I want you to turn with me to
Revelation chapter 22, if you would please. Revelation chapter 22. And I want you to look in verse 21,
the very last verse in the Bible. Revelation chapter 22. In verse
21, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. I just want to talk to you for
a few minutes about some thoughts I had on this verse. It must
be a very important verse. It's the last verse of this Bible. And it talks about what the Bible
talks about everywhere, the Lord Jesus Christ. When our Lord had risen from
the dead and he met those two men on the road
to Emmaus, those two disciples, they had no idea who they were
talking to. He rebuked them, called them fools, and slow of
heart to believe. And then he made a wonderful
statement to them about what the Bible is all about. What is this book about? Book
inspired of God, holy men of old. Wrote it down as the Holy
Spirit moved them. What's it about? Who's it about?
And the Lord made this statement to those two disciples. Beginning at Moses, in the book
of Genesis, and in all the prophets, he preached unto them in all
the scriptures, all the scriptures, the things concerning himself. And we come here to the very
last verse of the entire Bible, And it says, the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ. One last time, he's writing to
his bride. Is this not a book to the husband's
wife, to the groom's bride, to his loved ones, to his people?
Telling of him, who he is and the glory of his person, what
he's did, what he's promised to do, what he's covenanted to
do. What he's doing now, sometimes he rebukes her severely, does
he not? Sometimes he lays the rod to
her back in this word. He teaches her doctrine, gives
her precious promises, and it's all in love. This is a love letter
from the husband to his wife. Some have said this is the salutation,
the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. A tender and closing word to
his wife. And he identifies himself here
in three ways. Did you notice that? He identifies
himself in his deity, the Lord. He identifies himself in his
humanity, Jesus. And he identifies himself in
his office, prophet, priest, and king. And it seems, O, that
he is saying to his people, this is who I am. This is who
you know me as. Don't forget me. I am your Lord. I am Jesus. I am the Christ. Somebody says, well, I've accepted
Jesus as my Savior, but not my Lord. You can't divide the Son
of God. You cannot separate Jesus the
Savior from Jesus the Lord. He gets all of you, and you take
all of Him. Our Lord Jesus Christ. The Lord, our Lord. This Bible
is full of our Lord, isn't it? If they had known, Paul said,
who He was, they would have never crucified the Lord of glory. That's who this is. He's the
Lord of glory. He created that place. That's
His throne. He is so high, the Scripture
tells us, above the heavens, that He has to humble Himself
to behold the things that's there. That's the Lord. He's the Lord
of this universe that you and I look up in the night sky and
see the brightness of the sun during the day. He's the Lord
of that creation. He took His hand and spread it
out as a tent for a man to dwell in. He commanded and it was done. He just spake. That was it. It was settled. All of this came
into being. He's the Lord. And you know something? He's the Lord of this earth. He's the Lord of this place.
The earth is the Lord's. And the fullness thereof. The
world and they that dwell therein. He's the Lord of all. He's the
Lord of glory. He's your Lord. You may believe
Him, or you may not believe Him, but He is the Lord. There's but
one, and He's the Lord of everything, and He's the Lord of everybody.
To this end, He both died and revived and rose again, that
He may be Lord. of the dead and the living. And
he said, as I live, as surely as I live, I swear to it, he
said, as surely as I live, saith the Lord, unto me every knee
is going to bow, every tongue is going to confess that I'm
the Lord. I'm the Lord. And you know there's
some people here tonight, there's been multitude down through the
ages that has confessed this. In the Lord have I righteousness. In the Lord shall all the seed
of Israel be justified. This is the Lord. You call me
Lord, and you say, well, for I am my Lord and my God. Ain't that what Thomas said?
He's the Lord. Don't forget who wrote this book. Don't forget who it's about.
His parting word to us as his people, I am your Lord. I am
your Lord. But he mentions another name
here. He identifies himself in his humanity. Jesus. Ain't that a lovely name? You
know he got that name from heaven. Heaven gave him that name. God
sent an angel down to Joseph and says, call his name Jesus.
And isn't that an appropriate name? Jesus, for he shall save
his people. Jesus the Savior. In our humanity,
a virgin shall conceive and bring forth a son. And he's going to
be called Emmanuel, God with us. Veiled in flesh, the Godhead
see. Hail the incarnate deity. Pleased as man with men to dwell,
Jesus, blessed Jesus, our Emmanuel. He's Jesus. He's bone of our
bone. He's flesh of our flesh. Folks,
it's been said, and I love to say it, he's as much man as if
he were not God. and as much God, if he were not
man. He is indeed a man, sin accepted. He had a real body. He had a
human soul. He was so much human that he
could increase in wisdom and stature. He could be tempted. He could grow weary. He thirsted. He grew hungry. He was susceptible to natural
impermanence. He could fear. He could cry. He could pray. He could believe. He could hope. He could suffer. And he could die. Jesus of Nazareth,
the Son of Mary. He is indeed a real man. A mediator between God and man,
the man, Christ Jesus. Meek and lowly in his heart,
so tender that he'll never break a bruised rib, and he'll never
quench smoking flax. So approachable that publicans
and harlots felt that they could come to him and confess all.
and love Him the rest of their lives. Jesus, the name that charms
our fears and bids our sorrows cease. Don't forget who He is. This is Jesus. This is our Savior
in our humanity. And he mentions another name
here that we often see in the Scriptures, the Christ. I am
the Lord Jesus Christ. Of course, that means the anointed
of God, the chosen of God, sin of God, to do the work of God,
to accomplish the purpose of God. I love John chapter 6 and verse
38. It's one of my favorite verses.
I came down from heaven. That's where he's from, isn't
it? Then come with myself. The Father sent me. I'm His anointed. He sent me. And here's why He
sent me. Not to do my own will, but the
will of Him that sent me. And this is the will of Him that
sent me. We want to know why God sent
His Son. This is the will of Him that sent me. That all which
He hath given me, I should lose nothing, but raise it up again
at the last day. He's God's anointed. Not with oil. Not with oil that
they crush from olives. Moses poured that oil upon Aaron's
head. I can see Moses, as the Lord
said, as God said, Moses, you anoint Aaron. He's my high priest. Well, you know what come to Moses'
heart as soon as God told him, this is my high priest. Moses'
heart went to a thousand or fifteen hundred years ahead when he saw
God's high priest coming down from heaven. The anointed of
God. Anointed not with oil that man
crushes and pours over men's heads, but anointed with the
Holy Spirit. God anointed Jesus of Nazareth
with the Holy Ghost. And Moses had just an idea of
who Aaron represented. Christ, the anointed of God.
And he took that oil and he couldn't quit pouring. He poured and he
poured and he poured, and the oil was running down on Aaron's
beard, and it went down on his garments, and all the way down
to his feet, and Moses just kept pouring. He saw Christ in Aaron,
God's anointed. When you read Luke chapter 4
and verse 18, I was reading this just today and I saw this. What the Lord Jesus was preaching
there at Nazareth, and remember He opened the Scriptures and
they brought Him the Bible and He opened them up and read. And
in verse 18, you see all three of His offices. You see the prophet,
you see the priest, and you see the king. God anointed him. If you were a Jew and you were
a priest, you had to be anointed. If you were a Jew and you were
a king, you had to be anointed. If you were a Jew and you were
a prophet and a king and a priest, you had to be anointed. Listen
to what the Lord Jesus said in Luke chapter 4, verse 18. The
Spirit of the Lord God is upon me. For He hath anointed me to
preach the gospel to the poor." Jesus Christ was a preacher.
He was a teacher. He was a prophet. And He said,
God has anointed me to preach. Has He ever preached to you?
Oh, it's our hope as a preacher that when we stand here opening
our mouth and taking our text and trying to expound upon it,
that the Lord Jesus, the prophet, is the one that's doing the preaching.
Paul said, you've heard him. You've been taught by him as
the truth is in Jesus. We've had people to try to teach
us, and bless their hearts, they're wonderful preachers. They're
good preachers. But they can't get through to us, can they?
But oh, as soon as He, the Prophet of God, Son of God, let Him teach
us. Let Him preach to us. We hear
Him, don't we? We hear Him. Saul of Tarsus went about killing
Christians. Early church tried to preach
to him. Oh, he got so mad. Stephen preached to him. He got
so mad he had Stephen stoned. I'm not hearing that garbage,
that gobbledygook. Kill that man. I'm not hearing
that. You will hear it. Just a few days from now, mighty
self-righteous Saul of Tarsus, you will hear it. And I'll tell
you who you're going to hear it from. God's prophet. And you know what you're going
to do and you know what you're going to say when you hear His voice
and see His glory? You're going to get your mouth
in the dust and you're going to say, Lord, what will you have
me to do? That's what we all say when He
teaches. But there in that verse, He also
said this, He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted. That's our priest, is it not?
Isaiah 53 said this, he was wounded for our transgressions, he was
bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was
upon him, and with his stripes we are healed. How does he heal
us? How does he heal our wounded
conscience? His stripes. Christ the high
priest. offered the sacrifice of himself
that heals our souls' diseases. He is indeed the high priest.
And the last thing he said there in that verse was this, he has
sent me to set at liberty them that are bruised. Who can set
a man at liberty? Let the devil come in and set
himself up on the throne of a man's heart. I tell you, he's such
a strong man. He takes possession of a human
being. They brag about their free will.
It's all up to me whenever I choose. Oh, my soul, the devil has taken
you captive, and he's got you secure in his hold. Then he's
pulled down the window blind over your understanding. You're
in a dungeon and he's your master and you can't get out. Somebody
that's stronger than he has to release you. And who would that
be? King Jesus. To a stronger than
he enters in and drags him from his throne and casts him out
and sets up on the throne himself. And that's God's anointed king. And where the Word of the King
is, there's power. And that's Him. That's Him. The
Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that wonderful? Isn't that
a wonderful way to remember Him? The last verse in all the Bible
has this. The Lord Jesus Christ. And notice this about Him. Notice
what else He says in verse 21. He adds one little word here
that makes this so precious. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. Ours. He's ours. He belongs to
us. In His divinity, in His deity,
in His Lordship, in His sovereignty, He's ours. In His humanity, He's
ours. In His offices He belongs to
us. He is ours. Our Lord Jesus Christ. He is ours by gift of the Father. For God so loved the world that
He gave. He gave His only begotten Son. And to you a Son is given. What a gift! The Father gave
Him to us to redeem us to bring us home to heaven at last, to
save us from all our sins, to give us a new heart, to give
us a new spirit, to give us a new love, new desires, new motives. He sent His Son and said, He's
yours. He's yours. And you know something,
brothers and sisters, if He's yours, you'll never lose Him.
We lose a lot of gifts, we lose a lot of things, but you'll never
lose Him. If He's yours, you'll never lose Him. You may say,
I won't because I'm going to embrace Him. That's wonderful.
Hang on to Him the best you can. Cleave to Him. But I'll tell
you one thing. He's yours by the gift of the
Father. And the Father will never take
back His gifts. The gifts and callings of God
are without repentance. If he's ours now, he's ours forever. He's the gift of the Father.
He's ours by birth, and to us a child is born. Jesus Christ is not a mighty
preacher that merely took on him the form of a man. He's the mighty God who was conceived
in the womb of a virgin. And he belongs to our humanity. He's one with us. Mary brought forth her firstborn
son. Mary brought forth her firstborn
son. You mothers know what that means,
don't you? You brought that child from your womb and they cleaned
the little eyes out and washed his little body up, and you've
looked at him, that baby is yours. You bore him in your womb and
you fed him, and now you've birthed him. He's yours. Jesus belonged
to Mary the Virgin. And if he belonged to her, he
belongs to us. He is heavenly. He is heavenly. Because he came down from that
holy and happy place. But he belongs to us. Listen. He belongs to us as much as he
belongs to heaven. Because the earth is the place
of his nativity. This is where he was born. If
these nativity scenes have any merit and worth at all, it's
to teach us this. Jesus Christ, indeed, was born
to the Lord. He was Mary's baby. He was Mary's
child. And though the Lord Jesus Christ
is in heaven today, He's still ours. He cannot, He will not
deny us, because He's there in our humanity. How can He deny
us? He'd have to deny Himself to
deny us. He's there in our humanity. And He can never be separated
from us again. He's ours. He's ours. And since He is now in heaven
in our glorified humanity, heaven and earth are one in Him. He has done what no angel could
do, what no man could do. He's made heaven and earth one. He's brought a holy heaven. And
a sinner and earth together and says, there is one in me. He is ours. And He is our tie to heaven. And He is our title to heaven. He has taken over possession
of that place in our behalf. And because He is that, we will
go there. Heaven cannot deny us, can it?
How can heaven deny us when it looks at Jesus and His humanity? Oh, He belongs to heaven, but
He belongs to us. He is our Lord Jesus Christ. And I'll tell you something else,
He's ours by this vital union, intimate, vital union. In the 19th chapter of this book
that I'm in, in verse 7, listen to this. The marriage of the
Lamb is come, and his wife has made herself ready." That's union,
isn't it? There's no greater union or closer
union and more intimate union than a husband and a wife. For all I know, brothers and
sisters, the reason God instituted marriage is to show the vital
union. of Jesus Christ and His Church.
Marriage means nothing. And you and I will never know
the true meaning of marriage until we see that it merely represents
Christ and His Church. We're one with Him, born of His
bone and flesh of our flesh. And what God has joined together
shall never be put asunder. Not this marriage. God hates
putting away, and He shall never do it. We're His, and He is ours
by vital giving. Our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, brothers and sisters, isn't
that wonderful? He's ours. The Church of the
Old, they claimed Him, the Church of the Old Testament. They said,
I am my Beloved's, and my Beloved is mine. The angels who came
down and announced His birth, they told us that He belonged
to us. Until you is born in the city of David, a Savior, He's
yours. And how does the covenant promise
run? They shall be my people, and I will be their God. He's
ours. He's ours. Look at another little word here
He gives. The grace. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with you all. Grace, the unmerited favor, the
unearned favor of Jesus Christ. Undesired? Did we desire it when
he first came to us? We sure didn't deserve it. Grace. Sovereign, free grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ. As you and I read the Scriptures,
one thing is so evident, that the Father in Heaven has
purpose to magnify the Son in putting all saving grace for
His people in His Son. And that's one of the things
the Holy Spirit teaches us when he comes to open our hearts.
That if we're to be saved, we must be saved by this grace that
is in the Lord Jesus Christ. If you want corn, Pharaoh said,
go to Joseph. Go to Joseph. If you want the
grace of God, if you want to see the smile of God, if you
want fellowship with God, go to Christ. The Father has put
all grace in Him. The Bible says He was made flesh
and we beheld His glory. And what was it? Full of grace. Full of grace. How do you measure
the Lord Jesus Christ? If you can measure Him, you can
measure His grace. But how in the world do we measure
the Lord Jesus Christ? Do we measure His days? The Scripture
says His going forth are of old, from everlasting. We can't measure
His days. Can we measure His knowledge? David said, It's too high for
me. I can't attain to it. All our
thoughts are open to Him. Everything is naked and open.
Can you measure His love? The Scripture says it passes
knowledge. Can we measure His riches? The
Scripture says they're unsearchable. How do we measure Him who is
so immense? That when He was upon this earth,
He said, I'm in heaven. He's so immense as far as I know,
that He not only fills the heaven and the earth, but the heavens
and the earth and the universe is in Him. How do we measure
that? To measure grace, you first have
to measure Him. And then when you've measured
Him, you can measure grace. I don't think any of us will
measure him. And the Bible says he's full. He's an eternal fountain
of grace. And let everybody here tonight
come. Let everybody in Rocky Mount
come. Let everybody in the state of Virginia come. Let the United
States come. Let the world come. without exception,
every man and woman and boy and girl, and let them come to this
fountain and drink their fill and heal all their souls' diseases
and save them everlastingly. And when all have drunk their
fill, the Son of God will not be diminished in His grace."
He is an eternal fountain of grace. Grace, grace. Ain't that wonderful? Oh, what
a gospel. What a Savior. What a great,
great Lord. Through the ages to come, He
will show the exceeding riches of His love. He's full of it. Grace, grace. What does he say
lastly? The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ
be with you. Be with you. If His grace is with us, it doesn't
matter who's against us. It doesn't matter how deep the
waters get. We say this, and we've said this
so much. When you go through the waters, and we read over
that, and we forget until finally we get in deep waters, and we
have to go back and read that more carefully. When you're going
through these waters, and they're deep, and there's no standing,
and you're sinking, if grace is with you, When you go through
those rivers, and they're white-capped, and your little boat is turned
over, and you're dashing against the rocks, and you can hardly
get your breath, when you go through the rivers, they'll not
overflow you. Why? Because grace is with you. You may sink, but I don't think
a man's going to sink any lower than these everlasting arms of
grace, do you? There's grace, and if grace is
with you, you may be down. Something may be getting you
down, but you can only sink so low because this grace catches
you. And when it catches you, when
your feet feel the bottom, you'll sink no further. And when you
go through the fire, some of you have been in the fire, haven't
you? Fiery trials. I'll be with you. I'll be with
you. I was talking to my dear wife
the other day. I could see she was burdened. And I said, baby,
you're alright. And she said, I'm so heavy, I
have to force myself to breathe. But you know, she came out of
that. You know how she did? His grace was with her. The devil,
as wretched and as destructive as he is, sent one of his messengers
into the body of Paul, and it grieved him to death. He was
a thorn. You ever had a thorn in your
foot? And you're walking along pretty
good and suddenly you hit it and, oh, my soul, I can't walk. You get one in your thumb and
you reach out to get something. Oh, you get one in your elbow.
A thorn is an awful thing. And Paul said, I can't make it.
I just can't make it. This is killing me. And he said,
Lord, Lord, would you remove this thorn? Lord, would you remove
this thorn? Lord, would you remove this thorn?
You remember what the Lord Jesus said. He said, no, I'm going
to do something better than that. I'm going to do something better
than that. You're going to keep your thorn. And you're going
to have to limp them on. You're going to have to struggle
with it. But I'm going to give you something, Paul. And what
was it? My grace. My grace is sufficient
for you. My strength is made perfect in
your weakness. Well, I'll say this, brothers
and sisters, if it takes going through the deep waters, if it
takes going down the rivers, if it takes going through the
fires to know and experience this grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ being with me, I don't pray for sufferings, but I'll
say this, Lord, put me through it. I want to know your grace. I want to feel the power of it
in my soul, holding me up, binding up my wounds. When I'm flat on
my face and blood is running, and I'm so weak and weary I can't
get up, I want to feel the power of that grace lifting me up and
standing me on my feet. Oh, the grace of the Lord Jesus
Christ be with who? All of you. Poor, worm, me? Poor, me? Weak, unworthy, wretched, hell-deserving
me? Are you in Christ? Are you His? Is He yours? Yes, grace is with
you. Grace is with you. Grace will
save a man from his sins, brothers and sisters. Grace will give
him everything God requires, everything he needs. It will
get him through this sin-cursed world. It will get him through
the valleys and up the hills and finally through the river
of death and land him safe on heaven's coast. And you know
who that will do that for? Everyone that's His. All of them. All of them. Oh, what a salutation. The grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ. Be with you. I can't preach like
Henry Mann. And I never will. But I love to preach to Henry
Mann. I've sat with that dear man.
I hope I don't embarrass you, Henry. He used to come up to
Newcastle or something and preach for us. I got him ran off one
time. The pastor of the church where
I was going wanted me to get somebody to preach a meeting.
He said, do you know somebody? And I said, I do. I called Henry. And Henry came the first night
and preached the best message I ever heard him preach in my
life. Why won't you come to Christ? I preached it three or four times.
The second night the place was full. It was absolutely packed
down. Henry preached twice. All these
preachers keep dropping Henry's name. I don't know if you've
noticed, I was talking with Donnie Bell the other day, and I said,
I'm going down to Savannah. Oh, he said, I mean, Henry's
been there. I went down there. I mean, Henry preached there.
Talking to him a while before that about going up to Montana.
Yeah, I mean, Henry went up there and preached. I'm going to tell
you something, Donnie, you haven't preached that many times with
Henry Mayhead. But what I like to tell people, these preachers,
have you ever been in a congregation when Brother Henry's preached
two messages? I heard Brother Henry open his
Bible, take a text, preach a message, go to another text, take it,
and preach another message. The next day, they ran him off. Remember that? Ran him off. The pastor said,
the women are calling me. I can't take it anymore. About
six months later, They amputated that pastor's legs. Then he went
blind. Then he died. Then he died. Me and Henry go
way back. We go way back. Old friends.
Henry would come up and we'd go out to the parties and eat
gravy and biscuits with a scrambled egg on the side. And Henry would
give me some good advice. Thank you, Henry. Thank you. Thank you, Pastor Mayhem. Thank
you.