If you would, open your Bibles
again to John chapter 1. Now, the theme of this book we're
going to begin to study this morning is the deity of Christ. John starts with that theme in
the very first words of this gospel, and he hammers it all
the way through the whole gospel, the deity of Christ. Now, between
verse 1 and verse 14 of chapter 1, in the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the
Word was God. In verse 14, the Word was made
flesh and dwelt among us. Now, something great has happened
between those two verses. There's a message there worth
preaching. There's a message there worth
believing. something great has happened between these two verses,
and Lord willing, we're going to look and see what that is
this morning. Now, there's four things I'd
like for us to see in these fourteen verses this morning. John tells
us, first of all, something about the Lord Jesus Christ, who He
is. He tells us, second, something about man, who man is. Third,
he tells us something about those who believe. And fourth, he tells
us how it is that God saves those who believe. So first, John tells
us who the Lord Jesus Christ is. He shows us something here
of the glory of the person of Christ. First, John tells us
that the Lord Jesus Christ is God. Look in verse 1. In the
beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the
Word was God. The same was in the beginning
with God. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ is
God, and as God, he's eternal. You notice John doesn't say,
from the beginning. He says, in the beginning. In
the beginning. That means that Christ does not
have a beginning or an ending. He's eternal. The world was from
the beginning, wasn't it? The world has a beginning. When
God said, let there be light, the world had a beginning. The
world is from the beginning. is in the beginning. And that
Word is the Lord Jesus Christ. You'll notice that W is capitalized. It's speaking of someone's name,
someone specific. And that person is the Lord Jesus
Christ. He is the Word of God. The way
that God communicates with men is through His Son, the Lord
Jesus Christ. And that tells us something about
God in and of itself. How wonderful is it? that God
would stoop to communicate with sinful men and women, those who
rebelled against Him in the fall. How wonderful is it, beyond human
comprehension, that God Almighty would communicate with us, much
less through a son that He'd send into this world. You know,
I communicate with you by words. I can't just stand up here and
will it, If I don't speak words, you're never going to understand
what I'm trying to tell you. I use words to communicate with
you. When our girls were little, you
know how little children are. They just whine, jam. She'd never
tolerate that. She'd always say, use your words.
Use your words. That's what's so frustrating
with you and Noah's so sick. He doesn't have the words to
tell you. Use your words. That's how we communicate with
one another. And God's Word is His expression of Himself. Christ. He reveals the thoughts of God.
We would never know the thoughts of God if Christ didn't come
and reveal them. Christ reveals the will of God.
Christ reveals the heart of God. Christ is everything that God
has to say to men. Everything. He is everything
that God has to say to men. In Revelation 1, Christ calls
Himself the Alpha and Omega. He's the first and last letter
of the Greek alphabet and everything in between. He's the whole alphabet
and He's every word that's spelled by those alphabets. That alphabet,
He is the Word of God. Look over in verse 18 of John
1. No man has seen God at any time. The only begotten Son,
which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. He's the Word of God that has
declared God. Look over in Hebrews chapter
1. If we're going to know anything
from God, it's going to be through Christ, the Word of God. He communicates
God to men. Hebrews 1 verse 1, God who at
sundry times and in diverse or different manners spake in time
past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last
days spoken unto us by His Son. He's spoken unto us by the Word,
His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Arthur Paint made this statement.
In Christ, God is fully told out because Christ is the Word
of God. Now, the Lord Jesus Christ, He
is God and He has all the attributes of God. John lists here his eternality,
but he could have gone on and on and on. Every attribute that
we know God to have, Christ has, because he is fully God. And
he's part of the Holy Trinity. You'll notice that John doesn't
say that the Word was with the Father, because he wasn't just
with the Father. He was with God. He was with
that Holy Trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit
all were together. The whole Godhead. There's one
God. in three distinct persons, Father,
Son, and Holy Spirit. And they're all three equally
God. They're all God. And that's what
he's saying is that the Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God,
He is God. Secondly, he tells us this about
the person of Christ. He's the Creator. Look in verse
3. All things were made by Him,
and without Him was not anything made that was made. Now, we know
God created the heavens and the earth. And John tells us that
work of creation is the work of the sun. We read over in the
scripture in Genesis 1, God said, God said, God said, God said. And every time God said it was
so and it was good. God said. That's the word of
God. God said, that's his word moved
and created everything in God's creation. Christ is the creator
of everything physical and every spiritual life. All spiritual
life, He's the creator of it. He's the giver of it. Now, all
life depends upon the creator. That's probably why men are so
insistent on this theory of evolution. Because if there's a creator,
we're beholden to Him. We're dependent upon Him. All
life comes from God. All life is dependent upon God.
We get everything that sustains life from God. The air we breathe, God gave
it. The food we eat this afternoon,
when we sit down to eat, we give thanks because God gave it. The
water we drink, Janet filled this glass up for me this morning.
God gave it. He gives us everything that there
is to sustain our life. It all comes from the Creator.
And the same thing is true of spiritual life. God must give
it. And when He gives it, He sustains
it. He gives everything that's necessary
to sustain it because He's the Creator. And that brings us to
the third thing John tells us about the person of Christ. He
is life. Look at verse 4. In Him was life,
and the life was the light of men. All living creatures have
their life in Christ. He gives life, He sustains life.
Every living thing on this earth will live as long as God gives
it life. In Him we live and move and have
our being. Now that's true physically and
that's true spiritually. Christ is our life. It's not accurate to say that
Christ is alive. It's accurate to say Christ is
life. And knowing Him is life eternal. I'll show you that in John 17. We shouldn't just say that Christ
is alive. That's not accurate. He is life. And knowing him is life eternal. John 17, verse 3. And this is
life eternal. We're not left to wonder. The
Lord gives us the definition. Here it is. This is life eternal.
That they may know thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ,
whom thou hast sent. Knowing Christ. is life eternal,
because He is life. And fourth, John tells us this
about the person of Christ. He is light. Look at verse 4. In Him was life, and the life
was the light of men. That light is the Lord Jesus
Christ. Now look over Genesis 1. We read
this to begin our service. In verse 3, God said, Let there
be light. And there was light. And God
saw the light, that it was good. And God divided the light from
the darkness. That light is Christ. That light's
not the sun. He didn't create the sun to the
fourth day. That light is Christ. He is light. He wasn't created. He appeared. Let there be light. Let that light appear. And He
appeared. And that light This person of
the Lord Jesus Christ lets us see. Now this is important, because
we're going to see this in a minute. Why is this so important to you
and me? Because all men are darkness. We don't have any light. And
if we don't have any light, we have no ability to see. You can't
see anything without light. Without light, we cannot see
our sinful condition. I could stand up here all day
long and from God's Word tell you, you're a sinner. You'll
never see it. unless God turns the light on,
unless He reveals the Lord Jesus Christ to you. We can't see our
sinful condition ever until we see ourselves in the light of
who He is. Without any light, we can't see
our hopelessness. Until we see the light of Christ,
we think we can do something for ourselves. Until we have
light, we have no idea that we need a Savior. And we will never
know it until we see light, the Lord Jesus Christ, until God
says, let there be light. We'll never see. But when he
says, oh, let there be light. Suddenly, we see we see the gospel,
we see every every truth that's necessary for our salvation,
we see it through the light, the Lord Jesus Christ. And I
said that exactly the way I meant to say it through the light.
The Lord Jesus Christ, not the light of Christ, the light, the
Lord Jesus Christ. Look over second Corinthians
chapter four. The only way we can know God is through the word
of God, right? That's the way God communicates
with men through the word of God. Well, the only way we'll
ever see God is through the light, the Lord Jesus Christ. Second
Corinthians four, verse six. For God. who commands the light
to shine out of darkness, has shined in our hearts to give
the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. That's how we see God, in the
light of the Lord Jesus Christ, the light of His glorious face.
And fifth, John tells us this about the person of Christ. He
is gracious and merciful and loving enough to send us a messenger. Look at verse 6 in John 1. And
there was a man sent from God, whose name was John. God created
man perfect. We read that how God created
Adam in the garden. He was perfect. God didn't create
something simple. He created a perfect man. But
Adam fell. And God is so loving that He
purposed to save some of Adam's fallen race. Between verse 4
and verse 5 in our text, something happened. In him was light, and
the light was the light of men. And the light shined in darkness,
and the darkness comprehended it not." Now, something great
happened between those two verses. And what happened between those
two verses is Adam fell. When Adam fell, he lost all light. And he plunged all of his descendants
into complete, utter darkness. When Adam fell, he rebelled against
God. He rebelled against the crown
rights of God to do with his own as he will. He rebelled against
the sovereign rule of God. When Adam fell, he took all of
his sons with him. Ever since Adam fell, all of
us have had the same nature of Adam. We all said, I'll not have
this man to reign over me. Because we're in darkness. That's
why we say that. But God's so gracious. He's so merciful. He's so loving, He sent a witness
to tell fallen men of salvation in His Son. So the Lord Jesus
Christ, the glory of His person, He's God. He's the Creator. He is life itself. He's light
itself. And He's merciful and gracious.
Second, John tells us who man is. Mankind is fallen in Adam. And John tells us three things
that happen. all men, all mankind, as a result of the fall of Adam.
And the first one is this. Because Adam fell, man, all man,
is blind. Look at verse 5. The light shined
in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not. There was
a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a
witness, to bear witness of the light, that all men through him
might believe. Now, every man, woman and child
born into this world is born spiritually blind. We can't see
light. We can see no light whatsoever.
So we don't know what we look like. We don't have any idea
what we are by nature because we can't see ourselves. We can't
see what the light reveals about ourselves because we're in darkness. We have no concept of our sin,
no concept of our need because we're in darkness. The only reason
God sent a witness to bear witness of the light is men are blind. Light is its own witness, isn't
it? I mean, if you're sitting in darkness and somebody turns
the light on, they don't need to say, hey, turn the light on.
When they turn the light on, oh, light's its own witness. Unless you're blind. If you're
blind, you need someone to come bear witness of the light. A
lady that works for me, Lord willing, yesterday she became
a grandmother. She was telling me about the
pictures they're taking of this baby. They were going to do slavery
yesterday morning. And they're taking pictures of
this baby thirsty. Just to make sure everything
was fine with the baby. I don't know what kind of picture
it was, but the kid's asleep. So they try to wake it up. They
put this thing on the mother's belly and they're blowing chimes
in there and got all this light. I mean, they're aggravating this
little boy. And he puts his hand over his eyes and rolled over.
to go back to sleep. That kid can see. He can see
light. That's just, what a miracle. We don't have that ability by
nature. The sound of the gospel irritates
the life out of us by nature. And we'll just hide our eyes.
We don't even have that ability that that little boy has in his
mother's womb to see light. We're so blind. God had to send
us a witness to tell us of the light. And this is how blind
we are. When that witness comes, he has
to tell us, I'm not the light. Look at verse eight. He was not
that light, but he was sent to bear witness of that light. John
had to tell him he had to confess and say, I'm not the Christ.
I'm not the light. I'm not even worthy to undo his
sandal. Christ is the light. He had to
point out. Me and my darkness, I'm not the light. My goodness,
that's our fallen dead nature. I asked Janet if I could tell
this story. She said I could. When she was five or six years
old. This will tell you the importance of teaching our children. Five
or six years old, she understood there's a Trinity. She understood
that. And she sat there right where Maggie's sitting on the
second row. That's where she sat. Every week. And there sat Henry.
Don fits her, and invariably there's a third man sitting up
there. Read the scripture. She's looking. Finally, she's
sitting there one day. I don't know what then. It was
in the service, and she leans over and asks her mother. She
says, is that God? It made sense to her. There's three. Is that
God? And Athel just horrified her.
She says, no, that's not God. And that's kind of a cute story
of a little girl's perspective, of a child's perspective. But
that's man's nature. That is our nature. Somebody
has to tell us, no, I'm not the light. He's the light. That's how blind we are by nature.
Look at verse 9. That was the true light, that
light of every man that cometh into the world. Now, this verse
is not teaching that all men have some spark of spiritual
light in them. It doesn't mean that at all. It means that all men have some
natural understanding. All men have some moral life.
What it means is all men are born with a conscience. Now,
we do everything we can do to kill it and ignore it, but all
men are born with a conscience. We'll ignore it when it doesn't
suit us to have conscience. Men can tell by the things that
they see in creation that God is. God put that knowledge in
them. That's what Paul said in Romans
1. God put that knowledge in them. They know that God is.
They can see it by the things that's created. They just choose
to ignore it. We're blind by nature and we're
willingly blind. We willingly turn our eyes away
from the Lord Jesus Christ because we fell in Adam. Second, John
tells us because of the fall of Adam, men didn't know and
didn't recognize the Creator when He walked among them. Look
at verse 10. He was in the world. The world
was made by Him and the world knew not God. in human flesh,
walked among men, walked among his creation. He worked miracles. He did things only God could
do. He healed the sick for whom there
was no cure. He raised the dead. They're on
their way to the cemetery and he raised the dead. He walked
on water. He turned the water into wine.
And if all that wasn't proof enough, this man is God. He forgave
sin. He said, Thy sins be forgiven
thee. Only God can do that. But men
didn't see. And men refused to see. The nature
of man will never change. Men don't recognize the Creator
now when we hear him. The ox knows its owner. The ax
knows its master's crib. We don't recognize who God is.
This word, no, is a whole lot more than just recognizing. This
is an indictment on our nature. It's more than just recognizing.
It means to love. The word actually means in the
original Greek to be joined, like a husband and wife are joined
together in love. That's what the Lord told those
false professors there in the judgment. He said, I never knew
you. Now, he knew who they were. He
knows everything. He knew their names. He knew
what they did, where they'd gone. He knew everything about them.
He didn't say, I don't know who you are. I know who you are.
What he's saying is, I never loved you. You were never one
with me. You were never joined to him.
And because of the fall of Adam, all men like it that way. We hate God. We hate God's Son. And we do not want to be joined
to him because of the fall of Adam. We don't know or love the
Creator. Third, because of the fall of
Adam, man, all mankind, rejects God's Christ and rejects God's
Savior. Look at verse 11. He came unto
his own and his own received him not. The Lord Jesus came
to his own nation, that nation Israel, the nation that he had
dealt with almost exclusively from the time of Abraham. They
didn't recognize him. He told them who they were. They
didn't listen. He told them plainly. After he
told them plainly who he was, they said, now tell us plainly
whether you'd be the Christ or not. He told them. They wouldn't
listen. They wouldn't hear. They wouldn't
love him. He showed them through his miracles. He showed them
through all the ways he fulfilled all those Old Testament types
and prophecies of the Messiah. And they wouldn't see. They had
the Old Testament scriptures. They read them every day. They
had the priesthood. They had all those sacrifices
that pictured the sacrifice of Christ. They wouldn't see. They
had the prophets who all spoke of Christ. They said, oh, we've
got Abraham. And they wouldn't listen to Abraham's
message. Our Lord said, Abraham, he saw. Abraham had some life. He saw
my day and was glad. But they didn't see. They would
not see him. They wouldn't love him. And they
ended up crying, crucifying him. And the problem was this, the
nature of Israel in the wilderness, that nation that Moses led out
of Egypt, crossed the Red Sea on dry land out into that wilderness
to the brink of the Promised Land, their nature was the nature
of unbelief. They entered not in because of
unbelief. And all those years later, the
nation, Israel, that our Lord came to, had the same nature
of unbelief. And the nature of mankind hasn't
changed from the time of Adam until today. It's a nature of
unbelief. A nature of rebellion and unbelief. Satan said, oh, you eat that
fruit, you won't die. God said you would. But he ate anyway. Unbelief. And we preach the gospel
and preach the gospel and preach. I can't tell you, I couldn't
even count up how many services I've been in from the time I
was a little boy. Here in the gospel preached and
we do not believe. Unless God says, let there be
light. That's why we keep preaching,
because God is good. We're going to get I'm getting
ahead of myself, but God's going to save somebody. That's why
we keep preaching. That's why we keep going, because
if he's going to do it, he's going to do it through his word,
through a written word, the incarnate word. I lost my place. This nature of unbelief we have.
Oh, it's an obstinate refusal to believe the record that God's
given us. It's an obstinate refusal to
believe that God is who He says He is. It's an obstinate refusal
to believe we are who God says we are. It's an obstinate refusal
to believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is who He says He is.
It's a refusal to believe that God saves sinners in such a way
that God's going to get all the glory. We refuse to believe that
God will save a people in a way that enables him to be just and
justifier. Salvation does not come when
you decide if you're going to let Jesus into your heart or
not. Salvation allows God to remain holy and still show mercy
to sinners. But man rejects that nature because
we're fallen in Adam. The nature of man is completely
There's no spark of anything good in us. Our nature hates
God and refuses God's Son. Now you'll notice I didn't say
the nature of man is not religious. Man's religious. Very religious. But a blind man has devised a
thousand ways to obtain salvation. And every one of those ways leads
to destruction. Every one of those ways is going
to lead to falling in the ditch every time because it's the blind
leading the blind. And they'll never see God's way
because we're falling in that. But third, all's not lost. Third, John tells us God's going
to save some. He tells us who the believers
are. Look at verse 12. For as many as received him,
to them gave he power. He gave them the right or the
blessed privilege to become sons of God, even to them that believe
on his name, which were born, not of blood, nor of the will
of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God, but of the
will of God. A man by nature will despise
and reject God's son, but now somebody is going to receive
him. Somebody is going to believe.
Now what is this to receive? As many as received him. What
is it to receive Christ? And no one is saved because they
receive Christ. I know that's the common religious
lie of our day. Well, you'll be saved if you
receive Christ. That's a lie. A sinner is saved
because Christ receives sinners. Isn't that right? This man receives
sinners. That's our hope of salvation.
No one's saved because they received Christ. The fact that we receive
Christ is evidence God's already done a work of grace in our heart
and given us faith to believe him and to lovingly receive him. He's given us a new nature, a
nature that would love him, that would receive him. Natural man
will always reject Christ. Look in Luke chapter 19, just
back a few pages. Natural man rejects Christ. What does a spiritual man do? Luke chapter 19, look at verse
5. But when Jesus came to the place,
he looked up and he saw him. Saw Zacchaeus up there in that
tree. And he said unto him, Zacchaeus, make haste and come down. For
today I must abide at thy house. He didn't say, Zacchaeus, now
will you receive me into your house? He said, Zacchaeus, I'm
coming in. I'm going to abide at thy house.
And verse 6, Zacchaeus made haste and he came down and received
him joyfully. Why did he receive him? He'd
been born again. God gave him a new nature that
would believe and receive the Lord Jesus Christ. John says,
as many as received him. Him. received Christ, not received
the doctrines of grace, not received the catechism of the preacher,
not repeated some words that the preacher made up, whoever
received him, whoever received Christ is everything we need. To as many as received Christ
is everything that we're not. To many as received Christ as
King and Savior, God gave them the right to become sons of God. Now, why did they receive Christ?
Because God gave them the power to. God gave them the power,
the privilege to become sons of God. Zacchaeus received a
privilege. Today I must abide at your house.
That's a privilege. He gave him the right to become
son of God. God gave them power to believe
and receive God's Son. They didn't have that power in
themselves. They don't have the power to
make a decision to receive Jesus or not. God gave them that power. Well, now how'd that happen?
How did God give them the power to receive Christ? They were
given a new nature in the new birth. That's why we believe. That's why we receive Christ,
because they're born again. And when they're born again,
they receive a new nature. They receive the nature of God,
the nature that will believe and trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Now, this new birth, is an act of God. No sinner has anything
to do with the new birth. Just like no human being has
anything to do with their first birth. I have no remembrance
of being born. I must have been at some point
because here I am. God's elect usually don't remember
that moment that they were born again. But they know they were. Why? Because here I am. Believing God, receiving the
Lord Jesus Christ, looking to Him as my all and in all. Now,
when we were born again, we're not born again because our parents
are believers. We're not born again because
our grandparents are believers. We're not born again because
our friends are believers. Dale, you said you're a Republican
because your dad was a Republican. You're not a believer because
your dad was a believer. That didn't come to you through human
blood, through natural blood. That would make salvation come
through the bloodlines of men. You can be a Republican through
the bloodlines of men. You can be a Union man through
the bloodlines of men. You can't be a believer through
the bloodlines of men. Grace does not run in our blood.
Corruption runs in our blood. Well, my daughter Holly was hardly
out of the womb until I saw just, oh my goodness, that's my nature.
Mad face. This is the honest truth. She looked at that doctor with
hatred in her eyes and yanked her arm away from that doctor.
And I thought, oh boy. She got her daddy's nature. Corruption. Sin runs in our nature. And we
inherit the corrupt nature of our parents from our first birth.
Salvation comes from the blood of Christ. And when we're born
again, We receive the nature of our Father, our Father, our
spiritual Father. The new birth never happens because
a sinner decides to accept Jesus. Of course, salvation is not the
will of the flesh. The will of the flesh is to sin.
The will of the flesh is to reject Christ. It can't come from the
will of the flesh. Of course, salvation didn't come
to us from the will of man. The will of man is always going
to be the will of our father Adam. The will he showed in the
garden to willingly disobey God. Eve was deceived. Adam was not
deceived. He disobeyed willingly. And that's
the same nature that we have. And God's elect receive Christ
because they believe. A man doesn't believe. The world
will never believe. But believers always believe. Always. And they always believe
the same thing. I've been a lot of places preaching.
And I can tell you this. Believers all believe the exact
same thing. They believe on the name of the
Lord Jesus Christ. Every one of them without exception.
The name of Christ reveals who He is. That's why we're studying
the names of Jehovah in our midweek service. His name tells us the
Lord's going to provide. His name tells us the Lord's
going to heal all our spiritual diseases. His name tells us the
Lord's our banner. He's our message. His name tells
us the Lord's our righteousness. His name tells us the Lord's
my peace. I'm at peace with God through
the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ. His name reveals who He is. And God Almighty is going to
reveal Himself to somebody. That's why He's still sending
preachers. For the longest time, up into my 30s, I was the youngest
person that I knew preaching the gospel. About once a month,
Eric and I go up to the preacher school Todd has there in Lexington.
And that room is full of men who are younger than me preaching
the gospel. And I'm telling you, that gives
me hope. God's going to save somebody.
If God's raising up men to go out and preach His Gospel, He's
doing it for a reason. He's calling out His sheep. God's
going to save somebody. And when He does, He's going
to reveal His name, the name of His Son to them. He's going
to reveal Christ to them. Do you want to know Him? Does anybody here want to know
the Lord Jesus Christ? If I was you, I'd ask Him to
reveal Himself to me. That's what I'd do. I'd ask Him
to give me eyes to see. Just be honest with the Lord.
I don't know why we try not to be honest with the Lord. You
don't have to talk in language that you think Abraham would
have spoken with to pray. Just be honest with the Lord.
Lord, I'm blind. I can't see. I'd like to. I'll tell you this. We'll never see unless He gives
us eyes to see. I'd ask him, and I'd be where
his gospels preach, where his words preach, because that's
how he's going to save sinners, is through his word. Fourth,
John tells us how it is God saves those that believe. He's going
to save somebody, and John tells us how. Every son that's been
born again, they believe Christ, they receive Christ, they behold
the glory of Christ our substitute. Look at verse 14. And the Word
was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory,
the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace
and truth." Now, verse 1 told us that the Word is God. Verse 14 tells us that God was
made flesh. Why would God do that? Make Himself
flesh to be a substitute. That's exactly why, to become
that perfect lamb that God would provide for himself, that Abraham
told Isaac, God said. If God's going to be a representative
for men, if he's going to be a substitute for men, God's going
to have to become a man. God can't be the representative
of men. If he's going to be our representative, he's going to
become what we are, a man, flesh and bones. God doesn't have blood
to offer as a sacrifice for sin. But a man does. God doesn't have
a body that can be broken as a sacrifice for sin. But a man
does. God cannot be the high priest
who is touched with the feeling of our infirmity. But a man can. So God became a man. The invisible became tangible. Spirit became touchable. John said, we handled him. handled
and touched him. He became a real man. And that's a whole lot more than
just taking on flesh and blood. Now, he humiliated himself to
be clothed in flesh and blood like we are. But more than that,
God took on him a human nature. A nature just like we have, yet
without sin. He became just like we are. Now that's a mystery beyond comparison. You said that Apostle Paul had
to be the smartest man God ever used to write the scriptures.
And Paul said, without controversy, this is a great mystery. You
can't even argue about this. This is a great mystery. God
became flesh. God was manifest in human flesh. That's a mystery. Look over in
Job 19. studying this Friday evening,
I believe it was, and just about came out of my seat. This must be one of my favorite
passages of Scripture. Job chapter 19. I've read it
over and over and over again. I've never seen this. In verse
23, Job says, Oh, my words were now written. Oh, that they were
printed in a book, that they were graven with an iron pen
and led in the rock forever. For I know my Redeemer liveth,
and he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth. And though
after my skin worms destroy this body, yet in my flesh shall I
see God, whom I shall see for myself. Mine eyes shall behold
him, and not another. He won't be a stranger. I'm going
to know him, though my reins be consumed within me." And I've
always thrilled to read that and think like my brother Joe
one day with these With this flesh, it'll be changed, it'll
be made incorruptible, but now it's going to be me. You're going
to see me, so there's strength. With these eyes, I'm going to
behold my Redeemer. He's going to stand the latter
days on this earth. I'm going to see Him. I saw this
and it's just thrilling to me. I'm going to see Him in my flesh
with these eyes. I'm going to see My Redeemer
in my flesh. Can you imagine? I'm going to
see him and he's going to be in my flesh because he came as
my substitute to bear my sin burden, to be punished for my
sins, the punishment that I deserve. I'm going to see my representative
in my flesh, in flesh just like mine. And thank God that day
when I see him, I am going to have this flesh. It's going to
be perfect. Because of His work for me. Oh
my goodness. He came. The Word was made flesh
and tabernacled among us. Now that is a clear reference
to that tabernacle in the wilderness. The tabernacle that Moses built.
That tabernacle that pictured Christ in every detail. God the
Son pitched His tent among us for a while. And just like that
tabernacle, it was temporary. He was just here for a while.
And just like that tabernacle. That tabernacle didn't look like
much on the outside. Covered with badger skin. Somebody
look at it. It didn't look like much. That's what people thought
of our Lord. It just looked like any other
man to them. But inside that tabernacle was
glory untold. Besides all the gold and all
the things that were in there, the Shekinah glory of God shone
in that tabernacle. glory. And our Lord pulled back
that tent flap at the Mount of Transfiguration and those disciples
saw glory like they'd never seen before. He tabernacled among
us and we beheld His glory. And I'm telling you, the flesh,
the Word was made flesh. Now I gather from reading that
there was a time that He was not flesh. But He was made flesh. And from that time forward, he
never ceased to be flesh. Right now, there's a man in glory,
in flesh, seated at the right hand of God because he saved
his people from their sins. And we beheld his glory, full
of grace and truth. Full of grace that meets the
need of every sinner and full of truth. that will satisfy the
holy requirements of God, full of grace and truth. Everything God requires and everything
that a sinner needs is found in the Lord Jesus Christ. His
sacrifice was the only sacrifice that could satisfy both God and
sinners. Call sinners to Him and make
God say, I'm well pleased. Now, let me ask you this question
in closing. This is a question that you can know the answer
to when you go out these doors this morning. Are you a son of
God? To as many as received Him, to
them gave He the right to become sons of God. Are you a son of
God? I ask myself that question. I want to know. Am I a son of
God? It's very simple. Do you believe? Do you believe
on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ? If you do, You're a son
of God, a daughter of God. You were not commanded ever to
figure out, am I a son of God or not? God's Word never commands
us to figure out, am I one of the elect? Only believe. Only believe. Oh, I pray that
God in His mercy and His power would cause each of us to do
that this morning. believe on the name of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Alright, may the Lord bless you.