Alright, we'll start off here
in John chapter 12, wanting to see Jesus. That's our subject
this evening. These Gentiles, they came to
Philip, and this was their desire. They wanted to see Jesus. I hope they had a good motive.
I want to think that they Salt the Savior. We're not told. The Holy Spirit doesn't go into
the details regarding the desires of these Gentiles. Don't know
how many there were. Perhaps men and women, Gentiles,
they had come from afar. And they gathered with the Jews
on this Passover. And their desire is They wanted
to see Jesus. I hope they wanted to get acquainted
with this One who is the only Savior of sinners. I hope they
wanted to talk to Him about how their sins could be forgiven.
I hope they wanted to talk to Him about how they could be righteous
before a holy God, how they could be accepted before the throne
of justice. I hope this was a real desire
of their hearts to know this One who is the Savior of sinners,
whom the book of Haggai, He said that this is the desire of all
nations. In fact, I'd like for you to
go back to the book of Haggai, and I want to read a few verses.
I'll read more verses now than I did just before the lead in
prayer. Haggai, there are only two chapters
here, and if you have trouble finding it, Last book of the
Old Testament is Malachi, then there's Zechariah before that,
and then there's Haggai before that. So it's the third to the
last book in the Old Testament, the book of Haggai. And it's
only got two chapters. Two chapters. And I want you
to look in the second chapter, and I'll give you a little bit
of background. Book of Haggai, the second chapter. This is about roughly 500 years
before the Lord Jesus entered into this world. So therefore
it means it's 100 years before the end of the Old Testament.
Because you know, all of you know, I'm sure, that between
the book of Malachi and Matthew there's a period 400 years. 400 years that God didn't speak. God didn't have a prophet. 400 years. And so this, the book
of Haggai, 500 years. So 100 years before the end of
the Old Testament. That's when Haggai prophesied.
And he wrote this book, especially the second chapter, he writes,
at least on the surface, he writes to lift the spirits of the men
who were rebuilding the temple. That would be Zerubbabel, Joshua,
and the others. And he is, here's what Haggai's
doing, he wants to kind of pick up their spirits. That's the
reason he writes. And I want to read a few verses
here in the second chapter of Haggai. In the seventh month,
chapter two, verse one, in the seventh month, in the one and
20th day of the month, came the word of the Lord by the prophet
Haggai, saying, speak now to Zerubbabel, well, who's Zerubbabel,
he's the son of Sheateel, who's the governor of Judah, and to
Joshua, the son of Josedek, the high priest. This is a different
Joshua than the man who succeeded Moses, of course, because this
is a few hundred years later. And then speak to the residue
of the people, and this is what I want you to say. Who is left
among you that you saw this house in her first glory? That is,
who saw the temple. And how do you see it now? Is it not in your eyes in comparison
of it as nothing? And it was back in the days of
Solomon, and of course, before him, David. David was the one
who gathered all the things together, the great wealth of Israel, of
people. Everybody donated to the building
of the temple, but David couldn't build the temple because he is
a man of war. It was left to his son, Solomon, built the temple. And so here's what Haggai says,
is there anybody left here that remembers what that temple looked
like in her glory? And now you see this, crumbling,
falling down, old, dilapidated, the Babylonians had torn it up,
The enemy had about destroyed it and said, you know, in your
eyes, in comparison, for those of you who saw the temple in
its glory days, well, this is like nothing now. And it was
to them. And it was very heartbreaking.
Verse 4, But now, yet now, be strong, O Zerubbabel. That's what the Lord said. Be
strong, O Joshua, son of Josedec the high priest, and be strong,
all the people of the land, saith the Lord, and work. For I'm with
you." That's the thing that will encourage him. I'm with you. And those of us who labor in
the gospel, who labor in the Word of God, And we are co-laborers,
are we not? That's what it says in 1 Corinthians
3. Let's all be greatly encouraged. Be strong. Be strong in the Lord
because He says, I'm with you. You're not by yourself. We don't
labor in our own strength. We don't have any strength. All
of the strength we have is the strength that He gives us. So
be encouraged. and be faithful and labor because
the Lord says, I'm with you, I'm with you, saith the Lord
of hosts, saith Jehovah, our Savior, who is the Lord of all
of the hosts of heaven. Watch verse five, according to
the word that I covenanted with you when you came out of Egypt,
so my spirit remaineth among you, fear ye not. The Lord said,
I made a covenant with your father. I made a covenant with Abraham.
And I tell you, our Lord made a covenant with Christ Jesus.
God made a covenant with His Son. And we're the beneficiaries
of that covenant. The covenant of grace and of
salvation. And the Lord says, My Spirit
remains with you. With you. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. For thus saith
the Lord of hosts, verse 6, yet once, it's a little, just a little
while, I'll shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and
the dry land. It'll be just a little while.
Here's what he's talking about. He's talking about the coming
of the Lord Jesus. That's what he's talking about.
He said, but that's 500 years. That's 500 years. It's just a
little while. Because a day with the Lord,
or a thousand years with the Lord as a day, right? It's just
a little while. Take it to verse seven. He says,
and I'll shake all nations. And the desire of all nations,
he shall come. And I'll fill this house with
glory. saith the Lord of hosts." And
he says, the silver is mine, the gold is mine. You know, that
original temple, they collected all this gold and all this silver. And of course, the enemies of
Israel, they'd taken the gold and taken the silver. But here's
what the Lord reminds these men, Zerubbabel and Joshua, and the
other workers who were rebuilding the temple. Here's what the Lord
reminds him of, all of those things belong to me. There's never a shortage with
God. And he says this, look at verse
nine. He says, the glory of this latter house shall be greater
than the former. saith the Lord of hosts, and
in this place will I give peace, saith the Lord of hosts." Now,
what's he talking about? Who's he talking about? He's
talking about a greater temple. The Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus. Remember the Savior said in John
chapter 2, He said to those people, destroy this temple. Three days,
I'll raise it up. I'll raise it up. And they thought
he was talking about the temple that these men were rebuilding.
That wasn't the temple he was talking about at all. He was
talking about the temple of his body. And there's a greater glory
in the Lord Jesus who is the temple of God than there was
in that original temple, Solomon's temple. For the glory of God in the person of the Lord Jesus,
is His own deity. That is His glory. That's the
glory He revealed when He was on the Mount of Transfiguration. We read in John chapter 1, The
Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory. The glory as of the only begotten,
the Father full of grace and truth. This is our Lord Jesus. And I'll tell you, when He comes,
when He comes, He shakes things up. That's what He says. This is what the Lord says through
Hagin verse 7. I'm going to shake things up.
Now as you read the writers, various men who commented on
Haggai chapter 2, some of them say it's talking about the first
advent of our Lord Jesus. Some talk about, think it's talking
about the second advent of our Lord Jesus when He's coming again. And then others say it's talking
about when He comes to a sinner in saving grace. I think it's
all true. Because whenever He comes, He
shakes things up. Things are never the same. Back
in the book of Exodus, when the Lord came down to give the law,
you know what He did? He shook the mountain. He shook
the mountain. And throughout the Old Testament,
we read about the Lord coming down and whenever He came down,
He shook things up. When He comes to a city, He shakes
the city up. He came into the city of Jerusalem.
We've read about this in John chapter 12, when He made His
triumphant entry in. He shook things up and people
said, who is this? Who is this? When our Lord Jesus died, He
shook things up then because the earth shook. The earth shook. In fact, it shook so violently
it opened up the tombs of many people. And they were raised
from the dead after our Lord's resurrection. Whenever the Lord comes, He always
causes us shaking. He causes us shaking. And when
He comes a second time, He's going to shake things up too.
And I'll tell you, when He comes to us in saving grace, He shakes
things up. He shakes everything loose from
our hands. Everything we look to, everything
we trusted in, all of our works, all of our deeds, all of the
things that we trusted in, He shakes them loose from our hands
and makes us look to Christ alone and reach out and take hold of
Him. He takes hold of us by grace
so that we take hold of Him by faith. That's what the Lord says,
I'm gonna shake all nations. And the desire of all nations,
he shall come. And that's what I think about
when I read there in John chapter 12 about those Gentiles. They
desired to see Jesus. He's the desire of all nations. Now he isn't the desire of all
people of all nations, but he's the desire of a people out of
all nations. and kindred, and tribe, and tongue. Now, we don't naturally seek
Him, we don't naturally want to see Him, and we don't naturally
desire Him. In fact, isn't it written in
Isaiah chapter 53, there's no beauty of Him that we should
desire Him? And yet, within the hearts of
so many of you, And many of you who are watching, we have a desire
to see the Lord Jesus, don't we? We have a desire to know
Him. We have a desire to be found
in Him. We have a desire to be washed
by Him. We have a desire to be robed
in the garments of His righteousness. And we would say with these Gentiles,
Sir, we would see Jesus. We're wanting to see Jesus all
over again. We want to see Him in the Word
of God. We want to see Him in the types
and the offerings and the pictures of the Old Testament. We want
to see Him and we want to see Him for ourselves. For ourselves. I know that no man desires the
Lord by nature. We read in Romans the third chapter,
None seek after God. That's what it says, isn't it?
No man seek after God. But aren't you a seeker? I am. I'm a seeker. I seek Him in His
Word. I seek Him when I hear a gospel
preaching. I seek Him as I go to Him in
prayer. I seek the Lord. Well, how come
I seek Him now, but I don't seek Him by nature? It's because of
effectual grace. That's why. The Lord sought us,
and therefore we seek Him. And that's, when I look at that
passage back over here in John chapter 12, here's what I hope. I don't know it for sure, so
I can't stake my life on this, but here's what I hope. That
they want to see Him because they need Him. That they desire
Him. That He is the desire of all
nations to these men. To these men. They want to see
that One who is the very glory of God. Well, I know this. None can see Him apart from a
divine revelation. You're not going to see Him.
You're not going to see Him. Except a man be born again, he
can't see the Kingdom of God. That's what the Savior said to
Nicodemus, you can't see. In essence, Nicodemus said to
him, I don't see what you're saying. I don't understand. That's
the reason Nicodemus made so many foolish statements. Well,
can a man enter into his mother's womb again, be born? He made
foolish statements like that. Do you know why he said stuff
like that? Because he didn't see. That's why. He didn't see,
he didn't perceive, he couldn't understand spiritual truth and
nobody will apart from God doing a work of grace within our hearts
and giving us eyes to see and ears to hear and a new heart,
a heart of faith to believe. That's what's necessary. You see, faith in the Lord Jesus
is a result of the divine revelation. The seeing of Jesus that saves
is an inward sight of Him. It's a soul sight of Him. Isn't this what the apostle said
in Galatians chapter one? He said, but when it pleased
God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and He called
me by His grace to reveal His Son In me, that's what he said,
in me. The Holy Spirit gives us eyes
to see the beauties of the Lord Jesus. And we look to him. And we see in him everything
that God requires and everything that we need. I'll tell you something
about seeing Jesus. That's the very beginning of
our experience of salvation. I do believe salvation must be
experienced. No question about it. No question
about it. I believe in God's electing grace.
I believe in the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus. The same God
who purposed our salvation and ordained that Christ die in our
stead, He also ordained the means whereby the Gospel comes to us
in life-giving power through the preaching of the Word. And
then we experience this salvation. I'm not one of those. I certainly
don't believe that you've got to go back to your experience
of salvation before you can have any assurance of knowing the
Lord. There are a lot of God's people who can't go back to the
time. They can't go back to the hour.
They can't go back to the day. There are a few men in the Bible
that they had such a glorious experience that they know when,
and we know when, the thief on the cross, we know when, it's
right there in his dying moments. Saul of Tarsus, we know when. That's when the Lord met him. But what about the rest of the
disciples? Do we have their conversion experience? No. We don't know when they were
converted. And they don't say, on such and
such a day, in such and such a circumstance, that's when the
Lord revealed to me my neediness and His glory. It isn't necessary
and I don't really think it's a good idea to bank too much
on that experience anyhow. Here's all that's important.
And I've talked to people that say, I don't have any assurance
of my salvation because I'm just not sure what happened 15 or
20 years ago. And here's my pretty much patented
answer. It don't matter what happened
10 or 15 years ago. All that matters is right now.
Do you look to Jesus Christ alone for your righteousness? for your
salvation, for your acceptance, for the forgiveness of your sins
right now. Right now is all that matters.
The rest of it is water under the bridge. Right? Hey listen,
maybe I was wrong back yonder. I'm not going to put a lot of
stock in what happened in the past. I'm thankful for the blessings
God's given me, the way He spoke to me through His Word through
the years. But listen, Those blessings,
that's like the manna that they didn't gather, left it out there. It's stale bread now. All that
matters is this moment. This moment. I'm thankful for His grace right
now. Because right now, I know I'm
complete in Christ. He's been made of God to be my
wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption.
and therefore I glory only in Him. I know this, seeing Jesus
is the beginning of our experience of salvation. Here's what the
Lord said, Look unto Me and be ye saved, all ye ends of the
earth, for I am God and there is none else. That's the beginning.
We begin by looking. We begin by looking. We begin by seeing the Lord Jesus
for ourselves. John the Baptist said, Behold
the Lamb of God. And that's what we do. Our Lord Jesus talked about it
as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness. The Israelites
had been bitten by the fiery serpents. Die left and right. Lord, what are we going to do?
Lord told me to put up a serpent of brass and give very, very
simple and clear instructions. Look and live. Ain't nothing
complicated about that. Look and live. And I'm telling
you, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must
the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth, whoever
looks, looks to Him out of their neediness, will receive from
His fullness. Who looks to Him out of their
weakness, will receive out of His strength. Who looks to Him
in their sinfulness, will receive out of His righteousness. Whoever
looks will live. That's simple. Look and live. Look and live. This is the way
we begin the life as a Christian. Look to Jesus. Don't look to
your feelings. Don't look to your experiences.
Don't look to the church. Don't look to the preacher. Don't
look to your works. Don't look to your decision.
Don't look to your repentance. Don't even look to your faith.
Look to the Lord Jesus only. We're saved by looking only to
Christ the Savior. If you look to Him for everlasting
salvation, hear me now, you're saved. He that hath the Son hath
life. And he that hath not the Son
of God doesn't have life, the wrath of God abides on him. If you look to Christ Jesus,
you're saved, you've been born of God, you're accepted in the
Beloved. I'll tell you something else,
number two, seeing Jesus, that's the way we live our lives in
this world. Hebrews chapter 12 and verses 1 and 2, you can read
it at your leisure. Looking unto Jesus, the author
and the finisher of our faith. Seeing Jesus, seeing Jesus, looking
unto Jesus. You see, it's looking unto Jesus
that gives us rest. He soothes the soul. He's a great
comforter of the heart. There's nothing and no one that
can bless you like simply looking to the Lord Jesus for all things. That will give you rest. If you
look to your works, you're not going to have any rest. If you
look and say, have I prayed enough? You're not going to have any
rest. Or have I studied the Bible enough? You're not going to have
any rest. Have I had enough holy thoughts? You're not going to
have any rest. The only place you're going to find any rest
is when the eyes of your soul focus solely on The Lord Jesus
Christ, that'll give you rest. He'll give you rest. Seeing Jesus
gives peace to the soul. I see him as God blessed forever. I see him as the one who governs,
not just the whole world, though he does that, but I see him as
the one who governs my world. My world, all that's going on
with me and around me. You see, it's one thing to say,
you know, God is sovereign over all the world. It's another thing
to say and really mean, God is sovereign over my world, over
everything that's happening to me, over all the things that
are going on around me, things that pertain to me. It's seeing, seeing Jesus as
the governor of my world. That'll give me rest. It'll give
me rest. It'll give me peace. Seeing Jesus
puts life into my desires to serve Him. When I see all that He's done
for me, When I see all that He is doing for me, it motivates
me to serve Him. Seeing Jesus as my great protector,
I won't fear the awful powers of the evil one that are against
me. Christ is my protector. I see
Him. I see Him as my guardian. I see
Him as my mighty protector. The angel of the Lord, the scripture
says, the angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear Him. Well, how can an angel be all
the way around you? Because of who that angel is.
He's the angel of the covenant, Christ Jesus. He guards me out
here. He guards me out back there.
He guards me over here. He guards me over here. I'm not
vulnerable at all. Because he encampeth round about
them that fears him. And seeing Jesus, seeing Jesus
as my savior, I have no fear to draw near to God. I'm welcomed at the throne of
grace. When I come in the name of the Lord Jesus, when I come
by His blood, when I come through His merits, when I come in His
name, the Heavenly Father is always ready to hear what I have
to. Whatever petitions I have, whatever worship I present, it's
accepted through the Lord Jesus. Seeing Jesus strengthens me. I'm weak, but He is strong. And seeing Jesus, that makes
me glad. That makes me happy. That makes
me joyful. And I'm telling you, this is
a way to live our lives in this world. Just seeing Jesus. Just looking to Jesus. We just studied in Sunday School
lesson about when the disciples, the Lord had sent his disciples
away, constrained them to go. He forced them to go. He said,
go get in a ship and sail across the Sea of Galilee. And then
he stirred up a storm. And then he walked on the water
toward them, and they thought they'd seen a ghost. And then they heard the voice
of the Savior. And Simon Peter said, if it's
you, bid me walk to you. Come on, come on. And Simon Peter
started walking on the water. And the word of God says, but
when he saw the wind boisterous, He began to sink. He started looking at the dangers. And he took his eyes off the
Savior. And he began to go down. And his body was going down,
but his head didn't go under. And the Savior reached down and
pulled him up. But old Simon, he was afraid,
he said, Lord save me. Lord save me. Keep your eyes on Him. That's
the way to live in this world. And here's the third thing, seeing
Jesus, that'll be the very consummation of our salvation. The scripture says, We shall
see Him someday. We shall see Him as He is. 1
John 3 and verse 2. We sing face to face with Christ
my Savior. Blessed are the pure in heart,
for they shall see God. Revelation 22, 4 and 5. Speaking
about the people of God. They shall see His face. That'll consummate salvation
right there. We'll see His face and we'll
know Him. Oh, to see Him. To see Him in
the Scriptures as the promised Messiah. To see Him as the Ancient
of Days, God over all, blessed forever. To see Him as the bright
and morning star. To see Him as the branch. To
see Him as the root from the tribe of Judah. To see him as
the seed of woman. To see him as the son who was
given, the child who was born. To see him as wonderful counselor,
the mighty God, the everlasting father, the prince of peace,
the one upon whose shoulders the government has been placed.
To see him. To see him as the king of kings
and the lord of lords. To see him as our very savior. And if we see Him, we'll worship
Him. Isaiah wrote in the year that
King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord high and lifted up. And he said, woe is me. Woe is
me, mine eyes have seen the King. That's what he said. When the Lord revealed Himself
to Abraham, Scripture says, lo, a great horror of darkness came
upon Abraham, and he was afraid. Tell you what, if you ever see
the Lord Jesus, you'll be brought to fear Him and to worship Him. When the angel of the Lord appeared
to Abraham, Abraham, or excuse me, the Lord appeared to Israel
in the tabernacle. It says, the glory of the Lord
appeared to the people. There came a fire out from before
the presence of the Lord, consumed upon the altar the burnt offering.
The people shouted and fell on their faces. They saw His glory. When Daniel saw it, He fell on
His face before Him. And in Revelation, when John
saw Him, John said, I fell before Him like a dead man. I tell you, you're never the same
if you ever see Him. You can't be the same. Because
here, it's like, those disciples who saw Him on
the Mount of Transfiguration, and He revealed His glory to
them. And if He ever shows Himself
to us in His glory, the glory that's brighter than
that sun shining in the sky at noonday, as somebody said, we'll
have sunburned eyes. We'll have sunburned eyes. We
just won't ever get over it. And we'll always be saying, we'll
say it when we come to the place of worship. We'll say it to the
preacher. Sir, we would see Jesus. You'll say it to your Sunday
school teacher. Sir, ma'am, I want to see Jesus. That's the desire of the people
of God. And really, that's all we want
in it. I would just want to see, show
me the Lord Jesus again. Oh, and what a sight He is. Well,
let's sing the closing.