What a great privilege it is
to be able to meet together like this, to hear the gospel of the
Lord Jesus Christ, to fellowship with one another and get to know
family better. And what a great weekend we've
had. Great meeting. What great messages
of Christ and Him crucified that we've heard. I mean it when I
say this has truly been great. for me, and I have no doubt that
as Gabe told us yesterday, that John wrote that it's been great
for you all too, or y'all too, as we say. So with that said,
turn with me to Luke chapter one, if you would. The gospel
of Luke chapter one, verse 30. You might have noticed there
in my introduction that I use that word great a lot. And that's
the title of my message. Great. Or he shall be great. Or he is great. It's great. It's
great. A couple weeks back, or a few
weeks back, I preached from Psalm 126, verse 3, which provides
a simple five-point outline. The Lord hath done great things
for us, whereof we are glad. That's the gospel right there.
The Lord has done great things for us. And you know, only one
who is great can do great things. We ourselves are unable to do
great things. A lot of times we think we do,
but not really great. But the Lord does great things
and sometimes he does great things through us. growing up in free
will works religion. And that's what it was. It was
free will, my will, and my work that supposedly saved me. The preaching that I heard described
the Lord Jesus Christ as anything and everything but great. He
needed my help and He needed my cooperation to save me. He needed me to lend Him my will
in order for Him to accomplish His will. That's not the description
of one great. Not at all. In our day, everything
is thought to be great. I heard the word several times
this morning talking to some of you. This is great or that's
great. Well, everything's just great.
Isn't that great? How great is that? Great means
to be considerably above and beyond the average. We are not. The Lord is infinitely so. To
be great means to have an ability, a quality, an eminence, a superiority
that is high above the norm. Most of what people consider
great is not. Just not. There's only one who
is great. In our text we're told who it
is. Luke chapter 1 verse 30 we read, And the angel said unto
her that being Mary, Fear not Mary, for thou hast found favor
with God. Now Mary was chosen of God to
give birth to the Lord Jesus Christ. We all know that. Everybody
that's been exposed to religion at all knows that. But Mary is
not a deity. She's not to be worshipped. She
was a sinner just like you and I. She had no say in this matter. She was chosen of God for a specific
purpose. You know, I was raised in Southern
Baptist denomination, and at five years old, my parents enrolled
me in a Catholic kindergarten. You're talking about being a
mixed up kid. You know, I didn't only have to believe that I had
to help God out, I believed I had to help Mary out too. No wonder I didn't like this
religion stuff much. But here in verse 31, God the
Father, through His messenger, the angel, reveals to Mary that
she'd bring forth a son who was to be called Jesus. This is not
just any child. This child is gonna be great,
as we'll see. Verse 33, or verse 32, excuse
me, the angel of the Lord adds, he shall be great. Great. That puts the word great into
perspective. He shall be great and shall be
called the son of the highest. and the Lord shall give unto
him the throne of his father David. He's gonna be great. Verse 33, and he shall reign
over the house of Jacob forever. And of his kingdom there shall
be no end. The Lord sure sounds great to
me. Mary's nothing more than an instrument,
a vessel used of God to bring Christ, the Messiah, into the
world. Mary is not the mother of God. God simply made her a mother,
just as He did each of you. If you're a mother here today,
God made you so. If you're a father, same thing. Mary is not a Savior. She has nothing to do with the
salvation of sinners. Nothing. Russell, Mary didn't
even know what was going on here. Look at verse 34. She says, Well,
how shall this be seen? I know not a man. You see, when
it comes to God doing great things, He doesn't need to run it by
us. A lot of people think He does. That's what folks in our day
seem to think. If God is so great, do you remember what He said?
He said, if I was hungry, I wouldn't tell you. For the world is mine
and the fullness thereof. What does God need from us? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. God does
great things because He's great. And being great, He doesn't need
our approval, He doesn't need our cooperation in what He purposes
to do. What God purposed to do, heaven
and earth, seeing all deep places, that did He. No help was needed. No approval on our part was qualified. Notice also that in verse 32,
we're told that the Lord Jesus was David's Son in the flesh.
Gabe told us yesterday, this One who is great is David's Son,
but I tell you, as the Scriptures do, yet He is David's Lord. You see, only One who is great,
only One who is God, and only One who is man could be those
things. Both those things. Yet, to the
ordinary, enlightened, I in the Lord's day and in ours. The Lord
Jesus was anything but great. Seemed anything but great. He
stooped from heaven's throne to the womb of a woman. And what
a low, very low condescension that was. How great did it seem
in His first estate on earth? Who thought one to be great who
was born in a barn? In a stable? whose crib was a place where cows ate and drank. Who thought the Lord was great
as He nursed from His mother's breast? He was just like any
other child, at least it seemed. Who thought He was great when
He was persecuted and rejected and in the end crucified? Who
considered Him great when He had no place to lay His head?
The Lord Jesus was homeless. And you see a homeless person
today, you can have pity and compassion, but you don't think
they're great. How great was He when the tongues of men called
Him fellow? And that word fellow means a
worthless person. How great did He seem when He
was accused of being a drunk? A winebibber, they called Him.
A glutton. accused him of having a devil.
How great was he? How great did he seem? Was he
thought to be great when they asked him, can there any good
or great thing come out of Nazareth? How great was he when he was
tried and condemned and suffered and crucified as a true criminal? How great did he seem then? How
great did he appear when his own people desired Pilate to
release a common, well-known criminal, a murderer, in his
room instead? Pilate said, you've got a custom
that I should release unto you one at the Passover. Will you
therefore I release unto you the king of the Jews? And they
cried all together. saying, not this man, not this
man, Barabbas. Give us Barabbas. And then it
adds, and Barabbas was a robber. Did you know that the name Barabbas
means son of the father? He pictures us, the sinners,
that we are sons and daughters of our father Adam. What a picture
that whole thing is of the substitution of the Lord Jesus for Barabbas. That's why we love this gospel,
those of you that do, because you know, you know what God's
done for you. He took you who deserve nothing
but death and condemnation and killed his own son in your womb
instead. And that's good news for you,
the sinner. And that's good news for me.
Mark 15-7 tells us Barabbas had committed murder in the insurrection.
Luke 23-25 tells us that Barabbas was for sedition and murder cast
into prison. But Pilate delivered the Lord
Jesus to their will. So let's just take just a moment
here to talk about our will, our free will. There's a picture
of it right there. Here we see the true nature of
man's true will. Apart from divine revelation,
dear friends, you and I will not come to Christ that we might
have life. We will not come to Him that
we might have life. That shows you something of our
will. We will choose the worst of the
worst, and that is in ourselves. That being ourselves over the
perfectly holy and righteous Lord Jesus Christ. Oh, I'm not
going to talk about my will. My will? Wicked. Wicked. How great did the Lord
Jesus appear when he was scourged and beaten beyond recognition?
The scripture says that his visage was so marred that he didn't
even look like a man. How great did He seem then? How
great did He appear when they took a crown of thorns and shoved
it down on His head and the blood ran from His brow into His eyes? Was everybody saying, well, this
is a great man. Did He show the signs of being
one great then? Was the impression of the Lord
Jesus great when He was crucified between two thieves? How great was He viewed when
they put Him in a borrowed tomb? The angel said He should be great,
but who's ever been made so vile as our Savior was? The angel
proclaimed that He would be called the Son of the Highest, who would
sit on David's throne, but this great One, the One that these
men and I today have endeavored to proclaim to you, who He was brought into the dust
of death. And His name cast forth as one
evil. I declare to you, dear sinner,
that the very man who was despised and spat upon, you know, there's
no greater act of, you know, just hatred and
disrespect than to spit on someone. And yet they spit in God's face. But now He sits on a much higher
throne than David's. He's crowned and anointed King
of kings and Lord of lords. And I declare to you this morning,
Rick, He is great. Regardless of what this blind
world does not see, our Lord Jesus rose from the lowest depths
to the greatest heights to reign throughout eternity. And Peter
and the apostles testified, this Jesus hath God raised up, whereof
we are all witnesses, he being by the right hand of God exalted. He's great. He is great. Well, Stephen was being stoned. You remember that story. He said,
behold, I see the heavens open. and the Son of Man standing on
the right hand of God. The Lord was great in the fact
that He didn't seem great. You know, everyone wants to have
a good reputation. Everyone wants to not be disappointed
in someone's eyes. But our Lord was great in the
fact that He didn't desire to look great. He made Himself of
no reputation. Men endeavor to have a good reputation. We want to have a good reputation,
believers especially, for the glory of God. But Christ's greatness
was that He made Himself of no reputation. He took upon Himself
the form of a servant. He was made in the likeness of
men. What a great thing! Jesus Christ is God our Savior. And He's the man Christ Jesus.
He's wonderfully unique. He is the only one of His kind.
There'll never be another. God in the flesh came once. And
you know, I hear people talking about the Jews being God's chosen people. They still don't believe that
the Messiah has come. Well, He has. And He's great. And friends, if I could sing
forth Christ's praises as with the symphonies of a choir of
cherubims, I'd fail to sing of the heights of His greatness. So, Brother Darwin, we just have
to be content to simply touch the hem of the garment of His
greatness. And the wonderful thing about
that is it's at His feet that we're lifted to the highest.
We fall and we bow at Christ's feet for our highest obtaining. You can't get any higher than
at Christ's feet. And just as God put Moses in
the cliff of the rock and caused him to only see the back parts
of the Lord's great holiness and glory, we've got to be content
with that also. Christ in all His glory and greatness
cannot be described. We just take a stab at it, we
preachers. Like Paul, if we were called
up to the third heaven, we should come back with just little to
say. For the words would be unspeakable
words. They're unspeakable. Don't mean
we couldn't pronounce the word. It just means we can't find the
words great enough. He shall be great. In what ways is the Lord Jesus
great? Well, in every way. In every way. I'll just give
you a few. He's great in the perfection
of His nature. He's divine and therefore He's
unique. He's the God-Man. He's very God
of very God. He's equal with God. He's not
a step below God. He is God. God in three persons. None less God than the other. He's the Son of God. He's God
the Son. He's equal with God, one with
the Father and one with the Spirit. He's infinite. He's immeasurable. He's incomprehensible. He's inconceivable. He fills all things, but nothing
adds to Him, and He's great beyond any perception of what we consider
to be great. You think of something that you
consider to be great, He's infinitely higher than that. He was in the
beginning with God. He's God's Word and all things
were made by Him. Without Him was not anything
made that was made. Isn't that great? Boy, that takes
a great one. For of Him and through Him and
to Him are all things to whom be glory, greatness forever. Amen. He's before all things. By Him all things consist. And
for the elect's sake, for His people's sake, He who is God
is also a man. Not 50% man and 50% God. He's 100% God and 100% man. He's all that God is and He is
all that God created man to be. And what did man do? He messed
that up. He's as truly God as if He wasn't
man. And He's completely and perfectly
man as if He wasn't God. Oh, you think of that wondrous
and great combination of perfect man without spot, without stain
or original sin. How great is one who's never
sinned? He's the only one that never
did. But his greatness doesn't stop
there. And we don't have time to enter into his greatness,
not like we should. You gotta add that he has all
the attributes of God and he's the fullness of the Godhead bodily. The Lord Jesus is great where
all else are little. Christ is great while all else
are nothing. Friends, we are nothing. We are
nothing, we have nothing, we can do nothing. But Christ is
great when we are nothing. Our Lord Jesus stands alone in
his greatness. He's great in the grandeur of
His attributes and offices. Pile up all His offices and all
His attributes, and you'll see that He's great. Why, His name
is called Wonderful, Counselor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting
Father, the Prince of Peace. Only one great could have such
names as those. Blessed and great be He that
cometh in the name of the Lord. Christ is infinite. He's self-existing. He's without origin. Christ is
immutable. He's unchanging. He never changes. Oh, we're up and down like the
weather, but not Him. He never changes. Christ is self-sufficient. He doesn't have any needs. How
dare us to think we could help God out? Christ is omnipotent. He's all-powerful. He's sovereign.
I had a man ask me not long ago, he said, why do you always have
to put sovereign in front of God? If God is God, isn't He
sovereign? I said, yeah, but most people
don't know that. We have to qualify our God over this imagined God
of the world. But the God of this world is
trying. He wants to. That's not my God. My God's sovereign,
He's omnipotent, He's all-powerful. He does what He wills in the
army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. And
listen, nobody, no man, no woman can stay His hand or say unto
Him, what? Do this, that. Isn't that your
God, Larry? He's omniscient, He knows everything.
We don't let God in on secrets. Christ is omnipresent. He's always
and everywhere. Thirdly, our Lord Jesus is great
in the splendor of His achievements. That's what us preachers talk
about, what He's done. He's done great things for us. His duty is never neglected.
His name is faithful and true. He finished the work His Father
gave Him to do. He bore His people's sin upon
the cross and He paid for all our sins in full. Paid in full. Boy, I remember the first time
I had a sizable loan and I finally got that thing paid for and I
got that note that I signed in the mail and stamped in red was
paid in full. That's what Christ had done for
us. And it's stamped in the red of His blood, paid in full. Our sin never be mentioned to
us again. Why? Because we don't have any. We don't have any. Isn't that
great? He's made an end to sin for His
elect. All past sin, all present sin,
all future sin, gone forever. Christ conquered those who conquered
us. And people will say, well, brother,
you can't preach that. If you tell people they don't
have any sin and that all their past sin's gone, present sin,
future sin's gone, that'll give them a license to sin. We don't
need a license to sin. We do it pretty good without
a license. Seriously. We are more than conquerors through
Him that loved us, not on our own. And He's given gifts to
man, the gift of the Holy Spirit. Gifts to make us useful for His
glory. Gifts that make us profitable
for the good of the church. In Christ's marriage, cover every
believer from head to toe with the perfect obedience of the
law. You ever run into folks that
say, you know, I've got six or seven of the Ten Commandments
down. I'm working on the last four
or three. No, no, no, no. I haven't kept the first one
because I've got to keep it perfect to be accepted. I've never done
that. And if I'm not, if I'm not, if
I'm guilty in one point of the law, I'm guilty of the whole
law. So there ain't no hope for me being saved by trying to keep
the Ten Commandments or Any of them. You can't do it. It's impossible. But our Lord, oh, the Great One,
He's turned hell into heaven for us. And He's turned disease
into health for us, and disobedience into obedience for us, and He's
lifted us up from the dunghill to set us among princes. Isn't
that a great thing? The Lord Jesus is great beyond
measure. He's great in the number of those
whom He saved. When all the elect throughout
all time are gathered together, it's going to be a great number.
It's going to be a multitude that no man can number. I've
never took the time to see how far I could count, but I know
this, those in glory are going to be more than I can number.
It's going to be much more than that. I reckon I could count
to a zillion. When all the elect of God are
gathered together, a multitude, a multitude. Election, let me
just throw this in. Election doesn't mean that God
has only chosen a select few. and left the mass of His creatures
to perish. No, but as many as the stars
are in heaven. That's what God told Abraham.
As many as the stars are in heaven, as much as the grains of sand
on the seashore, there will be enough to mark those that are
saved. What a great number. And what's even greater is that
He chose such a one as me to be one of them. I say it often,
I'll say it again, election never shut anybody out of heaven. I
don't know why folks think that. Oh, as Gabe said, you're one
of those selected ones, one of those predestinators. Yes, by God's grace, I am. And I'm so thankful for it. Election
never shut anybody out of heaven. Men's unbelief, men's obstinance,
men's unwillingness to bow to Christ is what does that. The
election of God assures that a multitude gonna definitely
be saved. And that's why I love election.
I wouldn't be saved apart from it. God chose me before I'd done
any good or evil that the purpose of God according to election
might stand. It's not of my doing, it's of
His doing. And every believer say, that's
exactly how God saved me. I can't do anything to be saved.
Election and predestination doesn't lock anybody up, but it makes
it certain for some. Whosoever's thirsty. Whosoever
is thirsty can drink from Christ's fountain of living water. Are
you thirsty? That's the question. Well, how
do I know if I'm elected? Are you thirsty? How do I know
if I'm elected? Are you hungry for the bread
of life? I can't do anything to be saved.
And here's the great thing. I can't do anything to be lost. You see, if the Lord Jesus Christ
saved me, if I'm saved by His perfect work of righteousness
and His obedience to the law, And I really believe that, then
I have to really believe that I can't do anything to be lost.
And that's what makes the gospel so great. Because I can't be. I love the story where someone
asked Brother Mayhem one time, do you believe one saved always
save? You know, I heard that question
all my life growing up in religion. I never knew what it meant. But
I do now. And they said, Brother Mahan,
do you believe one saved always saves? He said, I believe it's
all decided by, determined by who does the saving. Who saved
you? If God Almighty saved you, yes,
I believe one saved always saves. But if you saved yourself, you're
in a heap of trouble. Salvation's not of me. Salvation's
of the Lord. Salvation's not of man or woman.
Salvation's of the Lord. It's the Lord that saves. And
you know what? Only one great can, Mary. In
the estimation of His people, the Lord is great. The believer's
estimation of Christ could never fully express their overwhelming
love and appreciation and thankfulness to Him for what He's done for
them. We try. We try. We want to. That's why we meet together,
that's why we hear the God. Tell me again, tell me again
how God saved a wretch like me. Would you tell me? And we sing
and we praise Him and we worship Him for what He's done for us? Oh, He's high in His people's
estimation. He's redeemed our souls with
His blood. He's not only great, but He's
great eternally. Who can look at the sun at noonday?
You know, they told us all life, don't do that, you'll go blind.
And they're right. But who can look at the sun at
noonday and not see something of the power, the unlimited power
and glory of the sun, S-U-N. But the sun, S-O-N, of glory
and greatness outshines that sun. And He's the one who created
it. Can we with mortal tongue express
the greatness of His glory and power? No. But we sure want to. We sure want to. These people
are going to strive to do so all the days of their life. And
that's not just preachers, not just pastors, that's every believer.
We want everybody to know how great our God is. Oh, our estimation of the one
who loved us and gave himself for us is great, isn't it? How
great must the glory of Christ be in heaven? I can't wait to
find out. I can't wait to see it with my
own damn eyes. Child of God, the only thing
that you and I yet lack of our fully provided redemption is
the glory that awaits us in heaven. Did our Father not say, or did
our Lord not say, Father, I will that they also who now has given
me be with me where I am, that they may behold my glory. We're gonna behold His glory.
We're gonna see it with not just eyes of faith. One day we're
gonna see it. We're gonna truly see it. And
what honor and majesty surround our prince and the great city
of our Lord and the mountain of his holiness. I love this
verse, Revelation 21, 23. And the city had no need of the
sun or the moon, neither of the moon to shine in it for the glory
of God did lighten it and the lamb is the light thereof. From where does this light in
heaven come? The glory of God did light it. And the Lamb is
the light thereof. Oh, isn't He great? The whole
city shines with the Redeemer's glory. That is beyond greatness. The Great One unto whose name
we give glory. He deserves all the glory. For
He did it all for us. With wonder and surprise, the
elect of God will express their admiration that He could love
such unworthy sinners as they are. I can't get over it. I'll
be honest with you, I can't get over that my wife, after 42 years,
still loves me. And you know, a lot of you aren't
bashful to say, how'd you get her? I didn't always look like this. But how much more so is that
true when we think about what Christ has done for us? That
He loved me in spite of me. That's grace. That's great grace. That's marvelous grace. You see, we're in great ruin
and we need a great deliverer. Our house is ruined. We, like
the foolish man, built our house upon the sand. and the waves
of life beat against it, the winds of life beat against it,
and great was the fall of it. The rain descended, the floods
came, the winds blew and beat upon the house, and it fell,
and great was the fall of it. But we must be wise and build
our house upon Christ. I say to you this morning that
are yet without Christ, that are yet trusting in Him, is to
be your all in all, your obedience before God, that build your house
upon the rock. On Christ the solid rock I stand,
all other ground sinking sand, and it's going to fall. We're covered with great sin,
but He who is great will make short order of great sin, because
He's the great one. He put away sin, how? By the
sacrifice of Himself. What a joy for great sinners
to know that their Christ that Christ, their Redeemer, is great.
He is great. We have a great high priest,
the Scripture tells us. He's so great that he's been
touched and still is with the feelings of our affirmatives.
He's so great that he was in all points tempted as we are,
yet without sin. How great is that? He's the Christ
of great preparations. We have great poverty. He's a great supplier. He supplies
all our needs. All of them are supplied in Him.
God shall supply all your needs. Do you ever notice that? That's
in the singular. We've got a lot of needs, but
there's one thing needful. He shall supply all our need
in Christ Jesus. That's where our need is met. We're greatly famished. He has
a great abundance of food. We require great rivers of living
water. Christ's smitten rock yields
a ceaseless flood. We have great demands. Christ
has great supplies. We have great needs and Christ
has made all the necessary preparations. He's prepared a great heaven.
Heaven is certain because of His great deliverance. We're
certain to have great peace, great joy, great rest, great
fellowship, great glory because of Him. God's kingdom is no little
heaven. It's a great one. No narrow delight
in the greatness of God's kingdom. He shall be great. To Him every
knee shall bow. Every tongue is going to confess.
The nations are going to bow at His feet. The nations shall
own Him as their King. I was thinking not long ago,
the Lord is Lord over everyone, but He's only Father to some.
He's Lord over all, and one day we're all going to stand before
Him and give an account of the things that we've done in this
body. But the Son, He's going to look
at it and say, My Son, My daughter, enter in. Enter in. Because I've
done great things for you. The battles of the Lord's, our
enemies are His. He will deliver them into our
hands because He's great. Resurrection is at hand. Judgment
is coming. But there's no fear for us to
fear. He shall gather His elect people
and they will proclaim. Hallelujah! Hallelujah, the Lord
God Omnipotent reigneth, and His Son is exalted to sit with
Him upon the throne of His glory forever and ever. And that's
our hope. The Lord has done great things
for us. What about us? What do we do
in the equation? We're of. We're glad. I'm glad. Aren't you glad? Oh, I tell you,
we've got something to be glad about. I used to get upset and
pout around. My mother said, well, you can
just get glad in the same pants you got mad in. Just get glad. Oh God, very high, who has done
great things. Oh God, who is like unto thee.