If you would open your Bibles
with me to Psalm 146. Psalm 146, in case you missed
it in our bulletin, the Lord willing, next Sunday, John Chapman
will be here to preach for us. He's agreed to come from the
conference in Lexington and preach for us Sunday morning. I know
we'll all look forward to that. Psalm 146. Praise ye the Lord. Praise the
Lord, O my soul. While I live will I praise the
Lord. I will sing praises unto my God while I have any being. Put not your trust in princes,
nor in the son of man, in whom there is no help. His breath
goeth forth. He returneth to his earth. In
that very day his thoughts perish. Happy is he that hath the God
of Jacob for his help, whose hope is in the Lord his God,
which made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that therein
is, which keepeth truth forever, which executeth judgment for
the oppressed, which giveth food to the hungry. The Lord looseth
the prisoners. The Lord openeth the eyes of
the blind. The Lord raiseth them that are bowed down. The Lord
loveth the righteous. The Lord preserveth the strangers.
He relieveth the fatherless and widow, but the way of the wicked
he turneth upside down. The Lord shall reign forever,
even thy God, O Zion, unto all generations. Praise ye the Lord. All right, let's do that, standing
together as Shawn leads us in singing our call to worship. Amazing love, God chose the dead,
in Christ our hope and head. Chosen by God, e'er time began
to receive life again. Elect not for some good in me,
I know that cannot be. Despite of all my sin and shame,
Christ stood to bear my blame. Amazing blood was shed for me
upon Golgotha's tree. Blood shed to pay the law's demands
and lose all of death's bands. Amazing mercy from on high, for
I deserve to die. Mercy that brings salvation nigh
to such a wretch as I. Okay, if you would now turn in your
hymnals to song number 282. 282, Hiding in Thee. Oh, save to the rock that is
higher than I, my soul in its conflicts and sorrows would fly. So sinful, so weary, thine, thine
would I be. Thou blest rock of ages, I'm
hiding in thee, hiding in thee. Thou blessed rock of ages, I'm
hiding in Thee. In the calm of the noon, Tide
in sorrow's lone hour, In times when temptation Casts o'er me
its power, In the tempest of life, On its wide heaving sea,
Thou blessed rock of ages, I'm hiding in Thee. Hiding in Thee. Hiding in Thee. Thou blessed rock of ages, I'm
hiding in Thee. How often the conflict, when
pressed by the foe, I have fled to my refuge, hath breathed out
my woe. How often when trials like sea
billows roll, have I hidden in thee, O thou rock of my soul. Hiding in Thee, Hiding in Thee,
Thou blessed Rock of Ages, I'm hiding in Thee. Turning with me, if you would,
to the book of Zechariah. The next to last book in the
Old Testament, our pastor has asked us to read the first five
verses of Zechariah chapter three. And he showed me Joshua, the
high priest, standing before the angel of the Lord and Satan
standing at his right hand to resist him. And the Lord said
unto Satan, the Lord rebuke thee, O Satan, even the Lord that hath
chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is not this a brand plucked out
of the fire? Now Joshua was clothed with filthy
garments and stood before the angel. And he answered and spake
unto those that stood before him saying, take away the filthy
garments from him. And unto him he said, behold,
I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will
clothe thee with change of raiment. And I said, let them set a fair
mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon
his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the
Lord stood by." We'll end our reading there. Let's pray together. Our Holy Heavenly Father, what
a privilege it is and a blessing to be able to approach your throne
and call you our Father in Christ. For this opportunity to come
together as a family and praise your name according to your will,
what a blessing this is. And we thank you for this opportunity
that you've blessed us with this morning. We thank you for calling
us here together And we humbly and thankfully bow, knowing that
this is of your purpose, that we're here. We pray together that you would
have this time be a time of worship and a time that together as a
family and also individually, one by one, that we would praise
your name. Certainly your name is worthy
of being praised. And we pray that you send your
spirit, that this time be a time that we worship as your name
ought to be praised. I pray that you be with our pastor
and give him strength and clear recollection of his studies.
Give him a word from you that we hear from you today and that
we see you in the face of Christ. Father, we're thankful that all
things are in your hands. We pray that you would give us
faith, increase our faith to trust. Not to necessarily try
to figure out your will in things, but rather to trust in your will,
to trust in your goodness, and to give us rest there. We're
thankful that all things are in your hands. We're thankful
that salvation is in your hand, and that it's as sure as the
work of Christ is sure. And it's as sure as your goodness
is sure. Nothing that we speak of here
today has anything to do with anything that we've done, but
rather it's all of Christ's work, and we're thankful. I pray that
you give us a heart to believe that. Our Father, we also come
to you with the trials of this world, and we're thankful that
you know. You have children who are hurting.
Father, you know the need, whatever that need is. We pray that you
comfort according to your will. and bring bring peace and rest
and that the trial may may work. It's it's cause your cause according
to your will. Again, we pray that you be with
us both both as our pastor preaches and as we sit and listen, I pray
that you give us a heart to believe and ears to hear that your name
be glorified. We pray this all in Christ, our
savior's name. Leave your Bibles open there
to the passage Jonathan just read for us, that will serve
as our text this morning. I titled the message, Is This
a Brand? Plucked Out of the Fire. Zechariah lived and prophesied
at the same time Haggai and Ezra did. And at that time in their
history, Israel had returned from bondage in Babylon, and
now they were going about the work to rebuild the temple. And
Zechariah is writing to encourage Israel in this work of rebuilding
the temple. And they're going to need some
encouragement because they met with a lot of opposition along
the way, a lot of difficulty in the work. And the way that
Zechariah encourages the people and strengthens their heart is
by showing them Christ. That's who he prophesied of.
Now in our text this morning, there are three people involved
here. First, there's Joshua. Now I know we normally think
of Joshua as a type of Christ, but here Joshua is a picture
of all believers. He's been delivered from bondage
in Babylon. That's a picture of every believer.
God delivers them from the bondage of man's religion. He delivers
them from the bondage to the law, from bondage from sin and
bondage to religion. You know, a lot of us would like
to be delivered from bondage of the law, bondage to sin. But
boy, people by nature like their religion, don't they? Well, God
delivers his people even from bondage to man's religion. Then
second, there's the angel of the Lord. The angel of the Lord
here is our Lord Jesus Christ. He's the one who's the judge
of all the earth. Now, almost always in the Old Testament,
when you read of an angel, almost always it's a pre-incarnate appearance
of Christ. It's not a created being that
we call an angel, but it's Christ. Pre-incarnate appearance. Now
an angel is a messenger. That's who God's son is. The
Lord Jesus Christ is the messenger of the covenant. He's the messenger
of the covenant of grace. The law came by Moses, but grace
and truth came by Jesus Christ. He's the messenger of the covenant
of grace. He's the messenger of the forgiveness
of sin. He's the messenger that tells
us about a salvation. that's free and full and complete. And later on in our text, we
see this angel giving a commandment to take Joshua's filthy clothes
from him and to give him these new clothes. The only one who'd
give that kind of commandment is Christ the Savior. And then
the third person we have in our text this morning is Satan. And
his name means the adversary. And boy, this is an adversarial
character, Satan. He is the adversary of God's
people. He always stands to accuse them. He's the accuser of the brethren.
Satan is the adversary of God. At one time, he tried to take
Christ off of his throne. Satan's also the adversary of
all men. You know, Satan came to Eve and
deceived her into talking Adam into, you know, taking his fruit
and deceived her into death. He's the adversary of all men.
He tried to kill the whole human race. That's an adversary. And Satan is the adversary of
God's people. He's always trying to get them
to look away from Christ and trust themselves. He's always
trying to get them in their religion. I tell you, free will religion
is the message of Satan. Because it tries to get people
to look to themselves instead of looking to Christ alone. And
someone who's trying to make you lose your soul is your adversary. And here's why Satan is so adamant
in this matter of being an adversary to God's people. Because he knows
this, if he can just get one of God's elect to trust in themselves
and not trust Christ, he's gonna win the whole shooting match.
If he can get God to just, if he keeps accusing the brethren,
accusing them and accusing them of sin, because he knows if he
can get God to cast out just one for whom Christ died, because
of their sin, he'll win the whole shooting match. And here it appears
in our text that Satan has a real good case here, accusing Joshua.
In verse three it says, now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments
and stood before the angel. Joshua is clothed in his sin
and his guilt. He's clothed with garments that
are defiled through and through by his sin. Joshua, Remember,
he's a picture of us. He hasn't committed just a few
sins. Joshua is a sinner. That's all he is. That's all
he does. That's all he thinks. That's all he can produce is
sin. These rags that he's wearing
are the rags that he has produced by his own religious deeds, by
his own attempts to keep the law, and they're defiled by sin. That's all of us. Now, there
he stands in his guilt and his sin and his filth before Christ
on his throne. There he stands. There's no hiding
it, is there? Satan thinks he's got a good
case here. But look what the Lord says in verse two. The Lord
said unto Satan, the Lord rebuked thee, O Satan, even the Lord
that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuked thee. Is not this a brand plucked
out of the fire? Now, Joshua, remember he's a
picture of all of God's elect. We're sinners. And we deserve
to be cast into hell for our sin. I mean, we stand just on
tiptoe on the very brink of hell, ready to plunge in there because
of our sin and our guilt. That's what we deserve. But Almighty
God has reached down and plucked them out. Now that is God's sovereign,
distinguishing grace. Of all the brands there in the
fire, God reached down and selected this one. on purpose. That's
election. God chose to save some. Now obviously
those brains plucked out of the fire, they're saved, aren't they?
They're saved from God's wrath. They're saved from their sin.
They're saved from condemnation of their sin. Here's my question. I want to know if you and I are
one of these brains plucked from the fire. Are you a brain plucked
from the fire? Or are we just religious? Now,
I want to know that, don't you? If God has plucked you as a brain
from the fire, our text is going to describe you. You see, God
has plucked you from the fire. He's plucked you as a brain from
the fire. God didn't leave you like he
found you. He didn't leave you in your sin and your guilt. God's
people are changed. Whenever God lays hold on them,
they're changed. There's a new sheriff in town.
There's gonna be a new wardrobe here. There's gonna be a change.
God does not leave his people like he finds them in Adam. So
let's look at this and see if we can see something that'll
encourage our souls. Number one, if you're a brand
plucked from the fire, this is what you know about yourself.
You're a natural born sinner. It says in verse three that Joshua
was clothed with filthy garments and stood before the Lord. Now,
back in verse two, God's elect, those that Christ has saved,
he describes them as a piece of wood plucked from the fire,
just a dead hunk of wood. Now, have you ever smelled wood
that's been in a fire? Maybe a house burned down or
you had a fire pit in your backyard or whatever. Once there's been
a fire there, you can't get the smell of smoke out. I mean, you
just can't get it out, can you? Long after the fire's been put
out, There's, you can just, that smoke, that smell of smoke is
constantly reminding you of the fire. Now that's a believer. We've been saved from sin. God's
plucked us as a brain from the fire. But we're still in this
flesh that smells a whole lot like smoke, doesn't it? Smells
a whole lot like sin. And the only way that smell of
sin, the only way that contamination of sin can be removed is if we're
washed in the blood of Christ. See, that's why I said God doesn't
reach down and pluck that brain from the fire and leave them
as they are. No, He plucks them from the fire and He washes them
in the blood, the precious blood of His Son. And when we're washed
in the blood of God's Son, I'm telling you, sin's gone. It's
gone. Our souls have been washed white
as snow in the blood of Christ. There's no sin left. And one day, Christ is going
to return, and he's going to take his people. He's going to
gather them from this earth, and he's going to take them to
be with him in glory, and he's going to make them perfect, body
and soul. See, right now, God's people,
we're just perfect in soul. We're perfect in that new man.
We're not perfect in our bodies, are we? In glory, we'll be perfect
body and soul, and you won't even get a whiff of sin anymore.
The smoke's going to be gone. It's gone from our souls now,
but we sure have to deal with the effect of it in our bodies,
don't we? And that's what Joshua's filthy garments are all about.
You know why we're sinners? It's because we're born that
way. We're born in sin, and we've clothed ourself in our sin. And this clothing is not just
a covering of sin that's on the outside. Sin is what we are. It's through and through. Sin
is what we produce. Now we've got some idea that
we're naked before God. We've got some idea of our guilt
and our shame. So what we try to do is make
ourselves a covering. That's just man's natural reaction.
It's been that way from the time Adam and Eve knew they were naked.
They made themselves an apron of fig leaves, didn't they? You
and I do the same thing today. We try to cover our nakedness
and our shame. We try to make this up to God.
We know we've sinned against God. There's a gap between us
and God, so we try to make it better. by clothing ourselves
with the works of the law. I'm gonna keep the law the best
I can. I'm gonna just do all this religious stuff. I'm gonna,
whatever it is they tell me down there at the church, I'm gonna
do it. If I gotta wear my hair a certain way, gotta dress a
certain way, gotta talk a certain way, gotta sit a certain way,
whatever it is, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do all these religious
deeds to try to make up for my sin. The problem is when we do
that, all we're producing is more sin. God calls that the
filthy rags of righteousness. These filthy rags that we've
tried to produce, they're not just rags that are dirty, they're
defiled. They're defiled by sin. And that's
no covering at all. Can you imagine standing in that
filth before the holy throne of God? That's what we're doing. Now God's gonna reveal sin to
his people. He's gonna reveal their sin to
them. And you know, the Lord does not do that by sending us
on a guilt trip over our sin. I was flipping through the channels
yesterday like I know I shouldn't do and I stopped on this religious
channel and there's this guy trying to make people feel guilty,
you know, about their sin and all the things that they've done
wrong and just, you know, the way they talk to people, the
way they did this. He's sending people on a guilt
trip, trying to make people feel guilty so they, you know, do
something for God. God doesn't send his people on
a guilt trip. God does not show us our sin
by making us scared of hell. God doesn't use hellfire and
brimstone preaching, you know, to scare people into doing something
for him, you know. You know how God reveals our
sin to us? It's by revealing his son to
our hearts. It'd be pretty easy to send me
on a guilt trip. It would. I've got a lot to be guilty about.
It'd be pretty easy to scare me half to death. I've got to
be guilty over all the things I
am, all the things I think, all the things I do. But that's not going to make
me love Christ. That's not going to do anything to get rid of
my sin. But if the Holy Spirit is pleased
to reveal Christ to me, Now I'm going to know what sin is. Because
I see myself in light of who Christ is. Now I see. And the only way we'll ever be
convinced of our sin is by hearing some man tell us and preach to
us and tell us who Christ is. When I see Christ, now this is
what I know. I'm convinced of this. I am a
guilty, hell-deserving sinner. I deserve that because of what
I am. I am a natural-born sinner. and that means I got no hope
in myself. All right, number two. If your brain plucked from
the fire, you know this. Almighty God elected you unto
salvation. Verse two, it says that the Lord
said unto Satan, the Lord rebuke thee, O Satan, even the Lord
that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee. Is not this a brain plucked
from the fire? It says here the Lord has chosen
of people, spiritual history has chosen them. He's plucked
them as a brand from the fire. God didn't do it randomly. No,
he reached down and plucked the people out on purpose, by name,
individually, on purpose, because God set his love upon them. Now,
if that brand is going to get plucked out of the fire, God's
going to have to do the plucking, isn't he? You're gonna have to. The brain is just a dead hunk
of wood. It can't jump out of that fire. If the brain had its
way, it wouldn't be in the fire in the first place. If it's gonna
get out of the fire, Almighty God's gonna have to pluck it
out. Now that's election. And I'm hard pressed to find
anything in scripture more amazing than God's electing love. God
elected a people unto salvation even though he knew what they'd
be. He chose them before time began. He didn't look down and
see that there were some good folks and he chose them. No,
God looked down from heaven to see if there were any that did
good. Are there any? None. No, not one. But God chose a people anyway.
Election is personal. Individually, by name, one at
a time. Jacob have I loved. And since
it's personal, I want to make this personal to those of us
here this morning, especially those who believe Christ. If
your brain plucked from the fire, I want you to think about this.
God chose to save you. He set his love upon you, electing
love, even though he already knew you would never do one thing
to deserve his love. And he chose you anyway. If God
has chosen you, he knew your sin, he knew your guilt, he knows
it better than we do, but he chose to put that sin away by
the sacrifice of his son. Anyway, even though he knew our
sin, he chose to do that anyway. If God chose you, he knew you'd
be unlovable. He knew that you would never
love him first. But God chose you to save you
by his divine love anyway. Can you think of anything more
amazing than that? I mean, of all the people who have ever
lived on earth, God would choose me? God would choose you? The songwriter said, I stand
amazed in the presence of Jesus, the Nazarene. And I wonder, boy,
I wonder how God could love a sinner like me, condemned, unclean. I wonder. It's amazing, isn't
it? If God has chosen to save you,
this is what you know. You know this. I did not choose
God first. Can't be. I sure choose him now. Oh, I choose his way of salvation
now. I choose Christ now, but only because he chose me first.
That's the only way this thing of salvation could have ever
begun. God chose to save me before time began. All right, number
three. If you're a brand plucked from
the fire, you know how God has made you righteous. You know. Now there Joshua stands, I mean
he's a picture of all of God's elect. He stands before the holy
throne of God in his guilt and the filth of his sin. He had
to come before God that way because it's the only thing he had to
wear. The only thing that you and I have to wear is the defiled
rags of our own attempts to make ourselves righteous. It's filthy
and it's full of holes. One of Henry T's quotes that
Janet, this is one of her favorite ones of his, he talked about
his righteousness. He said, it's shot full of holes. I know it and you do too. It's
full of holes. It's defiled with our sin. And
there he stands wearing that before the Holy God. Now the
Holy God will never accept that. He can never accept us in our
sin. Our mama can, but he can't. He's
holy. Well, then what's to be done
with these rags of righteousness? Something's gotta be done with
it. What's gonna be done? Well, the Savior tells us in
verse four. He answered and spake unto those that stood before
him, saying, take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him
he said, behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee,
and I will clothe thee with change of raiment. Now, this is a picture
that tells us how God forgives sin. Now this is the real sin
of a real sinner. And God takes it away. He doesn't
pretend like he takes it away. It doesn't, he just choose to
ignore it, you know, until he takes you to glory. He takes
away the sin of his people. It's just like poor old David.
Remember when Nathan came to him and told him, you're the
man, David. He told him that story about
that man that had a lot of lands, but he took this one man's little
yew land, and he took it away from him. David said, I'm going
to kill him today. His head's not going to remain
on his body. I'm going to, today, I'm going to. And Nathan said,
you're the man. And you know what Nathan told
him next? You shall not die. God's taken
away your sin. He's taken it away. The Savior
says to those They're around Joshua. You take those filthy
garments off of him. Take them off of him. Now, that
wasn't going to be easy to do. I mean, you think about standing
before the holy God, you're clothed and trying to cover your nakedness
the best you can in these hole-filled, defiled garments. But now, they're
the best you got. And somebody said, I don't want
to take them off of you. I'm going to make you naked before
God and naked for all these watching. You're going to hang on to that
rope for all you're worth. It's polluted by sin, but it's
all Joshua's got. Just like you and me. Our works
that we used to trust in, it's all we got. It's all we had at
that time, isn't it? So Christ says, take them away. Stripping. Now some energy and
effort had to go into that thing. Take him away. But that's what
has to be done to us. And it's a painful process. God's
got to strip us before he can clothe us in the righteousness
of Christ. Before he can make us righteous, he's got to take
away from us everything we used to trust in. We're not going
to give it up willingly. He's got to take it away. And if you're
God's, he will. If you're that brand plucked
from the fire, he'll take it away. In Isaiah 52, the Lord tells
His people, touch not the unclean thing. People have, for years
and generations, have taken that to, you know, and I know it has
reference to the things of the world and that kind of thing.
But I'm convinced the primary meaning of that is this. We are
the unclean thing. I am the unclean thing. Our best
deeds that we've ever done trying to please God, That's the unclean
thing. And God says, don't touch it.
Don't touch it. Don't depend on anything you've
done to make you accepted by God. Don't touch it. Those rags
of our religious works and our obedience, those things that
we try to do to please God, the things that come from our flesh,
they're offensive to God. They're offensive. God says,
don't touch them. He also says, take them away. See all those garments, that's
what Joshua produced. It's sin. And Christ says, take
your sin away from them. Now that sounds good, but how
can he do it? How can God take my sin away
from me and still be just, still be holy, and still be God? Take
him away, Christ said. You see the judge, the savior,
the king can say take him away because Christ took the sin of
his people away from them at Calvary. When Christ was made
sin for his people, he took the sin of his people away from them
and he took it into his own body upon the tree. And he put it
away by the sacrifice of himself. Now Christ had been crucified,
he suffered, He died, he rose again the third day, and he's
sent back to glory, wherever he lives, making intercession
for his people. The transaction's done, isn't it? Charlie, the
price is paid. There's no more debt, it's paid.
This thing's accomplished. But we don't know about it. That
brand down there in the fire don't know about it. We're still
gonna trust our own righteousness. We're still gonna cling to those
rags until God strips us. and causes us to be born again.
He's going to strip us naked of everything that we've ever
trusted in until we're naked before God and we're humiliated
by what we are. Now I've been revealed for what
I am before God and for everybody else. And then God says through
the gospel, behold, behold, I know you're ashamed. I know you're
naked. Behold, I have caused your iniquity
to pass from you. Not just the nameless masses
of people. From you. From you. I've taken it away from you when
I died for you on the cross. I suffered and died for you.
Now I found you. I'm not going to
leave you like I found you. I'm going to clothe you. I'm
not going to leave you naked. I'm going to clothe you in the
righteousness of my son. Now this is a glorious truth. Only a believer can understand
this. Only somebody who's been born again can understand this.
But if you're a brand that's been plucked from the fire by
the electing love of God Almighty, God's revealed himself to you.
He's given you faith in Christ. You believe him. You trust him.
You wouldn't have any other way of salvation. You trust Christ.
You know that you're righteous before God. You know Christ has
made you righteous. He's your only plea. He's your
only hope. But yet, when you look at yourself, the only thing
you see about yourself is sin. Everything you see about yourself
is so shameful. But God sees you as holy. God
sees you as righteous and perfect. Right now. Right now. Not someday. Not someday. right now. Now are we the sons
of God. Now it does not yet appear what
we shall be, but you just wait till Christ appears again. You
just wait. Christ presents his people to
the Father, holy, unblameable, and unapprovable in God's sight. I don't see myself that way,
but God does. And the way God sees things is
all that matters. Because the way God sees things
is what they are. God sees his people as what Christ
has made them. Righteous. And you know, if you're
a brand plucked from the fire, your righteousness has not come
from anything you've done. Your good works before or after
Christ has revealed himself to you. It's the righteousness of
Christ. It's the obedience of Christ.
It's the sacrifice of Christ. It's your only hope. All right,
number four. If your brain plucked from the
fire, you know that God has made you a priest. And the thing about
being a priest is this, you can come to God anytime you want.
Verse five, and I said, let them set a fair mitre upon his head.
So they set a fair mitre upon his head and clothed him with
garments. And the angel of the Lord stood by. Now that fair
mitre is a crown. turban, what the high priest
actually wore on the day of atonement was a turban. And this tells
us whose garments we're wearing, whose garments Joshua's wearing,
whose garments God's elect are wearing. It's all the righteousness
of Christ our high priest. It's his holiness. And this change
of garments You know, Joshua's filthy rags, the rags of his
own righteousness, that wasn't just a pasted-on sin, a pasted-on
defilement, was it? It was through and through. When
Christ clothes his people with the righteousness of Christ,
it's not a pasted-on righteousness. It's not a covering that covers
up our sin and our defilement, but if you look, it's still there. When Scripture talks about us
being clothed in the righteousness of Christ, it's being made righteous
through and through. Just like Adam made us sinners
through and through, Christ made His people holy and righteous
through and through. And that's what this fair mitre
represents. Remember when the high priest went in, he's wearing
this mitre on the Day of Atonement. There's a gold band across it.
You know what was written on it, do you remember? Holiness
to the Lord. God crowns His people with holiness. He covers them with the righteousness
of Christ. And it was the high priest in
the Old Testament, he was the only one who could come into
the presence of God. Just average folks like you and
me, we couldn't do it. We needed the high priest to
go into the presence of God for us. And the high priest could
only go into God's presence one time a year, on the day of atonement,
and he sure better be bringing blood, hadn't he? God'll strike
him down if he's not. He better have the blood of the
sacrifice. And that went on for how many years? 4,000 years? Well, Christ died. And when he
gave up the ghost, you remember what happened in the temple?
The veil separating the holy place from the holy of holies
was torn in two from top to bottom, showing us that the way into
God is now wide open. If you trust Christ, you are
a priest to God. You can come to God anytime you
want. You can be heard. You can be
accepted by the holy God as long as you come pleading the blood
of Christ, pleading the blood of his sacrifice. Isn't that
a glorious work? It's a glorious work. It's so
glorious. That's what the saints in heaven
are saying about right now. unto him who's made us kings
and priests unto our God. Oh, it's an amazing work. And
here's the last thing. If your brain plucked from the
fire, your only hope of salvation is the Lord Jesus Christ. He's
your only plea. Now we read these five verses,
we read everything that transpired here from Joshua being clothed
in those filthy garments Now him being clothed in the righteousness
of Christ, he's wearing that turban, holiness to the Lord
on it. Did you notice Joshua never said a word? Not one word. Christ spoke for him. His intercessor
spoke for him. Joshua never one time defended
himself when Satan was accusing him and saying, I didn't do that.
He did it. So he didn't say I didn't do
it. He didn't say, Well, I did it, but I'll do better next time,
because no, you won't, you won't do better next time. He just
stayed silent and let Christ the intercessor speak for him.
See, true repentance, if we're gonna look at Romans chapter
three, true repentance involves understanding our guilt
so that we stay silent before the Lord, just silent. That's
the reason God gave the law. Look at Romans 3 verse 19. Now we know that what thing soever
the law saith, that saith to them who are under the law, that
every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty
before God. Therefore, by the deeds of the
law, there shall no flesh be justified in his sight, for by
the law is the knowledge of sin. That's why God gave the law so
we'd see our sin and we shut our mouth. We're guilty and we
shut our mouth before God. Now, here we've got Satan accusing
Joshua. Joshua's standing there before
God. He's guilty. I mean, he can't deny his guilt. The only plea he has is mercy,
isn't it? The only hope he has is Christ. Here's Satan accusing Joshua,
accusing God's people. And did you notice Satan is standing
there as the accuser of the brethren. As far as what's written there,
Satan didn't say anything either. Christ the judge didn't entertain
any charges from Satan. He just wouldn't hear it. There's
no reason for him to. There's no reason for him to
entertain those charges. Christ has made his people not guilty.
He's made them not guilty. He plucked a brain from the fire. He's washed them in his blood.
He's caused them to be born again. He dressed them in the righteousness
of Christ. There's no charge can be brought
against them. Nobody knows better than Christ. He's the judge. He's the judge of all. Nobody
knows better than the judge that your sin has been taken away
because he's the one that died for you. Nobody knows better
than him. Sin is gone so that none of God's
people could ever be charged with sin. and it's an act of
folly to try. Look over at Romans chapter eight. It's an act of folly to try to
charge God's people, to get God to condemn them, because the
substitute's already been condemned for us. Romans eight, verse one. There is therefore now no condemnation
to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh,
but after the spirit, For the law of the spirit of life in
Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death.
For what the law could not do, and that it was weak through
the flesh, God sending his own son in the likeness of sinful
flesh and for sin, as a sacrifice for sin, condemned sin in the
flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled
in us who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. There is no charge of the law
can be brought against you if you're trusting Christ, if your
faith is in Christ. I'll show you how full and complete
that is. Look over at verse 33. Now, verse
one says, there's therefore now no condemnation to them which
are in Christ Jesus. Verse 33, who shall lay anything
to the charge of God's elect? I mean, okay, there's no condemnation,
but could somebody someday condemn you? Could somebody someday make
a charge stick against you? Who shall lay anything to the
charge of God's elect? It's God that justifieth. Who
is he that condemneth? Who could condemn any of God's
people? It's Christ that died. Yea, rather, that is risen again,
who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession
for us. If Christ died for you, Not only
did he die, he died and rose again. As evidence, his sacrifice
put away all the sin charged to him. So no one can ever bring
any charge against you. And the one who suffered and
died and rose again for his people is the one on the throne who's
interceding for his people. He'll never allow any charge
to be brought against him because there he sits on the right hand
of the father, the scars, of his sacrifice in full view. Those
scars are the evidence he was sacrificed for the sin of his
people. Then no charge can be brought against him. Now does
that describe you? If your only hope of salvation
is the Lord Jesus Christ, then you're a brand plucked from the
fire. If you have some hope in yourself, then you're not a brand
plucked from the fire. But if Christ is your only hope,
You're a brain plucked from the fire. If the only hope that you
have of ever being made righteous is not by your obedience to the
law, but by Christ's obedience to the law for you, as your representative,
then you're a brain plucked from the fire. If when you look at
yourself and you see your sin, but you have hope of the forgiveness
of your sin because of the blood of Christ, you're a brain plucked
from the fire. I pray God will make it so. I
pray God will make it so for each one of us. All right, let's
bow together. Our Father, how we thank you
for our Lord Jesus Christ. How we thank you for a Savior
who takes away the sin of his people. How we thank you for
a Savior who ever lives to be our mediator, to make intercession
for the sin of his people. Father, how we thank you that
we don't have to come up with any arguments of our own or any
goodness of our own, but just stand silent in Christ our Savior
to be complete in him. Father, how we thank you. And
I beg of you that you would take your word as it's been preached,
that you'd use it to reveal the glory of Christ to each heart
here this morning, that we could leave here resting in, hoping
in, rejoicing in Christ and Christ alone. Is it his blessed name,
for his sake we pray, amen. All right, Shawn. If you would, turn in your hymnal
now to song number 269, Under His Wings. Under His wings I am safely abiding,
Though the night deepens and tempests are wild, Still I can
trust Him, I know He will keep me. He has redeemed me and I
am His child. Under His wings, under His wings,
Who from His love can sever? Under His wings, my soul shall
abide, Safely abide forever. Under His wings, what a refuge
in sorrow, how the heart yearningly turns to His rest. Often when earth has no balm
for my healing, there I find comfort and there I am blessed. Under his wings, under his wings,
Who from his love can sever? Under his wings my soul shall
abide, Safely abide forever. Under His wings, oh, what precious
enjoyment! There will I hide till life's
trials are o'er. Sheltered, protected, no evil
can harm me. Resting in Jesus, I'm safe evermore. Under his wings, under his wings,
Who from his love can sever? Under his wings, my soul shall
abide, Safely abide, forever.