Try to hide themselves. Natural men don't like to talk
about sin. He'd much rather talk about how good he is. They'd
much rather hear how great they are, all the good that they do.
Well, bless your heart. No, that's not what God says
about us. And this death, this curse, was
not only to Adam, but it was given to us. Passed down. I was born a sinner. I did not
have to grow up to become a sinner. I was born one. The scripture
says that we come forth from the womb speaking lies. Lies. It is clearly seen that the sin of man is utter madness. Talk
about insanity. The very thing that causes us
pain, the very thing that is the cause of all sorrow and grief,
the very thing that causes us to cry and mourn and grieve in
our souls is the very thing we run to. This may be clearly seen in the
sin of drunkenness, couldn't it? Sin of drunkenness has never
caused anything but sorrow. I have not found one case where
drunkenness ended well. Not one. They end in sorrow, lust, adultery, fornication, I've seen
it ruin my family. I have seen it ruin my brothers. I've seen it ruin many lives. But the very thing that's killing
them is the thing they run to. Isn't that something? Isn't that
madness? Is that not the greatest insanity of all? It's insane, and I'm not just
talking about drunkenness. It could be adultery. It could
be fornication. It could be uncleanness. It could
be lying. It could be your self-righteousness. There is no happy ending for
sin. There is no happy ending. The trouble that they produce
is the trouble that they run with. Matter of fact, Paul says in
Corinthians, he says, God's not mocked. Drunkards, adulterers,
fornicators, effeminate, abusers of themselves, none of these
shall enter into the kingdom of heaven. And such were some
of you. See, I know what that is. Because that's who I am by nature.
I know what I am. I know who I am. And yet see how madly we run
to sin that causes the suffering. The fruit of the vine was made
for the joy of man, not for the drunkenness of man. God made
it for good. But our evil heart takes that
which is good and makes it sin. The union between a man and a
woman in the confines of marriage is meant by God to be a pleasure. It's meant to be good. And what
did we do? We took it and we twisted it.
We made it into something wicked. That's what we do. That's what
all men do by nature. And the thing that was good for
us, we find a way to make it hurt us or to hurt someone else. Ephesians 2 verse 1 tells us,
"...and you hath he quickened." You who are believers in Christ,
you are a believer in Christ because God has quickened you. God has made you alive. He's given you life. "...and you hath he quickened
who were dead." in trespasses and sins. When I was lost in
my sins, I loved my sins, and I didn't care if it hurt me or
hurt anyone else, I was going to have my way. Until God quickened
me, and such was I. Such were you. He quickened us who were dead
in trespasses and sin, and in time past walked according to
the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of
the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. And yet, just in case we would
still boast or try to shift the blame to someone else, he says, among whom we all. had our conversation in time
past, in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling
the desires of the flesh and the mind, and were by nature
haters of God. We all, every believer in Christ,
we understand this, that we by nature did not choose God, chose
us. We did not save ourselves. We had no merit before which
we could come before a holy God. As a matter of fact, because
we love sin, we would never have come had he not quickened us,
not made us alive. We were just as others. Is this not the experience of
all believers? Has sin not laid waste to the
dreams of men? Has it not only produced thorns
and thistles and sorrows? This is my experience, and I
know it's yours. But God. I like those two words. Those are my favorite words.
But God. But God, who is rich in mercy,
for his great love wherewith he loved us, we who were dead in sins, he
had quickened together with Christ. For by grace you are saved. By
grace you are saved. Are you saved? Then you are saved
by grace. You know what, there's no other
kind. There's no other kind of salvation but grace. Had it not been for the words,
these words, there would have been no salvation but God. Unless God had intervened, unless
God had not acted in grace to come to man, man would have never
come to God. The only word that Adam had was
death and curse. Isn't that right? When he sinned,
was there any other word that he had? Did he have any other
hope? God said, In the day thou eatest
thereof, thou shalt surely die. And that's the only word that
he had. So then who came to who? God
came to Adam. And if God will save us, God
will save any sinner. He must come to them. He must come to them. But God
came with a message of mercy. And what was the message? What
was this message of mercy? Do you not suppose that that
was the greatest news that Adam and Eve had ever heard? The seed
of the woman shall crush the head of the serpent, and he shall bruise his heel.
I'll tell you what, they didn't fully understand all that meant.
They knew this, that the seed of the woman would kill sin,
would kill Satan, the one that tempted, the one that deceived.
He'll kill him and he'll kill all the sins. But something must
happen. His heel must be bruised. He
must suffer. That's the very first gospel
message. He must suffer. In our text, it says, therefore,
in all things, it behooved Christ to be made like unto his brethren,
the word behooved, it means to owe. That's a shocker. Christ owed Himself to be made
like unto His brethren. In other words, He obligated
Himself. You and I could not obligate
God to do anything. This is what false religion teaches,
is that you can obligate God, that you can make God do whatever
you want, As long as you say the right words and do the right
things. Friends, God is not obligated to anyone but Himself. And Christ obligated Himself
in the eternal covenant of grace to be our Savior. And therefore, because He obligated
Himself, it behooved Him. He owed it to Himself that He
should be made like unto us. Sin, friends, truly is a debt
that is owed to the justice of God. We can read many scriptures
that teach us of sin being a debt. And you may liken it to monetary
debt, but truly it is a criminal debt that we owe to God. It's altogether different when
you have to pay a fine to the judge or go to the electric chair. That's a big difference, isn't
it? One is pretty bad, nobody likes that one, but man, who
would want the other? But friends, our debt is death. That's our debt. That's what
we owe. And not just any debt, an eternal
debt. Why? Because we've sinned against
an eternal God and God's justice is eternal. And so then it must
require an eternal sacrifice. The more we try to pay God, the more we realize that sin
is mixed with all I do. Isn't it a burden? All the chains
that men are under, they add to themselves. Well, if I just
check this off, Then I'll be closer to God. You check that
off and you got 20 more pop up in its place. You get done with
those, 40 more will pop up in its place. And on and on and
on. You see, you can't please God.
This is the whole message of the book. You and I cannot please
God. It's hopeless. in ourselves to
please an almighty, powerful, holy, righteous deity. What a debt we owe. And if we spend an eternity under
the justice of God and hell, we would have not paid for one
sin. Not one. Why? Because your blood and my blood
is tainted with sin. Guilty. Jesus said this concerning someone
who owed a debt. He said the man had two debtors. One owed fifty cents. The other owed 10 million. And neither one had anything
to pay. And he frankly forgave them both. Freely forgave them both. Which one do you suppose would
love more? 50 cents. Hey, thank you. Ten million
dollars? Oh, thank you! I'm indebted to
you forever! Thank you! Thank you! Jesus said that those who are
forgiven much loveth much. God, in the trinity of his persons,
by his own sovereign will and for his own glory, the Father
chose some of Adam's race that he would freely forgive. Freely. He chose some criminals
by which he, in his sovereign grace, would redeem and save. And Jesus, the beloved agreed. He obligated himself to pay the
debt we owe. That he should taste death. What is it when you taste something? You take it in. You put it in
your mouth and you absorb it into your body. Christ, who is
life, tasted death in every possible way. Unfathomable love. I can tell you how sweet strawberries
are. Last night we had chocolate cake.
Well, it was sweet. I like that chocolate cake. And I could tell
you how delicious that was, but unless you taste it, you can
only speculate. You can only guess what it actually
tastes like. Friends, Jesus Christ, from before
the foundation of the world, obligated himself to taste death,
and he did taste death. Not just physical death, he did
taste that. But friends, he tastes the eternal
weight of God's justice for our sins. The Lord hath laid on him
the iniquity of his soul. How bad do you suppose sin is? How evil is sin in the sight
of the living God? You want to know? You're going
to have to look at the cross. You will have to see what God
did to His own Son when He found our sins in Him. That's how much God hates sin.
Do you suppose that any one of us would escape if the Son of
God did not? The Son of God was sent to suffer
a man of sorrow and acquainted with grief. Is there any greater suffering
than what Christ suffered? You who are suffering, consider
Him. Consider His sufferings. We'll
always be moaning what we're suffering. We're always complaining
about it. Oh, man, nobody has sorrowed
like me. Oh, the suffering! Oh, I cannot
bear it! Woe is me!" Consider Him, and the thought of your suffering
will vanish away. You've not suffered under the
justice of God, have you? You've not been crushed by the
Almighty, have you? He has. He has. And friends, His suffering is
sufficient. I like this. He is not only the
suffering Savior, He is the sufficient Savior. When Jesus Christ bore
the weight of our sins on the cross and God poured out His
justice for our sins, know this, God was satisfied with His offering. Absolutely, completely satisfied
with His one offering. What a blasphemy it is when men
claim that Christ died for all of the sins of man, even those
in hell. What blasphemy! Why? Because they are saying,
his blood was not enough, his blood was not sufficient. Oh,
his blood was sufficient. For everyone he died for, his
blood was sufficient. See, Christ didn't make salvation
possible, he saved his people from their sin. Isn't that the
prophecy of Christ? Doesn't Christ have to fulfill
all prophecy to be Christ? Isn't that right? All of Old
Testament Scripture must be fulfilled. Here's one. Thou shalt call his name Jesus,
for he shall save his people from their sins. Here's another. He shall not
fail nor be discouraged. Did he fail? Absolutely not. Matter of fact, his last words
before he commended his spirit to God was, it is finished. Finished. Done. Done. Debt paid. Where was I? I wasn't even born
yet. And yet the debt had already
been paid. When I was born, I didn't know
anything about it. Matter of fact, I just like everybody else,
loving sin, living in sin, hating God, despising the gospel. And one day, God came and revealed
that to me. He quickened my soul when I wasn't
even desiring to be quickened. But after He did, I'll tell you
what I was. When He quickened, I was willing
to come. Scripture says, He hath made
us willing in the day of His power. Power. And not only did He pay. Not only was great was his sacrifice
to... You know how you hear about the
skin of your teeth? How somebody just barely gets
over the bar? There's one time you see these
football players and they just eek over the line, just a little
bit, you know, and they get a touchdown. Christ didn't save us by the
skin of his teeth. His price was of infinite value. Flip over to Isaiah chapter 40,
read this with me, Isaiah chapter 40. You who believe, take comfort
in this, look at this and just rejoice, rest, fall down on him,
worship him. God says, Comfort ye, comfort
ye my people, saith the Lord. Speak comfortably to Jerusalem. And cry unto her. That her warfare is accomplished. That her iniquity is pardoned. For she hath received of the
Lord's hand double for all her sins. Friends, I'm not going to barely
make it into heaven. I'm going to sit on the throne
with Him. Is that not amazing? I will have
His glory given to me. Me? Me? Yes, me. Oh, I love this message. A man
preached one time, surprised by grace. Grace is altogether surprising.
I wasn't looking for him and he found me. I didn't want him. He wanted me. I didn't love him. He loved me. And one day he said, surprise,
I love you. Surprise, you love me. Because
I loved you. And right now, walking around
in this mortal frame, this body, I can't fathom I can't fathom what glory awaits
me. But I'm patiently hoping and
waiting for it. Wait patiently. But as we wait
patiently, what happens to us? We suffer. As we wait for what
God has promised, what God has done, We will suffer in this
body. We who believe on Christ, the
suffering and sufficient Savior, also by grace will know that he is a faithful and merciful
high priest. Look at your text. He says, Wherefore, in all things
it behooved him, he owed it to himself to be made like unto
us, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of his people. Now,
for he, in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is
also able to succor them." The succoring Savior, what does that
mean? We don't use that word anymore. Friends, that is a helper. That is one that comes in to
someone with no strength and lifts up. That's what it means. To comfort. To care. To hold. To embrace. That's what it is to suffer.
A little baby. of Annie's, she cannot have the
strength to do anything. She must be suckered. She must be held and cared for. Well, Jesus Christ is such a
Savior. Not only has He died for our
sins, but friends, He has also obligated himself to care concerning our suffering. I know this, the Lord has put
me under a great deal of trouble and difficulty concerning a depression. A great depression came over
me in the last year or so. I never knew what it was. I never
heard. You know, I always said, well,
you know, they're just people need to just pull themselves
up. And you know what? When that happened to me, I was
really able to understand. Now, before I could probably
sympathize with him, I could just be there and, you know,
hold him and I couldn't tell him I really knew what it was,
what it was. I can be there. I'll tell you what, now I really
know what that is. And my heart grieves for anybody
to have anything like that. It really grieves more than it
ever did. Friends, our Savior suffered
everything that you did double. You see, he's able to enter in.
Have you ever been thirsty? I'm thirsty right now. You see,
my Lord understands in infinite number what that means to be
thirsty. You've been hungry? He understands
that. You've been betrayed? He understands
that. You've been mocked, ridiculed,
rejected by family and friends? He understands that. And friends,
because He understands, we can know this and have comfort that
He can come alongside us and He can put His arms around us
and say, I know. I know. He's never condescending to us. He's always caring. He's able to help. Do you need
help? If you don't need help, I don't
know anything about your condition. If you don't need any help, I
don't understand that. You need help? I understand that.
I need help. I need help. Well, friends, if he suffered
for me, if his sacrifice was sufficient for me, how in the
world would I not think he'd help me? That's nothing but sin and unbelief. Now, I'll tell you, if I get
sick and I ask the Lord to help I
ask the Lord to heal me, and he doesn't. Do you suppose that his promise,
that he didn't keep his promise? No, he keeps his promise. He
said, I'll be with you in the fire, not always out of it. Bear patiently the cross that
we have been given. Don't look to someone else's.
Don't envy someone else's cross. Bear your own. And bear it patiently. You out of strength? He'll come
right along and give you strength. He won't put on you more than
you can bear. Is that not the precious Savior of the Scriptures? Is that not the precious Savior
we know in our heart? What grace! What grace! I pray that God will bless this
to your hearts, strengthen you and encourage you. Let's stand
and be dismissed in prayer.