Chapter 2, and I told you I was
going to start preaching through the A's, and today we're dealing
with Jesus Christ, our Advocate. And I've titled my message, The
Best Lawyer for the Worst Case. The Best Lawyer for the Worst
Case. It says here in verse 1, My little
children, These things write unto you that you sin not. If
any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ
the righteous. And He is the perpetuation for
our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the whole world. Now, our Lord Jesus has many
titles, many, many titles throughout the Scriptures. You know, in
Isaiah, He's got five in one verse. In verse 6 of Isaiah 9,
they called him Wonderful Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting
Father, and the Prince of Peace. Five in one verse. And one place, it calls him the
ensign of his people. Now, when I was in boot camp
in the Marine Corps back in 1967, our ensign, you know, he's got
on, he carried our flag right in front of the platoon, and
we did march, he had his ensign up there, and he had that sign,
and that's what Christ is. He's our banner, he's our ensign,
he's our sign. And his titles, his names, and
the offices given to him tell us what it is that he does. Every one of them has a distinct
part of his work and his person. They tell us what he does. He
reveals his work on behalf of his elect, on behalf of sinners. And here he's called an advocate.
And an advocate is the only place this word is used in the scriptures. But it also means comforter.
It's the same word that's interpreted comforter when the Holy Ghost
and our Lord said, I'll send you another comforter, the Lord,
the Holy Ghost. And so here's a lawyer who's
not only a lawyer, an advocate, but also one who comforts you.
He has the ability to comfort you. Whenever you need a lawyer,
you don't have much comfort. But this lawyer is not only your
lawyer, but he's also your comforter. He's an advocate who comforts. Now, why in the world do we need
an advocate? Why do we need an advocate? Well,
John, first of all, he calls them, my little children. My
little children. Maybe he calls them his little
children because they were begotten by his gospel. It's one of the
precious history, you know, it's one of the titles, My Little
Children. Now some of these folks were old men, some of them were
middle-aged, some of them were young. But they're all his little
children. He says, My Little Children.
Maybe he called them his little children as being dear and precious
to him. Dear and precious to him. And
then he says, These things write I unto you. Now what things did
he wrote unto them? The things that's previous is
what he's talking about. I wrote these things unto you.
And I wrote him unto you that you sin not. Now why he got to
telling us here the message, that God is light and there in
his is no darkness at all. In case somebody thinks, it's
there in verse 6. If we say that we have fellowship
with him and walk in darkness and do lie, but if we walk in
the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another
and the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son cleanses us from all
sin. And what he says, these things I write unto you, and
he says in verse 9, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and
just to forgive us our sins, to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Now, he's saying here that because his blood cleanses us from all
sins, because if we confess them, he cleanses us from all unrighteousness,
then what he's saying is, I write unto you that you sin not, just
because His blood cleanses us, and He's faithful to cleanse
us from all unrighteousness, then we may come to the conclusion
that we can sin without fear and without impunity. Because
His blood cleanses us, so He writes unto us, now I've told
you these things. Not that you have the liberty
to sin, or the power to sin, or the ability to sin, but that
you sin not. That you sin not. That's why
Paul says, you know, he says, you know, God forbid, when he
says that where grace abounded, where sin abounded, grace did
much more abound. Well, then let's continue in
sin. Let's really sin so that grace may abound even more. How
then shall we that are dead to sin continue any longer then?
God forbid. Shall we continue in sin that
grace may abound? No. No. And he wrote unto them,
sin not. Little children, my right hand
to you, that's just sin not. We tell our children. How many
times have we taught our children? And you teach your children what
not to do. And then not only what not to
do, but also what to do. And that's the way he's addressing
these people here. You've taught your children.
You ought to teach them what to do and what not to do. And
that's what he's doing with these children. This is the benefit
you have in Christ. These are the blessings you have
in Christ. Sins are cleansed. God killings are small unrighteousness. God is light. No darkness at all in Him. He
said, but you don't have, right unto you that you sin not. You
don't have to sin. You don't have to sin. Now there's
not a person in this building today or anybody that you know
that has to sin. You don't have to sin. You don't
have to do it. You don't need to sin. Anybody
need to sin? Do you feel a need to sin? Don't sin just because you've
been shown grace. Now, I know this, I would say,
I know this much about human nature, my nature and your nature. I'd say that when I said, little
children, I'd rather tell you that you sin not, some of you
begin to make excuses in your mind, but how can I not? How can I keep from it? You begin to compare arguments
in your minds. Why can I not sin? How can I
not continue to sin? How can I do it? Well, he says here, little children,
I write unto you that you sin not, and that any man sin. You know, if has three meanings.
Let me see if I can explain them to you. If. There is an if of certainty. There's an if to certainty. If
you do a certain thing, if you're the cause, then there's going
to be an effect. If you do this certain thing,
this is what's going to happen for sure. There's an if of certainty. There's an if of maybe. It might
happen. It could happen. Maybe. And there's
an if of it may not happen. You don't have to. And that's
what he's saying here, this is a theoretical, if any man sin,
you know, I'm writing to you not to sin, but if you do, if
by some reason, by some deliberate or something different, so by
something you do, if any man sin, if you sin, Don't want you to sin. You don't
have to sin. You don't need to sin. You should
not sin. But if any man sin, we have an
advocate. Not only an advocate, but we
have one with the Father. Not only one with the Father,
but it's Jesus Christ. Not only is it Jesus Christ,
but He's the righteous. Not only is it Jesus Christ the
righteous, But He's the propitiation for our sins. So you just keep
building on it. And not only the propitiation
for our sins, but for the sins of the world. Huh? Now, it says
in verse 10, back up in chapter 1, if we say that we have not
sinned, we make Him a liar. These words are not in it. None
of us would not admit to not ever having sinned. We admit
to being sinners. But I also say this for those
of us that know the Lord, we're saved sinners. Saved sinners. Let me mention why we need an
advocate, if any man sin. We admit to being sinners, but
we're saved sinners. You see, we no longer love sin.
When little children sin, we no longer love sin. There was
a time we drank iniquity like it was water. We sin with both
hands earnestly. You see, we've been saved from
the very power of sin. Sin's power, sin's dominion no
longer has power over us. We know there's people that sin
has dominion over and they cannot do anything but sin. Sin, they're
under the law, and every move they make, they transgress the
law. They're under dominion. We're not under dominion of sin.
We're not under the reign of sin. We've been saved. We're
under grace and not under law. And another thing about us is
we don't boast of our sin. We don't boast of our sin. Let
me show you a couple of things. Look over in Romans chapter 6.
You keep John now. Look in Romans chapter 6 with
me, just a moment. We don't boast of our sin. You
know, that's why testimony services is just nothing but people bragging
about how bad sinners they were. You know, that's why they love
to have these celebrities come in and all these big shots come
in and pay them great big lots of money to come in and give
their testimony. I was a cocaine user. I was a
drunk. I was a, once a homosexual, now
I'm straight. And they have all these wonderful
testimonies. They're boasting and glorying in what they were.
Nobody needs to tell what they were and what they've done. Nobody
needs to. I know what we are. I know what
we've done. I know what we thought. I know
what we felt. I know how we've acted. You cannot
turn your hands for the difference in any human being, in their
heart, in their mind, in their soul, apart from the grace of
God. And we don't boast of our sin. There's people who boast
in it, and their glory is their shame. The thing that they glory
in, people glory in, oh, you wouldn't believe how drunk I
got last night. You wouldn't believe this woman
I was with last night. You wouldn't believe the things
that I've done. They glory in their shame. Because
what you ought to be ashamed of and hide your face and don't
call in a wholesome place and say, I'm so ashamed of what I've
done. They stand up and brag about it and glory in it. You
ought to have heard what I told that person. I cussed them the
way they deserved to be cussed. Glory in their shame. And oh
my, we don't boast of our sin. Look here in Romans 6, in verse
21. What fruit has you been in those
things whereof you are now, shame? What fruit did your sin bring
forth? What fruit did your lies and
your corruption and your sin and all the evil and deceitful
and miserable things you've done? What fruit had you in those things
that you've done? Did your sin bring forth all
that you would have done? Death? Our sin never brought forth no
fruit but shame and death with the shame of the things that
we've done. I remember one time, now look in Ephesians. I remember
one time, Scott and I was walking together in Ephesians chapter
5. We was walking together over
in Cherokee, North Carolina one time. And we was walking along
and talking, and Scott says, you know, I'll be walking. And
here's a man, he's in his eighties now, and he's walking along and
he says, you know, there have been so many times that I've
been along and I've just thought of something I've said or something
I've done or some way I've acted. It's shame. I just feel the shame.
Start at the top of my head and come all the way down to the
bottom. So ashamed of things that I've said. Oh my. He didn't brag about them.
He didn't go back and say what he done, what he said. No. Look
what he said here in Ephesians 5 and verse 8. For you were sometimes darkness,
but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light. Now here's the difference between
the fruit you had then and the fruit you have now. For the fruit
of the Spirit is in all goodness and righteousness and truth.
And this is what we do, proving what is acceptable unto the Lord.
We want to know what's acceptable to God. And have no fellowship
with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather we prove
them to watch it. For it is a shame even to speak
of those things which are done of them in secret. Don't even talk about what to
do. What they doing? Huh? Somebody starts telling me something
and I say, I don't want to hear it. I don't want to know nothing
about it. Just don't want to know anything about it. I know
too much about it already. Just leave it alone. So we don't
boast in our sin. We're ashamed of our sin. Oh,
a little chill for any man's sin. Then, oh, I'll tell you
something. If I tell you something else
about a believer, We don't sin with deliberation. We don't sin
with deliberation. We do not plan our sin or our
sins. We don't say, well, this is what
I'm going to do today. This is what I'm going to do
this weekend. This is where I'm going to go. This is what I'm
going to be with. This is how I'm going to act.
We don't plan our sins. But there are people that plan
from Monday to Friday what they're going to do. They plan where
they're going to go, who they're going to be with, what they're
going to say, what they're going to do, how much money they're going
to spend, how much they're going to drink, how much they're going to cuss,
and how much, what a big time they're going to have. We don't plan our sin. We don't
plan our, we don't sin. We just say, I'm just going to,
we don't do that. And I'll tell you something else
about it. We never, never find enjoyment in our sin. Never. Huh? You know the Scriptures tell
us that the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against
the flesh, and you cannot do the things that you want to do. Huh? Cannot. Now, I know that
the flesh wants to do certain things, but the Spirit won't
let it go that far. And the Spirit wants to go so
far, but the flesh won't let us do that either. And right
here, what we're going through right this morning is a perfect
example. Your spirit wants to pay attention
and hear everything that's said and done. It wants to rejoice
in the truth, acknowledge the truth, submit to the truth. But
the flesh wants to say, well, boy, I'm so tired, I slept so
late, and I feel so weary, and mind wanders here yonder and
everything else. You're dealing with that right now. And we are miserable, son. That's
what Paul means. We don't justify our sin. We
don't justify it. We don't condone it and say,
oh, well, I couldn't help it. No. Paul says, you know, I see
a war in my members. My flesh is sinned by the law
of my mind. I love the law of God and the
life of the law of God and the fact that Oh, wretched man that I am! He wants to be done with this
world, wants to be done with himself, wants to be done with
all his old flags. And I'll tell you something else
about us. If any man sinned, and we admit to being sinners,
we're different in the habits of sin. There are people that
sin in habits. They have habits. And they have
habits of sinful habits. And when we talk about habits
of sin, when we sin, we fall into sin, or sin overtakes us.
If any sin event overtakes it, it has to catch us. Or if we
fall into it, we don't abide in sin. Ain't that what he says
here in verse 4 of chapter 2? He said, He that saith, I know
him, and keepeth not his commandments, keepeth. That's now, that's always
in the present tense. He's a liar. And he ain't got
any truth in him. He says back over here in verse
6 of chapter 1, if we say that we have fellowship with Him,
we commune with Him, and are one with Him, and walk in darkness,
walk in sin, and do not the truth, we lie and do not the truth.
And oh beloved, we fall into sin and it overtakes us, but
we don't live in it, we don't abide in it. You know there's
a difference in sheep and hogs? Sheep and hogs should live in
the same field. But the hog, he'll go, he'll
fight, he'll go to the pond, he'll go to the mud hole, he'll
go somewhere and just water in it and just get nasty and stink
and eat awful stuff. And a sheep may get down there
and a hog may lock him over in that mud hole, but he ain't gonna
stay in there forever. He's gonna get out just as fast
as he can. Ain't that right? And that's the difference between
ducks and swallows. I got a lot of barn swallows
at the house. I got swallows everywhere. You
go out in the field and you know them things start swooping down,
you know, like they want to scare you away from your nest. Well,
a duck, he's at home in the water. I mean, he'll be in the water,
and the rain just pours down, and he's just happy with his
flutter. He's just watering his lawn. He just loves the water.
But the swallow, he just swoops down, just barely touches it.
That's where David is. A sinner without Christ, he's
a duck in his water. He loves his sin. But a believer,
he's like that swallow. He may touch the water, but that's
not his home. That's not his nature. God gave
us a new nature. Let me show you that over here
in 1 John 3.9, what I'm talking about. Here he says in verse 7 again,
he says, little children, let's go to verse 7, little children,
there he's using that word again, let no man deceive you. Now don't
sin in that hell, he said, don't let no man deceive you. He that
doeth righteousness is righteous, even as he is righteous. He that
commit a sin, present tense, is of the devil. For the devil
stinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God
was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.
Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin. That's that new nature. That's
that new nature that's not the duck. He's the swan. That's that
new nature that's not the hawk. He's the sheep. And he that's
born of God doth not commit sin, for his seed remains in him,
and he cannot sin because he's born of God. Now that's one of
the greatest mysteries, and only believers understand this. Only
believers, and they can't even explain it. They can't do nothing
without sin, and yet they cannot sin at all. I mean, we understand,
we just... You see, we're new creatures.
We're new creatures. God made us new creatures. If
any man be in Christ, he's a new creation. God is in us. Christ in you, the hope of glory.
And it's because of our imperfect natures that we are sinners.
And bless God the day that we'll be not only safe from the power
of sin, but we'll be safe from the presence of sin one of these
days. We cannot but sin as long as
Adam's in us. As long as we've got Adam, we're
going to... And here's the thing about it. People think they've
got to go out and sin with a high hand. But sin is an attitude,
it's a nature. You see, sin, that's why it says,
if any man say he has no sin, we deceive ourselves of truth.
Not in sin, Mars, everything we do. Sin is an attitude, it's
a nature. In Mars, we cannot repent the
way we ought to repent. We cannot be sorry enough. We
cannot change enough over the sins that we commit, over our
nature, we cannot be sorry enough. We sin when we read our Bibles.
We'll read our Bibles and have to keep coming back and reading
it and reading it and reading it. Oh, I just read all that
and don't have a clue what I just read. I'm going to back up and read
that again. Go over the same thing. Prayer. Oh, how we sin in our
prayers. We'll get down to pray and all
we'll be praying in our mind will go to something we need
to be doing somewhere we ought to be. You know, has that ever
happened to you? We leave off what we should do.
Do what we should. We sin not only in what we do,
but we sin just as much in what we don't do. He that knoweth
to do good and doeth it not, To him it seemed. Sinner is my
name. Sinner is my nature. But thank
God I'm a safe sinner. I've got a new nature. Now, now do you see why we need
an advocate? Now do you see who needs an advocate?
And bless His holy name, we have one. My little children, these
things I write unto you, that you sin not, and if any man sin,
we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He's the propitiation for our
sins. We have an advocate. We have
a lawyer. That's what that word advocate means. A lawyer. A lawyer. That's what it means.
An advocate. One to stand up and take your
case, take your cause. And look what he is. He's an
advocate with the Father. That's who we need an advocate
with. We need an advocate with the Father. And as you see, it
says in him is dark light, and there's no darkness in him at
all. I mean, God is light. He's holy. He's righteous. And
how are we going to approach Him? He cannot have sin in His
presence. Only holiness can come. Only
righteousness can address Him. And that's what the father, don't
say, you notice it doesn't say our father, but the father. The
same father that's the father of Jesus Christ our Lord is our
father too, the same one. His father is our father. And
so he says with the father, we're just one. He called him all righteous
father when he prayed. Now an advocate has to do with
law and an advocate has to do with a judge and a court. And when your conscience, or
when your mind, or when the brethren, we got lots of adversaries. We got an accuser of the brethren.
Satan accuses us. Sometimes our conscience accuses
us. Sometimes somebody else accuses us. So we need somebody to take
up our case, take up our cause. And you see, beloved, you remember
when Abraham, Bruce preached on it last Sunday. If you went
on down there, And Genesis 18, when those three men got up,
they were going to go down to Sodom and destroy Sodom. And
Abraham said, Oh, would you go down there and destroy those
people if there were fifty righteous there? He said, I would not. And Abraham said, Oh, I know
that you cannot destroy the righteous with the wicked, because you're
the judge of all the earth, and you must be right. And if there's
any righteous people down there, you can't destroy that place.
You've got to save the righteous out of it. You're the judge of
all the earth, and that's the way it is. He's the judge of
all the earth, and he must do right. And all the people that he can
bless, all the people he can receive, is righteous people.
And after all, we've come under the judge of all the earth. And
when we have an accuser of it, we're an adversary. And I've
told you this before, that if anything comes and accuses us
of sin, or sin comes to our mind, it's always the devil or our
flesh. God never does. But there are so many times that
something I've done when I was 10, 12, 14 years old comes across
my mind, and I'm so ashamed of it. I just get almost sick over
it. I'm embarrassed to think of it.
And again, I say, Oh Lord, have mercy on me. And I know the sin
to God. I know the sin. But that's why
I need my lawyer. Huh? And we have to accuse Satan. Goes right up there. You remember
how you accused Job? Oh, he's the accuser of the brethren.
But what is our lawyer's qualifications? Now, if you're really in trouble,
If you go out here and get in some trouble, everybody wants the very best
lawyer that they can get. I mean, you want the best, right? And the greater need you have,
the worse your case, the better lawyer you want. And also in
this world, if you've got lots of money, you can get the best,
There's the good, there's the best, there's the better, and
then there's the best. And if you've got the money and the
charges enough, you get the very best. Well, I'll tell you something. We've got the best in the whole
universe. We've got the one that God gave us. What are His qualifications,
huh? Well, first of all, here's His
first qualification there in verse 2. He's the propitiation
for our sins. What does that mean? That means
that our sins have been atoned for. You remember in Romans 3.24
when God sent him forth to be of propitiation? that through faith in his blood,
a propitiation is the mercy seat. It's the same thing as that golden
mercy seat with those cherubims over it, where the law was kept
in that Ark of the Covenant, and the blood was applied on
that mercy seat, where the blood was put on that mercy seat. And
so Christ is the blood and the mercy seat by which we are prohesed
the propitiation. That sinner in Luke 18, when
the Pharisee prayed thus with himself, I thank you that I'm
not a... That sinner smote his breast and said, Oh God, be merciful
to me. The sinner in that word, merciful,
that means be propitiated toward me. Have a mercy seat there for
me. Have atoning blood there for
me. And oh, he's the propitiation for our sins, the mercy seat,
the atoning victim. And the dead spent pain. Justice
has nothing against us. He's a provisionation. That's
why. And oh, not only that, but it
says He's with the Father. He's the Son of the Father. He's
one with Him. Always loved by Him. Always with
Him. Daily He is His delight. You know, I could never get to
see the President of the United States, but his daughters can
get to see him or get a hold of him any time they want to.
They'd get on the phone and say, Daddy. They don't call him Mr.
President. They call him Daddy. They call
him Father. They said, when Abraham Lincoln
be sitting at his desk, you little old boy, Tad, wasn't it Tad? Little old boy Tad would come
running in, he'd be sitting in there conducting affairs of state
and the world and all that, and little old Tad would just come
running into his office and jump up in his lap. He might be sitting
there talking with somebody, some great big dignitary from
some other country, and old Tad would just run in there and crawl
up in his lap. Why'd he do that? Because he was his daddy and
he was his son. And that's the way our Lord Jesus,
He's the Son of the Father, He's from the womb of the Father,
from the heart of the Father. And not only that, but He's righteous.
He's Jesus Christ the righteous. Righteous in His life as Jesus,
as the man Christ Jesus. Oh, from the day He was born
to the day He died, which of you can convince me of sin? This
is my Son, I'm always well pleased in Him. No sin in Him, no sin
about Him. Oh, He was righteous His whole
life. Perfect. Oh, the law had no power,
no condemning power. It could never convince Him of
sin. God Himself couldn't. And then
as God Almighty, He's righteous as God. He's God, and as God, He has
the righteousness of God. Now, here in this world and in
court, you may have a lawyer that's unjust. An unjust lawyer. He may be a shyster. He may not
have where he's worth. He's just a sorry person. But
yet, he may plead a just cause and win. In this world, And it
happens all the time. A lawyer's unjust. He's unjust. But yet, he takes a just cause. He said, I believe this fellow's,
my cause is just. I believe this fellow's innocent.
And he labors to get him off. And he gets him off. But our lawyer is just. He is righteous. He is righteous. Nothing unjust
about it. He's a just for the unjust. Oh, Christ is just. Christ is
righteous. And let me tell you something.
He only deals with the guilty. Only deals with the guilty. You
know, He's the only one who can practice in heaven. He's the
only lawyer. He's the only advocate who practices.
I know the Pope says he can. And I know there's priests who
say they can. And I know there's saints that, you know, people
go up to saints and they plead saints' names. They plead Mary's
name. You got all these people you
can go up there and plead. And they're supposed to say,
Father, please do something for, you know, take my name to the
Father and do something for me and give me some of your merit
and all. But there ain't but one person in all the universe
that can plead in the presence of God. Only one. I'm not an advocate before the
Father. I can't be an advocate for you. I can't do it. I can ask for mercy. I can ask
for grace. But oh, whenever you sin, whenever
you fall, whenever you stumble, ain't a thing the world can do
about that. I can tell you what you've done wrong, but I can't
undo it. But He can not only tell you
what you've done wrong, but He can undo it. And He can undo
it where it counts. Let me tell you something, not
only is he the only one who can practice in heaven, but he's
the only one who's never lost a case. Never, ever lost a case. Never. And you know how many
people he's represented? He started with Abel. Started
with Abel. Took up Abel's cause. Took up Paul's cause on the Damascus
Road. Took up Mary Magdalene's cause.
Took up Biomar Mez's cause. Took up the Prodigal Son's cause. How many cases has he taken over
the millennium? How many cases does he deal with
right now, every moment of every day, of every day, of every week,
of every year, of every decade, of every hundred years, every
thousand years. How many does he deal with at
any one time? How many? Not only here, but all over the
world. Right this moment. There's people
in bed right now that Christ is pleading for on the other
side of the world. And I'll tell you something else
about it. He only takes the guilty. He
only takes clients who are guilty. He only takes clients who are
guilty. You know, that's the thing. Only takes clients that are guilty.
You know, most lawyers say, I don't want to know what you've done.
I don't want to know what you've done. You know, I don't want to be a protector. Christ
only takes the guilty. You've got to plead guilty or
he won't have nothing to do with you. He won't hear you. He won't
take your name to the Father. He won't plead your case. He
won't have a thing. He won't do it unless you come. Guilty! The cop stops you. You're doing 85 miles an hour.
He says, you know how fast he's going? No, sir. I clocked you
at 85. What do you think about that? Guilty! transgressed in my thoughts.
Guilty! Proud. Fused the brinkles of
his blood. Felt so proud, proud, so full of self. Guilty! He had the office thoughts going
through his mind. Guilty! Failed to read the scriptures
for three days. Guilty! I know that I should have called
somebody and said something nice to them that's on my mind, and
then I found out later what happened. Guilty! What about your extenuation,
sir? I ain't got any. I ain't got
any. I didn't have to do that. I didn't
have to think, I didn't have to feel that at all. And not
only that, and a little bit of it. If you don't plead guilty,
he ain't going to have a thing to do with you. But I'll tell
you something else, whatever guilty person he takes, he cleanses
them from all unrighteousness. And guess where he gets them
off at? In the very presence of God Himself. Oh, how does he get them cleared
of all their guilt? First of all, he pleads his own
propitiation. I've atoned for these sins. I've
died for these sins. I've been punished for these
sins. He pleads his own righteousness. I'm Jesus Christ. I'm the righteous
one. I'm the righteous one. He was
righteous to the death. He who knew no sin was made to
be sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.
He was the judge for the unjust, being put to death in the flesh,
that He might bring us to God. He was righteous for these that
He pleads for. And then what's his evidence?
You know, every good lawyer has evidence to get your client off.
Gotta have some evidence. You know, if you're like a lawyer
going in, my client's innocent. Judge, he's absolutely innocent.
Well, prove it. Give me some evidence. He's been charged with this crime.
He's been charged with breaking the law. He's been charged with
offending justice. He's been charged with lying.
He's been charged with corruption. He's been charged with fraud.
He's been charged with so many... Give me the evidence that he's
innocent, that he's not guilty." Our Lord Jesus Christ's got evidence. And you know where He shows His
evidence at? Not to us, but to the Father. We're not using the brethren
until our conscience is there, the law is there. What does He
say? Father, that there. Ain't that what He told His own
disciples? Behold my hands. Here's evidence of the covenant,
the blood covenant. I entered in with you. And I
ratified their peace and their assurance and their righteousness.
There's the nail prints in my hand. Here, look at my feet,
Father. Here's proof of my righteousness. Here's proof that I died for.
Here's proof of my propitiation. Here's my rib and side. Look
at my side. Look at the scar on my side. And Father, I was righteous.
I obeyed You. Here's the proof that I have
by my own suffering, by my death, bore their punishment. Let them go free. And He clears
our conscience, gives us assurance again, and we turn right around
and go boldly to the throne of grace. Oh my! The judge says, Not guilty. Not only not guilty,
but I'm going to count them righteous. I'm going to count them like
they done exactly what this postman done to start with. That's how
good a lawyer we got. Huh? It's just like in a court
of law. Here you go in there and they
accuse you. They may get you off. But Dick Cheney turned around
and said, you know, I'm going to tell about all that. But he
kept the law just the way he should have done it. He done
just exactly what he should have done. That's what our father…
He said, the father said, I'm going to treat them just like
they done what they should have done, as if they had done.