I think so. Yes, it is. Yep. Well, I want to thank your pastor
and and you again for inviting us to come and be here. It's
been a real blessing this weekend. Our hearts are full. We're encouraged.
Can't believe it's come to an end so quickly and we'll be driving
back home this afternoon. But but thank you. And thank you, Rupert and Betty.
You all have just been wonderful to us over the years, and now
we're thankful for you. I'd like to lead, if I could,
Pastor, the congregation in a prayer for you. Most of you know that
Rupert's going to be having surgery this Wednesday at Chapel Hill. And I'm with you, Betty. My heart's
desire Lord, we'll keep our brother here with us. We're called on
the Lord to petition him. And Lord, sir, put that in my
heart to pray, and I know he has yours. So let's bow together
and ask for the Lord's mercy. Our heavenly father, we're so
thankful that we can call you our father. We thank you that
we have a throne of grace that we can approach you with. With
confidence, knowing that our advocate, thy dear son, the Lord
Jesus Christ. Intercedes on our behalf. But
he's all our righteousness and all our acceptance is found in
him. Lord, we know that. You. are merciful towards your children.
You've been that way all our lives, even when we haven't recognized
it. You've been that way most especially
in sending your son to put away our sin. Father, we thank you for the
blessing that you've given this church. with Brother Rupert. We thank you for his faithfulness
to preach the gospel. Thank you for the work of grace
that you've done in and through him as the pastor of this church.
Lord, we thank you for the doctors and the knowledge that you've
given to medical profession for healing. We know that these are
instruments, Lord, that are in your hand. Oh, how we pray that
you'd be pleased to use them Wednesday. Pray that you direct
their hands and make them skillful. And we pray Lord for, for healing
for our brother Rupert. We have great hope and confidence
in knowing Lord that what you do is right. We ask it in Christ
name. Amen. In knowing this congregation
and then being. Around you all, I feel quite
confident. that if I introduce this message
by asking you if Christ was all you needed, most of you would
say resoundingly, oh yes, he's all I need. He's all I need. But I don't want to ask that
question. I want to ask something a little more pointed. Is the
Lord Jesus Christ all you have? Is He all you have? Because that's
really where the rubber hits the road. God gives us faith. We find ourselves
shut up to the Lord Jesus Christ, and at the end of the day, He's
all we've got. All we've got for our righteousness,
all we've got for our breath, our life, our hope, our happiness,
is all bound up in him. If you'd like to turn with me
in your Bibles to Isaiah chapter 11. Isaiah chapter 11. I have found in talking to folks
that men want to try to find some common ground between the
gospel of God's grace in the finished work of the Lord Jesus
Christ and religion. A young man was at my house just
the other day and actually stayed till after midnight. And he was
a student at a reformed seminary in Orlando, and a seminary that
I went to. and wanted to know what the difference
was. And he just, you know, been listening
to me preach and he's trying to reconcile, trying to figure
out where's the common ground between what I've been taught
in Reformed theology and this message that you're preaching
about Christ. And I'm thankful to say that he left in tears
around midnight understanding that Christ was all he had. That's all he had. There's no
ground of compromise when it comes to that. I've talked to
folks who have tried to find some connection between the gospel
and psychology, and they try to blend the two. No. No. All psychology goes away when
Christ is all you have. Men try to blend philosophies
of the world with the Lord Jesus Christ. The scriptures speak
of philosophy. You remember when Paul went to
Mars Hill and he spoke with those philosophers? And the scripture
says that there were two groups of philosophers. They were the
Stoics. Those are the ones who were looking
for happiness and hope by personal discipline and going down deep
inside, you know, trying to find some meaning of life in one's
heart. That was the Stoic. You go there,
I promise you it's going to be like going down in a well. The
deeper you get into your own heart, the darker it's going
to get. Nothing there. And then there
was the Epicureans. You remember that? And the Epicureans
were the ones who were trying to discover the meaning of life
by indulging themselves in things and pleasures. And, you know,
let the world talk about philosophy all they want. God says that's
the only two schools of philosophy there are. Men are either trying
to find meaning of life in the world or in themselves. And most
folks vacillate between the two. They indulge themselves in the
world until they come to realize that happiness really isn't there
and so then they turn inward. until they come to the conclusion
that's not there and then they go back to the world and they
just go back and forth between these two schools of philosophy
trying to find the meaning of life. Christ is the meaning of
life. Herein is life eternal that they
might know thee the only true God and Jesus Christ whom thou
hast sent. Is he all you've got? Don't have anything in religion,
don't have anything in philosophy, don't have anything in psychology.
All I've got is Christ. You have your Bibles open to
Isaiah chapter 11. And there, verse 1, shall come
forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a branch shall grow
out of his roots. Our Lord came into this world
made of a woman, made under the law to redeem those who were
cursed by the law. He's the end of the law for righteousness
to everyone that believeth. But he came in the likeness of
sinful flesh, the scripture says in Romans chapter eight. For
what the law could not do and that it was weak through the
flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh,
condemned sin in the flesh that the righteousness of God might
be fulfilled in us who walk not after the flesh. We're not looking
to religion. We're not looking to ourselves.
We're not looking to the world. We're not walking after the flesh.
We're walking after faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's
what he came to do. I'm so encouraged to know that when God purposed
his son to come into this world, he brought him into the world according to the flesh, born
after a woman in the same way that you and I are brought into
the world, born as a child. And the ancestry of the Lord
Jesus Christ You see what he says here? And there shall come
forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse. You remember who Jesse
was? He was the son of Obed, who was
the son of Boaz, the kinsman redeemer of the Moabitess Ruth. So in the lineage of the Lord
Jesus Christ, yeah, I'm always somewhat humored when I see these
advertisements on TV for Ancestry, Ancestry.com. I've seen pictures
of some of my ancestors. I don't wanna know anything else
about them. I know where I came from. I mean, there's some outlaws
in my family tree. Problem is we all come from the
same tree. And that tree is rooted in our
father Adam. You remember when Boaz met Ruth
and committed to redeem her, but he said to her, there's a
redeemer, there's a kinsman that's nearer to you than me. And I've
got to reconcile with him before the law will allow me to redeem
you. And he goes and meets with this
other kinsman who, according to the flesh, was closer to Ruth
than, or closer to Naomi actually, than Boaz was. And Boaz approaches this kinsman
and says to him, Naomi has come back from Moab and it's your
responsibility to redeem her. And the nearer kinsman said,
I'll redeem her. And Boaz said, in the day in
which you redeemed Naomi, you've also got to redeem Ruth, the
Moabitess. And you remember what that New
York kinsman said? Oh, no. I can't have a Moabitess in my
family tree. She will mar my inheritance.
Well, it's that Moabitess that gave birth to Obed, who gave
birth to Jesse, who gave birth to David, who's in the family
tree of the Lord Jesus Christ. A Moabitist, a shameful Moabitist. Now that nearer kinsman is a
picture of the law. And Boaz is a picture of Christ.
And he had to reconcile with the law. He had to satisfy the
demands of the law before he could redeem us Moabitists. But here the Lord Jesus Christ
has a Moabite in his family tree. But you know what? It gets worse.
It gets worse because Boaz is the son of Rahab, the harlot. in the family tree according
to the flesh of the Lord Jesus Christ, in his genealogy. That's why God tells us over
and over again. When you go to the New Testament,
it gives a detailed chronology of his genealogy, doesn't it?
And oftentimes, here he's going to be born after the seed of
Jesse, a harlot. was in the family tree. Can you
identify? You know I said something about
my ancestors and I'm sure none of them are as bad as I am. Here's why the Lord was born
in the likeness of sinful flesh. To redeem those who are sinners. to satisfy the
demands of the law. And of course Jesse gave birth
to David and David's shameful actions with Bathsheba and even
more shameful in having her husband and probably at least a hundred
men put to death in order to take Bathsheba. And who was born
to Bathsheba? Solomon in the family tree of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And even before that, you remember
Jacob. Well, Jacob had an elder son
who was married to a woman by the name of Tamar, and the scripture
says that that elder son was wicked in the eyes of the Lord,
and the Lord killed him. And so Tamar was given to his
next son, and he refused to give children to her according to
the law, and so God killed him. And so Tamar dresses herself
up as a prostitute, as a harlot. And Jacob thinks that that's
what she is. And Jacob goes in under her and
she gets pregnant with twins. And that's the story where the
first child comes out and the midwife puts a scarlet thread
around his hand. And there's a picture of you
and me. Though your sins be like scarlet, they should be made
white as snow, but that child couldn't be born first. Remember
the hand went back in and the other child was born Pharaohs,
who was in the lineage of the Lord Jesus Christ, born of the
shameful union between Jacob and his daughter-in-law, who
he thought was a harlot. Faraz came forth in order that
that child with a scarlet thread around his hand might be saved. What a glorious Christ we have. God brought him into the world
out of the rod of the stem of Jesse. Now these things aren't
given to us in scripture in order to elevate his ancestry. They're given to us in scripture
in order to show us the shame of his ancestry according to
the flesh. In order to give us some hope.
Oh, that's how I came into the world. I've got a savior. For what the
law could not do and that it was weak through the flesh. God
sending his son in the likeness of sinful flesh, condemned sin
in the flesh. Look at verse two. And the spirit of the Lord was
upon him. Now in Revelation chapter 1 at
verse 4, the scripture is describing the Lord Jesus Christ in glory
and John saw the seven spirits of God. Now that doesn't mean
that there are seven spirits. The number seven is the number
of fulfillment and protection and rest, perfection and rest
and completion. And so here we have a list of
those seven spirits. all resting on the Anointed One,
the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Messiah. He's the one who
came in the full power of the Spirit of God in order to accomplish
the purpose of God in redeeming His people. That's what Christ
means. It's what Messiah means. It means
the Anointed One. Now God's people have been given
the Spirit of God in measure, but the Lord Jesus Christ came
in the full power of the Spirit of God. You know, even that Samaritan
understood that, didn't she? When the Lord was conversing
with that woman of Samaria at the well of Sychar in John chapter
3, and she said to him, we know that when Messiah comes, he'll
lead us into all truth. No Jew has ever thought of the
Messiah as being a failure. The scriptures are clear. When
he comes, he's going to come in the full power of the Spirit
of God. He's going to accomplish his purpose and his goal, which
is to save his people. He's going to do it. He's not
going to be discouraged. He's not going to fail. He's
not in the heavens wringing His hand, wishing that you would
let Him have His way. He has accomplished the purpose
He came to do. Why? Because He came in the seven
spirits of God. Here He is. He was born according
to the flesh, just like me and you, with a shameful ancestry,
a sinful genealogy, if you will. In order to redeem sinners, in
order to fulfill the law, he came in the full power of the
Spirit of God. Look, and the Spirit of the Lord shall rest
upon him, the Spirit of wisdom. Now this word wisdom translated
means skillful at war or skillful at work. And the Lord Jesus Christ
was perfectly skillful in both of those things. The battle's
not yours, it's the Lord's. Comfort ye, comfort ye my people,
speak ye comfortably to them. Tell them their warfare's accomplished. The Lord Jesus Christ defeated
the works of Satan. He took down the gates of hell.
He went in and led captivity captive. He satisfied the demands
of God's righteous law through his perfect obedience to the
father. He shed his blood in order to justify his people and
to cover their sins in the sight of God. What a, what a glorious savior. skillful at war. He fought our
battle for us. Oh, we go through this world
trying to redeem ourselves, trying to justify ourselves. Trying
to do, I gotta bring something to the table of salvation. No,
he is the one who came in the fullness of the wisdom of God,
and God has made him to be for us. All our wisdom, all our righteousness,
all our sanctification, and all our redemption is Christ Jesus
the Lord, all you've got. Easy, all you've got. Because
until God makes him all you've got, he's not the hope of your salvation.
Most folks, it's Jesus plus. Most folks believe this. Jesus
Christ is necessary for salvation. Most people that we know who
would consult, of course I'm meeting more and more folks now
that have no religious affiliation whatsoever, but Most people would say Jesus is
the Son of God and he's necessary for salvation but he's not sufficient. He can't do it all by himself.
He's got to have me do something to make what he did work for
me. And so then they add to what
Christ did. Whether it be a good work or whether it be a prayer
or whether it be a decision or whatever it is. Whatever it is. He came skillful at war. He fought
the battle and won the war for us. He came skillful at work. He did the work of redemption
and satisfied all the demands of God so that everything that
God requires of me, he looks to the Lord Jesus Christ for. What a Savior. What a Savior. The Spirit of the Lord rest upon
him, the Spirit of wisdom and understanding. Understanding. Discernment. You know, we have
a hard time getting to the bottom of things sometimes, don't we?
You know, it's like the woman I was talking about the previous
hour. You know, she's a PhD professor at a big college, a big university. And she didn't know that man
is driven by pleasure, popularity, and power. And that's all you
need to know. If you want to market a product,
just appeal to one of those things. People, we complicate things. The Lord Jesus Christ gets to
the bottom of the issues all the time. Truth is simple. It is. And He's got full understanding
of it. He knows our hearts. He knows
what we do and why we do it. He knows everything there is
to know about us. He came with full understanding. Look at the next one. The third one. The Spirit of
counsel. The Spirit of counsel. I meet more and more folks that
are bound up in therapy, going to another center, trying to
get the answers to life. Well, I'm here to confess to
you that I need therapy every day. Every day, I gotta have
a therapist. I do. I can't figure it out for
myself. And his name His name shall be
called Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father,
the Prince of Peace. Oh, and what a counselor he is.
I have found him to be sufficient. In every, every sin of my life,
I found him to be sufficient. Every sorrow that I experienced,
I found him to be sufficient. Is He all you've got when it
comes to your wisdom? When it comes to your counsel? When it comes to your understanding? Is the Lord Jesus Christ all
you've got? Look at the fourth one. The spirit
of might. Power. Ability. Ability. There's the truth of the gospel. Lord, I'm not able. I'm not able. You're the only one that's able
to satisfy the demands of God's law. You're the only one that's
able to let your works go before you and recommend you to God
by which God is going to be pleased with your works. I'm not able. You're the only one that's able
to open the eyes of this understanding. You're the only one that's able
to take out the heart of stone and put in a heart of flesh.
You're the only one that's able to cleanse me of my leprosy.
You're the only one that's able to save me. Lord, I know that you can if
you will. Isn't that what the blind man
said? I know you can if you will. It's all up to you, Lord. You know what the world says?
I know God wants to save me, but he can't do it unless I let
him. The truth is just the opposite.
He came with full power and full might. And when he's ready to
make one willing, They come running, don't they? They come running. No man can come unto me unless
the Father which sent me draw him. And when the Father draws
him, he's going to come. The Lord Jesus Christ came in
the power of wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, and knowledge. Knowledge. You think about this
for just a moment. Our God The Lord Jesus Christ
has never had a new thought. He's never had a new thought.
He's never discovered anything. He possesses all knowledge all
the time. And even before time, he had
all knowledge. You can't teach him anything.
You can't tell him anything he doesn't already know. He knows
your thoughts, according to Psalm 139, before you think them. Before
you think them, He knows your thoughts. And what did David,
what did the psalmist say? Oh, such knowledge is too wonderful
for me. I cannot attain it. I can't even
begin to go there. but to know that He knows everything
from beginning to end, and everything is right on schedule according
to His purpose and plan. You thought that I was altogether
as yourself. You thought you were going to
teach me, so you thought I could change. Oh no, I change not. I'm the Lord. It's the only reason
that you sons of Jacob are not consumed. I'm the same yesterday,
today, and forever. I've never changed. I've never
had a new thought. I've never been taught anything.
I've never discovered anything. I've never changed my mind. Perfect knowledge. That's what
He came. That's the anointing of the Spirit
of God. What a Savior. Is He all you've
got? Where are you going to find anything
more than that? The fear of the Lord. That's
number six. What is the fear of God? Is it
some sort of cringing fear like our father Adam had when he sinned
and tried to hide from God and cover up his nakedness with sewed
together fig leaves? Is that is that Adam was afraid,
wasn't he? He knew what he had done was
wrong. No, that's not that when the Bible speaks of the Lord
Jesus Christ being anointed with the spirit of the fear of God.
He's talking about faith. He's talking about believing
God. He's talking about living every moment of his life in perfect
obedience to the Father. Believing God to his dying breath. Father, into thy hands I commend
my spirit. He lived by the word of God all
the time, completely. He trusted the Father. And he
knew that he could commend his spirit to the Father, confident
that he had done everything that the Father had required him to
do. Why? Because he came in the full power
of the Spirit of God. And the seventh one is quick
understanding. Quick understanding. Now you
can look up that word. These words are easy to look
up. It means scent. It means aroma. It means the
smell that God's pleased with. What's God pleased with? He's
pleased with the prayers of the Lord Jesus Christ. And as I've
already said this morning, we pray in Jesus name because our
hope is not in the in the sincerity of our prayers. It's not in the
in the. In anything to have to do with
our prayers. We offer our prayers best we can. And we know that
they're fraught with sin. But we have an advocate with
the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous one, whoever liveth
to make intercession for us. Oh, he's of quick understanding.
He offers up perfect prayers to the Father on our behalf.
And when we go before God Almighty in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ, we can have confidence that He's going to present it
in such a way that'll be perfect and God's will will be accomplished. People ask me all the time, you
know, how do I determine what God's will is for my life? You
know the best answer for that is? You're smack dab in the middle
of it right now. It's true. It's true. You're right in the middle of
it. We were talking about this during
the break. Everything that was necessary for you to bring you
to where you are right now was ordained of God. See, we've always
been in God's will. Always been right in the middle
of His purpose. I know the thoughts that I have
for you. Thoughts for peace, not for evil. To bring you to
your expected end. He's not going to lose a single
sheep, is he? He's going to get every one of
his sheep to the end. Is the Lord Jesus Christ all
you've got? He came into this world according
to the flesh. His genealogy is just like yours and mine. Full
of sinners. But he came in the power of the
Spirit of God. In the power, in the Spirit of
God to accomplish the purpose of God, which was the salvation
of God's people. Go back with me to our text.
Verse 3, And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear
of the Lord. And he shall not judge after the sight of his
eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears. You know,
we make judgments based on what we see and what we hear. The
problem is all men are liars. And no man tells the truth. The
Lord is able, we look at the outward appearance. God looks
at the heart. Isn't that what God told, what
Samuel told, the Lord told Samuel when he was trying to find a
king to replace all, went to Jesse's house. And he went through
all the Jesse's sons and little David's out in the yard, a man
after God's own heart. God had put a heart of faith
in David's heart. And all those other boys that
looked so kingly. And the Lord had to tell Samuel,
man looks at the outward appearance. I'm looking at the heart. I know
what the heart is. I know what I've done in that
heart. I know the faith that I've put in that heart. And so
he says, I don't judge after what outward appearances. I don't
judge after what I see in a person's life. I'm looking at the heart
to discover the faith in Christ that I put there. A broken and contrite heart that
will not despise. When the Lord gives, I'm not
talking about having a, our hearts are deceitful. We can't know
our own hearts. I'm talking about that new heart,
that new heart of faith that says, yes, the Lord Jesus Christ
is all I've got. He's all I've got. I have no hope of standing before
God without him. Now, no hope, I can't draw my
next breath without him. But with righteousness shall
he judge the poor and reprove with equity for the meek of the
earth, and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked, and
righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness
the girdle of his reins. My only hope is that the Lord
Jesus Christ is going to judge me not by what he sees in my
life. If he judges me by outward appearances,
I'm in trouble. But if he judges me by the faith
that he's put in my heart, it causes me to say he is my only
righteousness. I have no righteousness outside
of Him. All my righteousnesses are as filthy rags. I will speak
of none other righteousness than the Lord Jesus Christ. Thy righteousness
and Thy righteousness alone. That's how He's going to judge
His people. And faithfulness. If He judges
me based on how faithful I've been to Him, I'm in trouble. But if he will judge me based
on the faithfulness of the Lord Jesus Christ, oh, I've got great
hope, great hope. Verse six, and the wolf also
shall lie down with the lamb and the leopard shall lie down
with the kid and the calf and the young lion and the fatling
together. It's not going to be natural that in the church, people
who would otherwise be at be in adversarial relationships
with one another are going to come together and
they're going to lie down in Christ together. And they're
all going to believe the same thing. They're all going to see
eye to eye. They're all going to have the same Savior and the
same hope. They're not going to be debating with one another,
fighting one another over over religion and over doctrine and
over theology, they're just going to hear the gospel of God's grace
and they're going to say, Amen, Christ is really all. And a child shall lead them.
What does that mean? What does that mean, a child
shall lead them? In religion, And I've been there,
I've been in lots of different flavors of religion. And some
of them are more legalistic than others. But all religions are
based on fear and intimidation. They're based on somebody promoting
himself as the standard of righteousness and wielding his authority over
the sheep, beating sheep up. And I've had people say, oh,
preacher thanks you. Boy, you stepped on my toes today.
You really beat me up today. And they leave church feeling
like they've done penance because the preacher has shamed them.
The preachers beat them up. And that's what really people
go to church in order to get beat up. They go to church to
get abused. Because that's their penance. They're coming in to
pay for their sins. The child shall lead them. He's
not talking about me. He's not talking about your pastor.
He's talking about an infant. An infant. A little baby. What can a baby do? Can't dress themselves. Can't feed themselves. Can't provide anything for themselves. A baby basically can do two things. Mess themselves up and cry. And
that's all a baby can do. And what the Lord's telling us
here is that the example of that baby will be their leadership. They'll look to that child and
they'll say, yes, that's me. I can't do anything. I can't
do anything but mess myself up and cry for mercy. That's all
I can do. Unless you become as a little
child, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Suffer
the little children to come unto me, for such is the kingdom of
God. And most men are way too proud
for that. I'm not a baby. We have some folks in our church
that are from Dominican Republic, and they sent some of our sermons
down to family members to listen to, who go to a Reformed Baptist
Church, very legalistic, very pseudo-intellectual, doctrinally
sound Reformed Baptist Church. And so our members asked their
family, What do you think of those sermons we sent? And they
said, well, those kind of sermons are good for children. They're good for children. We're
beyond that now. They shall be led by a little
child. Let's close the service by singing
together number 125, number 125.