You know, the great subject of
the Christian ministry is set forth here as preaching the gospel. In fact, that's how Paul refers
to it in verse 17. Christ sent me not to baptize,
but to preach the gospel, to give a declaration of the gospel. also speaks of it in verse 18,
is the preaching of the cross. And when he talks about preaching
the cross of our Savior, he's not talking about the wooden
beam upon which he died, but the doctrine of the cross, the
subject of the cross, that is, his sacrifice in order to save
sinners. And then we read that in verse
23, and I'll choose my title from this verse. He expresses
it this way, but we preach Christ crucified. That's my title, we preach Christ
crucified. Now really, most every denomination,
I'll say, acknowledges that Jesus of Nazareth was crucified 2,000
years ago between two thieves, and that happened on a mount
called Calvary. I know there's some crazy religions
that don't acknowledge Jesus of Nazareth and his death, but
most of the religions you and I would be familiar with, They
preach, they're priests and preachers. They set forth the fact that
one day many years ago, one Jesus of Nazareth was crucified and
died upon a cross. But the thing about this man,
the Apostle Paul, He did not confine himself or restrict himself
merely to that historical event. And he did not go into any gruesome
details about what the crucifixion involved. Now, I would not lessen the physical
agonies that our Lord Jesus suffered upon the cross of Calvary. But
there were two other men who were also crucified. And they suffered in their physical
being the same sorts of pain and agony that was inflicted
upon the one who died upon the middle cross. And I know a lot
of preachers spend quite a bit of time giving a description
or endeavoring to give a description of what crucifixion meant, how
awful it was, how painful it was. And that, of course, evokes
sympathy and compassion from their hearers, especially for
Jesus of Nazareth, who died on the middle cross, who did not
deserve that death that He died. The two thieves, they deserve
the agony, the awfulness, the wretchedness of the death by
crucifixion. But our Lord Jesus, He did not. At least in the same sense, he
did not deserve it as did the two thieves. You see, the two thieves were
guilty. They were dying for criminal
acts that they committed and were found guilty of. Our Lord
Jesus committed no criminal acts against anyone. He kept God's
law perfectly. He never sinned. He never harmed
anybody. He never hurt anybody. He spent
his public ministry showing him to be himself a compassionate
man, full of mercy. And he healed thousands of people. And many of those thousands of
people that He did heal didn't even believe Him, did not even
worship Him. But He went about doing good. The reason He was crucified was
because the Jews hated Him. The Sanhedrin found him guilty
of blasphemy, which was a criminal act worthy of death. He said
he was the son of God. He said God was his father. And the Sanhedrin, the highest
court in all of Israel, They convened in Jerusalem and they
determined this. He's guilty of blasphemy. He must die. And he must die the death of
crucifixion at the hands of the Romans because the Jews had no
authority to execute anyone. But know this. If we only focus on the physical
agonies of the cross of Calvary upon which our Lord Jesus hung,
we have failed to set forth the true message of the crucifixion
of our Lord. I'm not trying to get you to
shed tears for the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm not trying to get
you worked up in emotionalism so that you'll decide to let
Him do something for you. I'm telling you all that He suffered,
He suffered according to the will of God. He Himself with the Father and
the Spirit had ordained His own sufferings and death before the
world began. In Revelation 13 and verse 8,
we hear that He is the Lamb that was slain, slaughtered for the
sins of His people. And so, we don't want to get
into the gruesome details of crucifixion, although our Lord
suffered that. I wouldn't take anything away
from His physical sufferings. But it was by his soul's sufferings
that he rendered satisfaction to the law and justice of God
when he died for the sins of those sins that had been laid
upon him by the Father. in order to fulfill the true
end or the goal of the Christian ministry, we must, first of all,
we must set forth the nature of Christ's death. You see, in
appearance, the deaths of all three of those
men seemed very much alike. The people who watched the crucifixions
of these three men saw three individuals suffering greatly. Now, I know that our Lord had
been crowned with thorns, which the two thieves were not, because
our Lord was being mocked, because He said He was the King of the
Jews. He was also given a purple robe. Because they said if he is indeed
a king, if he thinks he's a king, a king ought to wear a royal
garment. So I realize there's some differences
in their sufferings between the three men. And I realize there's
a great difference in their deaths. Because the two thieves they
were still breathing, and the Jews insisted that all three
bodies had to come down from their crosses because it was
drawing near to sundown and the beginning of the Sabbath
day. And so the two thieves, when
the soldiers went around and found that they were still breathing,
The soldiers broke the legs of the thieves. But when they came to our Lord's
body, they found him to be already
dead. You see the two thieves, they
died according to the will and the actions of men. But our Lord
died by His own will. He said in John 10, I have the
power to lay down my life. He said, no man takes it from
me. You see, you could accurately
say that the soldiers took the lives of the two thieves. Because when they broke their
legs, they could no longer hold themselves up, taking the pressure
off the lungs. As their legs collapsed, then
they were unable to breathe any longer, and soon their lives
were snuffed out. But our Lord Jesus was already
dead. because He controlled, could
I put it this way, He controlled His own fate. He controlled the
things that happened to Him. Every lash of the whip, all the
thorns that went into the crown upon His brow, all the slappings,
all the beatings, all of the rest of the things that happened
to Him, they all happened by divine decree, His decree. And whereas the deaths of the
two thieves were necessary to uphold a lawful society, the death of our Lord Jesus Christ
was also necessary in order to satisfy another law, God's law. You see, when you think of the
death of our Lord Jesus Christ, think of it as a work of satisfying
the justice of God. You see, God's justice demands
death for sin. That's right, isn't it? You know
that's right. You who are watching, you agree
with me, don't you? I know you do. You're shaking
your head now. That's right. God's law demanded death for
sin. The soul that sinneth shall surely
die. You remember what God told Adam
back in the garden in Genesis the second chapter? In the day
thou eatest thereof, in the day that you sin, In the day that you transgress
my law that I give you, in the day that you sin, you will surely
die. Death is the penalty for sin. But our Lord Jesus had no sin. He knew no sin. He did no sin. So why must He die? Why did He
die? Why did the justice of God focus
all of its wrath and all of its fury upon the Son of God when
He had done no evil? The reason is because He bore
the sins of all of those that God gave Him in the covenant
of grace. So then in Isaiah 53 and verse
6 we read, all we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned
everyone to his own way. And the Lord hath laid on him,
literally made to meet on him the iniquities of us all. And our Lord Jesus, bearing the
iniquities of us all, we use the word imputed to Him, charged
to His account, made to meet on Him, the justice and law of
God finding all of the sins, a mass of sins that could never
be numbered by men. The justice of God finding sin
upon the Savior. struck out against him. His death,
you see, was a sacrifice. It was a sacrifice. The deaths
of the two thieves, that was not a sacrifice, neither was
a sacrifice. They deserved what they got.
But our Lord Jesus willingly, willingly bore our sins in order
to present to the Father himself as a sacrifice. You see, that's
what all the sacrifices pictured under the Mosaic economy. God gave to the Jews his law. And it included sacrifices. And they were necessary in order
to satisfy what God demanded. Bring the firstling of the flock,
a male of the first year, without spot, without blemish, without
any such thing, and offer it to God. Why was that necessary? It was necessary to cover the
sins of Israel, or the sins of an individual who may have brought
that sacrifice, to cover them, but not to put them away. You
see, we read in Hebrews chapter 10, the blood of bulls and goats
could never put away sin. They were sacrifices offered
to God, But they couldn't do anything about sin, because they
were just animals. They were just beasts of the
field. They were just lambs and goats or turtle doves or pigeons. They couldn't put away sin. But
then our Lord came, and all of those Old Testament sacrifices,
those animals, they all pictured Him who would come. That's why
John identified him as being the Lamb of God. He's the Lamb
that really would do something about our sins. Not just picture
something. See, that's all the animals,
the sacrifices in the Old Testament could do. All they could do is
just picture something. They foreshadowed another sacrifice,
a greater sacrifice, the one sacrifice that could put away
sins forever, the sacrifice of the Son of God. And when you
read about Christ being crucified, think of this, there's the sacrifice. It was the only way that a just
and holy God could ever forgive our sins in its entirety and
make us righteous in His sight. It was the only way. This death was a sacrifice. We read in Isaiah 53 and I'll
read A couple of more verses. But 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. I visited with a dear lady last
week. And she was telling me that one
of her loved ones said, Grandma, you wouldn't be sick. You wouldn't be disabled if you
believed the Lord Jesus Christ enough. Because he died, and
by his stripes, we're healed if we believe enough. And my response was, here's what
you need to tell your loved one. In the book of Hebrews chapter
11, I believe that's the great faith chapter. That's what we
usually call it. Somebody said it's the world
series of faith of people who believed on Christ. But you know what is said about
almost all of them with the exception of Enoch? It says, these all
died in faith. Their faith in the Lord didn't
keep them from being martyred. Their faith in the Lord didn't
keep them from being physically diseased. Their faith in the
Lord Jesus Christ did not prevent them from dying physically. Well, in what way were we healed
by his stripes? In a spiritual way. Of the disease
of sin, likened in the Bible to leprosy. And our Lord Jesus presented
himself, the sacrifice to God. He laid down his life in order to save His people,
in order to satisfy God's just demands. His was a substitutionary death. He died in the stead of everybody
who'll ever believe Him. That's correct. He died in the
stead of all those the Father gave Him in covenant grace. That's true. He died in the stead of all his
people. And by his stripes, with his
stripes, we were healed. You see, we must view the crucifixion
of our Lord Jesus. I knew it was a gruesome death,
and I can't imagine how bad that was. But it's more than that. That's what I want you to see.
He offered Himself without spot to God. And the only reason all
of you who believe the Gospel of Christ, the only reason why
those of you who are watching embrace the Lord Jesus Christ,
the only reason why we're not going to hell, to endure the
wrath of God forever for sins that we can never pay for. The
only reason is because this man died in our stead on the cross
and satisfied justice. He was a sacrifice to God. That's
the only reason. The blood, the blood of the Son
of God. Nancy was reading a monthly periodical
that I get, and I haven't had an opportunity to read it, but
she said, you need to read this. I said, okay. She said, because
it says out of the three services that you, that a preacher preaches
during the week, I believe this is kind of the summarization
of what she was telling me. I try to listen to her, but sometimes,
you know. The message of this article that
she read, as she summarized it to me, was this. Out of the three
messages that a preacher preaches every week, at least one of them
he needs to preach the gospel. That's right, that's correct
summarization. At least one of them he needs
to preach the gospel. So what do you preach the other
two times? Because you see, in my mind, if you're not preaching
the gospel, you're not preaching anything worth listening to. I realize that a lot of preachers,
they focus on preaching about things. About the abortion issue. Pornography. Homosexuality. Well, there's evil in that. I
wouldn't deny that. But that's not our message. Our
message is somebody and the work that somebody did for undeserving
sinners. Now, in the preaching of the
gospel, do we necessarily, therefore, speak as in the context of the
passage about the need for the necessity of us living lives
that are honoring to God? Well, of course we do. Every child of God here, every
child of God watching, we hate sin. We hate it in the world,
but we especially hate it in ourselves. And we long to be
with the Lord because when we're with Him, we'll finally be without
sin. We shall see Him as He is and
we shall be like Him. But ours is not an anti-message,
anti-this, anti-that. Several years ago, I had some
people got really upset with me because I wouldn't join them
in going to Washington in a march against abortion. I'm against the murder of the
unborn. But if we stopped all the abortions
in the land, preaching the non-abortion or
stop the abortion, that's not the gospel. People still perish. Oh, but
at least we got them to give up abortion. Let's tell them about Christ
and why He died. The necessity for His death.
You see what I'm saying? I wouldn't excuse the immorality
of the day. I would not excuse that at all. But it's not our message. That's
not our ministry. So I say we declare the nature
of Christ's death. You see, it's in the light of
His death being a sacrifice that all of the offerings were commanded
under the Levitical law. It was in the light of His death
that all the prophets set Him forth. And in the light of a sacrifice,
His death is clearly set forth in the New Testament. Unless the death of Christ is
presented in this view, we do not, in the apostles' sense
of the word, we do not preach the gospel. We must preach the gospel as
that sacrifice that forever silenced the justice of God against His
people. I'll tell you why I'm not going
to be punished for my sins. Because somebody's been punished
already. He took my punishment for me. And I'll tell you this. To fulfill the true end or goal
of the Christian ministry, we must not only declare the nature
of Christ's death, but we must set forth the results of his
death. There is no spiritual benefit
that is not traced to this death. Our acceptance with God. Paul
says in Ephesians 1, we're accepted in the Beloved. Our forgiveness. We have forgiveness of sins through
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. How come God's not going to hold
you accountable for your sins? Hey, you've committed them, hadn't
you? They're yours and you own up to them. And I've got news
for you. It's kind of like looking at
the ocean. You can see the top of it, but
all that water underneath. That's the way it is with our
sins. We see some of them, but most of our sins are beneath
the waves. It's in here. We are sin, and
the only reason we're not going to be punished for our sins is
because Christ died in our stead. Forgiveness? We have peace with
God? through our Lord Jesus Christ. God's not mad at you. He's not
upset with you. Isn't that amazing? See, all
the things that I've done, preacher, all the things I've said and
thought, evil words that I've spoken and something happens,
I hit my thumb with a hammer and I spew out a few words that
ought not to have said? You mean He doesn't hold that
against me? Well, you ought not to say those things that are
bad, but He doesn't hold it against you. And you have righteousness, you
have holiness, and you have glory to come. Those are the fruits
of His death. You see, without the crucified
Savior, we would have received nothing
but the just desserts for our sins. But through the atoning
work of Christ, we receive everything, everything a satisfied God can
give us. What lack ye? And I'd say we
lack nothing. That's the amazing thing about
this gospel. We preach Christ crucified. And if you want to hear Christ
crucified and He's satisfied justice, well, come on back tonight. Basically, it's the same thing. We'll start at a different text.
We'll start in Psalm 97 tonight. But this is our message. And
it isn't just our theme, this is our message. Christ and Him
crucified. Well, I trust the Lord will bless
that to your hearts. Let's sing 214. Verily, verily, And I'd say to all of you, look
to Christ Jesus for salvation. Oh, that God would cause you
to look.