While you're turning there, I'll
read something to you from Romans chapter 11. The words of our
Lord here in John 12 are full of ominous warnings, judgment,
darkness, blindness, hardness of heart that he will cause to
an unbelieving world. And yet, full of precious promises,
exceeding precious promises that we might be partakers of the
divine nature. Romans 11, Paul said, behold both the goodness
and severity of the Lord. The goodness and severity of
the Lord. So he is warning us telling us
of the wonderful goodness, the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ,
which we want to look at and hear, and which is the good news
of salvation to unworthy people. And the severity, the judgment
of God upon those who reject the truth, those who reject the
Christ. All right, John chapter 12, look
at verse 31. This is where we left off. Our
Lord said, now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this
world, speaking of Satan, Now, right then, he's talking about
going to the cross, because the next verse, he says, if I be
lifted up from the earth, will draw all unto me. This, he said,
signifying what death he should die, being crucified on the cross,
of which the whole Bible speaks from Genesis to Revelation, of
Christ and him crucified. Our Lord said, in going to the
cross, He said, at this particular time, this hour for which He
came, He said, up in verse 27, for this hour, for this cause,
came I unto this hour. He said, right now, when He goes
to the cross, is the judgment of this world. Now, this is one
of the most weighty verses in all Scripture. Now is the judgment
of this world. People of the world think there's
a future judgment, which there will be. where the sheep will
be separated from the goats, wheat from the tares, God's people
will enter into his kingdom, whether he's prepared for them
before the foundation of the world, while the others are cast
into outer darkness. But he said, going to the cross
is the judgment of this work. That Christ and him crucified
is the judgment of this work. that every human being was judged
at Calvary. That's what he said there, didn't
he? Now is the judgment of this world. Now is the God of this
world, the prince of this world, the ruler of the darkness of
this world cast out. Paul summed it up in 1 Corinthians
15, 22. He said, as in Adam all die,
even so in Christ shall all be made alive. Now all were born
in sin that come forth from Adam, scripture says. Dead and trespassed
in sin. We all die, we're all born dead
and trespassed in sin. And we're not made alive, spiritually
alive until God gives us life, until he sends the gospel, which
is the word of life and gives us life. All right? We're born dead in trespassion
and sin. We're all dead in Adam and we
all die because of sin. But now, he said, in Christ,
all made alive. Whoever's in Christ. Everyone's
not in Christ. Everyone's not in Christ. But
all in Christ shall be made alive, Scripture said. In Christ is
life. He that believeth on the Son
hath Well, everyone doesn't believe on the Son. But John 3, 36 says
the wrath of God abides upon them. But God's people are in
Christ. How do they get in Christ? Well,
1 Corinthians 1, 30 says, Are you in Christ, who of God
is made unto us salvation, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption? In Christ all be made alive. All of God's chosen people, His
elect people, His covenant people. Christ is the covenant head of
His people. They were in Christ before the
world began. They were chosen in Christ, Ephesians
1-4, before the world began. And put in Him their names written
in the Lamb's book of life. And then when Christ came, their
covenant head, he was crucified on Calvary's tree for his people,
for his sheep. He said, I lay down my life for
my sheep. He looked at some others, some
Pharisees, and said, you're not my sheep. that He laid down His life for
the sheep. And all that were in Christ when He came and was
crucified on Calvary's tree, they were judged, they were condemned,
they were sentenced, and they were killed in Christ on Calvary's
tree. Judgment was met. Like Noah's
ark. You remember Noah's ark? Who
was saved in the world? Only those in the ark. All right? The people in the
ark did not bear the wrath and the judgment, did they? They
were spared from wrath and judgment. Those outside of the ark, they
perished, all of them. And everyone outside of Christ
will perish, but all those in Christ. And those people in that
ark, The Ark bore the wrath. The Ark
bore the judgment. The Ark bore it all for them. They were spared because they
were in the Ark. That was the judgment of this
world, wasn't it? Noah's Ark. Wasn't that the judgment of this
world? God looked down upon the children of men and He said He
repented Him that He'd made them. He saw that the imagination of
man's heart was only evil continually every day. All the earth had
corrupted his way. Isn't that what it said? And
it repented. He said, I will destroy man.
All right, at Calvary's tree, that's Noah's ark. Noah means
rest, doesn't it? Christ is our rest. God's wrath
rested. All right. Noah's not in Christ
then. And here's the thing, all are
judged by John 16. Go over to John chapter 16. I
intend to go further than this verse, but I knew it was such
a weighty verse. He said, now is the judgment
of this world. Now is the prince of this world,
the God of this world cast out. That Calvary's tree, it all happened
right there. John chapter 16, our Lord said,
in a private message to his people. Verse 8. When he has come, the
Holy Spirit, he will reprove the world of sin, of righteousness,
and of judgment. All right, here's the sin. Because
they believe not on me. All manner of sin. The transgression
of the law is sin, right? All manner of sin brings judgment,
but this is the sin for which God holds everyone accountable,
for which God will punish people. Rejecting Jesus Christ. That's it. Of sin, because they
believe not on me. Do you believe? Why? It's not of yourself, it's a
gift of God. Do you see why? No flesh can
glory in His presence. If anyone believes God gave them
this precious gift, you've chosen, given to Christ. The Spirit of
God comes through the preaching of the gospel, gives you life,
gives you faith, gives you repentance. All glory belongs to Him then.
Verse 10 says, of righteousness, because I go to my father and
you see me no more. Of righteousness. You hear very
little of that today in religion, do you? You very seldom hear
the word mentioned when over 500 times righteousness is mentioned. Over 500 times. Paul throughout the book of Romans
talks about it, doesn't he? Righteousness, righteousness,
righteousness. David talks about it in Psalm
71. He said, I'll make mention of thy righteousness. You'll
deliver me in his righteousness. What's that mean? Well, Psalm
24 says this, Who shall ascend unto the holy hill of the Lord?
Who shall stand in his holy blood? Who's going to go and appear
before and be accepted by a thrice holy God who looks on the heart,
who knows the thoughts and intents of the heart? It shall be perfect
to be accepted. Who will be accepted by this
holy and just and righteous God who sees all, knows all? He that
hath clean hands, a pure heart, who hath not lifted up his soul
unto vanity, nor sworn deceitfully, he shall receive the blessing
from the Lord, and righteousness from God. He shall receive it
from the God of his salvation. And the gates will open up, and
let that person in who hath clean hands, a pure heart, never lifted
up his soul unto vanity, and never said anything deceitful."
Is that you? Anybody? None. There's none good, Paul said.
No, not one. There's none righteous. No, not one. One did come, though. In the last days came one. His
name is Jesus Christ. Covenant head. He had clean hands. He had never sinned. A pure heart,
spotless, holy, unblameable, unapprovable, separate from sinners. Never lifted up his soul under
the vanity, lived his whole life in glory to God, in service to
God, in service to God's people, keeping God's law, keeping every
commandment, in every jot, every tittle, perfectly, in thought,
in deed, in motive, pure, perfect, as the driven snow. That's Jesus
Christ. He's the only one. And it says
he never swore deceitfully. All the words out of his mouth
were truth, and right, and honest, and just, and glory to God, and
in verity and truth to all that heard him. Now, why did he do
this? Not to show us how, but to do
it for his people. The covenant head, the righteousness
of his people, and what he worked out, what he did by his righteous
and holy life, he imputed He imputed, He charged it. You've heard this a thousand
times. Everybody has heard it. Very few people in the world
hear it. Very few people know what I'm talking about. Righteousness. Righteousness. Our Lord Jesus
Christ is the Lord our Righteousness. Isaiah 45, the last verse says,
Surely shall one say, In the Lord have I righteousness. Oh,
it's not by works of righteousness which we have done, but it's
according to His mercy He has saved us. Righteousness imputed. Righteousness charged. Righteousness
imputed to our account by virtue of the death or the life of the
Lord Jesus Christ. But now, our sins have to be
paid for. The soul that sinneth must surely
die. Every sin must receive a just recompense of reward. God will
by no means clear the guilty. Not one sin will be left unpunished. Christ was made sin, 2 Corinthians
5, 21, made sin for his people. He who knew no sin, that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him. And when Christ died,
we died. God's people died. We were crucified.
He labors this over and over and over through the scripture.
He said, I was crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live,
but it's not I, but it's Christ in me. The life I now live, I
live by the faith of the Son of God who loved me and died
for me. This is the gospel plain and
clear. The gospel is nothing less than
this and nothing more than that. But Jesus Christ, covenant head,
righteousness of His people, sin payment for His people. You
and I must be found in Christ, or we'll be judged outside of
Christ. We were either judged in Christ at Calvary's tree,
or we will stand beside Him someday to be judged by God according
to His perfect righteousness. Acts 17, go over there, we'll
show you this. Paul preached this at Antioch. Acts 17, look at this. Athens,
he preached it at Athens. All right, Acts 17, verse 31.
You have it? It says, God hath appointed a
day in which He will judge the world in righteousness by that
man whom He hath ordained. Who's that? That's the Lord Jesus
Christ. We're either going to be judged
standing beside Him. And people, it must be perfect. Leviticus 22.21, the law in its
purest form. Leviticus 22.21 says it shall
be perfect to be accepted. Perfect! We're not perfect, but he is. He's perfect. He was made perfect,
Hebrews says. Oh, he's the perfect sacrifice,
a lamb without spot, without blemish. And we're judged. We were judged in him. His people
were judged in him, in him. You understand that? That's as
clear as I can make it. Now is the judgment of this world.
When Christ went to Calvary's tree, it was, as it were, Armageddon. You can go there yourself in
Revelation 16, look it up. Revelation 12 talks about Satan
being cast out into the earth. It all has its fulfillment right
here, what Christ said. That great battle that was fought
between the forces of evil and the great prince called Michael,
who is Jesus Christ, was fought at Calvary. And I'll
tell you who won. It's over. The Lord Jesus Christ
won. He brought in an everlasting
righteousness for His people. There is therefore now no condemnation,
no judgment for His people, because Christ bore their judgment on
Calvary's tree. But all the world will be standing
before the Judge, Christ. He said, the Father has committed
all judgment unto me. He's going to sit on the judgment
throne someday, and all flesh will be gathered before Him,
and here's the charge against Him. You didn't believe me. You
didn't trust me. You look to your own work. You
look to your own righteousness. You look to your church going.
You look to your baptism. You look to your works. You look
to your righteousness. You didn't look to me. You didn't
glory in me. And he says, bind them and cast
them into outer darkness. And there'll be weeping and wailing
and gnashing of teeth. But all those in Christ, are
there because of Christ, and they know it. And that's their
confession, and that's their profession, and that's what they
testify. That's rather who they testify
right now here on earth. And then in glory, everybody
in glory will be singing unto Him that loved us. Not that we
loved Him, but that He loved us first and washed us from our
sins in His own blood. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain. to receive all power, wisdom,
glory, honor, strength, everything, all adoration, all worship because
He did it of. He bore the wrath, He bore the
judgment for God's people on Calvary's tree. And how we know
that God accepted it is God raised Him from the grave like the Old
Testament priest coming out of the Holy of Holies. If He'd stayed
in there, God's angry. But He came out having God accepted
the sacrifice upon the mercy seat, the blood, and that's Jesus
Christ, our great High Priest, who went in the Holy of Holies,
not with the blood of lambs, because it's not possible that
the blood of bulls and goats would put away sin, but by His
own precious blood, Scripture says, having obtained eternal
redemption. For who? His people. He didn't
try to make an atonement for the world. He didn't make an
attempt at salvation. He made an atonement. He put
away. He paid for the sins of His people. And they're righteous.
They're spotless. They're unblameable. They're
unreprovable in God's sight. And there is therefore no judgment
for God's people. No judgment. That's good news. But outside of Christ? Wrath. We'll go back to Genesis
3. I thought I'd go on further,
but we'll just stay right here in this verse, okay? It's two-weighted. Two-weighted. Alright? This is
the covenant head. This is the woman's seed of whom
Christ, who was the Word who walked in the garden, the voice
of God who walked in the garden and preached this to the first
sinners. The first sinners who were about to be cast out of
paradise, cast out of the garden because of their sin. But our
Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Word of God, the voice of God,
came walking, spoke to them, and here is the prophecy that
He gave them. Here is the gospel that He gave
them. Now, this is Christ, I'm convinced of it, because He's
always been the voice of the Lord. And He says in verse 14, Verse 14, the Lord God said unto
the serpents, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above
all cattle, above every beast of the field. Upon thy belly
shalt thou go, and dust shalt thou eat all the days of thy
life. And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between
thy seed, the serpent has a seed, He has children. Our Lord said
that to the Pharisees one day. You're of your father, the devil.
He has his children. Sons of men, people of the world
who are not in Christ, who do not believe the Lord Jesus Christ. Those are the seed of Christ,
who is the seed of woman. All right, look on. I will put
enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her
seed. Over in Revelation 12, it talks
about a woman being chased by the dragon, which is Satan. That woman is the church, of
which we're going to talk about a little while later. That woman
is the church for whom Christ died, at the midst of whom Christ
came, the church. And it says, I'll put in between
thy seed, the serpent's seed, and her seed, which is Christ. which is His Church, and it shall
bruise thy head. The woman's seed shall bruise
thy head. Our Lord said that in the garden
before the world ever... right when the world just started.
Just started. Our Lord said, the woman's seed. This is the virgin. In Isaiah
7, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. Call his name Immanuel,
which means interpreted, God with us. Isaiah 9, 6, a child
is born, a son, the eternal son, the everlasting son of God, given
a body, made a body, born of woman, under the law, to redeem
them that are under the law, the seed of woman, not man, not
Adam. He had no seed of man in him.
He had no seed of Adam in him. He's sinless, he's spotless.
He's the seed of woman. Although she had nothing to do
with it either, because that holy thing was of God. This is
God's Son. God's only begotten, well-beloved
Son, sent in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned
sin into flesh. And it says, He will come. Our
Lord said, He will come and bruise the serpent's head. The word
bruise there is crush. The word bruised there is put
his foot on his head, like remember David and Goliath we looked at
last week? All of Israel's salvation depended upon David cutting the
head off that giant. Did he do it? Yes, he did. Did Christ crush the serpent's
head? Did Christ take captivity captive? Huh? Scripture speaks about the
world being under the captivity of the devil, but not his people.
He removed them from captivity. He led captivity captive. He
sends the gospel of their freedom, of their redemption, of their
deliverance, and leads them captive to him out of the captivity of
Christ, out of the bondage of Satan and sin and the world. And he put his head at Calvary.
Our Lord put his foot on the head of that serpent right then
and there. He said, now is the judgment
of this world. Now is the prince of this world
cast out. Now he's come to me. He said
he doesn't find anything in me. And now I'm going to crush his
head. I'm going to crush his power.
Just read it for yourself in Revelation 12. It's a complete
fulfillment or recollection of what Christ is saying there.
And it says, but it says that he, the serpent, shall bruise
his heel. You remember Satan put it in
the heart of Judas to betray our Lord. Who did it? Who did
it? It was Satan's will? Satan did
it? No, God, he did what God determined
before to be done. Judas was the son of perdition
from the beginning. He was, our Lord chose him to
be his betrayer. And before Judas did what he
did, our Lord, in the next chapter, the Lord says to Satan, He gave
him permission to go into Judas. And he did. And he went and betrayed
him. Alright, now Satan thinks. Satan's
not omniscient. He doesn't know everything. No,
no. He thinks, I've got him now. I've got him now. I'm going to
put an end to this son of God. And so Satan entered into Judas. Judas betrayed him. Evil men
with wicked hands took and crucified the Lord of glory. They did what
God determined before to be done. They did what Exodus 12 says,
everyone will take the Passover lamb and every one of them will
kill him. Both Herod and Pontius Pilate and all the people, the
Jew and the Gentiles, everyone's going to take him, reject him,
despise him and reject him and put him on Calvary's tree. But
they did what God said to do in fulfillment of his truth.
And Satan thought, I've got him now. when all the while Satan is doing
exactly what the Lord purposed for him to do. And in attempting
to destroy the Son of God, he destroyed himself. I remember as a young man reading
with some friends of mine, we were reading, I think it was
Matthew Henry that said, Satan with every blast of his hammer
against the children of God, is a blow, is a striking blow
that he did not intend to happen. He tries to hit them and says,
oh, that's not what I meant. Oh, that's not what I meant to
do. Oh, that's not what I meant to do. And when he put it in Satan,
Judas' heart to betray the Lord Jesus Christ, and when he led
all those evil people to crucify the Lord Jesus Christ, God's
hand came down hard right then on Satan, the forces of evil. Sin was put away. The rulers
of the darkness of this world were put in chains. God's people were delivered right
then and there. Oh, you say, but they're sinners.
They're born and they live and then they have to hear that.
That's true, but it's just a given. It's a fact. He said, all that
the Father giveth me shall come to me. They shall come to me. They're
going to hear the gospel and they're going to be delivered
from captivity and from the love of sin and this world. And they're
going to be my disciples from then on. And in the last day,
they're going to come and be with me and sit with me on the
throne while all the rest of the world will stand before me
condemned for one thing, rejecting the Son of God. That's it. That's it. Gospel as clear as
I can make it. Gospel according to the Lord
Jesus Christ. All right.