You can turn to Genesis 43. It's one of the scriptures we'll
start with. The title, Christ Our Surety. Or Christ Our Surety for Good. Because the psalmist said, Be
surety. Be surety for me for good. Now,
to understand the real value of Christ being our surety, we
must understand, and I mean spiritually understand, have a spiritual
understanding that sin is a real debt that we owe to God. It's a real debt. We owe to God's
law and God's justice. We owe a debt of obedience. We
owe a debt of suffering. We owe a debt of death. The soul
that sinneth shall surely die. We owe that. Every person on
this earth that ever has been, is right now, or ever shall be
owes this debt. You know, I think it's interesting. When a person files bankruptcy,
you really think bad of them. You look down on them, don't
you? Every last one of us have a debt
that we file bankruptcy on. We cannot pay God. And I don't
know why. I don't know why. That doesn't
trouble us far more than somebody just filing bankruptcy. It ought
to bother me so much more, trouble me so much more. I owe a debt
that I owed a debt I couldn't pay. I was indebted to God, to
his justice, to his law, and I couldn't pay it. And the debt,
listen, the debt was real. It's real. The penalty is real. It's real. I was driving the other day down
the road, and hanging from my mirror was a tiniest spider,
but a little thread. And I looked at it, and I thought,
how tiny. I mean, it was like almost about
the size of the head of a needle. It was that small. And the first
thought that hit me was sinners hanging over hell. by just the thread. People don't
even know. That thought just hit me how
I, and not just people in general, but I thought myself, hanging
by a thread. Now God can either cut it and
let me drop, or do like I did that spider, I killed it. Or
he can save me. He can save me. You see, the
debt's real, the penalty's real, death is real. It's real. And if we never come
to an understanding of this, we will never believe on Christ
as the scriptures teach. We will never really Believe
on Him, rely on Him, hold to Him, follow Him, confess Him
if this is not real, if this debt that we owe is not real
to us. We will never have a proper assurance
of salvation until we see our debt that we owe and how Christ
as our surety paid it. There's our assurance. Christ
paid the debt. I don't owe it. I don't owe it. I have peace with God. God's
not after me for payment. Now I want to look at a few scriptures
that teach us something of the suretyship of the Lord Jesus
Christ, for Christ is our surety. Now let me say this first, what
a surety is not. Look over in Genesis 42 look in Genesis 42
look in 36 37 In 36 and Jacob their father
said unto them Me have you bereaved of my children? Joseph is not
Simeon is not and you you will take Benjamin away. All these
things are against me and Reuben and spake unto his father, saying,
Slay my two sons, if I bring him not to thee. That's not a
surety. You can kill my two sons, your
grandsons. You can have them if I don't
bring Benjamin back. That's not a surety. That's not
a surety at all. If I bring him not to thee and
deliver him into my hand, and I'll bring him to thee again.
That's not a surety. No. You know what Jacob said
of Reuben? He's unstable as water. Now you
don't take someone unstable as water and trust them to be the
surety. Jacob like, there's no way I'm
sending Benjamin with you. But now we do have a real picture
of the surety ship of Christ in Judah. And we have this in Genesis 43,
9. And this is what is called the Law of First Mention. This
is how it's used throughout the rest of the Scriptures. And now
Jude is going to speak up over in chapter 43. And he says here,
I will be surety for him, for Benjamin, of my hand shalt thou
require it, not my children, Not your grandchildren, my hand. If I bring him not unto thee,
and set him before thee, alive and well is what he's talking
about. Set him before you alive and well. And if I don't do that,
then let me bear the blame forever. Now that's the surety. That's
what a surety is. The real surety here is Judah.
Judah represents the kingly tribe, the one which Christ came from.
And in this, Judah is a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ as our
surety. He's the real picture. Judah
said, I will be surety for him. I will be responsible for bringing
him back to you. I will bear all the responsibility,
no one else, no one else, not my brothers, not my family, no
one else, just me, just me. Now, one of the things that I
thought of here as I was looking at this, and he's talking to
Jacob, one of the things to notice is
this, Benjamin is silent in this whole conversation. This conversation
is between the father, Jacob, and the son, Judah. Benjamin
has no say-so in this. You see, when Christ and the
Father agreed upon our salvation, and I'm putting it in terms that,
you know, I put it in terms that we can comprehend, we had no
say-so in it. I have no say-so in my salvation.
God the Father, and God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit. All
three are engaged to save everyone of God's elect, every one of
them. That is why we are baptized in
the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The whole
Trinity, they are engaged in saving sinners and bringing them
home. But Christ is called the surety. He's the one who came into this
world and paid the debt that we couldn't pay. And it's a very
real debt. I've been thinking about this
for a while. It's a very real debt. And we couldn't pay it. And when
a man dies, a woman dies, and they have not Christ as their
surety, guess what? That debt's coming up. It's coming
up, and they can't pay it. They can't pay it. Assurity, as I believe, and you
all know this, assurity is a guarantor. It's one who stands responsible
for someone else's debt. It means, it means this, it means
to become or undertake for another, to stand in one's place. It is someone who engages himself
for the debt of another. Now listen, willingly. Christ
did this willingly. It's one who gives a pledge to
another willingly on behalf of another. And he does it willingly. Willingly. Assurity also is one
who has credibility. You know, a loser cannot sign
for another loser. That doesn't work. The person
that's the surety has to have credibility. You go to the bank
and if you're going to sign for somebody, number one, it's because you
don't have credit or you're not credible yet. And they are. They better be or the bank's
not going to recognize it. It's not going to recognize it.
Christ is credible. He's God. He's God. You can't be any more credible
than that. He's God. The Lord Jesus Christ is our
surety. Listen to this scripture in Psalm
89, 19. And listen, pray that the Lord really open your eyes
to this because this is where peace comes from. I mean, this
is where you get real peace, real joy, real assurance. When times are hard and you can't
discern His presence, yet when you understand He's your surety,
you can have rest. You can have assurance. Because
Christ is my surety. Christ paid the debt. Christ
stands for me. He stands for me. Listen to this
in Psalm 89, 19. Then thou spakest in vision to
the Holy One and saidest, I have laid help upon one that is mighty. I've laid help upon you. You
can't do anything. God knows you can't do anything.
I can't do anything. But he, he laid help upon one that could.
He laid help upon one who could do everything. I have exalted
one chosen out of the people. You see, if somebody's going
to be a surety for me, he's got to be one like me. My dog can't
sign. It's got to be one of us. It's
got to be one like me. Christ had to become a man. He
had to become a man in order to be a proper surety to represent
us. He had to. The Lord Jesus Christ drew near
to the Father and He pledged to bring home all of the Father's
Benjamins. I'll bring them all. I'll bring
them. I promise you, I'll bring them
all. He pledged to bear the blame
and pay the debt and bring them home safe and sound. That's how
we're going home. We are going home safe and sound. Christ's stewardship was voluntary. He wasn't forced into it. He
wasn't forced. It was voluntary. I bought a car when I was 18,
the first vehicle I had. I bought it. And a friend of
mine, his mother co-signed for me. I didn't beg her into it,
didn't talk her into it, didn't say anything to it. She willingly
just offered to do it. I never had barred anything in
my life. Assurity is one that's willing,
not forced to do it. Our Lord pledged to pay the debt
of obedience, suffering, the Son of Man must suffer, And death,
and he pledged to do it willingly. He's glad to do it, with desire. When he was taking that supper
with his disciples, he said, with desire. With desire, I've
desired to do this. Willing to do it. And let me
point out something here. This is important. As you and I know what a surety
is, it only goes so far than it falls apart. Because I signed
on as a surety if you can't pay it. Hoping you'll pay it. Christ signed on as a surety
knowing we were debt broke. We couldn't pay the first jot
or tittle. We could not pay the first. When Christ became our surety,
he knew, he knew he was paying the full debt. He knew it. It says over in Proverbs 11,
15, he that is surety for a stranger shall smart for hurt. Did he not hurt? Were we not
strangers? We were not strangers to the covenant of grace. That's
what it says in Ephesians 2. We were strangers. And He smarted
for it. By His stripes, we are healed. He smarted for it. But here's the beauty of Christ
being our surety. When our Lord, when He became
our surety, We were set free. If you've become a surety for
somebody, you know that you automatically become the, you really, you're
the one who owns that note. The person that you signed for,
he may or may not pay, but it don't matter, they're coming
for you. Not him, they're coming for you. When our Lord our surety in that
covenant of grace we were set free from all debt even before the world was we
were set free from the debt before creation the debt was transferred
to him even the Old Testament Saints they were set free they
were not put in a holding cell they were set free the whole
elect of God a number that cannot be numbered were set free, and
the whole debt was put on him. And we were free. Free. Job said this, I know that my
Redeemer liveth. He could have said it this way.
I know that my surety liveth. I know that. Abraham knew it. Abraham saw my day, he said,
and was glad. He knew it. He knew it. And here's a note of importance.
Judah said, If I bring him not unto thee, and set him before
thee. That word set means to place
permanently. If I bring him not unto thee
and set him permanently before you, you hold me responsible. Judah is taking full responsibility
to bring Benjamin home and set him before Jacob alive and well
and to set him there permanently. Our Lord has promised to bring
us home and set us before the Father permanently. We sit there
now in Christ, don't we? Permanently. We are already there. Now, we haven't experienced it,
but in Christ, we are seated at the right hand of God. If
we could just ask the Lord to open our eyes and our understanding
to that, it makes living this life a lot different. It makes
living it a lot different. Now here's another scripture
concerning Christ as our surety over in Philemon. Look over in
Philemon. That's right before Hebrews. You're very familiar with this,
but Paul is sending Onesimus back home. The Lord has saved
him. And he's sending him back home
to Philemon, his master. And no doubt, when Onesimus left,
he left with a, he left a bad taste in Philemon's mouth, no
doubt. He probably stole some stuff for the journey. You know,
he took off and went to Rome. He probably stole some stuff
and took it with him. Probably bad mouthed Philemon to the others
that were there. But Paul sends him back. And
in verse 17, 18, Paul says, if thou count me therefore a partner,
an equal. Can you hear the son saying that?
If you count me an equal, receive him Onesimus. Just put your name
in there if you believe the gospel. As myself. In my place. This is our oneness with Christ.
Can you see that? Can you see your oneness with
the Lord Jesus Christ? Receive him as myself, because
we're one. We are one in him. If he hath wronged thee, or oweth
thee aught, put that on mine account. He says in verse nine,
if he has, I'll pay it. I'll pay it. Henry wrote this,
in this statement, the grace and mercy of Christ to whom our
great debt of sin was imputed and who paid in full all that
we owed. He's the great surety. He's the great debt payer. That's
what he did at Calvary. Our Lord paid a debt. You know, we couldn't pay a debt.
We couldn't pay such a debt, because number one, it's a spiritual
debt. And we're not spiritual. We're carnal, sold under sin.
And then it's to an infinite God, God who's infinite. So the
debt's infinite. That's why hell's eternal. You
know why hell's forever? Because those there can never
satisfy justice. They can never render satisfaction. they're down there cursing God
now wherever that is they don't love God anymore now
than they ever did hate him just as much now weeping wailing gnashing
of teeth here's another scripture over
in Hebrews turn over to Hebrews chapter 7 He says here, by so much was
Jesus made a surety of a better, and here the word is testament,
which has the meaning of a wheel and testament. You see a wheel
and testament is not a negotiation. You can
take a covenant, two people make a covenant and they can make
You know, the father and the son made a covenant. There's
a covenant of grace. The father made with the son
over us. A will and a testament is what, if I make a will and
testament to my sons, they have no say so in it. They have no
say so in it. I'm making it. I'm making it. And I'm saying what goes in it. They don't have any say so in
it. And Christ being the surety of this will and testament of
God, God the Father, concerning us. Our Lord is the surety of a better
testament of this will and testament, and it's better because it's
one of grace. We don't earn anything. We didn't
earn anything good. We've earned the wages of death,
but we've not earned anything good. It's all of grace. It was made
with a father and a son, and the son, listen, the son, who's
the surety of this testament, lives to enforce it. This is part of his intercessory
work. He lives to enforce it. All the
promises of God in Him are yea and amen. All the promises in
this testament, of this will and testament. In no way at no
time does any part of my salvation, our salvation, rely on me paying
any part of the debt or fulfilling any part of the covenant or this
will and testament. It doesn't rely on me in any
way shape or form. Isn't that good news? That's why you gotta go back
to what I said in the beginning. God has to give us a real spiritual
understanding of this debt and how that Christ put it away. He stood as our surety and he
stands as a surety of this New Testament in order to enforce
it and that we get the blessings of it. My surety is completely responsible
to bring me and all the elect of God home, spotless and unblameable. I'll bring him home and set him
before you permanently, alive and well. And then last of all,
let's go back to Psalm 119. There in verse 122, be surety
for thy servant for good. This is interesting. It's those
two little word is very powerful. Exist as my surety, be this,
be this for me. Is that not what you want Christ
to be for you? Be my surety. David's asking the Lord, the
self-existing one, the Lord Jesus Christ, to be surety for him
for good. Be for my good. Exist for my
good. You know, I thought about this,
the humanity of Christ, human nature of Christ, it is for our
good. He became a man for our good. He is our high priest. Be my
high priest. Be my sacrifice. Be my atonement. Be my righteousness. Be my all
in all, be everything I need, be that. That word just jumped
out at me, it's never jumped at me like that before. Be that
for me, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, redemption, be
that for me. Because I don't have any of it
myself. And it's more than just, listen, it's more than just saying,
give this to me, be this to me. and be this for me before God. Be my acceptance. Be my righteousness. Be my pardon. Be my justification. Everything I need to stand before
God complete, be that for me. Be surety. Be surety. for my good. The God-Man. Here's the amazing part of it.
God is my surety. God is our surety. The God-Man Jesus Christ is our
surety for good. For good. Rather than we have
a good ending coming, We have a good ending coming. All right.