cursory, you have found some
real nuggets in this book of Zechariah. It has been somewhat
like Leviticus in the past to me. It's been a flyover book,
but I found out that this is one of those precious gospel
books of the Old Testament, just like all the rest of them are.
And I was brought up recently or tonight that that was what
the Lord Jesus shared with his disciples just prior to his ascension,
the glorious gospel in the Old Testament. He spoke in the things
concerning himself throughout the Old Testament. So it's just
been a blessing to be here. So here in the book of Zechariah
and Zechariah chapter 3, I'd like to read verses 1 through
5. And we're gonna spend our time, most of it tonight, I think,
on verse four. We've been looking at that cuz
it's such a glorious passage of scripture about someone who
has unclean, an unclean robe, and then the Lord gives him a
clean robe. So let's just read here, the
angel that talked with me came again and waked me as a man that
was wakened out of his sleep, and said unto me, What seest
thou? And I said, I have looked, and
behold, a candlestick. Excuse me, I'm in Chapter 4. I want to be in Chapter 3. That's
good reading. And he showed me Joshua, the
high priest, standing before the angel of the Lord, and Satan
standing at his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said
unto Satan, The Lord rebuked thee, O Satan. Even the Lord
that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuked thee. Is not this a bran plucked
out of the fire? And I just want to say again,
as we go across that verse of scripture to everyone here and
everyone that's going to hear this on Sermon Audio, that Satan
is not like God. He has no, there's no resemblance
whatsoever in his power, in his intelligence, or his ability
to be in any one place or other place at the same time. He is
a created being, he's God's devil, and here we have in that wonderful
verse two, the Lord, the Lord, and the Lord rebuke thee. Jehovah
rebuke thee, and Satan was rebuked. He was rebuked, much as we read
with regard to Moses' body. He rebuked him. So this one that
came to bring charges against Joshua as an elect of God because
the Lord says he is elect. I have elected him in that verse
of scripture. I've chosen Jerusalem and he's
part of Jerusalem, and I've snatched him out of the fire if you please.
So he is a chosen vessel, he is elect of God, and you will
not touch him in his spirit. Now we find with regard to Job,
he was permitted to touch his body. But you know what? Our
bodies have already been touched by sin. It's nothing new. We get all kinds of diseases
and it seems the farther we go in this world, the more diseases
there are to take us. So we are touched in our bodies
all the time anyway. Now Joshua was clothed with filthy
garments. They were dirty garments. They
were filthy garments and stood before the angel and he answered
and spake unto those that stood before him saying, take away. the filthy garments from him.
Now, it's amazing to me as I go over this again, it's amazing
to me that Joshua could stand in the presence of the Lord and
not recognize this. My goodness. If a dignitary comes,
we want to be in our best clothing, we might even shower. But Joshua, Stood, he's the high priest and
he stands before the high priest. He stands before Jehovah and
it doesn't seem to have any feelings in him. And yet the Lord knows
the problem and the Lord says, this is the answer to the problem.
We will take your dirty garments from you. And you know, I'm convinced
at that moment that Joshua, the high priest, understood he was
dirty. Amen. This is the reason it's
being removed from me. I couldn't see it. I'm too close
to it or whatever. But this idea that Jesus Christ,
the Lord, would be in the near presence of Joshua, this man
of uncleanliness, and then take care of him just like we find
him doing so many times in his earthly ministry here while he
spent his time on this earth. He did a lot of healing, physically
healing, physical healing that was pictorial of what he does
spiritually, but oh, the numbers of people that went away rejoicing
like the woman at the well. that he spoke peace to her there,
and she knew what she was. All right? And then it says,
take away the filthy garments from him. And that's another
thing about those who know the gospel. They know what's the
problem with their children. They know what's the problem
with their grandchildren. They know what the problem is with their
mother, their father, their aunts, their uncles, and everybody around
us. We're not fooled by this. We're not fooled by robes of
of self-righteousness. But there is a problem and we
have the only answer to the problem and that's the gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ. It was brought to my attention
tonight again that Noah, I just never had thought of it this
way and if I had, I'd forgotten it. But Noah, by preaching the
gospel and making an ark for the saving of his house, you
know what the rest of that verse says? condemned the world. Noah condemned the world by the
preaching of the gospel. There was hundreds and hundreds
of thousands of people, and that's found in Hebrews chapter 11 and
verse 7. So Noah preaching the gospel
and making an art for the saving of his household, says, by his
very activity, condemn the world. Now we know that Noah didn't
do it. But the preaching of the gospel and no response to it,
that God does that. God takes care of that. It wasn't
the devil that did that. God takes care of that. We read
about that in the book of Matthew at the goats on the left hand
and the sheep on the right hand. That's just the way it's going
to be. But the preaching of the gospel separates. It's a saver
of life unto life or death unto death. I am convinced that anybody
that comes here, or anybody that comes to any gospel church and
hears the gospel for the first time will never be the same. They'll never be the same. The
gospel has that effect. Now they'll go away and maybe
years later the Lord will bring it to their mind and they'll
bring them back and they'll want to hear it again. Or they may
go away and say, I'm never going to go back there because I don't
believe that stuff. But the gospel will never leave anybody the
same. and I'm thankful that the gospel
does not leave the lost sheep the same. It causes them, how
to explain it? I don't know, but there is something
about it that brings the lost sheep of the house of Israel
to the Lord, and God does that. Well, there in verse 4, and unto
him he said, behold, I have caused thy iniquity to pass from thee. We looked last week and saw that
That iniquity must pass to a substitute to be effectual. That iniquity
must pass to Christ. Now, we don't pass it to Christ.
He assumes it. He takes it. But it is passed
from one to another. It is passed from the sinner
to the savior. It is imputed to him. And he,
in his death on the cross, took care of every bit of it. There was nothing left out, nothing
hanging outside of the bloodstream of Jesus Christ. No sin will
go unpaid for for the elect, not one. And then he says there,
and I will clothe thee with change of raiment. I will clothe thee
with the change of raiment. What a wonderful gospel declaration
is found just here in these few verses in the book of Zechariah.
And in my religious days, I would have seen none of that. It would
have just been a historical declaration. Well, he'd been down to the altar,
and he'd been sacrificing animals, and that's why he had dirty garments.
Well, that's not what the Lord is talking about here, because
he didn't recognize that. Well, let's look at a few things
tonight with regard to that last phrase, and I will clothe thee
with a change of raiment. Now, this reminds me, is reminiscent
of a passage over in the book of Genesis. So would you turn
with me to the book of Genesis chapter 3? The book of Genesis
chapter 3, we find so early on, In fact, just after the fall. Now, God is not caught off guard
by the fall. He is not caught by something
that took place that he wasn't prepared for. Because we find
very clearly in a number of passages of scripture that the covenant
of grace and the one who is the messenger of the covenant of
grace was already prepared for the problem. He is called a lamb
slain from the foundation of the world. He is already prepared
for the problem. He didn't just get ready for
it, he knew it. As one preacher says, I think
Martin Luther said, ''Oh, glorious fall.'' Because we know more
about grace than Adam ever knew before the fall. We know about
grace. All right. Here in the Book of
Genesis Chapter 3 and verse 21, ''After Adam and Eve had come,
in their robes of fig leaves, their man-made righteousness. And all our righteousness is
as filthy rags. That's what we find with regard
to ours. And here is a display of that. Our first parents in their fallen
state have this idea that they can cover their nakedness by
their own fig aprons. It has continued on and continues
on and continues to continue on in every generation. Well,
here in chapter 3 and there in verse 21, we find that the Lord
takes care of this typically of what he will do spiritually.
He takes care of it typically. He says here in the book of Genesis
chapter 3 and verse 21, unto Adam also and to his wife, Did
the Lord God make coats of skins to clothe them? To clothe them. So they had as much to do with
their clothing as Joshua did the high priest. The Lord clothed
him. Here, the Lord clothed them.
They were just recipients and not participants in this process. It is the Lord alone that close
us with his righteousness. We are recipients of it. We are
sinners before God. We provided all we can. We're
sinners before God. That's all we can provide. And
I firmly see that the activity of Adam and Eve, when God took
care of this, there just after the fall, they were silent, they
were quiet, they stood there as only they could. That's the
only thing they could do, stand still and see the salvation of
the Lord. And he clothed them. Now it's
typical for them, that's the only covering he would recognize.
He didn't recognize their covering, he recognized his covering because
there must be shedding of blood to have this covering. But spiritually
speaking, God alone takes care of the issue and we're mere recipients,
never participants. We are quiet before the Lord. We're not saying, well, I think
that's the wrong size. No. We're simply quiet before
the Lord, trusting Him, trusting Him. His blood and righteousness
is what we have. They were recipients. So it was
with Joshua now we can go go with me to Luke chapter 15 Luke
chapter 15 Once again, we have an illustration
here in Luke chapter 15 We have a lost son He left of his own
free will. That's all we can do. Our free
will will lead us down this road. We will never, ever choose God. We will never choose spiritual
things. We won't choose the Bible to
rely upon. We'll pick and choose scriptures
out of the Bible. We did that and we know people
that do that. They just pick and choose. Well,
here we have this lost son when the Lord brought him to himself. Now, he was never going to do
that on his own. He was satisfied with that food he was eating,
pig's food, carob, false chocolate, and low-grade false chocolate.
It was pig food. But when the Lord brought him
to himself, he says, my father's servants have so much better
than I have. and if I go home and just be
a servant. Well, let's look here in Luke chapter 15 and verse
22. When this young man, and I'm
just amazed that the father has been looking down that road at
the right time. Isn't that the truth about our
Heavenly Father? He's been watching over us. He
knows where we are. He knows what we've been doing.
He knows that we haven't been trusting him, but has never caused
him to say, I'm just going to go do something else. He has
this interest, and there is a number that that person is, and they
can only fill that number, and that chair has that number on
it. Well, maybe I should say has the name on it, and it has
to be filled, and so he's going to do that. But here in Luke
chapter 15, and there in verse 22, it says, But the father said
to his servants. Now the boy said that he just
would like to have a servant's position. There in verse, he
rose and came to his father, verse 20. But when his father
yet was a great way off, his father saw him and had compassion
and ran and fell on his neck and kissed him. And the son said
unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight,
and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the father said
to the servants, bring forth the best robe. I read that today, and I just
wanted to say hallelujah. Bring forth the best robe. This Father, from an illustration
the Lord is teaching people, us tonight, is saying that this
Father brought forth the best robe so we can take it for granted
that the robe that the Heavenly Father brings is better than
this best one. Because it's an eternal robe. It is the righteousness of Christ
given to us. This robe is wonderful. The father
calls it the best, but to the son and daughter that God saves
by his free and sovereign grace, he gives better than the best. He gives us Christ. He gives us Christ. In going
back to the book of Isaiah for just a little bit. Isaiah, now
chapters 56 through 66, I'm not gonna read those all tonight.
I might have Mike do that. I'm not going to read very much
of this, but I just want to say this. The theme of these chapters,
the necessity of God's people to live out God's requirements
and the total inability to do so. This is what you must have
and you can't do it. You must have this righteousness,
and you can't do it. The law, the law, even though
we may have said we were keeping it, we couldn't keep it, and
so we'd say, well, I'm keeping this part of it. Well, we cannot
do that. Here in Isaiah chapter 59, Isaiah
chapter 59 now, and verse 16. It says, and he saw that there
was no man. God saw there was no man. What
an indictment. God looked down from heaven to
see if there were any that did seek after him, and God said,
I found none. We have the cranial incapacity
to say, well, I'm the exception. Well, I have, what does it say
here? In Isaiah 59 and verse 16, for
he saw that there was no man, and wondered that there was no
intercessor. Therefore, his arm brought salvation
unto him, and his righteousness, it sustained him. Now we're talking
about real righteousness. the righteousness of Christ.
That is real righteousness. When he absolutely, completely,
totally obeyed all that the Father commanded of him, he kept it
all. every jot and every tittle, every
dot, dotted every I and crossed every T, which is what we'd say
in our vernacular. He did everything that the father
asked. Even though we find in scripture
that fathers ask their boys, ask their daughters to do something,
we find they were unable. It was amazing. Someone was talking
to me today about Solomon. a message we had on Sunday. Someone
talked to me and says, David was in the same boat. Moses was
in the same boat. They were all rapscallions, except
for grace, except for grace. So let's look again here in the
book of Isaiah, if you would, Isaiah Chapter 61. Isaiah chapter
61, there's nobody that had the righteousness. Now, this high
priest that comes before Jehovah is accused by Satan, has no clean
garment. And the Lord said, your iniquity
has passed from you. And he stripped him of his old
garment and gave him a glorious garment, a picture of the righteousness
that God imputes us. And we know we did not deserve
this at all. Now, how much did we not deserve
this? As much as Jesus Christ did not deserve to go to the
cross. That's how much we didn't deserve
it. It's an infinity. It is heaven above earth. It
is, we can't measure it. That's how much we didn't deserve
it, but Jesus Christ no more deserved our sin, but as the
surety of the covenant of grace, he was willing to take that,
our sin. All right, here in the book of
Isaiah chapter 61, verses one, two, and three. Isaiah chapter
61, the spirit of the Lord God is upon me." And the Lord quoted
this. He went home one day and quoted this. He got a scroll. He rolled over to the book of
Isaiah, chapter 61, and read this. And then he said, this
is fulfilled in your ears. You know, I've had people tell
me it wasn't all fulfilled. Well, who am I going to take?
The Lord's words are some fool's words, some preacher's words.
Well, it was fulfilled. The spirit of the Lord God is
upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach good tidings
unto the meek. He has sent me to bind up the
brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and the opening
of the prison to them that are bound, to proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God to comfort
all that mourn. to appoint unto them that morn
in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for
mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness,
that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting
of the Lord, that he might be glorified. Now, in that comparison,
we have a real bad negative and then a very good positive. Here's
the negative, and it's very bad. And here's the positive, and
it is so supreme. It is glorious. And then he drops down and shares
with us that they might be called the trees of righteousness, the
planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified in this. He
might be glorified. The planting of the Lord. God
planted it. I'm amazed at how many of the
wheat farmers around here, grain farmers around here, they go out there and they pour
thousands of tons of grain into the ground and I've never seen
one of them out there wringing their hands trying to get it
to come up. They've learned it happens. They have nothing to
do with it. And that's the way we are. We
sow the seed. we pray for an increase. We sow
the seed and pray for an increase. But
the increase is of the Lord. And that's the way it's always
been and going to be. Well, here we have that the Lord,
they might call them trees of righteousness. Turn with me back
to the book of Exodus. In the book of Exodus, Some time
ago, several years ago, as we were going through the book of
Leviticus, we stepped over here into the book of Exodus because
the book of Exodus had some clear statements about the clothing
that the high priest wore. In the book of Exodus chapter
28, the book of Exodus chapter 28, and there in verse 4. And this is all typical of our
Savior, the Lord Jesus, and also typical of what he gives to his
children who are called King Priests of the Lord. Now I haven't
been able to get my arms around that total yet, and I won't until
I see him. But to be called King Priests
of the Lord, and to have that royalty given to us, and this
priesthood given to us, to be able to approach him without
someone in between. I don't have to go to a box with
a screen. I can go directly to him. What
king priests we have, what position. Here in the book of Exodus chapter
28, and there in verse four it says, and these are the garments
which they shall make, a breastplate and an ephod and a robe, an embroidered
coat, a miter and a girdle, and they shall make holy garments
for Aaron, thy brother, and his sons, that he may minister unto
me in the priest's office. And when we went through there,
I was just marveled at what all of these things spoke about when
it came to our Savior, the Lord Jesus. That this Aaron was a
picture, was a type, and a shadow of Jesus Christ the righteous. And these were pictorial of his
attributes and character. They were pictorial of his position
that he would enter into as the high priest on our behalf. But
in the midst of that, we read a robe. Now let's drop down to
chapter 28, verse 34. Verse 34, the same chapter, and
it says, a golden bell and a pomegranate, a golden bell and a pomegranate
upon the hymn of the robe round about. As they put this together
around the bottom of it, there were golden bells, which represented
the purity of the gospel, the purity of who this is representing,
the purity of the message, and then pomegranates. Now, there
was one thing I remember about the pomegranates, that when you
squeeze that seed, it sent off a red stain. That pomegranate
is speaking of the blood of Christ. And it's around the bottom of
this robe that this high priest was wearing. The glorious gospel,
the glorious son, gold. and the glorious ministry he
will perform shed his blood. The golden bell shed his blood. The golden bell shed his blood. All the way around the hymn of
this robe. So we have a wonderful garment
of salvation, a wonderful robe of righteousness that God has
imputed to us in Christ Jesus, and it is the gospel in its glorious
form, the deliverance of sinners by someone who became sin for
us by imputation so that he might impute his righteousness to us. We no more have any right to
his righteousness, But because of the covenant of grace, he
is liberal with his righteousness. Turn with me, if you would, to
chapter 28 and verse 32, verse 32, and there shall be a hole
in the top of it. This is that robe. Remember that
hole that was in there and it's stitched around it. Well, notice
why. In the midst of it shall be a binding of woolen work round
about the whole of it as it were the whole of a harbour gone that
it be not torn or rent. This righteousness cannot be
destroyed. It cannot be ripped up. It cannot be put off. It
is made perfect. It is the perfect righteousness
of Christ. And this robe that was put upon
the high priest was a demonstration of that, that nothing could tear
this righteousness from the wearer. The righteousness that is imputed
to the believer, nothing can remove it, and it takes care
of all the problem. We are now accepted in the beloved
because of his righteousness. And finally in the book of Exodus
chapter 39 and verse 23. Chapter 39 verse 23, there's
emphasis again, chapter 39 verse 23, there's emphasis upon this
woven hole for the neck and head to pass through. Chapter 39 verse
23 of the book of Exodus, and there was a hole in the midst
of the robe as the hole of a harbigon, and that's kind of like, a male,
a suit of male that a knight might wear. It was made so it
didn't cut into him and it was finished off so it wouldn't tear
with a band round about of the hole that it shall not tear. I'm so thankful for all these
beautiful illustrations that God gives us concerning that
robe because it will not be torn off the recipient, and it will
always be effectual and effective to everyone that is clothed with
it. Not one of them will lose their
robe. God makes sure of that. In the
book of Isaiah, going back to the book of Isaiah, we're going
to be at chapter 61, but we want to look there at verse 10. Isaiah chapter 61, verse 10. as we have Joshua the high priest
clothed with a clean robe, with the righteousness of Christ.
Isaiah chapter 61 and verse 10. I will greatly rejoice in the
Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my
God, for he has clothed me. with the garments of salvation,
he hath covered me with the robe of righteousness. As a bride
groomed, decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth
herself with jewels. Beautiful, wonderful, glorious,
and we find in there that he hath covered me with the robe
of righteousness. He hath covered, what did he
do to Adam? What did he do to Eve? What did he do to Joshua? Silently stood as he clothed
them. And that's what everyone that
God ever saves does. You know, how much we find out
after we've been saved. We have a lifetime of finding
out what we have in Christ. We have a lifetime finding out
about his righteousness. We have a lifetime of finding
out about the efficaciousness of his blood. We have a lifetime
of studying the gospel. Over in the book of 2 Corinthians
chapter 5, 2 Corinthians chapter 5, and here in verse 21, so clear, so plain, this passage
of scripture, And if we should read this entire chapter, we
should start with the first chapter of the book of 1 Corinthians
so we know where we're going, but we'll leave that to you.
2 Corinthians 5, verse 21. For he hath made him to be sin
for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness
of God in him. Another translation put it this
way, for God made Christ who never sinned, underline it, who never sinned
to be the offering for our sin. Now, that's what the original
really had to say about, he's our offering for sin. so that
we could be made right with God through Christ. We might be made
the righteousness of God through Christ Jesus. So he's the absolute,
impeccable sacrifice for sin. And he had all the sins of all
his people placed upon him, imputed to him. That's the only way he
was a sinner, is he had our sin imputed to him. Just as Christ
is made sin or a sinner to by imputation of the sins of others
to him, so they are made righteousness of Christ or righteous persons
through the imputation of his righteousness to them. And in
no other way can one be made sin or the other righteous. Christ could not be made a sinner
except by imputation. And we cannot be made righteous
except by imputation. We have no works to perform to
get that, so it must be given to us. And in order for it to
be given to us, our sin was given to him. imputed to him, placed
upon him. And he was the perfect sacrifice
for sin. And he put away sin by the sacrifice
of himself. One of the verse, if you turn
with me back to the book of Isaiah. One of the verse, the book of
Isaiah chapter 45. Isaiah chapter 45. Isaiah chapter 45 and verse 24. Surely shall one say, in the
Lord have I righteousness. That's what the church says.
In the Lord have I righteousness and strength. Even to him shall
men come and all that are incensed against him shall be ashamed. What does that say? By the preaching
of the gospel and by the building of an ark, Noah condemned the
world. All those that are incensed or
angry or upset with him and his righteousness shall be ashamed.
But to the church in the Lord have I righteousness and strength. Even to him shall men come."
This is the only place to go. He's the only one with righteousness.
Well, what a wonderful position now that Joshua is in when those
filthy garments are taken from him. The next thing that he's
adorned with is a fair miter. Now, that word miter really means
turban. a wrapping of cloth, and we'll
look into that the next time. So, may God bless you, and as
we close this section of scripture, we're just thankful that we have
this opportunity.