In verse 18, we're going to talk about another Old
Testament picture of Christ. I will raise them up a prophet,
see how that's capitalized, a prophet from among their brethren like
unto thee, and will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak
unto them that I shall command him. And it shall come to pass
that whosoever will not hearken unto my words, which he shall
speak in my name, I will require of him. But the prophet which
shall presume to speak a word in my name, which I have not
commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other
gods, even that prophet shall die. And if thou say in thine
heart, how shall we know the word which the Lord hath not
spoken? How can we tell when God you
haven't spoken? That's what they're asking. When
a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow
not, nor come to pass. That is the thing which the Lord
hath not spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously.
Thou shalt not be afraid of him." Alright. Mont West Virginia died
this morning. Went home to be with the Lord.
But he was the first man that Scott Richardson baptized. And
he took care of the finances at the church there for what,
40 years? 45? Something like that. and
the workinest man. He, Joe, he just, he was, you
never seen anybody work like him. But now I, you know what, when
they told me that, I said, I sure do rejoice now. You can't help
but rejoice. Huh? Leave this world of flesh,
drop this robe of flesh, and shout while going through the
air, farewell, farewell. Sweet air of prayer. All right,
I'm going to talk about Christ our prophet, another Old Testament
picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. I read there where God said,
I'll raise up them, I will raise them up a prophet from among
their brethren like unto thee, like unto Moses, and will put
my words in his mouth, and he shall speak unto them all that
I shall command him. And it shall come to pass that
whosoever will not hearken or listen unto my words which he
shall speak, my words which he shall speak in my name, I will
require it of him. Now our Lord Jesus It's clear
from God's precious word, God's blessed word, that our Lord Jesus
Christ has a three-fold office. Nobody else had all these offices. He was a prophet, he's a priest,
and he's a king. Now, David was a king and also
a prophet. Aaron was a priest, but he wasn't
a prophet. David was a king, but he wasn't
a priest. So only one person held all three
of those offices at one time. And that's our Lord Jesus Christ.
And no one's ever, ever been a prophet and a priest and a
king in one person except the Lord Jesus Christ. And you think
how gracious, how gracious God is. How blessedly gracious God
is. And the Lord is to send us a
prophet. Send among us so great a prophet. Not just a prophet, a great prophet.
He's called the Son of God, Emmanuel. God come down to be with us.
God with us. That's who it was, this great
prophet. And oh, what a gracious thing,
a gift that God gave us. A prophet and sent him among
us. And a great prophet. Great prophet. And what a prophet
our Lord Jesus Christ is. What a prophet he is. You know
Moses came from the earth. Elijah came from the earth. All
the other prophets came from the earth. But our Lord Jesus
Christ came from above. He came down. He came to this
earth. And He came down and God blessed
Him and gave Him the Holy Spirit without measure. And He fulfilled
what others only talked about. He fulfilled all the prophets,
to Him all the prophets give witness. And I tell you what,
He fulfilled all the scriptures, what all the others all talked
about. He declared the whole counsel of God. Declared all
of it. Now we say we do, you know. Paul
said, I've declared the whole counsel of God unto you. Christ
really, really did. And he brought life and immortality
to light through the gospel. I want you to look at something
with me. Over in 2nd Timothy look in 2nd
Timothy with me. I want you to see something over
here talking about a prophet our Lord Jesus Christ He brought
life and immortality to light through the gospel And he came
down from heaven above all Everybody else has the Holy Spirit by a
certain amount by a certain measure but our Lord Jesus God gave him
the spirit of without measure. In fact, all the Spirit and all
the... when the Holy Spirit comes to
us, the Comforter comes to us, He comes to us through Christ
and because of Christ. Because He's got Him without
measure. Got Him without measure. But look here in verse 8 of 2
Timothy chapter 1. Paul's talking to Timothy here.
Now he's in prison and he says, Be thou not therefore ashamed
of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner, but be
thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel. according to the
power of God, who hath saved us, and called us with a holy
calling, not according to our works, but according to his own
purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before
the world began. Now watch what I'm going to tell
you. We've talked about God saving us, God calling us, God's purpose
of grace in Christ given to us, but now this grace and this calling
and this purpose by Christ is now made manifest, brought to
where we can see it by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ. Listen
to this now. Who abolished death? Abolished it. When you abolish
something, that means it don't exist anymore. Now, He abolished
death. That's what when we say that,
you know, our Lord said, I give unto them eternal life. That
means that you don't have death. We have a physical death, but
not no death. We don't, you know, death has
had its sting took out of it. Death has had its fear took out
of it. And here, oh my, did God abolish death? That's why when
God calls somebody home, we say, thank God, bless the Lord, rejoice
in Christ. Why? Because death, it got the
victory over it. How come? Because Christ abolished
it. And listen to this, and then
not only did He abolish death, but He brought life. brought
life and immortality to light where we can see it through the
gospel. Now that's what our prophet did.
That's what our prophet did. You remember when our Lord Jesus
was standing talking to the Samaritan woman at the well? She said,
I know that when the Messiah cometh, he'll tell us all things.
All things, you know what our Lord said? He said, I that speak
unto thee, am he. And oh what a prophet he is.
And I'll tell you something else. We see, we know the absolute
necessity of having such a prophet. You know what would be if God
didn't send us a prophet? Didn't send his son to be our
prophet. And a prophet is one who speaks for God. A prophet
is one who speaks for God. God gives him something to say
and he speaks for God. Moses, God said, I'm going to
send you down to Egypt and you're going to tell Pharaoh to let
my people go. But he said, well when I go down
there, who in the world am I going to tell them sent me? Somebody's
got to send you. Somebody's got to give you something
to say. He said, well you tell them I
am that I am sent you down there. And that's what our Lord Jesus
Christ is. God gave him to us and we absolutely
need a prophet sent from God. And I tell you, if he hadn't
of come, and been our prophet to speak to God, speak the words
of God and the word of God in his mouth. And he said time and
again, he said the words that I speak, they're not mine, but
let the Father give me these words. And I tell you, do you
know what we'd do? We'd still be in blindness. We'd
still be in darkness. We'd still have no idea about
who God is. We'd still have no idea about
how to be saved. We wouldn't know anything about
His Word. We'd be sitting in darkness, in blindness. And I
tell you, His words though are true. His words are faithful.
And to hear Him, to hear the Lord, is to hear God Himself. That's what our Master said.
The words that I speak, they're not mine, they're my Father's.
I speak what my Father commanded me to speak. And Hebrews 1 said
in sundry times, and in different manners, God in time past, way
back yonder, spake to the fathers by the prophets. But hath in
these last days spoken unto us, how? By sun. By the sun. And so I tell you, thank God
that he sent us a prophet. And what a prophet he is. And
how blessed we are, how blessed we are and those who do hear
and believe him. You know when you believe the
Lord Jesus Christ, you hear Him. And you believe Him. And you
know when you believe Him, you believe He's the voice of God.
the word of God speaking and you hear him he says the hour
is coming and now is when the dead shall hear the voice of
the son of God and they that hear shall live and I tell you
beloved and it's inexcusable it'll be inexcusable for those
who refuse to hear him He says our Lord said in John 3.35 He
says he that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life he
that believeth not the wrath of God abideth on him and to
refuse to believe the Lord Jesus that one great prophet that eternal
high priest of whom Moses was a type eternal high priest of
whom Aaron was a type and the great king of kings of whom David
was but a type and so when he was born he was born king of
the Jews and when he died they wrote over his tomb king of the
Jews and not only is he king of the Jews but he's king over
everything that rise and wriggles on this earth I mean he's in
absolute control You know, I watch a lot of these old, you know,
you read about some of these kings and they've had good kings,
they've had bad kings in England, kings all over the world. And some of them are awful. And their
word, I mean, a man can live or die just at the word of a
king. The word of a king. I mean, if a king looked and
said, they took you out immediately. So you imagine what it is for
the Lord Jesus Christ to be King of Kings. Setting with all power
and all authority invested in Him. Ruling and reigning. Ruling and reigning. And it always... I've told you this before, but
over in Acts 17, one thing that they accuse Paul of, that he
preaches another King, even one Jesus. Now I preached that the
Lord Jesus Christ was king one time in a premillennial, fundamental,
dispensational, Baptist church. And I preached and they all thought
that you know that he's not coming, he's only going to be king for
a thousand years and reign for a thousand years in Jerusalem.
Sitting on a throne over there. Well I got up and preached that
he's king now, always has been king, was king before he got
here, was king when he got here, and he is always king. They excluded
me. Run me off. And I thought the
preacher was going to whip me. He was really upset. Poked me
in the chest. You know that's not so. I said,
no I don't. I said, Paul preached him as the king. Didn't he? And that's the thing that upset
the Jews. They said, well if he's the king, then you know
if we don't kill him and don't destroy him, then the Romans
are going to come and take away our nation. So we can't have
but one king. It's got to either be Caesar
or it's got to be Christ. And we choose Caesar. Well, bless
his name. Thank God that we have been able
by the blessed of God to see him as our prophet like Moses. Our priest like Aaron. And our
king of kings like David, huh? And I tell you, here's the thing. God makes a promise. God makes
a promise here in verse 18. Deuteronomy 18, 18. The promise
declares and tells us that the Lord thy God will raise up unto
thee one great prophet. Do you remember when our Lord
Jesus came and John the Baptist came and one thing they asked
him, said, are you that prophet that should come? They know a
prophet was coming. Are you that prophet? John said,
no, I'm not. Are you the Christ? No, I'm not.
Said, but there's one coming after me. And I'm not worthy to bow down
and unlatch his shoes or tie his shoelaces. And I tell you
this is that prophet that God promised. All of the true prophets
and all of the faithful priests were ordained in sin of God.
Nobody can go without being sin of God. There's very few prophets
that God used in the Old Testament. Very few. Very few prophets had
God used in the Old Testament. But they were ordained of God
and they have sinned of God and no man takes these offices unto
himself. God has to put you in that office
and call you to be in that office. But this promise here is of one
person. He said, I'll raise up a prophet
from among your brethren. Huh? I'll raise up one person,
one prophet. And I tell you our Lord Jesus
and the Word, not only is He the Prophet, but He was the Word
of God who come and was the Prophet. He was God's Word come down. You know, they spoke the Word
of God. None of them had it completely.
And the Spirit of God would come on a man, He would prophesy.
Then he'd leave him, and he'd go on about his business. But
our Lord Jesus Christ, when He come down, and He was the prophet,
He was God's Word come down itself. Huh? In the beginning was the
Word. And that Word was God. That Word
was with God. And the Word was made flesh.
Oh, God said, I'm going to send a prophet. Well, that prophet
came down here and we beheld his glory as the glory of the
only begotten of the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ. And now
you know what our master said? Oh, Philip said, Lord, if you'll
show us the Father, that will finally satisfy us. That will
satisfy us. You know what he said? Philip,
he that hath seen me, hath seen the Father. When you look at me, you're looking
at the Father. You know I said that the other
morning. That this is one of the most mysterious things, or
Sunday night I believe. One of the most mysterious things
in the world. In this whole universe. Not only that God was manifest
in the flesh. That's a great mystery without
controversy. But to think that the Father
said, I'm going to raise up a prophet. Now this prophet that he raised
up was eternal as God himself. But yet he was raised up as a
man to become a prophet. and the one and last and final
prophet that God would use and I'll tell you he that heard him
and he that heard him heard the father speak now Moses oh he
was a wonderful prophet great prophet Elijah he was such a
prophet that the scripture says that God come down in a chariot
of fire and took him to glory Elijah was standing there watching
him and watched him go up in a chariot. God took him to glory. Two men God took to glory without
dying. Enoch and Elijah. And you know
why he done that? To let us know what's going to
be like when he calls us out of here. And I'll tell you this promise, this
promise here that I will raise up them a prophet from among
their brethren like unto thee. the promise that God would raise
up this prophet from the midst of thee from the midst of thee
of thy brethren and you know what
that tells us is that our Lord Jesus Christ was of the nation
of Israel he was a Jew according to the flesh he was of the tribe
of Judah And he was of the household of
David. Look in Romans 1. Look in Romans 1. This is what
I'm talking about. He is of Israel according to
the flesh, of the tribe of Judah. Romans 1. And he was like unto Moses. But
look what it said here. It said in verse 1, Romans 1, this
is what we're talking about. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,
called to be an apostle. That's what I mean, gotta be
sin of God. Separated under the gospel of God. Now this is what
I want you to look at. This gospel, which he had promised
before by his prophets in the Holy Scriptures. God promised
that this according to the scriptures that he had promised and that
what did he promise in the scriptures? What did he say and what did
he talk about? Concerning the son, his son, Jesus Christ our
Lord, listen to it, made of the seed of David according to the
flesh. That means he come of the tribe
of Judah. That's how he was born king.
He had the throne of David and he'll sit on that throne forever
and ever and ever. And he said he'll make him like
unto Moses. And what that means is Moses
was a man, Christ is a man. Moses was God's prophet. Moses
was a mediator between God and man, but here's the difference
in Christ being the mediator and Moses being the mediator.
Moses was a mediator of the Old Testament, the Old Covenant,
the law. And the law kills, the law condemns. And he was a mediator between
them, and how many times did he plead for God on the behalf
of Israel? Don't destroy them, don't kill
them. God told him one time I'm going to destroy them and I'm
going to raise up a new nation and I'll make you head over that
new nation. He said no, no, no, no. And he was a mediator of
the law between them and God. But our Lord Jesus Christ is
a mediator of a better covenant established upon better promises
than him. And then he goes on to say, not
only is he a mediator, and God's a mediator, Christ's the only
mediator between us and God. And I tell you what, he performed
great miracles. Moses performed great, great
miracles. I tell you what, you know the
greatest miracle he performed right when he was getting ready
to come out of Egypt and bring them out of Egypt? When he raised
up his rod and parted them waters. He said, stand still and see
the salvation of the Lord. Well, I'll tell you what, we
stand still now and we see the salvation of the Lord. We see
Christ, God's salvation. And I'll tell you, He performed
miracles, but who performed more miracles than the Lord Jesus
Christ did? Who did more than He did? And
then Moses delivered his people from bondage, Egypt's bondage.
Our Lord Jesus came and delivered us from the bondage of sin. the bondage of law, the bondage
of depravity, the bondage of darkness. And he is so infinitely
far, so far above Moses and to all the other prophets, for he
himself is the Son of God. Moses was just a man, Christ
was a man, but he is also God, the Son of God. And then look
what else God said about him here in verse 18. And we'll put my words in his
mouth. I'll put my words in his mouth. Oh my. My words in his mouth. And our
Lord Jesus, all the days that He is on this earth, He always
told about the words that I speak. They're not mine. They're the
words that the Father gave me to speak. And so everything that
come out of His mouth was God's Word. And you know that's what
we say when we talk about the Lord Jesus. That He Himself,
when He spoke, He was speaking. Word of God. Everything He said
was the Word of God. And I tell you, you know, God
said, I'm going to put my words in his mouth. So every word our
Savior spoke, God put the words in his mouth. Huh? And I tell
you what, His words, first of all, is the words of life. They're
the words of life. When our Lord Jesus Christ speaks,
He don't speak about facts. You don't just speak about facts
concerning God and the Kingdom of Heaven. When He speaks, men
live. When He speaks, life comes. When He speaks, dead men come
out of graves. Ain't that right? Lazarus! Come forth. Young man, get out
of that casket. Get out of that casket. Young
lady, get up! And when He speaks now, because
He's the Word of God and He's God's great prophet, when He
speaks now, He still gives dead men life. Huh? Oh my, he don't just talk about
facts, but he speaks and men live spiritually. You know who
read it Sunday night? By his own will, by his own will,
begat he us with the word of truth. And we begotten again by the
gospel. by the Word of God, by the Gospel.
So that's how life comes, by the Word. By the Word. And I tell you where that Word
goes, power goes with it. Power goes with it. And not only
is He the Word of Life, no wonder His disciples said, He said,
when all that multitude walked away from Him, were you also
going to go away? Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou
hast the Words. That's the words of eternal life.
The words that I speak unto you, they are life. And not only that
they're words of life, but they're words of truth. Words of truth. Does anybody doubt that our Lord
Jesus Christ was God's true and faithful witness? That everything
he said was true? I mean, not only was He speak
the truth, but He Himself said He was the truth. He said, know
the truth and the truth will set you free. Sanctify Him with
thy truth. And not only does He bring us
the truth, but He gave us a love for the truth. It's one thing
to believe the truth, but it's another thing to love that truth.
and to love the truth that Christ teaches and preaches to us. When
he stood before Pilate, Pilate says to them, are you king of
the Jews? He said, did you know this of
yourself or somebody else? He said, well, tell us the truth. And he said, what is truth? And
then you know what he said? They that are of the truth, hear
the truth. They that are of the truth, hear
the truth. Hear the truth. And I tell you,
I believed a lie for years, I did. I really did. Some of you did too. Some of
you did too. And I taught a lie. And some
of you believed that lie. I preach legalism, fundamentalism. Preach works. But God brought the truth. And that truth set me free. And whom the set sets free, he
is free indeed. And of all the things that I'm
ashamed of in my life, and I'm ashamed of a lot of, a lot of
things, but the most thing I'm ashamed of is what I said about
God before He taught me the gospel. What I not only said about Him,
what I believed about Him, what I taught about Him. And not only
is His word the words of life and the word of truth, He said,
I'll put my words in His mouth. But His words are words of grace, Words of grace. He's full. Full of grace. Full of it. You know, we get just a little
bit. He gives us just a little bit. Scott used to say, if he'd
give me just a crumb, I'd go a long time on a crumb. He is
full of it. How can somebody be, when something's
full of something, can't hold no more? Well, Christ is full
of grace. And not only is He full of grace,
but He's full of truth. And when He has words of grace
and words of truth, He speaks that words of grace. And where
that word of grace goes, and where that word of truth goes,
it brings peace. It brings forgiveness. It brings
pardon. It brings life. It brings salvation
from sin, salvation from this awful, awful thing, this sin
that held us in such bondage. And our Lord Jesus as God's prophet,
God's prophet, the one that, you know, a prophet speaks for
God. Christ came and not only did He speak for God, He was
God. And here he come full of words of grace. And I tell you
he came not to condemn the world. You know why he didn't come to
condemn the world? The world was already condemned. I was condemned. And he didn't have to come to
condemn the world. It was condemned when Adam fell. And everybody
mourns under that condemnation. And then Christ comes. and he
comes and he brings the gospel and he himself is the gospel
he is that good news and he brings that good news with him and he
came bringing that gospel he is that gospel and when a man
hears his words hears his words and believes on Him, He'll never
die. Ain't that what our Savior said?
Huh? The gospel is the power of God. It's God's power unto salvation. Huh? And here's the thing, you
can't separate the Savior and His Word. You can't do it. For He Himself is the Word. And
listen, nobody can call on Him who does not believe Him. And
no one can believe Him who has not heard of Him. And the only
person that can make you hear of Him is He Himself. I can speak to your ears, I can
speak to your brain. But only God can speak to that
heart and that soul. Huh? Christ, that God's prophet,
He's the only one that can speak. And it'll be effectual. Huh? And this is true. I know this
without a shadow of a doubt. You can't call on Him in whom
you've not believed. And you can't believe in Him
if you've never heard of Him. So I tell you, this is the thing.
That's why we're so, so adamant about the gospel, so adamant
about preaching Christ. You'll never know when somebody
will walk in here one of these days and walk out and go into
eternity. And wouldn't it be awful for
them to go out into eternity and not, you come in here and
we was talking about all the isms that's in the world. Talking
about how bad the world's at. Talking about how we ought to
start living right and start talking about how to have a happy
marriage and all that kind of stuff. And they go out here and
they hear that and they go out into eternity. If we'd done that,
we wouldn't care anyway. But if you're preaching the gospel,
and if a person comes in and hears it and they walk out here
and drop dead, One thing you know, he heard the gospel one
time in his life. That's why it's so important,
necessary, absolutely necessary, to constantly and continue to
preach the gospel. The words of grace. Oh, he's
so full of grace. Oh, grace just comes out of him. He gives it out by the handfuls. And then look here in verse 19. Let me say this and hurry up. And look what it says here. And
this shall come to pass. He goes, speak to people all
that I shall command. This shall come to pass that
whosoever will not hearken or listen unto my words, My words
that I put in his mouth, which he shall speak in my name, in
my name. He said, Father, glorify thou
me with the glory I had with thee before the world was. I
finished the work you gave me to do. But look what he says,
as it will not hearken unto my words, my words.