We'll start in Luke chapter 2. Because I see a theme. Luke chapter 2 starting in verse
25. I see a theme that arrested my
attention. So I looked up some other scriptures.
See if you can see the theme. Luke chapter 2, I'm going to
read these scriptures first. starting in verse 25 Luke chapter 2 starting in verse
25 and behold there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon
and The same man was just and devout waiting for the consolation
of Israel And the Holy Ghost was upon him. And it was revealed
unto him by the Holy Ghost that he should not see death before
he had seen the Lord Christ. And he came by the Spirit into
the temple. And when the parents, that is
Mary and Joseph, brought in the child Jesus to do for him after
the custom of the law, then took he He took Christ up in his arms
and blessed God and said, Lord, now, let us, thou thy servant,
depart in peace according to thy words. For mine eyes have
seen thy salvation, which thou hast prepared before the face
of all people, a light to lighten the Gentiles and the glory of
thy people Israel. And Joseph and Mary, his mother,
marveled at these things which were spoken of him. And Simeon
blessed them and said unto Mary, his mother, behold, this child
is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel and for
a sign which shall be spoken against. John chapter 12. John chapter 12. and verse 20 and 21. John 12 verse 20 and 21, And there were certain Greeks
among them that came up to worship at the feast. The same came therefore
to Philip, which was in Bethsaida of Galilee, and desired him,
saying, We would see Jesus. We would see Jesus. Hebrews chapter 2. Hebrews chapter 2. Verses 8, 9 and 10. Speaking of Christ, thou hast
put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he
put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put
under him. But now we see not yet all things
put under him, but we see Jesus. who was made a little lower than
the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory
and honor, that he should, by the grace of God, should taste
death for every man. 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. Hebrews chapter 11. Hebrews chapter 11, verse 24,
by faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called
the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing rather to suffer affliction
with the people of God than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for
a season, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than
the treasures in Egypt, for he had respect unto the recompense
of the reward. By faith he forsook Egypt, not
fearing the wrath of the king, for he endured, as seeing him
who is invisible." Seeing him who is invisible. 1 John chapter
3. 1 John 3 1-2 Behold, what manner
of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called
the sons of God. Therefore the world knows us
not, because it knew him not. Beloved, now are we the sons
of God, and it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know,
that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall
see Him as He is. 1 Corinthians 13 Verse 12 For now, We see through a glass darkly,
but then face to face. I know in part, but then shall
I know even also as I am known. And lastly, Numbers 21. Numbers
chapter 21. Verse eight and nine. We'll start with verse seven.
Therefore the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned. For we have spoken against the
Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he take
away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people.
And the Lord said unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent and
set it on a pole. And it shall come to pass that
everyone that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. And Moses made a serpent of brass
and put it on a pole, and it came to pass that if a serpent
had bitten any man, any man, any woman, any child, when he
beheld the serpent of brass, he lived. Well, welcome to 2025. I usually don't do these yearly
things, but it seemed appropriate. It is my desire that perhaps
by the initiating of the Holy Spirit, that we would get a full,
pardoning view of Jesus Christ this year. This year. That we would see Jesus, and
that's the theme that I saw often, see Christ. Not with these eyes,
with the eyes of the heart and the mind. And only Lord can open
these things. But that in 2025, by faith, not
literally, we would see Christ. that we would be enabled to put
away our varying vanities and have a more excellent, a more
superior object to lay hold of. Now you can lay hold of money,
you can lay hold of your job, you can lay hold of all these
things that the world has, it's gonna pass away. It's gonna pass
away. But if you behold, if you look
like that serpent, if you're bitten by sin, and you may not
know it, but you are, we're all dying, because of sin, but there
is life in a look. There is life in a look. To borrow
an old writer's phrase, I've never seen this before but I
thought it was pretty good, to have a visionary enthusiasm. I like that, I don't know why.
To have a visionary enthusiasm pertaining to things above, things
heavenly, all things that were restored to us in and by Christ
The Lord, I have one question throughout this whole message,
one question. I simply ask each everyone here
this morning, have you seen Christ? Have you seen Christ? Not with these eyes, but as I
said, by faith and grace given in the heart and in the mind.
Have you, can you leave here? Can you ask yourself, have I
seen Christ? not another Christ. I'm not asking you if you're
religious. I'm asking you and I'm asking
myself, have I seen Christ? When we say, and I thought about
this as well, when we say we wish you a happy new year, we
simply mean we wish you, we desire you to see Christ. because this
is there's really no happy new year and I know about all the
the you know the promises that people make and it's going to
be a prosperous and healthy wealthy wise all these things but to
be a happy new year is to be is to see Christ is to have a
clear view of Christ. That's what we mean because really
there is no New Year without this heart-convicting, soul-rendering
view of the pure, spotless Son of God laying down His life a
ransom for many. So I have several sub-points
under this one question. Have we seen Christ? Have we
seen Christ, firstly, high, holy, and lifted up? Turn to Isaiah
chapter 61. Have we seen the God of the Scriptures as Isaiah
did, as you will, as I will, as Jeremiah, as Joseph, Jacob,
there is no difference. There is one God, there is one
man, given among men, whereby we must be saved. So, I'm not
asking you to see anything different than what's been shown all of
our brethren throughout all time. In the year that King Uzziah
died, chapter six, verse one, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne,
high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. Above it stood
the seraphims, each one having six wings. They covered their
face, they covered their feet, and they flew. And one cried
unto another and said, holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts. The whole earth is full of his
glory. Now, holy, That's an attribute
or characteristic of God. That is used more often to describe
Him than any other, look it up in the concordance, than any
other word. It's used more often than His love. It's used more
often than His supremacy. It's used more often than His
solitariness, His unchangeableness. This thought that God is holy,
we read this book, it's not called, The Reader's Digest Bible, no,
it's called the Holy Bible. Because our God, the God, if
we've seen Him, is holy. What happens when we see Him
holy? The post of the doors moved,
the voice of him that cried, and the house was filled with
smoke. Then I said, a man of God, a prophet, woe is me, for
I am undone, because I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell
in the midst of a people of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen
the King, the Lord of hosts. If we have seen Christ, we will,
see him high, holy, and lifted up. And we will also see ourselves
vile, polluted, and unholy. And then we will see, and then
there will be confession. Then I said, woe is me, God knows
that we're unholy, God knows that we're unclean in and of
ourselves, but we see it, we agree with him. There's one other
thing, I was talking to David Pledger the other night, I started
reading a new devotional, So good. And I sent it to him, and
he just sent back, he just said, oh, how much of a debtor to grace
I am. And that's what, we never get
over that. Yes, we realize in Christ we're
perfect, as Bruce mentioned last Sunday, perfect, we're just,
and as He is, we're as holy as He is, as Christ is, so are we
in this world. We know that. But, boy, every
day we are a debtor. took the grace of God, because
we didn't do anything. Matter of fact, there we go.
Any sin in this that we hear about, we read about, we are
capable and would do it except for the grace of God. Melinda
and I were talking about this very thing. I remember Marvin
Stoniker, after a time of preaching, we're heading home, and he made
a comment. He says, I've learned a while
ago to not say that. You know, I wouldn't do that
because if God withholds his hand, his grace, we would fall
instantly. Do we see him as he is revealed
in the scriptures? Do we see him as the righteous
one? In matter of fact, Jeremiah 23,
our righteousness. Do we see him as our righteousness? Do we see him as holy, separate
from sinners, yet bleeding and dying for sinners? It's our only
hope. Do we see him as totally sovereign,
I mean supreme, above all, yet do we see him voluntarily submitting
to the law and to men at Calvary's tree. The Creator submitting
to the creature, that's amazing grace. That's amazing grace. Do we see him full of peace,
which Matt just read, full of hope? Do we see him as the God-man,
our substitute? Yet he laying aside all his royal
garments, his scepter, his kingly position, and becoming a laughing
and gazing stock, spit upon, whipped, and mocked. This is
all in the scripture. Never a man suffered as this
man throughout history. And this history is the believer's
history. We own up to it. No, that's your pilot. Behold your king. In the Pharisees,
he's not our king. The believer says, yep, that's
my king. Because if he doesn't die, I
have to satisfy everything, and I can't do it. Thirdly, do we
see Jesus as our particular personal Savior? As in Luke chapter 2,
Simeon held up this human being and said, let me die, I've seen
your salvation. And Moses, Moses in Hebrews 2,
he saw the Lord Christ. They saw Him afar off. Now how
did they see Him? He wasn't alive then. It's the
same way we see Him. We look back. We look back and
see Him in the Word as He's brought forth all our desires, all our
salvation. He's our peace for our anguish.
He's our hope for our sin's despair. He's love for our enmity. His grace is for our vile, puny
works. You know, we're going to present
God with something that we don't even possess. Well, next Sunday,
I think I've already got a message, but I've seen some things in
Genesis I've never seen before, but that's what man tries to
do. He tries to build a Tower of
Babel. You know, oh no, it didn't work the first time. It's not
going to work in any religion, any denomination. If you were
looking to anything, anyone, whether it's yourself or any
other man, any other woman, anything other than Christ, you have not
seen Christ. You have not seen Him aright.
Fourthly, do we see, turn to Ezekiel 16. Do we see Christ
as our covering, as our protection, as our scapegoat
as our atonement. Do we see Him? I just love this
passage in Ezekiel 16. Verse 1, Again the word of the
Lord came to me, personally, saying, Son of man. Ok, you're
not a man. Ok, woman, boy, girl. cause Jerusalem to know our abominations. Thus sayeth the Lord God to Jerusalem,
to the church, your birth and your nativity is of the land
of Canaan. What's that mean? Well, it's
not good, but just put it that way. Thy father was an Amorite,
thy mother a Hittite. Not good. As for thy nativity
in the day that you were born, your navel was not cut, neither
you were washed in water. Nobody did this to supple thee.
Thou was not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. None I pitied
thee to do any of these unto thee to have compassion on thee,
but thou was cast out in the open field to the loathing of
thy person in the day that you were born. That's original sin. That's us. Now, when I, God,
through the Son, enabled by the Spirit, when I passed by thee,
and I saw thee polluted, polluted in thine own blood, I said unto
thee, when thou wast in thy blood, live. Yea, I said unto thee,
when thou wast in thy blood, live. That's the only way we're
gonna live. It's gonna breathe the breath of life into us. I
have caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, Verse
8, Now when I passed by thee, and looked on thee, behold, thy
time was a time of love. And I spread my skirt over thee,
and covered thy nakedness. And I swear unto thee, and entered
into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest
mine. This is what it is to see the
Lord Christ. To say, that's me. You put yourself,
I put myself in this text. Who's he speaking of? He's speaking
of us. Redeeming us to God by His sacrifice,
making us as He is. He pleads our cause, He intercedes
for us, and He's drawing us to Him and saving us, says Hebrews,
to the uttermost. To the uttermost. In closing,
I ask again, have we seen Christ? Have we seen Him? Have we beheld
Him in this word? Bleeding, suffering, and dying
for us. 2025 is upon us. I never thought,
what? Those are weird. I'm used to,
I'm thinking about this. I'm seeing all this. I'm used
to 19, 1977. I'm used to 19, 18, I'm used
to 19, and now we're, you know, the kids are like, I don't know
what you're talking about. 2025. Do you see Him right now? Oh, ask for God's
grace to behold Him, to view Him, to love Him. to come to Him for cleansing.
Indeed. Hebrews chapter 12. This is not for the person sitting
next to you. This is for the person sitting
right where you are. This is for me, standing up here,
saying this to you. Hebrews chapter 12 verse one
and two. Wherefore, seeing we also are encompassed about with
so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight
and the sin which does so easily beset us and let us run with
patience the race that is set before us in 2025. Looking unto Jesus and I got thinking I am
such as I like things simplified I love and This really is the
answer for everything Looking unto Jesus you having trouble
at work. You're having trouble with your neighbor. You're having
trouble with your kids. Whatever it is. I The answer is in here,
and not just an answer, but a compassionate, caring, loving Father instructing
us, looking up, but we gotta look unto Christ, and we always
say that, well, my eyes are off Christ. Well, there's, you're
doing what you wanna do. You're not looking to Christ.
looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, the
Alpha and Omega, who for the joy that was set before him endured
the cross, despising the shame." The joy? I don't know what that
means, but he went through it. He is set down at the right hand
of the throne of God. He's set down, that means the
work is done. And the only time he's going
to stand up again is when he comes to wipe this all, this everything
out. That's why you don't put stock
in this world. It's going to be wiped out. I
will close reading what an old minister read to a young Charles
Spurgeon. The Lord used this, and I pray
he would use it again. You can just stay there if you
want. Look unto Me, and be ye saved,
all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there's none else. There's absolutely no one else
who can save, who has saved, who will save, all on account
of the Lord Jesus Christ. And the Spirit will take that
and reveal Christ unto us. Looking have we seen Christ Have
we seen Christ I pray so Bruce would you close this please?