That song will fit any message
God's preachers preach. Jesus Christ is Lord of all.
We were singing in that last hymn that John led us in. One day, the songwriters had
buried, he carried my sins far away. You know how far away he
carried them? Out of God's sight forever. And
I thank God for that. You know, these people who hold
to universal redemption, that Jesus Christ died for everybody,
don't they know what the scripture teaches? That through his redeeming
work, God remembers our sins against us no more. And if that
was true of everybody, nobody would go to hell, but we know
that's not true. But I'm thankful he took my sins upon himself,
that he who knew no sin became sin for me, that I might be made
the righteousness of God in him." What a gospel we have for sinners
who know they're sinners. Turn to Isaiah chapter 9, if
you will, please. Our text for Friday night's Bible
study was taken from 1 Thessalonians chapter 1 verses 4 and 5. And
those two scriptures read this way, knowing, brethren, beloved,
your election of God, for our gospel came not unto you in word
only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much
assurance that ye know what manner of men we were among you for
your sake. So that verse alone teaches us
that the gospel must be preached. It must be. It must come to us. And like I brought out Friday
night, we can't come to the gospel. The gospel is Jesus Christ. Jesus
Christ is the gospel. And we can't come to him. No
man can come to him except the Father would send him drawing.
But when the gospel comes to us, It must be made effectual
by the power of God the Holy Spirit. It must be. If the gospel
of our Lord Jesus doesn't come in power, if it is not made effectual
in our hearts by the irresistible drawing power of God the Holy
Spirit, it will fall on spiritually deaf ears and will just be in
vain to the ones who hear it. We also consider this scripture
Friday night, taken from Matthew 11, where our Lord says, I thank
Thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast
hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed
them unto babes. Even so, Father, for it seemed
good in Thy sight. All things are delivered unto
Me of My Father, and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father. Neither
knoweth any man the Father save the Son, and He to Whomsoever
the Son will reveal Him." Folks, listen. The new birth is a miracle
of God's amazing grace. It's made effectual. The Gospel
is made effectual. The new birth is a result of
God's saving power. You must be born again is what
our Lord Jesus said to Nicodemus. It's a must. He said, except
a man be born again he cannot see. He cannot perceive. He cannot understand the kingdom
of God. But he also said, marvel not
that I said unto you, you must be born again. The wind blows
where it pleases. You can hear the sound thereof,
but you can't tell from whence it cometh or where it goes. So
is everyone that is born of the Spirit of God. So God moves when
He pleases, where He pleases, upon whom He pleases. And He
alone is the one who can bestow His mercy upon His children. He does that. God has mercy on
whom He will have mercy. Now, this miracle of God's sovereign
grace that's performed by His sovereign power under the preaching
of His gospel is that which God uses to enlighten our minds to
the spiritual truths that are found in His Word, to the Gospel.
And when the Holy Spirit enlightens our minds, He does not draw our
attention to any sinful, polluted works that we perform. He does
not draw our attention to our free will. He draws our attention
to Jesus Christ and His sovereign will. Now, Jesus Christ is the
subject of God's preachers. Every time we preach, He is our
subject. Jesus Christ, our Lord and our
Savior is the subject of the whole Bible from cover to cover.
Preachers who do not preach Jesus Christ are false preachers. They
might as well throw their Bibles away and get a copy of the Reader's
Digest preach from that, accomplish the same thing. God's not saving
anybody under the preaching of lies. Now our text for the past
few weeks has been Isaiah 9 verse 6, but I've been reading verses
6 and 7 together and when we get to verse 7, This is really
going to be very important to have that scripture in our minds
coupled with what we read in verse 6. So let me read these
two verses in your hearing. Isaiah 9, 6, and 7 says, For
unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and the government
shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful
Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince
of Peace, of the increase of his government and peace there
shall be no end upon the throne of David and upon his kingdom
to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice
from henceforth even forever the zeal of the Lord of hosts
will perform this. Now the Holy Spirit reveals to
us that the Christ child who was born of the Virgin is the
God-man, the mighty God. I was sharing with my wife just
yesterday that what I'm about to share with you, the words
that I spoke to her, would infuriate some religious folks so much
they would want to kill me, and they would if they could. Jesus
Christ, God Almighty, loves Rahab the harlot as much as he loves
the virgin who gave birth to the Christ child. I also told my wife, Jesus Christ
loves the thief on the cross as much as he loved David, a
man after his own heart. Jesus Christ loves me, loves
you, if you're one of his, as much as he loved the Apostle
Paul. His love is the same for his people. And He manifested
that love when He came to this earth. Our Creator, the mighty
God, became a man to redeem His people through His sufferings.
Now these descriptive words in verse 6 define the character
of Jesus Christ, the God-man, but only those who have been
given faith to see the glory of God in His face will love
these truths. They will be meaningful to every
enlightened child of God. Unto you therefore which believe
He is precious. Everything about Jesus Christ
is overwhelmingly wonderful. Jesus Christ is the wisdom of
God and the only one qualified to be our spiritual counselor.
When our Lord Jesus told His disciples that all power in heaven
and earth had been given to Him, He was telling them that He was
God manifest in the flesh. There's no arguing. this blessed
truth. Brother Lee read this scripture
from 1 Timothy chapter 3 verse 16 this morning. The word of God says, without
controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest
in the flesh. Now Isaiah prophesied that Jesus
Christ would be called the mighty God, which was our subject last
Sunday. But Isaiah said that Jesus Christ
would be called the everlasting Father. And this will be our
subject for this morning's message. There's only one God, but there
are three divine persons in the Godhead. Father, Son, and Holy
Spirit. Jesus Christ our Lord said, I
and my Father are one. He did not say, I and my Father
is one. What then does our text mean
when it says that Jesus Christ shall be called the everlasting
Father? In answer to that question let
me quote Pastor Don Fortner from a sermon that he preached on
this subject. He said from Isaiah 9-6 Let it
be established clearly in your mind that our text is not describing
the relation of Christ to the other persons of the triune Godhead. The prophet is not here talking
about the character of Christ as God, he is describing the
character of Christ in his messianic offices. He is describing Christ's
mediatorial relationship to his people. It is essential that
we understand this. Isaiah is not here declaring
the doctrine of the Trinity, confusing the three persons of
the eternal Godhead. There are three distinct persons
in the Holy Trinity, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
and these three persons in one glorious being are our God. We do not worship one God revealed
by three different names, neither do we worship three gods, but
we worship one God in three persons. God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit. In this text, Isaiah is giving
a prophecy of the incarnation of Christ, the Son of God. He
is describing the relationship of the incarnate God-man to us. Now with that in mind, turn to
John chapter 8. Let's go into the New Testament
and let's see if we can get a little a bit more understanding of this
term, His name shall be called, speaking of our Lord Jesus, the
Everlasting Father. Now Jesus Christ has always been. He is from everlasting to everlasting. Having no beginning of days nor
end of days, He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Speaking
of Jesus Christ, our Lord Paul, writing under the inspiration
of God the Holy Spirit, said, Now unto the King eternal, immortal,
invisible, the only wise God, be honor and glory forever and
ever. Amen. Jesus Christ is the eternal
God. He has always been. He is the
one who inhabits eternity. Now, there's a glorified man
in heaven right now. His name is Jesus Christ the
Lord. Our great Creator became a man, the God-man. And that same man that was nailed
to that cross 2,000 years ago, is in glory in that same body,
sitting on His sovereign throne of power, working all things
after the counsel of His own will, and nobody can stay His
hand or say unto Him, What doest Thou? So here in John chapter
8, our Lord is speaking to some unbelieving Jews who hated Him,
and He said, In verses 56 through the end of this chapter, where
I want to read this. He said, your father Abraham rejoiced
to see my day, and he saw it and was glad. I didn't make that
up. That's God's Word. Abraham saw
Christ. He saw him through the eye of
faith, the same way we see him. And he was glad. Then said the
Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou
seen Abraham? He was only in his thirties. I don't know if he had the appearance
of looking older or not, but they said, you're not yet 50
years old. Have you seen Abraham? And Jesus said unto them in verse
58, Verily, verily, truly, truly, I say unto you, before Abraham
was, I am. Then took they up stones to cast
at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple, going
through the midst of them, and so passed by. Now folks, Jesus
Christ was telling those unbelieving Jews that he was God, the great
eternal God, the one who has always been. And those Christ-hating
Jews didn't understand altogether what he was saying, but they
didn't misunderstand this much, that he was telling them that
he was God Almighty, and they hated that so much, they took
up stones and would have killed him, but it wasn't his time,
so he passed through the midst of them. Now they hated Jesus
Christ without a cause. And today is no different. Jesus
Christ is hated when he is presented as the Bible presents him, as
the Bible declares him. Not only in his person, but also
in his finished work for a particular people. Now before Jesus Christ
came into this world, before he was born of the virgin, he
spoke these words to Moses, and Brother Bill read these scriptures
in the men's meeting this morning. When our Lord sent Moses to Egypt
to talk to his people who were in captivity, Moses said unto
God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, And shall
say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you,
and they shall say to me, What is his name? What shall I say
unto them? And God said unto Moses, I am
that I am. And he said, Thou shalt say unto
them, Unto the children of Israel, I am hath sent me unto you. Jesus Christ is the great I am,
the eternal one. Yahweh. He's the one who inhabits
eternity. And so we have this established
that Jesus Christ is the eternal God. But that does not explain
this term together, the everlasting Father. It explains that He is
everlasting, but it doesn't explain the term everlasting Father.
So turn with me, if you will, over to Galatians chapter 4,
declaring that Jesus Christ is our great eternal God is not
only very important for our understanding of worshiping Him, but declaring
what He has done is very important to our understanding of what
He has done for us and in us. In Hebrews, you don't have to
turn there, But in Hebrews 2.13 our Lord said, Behold I and the
children which God hath given me. Those same words are found in
Isaiah 8 verse 18 which we looked at in one of our previous lessons.
Behold I and the children whom the Lord hath given me. Our Lord
Jesus calls us His children. He wouldn't call us that if our
relationship wasn't to Him as our everlasting Father. Let me
explain that a little bit more. In the eternal covenant of grace,
a people were given to Jesus Christ by God the Father. Once
again, don't misunderstand our text with the divine persons
in the Godhead. Jesus Christ is not the Father,
the Father is not the Son. But in the eternal covenant of
grace, God the Father gave a people to His Son, And speaking of Jesus
Christ and his children, we read these words in Hebrews 2.10,
For it became him for whom are all things, and by whom are all
things, and bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain
of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Now the term many
sons has nothing to do with male gender or female gender. It has
to do with God's elect, speaking of God's children. And our Lord
refers to His elect as His sons, bringing many sons into captivity. So we're the Lord's children
by virtue of a divine payment decreed from everlasting. In
that respect, He is our everlasting Father. So look at Galatians
chapter 4. Verses 1 through 5, we read,
Now I say that the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing
from a servant, though he be lord of all, that is under tutors
and governors until the time appointed of the father. Even
so, we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements
of the world. But when the fullness of the
time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made
under the law. Now this is what we're looking at in Isaiah 9.6.
Unto us a child is born. Unto us a Son is given. So in
the fullness of time, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman,
made under the law. And here's why He sent Him. To
redeem them that were under the law that we might receive the
adoption of sons. That we might receive the adoption
of sons. sons and daughters. Our Lord
Jesus came into this world to redeem His chosen people, and
He calls us His children. It says, because ye are sons. Now why would Our Lord referred to us as His
sons if He's not our Father in virtue of what He has accomplished
for us and in virtue of the miracle of the new birth. You see, what
God has done, He has sent His Son to meet all of the conditions
of the eternal covenant of grace. Those conditions were set forth
in old eternity, back before time began, before a star ever
twinkled in the sky. So in respect to that, in respect
to Christ Himself being the one who would receive this gift from
God the Father, His children promised to Him, conditional
upon what He would do for them, by virtue of that, by virtue
of the miracle of the new birth, were His children. Look at these
next two verses, 6 and 7. And because ye are sons, God
hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying,
Abba, Father, wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a
son, and of a son, and an heir of God through Christ. And so,
because we're His son, because we were promised to Him, because
He met all of the conditions of the covenant, because He redeemed
us with His own precious blood, Jesus Christ has the right and
He exercises the right to give eternal life to as many as God
the Father gave Him. Now folks, listen. This miracle
of the new birth is performed by the power of Jesus Christ.
All power in heaven and earth has been given to Him. The scripture tells us that we're
born again. Not of corruptible seed, but
of incorruptible by the Word of God which liveth and abideth
forever. Jesus Christ is the Word of God. The Word of God
is Jesus Christ. The Gospel is Jesus Christ. The
Lord Jesus Christ is the Gospel. You can't separate them. So the
Word of God comes to us when we're dead in trespasses and
sins. Draws us under the preaching
of His glorious Gospel. and sets us free from the curse
of the law, from the bondage of sin, from the power of darkness,
from the power of Satan. If the Son shall make you free,
you shall be free indeed. So we're born again by the power
of Jesus Christ. By virtue of that miracle, the
miracle of the new birth, were his children And He's our everlasting
Father. Because we're begotten of Him. Now this is what our text is
teaching. That Jesus Christ has a children
promised to Him by God the Father. And this loving relationship
between us and Him is performed by His sovereign
power. When He brings us out of darkness
into His marvelous light. Now let me share this with you. Jesus Christ by Himself purged our sins. He offered Himself as a payment
for our sins. We're not our own, we're bought
with a price. With the blood of Jesus Christ. Now we owed
a debt we could not pay. Jesus Christ paid that debt for
us. Who did we owe the debt to? The
first person of the Godhead, God the Father. Actually to God,
God Almighty. But Jesus Christ made that payment
to His Father. And God the Father accepted. He accepted that. And when He
accepted the payment, we were made accepted in the Beloved. I wrote this in an article that's
in today's bulletin. You don't have to read it right
now, but I encourage you to read it later. And I said this, if
you owed a big bill to a hospital, and someone came and paid that
bill for you, that hospital could not bring
any charges against you. The bill is paid. You have the
receipt paid in full. Well, Jesus Christ paid the debt
in full. We don't owe anything to God.
That's taken care of. And we have the receipt. We're
redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ. It says so in the Holy
Scriptures. So we have the receipt right
here in God's own Holy Word, and if we by faith embrace that,
not one thing can be laid to the charge of God's elect. Is
that not right? So He, when He paid the sin debt
in full, He was given the authority, the power, over all flesh to
give eternal life to as many as the Father gave Him, because
He met all the conditions of the eternal covenant of grace.
So here we are, in this world from our mother's womb until
we go out of this life for that matter, full of sin. But Jesus
Christ comes to us when we're running from Him, hating Him,
drinking iniquity like water, loving darkness, hating the light. And He by His power, brings us
under the preaching of His glorious gospel. By His Spirit, He enlightens
the mind, revealing to us who He is and what He has done for
us. That's the new birth. Man can't do that. The term itself
points to the fact that we must be born again and that nobody
has anything to do with the spiritual birth. We have no more to do
with the spiritual birth than we did with our physical birth.
This is by the power of God. And Jesus Christ is the one who
performs that miracle. So, we're born again. Born into
the kingdom of God. We have received the spirit of
adoption. Just go over one book to Ephesians. And we heard this read this morning
by our brother Lee when he brought his devotional. Starting at verse 3, it says,
blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places
in Christ. That's chapter 1, verse 3. Verse 4 says, according
as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world,
that we should be holy and without blame before Him. And that's
where the phrase should end. It should pick up, in love, having
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to
Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will. So we have
received the spirit of adoption. But it was predestinated. God predestinated this wonderful
new birth that we experience, receiving the spirit of adoption.
That took place in eternity. So the term everlasting father
We've received the Spirit of Adoption from Jesus Christ by
His sovereign power. So in that respect, knowing that
it was predestined before time began, then He, the Lord Jesus
Christ, is referred to as the Everlasting Father. Folks, this
is too rich not to embrace. This is too good not to just
embrace with all of your being, thanking God for such a Redeemer
as ours. We still believe in the Trinity. We'll never stop believing that. All Christians are Trinitarians.
We believe in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. But
these descriptive words in Isaiah 9.6 points to Jesus Christ, and
as Pastor Porter said, His meditatorial reign. He is the only mediator
between God and men. And we must see Him as the only
way that we can approach God. Our Lord Jesus said, I am the
way. He didn't say I am a way. He
said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto
the Father but by Me. So we just praise Him and thank
Him. for this unspeakable gift, eternal life through Jesus Christ
our Lord, begotten again unto a living hope by His sovereign
power to be His blood-bought children to praise Him forever
and forever and forever for who He is and what He has done for
us. Amen. God bless you.