If you will, open your Bibles
to Matthew chapter 8. We'll read these first four verses. And when he was come down from
the mountain, great multitudes followed him. And behold, there
came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou
canst make me clean. And Jesus put forth his hand
and touched him, saying, I will be thou clean. And immediately
his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said unto him, See
thou tell no man, but go thy way, show thyself unto the priest,
and offer the gift that Moses commanded for a testimony unto
them. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Our Heavenly Father, we pray
to you in the high and holy name of Christ Jesus our Lord. And
Father, we ask that we might also have this cleansing. Lord,
we pray that you'd move our hearts to seek your face and to believe
your gospel. But Lord, apart from your Holy
Spirit, do the work of grace in our hearts. Lord, we won't.
And Lord, we pray that you quicken us this morning. Quicken our
cold, dead hearts that we might hear your gospel and rejoice
in what's being preached. Give us eyes to see and ears
that we might hear. Lord, we're blind if you don't
give us sight. And Lord, we ask for that. Lord, we ask for your
spirit here this morning with us. Lord, make your word effectual. Lord, make Christ be glorified. Lord, we pray that you'd give
us faith to believe. Giveth faith to believe that
whatever we ask for, Lord, that you'll give us. Lord, we thank
you for the blessings which you've given us in this life. Lord,
we thank you for our jobs. We thank you for comforts of
our homes. We thank you for the many things
that you give us. And we need these things, but Lord, these
are pale in comparison for the gift you gave your son. Lord,
we pray that we could remember him this morning. Lord, we pray
that you'd call your people out. Lord, that you'd save our children.
And Lord, open doors where we might witness your gospel to
our friends and our coworkers and to our families that know
thee not. Lord, we pray for mercy upon our homes and upon our families.
And Lord, there are many who are sick. And Lord, we're thankful
because we can call upon you, who are the great physician.
And Lord, we pray that you'd be with those who have troubles
and sickness and things that we know not of. Lord, you know
what we need. Lord, give us what we need and
not what we want. Lord, we thank you for bringing
us here today. Pray that you might go with us. It's in Christ's
name we pray and ask these things. Amen. All right. We're going to look
at Matthew chapter 8 this morning, these verses that I just read
to you. And my message title is, How to Come to Christ. And
what I hope is that we'll have some understanding for how we're
to come to Christ by the end of this message. So we see here
in our text there was a leper that came unto the Lord because
he needed cleanse of his leprosy. And apart from the Lord doing
that for him, he would not be cleansed. Leprosy was a death
sentence in that day. And my question to you is will
you also come to the Lord for cleansing? Because your sin is
a death sentence and you can't be cleansed of it apart from
him cleansing you from it So we are to come to the Lord for
cleansing. Are there any here this morning who are weary of
your sin? Where it's a burden to you It's
something that you know, you've done, you know, you stand before
God guilty in your sins Then you need to come to Christ Is
there any here this morning who got trialed in your life? Maybe
you got lost. Maybe it's the first time you've
ever experienced that. Maybe you're someone who's in
trouble right now and you don't know how to get out of it. And
you're looking for comfort and you need assurance that it's
okay. Then you need to come to Christ. Do you need healed? Is there
anyone in here that needs healed? And I'm not talking about the
kind of healing that a man can give you. I'm talking about the
same kind of healing where God reaches out and touches you just
like He did this leper and says, I will. Be thou clean. Now you imagine for just a moment
what it's like to be this man, this leper. As I said earlier,
leprosy as a disease was the worst thing in this time that
you could do. Now today we can cure that with antibiotics. But
in this day when he got that, this was a death sentence in
many ways. And this parallels the death
sentence that you and I and everyone in this room has on them with
sin. Sin is a disease we will never
be rid of. And so I'm asking you when we're looking at aspects
of this man as a leper, also consider your own disease of
sin. This man had a disease that could
not be cured. And that's a hard thing to think
of, that you've got something, you know, at least those many
of which are sick, you have the hope, you know, that are at home
and couldn't make it, that the things that you're taking, that
there's some medicine that will make you well. It's something
else to know that you have a disease that will never be cured. It's
never going to get better. It's only going to get worse.
Consider that with our sin. This man was not only diseased,
but he was visibly disfigured. Leprosy causes necrosis of the
flesh, so it causes your flesh to die. And it particularly affects
the extremities of the flesh, the fingers, the toes, the nose,
the ears. So often when leprosy would infect
someone for a long time, you'd see their nose fall off. Their fingers start rotting away
and eventually they become kind of these gnarled mess that's
left. He was visibly disfigured. And people had to look at him.
And when they saw him, let's say that you were somebody who
knew him before. You hardly want to make eye contact with him.
Because when you make eye contact, it makes you look away. Because
you're ashamed and you feel sorry for him. He was stared at. He was also banished outside
the city because you didn't want anybody else to get leprosy.
So people that got this, they said you can't stay inside the
city anymore. You have to go live outside the
camp. You have to live outside the city in a leper colony where
all these other sick people are. Those are the people you're going
to spend the rest of your life around. Think about what all
this meant He also lost his family. He couldn't live at home with
them anymore. They couldn't go out to the leper camp because
they'd all get it and die. He couldn't hug his wife at night. He couldn't kiss his children.
He didn't have those things that we take for granted and all have.
So he was separated from his family. He also couldn't provide
for them. You think he may have been the
only provision they had in that day, but once he became a leper,
nobody's going to allow him to have a job. Because you see,
anything that he touches, it becomes unclean. And there's
nothing wrong with what was there, but because he touched it and
had his hand on it, it became unclean. He could do no work. He had to put a rag over his
face everywhere he went so that people were aware that he was
diseased and could infect them and say, cry, unclean, unclean,
which meant keep away. Keep your distance from me. You
can't come near me. What a heavy load to bear. You
imagine this. This was just more than being
sick and having something wrong with you. This affected everything.
And then to be able to hear the words, I will, Be thou clean. Do you have some understanding
now what that meant to this man? Do you have some understanding
as to what being cleansed of leprosy meant to him? This was
everything. This is all that he thought about
and all that he wanted. Now there's not a more visible
manifestation of sin in man other than leprosy. I think it's given
as many examples in the Bible because of the visible way it
affects in all the things that I described. There's no cure
for your sin. It doesn't get better. In fact,
the more you learn of it, it's worse than what you thought.
And what's even more shameful is that it always was that way
and you just didn't even know it. That causes us what shame
before God to know I've always been this way and I didn't even
know it. I can't come to God in and of myself because I'm
unclean. He won't have me in His presence.
He says your righteousnesses are as filthy rags. That means
unclean. You cannot come in His presence.
In fact, He's cast you out of His presence. You can't even
come near God. Remember when He was revealing Himself to Moses,
He said, you can't even look on My face. He said, you'll die
if you even look on My face. So we can't even come to God.
How bad is it? He won't even hear your prayers
in and of yourself. Outside of Christ, your prayers
are meaningless. They don't reach God. We can
only come before God if we have a mediator. Someone who can come
to Him for us. I can't come to God in and of
myself because of who I am and what I've done. You can do nothing
to please God. He can only accept perfection.
Your works are imperfect, therefore He can't accept it. So there's
nothing that you can bring before God that He can say, I'm pleased
with this and I'll do something for you that you need and deserve
because of what you did. No, there's nothing that you
can bring. You've never kept one commandment one time. We're sinners and that's all
we can do. We're polluted, we're vile, and
we're fit only for the wrath of God. This is an accurate description
of who a sinner is before God. I'd say, by and large, this world
is completely ignorant to how bad it really is. But then, to
hear these words after knowing all that, Thy sins, which are
many, are forgiven. Imagine what that means to you
as a sinner to know everything that kept you from God, everything
that kept you for prayers from even being heard, everything
that forced His hand of wrath upon you and punishment has all
been removed. There's a lot that we're concerned
about today, and in this life, and that we have to be. This
is really what matters. Because in the end, the rest
of this stuff is going to be burned up. And all we're going to be
left with is, what is my standing before God? I need forgiveness
of my sins. I need for Him to heal me. And
if He doesn't heal me, I won't have it. There's no way that
I can come to Him. Now this account of this leper
coming to the Lord asking to be made clean is mentioned actually
three times in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. So it does deserve
our careful attention because there's some great message being
put forth here. Yes, it's a pattern of faith,
but also it's how we are to come to God when asking for something. He shows us a pattern for this.
And we're going to look at five things, and they're all in verse
2. And I'll just tell you what they are real quick. The first
point is leper. The second is worshiped him.
The third is Lord. The fourth is if thou wilt. And the last one is you can make
me clean. So first, Leper. He had some
understanding of his condition. He may not have liked it, but
he had some understanding of his condition. He may have tried
to come in town a few times. He was immediately cast out every
time because it was unlawful for him to be there. This should
remind us of who we are and whom we are before. When we're before
God the Father, when He looks on us as a sinner, God hates
sin. The saying that God loves the
sinner but hates the sin is ridiculous because you can't separate sin
from the sinner. So if you have sin on you, God's
wrath is upon you. And so this is who we are before
God, just like this leper was before the wall there. He was
cast out. He was diseased, he was outcast, and he was not welcome.
Have you ever been made to feel this way? Not welcome. Somebody
made you feel like they didn't want you in their presence. This
is how we really are viewed before God Himself in and of ourselves. Outside of Christ, we are not
welcome. His condition was hopeless and
there was nothing that could be done to help him. He was never
going to get better. He had some understanding of
his condition. I wonder if we do also. Is there
a center in the house this morning? Is there anyone in here that
also needs healed? That needs this kind of help?
Have you ever prayed this? Lord, help me. It's one of the
simplest prayers there is. This is what the woman who had
the demon possessed child. She came to the Lord saying,
Lord, please help me. My child is vexed with a demon. How awful would that be? He just
kind of cast her away. He said, you know, children's
bread is meant for the children, not for dogs. He called this
woman a dog. She had no other thing to come to Him other than
just saying, I'm out of things to say. I don't know what to
ask for. Lord, just help me. If you don't
help me, I'm not going to be helped. Help me, Lord. I don't know what to ask for.
I have no right to ask anything for you or from you. Even to
call upon your name is an offense coming from me. But I'm tired. And I'm bearing a heavy load
that I can't bear. I can't bear it any longer. And
I have no way of helping myself. Lord, help me. This is the cry
of everyone who is at a point where it's totally out of your
hands. And it's totally up to Him to
do something if He will. It's only when we see who He
is. He's God. And He is holy. It's
only when we see who He is we have some understanding of who
we are. We talked about this a little this morning in Sunday
School. Apart from Him revealing Himself to us, we will never
see who we are. He must do that first. We must
know something of His power. He has the power, it speaks of
this in the Psalms, He has the power to forgive even your sins. That's power we know nothing
about. We think of His power of creation, power in the world
that we see, forces and knowledge that we know nothing of, but
He has the power because really what I care about is my sin at
the end of the day. I cannot know those things, but
I still have to deal with the problem of my sin. And He has
the power to forgive sins. I'm tired and I can't help myself.
I need to know of His power. It's only then that our guilt
our shame and our inability exposed. I'm exposed that I can do nothing.
And I'm completely shut up to His mercy. It's only then that
you will come to Him. Only then. Because you only come
for what you can't provide yourself. And when you're shut up to seeing
that you can't provide this, and apart from Him providing
it for you, you won't have it. What does this dire state of
being call for? Being where you are shut up to
His mercy. Brings us to our second point in verse number two. The
one thing that is required, true worship. The Lord requires true
worship. I don't think we really understand
what worship means. I think as we were driving in
this morning, there was a church building that we passed and said
something about, come worship with us this morning. You know,
it's the Lord's Day, you know, worship day or something. We
don't understand what worship is. Worship is not us getting
together, having some feeling that we feel when the gospel
is being preached and that we react to it. That's not worship.
Worship, when described in the scriptures, uses the word prostrate. Prostrate means falling down
on your face. It's being in complete submission
and inability before someone else. Submission and weakness
were the words it used. That's worship. You have understanding,
some understanding of who he is and who you are and you're
in complete submission and weakness before him. It's a plea to someone
far greater who has both the power and the ability to give
you what you need. This man worshipped the Lord. Question. Is he worthy of worship? For most, they wait to see how
things work out with worship. They say, you know, if things
are going well in your life and you're getting all the things
you need, no real problems, sure, why not? Yes, he's worthy of
worship. But what about when you're having
to endure the silence of the Lord, or you're asking for something
and he doesn't appear to be answering? Is He worthy of worship then?
What about when you're dealing with something you perceive as
bad? This is going the exact way I didn't want it to go. In
fact, it's really bad and I may lose everything. Is He worthy
of worship then? Well, it doesn't really matter
what you or I think when it comes down to it, whether we say He
is or is not. What does the Scripture say?
Turn with me, if you will, over to Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter 2 and we'll
start reading in verse 9. Keeping in mind is he worthy
of worship? Wherefore, God also hath highly
exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name, that
at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven,
in the earth, and under the earth, people who believe and love his
person, people who know his gospel, also those who curse his name,
How about those that reject his gospel? How about those that
are trusting in their works, either a little bit, in just
saying that I made a decision and he did the rest, or they
trust in a lot, in saying, I did this Lord, do this for me. How
about those who deny that he exists, altogether, because that
seems to be the tenor of today. And for those who just aren't
interested in any of this and don't care. What does it say? Scripture says that every knee
should bow. They will bow before Him in devout
recognition of His name for who He is. What else does it say
they're going to do? It said every tongue Those who
praise His name and those who revile His name and who esteem
Him not. If you have a tongue, you will
do this. It says you're going to confess. Openly acknowledge
what will be openly acknowledged that Jesus is Lord to the glory
of God the Father He will be worshiped Let there be no confusion
on this matter He will be worshiped now. You may bow willingly in
this life and you ought to But to the others your rebellion
will be crushed and And you will be made to bow before a conquering
king. And there's no more Jesus as
you view him in the scriptures. Many people view him as this
pitiful Jesus hoping that you'll come do this. He comes as a conquering
king in that day. And it's too late. So you'll
bow now or you'll be made to bow. Which brings us to our third
point. There will be acknowledgement
of his lordship. He is Lord, and all things are
under him. It is he who must reign until
he puts all of his enemies under his feet. We'll acknowledge he
is Lord, he who crushed the serpent's head. Acknowledgement of His
Lordship, He who died for your sins, all because He loved you. He loved His people so much that
He came and He died for them. We don't know love like that.
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man give his life
for his friends. Do you realize if the Son of
God gave His life for you and died for your sins, He can call
you a friend? That's beyond my experience and
what I can feel and think I know in this life, but He can call
me a friend because there's no more reason for Him to be angry
with me. And it doesn't matter what I think about it. He's the
judge. He's the Lord. He's the one that
says that things are the way they are. He's Lord over all. And of the kings of the earth,
He's their King. Is there anybody in this earth
that has power, authority, prestige among men? He says He's the Lord
of Lords. He's over it all. Look ye to
Him, for He is worthy of all worship. there will be acknowledgement
of His Lordship. Do you remember in Mark chapter
5, when the Lord came over on the boat where they had the tempest
on the sea, and He said, peace be still, because they were afraid
they were going to die. He said, Lord, are you asleep? Save us,
we're going to die. As soon as His foot hit the ground
on the land of the Gadarenes, remember the man in the tombs?
They chained him up. They couldn't even hold him with chains. He
was demon-possessed. What was the first thing he did?
It says, first of all, he came running immediately to where
the Lord was. And then what did he do? It says
he worshipped. He fell down at the Lord's feet.
This was a man, you know, everything that was controlling this man
was out of his, you know, he couldn't control himself any
more than you can control sin in your own life. So that story
is another story in itself of how we're completely empowered
by sin and that's all we can do. The demons came before him
because they knew who he was. He must be worshipped. They bowed
in submission to his power, to his authority, and his right
to the kingship. They had no love for the Lord,
but they still were made to bow, and they had some understanding
of who he was. Because the first thing that they said was, I know
thee who thou art, Jesus, thou Son of the Most High God, Are
you come to torment us before the time? Have you come early
to punish us?" They knew they were in a temporary time where
they were. But when they saw him, the first thing they did
was come to bow. Now a demon is far more powerful
than you or I could ever want to think to contend with, had
complete control over this man. But they're still under His feet.
He's Lord of even the devil and the demons. So they must obey
Him. In fact, when you look at the
respect that they showed Him was more than any man in the
Scriptures. When you look at His interactions
with them. that he was always bowing and in fact he silenced
them. It said because they knew who he was. He was not meant
to reveal himself in some of these cities he came to so he
silenced the demons because they immediately as soon as they saw
him they started confessing. In fact, in the book of Job,
when you read about Satan coming before the Lord, it was the whole
host of heaven that had to present themselves before the Lord. Demons
included. Satan included. So they are completely
under his feet. So when they saw him, they bowed. There will be acknowledgement
of His Lordship. His will, it's sovereign. You
know what that means? That means He does what He wants,
when He wants, and with whom He wants. And it doesn't matter
what you or I think about it. What He does is right, and it's
right because He does it. Because of who He is. He's the
Lord. He said, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. Now,
your response to that can be, that's not fair because somebody
didn't get shown mercy. Or your response to that can
be, Lord, show me mercy. I need mercy. Show it unto me.
There's mercy that you can show. Mercy is undeserved. It's getting
something that you don't deserve. I don't deserve it, Lord, but
please would you give it to me. You will be met on the grounds
by which you approach. His will is sovereign, and you're
in His hands, and He will do whatever He is pleased to do
with you." Well, does that mean that I just throw up my hands
and say, well, I'm doing nothing then. It's all in His hands.
It's His control. It's out of my hands. You just
said it. So therefore, I just won't do anything, and we'll
just wait and see what He does. Is that what we do? Let's turn
over to Jonah chapter 3. We have an example of this. So where we're at in the story
here, if you remember, the Lord called Jonah and said, Jonah,
I want you to go to preach to Nineveh. And Jonah said, I don't
want to go there. They're not going to hear anything I have
to say. And that's when, you know, they put him on the boat
in the storm. They threw him off. The fish
came and gulped him up and then spit him back out. Salvation
is of the Lord. And so now, The Lord's come to
Jonah again. So let's just read through this
chapter. The second time, Jonah, Arise and go to Nineveh, that
great city, and preach unto it the preaching that I bid you,
what I told you to do the first time. So Jonah arose and went
unto Nineveh, according to the word of the Lord. Now Nineveh
was an exceeding great city of three days journey. And Jonah
began to enter into the city a day's journey and he cried
and said, so this was his message to Nineveh. Yet forty days and
Nineveh shall be overthrown. So the people of Nineveh could
say, I don't like you Jonah, we're going to kill you, you
don't have the Lord's word. That could have been how they
responded. Let's see how they respond here. So the people of
Nineveh says they believe God. They proclaim to fast, and they
put on sackcloth from the greatest of them, even to the least. For
the word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his
throne. And he laid his robe from him, and covered himself
with sackcloth and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed
and published throughout Nineveh by the decree of the king and
his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock,
taste anything. Let them not feed nor drink water,
but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily
unto God. Yea, let them turn everyone from
his evil way and from the violence that's in their hands. Do they
just throw up their hands and say, God's going to do what He's
going to do? Verse 9, For who can tell if the Lord will turn
and repent, and turn away from His fierce anger that we perish
not? The Lord said He was going to overthrow Nineveh. And so
the person that throws up their hands and says, God's sovereign,
He's going to do what He's going to do, they're going to just
stand there and let it be overthrown. But not these people. The Lord
didn't say, if you do this, I'll do this for you. He didn't say
that at all. These people turned when they heard the judgment
that was pronounced against them. They believed God, says they
repented, and they cried mightily unto God, turned from the evil
way. For who can tell if the Lord will turn and repent from
His anger? We just don't know what the Lord
will do. But what He will do when you
hear the message that I will have mercy on whom I will have
mercy, and I will harden whom I will harden." That tells us
we're to cry for mercy. We're not to stand there and
say, God, that's not fair, some are saved, some are not. All
deserve to be not saved. All deserve the wrath of God.
Lord, I need mercy. And I'll have it, you said in
your word, if I ask for it. And I'm asking for it. So we're
to cry for the Lord for mercy. Back to our text. And our fourth point. The leper
came and he worshipped him and said, Lord, if thou wilt, if
you will, Lord, I can't make you do it. I don't deserve it. I can bring nothing to you to
influence you because I have nothing. There's nothing I can
do to get you to do anything for me at all. But if you will,
Lord, you can make me clean. Now this is what we call faith. Faith is a confident expectation
that what I'm asking for, that I've never seen, never handled,
that I can't manipulate, that God will give it to me because
I asked for it. There's nothing I can do to get it. Now did this
man ask the Lord what he needed to know before the Lord would
do this? No. He just said, Lord, if you will,
Did this man ask the Lord which sins he needed to stop before
the Lord would make him clean? None. Did he ask the Lord what
righteous works that he'd be pleased with so that the Lord
would be willing to make him clean? Didn't say that either. Did this man ask the Lord what
he needed to do to make it work for him? That seems to be the
message of today. He didn't ask that either. He
came with nothing. He came in the condition that
he was in right now. Worshipping before he was told
yes or no. Because the Lord is worthy of
worship. Lord, if you will, you can make me clean. Now there
are three things about God's will. First, we've already talked
about it a little bit, it's sovereign. God will do what he will do,
and it's right because he does it. He has the power, the will,
and the authority to do so. His will is sovereign. Second
thing about God's will, it's unchanging. I am the Lord, I
change not. Therefore you sons of Jacob are
not consumed." Now who is that good news to? That's good news
if you're a son of Jacob. If you were one of the ones who
was put into the Lord Jesus Christ before time began. He's the Lamb
slain before the foundation of the world. That means my sins
were paid for in Him before I ever was. Before God ever had to look
at me and said, because He did that, Because he believed, because
he did this, I'm going to save him. He could find no reason
at all to save anybody. The whole reason he didn't destroy
the whole earth in the day he brought the flood was because
Noah found grace, unearned favor from the Lord. So might it be
that you and I find grace in his eyes to be found in the Lord
Jesus Christ before time began in eternal election? This is
good news. So the Lord's will is sovereign.
It's unchanging. Once He saves you, you're always
going to be saved and that's not going to change. When He
looks upon you in love, that'll never change. When He says that
your sins are forgiven, that's never going to change. When He
gives you the righteousness of Christ, everything that He could
be pleased or accepted with, That's never going to change.
He that hath begun a good work in you, he also will perform
it unto the day of Jesus Christ. That lets you know, if you believe
the Gospel, and are trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ right
now, that's not going to change. He's going to always keep you.
Because, the third point, His will is always accomplished.
This totally, you can see the utter falsehood in universal
redemption. That Christ would die for the
sins of all men, and then it's up to you whether you believe
it and make it work for you. This is ridiculous. The Lord
put those whom He loved in Christ before the world began, sent
His Son to keep the law here perfectly, ordered all things
in existence around this, His son was made to be sin, died
for those sins, paid for them, but yet he has no power over
your will. Come on. The Lord uses his Holy Spirit
to quicken us, to birth in us the new man that has a new nature
who can believe the gospel, see the Lord in his word. This is
how he does it. His will is always accomplished.
To which of his promises has he fallen short? None. The Lord's
will will be accomplished. And our last point, Lord, if
you will, my faith is resting on this, if you will fill in
the blank, whatever it is, you can do it. I've got confidence
in you to do whatever it is you said that you're going to be
able to do. You can make me clean. You can make me what I'm not,
because I'm not clean. There's no way I can be clean,
but you can make me that way. You can make me accept it. That
which I'm not also. I can't come in your presence
just like the leper. He was put outside the city.
But you can make me so that I can come back in. You can make me
clean. On the outside, yes, but Lord, on the inside too. And
my heart's where the evil comes from. Lord, you can make me clean
even on the inside. He said, I'm going to give you
a new heart. I can't do anything with the old one. It's broken.
It's evil. Desperately wicked. So what I'm going to do is I'm
going to give you a new heart. One that believes God. One that trusts
Christ. One that can see Him in His Word.
One that sees you're a sinner. That's that new heart He can
give you. Now John 2 is the clearest example,
that I can think of at least, of something being made what
it's not. Do you remember this? This was
the Lord's first miracle, public miracle, recorded at least. He
went into the wedding feast and it said there was they had no
wine in verse 3 No wine that doesn't mean a little bit in
the bottom of the barrel They had some additives that they
could add water to and then make wine. They had no wine so what
he told his disciples was you fill up those pots and you take
them over to the ruler of the feast and And when the ruler
of the feast dipped his cup in the water and tasted it, he said,
most men wait until the end when people have drunk a lot and they
bring all the bad wine out. He said, but you saved the best
for last because the water was made wine. It was made to be
something that it was not and impossible for it to become. I'm looking right now at some
people who have been made the righteousness of God in Christ. Something you're not. Something
you could never provide, could never be. But He has made you. Made you to be the righteousness
of God in Christ so that He can look upon you in the same way
that He looks at His Son. How does He look at His Son?
Is He accepted? Yes, He is. Can He come into
the Father's presence? Yes. Does He have glory? Yes. Does He have to worry about
sin? No. He has everything. And He can look at us the same
exact way because we shall be made the righteousness of God
in Him. He can make you clean. He can
make you free of sin. He can wash you in His blood
and give you His righteousness and to make you accepted. He
said to this leper, I will. Be thou clean. Now, did the leper
become less and less diseased until he became clean? Many of
your congregation, as with ours, are sick. I used the example
of Todd. He was in the hospital with pneumonia and they were
giving him antibiotics. So the first dose cut down on those
bacteria. Took another one, those bacteria
got less and less and less until they're gone. Is that how this
worked? No. If you look back in our text,
it says, I will be thou clean and immediately his leprosy was
cleansed. The effects were immediate. This
is where many of our friends err greatly. Immediately he was
cleansed of his leprosy. Right now, the way you are right
now, you're as holy as you're ever going to be. You're as accepted
as you're ever going to be. And your righteousness is as
full as it's ever going to be. If you've been born again, given
a new nature, are in Christ, and are made His righteousness,
that's never going to be any different than it is right now.
Now, do you feel that way? Not at all. No. When God does
a work of grace in a man, He gives you a new nature, and you're
as clean and acceptable as you could ever be. How do I know
this? How do I know this is true? This is just you saying it. Look
in verse 4. Jesus said unto him, See that
thou tell no man, but go thy way, and show thyself to the
priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded, a testimony
unto them." So the key here is, he said, you go to the priest.
Why would he have to go to the priest? Lord made him clean. Lord cleansed him of the disease.
But he had to go to the priest to be cleansed before the law. Because everything Christ did,
the works that he did, it all had to line up before the law.
The priest represented the law in this case, because the priest
was the one who was trained and enforced the law of the leper.
So there's the law of the leper, and there was also the law of
cleansing. There was a process by which you had to go through
for the priest to say, before the law, you're clean. The plague
of leprosy and the law of cleansing before the law. The Lord made
this man clean. The Lord took away all his disease. Because that's what it meant
to be clean. Clean from the disease of leprosy. Now, let me ask you
this question. What did he look like before
he was cleansed? He looked like a leper, didn't he? Nose had
rotted off. Fingers were gone. Toes were
gone. Scarred from this disease. What
did this man look like after he was cleansed? Scarred from
the disease of leprosy. His nose were gone. His fingers
were still gone. He didn't have the disease in
him anymore. But he looked just the same. What does that tell
us? We cannot look to the old man
for any evidence whatsoever of the work that Christ has done
in you. We can't see him. We can't see the new man in here
at all. All we see is flesh. All that we can do is the works
of the flesh. The Lord cleansed this man of
his disease. He was clean, but the scars still
existed. How about your experience in
this life? You who believe the Gospel. Sin's still here. But yet I know in here, I believe
and I trust Christ. I know that He's given me eyes
to see, He's given me ears to hear, and I can rejoice in seeing
Him in His Word. The scars are still here though, and I'll bear
them as long as I'm in this world, until I lay down my flesh, and
the Lord takes my new man, my soul, to be with him. Then I
won't have all those things. But as long as we're in this
life, the effects of the old man are with us, just as they
were with this leper. That's why he had to show himself
to the priest that he was clean, because he looked like a leper
still. So the priest had to look at him and say, okay, you're
clean before the wall. The wall has nothing to say to you whatsoever. That's what I'm saying here about
our experience in this life with sin. Is outwardly, you look at
me, you say, he's a sinner. Not before God, I'm not. He said,
I'm holy. He said, I'm clean. And he said,
I'm accepted. And I'm judged by his standard.
Just like this man, when you saw him coming down the street,
you say, he looks like a leper. But the priest said, he's clean.
He's clean before the law, has nothing to say to him whatsoever.
The work is done on the inside. The outside is going to look
the same all of our days, just like it did for this man. Your
nose doesn't grow back just as much as your sins still there.
But if the Lord makes you clean, you are clean. My question to
you is, can you call on the Lord in the exact same way as this
leper did, knowing what you are? Lord, I'm unclean, just like
the leper. I can't come to you, but I'm coming, Lord. I'm unclean.
Worshipping him for the glory that's due unto his name. Lord,
I bow before you in submission, in my utter weakness to do anything
for myself. believing that He is able to
give you all that you require. Everything that I need, Lord,
if you will, you can make me clean. If we come by this way,
then His words to you right now are, I will be thou clean. May the Lord bless you. Thank you.