Let's turn our Bibles again to
Isaiah chapter 61. I wasn't going to tell this story,
but the song Leah just sang brought it to my mind. Twenty-two years
ago, I had been filling in what Janet called a filler-inner.
I filled in to teach some of the Sunday school classes. I'd
been doing that for a while. And 22 years ago, Brother Tom
Harding asked me to preach for the first time. I had to go to
Pikeville and select my own text. When you taught the classes,
Henry gave you an outline. You could hardly go off track
with that outline, but this time I had to pick my own text. The text I selected is the text
we're going to look at this evening, Isaiah chapter 61. I hope that in 22 years I've learned
to present the gospel better than I did 22 years ago. But
the message is exactly the same. And the message hasn't changed
in 22 years because this old, old story goes back a whole lot
further than 22 years. It goes back before time began.
This gospel that we're going to look at this evening is the
old, old story, the eternal gospel of how sinners are saved. That
was the purpose of God before time began. But in the fullness
of time, God sent a messenger to tell men clearly how salvation
is obtained. And I've entitled the message
this evening, The Messenger of Salvation. The messenger of salvation,
the messenger is the Lord Jesus Christ, God's son. And when our
Savior chose a text for his first recorded public message, it was
this text, Isaiah chapter 61. It was the passage I read to
you to open our service this evening. And as our Lord preached,
the preacher of preachers preached from this passage. And he made
it plain to us that he himself is the subject of this passage. Not only is it all about him,
but he fulfilled it all. He told the folks that are listening
that day, this day is the scripture fulfilled in your ears. Salvation
has come to Israel. The messenger of salvation came
to teach it to us. So this passage shows us the
person and work of Christ, who is the messenger of salvation.
And that applies to the whole Testament. The whole Testament
is about Christ, certainly, but much more than that. The Old
Testament tells us what Christ came to accomplish for his people. This day is this scripture fulfilled
in your ears. The Lord Jesus Christ, the messenger
of salvation, he came preaching and he told us what it is he
came to accomplish. And then he went and accomplished
it. So here's the first thing. I've got five points that I want
us to see from these three verses. The first one is this. Christ
the Savior speaks. Verse one. The spirit of the
Lord God is upon me because the Lord hath anointed me to preach
good tidings. The Lord Jesus Christ came as
a man, but he never stopped being God. He was always God, yet he
did become a real man. And since he was a man, he needed
to be given the Holy Spirit, just like we do. The Father always
gives his people his spirit. The Apostle Paul called it the
earnest of the inheritance. It's the down payment or engagement
ring, if you will, telling us There's more to come. He gives
all of his people the spirit to dwell in us. The Holy Spirit
dwells in our hearts. And the Holy Spirit dwells in
our hearts for this purpose. To show us the things of Christ.
Every believer here has the Holy Spirit. But we only have the
Spirit in a very limited way, don't we? Very limited. We're
still so full of flesh. But the Father gave the Son,
gave Christ the Spirit without measure. Look over at John chapter
three. He gave him the spirit without
measure because the Lord Jesus is God. He's one with the spirit.
So he has the spirit without measure. John chapter three,
verse 34. This is John the Baptist speaking.
He says, for he whom God has sent speaketh the words of God. He is the word of God. For God
giveth not the spirit by measure unto him. The father gave Christ
the spirit without measure so that he would be equipped to
accomplish the mission the father sent him to do. Now, anytime
the father gives any of his people a job to do, he always equips
us with everything that's necessary to do that job. And when the
father sent his son on a mission, the mission to redeem his people
from their sins, the mission to establish righteousness for
his people, He gave His Son the Spirit without measure so that
He would have all of the power of God to fulfill that mission,
to save His people from their sin. And Christ our Savior, He's
the messenger of salvation. He left no doubt what it is He
came to do. He told us plainly what He came
to do, and He did it through preaching. He came testifying
what it is that He came to do. Now, you know, that ought to
tell us how important preaching is. We meet here Sundays and
Wednesdays. Wayne said that in his prayer. Thank God that we
can meet here on Sundays and Wednesdays and worship to hear
the word preached. This is important. Preaching
of the gospel has to be important. The Savior himself came preaching.
He declared salvation in him, he declared righteousness in
him. I love what Brother Henry said about this. He says, Christ
lived the prince of preachers. He died the theme of all preaching,
and He arose the Lord of all preachers. All of God's preachers
preach Christ. Christ our Savior preached salvation
in Him, and we do too. Preach there's salvation in Him.
We have good tidings. The gospel is good news, good
tidings. Christ says here, He's got some
good tidings. He's preaching some good news.
Now, is this good news for you? Is it for me? Who is this good
news for? Well, the rest of our text that Wayne Red Forest tells
us, this good news is for the meek, for the brokenhearted,
for the prisoners, and for those who mourn. So here's our second
point. Christ, the messenger of salvation,
came to save sinners. Verse one. The spirit of the
Lord God is upon me. because the Lord hath anointed
me to preach good tidings unto the meek. He has sent me to bind
up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and
the opening of the prison to them that are bound. Christ is
the messenger of salvation, and he is the message of salvation. He came preaching himself. This
good news is for the meek, and this good news for the meek is
found in Christ. Now this word meek, it has several
meanings that are kind of all rolled into one. It means depressed. It means self-chastising. And
it means poor. Now this is talking about the
spiritually meek. The meek are so low they're depressed. They can't find any reason for
happiness. They don't see any hope. There's
no reason for happiness. And they know it's all their
own fault. They're self-chastising. My sin is my own fault. This is what I did. And the meek
are poor in spirit. They're so poor, they're spiritually
bankrupt. They've got nothing. They've
got no goodness. They've got no righteousness.
They've got no obedience. They've got no holiness. They've
got nothing that could commend them to God. A few Sundays ago,
Brother Ralph Brown was walking out the door. He told me, I'm
so glad that Christ pleads for us. because we've got nothing
to plead. That's so true. I wish I'd said
that. That's being poor in spirit, knowing I've got nothing to plead.
I need Christ to plead for me. Well, Christ, our Savior, has
got good tidings for the meek. They don't have anything in themselves,
but they have everything in Him. Everything. They're depressed
about themselves, but Christ is their happiness. They're self-chastising,
their sin's all their own fault, and they hate their sin. But
Christ came to heaven with good news. He came to take their sin
away through the sacrifice of Himself. They're poor in spirit. They don't have any righteousness,
but Christ came preaching good tidings. He is their righteousness. That's good news. Good news for
the meek. Then the Savior says that the
Father sent Him to bind up the brokenhearted. Now again, this
is talking about those who are broken hearted over sin, over
their own sin. The father sent his son to bind
up those who have a broken heart. Now we talk about binding up
the broken heart. Scripture does not mean that
Christ takes that old heart with Adam's nature that we're born
with and put duct tape on it and some chicken wire and hold
it all together and fix it up and make it good. No. That old
heart, that old nature is worthless and it's got to be thrown away.
I'll tell you how Christ binds up the broken hearted. He binds
up the broken hearted by giving them a new heart. Perfect, sinless
heart. That's what he said in Ezekiel
chapter 36 verse 26. A new heart also will I give
you and a new spirit will I put within you. I'll take away that
old stony heart. I'll take it out of your flesh.
and I'll give you a heart of flesh, a heart that's soft and
warm and loving and a heart of faith. Christ binds up the broken
heart by giving them a new heart and the new birth. Now, this
is primarily talking about those who are heartbroken over their
sin, and it's talking about the giving of a new heart and the
new birth. But this is also true, speaking to believers. When your
heart's broken, I've got good news. Christ came to comfort. He'll comfort His people. When
our heart's broken over the loss of a loved one, when our heart's
broken over sickness and pain and anguish and uncertainty,
all the sorrows that this sinful flesh causes us, Christ is our
comforter. You know, when one of us is heartbroken,
rightfully so, We talk to one another about Christ who can
comfort. I'd talk to you about it. I'd
tell you where comfort is found. But Christ, the messenger of
salvation, He doesn't just tell you where it's found. He touches
the heart and comforts you. And while the pain is still there,
while the uncertainty of the future is still there, it's alright. It's all right. I know who's
in control of this thing. I know who's ordained this thing.
He actually comes. He doesn't just talk about it
now. He touches the heart and comforts the heart of his people.
He came to bind up the brokenhearted. Then the Savior says the Father
sent him to give freedom to the captive. This is talking about
sinners, sinners who've been taken captive by sin. Now, you
know, when Adam fell, All of us became guilty. When Adam sinned,
we sinned in him. God imputed Adam's guilt, his
sin, to each of us. We became guilty when Adam sinned.
But, more than that, when Adam sinned, we also became prisoners
of sin. We became prisoners of sin because
we received Adam's nature. A nature that can't do anything
but sin. So, you know, we say, Try not
to sin. I'd like to never sin again.
Well, the unregenerate man can't say that and be telling the truth
because the unregenerate man has only the nature of Adam and
that nature doesn't want to quit sinning. All it desires is sin. It drinks iniquity like water.
And even for the believer who's still carrying around that old
nature, when we try to not sin, what do we do? All we do is sin. That's being a captive to sin,
because that's our nature. But Christ came to proclaim liberty
to the captives. And just like comforting the
broken heart, He didn't just come talking about freedom. He
came and made His people free. He brought freedom to them. He gives freedom to His people
by taking hold of that prison door and opening it and telling
them, you're free. Go free. Christ gives His people
freedom from being a captive to sin by giving them a new nature
that can never sin. A nature that rules over that
old nature. Christ sets His people free from
the prison house of God's judgment by taking our place in the prison.
He becomes the prisoner for us so that we can go free in justice. See, that's freedom that can
never be taken away. You know, if it was just an organized
jailbreak, They're going to catch you and put you back in jail.
But if Christ is your substitute, he becomes a prisoner for you. You go free in justice. This
freedom he gives can never be lost. Christ sets his people
free from being bound by our sin, by taking our sin away,
by taking it into his own body on the tree and putting it away
through his sacrifice. Christ sets his people free from
being bound up in the law. by keeping the law for them.
Christ sets his people free from the bondage to this flesh by
giving us a new nature, making us partakers of the divine nature. Now, historically, Isaiah here,
you know, we've seen this as we've gone through our study
in Isaiah. Isaiah is telling the Jews that the day is coming,
that they'll go into captivity in Babylon. But the Lord has
already set the day that he'll come and set them free. But you
know the history of Israel. They go into captivity because
of their sin. The Lord sets them free. Before
long, what do they do? They go back to their idols,
they go back to everything contrary to God, and they go into captivity
again. The Lord miraculously sets them
free, and what do they do? Go right back to their sin, they
go back into captivity. That's the history of the nation
Israel. But that's not the history of
spiritual Israel. Christ makes His people free, so they'll never
be in bondage to sin or to the law ever again. If the Son shall
make you free, you're free indeed. A freedom that can never be lost.
Then here at the beginning of verse 2, Isaiah gives us a good
summary of everything that Christ came to accomplish. To proclaim
the acceptable year of the Lord. Now that's talking about the
year of jubilee. The acceptable year of the Lord
is the year of jubilee. The year of jubilee came every
50 years. Every seventh year, they had
a year of rest in Israel. And after seven of those years
of rest came the year of jubilee. Every 50 years, they had a year
of jubilee. And in that year, everybody that
had been sold into slavery because of a debt over the course of
the last 50 years, they were set free. In the year of Jubilee,
all property that had been lost as a result of a debt was restored
back to the original owner. Every debt was discharged. It was easy to keep the books,
the accounting books in the year of Jubilee. It was all marked,
paid in full. You start from scratch. Every
debt's paid. And a year of rest was proclaimed
for everybody in Israel. And that year of Jubilee is a
picture of what Christ has accomplished for his people. He came to restore
everything we lost in Adam. In Adam, we were sold into slavery
to sin, weren't we? Christ set his people free from
our sin by putting it away with his blood. In Adam, we became
slaves to the law. Christ set us free from the law
by keeping the law for us as our representative. In Adam,
we received a huge sin debt, a debt we can never pay, but
Christ paid it all with his blood. Jesus paid it all. All the dead
I owe. Sin had left a crimson stain,
but He washed it white as snow. And a believer doesn't just have
a year of rest. A believer has eternal rest. Eternal rest from all of our
works of the law. Eternal rest from trying to make
God happy with us by what we do. We just rest in Christ because
He already finished the work that the Father sent Him to accomplish.
Everything we lost in Adam, is restored in Christ so that we
can never lose it. Christ is our year of jubilee.
That's the good news. He is the good news. Then thirdly,
the Savior tells us how he accomplished all this for his people. Verse
two, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord and the day
of vengeance of our God. Now this day of vengeance of
our God is the day of days. It's the day when Christ was
crucified at Calvary. This is the day when the Lord
Jesus Christ, God's perfect holy son, was made sin. When he became
the sin offering for his people and he suffered and died for
their sins. On this day, when the Father
made all of the sin of all of his people to meet on the Lord
Jesus Christ, Christ our substitute bore the vengeance of them. vengeance of God against that
sin. The word vengeance means revenge. God took his revenge against
sin. He took that vengeance out, that
hatred of sin out upon his son. He poured out all of his vengeance
upon his son. He kept pouring it on until the
debt was paid. kept pouring it on until his
revenge was satisfied. You know why his revenge was
satisfied? Only when sin was put away. The sacrifice of Christ
put away the sin of God's people so God's not angry anymore. That's
exactly what this table represents. This bread is broken. It represents
Christ's body broken for us. And his body was not just broken,
it wasn't just bruised and battered and lacerated and punched by
the wrath of man. His body was broken under the
vengeance of God, the vengeance of his father. The body of Christ
our substitute was crushed till his blood flowed out, not just
by the wrath of man, but under the vengeance of his father,
taking out his revenge upon his son. And the blood that was crushed
out of his precious body is the sacrifice that satisfied the
father. That blood paid the debt, the
sin debt of God's elect in full. It removed their sin. So there's
no sin left. It's gone under the blood of
Christ. Now, the father can accept his
people. in Christ because their sin's
gone, removed by the sacrifice of Christ. That's what this table
represents. We can come freely, boldly to
the Father because of the broken body and shed blood of Christ
put our sin away. Now that's how the salvation
of God's elect was purchased. It was by the sacrifice of Christ,
satisfying God's vengeance for us. That's what Christ came to
accomplish and Jesus accomplished it. mission accomplished. And that's why this table, it's
a solemn occasion. It's very solemn, but it's a
celebration. It's a celebration of what our
Savior has accomplished for us. Fourthly, Christ, the messenger
of salvation. He doesn't just talk about the
salvation. He doesn't just talk about what he accomplished. Now
this messenger applies that salvation to the hearts of his people.
Look here at the end of verse two. To comfort all that mourn,
to appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty
for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise
for the spirit of heaviness, that they might be called trees
of righteousness, the planting of the Lord. Now because of the
sacrifice of Christ, our Savior, can comfort all that mourn. He's got something to comfort
them with. He applies His blood to their hearts. Those who mourn
over their sin, who are brokenhearted over their sin, they're comforted
when they hear the blood of Christ remove their sin. And that's
what they hear through the preaching of the gospel. The sacrifice
of Christ gives life to His people. That's what these ashes represent.
What are ashes? Well, they represent death. You
know, ashes are what's left after the fire's gone out. You know,
the fire burns up everything that's got life in it, takes
away everything that's living, and all that's left is ashes.
Ashes represent death. Well, that's what you and I have
in Adam. That's all we have in Adam. We have death. Adam, by
his sin, took away everything that's living and just left us
with ashes. That's what we have is death.
But Christ, He takes away the death of His people by dying
for them as their substitute. And He gives them His life in
the new birth. And that life, the life that
Christ gives, is eternal life. Life that can never be lost.
Then ashes, they represent death. And secondly, ashes represent
sorrow. You know what the old Jews would
do when they were mourning? They'd cover themselves in sackcloth. It must have been a very uncomfortable
material. and they'd cover their head with
ashes. That's how you knew someone was mourning. Well, Christ, our
Savior, has taken away our reason for mourning. We mourn, why? Over our sins. But Christ took
away the sin of His people by a sacrifice. He took away our
reason for mourning. And He gives His people joy.
He trades them our garment of praise, our garment of darkness,
spirit of heaviness, or sackcloth for a garment of praise. That
spirit of heaviness means darkness. Christ takes away the darkness,
the death, the blindness of His people and gives them instead
the garment of praise, the garment of beauty and light in Him. He takes away that old ugly sackcloth,
that old ugly covering of Adam's nature and He covers us in His
nature, His beautiful nature. That's the picture we see in
Ezekiel's baby in chapter 16 of Ezekiel. You remember that
baby? They found it laying out there
in the field. Just cast out there to die. Polluted
in its own blood. Ugly and horrible. Child of heathen
parents. Oh, but it was the time of love.
The Lord scoops that baby up, washed it, took care of it, taught
it, provided for its every need, and made that baby beautiful.
In the end, he said to that baby, all your beauty is perfect. Through
my company that I put on you. This is that beautiful garment
of praise. It's the garment of the righteousness,
the perfect, glorious righteousness and obedience of our Lord Jesus
Christ. And wearing that garment doesn't
just cover our sin and our nakedness and how defiled we are. It's
an outward show. No, the sacrifice of Christ makes
his people righteous through and through. Yes, he gives us
his garment of praise. He covers us with this robe of
righteousness, but he makes his people righteous. He was made
sin for us so that we might be made the righteousness of God
in him, as righteous as Christ himself. That's what these trees
of righteousness are. They're trees of righteous, a
tree's a tree all the way through, not just on the outside, but
all the way through, that tree's a tree. God's people are righteous
through and through, made righteous through the sacrifice of Christ.
Now Christ is the preacher. He's the one who applies these
things to the hearts of his people. I can preach and I can tell you
about these glorious truths. I can tell you about grace and
mercy. I can tell you about righteousness
and life and forgiveness. I can tell you about those things.
If you ever hear Christ the preacher, he's applied them to your heart.
He's applied them to your heart. And he can do that because Christ
is everything that we need. The meek or poor, Christ is our
riches. The broken hearted need help.
They need comfort. Christ is the great physician.
He gives his people a new life. The captive needs freedom. Christ
is our deliverer. And he is actually, he actually
is our freedom. Not only does he proclaim freedom,
he's purchased freedom. He is our freedom. Those who
mourn over their sin need joy. Christ, our comforter, is our
joy. Not only does he comfort His
people by talking to them. He is our comfort. He in our heart is our comfort.
The dead need life. Christ is our life. The guilty
and Adam need righteousness. Christ is our righteousness.
Christ is everything that we need. The messenger is everything
that we need. And then lastly, the messenger
tells us the reason why God did all this. Why did God do all
this? He did it all for the glory of His Son. End of verse 3, that
He might be glorified. Well, of course He should be
glorified. Christ did all the work, didn't He? He bought the
salvation of His people. He applied that salvation to
their heart by applying His blood to their heart. By His providence,
He worked it out so somehow they'd come and hear the gospel preached.
They hear one of God's preachers preaching Christ. And it wouldn't
just be words to them. Christ would give them faith
to believe. He'd give them an ear of faith that would really
hear. He gave them that new heart that would believe the gospel,
would receive those things that he heard. He's applied their
blood, His blood to their heart. Oh, that's so glorious. How Christ has accomplished that
and how He's applied that salvation to His people thrills the heart
of a child of God. God did all this for the glory
of His Son, and God's people want it just that way. We want
Him to get all the glory. And that's what we're going to
remember right now. We're going to remember how glorious
it is that this salvation we've just
heard preached, that we've just heard Christ declare for His
people. Then He accomplished that for
you. He accomplished that for me.
That's what I'm confessing when I take this table, when the men
hand out the bread. I take a piece of that broken,
unleavened bread, picturing the sinless body of our Savior. I'm
confessing He was punished for my sin. He had to die. His body had to be broken for
my sin. When they hand out that wine,
I take a cup of that wine. What I'm saying is he had to
shed his blood for my sin. The only way my sin, I am such
a vile sinner. My sin is so great against an
infinite God. The only way my sin could be
put away is through the blood of God's own Son. And when I
take that and drink that, I'm confessing he shed his blood
to put my sin away. I couldn't have been saved any
other way. That's what we're remembering,
is we remember the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ. All
right, Wayne, if you may, we'll distribute the bread.