chapter 3 of Galatians. The book
of the Galatians, the book of Hebrews, The Book of Romans,
Ephesians, Colossians, Philippians, all of these books and more,
the entire Word of God actually, but these in great clarity, the
Book of Acts, the Gospels of our Lord Jesus all teach that
our salvation is not by what we do, but by what the Lord Jesus
Christ has done. And we have such a tendency to
forget that. We have such a tendency to seek
for the approval of men and the approval of our own conscience.
that we go about to quiet our conscience and to make men happy
by doing things that they approve of instead of looking to Christ
who alone did what God approves of. And so we study the book
of Galatians with great thankfulness that God would be so gracious
as to teach us from His own word that His Son deserves all the
glory, that He is all of our salvation, and sinners like us
can look to Him And in so looking, find all of our salvation in
Him. What a glory that is. A glory
of God's grace. So let's begin our sermon today. We're going to be reading in
Galatians chapter 3, but before we do, let's pray. Heavenly Father,
thank you. Thank you for your grace. Thank
you for giving your own begotten Son, your only begotten Son,
our Savior, the Lord Jesus, who himself, in love, willingly took
our nature, bore our sins, endured the curse deserved to us, and
overcame every enemy, satisfied every demand, gave an answer
for every requirement and every demand of God's justice against
us, to Him alone we look that you would receive us for His
sake. Teach us from your Word how we receive your Spirit to
know these things and have the assurance of them. In Jesus'
name we pray. Amen. I am tempted always to go back
and review, but I'm not going to review too much today. I want
to pick it up in Galatians 3 verse 13, and we're just going to focus
mostly today on verse 14. I've entitled this message, The
Blessing of Abraham. What is the blessing of Abraham?
Let's read it together in Galatians 3 verse 13. Christ hath redeemed
us The Lord Jesus Christ has redeemed.
Redeemed means to buy back, buy back from indebtedness, from
imprison, from slavery. He paid the price, which was
a ransom of His own life, in His own blood. He redeemed us,
God's people, those who believe on Him, who were chosen by God
before the foundation of the world to receive this salvation.
Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law. God's law demanded
not only our obedience, but our punishment for violation of it.
And there's nothing that would change God's justice in that
demand. It had to be satisfied. It had
to be fulfilled. The Lord Jesus Christ, in His
own death, as our substitute, answered God's justice. He satisfied
it fully and fulfilled every requirement. And how did He do
that? Being made a curse for us. The Bible, the New Testament,
is wonderful. in such a high degree because
the Lord Jesus is declared to us as our substitute. He died
in our place. Where we should have died, He
died. For our sins, He bore our sins in our place. He was made under the law to
take our obligations under the law and fulfill them. He was
made a curse for us. God cursed Him. God the Father
did not spare His Son, but delivered Him up for us all. That's the
message of Scripture, and it's a glorious message of grace.
It's a glorious message of God's inflexible justice, satisfied
by God's own wisdom and grace, and His love in the Lord Jesus
Christ. For it is written, this is why
we know he was cursed by God, cursed is everyone that hangs
on a tree. The Lord Jesus Christ hung on
the cross, it was there he endured the curse of God for us. And
if he endured it, then our curse under God's wrath has been removed.
The price to redeem us from our sins has been paid. He has redeemed
us from all iniquity, Titus 2.14. He gave Himself for our sins
that He might redeem us from this present evil world, Galatians
1.4. And in Ephesians 1.7, we receive
the forgiveness of sins through the redemption that is by His
blood. Complete forgiveness. All the guilt of our sins before
God's court in heaven has been taken away. God looks upon His
people and He sees no sin in them. Now, to realize this is
to have eternal life. To realize this is to worship
God in the Spirit. To love God with all of our heart. And so he goes on. Why did the
Lord Jesus do this? Why did the just, Christ, die
for the unjust, us, sinners, who in ourselves are nothing
but sin? Verse 14. In order that the blessing of
Abraham might come on the Gentiles through Jesus Christ. That's
why. In verse 8, if you just scan over there, it says, "...the
Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through
faith, preached the gospel to Abraham, saying, In thee shall
all nations be blessed." That's the blessing. In thee, in Christ,
your seed, the one who would be born through you. And in him
alone, not every individual trying to fulfill God's law on his own,
But the Lord Jesus Christ, fulfilling it for all of His people, His
seed, Abraham's seed, all families of the earth, all nations, not
every person in every nation, but people out of every kindred,
tribe, tongue, and nation under heaven, would be blessed by the
Lord Jesus Christ. That's the blessing of Abraham,
to be justified before God. To be called into the court of
heaven to stand and answer. And have someone, one man, the
Lord Jesus, as our surety, come before the judge like Judah did
to Joseph when he pleaded for his younger brother Benjamin.
And he said, take me instead of the lad, to be a bondman to
my Lord. in His place forever, and let
the lad go free back to his father." That's from Genesis chapter 44
verse 33. This is the message of the gospel.
The Lord Jesus Christ, when the soldiers came to Him, He said,
and while the disciples were with Him, He said, if you seek
Me, then let these go their way. The surety stood for all of His
people, one for the many. One substituting himself in sacrifice
and offering of himself to God for all of his people. And God
received him. God released them from the debt
of their sins, from the curse of his law, from the bondage
of his law. And from the power of Satan and
everything else. All done by the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. The blood of the Lord Jesus Christ
has accomplished all of our salvation. It was a blood offered to God.
It was Christ himself offering himself in his life and his death.
And it was a blood of obedience. He laid down his life to obey
the command given to him by the Father that he should lay down
his life for the sheep. And he did that. And He didn't
just command him to lay down his life, He also commanded him
to take it up again. And that was the justification
of His people. That's the blessing of Abraham.
And so he goes on here. We're justified, not for what
we do, but for what God sees and receives and thinks of His
Son. That's the message of Scripture
to God's people. It's the comfort He gives to
us. And there are many blessings that flow to us because of that.
Many blessings come to us. In fact, all blessings come to
us through the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ. Through
the righteousness of the Lord Jesus Christ established by His
obedience in shedding His blood. What higher obedience could be
given God than that Christ would lay down His life, not for good
people, but for sinners. For those who had offended God,
those who were the enemies of God, the ungodly, without strength. That's what the Lord Jesus did
in His death. That's a love we can't begin
to comprehend. We can't even love others when
they're good to us without having an ulterior motive. Yet the Lord
Jesus Christ laid aside His reputation as God, and took upon Himself
the form of a servant, and our nature, forever taking our nature
to Himself in union with His divine nature, and in our nature
bore our sins and our curse, and satisfied all God required
of us as our surety, our Redeemer, and our substitute. And so he
says in verse 14, that the blessing of Abraham, that blessing, justification
by the blood of Christ, might come on the Gentiles through
Jesus Christ. Don't you love it? It's all because
of Jesus Christ. And then he goes on, that we
might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. The promise of the Spirit through
faith. Now that, to me, has been a mystery. What does it mean to receive
the promise of the Spirit through faith? One of the questions that
men wrestle with is whether or not this means that there was
no giving of the Spirit of God before the New Testament was
given and fulfilled in Christ's blood. Have you ever heard that
question? Maybe you've even heard people
address it, try to answer it. Was the Spirit of God given before
Jesus ascended into heaven? Were people in the Old Testament
given the Spirit of God? So that's one question. And why
is the Spirit given is another question here. It was given by
promise. He's called the Spirit, the promise
of the Spirit. But what does it mean that we
receive the promise of the Spirit through faith? Is it because
we believe that God gives us His Spirit? Is that the way it
works? Is the Spirit of God given to us as a fulfillment of a condition
that we meet, we believe, and then God gives us His Spirit?
Now remember that all these things are being spoken of as proof
that our salvation is of grace and grace alone because of Christ
and Christ alone. God was moved not for what He
saw or would see in us, but for what He saw and found in Himself
and in the Lord Jesus Christ. He was moved by His own grace.
And He was able to shed grace upon us abundantly because of
the Lord Jesus Christ. And part of that grace is the
giving of His own Spirit. What is the Spirit of God? Well,
He's not just an it. He's not a force. He's a person.
He is God Himself. He's spoken of. When the Spirit
of God comes, He's spoken of as a person in Scripture. There's
three in one God. The three are one, the one are
three, and all the three, by the grace of God, are all for
me. That's the teaching of scripture. We can go to many scriptures
about this, but I want you to think about these things, how
the Lord Jesus Himself teaches us about the Spirit of God. Let's
turn to a few scriptures in the Bible. Look at John chapter 14. Jesus is about to go to the cross.
His disciples have received the Last Supper, and they have heard
Him speaking about His soon departure. He tells them in verse 6 that
He is the way, He is the truth, and He is the life, and no one
comes to the Father except by Him. And that if you've seen
Him, you've seen the Father. So He's one with God. He's the
revelation of God. And then he goes on in verse
14. He says, "...if you ask anything
in my name, I will do it. If you love me, keep my commandments,
and I will pray the Father, and He shall give you another Comforter,
that He may abide with you forever." Now this Comforter is the one
that is spoken of in Galatians 3.14. He's the Spirit of Promise. The Comforter. The Lord Jesus
said, I will pray the Father and He shall give you another
Comforter. That He, the Spirit of God, may
abide with you forever. In verse 17, even the Spirit
of Truth. So that's the Comforter. He's
the Comforter and He's the Spirit of Truth. He's the Spirit sent
from God, the Father. whom the world cannot receive.
Why can't the world receive Him? Because the world seeth Him not,
neither knoweth Him. They can't see Him. Obviously,
He's a spirit. You can't see a spirit. Can we
see the Spirit of God? Do we see Him? Not with physical
eyes, but we see with spiritual eyes, with eyes of faith. The
world can't receive the Spirit of God because they don't have
faith in Christ. That's the missing gift to them,
is God's Spirit comes to us and is received by us in this gift
of faith. He says, "...because it seeth
him not, neither knoweth him, but you know him, for he dwelleth
with you and shall be in you." So the Spirit of God would be
sent by Christ, and He is with the disciples, and He would be
in the disciples. He goes on, "...I will not leave
you comfortless. I will come to you." He's not
going to leave them as orphans. They're the adopted sons of God,
and He's going to come to them as the Comforter through His
own Spirit. Then he goes on, verse 19, "...yet
a little while, and the world seeth me no more." He's speaking
about the cross. He's about to go to the cross.
After he dies and rises again, he will ascend to heaven. They
won't see him anymore. "...but you see me." You see
me. You see me now and you shall
see me later. Through the Spirit of God, you'll believe. Because
I live, you shall live also. Just because Christ lives, we
live. That's our life. He is our life.
Verse 20. At that day, you shall know that
I am in my Father, and you in me, and I in you. You see this
unity, this union? How? How do we know on that day
that Christ is in the Father, and we are in Christ, and Christ
is in us? Through the Spirit of God. That's
how we know. Verse 21, He that hath my commandments
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me, and he that loveth
me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will
manifest myself to him. Judas said to him, not Iscariot,
Lord, how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself to us and not
to the world? He was thinking about a physical
manifestation. Jesus answered and said to him,
If a man love me, he will keep my words, and my Father will
love him, and we will come to him and make our abode with him. What is this obedience he's speaking
about here? Keeping his commandments. Remember what he says in 1 John
3 and verse 23? This is his commandment. That
you believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as he has given us commandment
and that you love one another. believe on Christ and love one
another. That's the commandments he's
speaking about here. Verse 24, he that loveth me not keepeth
not my sayings and the word which you hear is not mine but the
Father's which has sent me. These things have I spoken to
you being yet present with you but the Comforter, here it is,
the Comforter which is the Holy Ghost whom the Father will send
in my name, he shall teach you all things. What will the Comforter
do when he comes to you? He will teach you all things,
and bring all things to your remembrance whatsoever I have
said to you. So what is the work of the Spirit
of God in the believer? It's to take the things Christ
has said and to teach them to us. And by doing so, he comforts
us. Christ, when he was on the earth,
spoke himself, by his own words, and taught his disciples. And
they were comforted by his words. Now another comforter comes.
What does he say? Something different? No. He speaks
the words of Christ and teaches them to us. Verse 27, "...Peace
I leave with you, my peace I give to you, not as the world gives
to you. Let not your heart be troubled,
neither let it be afraid. You have heard how I said unto
you, I go away and come again to you. If you loved me, you
would rejoice because I said I go to the Father, for my Father
is greater than I. And now I have told you before
it has come to pass that when it is come to pass, you might
believe." And then he goes on, and I want to read also in chapter
15. Look at this. In chapter 15, after telling
them that the unbelieving world would crucify him without cause,
it would hate him without cause, he says in verse 26, But when
the Comforter is come, whom I will send to you, now the Lord Jesus
Christ says, I will send him. In chapter 14 he says, my Father
will send him. Well, which one of them? Is it
the Lord Jesus, or is it the Father who sends the Spirit?
Well, it's both. Because whatever God the Father
does, the Son does also. And whatever the Son does, He
does in His Father's name. And whatever the Father does,
He does in His Son's name. You see, it's all about the lifting
of Jesus on high. God's exalting His Son, and through
His Son accomplishes His work. He's given everything into His
hand. The Father does nothing but what He does through His
Son. And so the Lord Jesus Christ is going to send His own Spirit,
the Spirit of God. When the Comforter is come, whom
I will send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of Truth, which
proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me." Oh, what
a glorious word this is. He shall testify of me. And you also shall bear witness
because you've been with me from the beginning. What is the Spirit
of God going to do when He comes? In the disciples, He's going
to be with them. He's going to be in them, and
He's going to speak of Christ, He's going to take the words
of Christ, teach them by those words that Jesus spoke, remind
them of those words, so that they know them in their heart,
and He's going to take the things of Christ, He's going to testify
of Christ, and because of that, what are the disciples going
to do? They're going to speak of the Lord Jesus as well. They're
going to speak of one thing. Christ, and Him crucified. Because that's what the Spirit
of God teaches us. The Lord Jesus Christ. Look at
chapter 16 of John, in verse 13. Well, let me read from verse 8, since
we're there. John 16, verse 7. Nevertheless, I tell you the
truth, it is expedient for you, for the disciples, that I go
away. For if I go not away, the Comforter will not come to you,
but if I depart, I will send him to you. Now the Lord Jesus
by himself was the comforter, but he was within the constraints
of a physical body. He couldn't go in that physical
body over the entire earth. So in His disciples, He puts
His Spirit so that through the Spirit of God and their ministry
after Christ is on the throne of heaven, that He could send
Him throughout all the earth and accomplish the salvation
through the preaching of the gospel that He intended to do. So he says, if I go not away,
the Comforter will not come to you. This is verse 7, John 16.
But if I depart, I will send him to you. And when he has come,
he will reprove, or convince, the world of sin, and of righteousness,
and of judgment. Of sin, because they believe
not on me. So, the Spirit of God first convinces us of our
sin, and that we don't believe on Christ. And so we're under
the wrath of God. And then He convinces the world
of righteousness. Because I go to my Father, and
you see me no more. Righteousness is fulfilled. That's why the Lord Jesus went
to the Father. Hebrews 1.3, when He had by Himself
purged our sins, He sat down on the right hand on high, because
the work was finished. God created the world in six
days and on the seventh day he rested because it was all done.
Christ sat down on heaven's throne because the work of our redemption
was all done. And so righteousness is finished.
It's the perfection of God's people and the fulfillment of
God's will is accomplished in the obedience of Christ unto
death. Righteousness is finished. And so the Spirit of God is sent
to convince the world of this in the hearts of God's people.
And you shall see me no more. And of judgment, because the
prince of this world is judged. Why? Because a court session
was held in heaven. Christ presented His blood. And
that silenced every accusation of the devil and Satan was cast
out of heaven. The prince of this world is judged.
The world is judged. The unbelieving world is judged.
Justice has been satisfied. God's people are released. The
ransom has been paid. And every enemy is subdued. In
verse 11. And then in verse 12. I have yet many things to say
to you, but you cannot bear them now. How be it? Notice. When
he The Spirit of Truth is come. This is speaking of Him as a
person, isn't it? He will guide you into all truth. So He hasn't
come yet because Christ has not yet gone to the cross, ascended
and sat down on the right hand of God. But when He comes, the
Spirit of Truth He will guide you into all truth, for He shall
not speak of Himself." In other words, He's not going to speak
independently of the Father. or of the Son, and he's not even
going to teach so much about himself, but, he says, but whatsoever
he shall hear, that shall he speak, and he will show you things
to come. He shall glorify me, for he shall
receive of mine, and shall show it to you. This is so significant.
What does it say in Galatians 3? In verse 13 and 14, the blessing
of Abraham, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law,
being made a curse for us, that the blessing of Abraham, our
justification by Christ, might come on the Gentiles, not just
Jews only, but the Gentiles also, through Jesus Christ, that we
might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. And
the promise of the Spirit is what Jesus has spoken about.
What does he do when he comes? He glorifies the Lord Jesus Christ. He takes the things of Christ
and makes them known to believers. He gives them faith in order
that they might know the things of God. We can't know the things
of God, can we? Unless the Spirit of God makes
them known to us. Isn't that what it says in 1
Corinthians 2? Turn there with me. 1 Corinthians
2.7 while you're turning. But we speak the wisdom of God
in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom which God ordained before
the world unto our glory. And what is that wisdom? Christ
and Him crucified. He just said it in chapter 1,
verse 24. To us who are being saved, Christ
is the power of God, the wisdom of God. So we speak the wisdom
of God in a mystery. Even the hidden wisdom which
God ordained before the world to our glory, which none of the
princes of this world knew, They didn't understand who Jesus was
and why he came. For had they known it, they would
not have crucified the Lord of Glory. He's the Lord of Glory. And yet they didn't know him,
and so they crucified him. But as it is written, Speaking
about the wisdom of God, "...Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man the things which
God hath prepared for them that love him." That's the glory he's
speaking about. God's wisdom, sending Christ
to save us from our sins and bring us to glory and give us
glory. And that glory, eye has not seen, ear has not heard,
it hasn't entered into the heart of man the things which God has
prepared for them that love him. "...But God hath revealed them
to us by His Spirit." You see? What does God reveal to us by
His Spirit? The things of Christ. But it's speaking about the glory
which was ordained before the world for us. What was that glory? It was the everlasting righteousness
and everlasting life established for us in the blood of Christ.
And God reveals that to us by His Spirit. He shows us what
Christ has obtained for us by His glorious eternal achievements
to the glory of God. And what is that? Eternal redemption. Justification by His blood and
righteousness. Our eternal, not only our redemption,
but our perfection in the eyes of God. Sinless and spotless
before Him to God's exceeding great joy and ours. All these
things, our sonship, it's all made known to us through the
Spirit of Christ, sent from God, from His throne on high, that
we might know these things. God has revealed them to us by
His Spirit. For the Spirit searcheth all
things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth
the things of a man, save the Spirit of man which is in him?
I don't know you, unless you make yourself known. Even so,
the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God. But
we have received not the spirit of the world, but the spirit
which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely
given to us of God. That's why it says in Galatians
3.3 that we might receive the promise of the spirit through
faith. Not that faith brings the spirit
to us. But that faith in believing Christ,
we see by the revelation of the Spirit, the things that Christ
has purchased for us and obtained for us. And so the ministry of
the Spirit reveals Christ to us and assures us that what Christ
did is for us and makes it ours. And gives us that peace and joy
in believing, as it says in Romans 15, verse 13. And so I'm going
to go on in 1 Corinthians 2. He says, I'll read it again in
verse 12. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world,
but the spirit which is of God, that we might know the things
that are freely given to us of God, which things also we speak,
not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth. It's not by
an intellectual process, studying and trying to figure all these
details out. It's the revelation of the gospel. It's simple. It's singular. It's all what Christ has done.
Who He is and who He is to us, to God for us, as our High Priest
and Mediator. It's all these things. It's simple.
When we understand it, it becomes crystal clear. It's easy to understand
because God's Spirit makes it known. Until then, we're completely
blind to it. The things of God are simple
to understand when they're made known by the Spirit of God. How
hard is it to understand that I'm a sinner, and that I'm corrupt
in my nature, that I'm helpless to do one thing about it, and
that God's judgment is against me because of my sin and my corruption?
And I can't get out from it. But God in His mercy acted on
behalf of His own glory and did it by His Son as our substitute. He took our sins and answered
for them. Is that hard to understand? Well,
it's hard until we know we're sinners and have no hope. Until
then we think we've got to go about doing something. I've got
to get busy. I've got to make God happy. I've got to keep Him
happy in order to get blessings. In order to avoid the curse of
God's law. All these things arise from within
the natural heart of man and they're sinful. The only way
to be justified before God is by Christ Himself taking our
case and going to God with His own blood. Making full satisfaction
for us. It's all done by Him. And we
stand and outside of ourselves we see what Christ has done.
And we look upon it. And that look... is the work
of the Spirit of God. And we rest in Him. And we take
to ourselves the benefits of what He's done. That's receiving
the promise of the Spirit through faith. We're receiving the blessings
of the Spirit through the operation of the Spirit in us through God-given
faith. In other words, the promise of
the Spirit is Him in us, living in us, Christ in us, giving us
faith in Christ for us. The same thing taught throughout
Scripture. And so verse 13, which things also we speak, the things
God has revealed by His Spirit. Not in the words which man's
wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth, comparing
spiritual things with spiritual. Not circumcision with the physical
elements of the Lord's Supper, or with baptism. No, we compare
spiritual things with spiritual things, what Christ has done.
The Spirit of God in us. Faith in Christ. Those are spiritual
things. The truth of God. Not what we
do. Not the law. As a way of getting
God to favor us and bless us. But, he says in verse 14, "...the
natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God,
their foolishness to him, neither can he know them, because they
are spiritually discerned." We can't know the things of God
unless He makes them known to us, and that is by His grace.
Paul, back to Galatians chapter 3. Look what he says again. Verse
2 of Galatians 3. This only would I learn of you.
Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing
of faith? When you first heard of Christ
and believed on Him, was that the effect of your own works?
Did you hear of what you had to do, and then you did it, and
therefore God blessed you? Or did you just hear about what
Christ did, and you were persuaded, that's all my life, all my hope.
And you saw in that moment of God-given sight in Christ, that
your salvation was accomplished outside your personal experience,
and you rested. And every day of your life since
then, You rest in what Christ has done, and you rejoice in
Him, and you worship God because of Him. That's the work of the
Spirit. You didn't receive that faith
because you did something. You received it by the Spirit
of God. It was through the hearing of the Gospel of Christ and Him
crucified. And God gave you faith. the sight
to understand and perceive, and the persuasion that this is yours,
and you embraced it with a glad heart, nothing could be better. And so he says it that way. Now
go back to John, the Gospel of John again, and look at John
chapter 7. We're talking about the promise
God made to give His Spirit to His people in this new covenant,
this New Testament, which was made to us by the blood of Christ. We receive the Spirit of God
because Christ suffered and died and fulfilled the will of God
and established for us an everlasting righteousness by which we're
justified and so God sends His Spirit from Christ on His throne
on high. John chapter 7 and verse 37. There was a great feast, the
Feast of Tabernacles, and it's the very end of the feast and
all the people had eaten and drunk for days. And now at the
end of the feast, after everyone is full, completely full, they've
been feasting for seven days. Can you imagine? Who would stand
up and say this thing if you had just completed a feast? In
the last day, verse 37, John 7 verse 37, In the last day,
that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying,
If any man thirst, who out there who had been eating and drinking
would be thirsty? I'll tell you who. a man who
was a sinner, who couldn't do what God required, and he knew
he was damned for his own sin, and he could do nothing about
it, and he was thirsty to know how he might be saved by God,
and come to God and be accepted by Him, and stand before God
in peace in God's presence, and know in his soul who God is,
and commune with God, That's the kind of man. And here's what
Jesus said. In that last day, that great
day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried saying, If any man
thirst, a thirst even itself given to us by God, What is that
man to do who thirsts? Not physical thirst. We know
what physical thirst is, don't we? The Lord Jesus uses thirst,
a physical thirst, to teach us about a much deeper and substantial
spiritual thirst of our soul. An unmet need of our soul which
can't be satiated or satisfied by anything except this one thing. Jesus said, if any man thirsts,
do what? Let him come to me and drink."
There it is, the fountain of living waters, the Lord Jesus
Christ, and Him crucified. That's it, isn't it? Come to
me, Jesus said, you who have no money. In Isaiah 55, ho everyone
that thirsteth. Come ye to the waters, the Lord
Jesus Christ, the fountain of living waters." And he goes on.
Come to me and drink. Drink. Dip your cup into the
wells of salvation and drink deeply, coming to Christ. What do you need? Do you need
to remove your sins before you come? Do you need to clean up
yourself? Do you need to make yourself
presentable to God? No. If you do that, then you
deny the fact that you're thirsty with a thirst that you can't
meet. You come to Christ because only in Christ can that thirst
be met. In the Lord Jesus Christ, whose
blood alone cleanses us from all sin, He says, if any man
thirsts, let him come to me and drink. Verse 38. He that believeth on me. That's what drinking is. People
get all confused about these words, these physical things,
actions in scripture like eating and drinking. They don't understand.
And coming. It's simply... pointing to this
one act, a spiritual act of the heart and soul, looking to Christ,
seeing what God has said, believing this is all my life, this is
all my salvation, and trusting Him. with joy in our heart. God-given persuasion, God-given
sight, and God-given thankfulness and joy resting in him. He that
believeth on me, not on yourself, not on what you can do or be
someday, but on me to do it all. As the scripture has said, this
is what's going to happen to the one believing. It says, out
of his belly shall flow rivers of living water, But this he
spake of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive.
For the Holy Ghost was not yet given, or not yet come, because
Jesus was not yet glorified. When the Lord Jesus sat down
on the right hand of the throne of God, He sent His Spirit. That's
when He sent His Spirit. Was the Spirit in the world before
then? Clearly, He was. Doesn't it say so in Scripture?
1 Peter 1, verse 10, it says that the prophets of old spake
of Christ by the Spirit of Christ which was in them. They spake
of the sufferings and the glory of Christ by the Spirit of Christ
which was in them. David himself said, Lord, in
Psalm 51, verse 11, take not your Holy Spirit from me. And
throughout scripture it speaks of the water and compares it
to the Spirit. And God promises how He would
pour out His Spirit on all flesh. In other words, the Spirit had
not yet come in a way in which He would fulfill the building
of Christ's temple, calling His people with an effectual call,
pointing them to Christ with God-given faith. So that they
would see and believe him through the preaching of the gospel.
That ministry of the spirit that the apostles fulfilled when he
was poured out on Pentecost. It was not some kind of a babbling
going on like is claimed by many people today. That you get a
second blessing, that's what you need. All of that is heresy. It's false. It detracts from
Christ and Him crucified. It claims that there's some kind
of a second blessing that we get from God by the Spirit. It's not true. There's nothing
in the Bible that speaks of that. The apostles were given the Spirit.
They had the Spirit of God with them, according to John 14, even
before Christ left them. But He was in them in a way that
took the things of Christ accomplished for them and made them real to
them through this operation of faith. The promise of the Spirit,
all that Christ obtained for us in His death, our justification,
our adoption, our redemption, our perfection, our sanctification,
even our future glorification, all these things He accomplished
by His death, they are made known to us. Eye hasn't seen it, ear
hasn't heard it, but the Spirit of God makes it known. And He
makes it known in such a way that He teaches us He convinces
us. You don't need anyone to teach
you. The Spirit of God in you has given you an unction. You
know all things. All the things Christ has done.
You know them because in the Gospel they're declared to you
and in your heart. He's given you a persuasion of
them. A man doesn't have to persuade
you of it. God has done that. And so he
says here that they would receive the Spirit, the Holy Ghost, not
yet come, or given, because Jesus was not yet glorified. But when
He came, those who heard the gospel preached believed on Him. And they themselves had this
river of water. The grace of the Spirit of God
is compared to a river of water flowing out of their belly. How
do you know what's in a man's heart? How do you know what a
man is thinking? Well, you listen to what he says,
don't you? You see how he acts. And didn't the Lord Jesus say,
out of the abundance of the heart, what does a man do? Out of the
abundance of the heart? He speaks. In other words, what
you say is simply what you really believe in your heart. The way
you really are. And what does a believer talk
about? What does he speak to God in prayer? What does he confess
with his lips? What does he speak in fellowship
with the saints? What is the one desire of his
heart? I want to know more and more about Jesus. Tell me the
old, old story. And I want to tell you the old,
old story of Jesus and His love. The Son of God who loved me and
gave Himself for me. Isn't that what we talk about?
Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law. God has made
Him unto us wisdom and righteousness, sanctification and redemption.
And we look at Isaiah 53, look at the glad report, the good
tidings. And we look at what he suffered
on Calvary and how he went into the grave and put our sins away
and rose from the dead and is exalted in God's right hand because
he accomplished our salvation. And we love to talk about these
things. We love to turn it over in our mind and we look into
it. We search the scriptures and
we hear sermons and we come week by week wanting to worship God
in spirit and in truth. To know the things of God which
the Spirit of God takes and shows us by showing us Christ and Him
crucified. This is the operation, the ministry
of the Spirit. It's not some mumbo-jumbo, some
language that people utter uncontrollably. That's a man-made attempt to
make up, to generate a work of God by doing something. It's
just another evidence of man's attempt to make himself spiritual. When only God can do that, He
shows us Christ and He says, look upon Him. Do we do something? Do we do something physically
in order to make this happen? Do we try to gain God's favor
by our baptism? Or do we try to get God to bless
us because we eat the Lord's Supper? Well, that's exactly
what the Galatians were doing with circumcision. What can I
do? I've got to do something to make
myself perfect. Yes, I've heard the gospel, but
I've got to go on. I've got to make myself perfect now. I've
got to be circumcised. I've got to receive some grace
from God, so I've got to take the Lord's Supper, or I've got
to be baptized, all these things. It's all another facade of man's
attempt to try to get something from God by what he does physically,
or what he thinks, his attitude. The gospel is all about Christ. It's to get our attention away
from ourselves and lift up Jesus on high. Jesus said in John 12,
32, that if I am lifted up, I will draw him into me. That's the
answer. That's what the Spirit of God
does. He preaches and teaches and leads us to Christ and comforts
us in so doing. And that's the blessing of Abraham.
the promise of the Spirit of God, the justification that comes
to us by faith, and all the blessings that come to us through that.
I could read many scriptures about this, but I'll just take
you back to Isaiah 55. I love this text of scripture. We're just going to read through
this, and then we'll close. Isaiah 55. I hope you understand
something about how we receive the promise of the Spirit through
faith. We receive the ministry of the Spirit of God, which is
revealing Christ to us through faith. And God gives us that
faith. And when He does, we're assured
that what Christ did is all of our salvation, all of our hope,
all of our glory. Didn't He say in Galatians 5.5,
Through the Spirit, do wait for the hope of righteousness by
faith. That's it. By the Spirit, we
wait. We look in hope, in expectation,
a confident expectation, because of Christ's righteousness, and
that's all by faith. God-given faith. Isaiah 55. Ho,
attention everyone that thirsteth. Come ye to the waters. The waters
of the gospel, the waters of salvation, which are in Christ,
the fountain of living waters. And it goes on, you who are thirsty,
come to the waters. He that hath no money, Your debt
is great and you have nothing to pay. Come ye, you who have
no money and are thirsty, come and buy and eat. Ye, come and
buy wine and milk without money and without price. There's no
price that could be put upon it. It's a price beyond pricing. And it's certainly beyond your
reach. And then he asks this question of stupid, senseless
sinners. Wherefore do you spend your money
for that which is not bread, and your labor for that which
satisfieth not? That's what we do, don't we?
When we think that we live by our own obedience to God because
we did what God required, instead of living on Christ's obedience
and the dependence upon God to give us grace and conform us
to the image of Christ, When we do that, when we live that
way, we're wasting our money and spending our labor for what
cannot satisfy. But here's what we're to do.
Hearken diligently unto me. That's what we do as believers.
Faith comes by hearing. Hearing by the Word of God. The
Word of God teaches us the Gospel of Christ and Him crucified.
I want to know about it. I need to know about it. I got
to hear about it. I want to believe it. Lord, show
it to me. Make Him my life. Hearken diligently
to me and eat ye that which is good. And let your soul delight
itself in fatness. Not in leanness. Fatness. It's
healthy fat. That's what faith does. Just
give it to me. I want to see Christ. I want
to know Christ. I want to feed upon Him by faith. A God-given
faith. I want to receive all that He
purchased by grace alone. I bring nothing to myself. In
fact, I'm ashamed of everything about me. I find no strength
in myself, but I find it all in Christ my Savior, and so I
worship God, looking to Him, and I'm rejoicing, and I'm looking
to Him, and in so looking, it says in 2 Corinthians 3.18, we're
changed into the same image, even from glory to glory, by
the Spirit of God. So delight yourself in fatness.
In the fatness of Christ work for us. Take it and eat it by
faith. Incline your ear and come to
me, Christ says. Here and your soul shall live. We don't have ears. We're unable
to hear, but when God commands us to hear and preaches the gospel
of Christ to us, boom, He gives us ears to hear. And then we
hear. And His command to hear is fulfilled
because He qualified us to hear. And He grants us His Spirit and
gives us faith in Christ. And we say, the Lord, He's everything. He's all of my salvation, all
of my desire. And he goes on, and we could
go on here, but look at verse 11. Verse 8, he says, My thoughts
are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith
the Lord. It's all by grace. It's all done
by Christ. For as the heavens are higher
than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my
thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain cometh down,
and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth
the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give
seed to the sower, and bread to the eater. In other words,
fruit to God. So shall my word be that goeth
forth out of my mouth. It shall not return to me void,
but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall
prosper in the thing whereunto I send it." You see, it's all
because of the gospel preached to us by the Spirit of God. Promise,
the blessing of Abraham, justification. Eternal salvation in Christ our
Savior. The promise of the Spirit to
know these things by God-given faith. I hope you see this. Christ said, if you're thirsty,
if any man thirst, let him come to me and drink. May God give
us grace to do so. Let's pray. Father, we pray that
we would so come to you as the Lord Jesus spoke in John chapter
7 and verse 37 through 39. We would find it in our souls,
a great unmet need, a soul thirst that supersedes every other desire
to be found in Christ, accepted by God without our own righteousness,
our own personal obedience to God's law. but seeing that only
Christ's obedience and blood make us fit to come and to be
received by God himself in peace, and not just merely fit, but
the objects of special blessing, sons of God, heirs of God himself
with Christ. inheritors of eternal and everlasting
life, to know God in our souls, and to live forever with Him,
and to see His face in peace and joy, boundless joy. We pray these things would be
ours according to the revelation you've given in your word. Christ
has purchased for us. Minister these things to us by
your Spirit. Give us this faith to lay hold
upon them and to know them as ours. In Jesus' name we pray,
for His sake. Amen.