The Lord Jesus Christ is very
rightly and very properly the subject of our new focus conference
this weekend. Christ is the great theme of
the Church in this world. The true Church of Jesus Christ
have no other desire than to worship their Lord and Saviour. He is the object of praise in
heaven and he is the exclusive way of salvation for sinners
here upon earth. And this unique matter of the
exclusive way of salvation, the true gospel ministry, from the
days of the apostles through all the ages of the church until
this present time, is the subject Jesus Christ. And so we gather
to look to Him. We gather to hear of Him. We gather to see Him lifted up
in our midst. And there is no better way on
the face of this globe that you and I could spend the next two
days than to be in the presence of the Lord's people, communing
together in fellowship and worshiping our Savior who is pleased to
come amongst us to do us good. This hour, we will dedicate to
the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ. And I have every confidence,
if I may speak on their behalf, to say that the men who will
speak to us in the coming days will also have to the forefront
of their attention that they might lift Jesus Christ up in
our midst. When the Apostle Paul went to
Corinth, He preached the Lord Jesus Christ. And we trust, upon
the basis of the apostolic testimony, that we continue in that same
vein to this day, preaching as he did, Jesus Christ, to our
age and our generation. Paul preached in Corinth Christ,
No different than he had preached in Damascus in those days, those
earliest days of his conversion. No different than he had preached
in Jerusalem when called upon to bear witness of the things
that he spoke amongst the Gentiles. When he went to Rome, and when
he wrote to Rome, these were the things that he had front
and center in his mind. When he was at Ephesus, when
he was at Philippi, when he was at Colossae, when he was in the
churches of Galatia. And he called it the gospel of
Christ, and he called it the power of God unto salvation. He declared, As much as is in
me, I am ready to preach the gospel. And he didn't want to
know anything else. Why was that? Why was it that
he was so taken up, so engrossed with this subject, this subject
of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the power of God unto salvation? Why was it that this was the
singular substance and subject of his message? Because he had personally experienced
the transforming power of the gospel in his own life. He knew
the man that he had been. He knew the man he still was
in the flesh. And he knew that for all of the
efforts of his own godliness, practiced carefully, assiduously,
for many, many years, He was the chief of sinners in his heart
and only the blood of Jesus Christ could cleanse him from his sin. Only the blood of Jesus Christ
could cleanse his conscience. He knew that because he had experienced
it for himself personally and he took that personal experience
onto the road, and he took it to villages, and he took it to
towns, and he took it to cities. He took it to the vast areas
that were before him in order to preach the Lord Jesus Christ,
and wherever he went, the message was the same. And so he writes
to the Corinthians here, our word toward you was the Son of
God. That's it. Our word towards you
was Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The Son of God, Jesus Christ,
who was preached among you by us, even by me and Silas and
Timothy. For I determined not to know
anything among you, that is, anything else, save Jesus Christ
and Him crucified. Why this singleness of purpose,
I repeat myself, why this determined resolution on the part of the
apostle? Why was it not Christ and us? Or Christ and the law? Or Christ and the holy angels? Or Christ and good works? The Apostle Paul tells us in
verse 20 why he was singular in his emphasis of Christ alone. And he says, for all the promises
of God in him are ye and in him, amen, unto the glory of God by
us. This evening, I'm well aware
that many of you have come a long distance in order to be here.
You've encountered the weariness of travelling. You've had to
engage with the traffic in those motorways. It seems to get more
and more congested as the years go by. and we have much time
ahead of us in the next few days, so I'm not going to weary you
by an overly long sermon this evening, but I want to leave
with you three simple points with respect to this testimony
of the apostle and this reference to Christ being the yea and the
amen of God. I want to say this first of all,
All the promises of God are the wishes of God's people. All the promises of God are the
wishes of God's people. And all our wishes are granted
freely in Jesus Christ crucified. Secondly, I want to say this. Nothing else is required to enjoy
God's goodness and grace than Jesus Christ crucified. And thirdly, thereby God is glorified
even by us who believe in Christ, who rest in Christ, and who preach
Jesus Christ crucified. So let us take these points one
by one and just briefly think about what this verse is saying
to us for our comfort, for our encouragement, and for our spiritual
growth and maturity. Firstly, I want to make this
point. All the promises of God are the
wishes of his people, and all our wishes are granted freely
in Jesus Christ crucified. There are many, many promises
in this book. The Holy Scriptures are filled
with the promises and the statements of God. A great many divine promises
are in the Word of God. In fact, the Scripture is called
the Word of Promise. The Word of Promise. And it is
full of statements and declarations of God's unchanging will and
purpose and intent towards man. So this is not a hidden thing
that we are engaged upon this evening. The agnostic would tell
us it's too much for us to know. We can't possibly know or understand. The atheist would tell us there's
nothing in this that's worth us thinking about. It's a fallacy. But the Word of God is clear. The testimony of God is open. This Word of Promise declares
comprehensively, absolutely, the things that are the will
and the intent and the purpose of God and the very promises
of God, those things which He, as the absolute Sovereign, has
declared He will do. And it's right there on the face
and in the surface of the scriptures that he has granted to us and
revealed for the well-being and edification of his church and
people. God's promises are promises of
life and promises of liberty, promises of salvation and grace,
of mercy and peace, promises of judgment, damnation, eternal
separation, promises of heaven and promises of hell. But the great theme of the scriptures
is the outworking of God's purpose in holiness, justice, love and
truth for the salvation of his people. God's promises that come
to a people of His choice as gracious gifts and those set against a back
cloth of dire warnings. Paul tells us that all the promises
of God are yea and amen in the Lord Jesus Christ. all the promises
of God will find their fulfillment in Jesus Christ. For all the
promises that this book contains, and it would be impossible for
us even to begin to start enumerating them on an occasion like this,
I have distilled them into one great promise, if I may take
the liberty of doing so. And it is a promise that is made
several times in the Old Testament and in the New. It gathers up
the whole of the purpose of God throughout the ages and the dispensations
of this world, from the very earliest days until this present
moment. And it speaks of God's great
promise in salvation. It is this. I will be their God
and they shall be my people. I shall be their God and they
shall be my people. That promise speaks of covenant
purpose. And in that grand promise that
God has made, that I shall be, I will be their God, and they
shall be my people. In that grand promise, every
good and perfect gift from heaven is captured and contained. Every enabling act is provided. Every requirement is fulfilled. It is neither conditional upon
an outside contribution, nor uncertain as to its absolute
success. I will be, and they shall be. That's God who has spoken. That is the eternal God, the
absolute God, the sovereign God who has spoken and he has declared
that I will be their God and they shall be my people. And in that covenant promise,
the Lord Jehovah gives himself to his people. He says, I shall
be their God. I shall be. He gives himself.
He has given himself to that people. He has given himself
to a people that he declares he will be their God. Now, men
are very imaginative about making gods for themselves. And from
the earliest age, they have constructed, whether it be by the skill of
their hands or the waywardness of their imaginations, gods after
their own image. But the true God has declared
that there is a people to whom he will give himself as God. And he claims them for his own
people. he betroths himself to them. He pledges to share with them
his glory and his divine perfections with that people whom he is pleased
to call his bride. Many of us know something about
marriage. And we know that the Bible teaches
that when a man and a woman come together in marriage, the two
become one flesh. That's how Scripture views it. That's how the pattern of marriage
has been left to us. Now again, the world is going
to twist that. and it is going to mess that
up to the best of its ability because it will hide anything
at all that gives us a picture of the perfection of the union
that exists between Christ and his people. But when we think
about that union, that oneness, We see a beautiful picture of
what God is saying when he says, I shall be their God and they
will be my people. In this covenant, the church
is promised to Christ. It is promised to him as the
bridegroom. upon the fulfillment of a perfect
blood atonement. That he, in the pattern of this
covenant, should lay down his life, should shed his blood,
should take upon himself the humanity of this people, and
as a representative for them, die in their place, taking all
of their sins and bearing them in his own body. This was a work
which Christ, in love, was willing and able to fulfill. And he performed it by his sacrifice
upon the cross. He, taking our flesh, taking
our sin, taking our guilt, united himself to us, binding us forever
to himself. And in that covenant, in that
union, Christ is God's promise to the church. All he is, all
he has, is hers. We, united to Christ, are possessors
of all the glory that is Christ's. That's what it is to be one with
Him. That which He obtains, we have
a part in, and it becomes our inheritance also. Heirs together
with Him. Has the church peace in this
world? It is because He is the Prince
of Peace. Have we been reconciled to God? It is because He is the mediator
between God and man. Have we redemption? It is because
He is the Redeemer. Have we salvation? It is because
Christ is an able Saviour. Have we a righteousness? It is
because He is the Lord, our righteousness. And all that we are and have
has been granted, bestowed, given freely by God to us. in this beloved one, the Lord
Jesus Christ. And having satisfied all of the
terms of that covenant, all of the promises of that covenant
now flow freely to its recipients and beneficiaries. Nothing is
held back, because all the promises of God in him are yea, and in
him Amen. And then I want to just draw
your attention to this point. Nothing else is required to make
up a shortfall of goodness towards us. Because there is no shortfall. And it might seem quite obvious. After all, the amen of this statement,
all the promises of God in him are yea and amen. The amen of
that statement tell us it shall be so. It's an attestation, it's a confirmation,
it is a double underlining, it is a recognition that this is
the purpose of God that will be fulfilled. And yet we are
called upon in the generation in which we live as a gospel
church and as a gospel people and as individuals, whether that
be through personal testimony and witness or by our upholding
and maintaining gospel congregations where the preaching of the gospel
goes forth with a faithfulness. We are to contend for the truth. in a contrary and sinful world. Flesh, the flesh of man, demands
a place and a part in his own deliverance. But the Apostle
Paul, writing to Titus, says that the preacher must be one
who is holding fast the faithful word as he had been taught that
he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and to convince
the gainsayers. That's the power of the double-edged
sword. And so we must, though we are
convinced that all of the promises of God in Christ are ours, yet
we must declare it to be so in the hearing of this world. The gospel declares a finished
work for a particular people, a chosen people. Recently, a
friend of mine made that statement to a minister, ostensibly a gospel
minister. He made the statement that the
gospel declares a finished work for a particular chosen people. And the reply came back, well,
yes and no. Really? Is it yes and no? Is it maybe? Is it perhaps that
God has a chosen people for whom the Lord Jesus Christ died? Is
that a perhaps question upon the basis of the testimony of
Scripture? Can a minister of the gospel
truly make such a statement that maybe that's right, but there
are different ways of looking at it? Paul testifies, as God is true,
our word towards you was not yea and nay. The problem with
many churches today is that they are preaching a yea and nay gospel. They are preaching a gospel that
is indefinite, a gospel that is broad and open-ended, a gospel
that they say caters for everyone. That's not what we're about.
We're about declaring the Gospel of Scripture. We're about testifying
to the best of our ability. And we confess that we are slow
and we are dull and we are difficult of understanding. And that is
the nature of this flesh. But as God gives us insight,
we declare what we have seen in His Word. and we will declare
it with a boldness for we see Paul doing this and we see it
as the legacy of the church in every generation. This is a declaration
of what God has done and God has a finished work upon the
cross for a particular people whom he has chosen to salvation. There is nothing uncertain about
this, nothing doubtful, nothing dubious, nothing imprecise. The Lord Jesus Christ in his
work of redemption is to be preached as he was preached by the faithful
apostle. A finished work. Did God choose
a people to salvation? Did Christ die for them? Will
the Holy Spirit quicken them by the preaching of the gospel?
Is their number fixed, their salvation assured, their end
predestinated? Our God declares all mankind
condemned in Adam, guilty in sin. There is none that doeth
good. And all of us are a testimony
to the validity and veracity of that statement. All of us
know what's in our hearts. All of us know what's in our
nature. I find it frightening, even in
my own life, to see how quickly sin rises up like a serpent in
my soul. and its venomous nature could
draw me down just as quickly as that, and I feel it every
day. I can testify to the fact that
sin encroaches upon us with all its deception, with all of its
hideousness, every moment of every day. And if it were not
for the grace of God, we would be as far gone as the worst. Is that a yea and a nay gospel? Is there some evil and some good?
Is there some desire that is frustrated? The Apostle Paul
says that salvation is the free gift of divine grace, that it
is settled in eternity and that it is applied in time. Is it
yea or is it nay? Is it yes or is it no, as it
may be? The wages of sin is death. but the gift of God's eternal
life through Jesus Christ our Lord. That is a promise which
we hold onto, and it is yes in the Lord Jesus Christ. By grace
are ye saved through faith, that not of yourselves, it is the
gift of God, is a promise that we lay hold of, and it is yea
and yes in the Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation is either all of grace,
or man has a role in his own deliverance. Christ's redemption
is either sufficient or something more will have to be added. Either
grace is free or it is conditional. Why not Christ and us? Why not Christ and the law? Why not Christ and the angels? Why not Christ and our works? because if it were so, then we
would have reason to glory before God, and that glory that is His
alone would go to another. Some of the distinctives that
we have tried over the years to declare in the New Focus magazine
and at conferences such as these referred to Theologically as
perhaps limited atonement or particular redemption, we've
endeavoured to show that the Lord Jesus Christ in his death
died for a particular people and that the benefits and blessings
of his death are limited to that particular people in the plan
and purpose of God. We have tried to show that therefore
All true believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are heirs of all
the blessings and promises of God and that there is no role
for the law in adding to our righteousness or our sanctification
or our holiness in any way because everything that is needful has
been provided in Christ. We have endeavoured to do that.
And for our trouble, we have been called hyper-Calvinists,
and we have been called antinomians, and we have been called probably
a lot of other things which we won't repeat. We deny those terms. We don't recognise them as applying
to us. We reject them both. But we believe
emphatically that the Lord Jesus Christ died for a definite number
and that he paid every debt for that people for whom he died
and that every one of those people for whom he died will be eternally
saved and are possessors of a righteousness that is acceptable with God apart
from any labors or works of their own fleshy nature. Upon this
ground we stand. We can add nothing by fleshy
law obedience to our righteousness. And we believe that the new man,
the spiritual man, is holy and is perfect in the Lord Jesus
Christ. That man of whom Peter speaks
when he says, the hidden man of the heart in that which is
not corruptible. Let me remind you of God's overarching
covenant promise. The sovereign God declares, I
will be their God and they shall be my people. There is no doubt
about that statement. It is a promise. It will be so
as God is God and as words have any meaning. Paul employs that
very promise, that faithful promise which God speaks, as the ground
of our hope and the motivation for the believers' conduct in
this world. Paul employs it in this letter
to the Corinthians. He says in chapter 6, verse 16,
Ye are the temple of the living God. As God hath said, I will
dwell in them and walk in them and I will be their God and they
shall be my people. He was employing those promises
first given in Isaiah and Jeremiah and in the prophets of the Old
Testament and he is showing how it is to be applied to these
New Testament churches and New Testament believers. It is our
promise from God. The Lord Jesus Christ says, lo,
I am with you always, even unto the end of the world. God walked
with Adam in the Garden of Eden. Now he dwells in his people,
and now he walks, not with his people, but in his people, in
his people. Christ lives in me. Christ walks in me. What greater incentive to godly
living could there be on the face of this earth? And finally, God says that he
is glorified by his people believing these truths. It's an amazing
thing that we are able to glorify God at all. We who would shake
our fist in his face, we who would spit against him, we who
would have been with that mob that tore the Lord Jesus Christ's
hair from his head, beard from his face, and beat him and slapped
him and crucified him that day, we are able to glorify God and cause
God to be glorified in this world. How is that? How is that possible? How is it possible that I am
able to glorify God? Not by the things that I do,
not by my good works, not by my obedience, not by my pattern
of life, but by resting in the faithfulness of my God and believing
the promises that he makes to be true. That's it, that's all. That is the praise and the glory
of God in my life as I rest and trust in him. We preach his gospel,
the gospel of salvation and grace, thereby the glory of God is manifested,
attested, and declared in this world. We are glorifying God
right now by holding this service and preaching this sermon and
telling this world what Jesus Christ has done. The angels are
watching, the devils are watching, Men and women may go blithely
past with 101 different demands upon their time in this world
and be careless about their soul's eternal destiny, but they will
be accountable in a day to come that they walked past the door
of this church when the gospel of Jesus Christ was being preached. The glory of God is hereby manifested. because he says, I will be their
God and they shall be my people. Brothers and sisters in Christ,
your time on this earth is blessed because the promises of God are
yours and you shall want no good thing. Your afflictions, your
trials, your anxieties, your problems, your difficulties,
and we all have them, are for your good. and they will tend
to your good, and they will glorify God in you. And as you live and
as you trust Christ and lean upon Him, as you rest in Him,
then God is glorified even in your trials. You will be upheld in them and
through them, because God Himself says, I will be their God and
they shall be my people. Brothers and sisters in Christ,
Jehovah is your God. and you are his people. The Father
loves you with an everlasting love. He walks in you and he
stands for you. His presence attends you daily. His divine protection comforts
you. He has promised to be a father
and he calls you his child. and all his promises to you in
Christ are yea, and in him, amen. Our God has promised Christ as
our surety and our saviour. By him comes cleansing from sin
and perfect righteousness. In him we are promised a great
and everlasting salvation. Our God has promised us the spirit
of life. as a comforter, to reveal truth
to us, to strengthen our faith day by day, to supply daily grace
from Christ for every need. Brothers and sisters in Christ,
are you weary? Are you downcast? Are you tried
and are you tested? Then lean upon your Savior. Rest
in Him. He promises everlasting life. He promises everlasting happiness. He promises an eternal bliss
which lies just beyond the horizon. And soon we will enter into the
fullness of all of those promises which are stored up for us in
Christ. Soon we shall enter into their
immediate enjoyment. The promises of God are personally
designed to suit your case. They are free, they are fixed,
and they are firm. You will have God's promises
if you are his, and you will have them all, for all the promises
of God are in Christ. everlasting promises in an eternal
saviour. He who has been present from
the very beginning and will be present to all eternity is the
one who carries the benefits of those promises for his people. Covenant promises received by
him and secured in him, safely held in trust for every blood-bought
child of God. Blessed people you are, heirs
of God, joint heirs with Christ, possessors of every blessing
in the Lord Jesus Christ. I encourage you this evening,
lay hold upon these promises, rest in them, embrace the Savior
who brings them. by whom the promises come to
his people. Rejoice in the generosity of
God and in his goodness and kindness. And let all of your praise be
thanksgiving to God, who is faithful to his word. Amen.