And the government shall be upon
his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor,
the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Of the increase of his government
and peace, no end. Upon the throne of David and
upon his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment
and with justice from henceforth even forever. The zeal of the
Lord of hosts. We'll perform this. Our Lord Jesus Christ here has
five names in one verse. Five names. And when we read
about this one who's called Wonderful, the Counselor, the Mighty God,
the Everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace, the government
being upon his shoulder, we're reminded of another verse where
Paul says, Great is the mystery of godliness. Grave is the mystery
of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh.
Here he is, God manifest in the flesh. It says unto us a child
is born, but it also says he's a counselor. How can a child
be a counselor? How can that be? And it says
here that he's a son that is given, and yet he's called the
everlasting father. How can the son be the everlasting
Father. It says here He is born and yet
He is everlasting. How can you be born and yet be
everlasting? He's called a child and also
in the same breath He's called the mighty God. And the infant here that's born,
that says here a child is born, the infant born and the son is
given, They're both one and the same, and they're both eternal,
and they're both infinite. He's called the mighty conqueror,
the mighty God, and yet He's called also the Prince of Peace.
The Prince of Peace. When we read things like this
and see things like this, it reminds us of how little, how
little we know of our Lord Jesus Christ. Of all the study we've
given, of all the consideration we've given, of all the things
that we've said about Him, all the thoughts that went through
our mind, All that we've read about Him. And yet, how little
is known of Him. It's going to take all eternity.
All eternity. And we still won't know it all.
Still won't know it all. And oh beloved, He's in our midst.
He's right here. He's in our midst. And He speaks
to us. And we see Him by faith. And yet there is in His person.
In His glorious person. And that's what we deal with.
You deal with the person. If you understand the person,
and you believe the person, and you see the person of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and you trust that person, then you get everything
he's done, and everything he is with him. That's why we preach
Christ. And the human intellect can't
measure it. It just can't measure it. The mystery of our Lord's person
is so deep and so glorious that if we ever know anything about
him at all, just a little, he must be the one to reveal it
to us. Or we'll never even know anything about him at all. In
fact, the scripture says there's no beauty about him that we should
desire him. And yet, beloved, once he reveals
himself to us, he's all we do desire. We're like David. This
one thing have I asked of the Lord, this one thing have I desired.
You know you can't find him out by research. Canst thou by searching
find God? You can't know him by your reasoning. You know, look with me at John
14. He asked his disciples one day,
he said, who do men say that I, look with me at John 14, who
do men say that I the Son of Man am? They said, some say you're
John the Baptist. Oh, you're a mighty preacher.
You're that voice of the one crying in the wilderness. Others
say you're Jeremiah, you're that weeping prophet because you go
around, you're a man of sorrow and grief. And another says you're
one of the other prophets. But he said, but I'm asking you,
who are you? You personally say that I'm the
Son of Man. That's why I ask him, what make
you cry? Who do you say that I am? And
Simon Peter answered, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living
God. And you know what he said to
him? He said, Blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jonah, Simon's son
of Jonah. Flesh and blood didn't reveal
this unto you. Even my flesh and blood didn't
deliver this unto you and reveal this unto you. But my Father
which is in heaven. And that's the only way we'll
ever know anything about Him is by revelation. Look here in
John 14 verse 22. Here's a mystery. Judas saith
unto him, not Iscariot, not the one that betrayed him. Lord,
how is it that thou wilt manifest thyself unto us and not unto
the world? How are you going to make us
see you and us know you and us have a relationship with you
and us commune with you and fellowship with you and the world never
see you? How are you going to do that? Well, he's doing it
right now. The world don't see him. The
world don't know him. But do you know who knows him? His people. His people. And oh, beloved,
he's the one who has the keys of David. He opens and no man
can shut. He shuts and no man can open.
And when he opens your heart, no man can shut it. And if he
don't open it, nobody else can open it. He's the only one that
can open it. He's the only one that can shut it. And, O beloved,
our Lord Jesus Christ, He's the lesson that we're to learn, but
He's also the schoolmaster that has to teach us. He is the key
to the scriptures, to our relationship with God, to understand anything
about ourselves or salvation. But He's also the lock, unless
He unlocks it and takes the key. But, O beloved, He's the one
to whom we look, And yet we can't see unless he gives us sight
because we're blind. And so may he be our teacher
today. Oh, Lord Jesus, teach us that we might truly learn
something worth learning, worth knowing, our Lord Jesus Christ. May he let us sit at his feet
today like Mary sat at his feet. May this be our prayer, O, that
we may know Him and be found in Him, not having our own righteousness,
but the righteousness of God by faith in Christ. May this
be our heart's desire, that we may learn and grow in grace and
knowledge of whom? Just information. That we may
grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Let's go through these five titles
of our Lord here. First of all, it says, For unto
us a child is born. Unto us a child is born. Now,
beloved, this is talking about the virgin birth of our Lord
Jesus Christ. Behold, a virgin shall conceive
and bear a son, and thou shalt call his name Immanuel, God with
us. That's why he's called the mighty
God. You know, when the angels came to the shepherds in the
field, they said, unto you this night is born in the city of
David, born in the city of David, a Savior, which is Christ the
Lord. What happens here, beloved? Eternity
breaks into time. And how did eternity break into
time? Broke into time through the womb
of a virgin, and He took upon Himself the likeness of sinful
flesh. Not sinful flesh, but the likeness of it. He looked
just like everybody else. He had a body. He hungered and
he thirsted. But like you and I, we were born
of sinful parents. Our Lord Jesus Christ was born
of a woman. With God being His Father. And
so He had no sinful nature. No, He was in the likeness of
it, looked like it. And you could touch Him, and
you could see Him, and you could handle Him. But oh, He was not
sinful flesh. And the Godhead can't be born,
it's eternal. And that's why Paul says, great
is the mystery of godliness, and the greatest mystery known
to the human mind, known, beloved, to the human mind that you ever
considered as God, who inhabits eternity, who measures the waters
in the hull of His hand, who stretches out the heavens with
a span, who calls all the stars by name, that God Himself, God
Himself was manifested in the flesh. If you ever see God, if
you ever see God who is nothing but pure Spirit, you can only
see one place, only one place you can know Him is in Jesus
Christ. Unto us a child is born. And
oh, think about this, here's a child. He's born, an infant. Come from a mother's womb. And
his mother, and his earthly father, Joseph, love and the tender care
that they gave him. He had to be taught. Had to be
taught how to walk. Had to feed him. Had to instruct
him. Had to clothe him. And listen
to him cry as an infant, as a child. He cried, and now He's the one
who hears our cries. See Him helpless there in His
mother's arms, who is now our help in the time of trouble.
See Him in need of a mother, and a care, and love, and see
Him in need as a child who now meets all of our needs as we're
His children. And so He's a child born, broken
into time. And what Jesus says here now,
that's his human nature. He'd come into time in his human
nature. God said, a body hast thou prepared
me. God prepared a body for himself
to dwell in. A body for God to come here and
dwell in. And you know, all the gods that
come in flesh, in Greek mythology and Roman mythology and all of
these things, every one of them had a weakness in the flesh.
Every single one of them. But the Lord Jesus Christ was
God manifest in the flesh and had no weakness at all. He was
the mighty God. But then it says here, a son
is given. This is His divine nature. A son is given. Oh my, God gave Him. God so loved
the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Oh, the grace of
God, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ that He would come and
be given. He was given. What was He given
for? Why did Christ come into this
world? Why was God manifested in the flesh? What was the purpose
of it? We needed a Savior. We needed somebody to save us
from our sins. We can't save ourselves. We can't
put our own sins away, and thou shalt call His name Jesus, for
He shall. Not try to, not want to, not
desire to, not make it possible for you to be, but he shall save
his people from their sins. And he's the Lamb of God, and
what's a lamb for? to be a substitute, to be a sacrifice,
to be a blood offering. And Christ had this body in which
He could be a sacrifice, that He could take our place as the
Lamb in our room and in our stand. That's why He was given, in order
to die. He came here to die. He came
here to offer Himself a sacrifice, once and for all, for all the
sins of all these people, once in the end of the world. Oh my,
bless His holy name. You know, John said, there's
the Lamb of God. We know what a lamb for. Every
morning they offered a lamb for Israel. They didn't offer it
for Egyptians. They didn't offer it for Amorites.
They didn't offer it for Gentiles. Every morning there was a lamb
offered for Israel. And not how a priest took that
blood and offered that blood and then put that lamb on that
Praise an altar, that every evening, they done it ever again. And
they took that blood and they sprinkled it. And beloved, Christ
is that Lamb, that one final Lamb. That blood that was shed. And He entered in once into the
holy place. And He offered His all blood
without spot and blemish. And when He got in there, He
come back out with eternal redemption for us. And all he was given to be our
righteousness. Oh, what a righteousness. Men
want to be right. Do anything to be right. But
oh, we've got the very righteousness of God in Christ. Not human righteousness. Not the righteousness of Adam.
But the very righteousness of God. To be right means that you
can face the law and the law can't find any fault in you. To be righteous means you can
face God, and God can't find any fault in you. And then you
know, how in the world can you justify yourself saying that?
Christ was offered for our offenses, for our sin. But He was raised
again for our justification. How can I say I'm righteous and
have no sin? Christ is my justification. See
Him sitting up here under the right hand of God. He raised
again. There He is, bearing my sins
on the cross. There He is in the tomb. There
He is coming up. And there He went back into glory.
And beloved, because He's in glory, that gives God the justification
for accepting me. Because I believe Him. I trust
Him. Oh beloved, And why was He given? Because God loved us. He didn't
give Him to show us, you know, to cause us to love Him or anything
like that. He gave Him because He already
loved us. He loved us with an everlasting love, with an eternal
love, and with cords of loving kindness He'd drawn us. Our Lord
Jesus Christ came because He loved us, having loved His own,
which were in the world. How long did He love them? To
the very end. And you notice here it says that
this Son is given. The child is born, but the Son
was what was given. God gave His Son. It was the
Son, the eternal Son of God that was given. It says He was given
everything we've ever got from God's giving. Christ was given. He wasn't deserved. He wasn't desired. God gave him. He was the lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. Given because God will not accept
what he himself only provides. He won't accept anything we do.
So he provided us a son, a substitute, a sacrifice. Now what else is
this? That's why no wonder Paul said,
thanks be unto God which giveth us his unspeakable, unspeakable
gift. Look what else it says about
it. For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. Who's
us here? Huh? For the transgression of
my people was he stricken. Oh my, us. Sinners. Sinners. I've heard so many preachers
say, and I say it myself, if we can ever find a sinner, If
we could ever find a sinner, I could tell them without a shadow
of a doubt, Christ died for them. But if you can't find one, you
can't say Christ died for them. They've all beloved unto us.
Sinners unto us that are helpless. Unto us with no power. Unto us
who have no ability. Unto us who have no free will
except to sin. Unto us who sit in such darkness. Unto us God commendeth His love
toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for
us. He was the just for the unjust,
that He might bring us to God. Unto us who were chosen in Him
before the foundation of the world. Unto us who were elect. Unto us who were predestinated
to the adoption of children. Unto us that God loved from all
eternity. Unto us, who worked us in his
own blood. Unto us, who was that infant
cast out, polluted in our blood, and he passed by us in the time
of love. And he said, yea, I say unto thee, unto us, he said,
live. Yea, I say unto thee, live. That's
the us. Are you one of us? Are you one of us? You say, you're
pretty high-minded. Well, no, I hope I ain't. I don't
mean to be that way, but I'll tell you. If He are, He ain't. I want to
be one of these, don't you? Oh, I want to be one. You know
Sid, I don't have no ability. I just read to you, He's my salvation,
He's my life, He's my strength. And oh beloved, if He ain't all
my salvation, then I don't have any. I don't have no ability.
I don't have no righteousness of my own. I don't have no strength
of my own. And all my will's ever gotten
me into is trouble. So I've got to have a power outside
myself and inside of me that keeps me from myself. And that's
why I said, unto us. When I read unto us, I can say,
for unto Donald Bell. Huh? Unto us, Brad Hartman. Huh? Unto us? Can you put, unto
us? Can you put your name in there? Oh, watch what else it says about
it here. Oh, He's the child born, the Son given, and He's given
unto us. Then it says, and His name shall
be called. You know why it's called this?
You've all been given a name. What's your given name? You know,
when you go into a fort, you've got to have your given name. You know, you fill out a name.
What's your given name? What's your middle name? Are you a junior?
Are you a second? You've got to have a name. Somebody called
you that name. When you was born, let's call
him. When he was born, let's call his name John. When he was
born, let's call his name Jesus. Let's call him Isaac. Somebody
gave you a name. Well, you know who gave this,
our blessed Redeemer, these names and called him this? His father
did. God gave him this name. You reckon
God gave him a name he didn't deserve? God gave him a name
he's not worthy of? God said He gave him a name that's
above every name. That's named in heaven and on
earth. Oh, you reckon He had a name He didn't deserve? And
I'll tell you something else about Him. If you ever know His
name, whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be
saved. And all beloved, he lives up to his name. And there's five
glorious titles here. And God gave him these names.
First of all, he's called Wonderful. And notice how every one of these
is capitalized. Every one of them is capitalized. That's the
title. That's the name. You know, you capitalize people's
names. Wonderful. Wonderful. It also
means this. Wonderful means miracle. Wonderful
means marvelous. And beloved, we use this word
wonderful sometimes in a very glib manner, but wonderful means
it's full of wonder. And beloved, we've seen things
that just fills us with wonder. We just look at it and say, ain't
that the most beautiful, ain't that the most wonderful thing
you've ever seen? And we do that. Well, that's what God says about
our Lord Jesus Christ. He's wonderful, full of wonder. He's wonderful in His eternality.
There never was a time that He didn't exist. You know, our Lord
Jesus Christ didn't come into existence when He was born in
Bethlehem 2,000 years ago. He had always existed. There
never was a time when He wasn't. That's what makes him wonderful.
Here he was. And we see him, and we behold
him, and we worship him, and we adore him, and we call on
him, and we trust him, and we read about him. And yet, beloved,
he's eternal. And we're just people of time. And yet, we see him in his eternality. How wonderful. And when you come
into this world, look at his life. Look at his life. What was there about his life
that wasn't wonderful? Everything he did. That's why
they said, we have seen strange things today because we've never
seen anything like this. Never heard any words like this.
Never seen anybody raised from the dead. Never seen a blind
man receive his sight. Never seen a leopard cleanse
before. Never seen the lame to leap. Never. Never seen the deaf. Just by word, start hearing?
Oh my! In words, they said, oh my, never
man spake like this man. And oh, and in his death, in
his death, it's so full of wonder because what he'd actually accomplished.
His death accomplished salvation. His death actually, actually done what it was intended to
do. It wasn't a valiant effort of God to make salvation possible,
to open a door. Our Lord wasn't a martyr in order
to be pitied. No, His death. First of all,
it's absolutely marvelous and a miracle that He should die
at all. He had no sin, and if you had no sin, there's no reason
for you to die. He's the only human being that
ever man has ever been on this earth that God looked at him
and said, I'm well pleased with him. He's the only man God ever
looked at and said, I'm glorified in you, that you finish the work
that I gave you. He gave everybody a work. Everybody,
teachers talk all the time about, we need to get out and work for
Jesus. God gave us a work to do. He's the only man who ever
did a work that God's satisfied for. And, oh beloved, He is the only
one that at His death, it's a marvel that He died at all, but it's
a marvel what He accomplished in that death. I've preached this so many times,
but you can't help but say it, that His death was not for Himself,
and His life was not for Himself. As by one man, we was all represented
in that. We know what a representative
government is. I write my representative, I wrote him last night. I write
him, I call him. I mean every time I get a... I call him all the time, I write
him all the time, I talk to them people in Washington. Don't do
this, don't do that, stop this, stop that. Because they represent
me. And they'll write me back, thank
you for your letter, thank you for your call, and we appreciate
it, and we'll take it into consideration. And that's what Christ is. He
was our representative. He came to represent us, and
we didn't ask Him to. And then His life represented
somebody else. Who did it represent? It represented
all that was given to Him in the eternal covenant of grace.
His life was a life we lived. We lived a life in Him. And when
He died, we died in Him. And when He was buried, we was
buried in Him. When He was raised, we was raised with Him. When
He set out, we set out with Him. And when He comes again, we'll
come with Him if we're dead in Him. And His death, beloved,
put away sin once and for all. And oh my, and here's the ascension. They stood outside Jerusalem,
down the Mount of Olives, and disciples walked with him. And
all of a sudden they stand there talking to him. And his feet
started going off the ground. He just started lifting up off
the ground. And up it went. And those fellows stood there,
what, where are you going, Lord? What, where are you going? And
all of a sudden they see him go up into the clouds. He is
going back where he came from. He is ascending back to that
throne. He is going to sit down at the
right hand of the majesty of the eye in the tabernacle. There
never was a place for the priest to sit down. Because their work
was never finished. Day and night, all day and night.
They offered sacrifices. They would never take away sins.
Continually, they continually done it. Never a place to sit
down. No chairs. They owned their feet. Offering
sacrifices. But I, Lord Jesus Christ, I preached. I came in
there and obtained eternal redemption for it. There he sat down. Why? Because his work is done. No more offerings. No more sacrifices. And why is he also sitting there?
Because I read it to you there in the 27th Psalm. We had enemies.
accusers, though our enemies accuse us. And we have an enemy
before God that accuses us. And Christ stands there and takes
up our case and our cause. He intercedes for us. And then
not only is His name wonderful, but look what it says here. It
says, Counselor. Counselor. Well, ain't this something? God said He worked all things
after the counsel of His own will. Well, who was the one God
counseled with? They sure didn't ask me into
this. You know, people ask me sometimes, what do you think
I should do about this? What do you think I should do about this
and that and the other thing? And you know, they've got a place
up here where you can go and learn how to be a counselor. But oh, our Lord Jesus Christ,
oh, what a counselor. You've got to be wise if you're
going to be a counselor. You need to know the whole story
to be a counselor. You need to know both sides of
the coin to be a counselor. You've got to have infinite knowledge
to be a counselor. You've got to know what tomorrow
is going to bring to be a counselor. And all that God purposed to
do in Christ before the foundation of the world, our Lord Jesus
Christ was the counselor in it. He is the counselor. Everything
that our Lord Jesus Christ, that's why it's called the wisdom of
God. That's why it's called the power of God. Everything God
did, He did by Him. Everything that God created,
He created by Him. Everything is in Him. Oh beloved,
what a counselor in creation, in Providence. He is our counselor. If you don't know what to do, you
don't know which way to go, you know what you do? You go to Him. Oh, Lord, lead me. Oh, Lord, guide me. Lord, don't
let me go this way. Don't let me go that way. He's
our guide. Not only is He our guide, but
He's our way. He's our wisdom. That's why David says, the Lord's
my shepherd. I shall not want. Watch this
now. He leadeth me. He leadeth me. beside the still
waters. He maketh me to lie down. He
leadeth me in the paths of righteousness. What for? For His sake. For His name's sake. What are some of the things He
counsels us to do? We can find these things in His
Word. He counsels us to love. Love you one another. He counsels
us to forgive, forgive you one another even as God for Christ's
sake hath. He counsels us to forbear, forbear
one another in love. Bear you one another's burdens
and so fulfill the law of Christ. He counsels us to be humble.
Don't count yourself to be anything. A man who counts himself to be
something when he's nothing, he's deceived in himself. He
counsels us to be generous. Generous. Don't be stingy. Be generous. God's been generous
with you. Everything you have, He gave it to you. You don't
have anything that belongs to you. You say, what's mine? No,
it ain't. He can take it from you that quick. I mean, He can
take anything you've got just in a snap of a finger. So don't
think you've got anything that's yours. Everything's His. Just
be a good steward of what He gave you. And then, oh beloved,
He taught us to be giving. And He counseled us to trust.
Trust. He counseled us to cast all our
care upon Him. Why? Because He cares for us. He counseled us to wait upon
Him. When you don't know what to do, He said, wait, I say,
wait on the Lord. And He counseled us, He says,
come unto Me, and you will find rest for your souls. He counseled
us to find rest. And he counsels us to our eternal
hope. You know what he said? He said, don't let your heart
be troubled. You believe in God? Believe also
in me. He didn't say if you believe.
He said, you do believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's
house, there's many mansions. If it were not so, I'd have told
you. But I'm coming again. But I go to prepare a place for
you and I'm coming again. That where I am, Oh, what a wonderful
word of counsel. I'd wait for that, can't you?
Then where I am, thou, you may be also. And then he says he's
the mighty God. He's the mighty God. In the beginning was the Word.
The Word was with God. Watch this. The Word was God.
And everything that was made was made by Him, and without
Him was not anything made that was made. You ever went through
the Gospels, especially the Gospel of John, where he says, I am?
He said, I am. And every time he said it, they
understood that he was talking about the man who, the God who
met Moses on the mountain. I am that I am. They understood
that. I am. I am. Except you believe,
I am. You're going to die in your sin. Abraham rejoiced to see my day
and he saw it. Oh, I am. He's the great I am. His words, everything he said
and every work he did testifies that he was God manifest in the
flesh. He's as eternal, though he was
born in time, as eternal as God. He's equal with God the Father. He's existed as long as the Father
has. How the Father and the Son exist
all together at the same time? Well, when you're God, you can
do that. You know, that's why it's called the Mystery of Godliness.
How can the Son and the Father be the same age? How can the
Son... That's why so many people have
such problems. How can the Son exist as long as the Father has?
And that's why they say that Jesus Christ is just a creature.
That's why they say he couldn't be God manifest in the flesh,
because you could see him. But oh no, he's God. He's God. And when you're God, you can
do that. That's what makes him God. That's what makes it a mystery. He didn't just come into existence
in Bethlehem and he didn't cease to exist when he died on the
tree in Calvary. He was God when He was born,
He was God while He lived, He was God when He died, He was
God when He went to the tomb, He was God when He was raised
again, and He's God sitting now at the right hand of God. And
the only God you'll ever see will be Jesus Christ, the Lord
of Glory. And oh, you know how you'll recognize
Him? First of all, same way you do now, by faith. But when you
see Him by sight, you'll recognize Him because of the marks in His
body. You'll see him with the marks
in his body. He's as a lamb as it had been slain. Because that
man, Christ Jesus, sits at God's right hand. And he bears the
scars of a man in his body. Though he's the mighty God. And
beloved, as the mighty God, he's able to save. But also as the
mighty God, he has the power to damn. He can uphold you, or
he can bring you down. Can he do that? He was the brightness
of God's glory to express the image of God's person. He's not God-humanized. He's
not man-deified. And since our Lord said God alone
is worthy to be worshiped, that's why we can worship Christ, because
He's God. Now look, let me show you this
here real quick. Let me show you this. This is something. Not only is He the Wonderful,
the Counselor, the Mighty God, but look what it says here, He's
the Everlasting Father. You know, we say there's God
the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Ghost. Here He's called
the Everlasting Father. How can the Son that's given
be the Everlasting Father? There's only one Father in the
Godhead. He prayed to His Father. I'm going to show you tonight
in Matthew chapter 6 how many times He's referred to as our
Father. To show you this wonderful relationship.
And our Lord prayed to His Father. He called Him Holy Father. He
called Him Righteous Father. And He's our Advocate with the
Father. Ain't that right? How then is
He the Everlasting Father? How is He the Everlasting Father?
How can that be? Well, only to His elect, only
to His chosen people, only to His redeemed. Now how can it
be that way? I'll tell you why. Because it's
by Him we're begotten again. We're begotten again by an incorruptible
seed. We cannot sin because His seed,
whose seed, Christ's seed remains in us. And He loves us from eternity. Since He loves us from eternity,
that means He's everlasting. And he's the author and finisher
of our faith. He's the one that gave us this
eternal salvation. And he's our everlasting father
because he cannot die. And he said that he'd never leave
us fatherless, I'll not leave you as orphans. And it says that
he saves us from everlasting to everlasting. And since he's
the author of eternal life, That means he's our father of eternity.
He's the one that gave us this eternal life. And as an everlasting
father, he closes us with an everlasting robe of righteousness.
He gives us everlasting forgiveness. He don't... Oh, bless his name. He forgives us of past sins,
present sins, and future sins. Because when he died, all my
sins were future. Right? And oh, beloved, listen
now. And He gives us not only everlasting
forgiveness, but He gave us everlasting justification. Our justification
didn't just take place when we believed. Our justification took
place when Christ the Lamb flamed from the foundation. It took
place when Christ died on the cross. And it took place when
God saved us. We didn't know anything about
it until we heard the gospel. Right? And, O Beloved, He's the
Father of all that's ours, because they come from Him and because
of Him. And then last of all, look at
this. The Wonderful, the Counselor,
the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace.
Now He's a King and a Prince by birth. That's why Herod said,
where is He that's born King of the Jews? Born King of the
Jews. They knew that David was going
to have a son when he would be born, when he would come, that
the Messiah would be born King. Born King. And He's a King and a Prince
by office, He's a King and a Prince by power, and He's a King and
a Prince by authority. All authority in heaven and earth
is given unto Him. And He's called the Prince of
Peace because He established peace. He established peace. Huh? Established it. Ain't that what it says down
in verse 7? Look there in verse 7, Isaiah 9. of the increase of his government
and peace. His government, where he rules
and reigns as the king, as the prince, he brings peace with
him. He brings peace with him. There is peace for us. He established
peace. He brought peace. And he gives
peace. My peace I give unto you. He
established peace between man and God. He slew the enmity that
was in my heart against God. And He consumed the wrath that
was against me from God. And now there's peace between
God and myself. And since I know that, I have
peace in my heart that passes all understanding. And He's the
one that gives peace. He sustains peace. Therefore,
being justified by faith, we have peace with God. For the
kingdom of God is not in meat and drink, but righteousness,
peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. Now watch what it says here quickly.
For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, and watch
this, the government, the government should be upon his shoulder.
Don't say shoulders there, say shoulder. Shoulder. The government. What government?
Everything in this universe is given. The Father loveth the
Son, who hath given all things into His hands. Everything that's
on topside of God's earth, from me and you, to the smallest,
minuscule thing that there is, is in the hands of Christ. It's
in His power. He governed over it. That's why,
you know, I was reading something in a bulletin this week. from
Jim Bird's bulletin where it said, this fellow, this preacher
was talking about how gloomy the times was at the Revolutionary
War. He said, the times are dark and
the times are gloomy. And we don't know what things
will happen, by whose reign we shall be under, what we shall
eat, whether we shall die, what shall happen in this war. But
he says, one thing I know, is that He's got this world in
His hands. He had George Washington in His
hands. Thomas Jefferson in His hands. He had America in His
hands. He's got you in His hands. He's
got me in His hands. He's got Obama in His hands.
He's got every sinner in His hands. And He'll do what He will
with them. And we're going to live with
it. And we're going to bless His name for it. Huh? The government's on His shoulders.
If it wasn't, what would you do? What would you do if the
government were on his shoulder? What could you do about it if
it wasn't? What could you change in this
world as to who reigns, who lives, who dies, who's healthy, who's
sick, who's saved, who's lost? What could you do about it if
it wasn't on him, if it was left up to you? What could you do
about it? What could you do about your
own salvation if the government wasn't on his shoulder? Oh, what could you do about it?
Folks say, oh boy, I love it. And oh, here's the thing about
his government. He rules in wisdom. He rules in love. He rules in
grace. He rules in power. He rules in
prudence. Oh my, He's got the wisdom to
know everything to do. And then it says there, in verse
7, that of the increase of His government and peace, watch what
it says, there shall be no end to it. There'll never be an end
to it. There'll never be an end to the
government of Christ. This world is His and soon He's
going to destroy this and He's going to bring a brand new one
into existence. And ain't nobody going to live on it but His people.
The righteous. And then watch what it says.
And it'll be He's ordered it and upon His kingdom to order
it. It's been ordered. To establish it. Order it and establish it. It's
established. And then look what it says in
the last part of the verse. The zeal of the Lord of Hosts. He'll
perform this. You reckon God can do it? Oh, my. Oh, what titles. Unto us a child is born. Unto
us a son is given. And the government shall be upon
his shoulder, and thou shalt call his name. Wonderful. counselor,
the mighty God, the everlasting Father, and the Prince of Peace,
and of His government there shall be no end. Amen.