Let's open our Bibles again to
Isaiah chapter 52. The title of the message this
evening is Free Redemption in Christ. I pray that our Lord will enable
us, first of all, to see our need of this redemption. And
then he'll let us see the glory of the free redemption that's
in Christ Jesus. Now my first point is this, we
have, you and I, all of us, have a great need of redemption because
of our sin. Isaiah 52 verse 3, for thus saith
the Lord, you've sold yourselves for naught. Now what this is
referring to is the way that a man could pay off his debts
if he didn't have any money. If a man got into such serious
debt, he couldn't have paid everything he had, didn't have a penny left,
he still had a large debt, he could sell himself into slavery
and he'd work for his creditor until the debt was paid. The
law provided a way for him to work off his debt. Well, in Adam,
you and I sold ourselves into sin. We sold ourselves into bondage
to sin, into slavery to sin. Sometimes we use nice words like
bondage or serpent. It doesn't show you the depth
of what this is. This is slavery to sin. When Adam died, when he sinned,
he died spiritually. And all of his race, all of us,
we died spiritually too in Adam. When Adam sinned, what he did
is he sold all his children, all of his race, everyone who
would descend from him, he sold us into slavery to sin. And now
our dead nature can't do anything but sin because we're the slaves
of sin. That's right. That's what we
are by nature. We're slaves to sin. We have to do what sin says
because sin is the master of our nature. And if you want proof
of that, try not to sin. Can't do it. Why can't you? Why
can't you stop sinning? Because we're slaves to sin.
Now the gospel will never be good news until God shows us
that we're sinners, that all we are is sin, that we're slaves
to sin. Look in John chapter 8. The gospel will never be good
news until we see we're slaves to sin. And this is what our
Lord makes clear in John 8 verse 32. Ye shall know the truth and the
truth shall make you free. Now they answered him, these
are the Pharisees our Lord was talking to. They answered him,
we be Abraham's seed and we were never in bondage to any man.
How sayest thou you should be made free? Well, you talk about
revisionist history. That's all Israel had ever been,
seemed like, in bondage to somebody, you know. We'd never been in
bondage to any man. Verse 34, our Lord answered them,
verily, verily, I say unto you, whosoever commit a sin is the
servant of sin. That's how you know that you're
a slave to sin. You commit sin. Even us, Americans
who live in the land of the free and the home of the brave, we're
slaves to sin. But here's the problem. We're
slaves to sin. But when we sold ourselves into
sin, we didn't get anything in return. We just became slaves
to sin. We didn't get something in return
to pay off our debt. We just became slaves and we
can't pay off our debt to sin because we're a slave to sin.
Being a slave to sin stops us from being able to pay off our
debt. Matter of fact, all it does is makes us go further and
further and further, deeper and deeper and deeper into debt.
A slave to sin can never pay off his own sin debt because
what's the wages of sin? It's death. It's not freedom,
it's death. So all man got for selling himself
into sin is loss. We didn't get freedom. Satan
promised freedom, didn't he? We didn't get any, we got bondage.
We didn't get riches, we got poverty. We didn't get honor,
we got shame. We didn't get life, we get death.
So the only way we can be made free from our sin is if we're
made righteous, made without sin so that we'll never sin again.
You and I can't do that on our own. And God gave the law, he
gave the law to Moses to make that obvious, to make it obvious
that there's nothing we can do to make ourselves righteous.
God didn't give us the law as a way to earn some obedience
so it would be easier for Christ to save us. He didn't give us
the law so we could keep part of it or do our best to keep
part of it so we'd earn some favor with God. No, the law was
given to remove all hope in ourselves, to show us how sinful that we
are, to show us we can't keep any of God's law. So we got ourselves
in this mess because of our sin, didn't we? But now somebody else
is going to have to get us out of this mess because we can't
do it for ourselves. We can't do it by our own works.
So here's the second point. The word of God promises free
redemption from sin in Christ. Look at verse three again. For
they say to the Lord, you sold yourselves for not, and you shall
be redeemed without money. Now the law gave two ways for
a slave to go free. He could go free, first of all,
if his debt's paid. But now the problem with that
is he can't pay his own debt, can he? He's spending all his
time serving his master. He can't go out and get him a
side job to pay off his debt. He's a slave. But now a kinsman
redeemer can pay the debt. A kinsman can set him free by
paying his debt for him. And that's what redemption is.
Redemption is simply buying back that which was lost. So the rich
and the generous kinsman, he could pay the redemption price
to set that slave free, but the slave could never do it. So he
could be set free if the kinsman redeemer paid the debt. And the
second way the law gave for a slave to go free is the year of Jubilee. A slave goes free in the year
of Jubilee because in that year, all debts were canceled and he
would go free. Now that law of how the slave
could go free was given as a picture of how God redeems his people
from their sin. Christ is our kinsman redeemer.
You and I can't pay the price, but our kinsman did. And God's
son had to become a man so He could be related to us, so He
could be our kinsman. And all the Word of God is written
to show us Christ. All the Word of God is written
to show us redemption in Christ. And Christ our kinsman, He redeemed
His people. And He did it without money.
Look at 1 Peter chapter 1. Christ paid the redemption price
with something a whole lot more precious and a whole lot more
valuable than money. He paid the debt with his own
blood. 1 Peter 1, verse 18. This is such a familiar passage.
I don't know how many times I've read it and it just gets more
precious every time I read it. For as much as you know that
you're not redeemed with corruptible things, the silver and gold from
your vain conversation received by tradition from your fathers,
but you're redeemed with the precious blood of Christ. as
of a lamb without blemish and without spot. That blood that
was shed as the redemption price is the blood of God. Now explain
that. That's how precious this blood
is. It's the blood of God. And justice was satisfied and
mercy was magnified when God in the person of his son shed
his blood to pay the redemption price for his people. Now redemption,
you're going to go free without money. Redemption is free to
the sinner. We don't contribute anything
to it, do we? But it cost Christ his life. He had to lay down
his life to redeem his people. First, God's son had to become
a man. He's going to be the representative
of his people. He's got to be bone of their bone and flesh
of their flesh. He's got to become a man. And God's son had to become
a man so that he'd have something to pay. God's Son had to have
human blood to pay the price for human sin. Animal blood wouldn't
do it. They offered how many animal
sacrifices did they ever offer and they never took away sin.
So God's Son had to have human blood to pay for human sin. And
second, in order to pay the sin debt of His people, the Lord
Jesus not only had to be a man, He had to be a perfect man. He
had to be a spotless lamb. As a man, he had to obey the
law perfectly. Not just indeed, not just outwardly
where we could see it, but in heart, in motive, in thought. He had to obey God's law perfectly. And he did. The Lord Jesus earned
a perfect righteousness as a man by obeying the law perfectly
so that he'd have perfect blood to shed as payment for the sin
of his people. That blood, brethren, paid the
debt. Now it's paid in full. Then his
people must go free. They can't be held captive any
longer. The debt's paid. They go free. They go out for
nothing. They didn't pay anything to help
even to pay this debt. Christ paid it all to redeem
his people from their sin. They went out for nothing. And
they went out for nothing in this way too. Now you think of
this. We sold ourselves into sin, slaves
to sin, and God paid the redemption price to set us free. But now
he didn't pay anything to the captive, the captor, the one
who was holding us captive. He didn't pay anything to Satan.
He didn't pay anything to sin to set us free. God's a debtor
to no one. And that includes Satan. God
did not pay a price to Satan. prince of the power of the air,
so that Satan would let God's elect go free. No, he did not. Satan didn't have a choice in
the matter. God's not going to pay Satan anything. Satan's not
going to profit for coming and deceiving Eve. He's not going
to profit for helping plunge man into sin and rebellion against
God. Payment was made to redeem God's
elect, but that payment was made to God, who we've sinned against. That payment wasn't made to anyone
who held us captive. I don't know if I've explained
that just right, but there's a beauty there that I cannot
describe. I sat in my study this week just
overwhelmed by that. Satan held us captive, but God
didn't pay him to set his people free. God paid himself so that
his people could go free. You see, man didn't get anything.
for selling ourselves into slavery to sin. And worse yet, God didn't
get anything for it either. Man was created to be the servant
of God. But when man sold himself into
sin, man defrauded God. Man took God's property away
and sold it to sin. And God didn't get anything in
return. Yet God, the one who was defrauded because of man's
sin, paid the redemption price to set his people free and bring
them back to him. I love that. I love how God is
both glorified and satisfied in that transaction by paying
the debt. He paid the debt himself and
he paid it to himself and set his people free. So a slave goes
free when the debt's paid in full. Now the second way a slave
would go free under the law is when the year of jubilee came.
Well, Christ is our year of jubilee. Just like Christ is our Sabbath,
Christ is our year of jubilee. All the debt that his peoples
canceled because he paid it with his blood. And in that year of
jubilee, Israel had a year of rest. Well, Christ is more than
a year of rest. He's eternal rest to his people. When God sets his people free
from sin, They rest, they rest from their works of the law.
They rest from trying to please God and they become servants
of righteousness. I'll show you that Romans chapter
six. Paul in Romans six is talking to believers. Now, since Christ
died for you, what is your attitude to be? You're not the servant
of sin anymore. Now you're the servant of, you're
his servant, you're the servant of righteousness. What should
your attitude be? since Christ redeemed you. Romans
6 verse 11. Likewise, reckon ye also yourselves
to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in
your mortal body, that you should obey it and the lust thereof.
Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness
unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive
from the dead. and your members as instruments
of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion
over you, for you're not under the law, you're under grace.
Now this is what the natural man will say. What then? Shall
we sin because we're not under the law, but under grace? God
forbid. Now the next verses, Paul tells
us why a believer doesn't want to sin, that grace may abound. And the reason is we're servants
of Christ, not servants of sin. Verse 16, know ye not that to
whom you yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants you are
to whom you obey, whether of sin unto death or of obedience
unto righteousness, but God be thanked. You were the servants
of sin, but you've obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine
which was delivered unto you. Being then made free from sin,
you became the servants of righteousness. Now that's our attitude and that's
the result of Christ's free redemption. We rest from our works of the
law. We rest from all those works, all those efforts trying to please
God and we become servants of righteousness. Now here's the
third point. God gave us a picture of that
free redemption in the Old Testament. That's what all the Old Testament
is written about. And Isaiah gives us a specific
picture here, that's a picture of free redemption in Christ.
Isaiah 52 verse 4. For thus saith the Lord God,
my people went down aforetime into Egypt to sojourn there,
and the Assyrian oppressed them without cause. Now therefore,
what have I here, saith the Lord, that my people has taken away
for naught? They that rule over them make them to howl, saith
the Lord. and my name continually every
day is blasphemed. Now, if you want encouragement
that God will deliver you from your current state, I tell you
the best thing to do is look in the past and see how God has
delivered Israel in the past, how he's delivered his people
in the past. He never let them perish, did
he? And God here in the Israel sojourn in Egypt gives us a picture
free redemption from sin when he set his people free from Egypt.
That's what all that was was his purpose and all that was
to give us a picture of free redemption in Christ. Now, you
know the story Israel went down to Egypt during the time of famine.
They're just 70 of them and they grew to a great nation, but they
ended up being slaves in Egypt. Now that bondage wasn't right.
It was fraud. They didn't do anything to owe
a debt to the Egyptians. They didn't do anything wrong
that they're being punished. Israel didn't do anything wrong.
The Egyptians just took control by their military might and put
Israel, God's people into bondage. And that bondage, that slavery
was horrible, just horrible. You imagine being a slave to
a wicked person, having your entire life controlled by a wicked
person. The Egyptians, just like in the
days of the old South here in our country, those people, white
people would do anything they wanted to a black person. The
Egyptians could do anything they wanted to do to an Israelite
and nobody would say anything about it. The Egyptians made
it impossible for the Jews to make bricks. They said, you got
to make bricks without straw, but now your daily total can't
go down. You got to make as many as you
did before. That's unreasonable, but they could do it. They beat
the Israelites with whips. They could control how much food
they had to eat. They could control how much time they had to sleep.
I mean, it was total control. One day they came in and took
all their babies and killed them. Now you imagine, I mean, I just
can't even imagine how horrible that would be to have an infant
baby taken and thrown to drown in the River Nile. I mean, I
can't imagine that. But they could do it. They were
the masters. And the children of Israel groaned. They howled under that heavy
burden and cruel bondage. Now we think, that's an awful
story. But you got to remember what
this is a picture of. This is a picture of free redemption
in Christ. Israel's bondage in Egypt is
given to us as the bondage of God's elect when they're in bondage
under sin. And just like the Egyptians did
to the Israelites, sin does what it wants. It whistles and we
come running. We can't help it. We're the slave
to sin. The law puts demands on us, sin
will not let us keep. Sin brings nothing to us but
disease, sorrow, loss, and misery. And when sin's finished with
us, it brings forth death, puts us to death. And God brings his
people in that bondage to the place where they groan, where
they howl under the burden of such a cruel master as sin. And when God brought Israel to
the place where they howled, Their cries came up to God. You
know what he did? He heard them. He sent them a
deliverer. In his might, he delivered Israel
and set them free. Scripture calls that redemption
from the bond. They were redeemed from the bond.
They were redeemed from their bondage. But you know what? Not
one red cent was paid to the Egyptians to let Israel go free.
Matter of fact, that night they were leaving, who paid who? The
Egyptians paid the Israelites. Here, take all my family. We've
hoarded up all this gold and jewels. Why don't you just take
it all and leave the pastor? They paid Israel to leave. Israel
didn't pay anything to that bondman to leave. How did they go free? How did Israel go free? Through
the picture of redemption that's in Christ Jesus. They went free
through the blood of the substitute. They went free through the blood
of the Passover lamb. And that price, I want to make
this clear, was not paid to Pharaoh. No, sir. That price was paid
to God. What did God say? When I see
the blood, I'll pass over you. That blood was paid to him. And
he told them that. He said, you take this lamb,
you make sure it's perfect. You watch it. You make sure it's
perfect. You kill the lamb. You catch its blood in a basin.
You roast its body with fire. You put the blood on the door.
And you go in there and you eat that lamb. And you eat that Passover
in haste. You know why? You're leaving
this place. Because when I see the blood,
you're going free. All that was given to us for
this reason. picture of redemption that's
in Christ Jesus. Now you look to the Lamb. You
look to Christ. You plead His blood and you'll
go free for nothing. That's what this is a picture
of. And here's the fourth point. God gives us assurance that He'll
keep His word. He gives us an assurance of free
redemption in Christ. And the assurance is this. It's
God's glory. Look at verse 6. Therefore, my
people shall know my name. Therefore, they shall know in
that day that I am he that does speak. Behold, it's I. Now, he says there at the end
of verse five, he said, my name continually every day is blaspheme. Well, God's not going to allow
that to happen. Whatever he does, God does it to bring glory to
his name. And he'll never allow anything
to happen. Anything that'll take away the glory of his name. And
he's going to teach his people the glory of his name. He's going
to speak to them and teach them the glory of his name. Now, this
is something every believer knows. I don't care where you find them.
They know the glory of the name of Christ. They know Christ gets
all the glory and salvation. Every believer knows that. The
newest believer, that's the first thing God teaches them. Every
believer knows we didn't do anything to contribute to this salvation.
So we don't get any glory at all. The only thing I contributed
to this equation is sin that required redemption. There's
no glory in that. Christ gets all the glory for
taking that sin away. He did all the work of redemption,
so he gets all the glory. Now God is going to get the glory
when he saves a sinner. So the gospel that we preach,
is a glorious gospel, isn't it? This glory, this gospel that
we preach declares the glory of Christ our Savior. Now I ask
you, this is a glorious gospel. What's more glorious than God
choosing sinners to save? Even though left to ourselves,
we never choose him. That's glorious. What's more
glorious? than God sending His only begotten
Son to die for sinners, to shed His precious blood to pay the
sin debt for a people who would never ask Him to do it if left
to themselves. And after He's done paying the
debt, they can never pay Him back. Yet He did it anyway. That's glorious. What's more
glorious than God sending His Spirit to give life to a dead
sinner. I mean to actually give eternal
life to a dead sinner so that they hear and believe the gospel
and look to Christ. It's more glorious than that.
What's more glorious than Christ by His power, keeping His people
so that they'll never fall, even though we can't keep ourselves
for a split second? What's more glorious than that?
Not a thing. And everyone God saves is going
to see that. They're going to see that glory.
They're going to see they didn't contribute anything to their
salvation. They didn't do anything to set
themselves free. Christ did that for them. Now seeing that, believing that,
that's knowing God's name. That's knowing God's character.
That's knowing how God saves sinners. That he will do it in
a way that he gets all the glory because he's not going to share
his glory with another. And knowing his name means I
don't want it any other way. That's the way I want it. You
preach to me a gospel that declares the glory of Christ, and I'll
find rest and comfort and assurance for my soul. Not one sinner for
whom Christ died, not one will ever perish. Because if Christ
lost even one for whom he died, He'd lose all of His glory. He
wouldn't lose just part of it. He'd lose it all. And that makes
salvation sure. That gives rest to the heart
if you're a sinner. If you can't do anything for
yourselves. Now I want you to look in closing
at Exodus chapter 32. God saves sinners for His glory. Then if you're lost, Ask God
to get glory by saving you. If you'd like God to answer your
prayer, grant your request, ask for God's glory. Ask Him to do
something that will bring glory to His name. In Exodus 32, we
have an example of that. Verse 9. This is when the children
of Israel made the golden calf. In Exodus 32, verse 9. The Lord
said unto Moses, I've seen this people. And behold, it's a stiff
neck people. Now, therefore, let me alone
that my wrath may wax hot against them, that I may consume them
and I'll make of thee a great nation. Now, you know, to the
flesh, that sounds like a pretty good deal. These people are giving
Moses a headache and he just, you know, just if you can be
done with them and you're going to make me a great nation, that
sounds pretty good, doesn't it? I want you to look what Moses
said, verse 11. And Moses besought the Lord his God, he begged mercy
for that stiff necked people. He besought the Lord his God
and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people,
which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt with
great power, with a mighty hand? Wherefore should the Egyptians
speak? This is, he said, now, if you destroy your people, this
is what the Egyptians are going to say. Wherefore should the
Egyptians speak and say, for mischief did he bring them out,
to slay them in the mountains and to consume them from the
face of the earth. Turn thy fierce wrath and repent of this evil
against thy people. He said, Lord, if you take your
people out in the wilderness and kill them, the Egyptians
are going to say, I knew it all along. He said he's going to
redeem them without money. He's going to redeem them without
price, but he couldn't do it. So he destroyed them out there
in the wilderness. And the Egyptians are going to say, we knew it.
That's a false God all along. That God doesn't have any glory.
Our gods are the snakes and the rivers and the moons and the
sun just as wonderful as this God. This God doesn't have any
glory. He couldn't redeem his people. He couldn't bring them
to the land that he promised. That's what he says in verse
13. He said, remember your covenant. Remember Abraham, Isaac and Israel,
thy servants to whom thou swearest by thine own self. And you said
unto them, I'll multiply your seed as the stars of heaven,
and all this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your
seed, and they'll inherit it forever. Lord, do this, spare
your people, show mercy for the glory of your name, and to keep
your covenant, to keep your word. Verse 14, and the Lord repented
of the evil which he thought to do unto his people. The Lord
spared that stiff-necked, rebellious people falling down and worshiping
a calf made out of gold so the glory, the reputation of his
name wouldn't be ruined. Now, would you like God to save
you? Would you like God to be merciful to you? Then ask God
to save you for this exact same reason. Just use this prayer
of Moses as a pattern. Ask God to save you so his name
would be glorified in saving such a rotten sinner as you. Are you a poor sinner with nothing
to pay? Are you such a poor sinner you
don't have anything that will commend you to God? Are you such
a horrible sinner that God would get glory by saving you? Would it be such a miracle That
a sinner like you could be saved? That God would have to get all
the glory? Is your sin so great that it would be a miracle if
God could forgive your sin? Are you such a vile sinner that
it would be such an amazing miracle that God would make you righteous?
It would be such a miracle that He'd have to get glory in that?
If that describes you, then this free redemption in Christ is
for you. It's for sinners. You know, the
Lord began chapter 52 by telling his people, now you wake up and
you see my power in salvation. Well, then I say this evening
to all of you who believe, let's wake up. Now let's wake up and
let's expect a great salvation. Let's expect full and free redemption
that Christ has purchased for his people. And let's enjoy it. Brothers and sisters, You're
free. You're free. You're free from
sin. You're free from the controlling
power of sin. You're free from the condemning
power of sin. You're free. Free in Christ. What do you got to say to that? Thank you, Lord. Thank God. To God be the glory. To God be
the glory. for redemption that's in Christ. And after we bow and pray, that's
when life's gonna lead us in sin. Let's bow in prayer. Our Father, we can't find words to thank you enough
for this glorious, free redemption that's in your Son, our Lord
Jesus Christ. Father, we're thankful. We're
thankful that in your infinite love and mercy and grace, you'd
send your son to be the representative of his people, that you'd send
your son as a man made under the law, that he might earn a
perfect righteousness, that he would impute to his people to
make them righteous, the righteousness of God in him. And that you would
send your own darling son to the cross and make him sin for
his people. That he might take away our sin
and redeem us from our sin. Full and free redemption in him. Sin gone forever under his blood. Father, we're thankful. How can
we ever thank you? And we thank you that you send
your gospel to your people. That you don't leave this thing
to chance. You send your gospel to your people. That you give
faith to hear. Faith to believe and look to
Christ. Father, we pray you'd bless your words that's been
preached tonight. Cause it to be mixed with faith. Cause your
people to hear with faith and look and find salvation in our
Lord Jesus Christ. Cause your people to rest and
joy in a glorious free redemption that's in Christ Jesus through
his blood. Father, we're thankful. Bless
us, we pray. Bless your word for your namesake.
You said your word would not return unto you void. Father,
cause it to bring glory to your name and comfort and assurance
to the hearts of your people. First, in the name of our Lord
Jesus Christ, for the glory of his name, we