If your Bible's open there to
Matthew chapter 11, that's gonna be our text this morning. I've
titled the message, Do We Look For Another? Our Savior here
shows himself in the text that we have. This is the Savior most
of us believe. But I have a question. How do
we know that we're worshiping the right Savior? Do we need
to look for another? I think that's a fair question
to ask. I was sitting up here looking
out at all of you. I thought how horrible that it
would be for me to find out that you went to hell. Because I wasn't
preaching the Savior to you. I was pointing you to another
Jesus. You know, there are other Jesus's
in the world, aren't there? Many different religions, they
all have a different way of salvation. They preach what Paul called
another Jesus. They're not preaching the Jesus
of the Bible. I know that, but sometimes somebody
might wonder, is there any truth in anything that they're saying?
Do I need to look for another savior? You know, even the strongest
believers are prone to doubts and fears and to ask, You know,
really such an unfounded question, do I need to look for another?
Our Lord said, among them that are born of women, there hath
arisen a greater than John the Baptist. And even John the Baptist
had doubts and fears. Look at verse one of Matthew
chapter 11. And it came to pass when Jesus
had made an end of commanding his 12 disciples, he departed
thence to teach and to preach in their cities. Now when John
had heard in the prison the works of Christ, he sent two of his
disciples and said unto him, art thou he that should come
or do we look for another? Now John sent them to ask this
question and there can be no doubt John the Baptist knew who
the Lord Jesus was, didn't he? He knew who the Lord was in the
womb. He leapt for joy when Mary came
into the room with the Savior in her womb. He knew from the
womb who the Lord Jesus was. At the baptism of our Lord, John
the Baptist saw the Holy Spirit. in the form of a dove to send
and light upon the Lord Jesus, showing John this is the Messiah.
John knew, then I questioned the world, he knew who he was.
John announced to the world who the Lord Jesus is. He said, look,
behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
So there can be no doubt, John knew who the Lord was, he trusted
him. He trusted him to take away his sin. But even John, even
John had doubts and fears. And I'm just sure that I know
how this happened. Here's John, John the Baptist.
There's not arisen a greater born of woman than John the Baptist.
The last of the Old Testament prophets. The prophet who had
the honor of saying, all the Old Testament prophets were saying
somebody's coming, somebody's coming, somebody's coming. And
John started out his ministry saying somebody's coming and
John got to be the one to say now here he is. Here he is. John was faithful. Wasn't he
a faithful man? I mean, no matter what it cost
him, he was faithful to preach the truth. Yet here John sits
in a horrible prison, waiting until he gets his head chopped
off. John, I'm sure, at least at times had to feel forgotten.
He had to feel cast aside. Even though he knew this was
right, he said, the Lord must increase and I must decrease.
But here he is in prison, cast aside, and it just wouldn't shock
me to find out that the man thought, what have I done wrong? Did I point sinners to a man
who really isn't the Savior? I mean, could that possibly be?
Could it be? I'm the one who preached another
Jesus. I mean, is that possible? Is
that why this is happening to me? So John sent two of his disciples
to go to the Lord and ask and find out. You know, a lot of
writers say, oh, John, he had no doubts, you know, that he
sent his disciples out so the disciples would know who the
Lord was. Well, John already told him who the Lord was. I
really don't think that was the reason. I think John asked this
question because he had to live in the same flesh you and I live
in. He had doubts and fears. He wasn't above those things,
just like we do today. And our Lord answered. In verse
four, and said unto them, go and show John again those things
which you do hear and see. Our Lord told John's disciples
what he tells all of his preachers, go tell John again. Go tell that
same old, old story, tell it over and over again. Don't tell
him anything new, just tell John the same things that you've told
him before. Tell him the old, old story of Jesus and his love. Tell John again. Tell him one
more time. He's full of doubts and fears.
He's in a horrible spot. Tell John again who the Lord
Jesus Christ is and what has He done for His people. That's
what preaching the gospel is. It's telling the old, old story
over and over again. And this morning, that's what
I want to do for you. I want to tell you again who the Lord
Jesus Christ is and what he's done for his people so that you
know, so that you're confident, you don't have to look for another
savior. You trust Christ, the Lord Jesus Christ. You trust
your soul to him because he's the only savior of sinners. Now,
verse five, our Lord went on. He said, the blind received their
sight. This is what you tell John. The blind received their
sight and the lame walk and the lepers are cleansed and the deaf
hear. The dead are raised up and the
poor have the gospel preached to them. Now the Lord lists these
physical miracles that he had performed on helpless, needy
people. These miracles are things that
only God can do. So it's obvious, it should be
obvious to us, the Lord Jesus is God. He's God in human flesh. No doctor, no religious healer
ever could heal these people of their ailments. Only the Lord
Jesus Christ could. So that tells us He's God. He's God in human flesh. He's
the one that God has sent to save his people from their sin.
Now, when the Lord was performing these miracles, he wasn't just
displaying his omnipotent power so people would be amazed at
his power. These things that the Lord did
were fulfilling the Old Testament scriptures. The Old Testament
is full of prophecies. This is what the Messiah is gonna
do when he arrives. And the Lord did them. He performed
these miracles that nobody else could perform, fulfilling the
Old Testament scriptures. I mean, the real issue is not
that nobody else could perform these miracles. The issue is,
the Lord performed these fulfilling the Old Testament scriptures,
showing us He is the Messiah. He's the Savior to whom we look.
Now it's obvious, only God can give sight to the blind. Only
God can make the lame walk. Only God could cleanse lepers.
Only God can make the deaf hear. Only God could do that. The wise
man said, the hearing ear and the seeing eye, the Lord hath
made even both of them. Only the Lord can give sight.
Only the Lord can make the deaf hear. Only the Lord could cleanse
lepers. Only the Lord can give life.
I mean, only the Lord can give life. You know, these infertility
clinics are making a killing, aren't they? And they do good
work to help people in infertility. But listen, let me tell you,
with all that they do, they still can't make life. Only God can
give life. Only God can sustain our life.
And certainly, only God can raise somebody from the dead. Only
God can do that. So there's no question that the
Lord Jesus Christ is the Messiah. Now, I went through that because
it's right there in the scripture. I'm not trying to prove to anybody
here that the Lord Jesus is the Messiah. I'm not trying to prove
to you that he's the Savior. He just is, because scripture
says he is. What I want to do this morning is to preach Christ,
who he is, how he saved sinners, so that you trust your soul to
him, so that you trust your soul to him. See, these physical miracles
that the Lord performed, I know we're all fascinated with them,
but they're just the tip of the iceberg. All these physical healings
are pictures of how the Lord saves the sin sick souls of his
people. The glory of the gospel, the
amazement of the gospel, what thrills the souls and hearts
of God's people, what thrilled my soul in studying this this
week, is how, how the Savior saves his people from their sin.
When the Lord healed the physically sick, when you read all the miracles
in the gospels, what did he do? Sometimes he just spoke, didn't
he? The centurion, remember he told the Lord, you don't have
to come to my house. All you gotta do is just speak it. You don't
even have to come there. Just speak it here. The Lord
could just speak and heal folks. Sometimes he touched them. and
they were healed. Like that woman with the issue
of blood, she just touched the hem of his garment and she was
healed. That's all he had to do to heal all these physical
illness. But when it came time to save
his people from their sin, the Lord didn't just speak. God didn't
just speak from heaven. He didn't issue just a proclamation
and say, well, you've got diplomatic immunity. You know, you did it,
but I'm not going to charge you for it. When it came time for
God to save His people from their sin, the Son of God stood up
from His throne and came down. He came down all the way to be
an embryo in Mary's womb, the womb of a virgin. He went all
the way down to be born as a man, clothed in flesh, limited to
the weakness of flesh as far as what He could do for Himself.
Now, He wasn't limited what He could do for others. He performed
all kinds of miracles. but he never performed a miracle
for his own self, for his own benefit or for his own glory.
He was made. He came down so far. The lawgiver
was made under the law. He was made under the authority
of creatures who depended on him to give them breath. Oh,
he came down. And then he went down further.
He went down further to be made sin for his people. To take all
of their spiritual sicknesses into his own body on the tree.
Christ heals the spiritual sicknesses of his people by taking their
sicknesses away from them, taking it to himself and giving them
his health. Now that's amazing. I would be overcome with thanksgiving
if the Lord would touch me and heal me, wouldn't you? Oh, it'd
be something else if he'd just speak and he'd heal me. Oh, it's
something. But for him to heal me by taking
my sickness and making it his, oh my goodness. The human mind
can't comprehend it, can it? If you trust Christ, that just
made your heart leap in your chest. Christ saves his people
by taking their sicknesses and making them his and taking his
help and making that belong to his people. There's three examples
of that here in our text. Number one is this. The Lord
Jesus is the only Savior. Because he gives spiritual sight
to the blind. Now you and I are born spiritually
blind. So we can't see any spiritual
truth. We're so blind we can't even see that we're blind. We're
so blind we can't see our sin. We think, yeah, I'm okay. You
know why we think that? We can't see. We can't see the
filth of our sin or the guilt of our sin. We're blind so we
can't see who God is. We don't know God's holy, that's
why we think God can just accept the best I can do, because we
don't see that God is holy. We don't see God can't accept
me and my sin. Now that ought to be obvious,
but we can't see. We're so blind, we don't know,
we don't see how desperately We need Christ to save us because
we're the guiltiest and the filthiest in Adam's fallen race. We're
so blind that we can't see that if God saves me, he's got to
be just to do it. He's got to make it right for
him to do it. We're so blind, we can't see. How is it that
God can be merciful to me? How is it that God can justify
me and still be just? How can God not damn me and still
be just? We don't know the answer to that
question and we're so blind, we don't even know the question
should be asked. Spiritual blindness means this. We cannot and we
will not believe on Christ when we hear Him preached. That's
what the Lord told the Pharisees. That's how He showed them their
spiritual blindness. Now, if you and I would be saved,
we must see God. We have to see, we have to see
how it is God can be just and justify. If we would be saved,
we must see that the Lord Jesus Christ is my only hope of salvation. I've got to see him and I've
got to trust him. I've got to trust him alone without
any of my religious works added to it. Without any of my morality
helping contribute to my righteousness, it's got to be Christ alone.
I've got to see him. Not with these eyes, but with
eyes of faith, so I trust Him. And the only way any sinner can
ever see Christ is if Christ is pleased to reveal Himself
to us and give us eyes to see. And the way that Christ the Savior
gives His people sight, get a hold of your seat, I want
you to be so thrilled at this, the way Christ the Savior gives
His people sight is by taking their blindness and him suffering
for it and giving them his sight. At the cross, when our substitute
was suffering the wrath of the father against the sin of his
people, the substitute couldn't see his father. He cried, my
God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? He looked and there was none
to help. He looked and he couldn't see.
In Psalm 40 verse 12, the Savior says, for innumerable evils have
compassed me about. Mine iniquities have taken hold
upon me so that I'm not able to look up. The Savior suffered
the blindness of his people. He suffered for their sin. He
suffered for their willful unbelief so that he could not see his
father. He couldn't see his father's mercy. He couldn't see his father's
love. He couldn't see He couldn't see
it, so all he could see of the Father was justice and wrath
that was pouring down upon him. And he suffered that for his
people so that they could see God. Now, if you would see God,
do you wanna see God? You need look no further than
the Lord Jesus Christ. In Christ, we see God. In Christ, we see the Father.
Isn't that what he told Thomas? Thomas, you've seen me, you've
seen the Father. If we've seen Christ, we've seen salvation. If we've seen Christ, we have
seen life eternal. He is life eternal. If we've
seen Christ, we've seen the grace of God. It's all in here. If
you would see, look no further than the Lord Jesus Christ. All
right, number two. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
only Savior who makes a spiritually lame walk. Now you and I are
born spiritually lame. Lame people don't have the ability
to walk. Spiritually, we don't have the
ability to walk in God's ways. We don't have the ability to
walk in holiness. We don't have the ability to
walk obeying God's law. Somebody can preach the law and
tell me about the law and tell me everything the law requires,
and they can tell me how I ought to be doing it, all they want.
It doesn't change the fact I'm lame. I can't walk in those ways. I can't obey God. I can't do
it, I'm lame. By nature, we don't have the
desire to come to Christ. We don't know the way to Christ,
but we also don't have the ability to come to Christ. We're lame.
We're spiritually lame. And we talk about coming to Christ.
This is what we're talking about. It's believing Christ. It's believing
Him. And our nature is so lame, we
don't have the capacity to believe Christ. And left our lameness,
We're going to go to hell separated from God because we cannot come
to him. We cannot do it. So you know
what God did for his lame people? He sent his son to be the savior
of his people, to save them from their sin and give them the faith
to believe on him and trust him. And the way Christ, our savior,
our substitute, heals the spiritual lameness of his people is by
taking their lameness away from them and making it His, so that
He could give them His ability to walk and to come to God. At Calvary, what happened to
the Savior? His feet were nailed to the cross.
He couldn't walk. In that way, He was lame, wasn't
He? He couldn't walk. His feet were nailed to the cross. He
could not walk away from the wrath of His Father. that had
been pouring down upon Him for the sin that had been laid on
Him. He couldn't walk away from it. He could not walk to the
Father and receive mercy. The only thing He could receive
at that time from His Father is justice. And He suffered it
because He's suffering the lameness of His people. And Christ suffered
all of that. Remember when the Pharisees threw
this up at Him? Come down from the cross now,
we'll believe you. Well, physically, He had the power to come down
from the cross, but it wasn't the nails that held him there,
was it? It wasn't the nails that made him lame, and so he could
not walk and come down from the cross and show them he had the
power to do it. It was his love for his people that made him
lame, that made it so he refused to walk away from the wrath of
God until he suffered it all so his people never would. Christ
suffered all of that So that when His people hear Christ crucified
preached, this is what we preach, Christ and Him crucified. When
God's people hear Christ lifted up as a sacrifice for their sin,
you know what the Savior said would happen to Him? They'll
come to Me. All of them will. All that the
Father gave Me. Anybody who with the ears of
faith hears this message of Christ lifted up, they'll come running. The lame will suddenly come running
to Christ for Him to be there all. And the Holy Spirit makes
us walk spiritually. How do you know that you're not
lame anymore and that you can walk spiritually? You know, you
can know that the answer to that question. How do I know if the
Lord's really enabled me to walk spiritually or I just dress up
in a suit and act religious? How do I know? If the Holy Spirit takes away
your lameness and makes you walk, I can tell you where you're going.
You're going straight to Christ. He's your all. You need righteousness,
you're going to Him for it. You need forgiveness, you're
going to Christ for it. You need life, you're going to Him for
it. You need salvation, you're going to Him for it. You're not
gonna try to contribute anything to this thing, because now you
believe Christ, and you go straight to Him. The Holy Spirit, He takes
away that lameness of His people. You know what He does? He draws
them to Christ. He draws them and they come willingly. They come willingly because now
they believe. Now, believers walk. We walk
and we come to Christ. We walk and we follow Christ. Now, if you want to be able to
spiritually walk, you want to walk in that straight and narrow
way that leads unto life eternal, I'll tell you what to do. you
have to look no further than the Lord Jesus Christ. He takes
away the lameness of his people so that they believe him and
they walk in him. All right, number three. The
Lord Jesus Christ is the only savior who cleanses spiritual
lepers. Now, leprosy is such a good picture
of sin. Leprosy is not a disease of the
skin that rots us from the outside in. Leprosy is a disease of the
blood. that rots us from the inside
out. It's an uncleanness. The Jews didn't just consider
it a disease, it was uncleanness, unclean. That's why they had
to go around crying, unclean, unclean, don't come near me,
I'm unclean. And they called leprosy the living death. You
may still be alive and breathing if you have leprosy, but you're
as good as dead. Because that time, there was no cure for it. You're as good as dead. Isn't
that a picture of us physically by nature? We're physically alive,
but spiritually dead. Don't ever confuse the fact that
you're physically alive and you think you can do things and that
means you have some spiritual life and you can make some good
spiritual decisions. No, sir. We're the living death. We're alive physically, but dead
spiritually. And this is an uncleanness. You
and I are born unclean, defiled with sin. Our sin is a corruption. It's not just breaking the rules.
Our sin is a corruption that makes us unclean before God.
We don't just need healing for our bodies. You know, people
read this text and they can just go berserk about the healing
of the body, you know, and how we should still be doing this
and people's bodies, you know, be healed. We don't just need
healing for our bodies. People who've had their bodies
healed, they're gonna die again sooner or later. We need healing
for our souls. We need cleansing for our souls
so we don't die eternally. So the Lord Jesus Christ came
to heal the spiritual leper. Remember after the Lord preached
there on the mount, and he came down from the mountain, that
leper came to him and said, Lord, if you will, you can make me
clean. And the Savior said, I will.
And he touched him and immediately he was healed. Isn't that something?
I mean, that's something else. I mean, wow. How that must have
felt to that poor man. But it's a whole nother story
when Christ came to save spiritual lepers. In order to save spiritual
lepers, to cleanse spiritual lepers, the Savior, took the
disease, he took the corruption of his people, and he made it
his, and he gave them his spiritual health. On the cross, Christ
the Savior became unclean before his father because he had been
made sin. Now please understand what I'm
saying. I'm not saying that Christ was a sinner. He never committed
any sin, never, wasn't even acquainted with any sin, but he became unclean. He became sin and the father
put him to death for it. Christ took the sickness, the
sin sickness of his people into his own body on the tree and
he cleansed it all away with his precious blood. Now, would
you be cleansed from your sin, from your spiritual corruption?
Would you be cleansed from that? Would you be made whiter than
snow? Would you have your spiritual leprosy, all that corruption,
would you be made whiter than snow? You need look no further
than the Lord Jesus Christ. You come be washed in his blood
and you'll be clean. You trust His blood alone to
put away your sin, to cleanse you from all of your sin, and
you will be clean. You will be. And none of these
other so-called Jesuses, none of these other so-called saviors,
they never make the claim that they make their worshipers clean.
Never. They make you do that. If you
do that, they'll accept you. They never make the claim they'll
make you clean. Christ does. He takes away the
spiritual leprosy of his people and washes them white as snow
in his blood. All right, here's the fourth
thing. The Lord Jesus Christ is the only Savior that makes
the deaf hear. Now all of us are born not being able to hear
the gospel. Now again, hearing means believing. You'll notice that believing's
the issue here, isn't it? Believing is always the issue. All these
sicknesses You know what they picture? They picture our spiritual
problem. It's unbelief. It's just different
ways of pointing out the disease of our unbelief. We're born not
being able to hear the gospel. Now, we can hear physically. But the gospel being preached,
it's not just words. It's not just words. You know,
our young ones here, they've been taught the right words.
They've been taught memory verses. They've been taught, and we know
the right words. I grew up the same way. I knew all the right
words. I knew all the right words. But
by nature, when we hear the gospel, we don't hear anything that satisfies
our soul. We have a need. We may not even
know what the need is. We may not even know how great
the need is, but we have a need, and we hear the gospel. We don't
hear anything that satisfies my need. It's just words. It's not life to me. It's not
life. I don't find any mercy and grace
in it. I don't find any truth in it.
And the reason for that is we're just hearing from a man. We're
not hearing from God. I'm deaf, so there's nothing
there for me. But look at Psalm 22. Christ heals the spiritual deafness
of His people. And He doesn't do it by sticking
His fingers in their ears and making them hear. Oh, that would
be something else, wouldn't it? What a miracle, how thankful
we'd be. But the amazing thing of the
depth of compassion of our Savior, that He would really, truly become
our substitute. Not just in word, but truly become
our substitute and take the deafness of His people and give His people
His hearing ears. Psalm 22, verse one. My God,
my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Why art thou so far from
helping me and from the words of my roaring? Oh my God, I cry
in the daytime, but thou hearest not. In the night season, and
am not silent. The substitute cried out to God,
didn't he? Oh, he roared, he cried, he cried
out to God. But he didn't hear any response.
The only response he received was a strict justice. He heard
no words of comfort from his father. He heard no words of
assurance from his father. The only thing he heard was more
wrath and more wrath and more wrath being poured out upon him
because he had been made sin. And the only thing his father
could do was pour out his wrath and justice upon him. And Christ
willingly suffered all of that. He willingly suffered that separation
from His Father so that His people could be given hearing ears that
would hear the gospel, that would hear that Christ is the Savior,
that would hear and believe on Him. Now, do you want to hear
from God? I do. I want you to hear from
God. I want to hear from God and I want you to hear from God.
I don't want you to just hear me. I want you to hear from God.
Would you hear from God? Look no further than the Lord
Jesus Christ. Everything Almighty God has to
say to a sinner is found in Christ. And if you look to him and you'll
come to him, you'll hear. You surely will. Cry out to him,
cry out to God, beg him for mercy, beg him for forgiveness, and
he will make you hear. the words mercy and grace and
forgiveness in him. All right, number five. The only
savior who gives spiritual life to the dead is the Lord Jesus
Christ. You and I are born spiritually
dead. We're alive physically, but we're spiritually dead. We're
dead in trespasses and sins. We have received from our father,
Adam, the only nature that Adam had to pass on to us, a spiritually
dead nature. Now God told Adam, Adam you can
eat all the trees in the garden that you want, eat them freely.
But this tree, the tree that's in the center of the garden,
the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it. And
in the day that thou eatest thereof, thou shalt surely die. And you
look this up, this is what that thou shalt surely die means.
Dying thou shalt die. Literally translated, what God
said to Adam is dying thou shalt die. Adam in the moment you take
that fruit, You're going to begin dying physically. It took about
900 years for sin to kill Adam's body. It didn't take about 70
or less to kill me. It took 900 years to kill Adam's
body. But in an instant, he died spiritually.
And that's the nature. Adam passed on to you and me.
We're alive physically, but dead spiritually. And to be dead spiritually
means this. We can't believe on Christ. Dead men can't do anything. A
dead man can't do anything but stink. A dead man can't hear
you talking to him. A dead man can't get up and walk.
A dead man can't get up and run out of a burning building. A
dead man can't do... They can't do anything. They're dead. You
would never expect anybody that's dead to do anything. They're
dead. You and I are dead spiritually, so we can't do anything for ourselves.
We can't. We're dead. We cannot believe
on Christ. But God the Father chose a people
to save. Now they must be saved. So Christ the Savior comes and
gives his people life, not by touching their coffin and making
them rise again, not by saying unto the dead, I say unto thee
arise, but by coming and being their substitute, taking their
place, taking the spiritual deadness of his people and giving them
his life. As a substitute hung on Calvary's
tree, He was paying the sin debt of his people. He was paying
it with his own suffering, with his own blood. And when the price
was paid, the great transaction is done. Do you know what he
cried? It is finished. And he gave up the ghost. Life
himself died. The life giver died so that his
people would begin eternal life. Now, do you need spiritual life?
We all do, but do you know it? Do you need spiritual life? Look
no further than the Lord Jesus Christ, whom to know is life
eternal. And then last, the only Savior
who preaches good news to the poor is the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, you and I are so needy spiritually
that we're born spiritually bankrupt. We have an astronomical debt
that we owe to God for our sin, and you and I don't have the
first penny to pay down on the debt. And we'll never earn anything.
We'll never earn the first penny to pay down on our debt. We're
so poor, there's not one blessed thing we can do to help ourselves
spiritually. Now, every idol that men preach,
that men make up to try to solve this matter of sin and salvation,
you'll find the idols only help those who help themselves. You've
got to help yourself at least a little bit. You've got to do
something. You've got to take the first step. You've got to
clean up your act a little bit. You've got to start being a little
more moral. You've got to start putting more
money into offering. You've got to do this, that, or the other.
At least some, you've got to help that idol save you. Idols
only help those who help themselves. Every idol only wants worshipers
who can contribute something to the idol. If you can't contribute
something to idol, they don't want you. Plain and simple. Then
the poor are left out, aren't they? The spiritually bankrupt
are left out. But Christ the Savior, he only saves people
who can't help themselves. If you could help him, you know,
Lord, I'll do this and then you do the rest, he's not gonna save
you. Christ the Savior only saves
those who are helpless. who are bankrupt, who are too
poor to do anything to help themselves, much less God Almighty. So Christ
the Savior, He comes to the poor, and He preaches the gospel to
them. He preaches the gospel of Christ to them, and this is
what He tells them. Here's how I cure the spiritual
poverty of my people. I take the poorness, the poverty
of my people, and I give them my riches. At Calvary, the Lord
Jesus Christ took the poverty of his people. He cried out,
I am poor and needy. He took the poverty of his people. He did that as a substitute for
his people so he could make his people rich. He could make them
rich in righteousness. How rich is the righteousness
God gives his people? The Apostle Paul says it's the
righteousness of God. Oh, it's a perfect righteousness.
How about holiness? Huh? It's sanctified. Christ is our sanctification.
Sanctified. As holy as Christ is, that's
how holy you are if you believe. How about grace? It's abounding grace. Oh, rich
in grace. I need a lot of grace. God's
got abounding grace. How about mercy? I mean, I'm
a poor sinner. I need lots of mercy. It's the
riches of His mercy. Riches of His mercy. How about
His love? I mean, I'm a poor sinner. I
mean, I need love. I mean, does God really have
enough love to love a sinner like me? The Apostle Paul says
it's immeasurable. You can't measure the height
or the depth or the length or the breadth of it. How about life? I'm poor in life.
I'm so poor in life, I'm dead. I need spiritual life. Does God
really have enough life to give me, to make me live? He does.
It's eternal life. Other riches, the spiritual riches
that God gives His people is all because Christ took their
poverty, took it away from them. Look at 2 Corinthians 8, I'll
close. It's a good scripture for us
to close on I think it drives home this point well, that what
I'm trying to make to you is how Christ saved his people. It's by taking their punishment,
by taking their place, and giving them everything that he is. 2
Corinthians 8 verse 9. For you know the grace of our
Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sakes
he became poor. that ye through his poverty might
be rich. He took our poverty and gave
us his riches. I don't know about you, but that's
the Savior I want. That's the Savior by God's grace
I believe. That's the Savior by God's grace
I trust. Ain't no need for me to look
for another. How about you? All right, Lord bless you. Let's
bow together. Our Father, I thank you for this time that you've
given to us to look into your word, to hear our Savior speak.
And Father, I pray that you take your word as it's been preached
and show us your glory. Show each heart here this morning
your glory so that we leave here believing in, trusting in, resting
in Christ our Savior. Father, I know I ask a great
blessing. There can be no greater blessing
for any son of Adam than that you'd be merciful to us and save
our sorry souls. But Father, would you be pleased
to save us here this morning for your glory, that you get
all the glory doing what only you can do, giving life to dead
sinners such as we are. Father, we thank you that our
Savior is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto
God by him. And I pray he draws to him. It's
in Christ's name, for his sake and his glory, we pray. Amen. All right, Sean.