I invite you to turn back with
me now to 1 Peter chapter 2. I titled the message this morning,
was a single word, precious. Over and over, chapter 2, it
keeps telling us Christ is precious. He's precious. And there are
many great and glorious terms used to describe our Lord. These
are but a few. Wonderful. Have you found him
to be that? Wonderful. Counselor. The mighty God. The everlasting Father. The Prince
of Peace. He's called blessed. Blessed. He's called holy and undefiled. But no name is so endearing to
the believer as this one. He's precious. He's precious. Unto you therefore which believe. Who does that include? Everyone
who believes. There's not one individual in
the kingdom of God, not one individual born of God, to whom Christ is
not precious. He's precious. Unto you therefore which believe,
he's precious. Now, you notice in that verse
that there is a therefore. therefore points us back to what's
already been said. That's why I wanted to read that
to you a few moments ago. And the gist of which is that
Christ is the seed of our regeneration. It's the preaching of a person.
It's this wonderful, glorious name which Christ has manifested
and revealed to man. As the Spirit of Christ put within
the Virgin a holy seed and Christ was formed within, so that same
Spirit takes the preaching of the Gospel and causes Christ
to be formed in us. Paul said to the Galatians, of
whom somebody came in unawares, came in unnoticed, and before
long he was in the pulpit, and before long he had preached lies
to these people. And Paul said to them, he said,
I travail in birth again. Now listen, until Christ be formed
in you. That's what it is to be born
of God. Christ begins to be formed within
us. Christ in you, that's the hope
of glory. Not Christ to you, not Christ
in your head, Christ in you. Not as he was in the womb of
Mary, but in image. The image of your mind. been filled with idolatry since
you were born, been filled with all kind of false notions of
who he is, but Christ manifests God for who he is. You who by
him do believe in God. Isn't that what I read to you
a few moments ago? He's not in us as he was in Mary,
an actual human being in her womb, but he's in us by image
and he's in us by nature. And He's in us by authority.
And He's in us in spirit and truth. In Romans 8, 29, it said,
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. And that image is the very revelation
of God, the saving revelation of God in us. It's the very saving
nature and character of God, holy, in perfect harmony of attributes. He's in us, in love and mercy
and justice and righteousness and all these things in perfect
harmony. The scripture said He is the
image of the invisible God. I'm going to tell you something
and I want this to stick. No man has seen God at any time. You're going to have relatives
and friends and preachers and who knows what, maybe teachers
at school, I don't know. But you're going to have somebody's
going to tell you before very long, I saw God. God said to me. Well then God's
a liar because he said no man has seen God at any time. The son of God, he has seen him. And he makes him known. The only way you're ever gonna
have any knowledge of God is through Christ. He is the image of the invisible
God and we see God in Him. We come to God through Him and
we walk with God by faith in Him. And those who have experienced
this, this new birth, who have tasted, isn't that what that
says there? If so be you have tasted that
the Lord is gracious. who having come unto a living
stone, that's Christ, he's the living stone, and as lively stones
have been laid in your place in this spiritual house, enabled
of God to serve him and worship him and offer unto him spiritual
sacrifices. Unto you, therefore, which believe,
he precious. He's precious. All right, let's
talk about the preciousness of Christ. First of all, to whom is he precious? Well, if you were listening as
I read through these verses a while ago, it says he's precious to
God. 1 Peter 2 verse 4 said, he is disallowed
indeed of men but chosen of God and precious. He's precious. Now lots of things have seemed
precious to me over the years, and I've come to know that that
word precious to me is a relevant term. When Kathy and I first got married,
we didn't have anything. We moved everything we owned
in a 64 Plymouth wagon, a little tiny car. And even simple amenities
were precious to us. Somebody give us a coffee pot,
we were just tickled to death. Anything. But then as things
got better, the standard of preciousness went up. Wasn't moved by the
coffee pot thing anymore. already had more and what i'm getting at this
with uh... it is a relevant term but with
god what must i think they need to god to be precious to him even if i can't relate to any
even if it's Even in my limited, in my limited
ability, in my limited knowledge, he's precious. What must he be
to be precious to God? He's chosen of God and precious.
And then secondly, he's precious to God as God has trusted his
eternal purpose and will to him. He who first trusted in Christ,
huh? In whom you also trusted after
you heard who he was. God trusted in him, trusted everything
to him. When did he do that? In the beginning. Our Lord says in Hebrews chapter
10 in the volume of the book it's written of me, I come to
do thy will, O God. In John chapter six, he said,
I came down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will
of him that sent me. And this is the will of him that
sent me, that of all which he has given me, I should lose nothing
but raise it up again at the last day. He's precious to the Father. And he's precious to believers. Now precious is still a relevant
term, but nothing else can compete with it. You know, if you get
something tangible, something you can, like I mentioned a while
ago, a coffee pot or a gift or something, whatever it is that
you got something for Christmas, you know, you really wanted it
and you got it and you're happy with it. Pretty soon that wears
off and you're ready for something else. But not so with Christ. Because as we grow in grace,
we grow in knowledge of him. And even though it's still a
relevant term, his preciousness just keeps going. And his knowledge
just keeps coming. It never wears out. It increases,
it grows, it expands. Until pretty soon the whole universe
is swallowed up in him. And it is a relevant term, but
we never leave it. We never get past it. He's always
precious to us. And as our knowledge increases,
so does his preciousness. The more light I receive, the
more of my sin and inability I see in my need of him, and
the more precious he becomes. To whom is he precious? Well,
certainly not to Satan who holds him with a chain. The devil's his devil. That's
what that chain says. He put that chain around his
neck and he holds him. He can do exactly what our Lord
allows him to do and no more, no more. And He's certainly not
precious to the servants of Satan, those demonic spirits, or whatever
you want to call them, demons they're called in the Scriptures,
because they're reserved in chains of darkness under that great
judgment. Christ's not precious to them. Nor is He precious to this unbelieving
world to whom He is the bud of all their jokes, Considered no
more than a figment of man's imagination and concepts. He's
got no place in their lives He's got no place in their worship,
and he's got no place in their hearts But all to the believer He's
the pearl of great price Isn't that how you see him in the beginning
he's the pearl I have to have it I have to have it I'll turn
loose of everything I have but I got to have that pearl That's
at the beginning. He's the heavenly treasure as
we begin to move on. He's the heavenly treasure. We've
discovered treasure in the field. We bought the whole field. In the end, Christ is all. He's all. He's everything. All right, how is he precious? Wow, that'd be a big list, wouldn't
it? I've tried to narrow it down
a little. He's precious in his oneness. He's a one of a kind. One of a kind. There are a multitude of angels.
There's just one angel of the covenant. There's multitudes
of men, but there's only one God, man. The scripture said there's one
mediator between God and men, the man, Christ Jesus. There's a oneness about Christ
that makes his person and his presence precious to the believer. Most of us were saved out of
religion, anti-Christ religion, where God is whatever you want
him to be, whatever you allow him to be, and whatever you need him to
be. And his son, is subservient to
man. His work needs their approval
and help to be sufficient. His power is subject to their
will. Can you imagine the creator of the universe subject to a
man's will? His purpose is subject to their
decisions. And all these images they have
of him are only limited by their wicked imaginations. But Christ
is one. Over in Ephesians 4, Paul goes
through a whole list of things, but here's what he says. He said,
there's one Lord. There's just one. Not this Jesus and that Jesus
and some other Jesus, but the Jesus that sits on the throne.
There's one Lord. One faith and one baptism. One God, one Father of all, who
is above all and through all and in you all. Christ is one. In all the world, in all eternity,
in all creatures, there is but one Christ. How precious is He then to the
believer? Some of you don't even know what
I'm talking about, but I'm telling you, I was raised in religion.
And the Jesus that they talk about is not the same Jesus as
the Jesus in the scriptures. He's totally different. Totally
different. You couldn't use anything in
the scriptures that describes him to describe this Jesus that
they worship. I grew up in it. I know what
I'm talking about. Won't you let him come into your
heart? Let God, give me a break. If he wants to come in your heart,
he'll kick the door down, bolt, bar, and jam. He'll come in.
He'll come in. Without him, we can do nothing. Isn't that what he said? Without
him, we can know nothing. No man knoweth the father save
the son and he to whom the son will reveal him. And without
him we are nothing. What are we apart from his name?
What are we apart from his love and his grace and his mercy and
his adoption, his election? We're nothing. Up in Kentucky when they don't
like somebody they say, He ain't worth killing. That's
us. That's us. Every one of us. We
ain't worth killing. But in Him, we're precious. That's
what He calls us. Precious. You know why? Because
we're in Christ. And Christ is precious. He's
precious in His oneness. Secondly, He's precious in His
appointments. What if God had not appointed
Him for us? in anything? Huh? Where would
we be? Huh? Standing before that judgment
seat, standing before a holy God, trying to justify ourselves? Which work, which thought, which
prayer, which anything that you've ever done in your life would
you like to present to God and say, this is my righteousness? You can't even look me in the
eye and say it's your righteousness, let alone God. The prophet said all our righteousnesses
are as filthy rags. We're all together as an unclean
thing. Oh, how precious is he and his
appointments. If God had not given him these
appointments, Man would have disappeared in the garden when
he sinned. That would have been the end
of it. God's purpose would have been overthrown and His glory
would have remained unknown to this day. God appointed His Son
the surety of an everlasting covenant of grace and all of
its terms and its demands and its requirements were all required
at His hand. He is the surety of that covenant. The sweet psalmist of Israel,
David, who wrote the psalm. It says over in the book of Samuel,
I can't remember exactly where, I can't give you the chapter
and verse, but it says, these be the last words of the prophet
David. He said, although it be not so
with my house, yet God hath made with me an everlasting covenant,
ordered in all things and sure, and this is all my salvation
and all my desire. Christ was appointed as our surety. All of that covenant of grace
is sure because of the surety. Everything God requires from
the sinner, he supplies by himself. And God appointed him mediator,
just one mediator between God and me and the man Christ Jesus.
Nobody else, now hear me, nobody else shall mediate a reconciliation
of man to God and God to man except Christ. That's it. Nobody else can make the peace. They used to tell me from the
pulpit in false religion, won't you make your peace with God?
I can't. I'm not the mediator. He is. He is. He's the only one. Our Lord said, I am the way.
What way? The way to justification. The
way to understanding. The way to salvation. He's the
way. The way to righteousness. The
way to truth. He said, I am the way and I am
the truth and I am the light. No man cometh unto the Father
but by me. Be no peace except it be brought
to pass by the God-man. God appointed him also as our
federal head and representative. He tells us that in Adam all
die. You mean that's still true? Absolutely
still true. In Adam all die. All his sons,
all his daughters, all his generations, from the beginning of time, they
all die. But in Christ, shall all be made alive. All for whom
Adam stood, all for whom he was the federal head, they all die.
They're going to continue to die. They're going to wake up
in judgment. But all for whom Christ was appointed
head and representative, they're all going to live. Every one.
Every one. He is the head of the body of
the church who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead.
And His life under that law is my life. His obedience to the
law is my obedience. His satisfaction of the law and
justice of God is my righteousness. And His resurrection is my justification
and His reign my assurance. God, who is rich in mercy for
his great love wherewith he loved us even when we were dead in
sins, hath quickened us together with Christ. That is, by a holy
union made us to be one with him, and hath raised us up together
and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In him, by covenant union, so
that we are one. And he says in his high priestly
prayer in John 17, he says, I in them and thou in me, that they
may be made perfect in one. And that the world may know that
thou has sent me and has loved them as thou has loved me, oh
my soul. Paul wrote to the Corinthians
and said, of God are you in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto
us wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption. And I'm gonna
tell you something else. God appointed him Lord. You can't
make him Lord. He's not running for office,
he's Lord. They talk about judges. I've
heard them refer to judges as sitting judges. Means they're
active. Means they're sitting in the
courthouse. They're judges. He's sitting
at the right hand of God. He's Lord. He's Lord. And whether you live, you live
unto the Lord. And whether you die, you die unto the Lord. Whether
we live, therefore die, we are of the Lord. We belong to him. You see, religion says it's all
up to you. It's all up to you. Now what
are you going to do for the Lord? Now I'm telling you that the
Lord sits on the throne. It's not what you're going to
do for Him, but what He can do for you. You can't do anything
for Him. You can't make Him anything.
You can't make anything He's done acceptable. It's already
been accepted. You can't make it sufficient,
he's already accepted into glory. All his people are fully justified. Fully justified. God made him
Lord. He said in Psalm chapter two,
he said, I've set my king up on my holy hill of Zion. Now, what you need to do is kiss
the son, lest he be angry and you perish in the way. Kiss the
son, he's already king, he's already Lord. And he tells us
in Philippians 2, he said, because of what he's done, he said, I've
given him a name above every name, that at the name of Jesus,
every knee gonna bow, every tongue gonna confess him to be Lord,
to the glory of God the Father. I don't care if you're Satan
or a fallen angel or an unbelieving parasite. I don't care what you
are, your knee's gonna bow and your tongue's gonna confess him
to be Lord. You're gonna bow down before
him just before God sends you off into everlasting punishment. He appointed him Lord to fulfill
his redemptive purpose and save a people given to him by the
Father. Listen to these words. He said,
Father, the hours come. The cross is before me. I'm about
ready to go to the cross. The hours come. Glorify thy son,
that thy son may also glorify you. As thou hast given him power
over all flesh, that he should give eternal life to as many
as thou hast given him. His Lordship. is not about, he
was Lord before he ever came into the flesh. He God. He had an authority. It's not
an abstract authority over everything that he is. This authority is
a specific authority and his lordship is about redemption.
It's about reconciliation. It's about salvation. It was
given to him over all flesh to save. That's why it was given. And that active authority seated
at the right hand of God is being exercised for the salvation of
his elect. He must rule till he put down
all enemies. All enemies. His rule is to save. His rule is to give life. His
authority is to glorify his father through the salvation of his
elect. And it's a glorious rule. Glorious rule, a righteous rule,
a holy rule. But make no mistake about it,
he rules. He ruled. He said, for to this
end Christ both died and rose and revived, that he might be
Lord of the dead and the living. What are you saying, preacher?
I'm saying sitting at the right hand of the majesty on high is
one whose power and sufficiency rules in full expectation of
success. Isn't that what it says? He's expecting till all his enemies
be made his footstool. Our great Lord is pictured by
the Holy Ghost in Revelation 6-2 as sitting on a white horse
with a bow in his hand and a crown on his head and going forth conquering
and to conquer. Who goes forth conquering and
to conquer? The Lord. The Lord. But he's a gracious
Lord, a merciful King, one who delights to show mercy. and he's lowered by the appointment
of God and therefore he's precious to all them that believe. And
then God has appointed him as a savior. Thou shalt call his
name Jesus for he shall save his people from their sin. He's my savior and makes him
precious to me. The angel said unto you is born
this day in the city of David a Savior, Christ the Lord. And he's precious because he
alone can save sinners. Says by his own blood he entered
into heaven itself and obtained eternal redemption for us. I cannot fathom the value of
his sacrifice that can and did put away sin forever. Can you? How much? All the men ever born
of Adam, every human being that was ever born, who not justified
by God, who's not redeemed through the blood of Christ, they'll
suffer forever because their value cannot satisfy God's demand
for sin. That's why it's everlasting punishment.
That's why hell is everlasting. But this man, by his own blood,
entered into heaven itself and obtained eternal redemption for
us. How much is that blood worth? How much is the life of Christ
that he laid down on that cross, the humility he suffered? Can
you imagine the living God Robing himself in human flesh and submitting
himself for our sins to the lash and to the spitting, to the mocking. Laying his hands out on that
cross that he carried and dying with common criminals
while they mocked and made fun of him, dying on the cross. Huh? What's that worth to God? He's
precious. He's precious. He'd be precious
to you too if you ever see that. He's precious in all these things. And then lastly, he's precious
to all them that believe because he loves us. He loves us. If I lived to be 100, I'd never
get over it. He loved us. Why? Because he would. Just because he would. He loved
us. But why? There is no reason in
you. There's nothing in you but a
black hole. You ever read that over in Ezekiel
16 about that little baby that was cast out? There it was, never been cut,
it wasn't salted, it wasn't swaddled, nothing. That childbirth, they
just took it, it was useless. Threw it over in the sand and
it just lay out there in the sand until the Lord came by. And the Lord came by and said it was a time of love. They
loved that little box and took it. and he swallowed it, and
he cared for it, and he salted it, and he clothed it, and he
put jewelry on her, and made her a queen. Made her a queen. That's God's will. Huh? He loved us. You got over that
yet? Boy, I have it. Not near about. I just, and the more I walk through
this world, and I discover my own inabilities, and hardness
of heart, and things, He couldn't love me, but he did. And he keeps right on loving
us. And now he said, what's gonna separate you from the love of
God? Tribulation, distress, things
present, things to come, not life or death or any other creature
can separate you from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus
our Lord. Those he loved, he loved to the
end. He loved us. My husband's so
precious, precious. Take that home with you and chew
on it. He's precious.