Preach to your heart's content.
Some preachers I won't tell that now. There you go. Thank you, Brother Rupert. It's
good to be back with you. I guess I came down one Wednesday
night a few months ago. I don't know if they're whole
months ago. It's always nice to come down
and be with you folks. I've always enjoyed it. I've
been places where I didn't enjoy it much, but I've always enjoyed
coming down here and seeing you folks. Turn with me in your Bibles
to the book of Philippians. Thank you for the, I guess you
call it Sunday school lesson for the dud. Okay, thank you
this morning. Got some wonderful verses here.
Of course, all the word is wonderful. But I want just to look at verse
number eight, but I'm gonna read a few more verses other than
verse eight. And we'll take our thoughts from
verse eight. Look at verse 5 Let this mind
be in you which was also in Christ Jesus who being in the form of
God Thought it not robbery to be equal with God But made himself of no reputation
And took upon him the form of a servant Was made in the likeness
of me You know how much this book is
about all of this, isn't it? Verse eight, and being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto
death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also has
highly exalted him And given him a name which is above every
name, that at the name of Jesus every knee shall bow, of things
in heaven, things in earth, and things under the earth, and that
every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the
glory of God the Father. we see Jesus Christ he's God
he's man and this would tell us the purpose
of him becoming a man the scriptures puts it in different ways and
one says he that is rich became poor now you think of heaven
and his daily the father's delight the richness But look when he
came to earth, how he took upon himself a servant, as in the
form of a servant. He was creator, but he was born
of a virgin. Isn't that something as we see
the mysteries of the scriptures? He's the Son of God, the Son
of Man, and we see the heights, then we see the depths as He
came into this world. I say unto you this morning that
every circumstance of the Lord Jesus Christ demands our attention. All of these circumstances. the
incarnation, the suffering, the triumph. And the Holy Spirit
sets him forth. And the scriptures all the way
through sets his character forth, sets his work forth. And it's
something for us to think about, meditate upon, his work that
he came to do and his person. Then this verse tells us he is
found in fashion as a man Now all that's going to heaven is
gone Because that he came as a man his fashion as a man And
we look how important that this is in the scriptures. I was gonna
go there, but that fashion aren't it as he came Did you reject
this fashion you never get to heaven? I? He is fashioned as
a man and here's something else that his people is gonna be fashioned
after him look in your Bibles in chapter 3 and verse number
21 It tells us here in Philippians. He says he shall change our vile
bodies Let it be fashioned like unto his glorious body That's his resurrected body And
it tells us that we'll be fashioned like unto His glorious body.
Who shall change our bodies? These bodies are going to be
changed to be fashioned like His. That's what awaits that
of the Christian. And it goes on to say, according
to the working word, He is able to do all things to Himself. Now, this fashion that is set
before us this morning is the manhood of the Lord Jesus Christ,
this sinless humanity. Pure, holy, no sin, spotless,
undefiled, a perfect humanity. when we see the manhood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And that has to be absolute because
of the work that He did upon the cross. This has to be something
that is absolute, a perfect humanity. Now the Old Testament prophets,
they were great men. You look at David, a great man. You look at the prophets, you
look at Isaiah, they were all great. But none of them could
do this. You take the Old Testament priests,
none of them could be a mediator like the Lord Jesus Christ. None
of them could be a surety like Christ. None of them could be
a substitute. like the Lord Jesus Christ because
all of Adam's race is part of Adam The bloodline goes through Adam
right on down, and it's corrupt, it's fallen nature, the whole
human race. But the Lord Jesus Christ, when
he comes to him, the scripture says there's a body prepared
for him by the way of the virgin, and the power of the highest
overshadowed her. There's no sin. No sin. That's perfection of His manhood
and all of this is necessary for the work that is to be done.
Now He didn't ever have a sinful thought. And I don't know that
we can go a day. I don't know. But He never had one His whole
life. He never had a sinful act. He
never had a sinful deed. This made Him a perfect sacrifice. This made Him also to have perfect
obedience. And that's the fashion that we're
talking about here, and that's the fashion that saves sinners. This God-Man. Now in this fashion,
as the Scripture speaks of it here, is where He performed all
the work of salvation and redemption. And he was fit for the office.
You have in the Old Testament the lambs set forth and how they'd
pick out the very best of the lambs, so forth. And here's Christ. He's the Lamb
of God, the perfect Lamb. And here's a special work. And there's none but the Son
could perform this work that He came to do. He came into the
world with this fashion. And I say He came into the world
because He's already there. He's with the Father. He told
us this before Abraham was I Am. They were surprised by that,
weren't they? But no, He's from everlasting. And He talks about having the
glory with the Father before the other world. And daily He
is delighted. So he entered into a covenant
to come into this world. He entered into a covenant to
come and do this work. He entered into a covenant to
do this suffering and this salvation for that of his people and for
that of his church. And so here's a fashion that
he acted officially on behalf of his people. When we look at
this verse today and being found in fashion as a man, We look
at it as that he did this for us. For our salvation. And over in the book of John
chapter number 10, we see him as a good shepherd and what does
he do? He gives his life for the sheep. I like that chapter. He says that I know my sheep. He knows each one of them. He
knows everyone the Father has given him. He knows them in love. He has this of a special knowledge
of that of His sheep. And here's something else. The
world doesn't know them. Do they? The world doesn't know
who the Lord's sheep is. But the Lord knows His sheep.
He says, they're known of mine. They know Him. They see Him from
the Scriptures. They've been taught of Him by
the Holy Spirit. They have light concerning the
Lord Jesus Christ. And they have this knowledge
of Him as Savior and Lord. And that's how they see Him. You know, they've tried to make
a distinction over the years, and a lot of preaching says,
well, you take Him today as Savior, and later on you take Him as
Lord. You can't divide Him up. He's
Lord and Savior. And that's how you take Him.
And His people know Him. as their Savior, they know Him
as their Lord, they know Him as a friend, and we see not only
that He searches for that of His sheep, He tells us in that
chapter, He says, other sheep, what does it say? I must bring. And He's talking about, there's
the Jewish, but there's the Gentiles, and He speaks of these Gentile
sheep, and He says, I must bring them. He says, other sheep, I
have. Isn't that amazing how the scripture
speaks of these spiritual things? I have them. I must bring them. Aren't you
glad one day he must bring you? He brought you one day. You might
be like the old Saul was. As old Saul says, you kicked
against the pricks, didn't you? But he gathered him in, didn't
he? You might have been kicking against the bricks. That is,
what they would gold these oxen with, these sticks, they'd prod
them to go a certain way. And we see the old Saul cries
out, Lord, what wilt thou have me to do? Everything changed. So he comes in this fashion.
He comes in this fashion for that of his people, people that
is given to him. They're called his sheep. They're
to be brought back. And they're to be redeemed. They're
to be saved. And he says, hear my, and that
chapter says the sheep, hear my voice. There's a lot of voices go out.
You can turn on the TV and the radio, and there's just all kinds
of voices. But the Lord says, hear my voice. Hear his. That's the most important,
isn't it? To hear his voice. And he goes
on, he says, his sheep follow him. That's two marks of the
sheep. I heard Mr. Wallace one time,
an older preacher, and I was a young fella, and he said them
sheep said to have two marks. He said to have that ear mark,
and he said to have that foot mark. He said to hear, and he
said to follow. Follow Christ. And what does
he do? He gives them eternal life. The word redemption means to
buy, it means to deliver. And we see that he bought us
with his blood. We know that there's our nature
and how we were exposed to wrath. The Bible says we were children
of wrath even as others under sin. But the Lord Jesus Christ
bought us. He paid for us. And redemption,
two things you remember about redemption is price and power. A lot of people just talk about
one, but redemption is two. There's the price he paid and
the power also that he redeems us with and brings us to himself.
Price and power. And we know that his redemption,
and I like to speak of it in this way, that it's something
that is accomplished. That's an important word. accomplished
he accomplished salvation he brought us to the privileges
of sons and daughters and he does this he did this on the
cross then what does he do he comes and gives us a new nature new life spiritual life he takes
away the enmity of the heart We bow to Christ. We look to
Christ. And here's this redemption. The
Bible says it's like this. He makes us willing in the day
of His power. He delivers us from all evil. What about sin? The evil of sin. If nothing is done, where does
a person end up? And what does He do? We see He
delivers us from all evil. He brings us into all good. You're a child of God this morning.
You've been brought into all that's good. Oh, we, sometimes we murmur and complain,
which tells us not to do in the Scripture. But yet, you've been
brought into all good, haven't you? We've been brought into
it this morning. And all of this was accomplished. This redemption was accomplished
in Christ Jesus as a man, the God-man, as he paid that price
upon Calvary's cross. He took upon himself flesh. His
bone is our bone. He's flesh of our flesh. And
in that he wrought out salvation. Now let me make a point here
this morning and what's taught and preached in our day and other
days gone by That Christ Jesus came from heaven He had a work he suffered and
he died but they say for nothing definite Just to make man and
put him in a put him in a savable that of a state that's what they
say So it's up to man to save himself. Telling a dead man that he can
resurrect himself. And I've never seen anyone birth
themselves. But that's what they claim today,
that people can birth themselves and give themselves life. They say that he's able, but
he's left to themselves, people to themselves. Now, let's look
at this fashion. Now, I want you to think about
this fashion this morning. He came to do a great work as
a perfect, sinless man, as a God man. And he came and he did this
as a living head of the church. And he took responsibility to
accomplish. And that's what he's done this
morning. He has accomplished the salvation of his people. Something definite. Something
of certainty. He came to die. He came to accomplish. And that's what he's done. Joseph
says he humbled himself. You know, man, in his pride,
it's one of the worst of sins, and that's what happened to Adam
and Eve in the garden, wasn't it? Pride. They thought God was
withholding something from them and there's a devil tempting
them and and Says ye shall be gods But that pride ruined the
human race And it's pride that keeps people from Christ Refuses to bow to him It's pride
that they reject grace and They say, well, I've got to have
a part in all of this. I've got to get some credit for
myself. Pride goes along with mankind.
But here it tells us our Lord said He humbled Himself. It was all His. Isn't that amazing? It's all His. Yet he humbled
himself. Here he comes. He said, foxes
have dens and birds have nests, but I have no place to lay my
head. Here's our Lord. What does he do? We see him washing
the disciples' feet, a task for the slaves in that day. He girded
the towel and washed their feet. He stood before Pilate, humble. There's accusers, accused him,
humble. He was meek, the scripture says.
Humble, lowly. Didn't speak. He was obedient to the law. And He performed that for us,
the whole law. Obedient unto death. Now the
cross was the worst of all this. That was reserved for those that,
you know what they were saying when they hung somebody on the
cross was they wouldn't fit for society. They wouldn't fit to
live in society. Can you think about, here's the
Son of God? Here's the Son of Man? Humbling
himself to the cross, bowed his head, the scripture
says, and he cried out, it is finished. That's some important
words for us. Isn't it? That's our salvation.
It is finished. And it's all vicarious. It was all on behalf of us, on
behalf of this church. I like that in the scriptures
where it says, he shall not fail. I wrote something in my Bible,
and I thought of it this morning, several years ago, and it comes
from Rabbi Duncan. Now, his nickname was Rabbi. His name was John Duncan. He
was a Presbyterian preacher. He wrote this. In Isaiah 53,
it says, where ye shall see his seed. He says he's going to see
them born and brought in. He's going to see them educated
and brought up. He's gonna see him supported
and brought through, and he's gonna see him glorified and brought
home. Amen? That sort of stuck with me. That's
one of the little gems I picked up along the way. And he shall
see his seed and be satisfied. And all of this speaks of the
certainty. Yet, people speak of it as perhaps
and change, but this is a certainty, as He vicariously died in our
very stead, paid all of our debts, cancelled the handwriting that
was against us, and what was due us was poured out on the
Son of God, poured out upon Him, this Lamb of God. And I say unto
you today, it's all paid. Justice Demands no more The Bible says he put away sin
by the sacrifice of himself When he is found in fashion as a man And his people are set free They're redeemed Their salvation is secured. They're
saved with an everlasting salvation. Mrs. Spurgeon said one time,
that's the only kind of preach. It is. The only kind. Now, what would have happened
if Christ had failed when it comes to the Old Testament saints?
There's Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and David, and so on.
What would have happened if he'd failed? I mean, there was no possibility
of that, but you know why? Because he is a lamb slain before
the foundation of the world. If he'd failed, they couldn't
have stayed there, they'd have been cast out. But he's that
lamb. And it's this fashion. This is
who they look to. And they were there. It's put
the Old Testament saints in heaven. And it's the same fashion that
puts us there too. I've met all of these people
over the years and they talk about the Old Testament. How
they're saved one way, and the New Testament is saved in another
way, and Old Testament is saved, but I've heard people say grace
hand works, and the New Testament is saved by grace. I'm telling
you this, this morning, that everybody that's ever been saved
is saved by the grace of God. That's how they're saved, whether
in the Old Testament, whether they lived before Christ or after
Christ. It was grace that saved Abraham.
It was grace that saved Moses. His grace saved his Old Testament
prophets. His grace all the way through. And He secured his life. In this
fashion we have a complete salvation. All of grace by the merits of
Christ. And all the glory goes to the
Godhead. I got a friend. He started talking
to him. He said I give God the glory
I Give him the glory That's what we all do and give him the glory
for what he's done and Here's that fashion We see that it's
acceptable Christ is acceptable and we're accepted in the beloved It's a perfect We see it in perfection. Now, free will says Christ died
and suffered for all, and they stop there. They leave a man
dead, wounded, and groaning in themselves, and even say the
devil may have him. They'd save themselves. But the
captain of our salvation, he not only died, but he gives life. He gives spiritual life. He saves. He heals the wounds of sin. The Bible says, by his stripes
ye are healed. Now that's not talking about
disease. Preachers on TV and they say
well, that's he should never be sick And you never see it. Nobody's could be sick and all
this now that's spiritual healing But the Lord's been healed spiritually
When he says we're healed by his stripes There's a spiritual
thing And He gives life. He saves.
He heals the wounds of sin. He triumphs. He preserves. And here's a fashion that never
changes, and it's the same message. One thing about the Bible, it's
the same message. I talk about reading old books,
and most of my books in my library are written 100, 200 years ago,
and I even got one in 1600, written by Philip Henry. Matthew Henry's father and the
message is the same The message doesn't change this fashion doesn't
change Now I've noticed this And I'm noticing it more and
more All the time And that is religion
changes with the times That's what it does I said, walk in your old house.
Didn't he? Didn't he say walk in your old
house? Walk there. And man invents this and this
form and that form. And I've been amazed what people
call old. I hear these people every once
in a while say, talk about that of old and what they think about
something in the 50s or 40s or 50s. I tell you, we go to Apostle
Paul. Now, you can call that old if you want to, but that's
where we go, don't we? And here's something else, and
I want to warn you of this. What was called unchristian 50
years ago is now Christian to people. Now, you go back and
find you a book on cults. say written 60 or 70 years ago
and you look at what society has done today and they're calling
those cults Christian. Now I can give you what it is
but you can check it for yourself. That's how things has changed.
But this fashion of Christ is unchanging. He's the same. Immutable. It's an infallible
salvation that never fails a poor sinner that trusts in Christ.
Isn't that something this morning? A poor sinner. This salvation
that he has, it never fails him. It comes to the sinner's heart.
It comes by the Holy Spirit. Gives life. Makes alive. And when you're made alive, I
want to tell you what you do. You believe. We've got a generation to turn
everything around. When you have life, you believe. If you believe this morning in
the Lord Jesus Christ, you've got life. He's made you alive. You trust
Him. You've been made alive. You trust
Christ. You've been made alive. And this
is the only fashion right here that I'm speaking of this morning
that saves a sinner. There's no other name given.
Well, I must be saved. Now, Let me make a point here
about this salvation, being saved in Christ. If you ask how you're saved,
it's not looking to this or that. A lot of people say, well, I've got
to look back. No, I'm telling you, this salvation is looking
to Christ. It's looking to Christ. Peter
says, to whom cometh. You come initially, but you continue
coming. If you come initially to Christ,
you keep on coming. There's this continuous. A lot of people says, when it
comes to salvation, I'm saved by so-and-so this way or that
way, but you're saved looking to the Lord Jesus Christ. And now what scripture you say
look into him look unto me all the ends of the earth and be
saved Now here is also a fashion that
is an example to us The Bible says be you followers
of Christ When it says be you imitators or followers And the
sheep follow the shepherd I read a story one time of sheep and
a shepherd and it said the sheep, the shepherd would go along and
some of them would be back a little ways but yet they'd be following
the shepherd and some would be back a little further and they'd
still be following but some of them just wanted to be right
around the shepherd's knees. They wanted to be that close
to him. Wouldn't it be nice if that's
the way we were? We'll be right next to Him. Not far in the back
a little ways, but right next to Him. He's our Lord and our
Savior. What has He done? He separated
us from the world. We live in it, but we're not
a part of it. He separated us. You're holy
in Christ today. You're righteous in Christ. You
go to the Father. How do you go to the Father?
In Christ's name. In this fashion right here. That
is speaking now. That's how we stand before God
and how we call upon Him. This salvation, and this is just
how important that it is this morning, outside of this fashion,
outside of this salvation that Christ brings, the Bible says,
bind them hand and foot, take them away, cast them into outer
darkness. There's no approach outside of
Christ Himself. But with this fashion, We plead
His merit. You don't go to God and tell
Him all that you've done and try to plead your merit. You
plead Christ's merit, don't you? When you go to God, don't you
plead Him? If you go to Him, you plead Him.
Don't you? You plead Christ. That's who
you plead. You plead His righteousness. You plead His obedience. You
plead His suffering. You plead His finished work.
You plead His dying. You plead His resurrection. You plead Him upon the throne.
There with the Father. Now, it's not the world's fashion.
It changes all the time. It's not religious fashion because
it continues to change, but it's the fashion of Christ. You trust this fashion this morning?
If you do, bless Him. Praise Him. A couple thoughts. One is, when we look at this
fashion and what Christ has done, Him coming from heaven, going
to Calvary's cross, we see this humiliation of dying upon Calvary's
cross. The thought comes, what will
Christ not do for that of His people that's given to Him? If
He's done this, if He's come from heaven's glory,
Walked upon the face of this earth. Had men to ridicule Him,
spit upon Him, put Him on a cross. What will He not do for that
of His people? That's something we ought to
think about, isn't it? When we look at Him, it ought
to give us a firmness of faith in the atonement. He comes from heaven's glory
to die for his people. We see the atoning sacrifice. We hear the Father say, I'm well
pleased in the Son. I'm well pleased. It will bring about a hatred
of sin. What was he put there for? Our
sin? Wasn't it? Wasn't it our sin
that caused him this suffering? Wasn't it our sin that he came
from heaven's glory? The wrath of God was poured out
upon him? I tell you, that's why we won't face the wrath of
God because it's poured out upon Christ. For our sin. Another thing you ought to bring
is obedience. Obedience. You ought to bring
self-denial. That's what he did. He's our
example. Self-denial. You ought to bring about a great
love. I don't worry about all I've
told you of the past when I've come down here. I don't remember. But I'm going to repeat this
story that I read one time. An old saint said he was sitting
there crying. He was by himself, tears running
down his eyes. He said the brethren went over
to him and put their arm around him. They thought something,
didn't know what was wrong with him. He was just crying, tears
running down his eyes. And they asked him, what's wrong,
brother? He says, I just can't love my
Lord enough. I can't love Him enough. That ought to be us, hadn't it? We can't love Him enough. We ought to honor Him. Desire to honor Him. What a wonderful thing is said
right here. Being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. I went through this and talked
about it. But there's no way we can know, are we? The height or the depth. We can't
know the height of His glory and glory. And we can't know
the depth when He came into this world, His humiliation. We see
something of it. The Son of Man, the Son of God, on a cross, dying. We can't grasp it. The depth
of it. You can preach from now on. The
preachers can preach from now on. But they'll never fathom the
depth of what we're talking about here in His humiliation being
found in fashion as a man. They preach 24 hours a day. That's how vast the things of
the Lord are. Don't you just sometimes say,
well, I see a little bit and that's good to see something.
But there's so much here. There's so much here. Being found
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. Became obedient unto the cross,
the suffering of the cross. He accomplished our salvation
at the cross. He accomplished it. He saved us. Now, you can talk
about salvation in a little different ways sometimes, like we are saved
before the foundation of the world in one aspect. We are saved
at the cross. We are also saved when we are
made alive spiritually in a new birth. Isn't it? He saves us. It's all because
of Him coming from Heaven's glory. being found in fashion as a man. Father, thank you for your word
suited to those here and may we in to return just praise
thee and thank thee for what you've done for us. There is no Old Testament saying
could have done this But our Lord had to come from heaven, come into fashion as a man, to
pay the penalty that we owed. Bless this church. Bless Brother
Rupert and Sister Betty. Bless them in a very special
way. We thank you for our friendship over the years. Lord, just bless
them. You know more about each one
of us and we know ourselves. You know how to speak to each
one. We in turn just look to Thee.
We look to Thee solely for our salvation. We look to the very
Lamb in Him we trust. Bless you people in Christ's
name. Amen. Yes, sir.