Well, I want to look with you
at Isaiah chapter 52 this morning. We looked at chapter 51 last
week. And again, I'm going to take
the whole chapter this morning. As I've often said, the message
of the Bible is about God gathering up the people of His choice.
That's exactly what we see in verse 12. In verse 12, we read,
For ye shall not go out with haste, nor go by flight, for
the Lord will go before you. And the God of Israel will be
your rearward, will be to the back. But what does that really
mean? Well, if you've got a marginal Bible, then you look there and
it says the Hebrew means, gather you up. The God of Israel will
gather you up. The message of this book is about
God gathering up the people of His choice out of this world.
as they are you can't tell the difference, children of wrath
even as others, but the message of this book is that God gathers
up the people of his choice and that message is delivered in
the Gospels of the New Testament, Marth, Matthew, Mark, Luke and
John in the Acts, through the Epistles, it's the same message
because it's inspired by the same Holy Spirit giving us the
same truth of God, that God by sovereign grace, gathers up the
people of his choice on the basis of the justification wrought
by the Lord Jesus Christ. In the prophecies, he pronounces
it. In the pictures of history of
God's dealing with Israel, he pictures it, he shows it This
same message. It's a gospel. It's the gospel. Gospel, good news. It's good
news. And this book of Isaiah is the gospel according to Isaiah. The good news according to Isaiah,
which is entirely consistent. with every other place where
that gospel is proclaimed. This book of Isaiah was written
about 700 to 750 years before Christ came. So a long time ago,
2,700, 2,800 years ago from where we are now. And a lot of it spoke about the
impending Babylonian captivity. You know, the people of Israel
and of Judah were to go into captivity in Babylon for 70 years. And Isaiah speaks a lot about
that captivity. And that captivity took place
between 606 BC, and it was 70 years, 536, and then in dribs
and drabs they came back and Jerusalem was re-established.
And a lot of this prophecy is historically promising recovery
of the people taken into captivity, and they're coming back to Jerusalem.
And it's about the restoration of, if I say, the type, I mean,
the thing in Scripture, which in this case was the city of
Jerusalem, which was the city of God in the Old Testament,
that is a type, it's a picture. It's an analogy, an allusion
to the truth. It pictures the spiritual reality,
which is God saving his people, not out of Babylonian captivity,
but out of the captivity that we're all in by nature, the captivity
of sin and of Satan. The God of this world has blinded
the minds of those who believe not. God in his sovereign grace
has blinded the minds, but Satan is the instrument that has been
used to bring about this blinding, this delusion, this deception.
And in these days in which we live, I believe that Satan has
been released from his thousand years of bondage where he was
restrained in his deception to deceive them. There's never been
such deception as there is at the moment. It's rampant, and
it's darkness, and it's keeping people in bondage. It's the bondage
of captivity of sin. And this message is about release
from that bondage. The chapter of Isaiah 52 is a
prelude to Isaiah 53. In fact, from verse 13 of 52,
the chapter division should really be between verses 12 and 13 of
chapter 52, because where it says in verse 13, behold my servant,
that really is the start of the message of chapter 53, which
is the clearest account of salvation accomplished by God's suffering
servant in the whole of the Old Testament. Is it not? It is referred
to so often, it is preached on so much, and when we come back
from our break it's my intention at the moment to look at that
in some detail. But who is it about? Who is he
talking about? You know, when Philip the Evangelist
in the Acts of the Apostles, chapter 8. And he's moved by
the Spirit of God to go down into the wilderness south of
Jerusalem on the road back to Africa, back to Ethiopia. And
there he comes across, by the Spirit's movement, an Ethiopian
eunuch, or a high government official, in his chariot with
his entourage. And they've been to Jerusalem,
because why? If you want to know the truth of eternal life and
the truth of God, then you went to Jerusalem. For it was the
Jews who had the oracles of God, the word of God. the light of
life in the Scriptures and you went there and he went there
and while he was there he bought a scroll of the prophet Isaiah
no doubt scribes made a living out of copying out the Old Testament
Scriptures and selling copies of it and he bought we don't
know what else he bought but he certainly bought a copy of
the scroll of Isaiah and he's reading it and he's reading As
Philip comes alongside him, by the Holy Spirit moving him to
be there, he's reading verse 7 of chapter 53. And Philip says
to him, do you understand what you're reading? And he said, how can I except
someone explains it to me? He said, I don't know. Ah, but
you're the government official of Ethiopia. You're a grand character. Surely you know. No, I don't
know. In my flesh, I've no idea. Is there going to be a man that
will explain it to me? Is God going to send me a preacher?
He wasn't really saying that, but that's in effect what he
was saying. Is God really going to send me a preacher? And Philip
came up alongside him into the chariot. And he says, is he speaking
about himself, Isaiah the prophet, is he speaking about himself
or about some other man? And we read in Acts 8, 35, Philip
opened his mouth and began at the same scripture and preached
unto him, Jesus. Jesus. He preached unto him the
Lord Jesus Christ, because he's in this chapter. He's in the... What did Jesus say? You search
the scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life,
and you're dead right in that. These scriptures are they which
speak of me, of him. They speak of him. Paul says,
I determine not to know anything other than Jesus Christ and Him
crucified. For that message is the whole
counsel of God. God gathers up the people of
His choice by His suffering servant, the Lord Jesus Christ, who is
God in flesh, God manifest in flesh, coming to this earth.
to be made the curse of the law. The curse of the law is that
which the law demands, which is death. The soul that sins,
it shall die. And he was made that curse. The
law demanded a death and he became that death in the place of his
people. So when the law looks at me now,
if I have faith, if I'm trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ, not
because I have faith, But the law looks at me, and because
I have faith, I see that that death is accounted as my death,
and therefore the law is satisfied. And the law has nothing more
to demand of me, for Christ has died. So who shall bring any
charge to God's elect? It is Christ that has died. This
is the whole counsel of God. If you want to know the truth
of God, Christ, as it says in Colossians 3, He, Christ, is
all. and He is in all. You are complete
in Him. In Him dwells the fullness of
the Godhead bodily. You are complete in Him. He is
all. There is nothing else that God
has to say. What more can He say? For He
said it in His Word. He is the Word that was in the
beginning with God. Verse 13. How high should we
put the Lord Jesus Christ? He shall be exalted and extolled
and be very high. the Lord Jesus Christ, extolled,
exalted, and very, very high. So this book is looking forward
the best part of 200 years at the time. picturing the call
of captive Judah out of Babylon back to Jerusalem to rebuild
Zion, city of our God, but it's picturing the true call of God's
people, his elect, out of the captivity of sin and the bondage
of the law and the bondage of corruption into the glorious
liberty of the children of God. Is that not right? The glorious
liberty of the children of God. And so we see in chapter 52,
firstly God calls to Zion. God calls His people. Secondly,
He promises redemption. Thirdly, he heralds his preachers. Fourthly, he calls for repentance. And fifthly, he lifts up Christ. First of all, he calls to Zion. Look at the first two verses
of chapter 52, where we've got it again. We've seen a lot of
this in these passages. Awake, awake. Awake, awake, God's
calling to Zion. Put on thy strength, O Zion. Put on thy beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city. For henceforth there shall no
more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean. Shake thyself
from the dust. Arise and sit down, O Jerusalem. Loose thyself from the bands
of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion. A call from God to wake
up. Wake up! Come out of the sleep
of sin and the bondage. Come out of captivity. Of course,
it's Jerusalem in its captivity in Babylon in the historical
context, but it's God today speaking to His people, speaking to the
elect that He's chosen in Christ before the foundation of the
world to awake, because He says there's some strength to put
on. Put on thy strength, O Zion. What is the strength? that we're
to put on. It's the strength that God supplies
in the Lord Jesus Christ. What is that strength? It is
the strength of the redemption price that Christ has made in
His broken body and shed blood, satisfying the demands of the
law to pay the sin debt. Do you know what, when someone's
taken captive then the captors will say, if you pay us a ransom
price, we will let the one that's captive go free. We will liberate
them. And so, I know they don't like
doing it, but if a ransom is paid, and the captors release
the one who is in captivity because the ransom price is paid, the
books are square, things are squared up. Christ has redeemed
his people from the curse of the law. That is the strength
of God. You know when you, in the Wild
West, when money was beginning to circulate
in the 1700s and early 1800s. Money's beginning to circulate,
but there was lots of phony money around. It wasn't right. And
do you know the old films where somebody pays something, and
the cowboy, the tough old cowboy, gets the coin that he's paid,
and he bites it, ah, ah, right? If he nearly breaks his teeth
on it, what does he know? It's a good one. it's the proper
thing, it's the real thing. But if not, it's phony. I might
have got that the wrong way around, I'm not a metallurgist, but you
know, the strength of the currency is its purchasing power. If it's
the real article, you know, if I go into a shop with a pocket
full of Monopoly money, I think everybody that's listening knows
what Monopoly is, if I go into a shop, you know, we play the
game of Monopoly, at least I don't, I don't like things like that,
but never mind. But when we play the game of Monopoly, you know,
you buy Park Lane and you hand over your money and it all works
in the game. You go down to the village shop
and see if you can buy some sweets with Monopoly money. What will
they say to you? Nothing doing. Why? Because it
doesn't have the strength of real money, does it? It doesn't
have the value of real money. Put on thy strength, O Zion. What's the strength of Zion?
It's the redemption. that Christ has purchased with
His own precious blood, the redemption price that He has made. And He
provides the qualification to awake, O Zion, and to come out. He provides the qualification.
What is it? Put on thy beautiful garments,
O Jerusalem, the holy city. Put on your beautiful garments.
What are the beautiful garments? Isaiah 61 verse 10 tells us,
he has clothed me with the robes of salvation, the garments of
salvation and the robe of righteousness. He's done that because in Isaiah
61 and verse one, he says what his objective is. Verse 10 he
says, chapter 61, he says, put on your
robes of righteousness and your garments of salvation. And the
reason for that is, Verse 1 of the same chapter, the Spirit
of the Lord is upon me, this is Christ, because the Lord hath
anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek. He hath sent me
to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives,
and the opening of the prison to them that are bound. This
is what Christ came to do. And this is the strength, and
this is the beautiful garments that he clothes his people with,
the righteousness of God. For he who knew no sin was made
sin, became sin. Why? That he might answer the
curse of the law, that he might satisfy the demands of offended
divine justice. The reason why is to make his
people the righteousness of God in him. We must have the righteousness
of God. Follow holiness without which
no man shall see the Lord and he makes us that righteousness.
He clothes his people with those garments of salvation and with
that robe of righteousness. He does all of those things and
he calls to captive Zion just as he called to captive Jerusalem
in Babylon to come out after the 70 years of captivity. He
calls to captive Zion, which is his elect, children of wrath
even as others, in this body of flesh, in this body of sin,
in the captivity of sin and the bondage of corruption, which
the law of God, the justice of God, the person, the nature of
God cannot let go free, for God will in no wise clear the guilty.
Yet in Christ, because He has paid the price in the place of
His people, He pronounces liberty. Liberty. That verse 1 of chapter
61 of Isaiah, pronouncing liberty, is exactly what the epistle to
the Galatians pronounces, and again and again throughout scripture.
Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. You
see, by nature, we are what we read in Psalm 40, in verse 2.
We're in a horrible pit. We're in the miry clay of sin,
which drags us down. I was watching a Rescue at Sea
documentary the other night, and it was on the sands of the
River Dee, near to Liverpool, near Chester, and a horse had
gone walking on the sands and had got into quicksand, and it
was up, right up, all its legs were completely in, and it couldn't
get out. As strong as a horse is, it could
not get itself out, and the lifeboat people struggled and struggled.
They did eventually get it out, but it was stuck. That's what
we're like by nature, in sin, in the horrible pit, in the miry
clay. But where has God put us? He
brought me up out of that horrible pit, out of that miry clay, and
He set my feet upon a rock. It's not that, you know, the
one thing that horse wanted was to have its feet on solid ground.
He set my feet upon a rock, and that rock is Christ. The New
Testament tells us again and again, that rock is Christ. He
established my goings. Everyone around you, including
yourself, lies in the bondage of darkness and the sleep of
ignorance regarding God and righteousness. Is that not true? Everyone around
us, the world all around us, they're all so proud of their
atheism. Do you know something? They're in a stupor. They're
in darkness. They're in a sleep of ignorance
regarding God and His righteousness. But God is calling His people.
He's calling His people in Zion. He's calling them to awake, to
put on thy strength, to come. Because He has made the way for
us. He has accomplished it. He has
answered the law's demands. Because the next bit is verses
3 to 6. He promises redemption. Redemption
is the payment of the price. Look, thus says the Lord, verse
3, you have sold yourselves for naught and you shall be redeemed
without money. For thus says the Lord God, My
people went down aforetime into Egypt to sojourn there, and the
Assyrian oppressed them without a cause. Now therefore, what
have I here, saith the Lord? That My people is taken away
for naught, that they that rule over them make them to howl,
saith the Lord, and My name is continually blasphemed every
day. Therefore My people shall know My name, therefore shall
they know in that day that I am He that doth speak. Behold, it
is I. He says, You have sold yourselves
for nothing into the captivity of sin. And it's pictured by
Israel going down into Egypt and ending up in bondage in Egypt
and needing to be brought out of that bondage of slavery in
Egypt. And the Assyrians that constantly
oppressed the Israelites and scattered them so they became
no nation. It's all speaking of the flesh,
of Satan, and of sin, separating us as his people from our God. But it says, he shall redeem
them. He promises. He says, you shall
be redeemed without money. You shall be redeemed without
money. The ransom price of your liberty
shall be paid. The ransom price of your liberty
from just condemnation shall be paid, not with perishable
currency, as says the Apostle Peter. You are not redeemed with
silver and gold, perishable things, things that will pass with the
rest of this creation. You're not redeemed with those
things, but with the precious blood as of a lamb, without blemish
and without spot. And when we take communion, that's
what we remember. We seek to remember. We seek
in that symbol of remembrance to remember the blood that was
shed to purchase our redemption, our purchase of liberty from
the condemnation that is justly ours. And though all around God's
name is blasphemed, as he says there, God's people shall know
his name. That's in verse 6. His people
shall know his name. They know his name as the God
of grace and of glory. Do we really know the name of
God as the God of grace and glory? You only really know His name
when you've felt the power of that name in your soul. Purchasing
your redemption. The God of grace and glory. There's
lots of religion not far from us. There's people that'll be
waving their arms in the air and thinking they're having a
wonderful time this morning in several buildings within about
a mile radius of where we are at the moment. And I tell you,
there is no sign, no hint of anything of the true grace and
glory of God in those meetings, in those things, because it all
denies the truth of God, the sovereignty of God, the purposes
of God, the absolute sovereignty of God. In the day of salvation,
in the day of Christ, his people shall hear God speaking. When
Christ walked this earth as a man in his ministry, in flesh and
blood, The people that heard him, and us when we read his
words as recorded in scripture, were hearing the voice of God. The one who was in the beginning
was the Word, and was with God and was God. There is no strange
God among you, he says again and again, for he is God. The Lord Jesus Christ is God.
A man there is, a real man, with wounds still gaping wide. This
man is true God, is what that hymn tells us. And it tells us
rightly, for that's what the scriptures speak. He, our God,
came and walked this earth that He might redeem His people. As
we read in Psalm 40, lo, I come. In the volume of the book, it
is written of me. A body has been prepared, and
He came in that body, a body of flesh and blood, like the
body of the children that He came to redeem. Because for the
redemption of the children, human blood had to be shed. Human body
had to be broken to satisfy the law. And so He came in the likeness
of that sinful flesh yet without sin, that he might be made sin,
to redeem his people from the curse of the law. How does he
let people know this? This is our next point. God heralds
his watchmen. Look in verse 7. How beautiful
upon the mountains are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings,
that publisheth peace, that bringeth good tidings of good, that publishes
salvation, that saith unto Zion, Thy God reigneth, thy watchmen
shall lift up the voice, with the voice together they shall
sing, for they shall see eye to eye when the Lord shall bring
again Zion. Break forth into joy, sing together,
ye waste places of Jerusalem, for the Lord hath comforted his
people, he hath redeemed Jerusalem. The Lord hath made bare his holy
arm in the eyes of all the nations, and all the ends of the earth
shall see the salvation of our God. How does God call to his
people? The awake? Awake? How does he
call? Is it by a voice from heaven?
Is it by a booming voice out of heaven? No, it isn't. but
it's by the preachers that he equips and he raises up. You
know, people love to sing. We used to sing it years and
years ago. How beautiful on the mountains are the feet of them
that bring good. That sing, thy God, oh, and they'd sway and
they'd go, oh, can we sing it again? Oh, we love the tune.
It's just such a good thing. and there's no knowledge of what
it really means. No knowledge of what it really
means. The whole context of it is contrary to what it says at
the end of that verse, thy God reigneth. What do God's true
preachers proclaim? The absolute sovereignty of God. Now you apply that test to all
the preaching around, and you will find very, very little that
is true preaching from God's true preachers. Look at Romans
10. I know we've looked there before, but it won't hurt to
look again. Romans 10 verse 13. where we read a verse that is
quoted several times throughout the scripture. For whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. You say
you talk a lot about election. Well, election's going to keep
me out of heaven and out of eternal life. Is that what it says? Is
that what it says? Seeking sinner, heavy burdened,
laden, heavy laden sinner. What does it say? It says, whosoever
shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. And if free
grace says that hymn, why not for me? Hark how the gospel trumpet
sounds, and if free grace, why not for me? Whosoever shall call
upon the name of the Lord shall be saved from their sins, shall
have peace with God. But how shall they call on him
in whom they have not believed? You see, people widely have not
believed. And how shall they believe in
someone that they haven't heard about? They haven't heard! Unlike
in the day when I was a child growing up, at least people heard
the name of God, at least people heard the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ. They don't now, they don't know it. They've not heard
and therefore they've not believed. So how are they going to call
on that which they've not heard or not believed? And how shall
they hear? except there's a preacher sent.
How shall they preach except they be sent by God? Anybody
can stand up and preach, as it were, but not the truth of God,
only those sent by the Holy Spirit with the Word of God, with the
truth of God. As it is written, verse 15, how
beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace
and bring good tidings of good things. Is that not what we just
read in Isaiah? How beautiful are the feet of
them that preach the gospel of peace. You know, feet are not
naturally beautiful things, are they? Feet are not naturally
beautiful, but as far as the truth of God is concerned, the
feet that bear the words of eternal life. You imagine, we now have
the internet, and this goes wherever anybody in the world wants to
see it or hear it, they can do it right now if they have an
internet connection, and that's wonderful. But you imagine in
the days of William Gadsby, whose hymns we sing so many of, and
he preached all over the north of England and further afield
than that. And a lot of the time, he would walk miles to preach. And he would walk over the moors
of northern England to go to preach for a group of people. He would do it again and again,
several times a week he would walk. Wouldn't you have thought
those people, those sinners, crying out for good news from
heaven, when they saw that man on his feet walking towards them. How beautiful are those feet,
William Gadsby, because the Lord is bringing His word from you. Good tidings of liberty. Peace
with God. Is this not the message? Peace
with God. Look in verse 7. He brings good
tidings. He publishes peace. Good tidings
of good that publishes salvation, that says to Zion, your God reigns,
a message of sovereign grace. of absolute sovereign grace,
for it is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God
who shows mercy. Shall not the judge of all the
earth do right? Oh, whilst on others thou art calling, do not
pass me by. Saviour, dear Saviour." And did
you notice, you say, oh well, there's all sorts of disagreements
among preachers. There's not amongst the true
preachers of God. You know, every preacher on Free
Grace Radio, if you look them up, how many are there now, 50
or 60 perhaps on Free Grace Radio, and I know of more beyond that,
but they see eye to eye. I don't ever have any fundamental
disagreements with any of them about the basics of the gospel
of sovereign grace and particular redemption. We all see eye to
eye. I have severe disagreements with
others who sound like they're preaching the truth, but the
more you dig into it, the more you discover it's a refuge of
lies. It's a pack of lies. It's not
true. God's true preachers see eye to eye. As we read in Isaiah
50 verse 10, The true people of God all obey the voice of
God's servant. Who's God's servant? The Lord
Jesus Christ. He is the good shepherd, the
sheep hear his voice and they follow him. And it's a promise
given here that this message will be worldwide. Look in verse
10, the Lord hath made bare his holy arm in the eyes of all the
nations and all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation
of our God. Every knee shall bow and confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
What great rejoicing there will be. And he calls for repentance
because it's not without repentance. Repentance and faith. Verses
11 and 12. Depart ye, depart ye. Go ye out
from thence, touch no unclean thing. Go ye out of the midst
of her. Be ye clean that bear the vessels
of the Lord. For ye shall not go out with
haste, nor go by flight. For the Lord will go before you,
and the God of Israel will gather you up, will be your rearward.
You must break, he says to them, you must break with idolatry.
You're in Babylonian captivity because of idolatry. It's idolatry
that has driven you into captivity. Break with idolatry. Repent. What does repent mean? Rethink,
penser, to think, French, repent, rethink. Break with idolatry. Break with falsehood. Get out
of that covenant that you've made with death that Isaiah talks
about in chapter 28. Flee from that refuge of lies
that things will be all right with you. outside of the redemption
that Christ alone has accomplished. Wholeheartedly embrace the righteousness
of God in Christ and in Him alone. But how is it all accomplished?
It's all accomplished by the redemption secured in Christ
the Lamb of God. And so in the final three verses
of this chapter, which is really the start of chapter 53, Our
God, by His Spirit, lifts up Christ. Look at verses 13 to
15. Behold my... How's it going to
be done? This justification, this waking
up, this redemption, this proclaiming of the message, this calling
to His people. How's it going to be done? Behold
my servant. My servant shall deal prudently. He shall be exalted and extolled
and be very high. As many were astonished at thee,
his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more
than the sons of men, so shall he sprinkle many nations. The
kings shall shut their mouths at him, for that which had not
been told them they shall see, and that which they had not heard
shall they consider. You know that old question of
Job, how should a man be just with God? Answer, by the redemption
price being paid by the Christ of God. That's how a man is just
with God, that's how a woman is just with God, made just with
God, by the redemption price paid by the Christ of God. not
in any respect whatsoever by the works of the law, for by
the works of the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight,
but by the sacrifice of a fitting substitute for his people. We're
going to look in much more detail in coming weeks when we're back
from our break, we'll look in much more detail, God willing,
at those verses and chapter 53. But I want to illustrate it just
as we close in the few minutes we've got left from the New Testament.
So turn with me to Philippians chapter 2. Philippians chapter
2 and verse 5. And there are words,
these are words that you know so well, I quote them to you
often enough. Let this mind be in you which
was also in Christ Jesus, who being in the form of God, he's
God. Thought it not robbery to be
equal with God. He wasn't taking anything from God that was not
rightly his when claiming to be God. But he made himself of
no reputation. He came down with no reputation. Not in great palaces, not in
great grand robes, not in chariots of splendor, which is what the
Jews expected, but of no reputation. the stepson of a carpenter, as
it were, in poverty, with brothers and sisters all around him, and
took upon him the form of a servant. Behold, my servant shall deal
prudently. And he lived prudently as a child. We read of him in Luke's gospel
when he was 12 years old, prudently debating with the teachers of
the law in the temple in Jerusalem. Wise, wise in the things of God,
no reputation, took upon him the form of a servant, made in
the likeness of men. He was flesh and blood, like
we are. True man. God became that which
he wasn't before. When Jesus was born in Bethlehem
of Judea in the days of Herod the king, God became man in the
Lord Jesus Christ. And being found in fashion as
a man, He humbled himself because he came for that purpose. What
purpose? He became obedient unto death. He acted prudently in
everything it says. My servant shall deal prudently. My servant shall prosper prudently
is another way of putting it. That word deal, prosper prudently. How has he prospered? Look at
the people. Look at the people. For the joy
set before him. For the people that he's taking
to glory. He humbled himself and became obedient unto death.
And not just any death, but the death of the cross. The most
shameful death. The death where cursed is everyone
that hangeth on a tree. When a son had been repeatedly
disobedient to his parents in Deuteronomy, in the harshness
of the law, they were to take him to the elders and they were
to stone him to death. But to show that what had been
done had been done justly, his body was to be hanged on a tree
for the rest of the day. So therefore it says, cursed
is everyone that hangeth on a tree. And the Lord Jesus Christ in
the place of His people was hanged on that cursed tree, that cross
of Calvary. Wherefore, wherefore, God also
has highly exalted Him. When He finished the work and
paid redemption's price, when He gave up the ghost and died
the death that the Lord required, God has highly exalted Him and
given Him a name which is above every name. And here it is, that
at the name of Jesus, you see, He shall sprinkle many nations,
the kings shall shut their mouths at Him. For that which had not
been told them they shall see, and that which they had not heard
they shall conceal. They all shall. That at the name
of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven and things
in earth and things under the earth. And that at the name of
Jesus, Every knee should bow of things in heaven and things
in earth and things under the earth and that every tongue should
confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the
Father. What shocking disfigurement was
required to pay the ransom price of sin. As many were astonished,
it's essentially the same word, but I think it's put like that
in the sense of being absolutely stunned, absolutely shocked. Rather than a majestic, kingly,
princely ruler, what do you see? A man whose face was marred more
than any man. A man of sorrows, as we're going
to see in chapter 53, and acquainted with grief, and we hid, as it
were, our faces from him. He was despised and we esteemed
him not, because he was bearing the griefs of his people and
carrying the sorrows. We esteemed him stricken, smitten
of God, and afflicted. We were astonished, for his face
was marred more than any man. Look at Romans chapter 3. Just
turn back to Romans chapter 3, verse 19. Why did he do it all? Now we
know that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them
who are under the law, all of us by nature, that every mouth
may be stopped. Guilty, guilty, nothing to say,
no defense to bring, all the world may become guilty before
God. Therefore, by the deeds of the law, the things that we
try to do, everything that we try to do. No flesh justified
in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. The
law doesn't show us how to live, the law shows us what sin truly
is. But now, the righteousness of
God without the law is manifested. Being witnessed by the law and
the prophets, the books of scripture said it consistently, this is
how you get righteous with God. Even the righteousness of God
which is by faith. Faith of Jesus, not faith in,
faith of Jesus Christ. It's what he faithfully accomplished,
which is how the righteousness of God is established. And to
all and upon all them that believe, for there is no difference. For
all his people, his chosen people, have sinned. Not one has not,
and come short of the glory of God, but they've all been justified
freely by his grace that is through the redemption that is in Christ
Jesus. He, in coming, has paid the price
for the sins of his people, for whom God has set forth to be
a propitiation through faith in his blood. He turns away the
just anger of God by what he has done in his death, to declare
his righteousness for the remission of sins that are passed through
the forbearance of God. Verse 28, therefore we conclude
that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.
Verse 31, Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid. Yea, in Christ. In the faith
of Christ in what he did and our faith in him apprehending
and grasping what he has done, we establish the law of God. This is the triumph of the gospel. This is the triumph of God in
the gospel. Offended, justice satisfied. Sinners justified. God's kingdom
triumphant. That's it. That's the message
of this book. Now tell me, tell me, anyone
listening to this, tell me, Why would you not gladly grasp at
such wonderful news? Amen.