It's a good dilemma sometimes that
I face, not knowing which message to bring at which hour. I do
think about it because, like it or not, we approach these
hours differently. More people come in the next
hour, like Wednesday and Sunday. We're preaching the same gospel,
but still there's often a different audience or some that come at
one time and not another. Same with this morning. But it's
all the same. We're going to preach Christ.
We always hope that this is not just a Bible study, but rather
a time of worship as any other. But by definition, we do tend
to go verse by verse. That's why we call it a Bible
study. But look at Matthew 17, verses
22 and 23. We're going to just look at these
verses by themselves. Matthew 17, 22. While they abode
in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, His disciples, The Son of Man
shall be betrayed into the hands of men. And they shall kill him. And the third day, he shall be
raised again. And the disciples were exceeding
sorry. Exceeding sorry. Mark's account, Luke's account
says they didn't fully understand what he said and they didn't
want to. what he said. They understood that he said
he was going to be killed. But they didn't want to think
about it like we would not want to think about something. The
worst news we could possibly hear. The worst thing that we
want to avoid. And this is what I hope to show
us that the Lord will show us this morning is that that thing
that gives us exceeding sorrow is actually that which will give
us exceeding joy. Joy, the Scripture says, is unspeakable
and full of glory. Back in chapter 16, do you remember
this? Chapter 16 and verse 21 says,
from that time forth, He began to show unto His disciples how
that He must go into Jerusalem and suffer many things, be killed
and be raised again the third day. From that time, He began
to show His disciples. Is this on? He began to show his disciples,
not everyone, not everyone. He didn't show everyone. He showed
his disciples. He began to tell them, began
to show them who he was. He took them up on that mountain,
I remember, right after that. Showed them who he was. All his
disciples. Then and now, he shows them who
he is. Why he came. He began to tell
them, I came for this cause, I came into the world. And for
whom he did it for? For them. And in John 15, listen
to this, our Lord says, I call you not servants. Servant doesn't
know what his Lord is doing. But I have called you friends,
because all things that I have heard of my Father I have made
known unto you. You have not chosen me, he said,
I have chosen you. So to his intimate friends, as
you would, you confide in, you reveal secrets to. Not that that's
necessarily a good thing with us, but our Lord does this with
His friends, His choice friends. He makes known things to His
people that He doesn't to everyone else. He reveals secrets to them. And He began to show them from
that time forward. what He showed them, and this
is what He shows us. He hides these things from most
people. Oh, everyone knows Jesus came
and was crucified, but they don't know why. They don't know who
He is. They don't know why He had to be crucified. They just
don't know. But He shows us and our children. These things are revealed unto
us and our children, like I just read the story of Manoah and
his wife. Manoah was worried, you know,
knowing he's a sinner like we do. We worry the Lord's going
to kill us. And Manoah's wife said to him,
if the Lord were pleased to kill us, he would not have received
a burnt offering, a meat offering in our hands. He would not have
showed us all these things, nor would as at this time have told
us all these things. began to show them from that
time forward, and those whom he hath chosen, that's what he
does for them, always, at all times. And every time we meet,
the Lord, if he sends his Spirit, will show us that he came to
be killed and to be raised again. and that our sorrow will be turned
into great joy. I passed over verses, look at
verses in chapter 17, verses 10 through 13. I did not mean to. It was unintentional. They came
down from the mountain and His disciples asked Him, why do the
scribes say Elijah must first come? They got that from Malachi. 1 and 4. And our Lord said, Elijah
truly shall first come and restore all things. He will restore a
true understanding, a true God, his Christ. And he said unto
them, I say unto you, Elijah is come already. And they knew
him not, but they have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise
also shall the Son of Man suffer of him. They killed the forerunner. as they will kill the Christ's
disciples, then they understood that He spoke unto them of John
the Baptist. How does that go with what we're
looking at, what He's just said to them? Well, whenever the Lord is going to
reveal Himself to His people, He sends a forerunner. He sends
a messenger. To every single one of His children,
He sends a preacher. And when He ascended on high,
He gave gifts unto men and women, some prophets, some apostles,
some evangelists and pastors and teachers. These are the forerunners. These are the messengers sent
by the Lord before He comes to reveal Himself to His people.
It's always so. If you or I are going to hear
of Christ, we're going to hear His voice, we're going to hear
it through the preacher. So the Lord sent John. So that's
how that goes with this. And it says he'll restore all
things. Restore all things. That is,
the preacher will tell you that Christ is all. All things in
him. Alright, now look at verses 22
and 23 again. You notice the little backward
P at the beginning of verse 22. That's in the original text that
shows that there's a frame of a time period, a pause, some
time that took place between the previous verse and this one,
or a new thought or something of that sort. So some time went
by. Verse 22, while they abode in
Galilee, our Lord began to tell them again this secret, this
blessed truth. While they abode in Galilee,
stop and think about this a minute. The Lord Jesus Christ chose these
men. They didn't choose him. As he
chooses some now, we don't choose him. And he abides with his people. He comes and he lives with them. The Lord of Glory. Not all men. Oh, He came unto His own. He
was in the world. The world was made by Him. The
world knew Him not. He came unto His own. Those that
He made, they received Him not. But as many as received Him.
Why did they receive Him? Because He received them. Because
He chose them. Because He loved them. Because
He set His love and His affection on them. But they wouldn't give
Him a thought. They wouldn't know Him. And He
begins to teach them. He begins to show them. One of the disciples said, Lord,
how will You manifest Yourself to us and not to the world? He
said, My Father and I will come in and make our abode with You. We're going to live with You,
with My people, and begin to show You, teach You. What a blessing! What an evidence
that our Lord has chosen us in that He takes the things of Christ,
the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, takes the things of Christ
and shows them unto us over and over and over again. But we like
the disciples are so blind and so selfish and so childish and
we take them for granted or we fall asleep. Oh, the Lord has
called us friends and He abides with His people. Wherever Christ
is preached, wherever he has a man that really preaches Christ,
he is there. They're the chosen people of
God. And you look at the whole world in religion, in darkness,
but we're not in darkness either as others. And these secret things
that belong unto the Lord now belong to us and our children.
We don't deserve them. And our Lord said, where two
or three are gathered in My name, Whenever two or three people
really gather in Christ's name, Christ said, I will be there.
If I don't experience Him, if I don't hear Him, it's my fault. He abode with them. Oh, Thou
who changest not, abide with me. We should pray. Read Brother
Joe Terrell's article. I wish you had read that before
we started this lesson. He abode with them. They abode
together. And our Lord said unto them,
The Son of Man shall be betrayed into the hands of men, and they shall kill Him. I can't imagine what they were
feeling when He told them this or even how He said it. betrayed. The Son of God, the holy Son
of God, betrayed in the hands of men, given over to men. The Son of God. And they will kill Him. But the third day, He would rise
again. He raised again. And they were
exceeding sorry. That is, they were more sorrowful
than they had ever been before. Their sorrow, I'm hearing this,
exceeded any sorrow that they had had to this point. Exceeding
sorrow. It exceeded all sorrow. It's the last thing they want
to hear. It's the thing they did not want to hear. I want
to give us six things to learn from this. Six things to learn
from this. Number one, godly sorrow is true
sorrow. Gospel sorrow is true sorrow. Gospel sorrow is true sorrow. The greatest sorrow is really
the greatest good for God's people. The greatest sorrow is the greatest
good for God's people. Thirdly, weeping will endure
for a night. It often endures longer than
that. But the joy that comes in the
morning will exceed that. If we would listen more carefully
to what our Lord is saying, it would greatly relieve many of
our sorrows. If we would just listen more
carefully, as they should have, it would greatly relieve many
of our sorrows. Another thing is that all things,
no matter how horrible, or how much sorrow is brought. For the child of God, they work
together. They are working something. They
work together. It all goes together. It's inseparably
connected. And lastly, God's grace is sufficient
for the most exceeding sorrow. Now, gospel sorrow exceeds all
sorrow. It is true sorrow. Our greatest
sorrow ought to be over sin. Our greatest sorrow ought to
be that it was laid, our guilt and our sin was laid on the Son
of God who did not deserve it at all. If we realize, if we ever come
to this point where we realize that the Lord came to this earth
to be made sin for us, He who knew no sin, that God laid on
Him the iniquity, and my iniquity, me, I who rejected Him, that
the Lord laid on Him my iniquity, my guilt, my sin, my shame, that
the Lord had to go through what he did on my account, that ought
to give us exceeding sorrow. That ought to make us more sorry
than anything. He was wounded for our transgression. He was bruised for our wept unmercifully
for our transgressions, not His own, but for mine. That ought
to make us sorrowful. More sorrowful than ever. As our Lord, He was carrying
that cross on His bleeding back up Calvary's mountain. He was
without sleep for days, without food. It was His weakest point.
scoffed, mocked, jeered, rejected, taunted, made fun of, hurt unmercifully
physically, carrying that cross, his own death instrument. And the women were weeping, and
he stopped and said unto them, Weep not for me, but weep for
yourselves. Do you understand why I'm doing
this? No, they didn't. Nor do we fully. If we did, that
would make us sorry. Exceeding sorry. Weep for yourselves
and for your children. And if they don't come to know
me, weep for yourselves and for your
children. We weep over many things, but this ought to give us our
greatest sorrow. He was made sin for us. Our Lord
said in the garden, praying while they slept, my soul is exceedingly sorrowful,
even unto death, and sweat blood for them who slept." And that's
what I said. I ought to weep over myself.
Weep over my lack of weeping. Weep over my lack of sorrow.
Weep over And Luke's gospel, he said, let these sayings sink
down deep in your ears. What? That the Son of Man will
be betrayed and given and killed. But praise Him. Exceeding. How can we listen to this without
sorrow? And the fact that we do makes
us exceedingly sinful, doesn't it? Exceedingly sinful. Alright? That which gives greatest
sorrow, though, is for our greatest good. This is the way God does things. His ways are mysterious. Not
our ways. That which gives greatest sorrow
is for our greatest good. Christ dying on Calvary's tree
is the greatest sin and the greatest horror ever known to man. And yet God, in great wisdom
and great glory, great love to his people, brought about our
salvation. That the very ones who killed
him, the very blood that they shed, was the redemption of their
wretched souls. My, my. Godly sorrow. And really, when we first hear
the gospel, It will make us exceedingly sorrowful
over our sin, make us exceedingly guilty and ashamed, and then
God will show us why He did that, that why Christ came and He did
it for us, made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in Him, that He was our substitute. Substitution, you
see, is the sum and substance of the gospel. It's the core
and the crux of the whole. message, substitution, that somebody
had to die. And so the Scripture says that
sin must surely die. Well, he had no sin. He shouldn't
have died. Well, we did. We do. We sinned. We have sinned. We are sinned.
But God made him to be sinned. This is the sum and substance
of the gospel, substitution. And the message of substitution
is all through the Scripture, and great sorrow See, someone
dies, but they have to for someone else to live. This is the message. Let me give you an illustration.
David and Bathsheba, a child was born from them. And the child
became sick, and David went in and laid on the hearth all night,
would not eat anything, wouldn't drink anything. And they tried
to comfort him, and he would not be comforted. He begged the
Lord, beseeched the Lord, let the child live. Let the child
live. No, this child can't live. This child produced in this way
cannot live. No, no, no, no. And God took
that child. And David, while he was sick,
was more sorry than he had ever been in his entire life. And
as a result of all that, you remember David was convicted
of his sin and wrote Psalm 51. Psalm 38. Psalms like that. Oh, thank God. Psalm 32. Blessed is the man
whom the Lord won't impute sin. Charge sin. But then the Lord
took that child, and then they had another child. David was exceeding sorry. He
finally realized his sin. His sin should be the greatest
source of his sorrow. His sin against the Lord. Not
the loss of his child. Then the Lord sent another child.
Who was the next child? What child was born of David
and Bathsheba? Solomon. Now that child has to go. That Solomon might be here. Substitution. In the midst of all that sorrow
and pain and distress and despair, great joy,
David was comforted. And Bathsheba, two sinners, God
sent the king. Well, I could go on and on about
that. The Lord has taken many people
down through the years and replaced them with others. It would not
be if he had not taken them. I'll just give you this one.
My wife's mother died of cancer, which is a horrible thing to
witness one you love go through that. You wouldn't wish that
on anybody, would you? You don't want to see your loved
one die a painful death like that, a slow death like that,
do you? Nobody wants to see that. But
the Lord sends it. Every time it happens, the Lord
sends that for a reason, all right? her mother that her father
would marry someone else. And just recently, the granddaughters
of that woman were both baptized. That's substitution. It wouldn't
have happened. You can say, well, yes, sure
it would. No. No. That's exactly the way it
happened. Or it wouldn't have happened.
It wouldn't have happened. That's the reason he did that.
Substitution. Death. Pain. Suffering. Horror. I don't want to think
about that. You need to think about it. It's going to happen. But it's for good. For good. If we would listen more carefully,
we wouldn't be filled with so much care and so much sorrow. The Lord began to tell them over
and over and over and over and over again. It says, from that
time forth, that is, all the time He kept telling me, I'm
going to be betrayed and I'm going to be killed. I'm going
to suffer. I'm going to suffer. And He tells
us, you will suffer. I don't want to think about it. You need to think about it because
it's coming. It's coming. And he said, I will
suffer and be killed. We're going to die. Every one
of us are going to die. I don't want to think about that. I don't
want to think about losing the one I love. They didn't want
to think about losing their Lord. He was their everything. They
thought, we can't live without you. We can't live without Him.
I don't want to think about that. Let's think about something more
pleasant. And then, isn't that us? You're
going to die. Those you love are going to die. And you need to think about it.
Let these sayings sink down deep in your ears. That's what he
said right before he told them again. I'm going to die, but
I'm going to live. And he that liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. Do you believe this? He said
that to Martha and Mary at Lazarus' death. They were exceeding sorrowful. And he said, do you believe this? Or like the man whose son was
a lunatic. Lord, I do believe. I don't understand
why this is happening. I do believe, though. Help my
heart. You see, the gospel rightly heard
ought to give us fear, like the ladies at the tomb Matthew 28,
you remember that? They were fearful and yet joyful. They worshiped, yet doubt. It ought to make us mourn. The gospel rightly heard ought
to make us mourn over our sin, but then it ought to make us
laugh, joy, and rejoice. It ought to make us poor. It
ought to make us rich. At the same time, guilty. The gospel
rightly heard ought to pierce us through. with our guilt and
our shame. But then rightly heard, it ought
to make us feel completely pardoned, forgiven. And our Lord, in this one line,
He said, in the world you shall have tribulation. Tribulations. Oh no, I don't want to go through
that. I've overcome the world. Another
thing, all things, no matter how seemingly bad, how horrible,
no matter how horrible, they work together. They work together
according to God's purpose. Oh, wise God, it's all working
together. It has to happen this way. We
don't understand it. But it's all working together.
We can't see it. We can't see how the things are
connected. We can't see that. God does.
Someday we will, I believe. We'll know even as we've been
known. How can something happening over in China right now may have... Well, it is connected to something
that will happen in Australia years from now. If something
happened way down over here, intimately connected with something
that happened up here. Something that happened thousands
of years ago had to take place. And there's so many examples
throughout the Scripture stories like that. So we just don't understand.
And here's something that gives us trouble. Something that gives
us trouble is all the horrible things that happen. All the atrocities that happen
in the world. Things you don't even want to
think about. Things I hesitate to bring up. Because it just fills you with
just, oh, how could God allow that to happen? How could
that serve any purpose whatsoever? Tell me. Don't you? You hear
this thing? Terrible atrocity. Unspeakable
atrocities have happened from the beginning of time. All right,
let me give you a first example. Adam and Eve walked out into
the field. They had two boys, but they loved
them both. And there lay their second son,
Abel, with his brains lashed out. They had never known sorrow like
that. But on top of that, they found
out it was their other son that did it. Now you tell me how you
would feel. That's the first human beings
to ever live. The very first human beings.
They came out, their one son's dead, and the other one's a murderer. No hope. How can that serve any purpose?
Huh? It did. It did. Unspeakable atrocities beginning
with that. Show us, number one, man's depravity. God tells us that man's evil
and depraved, and we're going to experience it. We're going
to see it. We're going to turn the news on and look at the paper
every morning, and God's going to confirm to us, I told you,
didn't I? This is a present evil world.
It's not a good place. This place is full of... And
you, except by the mercy and grace of God, will be just like
them. This is the truth. People argue
that. God's people don't. They see
it very clearly. This is a sinful world, full
of sin. And it's in us. Number two, to
show us that with man it's impossible. It's impossible to reform a man. It's impossible for a man. How
can he be clean that's born a woman? There's not a just man on the
earth that doeth good and sinneth not. God shows us that clearly
through everything we see around us and everything we experience
in us. Doesn't He? He's going to show
us from the Spirit. That's why these things happen.
To show us God's power over evil. Yes, He reigns and rules even
over evil. He made all things for Himself,
even the wicked. Well, how can all that evil that
happened work God's purpose? God shows us. And Calvary is
the greatest show of that. How? They thought, this can't
bring any good, you being killed. Bring any good? All good is going
to come out of this. Show us his great power over
evil, even using evil, using evil. Joseph, the whole story of Joseph. Joseph in the end said, you meant
it for evil, but God meant it for good. You wanted me dead,
God wanted you alive. Unspeakable atrocities have always
taken place and always will. Before Israel was brought out
of Egypt, thousands of babies died. Rachel weeping for her children
and would not, could not be comforted because they were not. How can
that be of any good? Huh? Thousands of Jewish mothers
losing their babies. What good would that bring about?
Let me tell you something. Are our children born in sin?
And if they grow up and God doesn't have mercy on them, what will
they be? Maybe the next murderer. Maybe the next rapist. Maybe
the next serial killer. Huh? If God doesn't do something
for them. This is where people accused
John Calvin of so much heresy. They said he called our children
like little snakes. Little snakes are full of venom
just as much as old ones. That's what he was saying. And
our children, if God doesn't have mercy on them, they'll grow
up to inflict, themselves, inflict sins, pain, suffering, sorrow,
a world of sin. Thousands of babies were stopped
Thousands of babies were taken to glory before they grew up
to be wretched sinners. How many millions of people were
spared the sins of those children? Have you ever thought about that? And what was exceeding sorrow
for those mothers that lost those babies, was exceeding joy for
every one of those children, spared a life of sin. Oh, the goodness of God. None
of them deserved it. Our children don't deserve to
be saved. At our Lord's birth, the same
thing happened. At our Lord's birth, thousands
were killed when Herod sent out that edict to kill all those
babies, two years old and under. How? Oh, what great good. exceeding joy in the midst of
great sorrow. All these things work together. And let me just give you one
more example. You may not even know this story,
but you know David Edmondson, his wife. is of Japanese descent. Her mother is Japanese, full-blooded
Japanese. You know about Hiroshima and
Nagasaki where the atomic bombs were dropped, don't you? How
many people were killed in that? I forget. Hundreds of thousands,
right? It's horrible. It's horrible. Horrible. Teresa's mother was
a little girl going to school, about eight or nine years old,
going to school in Hiroshima. And that morning she got sick
and stayed home. And the bomb dropped and wiped
out All her friends, her school, everything, wiped everybody and
everything out and spared Teresa's mother. Teresa moved back and
moved over to the United States during the World War II and her
mother was ill-treated. They did Japanese in World War
II but married an American man and they had a baby named Teresa
who married a man named David and the rest is history. How can this be any good? Substitution. I gave Egypt for you, the Lord
said. Ethiopia and Saba for your ransom,
since thou wast precious in my sight. And lastly, God's grace is sufficient. I'm taking a little too long,
but God's grace is sufficient for all things, even unspeakable
horror and exceeding sorrow. One word will suffice to prove
this. God's grace is sufficient for
all things, no matter how horrible, no matter how much sorrow, exceeding
sorrow. God's grace is sufficient for
all. One word, Job. Job. And the Lord, that being
the oldest book, the first book recorded, the oldest book, God
showing us very clearly from the very outset that you can
lose everything and everyone dear to you, and have no hope
of anything, anyone in this world, have lost all of your earthly
comforts, all of your earthly joys, all of your earthly goods
and loved ones and so forth. Lose it all, but God says, My
grace is sufficient. None of us will be called on.
have been called on to do that. Job was. He really was. To show
us from the very beginning, my grace is sufficient. Because
in the end, the Scripture says, in Job 42, in the end it says
God gave Job twice as much as he lost. Twice as much. He lived a full
life to see his sons and his sons' sons and his sons' sons'
sons, and He had twice as much as he ever had. This is a picture.
You know, this is a picture of the exceeding joy that we will
have when we. And God, you see, we've received
of the Lord's hand double. For what? We received from the
Lord's hands double. For what? What have we given
him? Sin. Isn't the Lord good? Much of what befalls us, we deserve
it. We sure don't. The Lord has not
dealt with us after our sin. But He did deal with Christ.
And they were exceedingly sorrowful. Oh, but He said, your sorrow
will be turned into joy, didn't He? He said, when they finally
realized why Christ came, that they were His chosen ones and
nothing and no one could hurt them, it's all for their good,
they were exceedingly joyful. And nothing, our Lord said, no
one's going to take that from you from here on. If you really
realize it. Let this say and sink down deep
in your ear.