Matthew 20, and today I wanna
bring a message, our great Redeemer from this text of scripture.
And I have to tell you that if I had all of the time of earth's
history and all of eternity to preach this sermon, we could
never get through it. We just won't. So you're just
gonna have to be content with just a snippet of things And
the Lord himself has given us this chapter and really all of
scripture to unfold this great subject to us. As Brad alluded
to, I always appreciate his comments, his reading, his prayers, my
brother. And I don't want to say too much
about that, otherwise I won't be able to preach either. I don't know really how to begin,
but I do want to say this. I want this sermon to be for
Anilla. You might wonder, who's Anilla? Well, she's a two-year-old,
and she listens to Grandpa on Zoom. And the reason I know she
listens is because last week she told her mom how Jesus healed
two blind men, a two-year-old. Mama didn't have any idea she
heard that. But you see how the Lord is able to take the frailty
of someone like me and speak to a little child? Now that actually
is a great illustration, a commentary on this entire chapter. Because
this chapter is against the pride of man. And it is the glory of
God seen in the humiliation, the willing humility of the Lord
Jesus Christ. to have a people for himself
and give them the grace of eternal glory. And we see the great contrast
here. I mentioned last week the rich
young ruler from the 19th chapter preceding this one, how he was
unable to let go of his temporal and fading riches in exchange
for eternal life. because he was proud, he was
very proud, and he was covetous. He thought he was good enough,
he could do something good enough to have eternal life. And he
was covetous because he held tenaciously, he held very firmly
to what he believed would give him eternal life, but he couldn't
let go of his riches, so he thought high of himself and low of the
Lord Jesus Christ. But the Lord Jesus, in complete
contrast to that rich young ruler, the rich young ruler couldn't
give his earthly wealth for Christ to the poor and follow the Lord
Jesus Christ. He couldn't keep the very first
and most important commandment, which was to love God with all
of his heart, soul, and mind and strength. And so he went
away sad. His pride and covetousness prevented
him. But that's set up in contrast
not to say, oh, look at that bad, bad man. I'm glad I'm not
like him. But it's set up to show us this
is who we are. unless the Lord saves us, and
also, more importantly, to show us how that the Lord Jesus Christ
did give everything that he had to the poor. He emptied himself
in order, by his poverty, to make them rich. Remember 2 Corinthians
8, verse 9, I will read that to you. This is really the theme
of redemption, the theme of redemption, which is what we're going to
talk about today. In 2 Corinthians 8, it says this, in verse 9,
4, you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though
he was rich, yet for your sakes, he became poor. He was truly
rich. The rich young ruler thought
he was rich in the world's goods, but Jesus Christ, the Son of
God, was rich. He had everything. Though he
was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, that you through
his poverty might be rich." Not rich in worldly things, rich
in spiritual, heavenly blessings. And so this is the theme of what
Matthew 20 is talking about. The poverty of Christ, he willingly
gave everything in order to make his people who were poor in themselves
rich in him. And the contrast is amazing because
first the rich young ruler and then even Peter said, Lord, we've
left everything, what do we get? And then, of course, Jesus gave
the parable. We went through that last week.
These men who were first called into the vineyard by the Lord
of the vineyard, the Lord Jesus called them. If he hadn't called
them, they couldn't come, yet he called them. But they came
with an attitude that they could earn, like the rich young ruler,
they could earn from him. And the wickedness of their heart
was revealed when the Lord gave freely to those who were last
called. and who were actually chosen
to receive the gift of grace. Remember, those who came at 5
p.m. and only worked one hour to 6
p.m. were given a whole day's wages,
a reward of grace. What possibly could be right
about that? What could be fair about that?
The first called workers said, it's not fair. We worked all
day and we didn't get more than they got. And they received the
full day's pay. And the Lord said this, he says,
is your eye evil because I'm good? Isn't it right for me to
do with my own what I will? And so in that very parable,
we see that it's right for the Lord Jesus Christ to be gracious. It's right for him to give as
it pleases him out of pure grace. And our own wickedness is seen
in that we object to what he says is right. It's right because
he does it. We can't know right until we
know the Lord's thoughts. Right is what God thinks. Right
is what Christ does, what God does in His Son. That's right.
Whatever God gives a sinner, it's right. And he makes it right,
and that's the next part of this chapter. He makes it right because
in verse 17 he says this, and Jesus going up to Jerusalem took
the 12 disciples apart in the way, and he said to them, behold,
we go up to Jerusalem, and the Son of Man shall be betrayed
to the chief priest and to the scribes. They shall condemn him
to death. and shall deliver him to the
Gentiles to mock, to scourge, and to crucify, and the third
day he shall rise again. This is a summary of how what
Jesus gave in the parable to those who came at the last hour,
it was right. He made it right, not only because
he did it, but because in his grace, he not only gave this
to them freely, but he provided all that made it right in the
eyes of God's holy justice. He gave himself. And so this
is, again, a steep and deep contrast. Here we have the pride of the
rich young ruler, the pride of the Pharisees, the pride of even
his disciples. We have the pride of the Gentiles
here. They're the ones who would mock
him and scourge him and crucify him. The pride of the scribes
and the Pharisees. And yet, in the context here,
in the midst of all that, we have the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ, who gave freely to those who didn't deserve it. And then
he gave what was necessary in order to make the gift of that
grace glorify God. How did he glorify God? Because
he did what was in the heart of God when he gave himself for
sinners to pay the debt that sinners owe to God by their sin. And this is amazing, isn't it? You see, that's what redemption
is. And he's going to explain that here. But he gives us yet
another example of our pride in contrast to his deep grace. He says in verse 20, then came
to him the mother of Zebedee's children with her sons, worshiping
him and desiring a certain thing of him. And he said to her, what
wilt thou? What do you want? She said to
him, grant that these, my two sons, may sit the one on the
right hand, on thy right hand, and the other on thy left hand
in thy kingdom. So their mother, James and John's
mother, came to Jesus and said, I have something I want to ask.
What do you want? Jesus asked her. Well, I want
James and John to sit one of them on your right and one of
them on your left hand. Now think about that, and think about what
happens at the end of this chapter. The men in the parable, first
of all, who received a full day's pay, they didn't deserve a full
day's pay, did they? But the Lord considered it right
to give it to them, because He's gracious. and he would make it
right in his own sufferings and death. And here, these two disciples
aspire, they have an ambition to sit with Christ in his glory
in a principal place. And yet at the end of this chapter,
two blind men having nothing and being only beggars, hear
that Jesus is coming by. They know he's Christ. They call
him that by calling him the Son of Man, and they ask him to have
mercy on them. Only mercy. And what do you want,
he asked them, that we might see? In other words, that our
sins might be removed so that we might see who you are. That's
what Jesus said. Those who are blind have no sin,
but those who think they see, their sin remains. He says that
in John chapter 9, when he healed the man born blind. So these
two men are begging. They have nothing. They need
everything. They know Christ is able to give,
and all they ask for is to see. Contrast that to the two disciples
who want the principal place with Christ in glory. Now, the
Lord Jesus didn't rebuke the disciples openly here. In fact,
he lets this develop because he says, Jesus said to them,
you know not what you ask. Are you able to drink of that
cup, the cup that I shall drink of? That cup was the cup God
put in his hands by his will to endure his wrath because the
sins of his people were made to be his. So he was drinking
not only the wrath, but the sins of his people all in that cup,
because wrath is only coming upon us because of sins. So he
asked them, are you, James and John, able to drink of the cup
that I shall drink of, and to be baptized, to be overwhelmed
and immersed with the baptism that I am baptized with? Not
water baptism, but this suffering in the garden, sweating drops
of blood, great drops of blood because his soul was heavy. And
he was sore amazed, bearing our sins and the wrath due to us
for our sins when no one had yet touched him because God was
afflicting his soul. And so they said to him in their
naivete, their ignorance, we are able. Verse 23, and he said
to them, you shall drink indeed of my cup and be baptized with
the baptism that I'm baptized with. But to sit on my right
hand, notice here the Lord's humility. To sit on my right
hand and on my left is not mine to give. He laid his life down. in order to give grace to sinners
and yet he says it's not mine to give but it shall be given
to them for whom it is prepared of my father. Notice he's so
humble and meek and lowly the Lord Jesus Christ. He not only
looks at the great sin of his people with compassion and gives
grace to them and substantiates that grace in his own death,
bringing that grace to them on the grounds of his own redeeming
blood. But he also defers to his father
to give what he purchased with his own blood to those he had
already prepared it for before the foundation of the world.
And this coincides with what Jesus said in the parable. Many
are called, few are chosen. The Lord Jesus gave salvation
and grace to those the Father chose, and he was happy to lay
his life down in order to glorify his Father as the one who he
exemplified in his humility and in his love and compassion for
sinners. And so in verse 24, when the other 10 disciples heard
what James and John did, coming to Jesus and asking Him for this
principal place in His glory, they were moved with indignation
against the two brethren, which proved that they themselves aspired
to have the chief place. So the ten disciples and the
two disciples, the twelve together, all had the same root problem,
a heart of pride. And all of that is seen in contrast
to the only one here who is humble, the Lord Jesus Christ. And he's
so humble that it boggles the mind that the Lord of glory We've
become the servant in the world. The slave has sinned, the songwriter
writes, but the son has suffered. The one who rules and commands
stood under the rule and command and made obedience his rule of
life. He who was equal with God made
himself of no reputation and then took upon himself the form
of a servant. And as a servant, he stooped
in obedience and submission to his father and gave himself,
his life, all that he had to bear our sins and the suffering
for them. in order to compensate God, to
restore the glory we failed to give in our obedience, and the
glory due to His justice that He demanded in the punishment
for our sins, and the Lord Jesus Christ bore that sin and glorified
God in fulfilling His law and magnifying His law and His justice
and His sufferings and His death. that stoop of humility in order
to save sinners and glorify his Father with no thought of himself. That's humility, and this is
the heart of God the Father. You see, and he tells the disciples
this in words, and he sets forth the parable to them, illustrating
it in the rich young ruler, and then gives them the revelation
of his own substitutionary death that made satisfaction to God
in order that God might lavish upon his people the grace of
the Lord Jesus Christ. On the grounds of his poverty,
he made us rich. He purchased this redeemed, this
glory, eternal glory for us in the blood of His own Son. He
removed our sins and offenses against Him by punishing His
Son. What grace! What a glorious God! When the disciples saw the Lord
Jesus Christ die on the cross, and they knew their Master was
dead, they saw Him die. and they were so distraught. Do you know why they were so
sad? Because they loved Him. Why did
they love Him so much? Do you see what happened here?
The Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Master, who has all of the
wisdom of heaven, He came without any sin, did nothing wrong, and
then He stooped in order that he might give them life. He never once appeared before
them in an arrogant position of demanding their worship, but
he earns it from them in making himself so adored in their eyes,
so highly esteemed, because he who is God stooped to do and
to die. Thomas says, I will not believe
unless I see the nail prints in his hands. He says, Thomas,
look, reach your hand here in my side, put your fingers in
these nail prints. And then Thomas said, my Lord,
my God, you see, he was so glorious in their eyes because he is God
and he was God in all of his glory, in his stoop of humility. This is the Lord of glory. This
is the one they loved. Who could not love Him? And so
we see this great contrast. And then we see at the end of
this chapter here, how that after the Lord explained this to his
disciples, this necessary, it's necessary for me to take this
place in glory only by undergoing the baptism, the outpouring of
God's wrath for your sins. Then we see these two blind men
coming at the end, and they exemplify those last hour Workers who were
given grace, even the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ purchased
at the price of His own blood. And they call for mercy. They
have nothing. And this describes every child
of God. We're made poor in spirit. No one has anything. And yet
the Lord has to give us this great grace to be poor in spirit,
absent of value, having nothing, needing everything, and finding
it all in Christ. So he says this back in verse
25, Jesus called to him, them, his disciples to him. He says,
you know the princes of the Gentiles. They exercise dominion over them. And they that are great exercise
authority upon them. It's like a stack of blocks.
You know what it's like. The very bottom layer, there's
lots of blocks. And as you go up the stack, it
gets fewer and fewer until you get to the very top. There's
one little block on the top. The Gentiles love this. They
love this stack. where the one at the top gives
orders to the ones below them, who give orders to the ones below
them, and they receive honor from the lower levels. And like the king, everybody's
there to serve the king in the Gentile world. It says, it's
not going to be like that with you. It will not be that way
in my kingdom. You know who's at the top? You
know who's sitting on the top? The one who made himself the
servant of all. who gave himself, who took our
sins, the things that highly offend the holy and infinite
and eternal God of glory. And here we see in him, seeing
us in love and grace incomprehensible, seeing our need when we didn't
know it. The disciples had no concept
of this greatness in his kingdom. Until they saw it in Christ,
until they heard it from Him, they had no idea. But then, as
they were jockeying for that position to be the top block
in the stack, The Lord Jesus Christ from the very bottom says,
he says this, it shall not be so among you, but whosoever will
be great among you, let him be your minister, your servant,
your slave. Whosoever will be chief among
you, let him be your servant. Doesn't take talents, does it?
Doesn't take greatness, does it? You don't need a lot of skill
to be a servant, do you? In fact, they usually make the
lowest and least capable the servants. You go down to the
bottom of the boat, grab an oar, and start rowing. That's what
I want you to do. And if you slack off, then expect
the whip on your back. That's what a servant does. He's
nothing. He's expendable. When he's tired, throw him overboard.
The Lord Jesus Christ is that servant. He says, whosoever will
be chief among you, let him be your servant, even as the Son
of Man came, not to be ministered, not to be served, but to minister. And how? To give his life a ransom
for many. A ransom. You know what a ransom
is, don't you? If you've seen stories or heard
these stories, somebody is taken, kidnapped maybe, captive. And the one who kidnaps them,
holds them, won't let them go. They demand a ransom. You've
got to pay. You want your son back? You've got to pay. And
so they hold them as a captive, a ransom. And here, in this case,
the ransom is paid to the one who holds men in captivity. And who is that? Well, it's the
Lord Jesus. I mean, it's God himself. God
himself. God himself is the one to whom
the ransom has to be paid. God is the one we sinned against. Why is God the one who holds
us in captivity? And how does he do it? Well,
because of sin. You see, God is holy. He's sovereign. Obedience to
Him is the very least that we can do. We should be honoring
and worshiping Him, and obedience and submission to Him is owed
to Him. None of us have obeyed God. Obedience
to God magnifies His sovereign rule as the just and holy lawgiver. Failure to obey His law shows
a disregard a reproach to His holiness. So that obedience actually
is meant to glorify God in His proper place as God. But none have done it. We have
all sinned and come short of the glory of God. We fail to
do what we must do. And then God's justice says,
that is a crime. a crime that has to be punished. So the one who failed to obey
now will receive the just compensation for that failure. And that's
called punishment or a payment from God. It's called the wages
of sin. It's a just payback. And that
payback from God is death. So God's anger, his wrath, death,
eternal death is a payback. And God's justice demands it,
but we cannot bring glory to God's justice because we can't
endure that. We will spend eternity under
the wrath of God unless the Lord redeems us. And so what the Lord
Jesus Christ did then is he gave himself a ransom. He paid what
we didn't pay in our place and instead of us, he substituted
himself. The sin that we committed that
demanded God's justice, he bore, he lifted up from us as a servant
would and bore it on himself and carried it into the presence
of God. And then he suffered the punishment
due to that sin according to God's strict justice. So that
God's justice was satisfied. God received compensation. Now things are restored. And
also, in doing that, the Lord Jesus Christ, who was so high,
stooping so low, fulfilling all of the obedience that we fail
to fulfill in His love and in His humility of service, Enduring
the wrath of God in love for sinners and in honor to God,
all for God and for His people. That obedience was the very righteousness
of God. And now God is glorified. He's
magnified in His law. He's glorified in His justice.
And it's all in the ransom. The ransom price paid to God.
Not to Satan, not to some king. It's paid to the Lord Himself. Now in the Old Testament, in
Leviticus 25, God provided that if a person became a debtor and
had to sell themselves as a slave, that one of their brothers could
buy them back. But as Brad just read in Psalm
49, the Lord says, it doesn't matter how wealthy you are, you
cannot pay the price to redeem your brother. And I want to point
that out to you from Psalm 49 again. Let me read that to you. He says in verse 7 of Psalm 49,
let me read that. He says, none of
them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God
a ransom for him." You see? It's the ransom God requires
in order to set free the captive prisoner who was lawfully held
captive under the bondage of all that sin brings. And that
means death, and the grave, and the curse of God's law, and hell,
and bondage to Satan. everything, sickness, death,
everything. He says in verse 8, for the redemption
of their soul is precious and it ceases forever. It's not possible
for a man to pay God the ransom price necessary to redeem a brother.
No man can pay it. God requires a payment. God is
the one who determines whether or not a payment from another
can even be accepted in order to redeem a brother. If it weren't
for God's own sovereign will, a substitute would not be allowed. But God in his sovereignty says,
another can pay for the poor, enslaved, lawfully imprisoned
debtor. But the price is so high that
no man on earth can pay it. It ceases forever. It's such
a high price that God himself has to, in his wisdom, describe
the price that's enough to redeem a sinner. And we know what that
is because the Lord Jesus Christ said, I came to give myself,
my life, a ransom for many. The curse of God's law is upon
us because of our sin. Christ has redeemed us from the
curse of the law. How? Substituted himself, paying
with himself, enduring the curse. Christ has redeemed us from the
curse of the law, being made a curse for us. That's substitution. And that curse was poured out
according to God's own requirements. God required the payment of Christ's
blood. for sinners, to release them
from the guilt, from the curse, from the death, from the grave,
from the hell, and from bondage to Satan. From being separated
from God. And that price was paid to God
by the Lord Jesus Christ, and He did it in love. But it not
only freed us out from under the bondage of that curse, And
enslavement to death in the grave and hell and Satan and everything
else that came because of our sins. But it paid such a price
that everything that belongs to the Lord Jesus Christ in all
of the riches of his grace was given to those for whom he paid
it. They were made the sons of God,
the heirs of God, joint heirs with Jesus Christ. And in his
redeeming work, he not only endured this, but he brought them to
God, not just forgiven, but justified in his sight, so that God considers
the obedience of Christ as righteousness imputed to them. And I want to
look at a couple of verses of scripture that teach us this
now. Look at Romans chapter four. Actually, I want to look at Romans
chapter 3 first. In Romans chapter 3, I was thinking
about this. You know how the Bible is written?
In a lot of ways, it's written as a diamond. You know, a diamond
is one of those things that if you look at it in the light,
it sparkles. And if you turn it or turn the
light, it sparkles differently. And you look at, oh, look at
that. Oh, look. No, wait, look at this. Every
angle you look at it from, it's beautiful because it reflects
the light with these colors and things. Well, that's the way
scripture is. Scripture is like this because the Lord, he'll
tell us doctrine in words. And then he'll tell it to us
in parables. And then he'll tell it to us
with illustrations of people, like the rich young ruler or
the blind men who were healed. Or he'll tell it to us in his
own self, in his own person, what he did. Or in the example
of contrasting examples, like the rich young ruler and the
Pharisees, or the disciples and their sin, their sinful thoughts.
So God's word is like this. And here in Romans chapter 3,
This is an example of where the truth has been. you know, distilled
to the point where everything has been removed that would keep
us from understanding the clarity of the revelation here. He says
in Romans chapter 3 verse 24, he says, notice, being justified,
that means that God looks upon in all of his justice and holiness
and righteousness and he cannot compromise the truth. And he
says, this one is righteous before me, justified, notice, not for
anything found in them, being justified freely, without cause
to be found in us, but for this reason, by his grace, given out
of God's own heart of grace. that looks for nothing in the
one He gives it. In spite of all that they deserve,
He gives them and lavishes upon them abundant riches of spiritual
blessings, because that's who He is. Through, on the ground,
the basis of this just platform, if you will, through the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus, the foundation, all the blocks are
stacked upon the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why God made Him the
servant of all, the highest block in the stack, you see. whom God
set forth to be a propitiation. Now a propitiation means something
given to God to satisfy his justice and take away his wrath. And
what was that? It was the Lord Jesus Christ
in his sufferings, in his death. God took away his own wrath that
was against us. And it was right that it was
against us for our sins. And he did this out of his grace. And what measure is there to
this grace that caused God to give his son as the propitiation? for our sins. This is the definition
of love. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that he loved us and gave his son to be the propitiation
for our sins. The wrath of God appeasing, the
justice of God satisfying, sacrifice that lifted our sins from us
and bore them as his own and answered for them in his own
sacrifice and offering of himself in death. He loved us and he
gave himself an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet
smelling savor. Ephesians 5 verse 2. You see
this? This is what made the gift to
the last called workers right. Because it seemed good in the
eyes of the Lord Jesus who earned it all at the price of his own
blood. This is why it was right. For
the two blind men to be given mercy from the Lord Jesus Christ,
because He purchased them. He bought them out of the bondage
of all that their sins brought them under. The wrath of God,
and hell, and the curse, and death, and the grave, and everything
that sin brings. He bought them out because He
redeemed them from all iniquity. He gave himself for us that he
might redeem us and deliver us from this present evil world.
Everything the Lord Jesus Christ did took away the cause of God's
wrath. In Psalm 85, he says it this
way. Let me read these words that are so endearing to a sinner,
a blind and helpless beggar who has so much sin that no one on
earth can buy him out of it, and the Lord himself against
whom we sin stoops bears our sin and satisfies his own requirements,
his wrath and his law and his justice and righteousness and
truth. Psalm 85 verse 1, Lord, thou
has been favorable to thy land, thou has brought back the captivity
of Jacob, See that captivity was brought back through ransom.
Thou hast forgiven, that's what redemption does, forgiven the
iniquity of thy people. Thou hast covered all their sin.
Thou hast taken away all thy wrath. God took away his own
wrath. You realize what power that took?
That God would set aside his wrath which was a just wrath,
the wrath of God. No one can stand before the wrath
of God. Jesus told James and John, you
don't know what you ask. Are you able to be baptized with
the baptism? I'm going to be baptized to drink
the cup that I'm going to drink. Yes, yes, yes, we're able. The Lord Jesus did. He did. He says in verse 10 of the same
chapter, He says in Psalm 85 verse 10, mercy and truth now
in the Lord Jesus are met together. Mercy. The blind men received
truth. How could God be just and be
so merciful to a sinner? They're met together. Righteousness
and peace have kissed each other. The king of righteousness, the
king of peace, in the Lord Jesus Christ, in his blood, through
his cross, reconciling sinners through his own death, and God
the Father giving him to reconcile those sinners to himself through
the death of his own son. Do you see the humility of God? Do you see his great stoop in
the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you see his grace? And then
in Romans 4.25, he was delivered for our offenses, because of
our offenses. and to bear them as his, and
to take them from us, to answer for them before God, because
it seemed good in God's sight. And he was raised again in success. That's what resurrection means.
It's all done. And it's the crowning jewel of
achievement here on what he did. He rose from the dead again. God raised him again. He justified
him in that. He put his stamp of approval
and the highest praise upon his son for all that he did. And
he didn't do it for his son alone. But for those he gave his son,
for he justified him, and with him justified all of his people. Look at Romans 8 and verse 34,
same thing. Who is he that condemneth? Let
him stand up now, so that he can be put down. It is Christ
that died. That's the ransom. That's the
propitiation. That's the requirement of God's
sovereign will. It seemed good to God. It behooved
Him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, and
bringing many sons to glory. That shows how far He redeemed
us to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. Here in Romans 8, 34, who is
he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea,
rather, that is risen again. It's done, the work is done. Who is even at the right hand
of God who also makes intercession for us. What humility, what meekness,
what a savior, what a ransom, what a redemption. And it's all
given to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. And in this, we see the
glory of God, don't we? And the glorious part of it all,
the most glorious part of it all, I think, is that he would
look upon me, a blind, begging sinner, a mercy beggar. with nothing to pay, a debt so
huge that only God could pay it. He purchased the church with
his own blood. And he didn't just buy us out
of something as an abstract act, but he bought us for himself.
He bought us from sin for himself. Can you imagine this? Can it
even begin to sink in? This is why we sing so much. I will sing of my Redeemer. In Revelation 5, he says, Thou
hast redeemed us to God by Thine own blood. Out of every kindred,
tongue, people and nation, the Lord Jesus said, I gave my life
a ransom for many. Not one for whom Christ died,
according to Romans 8.34, shall ever perish. Who can lay anything
to their charge? God justified them. Who can condemn
them? Christ died for them. He's risen again. He's seated
at the right hand of God. He makes intercession for us,
so meek and so lowly. And that is the chief in the
kingdom of God. He says in Galatians 6, bear
ye one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.
This is his own heart. This comes from him. This is
his mind. This is his law. And this is
what he's teaching his disciples by word, by example, by counterexample,
and by himself, and then in the blind men. Disciples, if you're
going to be great in this kingdom, you're going to be under the
ladder. you're gonna be under the very
bottom rung. And the Apostle Paul said this, I've made myself
a servant to all. To the Jew, to the Gentile, to
the rich, to the poor, and the Apostles, every one of them to
a man, gave themselves for Christ's namesake in the gospel, bearing
his name to the Gentiles, to the Jews, and suffering for it.
There was no price that could begin to equate to what the Lord
gave for them, and they were thankful for it. And this is
the way God saves us. He deserves all the praise. Let's
pray. Lord Jesus, thank you for your mercy that you purchased
for us out of your own heart of grace to give to us freely
and to make it such a gift that it was right. Who would have
imagined that God could stoop so low to save those who were
on the dunghill of their own sin, who deserve to be left there
and to suffer eternal fires burning there on that dunghill of sin,
and yet you've raised us up in the Lord Jesus and made us sit
among princes and we didn't do anything for it. We can't do
anything for it. We don't want to do or attempt
to think that we can do anything for it. Help us, Lord, in our
hearts to praise you for all eternity for your grace, for
saving us and redeeming us with a price that is done, finished. No one can add to it. No one
take from it. No one could have ever paid it
but you yourself. What a great Savior. In Jesus'
name we pray. Amen.