Be gone all fear and unbelief,
has not the Father put to grief? His spotless holy Son for me,
upon the cruel cursed tree. And will the righteous judge
of men Condemn me for that debt of sin? He charged to my great
surety When he was slain at Calvary. Complete atonement Christ has
made, the laws demanded, Christ he paid. And all that his people
owe to God, he's satisfied by his own blood. God's wrath on
me shall not take place. I'm robed in Christ's own righteousness. He shed for me his precious blood. My sins are drowned beneath the
flood. Christ Jesus, my discharge procured,
the whole of wrath divine endured. The law's tremendous curse he
bore, justice can never ask for more. Payment God cannot twice
demand, First at my bleeding surety's hand, And then demand
the price from me, For whom Christ died at Calvary. Be still, my soul, and feel sweet
rest The merits of my great High Priest His righteousness and
precious blood Have satisfied the Holy God I trust Christ's
efficacious blood, And never fear the wrath of God, Since
Jesus Christ has died for me, And lives for me to intercede. all right uh in number 51 God our Father rules over all
things and takes care of our affairs. Our mighty Lord, the
King of Kings, bids us cast on Him our cares. Wondrous grace, so full of comfort,
Grace to meet our every need. Jehovah is face we resort. Trusting Him from care we're
free. Children of the glorious Sovereign,
trust His gracious providence. Bow to God's almighty just reign
With implicit confidence He will keep you and defend you As the
apple of His eye God will never, never leave you He is always
by your side I will trust and be not fearful Though my path
be rough and dark For my God is ever faithful He secures my
weary heart Every promise must be fulfilled. Every word from
God will stand. Hush my trouble, hard now be
still. God my Father's in command. All right. Does anybody have
a song that you'd like to sing? Number sixteen. Christ the lamb was for day and
before all time was slain. In God's purpose Christ the Lamb
Stood for us and we in Him God's elect are kept secure To the
end we shall endure By His power and by His grace God preserves
His chosen race By His power and by His grace God preserves
His chosen race Though we fell with Adam's race God's elect
are kept by grace Kept alive until they're called One by one
to Jesus called God's elect are kept secure To the end we shall
endure By his power and by his grace God preserves His chosen
race By His power and by His grace God preserves His chosen
race In the fullness of God's time Christ bought us by blood
divine God the Spirit calls his own And preserves them every
one God's elect are kept secure To the end we shall endure By
his power and by his grace God preserves His chosen race By
His power and by His grace God preserves His chosen race Though
trials come and Satan roar And temptations press us sure Though
we often, often sin, still God's grace remains within. God's elect are kept secure,
to the end we shall endure. By His power and by His grace,
God preserves His chosen race By His power and by His grace
God preserves His chosen race Blessed, blessed is the man To
whom God will not charge sin Chosen and preserved by grace
This poor sinner sings God's praise God's elect are kept secure
To the end we shall endure By His power and by His grace God
preserves his chosen race by his power and by his grace. God preserves his chosen race. All right, Galatians chapter
3, verse 19. Galatians 3, 19. It's getting dark in here. I
have trouble saying my words. Galatians 3.19, bow and have a word of prayer. Father,
we thank you for this day and we thank you for this opportunity
that we have together again to lift up our voice, to lift up
our prayers together for worship today, to hear your word, to
be taught of God. Father, we pray your presence
will be here with us. Through your precious Holy Spirit,
we ask Lord that you might teach us, give us understanding of
these things, help us to preach. Lord, I thank you for these brethren
that are here today. I ask Lord that you just might
speak and minister to their hearts. Lord, that you might encourage
them and edify them, that you might give them further understanding
of the truth that is in Christ. And Lord, we just are so grateful
that we have the word of God before us and the Holy Spirit
within us to teach us and to give us more. of Christ, to tell
us more of Christ, to grow us in the grace and the knowledge
of our Lord and Savior. Father, we just pray for our
members and our other friends that are not here with us this
morning. Lord, we just thank you for them. But we know that
they are in circumstances this morning that will not allow them
to be here. And we just pray, Lord, that you'll be with them,
that you might bless them, that you might keep them safe. Lord,
we ask that you just might guide and direct us now in this worship.
May we lift up our hearts to you. You are the great sovereign
God of the universe, that all things that is in this world
are held together and consist because of you. They came into
existence because of you. They hold together because of
you. And at your command, they will all dissolve away in a new
heaven and a new earth. We'll proceed from you and we
will live with you forever as you come for your elect. as you
separate the tares from the wheat, the sheep from the goat, the
righteous from the unrighteous, the elect from the non-elect.
And Lord, we just pray that that day that we might be found in
Christ Jesus. We pray, Lord, that we have by
mercy and grace been given life in Christ Jesus and that by his
grace, by his work of atonement, we have been saved and that we
find ourselves in the right hand of God, with all those elect
of old and all those elect of the future, all those that you
will be saved, that you will be bringing to you through the
salvation that is in Christ Jesus. Once again, we thank you, Father,
and we ask you to bless this day in Jesus name. Amen. Galatians chapter three, we started
looking at this verse 19 last week, and we looked at the
first half of this, and the question that we asked is, wherefore then
serveth the law? And we dealt with that, I believe,
pretty thoroughly last week. I won't go back into any of that
other than to say that the purpose of the law, the answer to that
question, the purpose of the law is that it was given so that
it might manifest the transgressions or manifest the sinfulness of
man and show our inability for righteousness, our inability
to keep God's law, and to be righteous before God, that there
is no hope for us to ever be on the mark, as the word sin,
the opposite of sin would be on the mark, because the word
sin means miss the mark. We always miss the mark of righteousness. We don't even hit the target,
by the way. We miss the mark of righteousness.
We cannot attain righteousness. We have no righteousness in and
of ourselves, the Bible tells us. that all of our righteousness
is there. The very best thing that you
can ever do in your life is filthy rags on God's side because the
flesh profits nothing. You cannot please God. The only
thing that is acceptable to God is what Christ has done. And
so we've seen last week that the purpose of the law is not
to make us righteous or not to make us holy. not to make us
correct before God or keep us in line with God, keep us in
right standing with God. The purpose of the law is to
literally obliterate us into the dust to show and to prove
and to manifest how sinful we are. So that those who are given
spiritual understanding, those who have been given the spirit
of God will see what has been freely given to them in Christ
and will trust Christ alone for their salvation for their righteousness. So that's basically what we looked
at last week. Now we left off last week and
there was still another half of that verse and we wanted to
deal with that today because there's a few things to be said
about this passage. Some confusion for some I guess
in this passage, debate about what this second part of this
verse, who it's talking about, And so let's look at this. The
scripture says, wherefore then serve the law, it was added because
of transgressions, and that's where we stopped last week, till
the seed should come. Now remember who the seed is.
Who is the seed? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone? Who is the seed? You guys, you
say anything, you go whipping stuff. It's Christ, Christ was
the seed, so I'd like to speak of. It was Christ. We learned that it was Christ.
Remember back in verse 16? Now to Abraham and his seed when
the promise was made, he said, not unto seeds as of many, but
as of one, and thy seed, which is Christ. The seed is Christ. So it says here, wherefore then
serve the law? It was added because of transgressions
till the seed should come to whom the promise was made. So
the promise was made to the seed, and so the law was given to show
us that we cannot keep the law. And it's given there, and the
law is put in place until the seed should come to whom the
promise was made. Okay? Now, as I've been looking
at this, I've been looking at this from a couple of different
angles. I believe that there's a couple of ways that we can
look at this. I don't want to get into that now because I haven't
fully studied out what I'm seeing as a different angle here. But
I will say this, that the law was completely and totally fulfilled
by Christ. Whenever he came, he was the
only one to have ever kept the law of God 100%, every bit of
it. So in Christ Jesus, all the law
has been kept and he did that on our behalf. He did that for
us. His obedience was given to us
so that every bit of obeying the law that he did was accredited
to his elect. So if you're a child of grace,
every bit of obedience, 100% obedience, was credited to your
account. It's not you keeping it. It's
not you trying to make those laws happen. It's Christ who
already did that, all right? He kept the law for his people. But the other thing is, is when
in our life, we are under the law until Christ comes and seed
into us. We have that seed that is in
us. In one John, it says those who,
that we cannot sin because the seed remains in us. We have that
seed in us. Whenever Christ comes in us by
the Holy Spirit, he'll teach us the gospel, which is imputed
righteousness for salvation. Christ has done all for us, and
that righteousness is imputed to us. And so whenever the seed
comes into us, whenever that promise comes to us by way of
the teaching of the Holy Spirit, remember we read in Corinthians
that the Spirit has given us that we might know what has been
freely given to us, the promise. Remember, that's the promise
that Abraham looked to and said, yes, I count that for my righteousness. That seed is my righteousness.
The promise that he is going to be our righteousness, the
promise that he is going to be our redeemer, the promise that
he is going to be our law keeper, that he's going to be our wrath
taker. And we account him for our righteousness. Whenever that promise comes to
us by way of the teaching of the Holy Spirit through the new
birth, whenever that teaching comes to us, that we have Christ
in us, then the law has served its purpose. The law has served its purpose
for us. It is no longer needed for us. The law was there not
to make us righteous, but to point us to Christ. You can't
keep it. He's kept it for you and now
if you've been born from above, if you are a child of grace and
have been born from above, you now have spiritual understanding
and Christ in conversion will give you repentance and faith
where you'll turn from thinking, hey, I can do righteousness before
God. I can do something that will
be acceptable to God. I can do something that will
be looked upon as favorable from God and he'd turn and say, all
I am is an unprofitable servant and all I can do is hope in Christ
Jesus as my Savior, hope in Christ Jesus as my law keeper. And so the law is only there
until that place where the Holy Spirit teaches us and gives us
repentance and faith. Repentance And you guys are going
to hear, and you probably have heard, you know, in churches
all over the place, in radio programs, TV, the majority of
the time when people are talking about repentance, they're talking
about, you need to repent of your sin and turn from your sin,
and you need to quit sinning, and don't ever do that sin again,
and all like that. And surely, we should hate our
sin. We should hate that sin that
is in us. And we should want to turn from that sin and not
want to do that. But brethren, whenever the Bible
talks about repent, and believe upon the Lord Jesus Christ, that
word repentance there, that command to repent is not talking about
turn from your sin and don't do that no more because that's
all we can do. We can't do anything apart from
sin in this flesh. What that is saying is let this
mind that's in you now, this Christ mind that's in you, let
it change. Let it turn. See, in our mind
now we change and repent, not in our actions. Our actions are
still going to be sinful until the day we die. That's why Paul
said, O wretched man that I am. He, in his mind, loves the law
of God, wants to keep the law of God, desires the law of God,
desires righteousness, desires holiness, but he sees that he
can't keep it. He can't keep up with it because
his flesh is always sinful. And so when we repent, what we
repent of, is we turn from thinking that we can make a righteousness
of our own through our flesh and that we trust in Christ and
his righteousness alone. That's what repentance is. It's
turning from thinking we can make righteousness ourselves. And then faith, he gives us repentance
and faith. So we turn from believing that
we can do something for God or in a place where God will accept
it And He gives us faith to believe on Christ alone, that His faithfulness,
that His righteousness, that His obedience, that His work
upon the cross, His death, His life, His death, His burial,
His resurrection, that all of that was all that we needed. It's everything that we need
for righteousness. And that we don't have to try
to please God. We want to please God, right?
We want to please God. And I'm not saying that we go
around what everybody calls antinomians, that we hate the law, and all
like this, we don't. We don't go around saying, I
don't like the law, and I'm not gonna do the law, and I'm just
gonna live like hell. We don't do that, right? We desire
to be right. We desire to be correct. We desire to be better than we
can be in the flesh, or that we are in the flesh. We desire
to be better than that. But that doesn't mean that we
can achieve that. And so our thoughts, while our
mind is obeying the law of God, our flesh continues to sin, and
that's all it can do. And so we must trust that Christ
alone is all that we need. But the problem is, is in our
flesh, in our Adamic nature, we continue to think that there
is something that we have to do. In our mind, we just cannot
We just cannot fathom, you mean all I gotta do is look to Christ
alone? What he did is it, I just don't
do nothing. You mean to tell me that we do
nothing? You just do nothing? I've had
people ask me that. So you're just saying we just
sit around and do nothing. We just do nothing. Absolutely,
that's exactly what I'm saying. I am saying, as far as it concerns
faith, yes, we sit around and we do nothing. Because we can't
do anything. Faith is looking outside of ourselves
and looking to Christ alone for our salvation. That He has not
only elected us from the foundation of the world, that He has kept
us secure throughout all time, that He has not only died for
us and rose for us, but that He has sent His Spirit into us
and has sealed us and is preserving us until the day that we die
or He comes back. We are trusting on everything
that Christ has done and is doing for us. We are trusting holy,
W-H-O-L-L-Y, on His being holy, H-O-L-Y. Whenever the Bible says,
be ye holy for I am holy, that is not a command for you to go
out and try to keep the law. Be ye holy for I am holy is Reckon
in your mind that you are just as holy as Christ is because
His holiness has been imputed to you. It has been given to
your account. Right? So that is the purpose of the
law. And it says here that it was
added until the seed should come to whom the promise was made. So that law is in effect. For us, it weighs upon us, it
condemns us, even though we're not under condemnation because
we're in Christ Jesus, all the elect from the foundation of
the world are in Christ Jesus and not under condemnation. Although
through the law we deserve condemnation, we are not under condemnation.
But again, as I said earlier in our hymn service, that's our
experience. We feel like we are condemned.
Whenever we learn of our sin, whenever Christ gives us understanding
of our sin, then we feel the condemnation of the law. The
law is saying, you're guilty, you're guilty, you're guilty,
you're guilty, you're guilty at every turn. Every time, like
Paul said, every time I wanted to do good, evil was with me
saying, you can't do it, you can't do it. It's also there
saying, you're evil. Every time I wanted to do good,
evil was with me. That's all I can do. And so the
law is there until then. But once we, by faith, look to
Christ and see Christ, we receive Christ as our righteousness,
as Abraham received Christ as his righteousness, then the law is not for us anymore. It was our schoolmaster. It was
the one that was to teach us of that thing. And then whenever
faith receives the gospel, the good news that Christ did all
that, that the law is telling you to do, Christ did that for
you. And so by faith, we receive that. By faith, we trust in Christ. By faith, we rest from our works
and rest in him. And in effect, we do nothing
to try to earn God's favor, to try to earn our way to heaven,
to try to earn preservation in the faith. All of that is done
by God. He's promised that. That's part
of the promise. And so that is given to us because
of our union with Christ Jesus and his mediatorial work on our
behalf. So that's what the law is there
until then, till the seed should come and not only accomplish
all those things, but whenever the seed comes in us, gives us
knowledge of what Christ has done for us. And by faith, we
receive those things, and trust those things, and rest in those
things. But look, if you would, at the
next phrase. It says, and it was ordained
by angels in the hand of a mediator. Now, a couple of things here.
This word ordained, and I want us to look at this. Number one,
I'm gonna ask the question of who is the mediator that is mediating
the law here, okay? Who is the one whose hand, the
hand of a mediator, who is the one who is mediating the law? And then the other question is,
is how can angels ordain this mediation? Because that's what
it looks like, this verse is saying. And it was ordained by
angels in the hand of a mediator. It looks like that is saying,
and it's not by the way, that angels have ordained that this
mediator would mediate this law. Is that what it's saying? I don't
believe that's what it's saying, brother, and I think I have ample
proof through scripture that it means something different.
First of all, let's ask the question about angels ordaining anything. We know that nothing in the sense
of decree or predestination, that angels do not do that. There
is only one person who can predestinate anything, who can decree anything,
and that is God. God is the one who decrees all
things, right? We know that to be true. Matter
of fact, I jotted down a few things. I looked up that word
ordained, and I found every place that it was used in the King
James Bible. And I was looking at the Greek words behind it.
And there are actually several Greek words that are one word
ordained in English is used. There is the word tasso. There
is the word genoamai. And I may be saying these wrong.
I'm not a Greek scholar or anything like that. There is horizo. There
is cheriotonio. And there is perizo. And matter
of fact, I think there was even another one that I didn't get
jot down before I ran out of time this morning. But anyway,
all these words here in our English mean ordained. So anytime you're
reading through the scripture and you see the word ordained,
that doesn't always mean to predestinate or to decree or to predetermine,
okay? So that's the first thing whenever
we're looking at this verse, we must determine Obviously,
we know angels do not predetermine or predestinate or decree anything,
so we need to find out what is this word meaning so that we
might know what the fuller meaning of this verse is talking about.
This word ordained here is the word tasso, which means spoken
or arranged by. Another way that it's used in
scripture is by the disposition of angels, by the orderly arrangement,
it means to be administered to. It means someone who administers
or to dispose of. You know, whenever we think of
dispose, we think of throwing something in the trash, right?
But whenever we talk about dispose of something, that means that
we are giving it out. Okay? We're handing it out. Getting rid of it. Getting away.
Do what? Dispense. Dispensing. Exactly. Dispensing. Okay? So, this word
tasso means to dispense. Now, there are other words, like
I said, genomai, that means to cause to be or to be brought
to pass. That would be God's providence,
right? Horizo means to mark out or to
bound or to appoint or to decree. Then there is chariotinio. Like I said, I might be getting
that wrong. That word was interesting when I found that. That word
actually means voter, or chooser, someone who stretches out a hand
and chooses. And that had to do with whenever
they picked elders, and they ordained elders. Each one of
them ordained elders. Well, that was, they voted on
elders, okay? That word meant, that word ordained
mean voted on elders, which shows that it's congregational. rule within the Assemblies of
God, within the Churches of God, that the Assemblies voted. Whenever
they cast lots, that phrase, casting lots, that's voting. That's not rolling dice and seeing
what chance there is. It's actually voting. They vote,
each person voted on the same. Anyway, that's another story.
And then the last one was Perrizzo. Perrizzo, which means to limit
in advance or to predetermine, that word predestination that
we use around here a lot. The word perizo is that word
ordained whenever we talk about God is ordained from the foundation
of the world. Well, he's predestinated all
things from the foundation of the world. That word ordained
actually means predestined. But tasso, it doesn't mean that. It means to dispense. So let's
look at a verse here. It says, wherefore then starteth
the law, it was added because of transgressions, till the seed
should come, to whom the promise was made, and it was dispensed
by angels in the hand of a mediator. Okay? It was dispensed by angels
in the hand, or it was disposed of, or orderly arranged in the
hand of a angel, or pose. by an angel in the hand of a
mediator. Now, let's look again at this
word angels. Now, what do you think of when you think of angels? Little fat chubby babies with
wings and diapers floating on a cloud, plucking a heart. A lot of times, I'm going to get
off on a little side note here, just for, because it's a pet
peeve of me. Number one, nowhere in scripture
is there ever a picture of an angel anywhere that tells us
that it's a little baby floating around like that. Second of all,
most of the time whenever you see angels in pictures and statues
and things like that, it's a lot of times women. It shows the
angel is women. Nowhere in scripture ever was
there an angel that was given any kind of male or female designation. Matter of fact, the Bible even
tells us that whenever we go to heaven, and I think we will
be as the angels, not given in marriage, not given neither male
nor female. So that distinction, it won't
be there. And so as far as angels are concerned,
as we've seen them through scripture, it's always had a male connotation
to it. It's had a male name. It's had a male visage and everything. And so why people believe that
it's a woman or a baby or something like that is kind of funny. But
anyway, back to the passage here, the word angel here, the word
angel means messenger. And a lot of times the scripture
uses the word angel, not talking about the divine messengers who
truly were messengers of God. I mean, God sent and used angels
a lot of time. As a matter of fact, look with
me if you would at Acts chapter 7 and verse 53. God used angels to send messages,
right? As a matter of fact, probably
the biggest famous one that we know of is the angels coming
to tell Mary that she's going to have Jesus. and to tell Joseph
that they're gonna have, that Mary's gonna have Jesus, right?
And then whenever the shepherds were out there, we even sing
songs, you know, about the shepherds, you know, keeping watch over
the flock by night, you know, and the angels coming and singing
to them. Acts chapter seven, hooking verse
53. It says, whoever received the law by disposition of angels,
and had not kept it." So here we see that the law was given
by, there's that word disposition. Remember I just said that that
was one of the meanings of this word, is to dispose, the disposition
of angels. The law, so the Bible says here
that the law was, who received the law by the disposition of
angels. Let's look at the context of
this. It says, verse 49, or let's go to 48. How be it the most high dwelleth
not in temples made with hands, as saith the prophet? Heaven
is my throne, and earth is my footstool. What house will ye
build me? See, I don't know why there's
a notion that people believe that there's gonna be another
temple built. That temple was destroyed, that that house was
laid desolate, and that God does not reside in temples made with
hands, and whenever the eternal state comes, we will not be living
in a, worshiped in a temple on the mountain in Jerusalem that
is being rebuilt by some, you know, Zionist group of people,
okay? Heaven is my throne and earth
is my footstool. What house will ye build me? Saith the Lord of what is the
place of my rest? Hath not my hand made all these
things? Ye stiff-necked and uncircumcised
in heart and ears, Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost as your
fathers did, and so do ye. Now he's talking about the religious
leaders here. He's talking about the seed of the serpent, the
children of the devil, the Pharisees, those who were ordained of old
to not ever receive grace. He's speaking to these people.
He says, which of the prophets have not your fathers persecuted?
And they have slain them which showed before of the coming of
the just one. talking about the coming of Christ,
of whom ye have been now the betrayers and murderers who have
received the law by the disposition of angels and have not kept it. So he's talking about the angels
who dispensed the law. He's talking about the teachers
of the law that God had given them. He'd given them people
to teach them what this Bible said, what was written in the
Old Testament. He'd given them teachers of that,
but these men have perverted that thing. So the word angels
there is not in referring to these divine beings, so to speak,
but of, and I can't really call them divine because only God
is divine, but to distinguish them between human angel messengers
and heavenly messengers. Maybe that's the best term to
use, heavenly messenger. Okay. The heavenly messengers
that God has made, the cherubim, the seraphim, these angels that
attend on Christ and attend the throne of God, those divine messengers,
divine beings coming from God, those divine messengers are truly
there. We see that they are prevalent. But we also see that that is
also the term that the Bible uses for men who are called to
preach the gospel of grace. To preach the gospel and to teach
what the law and the purpose of the law is for. It is to do
that. Look at Hebrews chapter two.
In verse two. Sorry, verse one. Therefore we ought to give the
more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, less than
any time we should let them slip. For if the word spoken by angels
was steadfast and every transgression and disobedience received a just
recompense of reward. How shall we escape if we neglect
so great salvation, which at first to be spoken by the Lord
and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him." Okay, so
it was confirmed by them that heard him, those who are the
teachers of the thing, okay? So we see that this word angel,
it means messengers. So yes, it can mean those heavenly
messengers that come from God, divinely sent, or it could also
mean the pastors. It could mean the teachers that
God has called to preach the gospel, to preach and to teach
the things of God, and in the Old Testament, to teach the law,
and out of the law, teach Christ. I believe that those prophets,
and I could, there was several passages that we could have went
to where the prophets are taking the law of God but are preaching
Christ, pointing them to Christ. As a matter of fact, Christ himself
said that he went to the law and to the prophets and showed
that they were talking about him. The law was talking about
Christ, the prophets were talking about Christ, that the whole
Old Testament was a testament that was talking about Jesus
Christ. It's all about him. The New Testament
is all about him. Everything in God's word is about
Christ. And so these messengers were
messengers who were preaching the message of Christ, whether
it be through the law or now after Christ has died and been
resurrected and sent back to heaven. Now we preach him in
the New Testament. We preach him with the full disclosure
of everything that he has done and how he has done it. And what
it means to all of us if we are his people, right? Okay, so this
word angels here, I believe to be the preachers of God's word. Wherefore then serveth the law.
It was added because of transgressions till the seed should come to
whom the promise was made and it, the law, was disposed or
dispensed or taught, orally arranged, properly exegeted, properly preached by messengers in the hand of a mediator. Now,
here's the question we ask, who is this mediator? Who is the
one that mediates the law? Well, most people will say, well,
Moses was the mediator of the law. And Jesus was the mediator. Moses was the mediator of the
old covenant. Jesus is the mediator of the
new covenant because he's the mediator of the better covenant.
He's the mediator of the covenant of grace. He's Moses was the
mediator of the old covenant. Well, brother, I, I can't agree
with that. I can't agree with Moses being
the one that's in view here, okay? And this may not even be
a problem with a lot of people. Someone might say, well, duh,
yeah, I agree with you, but who would even say Moses? Well, I
think that a lot of people think that it's Moses because Moses
was the one who received the law from God on the mount. Moses was the one who took it
from God and then took it down and give it to the people, right? And so therefore, Moses was the
mediator between God and the people with the law. So it must be Moses who is the
mediator of this law. But brother, let me ask you this.
In 1 Timothy 5, the Bible tells us that there is only one mediator
between God and man, and that's the Lord, or the man, Jesus Christ. There's only one mediator between
God and man, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. How can Moses
be the mediator of the law? As a matter of fact, how can
Moses be or have any kind of position or worth to take the
holy law of God and to be the mediator of that to men. Moses
himself is in need of salvation because he cannot keep that law
either. As holy and as righteous as seeming,
seeming as Moses may have been, he had his issues, remember?
He had a lot of issues. Remember whenever he killed the
Egyptian on the backside of the desert? Remember whenever he
got mad and struck the rock? Moses had his issues. Matter
of fact, Moses wasn't allowed to go into the promised land
because of his actions. And he ended up not ever getting
to go in and see the promised land. He died on the other side
in the wilderness. Moses had his issues. So there's
only one mediator between God and man, and that's the Lord
Jesus Christ. When we look at this mediator, I have to say
it has to be Christ based on that one verse, but is there
other verses that mean that? Look if you would with me back
at Deuteronomy chapter five. And hang with me on this because
I hope that I can, I hope that I could present it clearly. I
know that presenting stuff clearly doesn't make you believe it,
only the spirit makes you believe it, but if it's truth, if it's
not truth, it'll confirm it immediately. All right, Deuteronomy chapter
five, and I'm gonna start reading in verse five. It's gonna be
a little lengthy reading, but bear with me here. Deuteronomy
five, starting in verse five, Let's go back to verse one. And
Moses called all Israel and said unto them, here over Israel,
the statutes and judgments, which I speak in your ears this day,
that you may learn them and keep and do them. The Lord, our God
made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not this covenant
with our fathers, but with us, even us who are all of us here
alive this day. The Lord talked with you face
to face. The Lord talked to you face to
face in the mount out of the midst of the fire. Out of the
midst of the fire. Not as fire, but out of the midst
of the fire. Who talked to you face to face?
The Lord talked to you face to face. What does the Bible say
about the face of God? Who is the face of God? Jesus
Christ. He is the image, the exact representation. He is the one who is the face
that God has seen in the face of Jesus Christ. Jesus is Christ. And for folks to say, well, Jesus
wasn't there before the New Testament. He wasn't there before he was
born of Mary. Of course he was. He had already
assumed his manhood before he was born of Mary. Yes, he was
truly born of Mary. He was born of a virgin. The
Holy Spirit overshadowed her and he was conceived within her
womb. That man from heaven came down
from heaven and was conceived in her womb, yes. And she formed,
that body of hers, he was formed from her in the likeness of men. But that manhood was preexistent
before that. Jesus took form in human form
all throughout the Old Testament. We see it in all places, a whole
bunch of places that I could take you to that tells you that. If God is ever seen in flesh,
it's Jesus. He is Emmanuel, God with us.
He is God in the flesh. Anytime God manifests himself
in flesh, And people want to throw these theological terms
on it like it's a theophany. The burning bush was a theophany. God was in the bush and it was
burning. It's a theophany. Or whenever
Christ makes an appearance in the Old Testament like he did
with the children in the fiery furnace or whenever he talked
to Abraham on the plains of Mamre. That was a Christophany. I can't find that anywhere. Why
not say that it was Christ? Because that's who it was. It
was Christ. Well, get me Christ. It was a
Christophany. It was just a vision of Christ.
Because Christ hadn't been incarnated yet. In Mary, he was in the flesh. Right here, he said, face to
face. The Lord talked with you face
to face. I have a face. He had a face. His face was talking to my face.
That's the Lord talked to them. Now, why am I making that clear?
Well, for two things. Number one, that there is a teaching
in the Bible about Christ's preexistent manhood. And there's a lot of
people that has looked at our church and specifically me and
my teaching of this and thinks that I'm heretical about it and
that I deny the virgin birth, that I deny, you know, all kinds
of things that go along with the christ incarnate uh... passages you know but i don't
denied those things i'd just i'd just see that there's more
to it than what is preached by modern or by you know catholic
theology uh... so yeah i believe there is proof
here and we are not just crazy for thinking this second of all
is to show us that if this is How can Moses be the mediator?
It has to be Christ. And for some, they'll say, well,
how can it be Christ when Christ wasn't there in the Old Testament? Well, here it is. The Lord made this covenant. The Lord,
our God, made a covenant with us in Horeb. The Lord made not
this covenant with our fathers, but with us, even us who Are
all of us here alive today? The Lord, this is talking about
Jehovah. The word Jehovah there is behind
this word. The word Jehovah is here. And it speaks of Christ. And it says the Lord talked with
you face to face in the mouth out of the midst of the fire. We see all these pictures. If
you grew up like me going to Sunday school and going to vacation
bible school, they always had these little pictures or if you're
as old as I am, they had the little, uh, they had the little
velvet board or the little felt board, not velvet felt, a little
felt board where they put the little felt pictures up there
and they'd show the burning bush and God would, you know, if you've
ever watched, uh, the 10 commandments, uh, with, uh, um, with, uh, I
just lost his name, the actor. Um, anyway, whenever you watch
that and you see God talking out of the bush and everything
like that. But here it says that it was
the Lord who was talking to them face to face out of the midst
of the fire. If you go throughout the Old
Testament, when I talked about the pillar of smoke and the pillar
of fire, it says that God was with them, not as a pillar of
fire, but in the pillar of fire, in the pillar of smoke. that
whenever he came down and talked to Moses, he came down and stood
in the doorway as a man and spoke to him face to face as a man,
the Bible says, but he came down in a pillar of smoke, in a pillar
of fire. It didn't say as a pillar of
fire. And here it doesn't say he spoke to you as a midst or
as fire, but he spoke out of the midst of the fire. It was
him standing there, I believe, surrounded by whatever kind of
glorious fire was burning up this bush, but yet not burning
up the bush. It says, I stood between the
Lord and you at that time to show you the word of the Lord,
for you were afraid by reason of the fire and went not up into
the mount saying, I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out
of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage. Thou shalt
have none other gods before me. Thou shalt not make thee any
graven images, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven
above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters
beneath the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself
unto thee, nor serve them. For I the Lord thy God am a jealous
God, visiting the iniquities of the father upon the children
under the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. and showing
mercy unto thousands, then they'll love me and keep my commandments.
Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.
The Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.
Keep the Sabbath day to sanctify it as the Lord thy God hath commanded
thee. Six days shalt thou labor and
do all thy work, but in the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord
thy God, and in that thou shalt not do any work. Thou nor thy
son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant,
nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy
stranger that is within thy gates, that thy manservant and thy maidservant
may rest as well as thou. And remember that thou wast a
servant in the land of Egypt and that the Lord thy God brought
thee out thence through a mighty hand and by an outstretched out
arm. Therefore, the Lord thy God commanded
thee to keep the Sabbath day. Honor thy father and thy mother
as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee, that thy days may be prolonged
and that it may go well with thee in the day and the land
which the Lord thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt not kill, neither
shalt thou commit adultery, neither shalt thou steal, neither shalt
thou bear false witness against thy neighbor, neither shalt thou
desire thy neighbor's wife, neither shalt thou covet thy neighbor's
house, his field, or his manservant, or his maidservant, his ox, or
his ass, or anything that is thy neighbor's. These words the
Lord spake unto all your assembly in the mount, out of the midst
of the fire, of the cloud, and of the thick darkness, with a
great voice, and he added no more. And he wrote them in two
tables of stones and delivered them unto me. And it came to
pass when he heard the voice out of the midst of the darkness,
for the mountain did burn with fire, that ye came near unto
me, even all the heads of your tribes and your elders. And he
said, behold, the Lord our God has shown us his glory and his
greatness. And we have heard his voice out
of the midst of the fire. We have seen this day that God
does talk with man and he liveth. Now therefore, why should we
die? For this great fire will consume
us. If we hear the voice of God,
of the Lord our God, anymore, then we shall die. For who is
there of all flesh that had heard the voice of the living God speaking
out of the midst of the fire, as we have and live? Go thou
near and hear all that the Lord our God shall say, and speak
thou unto us all that the Lord our God shall speak unto thee,
And we will hear it and do it. I'm going to stop right there.
Now, when we read this, I'm going to say, well, there you go. Moses
was the mediator of the law between God and the people. They, God
spoke, Moses received the tablets, conveyed it to the people. They
were feared, didn't want to go up there. They sent Moses as
their mediator to mediate between them and God. And it sounds like
that might be true, but brethren, the Bible says there's only one
mediator between God and man, and that's the Lord Jesus Christ.
It didn't say there's only one mediator of the new covenant.
It says there's only one mediator between God and man. So you say,
well, what's Moses' part in here? Well, I believe that Moses here
is representing his people, God's people. Moses is the one who
represents God's people. And it is God who is given the
law, Christ who is the mediator of that law, and then his people
represented by Moses are the ones who are the recipients of
that law. And ultimately in Christ are
the ones who have fulfilled that law because of Christ. Christ
mediated the law on their behalf. I believe that Moses is a type
here in this place. Now he's a type of Christ in
other places, but here he is shown as a type of the elect
of God, the Lord God who spoke out of the fiery bush. He is
the one who represents Christ. Christ mediated the law from
God to Moses. Okay, now, there's another reason
I believe this. Not only because of what we see,
but turn back with me, if you would, to Galatians chapter three. It's pretty close here, yeah. Galatians
chapter three. Anybody that's watching or listening
there, if they have any comments, or any questions, or maybe even
corrections, leave them in the comments there. What you think, as far as the
mediator. But the other reason I believe
that this is speaking of Christ is, look with me if you would,
at verse 20. Now a mediator is not a mediator
of one. Now what does that mean? Why is it all of a sudden that,
now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one. It kind
of sounds like, did you just make that up? All right, what
is that saying? Well, what is a mediator? A mediator
is someone who is a go-between between two parties. Someone
who is a mediator between two parties. This party and this
party. So a mediator isn't a mediator
of one, a mediator, if you're just talking to one person, You
don't need a mediator for that. You don't need a mediator for
one person. A mediator is someone who comes on behalf of both parties
to represent both parties. Okay, that's what a mediator
is. If Moses was the mediator, there would only be one. God
and Moses. That would only be one. Because
if Moses was the mediator, There's only one other person that's
there, that's God. If Moses was the mediator. But
if Moses wasn't the mediator, but was one of the ones being
mediated for, and Christ is the mediator, then we have God, we
have Christ, and we have Moses. There's two parties, one mediator. But if it's just Moses and God,
and Moses is the mediator, who's Moses mediating God to? There's
no one else there. No one else there. See, Moses
was sent up as a representative for all the people. But if he's
the mediator, how can he be the mediator? Because the mediator
is not a mediator of one. He's a mediator of two or more. But it says, but God is one.
God is one of the ones who is being mediated here. And Christ
mediates on behalf. There's only one mediator between
God and man. Now, here's the other reason.
Christ can be the mediator and mediate on both parts because
Christ is both God and man. He can mediate on behalf of God
because He is divine. He is eternal God in His divineness. He is also man. Whenever He was
brought forth from of old and a body was prepared for Him and
He took on that manhood and He became the Christ whenever He
was begotten of God and He took on this servant this role of the anointed one,
the mediator for God. Now he's man. He's God. He's fully man. And by being
God, he can mediate God's part. By being man, he can mediate
man's part. So therefore, Christ can be the
mediator between God and man because he is suited as both
God and man to mediate for both parties. Christ can only be in
view here. Christ is the mediator. The law
was mediated by Christ. The new covenant is mediated
by Christ. Now, some people are going to
keep throwing up Hebrews and saying, Hebrews keep saying Jesus
is the mediator of the new covenant, not the old covenant. Well, is
that what the Bible says? Well, yes. But does the Bible
ever say that he's not the mediator of the old covenant? Well, turn
with me to Hebrews because I want to let you see it from what God's
word says and not take my word for it. Don't check out on me. Don't check out on me. Hebrews
chapter eight. And I want you to pay close attention
to how the Holy Spirit worded these passages. Hebrews chapter
8 and look with me if you would
at verse 1. We'll start at verse
1. Now of the things which we have spoken, this is the song. We have such a high priest who
is set on the right hand of the throne of the majesty in heaven.
Who is that? That's Christ. a minister of the sanctuary and
of the true tabernacle which the Lord pitched and not man."
Okay? So here's a high priest. Now,
what was a high priest? Well, a high priest was the one
who offered the sacrifices on behalf of the people to God.
So in effect, the priest was a type of Christ. The priest
was the one who was showing forth that mediation between God and
man in the sacrifices. But look here, it says, for every
high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices. Wherefore,
it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer. Speaking of Christ. For if he
were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there
are priests that offer gifts according to the law. Okay, so
there are priests that offer gifts according to the law. That's
what the law says. Who serve unto the example of
and shadow of heavenly things. As Moses was admonished of God
when he was about to make the tabernacle. For see, saith he,
that thou make all things according to the pattern shown to thee
in the mount. See, these things serve as an
example of what's going on in heaven, heavenly things. Now
look at verse six. But now, speaking of Christ again,
but now. Now, before we read this, look
back at chapter seven, verse 22. It says, but so much was
Jesus made a surety of a better Testament. Okay, so there's where
the people are probably saying right now, preacher, I think
you're off on this because Jesus is the mediator of the better
Testament. not the Old Testament, the previous
Testament, the failing Testament, the fading Testament. He is the mediator of the new,
the better Testament, right? Is that true? Well, that's what
it says. He is the mediator of that better Testament. But look
at verse six, if you would pay close to the wording again. But
now, Have he obtained a more excellent ministry? Whoa, wait
a minute. He's obtained a more excellent
ministry, but now lends us to think that there
was something going on before now. Right? Have he obtained a more
excellent ministry? So what was going on before now? something that wasn't as excellent
of a ministry as this ministry. There was a prior ministry that
he had that was not as excellent as this ministry. The ministration of death by
the law. The ministry of the law was by
Christ also. But now, he had a more excellent
ministry of a better testament before he was the minister of
the old testament that is not a better testament because that
testament never had the power because of the weakness of the
flesh did not have the power to make anybody righteous before
god it was a ministration of death but this testament this
ministry this covenant is the ministration of life It's better
because it doesn't partake of man trying to do anything. It's
all of what Christ does. And so he was the mediator of
the old covenant, which was a lesser ministry. Now he is the ministrator
of a better testament and a more excellent ministry. By how much
also he is the mediator of a better covenant which was established
upon better promises. See, the promises of the Old
Testament was do this and live. Don't do this and die. The wages of sin is death. If
you break the law, at any point, you are a transgressor of the
law, and under the wrath of God, you will be condemned by the
law, and you will be found guilty. See, that's not a good ministration
to be at the ministry. How would you like to be that
guy all day long? Like I said, have you ever had that person
that just always nitpicks you to death? How would you like
to have that administration all the time of the person always
going around saying, you're wrong, sorry, you're wrong, you're wrong,
you're wrong. Everything you say is negative all the time,
never a positive thing. The law has never a positive
thing to say to you. It never has anything to say
to you, positive. It's always death, death, death,
death. And Christ being the mediator
of that was always having to declare, this is God's law. You're guilty. This is God's
law. Yep. You're guilty. But now through
the better covenant, through the new Testament, the new covenant,
and when I say new Testament, I'm not talking about the books
of the Bible and the new Testament. I'm talking about this new covenant.
the covenant of grace, the eternal covenant, the everlasting covenant,
the Bible calls it. That by this Testament, it's
a more excellent ministry in the fact that he's ministrating
life, not death. He's ministrating life. He's
telling people and showing people God promised that he would redeem
you and give you eternal life. But guess what? It isn't by anything
that you have to do. It's something that I'm going
to do for you. There's no way that you can not get it, and
there's no way that you can lose it. You will definitely get it,
you will definitely keep it, and you will never be able to
lose it, because it has nothing to do with you. It's a better
covenant. It was established upon better
promises. It was the promise of Jesus to
fulfill it, not us. In the old covenant, the promise
was this. Here's the Ten Commandments,
or however many commandments total, there were 600-something
or 700 commandments altogether, but Here's the commandments,
you keep them. If you keep them, the promise
is yours. But see, nobody ever kept them. That's why they had to have the
sacrifices. The sacrifices was there. They had to continue in that
sacrifice. It was a complete bloodbath all the time because
everybody was sinning all the time. The priest had a nonstop
job of always having to offer. Can you imagine to have that
job of cutting and slitting throats of animals all day long, every
day, all the time for people seeing us? Burning stuff on and
off, burning dead things on the altar all the time. I mean, it
was a gory, nasty thing. And it was nonstop. But by Christ,
it was one sacrifice and we're done. One sacrifice is all over
for God's people. For if that first covenant, look
at verse 7, Hebrews 8, 7. For if that first covenant had
been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the
second. For finding fault with them, he said, behold, the days
come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the
house of Israel and with the house of Judah, not according
to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when
I took them by the hand to lead them out of Egypt because they
continued not in my covenant and I regarded them not, saith
the Lord." That was when they were in Horeb on Mount Sinai. For this is the covenant that
I will make with the house of Israel after those days. said
the Lord, I will put my law in their mind and write them in
their hearts. And I will be to them a God,
and they shall be to me a people. And they shall not teach every
man his neighbor and every man his brother, saying, Know the
Lord, for all shall know me from the least to the greatest. For
I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, for their unrighteousness and
their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. in that
he saith the new covenant, he made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth
old is ready to vanish away. Christ was the mediator of the
old covenant, but now he is the mediator of the new covenant.
He mediated both of them. And so Christ is the mediator of the
more excellent covenant but in our passage we see he was also
the mediator of the Old Covenant. We see this in several passages
throughout the Old Testament, but I just want to read them
quickly to you. Psalm, in Psalm 90, excuse me,
68, Psalm 68, two passages of scripture and we'll be done.
Psalm 68, Verse 17. The chariots of God are 20,000,
even thousands of angels. The Lord is among them, as in
Sinai, in the holy place. Thou hast ascended on high, thou
hast led captivity captive, and thou hast received gifts for
men Yea, for the rebellious also that the Lord God might dwell
among them. Blessed be the Lord who daily
loatheth us with benefits, even the God of our salvation. This is speaking of Jesus Christ,
but it spoke that he was the one on Sinai. And back in Acts chapter seven,
we see Verse 38 or verse 37. This is what Moses, which said
unto the children of Israel, a prophet shall the Lord your
God raise up unto you of your brethren like unto me, him shall
ye hear. This is he that was in the church
in the wilderness with the angel which spake to him in the Mount
Sinai and with our fathers who received the lively oracles to
give unto us. Christ was the one who was on
Sinai. He was the one who was the one
given the message. He was the messenger of God.
He was relaying the message of God to Moses. He was the mediator
between God and God's people. And so just as in the old covenant,
Christ mediated the law between God and the Israelites, God's
people, who is of the natural, the spiritual aspect of that,
and the spiritual covenant, which is the better covenant, Christ
is the mediator between God and His elect people, or His spiritual
Israel. All for whom He died that the
promises will be to them. The Bible says that all the promises
of God are yea and amen in Christ Jesus. He is the mediator. of that better covenant. So wherefore
then served the law, he was added because of transgressions until
Christ should come to whom the promise was made and it was ordained
or it was dispensed of by messengers in the hand of a mediator. How is it dispensed? How does
the mediator Christ dispense this message? Through his people. through his men that he calls
to preach these things. He dispenses that, what am I
doing now? What have I been doing for the
last however many weeks? I've been teaching about what
the law means, the biblical use of the law, the correct use of
the law, not the law for righteousness, but the law that is given to
us that is holy, that is good, that is just, but that condemns
every sinner because there is no one that can keep it. That's
what I'm doing. I am the message. I'm the angel. And every preacher that God has
called to do such a thing is that very thing. Christ being
the ultimate angel, the ultimate messenger, because he's the one
that comes to your heart and teaches you these things in your
heart. I'm up here proclaiming and declaring
these things, but unless the Spirit of God, Christ in you,
is giving you understanding of that and teaching you that, you'll
never understand those things. All right, well we'll stop right
there. Does anybody have any questions or comments? We'll start with verse 21, Lord
willing, next week. Is the law then against the promises
of God, since they are a lesser covenant? Are they against the
law? of God? Are they against the
promises of God? God forbid. We'll look at that
next week. All right. Okay. Let's have a word. Father,
we come to you once again. We thank you so much for Christ
Jesus. And Father, I do pray today that
the things that I've shared with these brethren, I pray that they
have been of the truth. Lord, I pray for correction,
whether it be by the Holy Spirit to Show me other verses and where
I was wrong and looking at these things or whether it be from
a brother or sister to point me in the right direction. Again,
ultimately the Spirit will dictate the truth to our hearts. But
Father, I truly do desire to be right in what we convey here
and not to purport any kind of error. But Father, we are fallible
and we do depend upon you to teach us and to give us the words
to say. And so, Father, I just pray that
today that what I've said has been honoring to you and your
word and to Christ, our Savior. Lord, I pray that these brethren
have been edified and blessed by you today, that if you would
just draw them to you, those who have not been given repentance
and faith, Father, I pray that you would draw them by your spirit
to yourself and giving them those gifts of faith, Lord, to trust
in you alone. And that once doing that, Father,
I pray that you might teach them their need to be baptized and
that we might be able to bring them into the membership of this
church, Lord, that they might be servants and help here within
the labors of the gospel and the church. Father, Lord, we
just thank you so much for grace and mercy to Christ Jesus. We
ask you to bless the food that we're about to eat and have,
the nourishment of our bodies. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.