Verse 10, Paul writes, For it
became him, for whom are all things, and by whom are all things,
in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their
salvation perfect through sufferings. It became him, Paul says. The him he's talking about here
is the Father. Everything was created by him.
It was created for him, for his glory, for the glory of his son.
And He's the first cause of everything, not just in creation and in providence,
but also in grace. He's the first cause of everything.
It was His cause, His purpose from before He founded the world
to have mercy on His chosen people. And the salvation of sinners
is an act that's becoming to the Father. It became Him. Now
we know God must save sinners in a way that's consistent with
his character. He can never violate his holiness
or his justice in order to have mercy on us. We know that. But
salvation through the sacrifice of Christ our substitute isn't
just a way that God can save us without violating his holiness. Salvation through Christ our
substitute is not just a way that God found to save us without
dishonoring himself. This is a way. This is more than
just a way that's technically right, that legally meets all
the requirements, dots every I and crosses every T. Salvation
in Christ, the salvation of sinners, is becoming to the Father. This
is the way. that God gives all the glory. This is the way that He brings
glory to Himself. Salvation, through the sacrifice
of Christ, is glorious. I mean, it is more glorious than
our human mind can really comprehend. This glorifies not just God's
holiness and His justice. It glorifies His righteousness.
It glorifies His love, His mercy, His wisdom, delivering from going
down into the pit. I found a ransom." That's God's
wisdom that glorifies Him. And Scripture tells us it was
becoming, it brought glory to God to bring many sons to glory. Now the elect here are called
God's sons, His children. We're children by adoption. We're
children by the new birth. And children, you parents know
this, have a special place. in a father's heart. They're
special to the Father. And He calls us His sons, His
children, sons and daughters. These sons were chosen by the
Father, because He's the first cause of everything. They were
redeemed by God the Son. He came and shed His blood for
the sons, the children that He loved. These sons are called
by the Spirit through the preaching of the gospel. And they're brought
to glory. God's children are heirs of heavenly
glory. One day, we're going to have
glory that we can't begin to comprehend in this life. The
glory that it will be to be in a perfect body, face to face
with the Lord Jesus Christ is glory we can never begin to comprehend. That's what we're heirs of. God's
children. But you know, we also enjoy glory
now. You don't have to wait for all
that in the future. You don't have to wait until
you just suffer through this miserable life and die and then you can
experience glory. We have a taste of it now. This
gospel is glorious. Isn't this a glorious gospel? And I'll tell you why it's glorious.
Because it declares the Lord Jesus Christ. And He's glorious. We can't see it all now. We can't
comprehend it all now. I certainly can't tell it all
now. But we get a taste, a glimpse of seeing Him. He is glorious. And God's children enjoy that
in this life. He's given us that right now.
And I can tell you who these children are. Look over in John
chapter 1. If you want to know who God's
children are, He tells us who they are. He gives us a description
here in John 1. They believe Christ. That's how you can tell
who these sons are, who are heirs of this heavenly glory. In John
1, verse 11, John writes, He, our Lord Jesus Christ, came unto
His own, and His own received Him not. Well, He didn't receive
them because they weren't His children. But, he says in verse
12, as many as received Him, to them gave He power. He gave
them the right or the privilege, the glorious privilege to become
the sons of God, to them that believe. on His name. That's
who these sons are. They believe on His name, on
the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. And He tells us many sons are
going to be brought to glory. Now I know when you look around
and it seems like few. I don't know how many people
live in this town, but you know, you look around and it seems
like just a few, doesn't it? But I'm telling you, when they
are all brought together, there are going to be a number that
no man can count. There's going to be many of them. Many people believe that there's
going to be more people in heaven than there are in hell. Because
God's going to have the glory. He's going to have the glory
in redeeming more than are damned. And that very well could be true.
You think of all the, in the history of this earth, all the
infants who died in their infancy. We believe that those infants
are part of the elect, that Christ redeemed. All those infants are
in glory. That's what David said about
his infant that died. He can't come to me. I'll go
to him. I'll see him again. And many of these sons are going
to be glorified. There's no doubt about it. Look
over in Romans 8. You know this scripture like
the back of your hand, but it does good to read it. In Romans
8, verse 29. For whom He did foreknow, He
also did predestinate, to be conformed to the image of His
Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover,
whom He did predestinate, then He also called. And whom He called,
then He also justified. And whom He justified, then He
also glorified." These many sons, many brethren, they're going
to be glorified because of Christ, because of what He did for us,
because of the Captain. of our salvation. That's the
way Paul describes him here, the captain of our salvation. He's called our captain because
he's the author of salvation. He's the completer of our salvation. He's our king. He's our commander. We bow to him. He's our guide. He's our leader. We only go somewhere
where we follow him. He's our captain. And our captain
humbled himself. more than we can understand how
He humbled Himself so that He could suffer everything that
God's law and God's justice required. He humbled Himself to take on
our sin, to be made sin for us and suffer everything that God's
wrath requires of that sin. And we are made perfect through
His sufferings. That was the Father's will, that
we be made perfect through His sufferings. And Christ perfected
His own work by shedding His blood to pay for our sins and
make us perfect. He showed His perfect righteousness
that He imputed to us. He showed the perfect love for
which He loved His people, that He's willing to suffer for us.
And He showed His perfect obedience. He was obedient even to the death
of the cross. He's perfect in every way. And
we're made perfect in it. That's what Paul says in verse
11, for both he that sanctified and they who are sanctified are
all one. For which cause he's not ashamed
to call them brethren. Now it's Christ who sanctifies
us. Never make any mistake about
it. It's Christ that sanctifies us. He makes us holy. He takes
up his abode in us and makes us holy. He sets us apart from
this world for his holy use. But this sanctification is a
whole lot more than just a technical legal state before God. The Lord
Jesus Christ Himself is our sanctification. This is a person now we're talking
about. We're sanctified in Him because
of Him. Because His blood washes away
our sin. Because His blood removes both
the guilt and the stain of sin. We're sanctified because His
righteousness imputed to us, makes us holy before the Father. We're made partakers of His nature
in the new birth. He is our sanctification. It's not just a legal state now.
It's a person. It's Christ Himself. We're not
holy in ourselves. We're not holy in something that
we do or certainly by nature. It's in Christ. It's all in Him. Talking about a person, There's
a whole lot more than talking about some sort of legal state
or something. It's a person. That's what makes
it glorious is it's Christ Himself. I don't know if I'm getting that
across. I love that. I hope I'm getting
that across. And we're made one with the Lord Jesus Christ. Made
one with Him. One Father. He told those ladies
in His tomb after He had resurrected, I go to my Father and your Father. We have one Father. There's one
body where Christ is dead. There's one family where we're
made sons of. There's one covenant of grace.
There's not a covenant of law and a covenant of grace. There's
one covenant. The covenant of grace. He's the mediator of it.
And the Lord made himself one with us. We didn't make ourselves
one with him. He made himself one with us.
He made Himself of the same flesh that we have. He made Himself
of the same nature, the same human nature that we have. Yet,
He was still God. He's always God. He never stopped
being God. The God-Man. As much God as if
He were not man, and as much man as if He were not God. The
God-Man. And He did that so that He could
be one with us, and we could be one with Him. Now get a hold of this. This
is one of the most amazing statements you'll ever read. He is not ashamed
to call us pregnant. Now the only way that statement
can be true is unspeakable grace. My friends, we're born a disgrace. Did your parents ever tell you
you don't have to be ashamed of yourself? We should be ashamed. We are
ashamed in our sin and shame and rebellion and wretchedness.
God is ashamed. By nature, God is ashamed of
us. A holy God could never have any
relationship with sinners like we are because we're ashamed.
If we're going to be one with God, we've got to be changed.
We've got to be washed. And that's exactly was the Lord
Jesus Christ did for His people. He came and washed us in His
blood and He changed us. He gave us a new heart and a
new nature so that we could be one with Him. Now that's a great
undeserved honor that's given to God's people. That we could
be made one with God's Son. Christ is our older brother.
This older brother is not ashamed to call us brethren. These little
brothers he's got running around all over the place. He's not
ashamed to call us brethren. He's our older brother. I thought
this this week. Christ is everything to the believer. Everything. He's our older brother.
He's our father. He's our husband. He's our kinsman
redeemer. He's our captain. He's our savior.
He's our shepherd. And He's our friend. He's everything
to us. And he's not ashamed to call
us brethren. And in verse 12 he says to the
Father, I will declare thy name unto my brethren in the midst
of the church while I sing praise unto thee. Now this is a quote
from Psalm 22. Look over at Psalm 22. In verse
22. This is a Psalm of the cross.
People who are supposed to know what they're talking about say
that Christ quoted this Psalm. as he hung on the cross. This
is the psalm of the cross. He quoted it verbatim. And in
verse 22 he says, you can imagine him hanging there on the cross
quoting this. I will declare thy name unto
my brethren. In the midst of the congregation
will I praise thee. Throughout the whole time he
spent on this earth, the Lord Jesus declared the Father to
us. He declared the Father to his
brethren, to his elect, those he came to redeem. As he hung
there on the cross, quoting this psalm, he declared the Father,
didn't he? He declared the Father's holiness.
God's holy. He will punish sin, even when
that sin is imputed to His Son. God's going to punish sin because
He's a holy. He declared the Father's justice. This is a way
that God can be just and justifier. He declared the Father's righteousness.
He declared the Father's wisdom. He declared the Father's love.
This is unspeakable love. For God so loved the world that
what? He gave His only begotten Son. He gave His Son to be a sacrifice
for us. That's love. He gave His Son
to be our substitute as mercy and grace. He declared the Father
to us. And we can be so thankful we
never would have known the Father. if Christ didn't come and declare
Him to us. We never would have known the will of the Father.
We never would have known the purpose of salvation that the
Father had. We never would have known God
was merciful and gracious if Christ didn't come and declare
Him to us. We'd have known God's holy. We'd have known His power
when He sent us to hell for our sin and rebellion. We'd have
known that. But we never would have known about God's mercy.
if Christ didn't come and declare it to us, that God could be merciful
to us and Christ our substitute. We never would have known anything
about the Gospel. How did you come to hear the
Gospel? How did you come to believe this Gospel? Are you smarter
than everybody else? How did you come to believe this?
How did this come to be life to you? It's because Christ came
and the person of His Spirit spoke to your heart. Gave you
a new heart. Gave you ears to hear and faith
to believe. He declared the Father to you.
And He taught us to sing praises to the Father. That's why singing
is such a wonderful part of the worship service. To sing praises
to the Father. That's what our Lord did. He
sung praises to the Father in the midst of the church. Taught
us to sing. Taught us the words. Taught us the tune. In verse
13 He says again, I'll put my trust in Him. And again, behold,
I am the children which God hath given me." Now, as a man, the
Lord Jesus trusted in the Father. He always was constantly in prayer
to the Father. And He trusted that the Father
would hear Him. He trusted the Father would give
Him the strength and the ability to accomplish what He sent Him
to do. Look over in John chapter 11. He trusted in the Father. He
trusted that the Father would hear Him. In John chapter 11,
outside of Lazarus' tomb, in verse 41, Then they took away the stone
from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up
his eyes and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.
He knew, he trusted that the Father heard him. And I knew
that thou hearest me always. But because of the people which
stand by, I said it, that they may believe that thou sent me."
See here, even then he was declaring the Father to us. He was declaring
the Father always heard him. Look over in Luke chapter 23. In the greatest moment in the
history of this earth, in the history of mankind, the Lord
Jesus trusted that the Father would accept his sacrifice. Look
in Luke 23, verse 46. And when Jesus had cried with
a loud voice, he said, Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit. And having said thus, he gave
up the ghost. He trusted that the Father would
accept his sacrifice. Now, who is this sacrifice for?
That's a good question. I'd like to know, who is this
sacrifice for? was for the children that God
gave Him. This sacrifice was made for His
brethren. These children were given to
Christ as a gift from the Father, given to Him in eternity past
in the covenant of grace. I'll show you that in John 17.
In our Lord's great high priestly
prayer, five times He talks about those that the Father gave Him. He says, as thou hast given him
power over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as
many as thou hast given him, those that the Father gave him
as a gift. In verse 6, I have manifested thy name unto the
men which thou gavest me out of the world. Thine they were,
and thou gavest them me, and they have kept thy word. Verse
9, I pray for them. I pray not for the whole world
now, but for them which thou hast given me, for they are Verse
11, And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world,
and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine
own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one
as we are. And verse 12, While I was with
them in the world, I kept them in thy name. Those that thou
gavest me, I have kept, and none of them is lost. We were given
to Christ as a gift of the Father, so we belong to Him. We belong
to Christ, secondly, by purchase. He purchased us with His own
blood. He bought us. He redeemed us
out of the clutches of the law, out of the hand of justice, and
redeemed us. He bought us. And we belong to
Him. Scripture says you're not your
own. You're bought at the price. The price of the blood of God's
own Son. We belong to Him by purchase.
We belong to Him by creation. He created us. He created in
you a new heart. That new man, He created it.
We belong to Him by creation. And we belong to Him because
He lovingly receives all His children. Can you imagine one
of your children coming to you, coming home, and you're not lovingly
receiving them? A loving child? He lovingly receives
His children. Look over in John chapter 6.
He receives all those that the Spirit brings to him. John chapter 6, verse 37. All
that the Father hath given me, those he gave to him as a gift,
they shall come to me. And him that cometh to me, I
will in no wise cast out. You never have to be afraid to
come to Christ and beg for mercy. He'll always receive you. So
come to Him. Now verse 14, back in our text. For as much then as the children
are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took
part of the same, that through death he might destroy him that
hath the power of death, that is, the devil. Now since these
children, these eleven, that God's given to Christ, are human,
Christ became a man. He assumed our nature. a nature
just like ours, so that He could redeem us. The Lord Jesus Christ
became a real man without sin. But in every other way, He's
exactly like us, but He's without sin. And He's without sin because
He was born of a virgin. There's no trace of Adam's sinful
seed in His conception or in His birth. Yet He did become
a real human being. He had to. If we're going to
be redeemed, He had to become just like us. Our substitute
has to be a man. God can't be our substitute.
He doesn't have the same nature that we do. He doesn't have our
flesh or our nature. God's spirit. He can't be our
substitute. So our substitute's got to be
a man. The law demands death for our sins. That's what the
law demands. God can't die, so our substitute's
got to be a man so He can die. God can't be made sin, so a man
had to come and be made sin for us. But at the same time, the
law requires perfection, and no son of Adam can ever produce
that, so our substitute has got to be God too. He's got to be
the God-man. He's got to be both. And Christ,
God's Son, was born a man so he could die. I kind of feel
like I was born so I could live. He was born so he could die.
That's why he came to this earth. His purpose was to die. And when
he died, he conquered death. He conquered death by dying and
rising again. Satan was destroyed. His head
was crushed. When God allowed Satan to bruise
the heel of our Savior when He died. He did bruise His heel,
but Christ crushed His head. He took away all His power, the
power of death, when He died. And Satan here is called the
one that has the power of death, because he's the one that introduced
sin into the world. And that sin, you know, brought
death. And He still tempts man to sin. He still brings death.
The power of His kingdom is all wrapped up in death and darkness. But Christ, destroyed that power. He took it away. Now, Satan still
roars. He still goes about as a roaring
lion, seeking whom he may devour. And his roars are going to scare
you half to death. Now, they will. He's still a vicious lion,
but he's a toothless lion. Christ took his power away and
destroyed it. And one day, the job's going
to be complete. One day, God's going to put him
in a place where his roars won't even scare you anymore. It's
going to be complete. The job that he started at Calvary
is going to be complete. And even now, I'm telling you,
he's a toothless lion. He's on God's leash. And he can't
harm you. Christ took away his power. And
these children, these sons that Christ came to die for, they're
delivered from Satan. They're delivered from the fear
of death. Look at verse 15. He came to deliver them, who
through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. Now, every human being, it's
just a human being's nature to have a distaste for death. Nobody
here got up this morning with plans of dying this afternoon,
or the thought of dying this afternoon being something you'd
really enjoy. That's not something you look
forward to. And I know believers. We look
forward to the day that we can go be with Christ. I just don't
want to particularly die this afternoon. I used to feel pretty
guilty about that. Maybe I ought not to feel that
way. It's a weakness in me. I'm sure it is. But somebody
said this one time. It helped me so much. You know
why human beings have a distaste for death? Because God made these
bodies for living, not for dying. He didn't make Adam to die. He
made him to live. He never would have died if he
didn't sin. But death without Christ. is a terrible, terrible
thing. What a fearful thing to die outside
of the Lord Jesus Christ. But now listen to me. Every believer
is delivered from that fear. Death is the friend to the believer. Death is your friend if you're
in Christ. Now it is. Death can't hurt you if you believe
Christ. If you're in Him, death cannot
hurt you because Christ took the sting away. I know it's fearful,
the fear of the unknown, but it will never hurt you because
Christ took the sting away. For the believer, all death can
do is bring you into the presence of Christ. That's your friend.
All death can do to the believer is take you out of this veil
of tears, to take you away from the grief and the sorrow and
the sin of this life and bring you into the glorious presence
of God Himself. That's your friend. Your friend
is the one that takes you out of this pit, this mess, and brings
you to glory. Death is the friend of the believer.
And it's not what I want to do this afternoon. I grant you.
But I don't fear it. I don't fear it at all. But now,
especially to these Jews in the early church, the Jews who believed
God, they grew up under bondage that we really can't understand.
They grew up under bondage to that law In fear of death, every
transgression of that law could bring death instantly. Pick up
too many sticks on the Sabbath or something. You know, God could
strike you down. Fear of death. Well now, Christ
has taken that sting away. Can you imagine the liberty that
they had to experience when there was no more fear? Because they're
not under law. Just like we are. We're not under
the law. We're under grace. And there is no fear in that.
So verse 16, Paul says, "...for verily he took not on him the
nature of angels, but they took on him the seed of Abraham."
Now I know we're thankful, how thankful we should be for our
Savior. But now think of this, the Lord
didn't send a Savior to those fallen angels. And they committed
the same sin we did. Rebellion against God, against
the kingship of God. They tried to have somebody else
sit on His throne, the same way we did. And there's no mercy
reserved for them. There's no substitute for them.
Christ didn't assume the nature of angels. He assumed the nature
of men, the nature of Abraham, the seed of Abraham. Look over
in Genesis 22. When Christ was born in Bethlehem's
manger, He fulfilled a promise that He made way back here to
Abraham. In Genesis 22, verse 18. This is the promise that God
made to Abraham. And in thy seed shall all the
nations of the earth be blessed, because thou hast obeyed my voice.
What seed is he talking about there? Is he talking about Isaac
that was just delivered from being offered as a burnt offering?
Look over in Galatians 3. Scripture doesn't leave us to
guess who he's talking about right there. Galatians 3, verse 16. Now to Abraham and his seed were
the promises made. He saith not into seeds as of
many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ. When Christ was born in Bethlehem's
manger, he took on him the seed of Abraham and fulfilled that
promise that he made to Abraham. I heard Cecil Rope say once years
ago, he said the greatest miracle this world's ever seen is that
Christ was born a baby in Bethlehem's manger. And if that's not the
greatest miracle that this world's ever seen, it's what happened
a few years later when Christ died. One of those two is the
greatest miracle that ever happened. And they happened because Christ
was born a man to become our kinsman-redeemer. A kinsman-redeemer,
first of all, has to have the power to redeem. Well, Christ
has the power to redeem. He's God's Son. He's got all
power, all authority. Well, a kinsman-redeemer's got
to be willing to redeem. He's willing because love is His character. Mercy is His character. He's
willing to redeem. But a kinsman redeemer has got
to be related to us. He's got to be our kin. If God's
not related to us, Christ became a man. So He can be our kin and
be our kinsman redeemer. Now verse 17, Wherefore in all
things it behooved Him to be made like unto His brethren,
that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things
pertaining to God. to make reconciliation for the
sins of the people. Christ had to become a man to
be our high priest. A high priest has to be taken
from among the people that he represents. So he became a man
so he could be our high priest and represent us to God. He had
to be a man so he had something to sacrifice. He has to offer
a sacrifice. He has to have blood shed so
he's got to become a man. So he's got a body to offer.
He's got to have the blood of a man to shed as a payment for
our sins. And he's got to be a man so he
can be a compassionate high priest. You can't be compassionate for
somebody when you've never gone through what they're going through.
But he became a man so he'd have compassion on the weakness of
our flesh. And our great high priest is
both merciful and faithful. Matthew Henry said, Christ must
be faithful to God and merciful to men, and He is. And our high
priest made reconciliation for sin. None of those other high
priests in Levi's tribe ever, ever made reconciliation for
sin. They offered rivers of blood, but none of them made reconciliation
for sin. Man and God were forever separated. when Adam fell, created a gulf
man can never cross. But God sent His Son and completely,
totally reconciled Himself to sinners through the sacrifice
of His Son, through His righteousness and through His blood. Christ
put away our sin forever. And God's reconciled. He's not
angry anymore. He's reconciled because of our
high priest. And verse 18, For in that he
himself has suffered, being tempted, he's able to suffer, to comfort
them that are tempted. Our high priest is compassionate. And he was tempted in every way,
just like we are. He was tempted by Satan. He suffered
poverty, hunger, thirst. He knows what it is to be hated
by men. He knows what it is to be deserted
by all his friends. All His friends deserted Him. His Father deserted Him. He suffered
loneliness. Oh, nobody was ever as alone
as Christ was when He was made sin for us. His Father deserted
Him. He suffered pain. He suffered
anguish of mind and soul and body. He even suffered death
without sin. Every way we were tempted, He
was too. Every step you ever take, He
took it first. He opened the way and made it
easier. And He knows how to sympathize. He knows how to comfort because
He's been there first. Look over at one page. I'll quit
here. Hebrews 5, verse 2. Speaking here of our High Priest,
who can have compassion on the ignorant and on them that are
out of the way, for that He Himself also is compassed with infirmity. I've got written above this verse
2, Christ came for me. The ignorant. Those who are out
of the way. He has compassion. I thought
this morning, He has compassion. on those who are ignorant and
out of the way. Talk to Him. Pour out your heart
before Him. He has compassion. Oh, that's
a good message. Okay, I hope that's been a blessing.