If you would, turn in your Bibles
to the book of Mark chapter 13. I've been preaching through this
passage of scripture concerning the last days leading up to the
second coming of Christ. It may seem strange to many people
that I'm talking about the last days leading up to his second
coming when so many in this time are talking about his first coming,
his birth, but I'm going to tie those two together. I want you
to see that. I dealt in verses 9 through 13
last week. I want to reread those and then
I want to go back to one passage that I'm going to use as my text.
I'm not going to get to verse 14, so if you were expecting
to hear about the abomination of desolation, you'll have to
come back next Sunday. So look at verse 9 of Mark chapter
13. Christ speaking to his disciples
says, take heed to yourselves. In the last days, now he's talking
about, they shall deliver you up to councils. That's religious
councils, like the Jewish Sanhedrin. And in the synagogues, you shall
be beaten. They won't tolerate you in their
religious services. That is, because of your preaching
of the gospel. Standing firm for the cause of
God's grace in Christ. Salvation by grace, which does
not exalt the works of men and the pride of men. He says in
the synagogues you shall be beaten, you shall be brought before rulers
and kings for my sake, that's the civil government. for a testimony
against them. In other words, this is a testimony
from God against them because of their hatred of the gospel.
Now, as I said last week, men and women by nature hate the
gospel for so many different reasons, but the main reason
is, as I said, it exposes the self-righteousness and false
refuge and evil deeds of those who do not look to and rest in
Christ for all of salvation. for all righteousness, for all
eternal life and glory. What I'm telling you is this,
if you're sitting here this morning and you have any hope or assurance
of salvation other than Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ and Him
crucified and risen again, you're not going to like what I have
to say. Now, you may express it in a different way than some
do back here, but you're not going to like it. If your hope
is in your baptism, I'm telling you that's wicked. Is that too
strong? Well, that's what the scripture
says. John chapter 3 and verse 19 and 20, that's the evil deeds.
If your hope of salvation is in your works, what you've done
for the Lord, what you've done for people, if that's your hope
of salvation, should you work for the Lord? Yes, you should.
Should you be charitable and kind to other people, love other
people? Yes, you should. That's not the
issue. But now, will that save you? Will that make you righteous? No, sir. There's only one thing
that'll make a sinner righteous, and that's the blood and righteousness
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's why he was born. And
that's why he's coming again. So think about that. Now, verse
10. This is my text. It's verse 10. And the gospel must first be
published among all nations. The gospel, the good news. the
good tidings of great joy that people talk about. Now, let me
tell you something. The good tidings of great joy
is not just simply that a Savior is born. Now, that's part of
it. But if it goes no further than
that, you don't have any good tidings for a sinner. The good
tidings here, the gospel, the good news is of the salvation
that He accomplished in His death on the cross. That's what that
good news is, and I'll show you that. But the gospel must first
be published among all nations. That is, before Christ comes
again, the gospel is going to be published in all nations.
Now that doesn't mean, when you look at a globe or on a map,
it doesn't mean every little borderline. It means all peoples. all ethnic groups, all nationalities,
all races. That's what it's talking about.
Okay? It doesn't mean that the gospel is going to be preached
in every point on the globe. But it's going to spread out
through all... It's not going to be limited to the Jews. Now,
one of the reasons the Jews, the unbelieving Jews, hated the
gospel is because they resented the gospel going out to the Gentiles.
We be Abraham's seed. They were proud of that, the
physical connection with Abraham. They were circumcised. They kept
the law of Moses. Now, they didn't, but they said
they did. It's like people today who think they keep the law,
or people today who think they love their neighbor as they love
themselves. They don't, but they fool themselves into thinking
they do because they've lowered the standard. And so now here
they're saying, you know, I'm a Jew, I was born of the seed
of Abraham physically, I'm circumcised, I kept the law, and you mean
to tell me that you're going to bring a Gentile dog into this
situation and give him equal standing before a holy God as
I have? No, sir. That's what they hated.
That's one of the reasons. We'll see that. But the gospel
must be published. Now verse 11, but when they shall
lead you and deliver you up and take no... That is, when you
go up before these councils, he says, take no thought before
him what you shall speak, neither do you premeditate. But he says,
whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye,
for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost. He's not
telling them not to prepare and not to study and not to read
and not to pray. He's just simply that says when
you're in these situations where you're pressured, God will be
with you. He said, I'll never leave you
nor forsake you. The Holy Spirit will give you the words that
you need to speak. And he did. You can read it in
the book of Acts quite a bit. But it's there. And then he says
you're even going to have problems, opposition from your family.
Now this is important. Opposition. You see, believers,
those who are in Christ, Christ himself, we're in the world,
but we're not of the world. And he says in verse 12, now
the brothers shall betray the brother to death and the father,
the son. Children shall rise up against
their parents and shall cause them to be put to death. This
is over the gospel. In the book of Luke, chapter
14, you don't have to turn there, and that's why he said, if you
hate not mother, father, brother, sister. Now, he's not telling
us to hate our family, but he's simply saying this. He says,
if we'll deny Christ in order to get along with our families,
we don't love him. And so he says in verse 13, you
shall be hated of all men for my name's sake. Did they hate
our Savior? Did the unbelieving world, the
religious world, the self-righteous world hate our Savior and our
Lord? He said they did in John chapter 15, verse 18. He said,
marvel not if the world hate you, it hated me before it hated
you. And the servant is not greater
than the master. So you'll be hated of all men
for my name's sake, but he that shall endure, persevere unto
the end, the same shall be saved. Now, he's not saying there that
our final glory is conditioned on our perseverance. But he's
just simply saying here is that those who endure reveal that
they're saved by the grace of God. So that's the issue. Now my text, verse 10, the gospel
must first be published, preached, spread out, communicated out
among all nations. It must be published. But it's
going to be published with much opposition. and persecution over
the truth. Now, let me ask you this question.
Now, think about this in this season that people are thinking
about the birth of Christ. When the Lord of glory condescended
to be made of human flesh, was there opposition? Even when He
was born, was there opposition? Well, turn to the book of Matthew
chapter 2. Turn to Matthew chapter 2. Now first of all, understand
that this opposition is not new. It's always been. And even before
the birth of the Savior, there was opposition to the message
of the Savior. Because Christ Himself in the
Sermon on the Mount, you remember He told them, He said, they persecuted
the prophets before you, they killed the prophets. Isaiah spoke
this gospel message. He preached this gospel message
to his generation, and they killed him. Jeremiah preached it to
his generation, and they made his pulpit in the bottom of a
well. That's where they put him, in the bottom of a well. That's
how much they hated him. And even before that, you can
go on back and back, all the prophets, Moses himself a prophet
and a lawgiver. preached this message and the
people opposed him. There has always been opposition
from the unbelieving, self-righteous, religious world. But look here
in verse 13 of Matthew chapter 2. It speaks, And when they were
departed, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in
a dream, saying, Arise and take the young child and his mother
and flee, run away to Egypt. This is the messenger of God
telling Joseph and Mary to take the child, the Christ child,
and run away to Egypt. And be thou there until I bring
thee word, for Herod, King Herod, will seek the young child to
destroy him. And when he arose, he took the
young child and his mother by night and departed unto Egypt.
And it was there until the death of Herod that it might be fulfilled
which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, and this is the
prophet Hosea, saying, Out of Egypt have I called my son. So
there was opposition even at his birth. You see, this gospel
must be published among all nations, and it's the gospel of the king.
And Herod thought of himself as the only king, and he didn't
want any competition of that. Now my question is this, why
must the gospel first be published among all nations? Please, let
me give you these reasons. First of all, This is God's sovereign
electing purpose from the very beginning. Now, turn to Romans
chapter 9. Now, as I told you before, the
Jews opposed the gospel for several reasons. The Bible tells us in
the book of Romans chapter 9 that the Jews, the unbelieving Jews
now, not all without exception, Paul was a Jew, John was a Jew,
Peter was a Jew, and they believed in Christ. And you could put
any Gentile in this category too, but man by nature. Here's
the issue. Romans chapter 9 tells you that
they seek righteousness, how to be justified before God, how
to be righteous before God by their works. The gospel message,
the good tidings of great joy, that the Bible speaks of, brought
in by the prophecy and the promise and the coming of our Savior
and the death of our Savior, and in His coming again, all
of that, that same message has never changed. It's not, listen,
it is not salvation or righteousness by works. It is salvation and
righteousness completely by grace. That's what the message... But
look at Romans chapter 9 and verse 31. It says, but Israel,
which followed after the law of righteousness, trying to be
righteous, trying to be accepted with God, trying to be saved,
trying to be holy, they have not attained to the law of righteousness.
That's the first thing the gospel, this good tidings of great joy,
tells a sinner. You haven't made it. You're working
hard. You've joined the church, you
got baptized, you give your tithe, you do all this, you do that,
you stop doing this and stop doing that. You quit being a
drug addict and you've become an upstanding citizen and that's
fine and that's what you ought to be, but that has not made
you righteous. And if you think it has, you
know what the good tidings of great joy calls that? Pride,
self-righteousness. That has not made you holy. That's
the first thing it tells you. They didn't attain it. Now verse
32. Why? That's what wherefore means.
Why? Because they sought it not by faith. The other way you're
going to find righteousness is by faith. What does that mean? This is key. You mean if I believe,
then I'm righteous? Not necessarily. In whom do you
believe? What do you believe? You see,
how do you seek righteousness by faith? It says here in verse
32, "...because they sought it not by faith, but as it were
by works of the law." A person can believe that they can be
made righteous by their works, and that's a lie. You can believe
a lie. Did you know that? You can sincerely believe a lie. You can be dedicated to a lie.
You can be sold out to a lie. You can attend services four
times a week listening to a lie. Am I right? That's possible,
isn't it? You can give your tithes to support
the preaching of a lie. So, sincerity is not the issue
here, you see. How do you seek it by faith?
Well, it says, they sought it by the works of the law, for
they stumbled at that stumbling stone. Now, what does that mean?
Who is that stumbling stone? Well, verse 33 takes you back
to the book of Isaiah, which is a prophecy of Christ. And
it says, as it is written, behold, I lay in Zion, that's the church,
a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whosoever believeth
on him shall not be ashamed. How do you seek righteousness
by faith? You seek righteousness in the
Lord Jesus Christ. Now stay there at Romans 9 and
go across the page to verse 6. Now many of the Jews were expecting
the Messiah to come. It's like people today. Alright,
they're celebrating the birth of Christ. Which Christ? Is that a valid question? I know
some people get upset from even asking that. But is it a valid
question? In the Scripture it is. The Jews
expected him to come, but the one they expected is not the
one who came at all. It was another one. They expected
one to come in the clouds riding a white horse of victory bearing
a sword to cut down their enemies, their oppressors, especially
the Romans, set up his kingdom in Jerusalem and pat them on
their back and say, well done, fellas. Now you're my lieutenants
and we'll rule. That's what they expected. They
didn't expect a babe in a manger. They didn't expect one who would
come in such a humble way, as Isaiah 53 speaks of. In fact, if you ask an unbelieving
Jew today how they interpreted Isaiah 53, that's not Christ,
that's Israel to them. But it's Christ. That tender
plant. That man of sorrows. despised
and hated and rejected, you see. This is why the opposition to
the gospel, we preach one who is despised and hated and rejected. And they didn't expect that one
to come, but when he came, they rejected him. And it's like people
today who expect Christ to come again. Now, who are you really
expecting? What are you expecting him to
do? What did he accomplish on Calvary? All of these things
come into play here. Well look, it says in verse 6,
so the majority of the nation of Israel rejected Jesus of Nazareth
as being the Messiah. And so we know that God promised
to save Israel, but the majority of Israel rejected him. So did
God's promise fail? Was God not powerful enough to
save them? Or was he not faithful enough?
Well, look at verse 6. It's not as though the word of
God hath taken none effect. Now, what is that word of God?
That's the gospel that must be published among all nations.
For they are not all Israel which are of Israel. What does that
mean? Well, look at verse 7. Neither
because they are the seed of Abraham, the physical offspring
of Abraham, are they all children, that is, children of God. In
other words, just because you're born into the physical family
of Abraham does not make you a child of God, doesn't make
you saved, does not make you righteous. So he says, but in
Isaac shall thy seed be called. Now Isaac was the child of promise
who had a miraculous birth and Isaac is a type of Christ here.
And here he says in verse 8, that is, they that which are
the children of the flesh, physical offspring, these are not the
children of God, but the children of the promise are counted for
the seed. Now here's my question. Am I
a child of the promise? Are you a child of the promise?
Well, what is the promise? What did God promise to do? That's
what we've got to understand. Well, the promise is communicated
in the gospel that must be published in all nations. It's the gospel
promise, you see. In Acts chapter 2 and verse 39,
let me read it to you. Peter preached Christ. He preached
salvation by the grace of God, just like Paul and the rest of
them, just like any true gospel preacher. For by grace are you
saved, through faith that not of yourselves. It's the gift
of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. It's grace,
grace, grace. And Peter preached that at Pentecost
and in verse 39 he made this statement. He says, for the promise
is unto you and to your children and to all that are afar off
That would include the Gentiles. "...even as many as the Lord
our God shall call." Now, how does he call them? Well, he calls
them through the preaching of the gospel. Look over at John
chapter 10. This is what Brother Joe read
to us. I know I'm having you turn to
a lot of scripture here, but look at this. See how this fits together
in the scripture now. He starts off in John chapter
10 talking about himself as the Messiah. The Messiah. Verse 1, "...verily,
verily, I say unto you, he that entereth not by the door into
the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a
thief and a robber. But he that entereth in by the
door is the shepherd of the sheep." Who's he talking about there?
He's talking about himself. He entered the sheepfold. How did
he enter the sheepfold? He entered the sheepfold by being
born of a virgin. That seed, that woman's seed
that was promised back in Genesis chapter 3, 15. And incidentally,
now let me tell you something. When that promise was made in
Genesis 3 and verse 15, there were no national physical Jews
at that time. There was no nation Israel. The
nation Israel was not formed until God brought them out of
Egypt and put them at Sinai and gave them that law. That's when
the nation was actually formed. But there was the promise of
the woman's seed back in Genesis chapter 3 and verse 15. And he
said that woman's seed is going to come and he's going to die
for the salvation of his people. He's going to be born of a virgin.
You see, he's not man's seed, he's the woman's seed. That's
Christ. Unto us a child is born, unto
us a son is given. He's both God and man in one
person. His name shall be called Jesus,
for He shall save His people from their sins. His name shall
be called Emmanuel, which being interpreted is God with us. John
chapter 1, the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us. John
1, 14. That's how Christ entered into the sheepfold. Who are the
sheep? That's His people. That's the ones whom God gave
him before the foundation of the world. He entered into the
sheepfold by condescending to unite himself to sinless human
flesh, body and soul, conceived in the womb of the virgin by
the Holy Spirit. That's how he entered. And he
came to do what? Well, now look at verse 11 of
John 10. Now, he came, he was born. This person who is both
God and man, and he says in verse 11, I am the good shepherd, the
good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep. He came to die.
He was born to die. He was born to die. And he did
under the judgment of God's wrath for the sins of his sheep. He
giveth his life, didn't give it for himself, And giveth his
life for the sheep means he gave his life as a substitute, not
as a martyr. In other words, this was no object
lesson. This was an actual dying under
the justice of God, paying a debt. For God made him to be sin, Christ
who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of
God in him. The sins of his sheep were accounted
to him. And his righteousness is accounted
to us. And so he says in verse 14, look
at John 10 and verse 14, I'm the good shepherd and know my
sheep and am known of mine. In other words, I know who they
are and they're gonna know me. He says in verse 15, as the father
knoweth me, even so know I the father, and I laid down my life
for the sheep. Now look at verse 16. Now why
must the gospel be published in all nations? Look at verse
16. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold, What's
he talking about this foal? He's talking about this Jewish
foal. He has some sheep among the Jews. But he has some sheep
elsewhere too, among the Gentiles. In fact, if you read the scripture,
it says he has some sheep out of every tribe, kindred, tongue,
and nation. And he says, other sheep I have
which are not of this foal. Now listen to this verse 16.
This is a good translation of it. Them also I must. bring. I've got to bring them. Now why must he bring them? And this is why the gospel must
be published in all nations. I'll tell you why he must bring
them, because he died for them. This gospel being published in
all nations is the fruit of His death on the cross. It's the
fruit of His redemptive work on the cross. He died for them. You know what that means? That
means He bought and paid for them. There He is. He said in
John chapter 6, "...all that the Father giveth me shall come
to me, and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.
And this is the will of him which hath sent me, that of all which
he hath given me I should lose nothing, but should raise it
up again at the last day." I must bring them, but go on in verse
16. He says, "...and they shall hear my voice." That's the ones
whom Peter was talking about, to as many as the Father called.
You hear His voice. What's he talking about? He's
not talking about a dream or a vision or some kind of an ecstatic
experience. He's talking about the preaching
of the gospel of God's grace in Christ. And he says, and there
shall be one fold and one shepherd, one church, and their one shepherd,
Christ. Look over at verse 26. He talked
to those who rejected him And he says, you believe not because
you're not of my sheep, as I said. Now, if you walk, you know, those
who continue in unbelief and die in unbelief, they're not
his sheep. Now, you know, sheep, those who
are Christ's sheep, they start out as lost sheep. You don't
know your way. I didn't know my way. until God
called me and brought me to Christ who is the way. I am the way,
the truth, and the life. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. But look what he says in verse 27. My sheep hear my
voice, and I know them, and they follow me. They follow Christ. Now, how do you know you're following
Him? By the Word. Who is He? He's God and man in
one person. He's Emmanuel. He's Jesus. He's the great I Am. You can
go on and on. Every book of the Bible describes
Him. Shows us who He is so that we
won't follow a counterfeit. What did He do? He died for His
people on the cross. He drank damnation dry. He paid
my debt in full. He made an end of sin. He finished
the transgression. He brought in everlasting righteousness.
He enabled God to be both a just God and a Savior. He made us
righteous, forgiven by His blood, accepted in the Beloved. Nothing
else added to Him, nothing taken away from Him. It's not Christ
plus this or Christ plus that, it's Christ alone who saves me
and keeps me and brings me to glory. His blood is the only
ground of my forgiveness. His righteousness is the only
ground of my justification. I have no one else, nothing else,
don't need anyone else, don't want anyone else. I have Christ.
Oh, that I may know Him and be found in Him, not having mine
own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through
the faith of Christ. That's what it is to hear His
voice. He says in verse 28, I give unto them eternal life and they
shall never perish. If you have Christ, you'll never
perish. Don't let anybody else tell you
otherwise. Neither shall any man. Now I've heard people say,
well that says any man. Man can't do it, but Satan could.
No, man's in italics there. That literally should be neither
shall any pluck them out of my hand. Nobody, nothing can separate
us from the love of God in Christ. He said, my Father which gave
them me is greater than all and none is able to pluck out of
my Father's hand. I and my Father are one. together
in this. This is God's electing purpose
from the very beginning. The gospel must be preached in
all nations. And then He'll come again. This
is God's promise from the beginning. Even when He revealed the gospel
to Abraham, He said, Abraham, I'm going to make you a blessing
to all nations. How? Because the Messiah, who
has a people out of every tribe, kindred, tongue and nation, will
come through you. Jew and Gentile, any sinner,
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, Jew or Gentile,
shall be saved. This was God's way from the beginning. It's never been any different.
God has a people. And he's going to bring them
to Christ through the preaching of the gospel. It says in 1 Corinthians
chapter 1 that it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching
to save them that believe. This is the fruit of God's redeeming
grace in Christ. I want you to turn to Luke chapter
2 with me. Look at Luke chapter 2. And I
want to show you this. And you know, much of the time,
to show you something about how this message is so radical, in
this time here, during the birth of Christ, at the time during
the inauguration of the new covenant at Pentecost, all of that, and
even back in the Old Testament, Whenever there was a prophecy
given of salvation through the promised Messiah and it was applied
to Gentiles in any way, it always met with opposition from the
unbelieving Jews. Always. But listen to this. Look at Luke chapter 2 and verse
8. Familiar passage during this
time of year. It says, And there were in the same country shepherds
abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory
of the Lord shone round about them, and they were sore afraid.
And the angel said unto them, Fear not, for behold, I bring
you good tidings of great joy. What's the next line? Which shall
be to whom? To all people. Now, I know a
lot of people get upset and they have questions over this thing
about the love of God and the death of Christ as it applies
to everybody or, you know, does it apply to everybody in the
world? Let me tell you something. Listen to what this says. It
says, fear not for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy
which shall be to all people. Now, I want you to realize something
that's so obvious here that it almost hits you right in the
face. Whatever this angel has, whatever message he has for these
shepherds, it is not good tidings of great joy to every individual
without exception. Is it? Was it good tidings of
great joy to King Herod that we read about in Matthew chapter
2? who wanted to kill the Christ child? You know, you read on
about that, do you know that King Herod was so opposed to
this good tidings of great joy that he issued a decree that
every male child in Israel was to be killed that was two years
old or less? Was it good tidings of great
joy to him? Was it good tidings of great
joy to the Pharisees, to the Sanhedrin? Christ said in the
last days, they're going to bring you up before councils, you'll
go into their synagogues to preach this good tidings of great joy
and they'll throw you out. In fact, the first time that
our Lord in his public ministry went back to his hometown of
Nazareth to preach in a local synagogue there where everybody
knew him as Joseph's son, And they read from the book of Isaiah,
chapter what, 61? Chapter 61. And he stood up there
and read that and he looked at them and he said, today this
prophecy is fulfilled before your eyes. What he said, I'm
the one, what he was saying there, I'm the one Isaiah is talking
about here. Did they all stand up and applaud and say, good
tidings of great joy? No. You know what they did? They
grabbed hold of him and were going to take him outside the
door and throw him over a cliff. Now let me tell you something.
If it were not for the grace of God and the mercy of God,
it would not be good tidings of great joy to me or to you.
You mark it down. That's right. It would not be. So when he says to all people,
what's he mean? He's talking about to all of
Christ's sheep all over this world. That's who he's talking
about. Am I part of this all people?
Well, is it good tidings of great joy to you? Is it the best thing
you've ever heard? I'm going to tell you something.
I've heard a lot of good things and I've heard a lot of bad things.
There's nothing that even compares with this. There's a lot of things I want
to hear that I don't hear. And I get real frustrated. I
want to hear it from people. Especially certain people. Boy,
I'd like to hear some things from certain people. How about
you? And I'd say it'd be really great to hear that. Not even
on the map. compared to this good tidings
of great joy. Read on, look at verse 11 of
Luke 2. He says, For unto you is born
this day in the city of David a Savior, which is Christ the
Lord. That's a lot of description there
of who He is. City of David, that's where the
Messiah was going to be born. You know what the city of David
is? A lot of people say Jerusalem. Well, that was David's home after
he became king, but that's Bethlehem. Bethlehem. And so, he's born
in the city of David. He's a savior. He's not going
to try to come and save anybody. He's going to save his people
from their sins, which is Christ. That's the anointed one. That's
what that means, the chosen one, Messiah, that's the Greek word
for Messiah. That's who He is, He's the Messiah,
and He's the Lord, that's Jehovah. God, our Savior. You know all
that was in there. That's it. He's God, our Savior. That's who I need. Jesus Christ
came into the world to save sinners. And he's the only one who can,
he's the only one who's able, and he's the only one who was
chosen to do so. And he says in verse 12, "...and this shall
be a sign unto you. You shall find the babe wrapped
in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there
was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising
God." It was good tidings of great joy to the heavenly host. And they're not even the sheep
of Christ. They're just the elect angels
who are kept by the power of God. So if it's good tidings
to them, man, what it ought to be to us. And he says in verse 14, here's
what they said, glory to God in the highest. Here is the highest
manifestation of God's glory that will ever be upon this earth. Where? Jesus Christ, the Lord
of glory. Here's the Shekinah glory of
God. Listen, if you could ever see
by the power of the Holy Spirit, the glory of Christ, you would
never even consider the Ark of the Covenant again. You know,
people get so wrapped up in stuff like that and impressed by it. You wouldn't be impressed by
that at all. Like you'd be like Ohezekiah when they found the
serpent that was set upon the Pope. Grind that thing into powder,
somebody might worship it. If you'll ever see this glory.
And then he says, and on earth peace. Now he's not talking about
peace between men and nations here. He's talking about peace
between God and sinners. Christ is the Prince of Peace.
And goodwill toward men. That's not a good translation
of that phrase. What it would mean is God's favor
upon men of his goodwill. Now with whom is God favorable? Upon whom is God's good will?
I'll tell you exactly. Every sinner who flees to Christ
for salvation, for righteousness, for life, for forgiveness, for
acceptance, for glory. But then look on down in Luke
chapter 2. Here's another very telling issue
here. Look at verse 25. Now this is
later on when Joseph and Mary were bringing the Christ child
to the temple to have him circumcised, to do according to the law. And
it says in verse 25 of Luke 2, it says, And behold, there was
a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, And the same man
was just and devout. That means he was a believer,
and that's proven by this. He was waiting for the consolation
of Israel. Now, what is the consolation
of Israel? Well, if you read over in Isaiah chapter 40, you'll
find out that the consolation or the comfort of Israel, which
is that spiritual Israel, is the Lord Jesus Christ. He was
waiting for Christ. We're waiting for His second
coming, aren't we? Simeon was waiting for his first
coming and he says, and the Holy Ghost was upon him and it was
revealed unto him. Now listen to this. It was revealed
unto Simeon by the Holy Ghost that he should not see death,
that's physical death, before he had seen the Lord's Christ. The Holy Spirit revealed to this
man, you're going to see the Christ child before you leave
this world. But you know what? Simeon was already a believer.
He was already a born-again believer. He was waiting for the... He
was looking to the promise that God made of the coming of Christ.
Now look at verse 27. Then took he him up in his arms. Simeon lifted that child up in
his arms and blessed God. It means he worshipped and praised
God and said, now listen to this language, verse 29. Lord, now
lettest thou thy servant depart in peace according to thy word,
for mine eyes have seen thy salvation. I've seen your salvation, the
salvation that God has provided for me, a sinner. The only way
of forgiveness, the only way of righteousness, the only way
of life and glory. I've seen it. But now look at
verse 31. Which thou hast prepared before
the face of all people. Now not everybody without exception
is going to say I've seen your salvation. All people where? That's God's sheep out of every
tribe, kindred, tongue and nation. Verse 32, a light to lighten
the Gentiles. Simeon knew the Scriptures. He
knew the Old Testament. This was already prophesied.
That's from Isaiah chapter 42 and Isaiah chapter 49. You can
go on, there's other passages. A light to lighten the Gentiles
and the glory of thy people Israel. God has a people out of every
tribe, kindred, tongue, and nation. And for that purpose, this one
who was born, and I don't know what day he was born, I don't
even think it was in the winter, myself, but either way, it doesn't matter.
I mean, it was on that day that God appointed. He had to be born
because He had to be made human flesh. He had to identify with
His people in our name and in our nature without sin. He had
to be God-man to do the work that He came to do. And He went
to that cross and He died. And that one that we're waiting
for to come again, He's the salvation that God has provided and the
only way of salvation. And so we, like Simeon, we wait
for the final consolation and consummation of spiritual Israel. And the gospel must be preached
in all nations. And then he'll come again. All
right.