John 19. Go with me to John chapter
19. John 19. Read with me verses 23 and 24,
which we read in Psalm 22. Our Lord is being crucified,
and the soldiers when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments
and made four parts to every soldier a part, and also his
coat or robe. Now, the coat was without seam,
woven from the top throughout. They said, therefore, among themselves,
soldiers that is, let us not rend it, but cast lots for it,
whose it shall be, that the Scriptures might be fulfilled, which saith,
They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they
did cast lots. And these things therefore the
soldiers did." These men did what God said was to be done. Everything our Lord did was to
fulfill Scripture. Everything. And everything men
did to Him and said about Him was to fulfill Scripture, that
we might know. God wrote this book. God is true. Every man's a liar. I want you to turn with me to Hebrews
2. And what I want us to see in
these garments of his. That's written in all four Gospels. This is written. All four Gospels
tell us about the garments being rent or divided, four parts,
and the robe not being rent, the cash lot. All four Gospels.
What's the significance? What's this about? Why did God
write it once, but alone, four times? We must need to know this. We must. And what I want us to
see is these garments. These garments of His. These
garments of Christ's war were the garments of our great High
Priest. Now, I told Mindy that I agonized
over this. I lost sleep thinking about it. Like the Bible said, I don't
want it to be just a study of the garments. I want us all to
feel naked and that we need to be covered in the background.
I want us all to see that we must have a high priest. There are no more high priests.
Do you know that? There are no more high priests like the Pope
pretends to be. All these men who pretend to
be these priests, they're phonies, they're fake, they're anti-Christ. Any man that pretends to do what
Jesus Christ only can do is anti-Christ. The Pope, these cardinals, these
priests, all of them who dress up They try to dress up in these
holy garments, these priestly garments, are fakes and phonies
and they're anti-Christ. That's how serious it is. Our
Lord's garments were not different than anybody else that you ran
into. Do you understand? That's not what
set him apart. That's not what proved him to
be a holy man. The cloth. All his garments he wore perished. There is no shroud of Turin.
There is no burial cloth. It's gone. It's rotted. It's
just a cloth. Can't save anybody. Can't do
anything. The actual clothing of our Lord Jesus Christ. There's
no salvation in a thing. There's no salvation in a place. Salvation is only in a person.
And all these garments represent His person and His work, our
great high priest. You know, people feel this. One
man called it priestcraft, the craft of being a priest, crafty.
It's like witchcraft. It's just as it is worse. It's
more evil. People feel a need for priests.
Probably not so much anymore, you know. But people still have
a need for a priest. And people still go into little
booths and confess their sins. They feel a need to confess their
sins to a priest. They hear, this is the man that
takes confession. And they feel a need for an even
higher priest, one who is much higher than these common priests.
One who sits as his holiness, whom we can go to and he imparts
unto us heavenly favors and divine blessings. He has that power
with God to confer upon us heavenly, divine favors. That's what people
think about the Pope. They do. Didn't some of you,
some of you in Catholicism, isn't that what you thought? This is
the man who's closest to God. He can get me to God. People,
there's only one mediator between God and me and the man Christ
Jesus. We have the, we must have a priest. We must have a priest.
Someone to confess to. You know what the issue is? You know what the issue is? Sin. This is the issue between man
and God. We need somebody to put it away. We need somebody
to confess our sins to. We need somebody that when we
confess them to, He can put them away. There's only one. There's one. If you don't hear
another thing I say, we have a high priest, Jesus Christ,
who's passed into the heavens. Look at chapter 2 of Hebrew,
verse 17. In all things it behooved Christ
to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and
faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to do what?
Make reconciliation for the sins of the people. How many times
have we heard that? How many times have we heard
that? Sin's a problem. Sin's our problem.
It's a problem with this world. It's a problem between us and
God. Always has been, always will be. It's a problem we need
to get rid of. And only God can do it. Only
Jesus Christ can do it. It's what we need to confess
all the time. It's what we need to eschew.
It's what we need to avoid. It's what we need to mortify.
But we can't do it without sin. Sin, sin, sin. You see, look
at Chapter 3, Hebrews 3, verse 1. Brethren, partakers of the
heavenly calling, consider the apostle and high priest of our
profession, Christ Jesus. Chapter 4, look at chapter 4
with the Hebrew, chapter 4. And as I was preparing this and
writing all these verses down, I thought, it's going to bog
down. We're going to read through Hebrew, it's going to bog down. How could we bog down reading
this, God's Word? How could I bog, how could I
say that, you know, just go on, don't read it. Look at verse
14, Hebrews 4. Seeing then we have a great high
praise. We have one. Passed into the
heaven. He's not sitting in a booth.
He's not sitting in Rome. He's sat at the right hand of
the majesty on high. All power, all authority, the
ability to to do whatever he will. What do you need? What
do you need? The leper said, Lord, I want
to be clean. Clean. The blind man said, Lord, I want
to see. See! The deaf man. The woman will initiate. He's
only one. He's just one in heaven and earth. One. Jesus Christ is the one. Great high priest. So he says,
oh, verse 15, I cannot not read this. We have a high priest,
he's touched. He's not one who cannot be touched
for the feet of our infirmities, like those imposters that shield
themselves from the world and sin. No, He came into this world
and He was made sin, tempted at all points, like as we are,
yet without sin. So let's come boldly, shall we,
to the throne of grace. It's a throne, all right, but
it's grace. That we may obtain what? What
do we need more than anything on this earth? Mercy. It's of the Lord's mercies that
we're not consumed. Do you hear me? It's going to
be the Lord's mercy that every person in this room is not consumed
by sin, by the God of this world, by the by the world and by the
wrath of God. It's going to be the mercy of
God. Where is the mercy of God? It's in a person. If anyone had
asked, Lord, be merciful to me. Seven word prayer. Lord, be merciful
to me, the sinner. I will. And Brother Kelly lasts What he says last prayer. You
need a high priest? I do. That's you and I come bolder,
shall we? The only right we have to come
to is our sin. Our need. All the fitness He
requires is to fill your need of Him. Come. Come. Oh, everyone that thirsteth,
come and watch. We have a high priest. See, God hasn't changed. Go back. I want you to turn to Leviticus
4. Leviticus chapter 4. Leviticus 4. God hasn't changed. God is holy, holy, holy. God will punish sin. God always
has, God does, and God will. God hasn't changed. The way to
worship God, the way to approach God has not changed. The way
God told His people to approach Him, to come to Him, to worship
Him, It hasn't changed from the Old Testament, from the beginning.
He told them they needed a tabernacle, tent, or a temple. They needed
a sacrifice lamb without the shade of blood. He
said they need a high priest to offer up that, and it's just
one. Just one man is to go in and offer the sacrifice. Brothers
and sisters, Jesus, these three, are one. He's the place, we come
to Him. We don't come to a building,
we come to Christ. He's the sacrifice, He's the
Lamb. Behold the Lamb of God that taketh
away the sin of the world, whose blood alone obtained redemption
for His people. And He's the High Priest. He's
the one that took His own blood into the Holy of Holies and put
it on the mercy seat. He's the mercy seat. He's all these things. Leviticus
4, as I said, sin. Sin is the issue. The reason Christ is crucified,
the reason He's on this cross right now, why? Sin. He came into the world to do
what? Save sinners. From what? Sin. The penalty of
it, the power of it, and the presence of it. We need forgiveness
of sin. We need to have an atonement
made for our sin. We need our sins forgiven. We
need our sins covered. And as I said, the people all
over, they feel some guilt and they go into these little booths
and they confess their sins to men, or even people that don't
have any religion, they confess them to one another, and it does
no good. If we confess our sins to the
right one, He is faithful to forgive our sin and cleanse us
from all wrong. Jesus Christ. As I said, there's
three things. Tabernacle, that's his body.
The sacrifice, that's his blood. The priest, that's himself. That's
himself. Leviticus 4 talks about the sins of the people.
And it particularly deals with ignorance. The whole chapter
talks about sins of ignorance. You know, to sin against God
is ignorant. You've got to be a fool to reject
your Creator, don't you? Ignorant. Look at chapter 4,
verse 13. Look at it. If the whole congregation
of Israel sinned through ignorance, ignorance, Verse 16, the priest
that's anointed shall bring a bullock with blood into the tabernacle. Okay? Verse 20, he'll do with
the bullock as he did with the bullock for a sin offering. So
shall he do. And the priest shall make an
atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them. Ignorance. Sins of ignorance. No matter
what it is. Ignorance. Have you been ignorant? Are you? You know, there's willful sin
and there's ignorant sins. There's secret sins. There's
presumptuous sins. Sin is sin, isn't it? David prayed, Lord, don't remember
the sins of my youth. What do you do when you're young?
Just ignorant stuff. If you knew what you know now,
you wouldn't have done it. You were ignorant. You look back
and think, what was I thinking? You weren't. Ignorance. Anybody ignorant? Alright, when
you get old, you're older. Now you're through with all that.
Not hardly. And you repeat some of those
same sins. You think, what was I thinking?
David said, what was I thinking? And so he
said, Lord, Please forgive me my sins of my youth, don't remember
those, my presumptuous sins, my secret sins. Lord, help me. You know, ignorance. He goes
on and on and talks about the sins of ignorance and ignorance.
The high priest alone, he's the only one. Take this sacrifice
and go in there and offer this atonement. He said, it shall
be forgiven. It shall be forgiven. John, it lists thing after thing,
no matter what they've done. All matter of sin. It doesn't
matter. If they come to the high priest
for forgiveness, it shall be forgiven them. He does this atonement
and their sins are gone. Because he said so. Because he
made this sound. Oh, man. I don't know what you
did as a young girl or a young boy. I don't know. He does. But
I know if you come to him right now and you ask him for forgiveness,
your past is gone. It's not remembered. It's not
there. It's wiped out. The slate is, Brother Stephen,
is clean. If you ain't nothing but an ignorant
sinner, that's the best news you've ever heard. I don't know
what you've done today, this morning. You know, to not
listen to God's Word is the height of ignorance. Isn't it? That's the worst ignorance of
all. That's the worst ingratitude of all, to listen to the good
news of mercy and grace indifferently or without a care. You know,
it's the blood of Christ that keeps you from... that forgives
that. If I don't preach with all my
heart, mind and soul and strength, it's the blood of Christ. Forgive
me of it. If you don't hear it. Our Lord is hanging on the cross
at this time. And the first words, the first
words from his mouth, listen to me. This is the great high
priest. He says, Father, forgive them
for They know not what they do. She didn't know what she was
doing. He didn't know what he was doing. They don't know what
they're doing. Father, forgive them. You know
what the Father did, like in the Biblical story? He accepted
the blood and he frankly forgave them. I will. Every last one
of them. It's good news. Father, forgive them. We say,
what about these garments, preacher? Well, these garments, turn with
me to Matthew 9, Matthew chapter 9. This story best illustrates
this really. Matthew 9. And we're going to
go to Exodus 28. But Matthew 9, turn over there. As I said, His
garments are the garments of the great high priests, which
are four, we'll look at in a moment. His garments tell us who He is.
His garments tell us what He did. Okay? His garments heal
us, make us clean. His garment cleanses us from
all sin, this issue called sin. In Matthew 9, there was a woman.
Twenty. Behold a woman which was diseased
with an issue of blood twelve years. This woman had this issue
in her blood that was killing her. And she couldn't stop it. What is the issue in us? It's
in our bloodstream. We got it from our father, Adam. Sin. And we can't get rid of
it. It's going to be with us to the
day we die. It's killing us. She had an issue of blood. And
you know what she said? In her mind, she heard that Jesus
Christ, Savior of sinners, was passing by. And she said,
if I can just touch the hem of His garments, if I can just touch the hem of
his garments, I'll be healed. And she did. He did. And she was. She crawled and
just touched the hem of his garments. It's gone. She was gone. And I've already told you. There's
no power in his clothing. Go to Exodus 28, Exodus 28. But it's what these clothes represent,
it's what these garments represent, his person, his work. Exodus
28, okay, Exodus 28. And I told you, we read how that
four soldiers parted his garment, and one obtained his robe. I
hope you're with me. I'm trying my hardest, but I
can't make one person in here listen. You know there's preparation
involved in preaching. You know that? If I didn't prepare,
you'd know it. And if you don't prepare by praying, I'll know
it, and you'll know it. Preparation. Lord, bless the
preacher. Lord, bless me. Lord, bless our
children. Lord, please speak to us. Four soldiers parted his garments
and one obtained the robe. In Exodus 28, look at verse 1.
It says, Take thou unto Aaron thy brother and his sons with
him from among the children of Israel. He is going to minister
to thee. My brother, the Lord Jesus Christ,
My elder brother is the one that God chose from among the people
to minister my needs to God. To minister
the Word unto me. He's my elder brother. Anybody
had an older brother that you looked up to? Oh, I did. I loved
him dearly. We've got a brother. What a blessing.
An elder brother. Verse 2. Make holy garments for
Aaron, thy brother. What are these garments about?
Glory and beauty. Holy garments. Speak unto all
that are wise-hearted. I'm speaking to people that know
Jesus Christ, who's made unto them wisdom. You with me? You're with me. I'm going to
keep preaching to you. Speak to them that are wise in heart,
those that are filled with the spirit of wisdom, those whom
are filled with a need for Christ to be their wisdom, their righteousness,
their sanctification. Speak to them and make Aaron's
garments to consecrate him, to set him apart, to distinguish
him as their great high priest. Make these garments and put them
on their brother and let them show this is him. This is him. Look at verse 4. These are the
garments that you'll make, a breastplate, an ephod, a robe, a coat, a miter,
and a girdle. That's six things. There were
four garments and a robe, okay? The miter is not a garment, it's
a headdress. So there's five. Okay? Four and
a robe. Four garments and a robe. Right?
Okay. Verse 5, Make them take gold,
and blue, and purple, and scarlet, and fine linen, and make these
garments out of gold, and blue, and purple, and fine linen. Alright? These are the garments
of our Lord Jesus Christ's personality, character, everything He did,
His person, and His work. It says, In verse 6, the ephod
is to be made of gold, blue, purple, and scarlet, fine twine
linen, with cunning work. You know that one man made all
these things? You know that one man made every
piece of furniture? I forget what his name was. One
man the Lord raised up, named him, that would be a blessing,
and he'd make everything in that tabernacle, that temple. One
man. Isn't that a good illustration? The garments, the table, and
everything. All right? That's God in it. God hath made
him to be. All right? He says, take this
verse 6, this ephod. What's ephod? It's the first
thing mentioned. It's the undergarment. Nearly
everybody wears undergarments, right? It's the thing that's
hidden. It's this underlying garment
of everything. It's undergarment. It's made
out of linen. It's a plant, a tender plant
that grows up out of a root and you crush it and you make clothes
out of it. Linen. Anybody like linen? What is it? White. Pure. What is this? Holiness. Every
priest was to wear this undergarment of holiness under the Lord. This
was Christ's holiness. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord
Jesus Christ, the Son of the Most High God. It underlies and
undergirds everything that He is and does. His holiness. He
was holy, John, before the Lord. We all see it now. Gold is deity. Blue is eternity. Purple is royalty. Red is redemption. Christ is
all of that. Everything about Him, everything
He did, everything He said was holiness unto the Lord. God did
it. Eternal and our King of kings
and for our redemption. All these things. Gold, blue,
purple, and red. Not because God just liked the
color. It meant something. Look at the next thing, verse
8. A curious girdle of the ephod. A girdle. I don't know if you
women still wear them. Maybe you do. What does it do?
It holds everything together. A girdle. We wear belts now. It's the equivalent
of a belt is what it was. It's the tie that binds. You with me? It's the thing that
bound the high priest, the ephod, it bound it. Bound the ephod,
it binds. It's the girdle of truth is what
it is. Christ is the truth. The Word
of truth and He is bound by His Word. Bound to tell the truth,
He is truth. Bound by the Word of God to do
everything, to fulfill every jot and tittle. This is the girdle
of truth. What's it made of? Gold and blue
and purple and scarlet. See, this was God manifesting
the plan. This was God doing it. God was
doing the work of God, because man can't do it. Look at the
next thing, verse 15, a breastplate. Make a breastplate of judgment
with cunning work, skillful work. The work of the ethos. What's
she to make it of? Gold, and blue, and purple, and scarlet. What's the breastplate? What
is that? The breastplate. You know, the
breastplate had names. The breastplate had the names
of all the children of Israel. Not the whole world, but the
children of Israel engraved on this breastplate that was right
here. What is that? It's a heart of
Jesus Christ. Gold. Heart of gold, we say that. Don't ever say that again about
another human being. He had a heart of gold, didn't
he? Blue, eternal. His love was eternal. Purple,
oh, the royal, the king. The king's daughters are all
glory. He loves his daughters and will always love them. And
Scarlet, he's the Redeemer. He came to redeem and he did
it. He was in his heart to do that. God put it on his heart.
He was bound. He put it on his heart to do
it. And as another place says, He put it on these epaulets on
his shoulders, the names of all Jews. He bore all the people
on his shoulders into the Holy of Holies to put away sin. Isn't
this wonderful? Wonderful. This is Christ whose
name is wonderful. The breastplate. Then the mitre
he wore on his head. That's our Lord. He had holiness
under the Lord. The mitre had linen and gold
and silver on his head. And Christ wore that crown of
thorns. That was his mitre. But then
verse 39, I had a coat like a shirt. This wasn't a coat as we know
it, but the shirt. You had an undergarment and then a girdle
and then you had this coat over top of it, like a shirt, like
we men, women wear shirts. And it was something that was
seen. You could see it with the outward eye. What was it made
of? Linen. Gold. Blue and all of that. A girdle of needlework. What is that? That's our Lord's
profession of faith, seen by all men. He witnessed a good
profession. The just shall live by faith.
You know that? We've got to live by faith. And
Tammy, the first time that's mentioned is in Habakkuk, and
it reads this way. The just shall live by His faith. The just shall live by His faith. Brother John, he lived
as a man by faith. Why? He did it for me. See, his faith is imputed. We're saved by his faith. That's
the coat. All men saw it. They saw his
holiness, his righteous life. He's a just man. Then there's
this road. Okay? This is the covering of
it all. This robe, down in verse 31,
it said, Make a robe of ephod, of what? Blue. Pure blue. Eternal. Are you with
me? Eternal robe. And back in John 19, now go back
there and I'll quit. John 19. This robe was woven
from the top. By God. Like the veil in the
temple. You remember the veil in the
temple? It was so thick, no way a human being could rip that.
And when Christ was hanging on that cross, that veil was rent.
How? From top to bottom. Opening the
Holy of Holies one way. Jesus Christ. His blood. His
righteousness. But this robe was woven from
the top. And look at verse 23 of John
19. It was without seam, woven from
the top, without seam. There was no seam. And it says in Exodus that it
had what's called a habergen, or the hole, the collar, of that
robe was especially reinforced. It was linen and it was sewn
so well and so, with such strength that there's no way you could
rip that robe. The strongest man, the strongest
person could, no way they could take that robe and rip it. And
it had this hole that the high priest would stick his head through. And the one thing you saw was
the head. And he had this robe covered.
Our Lord wore such a robe. He always wore this robe. The four soldiers represent the
four Gospels. Every one of which tells of our
Lord's person and work. That's what they're about. The
four soldiers represent the four corners of the earth to which
the preachers of the gospel have gone. That God has a people out
of every nation, kindred, and tongue and head. Four corners
of the earth. And they go out, soldiers, and battle with the
forces of evil. And their sword is the cross
of crime. Alright? The robe And they parted
these four garments, didn't they? Four Gospels all represent a
work, an aspect of the work of the Lord. A lion, like the head
in Ezekiel, or the heads in Ezekiel in Revelation. A lion, a lamb,
and a man, and an eagle. The four Gospels. All right?
But the four soldiers saw this robe and they said, let's don't
rip this. They said, let's cast lots. Let's
roll the dice and see who gets it. Now this robe is the righteousness
of Jesus Christ that God wrought. We don't make one. Don't do it. It's a filthy rag. But his robe
is perfect, pristine, spotless. without blemish, and His robe
covers the chief of sinners, and His robe can't be rent. You're
complete in Him. You will never be rent, never
be taken from you. You're going to be robed throughout
eternity in His robe. This robe. Now Christ was stripped
for them to have His garment, wasn't He? Christ was stripped
naked. He hung on a cross naked. He
didn't have a little loincloth on Him. He had nothing on. He
was naked. Because man in the garden, before
he sinned, man was naked and no shame, no guilt, okay, without
sin. Christ had no sin. When they
stripped Him naked, He had no lust of the flesh, no lust of
the eyes, no pride of life, no sin in Him. He thought nothing
of the shame. His nakedness was not shame to
Him. It was glory. Glory. Isn't the worst thing?
We all have dreams all the time where we're found naked. Knowing,
all of us. And it's humiliating. It's awful
to think about. All men shall stand before God's
Son today, naked. Behold, in the eyes of the Lord,
naked before whom we have to do it. All things naked. Every
secret of man, Judge. I need a covering. Don't you? A robe. Christ hung naked on that cross
and they stripped Him of His garments and His robe and parted
four of those garments and the robe. They cast lots. And one
man, one out of four, got the rhythm. He doesn't realize. And I don't either, really. You
know, people gamble their lives away. And I read the commentators,
and I couldn't believe that mostly what they talked about was the
evils of gambling. Couldn't believe it. And it is
wrong. It's bad. But here's what people
gamble. They gamble with their souls.
They gamble their lives away. Oh, how people gamble and spend
money for that which is not bread. Waste their substance in this
life wanting nothing but fortune and fame and these things. That's
what people want. Fortune. Oh, if I could just
win the lottery. You know what'll happen to you? It'll ruin you.
You'll drown in this perdition. That's what Paul said about Richard.
But that's what people, they'll gamble their soul. What will
a man give in exchange for his soul? Anything. One soldier, the lot fell on
him. One soldier got the road. Scripture says, the lot is cast
in the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord. Do you know you need a covering?
Do you know you need a righteousness? Do you know you need a high praise?
Do you know you need a blood atonement? I don't mean here,
I mean here. Do you know the issue between you and God is
sin? Do you know that there's one mediator between God and
man, the man Christ Jesus? Do you know that He's all your
wisdom, your righteousness, your sanctification, your redemption?
Do you know that you need the blood of Jesus Christ, God's
Son to forgive you of your sin? Do you know that you need to
be dressed in a robe if you're in heaven someday to get there?
Do you know that? Do you know that? You know why?
The light fell on you. It was your hat. The light on
the place. You rolled the dice. Are we looking
for a church? And you didn't know what God
was looking for. I've got to believe, Brother
Kelly, that this man that got this robe, the Lord saved him.
I know for a fact that that centurion that was at the foot of the cross
may have been the one that pierced his side and got blood on him.
I know for a fact the Lord saved him. And this man that got the
robe, I'm here to tell you, anybody that gets the robe of Christ
is saved, is covered. My favorite story in all the
Bible was a young man who left his father's house and didn't
realize how good he had it and didn't realize how good his father
was to him, didn't realize the danger out in the world. He had
to get out there in the world, so he went out in the world.
Wasted his sustenance. Just a miracle of God's grace
that he didn't die like a hog in a pen. That's where he was. And God brought him to himself.
Made him realize, I'm in a hog pen and I'm going to die. I got to go home. I got to go
home. God did that. Brought him to
himself and brought him home. You know what? Before he even
got there. Before he got to the place. See,
it was the Father that was drawing him. Before he got in there,
the Father ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. You know
what the first thing the Father said? He's dressed in rags. He's half
naked like this world is, with no shame. Our Lord was without
spot and blemish. He didn't mark His body up. Don't
you do it either. That's just another show of the
flesh. Another way to show your flesh. Look at me. Don't do it,
young people. Our Lord was hanging naked and
He was without spot, without blemish. And He wasn't showing
off His flesh. Well, that prodigal came home
by the grace and the mercy of God and the power of God and
the sovereign providence of God. And the father said this, one
thing, bring the best robe. He's naked. He's in rags. He's
filthy. Cover up his flesh. Put it on
him. Cover up his flesh. He's filthy.
He's vile. He's marked himself up. Cover
him. Covered. And don't ever take
it from him. Don't ever take it from him.
Do you need it? If you do, the lions have fallen
under you, pleasantly. Okay. That's the truth. Because Christ is. 272. On Christ
the solid rock I stand. 272. Sing a couple of verses.