Well, let's go to John chapter
12 tonight, shall we? John chapter 12. We'll pick up
our studies again. Actually, I'm not going to get
much further than I did last Wednesday night, because last
Wednesday night I pretty much dealt with the expression, we
would see Jesus from John chapter 12 and verse 21. And really,
that's what I want to focus in on again. And I'll go ahead and
read the verses to you, John 12, beginning at verse number
20 and going to verse 22. You know that our Lord Jesus,
just to kind of bring you up to date, give you a timeline,
this is less than a week before He dies. This is at least Monday,
maybe even Tuesday of the week that he will be crucified in
Jerusalem. And he has made his entry into
Jerusalem and multitudes of people met him, lined the streets, and
lots of people said, who is this? They want to know who he is because
there was a great fanfare about his entering into the city. who
raised Lazarus from the dead, and just very few days before
this. And so all of the city has come
out. And in addition to that, it is the
time of the year called Passover for the Jews. And we know that
was one of three great feasts that all of the Jews had to attend,
Passover, Pentecost, and the Feast of Tabernacles. And this
was mandatory that all the males had to attend this, age 20 and
over. And in addition to the Jews being
there, filling Jerusalem with most likely about 200, 250,000
people in Jerusalem at this time, in addition to that, there were
also some Greeks who came. No doubt, they were believers
in Judaism. And they have also witnessed
the entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. And so then we get to verse 20.
Now that kind of brings us up to speed. In John 12 and verse
20, and there were certain Greeks, Gentiles, among them that came
up to worship at the feast, the feast of Passover. And those
people, the same, came therefore to Philip, which was of Bethsaida
of Galilee, and desired him saying, Sir, we would see Jesus. Philip cometh and telleth Andrew,
and again Andrew and Philip, they tell Jesus. My subject this evening is seeing
Jesus, simply seeing Jesus. Now these words came from the
lips of Gentiles, Sir, we would see Jesus. Up until this time,
you know your Bibles and the history of the scriptures up
until this point. The things of God have pretty
much been confined to the Jewish nation, right? To the Jews. The Lord Jesus, he came through
the lineage of David, Back in the study this evening,
Bill read to us from Romans, the fourth chapter, and about
Abraham. God called Abraham, and through
Abraham's seed, the Lord Jesus would come into this world, born
in the tribe of Judah, of the family of David. He's called
the son of David. He's called the son of Abraham.
And so most of the Old Testament, therefore, it has to do with
Jewish history and things that pertain to the Jewish method
of worship. They worship God by means of
animal sacrifices and offerings. Blood was offered, it was not
a bloodless religion, and the reason it couldn't be a bloodless
religion is because God had already stated that the soul that sin
shall die. The Lord said to Adam there in
Genesis the third chapter, In the day ye eat thereof, in other
words, in the day you violate my command, you're going to die. Now, he didn't die physically,
he didn't drop dead when he ate of the forbidden fruit when he
rebelled against God, but he did die spiritually. And since God had said, in the
day ye eat thereof, you'll surely die, the only way for Adam and
Eve to continue to exist was for an innocent animal, or in
that case a couple of animals, to die in their stead. And that's
what happened there in Genesis chapter 3. And you think about
this, the very first blood shed in this world was shed by God. He made the animals and it was
His right, the one who gave them life, He could take the life.
And thus he was illustrating, if the guilty are to go free,
if they're to receive mercy, if they're to be allowed to live,
innocent victims have got to die in their stead. And so, thus
we're introduced in Genesis chapter 3 to the wonderful gospel doctrine
of substitution and satisfaction. Because that's what satisfied
God. And then we get to Genesis chapter four, and we find that
Adam and Eve had two sons. They had a bunch of sons, but
two stand out. One of them was a man by the
name of Cain, and the other one was Abel. And Cain, he sought
to worship God, he sought to honor God, he sought to come
before God, But he didn't bring an animal sacrifice. He didn't
bring blood. And God had insisted, God had
instructed, there must be death. There must be death. That is
the punishment for sin. Romans 6.23 says, for the wages
of sin is what? Death. But the gift of God is
eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. And so in chapter four,
Cain, he didn't bring an animal. He brought lots of people growing
gardens this time of year, of course. And when you gather your
vegetables in, that's a wonderful thing. And when you do, don't
forget your hungry pastor, because I love vegetables too. But Cain,
he grew a garden. He had all of these. I have to
sneak those things in every once in a while. But here's what Cain
did. He grew his garden. He had all
of these vegetables and fruit trees and so forth and so on.
He brought him to God thinking God would accept him on the basis
of what he brought. But here's what Cain forgot. He brought that which came forth
out of the earth that was cursed. Because God cursed the earth
in Genesis chapter 3. And then there was Abel. And
Abel, he believed God. He brought an animal sacrifice.
He brought the firstling of his flock. He brought a lamb. And that lamb died in his stead. Abel was accepted. Cain was rejected. And I'll tell you right now,
when you seek to come to God, and by all means come to God,
but you've got to come the right way if you would be accepted.
If you come the way Cain came, you're going to be rejected.
I promise you that. You will be rejected because
everything you bring to God, everything you produce, is defiled
by your own sinfulness. The only way to come to God is
through the Lamb of God, Christ Jesus. And He has been sacrificed
by God for sinners like us. And that's the reason we sing
songs like, what can wash away my sin? Nothing but the blood
of Jesus. What can make me whole again?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Well, so get up to Abraham. And of Abraham, God made a great
nation, the Jewish nation. And from then, in the middle
of the book of Genesis, all the way through the Old Testament,
all 39 books, almost all of the people that God had anything
to do with, by way of grace, by way of salvation, almost all
of them were of the Jewish nation. Now that was God's prerogative
to do that. He didn't owe mercy to anybody,
did he? I mean, everybody had fallen
in at him, so he didn't owe anything to anybody except death and judgment
and everlasting destruction. But for his own purposes, God
dealt in mercy with people, most of them of the Jewish nation.
Because that's who That's through whom Jesus Christ would come,
and that's also the ones who wrote the scriptures. Almost
all the writers of scripture were Jews, except in the New
Testament, except for Luke. Luke was a Gentile. So the Lord
dealt with Jewish people, mostly. But there's always, throughout
the scriptures, this underlying word that eventually the gospel
would go forth to all the world. And that includes us Gentiles.
And here is our Lord Jesus. He's on his way to Calvary. He's going to die. And there
are some people, some Gentiles, and they come up to one of his
disciples, Philip, who was from Galilee. And Galilee was the
largest concentration within Israel of Gentiles. If you were
a Gentile, most likely you lived in Galilee, which was under the
jurisdiction of King Herod. And they came to Jerusalem. and they wanted to see Jesus.
They wanted an audience with Jesus. They had already viewed
Him because most everybody saw Him as He made His way into Jerusalem.
But when He said, Sir, we would see Jesus, what that means is
they want to spend some quality time with Him. They want to talk
with Him. They want to observe Him. Now,
we don't know all, we don't know where they're from, don't know
what's on their heart, don't know any of that. We only know
they're Gentiles and they sought to see Jesus. You notice that
they said, sir, we would see Jesus. They didn't say, sir,
we would see the Christ. If they had said, sir, we see
the Christ, it'd have been Jews. Because to the Gentiles, they
didn't know a thing about Christ. They didn't know a thing about
the Messiah, the Word of God. The Old Testament wasn't given
to them. It was given to the Jewish people. These men, they want to see Jesus. What does Jesus mean? He's Jehovah
who saves. That's who Jesus is. Jesus is
Jehovah who saves. This is what the angel said to
Mary. Thou shalt call His name Jesus.
This is what the angel said to Joseph. Thou shalt call His name
Jesus. And this is the reason. For He
shall save His people from their sins. He's the Savior. His name Jesus of the New Testament
is the identical name of Joshua of the Old Testament. Joshua,
Jehovah who saves, Jehovah who delivers. You remember in your
Old Testament history, and I'm sure you do, put your thinking
caps on, go back to your Old Testament history, you know that
Moses couldn't take the children of Israel into the promised land.
We know he sinned against God. The Lord said, smite the rock
and water will come out. And he said, must we, me and
Aaron, must we fetch water from the rock for you rebels? And
he hit the rock two times. The Lord told him to hit it one
time, because it pictured the death of the Lord Jesus. It pictured
the justice of God dealing in the most severest way with Jesus
of Nazareth, who died in the stead of his people. But Moses
was angry. He got frustrated. And he hit
the rock two times. The Lord said, now that'll cost
you. You can take the children of Israel right up to the river,
And then I'm going to take you up in the mountain and you're
going to look over and you're going to see what you missed
out on. And I'm going to kill you. It's not for you to take
him into the promised land. Joshua is going to take him in.
And you see, here's the wonderful picture in that. Moses couldn't
take them in because Moses represents the law. The law can't take you
into the promised land. The law can't take you into heaven.
The law can't save you. All the law can do is condemn
and point out faults and say, the soul that sinneth shall die.
The law of God, the justice of God, it can't show any mercy. It can't bend. I know sometimes
in our country laws are bent. And you know, well okay, I know
you did wrong, but there were extenuating circumstances. God's
law is not like that. God's law is strict. You break
it, Death is the penalty. That's all the law knows. Our Lord Jesus, He is pictured by Joshua. See,
Moses is the law. The law can't take you into the
promised land. Joshua takes him into the promised
land. Jehovah who saves. Jehovah who
saves. That's a sweet name. That's the
reason we talk about the sweetness of the name of Jesus, the Lamb
of God. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus we sing in
that chorus. There's just something about
that name. It's a wonderful name. It's a precious name. Jesus takes people into the promised
land. Jehovah who saves. These people said, Sir, we would
see Jesus. That's who I want to see. Now,
not with these eyes. Not with these eyes. You see,
there were lots of people who saw Him literally, physically,
and were no better off for it. In fact, those who who actually
witnessed His presence on the earth, and who didn't believe
Him, actually it added to their guilt, didn't it? It added to
their guilt. It added to their responsibility
because here they were privileged to see Jesus, who is the Son
of God, who is the only Savior. They were privileged to see Him
with these eyes and yet they rejected Him. And as we know
in religion that day, everybody who was anybody turned thumbs
down on Jesus of Nazareth. They said, we will not have this
man to rule over us. Jesus. And yet He's the only Savior
of sinners. He's the only one who can do any good for us. But having
a visual sight of Him, When we talk about looking to
Jesus and seeing Jesus, we're not talking about seeing Him
like I'm seeing y'all. In fact, if you read in 2 Corinthians
5 and verse 16, Paul talks about we know no man after the flesh
anymore, not even the Lord Jesus. Because it isn't knowing Him
or seeing Him after the flesh. It's a spiritual sight of Him.
It's a spiritual understanding of Him. It's a spiritual knowledge
of Him. We see Jesus. That's who we want
to see. But not with these eyes. You
know, when the Lord Jesus went before Pilate, And he interviewed
him and asked him all kinds of questions. And he came back out
and told the people, he said, I find no fault. This is what
Pilate said to the Jewish authorities. I find no fault in this man. And they jeered him. They said,
crucify him, crucify him. This Galilean. And here's what
Pilate said, Galilean, did you say? Yeah, he's from Galilee. He said, oh, I'll send him to
Herod then, because he's over the jurisdiction of Galilee.
That's under his jurisdiction. And the whole pilot thought he's
through with him. And so he'd send him to Herod,
and Herod, he was glad. Because the Scripture says he
had wanted to see Jesus, and he hoped he would see a miracle. He would perform a miracle. And
Herod said a few words to him, and the Lord Jesus said nothing
to him at all. And then Herod and his soldiers
began to mock Jesus. They found a robe, a purple robe,
and they put it on him, made all kinds of fun of him, sent
him back to Pilate. He wanted to see Jesus, but for
the wrong reason. What is this seeing of Jesus?
Well, it isn't seeing a vision of Jesus or having a dream of
Jesus. I read that, this is back in
2010, they had a landslide in San Francisco. And people said
after that landslide, in that dirt, they saw the face of Jesus. People were just awestruck. I saw Jesus in the dirt. That's not the sight of Jesus
you want. I read today about a woman, and
I don't want to make fun of people,
but I'll tell you this, we've got to set the record straight.
This woman, she had condensation on her water pipe. And on this condensation, she
saw what she said was the face of Jesus. And she took a picture
of it. Sent it to the Pope. Said, you
need to come to my house and see Jesus as His face appeared
in this vapor on her water pipe. You don't see Jesus in a vision,
and you don't see Him in a dream. I'll tell you first of all, where
you see Jesus in the Word of God, that's where you're going
to see Him. That's where you're going to
find Him. There's a reason I tell people, you're not going to find
Jesus walking through the woods. You're not going to find Jesus
out in nature. Has He made all of nature? Oh
yes. Has He made the woods? Absolutely. But you're not going to find
Jesus, the Lord of glory, who is the very friend of sinners,
you're not going to find Him out in the woods. Where are you
going to find Him? In His Word. That's where you
find Him. In the Scriptures. Where are
you going to see Jesus? In the Old Testament. In all
of the offerings, in all of the sacrifices, in every Passover
lamb that was offered on a Jewish altar. That's where you see the
Lord Jesus Christ. You see Him in the Word of God.
And this sight of Him is not a literal sight, and it isn't
merely an intellectual sight. You see, we can know lots of
facts about Jesus. Now, we know this, the way to
the heart is through the understanding through the mind. And God does
use the mind. But it isn't a knowledge of Jesus
or seeing Jesus isn't merely having a bunch of thoughts of
Him in the mind, factual knowledge of Him. It's to know Him from
the heart by the power of the Spirit of God. Isn't that right? And this is what our desire ought
to be tonight. Sir! We would see Jesus. I want to see Jesus. I want to
see Him. I want to see Him as the Savior.
I want to see Him as the one who can rescue me. Sir, we would
see Jesus. We would see Jesus. I know this, without a sight
of Him, We'll go through life. Maybe enjoy life. Maybe have
a great life. But if we don't have a spiritual
knowledge of, a spiritual understanding of, and a spiritual seeing of
the Lord Jesus as to who He is, He's God and He's man. If we don't have this spiritual
seeing of Jesus as the only one who could bring us to a holy
God, the only mediator between God and man, he's the man Christ
Jesus. If we don't see him in that way,
then we'll leave this world and go out into eternity, graceless
and godless and Christless, and we'll be in for everlasting destruction. Sir, we would see Jesus. Now, let me tell you this. The
only way you're going to see Him is by divine revelation. The Lord's got to show Him to
you. This is what the Apostle Paul
said. Now, look with me in the book
of Acts. Let me show you what he said.
Look in Acts. Acts chapter 22. He saw the Lord Jesus, and he
saw Him with his understanding, and he saw Him by faith. Look
at Acts chapter 22. He goes back, he's in Jerusalem,
he's talking about what the Lord did for him. And you know the
story, how he was on the road to Damascus and he hated Jesus. Oh, he despised him. And he's
a very religious man now. Oh, very religious. It wasn't
that he was irreligious. Oh, he was very religious. But
he hated the way of grace. And he hated everybody who believed
that way, that way of salvation by the Lord Jesus Christ. He
just hated them. It didn't matter if men, women,
or children. And he had papers. that authorized him, these were
papers, documents by the high priest. These were signed by
the high priest authorizing this man to arrest and bring back
to Jerusalem and put him in jail anybody who believed that Jesus
of Nazareth was the Christ of God and the only Savior of sinners. He had those papers, he had those
official documents. And boy, he's on his way to Damascus,
and he's been frightening people all over the place. He's scared
to death of Saul of Tarsus. And he's on this road to Damascus,
and all of a sudden, somebody meets him. He had an encounter
that he hadn't figured on. He wasn't seeking the Lord. He
didn't set out to know Jesus of Nazareth as the very God of
very God. But what he didn't know was,
long before God ever made the world, the Lord had ordained
this encounter. That he would meet Saul of Tarsus. We know him as Paul. He would
meet the Son of God. And the Lord Jesus met him. and
he unhorsed him, knocked him off his horse, blinded him, and
brought that man to say to Jesus, who art thou, Lord? He called him Lord. And we know the Lord did something
wonderful for him. The Lord sent him to a preacher.
Sent him to Ananias, didn't He? And the Lord told Ananias, I'm
going to send you somebody, I want you to preach to him. And Ananias
said, send him my way, I'll preach to him. The Lord said, it's Saul
of Tarsus. And Ananias said, could you send
him to another preacher? That guy's putting everybody
in jail. The Lord said, he's one of mine. Behold, he prayeth. He's looking
for somebody to talk to Him. Tell Him the truth. And so, years
later, here is the Apostle Paul. And he is remembering everything
that happened on that day. He's in Jerusalem and he's telling
the Jewish leaders. He said, let me tell you what
happened to me. Let me tell you what happened to me. So I pick
up the reading, Acts 22, verse 12. In fact, back up to verse 10,
Acts 22, verse 10. And I said, this is, he'd been
knocked off his horse now. What shall I do, Lord? And the
Lord said unto me, Arise and go into Damascus, and there it
shall be told thee of all things which are appointed for thee
to do. And when I could not see for the glory of that light,
because he was blinded by the glory of Christ Jesus, being
led by the hand of them that were with me, I came unto Damascus. And one Ananias, a devout man
according to the law, having a good report of all the Jews
which dwelt there, he came unto me and he stood, he said unto
me, Brother Saul, Boy, what an honor to call him brother. Brother
Saul, receive thy sight. The same hour I looked up upon
him and he said, it's what he said to me. He said, the God
of our fathers has chosen thee. It's the first thing he told
him. The reason all this has happened, the Lord chose you. He chose you in grace before
the world began. He sovereignly set you apart
to be His own. That thou shouldest, watch it,
know His will. What do you mean? His redemptive
will. How God saves sinners. God saves sinners. I read from
Isaiah 45. God is a just God and a Savior. He's got to be just before He
can save. He's a just God and a Savior
through the Lord Jesus Christ and His sacrifice for sin. That
thou shouldest know His will, His redemptive will, and see
that just one, that righteous one, to see Him. See Him how? See Him in His heart. See Him
in His understanding. And hear the voice of His mouth. And you see, this is what the
Lord in grace, this is what He does for us. He enables us to
see the just One. And to hear His voice. I hear
His voice through His Word. And I see Him. I see Him in His
glory. I see Him as the Savior. Do you
see Him? Do you see Him? Do you see an
image of Him or a vision of Him or a picture of Him? Those things
are useless because nobody knows what Jesus looks like. And that
would be a violation of the law of God anyway. Don't make an
image of anything in heaven or earth. Don't do that. That's
what the Lord said. So no pictures of Jesus. We're
not talking about seeing Him like that. We're talking about
seeing Him in His Word and seeing Him as just the One you need. As your righteousness. As the
One who forgives you. As the One who died a bloody
death that God might be just and justify the ungodly. The
Lord chose you, this is what Anna and I said, to see that
just one and to hear His voice. Do you hear His voice? I hear
His voice in His Word. And I see Him. I see Him. Like these men in John 12. We would see Jesus. I want to
see Him. And I want to see more of Him,
don't you? I want Him to fill all of my
vision. And you know, one of these days,
we shall enter into everlasting glory. And He will fill all of
our vision. That's what your mother is about
to experience, David. Isn't that right? That's what
Brother Lloyd Bush experienced just three weeks ago. He entered into everlasting glory
and now he sees face to face the Lord Jesus Christ. And that
will bring a man unparalleled happiness. That will bring a
woman unparalleled joy. There's joy in the very presence
of Christ Himself. To see Him who redeemed us. He redeemed us. Redeemed by the
blood of the Lamb. Well, I guess that would be a
good song to close with tonight.