Isaiah 45 and verse 21 and 22,
mainly 22, but let's look at 21 to start. Tell me, or tell
ye, and bring them near. Yea, let them take counsel together. Who hath declared this from ancient
time? Who hath told it from that time?
Have not I the Lord? There is no God else beside me. a just God and a Savior. There is none beside Me. Look unto Me. Look unto Me. That's what we're going to be
talking about. Look unto Me, says the Lord God,
and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God and
there is none else. Now, contrary to what the media
Contrary to what people write, there is one God, one Lord, one
Gospel, one faith, one baptism. To deviate from that is to bring
upon yourselves, or bring upon ourselves, sure destruction.
It may not be swift, but it's going to be sure destruction.
I don't care what intellectual status we think we may have,
God is true and every man a liar. But this phrase, look unto Me,
look unto Me, it's amazing that man is both lost and saved by
a look. Turn with me to Genesis chapter
3. Man is both saved and fell by a look. Genesis chapter 3,
in this blissful, peaceful, garden setting paradise as it's called,
Genesis chapter 3 and verse 5, for God doth know
that in the day says Satan to the woman that you eat thereof,
Then your eyes shall be opened, and you shall be as gods, knowing
good and evil." And when the woman saw, when
she looked, when she beheld, when she saw that the tree was
good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, a tree
to be desired to make one wise, she took of the fruit thereof
and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her. And he
did eat. She saw. She looked. She beheld. So this is our beginning. This is where it all started
as far as we're concerned. It started in debt by one look. Adam and Eve fell in the garden
and plummeted our whole existence into sin. Just a look. A complete fall, not a partial
fall. Not man's free will was spared
the fall. Everything about man, everything
about his fortitude, everything about him,
mind, soul, body. That's why we get older. That's
why the doctors, they do so well in this country. That's why the
health occupation does so well. It's because, like John Newton
said, I'm suffering from a disease of which there is no cure. Old
age. What's going to happen? Total
fall. Total separation from God. Therefore,
he demanded that they leave paradise. Matter of fact, he shunned them. He sent them out of paradise.
They were once created, we were once created in God's image,
followed Him, they followed Him, obeyed Him, but now, as Ephesians
2 says, we're spiritually dead. Well, I can still have the ability
to think. Yes, you do. I still have the ability to reason.
Yes, you do. I still have all these abilities. Yes, you do.
But in the area of spirituality, and that's what the Gospel deals
in. That's what the Gospel deals
with. Because these mortal bodies, they're passing away. But the
soul, the soul, that's what God's concerned with. Trespasses and sins. trespasses
and sins. Ephesians chapter 2 and many
other places. Romans 1, 2, 3. We're all dead. Our throat is an open sepulcher. It's not a pretty sight. Scripture
says from the top of the head to the bottom of the feet. It's
open sores. It's putrefying. We're likened
to dead and dead can't move. Dead can't move one smallest
increment towards God. And towards God is salvation.
To look to Him is to live as we saw in Isaiah 45. Look unto Me. Well, a look we're
saved and a look we fell. In that order, a look we fell
first. So we're all sin. And in that
passage in the Old Testament where The prophet says, the Lord
takes him and sets him, I think it was the valley of Ankor, sets
him in the valley and says, what do you see? I see a bunch of
dead, dry bones. And he says, can these bones
live? No. And he says, you know, Lord. He says, preach unto them, prophesy
unto them. And he did, and there was a stirring.
But there was no life. And then the breath of God came. And they all stood up. But that's
what we are by nature. We cannot please God. We cannot
come to Him that we may have life. In us is no good. We know this from the Scriptures. This is what we tell our children,
even though the schools and everybody else is telling them other things. But when we gather together under
His name, under His banner, we see our beginning was one of
debt. We had no way to pay. to free
ourselves. And so, turn to Numbers chapter
21. So it begins, by a look, there's
death. She saw that the fruit was good
and pleasant, and she took it. But just as with that look, death,
so with the look, there's life, there's a new walk, there's new
birth. It begins with the look, Numbers
21, verses 4-9. And as they, that is the children
of Israel in Numbers 21, as they journeyed from Mount Hor by the
way of the Red Sea to encompass the land of Edom, and the soul
of the people was much discouraged because of the way. and the people
spake against God, and spake against Moses, wherefore have
you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness? For
there is no bread, neither is there any water, and our soul
hates this light bread." Well, that light bread was manna. Well,
that pictured Christ. It came down from heaven, unasked
for, unassisted, it freely came. And if you were hungry, you took
some. If you weren't hungry, you didn't.
But you didn't store it over. It says His grace is sufficient.
You didn't store it over. Store any over. That's what they
had. And it was like hoarfrost. They
said it was tasty. It was like honey. It was light. Refreshing. Now they're tired of it. And
isn't that us by nature? We hear the message. We're thinking,
I'd rather be somewhere else. or we're doing something else,
that again goes back to our beginning. Depravity. That's us. So, the
Lord sent fiery serpents among the people and they bit the people
and much people died. The visceral died. Therefore,
the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned. That's
good. For we have spoken against the Lord and against thee. That's
the right order. You may speak against a brother
or sister, but you're speaking against God. We've sinned against
Thee, we've sinned against God, we've sinned against Thee. Pray
unto the Lord that He take away these serpents from us, and Moses
prayed for the people, and the Lord said unto Moses, Make a
fiery serpent, set it on a pole, and it shall come to pass that
every one that is bitten, when he looks, when he or she looks, shall live." Verse 9, 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, when he beheld the serpent of brass,
he lived. He looked and lived. Look unto
me, and be ye saved. It's a look. It's a look. Now I know that this look is
none other than believing in Christ. And I know that this
look is none other than faith in Christ. Turn to John chapter
11. How do you look upon something
that's not here? How do you believe upon someone
who's not in front of you? Well, you believe from the heart.
From a new heart that God's given you. But you look. You look. John chapter 11 and verse 26. Whosoever liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. Whosoever liveth and believes
in me shall never die. John chapter 7 verse 38. John 7. Verse 38, Christ says,
"...he that believeth on Me, as the Scripture saith, out of
his belly shall flow rivers of living water." He that believeth
on Me. He that looks upon Me. Salvation is a look. And I've
said this before, I think Spurge, somebody said, metaphorically,
believing is tied to every sense. Look. Taste. Handle. And I think, well, that's
so true. And it's metaphorically, it's
spoken so we can understand it. And I know God chooses a people,
and I know God's predestinated. All who will come to Him will
come to Him. But I ask you, have you been bitten? Have you been
bitten by sin? Yes, you're born in sin. We're
all born in sin. Are we aware of it? Has the Holy
Spirit made you aware of your need to look? If you were not
bit, according to numbers, you didn't need to look. Why go to a physician if you're
not sick? You don't go. You don't go unless
you have an issue. Would to God He would bring us,
each one of us, our children, ourselves, to realize we've looked
at that fruit and we fell in Adam. Would to God He would bring
us to the realization that we've been bit spiritually by sin,
Satan himself, and we're going to die. I've turned away from
it, but I believe in Numbers he says, and the Lord sent them
fiery serpents, and much people died. So there are people who
died, they had no hope. As people die today, never hearing
the Gospel, they have no hope. They're following the religion
of Mama, they're following the religion of Daddy, they're following
the religion of Grandma and Grandpa, What does the Word say? The Word
says you can do nothing to please Him. Christ says without Me,
you can do nothing. And He says in Hosea, and Christ
almost reiterates it, from Me is your fruit found. So any fruit
that we have in repentance is a fruit, belief is a fruit, trust
is a fruit, a look is a fruit, it's from Him. If He's provided
faith and grace and repentance, He's going to supply it. He's
going to supply it. Looking unto Jesus, as I said,
is none other than faith, none other than believing in Christ.
Both believing in faith is a free and sovereign bestowal of grace
upon us. And we cannot produce either
without divine revelation. So why do I stand up here? Because
He's chosen the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.
You would think, just at one time, just one message, everything
would be fine. But we are, well the scripture
says even believers get dull of hearing. And we do. It sure makes my job easier,
I could say it that way. I got one message. I just love
that illustration with Spurgeon. He talks about a guy that's playing
the guitar and got one string. And he's sitting there plucking
it. Just plucking one string. To the unbeliever, how monotonous,
how boring. Are we going there to hear about
the same old story? To the believer, he sings, he's
got a hymn written for him, tell me the same old story. That's what we want to hear.
That's what we desire to hear. That's what we're looking for.
That's what we're looking for. In this life, this look, this
trust, this faith, this hope, this belief, it's all by and
through that glorious object of the Second Person of the Trinity,
the Lord Christ. Look unto Me and be you saved. But here's the beautiful part.
We don't look once and then that's it. We look unto Him once for
salvation. But turn with me to Hebrews 12. Let me put it this way, if you
ever stop looking, you've never looked. That's my point. If you ever stop looking to Christ,
you've never looked to Him. Let me show you this. Hebrews
12. Now, I didn't say if you quit
coming to church, though, you know, we could discuss that.
Don't quit coming. If you ever quit looking to Christ,
you've never looked. And there are people who, as
Scripture talks about in 1 John, that they were of us, but they're
no longer a part of us. They've walked away. And there
is apostasy. But that's not what we're talking about. I'm talking
about looking. We look to Him from first to last. He's the
Alpha and the Omega. We look unto the Lord and Isaiah
and be ye saved. And we look unto Him. Not only
is this important in our beginning of grace, truth, and happiness,
but we continue to look all throughout our sojourn here. Hebrews chapter
12 and look at verse 1 and 2. Hebrews 12 verse 1-2, Wherefore,
seeing we are encompassed about, he's writing to the believing
Hebrews, with great a cloud of witness, let us lay aside every
weight and the sin which doth so easily beset us, unbelief,
and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,
looking unto Jesus. Now as you run, This is what you do. Now, if
you're running a marathon, you really can't see the finish line,
but if you studied the course, you know where it's at. Now,
if you're running a 440, I guess they still call it a 440, if
you're still running a 440, we used to have a 220 when I was
in school, you know where that end is. And
I was watching something the other day, I can't remember who
it was, But the crowd was laughing at this guy because he was so
far behind. Well, nobody, I think it was
a mile, he was running in a track. And the announcer was saying,
these people are laughing. And you could see it. I can't
remember what country he was from, but nobody ever kicks a
full last lap. This is 884, whatever it is.
Nobody ever kicked, they kick about halfway through. He had
one more lap to go and he just started, which means he was running
for all he was worth. And he ended up taking over the
field and winning. He knew where the finish line
was. We never stop looking to Christ. Look at what it says. Let us
run with patience. Let us run. That word is to run
or to walk. To move forward with patience. The race, that race, that literally
is our conflict. I thought that was interesting.
That word is literally our conflict or our assembly. So when we gather
together in the assembly, we look to Christ in our conflict
out in the world. And believe me, if you don't
know it's a conflict, you will know it's a conflict by the end
of your course. Yet the outcome is sure to all
the seed. Victory is certain in Christ.
And as we run, walk this earth, sojourn, whatever you want to
call it, we are solely, singularly, without hesitation, to look to,
to look upon and trust our Redeemer. That's what he's saying. Run
with patience that race that is set before us. If we all have
a race, we all have something set before us. Looking unto Jesus,
we don't ever... I remember telling my daughter
when she was running track, for Jackson, for school, and all
the kids at that age, it's like fourth or fifth grade, when they
run, they get to the stop, to the finish line, and they stop,
or they slow down. I told her, I said, run 10 feet
past, just act like the stop, the finish line is just run through
it. Don't stop. That's what we do. We continue
to run. Don't stop looking. Don't look
back. Don't take time off from beholding
the Lamb of God and His grace. This is what believers do. This
is whom we adore, we cherish and love. This is our beloved.
He is our spouse. He is the one among ten thousands
to us. This is how we survive the trial
of our faith. This is how we survive the war
against the soul, the storm by day and the winds by night, by
looking to Christ. I know it sounds simple, and
it is, because we're not to detract each other from the simplicity
that's in Christ. And I know it sounds basic, but the Gospel
is basic. And it's singular. And every
time I get up here, and every time somebody gets up here, they
point us to Christ. Look to Christ. Why? Look unto me. God through
the person of Christ, by the enabling of the Holy Spirit,
look unto me and be ye saved. Be ye saved. He is our everything
and He is everything needful to us. Okay, so we're looking. We've
looked to Him for our son's salvation. We're looking to Him as these
difficult trials and tribulations and times of distress, persecution,
nakedness, peril soared. We're looking to Him. But we
even look to Him at the last or at our end. Turn to Philippians
3. Philippians 3. Verse 20, for our conversation,
and that word conversation is everything about us, that's our
life, that's our walk, is in heaven, from whence also we look,
we look for the Savior and Lord Jesus Christ. So even at the
end, when we're laying in our deathbed, We are to look. Heaven is our citizenship. This
is to be our final living place. And we are to look for Christ
and look towards Christ. We look for the Savior, the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's our expectation. The word
hope is not like, oh, I hope this happens. The word hope in
the Scriptures for the most part is used as it means confident
expectation. He is our expectation. We've
looked to Him for life. We look unto Jesus, the author
and finisher of our faith as it's tried and we go through
difficult times. And at the last, we look to Him
then. And then we'll be with Him Forever. Our first look, our last look,
all centers around and all because of our merciful and kind Savior
of our sinful souls. May we bless God. He will not
abandon us, those whom He foreknew, which is for love. He will not
ever forsake the apple of His eye. He will not desert His lost
and now found sheep, but rather with the given ability to look
to Him He will keep us safe and secure under His everlasting
arms." Underneath, wasn't it? Spurgeon brought this to my attention
years ago. I never thought about it. The
everlasting arms. He says underneath. Underneath,
it's like you can't get any lower than underneath, can you? You
can't get any lower than underneath and His arms are there. I just
thought that was something that I had missed. I thought that
was beautiful. There's no one able to pluck you out of His
sovereign, powerful hands. And Job, we are hedged about
by omnipotence. And those adversities that do
come our way, He allows them to come in. But it's all for
our good and our best interest and for His ultimate glory. Let
me close and read something that Mr. Pink said about this, looking
unto Jesus. Perhaps right here and right
now, a troubled and trembling sinner will voice his last difficulty. Sir, I do not know that I am
looking in the correct way. The correct way. Dear friend,
God does not tell you to look at your look. That phrase, it
seems unclear, but it makes perfect sense. We look at our look, at
how we're looking. He says, it doesn't tell you
to look at your look, but look at Christ. In that great crowd,
back in numbers, that were bitten by the serpents, there were some
young eyes and there were some old eyes that looked at the serpent.
There were some with clear vision and some with dim vision. There
were some who had a full view of the serpent by reason of their
nearness to the uplifted type of Christ, and there were most
probably others who could scarcely see the image because of their
great distance from the pole. But the divine record still says,
it shall come to pass, that everyone that is bitten with sin, when
he looks, when she looks, upon it shall live. And so it is today.
The Lord Jesus says, Come unto Me, all you that labor and are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest. He does not define
the method or manner of coming. This is interesting. And even
if the poor sinner comes groping, stumbling, falling, yet if only
he will come, there is a warm welcome for him. So it is in
our text. It is whosoever believes. Nothing is said about the strength
or the intelligence of the belief, for it is not the character or
degree of faith that saves, but Christ that saves. Faith is simply
the eye of the soul that looks unto the Lord Jesus. Do not rest
then on your faith, but on the Savior Himself. Look unto me. Look unto me and be ye saved. Bruce, would you close us? I thank you, Father. We see your resurrection
and our peace because we give unto you the secret promises.
You see the things you do, especially for your saints. You see all
the power that you have in the Son of God. You look to your
Lord for all things because they belong to you.