Right. We just have read to you
a few verses here out of John chapter 12. Our Lord is nearing
the end of His public ministry. In fact, He's nearing the end
of His life. In just a few days, He will give
Himself a sacrifice for all of His people. He will give Himself
a sacrifice unto God. He'll die on Friday of this week. You'll remember earlier in this
chapter, as the chapter begins, actually, it begins on the first
day of the week on Sunday, and he spent a wonderful day in the
house of Simon, who was a leper, and there with Simon was Martha
and Mary and Lazarus. It was a great day for the Savior
because he could be with those whom he loved and people who
loved the Savior. It's always good to be with people
who love you, people who appreciate you, and people who think good
thoughts about you. You know how that is. It's always
wonderful. You know, you think of the Lord
Jesus. He was a real man, and He had
so much opposition. I read to you what the Pharisees,
their thoughts about Him, and of course they had already decided
they wanted to kill Him at the earliest convenience, whenever
it was It worked and it fit into their plans. They wanted to get
rid of him and all of this hostility building up against him. And
he has been confronted by them several times. It must have been
very refreshing for him to go to this house and sit down with
people who believed him. People who loved him. People
who cared about him. People who had great confidence
in Him. People who knew Him to be the Savior. People who knew
Him to be the fulfillment of all the Old Testament prophecies
and promises regarding Messiah. And He enjoyed that. Don't you
know He enjoyed that day? Spending that time with these
people. After all, He knows what is going
to happen later in the week because he's already purposed it himself,
even before he made the universe. He had already ordained that
which would be his path when he was in this world. He knew
where his life was going. All of this time, up until this
time, I should say, he's always avoided any kind of confrontation
of any length at least with the religious Pharisees, but now
he's ready to die. He's ready to die because this
is right on God's timetable. So here he meets with these people
and it was a blessing for the Savior and what a blessing it
was for them. to sit there and talk with the Lord Jesus. And
listen, folks, we have the opportunity. I know the Lord isn't with us
visibly. He's not with us physically,
but we have real fellowship with Him. We do, we have real joy
in believing Him and in reading His Word. And when we read His
Word, He speaks to us. This is a love letter from the
Lord to us, his people. And then we express ourselves
to him as we offer thanksgiving to him and worship to him. It's
a blessed time together. That's the reason, you know,
when we gather together as the people of God here, we know who
the guest of honor is. It's the Lord Jesus himself.
And He meets with us by His Spirit. He said, where two or three are
gathered together in My name, I'll be in the midst. I fully believe He's here tonight
with us, don't you? By His Spirit. He never made
idle promises. Everything He said, He meant.
And He said, I'll never leave you and I'll never forsake you.
Brother James and I were talking just before the service began
about the necessity of meeting together for public worship. This is where the Lord has promised
that He will be. I'll be with you. I'll minister
to you. And that's what I need. I need
Him to minister to me. Don't you need Him to minister
to you? And I know that you do. And He
does that as we meet together as an assembly of believers.
So this is what a blessed Sunday it was to these people. And Mary, on this day, Mary,
well, as you know, she offered a sacrifice to the Lord Jesus. It cost her a year's wages. She saved up for this. and she
anointed him for his burial, for his burial. Look back earlier
in chapter 12, and I know we've covered this, but it's such a
sweet passage in chapter 12, verse three. Then Mary took a
pound of ointment of spikenard, very costly. She anointed the
feet of Jesus. She wiped his feet with her hair.
The house was filled with the odor of the ointment. Oh, what
a blessing it was to everybody else. She exalted the Lord Jesus. She is honoring the Savior. And as she honored Him, that
was a blessing not only to the Savior Himself, but it was a
blessing to the others who were there. Those of us who love the
Lord Jesus Christ, as He's revealed in the Word of God, as the Savior
of sinners, we rejoice when He's lifted up, don't we? When He's
exalted, we exalt Him as well. When He's bragged on, we brag
on Him in our hearts. And our minds and our hearts
kind of soar with rapture. As we think about the blessed
Redeemer who saved us, who rescued us, who delivered us, He lifted
us up from the miry clay and He set our feet on the rock.
He established our goings. He is our salvation. He is our
wisdom. He is our righteousness. He is
our sanctification. He is our redemption. He is everything
to us and we are fully in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so when
we honor Him, it's a blessing to those who love Him. And as
Mary anointed Him, as it, you can just, I can almost smell
it, a wonderful fragrance. Can you smell it? Just as she
honored the Savior, it filled the entire house and people said,
what a blessing. At least, Several people said
it was a blessing. Of course, there were some who
said, hey, this money is being wasted. You have wasted money
on the Savior. It could have been given to the
poor. The Lord Jesus said, well, you always have the poor with
you, but you don't always have me with you. And He makes this
statement. Look at verse seven. Then Jesus
said, leave her alone. Stop fussing at her. Isn't it wonderful when the Lord
Jesus, he comes to your aid? He stands up for you. I wonder how that made Mary feel. The Son of God is standing up
for me. Leave her alone. And you know,
the Lord Jesus, He always stands up for His people. And when the
devil, he would come to take us, to steal our faith. I can almost hear the Lord Jesus
say, leave him alone. Leave him alone. And that's the
voice of authority. He said to Simon Peter, he said,
Satan, he's desired to have you, to sift you like wheat. He wants
to get your faith. But I prayed for you. I prayed
for you. And you who are the people of
God, you remember this, the Savior prays for you. Every prayer He's
ever offered to the Father, the Father has always heard Him.
But this is what He said, let her alone against the day of
my burying, as she kept this. In other words, the reason she
has done this is because she believes, I'm going to die. And
I'm going to be buried. And I'll tell you, that's something
the disciples had difficulty with. They had difficulty with
that. But not Mary. Not Mary. She believed, she understood
the necessity of His death. And before he died, before he's
buried, she goes ahead and anoints him. You know what that'd be
like? I got to think about this today.
It'd be like sending flowers to somebody before they die. Before they die. So they'll enjoy
them while they're living. Maybe we ought to do that. That's a good thing to do. But
here she anoints him. before He dies, in anticipation
of, believing that He's going to die and be buried. And in this, she has advanced
beyond the disciples. I tell you, she has some spiritual
understanding that they lacked. In fact, you can read in Mark's
account, I believe it is, the Savior said, wherever the gospel
is preached, this is going to be talked about from now on.
Isn't that what he said? That's what he said. What she
did, what she has done here today, wherever the gospel is set forth,
the way she has honored me, and exalted me, and anointed me,
that great confidence she's had, she has in me as the one who
will die and be buried, That's going to be talked about from
now on. And it is, even tonight, still being talked about because
it's in the Word of God. It's in the Word of God. Oh, the fragrance filled the
room and everybody in it, they were blessed. And I got to thinking
about this, that picture's the wonderful fragrance of the death
of the Son of God to the Father. Look with me in Ephesians chapter
4. Ephesians chapter 4. And I'm going to read the last
couple of verses of chapter 4 and then the first couple of verses
of chapter 5. Because really, chapter divisions
are very helpful, but they're not inspired. And I know that
they had to draw the line somewhere, and maybe they could have drawn
it somewhere else. But anyway, this is what the
words of the apostle to us, to the people of God, he says in
verse 31, Let all bitterness, and wrath,
and anger, and clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you
with all malice, and be ye kind one to another, and tenderhearted,
forgiving one another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath
forgiven you. God's forgiven you. Be forgiving. Be kind to people. Don't hold
grudges. People hold on to hard feelings
for years and years and years. And the only one that's doing
any damage to is yourself. So he says in chapter five and
verse one, be you therefore followers of God, his dear children. And
you know what the word followers means, imitators. Be imitators
of God. How many times has God forgiven
you? Well, over and over and over again. And he'll continually
forgive you. And He forgives you for Christ's
sake. Right? That's what it says. For Christ's
sake. So be forgiven. So be followers of God as dear
children. Walk in love. Walk in love as Christ hath loved
us and hath given Himself for us. He has given Himself. What
did He give? Well, He has the whole world
at His disposal. But He's not going to give the
world, because that's not going to help us. He's not going to
give angels for us. That won't help us. He's not
going to give men for us. He's not going to give all the
wealth and all the nations for us. Because that won't be of
any benefit to us. He's given Himself. That's what
it took to save us. He's given Himself for us an
offering A sacrifice to God, watch it, for a sweet smelling
savor. What do you think smells good
to God? That's an interesting subject. What is to God a wonderful fragrance? One thing, the sacrifice of Jesus
Christ. When Noah Back in the book of
Genesis, chapter 8, you don't have to turn to it. As soon as
he came out of the ark, put some rocks together. The reason he
took so many animals in, because he was going to offer some for
a sacrifice to God. And he offered it to God, and
the scripture says, it's a sweet savor to God. It smelled good
to God. Get over in the book of Leviticus.
talks about all sacrifices were a sweet savor to God. Kind of
interesting there in Leviticus chapter one, people came to the
brazen altar and that's the basis of worship. There's a very heart
of worship. A sacrifice is offered to God.
An innocent victim died for the guilty and we know that's the
theme all the way through the scriptures. If you were wealthy,
you chose out of the herd an ox. If you were middle class
out of the flocks, or if you're very poor, you chose turtle doves
or pigeons. But in each of those cases, in
Leviticus chapter 1, and I would challenge you to read it at a
later time, it says, of the ox, sweet savor to God. Of the lamb,
sweet savor to God. And if you're real poor and you
brought two turtle doves, sweet saver of the God. And in each
of those, this is also mentioned, blood. The blood of the ox, the
blood of the lamb, the blood of the fowls. You go through
the book of Leviticus, you'll find sweet savers listed, mentioned
16 times in the book of Leviticus, 18 times in the book of Numbers. Sweet savor to God. You go all
the way through the Old Testament. All of those Old Testament sacrifices,
they all, as we know, they all pointed to the Lord Jesus and
His sacrifice for sin, and of all of them it is said, sweet
savor to God. And that which they all pointed
to was the sacrifice of Christ Jesus, which was the sweet savor. unto God. You see, no subject
is more honoring to God and more delightful to God than this subject,
the substitutionary death of his son. You want to honor God? And people tell me, well Jim,
what can I do to honor God? I want to honor the name of God.
I want to exalt God. I want to bless the name of the
Lord. What must I do? Make much of the sacrifice of
Jesus Christ. That's how you honor God. Because
it's a sweet savor. It's like that ornament that
Mary anointed Him with. It fills the entire room. with a blessed fragrance, and
it ascends up to God. I thought about those Old Testament
sacrifices. They brought those animals, put
it on the brazen altar. All that smoke, that'd be kind
of offensive to men. I have a hard time with smoke
from a campfire or something. If you're downwind of it, yeah,
that's kind of offensive. And I'll tell you the gospel
of the Lord Jesus, it's offensive to some people. It's like smoke
in their nose. But it's delightful to God. And
it's delightful to the people of God too. No message is more
satisfying to God, and no message is more satisfying to the people
of God than the sacrifice of the Lord Jesus. Well, that happened
on Sunday. Mary, Martha, Lazarus in the
house of Simon with the Lord Jesus. Then on Monday, the Savior
made his way into Jerusalem in fulfillment of Old Testament
prophecy. Zechariah 9, 9, it said, Rejoice
greatly O daughter of Zion, shout, O daughter of Jerusalem, behold,
thy King cometh unto thee. He is just in having salvation,
and lowly in riding upon an ass, and upon a colt the foal of an
ass. This event was recorded in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. All four of them record this
when our Lord Jesus enters into Jerusalem. And multitudes of
people were there. In addition to the Jews, there
were Greeks who were there. There were lots of Greeks who
lived up in Galilee and Greeks from other areas as well. And
remember, this is the time of Passover. There are thousands
and thousands of Jews there, but also some Greeks or Gentiles,
they're there. But as we go back and look back
at John chapter 12, there were these Gentiles, these Greeks,
they came up to worship at the feast. In other words, they have
their kind of proselytes to Judaism, and I would presumed to say that
they witnessed Jesus of Nazareth walking into the city, not walking,
but riding into the city, and lots of people walking with Him,
and they witnessed that. But now they want to see Him.
That is, they want to have an interview with Him. They want
to spend some real quality time with Him. That's what they're
asking. They said, Sir, we would see Jesus. Well, they've already
seen Him as He entered into the city. It isn't a mere sight of
the Savior. That's not what they're talking
about. It's not like King Herod who said he wanted to see Jesus. It wasn't even like Zacchaeus. You know what the Scripture says
about Zacchaeus, the reason he climbed up in the sycamore tree?
He wanted to see Jesus who He was. But that was only out of
curiosity. He didn't know Him and He didn't
know what was in store for Himself that day. He didn't know He was
an object of sovereign mercy. But these Greeks, these Greeks,
they have witnessed His entrance into the city. And now they come
to His disciples and they say, we want to see Him. We want to
spend quality time with Him. We want to be in His company. We want to listen to Him. That's
what they're saying. But just before that happened,
the Pharisees, They've gotten together and undaddled the Herodians
with them and the Sadducees. And they said, we prevail nothing. The whole world has gone after
him. And little did they realize that actually they were speaking
to some degree the truth. Because Gentiles are going after
him. Now up until this point, It's
been, the gospel has been pretty much restricted to the Jews.
Now, I know back in chapter four, the Lord Jesus spent time with
Samaritan woman. In John chapter number 10, he
said, he talked about that he would gather together people,
not only from his sheep, not only from that flock, but from
other flocks as well, indicating that the gospel is gonna go to
the Gentiles. You remember in chapter 11, Caiaphas,
he was the one who said that it was necessary one man die
for the nation, that the nation die not. And it was that man,
Caiaphas, who said that he would die not for that nation only,
but he would gather together in one all the children of God. And he's indicating this is gonna
go beyond the borders of Israel. and hear the Pharisees, and once
again they speak the truth. Though they don't intend to do
it, they say, the world has gone after him, and look, here comes
some Gentiles. And it's almost as though they're
the first fruits of the gospel era, the gospel age. Because you see, this is the
way I would look at this in verse number 19. This is the official
rejection by all of the authorities of Israel of Jesus Christ of
Nazareth. And they're fed up. They're saying, we've tried everything. We threatened people. You remember
back at the end of chapter 11? They said, put the word out. If there are people who know
where he's at and they don't tell us, boy, they're in trouble.
But that didn't do any good. More and more people are flocking
to see Jesus of Nazareth. And now they say, perceive ye
how ye prevail nothing. We're not getting anywhere is
what they're saying there in verse 19. We're not getting anywhere
with this. Instead of stopping this man,
instead of discouraging the multitudes from going after him, more and
more people from all over the world are following him. You're
right. You're right, because here comes
some Gentiles. And here we come. Here we come,
drawn by effectual grace. They said, sir, we would see
Jesus. We would see Jesus. Notice certain
Greeks. There's certain ones. Not all
the Greeks, but certain ones. If you want them identified,
I would say that identified in Acts 13, 48, and as many as were
ordained to eternal life believe. That's the one. That's the certain
Gentiles who followed him, as many as were ordained to eternal
life. This is what this shows me. There is a universal aspect to
the gospel and to salvation. Now, I don't mean universal in
the sense of everybody's gonna be saved. So don't misquote me. I mean a people from every nation,
kindred, tribe, and tongue. Universal in that sense. They're
gonna go after the Son of God. They're going to believe Him
because God the Father gave a people to Him. I want you to see this too, and
I'll close with this. It's kind of the way I began
the message. I want you to see that in the last days of our
Lord's public ministry, before He lays down His life for His
sheep, it will be observed, it will be obvious that He's different
from all other men. Because, number one, he's the
Son of God. That's his relationship to God.
That's what John stresses throughout this gospel. That he is the Son
of God. Gabriel, at the announcement
of Mary's pregnancy, said to her, that holy thing which shall
be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. When the Lord Jesus was baptized,
the Father said, this is My beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. When Satan tempted Him, He said,
if thou be the Son of God. The demons in Matthew 8, the
man of Gadara, He had the demons, the demons in the man of Gadara,
they said to Him, what have we to do with Thee, Jesus, Thou
Son of God? His disciples said, Peter spoke
for all of them, said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living
God. And when the Lord Jesus died,
you remember what that old Roman centurion said? He said, Surely
this man was the Son of God. From before his birth up to his
death, this is a verified fact. He's the son of God. That's his
relationship to God. He's equal with God. That's the
reason the Jews got so upset with him in John chapter 5 when
he said, my father worketh who the two and I work. And they
said, you're saying you're equal with God. You're saying you're
God's son. He is the son of God. This is what Martha said just
before our Lord Jesus said to Martha back in chapter 11. He
said, I am the resurrection and the life. She said, I believe
that thou art the Christ, the Son of God. But He is also the Son of David.
That's His relationship to Israel. As He is the Son of God, that's
His relationship to God. So He is the Son of David, that's
His relationship to Israel. The very first words of the New
Testament are these. the book of the generation of
Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of David, the son of
Abraham. Gabriel also indicated that he
was the son of David, saying to Mary, he shall sit upon the
throne of his father David. He was of the lineage of David.
When our Lord Jesus entered into Jerusalem, and I said that Matthew,
Mark, Luke, and John all recorded that great event. It was Matthew
who said the crowd's word, yelling, Hosanna to the Son of David. To the Son of David. Matthew
21 and verse 9. So before His death, the Lord
Jesus is recognized as not only being the Son of God, His relationship
to the Father, but He's the Son of David. That's His relationship
to Israel. But He has another title. He's
the Son of Man. And that's His relationship not
to the Father and not to the nation of Israel. That's His
relationship to His chosen people. He's the Son of Man. And this
was our Lord's favorite way of identifying Himself. He referred
to Himself as being the Son of Man more than He referred to
Himself any other way. Monday, I was at the infusion
center all day. So I had some time to study.
I took my little laptop computer and I went through the New Testament.
I found every verse that pertained to Jesus as being the Son of
God. Jesus as being the Son of David,
and Jesus being the Son of Man. This is what I've discovered.
The Lord Jesus rarely referred to Himself as the Son of God
in relation to His death. I can think of only one passage
of Scripture that would be in John 3, 16. For God so loved
the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That's
one of the few exceptions. But most of the time, when He
would set forth Himself as being the Savior of sinners, He almost
always referred to Himself as the Son of Man. Let me just trigger
your memory a little bit, because according to my count, I was
drugged at the time. Thanks to Joella. This is necessary. According to the best of my recollection
and counting, 25 times our Savior identified Himself as being the
Son of Man with regard to His death and resurrection. There
are other times He referred to Himself as the Son of Man also,
Of all the times, at least 25 times, he referred to himself
as the Son of Man in this context, speaking of the salvation of
his people. He said, the Son of Man has come
to seek and to save that which was lost. He said as Jonah was
three days and three nights in the belly of the great fish,
So shall the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the
heart of the earth. He said in John 3, as Moses lifted up the
serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man. He didn't
say, must the Son of God, though He was the Son of God at the
same time. He didn't say, so must the Son of David be lifted
up, though He was still the Son of David. That is, He is the
Messiah. He is the Christ. But He said,
even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever believeth
on him shall have eternal life. When his disciples were with
him in Galilee, he said to them, the Son of Man shall be betrayed
into the hands of men. They shall kill him, and the
third day he shall be raised again. When he manifested his
glory to Peter, James, and John, he said, don't tell any man of
this vision until the Son of Man be raised from the dead.
He said to His disciples, for the Son of Man came not to be
ministered unto, but to minister and give His life a ransom for
many. And right here in John chapter
12, look at verse 23. And Jesus answered them, and
this is what He said, the hour has finally arrived, the hour
has come, that the Son of Man should be glorified. What do
you think He's talking about? He's talking about His death
and His resurrection, the Son of Man. Let me make this observation
real quick. Look back at verse 21. Here the
Gentiles, the Greeks, they came therefore to Philip, who was
a Bethsaid of Galilee, and we know that the largest population
of Gentiles lived in Galilee, that is the ones who lived in
Israel, they lived in Galilee, and desired him saying, sir,
we would see, they didn't say, we would see the Christ. You
know who would say that? Jews, right? You with me? That's what the Jews would say.
These are Gentiles. Gentiles. They didn't have the
Old Testament Scriptures. The Messiah. The Anointed One. No. They said, Sir, we would
see Jesus. The Savior. The Savior. One who is the Savior of all
kinds of people. People from everywhere. And another point worth making
is this. Our Lord Jesus often spoke about
His second coming and judgment. And you know, every time He brought
up that subject, every time, unless I missed one, He talked
about it 32 times. He talked about His second coming
and judgment. Every single verse. On those subjects, second coming
and judgment, He identified Himself as the Son of Man. The Son of
Man. And I'll give you this. Go to
Daniel. Let me show you this reference in Daniel 7. Look at Daniel chapter 7. Look at verse 13 and 14. Daniel 7,
13, and 14. Daniel 7, verse 13, I saw in
the night visions, and behold one like the Son of Man. The
Son of Man, he came with the clouds of heaven, he came to
the ancient of days, and they brought him near before him.
Who is this Son of Man? It's the Lord Jesus. He's not
identified as being the Son of God, though He was at the same
time the Son of God. That's His relationship to God.
He's not identified as the Son of David, though He had a relationship
to Israel. Because He was of the house and
the lineage of David, in fulfillment of the Scriptures. But He's identified
as being the Son of Man. He came with the clouds of heaven.
He came to the Ancient of Days. They brought him near before
the Ancient of Days. Who is the Ancient of Days? That's
God the Father. And there was given to this one,
the Son of Man, there's given something to him. Dominion, and
glory, and a kingdom that all people, nations, and languages
should serve him. His dominion is an everlasting
dominion and it will never pass away. And His kingdom that which
shall not be destroyed. That's the Son of Man. That's
our Savior. And so when you read in the New
Testament or even here in the Old Testament of Christ the Son
of Man, remember this. That's His relationship. to us. That makes it all the more precious.
All the more dear. He's the Son of Man. He's bone
of our bone. He's flesh of our flesh. He's
the God-Man. Well, let's sing the closing
song tonight.