Isaiah chapter 62. We have recently had the funeral for Evelyn, and
she is in Emmanuel's land. And oh, how glorious that has
to be. And I cannot imagine the joy
that fills her soul now that she's with the Savior and she
sees Him face to face. And she knows now personally
that the Lamb of God is all the glory. in Emmanuel's land. And we rejoice
that she's with the Lord and Brother Don's mother, Alice,
also in the presence of our Savior and enjoying the bliss of seeing
the Lamb of God and being with Him there in Emmanuel's land. Let's ask God to bless again. Lord, for all of your mercies
to us through Christ our Savior, we bow to give thanksgiving. We're thankful that you have
given to us the Word of God. this accurate word that you conveyed
to over 40 writers, all who wrote over a period of 1,500 years. They all tell the story, the
story of God's saving grace to sinners through the Lord Jesus.
We do rejoice in this glorious gospel of grace. and we rejoice in our Savior. And we're so thankful that when
your people leave this world, they immediately enter into Emmanuel's
land, there to be greeted by the Son of God Himself, who loved
us and who gave Himself for us. Take away from us every fear,
every fearful thought about dying, if we're your people. For Christ
Jesus is our life. He said to us, I am the resurrection
and the life. He that believeth in me shall
never die. These two sisters in the Lord
Jesus have fallen asleep in the Savior. Evelyn's body committed
to the earth just a few days ago. Alice McQueen's body to
be committed to the earth sometime later this week. But the soul
has gone back to God. God who gave it. God who's saved
by His grace. Who's saved through the redemption
that is in Christ Jesus. And oh, how thrilling beyond
description is the joy of being in the presence of the King.
We look forward to that day. Until then, Lord, Keep us ever
looking by faith to the Lord Jesus. Resting in Him. Knowing that by His righteousness
we're received. By His bloody death our sins
were put away. We stand before you even now. Robed in the garments of salvation. This is Your work, O God, and
we give You the glory. Bless now as we endeavor to sit
before these who are gathered before me and those who are watching
by way of the Internet. Be with me as I try to set forth
this glorious truth of believers and their crowns. Keep us faithful. Keep us believing. Keep us looking
unto Jesus. Keep us resting in Him. And Lord,
we know that all of this salvation is by Your free grace. So we
thank You and we bless You and praise You. For Jesus' sake,
Amen. My subject this evening is believers
and their crowns. But before I embark upon this
subject, I felt it necessary to introduce my message with
this glorious truth that is set before us in Isaiah chapter 62
and verse 3. Thou shalt also be a crown of
glory. That is, he's speaking to believers. Thou shalt be a crown of glory
in the hand of the Lord. He's speaking to Zion. We learned
that, we observed that when Bill read to us the first verse. Thou
shalt be a crown of glory in the hand of the Lord. and a royal
diadem in the hand of thy God. In this verse of Scripture, it is important for us to understand
that all believers, all of the children of God constitute the
crown of Christ Jesus. We are His crown. We are His
diadem in His hand. Who gets the crown? Who gets
the diadem? The victor. The victor. And our Lord Jesus Christ, He
has won the victory for all of His people. And He has saved
us by His grace. He has redeemed us by His bloody
sacrifice. And we are, we are His crown. and we are His diadem in His
hand. You see, what is the crown and
the diadem of the Lord? Is it not His saving grace? That's
His great honor. There's the honor, the glory
that goes to our Lord due to creation, no question about that. The heavens declare the glory
of God is what the Scriptures say. And as we observe the hand
of God in providence in all of the things that happen every
day, we say, oh, how great is our Lord. But His greatest, greatest
glory is seen in the salvation of folks like you and me. That
He would enter into this world and lay down His life for us. that He would save us by His
grace, that He would be the substitute for us, for all of His people,
that He would bear our sins in His own body on the tree, that
He would redeem us from the hand of divine justice, that He would
pay all of our indebtedness. This is to His great glory. And we are His crown. We are His diadem. That's what
the verse says here. Thou shalt be a crown of glory
in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of
thy God. And we're in His hand. That means
safety. That means protection. That means
preservation. The Savior said, My sheep hear
My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me. And I give unto
them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall any
man pluck them out of My hand. My Father which gave them Me
is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of
My Father's hand. I and My Father are one on this. I and My Father are in agreement
on this. We hold all of our people, those
chosen in the election of grace, those redeemed by the bloody
death of our Savior, those regenerated by the Spirit of God, those preserved
by grace and perfected by grace. The Lord says, they're safe in
My hand. They're My crown of glory. and they are my diadem, my royal
diadem," said the Lord. When Moses, in the book of Exodus
chapter 34, when he said to the Lord, he said, Lord, would you
show me your glory? And God said, I'll make my goodness
pass before you and I'll proclaim the name of the Lord. And I'll
be merciful to whom I'll be merciful. I'll be gracious to whom I'll
be gracious. That's His glory. God's great
glory, His great honor is in saving us. That's His great glory. This is magnificent. This is
wonderful. It's certainly wonderful to us,
but guess what? It's wonderful to the Lord. And
he rejoices over our salvation. In fact, in Luke chapter 15,
when the shepherd finds the lost sheep, he picks up the lost sheep,
puts it on his shoulders, and he goes home rejoicing. He says, rejoice with me. I found
the sheep that was lost. The woman finds the lost coin.
She says, rejoice with me. Says to all of her neighbors,
rejoice with me. I found that which was lost. And the father waits for the
wayward son to come home. And the older son was so angry,
so angry. And the father says, can't you
rejoice with me? Can't you rejoice with me? The
wayward has come home. This is our Lord's greatest glory. The salvation of sinners. And
I'll tell you, if you would honor and glorify the Lord yourself,
make much of what He does in redemption. Think about what
God has done for you. Thank Him for it. This is His
great glory. He saved us. He saved us by His
grace. I said last week that salvation
is everything that is required to bring a son or a daughter
of Adam from the ruin of the fall to everlasting glory in
heaven. He chose us unto salvation. He
predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ Himself. He predestinated that we'd be
conformed to the image of Jesus Christ. He justified us by His
grace. He justified us by His blood. He redeemed us. He sanctified
us. He's our righteousness. He's
our holiness. And He's our glorification. He's
all things to His people. In this matter of salvation,
from the bottom to the top, and everything in between, it's all
of the Lord. It's all to His glory. That's
the reason the Lord says of His people, you're a crown of glory
in the hand of the Lord. You're a royal diadem in the
hand of the Lord. It is our salvation that glorifies
Him the most. Now, there are those who believe
that we get to heaven by grace. But then our position in heaven,
now that's determined by our works and by our service. And there's lots that I could
say about that, but that doctrine, it promotes arrogance, it promotes
pride, and self-righteousness. When we get to heaven, If you're
going to have a higher position than me, if you get more crowns
than I'm going to get, or if you have more rewards, and I'll
kind of bring back to your memory my message last Sunday evening
about the reward of the believer. If you think that by your efforts
and your works, you're going to get more crowns and more rewards,
that promotes self-righteousness and arrogance. It's like a man
going to heaven. He looks down on others who didn't
serve the Lord as much as he did. And he struts around in heaven
like a peacock. I did more than you did. I got
more than you did too. You poor thing. You should have
served the Lord like I did. Well, you know that's not going
to be the case. Because the salvation of the
righteous is of the Lord. The doctrine embraced by many
of different degrees of heaven has an obnoxious odor of works
to it. And make no mistake about it,
our works in and of themselves because they come forth from
a polluted fountain. They are in themselves obnoxious."
There's that awful, awful stench about them. They just stink.
They stink. That's why they've got to go
to Christ first. All thanksgiving, all service
goes to our Lord Jesus, and He bathes it in His blood, and He
perfumes it with His righteousness, and then He says, Here, Father, you and I have never done anything
that is fit for God to accept in and of Himself. Nothing. And people forget that. They
forget that somehow they think they do enough, they work a lot,
they serve a lot, and therefore the Lord's going to say, I'm
going to give you more than others give because you labored more
abundantly than others. Many years ago, I heard a so-called
Sovereign Grace preacher, and I did hear him preach Sovereign
Grace from time to time. I doubt any of you knew him,
but you can ask me later and I'll tell you who it was. He's
dead now. But he said, in heaven, there'll
be many Christians who will be weeping all through eternity
because they didn't serve the Lord faithfully. like others
did, and therefore, they're missing out on the rewards and the crowns
that the Lord Jesus is going to pass out. That is a hideous,
hideous thing. And I'll give you one verse of
Scripture that just knocks all that kind of mess in the head.
Turn to Revelation chapter 21. Revelation chapter 21. And look at verse 4. Revelation
chapter 21 at verse 4. There are people who honestly
believe that when we get to heaven, there will be people who are
going to be weeping and crying. This is going on. They're going
to be so ashamed, so sad, because they didn't serve the Lord enough.
And so therefore, they don't get the rewards that others get,
they don't get the crown that others get. Well, look at Revelation
21 verse four. And God shall wipe away all tears
from their eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow
or crying, neither shall there be any more pain, for the former
things are passed away. Now you hear me, there will be
no regrets in heaven. Do you understand? No regrets
in heaven. The former things are passed
away. In the book of Jeremiah we read,
in that day, the sins of Israel and of Judah shall be sought
for and they shall not be found. Why not? Because they don't exist. The Lord said, your sins and
your iniquities, well, I remember no more. He's not gonna bring
them up against you. Well, but we're gonna go to the
judgment and we're gonna be judged for our sins. I beg your pardon. There's already been a judgment
for our sins that took place in the crucified Christ. That's
where our sins were judged He died for our sins. I will in
no way suffer any punishment. There is nothing penal coming
to me because the Lord Jesus has already been punished in
my stead. And that which awaits me in heaven
is everlasting glory. And if you have difficulty with
that, you need to learn how to spell grace again. You just don't
comprehend grace, the fullness of God's grace. Your position
in heaven is not determined by what you do on earth. Your position in heaven is the
reward for Christ's faithfulness, for His life, for His death,
for His burial, for His resurrection. Your position is based on His
merits. You don't have any. Now if that's too much grace
for you, we were talking about that back in the men's meeting.
Some people, they just... So I believe in sovereign grace,
but we just believe in too much grace for them. This is just
too much grace. Well, preacher, how much grace
do you need? I need all grace. I need grace
to lift me up out of the miry clay. I need grace that will
escort me all the way to glory with nothing ever dependent upon
me. That's the grace of God. He'll wipe away all tears from
our eyes. Your sins are not going to be
brought up against you. I remember back in my Armenian
days, I didn't know beans about the gospel. I was a youngster,
then a teenager. We had the president of a Bible
college came and he put all of his charts up. He'd talk about
going out to see the Lord. You don't want to be ashamed,
do you? No, I don't want to be ashamed. You need to work for
Him. You need to work for Him. And if you don't, You don't want
to see Him at the judgment. You show me in the Word of God
one scripture where any believer did not want to see the face
of the Son of God, or who was fearful of going before Him. I don't want to go. My life's been such a failure.
Well now, that leads me to say, who are you depending on for
your salvation then? You? Yourself? Your works? Your labors? Your faithfulness?
You see, this salvation is altogether in Christ Jesus. And if you really
believe that, you'll want to see Him. You're not going to
dread to go before Him. I don't have any dreads of seeing
Him. I want to see Him. I've preached
about Him. I've talked about Him. I've read
about Him. I've instructed people about
Him. I long to see Him. I'm not fearful of seeing Him.
I'm not fearful of any judgment. Are you? If you are fearful of standing
before the Lord in His majesty, in His glory, then you've got
real problems. Because there's a lack of understanding
of God's full salvation that is given to you by His grace
through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Now, I would
say this. I'll say this to serve the Lord
with gladness. Yes. You come before His presence
with singing. and into His court with praise. Honor the Lord in your life.
Absolutely. Absolutely. Always seek His glory. Labor for the cause of God in
truth. We read in Romans chapter 12,
I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that you
present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to
God, which is your reasonable service. And don't be conformed
to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind
that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect
will of God. But don't serve him as a mercenary. Don't serve him as a hireling. Well, I'm going to serve him
so I get more rewards when I get to heaven. I got news for you.
That's your attitude. You ain't going. You're not going
to make it. God's going to have to give you
a total change of heart. I'll tell you that. And I don't want to hear how
much you've done for the Lord. I don't want to hear how busy
you've been for the cause of God and truth. Sometimes people tell me, you
know, I read my Bible. I want you to know, preacher,
I read my Bible every day. Well, good for you. You got your
reward, didn't you? Yeah, you tried to impress me,
but I got news for you. You don't impress me. Nobody
down here impresses me. because even if you do read the
Word of God every day, and you should, that's a good thing to
do. You pray, absolutely. But all
of your worship is coming forth from a polluted fountain. You've
got to keep that in mind. Got to. We're all pitiful servants. That's the truth. And all along
our earthly journey, we weep over many things. weep over our
sins. But when we get to glory, the
Lord's going to wipe away all of our tears. Back in my Armenian days, and
I tell you, those grave clothes, they're halfway sticking to you.
The stuff's kind of pounded into your brain so much. I hear preachers say, you'll
be ashamed to see the Lord. No, I look forward to seeing
him. And I want to give you another
passage of scripture. Look at Ephesians 1. Look at
Ephesians chapter 1. And this will also help each
of us with this. Ephesians chapter 1. And look
at verse 3. You say, well, I know this passage
by heart. And I'm sure you do. This is
a well-worn portion of Scripture to all of us who love sovereign
grace. But look what it says. Look at
verses 3 and 4. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly
places in Christ, according as He hath chosen us in Him before
the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without
blame before Him in love." I want to ask you, how many spiritual
blessings were we blessed with in Jesus Christ before the world
began? All of them. That's what your Bible
says. All of them. All spiritual blessings. If words
mean anything, this portion of Scripture is saying that every
possible blessing, every possible honor that God could ever bestow
upon anyone has already been bestowed in
the Lord Jesus. You don't think God left anything
out, do you? All spiritual blessings except
those rewards and crowns that you've got to work for and get.
No. All spiritual blessings. That means my place in heaven,
my position in heaven, it was given to me before the world
began. All spiritual blessings. If I have all spiritual blessings,
and you have all spiritual blessings, then there are no different degrees
or levels of rewards or crowns in glory. And I'll tell you a good rule
to live by. People every once in a while say, I wish you'd
tell us how to live. Listen up. I won't tell you very
often, but I'm going to tell you. I'm going to tell you how
to live. See if you can handle this. Love Christ Jesus and live
as you will. What? Love Christ Jesus and live
as you will. Because you see, if you love
the Savior, the love of Christ constrains us to worship, to
be thankful, to honor Him? Yes, indeed. Well, go to the book of Revelation.
Now let me get right down to a few things I want to share
with you about the believer and his crowns. Revelation chapter
4. And I'm not going to read all
of this because we read all of this last Lord's Day evening.
But Revelation chapter 4 and verse 4, John has seen the throne
of God. Now look at verse 4. And round
about that throne of God were four and twenty seats, or smaller
thrones. And upon these seats I saw four
and twenty elders sitting. Who are these four and twenty
elders? Most believe, most who understand
the gospel believe, that these are a representative group, the
twelve from the Old Testament. twelve sons of Jacob, and twelve
apostles from the New Testament, that these constitute all of
the people of God of all ages." Here all of us are. You say,
well, what makes you think that? Because in the very next chapter,
look over in chapter 5. Look at chapter 5. Verse 8, Christ has taken the
book of predestination. Verse 8, and when he had taken
the book, the four beasts, preachers, and four and twenty elders fell
down before the Lamb, every one of them having harps and golden
vials full of odors, which are the prayers of the saints. And
they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book,
and open the seals thereof. Now remember, these are the four
and twenty elders. Slain. The word is slaughtered. And has redeemed us to God by
Thy blood. Watch this. Out of every kindred
and tongue and people and nation. And has made us unto our God
kings and priests and we shall reign on the earth. So these
4 and 20 elders back over here in chapter 4 who are seated on
their thrones, these are all the people of God gathered together.
Now watch this. I saw them sitting, clothed in
white raiment, and they had on their heads crowns of gold. Crowns of gold. Now look down
at verse 10. And the four and twenty elders
fall down before Him that sat on the throne and worship Him
that liveth forever and ever. And here's what they do with
those crowns. They cast their crowns before the throne, saying,
Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive honor and power. Glory and honor and power, for
Thou has created all things, and for Thy pleasure they are
and were created. These four and twenty elders
represent all the people of God from the Old Testament and the
New Testament. Every throne is occupied. Plenty
of room in heaven, but no empty seats. Notice they're all clothed
with white raiment. That's the righteousness of the
Lord Jesus. And it says they all worship
the Lamb who shed His blood. They're all redeemed. They're
the redeemed of the Lord. And they're all around the throne
of the Lord. Look at verse four again. And
round about the throne of the Lamb. That which occupied John's
attention, grabbed his attention right from the get-go when the
Lord took him up and showed him this vision was the very throne
of God and of the Lamb. And all around the throne are
these four and 20 seats. Here are the elders. They're
all around the throne. None nearer than others. Well now, surely, Jim, surely,
the Apostle Paul, who suffered so much, founded churches, preached
everywhere, shipwrecked, beaten, imprisoned, finally lost his
head for the Lord Jesus. Surely, he's going to be nearer
to the throne of God than that thief you preached on last Sunday
who was saved by the marvelous, sovereign, omnipotent grace of
God at the very last moment of life. No, Paul, it's not going
to be nearer to the throne of God than the thief. no nearer than the Philippian
jailer." You see, they're all around the throne. Did you know
there's a denomination and they profess to believe sovereign
grace? And some of them, some of them believe that those who
glide into eternity, people of God, who haven't been very faithful
to the Lord, they're actually going to be in darkness looking
in on the new Jerusalem and the joy in Christ Jesus and they're
going to be in the dark saying, man, I wish I'd been more faithful.
There's actually a denomination that believes that garbage. They
have no idea of the efficacy of the blood of Jesus Christ.
The power of the grace of God. These are all around the throne. They're seated there. They're
seated there. Oh, they're secure. And they
have on their heads crowns of gold. None without crowns. None without crowns. According
to the revelation given us in Holy Scripture, all the people
of God have crowns of gold on their heads in the beginning
of heaven's glory. Don't tell me there will be people
of God in heaven who won't be wearing crowns or have crowns. And they all cast their crowns
before the throne. I'm going to give you these crowns,
and I can give them to you briefly. But before I do, let me ask you,
I want to ask you a question, and you have to answer to yourself.
And this is especially for anybody who might be having difficulty
with what I said last week about a believer in the reward and
a believer in the crowns tonight. If you're having difficulty with
this, let me ask you a question. I don't want you to answer me,
I just want you to answer yourself. Do you really want the Lord to
reward you or give you crowns upon the basis of your service
to Him. Is that really what you want? I assure you of this, any service,
any work you've ever done for the Lord is a polluted work. It's a polluted service. due
to your original sin. So I've done some works for the
Lord. Do you do them perfectly? At
least it's got to be perfect to be accepted. And there are
no degrees of perfection. No degrees of perfection. You've
never done a perfect work. You've never spoken a perfect
word. You've never had a perfect thought.
You've never had a perfect motive. That is just the truth. Now,
if you want God to reward you for all of your imperfections,
you can go ahead and think that way. but I don't want him to reward
me for anything I've ever done. I want him to reward me, I'll
say this carefully, for the faithfulness and the obedience of my elder
brother, who lived for me, who died for
me, who arose for me, and who ascended for me. Let me show
you these crowns. I'll give them to you quickly.
First of all, Revelation 2. It won't take me long. Revelation
2. Look at verse 10. This is the
Lord speaking to the church at Smyrna. This is also found, if you're
taking notes, in James 1 and verse 12. Revelation 2.10, Fear none of
those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall
cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried. And ye shall have tribulation
ten days. You're going to have a tough
time. Be faithful unto death. You keep on believing. You keep
on believing the gospel. I'll give you a crown of life. You keep on believing, I'll give
you a crown of life. What is this faithfulness? It's
continual belief and confidence in the Lord Jesus Christ. You
see, true faith doesn't quit. Oh, it gets discouraged and sometimes grows weak. But those who forsake the Savior
altogether They never had true faith to begin with. The righteous, Job said, Job
17, 9, shall hold on their way. See, true faith doesn't stop
believing because faith is a gift of God. He keeps on giving. You be faithful to death, I'll
give you a crown of life. That's all of God's people. You
see, all of God's people keep on believing. Keep on believing. Here's the second one, 2 Timothy
chapter 4. I told you I can get them to
you pretty quick. It takes longer for me to give you the introduction
than it does to go through these crowns. Here in 2 Timothy chapter
4, here's the crown of righteousness. 2 Timothy chapter 4. Look at verse 6. Paul says, For
I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure
is at hand. I fought a good fight. I finished
my course. I've kept the faith. Henceforth
there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord
the righteous Judge shall give me at that day. Well, I can understand
why I'd give that to Paul. Now wait a minute. He says, And not to me only.
What? not to this great apostle only, but unto all them who love
his appearing." Are there any of the children of God that don't
love the appearing of the Lord Jesus Christ? We love His first
appearing. That's when He saved us by His
grace, by His bloody death. And we love His second appearing.
The Lord Jesus said, Behold, I come quickly, and all the church
of God says, and John speaks for us. Even so, come Lord Jesus. I'd like for Him to come tonight.
Come back. Come back. Take me out of this
sinful body. Take me out of this mess. Take
us all home to be with You where we can worship and praise You
and thank You perfectly because that's what we want to do. We
want to be with the Lord Jesus. He gives this crown of righteousness
to all who love His appearance. Why is it called a crown of righteousness? Because of the One who merited
this righteousness and who established this righteousness by His obedience
unto death, even the death of the cross. He is our righteousness. Thirdly, look at 1 Thessalonians
2, just a few pages over. Here's a crown of rejoicing.
We're all going to get this in two. 1 Thessalonians 2, verse
19. This is Paul. He's thankful to the Lord because
the Lord used him in preaching the Gospel and so many in Thessalonica
were saved by the grace of God. He says, what is our hope? Verse 19, chapter 2. Or joy. Or crown of rejoicing. Are not
even you In the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming,
what is His crown of rejoicing? All who desire to see others
believing and resting in the Lord Jesus Christ. I know all
of God's people want that. We want people to believe. We
want people to be saved by the grace of God. We pray to that
end. We're going to have a crown of rejoicing. And then here's
the fourth one. 1 Corinthians 9.25, an incorruptible
crown. Look at 1 Corinthians 9. Look at verse 25. And every man that striveth for
the mastery is temperate in all things. Now they do it to obtain
a corruptible crown. But we, we, an incorruptible
crown. This is an incorruptible crown,
the crown that the Lord gives us because we keep on going. Even though we get discouraged,
we have seasons of spiritual lukewarmness. But we don't stop. We don't quit the Gospel. We
don't grow tired of hearing the truth of Christ and Him crucified. The message of the Gospel is
not outdated to us. And so He gives us this crown. And then 1 Peter chapter 5. 1 Peter chapter 5 and verse 4. 1 Peter chapter 5 and verse 4. And when the chief shepherd shall
appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. This is a crown of glory that's
given to everybody who's united to the Lord Jesus Christ. When
Christ comes, we shall be like Him. We shall see Him as He is. Remember what the Savior said
in His high priestly prayer in John 17, the glory which thou
gavest me, I have given them, that they may be one, even as
we are one. The Lord's going to give us a
crown of glory. So there they are. crown of life,
righteousness, rejoicing, incorruptible, and crown of glory. We'll cast
all those crowns at His feet. Because all of this life, righteousness,
our rejoicing in Him, the incorruptible crown, the crown of glory, it's
all due to Him. And so we cast them at His feet.
Now, I have one more thing to give you. I want you to go back
to the book of Isaiah, this time chapter 28. Let me see if I can... I'm going to give you a bookend.
You know, a lot of times in a message, you have the first bookend at
the beginning, and then at the end you have the second bookend. Here are bookends to put all
of this together. Isaiah 28. I said in the beginning,
right from the start of the message, from that portion in Isaiah that
Bill read to us, I said that all of the children of God, all
of the chosen, justified, redeemed, regenerated, preserved and glorified
sinners, we're the Lord's crown and the royal diadem in His hands. Now look at chapter 28 and verse
5. In that day shall the Lord of
hosts be for a crown of glory and for a diadem of beauty under
the residue, under the elect, under the remnant of His people. All of the Lord's children have
Christ the Lord and He is the crown. He is the diadem. He's the royal diadem. Isn't
that interesting? Let me put them together. We
are His crown. We are His diadem. And He is
our crown. And He's our diadem. Don't you understand? that all
who somehow still think the more you do for the Lord, the more
you'll get, that's just not so. It's just not so. All we want
is Christ Jesus. He's all we want. Isn't that
right? He's all we want. And when we have Him, we have
all the crowns. Because you see, really, all
of those crowns that I mentioned, life, righteousness, rejoicing,
incorruptible in glory, they're all in Him. You have Christ Jesus. You've
got the crown. And you've got the diadem. And
God can't give you any more than His Son. And I'll tell you, for
all of His people, that's surely enough. That's enough to last
us forever. To worship King Jesus. The basis for our acceptance
into everlasting glory and our position there is not left to
our works, which at best are marred by sin. Our position in
glory is all due to grace. The grace of God given to us
and in Christ Jesus. Well, hope that'll help you some. To God be the glory. Great things
He hath done. Let's close in prayer. We thank
You, Father, for all that You've done for us unworthy, miserable,
pitiful sinners through the Lord Jesus Christ. The biography of
every one of Your children Reads the same. Saved by grace. Bought by blood. Robed in righteousness. Not our own, but the righteousness
of the Lord our righteousness, Jehovah Sidcanu. And that name
by which He is called the Lord our righteousness, bless the
name of God. That's our name. All of the ransomed of the Lord
are named the Lord, our righteousness. We want no more than Christ the
Lord. And that will be glory for us
to see Him and be with Him and acknowledge that all that we
are before God standing before Him in righteousness
and holiness and in beauty, is all due to the grace of God given
us in Christ Jesus. Bless the Word, give to all of
us understanding, and may we go away rejoicing in our Lord
Jesus Christ in His name. Amen.